Tap. Tap. Is this thing on?

Oh hi.  I'm back after almost 4 years.

First of all, I need your opinions.  I know Blogger is kind of like the anchovy of pizza toppings - a few people still like it but it's pretty old school with very few things you can customize.  I'm thinking about changing to a different platform/company/whatever you call it.  Do y'all recommend Wordpress?  I've looked online and that seems to be what is recommended.  But I have to pay for it so I want to see if anyone has better suggestions before I switch and put my money into something.  Keep in mind that technology is not my thang, so if it requires a lot of technical expertise it's probably not for me. 

The main thing I'd really like to be able to do is set it up so I can have people request to subscribe and not have it open for anyone in the world to see.  I saw what June went through with people finding her blog.  I had a different blog years ago that someone in my real life found and she started leaving anonymous comments about my appearance that were quite hurtful.  It was all because she had a falling out with a mutual friend who ended up having to go to the police because this girl was leaving the mutual friend threatening voice mails.  It was really ugly and while she and I had never had any issues, she decided to find me online and start attacking me because I remained friends with the mutual person.  I had absolutely nothing to do with their fight - it was all a business thing gone bad between them.  I'd really like to avoid having something like that happen again so I want to secure things a little bit and that doesn't seem to be an option here on Blogger. 

Since some of you may be new and know next to nothing about me, I'll tell y'all a little bit about myself. 

I've lived in Atlanta my entire life.  I'll be 50 in less than two weeks (how did that happen?).  I have two brothers - one older, one younger.  Both of my biological parents are deceased.  My mom died a couple of weeks after I turned 5 and my dad was remarried 9 months later before I turned 6.  The week after my 44th birthday my dad died.  So hey, my birthday brings up super happy anniversaries, right?  My mom who raised me is still alive.  I work at a law firm and have been a legal assistant for 18 years.  I was once married to my high school sweetheart (who was anything but a sweetheart after a number of  years and instead became an alcoholic, bi-polar, emotional abusing asshole) and I've been divorced for 14 years.  I had an 8 year relationship after that with a Brazilian guy and that's a long story for another day (a few of you already know that story).  I had another 2 year relationship which I ended last summer, but I don't want to talk about that one particularly. 

Now I'm single and dating.  And I have stories.  So many stories.  But I don't want people to be able to find them, so I really need to move things somewhere else before I share them. 

I know, this is a boring post.  They won't all be. 

But for now, I just need to know if Wordpress is the way to go. 

How to look like a gorgeous model in very easy steps.

Okay, do any of you remember when I humiliated myself with the step-by-step makeup photos last year when I decided to be a Lichtenstein painting for Halloween?  Trust me, it was about as humiliating as it gets. 

Guess what?  That was so much fun, I'm doing it again today!! 

Are y'all ready for this?  I'm not entirely sure I am.  My mom is coming from Texas tomorrow to stay at my house for a week and I have two (and possibly three) friends coming in this Friday evening so I will have a house full of people this week.  We are going to the Halloween Festival in Little 5 Points on Saturday so I decided I better make sure I knew what I was doing and how long my makeup would take this year so yesterday I decided to practice.  Before I did my practice run of makeup yesterday, I had cleaned 3 bathrooms (SO MUCH FUN!), cleaned my kitchen from top to bottom, cleaned up my dining room after hosting a wild and crazy night of cards until late Saturday night, and I was on my second load of laundry, so I was already looking a bit haggard before I did this.  Which was good because I was going for a gross and disgusting look and I had a great head start - exhausted, tired, sweaty and gross.  I am a dream catch for some guy out there.....I don't know how I haven't been snatched up.

I started out by messily swiping and kind of patching my face with regular makeup, white makeup, and gray all over my face.  And I smudged black cream around my eyes. 

The frizzy and gray hair!  The eyes!  The patched on makeup!  The rattiest and most worn out tank top on the planet!  Behold the most beautiful woman of the blogosphere:

Then I apparently wanted to look like I had gotten into a fight.....and had my butt handed to me......so I added smudges of red around my eyes.

Cindy Crawford has nothing on me:

 

Then I decided to measure out some strips of paper towel on my cheek bones.

This is probably what Heidi Klum does every.single.day.

And then I stuck the paper towel strips on my cheeks with some liquid latex.

I think Gisele keeps liquid latex in her makeup bag for this very purpose:

And then it was time for the best product of all......BLOODY SCAB!

Elle MacPherson passed along this great tip when we were about to walk the runway one time:  Bloody Scab will contour your cheekbones like nothing else!  But she called it Croute de Sang because she likes to sound fancy.

OMG, y'all!  She was so right!  Just check out the contouring I got from using this stuff!  Y'all should listen to Elle's tips.  I decided to contour my neck as well because I liked it so much:

Y'all want to see how well it contoured both sides of my face though, right? 

I will never run out of Bloody Scab again as long as I live!  Oh excuse me.....Croute de Sang.  Elle told me I should practice talking fancier than a girl from Georgia normally does.

