A lesson in what not to do. And an awesome time at #pbandtuna.

So this weekend, the fabulous M and I put our asses on a plane to fly to DC for LiLu and Maxie's wedding, AKA #pbandtuna.

There are some obvious logistical and practical problems with this plan. Mainly that we spent a total of 12 hours on planes to go to a party for less than half that amount of time.

TOTALLY WORTH IT.

If you'd like to read about the ticket purchase, please click here. It was a bit of a disaster.


We managed to get to the airport at 5:45 AM and get on our 6:45 AM flight. We were more than a little giggly, but we soon PASSED THE FUCK OUT. We slept so much that we didn't realize that the flight was actually over two hours long.

Once we finally made it to DC, M headed off with LateNight Drama Queen to have lunch with her Grams in Baltimore, while I was picked up by the lovely PQ and we went to snuggle the faces of GingerMandy and Just a Girl (and JP, of course).

I? Was in blogger heaven.

What no one bothered to mention is that people in DC don't stay home on the weekends. They drive. IN MY WAY. We sat in so much traffic, I was sort of concerned that my ass was going to permanently attach to PQ's front seat. Why weren't these people home having sex?!? Having said that, I've never had so much fun in a car, sitting in traffic.

And then it was finally time to go to #pbandtuna!

I would list all the lovelies I met, but...well, I was a little too drunk to remember. But I will say this: LiLu (and B), Maxie, Alexa, Lexa, Rachel, Alice, Just A Girl, GingerMandy, PQ, JP, Matt, Katie, Restaurant Refugee, fB, katierose, LateNight Drama Queen, and too many more to name. You guys are all amazing.

I can't even tell you what happened because...what the fuck happened? A bunch of awesome, that's what.

The worst decision? To fly home with a massive, angry hangover. On two planes with screaming children. I almost died. Scratch that. Children almost died. And I know exactly what I'm breaking up with this Friday. I'm looking at you kids on airplanes.

I don't want to hear it. Hell, I don't even want to see it. But yes, I did it.

Hold on to your hats, ladies and gentlemen. It's time for LiLu's TMI Thursday!

When I was on the drugs a couple of weeks ago, I might have decided it would be a good idea to record a video of myself.

Now, it's my wedding gift to LiLu and Maxie.

It's disturbing on more levels than one. Good luck.

I'm still calling it a dinner party.

My friend The Willis is moving to Oregon this week. And the thought makes me want to cry. She's leaving her boyfriend behind, but he's insanely anti-social without her, so I'll probably never see him again either. And he's actually one of the good ones.

To say goodbye, I decided to have a little dinner party at my place on Saturday.

Of course, since I'm kind of a hot mess, I got off to a late start.

I was making margaritas (okay, those were actually made by LOB), creamy chicken and spinach enchiladas (well, one without chicken for our resident Pretty Bitch), chicken and shrimp nachos, and this amazing cheesy corn dip (seriously, this shit is incredible). And Puppy Chow, because it's The Willis's favorite.

I was too much of a mess to take any pictures of the spread (TWSS?), but trust: It was awesome.

After college football was over, someone (who shall remain nameless) suggested a drinking game. Mostly a drinking game in that you stand around and drink while you do it. Now, I was on my fourth margarita and LOB didn't skimp on the tequila. So I was already a little tipsy. And the game is this:

Take a paper bag and place it on the floor. Like so:



The first person must lean over, touching only the soles of his or her feet on the floor (so no hands, knees, or elbows) and pick up the bag using only his or her mouth. Everyone takes a turn, all the while hoping no one has the herp. What?

After everyone has had a turn, someone cuts one inch off the top of the bag. And the whole thing starts again. If you fall, you're out. If you touch the ground with your hands, you're out. If you just can't do it, you're out. This proceeds until only one person is left standing.

Now, let me explain something about The Willis. She's very tiny. Except for her boobs, but that's not really the point. She's 5'2" tall or so (as is Gofahne, but for some reason she seems taller to me). Her boyfriend is probably 6'0" tall at least. And LOB is 5'10" tall, I think. I'm about 5'7" tall. So you can see that The Willis and Gofahne might have a bit of an advantage.

I'm pretty flexible, but the lack of friction between my bare feet and the carpet got me far sooner than I expected. Soon, it was just The Willis and her boyfriend. Two of the most competitive people I've ever known (aside from my Aunt Dana). The paper bag had maybe a 1/2 inch ring around the bottom. So far The Willis hadn't even looked strained. But her boyfriend wasn't going to give up easily.

After watching her essentially curtsy down and pick up the bag with no problem, he stepped up to the plate.

There was stretching and straining and a little grunting and a lot of lunging. And, after a minute of trying, he plucked the bag up between his lips and stood. Victorious. Sort of.

So we did what any slightly drunk party goers would do. We cut the rest of the lip off the bag, placing just the bottom of it on the ground. It was completely flat. The Willis pulled her curtsy move again and popped back up, immediately. Her boyfriend struggled, but still managed to get the thing.

Now what?

DO IT ON ONE LEG!

Yeah, that ended in both of them nearly face planting. I'm sure my downstairs neighbors love me right about now. We had to call it a tie.

After one more drinking game, in which I took a shot of tequila to avoid having to drink 40 drinks of my vodka/Bailey's cocktail, we called it a night. That tequila pushed me right over the edge. And I spent some quality time with the toilet after that.

When I woke up in the morning, I found that my friends had cleaned my kitchen, almost entirely, even going so far as to run the dishwasher, put away the dishes, and run the thing again. I love you guys. Seriously. LOVE.

But really, none of you could bother to fix the garbage disposal? My sink nearly overflowed twice. Geez...

I keed! I should really call that in, huh?

You look great, but I? Am a fat cow.*

I just had possibly one of the best weekends ever. Aside from falling off a step trying to get Thai takeout and busting my knee. Which originally looked like this:



And now, looks like this:



You're welcome. And just to further gross you out, it won't stop oozing. It oozed in my bed last night and when I woke up this morning, the hairs that I had shed in my bed were all crusted in the ooze (What? It's TMI Monday!). Yummy.

Friday night was amazing. Inglorious Basterds was truly glorious (and seeing it with Graygrrrl made it that much better! A serious case of the giggles had by all). As of right now, it is my new favorite Tarantino movie. Brad Pitt was fucking genius. GENIUS. It was bloody and gutsy and just the right amount of random, useless, over-the-top violence. Then I met @gaveupthefight and friends (Really, too many to name. She is one popular woman) at the club for some booty shakin'. And booty shake we did. Only got better when the Pretty Bitch (she loves it when I call her this, I swear! Maybe), @nataliecottrell showed up. She may be gorgeous, but man is she hilarious. We danced until our clothes were soaked.

