Scenario 57: Ways to impress strangers....

We were at a birthday part at a friends house and the strangers around the table were mentioning how delicous the almonds were. Wanting to blend in and make small talk I decide to try the said tasty morsels. I scan the table and all the bowls on it. I quickly spot a bowl of 2 almonds left and they look delcious in all of their dark roasted goodness. I pick one up and pop it in my mouth. I barely have enough time to savor the flavor on my tongue with my friend looks at me with horror and gasps "Mary NO!" Having heard this  many times in my life I quickly spit the almond out. Everyone stops and stares at me as humor spreads to their faces as they realize what I just put in my mouth.
"What?" I ask with concern.
She says to me, face red, "that's not an almond. That's the pit of an olive that someone spit into the discard bowl."
I wanted to die! I was so embarassed and also really grossed out! It's one thing to put a friends olive pit in your mouth its a completely different thing to put a strangers olive pit in your mouth.
Luckily, after the laughter everyeone felt bad for me and told their own equally embarassing stories.

Holiday Party

Another year, another Holiday Party. Actually, that's not fair to say as I have skipped the last 2 years because they have become very boring.
I decided this year to join the planning committee to see if I could change things up.
3 ideas of mine were implemented.
1) Purchase Xbox/Kinnect for people to play.
2) Create home made photo booth, featured above.
3) Face painting for the kids. Note my face above, the kids got to me...

Christmas Tree Check In

I am currently in the process of assembling my "show" tree for the downstairs. Things are going...interestingly.
As anyone knows who creates the magic that is a Christmas tree, it's a full day process.
All started well, I was so proud of myself for putting all the branches away properly so I could quickly put the tree together. Dolly crooning in the background some hypnotic Christmas tune, a fire roaring and me prancing around in my tiger footy pajamas, all was as it should be in the Brown household.
Next was to tackle the lights (I should have known this would have been the death of my magical Christmas morning). I plug in my first strand and only half works. I immediately am seething over the lights, my husband must certainly be wondering if I need to be tested for having bipolar disorder. One minute I am belting "O Holy Night" and the next minute I am yelling "O Holy Shit!".
I start messing with the bulbs. I replace one and voi-la, the second half now works but the working half has now stopped. I try replacing more lights but they are more tightly fastened. I start yanking bulbs out of their container with the little wires exposed. Meanwhile commentating the process to Ryan as he tries to ignore me. I keep hoping he might jump up and volunteer his expertise but my words fall on deaf ears. As I fuss around more I somehow manage to rip the entire copper wiring out of the lights and have that exposed while plugged in. I stare it for awhile wondering what would happen if I was electrocuted while trying to test Christmas light bulbs. What kind of eulogy would my family prepare for me? Would my funeral be a Christmas theme? Would my casket be wrapped in a thousand holiday lights? Or would they take the murderous light strand and have a ceremonial burning to honor my legacy? I shake myself from my daydreams and decide to can the lights.
I then test the other strand of white lights and they work perfectly. I now test the red lights that will go up the center of my tree and they are a no go. I twist one light and decide my well being just isn't worth the hassle. I'll impress my stepmother with my tree dressing skills some other time.
I am now ready to delicately drape my white strands perfectly upon the branches. These lights are two strands connected and therefore quite long to wrap around the tree. I decide the best approach is to wrap them around my body so that I can move around the tree, which is backed into a corner. On my 5th trip around the strands starts to tighten around my neck and I realize I probably need to readjust. Due to the circles around the tree I was running I managed to knot the lights around my body. I am trying to undo strands that are somehow looped together creating a treacherous web around me. Ryan somehow isn't alarmed as I grumble the fact that I am now stuck in the lights. I pick through each section and finally free myself; or at least until the last section which has now managed to get wrapped in my hair. I fight and fight with the strand but it will not loosen. I finally have to call out to Ryan to come untangle me. As he turns from the computer, finally registering what all has been going on he breaks into a large smile. Imagine the sight my husband turns around to see- his wife, in full body tiger pajamas with Christmas lights hanging out of her hair, the sheer look of panic and chagrin on her face. It actually took Ryan quite a while as my hair had made an impressive knot around one of the lights.
Freed I went back to work. I hid in the back of the tree starting from the bottom and spreading out the branches making my way to the top. As I got mid way up I somehow got one of the "needles" caught in my wedding ring and couldn't free myself, again! I had to take the ring off and let it hang from the tree as I analyzed how the needle was weaved around the stone and prongs.
This is the point where I stopped to write this down. I'll keep y'all posted if any more of these tree manages to ensnare me or I ended up burning it to the ground, whichever comes first.



