Summary of Mardi Gras 20 Ten

I'm not sure that I should go into detail. This pretty much sums it up. Oh, and I caught a life sized porcelain doll. Thanks Mark.

SEND ME BACK, RIGHT NOW!

Let's just be honest with each other, here. Send me back to Sundance already, because that crap was freaking AWESOME! I was super nervous about my travel companions because who knows what sort of freaky habits come out with people you semi-know. Nothing weird at all. I bunked with The Bish and there were no problems there (unless you count my snoring, which hopefully she didn't hear, but I'm quite confident that she did... oh well).

I saw some celebs. One would include CHUY!!! He was the only one that I was really excited about. I mean after seeing him, who needs Simon Rex, Philip Seymour Hoffman, or Renee Zellweger. Talk about D list.

I'm back to booking extras this week for a low budgie called 'Six Month Rule'. Directed by the same dude that did 'Weather Girl', if you happened to catch that one. It was pretty cute, I guess.

Well, I hope you all didn't miss me too much... xoxo

Weekend Recap (Plus A Recipe!)

This weekend was relatively low-key that involved two birthday parties and a baby shower (which I ended up skipping out on. Sorry Frances!). Friday evening after I left work, John and I traveled to B-City for a surprise Birthday party for my dear friend and former/possibly future boss Ryan Glorioso.

No, he is not related to the Glorioso's of Shreveport with the produce stand or whatever. So, the surprise party was at my favorite restaurant (and only reason to go to Bossier) Don Juanz. The Weisner's were kind enough to bring this delicious cake:

So fun! Saturday morning I was supposed to go to a baby shower for Frances, but I wussed out of going. We are going to have dinner next week so I don't feel SO guilty about it. Plus, baby showers are the worst (as you all know) unless you are the mother, and even then, I don't think they really even like them that much.

Saturday evening, I went to another birthday party. For my longtime friend Jen Herron:

Sass came along as well so it was a reunion of sorts. We played games and had cupcakes and visited with Chuck, Candy and Courtney. It is always so great to catch up with old friends. We played a super fun game called Scene It Squabble, which I think that I may need to invest in in the future for my own Game Nights.

On Sunday, I decided to finally use all of the fresh vegetables that my parents have given me. They decided to 'Live off the land" and start their own garden. Well I think it was more successful than they thought it was going to be because they have an abundance of veggies. They gifted me with about seven gigantic, like probably 2 pounds each, cucumbers, bell peppers and squash. After they had overtaken my kitchen counter for a week, I decided to cut them up and make a fresh and easy summer salad (Also, say hi to my new Seattle spoon rest!):

I had some leftover spinach from the "Creamy Turkey Pinwheels" so I threw that in a bowl, followed by some chopped up cucumbers, tomatoes, baby carrots, red bell peppers, Italian seasoning, Paul Newman's Italian Dressing, and some fresh grated Parmesan (yes, I grated it myself!). And that is what I like to call "Done and Done." A 10 minute healthy snack, or lunch for a few days.

Guess What Question My Team Got? (Plus Bonus Recipe)

John and I had a blast at game night on Saturday. The A Team dominated (as predicted) over the B Team (although the B Team was twice as large), and took the game of Trivial Pursuit with a blaze of glory. You guys will NEVER guess which question came up during the game... I will give you a hint, it involved this little beauty:

That's right. My team got a question about the Guggenheim Bilbao and everyone was shocked that I knew the answer. Oh well, they should have read the blog, then they would have been prepared. Also, I provided the snacks for the event. I made a lemon pie, the Turkey Pinwheel things and this:
I apologize for the crappy photo quality, but I forgot to take a photo of mine and Campbell's likes to have super tiny photos with their recipes. So let me just tell you how good this Double Cheese Crab Dip turned out to be. Sass ate more than half of it. So it really was good. Here is how to make it:

