Our rent went up, so V is moving out, and into a less expensive abode with my sister… Which is traumatizing on its own. Looking for a new roommate to fill her spot has already proven to be somewhat of a challenge. Saying we have unrealistic expectations in a roommate is probably something I wouldn’t admit. But our expectations are quite high.
Living in a desirable beach town, in an uncharacteristically large house for the area, and having perfect, sweet, fun, pretty, smart roommates, has created a situation where we are weeding through loads and loads of emails. We realized pretty quickly that we couldn’t keep up with responding to them all, and even more importantly, we had to choose carefully who we agreed to actually meet in person, otherwise we’d have weirdos in and out of our house for days straight.
Tay asked V to be part of the process, because she felt like I wouldn’t like anyone at all. So V would be a mediator. Tay wrote the first Craigslist ad. She made us sound like lovely, clean girls who do nice things and are kind and loving to all. It was a great, well written ad, but it caused us to get a lot of emails with people describing their “healthy lifestyles.”
As we’re all sitting on the couch reading through emails, Tay says, “What is with this HEALTHY LIFESTYLE everyone is talking about??”
“Maybe you made us sound too healthy. You were talking about hiking and working out and I don’t do any of those things.”
“Yeah but I also said we like happy hour and day drinking.”
“You didn’t harp on that enough.”
“These people won’t eat pizza with us on Sundays. That’s a problem.”
Tay had an original list of 32 potential normal sounding people. The three of us sat on the couch social media stalking one after the other, crossing them off as we went.
“Too skinny.”
Next….
“Too ugly.”
Next….
“Too much beard.”
Next…
“She takes too many pictures of food.”
Next….
We ended up with a winning four, and invited them to come see the place. We found ourselves warning them of what they’d be getting into.
“People show up and have parties here some Saturdays… people sleep on our couches… we’re loud every Friday and Saturday….and sometimes Thursdays, and Sundays… The dog is pretty annoying… V will basically still be living here because she will miss us when she moves out…. Court walks around naked if she works from home some days…”
We scared people away. But we felt it was only fair. That way they wouldn’t move in based on our “lovely” persona and then hate us. At this point, I decided to re-write the ad.
I added some flavor and some spice. I instructed potential roommates to bring us wine. And I put every sort of “warning” in black and white, in a charming tone.
Bingo. The slew of emails that came after that were from fun, creative, friendly people who offered to bring us wine, play with the puppy, watch the Bachelor with us, and jump in for driveway hangman and beer pong sessions.
We had our first visitor from the new batch of potentials come to see the place last night. It was Thursday night so we forewent happy hour out, and just opened some wine at home, hung out and waited for the guy, who didn’t arrive til 9:30pm. We considered this sacrifice. Carissa was over, and so was another girlfriend, Danielle. This dude walks into a house of 5 slightly buzzed girls, some with purple teeth (ok that was me), and was probably somewhat afraid to be eaten alive. We give the tour of the house, Danielle leaves to go home, and Carissa and V sit outside while Tay and I interview the crap out of him.
He stayed for SO long, that we had to offer him beer (he drank two), and he is now well versed on how badly Tay’s farts smell, which of our friends would probably try to jump in his bed, and how much I don’t shut up after a couple of glasses of wine. Although I warned V to not be weird and quiz him on his athletic abilities, I jumped right in for her to decide if he’d be a candidate for our softball team, and basically gave him a verbal tryout.
What’s funny is that he’s still interested in the place. We figured if he could handle that… he’d survive with us just fine.
We have four more girls coming this evening. We don’t have high hopes for the first because she’s way too pretty and skinny and none of her clothes would fit us.
As I was perusing my computer files, I found some DIY project footage I never finished putting together. If you’ve met me, you’d know that I’m just kinda more like “let’s see how this goes,” than like “let’s plan this out thoughtfully and logically.” I also from time to time set up a camera before I “see how this goes,” in order to document how it goes. Last time, it involved taking down a Christmas tree [How to Take Down a Christmas Tree (Video)].
Rewind to February. This time… it was a garden. I had seen a post on Pinterest that looked super cute and easy to make.
So I tricked my sister into coming to Home Depot with me (“I’ll buy you an ice cream cone?”), and got to work. A little taste of our trip to the store:
“Can I help you?”
“Yes, please. We need wood.”
“What kind of wood?”
“I don’t really know.”
You can imagine how the rest went. We were thankful for patient employees, and the fact that the store wasn’t closing anytime soon, because we definitely over-stayed our welcome.
I started the garden on my own. When it came time to paint, and lift heavy bags of soil, I took a break for a bit. Thankfully, around this time, Gingey entered my life. Upon his insistence on a Sunday afternoon, we spent our fifth or sixth date at Home Depot, followed by a few hours in my side-yard, finishing up the garden by painting, lining the bottom, and planting… while listening to Van Morrison and drinking a few Bud heavy’s, of course.
As much fun as we had that day, testing our teamwork skills, and revealing some of my weaknesses [ie. things that involve coordination and a brain], if the fate of the garden was any sort of indication of the fate of our relationship, we should have been broken up a long time ago. I’m not the best at keeping things alive… And when I got a puppy, I decided if I was going to choose one thing to put my effort into keeping alive, it would be the animal. Unfortunately, after a few delicious tomatoes, and a cauliflower and broccoli plant that looked like they were beginning to bud, the cute little garden went to shit (excuse my French).
Cheers to “seeing how it goes,” … garden style:
Hopefully my next project will have a better long-term outcome.
As my sister and I slowed to a walk, and turned into a dark ally, trying to catch our breath, I huffed, “we can never tell anyone about this,” and she quickly agreed.