Then I looked in the mirror and I said to myself, I said, "Self, you have never looked better in your entire 46 years of life on this planet!  But maybe we need to work on the lips a little.  They kind of pale in comparison to your cheeks.  The cheeks shouldn't get all of the attention."  And I agreed with myself and I pulled out some black lipstick and the red cream makeup again.

Oh, y'all.  This was a wise, wise, wise decision on my part.  It's maybe the wisest makeup decision I have ever made in all my years of applying makeup.  But I started off sneaking my mom's makeup out of her bathroom after she left for work when I was in 7th grade, applying it while sitting at the bus stop using a teeny tiny mirror, so really, things could only improve from there, right?  This lipstick application is a culmination of years of practice. 

There still seemed to be a little bit of room for improvement so I thought and thought and thought some more to come up with what else I could do with the Bloody Scab.  Sorry, Elle.....the Croute de Sang.  It's really such a miracle product!

Well shit, y'all.  Why didn't I think of it before?  Let's put some of it coming out my nose!

I studied myself in the mirror and I still felt like something was missing.

A SAFETY PIN!!!!  Of course!  But I discovered I didn't have those huge safety pins so I'll run by the Clinique counter after work one day and pick up some from their "Hardware" line so I can complete my cheek look a little better than this:

I planned on washing that gray right out of my hair at the same time I was very sadly washing that Croute de Sang right off of my face, but in the meantime I wanted to spruce up my hair just a tad to go with my fabulous new makeup repertoire even if it was just me and the bathroom mirror (and the iPhone camera) that would get to enjoy it last night.

This is what I whipped up on the fly (and I decided to try and copy the disgusted and soulless look the best supermodels seem to always have because I think that's the real secret to their success):

Then I wondered if my look would be better if I was in some different lighting because I know that's always important too.  So I went into my bedroom with only daylight coming in the window and snapped a couple of more selfies:

 

I just love my new look!  How about y'all?

Well, I have been told they are fabulous, but this guy must have really thought so.

As you can all see, my goal of writing more regularly on here is going really well so far.

I always seem to have stuff to write about but I don't seem to make the time to sit and write it all out is the problem.   I've been hosting a lot of stuff at my house, I went on a date with a new boy (which Imma tell y'all about today), one of my neighbors moved far away, a couple of more things have broken in my house, work has been busy, busy, busy, etc.

Anyway, I think it's best that I just talk about one of those things today and that is the crazy ass date I went out on a few weeks ago.

Y'all, I have not given up on my relationship with HB, but I honestly just have no idea what exactly is going on with that whole situation and so I gave myself a certain deadline that some certain things needed to happen and/or change, and if they didn't and then someone came along I was feeling interested in, then I would explore it and see what happened.  And I have been doing a lot of crying and a lot of praying about the situation with HB if I'm being completely honest.  I begged God to give me a gigantic sign as to what I should do and I'm kind of getting some mixed signals.  But one of the signs was clearly telling me to keep holding out that the HB thing is going to work out okay.  Because HB is such a good and decent man, and I explored things with another guy who wasn't either of those things.

It was 9 days after my self-imposed deadline and I was at the grocery store after work looking rather haggard and I hate grocery shopping as it is, and there were some crazy people in the store that night such as the lady who was losing her ever loving shit because the fried chicken at the deli was not fresh out of the fryer and she didn't want to wait 20 minutes for them to cook more.  And honestly by the time she bitched out 3 people at the deli, the lady doing cooking demonstrations across from the deli, and a couple of managers, they could have cooked her some fresh chicken because I'm pretty sure she was screaming and making a scene for at least 20 minutes.

As I got in the line to check out, a guy came up in line behind me and leaned up right into my face and said, "You are absolutely beautiful."  And beautiful was the last thing I was feeling at that moment and he kind of startled me getting all up in my face so I jumped backwards away from him.  So he said, "Oh, I'm so sorry.  Am I being creepy?  I really don't want to be creepy.  I just think you are a beautiful woman."  So I told him thank you and then I noticed he only had two items so I let him go in front of me since I had half a buggy full of stuff.  He chatted with me, introduced himself, shook my hand, and then he walked out the door.  And it was incredibly flattering.

I checked out, walked out the door and I was walking towards my car when I heard him shouting my name and running up behind me.  He said, "I was wondering if it might be okay if I get your phone number so I can call you and we can get to know each other a bit better."  I told him that would probably be okay and then he said he would load my groceries in my car for me.  So I let him do that and then I gave him my number.  In the conversation he told me he is an actor and perhaps he could tell I was a bit skeptical so he pulled up something on his phone showing me he had an audition scheduled for the following week for a new show coming out on NBC this fall and that is how I saw his last name so I could Google him.  No, I'm not telling y'all his name because (1) he's not famous and I can promise you that you've never heard of him even though he has been in some very well known shows and a couple of movies; and (2) this is not going to be a very flattering story about him and I don't want to get charged with slander.  And I'm really bummed about (2) because holy crap is he a good looking guy and I hate that he turned out to not be a very decent guy (or at least not the type of guy I would ever want to be involved with romantically).  And there are quite a few things that I'm going to leave out of this story because I think it's for the best that they remain private but suffice it to say that they are also not flattering things.

