Running

27 Sep 2011 7 Comments

by Love, Jimmie in Health, Imparting Wisdom, Weight Loss Tags: ,

You guys, this past weekend was the weekend for my half marathon. Apparently I am not a woman of my word because I didn’t run it. I would try to blame it on you for not nagging me but somehow I don’t think that will fly seeing as how Lynnette did nag me as did Jane and no one nagged them and they both ran it just fine. I did, however, run the 5K which is exactly like a half marathon only 10 miles shorter. Go me!

This race marks the one year anniversary of my “racing career.” Ha ha. Hahahahahahahaaaa! That sounds so awesome to say “racing career” but if you could see me run, you’d know that the slogan: Slow . . . . it’s the new fast was totally made for me. Still, I’ve run a number of 5K events and one 10K event over the past year and I’ve learned a few things along the way.

  • Even though it should, it matters not how steep the hill nor how many hills you run up during a race, your butt will never look like J.Lo’s at the end of it. Believe me, I speak with authority in this matter. Unfortunately.
  • It is a fantastic idea for food places (specifically, pizza joints) to sponsor a race. They get their name plastered all over the t-shirts which is excellent advertising and they only have to bring six pizzas to feed 2000 people because no one wants to eat pizza at 8:00 am after running three miles in 22 minutes. Win/Win. (Sidenote: Same principle applies to milk sponsors. Chocolate milk after a hot sweaty run = hurk.) (Additional Sidenote: This does not seem to work as well for beer suppliers. Everyone, it seems, runs for beer.)
  • I will cry every time a service person hands me a medal. Really it’s just too much energy to work up a bunch of tears every time I finish a race. It’s a heady experience when you realize that you just did the whole thing, even at a snail’s pace. So heady, in fact, that you might want to cry. But after a while, you realize that your breathing is more important than your tears and you just stop with the tears already because tears and rhythmic breathing do not go hand in hand. However, when a man in uniform who fights for your country in his spare time stands at the finish line with a medal in his hand just for you, a few tears are in order. (It’s possible that I clutched his shirt and sobbed “Thank you so much, for so many things!” It is also possible that I got some mascara and sweat on his shirt but he took it in stride. Good man, that man, whoever he is.)
  • I can run 3.1 miles without stopping. I can run 6.2 miles without stopping. I can run 7.5 miles without stopping and still feel like I can continue on. But I cannot do those things when the temperatures are in the 90s and the humidity is above 100. It seems that I’m a winter running person which really blows because in the South, daylight doesn’t appear in the winter until about 9:00 am and it disappears at 4:30 pm, leaving me to run in the dark no matter what time I actually get to run which really, really sucks.
  • I will be indignant and outraged when a 75-year-old man blows past me on a race course and leaves me eating his dust. And humiliated. I will react in the same fashion when a mom with a stroller full of babies blows past me also.
  • Sparkly eyeliner helps me run faster.

I’m not sure what is next for me now. I’d still like to run a half marathon but I told you I’m currently hyper aware of my knees. I wouldn’t say they hurt but they don’t feel like 20-year-old knees any longer which is just a crying shame. And since Daddy-O had both knees replaced in recent years (which incidentally made him an inch and a half taller as he is now no longer bow-legged), I know that, genetically speaking, I might want to be careful.

We did start a boot camp class at work. They offer it to us two days a week after work and we have a trainer and everything. She’s awesome, at least for the first five minutes of class. After that she kind of takes on this screechy nasty persona who yells stuff like “You can do it!” and “Give me 5 more laps!” and “That was just the warm-up!”

It is just like me to consider giving up running for a while now that the weather is perfect for it. Hmmm, y’all got any suggestions or words of advice? I can’t rely only on boot camp because even though it should, two days a week of doing 400 million lunges does not a J.Lo butt make.  Believe me, I speak with authority in this matter.  Unfortunately. 

Am I Middle Aged? Surely Not . . . . .