Then I decided to blog about it.
It was a Sunday night. Carissa didn’t have to work, so we decided to get dinner together at a BYOB restaurant, which will remain unnamed. It will remain unnamed because I’d like to avoid the possibility of someone going there and revealing our identities. I’m still convinced they can knock on my door and take me to jail.
It was an uncharacteristically hot day and night in San Diego. I had burnt my skin to a crisp the day before, so I holed up in my house all day with a book. I use the word house lightly, as it more resembled an oven. I spent the day switching between the couch, the cooler wooden floor, and my bedroom, which is strangely about 10 degrees cooler than anywhere else. By the time Carissa showed up, the sun was on its way down, and I was ready to exit the sweat chamber.
We sat out on the front porch for a while, chatting, watching Oliver play with every other dog that passed by, and drinking wine. V and T came home and joined us for a bit. By the time we decided to make moves for dinner, we had finished the open bottle of wine we started with, so grabbed the new big double bottle Carissa had brought with her.
The restaurant was a quick walk away. It’s the kind of place where you stand in line to order, and then they give you a number and bring the food to you. It always takes forever. And the food always sucks… Which is an issue I’d normally take up on Yelp, being this was the third unpleasant food experience… but my photo is on Yelp. So they’re getting off easy on this one.
I stood in line and asked Carissa to get someone to open the bottle of wine. When I met her at the table, I asked where the cork was, knowing we weren’t going to finish this huge bottle. She said the waiter didn’t give it back to her. I walked up to the bar and asked for the cork. The bartender wouldn’t give it to me. He told me we weren’t allowed to re-cork it. Ok…
We finished eating and had about three-quarters of the large bottle left. Carissa grabbed it, uncorked (how annoying), and we left. A few feet onto the sidewalk, someone from the restaurant comes out after us.
“You’re not allowed to take that wine with you.”
“Oh… why not?”
“We’re not allowed to let you leave with an open bottle of wine. You’ll have to either finish it here, or leave it.”
At this point it was late. We weren’t really interested in drinking more wine. But we also weren’t interested in wasting wine. So we went back in, took a seat around the fire, and began to plot. This is what we do. We plot.
“I’m not wasting this entire bottle,” I say.
“We can just run.”
“We can’t just run. There are people everywhere. They see us.”
We sat there thinking and slowly sipping for a few more minutes. We talked about how much the cheap bottle of wine cost, and did the math on how much was left, and decided we’d only be wasting about $8 of wine by leaving it. But that wasn’t the point. The point was that it was our wine, there was a lot of it, and we wanted it.
Carissa had a purse. I had my American flag backpack. I was clearly the one who was going to have to sneak the wine out. With Carissa on the lookout I quickly slipped the open bottle into my backpack, and clenched the fabric around the neck of the bottle. The restaurant had emptied out, and there was just one other couple sitting outside, with a waiter chatting with them. We decided to make our move as soon as the waiter went back inside. There were three exits and we decided on a different one than the way we left the first time.
Carissa instructed me, as soon as we exited the gate, we run. I was giggling already. Finally the waiter left the table and walked in the door to the restaurant when Riss whispers, “GO!”
We get up, quickly walk through the gate, and then break out in a sprint down the main street. Carissa is ahead, and I’m clutching the backpack in my arm like it’s a football, as I didn’t want to spill the precious uncorked wine. I’m in flip-flops and going as fast as I can, which isn’t very fast. A few seconds later, we hear:
“HEY! STOP!”
The waiter is CHASING us. Literally, running after us, chasing us down the street. It was in that moment that I had to make a decision. Carissa was far ahead and showed no signs of slowing. I could hear the waiter catching up. It was in a split second where I considered stopping, laughing, handing the bottle over and apologizing for the ridiculous behavior, and then it was in the next second where the adrenaline kicked in and I decided to just keep running.
The waiter was still chasing, and yelled “THIS IS SO CHILDISH!”
I knew it was, but at this point I couldn’t stop. I saw Carissa turn the next corner, and I yelled to her, “IS HE STILL COMING???”
She turned around and shook her head. We slowed to a walk, and turned down a dark ally. Safe from the waiter. We caught our breath for a few seconds, and I say, “I can’t believe we just did that. We can never go back there again.”
Carissa says, “Well at least for a year.”
“We can’t tell anyone about this.”
“No definitely not.”
“I’m gonna tell Ginge, and that’s it.”
“I’m gonna tell Shane.”
We nervously giggled for a few blocks. I felt like a teenager running from the fake cops who caught me hanging out with my friends in the local cemetery. But I wasn’t a teenager. I was 31 years old. And I was running from a waiter.
Guilt set in full force. Should I go back and apologize? No, it’s too late. I’m embarrassed. I can’t tell my roommates what I did. It’s awful. Am I going to get arrested? Do they have cameras? Will they find me? Was that illegal, or just against their rules? I slept on it for a few nights, and then decided to confess to Ginge.
“I did something bad. I need to tell you.”
Worry covered his face. After I was done with the story, he made a muffled sound in his throat and then started cracking up. Laughing. A lot of laughing.
“This is not funny.”
“It is very funny.”
“Well I’m glad I told you. I haven’t told anyone.”
“Do you feel like a weight has been lifted off of your chest?”
“Yes.”
The weight has been lifted. It’s interesting that it took me 31 years to experience running from authority, in a very literal way, at least. I’m glad I got that out of my system. What is the statute of limitations on running from a waiter with an uncorked bottle of wine? Until then, I’m avoiding all BYOBs.
Please don’t judge me too hard. I’ve judged myself enough already.
T comes home from work one day and says, “My trainer put together a cleanse I’m going to do next week. V wants to do it to.”
