oooh, stuff be different

Ahem.

Tada!

So, yeah, we've got a new look around here. It's clean, it's simple, it's plain ole white, just like its owner. (I can't help but be a teeny bit jealous when I'm in a group of people and they all start ethnicity dropping. Like, "Oh, I'm one-fourth Cherokee Indian," or "Oh, that's neat, but I'm one-fifth Iroquois and two-sevenths Japanese and one-eighteenth Aborigine," because I really have nothing to add to that conversation, except maybe, "Oh, right, yeah, um, I'm a Hitler Youth. HOW INTERESTING.")

You might have also noticed there's a new "About" page over on your right-hand side, which includes both information about me and also stories about weiners. And really, peanut butter and jelly. Weiners and personal information about me. This is nothing new.

Anywho. I'd love to hear your thoughts on the new design. I've also added a new commenting tool called Disqus which will allow you to log-in and leave comments through a number of different social platforms. Right now it seems to have sucked up my older comments, but I'm working on resolving that issue. So in case you'd previously written a novel of a comment that you were considering your personal stab at the Great American Novel, you work should be back soon.


cheers,
elizabeth

folks don't know how to act

Mr. Risky Business and I weren't even out of the car in the parking lot at GPAC on Thursday night (on our way to see David Sedaris, who was nothing less than brilliant) when I spotted some hooligans dressed in jeans and tee shirts with tickets in hand and with that, my first rant of the evening had begun.

At that moment I told Mr. RB, if we're going to keep going out of the house ("That will tend to happen," he said) then you need to be prepared to listen to my speech on how people don't know how to act, because you've already heard it once before tonight and I can guarantee you're gonna hear it again. I don't care if it makes me sound like I'm 85 and pointing my cane at somebody. Were you raised in a barn? Put on some damn clothes! Does your mama know you're at an event where the lowest ticket price is $35 looking like you just came from Sherwin Williams to pick out paint samples for your tool shed? Does she?

It all comes down to one plain and simple fact: Folks don't know how to act. And listen, my mama taught me how to act. What did your mama teach you? And she also taught me how to peel shrimps and calculate a discount during a clearance sale and other important and useful tricks, but you better believe that somewhere in all of that she was teaching me how to act like a goddamn civilized human being who might just, one day, be fit to be seen in a public location and be trusted not to act a total effing fool.

Once we were inside and the sight of blue jeans was so rampant that the very tears in the denim were burned into my retinas like a recurring nightmare of poor choices, I just could not take it anymore. So I began formulating a plan. A plan for my first book: Folks Don't Know How to Act.

Chapter One is without a doubt "Figure Out How to Put Some Clothes On." And while we were standing in line, waiting for David Sedaris to start signing books, I came up with about nine other chapter titles that are a little fuzzy for me now, but I know that somewhere in there were titles like "Figure Out How to Stop Running Your Mouth," "Yes M'am, No M'am," "Were You Raised in a Barn," "Get Your Elbows Off The Table" and "Do You Have a Mirror In Your Home (Because You Look Pregnant)." And also maybe, just for general rants, "Stop Acting A Fool," and "Have You Lost Your Mind?"

What crimes against humanity do you see committed in your daily life that prove to you that Folks Don't Know How to Act? I'm dead serious, y'all. Because if folks' mamas aren't going to teach them this stuff, then I will. The pen goes to paper on "Figure Out How to Put Some Clothes On" this week.


cheers,
elizabeth

on having balls

Here's what I like about having a boyfriend. Besides the dates and the cuddling and the groping and the constant attention and knowing that at literally any moment of the day someone, somewhere, thinks my ass looks phenomenal in these pants.

Having a boyfriend gives you balls of steel. And/or, in some situations, just a complete lack of giving a shit in general. It's like Beyonce once so eloquently sang: "Tennis shoes, don't even need to buy a new dress. If you ain't there, ain't nobody else to impress."

And y'all, I love it. It is this benefit of being in a relationship that allowed me to walk into the local on Monday night -- after having consumed two bottles of wine with Megan on my front porch AND having walked down to the Midtown Market for some Hostess cupcakes, because it seemed time for dessert -- completely unconcerned with the fact that I was a.) in my gym shorts, b.) in a dirty gray hoodie, c.) rocking a sweaty pony tail and d.) probably smelling RIPE. I'm just guessing on that last one, but you look at A through C and see if you don't come to the same conclusion.