A Tennessee Thanksgiving

I had the most amazing Thanksgiving! Dad and Kathy graciously flew me out to Knoxville, TN to spend my holiday with them. *Ry was in Idaho seeing his family*

We had an amazing Turkey dinner and Kathy really outdid herself. My cousin Dan and his beautiful wife Noel came over and he even let me sit in his new California edition Mustang GT! For anyone who doesn't know, I am in love with the new Mustangs. So if anyone is looking for the perfect present I will take a Black GTO, please. Tinted windows preferred...

 

 

Friday we headed into downtown Knoxville to enjoy shopping, peanut sampling, and a tree lighting! They shut down the main street for all the foot traffic and they had several train for children toting many a tot merrily as they rang the bells connected to each train car.

 

Saturday we headed into Nashville (3 hours away). We first did a drive by through the city. Near the Vanderbilt campus is the Centennial park. They have a to scale replica of the Parthenon in Athens, Greece. It was built for their 100 year anniversary. The city loved it so much that when it was time to tear it down they rallied to save it. Hopefully this isn't the closest I come to Greece.

 

We had tickets to the Grand Ol' Oprey to see the Rockett's (featured above). The show was such fun! There were a few aspects I wasn't for sure how to feel about which was the camels, donkey, and sheep they had on stage and then the Little People portraying elves.

 

We had a few hours to kill till dinner plans at Bob's in the Omni hotel so we ventured through the surrounding stores. Kathy soon felt tuckered out and "rested her eyes" in the hotel lobby while Dad and I explored Broadway, or better known as the Honkey Tonk. We travelled 3 blocks down, 1 block over and then back the same street. In that time, at 6 nonetheless, there was a live band playing at every bar. I lost count at 20! Even a karaoke singer sounded like she should have a record deal and we had to stop and listen as she belted "Faithfully" by Journey like a pro. Yep, definitely never singing Karaoke in that town...

Sunday was a lazy morning where I made crepes for the family and burnt out Kathy's Cuisnart while trying to de-lump the cottage cheese. I felt like such a jerk! Oh thanks Dad & Kathy for flying me all the way out here, driving me around, paying for my meals, and purchasing me a souvenir! - Let me just return the gratitude by burning up one of products you use daily.

Anywho!!!

We took a lovely drive through the Smokey's. They have a gorgeous park that you drive through, totally free. I believe it's an 11 mile loop. We stopped off at this cute little replica of an old town, or something, featured below. They had a great demonstration of how to ground corn using  water wheel energy.

We then drove on to Gatlinburg for dinner, it was amazing as well! Dad & Kathy just had to have their dessert, which they had every night I was there and swore this wasn't a usual thing- mmmmhmmmm...

The town was adorable and looked like a lot of fun. It reminded me of a beach community meant for tourists. Lots of gimmicks and fun places to stop at, putt putt golf, etc.

Not far was Pigeon Forge which is where Dollywood is. It was huge compared to Gatlinburg and had at least 15x the tourist gimmicks! It was however spread further out. They even had one structure that was built to look like an upside down building, with work street lights and everything! I was deeply fascinated by this!

Pigeon Forge flows into Sevierville which is Dolly's hometown. This is why she picked this location for Dollywood. Thanks to Dolly she pumped a lot of money and life into that town.

Lastly on the way home we stopped by my cousins Dan's house so we could see all the hard work he is putting into it. He has an impressive talent and a lot of work cut out for him and his Mrs. The home has a lot of potential and I think they will turn it into something very beautiful.

Auctioneer

We had a benefit at work and I was asked to volunteer as their auctioneer. It was pretty intimidating but also very exciting. We ended up raising $136k for a great local charity, Rainier Scholars.

I had to get people to vote on the silent auction as well as the live. I also had to inspire people during our "Raise the Paddle" where they had to generously donate their money just because. Probably the hardest part of this was remembering what number we left off on. I kept forgetting what the last number was as you are looking around the room, talking, trying to inspire. Major adrenaline rush!