“Okay. I’m in.”
5-day cleanse… how hard could it be, right?
The cleanse consisted of a strange combination of foods that were to be eaten in the same order each day. These foods consisted of things like canned tuna, pears, oranges, unseasoned baked meat, plain baked veggies, hard-boiled egg whites, an entire cucumber, balsamic vinegar, and plain organic chicken broth. You also had to drink a gallon and a half of water per day, and drink absolutely no alcohol or coffee.
On Sunday, before the cleanse started, I told Ginge I had to go to the grocery store to prepare. When he asked what we were doing and I explained the cleanse, he decided he wanted to do it with us too… In retrospect, I never should have let him in on it.
Our refrigerator was packed to the gills with Tupperware upon Tupperware of cut-up, prepared food to take to work with us. I have never spent so much time planning my meals, and that part on its own was exhausting. Also, who would have thought Ginge would turn into a Cleanse Nazi??
At one point on day two, I’m sitting there minding my own business, nibbling on my hard-boiled egg whites when Ginge looks over and goes “No!”
“What???”
He peeks into my bowl and says, “Oh, I thought you were eating part of the yolk.”
O….M….G………
I’m cranky when I’m hungry. I’m also cranky on the same several days each month. This month, those cranky days aligned with me also being constantly hungry, and I may have turned into the Tazmanian Devil. There was an exercise program that was supposed to go along with this cleanse, but Ginge and I decided to start the Insanity program instead. So here we are, the four of us sipping on chicken broth, whining all day over group text about how hungry we are, and then sweating our asses off in the driveway (or at the gym), waiting to be skinny.
You’d think 5 days wouldn’t be a hard task. But when Tuesday comes around and you have your weekly softball game with no beers, it all-of-the-sudden becomes a problem. When your team goes to the bar to celebrate a victory, and you go straight home instead to eat some plain baked asparagus…really, that’s a little depressing.
Mid-week, T texts and asks if we have any questions about the cleanse that she should ask her trainer. I fired off several:
-Are we supposed to be pooping?
-How come I’m not pooping?
-Why is this called a cleanse and not a diet?
-What’s the reasoning behind the combinations of foods at each meal?
V didn’t have any questions, just one comment: “Tell your trainer she sucks.”
If we thought Monday through Thursday was bad… we were in for a rude awakening on Friday. V had already caved on day three when she was offered a free sandwich at work, but T was mainly on track, save a cheat or two (or four) for things like Hershey kisses. Ginge and I were following the cleanse perfectly… [while moaning and complaining the entire time]. Friday night its time for our last meal of the day. We had perfectly saved 4 ounces of chicken each, for the final cleanse meal. It was about 8:30 and we were starving. V had just made pasta, and the delicious smell of it in the kitchen lit a rage inside of me. I left the house to go grab some supplies for the next day, while leaving Ginge to put the four strips of plain chicken in the oven. I figured that was an easy enough task.
Five minutes later I get a picture text…. it was a baking sheet with THREE strips of chicken on it, with the message, “Guess who helped himself to two ounces of chicken?”
I wanted to murder somebody. I leave him alone with our precious protein and a 5-month-old puppy for five minutes, and next I’m going to be left to starve to death. Going to get more chicken was going to delay my shoving my pie-hole with food, and that did not make me happy. The dog, on the other hand, was in his glory for the rest of the evening.
We did it. We finished out the 5-day cleanse, and 5 days of Insanity. I didn’t really feel much skinnier, or cleansed… I actually felt bloated and full of poop, but I figured the amount of crankiness it caused had to be equivalent to weight loss. I set an early alarm Saturday morning to get a last workout in before a day and a weekend filled with wine tasting and other indulgent activities. Before meeting Ginge out on the driveway with a laptop and yoga mats, I went into the bathroom to weigh myself.
Less….than….three….pounds.
I lost less than three pounds. Five days of an 800 calorie diet, no alcohol, and Insanity workouts, and I lost an amount that I could have pooped out in one sitting. I tried to compose myself, but I was mad.
I went outside. Ginge was waiting for me.
“I’m in a really bad mood.”
“Why?”
“I lost less than 3-pounds.”
He made some comments about well, at least I lost something!!! [not helping]. We started the workout. We’re doing the jogging in place, starting the awful warmups and V walks up to the front porch, just returning home from the gym, and says hello. I continue my jogging and say, “I lost less than 3 pounds all week.”
“Ugh…. really? That sucks.”
Ginge, jogging away chimes in, “I only lost 11 pounds.”
I stopped jogging. Tears started flowing. Ginge looks at me, and says, “Are you crying??”
I nodded. I felt so defeated. He came over and hugged me. V offered me some pretty good words of encouragement; but the only ones that really helped were when she said, “Want me to make you some coffee??”
Oh coffee, how I’ve missed you. I could kiss her right now.
My sister was on her way over, so I figured I should pre-warn her about the crying to divert any rude fat comments that were bound to happen (isn’t that what sisters do… call each other fat)? It’s nicer to warn someone about the things you will probably cry about, before they say them and then have to deal with your crying.
“Just warning you I lost less than three pounds all week and I cried. Like actual tears.”
“Don’t cry, little baby. That’s just because your muscles ate up all of the fat…and muscle weighs more than fat!”
That gave me a good laugh all on its own.
What have I learned this week? T’s trainer sucks. I also learned that I could eat a perfectly healthy, well portioned, whole foods diet, not go to happy hour, do intense workouts and drink 5 million gallons of water for 5 days, and lose the same amount of weight as if I were to just take a laxative at the end of the week.