Not only did I go into the local looking ratty, I also talked to everyone in the joint while looking (and maybe probably definitely smelling ratty) including tons of boys whose opinions would've previously mattered to me. The piece de resistance of it all, really, was when I spotted a group of guys sitting at a table near us on the patio who appeared to all be named Brett or Garrett or something otherwise populated with double consonants and radiating prep. So I bet Megan that one or more of them was named Brett. Being a good sport, she bet that one or more was named Austin. And what did I do to settle the score? I walked my ratty ass right over to that table and said, "Hey. What are your names? We have a pool going."

Turns out, they were Matt, Matt and Ben. And then -- and the details are sketchy on this for me -- I somehow ended up talking to them about the line-up of this year's Beale Street Music Fest, and I think one or all of them might've been Poison fans, and I think I maybe offended their sensibilities by saying that I was not going to Music Fest this year because I did not possess a time machine. Or maybe Matt, Matt and Ben did not get the joke.

Either way, I didn't care. I just put my feet up on a chair, took a sip of my pint and texted Mr. Risky Business and said, "How is it that I'm at the local in my gym shorts?"

His response? "LOL. that's a good question. mmm. sexy."

cheers,
elizabeth

project patio no. 6

East End Grill
What I Loved: East End has been one of my stand-bys for a good while now. They served me a few appletinis back in my underage days and that is enough of an act of kindness to win a girl's heart for years to come. So naturally, what I love(d) about East End is what I always love about East End. FRIED CHEESE BALLS. (Please note that one fried cheese ball was totally harmed in the taking of that photograph, because I scarfed it, but not before dipping it into copious amount of honey mustard.)

Why You Should Get Drunk There: Other than the cheese balls (FRIEDCHEESE), they have a pretty good beer selection (when you include bottled, as their draft offerings are fairly limited) and their patio really is one of my favorites. There's a TV on it! I can sit on the patio and watch basketball, and not while peering through the window into the restaurant and looking like some kind of blind peeping tom? Yes, thank you.



cheers,
elizabeth

Attention Memphis Readers!
This Friday will be the first Project: Patio Meet-Up -- I'd love to see you there! It's happening from 7 to 9 p.m. at Raffe's Beer Garden on Poplar. If it rains, we'll have to, um, take a rain check, what with the whole point being the consumption of the beverages on the patio. But keep an eye out for events all summer. Two patio crawls are in the works right now. Let's get drunk together -- I promise I don't exaggerate here. You will have a good time, if only because of my sheer entertainment value when intoxicated. Come one, come all!

hold yourself together, man

After spending our Saturday morning at the farmers' market and our afternoon napping on the couch in front of Casablanca, Mr. Risky Business and I felt fully prepared to venture out into the wilderness, to chart a course for the great beyond, to make the great trek to (gulp) THE SUBURBS.

Okay, so maybe it's not so dramatic. It's just Bartlett. It's just, like, a half-an-hour drive. And honestly we drove all the way to B-town last week just to get Dairy Queen. Who am I to deny an almost primal urge for a Blizzard? Those desires are instinctual. They're in-born. I am in no position to deny myself the base human need of ice cream blended with sugary treats.

Anywho.

This time we were not on a suburban brownie Blizzard mission; we were having an evening out with my parents.

And I have let you down in a colossal, monumental way, because not one awkward, ridiculous, horrendously mortifying or otherwise worthy of leaving a life-long scar incident befell the entire evening. Not one.

We started things off with a drink at their house and little walk around the yard -- since Mr. RB has a monstrous yard and likes to plant things, and my mom knows everything there ever was to know, ever, about planting things -- while mom pointed out different plants and said lots of extremely intelligent stuff about them that I could not repeat for you now if held at gunpoint. They were pretty. And several of them smelled good. That's all I got.

After our drink we headed to the Bartlett Performing Arts Center to see a show, which was a little weird but decently entertaining for what it was. Afterward we headed to East End Grill (Project: Patio for the win!) for some beers and (naturally) cheddar cheese balls.

