This may or may not be a true story

I went to the beach this past weekend with…some people. And while I was there, these…people and I decided to go out to dinner at a fairly nice restaurant in town. I’d eaten there before and was glad to go back, because after all, most everything on the menu is fresh seafood smothered in some kind of rich delectable sauce. What’s not to love?

So me and my…posse…go out and have wine and sangria and yummy salads and the most deliciously buttery, warm, fresh grouper in the whole world, which just happens to be covered in, oh yes, golden smooth bearnaise with just a hint of heat. After this orgasmic meal we’re all sitting back in our chairs, fat and happy, eyes glazed over in ecstasy when suddenly I hear next to me:

“SHIT! Shit, shit SHIT!”

And at first it doesn’t register, you know? You don’t really equate someone screaming “shit!” with a nice restaurant. You don’t automatically think, Yes, that’s something that totally happens here all the time, when you see the woman that gave birth to you your dinner partner leap from her chair at the table and scramble over top of you to get out and away. Away from what, you ask?

Away from the cockroach.

This nice establishment, it seems, has a little problem with bugs. Now granted, I’ll be the first to admit that we live in the extremely hot and humid South, where roaches (or water bugs or Palmetto bugs or whatever you want to call them) like to hang out. In fact, I’ll also admit right here on The Interwebs that we’ve found a handful in our house on occasion. Roaches like to either a) come in out of the rain to find a nice dry spot or b) come in out of the dry miserable heat to find some water. Odds are likely that if you live here and your house isn’t brand new and built on a concrete slab you’re gonna encounter one of these things at some point in your life.

But I bet you didn’t figure you’d find one RUNNING OVER YOUR FOOT in a swanky eatery. Me neither, and my table mate didn’t think so apparently, what with the SHIT SCREAMING SHE DID.

So here we are, drunk on mostly wine but also some food, and the other four of us are looking around quite befuddled because we don’t exactly know what’s going on. I mean, we know my mother this woman has abandoned our table and run for the hills but at first we aren’t quite sure why, and then we hear her saying something about a roach and can someone please get the manager and then the next thing I know, my aunt another one of our nameless table mates has pulled the maitre d’ to the side to start asking for the bearnaise recipe and Oh, don’t worry about her, it was just a little Palmetto bug and so tell me will you, did Chef use this or that in his sauce and do you see, Elizabeth, do you see how I’m distracting everyone from this minor little scene with my recipe request, do you see how no one NO ONE AT ALL notices what’s going on here? and so then I walk out the front door because my cell phone is ringing and I think someone else paid for my meal but I’m not sure because in the all the hubbub I might’ve yelled at the table next to us with its rubberneckers and therefore wasn’t paying attention to the bill and LOOK! Here comes the crowd! And they’re acting like it didn’t happen.

Seriously.

We get in the car to go back to the beach house AND NO ONE SAYS A WORD. Someone points out the pretty white lights on the water, someone else points out our friends’ beach house and would ya looky there it seems they’re home this weekend but NO ONE MENTIONS THE SPECTACLE.

This, Internet, is why I love being part of a Southern crazy go nuts family group of people. Shit like this happens. Maybe. On the one hand, the liquor might have made you hallucinate a little, but on the other hand, probably it did happen. Until you mention it later and people are like, Huh? What are you talking about? I recall nothing of the sort. And so then you’re left to wonder whether you’re actually crazy and all that, er, stuff you did in college is coming back to haunt you or whether all the other people are crazy and you’re the only normal one.

But then I get a text message saying that there’s an INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT! at the farm, except that I’m two hours away and so I call my dad to find out what’s up only to get his voicemail and so should I worry about it? Well yeah, maybe, so I call my brother only he’s not answering his phone either and WHAT THE HELL IS UP WITH MY FAMILY TONIGHT? It’s all good the next day, though, when I get the message from my dad that says, in all its Southern accent glory, “There was an intrudah at the fahm, honey, and that intrudah…was me.”

So yeah, whatever notion I had that maybe I’m the normal one was either totally confirmed or completely debunked, whichever way you look at it.

Regularly scheduled broadcasting has resumed

Aren’t you excited? I knew you would be. I am back, peeps! Back at work, back in the real world, back to opening the window at 4am to let the cats in, back to feeling anxious in my office. I really intended to do some blogging while we were gone, but OH MY GOD THE DISTRACTIONS.

First, the Good:

Brian had probably the most fun he’s had in, oh, forever. He chilled out, slept in, grew a beard and drank some beer. He made jokes, he laughed, he grocery-shopped and he told stories about his dad. It was one of the most heartwarming sights I’ve seen in a long time…watching him unwind and de-stress and get back to the person I married. I would give anything to keep it that way, but he goes back to work tomorrow.

I have to say that we truly enjoyed (most) of the time we spent with his family. I know I was a little utterly terrified apprehensive about the sheer volume of people we were going to share a house with, but it was a three-story house with a lot of bedrooms and living spaces and it (mostly) worked out just fine.

Next, the Bad:

My SIL got a stomach bug approximately 45 minutes after we got to the beach house. I didn’t take offense right away, especially when my niece came down with it that night, my MIL’s boyfriend got it and then I fell victim 24 hours later. We went through a lot of Gatorade and Clorox wipes, but then it was all good and we were happy campers once again.