Go suck a fat one, cleanse. Bring on the wine and french fries.
Our first date was a Friday night. Second was Monday, third was Wednesday, fourth was Thursday, fifth was Friday, sixth was Saturday, seventh was Monday, eighth was Wednesday. I’m not sure when you’re supposed to stop counting. But I’m very confused.
I’m confused as to how I have been being completely myself the entire time… at times, purposely pushing the envelope to see if I could creep him out, or he’d get squeamish, and he keeeeeppppsss coming backkkkk. I’ve burped, I’ve knocked over food, I’ve told him I had ghost pets, I’ve had him hang out with my sister and HER burps for an extended period of time, he’s witnessed my dance moves, I’ve made him sit through The Bachelor…TWICE… he’s stilllll calling.
I’m trying to find things wrong with him, but I really am having a hard time. He takes initiative on plans and always follows through, he’s been the epitome of a gentleman in every sense, he drunk dialed me, like an actual phone call… which yes, I consider very romantic, he’s a crap ton of fun to hang out with, my friends love him, he thinks we’re funny, and he has a cute bum (and a pool).
But there’s the one thing… The day after he came out in PB and met everyone, my sister was over, and was asking what I thought of Ginge. I explained that I thought I liked him, but there wasn’t anything that jumped out at me that was different. She responded:
“That’s because he’s a normal guy.”
“Yes! That’s what it is. He’s normal. I don’t usually see that as a positive.”
She gave me a long look. She didn’t even need to say anything, and I knew what she was thinking.
“Ohhhh…. maybe that’s what my problem is? I keep dating weirdos? Maybe that’s why it never works out?”
“Ummm… yeah…maybe, Court.”
Hmmmm… something to think about. Of course, now I thought I had found something wrong with him. He was too normal. But the more time I spend with him, the more his little quirks come out. He’s still normal, but there’s definitely a little spice in there.
Keeping true to form, there have obviously been the awkward moments. One night I was planning on going out in his ‘hood… Mission Valley… land of the strip malls (this is called sacrifice). I told him I’d leave in 15 minutes to pick him up at his place. About 15 minutes later, I’m getting ready to walk out the door, and Brie calls me.
“Ummm… I’m at Target in Mission Valley and I think I see the Ginger.”
“My Ginger??”
“Yeah.”
“No, it can’t be him, I just got off the phone with him and he was home. I don’t know why he’d need to go to Target right now.”
“Pretty sure it’s him. He’s wearing a blue shirt. Do you want me to go find him again?”
“Yeah… go ahead…”
I hear mumbling, and then Brie goes…”Yep…it’s him. Oh, we’re giving awkward hugs.”
She calls me back when he’s out of earshot.
I tell her, “I wish you didn’t let him see you. I could have been so creepy about this.”
“Court, don’t be creepy yet.”
“Was he buying anything weird?”
“No, just hair gel because he dropped his in the toilet or something. I wish I caught him buying condoms.”
“Ohhh yeah, that would have been so good.”
I picked him up a few minutes later, gave him a stalker look and told him I had eyes all over town. He just laughed, and our night continued as usual.
There’s something wrong here. And I’m going to get to the bottom of it. But I think I’ll wait to figure it out until after we jump out of a plane together… which he just bought us a Groupon for. Maybe he’ll swap my parachute for a faulty one and I’ll end up dead. Maybe murder is his end game. I think I’m going to go with that.
He messaged me on Tinder a couple of weeks back. He had a witty opening line, and kept interesting conversation going.
A few days into our conversation, I had a couple of glasses of wine at happy hour, looked over his pics again, and messaged him:
“Are you a ginger?”
His response was a solid, “No,” but I didn’t really believe him.
We were both busy in upcoming days with weekend plans and work trips. We kept in contact throughout, with conversations ranging from ear cleaning with q-tips to our biggest life fears. He occupied me via text during a week-long of loneliness I spent traveling around Arizona. I appreciated his virtual presence, even though I hadn’t yet met him.
I could not wait to get home after that week… I felt like I had been in solitary confinement (I was very dramatic and cranky about it). The Ginger wanted to get together. I made plans to do dinner and happy hour with the girls on Friday night when I got back, but suggested that we could meet up after. For some reason I forgot that I hate talking to people for an extended period of time before meeting them. I really do hate that. But I had done it anyway. When I realized that’s what we had been doing for two weeks, I all of a sudden got a little bit nervous.
I felt comfortable enough with him at this point to suggest we make a plan to escape each other immediately after meeting, if we decided we didn’t like each other in person. His response?
“If you want, but I already know I’m going to like you.”
Oh, a sweet talker. We planned to meet at Dirty Birds in PB. I somehow timed a really long trip to the bathroom perfectly for right before he showed up (this is sarcasm. This was really not perfect at all). He walked in, and apparently really awkwardly looked around for me. The girls saw him looking and thought it might be him, so they picked up my phone from the table and checked his Tinder pics to confirm. I came out several minutes later, saw him already standing there with them, and thought “Crap…” [pun intended]. Thankfully, even after I’m sure an awkward introduction to the girls, (my sister was involved, it was obviously awkward), he was holding his own.
We hugged hello, I apologized for being missing for so long (I wonder if he knew I was pooping?) and then he went to the bar and bought a round of Fireball shots for everyone. Sold.
The night progressed, we made our way to our usual spots. The Ginger was tall, and had a hot bod. I learned he was a D-1 baseball player which made him juuustttt a little bit hotter (I’m shallow… what can I say?)
…. I started writing this post almost two weeks ago. I got pretty distracted. I just pulled it up to continue, but realized it would turn into a novel at this point… so… until next time.