Saturday I met up with @mouthful, Little Ring, and Chihuahua Balls for rock climbing and hot wings. Also, 34 ounces of everclear lemonade. Such a great idea, considering I was going on a HUGE pubcrawl later that day. Here are the rocks I climbed. I was considering getting some action shots, but it's just awkward to keep up with a camera while climbing. You'll just have to trust me that my ass is MAGIC in my climbing harness (this is a lie).




Saturday evening, I attended the Dallas Becomes Chicago Pub Crawl. I had a fan-fucking-tastic time with @beckbee, @mikerehyer and about 200 or so other people. No really, there were at least 200 people there. The whole thing is public transportation-based. I can only imagine how the regular patrons of the DART rail felt about 200 people in matching Tshirts flooding the train all night.



One of our stops was Lee Harvey's. A great little bar with a huge outdoor area where people can bring dogs and stuff. Barb found a hoola hoop and went to town. The picture's a little blurry, but I think it captures the essence.



We all messed with our shirts at the second bar, to customize them. Mine turned out like this:



With the help of some lovely ladies.

It was a ton of fun and I'm hoping to get to do it again next year.

When I got home on Sunday morning, I. Could. Not. Move. For about five hours. I finally picked myself up off the couch (at 12:30 pm) and went to get Thai food take-out. I missed the step on my way out of the restaurant, which is why my knee looks vaguely like hamburger. My legs just wouldn't hold me up.

I pulled my ass together, though, to make it to @gaveupthefight's pool party. Where everyone promptly said, "Good god, woman, what the hell happened to your knee?!?"

My response? "There was a step."

Signature drink of the day? Brandy's Tall Paul. It was DELICIOUS. I saw it on her blog and I've been wanting to try it ever since. It was a huge hit and everyone loved it. Thanks, Brandy!

Needless to say, I couldn't really get in the pool. Motorboater made an appearance and felt the need to apologize for his behavior last Saturday. Can someone please just let him know that saying nothing is better than being a dick and apologizing later? I've had enough. Also the fact that I jumped six feet in the air when he touched my back should probably have been some kind of indication that I'm particularly interested in him being anywhere near me.

The second pool party of the day was also a blast. However, I learned that beer pong? Not so fun to watch. And it takes a really long time.

And today? I'm exhausted.

*This is in reference to one of the skinniest girls I know taking diet pills because she's decided she's fat. Seriously, at least complain about it to a skinny person. I don't want to hear it. Your waist is the size of my thigh. And said girl is GORGEOUS anyway. I might have to slap her. Then we probably won't be friends, and I love her too much for that already.

Having a bar across the street from your apartment is better than not having a bar across the street your apartment.

(Note: I'm not actually talking about this bar...it just had the right name.)

Friday night, Cheese met me at my apartment, and we went to the bar across the street. It's been open for months, but I'd yet to have a beer there. I'd heard from Graygrrrl that it was a lot like our old home, Ben's Halfyard House. EXCITEMENT!

I will say this: I'm not sure I agree. The members of the service staff I encountered were almost exclusively a new brand of stupid. With the exception of one waitress. I didn't talk to the bartender, though. I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, though as I can WALK HOME FROM THE BAR.

Cheese and I sat down at a booth and inspected the menu. Typical bar food and a selection of pizzas. At the bottom of the menu, we found some delicious sounding calzones and desserts. Oddly these were all priced $0.00. Yay! Free food!

I ordered a salad and a Shiner (I promise that I'm telling you this for a reason) and Cheese ordered a spinach and mushroom calzone and a Boddington's pear apple Guinness cider pale ale (she actually ordered this once because she got all intimidated by the taps and I'm determined to never let her forget it...in related news, Cheese does not like beer.)

The waitress looked down at Cheese and said, "Um. We don't have calzones."

So apparently $0.00 means "we don't have calzones," not "calzones are free." My dreams of dessert walked out the door in that moment (aside from the cupcake Cheese brought me from the stash I bought her for her birthday).

Cheese ordered a (cheese) pizza instead and we moved on with our lives.

It turned out that Cheese knew someone at the bar. When he walked by the first time, she yelled (completely out of the blue, you understand), "Donny Baseball!"

To which I replied, "I like hockey pucks!"

What? I thought we were yelling out random sports crap.

She went out to smoke with "Donny Baseball," and I overheard THE MOST AWESOME CONVERSATION OF THE WEEK.

There were a couple of dudes sitting at the bar behind our booth and they kept yelling out weird stuff like "I didn't sign up to be in no swingers' party" and "I don't need nobody looking at me like that." No idea what any of that was about, but when Cheese left, I started listening in.

At this point, they were flirting with one of the waitresses. Always a good plan. Of course, I didn't realize the genius I was hearing at first. But then...

"I don't wanna make this all sexual. I want to like know you. Like really know you. Like know you're favorite color and shit. The real stuff. I don't want to cloud that by making things all sexual right now. What is your favorite color?"

This is all being said by the guy who was shouting about swingers' parties, while the waitress is practically sitting in his friend's lap.

The waitress apparently relayed her favorite color, because the guy said to his friend, "Look how she just threw that out there like that?"

As though favorite colors are the stuff secrets are made of. Actually, my favorite color is a secret from now on. Please forget that you know my favorite color is orange. Thanks.

Then he says to the waitress, "You know, there's a good chance I'm going to remember that shit later. But I'm not going to ask you any more questions because I don't want to lose that one. So I can know you. You know. For real."

Then he and his friends hugged the poor girl until I suspect she couldn't breathe and left.

The weirdest thing? I think the waitress was actually flattered.

I'd also like to add that my hair was doing this SEXY BEAST volume thing (What? I'm modest!). Like so:



And this is me, doing my best Jodi Sawyer impression (From Center Stage. Shut up Jay). I think I rock. Oh, let me explain. Jodi Sawyer only becomes a good dancer when she bites her lip (the night before her birthday, Cheese may or may not have done this about 75 times at her apartment after she took her Ambien. Also, she not only tried to kick my iPhone's ass, she practically licked it. It still hasn't recovered). Seriously. So I was doing my best:


Yes, I realize I look like an ass.

There's a picture of Cheese doing her best, but I suspect she'd kill me for posting it. So I'll keep it to myself.