About a week and a half  after meeting him at the grocery store, I had not heard from him and decided I had nothing to lose so I sent him a text telling him I hope he was having a great week and asking how his audition had gone.  He replied and said the audition had gone well but he had not heard anything so he didn't know if he had gotten the part.  And that's all he said.  So I responded and told him to feel free to call me sometime if he'd like.  And he responded and said he would.  And that's all he said.

About 5 minutes later he sent me another message and asked if he could be completely honest and upfront with me.  So I was expecting him to say that he was just trying to make me feel good about myself in the grocery store that evening or that he really had no interest in me or something along those lines.  I replied and told him he could be honest with me and asked him if he was about to hurt my feelings.  He said he didn't think so, however, he might offend me a bit.  I told him to go ahead because I'm not easily offended.  He wrote back and said he would like to get to know me better, but he's not looking for a serious relationship and he approached me because he liked how big my boobs are.  Alrighty.

I responded and said I was not offended because I realize my boobs are big.  We ended up talking via text and a few phone calls off and on for the rest of that evening and he seemed like a fun guy.  There were a few red flags going up for me, but he seemed safe to talk with.  We chatted a couple of more times during the following week and then he asked me if I wanted to go to lunch one day.  He is right down the street from my office so he said he'd pick me up and he did.  And this is where things go bad.

As soon as we pulled out of my building he said, "Damn!  Look at that girl's boobs!" about a girl walking down the sidewalk.  I looked at him and said, "Seriously?  Did you really just say that less than 60 seconds into our first date?"  He apologized profusely, but the damage was done.

As soon as we sat down at a table in the restaurant he said, "Hey......flash your boobs at me."  To which I responded, "You're insane if you really think that's going to happen."  And he said, "Before too long you'll be flashing them at me without me having to ask." And I said, "That will not be happening.  In fact, I can say with complete certainty that you are never going to see them in your lifetime."  And that is when we moved on to safer subjects such as his acting career, past relationships, business ideas and stuff he's working on, etc. 

So while I think I can be friends with him and he's a pretty interesting guy, I can say that I am not interested in him romantically even a tiny bit.  And I took it as a sign that maybe I just need to hold out for the HB situation to work itself out.

What I Did This Summer. Seriously? I really did all of this?

Oh. My. Dog.

This summer has just about worn me slap out, y'all.  Imma try to recap my past few months:

Mid-May I was out of town for a weekend at an aunt's house.

Last weekend of May a cousin came in town from Fargo and I had her, her son, another cousin and her daughter and my aunt over to my house.

The next weekend I spent most of the weekend with them before my cousin flew back home to Fargo.

I cannot even remember what I did the next weekend because it seems like it was eleventy-billion years ago, but I know I had something going on because I've had stuff every single weekend.

The next weekend I went to the One Fabulous Mama retreat which I wrote about eleventy-billion years ago which was the last time I've managed to post anything on here.

The weekend after that I hosted a group of my friends from high school at my house for a potluck dinner on Sunday night.  One friend lives in Texas now so she was flying in on Saturday and staying the night with me.  I don't think I had seen her in almost 20 years since we were roommates for a summer in college.  Her flight was supposed to get in at a completely reasonable time.  Instead it didn't get in until 2:00 a.m. on Sunday morning and I almost ran over a skateboarder when I went to pick her up because he flew out in front of me in the pitch dark wearing all black clothes because apparently he's the smartest man on the planet.  We got to my house, slept a few hours, got up, did stuff to get ready for the dinner, tried to catch up on the past 20 years, then our other 5 friends arrived. One friend dropped a bottle of red wine in my driveway which shattered everywhere and another friend had accidentally left her lights on in her car and because we couldn't move cars around in my awfully skinny driveway for someone to jump her off, we had to call AAA to come rescue her and the driver took a bunch of group photos for us in my front yard.  We all had a great time catching up, I realized I am the only one of us who is not married with kids (and truthfully I am totally ok with that), and the last friend left at almost midnight.  Then my friend who was staying with me and I got up super early because we had to leave my house at 6:30 Monday morning so I could take her to the airport and get to work.  And then I almost fell asleep on my desk most of that day.

The next weekend my brother and I left to go visit my mom in Texas.  We stopped for breakfast at some point and we were discussing our childhood road trips and how our dad loved to make us listen to Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings for 14 hours straight to Illinois and 14 hours straight on the way back home.  And I made the stupid mistake of saying, "You know, now that I'm older I don't mind a little Willie" and my brother made fun of me for the entire week about that .  (Think about it if you didn't immediately get it.  And don't capitalize willie if you still don't get it.)  On the way to Texas we stopped in Mississippi for several hours to visit an uncle who was very ill. 

While we were in Texas, we had to go the mall for something and my feet were killing me from the stupid plantar fasciitis because we had been walking all day long, so I told my mom and brother I was going to sit on a bench and rest for a minute while they went into some department store.  Honest to goodness, y'all.  I looked at the time when I sat down.  I sat at the opposite end of a bench where a very normal looking lady was already sitting.  I made no eye contact and didn't say a word to her.  And I barely got my ass down on the seat before she started talking to me.

