27

It has been a while since I last posted, but a lot has happened!  Let's see, I went back to Italy, and can wholeheartedly admit that I 100% chose my job over my personal life while I was there.  Now do I regret this choice? Not really, do I wish I had made some alterations with this choice, absolutely!  My dear Italian Stallion from a few months back and I did reconnect, unfortunately it was only via text message and a few phone conversations.  Plus the 25 times he called when I didn't answer in a matter of 3 days.  How messed up am I in the relationship / dating department? I was annoyed this precious man kept calling. ANNOYED????  I'm not sure our paths will ever cross again, but his sweet message he left on my voice mail ending in "Big Kiss mmmhua" will be saved for many, many a long time.

Now why did I title this blog 27?  Well for some uncanny reason eharm, we are on a nickname basis at this point, has been matching me up with a bunch of 27 year old guys.  Now I'm just spitting distance from *gasp* 31, so 27 isn't that far away. Of course I am still doing at 30 what I was doing at 27, filling out eharm questionnaires...GASP!  But this number I realized is significant.  Most recently I have had the honor to accept the invitation to be in my 15th and 16th wedding as a bridesmaid.  Have you seen the movie 27 dresses? It actually looks a bit closer to reality.  I am honored the ladies consider me close enough to stand next to them on what will be the most important day of their lives.  They seem to trust that I will not make an ass of myself while standing there wishing them well and repeating with the congregation "We will" when the person who officiates asks if we will support them.  They are confident I will not object when the officiant asks if anyone who objects will speak now or forever hold their peace.  They are sure I will smile at them when they announce their "I Do"'s and clap when they are presented as Mr. and Mrs. Last name.

They have all attended weddings with me as a guest or a bridesmaid, there is no difference and no change in my behavior.  At the rehearsal dinner I will come up with a clever, methodically funny, and a little bit touching speech which will include the time we met, our laughter at one-anothers' expense, for some reason a failing relationship they watched me go through and of course when their beloved became a part of our inner circle. But what they also know, without an iota of a chance for change, that I will, without a doubt, be the first person to break a sweat on the dance floor. I don't mean a bead on my forehead, I mean, napkins shoved down my cleavage, rubber band stolen from the bartender's tip-wad for my beautifully blond coiffed hair turned blackened wet mess on top of my head.  I wait for my invitation from the band (if there is a band) to get on stage and regale for all the wedding guests my best version of the Hammer in my 4 inch heels.  I will continue to stay up there and eat up the lime light until bride or groom would like to take it from me.  There is no difference from wedding to wedding when it comes to my behavior.  But rest assured, I am the guest who does not break the alcohol bill on the wedding night because I cannot perform these moves drunk, I actually act this way with stone cold soberness. 

I am honored to play bridesmaid and to stand next to my friends, my dear friends and their partners. I promise to stand next to them in their life together as friend and confidant. I pledge my loyalty, I will say "I do" when asked to honor them and walk with them.  And I swear, by the blond highlights in my hair, I will out perform myself from the last wedding we attended together and I will with your blessing, do both the hammer and the typewriter to confirm my good time and your laughter on your wedding day!  To brides past, current and future, thank you for believing in our friendship, but more importantly, thank you for accepting my moves!

Sickly weekend

This past weekend I got sick with the same illness, both Friday and Saturday night.  The diagnosis: Diarrhea of the Mouth. Yes, it is confirmed, there is really no other explanation.  Thankfully this illness usually only shows up post hard liquor consumption and pre-next day apology calls.  To those of you who did not receive a call, my apologies, I cannot recall all of my actions and ALL of my words or do I choose not to?