You'll Need:
1 Cup Pace Salsa (Campbell's has to push Pace since I think they're the same company)
1 Teaspoon Chili Powder
1 8 ounce package of cream cheese (softened, i.e. heat in microwave for 15 seconds)
1 Can (8 oz) refrigerated crab meat (although I used the crab sticks from the Upscale Brookshire's and it was just as good and fresh)
1 Cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/4 cup sliced pitted ripe olives (although I left this out because, let's face it, some people are picky and won't eat them)
Pita triangles/tortilla chips/fresh vegetables for dipping

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Combine and stir salsa and chili pepper in a small bowl. Spread cream cheese on bottom of 9 inch pie pan. Top with salsa mixture, crab meat (if you get the sticks, you should shred them with a fork and knife first), cheddar cheese and olives. Bake for 15 minutes or until the mixture is hot and bubbling. Top with additional salsa (whatever's left in the jar after your take out your cup full). Serve with pita triangles, tortilla chips or fresh vegetables for dipping. I used tortilla chips.

After we played Trivial Pursuit, we whipped out Loaded Questions and all had some good laughs. The best question of the night would definitely have to be: "What are three words that you would use to describe the word black?" I feel like after that question that the group really loosened up. I also learned some new vocabulary words. Happy Monday!

Things That Happen When Kate-Naps Are Interrupted

Lately I have had NO energy. Seriously, none. This may stem back to Friday (unexpected day off when Nancy and I went to meet a friend for a margarita at 430PM at the Oyster Bar and didn't return home until 3AM.

All in one night I managed to run into a girl I taught at Disciple Now 3 years ago, a guy that I had a cyber screaming match with 4 years ago, and a girl that I roomed with in France 5 years ago. Not to mention, I had greasy hair, was wearing a tshirt and had no makeup on. AND it was 102 degrees outside so I was all sweaty and shiny. Ugh. Somehow we managed to go from Oyster Bar to Fat Boys to Fat Cats to El Dorado (where I ran into Losing Anna and the entire city of Shreveport) to Fatty Arbuckles to Stray Cat to home. By the way, there are way too many Cats and Fats in this town. Yeah, so it was an intense pub crawl.)

Anyway, I've been sleeping a lot lately. Like I was saying, it may stem back to bad decisions, or possibly a thyroid issue. I'm still paying off a dermatology visit so I have to pay that off before I have other things checked out (paying for my own insurance is costly). So, Sunday night I went to bed at 7 and last night I decided upon a Kate-Nap around 6. People kept texting me, so I ended up having a break from sleeping at 930ish where I got up and went downstairs to watch The Bachelorette (Jillian is a moron) and Chelsea.

I was all nestled on the couch when around midnight my doorbell rang. I froze and my heart started pounding very intensely. Seriously, there was no way in hell that I was going to answer that doorbell. I thought, if this was someone that I know, they would have sent me a text or called to tell me they are coming over. So it was most likely a child pranking me, or a rapist/murderer. (John warns me to never answer the door, even during the daytime. Goes along with the whole don't talk to strangers deal.)

So what do I do? I mute the TV, slide off the couch and army crawl to the bathroom where I hoped to go unnoticed. I stayed there until I decided that it was safe to come out, turn off the TV and lamp (very slowly and quietly) and tip-toe upstairs back to bed under the covers. I texted John and he was all like "Don't answer the door. If it happens again, I'll send a car out (which really made me giggle on the inside. FYI his father is retired Shreveport Police.)" So, I laid there until I fell asleep again.

Well, this morning, I woke up and tip-toed downstairs (I guess in case the doorbell-ringer was still there waiting on me) and made my coffee and got ready to go to work. I opened the front door slowly and peek outside. Nothing on stoop. No extinguished flaming bag of crap, no DVD (someone left one once), and no dead people or blood. So I glance over at my car and there is this on my windshield:

I was thinking "What the crap?!? I never get this stuff. Someone scared the hell out of me last night to leave a rose on my windshield? Was it John? A secret admirer (I have many)?" So I texted John and asked him if he happened to leave anything on my car and he said 'Maybe'.