"Oh man.  I've only got 4 minutes left on my break," she said as she sighed heavily and licked her ice cream cone.  I just politely smiled at her and said nothing.

"I work here in the department store.  I'm really tired," she shared with me.  So I figured she must expect me to respond.

"What time do you get off?" I asked her.

She went on to tell me what time she got off, what time her shift had started, how the management expected way too much from them, all about her previous career with Target and how she had to quit that job because she was having back pain issues, then she shared with me all about her husband's health issues, then she told me about a friend who had a sick child and told me all about how the Swiners (she meant Shriners but said Swiners about a bazillion times) would help them but she can't convince her friend to ask for help.  And seriously?  How does this happen to me when I ask one very simple question?  And then right in the middle of a sentence that she never finished, she looked at her watch and said, "Oh, my break is over now," and she stood up and walked away.  And when my mom and brother walked back out, I looked at the time again and they had only left me alone for 6 minutes.  And 4 of them were filled with crazy.

The next weekend we drove back from Texas and stopped for several hours in Mississippi to visit my uncle again (he was in ICU by that point).


The next weekend I hosted a bunch of my neighbors at my house to play cards on Friday night (I had never met any of them and we had the BEST time).  One of them had so much fun she called me the next morning and asked if she could come back again on Saturday night and bring her sister and brother-in-law to play cards with me.  She said she liked my house and I had good snacks.  So I mowed my yard, cleaned house, did laundry and then hosted her again.  And on Sunday my mom came in town to stay with me for almost  a week.

The next weekend I was in town and I wasn't hosting anyone at my house, but I had to work on a gigantic commission painting the entire weekend (I'm still not done with it).

The next weekend several of the ladies I met at the OFM retreat back in June came and stayed for the weekend.  A couple of others live local and they met us on Saturday afternoon for lunch and a little shopping in Little 5 Points.  We had the best time!  Until I fell down the stairs when I was helping one of them carry stuff out to her car.  And honest to goodness I think I broke my wrist again.  Yes, the same arm I broke last year.  And the year before.  I don't need anyone to tell me I should go to the doctor because I'm a grown woman and if it gets worse I will go.  But mentally I really don't think I can handle being in a cast for the third year in a row.  So I'm wearing a splint they gave me last year and I'm treating it very gently.  I got bruised up pretty good (left thigh, left ass cheek, left boob) and it's now 2 weeks later and the bruises are getting better.  I still have a goose egg on my left thigh and my wrist is still pretty swollen and after mowing my grass this past weekend I'm pretty much convinced it's broken.  I will live. 

The next weekend I was supposed to host another event at my house on Saturday, but for a variety of reasons several people had to cancel so we decided to postpone it for a while until everyone can make it.  I did go to an antiques show with a dear friend of mine on Sunday though.  And sadly, my very dear and precious uncle passed away that weekend.

So last week I took an unexpected trip to Mississippi in the middle of the week for a couple of days for his funeral.  It was super sad.  His son (my cousin) is a minister and he did the service.  It was pretty dadgum emotional.  The day before his funeral was when Robin Williams died and really, last week just sucked.

Yesterday was my birthday.  So my gift to myself was that I planned absolutely nothing for the entire weekend.  I mowed my grass (which certainly did nothing good for my wrist), did some laundry, cooked meals for the week, finally got the sheets changed on the beds from when my OFM friends stayed two weekends before, did a little bit of cleaning, and also crashed on the sofa all afternoon Sunday and watched TV and took several short naps.  The most important part of the weekend is that I never put a bra on.

This coming weekend I'm hosting another card game.  The next weekend Mrs. Oh is going to be in town so I'm getting together for dinner with her one night.  And my mom is trying to convince me to then head out Saturday morning to meet her at my brother's farm in Kentucky since it's Labor Day weekend and I'll be off work that Monday.  I'm honestly not sure I have it in me.......

So in between that I have been working and I do not know what in sam hill is going on at my office, but this past few months is probably the busiest I've been in 7 years.

And that, my friends, is what I did this summer.

A new tribe is born

Oh my dog, y'all.  I have been trying to get on here all week to update y'all on my fabulous weekend and that was a whole week ago.  And I have another fabulous weekend coming up right now.

I have been busy, busy, busy at work - overtime almost every single day even though we aren't supposed to have any.  And I'm hosting an event at my house on Sunday night so every evening has been filled with running errands, cleaning, etc.

Anyway, last weekend I went to the One Fabulous Mama retreat down in Nashville, Georgia.  And I honestly don't know how to put into words how wonderful it was.  Karen in VB.....you MUST figure out a way to go to the next one.

Now, I'm not gonna lie.  It started off a little frustrating.  Karen in VB, I know you'll find this shocking, but I got good and lost trying to get to the place.  We stayed at a hunting lodge and apparently Google maps was unable to determine that this place existed.  Their website did not have a street number, just the street name, so my regular GPS would not help me.  I pulled directions off on my laptop before I left Atlanta and it told me to get off I-75 in Tifton, and go 34 miles on Hwy. 82 E and then turn right on Hwy. 82 S and then some other stuff.  I got off on Hwy. 82 in Tifton and I drove 34 miles and there was nowhere to turn.  So I drove another 5 or 6 miles thinking that perhaps the mileage was just a little off on Google maps, and there still was nowhere to turn so I pulled off on the side of the road and decided to pull up the map on my iPhone.