25 Sep 2011 7 Comments

by Love, Jimmie in Health Tags:

How I Can Tell I’m Getting Old(er)

  1. I lecture people on the benefits of sunscreen and use it liberally myself
  2. I find men who are financially stable very attractive
  3. You could not pay me to eat at Taco Bell, Krystal’s or White Castle now – ugh!
  4. I don’t really get the whole Justin Beiber phenomenon
  5. The moment the sun peeks it’s pretty little head around the horizon, I am instantly and unarguably awake
  6. Sometimes I buy shoes for comfort and not cuteness
  7. When I do the elasticity pinch test on the back of my hand, I’m not all gloat-y anymore
  8. I have an incredible amount of affection for my own bed
  9. Going out on the town during the work week rarely holds any appeal for me
  10. I’m willing to spend an exorbitant amount of money on lotions, serums and creams for my face
  11. When last shopping for a car, I took consumer reviews into consideration rather than deciding on the purchase because the car was pretty
  12. I am hyper aware of my knees now
  13. I find that I really do care how much fiber is in my diet
  14. I have seriously considered using Preparation H on the bags under my eyes
  15. I realize daily that gravity is not my friend

 

How I Can Tell I’m Still Young(ish)

  1. I yearn for a kick-ass tan
  2. I have pictures of hot boys with giant arms on my desktop
  3. I will pay you to let me eat at Chipotle nearly every day
  4. I will cut you if you disrespect George Michael, gay or not
  5. Even though I immediately awaken when the sun rises, I still lounge around in my bed, making love to my pillows as long as time allows
  6. It is important to me that I have cute running shoes that match my clothes
  7. I still wear pigtails and have freckles on my nose
  8. My desire to travel trumps my affection for my bed almost every time
  9. I don’t care the day or time, I would spend half my paycheck on tickets to see Adele
  10. I’m willing to spend an exorbitant amount of money on mascara that makes my eyelashes look like caterpillars
  11. When last shopping for a car, I made the salesperson get into the backseat with me so I could gauge how much make out room there was back there
  12. I find that no amount of money is too much for a good push-up bra
  13. My wanting to lose weight has a little to do with my health but overwhelmingly to do with how I look in my bathing suit
  14. The thought of purchasing Preparation H for any reason at all mortifies me beyond all belief and I have never quite brought myself to do it
  15. I am in awe of all of the things still left for me to learn and discover in this lifetime

What does it say about me that it took me all of ten minutes to make the Old list and three days to make the Young list?

New Dammit Todd Story

20 Sep 2011 Leave a comment

by Love, Jimmie in Friends Tags:

I can’t believe I forgot to tell you guys this story!  This fits in with my Food, I Loves It Philosophy and is one more reason why I luff/hate Dammit Todd. 

I love this story! 

One day, Dammit Todd was hongry.  I mean hongry.  It was nearing lunch time and he needed a plan for food.  He is a recent college graduate (and by recent, I mean he graduated more recently than I did), so he still functions well under the direction of “spend little/gain a lot”.  Basically, he wanted to do the most amount of damage for the least amount of money. 

He pondered this for a bit and then made a decision: Pizza Hut buffet. He counted his money.  He worked up an eating strategy: two pieces of pizza per plate; eat methodically; eat slowly;  and, no beverages, as beverages take up precious stomach room.  He would go it alone – he needed all of his concentration for his food.  No distractions from anyone would do.  And the best part?  He weighed himself before he left.  I’m not even kidding.   

He returned to work after his hour lunch break.  He weighed again.  Total gain: four and one half pounds.

Doesn’t he make you sick?  Don’t you just admire him at the same time? 

In Which I Almost See Pee-tah Naked

18 Sep 2011 2 Comments

by Love, Jimmie in Friends, Health, In Which I Throw Myself Under The Bus Tags:

I realized recently that I barely talk about Pee-tah on this here blog and that is a tragedy.  He is one of my all time favorite people, so I decided to share with you the story of how I almost saw him naked.  This is a long one, the longest yet, so go get some coffee or something and settle in.  Also, please know that probably I should have asked his permission first but you know, he never told me I couldn’t share it.  That’s permission enough for me. 