There was also a photo booth, photo featured above.

Pumpkin Goo

This year we went to a patch to procure our precious pumpkins. Never having been done before by either of us it was quite the delightful adventure with kettle korn and muddy high heeled boots.
We bought our pumpkins near the beginning of October and carved them approximately 2 weeks prior to Halloween. I don't know if it was our organic patch pumpkins, the warm weather, or the intense daily fog but they were struggling to make it to Halloween.
We had 3 pumpkins. An extremely large pumpkin that laid on its side and had a schooner carved into it. A green tall pumpkin carved to be Frankenstein. And lastly a small perfectly round pumpkin in which I drilled a bunch of holes to create a lantern effect- thank you Pinterest!
A week prior to Halloween the large pumpkin started its stream of goo on our porch. Daily rivers running out of this thing full of rot! It had to go.
A week to go and we are down to two pumpkins. Day before Halloween, the rot stream starts up again, this time from the Frankinpumkin. We had just one day to go so we were going to chance it.
Pumpkins made it! and so did the constant river pouring from them. But being lazy and hosting many a guest we let it be.
My Aunt Cathy arrived Monday evening to our home for the first time ever. I wanted everything to be perfect for her which means the 2 pumpkins that have now collapsed (literally the insides melted away and there was no support for the outer shell) on my front porch must go. Ryan was still at work and I had left early to finish my remaining tasks. I had come up with a plan to use the snow shovel to lift the pumpkins into the compost can as I suspected they would melt into my hands and permanently stain me. I would later be known for the rest of my life as pumpkin hands and could never take up a career in hand modeling.
Plan created, time to execute. I am literally running around the house as I am on a time constraint. So I dart out to the shed, which is locked, to fetch the snow shovel. Due to the time change I am now in a weird twilight and can't see all that well. Ryan has the lock combo memorized but I can't bother him! He's slammed at work. So I try to lift the combo lock up and see the numbers on it. Nothing. I'm flying blind here and my bat sonar isn't strong enough to subtly listen for the clicks of the lock.
I must abandon my efficient plan and think outside of the box. Ryan has been building a garage in the backyard so there must be some scrap wood I can turn into a make shift shovel. I spy a triangular piece of plywood and decide that will do it.
Up front I throw my plywood next to the pumpkin and position my compost garbage can as close as possible. I find a large tree limb that was dislodged and placed in my yard. I use said limb to roll the smaller pumpkin on to the plywood. Majority makes it on but the rest of the pumpkin slimes all over the stick, my shoe, and the porch. I try and use the limb to push the remainder onto the plywood, it just smears it around more. I try to use a spooning technique with the limb and get majority of the rest with a large sploosh. I dump my contents and move on to Frankinpumpkin. He moves on easily and I think this will go off without a hitch. This pumpkin is significantly heavier and I now have goo all over one side of the triangular plywood- the side that I need to grab to distribute the weight evenly. As I don't want to be pumpkin hands freak girl I choose the other side and am now struggling to lift this 4ft plywood with a rotted pumpkin and goo all over it.
I manage to lift the pumpkin, I'm excited, I get cocky, and that's when I start to loose the balance. The pumpkin is shifting and I am losing my secure hold. I start dancing around, armpits pumping out sweat, as I try with failing might to get this pumpkin to the can. But I feel the final shift and watch it roll off my plywood and hit the front porch with a thud. Yelling "NO, NO, NO!!!!" I watch the initial impact take chunks of the pumpkin. Then it rolls to the second level leaving more bits of it's body and rolls to the edge of my walk.
I am now left to pick up the remains of my rotting, molding, gooey Frankinpumpkin. I don't care who I am cleaning for, I refuse to pick up the slick, soupy parts. So I take that hose and spray candles, bits, goo and all into the grass and pray to God no one notices.

When my Aunt Cathy arrived that night she asked if it had rained as the porch was soaked.

Email to fellow colleagues regarding spotify playlist "Twerk Tunes"

I noticed 3 new songs were introduced into our Twerk Tunes playlist and so I decided I best be investigating. One tune in particular caught mine eye and it was your submission of Wrecking Ball.

Initial reaction was “What the hell is this doing in here?”