TMI Thursday (not really) - My vacation hated me. Or at least the travel parts did.

Okay, so I know it's TMI Thursday, and I should be writing a gross or hilarious story to entertain you. But I'm not gonna. Today, you get to hear the story all about how my life got flipped turned upside down...oh wait, that's the Fresh Prince theme song.

You get to hear about my vacation. Or at least the travel portions of it. It was almost as eventful as my trip to Tennessee. But with less funny stuff and more almost crying. Mostly, it's just that I'm a dumbass. So you already know that:

1. I made my flight arrangements with the AM/PM screw up.
2. I managed to get food poisoning or some kind of bug two days before my trip.
3. The same day I was puking my guts up, all my sleeping arrangements fell through and I had to scramble around to get a hotel in Seattle. By the way, nothing is cheap in Seattle.

What you may or may not know is that on Saturday, after I went to work at my mom's, I was finishing up my packing. I went down to my car to get something and I...fell down the stairs and twisted my ankle. Not a sprain or anything, but still.

So I wrapped it up and kept on truckin'. (That's what she said! At least in my head, somehow.)

My friend Leslie took me to the airport and dropped me off. I decided to check my bag because when I'm traveling for nine days, I really don't want to have to worry about my liquid situation. Plus, I totally hate going through security anyway. The whole thing is getting a little out of hand.

When I checked in at the gate, the woman said, "Well, you got the last seat on the plane!"

Um, hi, excuse me. I bought my ticket on this plane weeks ago and you're telling me that I JUST NOW got a seat?!? Buying a ticket now means the same thing as thinking about buying a ticket, apparently. Let this be a lesson to all you smug bitches who think you've got a seat on the plane. YOU DON'T.

After all that, I figured I deserved a beer. I walked over to the bar and ordered a tall one. The bartender asked the usual questions, so I told him my story. And he totally gave me free beer! The woman next to me said I had "great style" (ahem, in my $15 Target dress, thank you). Things were looking up.

The plane to Denver took off and landed without a hitch, and my friend Bones was there to greet me at the airport. We decided to just stay and hang out in Denver with Joanna and Tony. Everyone had a good time, and on Monday afternoon, Bones dropped me off at the American terminal at the Denver airport for my flight.

Only my flight wasn't on American. Instead, this leg of my trip was on Alaska Air, something I totally didn't realize. So, off I went, across the entire terminal to find Alaska Air. Not that I don't enjoy a good scenic tour of the airport, of course. And this fit perfectly in with most of the other things that had happened on my vacation.

I got to Seattle and my friend Brian picked me up from the airport. We hadn't seen each other in five years, so there was much hugging and excitement. Seattle was wonderful and I promise to tell you more about it at a later date. This story, however, is all about travel hell. For this purpose, I'm going to skip to the end of my vacation.

My flight was at 11:30 pm on Sunday night, which put me back in Dallas Monday morning at 5:00 am. My friend Patrick (Don't blame me if you click that link and don't understand anything on his blog. I don't either.) actually agreed to pick me up. When I got to the airport in Seattle, however (after a day of drinking and hanging out by the pool), I found that my flight had been delayed for an hour. I called Patrick to let him know, and Brian hung out with me for a little while.

My flight was set to board at 11:50 pm, and take off at 12:30 am. They loaded us on the plane around midnight. But the plane went nowhere. At 1:30 am, the pilot's voice sounded in the cabin, "We're sorry folks, but we've decided to screw you all over. This plane is broken and it's not going anywhere. Please file off the plane and line up at the gate to change your travel arrangements."

Okay, so that's not exactly what he said, but it's the general gist of it.

Lucky for me, I was sitting in row 12. Which meant there were only about 40 people in front of me in line. At no point did they bother to call in extra American Airlines employees to help sort out their mess. I suspect that there are some people who are still standing in that line.

I thought maybe I would be sneaky and call to change my flight arrangements while I was in line. My phone had very little battery, but I whipped it out and dialed American Airlines.

First of all, technically, my flight had left the day before. So the system thought I was trying to make flight arrangements for the following year. Yeah, that's not annoying. Once I finally got a person on the phone, she said, "Well, ma'am, I can't really help you. They're not showing that flight as canceled in this system, so I can't change your reservations."

I said, "Okay, let's say I missed my flight."

She said, "Ma'am. As far as I know, you're on that plane. I can't do anything to help you."

Seriously?

So I gave up and hung up the phone. What else could I do?

A few minutes later, the women from the gate (who's supposed to be helping people change their flight arrangements) comes by to hand out the number for American Airlines, so we could all call and settle things. I let her know that they wouldn't help anyone until she pushed the little button for "Cancel This Flight."

She didn't seem to think this was terribly helpful.

I waited in line for almost two and a half hours before I got to the counter. And I was in ROW 12. At one point, someone got on the speaker and said, "We've rescheduled this flight for noon tomorrow (when really they meant the same day, as it was 3:00 am), but there will be limited seating for those of you in line." Really? Who the fuck else have you put on this flight? Shouldn't the people you just screwed over at least get the first chance at the seats on the new flight? No?

The soonest I could get to Dallas was 2:45 pm. My new flight was scheduled to leave at 6:00 am, with a layover in LA. I was so happy to have a flight, I didn't really ask any questions. And she never mentioned my luggage, which I had checked to be on this flight. She didn't even tell me what airline I was flying (Alaska Air...again). The thing about American is, even if you're flying a different airline, they don't really tell you. Nor do they give you the real flight number. You get the American Airlines version of the flight number, which has little to do with the actual flight number on the actual airline. And then you want to jam a pen in your eyeball.

I finally figured out the airline situation and decided that my best course of action was probably to go find my luggage and make sure it got on my new flight. So I went down to baggage claim, found my bag, went back up to the ticket counters. Alaska Air is, of course, on the opposite side of the airport. I had to pay to check my bag (AGAIN. I had just paid to check it on the American flight), which pissed me right off. Then I had to go through security again because they don't really care if you've been inside the airport all night and just had to come out of the secure area to get your bag because your airline is so jacked up that they canceled your red-eye flight and you just want to get back in there so you can possibly take a nap with the homeless dudes sleeping all over the airport. And then you want to jam a pen in your eyeball.

I made it to the gate, tried to fall asleep, didn't fall asleep, got on the plane and took off for Seattle. I had a middle seat, making it nearly impossible to sleep on the plane. I'm going to just make a new rule here. If it's a two hour flight, YOU CAN HOLD IT. Stop climbing over me to pee. Go before you get on the plane, and then sit there quietly for the duration of the flight. You're a grown-up. You do NOT have to pee every hour.