My newfound love of Southern California is that you can go from summer to winter in a three-hour road trip. And by winter, I’m referring to only the nighttime hours when the temps drop into the teens, and the mountains can make plenty of snow for you to snowboard on the next day.
This past weekend I took my first trip up to Big Bear to hit the slopes, and spend a couple of days in a rented house of 20 friends. The boarding experience was surreal. The conditions obviously weren’t the top-notch, but they were way better than I was expecting… And the weather during the day couldn’t be beat. By the end of the first run, our jackets were tossed into the lodge, and shortly after, Under Armour was removed on the lift. We spent the day getting tan instead of wind burnt. Removing cold weather and constant snot coming from my nose from the equation was key… it was amazing how little I complained.
The antics that went on in the house were what you’d expect of a rowdy group of 20. Or possibly not. After seeing Clueless 150 times, and always wondering if the cool “Valley” kids actually played Suck ‘n Blow at their high school parties [see clip below], I never thought I’d be 31 and giving it a whirl for the first time.
Over a two-hour period of time around the dining room table, I gained a ton of respect for those actors, and the entire crew of the movie Clueless, for the amount of patience they must have had to get that 18 second shot. Let me tell you… Suck ‘n Blow is NOT easy. It started with three of us. The first 20 tries were ruined with laughter. The next 100 were trying to figure out the proper ratio of sucking to blowing. The group slowly grew until there were about 10 of us and we refused to quit until we got successfully around the table. About an hour in, it wasn’t funny anymore. It became intense. I never would have put my money on a 35-year-old man screaming profanities over a game of Suck ‘n Blow… and vowing to go home and practice in his living room. But that happened. And I loved every second of it.
Sunday morning rolled around, and it was time to go home. As Carissa, V, Brie and I rolled out of the house in our mismatched pajamas, shoving all of our stuff back in the trunk and saying our goodbyes, we assumed the weekend was over, and it was a straight shoot home to plop on the couch for “Surf Sunday,” which included watching footage from the morning’s Maverick’s Invitational surf competition followed by the movie Chasing Mavericks. We were wrong.
The drive was okay for about five minutes. After five minutes V wanted to vomit. It wasn’t hangover vomit, it was windy mountain road carsick vomit. And unfortunately, the windy mountain road lasted for 25 miles, which equated to a full hour. Brie was in the backseat chit chatting away, and one of the only times V opened her mouth to speak was to say, “If I vom, I’m aiming it at Brie because she won’t shut up.”
She didn’t vom. We made it off the windy road without incident. It wasn’t until we were on a real regular highway, about an hour and a half into the three-hour trip, that we heard a huge THUMP.
“What the hell was that??!”
I suggested, “It was probably a rock hitting us that came off that trailer.”
I moved over to the left lane to keep away from the trailer. Brie asked V how she was feeling.
“I’d probably be feeling a little better if Court would stop swerving.”
I was swerving a little.
“I’m sorry, but it’s not my fault. Don’t you see these divots in the road? They’re making me swerve.”
I kept driving. And kept swerving. The damn divots in the road… Then I saw flashing lights in my rear view.
“Crap! What did I do wrong???”
“He probably thinks you’re swerving. Because you are.”
I pulled over to the side of the highway, and that’s when my car started thumping a little…. the girls looked out the passenger side door and noticed the back rear tire was COMPLETELY flat. The cop came to the window and told me I had a flat. ;aldfjsa;ldsfjal;dsjfa;ldfjal;kjdakld
Thankfully, there was a huge fieldy area next to the shoulder, so there was plenty of room to pull over. Before I was even out of the car, Brie and Carissa were walking through the prickly field to bring back a large piece of cardboard they found, and they promptly plopped their asses on it. V said she knew how to fix a flat tire, but didn’t trust herself to do it and then actually drive on it. The rest of us didn’t have a clue.
I called Emergency Roadside Assistance who said there was high call volume, and they would call back in an hour to let us know when someone would come out to help. At that point, V went and got another piece of cardboard that was a few feet away.
Carissa advises, “Stomp on the cardboard to flatten the grass before you sit… otherwise the prickly things might come through and stick you in the butt.” Solid advice.
Five minutes later, we were all sitting there on the cardboard, snacks out, and Loaded Questions set up. We figured if we were going to be here for the next couple of hours, we’d better make ourselves comfortable. The suggestion was made to get a few beers out of the car, but Brie piped in with “I think that might be illegal,” which it obviously is, so we decided against it.
At this point, we were very content, and in no real rush. Carissa found a cut-out finger bunny on the back of a box of crackers, got scissors from the car, and was kept busy practicing her fine motor skills. We crushed a bag of Doritos in 10 minutes flat, started on the bags of candy, and were playing some tunes. We alerted some friends who were still in Big Bear that we were on the side of the road, so of course they offered to come to our rescue on their way back if roadside assistance didn’t get to us by then.
About an hour later, a passing cop on a motorcycle spotted us and pulled over. Carissa says, “This guy’s shaking his head. I don’t think he’s impressed.”
He approached us and asked what we thought we were doing.
“We’re having a picnic, because we have a flat.”
“Did you call anyone?”
“Yes, we called roadside assistance. They’re supposed to call back within an hour but we haven’t heard from them yet.”
“None of you knows how to fix a flat??”
Three of us shake our heads, while V explains that she knows how, she just doesn’t trust herself to do it on someone else’s car.”
The cop grumpily says, “My 16-year-old daughter knows how to change a flat.”
Like what does he want us to say to that? Brie responds, “Oh she must be very smart!”
Officer stars yelling at us, “You cannot be sitting on the side of the highway. Do you know how easy it would be for a car to veer off and hit you?! Then I’d be dealing with four dead girls.”
