breathe in, laugh out

I just remembered I had a blog. Have I been boring lately or what? Maybe I’ve just been such a blast that I haven’t had time to properly document it. Let’s go with that.

The Patriots are in town all week to play the Chargers on Sunday. T and Brie are New Englanders so took a strong interest in “randomly” running into them while they’re here. You might think, “how can you just randomly run into football players?” Right? Right. Well here’s how… you stalk the crap out of their every move.

Within hours of them touching down in San Diego (touching down… see what I did there??), the girls had figured out where they were staying, what their curfew was, where they were practicing, and what Tom Brady ordered for lunch. Yes, that’s serious. He gets a tray of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches every day. Really, bud?

In any case, it had been thrown out there that no one would mind running into these dudes, but no moves had been made. It was a Tuesday night and one of those nights that one of us was having a hard time and needed girlfriends around. V and Brie came over after work to join T and me, and the four of us sat on the couches in the carport watching Friends re-runs, devouring pasta and garlic bread, drinking wine, crying, and laughing. T was in her PJs and nestled in for the night.

I got up to use the bathroom and two minutes later hear Brie’s loud mouth, “COURTNEY!!!! LET’S GO!”

I open the bathroom door a crack (get it…? crack) “What?! I’m pooping!”

“Well taper it off! The Patriots are at Tavern. We gotta go. Now!”

I cut my bathroom time short and rushed out. T is in her room doing a quick outfit change, exclaiming “Gotta wear an East Coast outfit!” as she throws a vest over a red and black plaid shirt.

Apparently T got a text from a friend who somehow knew where they were headed. V’s scrounging around my room for makeup, as T and Brie are already out the door. They told me I didn’t have time to change into a cuter outfit, so I did a quick hairbrush and makeup touch-up, chugged my last sip of wine and ran out the door. We piled into Brie’s little VW bug and raced down the street.

“We gotta hurry. They have to be home by 10:30 and it’s already after 9.”

I ask if I look cute enough to meet the Patriots. They tell me I have a boyfriend so what do I care?

“Oh, Ginge wouldn’t care if it was an NFL player.”

Brie agrees, “Yeah, I’d definitely get a pass too for a Pats player.”

Glad that’s settled. When push comes to shove, I don’t know any of the Pats besides my love, Tom Brady, and I was told he probably wasn’t there, so I wasn’t quite as giddy as the rest. They gave me a quick lesson on how sexual some guy named Gronk is, and passed a few pics around the car. We were hoping he’d be there.

He was.

I told the girls they had to play it cool. My version of playing it cool is acting like I have no idea that people are famous. I like the way this usually works. I utilized the method on a guy who later introduced himself as Darius. I positioned myself very near to Darius. I overheard a guy next to him ask, “Are you starting this week?”

He replied, “No.”

I took this opportunity to turn to him and ask, “What sport do you play?” [**playing it cool**]

“Football.”

“Oh, cool.”

He asks, “What sport do you play?”

“Co-ed softball.”

“Oh, like the slow pitch kind?”

“Yeah the ball has to go to head height. I think it’s harder to hit that way.”

“Oh yeah, I love watching girls softball.”

“No you don’t. Nobody likes watching girls softball.”

Darius chuckles, introduces himself. The girls come join the conversation. V asks why he has a tag hanging off his hat, which was on backwards, and he says someone had just given it to him. I ask to see the front, and it’s a Patriots hat. I ask why someone gave him a Patriots hat and he tells me it’s because he plays for them.

[Play.It.Cool] “Oh really? You play for the NFL?”

The girls think my act is moronic at this point, but I’m pretty pleased with how it’s going. He confirms that he does, indeed, play for the NFL, and asks if we’re going to the game on Sunday.”

“I’m not, I don’t have tickets…” [sad puppy dog face] [this face does not work] [Darius does not offer to gift me free tickets] [this is BS].

Brie pretended to play it cool for about 5 minutes before she broke into her story about how Gronk crashed her birthday party in college and ate all of her food. Mid-story I gave her a stern look to shut up, so thankfully she cut it short. Play.It.Cool.

The conversation somehow turns into an age guessing game, in which I correctly guessed Darius’ age on the first try, which made me remember my bar trick of guessing men’s weight. This trick was born a couple of years back at a national sales meeting for my old company. Professional as ever, one night I decided to have all the male sales reps sit on my lap one at a time, and I guessed their weight. I had never done this before, but I was surprisingly dead on the majority of the time, so I brought my talents back to Green Rock in Hoboken, still nailing it, and decided it’s quite a talent of mine. Pat.hand.on.back.

I asked for Darius’ height, and instructed him to get off his stool and sit on my lap.

I shook him around a little… “252.”

“Whoa. I’m 250.”

“Well probably after everything you ate and drank tonight you’re 252. And did you have that weird little patch of chin hair last time you weighed yourself?”

“Good point, you’re probably right.” He turns to his teammate and tells him I think his chin hair is weird. It is. His teammate agrees.

Darius got up and a few of his buds took a turn on my lap. I had no idea who anyone there was, being a loyal Saints fan and not paying much attention to New England (loyal Saints fan = I own a Saints jersey and know who Drew Brees is). I wish I had known who people were, I maybe could have yelled at some of them for ruining my fantasy season. T thought this weight guessing trick was hilarious and started taking pictures. She was instructed to not let the pics go anywhere, and one of the dudes asked her to not take any of him at all. They were all very embarrassed after a recent photo of them with Justin Bieber had just gone viral. T obviously immediately posted the photos to the fb.

When one of the guys asked, “What are you girls doing out tonight?” we clearly couldn’t respond with, “We got a tip that you were here, so we put on makeup and east coast outfits and raced over, ran down the street in the rain and arrived here out of breath…” so it was more, “Oh you know, just a girls Taco Tuesday night!”

After a bit, the guys had to hit the road, or they’d turn into pumpkins. We were very pleased with ourselves and left the bar as soon as they were out of sight. We ran back down the street in the rain and back into the Bug. Man, were our boyfriends going to be jealous. Not because we were flirting with large athletic men, but because they were not flirting with these large athletic men.

The girls’ stalking skills were at an all time high, and I’m proud to call them my friends. But the moral of this story is this: I didn’t meet Tom Brady.

The week isn’t over yet…

xoxo

Gossip Girl