If you'd seen any of my tweets leading up to Saturday, you'll note that I had been nervous about this meeting. I had. But at some point on Saturday I had a little talk with myself. Yes, my parents' opinion is really important to me. I see them as the most important point on what I like to call the Trifecta of Approval, where the other two points are My Best Women (Holly and Stefanie) and My Best Men (David and Harry). All the points in the Trifecta matter to me a great deal, but their point is like the brightest star in the constellation. So of course there's cause to be a little nervous.

But what I realized Saturday, perhaps even while I was en route to RB's house prior to the start of the evening and perhaps also while talking to myself, was that I needed to do myself a teeny little favor and CHILL THE EFF OUT. No one is chiming wedding bells and picking out cake toppers, no one's knocked up, no one's moving in together, no one is anything. We're dating. We've been dating for, what, barely two months since the official DTR? And this is cause to be nervous? Sister, be cool. Take a tip from the cucumber. This is what I said to myself.

And probably for the first time ever, one of those "snap out of it" pep-talks actually worked. Who knew?

Despite the massive amounts of shit I was taking all week long from both my dad and Mr. RB about the coterie of embarrassing things they were going to do that night, all of the shit-talking remained just that and I thought we had a pretty good time. Of course, maybe it was just the cheese high I was experiencing from mass consumption of cheddar balls, because dear sweet everything that is holy, fried effing cheese. FRIED CHEESE.

Please know that if I am ever faced with mediating a situation of conflict between two or more persons, be it a minor dispute or a conflict of international magnitude, I will counsel both parties, and I will bring both parties to the negotiation table, and on that table? Will be fried cheese.


cheers,
elizabeth

on a need to know basis

The other night after reading my blog post about our camping trip, my mom asked me if I was ever going to identify Mr. Risky Business. "It seems like it's all about you," she said.

"Well, it IS all about me," I said, knowing full well she meant the relationship, and I meant the blog.

But this blog IS about me. It's about my awkwardness and my mistakes and foibles. And aside from blogging about the occasional Jersey City game of "obese or pregnant," I try not to make this about other people, at least not in a negative way. But no matter how I try, and even think I succeed at that, I know that some of my writing could always be perceived differently by my audience. And since perception is everything, I don't identify anyone but those who are okay with being identified. Or rather, those who are okay with being associated with me.

If RB said to me today, "Elizabeth! It's come to me in a dream! I want the WORLD to know who I am!", then I would happily post a picture of him, if such an opportunity arose and it made sense to do so. Probably, though, I'd still go on referring to him as Mr. RB, because a.) it's more fun and b.) it's my blog, goddammit, and I'll code name if I want to.

These questions of who to talk about, what to share and how much of it, these are questions bloggers have been discussing since the invention of blogging. Whenever in the eff that was. It's something my hero, Dooce herself, has written about quite a bit as she's continually faced criticism over how much information is available about her family and specifically, her children, online.

But this is not a dilemma new to blogging. How much do you share with someone, anyone? And how do you make that decision of where the line falls? Disclosure is something that seriously ups the ante on emotional investment in any relationship, romantic or friendly. But how much you share and when, and then, in how much detail, is a fuzzy, fuzzy area for me.

The other night over dinner, RB and I were swapping stories about some of our romantic firsts. First significant other, first kiss. For the most part, they're sweet stories that happened so long ago as to be completely irrelevant now other than anecdotal and entertaining. But then, RB shared a story about a time he got hit on by a girl rather, uh, aggressively. And I pulled the brakes. I couldn't have told you what the line was of over-sharing, even at that moment, but much like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart and pornographic material, I knew it when I saw it.

Unless you're 15 and saving yourself for marriage, when you enter a relationship you have baggage and history. And to a certain extent, I do want to get to know Mr. RB's baggage and history, because I think that falls under the umbrella of disclosure, the kind that brings you closer to someone and emotionally matures your relationship. But maybe I don't want to know about that time at Music Fest when this chick -- that'll do. THAT'LL DO.