Brie pipes in again, “Well that wouldn’t be good.”
Officer: “Who’s car is this??”
Me: “Mine”
Officer: “WHOSE?”
Me: “MINE.”
Officer: “The rest of you get in the car and put your seatbelts on. YOU. You’re going to change this tire.”
Me: “Sir, I already called roadside assistance. They will be here. Thank you, but I don’t know how, and I’d just rather wait.”
He ignores me. “Open your trunk. We need to find the spare.”
Is he kidding?? I open my trunk which is packed to the max with all of our weekend gear. The girls are in the car looking back. The cop starts taking all of the stuff from the trunk and throwing it into the backseat, demanding Carissa and Brie help him. He grabs my backpack and starts to toss it from the back of the car into the backseat.
I say, “Oh my laptops in there. Please don’t throw it.”
He responds, “It’s fine; it’s not going to break.” And continues to toss it over the seat.
He tells me to get the car manual to figure out how to release the tire from underneath and find the jack and the tools. V quickly locates it and hands it to me. I’m shaking a little because this guy is so mean, and I finally find the pages that contain information on changing a flat. There are secret compartments and tools and levers and lots of confusing things. The cop is giving me some direction, but mainly wants me to figure it out myself, and is standing a few feet away watching.
A few minutes later, a car-full of our guy friends pulls up behind us. I’m thinking “THANK GOD.” Now this man will leave.
No. The four guys pull up, get out of the car, and start walking over. The officer turns around and yells, “All of you get back in your vehicle. ONE person can stay and help.”
They all stop in their tracks, turn around and start walking back to the car. I say, “Wait, ONE of you can stay!!”
The officer points to Clarence and says, “YOU. Stay.”
I plead, “Well can whichever one of you knows how to change a tire the most stay?”
Clarence turns around and goes back to the car, and Jarred was the chosen one. The officer immediately starts calling him “Raven,” for an unknown reason, and bossing him around as well. I just wanted him to leave. He didn’t leave. He was directing us, making me get under the car several times to LOOK at things because he wouldn’t just TELL me what to do. The guys behind us were texting the girls to get out of the car and go into theirs when we needed to jack it up. When they tried to do so, the cop shot them down and told them to stay where they were, and just sit on the opposite side of the car as the flat.
Raven and I are both fully under the car, because the jack is so far back. We have it about halfway up, when it slips out from under the axle and the car comes crashing down. I scream. Carissa yells to get out from under the car. Joey, watching from the car behind gets pissed, and gets out of his car. The cop turns around, points at him and tells him to get back in. Now I’m mad because I feel like I almost died. I’m also really frustrated because I’m hot, dirty, and have cactus pricklys all up and down the front of my body which are stabbing me, from lying on the ground. I DON’T want to be learning a life lesson right now. I don’t want to be changing this tire. I plead, “Can we just wait for roadside assistance?”
The cop says. “No, go put the jack back under the axle.”
I kinda want to cry. “Can the girls please get out and go in the other car this time?”
“No. It won’t make a difference.”
Back under the car we go. The jack looked like it was going to slip again, halfway up, so we had to release it and start over. Finally it was up. When it was time to remove the flat, the cop demands that we kick the tire and then pull it off. It’s not coming off. “KICK IT HARDER.”
He decides to take matters into his own hands and starts kicking the tire with all his might, as the car shakes with the girls inside. He finally loosens it and makes Raven take it off. At this point, I’m thinking, even if I KNEW how to change a tire, I wouldn’t have been physically able to do this by myself. This guy’s a jerk and I want him to go away.
When the new tire was on, and the old one was back under the car, the cop asked me how old I was and then pulled me aside.
“Are you going to reprimand me for not knowing how to change a tire?”
“No, I’m going to reprimand you for something else.”
We walk to the side and he continues to yell at me like I’m 5 years old and he’s the meanest father on the face of the Earth. He tells me I should never ever get out of my car again if I have a flat and that I should remain in it with my seatbelt on.
I’m sorry, but I’m not sure how sitting 30 feet AWAY from the shoulder, waiting for roadside assistance, which, by the way, is INCLUDED in my insurance because I PAID EXTRA for it, is more dangerous than being under the car and changing the flat MYSELF.
I thanked him for his assistance and life lesson instead of doing what I actually wanted to do, and kicking him several times in the nuts, and got back in the car. He then felt it necessary to get on his bullhorn and give us instructions on picking up speed in the shoulder before merging back onto the highway. Really dude?!
The girls complimented me on my patience, saying they would have probably freaked out. I’m not sure how I didn’t. I just wanted it to be over. I was beyond thankful that Raven and the other guys stopped to assist. Having to deal with the drill sergeant bossing me around on my own would have been an even more hellish experience.
We followed each other to Chili’s and then it was all better. We only half cared that we were still in our pajamas, and I was covered head to toe in branches, dirt, and cactus needles. V asked me if I felt accomplished after changing the tire. I told her I would have felt just as accomplished if roadside assistance had changed the tire.
Moral of the story is this: If you have roadside assistance, you do not need to learn how to change your own tire. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. Tire changing is for men.
Second moral of the story is: If you’re with the right people, any situation can be turned into a positive experience. But that’s something I learned a long time ago.
Cheers to a fantastic weekend with a bunch of terrific people. And hoping that police officer got really bad diarrhea. Or something else unpleasant and inconvenient.
I woke up this morning at 5am, on the couch with an empty bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos on the floor next to me, the TV still blaring, and all of the lights on. It’s Tuesday. It took me a couple of minutes to figure out where I was and what I did last night.