OK. Mystery solved. Whew! Moral of the story is that I decided that I should toughen up slightly and that John is a sneaky (and sweet) guy.

She's Baaaaack!

Well, it seems like I have been gone for a month, but alas, readers, I have returned from the best vacation ever. John and I had a wonderful time in Seattle. Everything went as well as it could have gone and we both proclaimed to each other that we were experiencing 'Not Wanting To Go Home Syndrome.' Usually we would both be itching to get back but this time we weren't. We've decided to 'summer' in Seattle. So that is that.

All in all, I probably took around 700 photos whilst there, but they are all on my computer at home so I can't share any of them at this time. However, today is your lucky day. While we were there, the one evening that I forgot my camera, John and I ended up having the most entertaining two hours of our lives. We went to a place called The Can Can. You can assume that it is exactly what you think it may be. A burlesque underground club/restaurant. John was thrilled, not only to be at a burlesque show, but to also be responsible for taking all of the photos via Roxanne and then emailing them to me. These are the few images that he captured:

This is me having a Manny's Pale Ale. I'm pretty sure it was a local brew. It was delicious. Also, it was extremely dark in The Can Can and that is why I am so illuminated by the flash (not because I'm pale or anything). We were lucky enough to not be right upon the stage, because we got this nifty overhead lighting:

Since we were underground, this was above us. We could see the shadows of feet walking above us, which was really cool. So after we ate, the show began. It was basically a 4-Man show of the 'Can Can Castaways' and they did a bunch of different dance routines. Sometimes they were all together, sometimes it was a solo or sometimes it was two of them. Once I saw some boobs with star sequined pasties. This is a photo that John took of the four of them. One is dressed as a squirrel, one as a raccoon, one as an owl, and one as a unicorn:

The Unicorn was my very favorite. His name was Faggedy Randy. The other guy calls himself Jonny Boy. Then there were two girls. One's name is Rainbow and the other is Fiona Minx. I called them Trena and Hillary because they resembled two girls I know. Trena claimed to be the choreographer but was always behind a little bit. I decided that I want Hillary's body. Here is a mural that adorns the walls walking into the Can Can:

From right to left: Jonny Boy, Trena, Faggedy Randy and Hillary. If you're bored you should visit their website: http://www.thecancan.com/ . All in all, the show was awesome and the food was good too. A fun evening was had by both.

The Emerald City.

John and I leave tomorrow for Seattle. We are so excited that we can hardly sleep. People keep asking us what we are going to do while we are there (as if there is absolutely nothing that would be remotely interesting for these people to see), so I will tell you. I have planned out an itinerary to ensure that we get to see everything that we want to see while we are there since it is possible that we will never go back there if we hate it.

Thursday - Travel day.

We leave Longview at 320PM tomorrow and won't arrive until around 830PM. No worries because it doesn't get dark in Seattle until 10. We will probably eat something and then pass out from exhaustion of flying. Flying makes me so tired to the point of lethargic. Or we will rock it out at the Nite Lite. We will just have to see.

Friday - Pike Place Market.

This is where they throw the fish at you. There is also a bronze pig named Rachel who is the mascot of the city (who also doubles as a giant piggy bank that supports the Market's charities).

We want to stop by the original Starbucks, and also get half priced tickets at their information booth to anything we may want to do. Such as an Argosy Cruise around Puget Sound (I like at least one SUPER-touristy thing to do on vacation)! Woot.

Saturday - Get this. We are going to take the 'Victoria Clipper' and head over to Victoria, British Columbia (Yes. We have our passports)! They have lots of pubs, shops, parks and little points of interest. Example:

There is a place called Miniature World with a working miniature circus, miniature aliens, and (hopefully) midgets who run the place. This had better be good. Also, Victoria has a totem pole park. I thought that may be interesting as well as a museum that was listed in my bathroom book "1000 Places to See Before You Die." So I figure we should probably hit that up so I can cross it off the list.

Sunday - John's Day. We are going to do whatever he wants to do this day (isn't that nice of me), including going to the Seattle Sounders' soccer game after hanging out in historic Pioneer Square. We are bringing our Drew Carey glasses and scarves. Can't wait!