It told me to turn around and go back 12.9 miles from where I'd come and turn on Hwy. 135.

So that's what I did.

Once I turned on 135 I saw a sign saying I was headed towards Nashville so I assumed that although my laptop didn't, perhaps my iPhone had good directions.

It did not.

My phone then lied like a dirty bastard and told me to turn on Roberson Gaskins and then turn on June Hendley and so that's what I did.  Because the website said this hunting lodge is on June Hendley Road.  I passed two houses and one of those houses had 5 Confederate flags in the front yard.  And both of those roads were dirt roads.  Only it was more like super thick sand and it was not easy to drive on.  It was mounded up in the middle of the road and scrubbing the bottom of my SUV and it would kinda jerk you around so you couldn't drive more than about 15 mph.  I had about 1/3 of a tank of gas when I first got on the dirt roads.

TWO HOURS LATER my gas light was on.  I had to pee.  I had to poop.  And I was super frustrated. If anyone had told me it was possible to drive back and forth on the same dirt road for 2 hours I would have said they were crazy.  But now I've done it my own self.  I tried to call OFM and didn't get an answer and her voice mail isn't set up for messages.  At some point I decided I probably needed to try and make it back to the main road, get some gas, and just go find a hotel.  I was already late for dinner and I was ready to call it a day.  My phone would tell me drive 4.6 miles NE.  Then it would say drive 0.2 miles SW.  Then 3.1 miles NE.  And all I saw were trees no matter what direction I drove.

This is what I saw for 2 long hours:



At some point I passed two different cars.  One was a lady in an SUV so we each squeezed over to the very edge of the road and passed.  After I had turned around for the 38702435712489234th time, I passed an older gentleman and I flagged him down to stop him and ask for directions.  I could tell he had no idea where the place was either.  I kept driving and I eventually passed another dirt road which I had passed 94759475957 times already, and I saw the lady in the SUV had turned on that road and stopped.  So I pulled up next to her, rolled down my window and she called out to me the most wonderful words I've ever heard:  "Are you looking for the plantation?"  "YES!" I screamed. 

She told me she was on the phone with OFM's assistant, (we'll call her Cutie Pie because she is) and to follow her.  "My gas light is on and I have to pee SO bad," I over shared with her.  She told me she had already pulled off the road, walked into a field and used a porta potty which she first kicked several times so she wouldn't get bit on the ass by a snake, and she was afraid a farmer was going to come out of a trailer and shoot her.  I loved her immediately.  "If you run out of gas, honk and I'll stop for you," she said.

I followed her to a paved road (THANK YOU, JESUS!) and she pulled over again and told me that Cutie Pie was on her way to rescue us.  Cutie Pie arrived like a knight in shining armor and said she had to go to a gas station to meet someone else who was really lost.  "I have to get gas so this is perfect!" I said.  I'm pretty sure Cutie Pie was way over all of us before the weekend started, but she didn't act like it if she was.  She was wonderful and sweet.

I think she had to drive and rescue 5 of the 9 of us because iPhone directions and Google maps sucked.

We made it to the hunting lodge where every square inch of the walls was covered in dead animals.  They even had candle holders made out of hooves, y'all.  I threw my purse in my room, met my roommate (we'll call her The Chiro because she's a chiropractor), and since we were late for dinner, we ate.  OFM's community made a potluck dinner for us and it was incredible!  I then ran outside and took photos of the beautiful peacocks, the incredible zebras, and there were also emus, bulls, guinea hens, two cats, etc.  The property is gorgeous.  It's so peaceful there.

Until the peacocks start screaming.

Y'all.  I have never heard a peacock before and it sounded like a lady screaming at the top of her lungs, "HEEEEEELLLLLLLPPPPPPPPP!"

Peacocks don't care if you stay up until 2:00 a.m.  They think they should scream their bloody heads off at 6:00.

 
 We played a game to kind of break the ice and get to know each other after dinner.  It involved sometimes having to sit in each other's laps.  And the drinking started too.  I actually stuck with Sprite and Ginger Ale, but 2 hours after we arrived, someone had to go buy more wine.

There was a screened in porch and we spent a lot of time out there over the weekend.  By 10 or 11, most of us were bra free, in our pj's and already felt like we had known each other for a lifetime.  We all talked, there were some tears shed, we shared dreams, struggles, fears, and also funny stories until we cried from laughing so hard.