What did I do last night? Ironically enough, I went on the most tame and sober first date I’ve ever been on. Then I watched the Bachelor and fell asleep in the middle.
I just started talking to this guy yesterday morning. All I knew was that his name was Toby, he surfed on really big waves, and he’ll be going to Darfur in August with an NGO to work with people with war trauma.
After a short conversation via text, he asked me to go for a “stroll on the boardwalk.” I declined, due to the fact that Sunday night was NOT the most tame and sober night of my life, and I was looking forward to sweatpants and a nap after work. Not “strolling” around the boardwalk. He then came back at me with an invite to the drive-in movie theater instead, claiming he’d have blankets and pillows, and would be going with his friend and a date. I’m not sure why, but I felt I couldn’t pass up an invite to a drive-in, because that seems like a pretty rad thing to do with someone you’ve never met before, and I’d never been to a drive-in. I mean, how 60’s of us. And I figured the friend would be a good buffer. So I agreed.
I come home from work, and start getting ready. My roommate T asks me what I’m doing.
“Going to a drive-in with some guy, his friend and another girl.”
“What drive-in are you going to?”
“I don’t know.”
“What movie are you seeing?”
“I don’t know.”
“What does the guy do?”
“No idea.”
“Did his friend meet his date on Tinder?”
“I don’t know.”
“Court, do you know anything??”
“No. Well… his name is Toby… I’m going to get murdered, aren’t I?”
“Drive-in” is definitely code for murder. Crap. I should have thought this over a little more. Toby is prompt and rings the doorbell at 7pm to pick me up. I told him beforehand I had a watch dog… Just in case he was thinking of doing anything creepy. I made sure T and V got a good look at him before we headed out the door.
He was a gentleman and walked around the car to open the door for me. Wowwwwyyyy. I probably made an awkward comment. Yeah, I definitely did. Guys don’t usually do that. The drive-in was really far away. Like really far. Like I’m pretty sure if we had driven another half a mile, we would have been in Mexico. This gave us a lot of time to talk. Although in the first few minutes of conversation I found out he had never drunk an alcoholic beverage before in his life. Wait, what? Most of my weekends (and, ok… some week days) are spent at the bars with friends, or at events that revolve around drinking alcoholic beverages. Is it wrong that I was ready for him to turn the car around at that point and bring me home?
That wasn’t an option. As I learned more about Toby, I came to realize he is pretty much the most interesting human being I’ve ever met. First of all, his job is literally chasing swells around the world. Literally. If there’s a big swell somewhere, he has a guy who calls him, tells him what plane to get on, meets him in whatever country it is, and then drives him to the wave. When I say “drives him to the wave,” I mean he drives him to the wave even if there are no roads that lead there. He holds a world record in surfing the biggest recorded wave paddled out t0, and his time out of the water requires a novel all in its own. He told stories about hunting down rapists in Africa, and his journalism in foreign war zones… stories that I may had questioned if I didn’t see photos and videos on his iPhone. Like, basically… I want his life.
He was pretty good-looking but also totally dorky and awkward. I enjoyed his company and conversation, but I most definitely didn’t want his hand on my back while we were lying in his Prius with the back seats folded down and the hatch up, watching the first movie. But that’s where he put his hand. I also didn’t want him to pull my head in to try to kiss me, out of no where. Which he also did.
I’m not sure why you think that you can hang out with me for an hour, not give me any alcohol, and then I’ll want to kiss you? No. No no no no no no no no. I pulled my head away so hard I think I got whiplash. When he asked what was wrong, I exclaimed, “I’m not making out with you!”
I felt like I was in 8th grade. Like what 36-year-old thinks this is a normal situation? Being in the back of a car at a DRIVE-IN MOVIE with someone you’ve NEVER MET BEFORE… I sure as hell don’t want to make out with you right now! I’m still trying to justify agreeing to this idea in the first place.
His friend finally showed up… with a date who I learned, he had only met once… but they parked a few cars down from us so basically it was only introductions. I legitimately felt like I was in high school and the two guys were having a contest to see who could make-out first… Although when I suggested that’s what was happening, Toby acted like that was a preposterous idea. If there was any sort of bet, he most certainly lost.
At one point he was trying to read my palm. I figured he was going to say something really cheesy. He kept looking at it.
I said, “I know you’re going to say something really dorky.”
“No.”
He looked at it, while tracing the lines with his finger… for so long that I legitimately started getting scared. My brain went into overtime, and I convinced myself that he was going to tell me he sees a murder in my very near future, and then he was going to stab me with something he had hidden under the blankets and dump me in the back of this big field behind the dumpsters… or even better yet, just throw me over the border into Mexico and be done with me.
At that point, I pulled my hand away and he finally said, “It says you’re beautiful!”
OMGGGGGGGGG get me outta here.
I was sooo tired, which I was sure to mention multiple times. It wasn’t that I didn’t like talking to him; it was just a weird situation. I wasn’t sure if I should be watching the movie or continuing conversation. We were in the back of a Prius in a random field far from home, and there was no wine… or beer. Just so many things wrong with this picture. I didn’t even know his last name. I wanted to go home.
On our loonnnggg ride home we talked a lot more. Apparently his aggressive make-out advances work “90% of the time” (I asked). But the whole drive-in was a first for him as well. He got to my house and turned the car off. I wasn’t understanding why he was turning the car off, so I obviously was super awkward and said, “Oh, why are you getting out of the car?”
In reality, he was just getting out of the car to be a gentleman. After I questioned his turning off the car, he offered a hug while he was still inside the car if I would prefer that, but I let him get out. I still didn’t understand why he had to turn the car OFF to give me a hug. Then he asked if I’d like to go out again… Like, what am I supposed to say?
