Being in a crowded bar with lots of drunks on Homecoming while completely sober- not much fun. If one more drunk slammed into my shoulder I was going to lose it. I tried to make it fun by guessing who was the most likely to throw up on my shoes.
I’m home eating sorbet, icing my shoulder, and petting Lily. Much better.
Violet
You’ve got the lavender aromatherapy going too, right?
When you’re not drinking, drunk people seem really loud and annoying.
Gin & Tonic
Baseball game is still going on.
Arclite
You’re an old. And you’re sober. You shouldn’t be going to bars.
Chill at home with Shadow of Mordor and kill some orks. Maybe watch some Entourage later.
Gin & Tonic
Well, probably not for much longer.
Narcissus
Here’s an idea: Cryotherapy clothing. Water-cooled textiles.
BruceFromOhio
Sounds like any night as the designated driver. Look at it this way, more $ for sorbet.
Who won the steaks?
brettvk
Oh, John — I just saw this for the first time, and I thought of you and Steve:
http://www.boredpanda.com/thula-therapy-cat-autistic-artist-iris-grace/
Bob In Portland
Hmm. Maybe Maidan wasn’t what we were told.
Violet
Since Ben and Jerry’s has gone to non-GMO ingredients they have stopped using actual Heath bars in their ice creams. The replacement “toffee bars” suck. Way too sweet, not enough toffee, too thin. Just wrong.
jibeaux
Well, raise a bowl of sorbet to your brethren and sistren in NC, getting gay-married left and right tonight.
Mnemosyne
There’s a reason for the old cliche, “I drink to make other people more interesting.” Drunk people are only interesting to each other.
Violet
@Mnemosyne: They are occasionally interesting to watch as they do stupid things. When you’re at a safe distance.
Punchy
ROYALS BITCHEZ!!!!!
Anne Laurie
You can also observe the drunkest drunks and prepare little… narratives to share when they’ve sobered up a bit. Use Dorothy Parker’s “You Were Perfectly Fine” as a model:
Corner Stone
Why would you find yourself in a bar in the first place?
dance around in your bones
I have been dealing with that in my household – stories of drunken hijinks that are “hilarious” but really are sad and pathetic from a person in their forties…. ah well. Live and learn.
Anyway, I am moving out on Sunday. I will miss my grandkids immensely (though I can see them whenever I want, being very close by)….but! I got the job I alluded to some weeks ago. I’m going to be a personal assistant to a very Southern Belle with a wicked sense of humor; my own apartment in a rather palatial home, and it’s all so surreal that sometimes I think I am just dreaming.
I mean, I couldn’t have fantasized a better job in my wildest dreams. Wish me luck, folks – and I found this job on Craigslist. Whocoodanode?
I don’t want to say more so I don’t invade my employer’s privacy, but it is sweet. She makes me laugh like no one has since my husband who died 3 years ago. Life is so strange! And sometimes you get lucky!
Wish me luck – I don’t want to fuck this up. O.o
Suzanne
@dance around in your bones: Congratulations! That sounds awesome. I’m glad the FSM is finally taking a load off your shoulders.
So I am making Mr. Suzanne a sushi and sake set for Festivus. I worked on the soy sauce bottle today. Man, do I hate twiddly little stuff. This is good practice, though. Making sets is a fairly advanced pottery skill.
JCJ
@dance around in your bones:
Best of luck! I will send happy thoughts your way.
Violet
@dance around in your bones: Wow, that sounds awesome! I hope it’s a wonderful new chapter for you.
Anne Laurie
@dance around in your bones: Crossing all my various digits for you!
dance around in your bones
@Suzanne: Thanks, Suzanne. I am crossing all my fingers and etc so that I make a go of this. There is travel involved! Woot!
My mom makes pottery, among her many other artistic talents. It’s a beautiful art/craft. I saw the pic of your suggestive jug (haha) the other day – quite nice.
@JCJ: Grazi, grazi, mil grazi. The place I am going to be living in is just – unbelievably beautiful – full of ethnic art that makes my heart sing.
dance around in your bones
@Violet: Thanks, Violet! Glad to see you back again after your worrisome post. I know there are days I feel like it’s just all too much – but we pick ourselves up and carry on, no? See, things just changed for me on a dime! And I was mightily depressed and sad – so….it’s good to wait around and see what turns up.
@Anne Laurie: Oh gads, did I EVER need a GOOD thing to happen in my life! It’s been a rather stressful few years….and now, I have the opportunity of a lifetime. Ya just never know what’s going to happen.
{{{ Happy Dance!!}}}
patrick II
I was driving through Kentucky this week and I saw an ad from the DNC about Mitch McConnell. It said that he has been in Washington for 30 years and has become an “insider”. Also he has given him self six pay raises. (over thirty years, that is only one pay raise every five years.)
Really, after all of the despicable things McConnell has done, that is the best attack ad the DNC could come up with?
ruemara
@dance around in your bones: luck luck luck. Sounds ultra fantastic and you two probably will be a hoot. If she has a friend who needs help I’m free.
It would be nice if I could believe good things happen on a dime, but the empirics have been against that conclusion. On the other hand, I like hearing about good things happening to people.
dance around in your bones
@ruemara: Where do you live?
I’m in Santa Barbara, but as I recall you are the most excellent cook? I’m supposed to do ‘light’ cooking for her, but I’m kind of a lazy cook…maybe we could work something out in the future in some way? Send frozen goodies through the mail or something,,,,Just brainstorming here….Who knows?
Hang in there ruemara – good things DO happen when you least expect it.
Mnemosyne
@dance around in your bones:
That’s awesome! I suppose back in Victorian days you would be referred to as the “companion.” I’m not sure what the modern equivalent (if any) would be.