What? Everyone else is allowed to make rules, but I'm not?

Anyway, I get into LAX to discover...LAX is like the shithole airport of the planet. I don't know where anything is and there's no one to really tell me. I can only seem to find four other gates, but none of the televisions have things on them that are useful to me. I have no idea where I need to be, I only have an hour to get there, and my phone is almost dead.

I decided that getting to my next flight was totally worth killing the rest of the battery in my phone, so I looked my flight up online. It said I needed to be in Terminal 4. Great. Now where the hell is Terminal 4?

I found a little place for a "shuttle." I think bus would probably have been a more appropriate word, but whatever. I had to take two, TWO buses on the tarmac, WHERE THE PLANES FLY to get to my terminal.

This is when I discovered that it's not possible to get anywhere in LAX in under an hour. The good news (depending on your perspective) was that my flight to Dallas had been delayed for two hours. Not exactly comforting, since my last delayed flight was canceled.

After I made it to the proper terminal and even the proper gate, I realized I still needed to check in to get my boarding pass. BUT WHAT IF I DON'T HAVE A SEAT? There are 25 people in line in front of me and at this point, I was almost in tears. I had been awake for over 24 hours and hadn't had any food since the previous day around 4:00 pm.

It turned out that I did have a seat. And the plane did take off. So a mere 16 hours after I arrived at the airport in Seattle, my flight landed in Dallas. By the way, this was also only about 15 minutes sooner than I would have landed had I just stayed in Seattle and taken the rescheduled flight. Awesome.

I had already decided that there was no way my luggage had made the trip with me, but it rolled off the carousel. I thought I was home free.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

On the way to my place, having stopped to get some food and feeling much better about life, I stuck my hand in my purse to retrieve my keys. But there were no keys to be found. In a flash, I remembered using my bottle opener earlier in the day and tossing my keys on top of my bag. They must have fallen into the couch or something.

My apartment complex does not consider being locked out an emergency and the tears of frustration and exhaustion were threatening to fall. I won't bore you with the rest of the story, but I will say that there was a locksmith involved (and the stupidest man I've ever met in my life) before I finally found my keys in the bottom of my suitcase. WHERE THEY HAD BEEN THE WHOLE TIME.

Asshole keys.

Please feel free to share your traveling horror stories to make me feel better.

TMI Thursday - Lock it up

Even though I'm on vacation (sitting at Tougo Coffee in Seattle, having a latte with Brian who runs the place), I thought I would share this little TMI Thursday story with you. Thanks to LiLu for once again encouraging me to make an ass of myself on the internets.

I used to live in this house in the suburbs with a couple of roommates (one of whom was my boyfriend at the time). When we all moved out of the house, I had to move back in with my parents for a little while. Yuck. Love you, Mom!

My neighbors had a little dog named Hunter, or "Hoosty." I have no idea why he was Hoosty, but there it is. Shortly after I moved out, they asked me to dogsit. Of course I was happy to do so. My boyfriend wanted to go to some party with his work people, so we did that first. I soon got tired and wanted to go home, but he wanted to stay out (I used to be kind of a wuss...). He drove me back to the neighbors house and then went back to the party. But he was going to come back and stay with me later.

I put on my cute little white nightie with the little pink flowers. And the matching cute little white panties with little pink flowers. You know...so I would be ready.

Then I walked out into the backyard with Hoosty.

Seems pretty safe, right? But what I had failed to notice (and my neighbors had failed to mention) was that they had the kind of door that appears to be unlocked on the inside, but when you get outside (in your nightie), it is most definitely locked. And then you're stuck outside. In your nightie.

Probably in this scenario, you would stay put. Wait for your boyfriend to get back from the party and let you in, right? I mean, he had a key and everything.

But it was cold. And I had no idea how long I would have to wait.

My parents house was only about two miles away, and I was a little tipsy, so really my only logical choice was to walk. To my parents house. Barefoot. In my little white nightie.

So I set off. I should mention here that my feet are really sensitive. I can't even walk on those aggregate sidewalks. You know, the ones with the little pebbles in them? Yeah, no. Ouch.

Well, between my neighbor's house and my parents house, there was maybe a half mile of sidewalk. I spent most of the walk through the neighborhood on my tippy toes, trying not to step on so much as a twig. Unsuccessfully.

Once I made it out to the main road, I had almost forgotten that I was only wearing my little white nightie. Which maybe covered three-quarters of my ass. And maybe three-quarters of my boobs. Sexy.

All I could think was, "Oh, sidewalk! Glorious sidewalk!"

Then, "Oh fuck. I'm naked."

What choice did I have at that point, though? I was no longer tipsy and really contemplating my course of action. It was a stupid thing to do, but I was already halfway there. The half ahead of me had a sidewalk, where the path back to the house had twigs and rocks and crap. I forged ahead.

It was about midnight and cars were sparse on the road. Two cops passed me, though. You'd think, if you were a cop, you might come to the conclusion that the chick on the side of the road walking barefoot in a little white nightie (in a residential neighborhood) might be having some kind of issue. They did not.

Right about then I heard an odd hissing sound. I looked around, but didn't see anything and then --

FWA SSSSSSSSS CH CH CH CH!

Sprinklers. On me. On the side of the road. In my little white nightie. Ugh.

Quickly I was soaked to the bone. And far more naked than I was before.

A pickup truck sped by me on the road. I thought, "Whew. At least he didn't stop." And then I saw his brake lights. He threw his truck in reverse and backed up to my location. The whole time I was chanting, "Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit" under my breath.

He got back to me and leaned over to roll down his window.

"You look like you've gotten yourself into a bit of a mess. You need a ride, little lady?"

Uuuuhhhhhh. Crap.

"No, sir. I'm good." I meant to do this, obviously.

"Is there someone you could call or something? Do you want to use my phone?"

"YES! Could I please call my 6'5" tall, incredibly buff (this was a lie...) boyfriend and tell him I'll be at my parents house. It's just right up the road."

"Sure. You sure you don't need a ride?"

"No, thanks."

So he let me use his phone and I called and left a message. Then I walked the rest of the way to my parents house, soaking wet and freezing cold. But I made it.

When my boyfriend came to pick me up, we had a "discussion" about how stupid it was to walk to my parents house naked. I had no choice but to agree. I didn't even get any that night.

And I haven't worn that particular little white nightie again.