On Saturday we toured Nashville and met some of OFM's sponsors. (One of the owners of one sponsor stayed with us for the weekend, Cutie Pie stayed with us, and two other locals were there all weekend.  They are all awesome!)  Two other locals came and spent the day Saturday with us.  We had lunch at Pa's Country Meats and I stocked up on stuff there, we went to a thrift shop, we stopped in Dixie Sales and Graphics and bought personalized goodies, and one thing I bought was this mug which says "What we Say on the Porch, Better Stay on the Porch":





We also stopped in the Nashville Farmer's Market which was ADORABLE and I bought some barbecue sauce as a souvenir of the beginning of my weekend:












Here is the farmer's market:



We eventually made it out to Horse Creek Winery where we had a wine tasting and drank wine slushies (which are the bomb diggity if I'm being honest).  They were prepared for us:





I bought mix so I can make my own slushies at home:








When we got back to the lodge, we were going to drink blueberry margaritas and pain killers (OMG, they are so yummy) and do this......an inflatable water slide:


Sadly, the inflatable water slide had a bit of a gash in it.  OFM's Mister came out with some duct tape but it was beyond repair so a bunch of grown women sat around in their bathing suits in a hunting lodge decorated with dead animals and drank a lot and we turned Catch Phrase into a drinking game which involved a few people doing shots out of a cap from the tequila bottle.  I had a margarita because shots make me barf.

OFM had an art table set up for us so after a wine tasting, a gigantic wine slushie, a blueberry margarita and half of a pain killer, I painted pretty much the worst painting of my life but enjoyed every second of it with some new friends:






We were supposed to all cook dinner together, but around 8 or 8:30 we all kind of said "F*&uck that, let's order some pizzas."  We did have a nice salad because we are a healthy group of ladies.

There is a bunk house right next door to the lodge and the owner likes to have himself a Saturday night poker game in the bunk house.  We saw the guys leave at some point.  We were all out on the screened in porch when they left and eventually we were all liquored up, and somehow the subject of sex toys came up because OFM does sex toy parties (you may remember when I hosted one for her a couple of months ago and Amanda came to visit me and that whole weekend went not as planned because my niece ran over herself with her car and all that).  Well, let's just say that the sex toy conversation got a bit loud and rowdy and it was full of laughter and we were all having ourselves a great time and suddenly, out of the corner of my eye I saw something.  And I said to OFM, "Um, there is someone with a flashlight headed over here from the bunk house."  And we all got quiet as a nice young man opened the door to the screened in porch to tell us the poker game was over and he was locking up and heading home.  "So, have you been sitting outside all this time?" someone asked.  He shyly nodded his head as he looked down at the ground.  "Did you happen to hear what we were talking about?" I asked.

"Good night, ladies," he said as he kept looking at the ground and left.

So yeah, we gave that guy probably the best night he's had in a while even though he was sitting guard at a men's poker game.

By the time I left that lodge on Sunday morning, I felt like I had met 13 of the most wonderful friends that I will have for a lifetime.  In fact, I think I'm getting together with one of them after work tonight!  I can't believe how much I missed them after I drove off even though I had just met them less than 48 hours before.  We are soul sisters and have built a tribe of fierce, strong, caring women.

It was a weekend filled with love.

I think it was the deodorant I was choosing that made him want me

For those of you who are friendly with me on Facebook, you may have seen that I had an interesting interaction while grocery shopping last week.  Karen in VB mentioned in the comments of my last post that she wanted to hear more about it. 

I vary the grocery stores I do my shopping in.  I frequent Kroger, Publix and Trader Joe's.  Last week I decided on Kroger.  This is the same Kroger where a half-blind, drooling, homeless lady followed me all over the store asking me to buy her dinner one night (I did) and that was the same night a man was frantic to find Nutella because he had just recently tried it for the first time and he yelled to me as he waved his hands all around in the air like he just didn't care, "I NEED NUTELLA!  WHERE IS THE NUTELLA?  I JUST HAD IT FOR THE FIRST TIME AND.....I NEED MORE!"  I couldn't blame him one bit.  Nutella is good, y'all. 

It is also the same Kroger where I asked an employee if she could help me find an item one night and she walked me all over the freaking store and never could find it.  She said she had only worked there for about 8 months so she didn't know where everything was yet.  (?)  And then I saw her again later and told her I had finally found the item I was looking for and she pointed to her name tag, asked me to call their headquarters or go to their website or something and tell them how helpful she was because then she'd be in the running to win a new big screen television.  Yes.  Let me get right on the horn to tell them how helpful you were in dragging me all over the store for absolutely no reason since you never helped me find what I needed.

It is the same Kroger where I once overheard a man trying to impress a woman by telling her he had a super fancy bottle of champagne at his house and invited her over to share it with him.  "I paid 28 BUCKS for that bottle!" said ol' Mr. Moneybags.

It is not, however, the Publix where I was walking through the produce section when a guy came running up from behind me, jumped in front of my face and exclaimed, "I think you are a lot like Wonder Woman!" before walking away.  And it was not the Trader Joe's where a lady recently danced and sang and shook her moneymaker at me when I motioned for her to go ahead of me when we almost collided our buggies in an aisle.

No, it was Kroger.

I was almost done with my shopping when it all went down like this:  I had just grabbed some beef from the meat department to make some stir fry and I was partially up an aisle right off the meat department where I was checking my list to make sure I wasn't forgetting anything before I grabbed some shampoo and deodorant and went to check out when I heard a man saying rather loudly from the direction of the meat department, "Do you own a restaurant around town?"  My back was to the meat department by that time and I didn't turn around.

"Excuse me, young lady.  Do you own a restaurant here in town?" he asked again loudly.  I still didn't turn around because I don't own any restaurant.