Monday - The Seattle Center. This is where the Space Needle is. I plan on venturing to the top and riding any roller coasters that may be secretly hidden up there (like at the Stratosphere in Vegas)! Also in the Seattle Center is the Pacific Science Center, the Experience Music Project (Jimi Hendrix exhibit), Aquarium, a carnival!, and fountains and whatnot. I'm pretty sure it was all built for the World's Fair in 1962.

Tuesday - Unplanned. I figure it would be best to leave this day open in case we see stuff that we want to go back to later. Or shopping, or doing nothing.

Wednesday - We come home :( or possibly :)

I am going to take my laptop with me on the trip in hopes that I may have an internet connection at the Moore (rolling eyes) so that I may upload a photo or two for you precious readers. I know that you will be extremely bored at work with nothing to read because I'll be gone, and I don't want to have that kind of pressure ruining my vacation.

The Time I Went To A Frat Party

Once upon a few years ago, some friends and I travelled over to our Alma Mater for, what else, Homecoming. I figured that this was going to be pretty interesting since the people I was going with weren't necessarily the people that I hung out with the most while actually attending Tech. So off we go. We ended up staying at the 'nice' hotel in Ruston, which was actually pretty dumpy. We didn't know this going in, because why would we stay in a hotel when we lived there? So we get there, unpack all of our crap and head over to the game. For whatever reason, we ended up having to park very far away... like near the Smoothie King far away. No big deal, we made it over there and ended up 'tailgating' if you would even call it that, from tent to tent outside the stadium. For the record, it looked NOTHING like this:

We meet up with some of our friends from Shreveport and hung out with them for most of the day. We sweated profusely throughout the game (thanks to Tech for making the students/cheap seats on the sunny side of the stadium) and ended up leaving early (since the game sucked) to meet some friends at Ponchatoulas for some food and beverages.

After eating, everyone wondered where we should go. Someone suggested the KA house. I jumped at the chance to go. (During my actual school-time at college, I had NEVER gone to a frat house, except once to the TKE house to borrow a water hose, but I don't count that time.) I had always wondered what actually goes on in a frat house. This was the only preconceived image that I had in my head:

I couldn't decide if I would be excited or disappointed if fraternities were like Animal House. (Everyone say hi to the real John Belushi. He's not as cute as mine is.) So, I walk in to the house and unfortunately, wasn't too impressed. There was a trough (like a horse feeding trough) filled with Natural Light. There was a stage area where a band played who were HORRIBLE . Everyone felt relieved when they would take a break and the sound system rap music resumed. This was circa the year that the "Chain Hang Low" song came out and fortunately for everyone there, I was wearing a rather large chain necklace, so I entertained everyone with my amazing dance skills. I mean, I was on Silver Spurs.

There was a GIGANTIC bowl of PDP (Panty Dropping Punch). It wasn't too bad. Mine stayed on, for the record. At one point, I needed to go to the bathroom and my friend Sass gave me a tour of where the toilets were. After nearly vomiting on myself in sheer disgust, I decided upon squatting near a fence far away from the house.

On my way back in, I discovered two GIANT swings on the front porch. This, I thought, is the only redeeming quality of this place. Sass, Eric and I sat on one side:

Will, Stephanie and an unnamed girl sat on the opposite swing from us. The goal was for us to swing at opposite rotations in order to make it impossible for anyone to enter the house without us kicking them. Sometimes we would catch up with each other and our swingers would try to kick the feet of the other swing's swingers. It was a lot of fun. At one point, when we were swinging toward each other at a rapid rate, I heard the unnamed girl mention to Will "I can't help it, I have eczema." I mean, who shouts that in front of strangers? So from then on we openly made fun of her until she ran off.

Thanks to the swing, it ended up being a pretty awesome Homecoming experience. Not to mention, I'm glad that I finally shattered the mystere of a frat house.