I’ve known Pee-tah for a few years now.  Long enough to consider him a very close friend, and long enough that we both know we can count on the other in times of trouble.  So when Pee-tah called one day to say he wasn’t feeling well, wondering if I would take him to the doctor, I said yes. 

I pulled into his driveway and he came slouching out.  This was a bad sign.  Pee-tah never slouches.  He’s always chipper.  He got into the car looking feverish and moany and we took off.  I was pretty concerned by this point.  He told me about the medicines he had tried already and the conversations he had with his mom about his sickness. Halfway to the doctor’s office, he said, “Jimmie, I’m sorry, but I think I have meningitis.” 

“Hahahahaaa!  Ha.  Ha?  Really?” Oh crap. That’s bad, right?   

Needless to say I stopped breathing and floored it all the way to the doctor. 

Turns out Pee-tah had strep throat which, you know, is close to meningitis.  So I drove him around to the pharmacy and got him some drugs and tucked him into his house with strict instructions to at least drink some chicken broth and just go to sleep already. 

Pee-tah can be known to have a weak-ish stomach, probably because he never remembers to put food in it, and his stomach gets all befuddled when some strange mixture (like potatoes or lasagna) hits it.  His antibiotics were strong, horse strong, and made him nauseous for a while.  The barfin’ worked his stomach muscles over pretty good (and I’m certain he will never eat a chicken sandwich again) so he was nice and sore a day later. And still kind of feverish. 

He called me and asked if I would come spend the night.  He didn’t want to be alone if he resumed the barfin’ and me being a good friend said, sure.   

What I really said was, “Well, I have to go to the gym first and then I have dinner with a group and then I will go home and pack my toothbrush and after all that, I will come over.”

And Pee-tah said, “Great.  Can you get me some Gatorade and some orange juice too?  Please?” 

Because I was worrying a lot about him, I bought loads of things at the grocery store.  I had orange juice, four different kinds of Gatorade, chicken broth, Jell-O and about two other bags full of stuff.  I like to feed people.  It comforts me.  Also, because I was worrying a lot about him, I drove like a bat out of hell all the way over to his place. I flew out of the car with my giant grocery bags, immediately tripped over a brick and dropped everything in my hands including my phone which broke into lots of pieces.  From face down on the driveway I sighed, “Well, f*ck.”  Faintly, I heard Pee-tah say out of the front door, “Jimmie?  You okay?”

With scraped knees and skinned palms, I made my way into his house and set all my stuff down.  Pee-tah looked awful.  We chatted for a while, he drank some fluids and I doctored my skinned knees.  He had a cozy living room with two giant couches so he was stretched out on one and I was stretched out on the other.  We both were kind of dozy and tired, thus we fell asleep on our respective couches.  I woke up often in the night and would ask, “You doing okay, Pee-tah?”  And he would say, “No,” and I would go back to sleep.   

At 5:30 the next morning I realized that Pee-tah didn’t answer my “You doing okay” question and at that time, I decided to take it seriously.  I found him upstairs on his bed facedown with his butt up in the air like an infant.  He was moaning and writhing around and we knew this was not good.  So I bundled him up and stuffed him in my car while he began calling his doctor to get her advice on what we should do.  My plan was to wait until 7:00 when the walk-in clinic (which was across the street from my apartment) opened. In the meantime we were going to go to my house so that I could take a shower.  Mind you, I had been at the gym the night before and had not showered.  I had dinner with the group and had not showered.  Then I slept on Pee-tah’s couch in my gym clothes with my gym hair and had not showered.  My knees were skinned and I had not showered.  Also, Pee-tah had not showered in a couple of days and was wearing two-day old sick pajamas.  Hot stuff, we were. 

On the drive over to my place I kept reassuring him, “I’ll just run up and take a quick shower and put on clean clothes.  This is probably just a bad reaction to the antibiotics and you’ll be fine in an hour.  You can hang on for an hour.  It’s fine.  Drink some Gatorade.”  I really wanted that shower.   