“No?” Or…. “You tried to stick your tongue down my throat at the drive-in?” So I said yes. Obviously.
Here’s the thing. I want to hang out with him more because he’s super cool. And I want him to invite me to Darfur. But I don’t want him to stick his tongue in my mouth. So I guess next time I talk to him, I’ll just tell him that. That’s fine, right?
I think it’s Wednesday now… So Happy Hump Day. With lots of love from me and my empty bag of Flamin’ Hots. Which I have officially quit. Cheetos, we are so done.
A friend posted an article on Facebook today called: 20 Ways Married Women Betray Our Single Girlfriends. It was written by someone who was married, as sort of eye-opener, and an apology to her single girlfriends. There are a few things I agree with, a few I don’t, a few that made me laugh, but as a whole, it made me think about how no matter what our relationship status, there are always things we envy of those on the other side of the fence.
Being in my early 30’s (ew, a;ldksfjadlfkja), the majority of my closest girlfriends are married… some have been for years. Many have children. I can honestly say that in my early 20’s, I thought I’d be one of the first. I had been in the longest, most serious relationship of any of my friends, and I didn’t see any path other than the one that led us down the aisle into happily ever after. I’d like to take my 23-year-old self and give her a swift kick in the ass. I didn’t know what I was doing when I was 23. I had no business living in a high-rise overlooking the Manhattan skyline with my college boyfriend, when our combined salaries barely paid the rent, and we basically pulled the couch cushions up about once a week to look for change for dinner. No business. But that’s what I chose to do. And I thought it made me happy. And I thought I was a grown-up and knew all there was to know.
That relationship ran its course. The boyfriend moved to California for work, and my job wouldn’t allow me to go with him. We tried to make it work for a while, but when push came to shove, I guess it just wasn’t right. That one took me a long time to get over. A lot of ups and downs, and “did we do the right thing?” and visits, and relapses, until one of us entered into a relationship with someone else, and things were finally really over. It wasn’t until my next serious relationship that I realized how big of a dumbass I would have been to get married in my early 20’s. I had no idea who I was. I had no idea what a real, grown-up relationship looked like. I didn’t know that passion wasn’t enough to have a healthy relationship. That following one taught me a lot. It taught me I could truly trust a person. It showed me that a higher level connection was possible, and it taught me that the person I want to be with is one I can sit on a front porch with until I’m 90 and not run out of things to talk about. It also taught me that two people’s priorities and goals need to align in order for a relationship to work. Which, in this case, they did not.
What has taught me the most, though, is the past two years. The ones I spent alone. I spent my entire 20’s in serious relationships, thinking every step of the way that marriage was the goal, and what was going to come next. I failed to look around, and see that there’s more going on outside of my little box than creating the perfect relationship, and wondering what the stupid ring would look like on my stupid fat finger. Like really? Who CARES?! Come to think of it, I’d like to give my entire 20’s-self a swift kick in the ass… For not really getting to know who I was alone. For caring about crap that really didn’t matter at all… And for not really opening my eyes and turning from side to side.
The past two years have been liberating. Lonely at times? Yeah, of course. Missing having a significant other to love sometimes? Yeah. But very much-needed. I don’t think as women, we always put enough stock in ourselves as individuals. It’s all about the chase for the perfect relationship, settling down with a house and kids, but what about our relationships with ourselves? Do we know ourselves without “another half?” Maybe some do. Maybe some were way farther along than I was in my early 20’s. But I sure as hell had no clue what I was doing, and I probably still have a lot to learn.
The article above hammers the point home. As much as some of us feel we should be looking for marriage and shouldbe starting to have children, maybe we should look around and see what we do have. Maybe we should realize that even if the husband and kids are the end goal, there ARE things about single life we will surely miss. As dreadful and awkward as many first dates are, as much as we’d like someone to cuddle up and watch a movie with sometimes, just take a moment and really think… think about when we’re married with little kids running around… how much we’re going to remember those nights at the bar with our other single girlfriends bitching about whatever meathead there was to bitch about at the time. And laughing about the awful dates and the weird things we accidentally said. And as much as I know I want the family life eventually… at some point, I do realize, I may mutter the words, “I miss Tinder.”
New Year’s Resolutions are funny things. They usually incorporate some sort of self-improvement, a goal of some sort for the upcoming year. Gosh, how many times was I going to be 10 pounds lighter the following year? Exercise more, eat less cheese, be more patient. What was last years? OH, I resolved to not look at other people’s phones when they lit up. Because that’s nosey. And rude. So I guess really, my resolution was to be less nosey and rude, with a focus on cell phones.
This year I’m changing things up. Do I still want to lose 10 pounds, exercise more and eat less cheese? Yeah, obvi. Will that happen? No. I love cheese. A lot. And I’d rather spend time eating cheese than going to the gym.
This year I’m making a resolution I probably should have made a long time ago. I am resolving to differentiate between my past, present and future. I recently realized I’ve always allowed there to be gray area in between past and present, where sometimes there should be a distinct line that separates the two. I feel like making a conscious effort to leave the past in the past, and live in the present will clear my mind for a better future. The present is a pretty awesome place to be right now… so here remains my focus.
And with that, cheers to all for a very Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year & every holiday in between. Cheers to egg nog and Christmas carols, accidentally lighting wrapping paper on fire with candles, playing telephone around the dinner table, prank calling pizza for the neighbors, making cardboard airplanes, stealing shoes off of feet under the table, and whatever other super normal holiday traditions you and your families have. I’ll be missing my family this year, but am thankful that they’re always only a plane ride away. NBD.
breathe in, laugh out 