Things That Suck

John, bless his heart, has been hard at work photo-documenting his trip for me. I told him to take as many pictures as he can and email them to me (with captions) so that I can feel as though I am right there with him. What an angel! This is the one that lulled me to sleep last night:

Most of John's photos are blurry because he is embarrassed to use the flash in front of people (I told him, "it's not like you'll ever see those people again. Flash away (not that kind of flashing)!"), so I have to deal with it and attempt to decipher these photos. Well, according to this photo he went last night to a San Diego watering hole and noticed that they served my favorite wine! This looks to me to be the Penfolds Hyland Shiraz that I blogged about a few weeks ago. John's Man-Training is finally starting to bear some fruit. It's only taken a year.

Anyway, so I was so excited about getting to enjoy some wine this weekend when I stumbled across this article online this morning:

WORST IDEA EVER!

If you can't or don't feel like reading the article, I'll summarize. Basically the government is going to increase the Sin Tax on beer/wine/hard liquor in order to pay for health care costs under the Messiah's Universal Health Care Plan. The people who will be paying the most tax are the (guess who) wine drinkers with a 233% tax increase per bottle. Beer drinkers will see a 145% increase per six pack and hard liquor drinkers will have 19% increase per fifth. (Note to self, Screwdrivers and Bloody Mary's will have to become new drink of choice.)

Oh also, soda (not diet soda) and sugary drinks will see a 3 cent tax increase on 12 ounce bottles. Yeah, because that's fair. So after 10 years, this tax will raise $50 billion to go towards healthcare for people who don't feel like paying for it.

Kate is officially mad. Why can't they increase tax on fast food? Plastic surgery? Elective surgery? Butter? Tanning? Potato chips? Televisions? Game systems? I mean seriously. I would consider moving to Europe or somewhere else, but they are worse off than America at this point.

Things That Should Be Fun (Part II)

Tonight I am participating in a Croquet Tournament. (This portrait was drawn from life with Melissa Martin and Mardi James Loftin-Martin as the models.)

This should be a VERY interesting evening. Originally we were playing on teams, but since Wednesday it has come down to every man for himself. Sounds pretty cutthroat to me. That's okay, I like some good friendly competition.

Also, I am bringing a pie that I made with my Granny yesterday. She taught me how to make her FAMOUS chocolate pies. I forgot to take a photo of the finished product, so I will wait until I can get such photo before blogging about that experience.

I will leave you with this little jewel:

Things That Should Be Fun

Saturday afternoon John and I are going to Dallas for a soccer 'match' to see the Seattle Sounders play FC Dallas. I'm a little nervous because I have never been to a soccer game (unless you count the time that my mother and I went to see one of my high school boyfriends play at Independence Stadium. We stayed for about 20 minutes, decided it was boring and left.) and am not sure what exactly to expect.

I am not nervous, however, about receiving free Drew Carey glasses!

At "halftime" or whatever the soccer equivalent of halftime is, some lucky person in the crowd is going to get to play PLINKO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

John and I have already pre-registered to play so tomorrow night by 6PM we will find out if we get to play or not. (If you were wondering why there is Plinko and why there are free Drew Carey glasses, it is because Drew Carey is the owner of the Seattle Sounders. Just an FYI.)

John has combed the internet in search of scarves for us to wear and they finally came in yesterday! This is what mine looks like (I am not certain why there is a clown statue modelling it, but I'm okay with it):

The reason we had to get scarves is because this is what we are hoping the Away Section looks like (also, we are gearing up to learn our chants and cheers for when we go to Seattle next month to see a Home game):

Perhaps we will even take some face paint with us just to further blend into the crowd. Scarves up!

Good Food, Good Friends

This weekend we celebrated the births of two dear friends Laura and Stephanie. We started the evening not getting the memo about a revised reservation time, so John and I show up a little early (I'm ALWAYS punctual) at 645 for dinner at the Cub and wait. And wait. And wait. Then we were told that the time had changed so we waited some more. At 752 we were finally seated.