We pulled into the apartment complex and hit the first speed bump.  That was the first time Pee-tah screamed.  He then screamed when we went over the second one and the third one.  By this time, my apartment was in my sights and I was determined to not smell like rotten bunghole any longer. His screaming was symptomatic of the speed bumps, nothing else, I reasoned.  Except by the time we crossed the fourth speed bump, Pee-tah had gotten hold of the doctor, screamed in her ear and she suggested urgently that we go straight to the emergency room.  So I swung by my apartment in my rush through the parking lot, waved at it and drove him to the ER.

What a sight we were – neither of us having showered in more than 24 hours, me with skinned knees in wrinkled smelly clothes, Pee-tah walking in bent at the waist like some decrepit old man.  I’m surprised they even let us in.  He was admitted and we got a room.  By this point, Pee-tah was in agony.  The only way he could get moderately comfortable was to lie on his side and have me rub his back.  I was seated behind him with my mop of hair, my disgusting clothes, my bloody bandages, my head down, rubbing his back when the doctor came in.  And asked, “Are you his mother?”   

 . . . . . . .

Pee-tah stopped breathing.  My hand stopped moving.  Pee-tah then gasped and said, “Oh, Jimmie.  I’m so sorry . . . .”  I looked up in horror and for once in my life, was speechless.  Pee-tah is a grown man. The doctor realized that suddenly something had gone seriously awry and immediately began the examination.  Pee-tah said later that his pain kind of went away at that moment, just for a few minutes.  Oh, the humiliation.

Here we began the real waiting process.  Pee-tah had every stomach test known to man.  They very much wanted a urine sample and kept coming in with this funky bottle, handing it to me and saying, “Any time he can go, please get us a sample.’ 

Now I don’t know about you, but even though I luff my friends, I don’t particularly want to see any of them naked.  I don’t really care if you are dying from the meningitis, I don’t want to see your nether parts.  Pee-tah, the one currently dying, kept saying, “Jimmie!  I don’t care!”  And I kept going out to the nurses’ station saying, “Y’all better come stick this thingamabob up in his nether parts cause I’m not gonna do it. I do not want to see my friend naked.”   We finally got a sample and it was determined that he had appendicitis.   

Let’s recap.  Pee-tah was diagnosed with strep throat on Monday.  He spent Tuesday barfin’, we thought due to horse strength antibiotics.  Wednesday he went to the ER and was diagnosed with the appendicitis.  Then it was all oh-holy-crap-get-him-in-the-operating-room-NOW-NOW-NOW-cause-we-are-gonna-lose-this-kid-and-his-mother-is-already-a-haggard-mess-did-you-get-a-look-at-her-get-him-on-the-table-now!  And they left me alone in the room with him with strict instructions to get his clothes off of him and dress him in this fetching paper towel that we call a hospital gown, open in the back, please.  So there we were.  Pee-tah needed to get naked.  And I was his only option.

With much finagling and draping of blankets and tugging at undergarments with my eyes averted, we got him disrobed and re-robed and I saw nary a nether part.  Off he was trundled to the operating room and only three point five hours later did he come out alive.  He really was near death.  Parts of the appendix had started to rupture but those parts were all up in the spleen or something so they couldn’t see them in the x-rays and it took them a while to get the toxic infection all out.   

Meanwhile, I went home and finally got my shower and my hair goo and my smell pretty and some proper band aids for my knees (because everyone knows that large bandages on knees don’t spell tramp at all).  When I got back and checked on his progress, they asked, “And you are?  His sister?”  The same people who had me sign release forms and strip him and try to get me to hold bottle thingamabobs up to his nether parts didn’t even recognize me.  So you can totally see why the guy at the gym is hot for me, right?

EPILOGUE:  A year later, nearly to the day, Pee-tah was visiting a friend in Cincinnati when he had to go to the ER for a serious stomach pain. Turns out the surgery the year before had left some stuff twisted and a part of his bowel died.  So he had another major surgery wherein they removed a foot and a half of his intestine.  And now he’s fine.   