God knows I've got plenty of stories that could make a boyfriend cringe a little, but why share them? As I told him, I think that I (and maybe women in general, but I won't throw all of you under the bus like that) like to hold on to this obviously fantastical belief that the person I am with has never liked or been with anyone before me, never was attracted to anyone until he met me and did not even know the scent of a woman until me. If you're wondering what that smell is, yes, it IS bullshit, and I do smell it too. I'm well aware.

I don't know if I developed this philosophy while I was living in England, but it certainly was influenced by the attitudes of my English friends towards a ritual that, up til that point, had been a very important part of my dating career: The Sharing of The Number. That sacred moment when one person inevitably gets bent out of shape because the other person has had sex with more people than they have, or they're embarrassed that their number is higher or, really, just invent any other of a MILLION reasons why feelings could get hurt, because there are a million. Easy. (No pun intended.)

My English friends were appalled at the very idea. That's in your past, they said. What bearing does it have on your current relationship? On who you are? On how they feel about you?

And I had to answer: None. No bearing whatsoever. And thus, my official stance on the matter was completely altered -- I don't want to know, and further, I simply don't care.

Because what does that number even mean? It is about as useful as on old man's dick (thank you again, Deadwood). It doesn't tell me how many times you've been in love, how many times you had your heart broken, how many times you went out on a limb for someone or invested in another person. Those are the things I want to know. That is the disclosure I'm after.

It makes sense, really. I've never been fond of numbers. Always preferred words.


cheers,
elizabeth

the marshmallow napalm incident of 2010

We were still in the loop when Mr. Risky Business realized he'd left his sleeping bag. We were already across the bridge when I realized I'd left my hiking shoes. And during our pitstop at the Wal-Mart in Wynne to pick up some $13 sneakers, we paused in the middle of the store and asked ourselves just what else we could've left. And of course, we could think of nothing.

And so, we were at the campground in Blanchard Springs and pretty much completely settled when RB realized we'd brought everything to make French toast -- except the syrup.

But really, aside from the 15 minutes or so I spent being thoroughly annoyed with myself for having to spend $13 on disposable shoes, it was all good for a lot of laughs. We went back for the sleeping bag, my Wal-Mart shoes only rubbed me raw in one spot and we improvised for breakfast and made cheesy eggs and sausage. Which, HELLO, involved cheese. This was clearly a win.

When we arrived at Blanchard Springs on Saturday morning we headed straight for the spring, and had lunch at the foot of a waterfall coming out of the caverns. After that, we headed into camp to claim a spot an then got ourselves ready to head out for a hike up the mountain.

The Wal-Mart shoes held up, god love 'em, and I did manage to get a gnarly scrape about 10 minutes in to the journey which resulted in some fairly spectacular scab formation that made me feel thoroughly bad-ass and also not unlike a mountain man.

When we made it back, we set up the tent (don't you love how I keep saying that WE did things when really Mr. RB did things and I watched him?) and then headed down to the creek -- or as I lovingly called it, The Crik -- to skip some more stones. I say more really only for Mr. RB, since we'd stopped along a little section of The Crik on our hike earlier and he had skipped stones while I had worked on my impression of a very drunk person practicing for a discus event at a track meet for blind people.

After The Crik, we made dinner, and after dinner, we invested some more time into our fire and then began making preparations for the roasting of marshmallows. Just thinking about it now makes my mouth water because Good God JESUS I love marshmallows.

I have two distinct techniques for marshmallow roasting/toasting, one of which is used for 'mallow, straight up, and one of which is used for the construction of the perfect s'more. The distinction is important, because when you make a s'more, you need to slow cook that thing. Rotisserie style. Get a nice little toasted color to it and then just when it looks like it's about to sag right off the stick, you pull it off and SMOOSHTOWN, you've got a s'more.

But when you're just roasting the marshmallow to eat it, plain, in all its gooey glory (which I like to do in between s'mores -- eat a s'more, eat a marshmallow, eat a s'more, eat a marshmallow, etc., so forth and so on) you want to light that bad boy on fire. Or at least, I want to light that bad boy on fire. I want it to go up in flames, I want to blow those flames out, pull the burnt shell off and eat it first and then suck the melted middle part off the stick. (Does this all sound super dirty to you, or is my mind stuck in its usual gutter spot? Gooey white stuff on a stick? No? Just me? Okay.)