John and I had the pleasure of sitting at a cozy booth with Amy and David Netherton, parents of birthday girl #2. Let me just say that I had the best time chatting them up about God only knows what (now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure that David told us a story about "Shaking Baby Syndrome" and how he used to deal with his children). The food was excellent. I had my first taste of a new favorite: Soft-shelled crab. Delish! Once dinner was devoured, we moved on to Tiki Tavern, Hangout Extraordinaire, for some karaoke:

I'm pretty sure that was a rendition of "Fancy" by THE one and only Reba McIntyre. When we got to Tiki, another group of my friends was there as well, celebrating the birth of Travis Hart (pictured below). Birthdays all around! So we got to see these friends as well as the ones mentioned above:

Travis and I discussed the changes in the oil and gas business, Carie and I discussed possible new job options, Melissa and I discussed people with missing fingers, and Casey and I discussed John and how precious he is in photos.

The evening was an interesting one, that's for sure. I got to hear John and his roommate Rex sing "The American Trilogy" by Elvis (John is apparently, in prayer):

Then I got to hear John petition everyone to make it the new National Anthem. What a doll! Let's just say that we had a great time. Once again, Tiki Tavern teaches us a valuable lesson about life as well as song lyrics.

Imaginary Vacation Planning

One of the things that I love most is planning future vacations. My dear friend Mark Crawford and I gathered last night at a place formerly known to Shreveportarians as "KingPinz.": (was that too much punctuation? Oh and photo by Mark)

Now, what was formerly the HOTSPOT of Shreveport/Bossier (they had 50 cent drinks on Thursday nights. We went EVERY week. Really.) is the Funny Bone and The Funny Bone Sports Bar (lame). So as we are visiting (talking VERY loudly in order to be heard over the obnoxious 50 year old lesbian comedian who is YELLING into her microphone, ugh.) we discuss going to New York City over Thanksgiving.

Mark goes on to tell me about all of his different trips to NYC that he's been on and how they were different, what's fun and not fun, where to stay, where to go, what he wants to see, etc. etc.... His goal of this trip is to see the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Cool. I can do that (note to self, pack long underwear) and I start having a conversation with my angel and demon in my head.

Kate Demon: "Oh my God it would be so great to NOT have to be at home for Thanksgiving. Kate, you wouldn't have to go to FOUR different Thanksgiving dinners, fake conversations with relatives who are annoying, discuss your job repeatedly, discuss what happened with the film industry, miss your naptime, then pack up and head to THREE more versions of the same hell you just went through."

Kate Angel: "But Kate, you will miss out on your mother's dressing that she makes every year that you live for. The holidays are the time to spend with your family. Friends come and go, by family is forever. Therefore, you wouldn't get to see Miller (nephew) and Jon Thomas (three year old brother in law) as they are blossoming into the young men that God is molding them to
be."

Kate Demon: "How boring. You could be in NEW YORK having the time of your life with Mark, friend since 2nd grade who you've never been on vacation with... Have another Michelob Ultra, darling."

Kate Angel: "Perhaps you should stop drinking Kate, it is a school night and you have a big night ahead of you tomorrow with LJ and Steph's birthdays."

Last year's birthday party. Not sure where LJ ran off to:


Anyway, I can't decide what to do. I'm stuck on the fence, sort of like a Liberal Conservative. If I can get the trip for $500 or less, I will do it. There. Mark, start your research.

Why Don't Animals Attack When You Want Them To?

This past weekend, I participated in the Martin Family Annual Crawfish Boil. Instead of Tshirts this year, we got cups!!! (The picture is a little blurry, but it says "Who's Your Crawdaddy?) It was a great party that included many many plumerias (which I will have to post about another day), 350+ lbs of crawfish, 1 margarita machine, and 2 kegs of Bud Lite.

I met a member of the family that I had never met before. THE Aunt Molly from Amarillo. This lady was FANTASTIC! She made taquitos, biscuits and gravy, lasagna, pea salad (don't like pea salad, but I'd eat hers every day for the rest of my life) and I'm sure there were plenty of other delicacies to write home about that appeared before I got there and were eaten after I left. (Mrs. Pam - if you are reading this, I'm going to need to get these recipes. She should write a cookbook!)