You are fine, right Pee-tah?

The end.

 

A Guest Post, By Woney

14 Sep 2011 1 Comment

by Love, Jimmie in Friends, Guest Post, Imparting Wisdom Tags:

I will be 48 this year.  Forty-eight.  Two less than fifty.  I will officially move from my mid-40s to my late-40s.  In musing over the fact that, with any luck, I’ve only hit about the mid-point of my life, I thought I’d look back at some of the things I’ve learned.  Here’s 48 of them.

  1. Never live to work, only work to live. 
  2. Buy a comfortable mattress.
  3. Travel.
  4. Singing your heart out will always improve your mood.
  5. Step outside of your comfort zone and do something scary.
  6. It’s none of your business what others think of you.
  7. Be nice to the janitor. Your true character shows through in how you treat the “invisible” people.
  8. If you love someone, say it the instant you realize it.
  9. Live alone at least once in your life.
  10. Tell the truth or keep your mouth shut.  Lies take an enormous amount of wasted energy to keep straight.
  11. Now only lasts for one second.  Live in the present.
  12. Sometimes you have to walk away from certain people, even if they are your family.
  13. You can choose to be happy or you can choose to be miserable.  Choose happy.
  14. You never look as bad or as good in a bathing suit as you think you do.
  15. Life is painful, but suffering is optional. 
  16. Most people who ask for your opinion don’t really want it.  They simply want you to validate their opinion.
  17. Flossing is overrated.  Really.
  18. Nothing is as easy or as hard as it first seems.
  19. You’re never too old for a coloring book and crayons.
  20. Fear and jealousy are wasted emotions full of negativity.
  21. Sometimes you have to lose your way to find yourself.
  22. Hotel room sleeping is the best kind. 
  23. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.
  24. Never exchange what you want most for what you want for the moment.
  25. When you feel good about yourself, you feel good about your world.
  26. Friends-with-benefits are really fun, but it can also be really dangerous.
  27. When you judge others you aren’t defining them, you’re defining you.
  28. Las Vegas is only fun for 2-3 days at a time.
  29. Happiness has two ingredients: Forgiveness and gratitude.
  30. There is a very big difference between hearing and listening.
  31. Nobody wins a war.  Somebody just loses less.
  32. Listen to your heart.  Your heart will never lie to you.
  33. Massages are worth every penny.
  34. So are personal trainers.
  35. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
  36. Money is a lousy way to keep score.
  37. Take each disappointment and setback and ask yourself, “Will it matter 5 years from now?”
  38. Make peace with your past so it doesn’t screw up your future.
  39. Sometimes the hard thing and the right thing are the same.
  40. Respect the people who find time for you, but love the people who make time for you.
  41. Ask why until you understand.
  42. Start saving for retirement with your very first job.
  43. Don’t be too eager to find out a secret.  It could change your life forever.
  44. Eating a whole bag of Hershey Kisses will make your stomach ache, but probably not enough to never do it again.
  45. One of the greatest inventions of all time is Google.
  46. No matter how bad it’s been, you should always be able to cite at least three good things about your day.
  47. People will forget what you said and what you did, but they won’t forget how you made them feel.
  48. And in the immortal words of Yoda: Do or do not, there is no try.

Happy Birthday, my forever friend.  Love, Jimmie.

The Logic Of A Six-Year-Old

12 Sep 2011 Leave a comment

by Love, Jimmie in Family

Tigger, my niece, is six.  Last week she lost her first tooth.  Her adult teeth were coming in already and she’s been telling me for weeks that her baby teeth are loose. Then she would demonstrate by wiggling her finger over her teeth a whole lot, yet the teeth never moved.  She wiggled at it and worried the mess out of it to no avail.  Finally, though, the tooth got loose and she was ecstatic. 

