The Girl With The Cute Shoes

Like most humans on plant Earth, I begin my workdays with a field trip to Starbucks.  A couple of things happen when you walk through the door(s) of Starbucks


1.  Small butterflies (aka tummy bats) begin to flutter in your belly as you realize your are only minutes away from sipping on a tall non-fat, no foam, no water, Chai Tea latte...no judging


2.  Secret conversations are being held in your mind as you look around the coffee shop:

"Where in the world did she get that sweater, its fabulous"

"His belt and shoes do not correlate. His wife probably forgot to lay out his clothes last night"

"That handbag is to die for.  Perhaps I can forego half of my paycheck to purchase one as well."

"Did she honestly think she could walk through these doors without being judged.  Heels and boxers, really??"

"Are those titanium cuff links?"

One particular morning my eyes wondered a little too intensely as I fell in love with shoes worn by the girl in front me.  Normal people would approach this person and politely ask, "I really like your shoes.  Where did you get them?"  Unfortunately, I took the creepy approach and pretended to text on my phone while pointing the camera toward her feet. (You know you have done this).  This act would have gone unnoticed if it weren't for my flash and camera sound that followed.  Taken aback by being exposed, I played it off by saying, "whoa, why is my camera shooting random pictures."  Not sure anyone bought it.  The people behind me probably thought I had a foot fetish.  I am sure she was creeped out.


After the ordeal, I was thankful that I captured a picture of these cute shoes so I could search online and order.

Creepy picture I took (and even creepier that I am blogging about her)

The Actual Shoe

DC Villainess Jute Women's Flat Shoes

20 by the 20th

A dear friend of mine began a list of things she wanted to complete by her next birthday:  26 before 26. 


Inspired by this, I started my own list.  Although I will not be turning 26, my birthday is Jan 20th and I wanted to complete 20 things by the 20th.  While watching football and sipping on mimosas, my list began....


1. Run a  5k
2. Complete a 1000 piece puzzle
3. Start and finish a book
4. Cook a lobster (yikes)
5. Go to a concert
6. Walk a dog 
7. Watch a foreign film
8. Barter on a price and succeed
9. Buy someone's order behind me in a drive thru
10. Give to charity
11. Play a round of golf (The Boo's idea...I am usually just his caddy and beer opener)
12. Bust a gymnastic maneuver on the beach
13. Go on a spontaneous road trip
15. Talk to a stranger and listen to their story
15. Memorize 3 bible verses with Juice
16. Volunteer
17. Clean off my sewing machine and use it
18. Mail a handwritten letter
19. Wrap all spare change in house and deposit in my bank
20. Finish Juice's scrapbook


This is a quite an aggressive list to complete in 8 weeks.  I need to get started in 5....4....3....2...1

Thanksgiving Weekend

The long weekend was filled with food, family, friends and a lot of laughter.  I am so thankful to be surrounded by amazing people.  God has truly blessed me.


The Boo's family came over for Thanksgiving supper.  I made my Granny's traditional southern dishes that greeted me every Thanksgiving as a child.   I always get nostalgic this time of year.  I miss my family and Virginia  and how vibrant the trees turn during autumn.   This weekend while The Boo and I were driving, we passed one (1) tree that had turned an fabulous, bright orange color. I screamed like a Justin Beiber fan at the fact that San Diego had a hint of fall foliage.   It was a lovely lolly day.

Getting kicked out of the "Cool" zone

Challenge me if I am wrong, but I am pretty sure  we all have suffered embarrassment from  our parents during our youth.  There comes a time when parents involuntarily leave the "cool" zone and enter the "embarrassing" zone.  My mother took embarrassment to a whole new level. Instead of granting my request to drop me off a block away from the middle school, she would drive on the sidewalk and grassy field while honking her horn to announce my arrival. I could write on book solely on these examples.  For those of you I grew up with and had the pleasure of witnessing these encounters, thank you for pointing and laughing at me.


Now that I am a parent, I have to admit that I have a large small amount of pleasure by testing Juice's threshold.  Depressingly,  I am only steps away being terminated from the cool zone.  She no longer joins me when I bust out my sweet dance moves in the grocery store. She now runs to the car.  So in desperate efforts to remain to remain cool without mortifying my daughter, I decided to get creative with her lunch today.  Inspired by Buddy the Elf, I packed her a surprise for her mid day meal.

Code Words

Codes words are quite popular in my household. They were developed in efforts to soften the shock of for-real words.   In the presence of children, code words provide a clever alternative to the "ear muff" command.