I got to visit with some friends whom I haven't seen in what seems like ages, but it's really only been like a month. Melissa and I even had a slumber party. Except we are too old to actually stay up all night, so we just gossiped and then fell asleep around 10, like our parents do. We got to see Raymond, The Blairs, The Harts (who we see more often than the rest) and so on and so on. Behold:

(Pictured above is John, Melissa and Kristen.) As we were sitting at the table enjoying our crawfish, a hellion child came over with a live crawfish and thought it would be fun to semi-attack us with it. I was hoping for the crawfish to put up a fight:

He proceeded to hold it (as pictured above) and take it around and either throw it at people, or leave it on their shoulders. Not cool, kid. Not cool. At one point he approached me with it. I said "You need to go ahead and take that away from this table, right now" (and then stomped my foot.) How motherly of me! I said it in a mean tone, like if he didn't stop, I was going to report him to his parent. And he left. He wandered away to torture someone else. Kristen decided that he behaves this way because he has a much younger sibling and is acting out to regain the attention that he once had, but has now lost. She's going to be a great mom!

Speaking of future great moms, here's Jen (Eric's sis) and her new puppy Jax. He is an American Bulldog (pit) and Boxer mix. Many Michael Vick jokes later, Jennifer decided to wrap Jax's neck with Mardi Gras beads for decoration. (Jen, down the road when you wonder why he's so violent, report back to this photo.)


A fun weekend was had by all. Many thanks to Ron, Pam and the rest of the Martins for their hospitality!

Scott Baio Sighting (53 and Still Single)

One of my favorite hangouts in the world is known as the ever classy Tiki Tavern (not to be confused with the Tiki Bar). When a person steps through those doors on a Friday evening, they should have already prepared themselves for some sort of show. If not a drag queen who calls herself 'LaTina Turner', then the antics of Jim Pittman (the karaoke ringleader) are enough entertainment for the weekend.

This Friday I met these friends there:



(I hung out with the two humans, not the dog). So as we are sitting there amongst the regulars, John and Rex Rupert, in walks the spitting image of Scott Baio:


(I apologize for the blurriness and the bright light... I wasn't using a flash for nonchalant purposes, folks). For most of the evening, I only had the back view. It wasn't until he had a few drinks that I got this:


He was getting very handsy/feelsy with this lady in the pink. At this point, he had a Javier Bardem thing going on. For the rest of the evening, Claire, Eric and myself watched the show. There was butt grabbing, making out and I'm pretty sure there was a lesbian who was waiting in the wings getting very, very jealous. At one point, Scott Baio was petting the hair of said lesbian and Claire and I were caught laughing. So, lady in the pink comes over to me and says and I quote:

"Never in your life have you had a man touch you as gentle as he does." Wow. Necessary? So, she continues unwelcomed and tells me a story of how last weekend some girls came up to herself and Scott and asked if he was the guy on Myspace who is all in spandex. (I'm thinking WHAT?!?!?!?!? the whole time.) So, over the course of this 'pow-wow' with "Lady In Pink" I learned that Scott was 53 and according to her, had 'Abs of Steel' and his real name was Philip. Too much information.

Well after I had my fill of people watching, John and Rex took me home. As soon as I stepped through the threshold, I got on Myspace of course. Behold:

http://www.myspace.com/365363201

Just a little teaser:




You are welcome, Shreveport. You are welcome.

Out With The Flush, In With The Navy

When I first was introduced to the truth serum that is, alcohol, there was always a tell-tale sign of when I had or was about to consume too much. Please note, The Sexy Flush:

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

I guess that's one of the drawbacks of being a fair-skinned redhead. Anytime that I get flustered or drunk, or embarrassed, it shows up right there on my face in the form of two red streaks on my cheeks. I mean, you can't have it all, right?