I wouldn’t necessarily call this part bad so much as I would call it THIS IS WHY I’M NEVER HAVING CHILDREN. We took all the kids to the aquarium one day, and on the surface it was an alright outing. There were no screaming fits, no real fistfights, nothing major. But the underlying theme of the entire past week was “I want it and I want it NOW and if you don’t bring it to me/buy it for me/make it appear immediately I will whine and stomp and possibly cry and I don’t care how gray your hair gets because I’M GOING TO GET WHAT I WANT.” At the aquarium, my MIL and Brian and I made a hasty undercover exit at the gift shop because I knew the whining would go up about 37 notches and none of us could take it. I adore my nieces, really I do, but there’s only so much a girl can take.

Finally, the Ugly:

I realized some things about myself on this trip (most of which I’ll discuss at a later date) that I’m not proud of. The first clue was when my 10 year-old niece cocked her head to the side one day and said, “Do you beg Brian a lot?” Oh, yeah, go ahead and laugh; we all did. And it was hilarious up until I started thinking that maybe I do beg a lot, and for what really?

And then I looked around at this family, most of whom are incredibly loving people, and I thought about all the shit that’s gone down between us and all the years I’ve spent talking shit about them and I realized that maybe, just maybe, I’m wrong. Maybe I’m the weird one. Maybe I’m the one who needs an attitude adjustment.

But then I cracked open another Corona, took a big long swig and decided that NOPE, I’m never wrong, and I”m not going to start being wrong now.

Because it wasn’t fun enough already

Okay, this is a quickie because it’s my night to cook supper and I’m between baked potatoes and a casserole. Here’s the rundown so far on how The Vacation’s going:

• It’s so windy here right now that our umbrella has blown away three times and twice we didn’t even notice until it was too late.
• My SIL came down with the stomach flu yesterday and my niece got sick last night. We’re overrun with ginger ale and saltines. And Lysol and Clorox wipes.
• Somehow I twisted my knee in the ocean…waist deep. I wish I had a super cool story about how I was dodging some 10-footer or something, but the truth is that I was standing still watching my nieces in the waves. It’s so not funny that I can’t even try to make it funny.
• Brian’s been to the grocery store three times in 24 hours and he’s in hog heaven. Also, he’s been listening to Bob Seger and now we all have “Night Moves” stuck in our head.
• I’ve only read one book and have only mooched a half-bottle of wine so far. There is still work to be done on this trip!

Tomorrow the masses show up and we celebrate a certain someone’s 71st birthday. More reports to come – stay tuned.

By the numbers

Tomorrow we leave for the beach for a week. I’ve been talking this up for several reasons, not the least of which is that it’s the first time I’ll be spending a week with my in-laws since…ever. We’ve done long weekends, short weekends, overnights, but never a whole big fat solid week. It will be interesting. Also it’s the first time in the five years since we’ve been married that ALL the peeps will be together as one. For at least one night, all of us big and small will gather under one roof, celebrate a birthday and wake up the next day in the same house.

So. Here it is…by the numbers.

30: The number of people that will have drinks at our shrimp boil porch party.

24: The number of pounds my suitcase will most likely weigh.

17: The number of people on the most crowded night in the house.

12: The number of two-liter drinks BB has purchased.

12: The number of two-liter drinks BB has purchased that have both caffeine and sugar.

7: The number of nights we’re staying. (We think.)

4: The number of pork tenderloins it will take to feed half our group.

8: The number of wine bottles accompanying me on the trip.

11: The number of books I plan to read on the sand.

45: The SPF on our six bottles of sunscreen. (It won’t be enough. Expect another post about sunburn.)

6: The number of children we’ll have running amongst us.

2: The number of hours it will take us to get there. (It’s not enough.)

2: The number of cats that will have shred our furniture to pieces because we left them for a week.

1: The number of people I would actually do all this for. You’re a lucky duck, BB!

9 Things To Do On Vacation

This is in honor of the fact that in (almost) a week, Beebs and I will be prone on a beach towel. Drunk. Hopefully not sunburned.

9. Bring enough stuff with you that it looks like you’re moving in for a month. Threaten to stay for a month. Also threaten to not pay for the extra three weeks.

8. Make a bunch of yummy desserts and bring-along things like chicken and pasta salad, then label the containers with masking tape that says “Mine! Don’t touch! I said PUT IT DOWN!” Encourage others in your beach house to help themselves.

7. If the first to wake up, offer to make the coffee. Substitute decaf for regular (or vice versa for the old people), add some Kahlua, sit back and enjoy. Alternately, add a Xanax to the sugar bowl. Sit back and enjoy the newly-chill atmosphere.

6. Bring all the scary DVDs you can find. Tell the children that these are “remakes” of their favorites, but that they are secret and special and must never be watched. Leave DVDs conveniently next to the television. Head out for dinner.

5. Offer your bag of books to the crowd. Suggested titles to bring: The Joy of Sex, Dr. Ruth’s Guide to Guilt-Free Love, How to Handle Awkward Situations, The Family Vacation for the Anti-Social Family Member, Why Children Could be a Mistake for Your Relationship.

4. Start up a card game. When someone mentions Uno, politely remind them that it’s strip poker or no poker. Unless of course, they brought $100 bills to play Uno with instead.

3. Use the phone for long distance calls home to check on the animals. Agree to hold while your cat sitter heads to your house to check on the water bowl level.

2. Take “couples” showers in the outdoor shower next to where the beach chairs are kept. Bathing suits and forewarning your housemates: optional.

1. Before leaving home, print out a Diet Coke label. Attach it to the bottle of Jose Cuervo. Take it with you everywhere you go, especially the movies, proclaiming that you never “travel without my Diet Coke fix!”

These are merely suggestions, of course, for enjoying a vacation properly. Feel free to share your own tips.