Friday night I went on a date.  What a fun date!  He picked me up and half way to the first destination he tells me that we were going bowling.  Well my corked-wedge-sandal shoes were not an appropriate choice for bowling and I started to panic.  Thankfully the bowling ally sold new socks and my kind and obviously flustered date bought me a $2 pair.  Now, I'm no athlete. Do you call bowlers athletes? I have no hand-eye coordination.  In short, I suck at bowling, but I can have a good time doing it, I only get competitive at a war of stories, not 8lbs balls thrown at pins at an average speed of 11 mph.  After bowling we went to dinner.  I was STARVING!  I've been doing weight watchers for 3 weeks now and the weekends are really starting to get in the way of losing weight, but I tried to eat little on Friday to eat much on Friday night.  I had to ask if it was okay to get guacamole, when my stomach was screaming for queso and all he wanted was grilled kabobs.  Oh lordy!  Well, we were having a nice time, having known each other for a little while as acquaintances, I felt somewhat at ease.  Then he broke out most personal questions to me, about my personal life, my dating history and what I am looking for in a partner.  All questions that are too deep for me on date number one, however, I can't do anything but answer truthfully.  Enter diarrhea of the mouth.  Eventually he said, and I quote "Yea, this isn't a date anymore".  What wonderful words to hear on a first date, errr, I mean, 1st intention of a date, but my illness turned it into an awkward interview.  Super duper.

Saturday I planned to make the day healthy and productive.  How did I do that you ask?  A friend came over and we drank beer and then went to have Mexican food so I could get my queso and then out on the town.  Now, my illness crept in when we were enjoying queso as I began to unleash the stories of my past romantic encounters and left little to the sanctity of a relationship.  Then we had moved on to the last bar of the evening and I managed to alienate a friend and accuse her of not be excited enough to see me, seriously, at this point it isn't even diarrhea of the mouth, it is diarrhea of my whole life.  Then I saw someone a bit more than an acquaintance but a lot less than a friend and talked his ear off about the energy industry (I may be in it, but I'm most certainly not of any status to talk intelligently about it, with or without tequila).  After, or before, I don't have a time-line, I turned some guy's hat to face front because I thought it looked stupid turned to the side, again, no friend of mine, just a stranger in the bar.  I knew it was my time to leave, I had insulted enough people and not eaten enough french fries.

Now I know I talk about wine and drinking a lot in my blog, but day drinking is not something I desire to do and trust me, I put myself into detox after engaging in it.  I typically choose not to drink into oblivion because my alter tornado ego blows through and destroys everything in it's path.  Two lessons for me. 1: There is a reason I cut hard alcohol out of my life 3 years ago...get back on that train.  2. SHUT UP in THE FACE OF STRANGERS, FRIENDS, and FOR GOD'S SAKE, DO NOT ANSWER ANY LIFE QUESTIONS!

Flashbacks

Today I had a flashback to college and a come to Jesus at just how stupid I was then too.  Thankfully I didn't have to have that come to Jesus during those 4.75 years at the University of Texas, because I was lucky...too lucky!

I was reminded of a time I met a guy in a bar...dun.dun.dunnnn.  And we hit it off. I remember he and I going on hikes or maybe one, I remember showing him around Austin, as he was new to the area from Mississippi.  I remember going to have some form of chili at his apartment, first time I had ever seen an efficiency and a bed that dubbed as a couch/table/dresser/closet.  And yet, this boy who I knew nothing about nor really any part of his story, I let him right on into my life.  Eventually I believe I got a little too happy via the phone one day and shortly thereafter I got stood up for the first time (eh-hem, not the last).  Now when I look back on that time and think of the pure stupidity of me showing this stranger, albeit very good looking, hippyish stranger around Austin, via the car or on foot in the woods, I think "man someone really should have slapped me".  Hey friends...YOUR FAULT! :)   If I remember correctly, I was illegally hanging out in said bar and he was most certainly there with his very own REAL ID.  I was too young and literally...too stupid!  REALLY??  I sometimes get a flashback of this fellow who's name I cannot forget and it just astonishes me.  

One time, and I swear this is true, about 2 years after never hearing from him again, I was living in a new place and had a new phone number by 2 or 3 times since knowing him and my phone rings one afternoon.  This guy asks for me by name tells me his name is Blake and I respond with "I don't know a Blake"...memory laps of ever knowing a Blake possibly due to the introduction of white wine into my repertoire.  Then he says to me "we met in the bar the other night, you gave me your number". I remember thinking to myself, "oh god, I gave my number out and I don't remember?"  My response was "What bar?" Seriously?  Did I really think I forgot I gave my number out to some stranger?  Well after some goings back and forth regarding this fellow Blake and asking for me by name, by complete coincidence, he met a girl who said her name was Hadley and gave him my phone number and by happenstance, it was the same boy who I had hiked in the woods with, ate chili with out of a pot and who stood me up on a date never to be heard from again.  I am quite certain it was one of my nearest and dearest friends who liked to give my number out to strangers, but what were the chances it would have been someone I already knew and had a romantic encounter with?  Ummmm...pretty good since A. it happened and 2. I didn't actually NOT date a lot in college.  :)  I quickly dismissed him and now we really have not talked again.  The Irony!