UPDATE: Upon request and because I forgot initially. My little white nightie possibly looked something like this...but white. And with little pink flowers.

It's a...date?

My friend LOB was staying with me this past weekend because she's subletting her apartment for the summer.

Wow. That was no "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," eh?

We decided to stay in Friday night (especially since we were out until 2:30 am Thursday and I had to work all day). So I made shrimp nachos and we ate them (and ate them and ate them. They were really good) while watching Center Stage and drinking much red wine. I blame the Center Stage thing on Jay over at Genius Pending (also known as the smartest person I know). He's doing a month long challenge of watching a chick flick daily and then reviewing it. So I've had the movie stuck in my head for a week, and it's what LOB wanted to watch anyway. It's a really really bad movie.

After our second bottle of wine, dancing along seemed like a good idea. So we danced. Okay, I danced and she threatened video while telling me that I'm surprisingly bendy. This is true, I am surprisingly bendy. Fourteen years of dance and cheerleading (Shut. Up.) will do that to you.

Her friend, Fransen, was in town from California for his sister's college graduation, and at this point, he talked his parents into driving him to my place and dropping him off. When asked if we could bring him back later, he made the wise decision (mostly based on the amount of giggling we were doing) to say, "Probably not." So his parents agreed to come back and pick him up later. And we were all back in high school.

We made experimental dirty martinis, which were far more dirty than martini, but I thought they were delicious. So there.

The next day, LOB and I were in red-wine-hangover-land, so we went shoe shopping. That night, LOB had to join her friend at a sorority graduation party. I laughed at her.

One of my favorite musicians in the whole wide world, Patrice Pike (and no those recordings don't even remotely do her justice) was playing at a bar about two miles from my house, so I had to go. She's so amazing. I just sort of melt into a puddle of goo around her. The first time I met her, I'm pretty sure I proposed marriage. It wasn't awkward at all.

So, naturally, I managed to almost sit in her brother's lap at the bar. Then when I got to talk to her, I acted like a complete idiot (me: Remember that time I asked you to marry me? Yeah, I didn't mean that...unless you might say yes...). It's what I do.

Where's my paycheck?

After the show and at the next bar, I saw a bunch of people I haven't seen since the best bar in the world closed. That was a sad day.

Anyway, so this guy came up to me and gave me a hug and said, "Wow. I haven't seen you in years. It's really good to see you again."

Me: (Silence. Crickets. Blank stare.)

Him: Uh, don't you remember me?

Me: (Light bulb!) Motorboater*?

Him: Yeah. I haven't seen you since [bar] closed.

Me: Nope. Guess not.

This is the guy who used to walk up and motorboat me pretty much out of nowhere. Nearly every time he saw me. So, ya know, we're already kind of on intimate terms. Also, I've never seen him sober. Keep in mind that we've really only ever seen each other at this one bar, so it's not unusual for people to be drunk.

So he sits down next to me and it begins...

Him: So...I'm Motorboater (puts out his hand for a shake).

Me: Uh huh. I know.

Him: Yeah, that was my smooth way of trying to get your name. I can't remember it.

Me: Uh huh. I know.

Him: So you're not going to tell me.

Me: Nope.

And pretty much the next thirty minutes consist of him trying to get me to tell him my name and me refusing. Then I was looking for my chapstick in my purse and having trouble holding onto my drink, so he took it for me. Which seemed nice, so I told him my name.

Me: It's Shine. My name.

Him: What made you decide to tell me now?

Me: You held my drink and I didn't even ask you to. That seemed nice.

Him: So that's all I had to do?

Look, I dated a complete ass for a year and a half. Nice is like a hot fudge sundae delivered to me in bed while I watch another episode of How I Met Your Mother.

So he kissed me. Uh...

Actually, it was a nice kiss. But still. Presumptuous bastard.

I told him to stop it and we talked for a while longer. We were talking about sports. Apparently it's impressive that not only do I like sports, but mostly I only listen to sports talk radio. So he asked if I wanted to go to the Rangers game the next day. Never one to turn down a baseball game, I said, "Sure."

What I didn't realize? It seems this was a date...

More tomorrow, because this is really long and I'm tired of writing it.

*Duh, of course that's not his name.

Hypothetically

Okay, I'm just going to lay out a hypothetical for you. Some of the names have been changed to protect the guilty.

Let's say that last Friday, I was supposed to go to a party. I may not really have wanted to go to this party, so one of my friends might or might not have bribed me with freshly made-at-home mojitos before the party. Upon which I may or may not have agreed to go to the party, as long as someone hypothetically gave me a ride. There and back.

So my friend and I may or may not have accidentally (on purpose) drank an entire gallon of mojitos before the party that may or may not have happened.

At this point, a lot of ridiculous dancing may or may not have occurred. Along with the possible drinking of beer, wine, sangria, whatever we could get our hypothetical hands on.

It's a possibility that there was more dancing after that. Also, I may or may not have ingested a few pepperoni pizza rolls.

My friend's boyfriend, who at this point might have been fairly annoyed and was possibly the most sober person at the party that may or may not have happened, might have gotten us in the car (although, truly, I was definitely less of a pain in the ass, if any of this even happened at all) and driven us to their place.

I quite possibly passed out on the couch because driving home could have been a really bad idea. Within a few minutes my stomach might have started grumbling and I may have gotten up to throw up, only to realize that the bathroom was in their bedroom...and they were too. You know, maybe.

I, then, might have made the brilliant decision that the kitchen sink was a more appropriate place to throw up, if I even had to throw up. However, I probably couldn't find the light switch as this may not have been my kitchen, so I might possibly have completely inadvertently thrown up all over the kitchen. Possibly including the rug on the kitchen floor. And if I threw up, whatever it was might have been red. But there's no way to know.

I may or may not have had the wherewithall to clean up the mess I made, while simultaneously possibly puking in the sink some more. At which point, I might have picked up the rug, rolled it up, and put it with my purse, hypothetically for cleaning.

Hypothetically, I probably would have passed out on the couch for the night and then I might have left in the morning with the rug. Whereupon arriving at my apartment, I probably would have put it in the washing machine for immediate cleaning and then stripped all my clothes off and possibly spent most of the rest of the day watching Food Network. Or possibly reruns of Sabrina, the Teenage Witch (maybe).

It's completely possible that I acted like a hypothetical 22-year-old (as my actual 22-year-old self didn't even drink, and that's the only thing in this post that is definitely true). So I ask you this...if any or all of this actually happened, and you were my hypothetical friend (and/or her hypothetical boyfriend) would you still be speaking to me?