"Young lady, where do I know you from?  Do you own a restaurant around Atlanta?"  I turned around to see exactly who it was that was annoying some poor "young lady" to discover the man was looking directly at me.  And so I said, "Are you asking me?"

"Yes.  Do you own a restaurant somewhere around town?"

"Um, no.  I don't."

"Hmm.  I know you from somewhere.  You're in the music business, aren't you? "

"No, I'm not."

"Well, I think I've seen you performing around town, haven't I?"

"Uh, no.  You definitely have not."

"Well where in the world do I know you from? "

"I have no idea.  You don't look at all familiar to me."

"Stand right there, please. I want to come shake your hand and meet you," he said as several shoppers were standing in silence watching all of this go down.  I stood there by the shampoo as he came up the aisle to where I was and shook my hand.  He introduced himself and asked me for my name.  He insisted again that he thought he's seen me performing my musical talents somewhere around town and I assured him I have no musical talent whatsoever.  He asked me if I shop in that Kroger a lot and I told him I'm in there on a fairly regular basis and he said he's in there all the time so maybe he's just seen me in there.  I told him I was sorry, but I felt like I had never seen him before in my life.  He then said, "Well, it was nice to meet you." And he walked away.  I turned my back again and started moving up the aisle a little further when I heard him coming up from behind me again saying, "You know what?  I'm going to surprise you here."  And I wish I had thought to say, "You're going to pay for my groceries?" but I wasn't that quick so I just stood there.

"I am in the music business," he said.  "I'm an instructor and a performer."  I told him that I'm pretty sure I'm un-instructable when it comes to music and he said he could probably teach me.  I told him I paint from time to time so I have a creative outlet already.  He went on to ask me if I've heard of a certain business and I told him I have heard of it.  He told me they have a warehouse not far from the Kroger and on Saturdays he sometimes performs there and sometimes his students perform there and people come to watch and then they hire them to play at parties and events and stuff.  He told me celebrities come by and hang out and local politicians visit regularly and no one bothers them and everything is super laid back and casual.  And then he invited me to come sometime.  He asked me if I had a business card.  (I don't.)  He then asked if I had a pen because he wanted to give me his card but wanted to write his personal email address on it.  (I didn't.)  He then asked a random lady walking past if she had a pen.  (She didn't.) 

"Are you going to be here in this aisle for a while?" he asked.

"Well, no, not for a while.  I need to grab one more thing and then I'm checking out and I'm outta here," I replied.

"I'll find you," he said.  "Like I told you, I'm in here all the time.  The guys in the meat department know me very well and they'll have a pen I can borrow.  I'll come find you in a minute."

And he walked off and I moved up the aisle a little further and I was picking up a thing of deodorant when he approached me for the third time.

"My god you're beautiful.  Here's my card and I've written in my personal email address.  Please email me.  I want to get to know you.  I'm begging you.....just email me," he said.

"We'll see," I said.

"Please.  Please email me.  I've got a few good years left and I want you and I to get to know each other really well over the years," he said.

"We'll see," I said again.

"Email me, please.  I'm so glad I met you.  Come out and listen to some music."

"We'll see.  Have a great night," I said as I turned and walked away.

I told my brother (the cop) about it this weekend when he stopped by my house.  He said he'd be glad to go with me to kind of check this guy out.

I waited about four days and then I emailed him last night.  I told him I might come out and listen to him perform sometime and asked if I could bring a friend or two with me.  He responded less than an hour later and said he'd love for me to come out and he was really glad to hear from me.

Now y'all, I have no desire to date this guy because I am guessing he is significantly older than me.  But I think he could be a really fun friend to hang out with and get to know.  I also don't really know what is going on with Hot Brazilian right now (it's a super long story that I don't really want to get into on here but I'm still committed to HB and until I know what is going to happen with that situation I don't plan to date Mr. Music Man or anyone else for that matter).

But that's a little story about getting picked up over a stick of deodorant.

I really need to throw away a certain pair of pants

Y'all.  It's kind of ridiculous how many times I say I'm going to write and then I just up and disappear.  It's not on purpose.  I just get busy.  And too lazy and/or tired to write at night after I get home and do the bazillion things I have to do when I get home.

For instance, the last time I wrote on here which was Thursday a couple of weeks ago, I went to the mall after work (and I wish I could tell y'all how much I hate going to the mall but there are not words sufficient to describe my hatred) because the lady who sits next to me at work also has plantar fasciitis and she told me about some flip flops that people say are good when you have yourself some hurty feet.  So I stampeded over there in my ugly ass shoes with the hard inserts in them because I wanted a pair of flip flops.  Yes, even though that's how I broke my arm a couple of years ago and ended up in a body brace.  I went and paid sixty-five damn dollars for some flip flops and, while they don't hurt my feet while I'm wearing them and walking around all day, my feet hurt like a mother-you-know-what the next morning.  But I've worn them a few times anyway because I spent sixty five of my hard earned dollars on them. 