So there we are, in between s'mores. I'm roasting a marshmallow. It ignites, little marshmallow flames leaping up in perfection, and I pull it away from the fire. I want to tell you that I have a clear understanding of what happened next, but it was all sort of like a dream, one you'd later describe with phrases like "allofasudden" and "I knew it was you, but your face looked like Michael Jackson's." And all of a sudden, that marshmallow was airborne. And it was flaming. And somehow, some kind of way, part of the hot gooey middle bits burst forth from the casing and wrapped around my hand like marshmallow napalm.

So my flesh is being melted off by steaming marshmallow insides. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the flaming casing of the 'mallow has landed smack on my leg, my leg that has PANTS on it, PANTS which are FLAMMABLE and suddenly my brain has alarms and bells and whistles going off in every direction because in that split second it cannot figure out whether to free my fingers from the flesh-melting-confection or to fling a fireball from my pants leg. What resulted next was me trying to do both of those things at the same time, which I'm sure looked something like an invertebrate in the electric chair. Because he's such a nice guy -- and because I was screaming bloody murder -- Mr. RB did refrain from laughing out loud until the incendiary was safely put out in the gravel nearby, the globs of white sticky mess all over my pants the only evidence remaining.

At least the riotous laughter following the screams reassured the other campers that no one was being viciously murdered. For now.

We crashed fairly early, what with being stuffed full of marshmallows and two tall-boys in each. Sunday morning when we got up to make breakfast we discovered little raccoon paw prints in the cast iron skillet. And though at the time we couldn't see that he'd bothered anything, later that day, after we were home searching for a bag of trail mix we knew we hadn't finished, we decided our little furry friend was probably chillin' in the woods somewhere, chowing on nuts and M&Ms. And maybe a resealable zipper bag.

After a long leisurely breakfast and at least an hour's worth of me entertaining myself playing "Don't Let the Fire Go Out," we started packing things up. We headed down to The Crik one more time for a quick toe dip and then got on the road.

And then, on the way home, not ten minutes from camp, we encountered some heavy traffic. Luckily, we were able to make a stealthy maneuver and pass, albeit on the righthand side.

cheers,
elizabeth

project patio no. 4 & 5

The thing about trying to get seated on the patio at a popular Mexican restaurant on a Friday night when the weather is sublime and the wind is practically whispering "Margarita!" in your ear is that I really, really just don't recommend it.

I don't recall if the wait had been more or less than an hour by the time we got seated at El Porton, but when we finally claimed our table on the patio a little after 8, our stomachs were so very empty that just one jumbo margarita each and we were pretty much drunk. Don't worry, though, we didn't drive. We spent some time giggling over nudey books in the adult section at BookStar to sober up. Because we're adults.


On Sunday, after returning from our camping adventures in the Natural State (tales to come soon!) we headed to Dan McGuinness for some grub. It was actually the first time I'd been there, and I liked the place except for the picturesque view of a Target and a SuperLo Foods. The burger was the bomb dot com, though, pretty scenery or not.

After Mr. RB snapped this photo of me with my beverage, he commented that he likes his photographic evidence of Project: Patio the best, because he's always sure to get a little cleavage in the shot.


El Porton
What I Loved: One of the things I missed most when I lived in England was Mexican food. Good Mexican is like a religious experience. Cheese and sour cream as far as the eye can see, AND you're going to give me a margarita!? So yes, my answer to this question is simply: Mexican food. Because I love it. So there.
Why You Should Get Drunk There: The 'ritas at El Porton are SO tasty. Like any Mexican restaurant, they are not going to eff around with you on that tequila. They're gonna do right by you, and that means tipping up the Cuervo in your honor and lettin' it flow.

Dan McGuinness
What I Loved: Though I enjoyed a Harp with my burger, I'm pretty partial to places with Guinness on draft. (Mr. RB enjoyed a pint of the black stuff for me.)
Why You Should Get Drunk There: Beer selection AND you're right next to the SuperLo in case you need to pick up some snacks once you're messy!


cheers,
elizabeth

outdoorsy = getting drunk outside

This morning I took a little stroll through the old Google Analytics and found that two people in the last month have arrived at my blog by searching for "Mr. RB Memphis."