NOW, when I have had or am about to have too much, instead of just having a 'Sexy Flush', I start to ask questions that are so dumb. Lately, my question is: "How do you feel about navy?" I ask this question to close female friends of mine that I would consider being in my imaginary wedding party. Why? Why, does this happen? The latest victim was Sass, bless her heart.

Sass:

She's so precious! How appropriate for her to actually be wearing navy in this photo. She's a girl after my heart I tell you. Anyway, last night we gathered for a toddy and the longer we visited, like clockwork, the question came out. She says she likes navy. So that's good. Because she's gonna have to wear it one day in the form of a bridesmaid dress that she won't be able to wear again. I'm not going to lie to people. No you can't shorten it and wear it as a cocktail dress. That is the biggest bunch of bullcrap I've ever heard.

Whoa, what just happened? I think I just went off on brides when I was supposed to be talking about how great vodka tonics are.... Sorry brides, I'm a little crabby today. Happy Friday!

Things That Are Awesome!

Say hello everyone to the newest love of my life:

THE CUB BURGER!

Beginning about a month or so ago, The Cub (home of the best steak in the world as well as the best au gratin potatoes) started offering Burgers on the Patio Wednesdays.

I heard about this from someone on Facebook and decided that it was up to me to figure out if the burgers were as good as the steak. So my friend Mark (Thanks for the photo), Laura and I checked it out today. Those burgers are super delicious! And they are super cheap! For $7 (not including tip) you can get a dressed burger, chips, baked beans and a beverage (soda, though I saw SEVERAL people there with beers... which makes me think to self: "What do these people do for a living to where their employer allows them to drink on the job?" followed up with, "Must be nice!"). To me, that is a deal! Plus, you get to sit on the patio with a nice breeze, friends and regulars that you are sure to have seen at the Cub during any regular evening.

Telephone Book Trick

Last month I went to a wedding. As the groom is getting up to sing karaoke I take out my digital camera that I have had for four months. I turn it on and a message flashes on the screen: "Zoom Error." No big deal. I turn it off, turn it back on: "Zoom Error." I look at John in distress. So I take out the battery, memory card, blow into the empty compartments, try to pry the lens open, hit the menu button and thumb through all of the options. Nothing. "Zoom Error." I was pissed to the point of shedding a tear. John told me not to worry, we will get it fixed when we get back home and to have another beer. Fine. I didn't get to take ANY pictures at the wedding. Sigh.

So we get back home and we Google Fuji Finepix J150w and see what the deal is. We write off to a fix it website only to hear that we have to pay for a subscription blah blah. Yeah right. I give up. I started researching prices for new digital cameras. I was so frustrated and disappointed that this happened. I mean, I had the thing for 4 MONTHS! AND I kept it it's protective case the whole time.... whatever.

So last night I decide to give it one last try. I do the same Google search that I did before adding the words "Zoom Error." This time a different website comes up where people have written in their problems and other people write in and try to help. On my camera, and most Fuji cameras actually, this was a common problem.

One user suggested something that I thought was the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. He called it the "Telephone Book Trick." Meaning that you slam your camera (lens down) repeatedly against a telephone, or other hard object. No way am I going to do this. So I keep searching. One person recommended unscrewing things and basically disassembling the camera and getting a can of air and cleaning the whole thing out. Like I could figure out how to put it back together....

So I go back to the "Telephone Book Trick" that the first guy was talking about. It seemed that 30 or more people on this site eventually tried it as a last resort and it made their cameras work. I thought to self, well I'm going to have to end up buying a new camera anyway since this piece of crap is a piece of crap so I tried it.

First, I slammed it against the coffee table. No luck. Then I slammed it against the kitchen counter. No luck. Then I thought, well this is going to break it... so I slammed it against the ceramic tile. It seemed to want to turn on... I had a visual of something on the screen. So I slammed it on the floor again. A little bit more of a picture on the screen. Then slam, slam, slam, slam, slam against the palm of my hand and THE THING TURNED ON!!!!!!

I'm still in shock. Who knew?