So last week she was ready for it to come out. She was insistent.  Rumor has it one of her friends got ten bucks for her tooth so I imagine this had a lot to do with it.  (BTW, Tooth Fairy – screw you.  I remember getting quarters for my teeth.)  She insisted so much that Martie grabbed a tissue and gave that tooth a twist and sure enough, it popped right out. 

I called Tigger the next day to see how much the Tooth Fairy left her.

Jimmie:  Hey, baby, did the Tooth Fairy come? 

Tigger:  Yes!  She left me a five dollar bee-yul!

Jimmie:  Wow, five dollars, huh?  That’s nice. 

Tigger:  Uh-huh.  It smells life barf.  It’s magic.

Jimmie:  I’m sorry, what smells like barf? 

Tigger:  The five dollar bee-yul.  Like barf.  That means it must be magic.  I bet I can buy ten dollars worth of stuff with it.

I wish I had that kind of optimism.  I don’t know about you, but stuff that smells like barf has never been magic in my book. 

Anatomy Of A Pick-Up Line: Men, This Is Not How It’s Done

08 Sep 2011 1 Comment

by Love, Jimmie in Imparting Wisdom, Weight Loss Tags: ,

If you want to hit on my sweaty hot mess of a self at the gym with the flushed face and just-rolled-out-of-bed hair (and why wouldn’t you – it’s an alluring package), please use the following guidelines to do it correctly. The guy from Tuesday should probably have read this before attempting.

Be taller than me:

We have established that this is important to me. 

Ooh, he gets one point

Be cute: 

You don’t have to be conventionally pretty by the world’s standards. 

You just have to be pretty to me. 

Yummy, he gets one point 

Be friendly: 

If you are a stick in the mud, we aren’t going to have a lot to talk about. 

Fantastic, he gets one point

Have giant muscular arms:

I like the gun show.

Purr, he gets a point for each arm.

Don’t hit on me after you have hit on all my friends: 

Minus one point per friend.

Yeeaaaaahhhhh . . . In this case, he loses three points 

Be positive:

When I say I’m gross, you say “Stop saying that.”

I like it, score one point for him

Be original:

“How much longer do you have on the treadmill?” queries he.

“About six minutes,” reply I.

“When you get done, come to the steam room,” commands he.

“What? Why?” query I.

Responds he, whilst staring at my bosoms, “So you can give me a hug . . . I’d like to ‘try that’ <leer>.” 

Minus one point for every time he has used the same pick up line on a friend.

Euw, in this case, subtract three points

But who cares?  He’s a million points down just for skeeze.  

I don’t think he will ever pull it back out of the negative.  His loss. 

 

****************************************************************************

Also, two funnies for you. 

Seamus would die if he knew I posted this picture.

 

And, a conversation between co-worker Hulk and Jimmie 

Hulk:  I would share my umbrella with you but your hair is too big.  It won’t fit.

Jimmie:  My hair is too big?  Really?!  That is FANTASTIC!

I Am So Spoiled

06 Sep 2011 2 Comments

by Love, Jimmie in In Which I Throw Myself Under The Bus, This Will Probably Get Me In Trouble Tags:

Today, I’d like to talk about work.  Sort of.  I have worked for Boss for about five years now.  I will follow him from one company to the next as our working relationship, while unconventional, works well for both of us.  Much of what I do is book travel for him.  He lives in Kansas and since our work involves designing things for airports in various cities outside of Kansas, it makes no sense for him to stay in Kansas.  You don’t get much work without schmoozing clients and to do that, you must actually go to the client.  As much as I love to travel, even I would have a hard time being away from home that much.

Because his time almost exclusively involves being away from the office and from home, someone needs to keep him grounded and organized.  That person is me.  I’ll wait for you to stop laughing.  I spend most of my days looking at flights on Delta, checking out hotels and booking rental cars.  The customer service agents for these companies know me well.  Once I type in his frequent flier numbers, they answer the phone with an “Oh, hi Jimmie, what can I do for you today?”  It’s ridiculous. 