If any of this actually happened, I'm throwing out a heartfelt apology to all those present at the party (if indeed there was a party), the kitchen rug (if I did really puke on it), my friend (if I actually have a friend), my friend's boyfriend (if my friend does actually have a boyfriend), the mojitos (if there were any), the pizza rolls (whether or not I ate them), and my dignity (provided that still exists, or if I ever had any).

Peein' Outside on Summer Vacation

It wasn’t a vacation exactly. I had one more class to finish up before they would allow me to graduate from college in 2007 (Yeah, I was old when I graduated. You wanna fight about it?). The class in question was Field Botany. Exciting, eh? Unfortunately, the class wasn’t offered at our regular campus, only at a campus in Taos, New Mexico. So I packed up all my gear and headed out for a month in Taos.

I had spent the summer before in Taos, too. It was my first field experience in archaeology. It was an amazing summer. We were required to camp out for the five-week duration of the class. I had never been camping, and I was scared to death of doing it for over a month. I just couldn’t imagine living in a tent for five straight weeks. Well, I liked it so much that time, that when I went back this summer, I requested to be allowed to camp instead of staying in the dorms. I love camping. And the thought of being cooped up in a dorm with seven other girls for a month made me nauseous. It was the right decision.

The other girls in my class were so puzzled by me. I was this strange creature who took four-minute showers and wasn’t afraid of bugs and slept in a tent because I wanted to and didn’t wear makeup everyday. Or any day. I mean really, we were in the woods. They started calling me “The Rugged Outdoorsman.” Every time there was a bug in the dorm, they would call me in to get rid of it. While they screamed and hid on the top bunks. I’ve never seen such prissy-ness.

My tent was like heaven. I could go in, zip the door closed and be in my own world. I set it up right in front of a stream, so I could hear running water all the time. There was a field school going on, so I wasn’t camping alone. We had a little tent city. My tiny two-person tent was sandwiched between Cam’s six-person monstrosity and Rey’s eight-person castle. Though neither of those compared to Angela’s tent. Angela’s tent is the tent that gave birth to all other tents. It even had a “sun-room.” Putting that thing up was a treat.

Living in a tent does have its difficulties. Namely, no bathroom (LiLu's recent post made me think to share this, by the way). Which isn’t usually an issue, but can present a problem in the morning. Leslie and I established a system early on in the summer. No liquids after seven, pee at ten, go to bed. Well, you can imagine how often that actually worked out. Leslie is good at schedules and she rarely wanted to be awake past ten anyway. I, on the other hand, am not good with schedules. So I often woke up with that I’m-going-to-piss-in-my-sleeping-bag feeling. It’s unpleasant, to say the least. The bathroom was a good three- or four-minute walk from tent city. Add to that the time it takes to put clothes and boots on, and you can see how tricky this can get.

Most of the time, I made it. One morning, I knew that I wouldn’t. I woke up at seven and felt like the pee was about to escape through my mouth there was so much of it. So I was going to have to pee outside. Now, I’m not against peeing outside. I did it frequently the summer before, but then my tent was sandwiched between the tents of two other girls. Not two dudes. I wasn’t that interested in showing either of them my fancy girl-parts. Especially not in the unflattering squat-without-pissing-on-my-feet position.

There was this nice big tree behind my tent, where Cam had been peeing all summer. I figured it would provide a little privacy from the other tent city residents. I got myself out of my tent (putting on my boots almost sent me over the edge), only getting the zipper stuck ten or so times in the process. I didn’t hear any noise from the surrounding tents, so I went for it. I positioned myself behind the tree to provide maximum cover, yanked my pajama pants down and squatted. In all my efforts to keep a look out for people, I hadn’t really scouted out the tree very well. In my haste, I had failed to notice the large, sharp, broken branch projecting out at the bottom. And of course that’s where I decided to put my ass. Hard. I yelped in pain, jumped back up and over about a foot, and tried again. I had to pee so bad I barely felt the pain.

After the sweet relief of peeing, I assessed the damages. That tree had left its mark. I had several cuts and a big bruise. Had I been a few inches further front or back, I would have needed lube. It was a close one. I know trees can’t get you pregnant, but attempted rape is not out of their realm.

That same tree got another visit a week or so later when, after a night of drunken Uno, my friend Hannah had to pee. She had never peed outside before, and she was too drunk to even stand up unaided, so I went out with her. You can read that as, I carried her out of Rey’s tent. She couldn’t manage her pants, so I helped with that. Then I was scared she was going to fall in the stream, if left to her own devices, so I talked her through the whole thing while holding her hand. It was quite the bonding experience. I warned her about this tree’s particular affinity for kink, so she avoided violation.

We did a lot of drinking. And Taos sits around 7700 feet above sea level. We were a lot of drunk. Just as a piece of advice: never chase warm grape vodka (this was sort of my fault. I like grape vodka, but this was more like cough syrup) with warm Dr. Pepper. The combination is likely to cause you to make out with a classmate (Ahem. You know who you are.) or puke on yourself in your tent (Ahem. Me. But only after I woke up to them making out on my face, so I can never be sure if it was the vodka or the making out). If you ever get a chance to hang out in Taos, New Mexico, I would go. Just watch out for those ass-raping trees.

Weekend in Review

I did a lot of drinking this weekend.

Friday night, I went bowling with a couple of girlfriends. The bowling alley was like the Twilight Zone. And no, I don't mean there were sparkly vampires running around. It just wasn't very "bowling alley." (I nearly typed "blowing alley." At least I make myself laugh!)

There were table cloths on the tables and a menu full of $10 entrees. My burger was sooo not worth $10, just in case you were wondering. Anyway, we bowled in style. (You guessed it. I almost typed "we blowed in style.") I even broke 100 in the first game. This almost never happens. Oh, I didn't even throw the ball backwards, nearly breaking my friends' toes. Go me!

After that we went to a bar to hang with some mortgage people. Some guy who is three years younger than my mom tried unsuccessfully (even though I had many beers in my belly at this point) to get in my pants for the rest of the evening.

Saturday I got up early to go to a "Coffee Meet-up Group." Yes, I'm that pathetic. I've decided that maybe it's time to make some new friends, because all my current friends (with the exception of one, and she's in her first year of grad school...and has no life) are couples or marrieds. So I don't have anyone to hang out with on weekends, because they're all doing their couple-y stuff and going to bed at 11:00.

I'm not interested in joining some singles' group and fighting off the douchebags at every turn, so coffee sounded like a safe choice. Safe, maybe, but not normal.