I am going to start adding to these flashback sessions of the blog just so you can see how I have changed and grown as a person...or you can judge the similarities between my college self and my 30self...soon to be 31..Yowsas!

Happy Friday Friends!

I'm doing my housekeeper's job

So about a year ago I decided I wanted to invest in a little help at home. I'm not the tidiest of people and I thought a $50 every other week investment in getting someone to help me out would be a good idea. Now, every other Tuesday I do come home to a clean house, it smells nice and looks completely wiped down.  However, there have been quite a few Tuesdays when I have come home to something unexpected as well.  I thought I would share with you a few of the things that I have stumbled upon since making this investment:

One day I discovered a breaker had gone out in my downstairs bathroom / laundry room after she was at my house.  I made this discovery on Thursday when I was looking for something to wear that I swear had to have been washed.  It was. It had been sitting in my washer since Tuesday.  Wash reload and switch of the breaker later, the mildew smell was almost out.  Why didn't I find this until Thursday? You might be asking.  Well, I hadn't been inclined to turn on the lights in the laundry room or bathroom until then.  And my housekeeper didn't think it was necessary to let me know.

One day I was getting upset at how much weight I was gaining. I hadn't actually weighed myself, but clearly, my clothes were fitting tighter and tighter.  I had to ask her not to come one week and so I was changing my sheets and washed them on the Tuesday she was supposed to come, not having done this in a while, since she is the one who does it, I hadn't noticed that my fitted sheet no longer "fitted" anymore.  I went downstairs at that point, while wearing my once long t-shirt what was now a mid-drift baring beauty and sweatpants that were giving my booty a nice squeeze and because they were now so short and revealing my ankle socks were completely worn to shreds, I found that my washer was on warm/warm and my dryer was on high heat.  Lord almighty, weight gain was not the issue, my housekeeper was making me squeeze into my clothes and my bed squeeze into the sheets because she prefers warmer climates in my laundry room.  I have started taping notes on the washer and dryer that read (cold/cold only and low tumble dry only) and sometimes she removes them because they get in her way when she turns the dial to warm/warm and high heat. So I have to repeat process about once a month. I guess I will continue to fight for my wardrobe for as long as I have this help.

One day I came home thinking there was no issue when she was there, until I got a phone call later that evening from her daughter.  She called with this message "Hadley, my mom is really sorry for breaking the knob off your washing machine."  WHAT?  Yes, so my 1997 washing machine that runs quite nicely, has to be turned on with needle nose pliers because she plum ripped off the knob which turns it on.  I now have to do my laundry before she arrives to ensure it gets done, not shrunk and not broken!  I actually am paying to learn to be responsible for my own clothing.  There's a lesson.

The final thing I find every time I come home is what of mine she has eaten.  Now keep in mind, I'm single and don't cook often.  So I rarely have food of serious edible quality during the week, but typically I can find something which she has found.  Usually it is my last apple or, and this I love, it is some canned food I have, I don't know if it is cooked, but I do know it is spiced up to perfection because I always find my spices in different places from basil and oregano to garlic salt and lemon pepper.  I feel bad sometimes I don't keep her fed well, but clearly the woman thinks I shouldn't eat much either since she keeps trying to shrink my clothes!

She came to my house early today which I wasn't expecting and I'm not allowed to be home when she works, but it is my favorite to stumble in on her a little early and find her barefoot and singing at the top of her lungs whatever random radio station she has found on my guest room radio.  Sometimes she leaves it on and I get to do a little dancing myself when I get home.  So I think it is good I have help to wipe things down and get things in order, but I'm not sure if I can keep risking my self esteem on shrunken clothes and tiny bedsheets. I am about to offer them up to my sister for crib sheets...they were once for a queen.

So I'm near to going home to see what is of my house, I will be thankful I can afford the $100 a month for some help and be hopeful that it won't cost me a new appliance in the mean time!  To the wonderful laughing woman who keeps me tidy and consistently self conscious, thank you for giving me surprises, wanted or not!