A few years ago we had a flurry of booking then cancelling then changing then re-booking a trip.  It happens often.  I never think my work is done on a given trip until he arrives and gets settled into a hotel – changes are part of the process.  This particular week, though, I booked a car for his Vegas trip.  Except I booked it in Kansas.  Whoops.  Two weeks later, I booked a car for his Texas trip, also in Kansas.  He called and said, “You know, booking a car in the wrong city was funny the first time. It’s not the second time.”  Mostly he was ticked because the only car left at the rental lot was a baby blue super girlie SUV and he had to drive to his appointments feeling completely emasculated in his foofy vehicle.  It took me a while to live that down.

Now let’s talk about Administrative Professional’s Day.  It happens every year in the spring.  Truthfully, it is another of those Hallmark holidays designed to get people to spend money on other people for virtually no reason at all.  If you don’t, those other people get all bent out of shape, claiming things like “You don’t appreciate me!” and flouncing off in a snit.  Score one for Hallmark.   

This year one of my co-workers who is extremely thoughtful sent a message to Boss about Administrative Professional’s Day.  He said:

Should we do anything for Jimmie? I know we don’t need to “spoil” her, but I figure she may appreciate a small gesture.  Then again, to pay her back for booking you a car in the wrong city, we can get her a spa gift certificate to somewhere out of state. 

To which Boss replied: 

We probably should do something. It’s in a couple of weeks, right?  Surely we can come up with something to embarrass her completely. 

I’m such a lucky person.  Thanks Heavens this is what I got because I did hear rumors of singing telegrams . . . .

Used to, I was the one who took care of the gifts on Administrative Professional’s Day.  I made sure that everyone in the aviation group received at least a small token of appreciation and a nice card.  No one was left out.  It would have been awkward for me to send myself a gift and card and Boss understood this, so every year he would do something nice for me (most likely because his girlfriend reminded him).  One year I received a necklace, the next some very fine chocolates.  My favorite year was the year we were on a business trip in Las Vegas and he offered (read: I made him) buy us tickets to Cirque de Soleil’s Mystere.  I was awed; he was mildly entertained.  And if you’ve never seen a Cirque performance live, I highly recommend it.  Last year we were on another business trip, this time in San Diego, and I wanted to go to the zoo.  Unfortunately, the business poop hit the business fan and the zoo never happened.   

I took this blow graciously (after throwing the mother of all fits); however, my graciousness did not allow me to let him forget the failure to buy me presents.  So when his vacation rolled around that summer, his girlfriend who knew that I had planned most of the vacation called to ask if I had any special requests.

“Buy me something pretty,” I said, “since Boss ditched me in San Diego.”  I have a mind like a steel trap, y’all and had no issue with throwing him under the bus. 

“Okay, great,” says Girlfriend, and she comes back with a lovely beaded bracelet from Costa Rica.  She was quite excited about the colors and the charms, just knowing I would love it.  She was particularly charmed by silvery palm trees and couldn’t wait to show Boss what she had purchased for me to get him out of the Jimmie-imposed doghouse.

 

“Those are not palm trees,” said Boss.

“Sure they are,” said Girlfriend. 

“Nope, honey, they aren’t.” 

“What are they then?” she asked.

 

Oh, she’s so cute.

This year I got to help plan his vacation again.  I told you, I’m nothing if not a planner and I love this stuff, even if I don’t get to go.  This year Girlfriend, wiser than she was last year, bless her naive sweet soul, bought me another bracelet from the wilds of Belize.  Isn’t it pretty?  Methinks we have started a trend.

 

 

Really? Thanks A Lot, Lee!

05 Sep 2011 1 Comment

by Love, Jimmie in I'm Going Somewhere

Labor Day weekend was supposed to be a weekend of bronzing myself in the sun.  I was to drive down to visit Daddy-O and JiJi and come back looking like browned butter.  The Squirt and I were going to hit the beach every day and for once in my life, I was not going to have skin so white it’s almost clear.  Hurricane Lee fixed that.  Instead of this,

 

I got this.  Ew.

 

Happy Labor Day .  . . . . sigh . . . .