I decided to give more thought to this submission on my drive home but I was still confused as to how one would twerk to Miley’s intense ballad of being considered a wrecking ball when it comes to love.

Distraught I consulted with our trusted colleague Taylor XXXX (name omitted). His sound council reminded me that our Twerk Tune’s playlist has grown to be so much more than just songs you can twerk to physically but emotional twerking as well. He ended his argument with the final question of “Why hasn’t Wrecking Ball made it in sooner”.

It seems that I have gotten so caught up in the game of life I missed what was really important and that is the essence of Twerk Tunes.

 

Thank you Sam and Taylor for reminding me that -

“I never meant to start a war; I just wanted you to let me in. And instead of using force I guess I should’ve let you win”.

 

Halloween: Clark Kent

Every year I wish to dress up at work for Halloween but I am as always a lone wolf and that can be quite disheartening. I was planning to fly under the radar this year. However our front desk gal emailed me and asked what we were wearing this year... luckily.

I had decided that Clark Kent was a safe costume as it required very little and still looked very professional. Plus I have been wanting to for years and now I also finally have my superman baseball T so I am quite happy.

I was surprised at how many people loved the costume and asked why we didn't ask them to dress up as well. Apparently that's what it takes to get my colleagues to participate- a group costume that is extremely subtle and manageable. Note to self for next year.

I texted my brother that night a photo of me and he sent me back the exact same photo. We two are cut from the same cloth, clearly.

 

 

 

Binx

Life isn't always happy and beautiful. A lot of times social media allows us to believe that other's peoples lives are just that. This post isn't going to be happy or leave you with a feel good feeling because it's going to be honest. I am really hurting right now, this moment, right here. Some of you know that Binx is gone and some of you don't. I don't want to talk about it with people. I don't want someone to ask me if I am going to get another cat. AND I sure as hell don't want someone to suggest to me that I should get a dog. I am in pain people! I have had Binx for 17 years and nothing will replace that. I don't want another cat because I don't think I can go through this a second time.
I love being home but it is the hardest and worst place to be for the last 2 months. Sometimes I hear a sound and I think its her. I see something that reminds me of her. Or we find her hair clumps in the deep recesses of our closet. Part of me wants to take those clumps of hair and put them in a jar. That is disgusting, but I miss her and I want her back and that's the closest thing I have to her.
Some people might not understand this, she is just a cat after all. But Binx was so much more to me. There were nights when I would have guy troubles, family problems, and friend issues and through all that Binx was always there. She even knew when I was in pain because that is when she would choose to be extra loving and curl up on me. At night when I would cry she would nuzzle into my hair and knead the pain away. She was consistently there for me.
She loved to nap with me. When I would work from home she would curl up in my lap. She was so used to hear me sing as loud as I could that if she was in another room and heard me singing she would come running into the room. That used to make Ryan laugh as hard as he was astonished.
It's been 2 months. The pain is slowly numbing but sometimes there are days like these where I feel her loss more than others. Maybe it's because it's Halloween and this was always our holiday. Maybe it's because Ryan and I have been arguing a lot this past week. I don't really know what has brought on the tears but today is a bad one.
I can understand how some people are so distraught they would bring a loved one back from the dead. I would give anything to have her here with me now.
I wish her last days hadn't been so hard on her. I was able to prepare myself and say good bye but I wish she hadn't been so weak. That I hadn't had to see all her pain and weakness. We were with her till the end and there are some things I wish I had never seen. Some memories I wish weren't in my head replaying over and over again. But I owed it to her to be there for her. To be the last face she saw.
I love Binx so much.

AI: Day 18

My final post! Such a sense of accomplishment! Woot!
Let's power through this people!
Went to Capuccini Crypt! This is a cathedral by the Caputian Monks (St. Francis of Assisi) and several rooms are decorated in the bones of their dead. No photos were allowed, so google it. It was really awesome! I forgot that I couldn't have bare shoulders so Ry and I had to hide on a side street while he gave me his shirt and he slipped into a tank top. Yeah, ridiculous! I can't have bare shoulders, but he can! Get with the times people! Equal rights! Whatever... Awesome experience regardless.
Then we walked down to the Pantheon because we couldn't remember if we had seen it or not. Turns out we had our first night but it was closed so we weren't a 100% for sure what we were looking at. At least now we could go inside, for free, in bare shoulders.
Lastly, we had a picnic in Villa Borghesse. Not as nice as we had hoped as it wasn't nice grass like we expect a park to be here. But it was cool. We somehow ended up in the dog park section and they were very attracted to our meat. Ry kept calling this wiry looking one over to us. I think he was a little drunk at this time... Anyway! He named it Chester and kept trying to feed it against my many requests to knock it off!
Home for nap, dinner out, restless night and flight in the morning.
End of story!
It feels so long ago...