At 10:00, I got to the coffee shop. This lady in the parking lot said, "Are you here for the meet-up?" Score one for me looking sad enough to immediately be pegged as "needs more friends." We walked in together, and discovered that we were pretty much the first ones there.

After a bit, a small group formed. Everyone was going around, introducing themselves. "Hi, I'm so and so and I pick lint out of my belly button for a living. My collection is now the size of a small child and I've named it 'Barney.'" That kind of thing.

One guy thought the question "what do you do for a living?" was a tricky one. He said, "What do you mean by that? You want to know what I do for work or you want to know what I do?"

Um, sir? If you don't get paid to do it, it doesn't count as "doing it for a living." As it turned out, he does something IT related for work, but really he's an astrologer. Oh and he talks to his cats. And I'm pretty sure they talk back. And no, I didn't spit my coffee out all over the woman sitting across from me. She has two pet cows. In Dallas. Really. They got her through her divorce. And to that I say...ever heard of a dog? WAAAAYYYY less clean up.

Saturday evening I went to my married friends' house and had dinner. And drank some beer. And made some funnies. Good times.

Sunday was Easter, so I did what any other normal, atheist girl would do on Easter. I drank. A lot. A bunch of us went to brunch at this little Italian place. For a dollar (with the purchase of an entree), you could have your choice of bloody Mary, Mimosa, or Bellini. With a six drink limit. Yeah...right.

They weren't even keeping track. I had a bloody Mary, at least eight Mimosas, and a Bellini. And they only charged me for three drinks. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, I had ten drinks for three bucks. Win!

After that, a couple of friends and I decided to go play some skee ball and have some more Easter beer. There's this great little bar near my apartment that has super old (ahem, classic) video games and skee ball. We had a blast. I invited one of my friends to roll around on the floor and get all sweaty with me. He said, "Not today. It's Jesus's day." I'm pretty sure that was me getting rejected. Who wouldn't want to roll around on the floor and get all sweaty with me? Then we traveled to another bar for more beer and an impromptu hot coffee drink ordering contest, which I won at the last minute. I'm such a sneak. Mine was delicious.

The only thing left to do was go back to my friend's apartment and watch BeerFest and drink some more beer. So that's what we did. Easter rocks. My liver cried.

The next morning, when I woke up, my ulcer was having issues. Oh yeah, I found out two weeks ago that I have an ulcer. I spent most of Monday in the hospital drinking nasty chalky white liquids (that's what she said) and being X-rayed. Now I don't get to have drinks (or caffeine or spicy food...) for two weeks. Sad face.

A Beautiful Night in the Gayborhood

There’s a great little area near where I live that is lovingly referred to as “The Gayborhood.” It’s much cleaner and nicer than any other alternatives. Rarely does anyone point and laugh while covertly whispering behind his or her hand, “Look at the straight girl.” The people are well dressed and groomed. The clubs are well maintained. It’s a little pricey, but you get what you pay for, right?

I met my friend Jessica and some of her old work friends for happy hour in the gayborhood around seven. I, of course, immediately proceeded to “get my drink on.” Which, for me, means I got my vodka press and sipped it through a straw. Slowly. So it took me at least two or three minutes to get through the first one. We were all cramped into a tiny booth. Wait. Table. Wait. I have no idea. It was crowded, whatever it was. Jessica’s friend Lynn was having trouble deciding whether she wanted to sit on my lap or Jessica’s, so she proceeded to put her ass on both of our laps as often as possible.

We soon tired of being cramped up in this booth-table thing, so we hopped on to another bar. It was there that I met my favorite bartender ever. This may be an exaggeration. But I was on my…fourth? Yeah, fourth vodka press. Everyone seems a lot more awesome after your fourth vodka press. I decided to switch it up a little and have a spicy bloody mary. Jessica and Patty had been drinking them all night, and while I don’t actually like them, I really really like green olives. So I went to Jennifer and said, “Jennifer, I’m going to need a spicy bloody mary. But, Jennifer, I am going to need more than my fair share of green olives.” It was no problem for her, that’s how talented she is. She gave me five green olives. Five. She put them on this sharp, black, toothpicky sort of thing and propped them up on the ice in my mug. I thanked her and walked off to find Jessica and shove my olives in her face. She likes them, too, but she never thinks to ask for extras. I ate one olive on the way. I can’t help it. They’re so good. But when I tried to prop the toothpicky thing back up on the ice, the way Jennifer had done, it fell through the ice and sunk to the bottom of my mug. I almost cried (I was drunk, remember?). I pulled myself together and fished them out in time to show Jessica.

Now Jessica was also drunk. Very drunk. Giggly schoolgirl drunk. See, Jessica doesn’t like to be touched, nor does she touch people. And she was touching people. Last time she got this drunk, she spent some time stroking a young man’s dreadlocks. I was down to my last olive by this point. As I went to fish it out of my drink once again, my drunkly inept fingers lost their grip on the damn thing and I dropped it. On the floor. I hung my head in shame and walked back to the bar to discuss this development with Jennifer. I must have looked pretty pathetic because she put four more olives on a toothpicky thing and put them in my glass. She loved me, I think. I certainly loved her.

At some point, Jessica and I decided we should have a non-alcoholic beverage. So we asked Jennifer for some soda. Jessica had hers all drunk by the time we got back to the group, so I handed her mine and went back for another. When I got back with that one, she handed me her empty glass for a trade. Again. So back I went to see Jennifer. I don’t remember how many times this happened, but I was in no condition to be running a soda marathon. I was much too drunk for that.

Then they were playing The Cupid Shuffle and Jessica was shoving me toward the dance floor. “Go do it!” I rarely turn down an opportunity to dance, so I went. To my complete surprise, Jessica was right behind me. That is a testament to her drunkenness. Jessica does not dance. She’s not the most coordinated of people. Patty joined us, too. So I’m counting beside them, “Right, two, three, four. Left, two, three, four. Kick, two, three, four. Turn, turn turn, turn.” Simple, right? They got it, and we danced our asses off. Well, no, mine is still in its place. But we worked up a bit of a sweat.

Paying my tab was quite the adventure. I just couldn’t keep a grip on the pen. It was a slippery little devil. It wasn’t me, I swear. Well, I dropped the damn thing. I bent down to pick it up, but sitting down seemed a better plan. So I sat. On the floor. Only for a second. And it wasn’t because I fell. I chose to sit. Once I got back to my feet, with the help of some kind strangers, I dropped the damn pen again. So the nice woman standing next to me said she would get it. Which was good, because I think I would have ended up sitting down again. I like to sit down when I'm drunk.