Karen in GA
@dance around in your bones: Congratulations! And you won’t need luck, but I’ll wish it for you anyway.
Ruckus
@dance around in your bones:
Congrats!
NotMax
After about 12 years of not having a working range or oven (am I the world’s easiest going tenant or what?) found a brand new stove at an acceptable sale price and bought it today, to be delivered on Monday (yes, they deliver on the holiday). Landlady will be reimbursing me for it, which is as it should be.
No more using a two-burner hotplate and a Lilliputian countertop oven when cooking! And can actually cook a whole turkey again for Thanksgiving dinner!
raven
When I quit many years ago I had to tell my wife “I will go out with you and your friends but don’t expect me to think your conversation are fun or interesting”.
raven
@dance around in your bones: Hell yes!!
raven
Advice? I’ve been wearing my hearing aid all day all week. I woke up a minute ago and was dizzy as hell. My eyes seemed to be jerking to my right. I sat back down for a minute a it passed but it was a bit freaky.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@dance around in your bones:
Wow. congratulations! I can’t believe it’s been three years, tho. #WhereDoesTimeGo?
ETA: I guessI was drunk for a lot of that time. Oh well. Anyway, congratulations again.
Aimai
@dance around in your bones: good luck! Sounds like tremendous fun and adventure.!
currants
@dance around in your bones: Best of luck to you–though I’m guessing you’ll just need to be you. Honestly, the job sounds like it could be fun too, so that’s lucky too..(Spoken with envy: haven’t had an actual job I loved, ever. Yet!)
Glad it’ll be easy to see your grandkids (the first time I remember you mentioning them, they were grandbabies)–seeing mine gives me an unbelievable lift every time, even when I don’t think I need one.
So have fun!
Josie
@dance around in your bones: Congratulations on your new job and lifestyle. Sunday will be a magical day. I am also changing my life in a big way – moving 200 miles to a new place to be nearer to my kids. It is the first time I have moved somewhere on my own volition, picked out the place I will live and made all the decisions myself and I am 71 years old. My late husband always made those kind of decisions and I was happy to let him. This is a big change. I feel like I am jumping off of a cliff and expecting to fly instead of fall, if that makes any sense. I am excited and scared all at the same time. Here’s wishing luck to both of us.
Mike E
@raven: Get an appt with your ear doc asap, so s/he can tell you that it’s nothing. :/
Brent
As the saying goes, “If you hang around the barber shop long enough you’re gonna get a hair cut”. Cherish your sobriety, John. Stay away from bars.
Steeplejack
@dance around in your bones:
Good luck! Hope you have a great time.
kc
@brettvk:
Wow, those pictures . . .
dance around in your bones
So naturally I fell asleep just after writing my BIG NEWS and missed all the congrats/good feelings from y’all.
Many thanks to: Mnemosyne, Karen in GA, Ruckus, raven, GHayduke, Aimai, currants, Josie, Steeplejack (I hope I didn’t leave anyone out!)
This job does have the potential to be a hoot. I am already thinking about keeping a journal because the things she says! are hysterical….I come home and tell my daughter about some of our conversations and have her gasping for breath, she’s laughing so hard. There might be a book in there someday….
One last detail? There is a secret door into my apartment that looks like a bookshelf from the house side. It has slider bolts “So I can lock you out or you can lock me out if you want to” sez my Southern Gothic employer. I feel like I’m in a Tennessee Williams play….
Cain
@dance around in your bones:
I can’t but help but recall the movie Deloris Clayborn :)
kindness
Poor John. I know how you feel. When I stopped doing the powders (’87) all of a sudden my tweeking friends were no fun at all. They thought the same of me. It all worked out for the best though.
chuckbutcher
I enjoy bars while happily drinking my iced tea… but when it gets annoying it is time to move along
dance around in your bones
@Cain: Yeah, I realize it sounds rather….Gothic.
I have no plans on killing my employer, however :) That would be the end of my job!
Lewis Thomason
Congratulations, hope you can stick to it.
StringOnAStick
@raven: Sounds like you woke up with vertigo, which may or may not be related to your new aides (been there, still do that). I hit a patch of that at about the same time I started using hearing aides, but it was related to being chronically low on Vitamin D and subject to a lot of viral infections. Getting my D level up put an end to it , so it is worth investigating with your MD – it’s a blood test. A lot of us lose our ability to absorb enough D from our diet as we age, and I’m an outdoors person who lives in Colorado so it wasn’t like I wasn’t getting enough sunshine.
dance around in your bones
@efgoldman: Heh – almost!
I think SP&T has her beat in a few categories, but then – Sarah’s rather unique, shall we say ;)
moderateindy
Call the whaaaambulance Cole’s been inconvenienced again.
I went to get a haircut the other day, and one older gentleman complained to the manager that a lady was serviced before him, even though she walked in after him. The manager explained that she signed in earlier, but the old guy responded that he didn’t believe that, and he wanted to let them know that he was upset. He then proceeded to continue complaining while she was cutting his hair, for another 4-5 minutes about how he didn’t believe that she was in earlier, blah, blah, blah. His extra wait time, was less than five minutes before he was able to get his hair cut.
I couldn’t stop thinking that this guy was a Fox News wet dream. Old guy that went around looking for reasons to be outraged, and when confronted with facts, refused to believe them, and became even more outraged.
Then I read Cole’s post and wondered………..how many years before Cole basically turns into that guy. Happiness isn’t a destination, it is a way of travelling. Perhaps if you concentrated on the positives of the evening, such as being able to hang out with friends and such, instead of the few minor inconveniences, you would have actually enjoyed yourself. Try it some time, before you find yourself at 70, getting all bent out of shape over perceived slights that caused you to almost be incovenienced.