For serious? I can't make this shit up.

In other news, Mr. RB and I are going camping this weekend. Here's hoping we don't get eaten by bears, or in a more likely scenario, that I don't barf up marshmallows and graham crackers all over half of Arkansas. (Thus attracting said bears to come and eat us. ACK.)

There's a possibility this camping trip will invite the appearance of tall boys into my life once again, so thankfully a computer will be nowhere nearby for me to continually update my status in all capital letters with no punctuation. And, I should clarify -- there will absolutely, without a doubt be beer, but there is a chance said beer will come in tall-boy form. I say this because Mr. RB wants me to try this stuff called Steel Reserve that (as far as I can tell) only comes in a big-ass can. So there are two big-ass cans of it in his fridge, which the other day he referred to as His and Hers.

Hey, better than monogrammed towels, I say.


cheers,
elizabeth

project: patio, no. 1 - 3

That, my friends, is Project Pat. He's a Memphis rapper from the group Triple Six Mafia, and though the group itself is probably most famous for a little Oscar-winning ditty called "It's Hard Out There for a Pimp" from Hustle and Flow, when I think of Project Pat I mostly think of a sweet love song called "Chickenheads."

Project: Patio gets inspiration for its name from the man himself, so his face (and wicked grill) grace the stamp that you will see on every post about the Project from now until October. Consider yourself warned.

This weekend three patios were marked off the list: Central BBQ, Celtic Crossing and Fresh Slices. Here's the proof.



At the suggestion of a friend of mine, Project: Patio is about to become much bigger. As I can I'm going to schedule some patio visits in advance so that more people can plan to attend, and hopefully others will be encouraged to start their own noble patio quests, as well. One big event I can tell you is coming is a Beale Street Patio Pub Crawl to knock out every Beale Street patio in one fell swoop. Can your liver handle it? Details coming soon.

Now, Mr. RB wanted me to do a rating system of sorts for these patios, but I'm not necessarily in this to pick the best one. I just want to get drunk outside. But in lieu of some type of review, I've created two items that I'll give you for each and every patio. What I Loved and Why You Should Get Drunk There.

Central BBQ
What I Loved: The patio at Central BBQ feels like a big-ass family picnic.
Why You Should Get Drunk There: When the drunk hunger really sets in, you can just order (more) pulled-pork nachos. INCREDIMOUTH.

Celtic Crossing
What I Loved: What don't I love about this place? It's the local. They have Ghost River Golden on draft and a huge tree growing out of their deck.
Why You Should Get Drunk There: Because you'll probably run into me.

Fresh Slices
What I Loved: I love the location, because their front-of-store seating provides the best kind of people watching. The kind that involves cute dogs being walked by your table every five minutes.
Why You Should Get Drunk There: The bean dip was the bomb, and even though they don't have any draft beer they make up for it with a very decent bottled selection.

cheers,
elizabeth

memphis style, ya heard

On Friday, Holly finally met the man, the myth, the Mr. Risky Business.

Of course, the whole boyfriend meets the best friend thing really would be more monumental if Holly and I saw each other more than a few times a year and were capable of doing anything but chattering at each other 150 million words per second in an unintelligible spew of inside jokes. Inside jokes which, God love us, we do try to explain, but when you're talking at 150 million words per second it can still be pretty confusing.

After dinner with Mr. RB (at Central BBQ, the very first patio in Project: Patio, blog post coming soon) we hit up the local for a drink (that'd be patio numero dos) and then headed home to get into our jammies and watch Sandra Bullock adopt an underprivileged kid in The Blind Side. And we loved every second of it and we boo-hooed over our Muddy's cupcakes and then, y'all, we made a huge mistake. We looked at Michael Oher's Wikipedia page. Have you ever seen a picture of a radio DJ and wished you hadn't? Same thing. The truth was a little bit uglier than we'd imagined.