Why didn't I flip this? Because I don't have to- Meh! Ry at the airport.

AI: Day 17

Today we caught the Colosseum, Forum, and Palatine Hill. We got this really fun tour guide. He didn't really give a ton of info but he certainly made us laugh. This isn't really a lot to say. We preferred the forum more than the Colosseum, maybe because having a guide brought it to life.
We then napped and went to have dinner and drinks that night.

AI: Day 16

We took a 4 hour train to Rome and eventually found our way to our crappy apartment. It was 46 euros so whatever, but it was disgusting.
We had, in my opinion, some of the best sushi ever!!!!!!! Ry said it was ok, but I think at this point I was so hungry for diversity that it was amazing.
We found Villa Borghesse park not too far from us and Ry took a nap. I left fun little artistic designs on him, which was unappreciated... True artists often are though.

AI: Day 15

Lazy morning with tanning on the terrace and then off to "Spiaggia Pane e Pomodoro" or the Bread and Tomato Beach.
Ryan finally got to enjoy the Adriatic in his super sexy 1950's dreamboat bathing suit- Yum Yum!
We only saw one pair of  breasts, but they were nice so we decided it was still a win.
We spent about 3 hours total at the beach.
 We tried to find somewhere for lunch but hit siesta so we settled for gelato.
We decided to go to the train station and catch a taxi back to our place. They tried to charge me a ridiculous amount of money and I told them no I had got a taxi for half that price and would go elsewhere. They argued with me but I got them talked down to only a few dollars over what I had paid before. Second win of the day.
We made another dinner at home and Ry tried Mr. Ed for dinner.
He also gets adventurous and uses a chair to climb onto the roof and inspect- "MAMA MIA!"

AI: Day 14

Happy Birthday to me!!! Flirty 30! At least that's what I say...
Ryan was absolutely amazing, so attentive, complementing, and sweet. He made me feel so good, it was wonderful.
As all transportation goes it was confusing. We catch a cab to the train station and a train to the Castellana cave. This Italian train guy kept telling us what stop to get off but we never understood. Finally he just came and got us. It was pretty creepy as we get off in the middle of nowhere. There doesn't appear to be a town and we get off in essentially what looks like a field with a rock wall around it. We found out way though and made it not too far behind the English guided tour.
The caves were really interesting, google it for details. We were only allowed to take photos into the first cave so unfortunately you don't get to see it in all it's glory. We found a couple who had come from Lecce as well and we talked about the Catholic processional.
After the tour we went to a restaurant and had a late lunch.
We then wait over an hour for the train to pick us up. We were quite nervous that it wouldn't even know to pick us up as our stop looked like an abandoned stop. We even found graffiti that said, "Hi, we're bored as we wait for the train back to Bari". I felt their pain.
When we got back we laid out on the roof and tanned and then took a nap. We got dressed up in our birthday attire and took a 30 minute walk to the beach. I had researched in advance a nice restaurant with a beautiful view of the ocean. Mom and Jim gave us a nice handful of birthday money to go out to a nice dinner and so I was quite excited. Unfortunately I forgot to write down the name of the restaurant.
We wandered all over the promenade and never found it. I suspect it closed down. We decided to walk our way over to old Bari and see what we could find.
Old Bari was quite cute and had a lot going on but we spotted a fun Mexican bar and after 2 1/2 weeks of Italian food this seemed like a god send.
I downed Margaritas and Sex on the Beach cocktails while Ryan made friends with our waiter (who looked like Matt Parker from Heroes) and sampled a ton of beer. We talked, ate, and drank- it was truly a perfect night! Our waiter also gave us free shots!
We then went back and had Nutella with grahams in bed while we watched MTV.