The rest of the group soon grew weary of this place, as well. I think ADD must be common among lesbians or something. I went off looking for Jessica and was rewarded by having my boobs grabbed and some drunk woman’s lips on mine (I’m pretty sure she thought I was someone else. People seem to think that all women with red hair are the same person.). It wasn’t a long kiss, and it was quite enjoyable. I’m not one to go around kissing my girlfriends for attention (I think that’s kind of disgusting), but kissing girls isn’t a bad thing. It’s totally and completely different from kissing boys. Which seems weird because we all have the same mouth configuration and we all grew up kissing one another, but it’s different. This kiss was mostly just drunk, though. Oh, and just for the record, when we get together for girls’ night, we do pillow fight in our underwear. You’re welcome.

I didn’t find Jessica. Apparently, she had gone outside to take a phone call. Once we were all together, we piled into Jamie’s car. Six of us. I had to sit on a lap. We weren’t going far. I don’t know where we ended up, but there was a Tina Turner impersonator and a dance off. I got to put a dollar down the dress of one of the competitors. She was a friend of Jamie and Patty’s. I don’t know if it was actually a competition. I was up to my sixth vodka press with a spicy bloody mary thrown in the mix. I was drunk.

There was a lot of dancing. A lot. I was busy dancing with all the lesbians. And Jessica. Who, by this point, had removed her sweatshirt to reveal her overalls and white t-shirt ensemble. She was still getting her white-girl-overbite groove on. “I’m not drunk,” she said over and over. Uh huh. Sure, Jessica, we all believe that. They played The Cupid Shuffle at this place, too, and by then Jessica was an old pro. Then The Electric Slide. I was a sweaty, dizzy, giggly, drunk mess.

After all the dancing, we were starving. We met up at Taco Cabana for some eats. The opportunities for “taco” jokes were abundant.

Girls' Night Out with the Homophobe

Mardi Gras celebration has never been high on my list of priorities.

This can probably be better summed up as: I have never been to Mardi Gras.

As luck would have it, this past Tuesday, I had plans with a girlfriend I hadn't seen in a while. Turns out that this past Tuesday was also Mardi Gras. I had no clue.

We decided to avoid the bead gathering festivities (though I did bring out the ladies with a low-cut-ish V-neck top) and just hang out at a bar near downtown. And away we went.

We ordered our drinks and ordered our food. I had a wonderful seared Ahi Tuna burger. Delicious. And some Guinness. Not exactly complimentary, but it worked out all right.

We sat at our booth in the back talking and drinking for a bit, and then her phone lit up. Some guy she had met the previous weekend (not that kind of guy, she has a boyfriend) wanted to know what she was doing. Being as how it was Mardi Gras and he hadn’t really been in town very long, she felt like it would be mean to ignore him. So she told him she was at a bar with a girlfriend, hanging out.

Twenty minutes later, he showed up with ten pink tulips. Apparently, he was starting a “buds for beads” program. He was nice enough to give us each one, though we had no beads to trade. I never really got where he was from, but somewhere south. I’m from Tennessee, I recognize the accent and mindset.

Somehow, the conversation turned to religion.

Well, let me back up. First, we were trading stories of holidays or birthdays that had sucked balls in the past. Bethany shared a humdinger about Valentine’s Day, so my follow-up was my less-than-stellar 21st birthday experience.

Poor Bethany found out on Valentine’s Day that her (albeit douchebaggy) boyfriend of four years or so was moving to Finland within two weeks and was going out to drink with his buddies instead of hanging out with her, as planned.

I was living with the nicest girl you’d ever meet for my 21st birthday. We had been living together for six months or so, I think, and had become really good friends. I was so excited to turn 21, and I wanted to do something that I wouldn’t remember the next day. You know, typical stuff. Well, my roommate told me not to make any plans because she wanted to plan everything.

The key part that she forgot was that she was still only 20. Hanging out with her meant, really, that I couldn’t do anything that wasn’t legal the day before (buying her alcohol would still be illegal, you see). I hadn’t thought about this either, so I agreed to let her make all the plans.

As the big night approached, I had visions of bars and shots and parties and all kinds of fun stuff. Unfortunately, my luck was not so good.

My 21st birthday consisted of me and my roommate driving to the grocery store, so I could buy us some Mike’s Hard Lemonade (we didn’t really drink beer back then…gross!). Then her big plan was for us to hang out at home and drink it. We played Uno on our living room floor all night.

She meant well, and I don’t hold it against her, though her 21st birthday extravaganza was far more exciting.

Since then, a couple of years ago, I decided I should make up for this travesty of a monumental birthday. I have yet to be successful. Apparently, good birthdays only happen if you spend the time to plan them yourself. Which is the last thing I want to do for my birthday. Instead, I think I’ll just spend them alone from here on out.

So I told Bethany and the southern guy my story. I had to add that my 21st birthday was such a big deal because I never really drank before I was 21. I think I had been drunk twice. Not even one good or fun thing happened either time. One was worse than the other, but neither was fun.

I had this guilt thing about drinking before I was legally allowed to drink. One sip of an alcoholic beverage and I would get the worst stomach cramps. It was terrible.

To which Bethany said, “What, were you Baptist?”

And thus the religion conversation began. I was raised Southern Baptist (hard to believe, eh?), but now I’m an atheist. Southern guy asked about that. He said he’d been doing some research on religion because he wasn’t sure what religion to choose.

None of them, says me. But that’s just my opinion.

I don’t know what kind of research he’d been doing. My experience with most people from backwoods southern towns is that they’re not terribly tolerant of anyone who isn’t just like them. It appeared that this guy was no exception. The next words out of his mouth were:

“Well, there are some things about Christianity that I agree with...like, queers are unnatural.”

Seriously.

I almost fell out of the booth. Who says that? Out loud? At a bar? ON MARDI GRAS? I was just waiting for him to start talking about all the n-words in the bar or something.

I excused myself to go to the bathroom, both because I had to pee and because I didn’t want to climb across the table and beat him upside the head with my purse (hey, I’m a lady). While I was gone, he told Bethany that I was hot and if she needed to go, he would give me a ride home. Ugh.

Sir, you have no chance. Less than no chance. Which, thankfully, Bethany told him. She’s a good friend, that one.

I decided to keep my flower as a reminder that not only do people like that still exist and walk among us, they also think I’m hot. :-)