On Saturday we headed to the Stax Museum, one of my all-time favorite Memphis spots, and danced and sang our way through soul music history. And then, while stopped at a light on the way home, a group of pre-pubescent boys on the corner started cat calling us. And unlike the gentleman later down the road who hollered into our open windows, "I love you baby," they took a more direct route at getting our attention and yelled, "Hey white girl!"

After lunch at the Beauty Shop, we headed to Target to procure goodies for Easter baskets for our respective significant others. Easter baskets, of course, with tiny bottles of booze. (And maybe dainty underthings.)

We spent our afternoon downtown, bopping around South Main and Beale and gawking at houses in Harbortown.


That evening we dined at Huey's with Stef before getting cute and heading to Mollie Fontaine's for a drink. We ended up gettin' real good and drunk on Saturday night, and I'll tell you why in a moment. First I need to tell you that we ran into Mr. October at Mollie Fontaine's. I walked into an upstairs room and saw him and I made no attempts at covering my mouth when I turned to Holly and said OH MY GOD and probably even pointed. With both hands. And runway flares. It really wasn't so dramatic except this was the first time I'd seen him since our Hindenburg of Awkward, and Holly was there to witness it and to see him in person for her very own self. It felt like we were in a museum of my dating failures for a minute there. No tapping the glass, please.

We ended up quasi-following him back downstairs (because we wanted to perch around the piano with our friends the gays), but we didn't talk. Probably because he knew the conversation would end up on the blog. Aha, Mr. October! We don't even have to exchange words and you're making an appearance. EVIL GENIUS.

After we left Mollie's we stopped at the Mapco for some tall boys of Bud Light and assorted treats (MoonPie, mmm) because we had made plans earlier in the evening to do it real Memphis style. Which meant take off our bras and drink on the front porch.

Before dinner, we'd been Facebook stalking. And I finally remembered to ask Holly to try looking for Boyfriend No. 4. Because I'd looked for him not that long ago and was under the impression he'd left Facebook. He wasn't listed anywhere, at all. And I think somewhere, I suspected I knew what had happened. And when Holly plugged his name in the search bar it was confirmed. He'd blocked me. But as soon as we clicked on his profile picture we knew why.

He proposed to his girlfriend. On Valentine's Day. In New York.

And y'all, I don't want to be married to him. I don't. He was a controlling jerk who treated me like garbage and called me names and made me cry. And cry. And CRY, sniffle, snort, snob, snotty cry. No thank you. But it doesn't make that any easier to see. And so, we got ourselves real good and drunk that night.

And as we were real good and drunk, we proceeded to write on the Facebook walls of just about everyone we could think of. Mostly in all caps. Mostly with no punctuation.

And then, in celebration of how we'd spent our evening, I changed my facebook status to the following:


cheers,
elizabeth

talkin' southern & patio sittin'

Today the fine, fine readers worldwide of Lemondrop.com will come to understand the glittery mysteries of the Sweet Potato Queens. An old friend of mine from my intern days in New York is an editor at the site now and approached me to write a first-person piece about losing my SPQ virginity after seeing my Facebook pictures of the parade and being (understandably) entranced and enthralled by big boobies and huge fake hair.

(You can read the story here.)

I don't know if it's just because it's on another site, a site that is not entirely written by crazy Southern women, that my voice seems so distinct when I read this piece. So distinctly Southern. And I know that the subject matter influences that tone tremendously; before mom and I even got out of the car in the hotel parking lot that weekend, we were drawing out every vowel and sounding like we'd just driven up to the big city from some rural backwoods holler.

And y'all, I loved it. Because the thing is -- and I may have only come to terms with this in recent times -- I love being Southern. There is nothing like Southern culture, Southern sensibilities, Southern traditions, Southern women. Nothing like it, not anywhere.

If there's anybody who feels the same way, it's my best friend Holly. In just a few hours she arrives in Memphis, and we will surely spend a good chunk of our weekend talking to each other in accents so thick and country they would require subtitles and skilled translators to decipher. I will have documentation of our adventures for you come Monday and surely many tales to spin.

Additionally, Project: Patio has commenced! The first patios will be sat on this evening and the photographic evidence will be collected. I was going to say, 'brace yourself,' but really I should be bracing myself. It's going to be a long, drunk summer.


cheers,
elizabeth