Anyway, I got home late that night is what I'm saying because I battled the Buckhead traffic, spent some miserable time at the mall, bought some ridiculously priced flip flops, and then sat in more traffic to get home.  I had decided on the way home that what I was craving for dinner that night was breakfast food instead of the chicken and vegetables I already had cooked that just needed to be heated up. 

We are already having summer temps here in Atlanta and when I got home I was sweating like a snowman in a sauna, so I decided that I would run upstairs and put on my pj's and release the girls from my bra before I started cooking eggs and whatnot.  Right before I ran upstairs (and I use the word "run" loosely) I set my home alarm system because I had no plans to go back out in the awful heat.  Y'all, I took off my bra and put on the rattiest, most worn out white tank top you've ever laid eyes on and a pair of super thin, super comfortable pj bottoms that happened to have a giant hole in the crotch.  I did not care because I felt a good ten degrees cooler.

I went back downstairs, pulled out a skillet, turned on the stove, and opened up a package of bacon.  That's right.  Bacon for dinner because I have given up all the white foods - bread, pasta, rice, processed sugar (except for Cake Day at our office once a month), white potatoes, etc. because I need to lose 8 million pounds - but I did not give up bacon.  I had just put two slices of bacon in the pan when my cell phone rang.  As my cell phone rang, I heard sirens coming up the street but that happens multiple times a day so I thought nothing of it.

I didn't recognize the 800 number but I answered anyway and it was my alarm company calling to tell me that they were showing a fire alarm going off at my house.

"Um, no.  There's no alarm going off.  I'm standing in the middle of my house and there is nothing on fire, and there is no alarm going off in here," I told her.

She then said they had tried to call me a minute or two earlier and didn't get an answer (I had my cell phone upstairs with me when I was putting on my beautiful and fancy pj's and it did not ring and there was no missed call from them) so they had gone ahead and dispatched the fire department and then she asked if I wanted them to try and cancel the call.  I had a sinking feeling in my gut but I told her to try since, you know, MY HOUSE WAS NOT ON FIRE.

And that's when two fire trucks pulled up in front of my house with sirens wailing.

"OH MY GOD!  IT'S TOO LATE!  AND I HAVE TO GO RIGHT NOW!" I screamed at her.  "Two fire trucks full of probably hot firefighters just pulled up in front of my house and I am in a white tank top with NO BRA on.  I have to go put a shirt on!  Thanks for your help!" I yelled right into her ear.  She laughed as she responded, "Okay....good luck to you."

And a firefighter was looking right into my front window as I ran up the stairs to go find a shirt.  And this time I am not using the word "ran" loosely.  I was hauling ass as fast as I could.  But I'm fat so it really wasn't that fast at all.  I didn't have time to worry about the giant hole in the crotch of my pants because by the time I found a t-shirt that vaguely matched those awful pants, the firemen were ringing my bell.  So to speak.

I ran back down the stairs and I was huffing and puffing like I had just run a damned 10K, got my alarm system turned off, and then casually opened the front door as though I was expecting two trucks full of loud sirens and hot firemen to show up that evening while I was trying to make some dinner.

"Ma'am, your alarm company called us because you have a fire alarm going off," Hot Guy #1 starting saying.

"Yes, well, I'm sorry that y'all wasted your time coming out here because my house is not on fire and there is no alarm going off so I don't know why they are showing that it is.  I just turned the stove on and I haven't even had time to burn my dinner yet.  Y'all are early!"

He cracked up.  And then I yelled, "OH MY GOD!  My stove is on!  Can I please run in and turn it off before we finish up here?"

Hot Guy #2 said, "Yes, ma'am.  Please don't burn your house down while you're standing on the front porch talking to the fire department.  That would be really bad."  I told Hot Guy #2 that I agreed with him 100% on that.

So I ran back in and turned my stove off and when I walked back out to talk to all of the hot firefighters hanging out with me, I saw one of my neighbors walking up to check on me.  "I'm fine!" I yelled to him.  Then Hot Guy #1 said, "Wow, this is a really nice house you have.  And it's huge!"

"Do y'all know ___________ and __________?" I asked them.  The contractors I used when I first bought my house are full time firefighters with the City of Atlanta and they own a contracting business on the side.

"Oh yeah, I know them" about 3 or 4 of the hot firefighters said.  "_________ is over at Station 13 now," Hot Guy #1 said.  I told them they had done a bunch of work on my house and we discussed what all they had done.  That's right, y'all.  I stood on my porch with a hole in the crotch of my pants and with no bra on and talked about home remodeling with hot firefighters while my bacon was in a pan getting all soggy.  Because that's just a typical Thursday night for me.

I asked them if they needed to check my house and they said as long as I didn't smell smoke and there was no audible alarm going off they did not need to check anything.

They left after a few minutes and I went in and finished making bacon and eggs. 

Y'all know this now means that in the past two and a half months I have almost gotten arrested by the police in a county just outside of Atlanta, had the Atlanta police show up at my house because someone emailed them and said I had a huge cat fight going on at my house when I was actually in bed watching Everybody Loves Raymond re-runs, and the fire department showed up because apparently a silent fire alarm was going off in my house.  And I had a hole in the crotch of my pj bottoms for two of those incidents.  That's right.  Same pants both times.