Juice  is at the age where "family planning"  is being introduced at school.   She has a plethora of code words resulting from that class.   I recall awkwardly listening to Mother as she gave me the  "birds and the bees" talk in my younger years.   Apparently, codes words were not invented then and I am still haunted by the for-real words she used during that discussion. I will have to say, as a parent, it is much more enjoyable being the informer rather than the receiver of such news.  Call me insensitive, but watching a child's deer-in-headlights facial expressions as they learn the true meaning of adult "special hugs"  is completely hilarious. 


Codes words can also be essential for couples to have when they are in the  presence of other adults.  These words can substitute "shut the hell up" when your significant other discloses you still wear a retainer and sock bun to bed every night. 

Having your own language with special people promotes laughter and fun.  It also provides  confusion for those around you that aren't privy to the transition.  Kinda like being in a nail salon.

Gen X vs. Gen Z

    

Juice, 13 years old going on 19, wants a facebook account.  She cannot have one due to two (2) reasons:  1.) There are creepy people out there and 2.) There are super creepy people out there.  In my day, we had a spiral notebook and No.2 lead pencil if we wanted to write to our friends.  A "wall" was used to display my posters of Corey Haim and Siberian tigers, not something I commented "OMG, I miss you so much xoxoxo" when I just saw them in the hallway.  


In Juice's quest to change my mind about Facebook, I received this email:  

Dear Mother

I, The Juice, have a question for you, Jami Lynn. All my friends have a Facebook and I feel left out that I am unable to join in on the facebook fun. I am willing to do anything you ask. Clean my room? You got it! Do the dishes? Of course! I promise that i will not put up anything thing bad and also to keep pictures of myself to a minimum. 

           Remember I love you very much and i respect you and what you decide. You  can frequently look on my page and post stuff on my wall. I will even be your buddy! Just remember I love you. 

With all love,

The Juice

Convincing but the answer is still no.   If only she could experienced the joy I had when it was Oregon Trail day in the computer lab.

Boys and Toys

When a couple comes together and decides to share a living habitat, two (2) things could happen:
1. You realize that the things you once found cute and adorable are no longer tolerable and annoy the hell out of you
OR
2. You receive internal confirmation that your new roommate adds so much value in your everyday life and living together is the best decision you made.
I'm blessed to be able to experience the latter. With that said, I have been exposed to toys and hobbies that I was unaware of when we lived separately. I am amused and entertained by The Boo’s interest level on subjects I find subpar. For illustration purposes, I want to share a couple of these toys and hobbies.


Note: Most of the time, I run my blogs by The Boo before exposing our lives to the world wide web. When I explained that I will be only be illustrating two (2) of his interests, he responded with “Wait, what about my love for Lance….I’m a cyclist". I fell silent.


Toys and Hobbies
1.  Fish tanks
2.  Beer
3.  Cycling (I was strongly encouraged (aka forced) to include this hobby but I am not certain I am ready to discuss his skin tight shorts and florescent USA themed shirts).


For now, I'll discuss the fish and beer. Cycling and his man crash on Lance deserves its own post.


The Tank
In a man’s world, bigger is better. I suppose this is true in a women’s world as well but we won’t go there. With that said, Booface decided to upgrade his 20 gallon fish tank. Careful planning and attention went into this project. After several hours of painting, siphoning and transporting bucket(s) of water from the bathtub to the living room (love the sound of H2O bombing my freshly mopped wood floors), he transformed his mini tank to a 60 gallon liquid heaven for his fish. I'm pretty sure a small person would be able to do laps in this.

Beer
Let me preface by saying I am a fan of beer consumption. There is nothing better than a cold brewski on a summer day at the beach. I'm referring to The Boo’s need to master the art of brewing beer. With a home brewing class under his belt and the purchase of the necessary equipment/ ingredients, he was ready to concoct his first batch. This attempt resulted in a frothy explosion during the fermenting stage. I was the fortunate one to discover this failed experiment when I came home from work. Now, I’m pretty sure we can all relate to the smell of stale beer at our local watering hole. And I know you all (all 1.5 of you reading this) have experienced the sticky sensation felt while walking through a dive bar. So you must understand the environment this explosion created. Welcome to my garage.


The second attempt was successful-ish and we launched a unveiling party of his masterpiece.


“Babe, I am not sure this batch has a lot of alcohol content, so I think we should chug and wait to see what happens” - The Boo


Awesome. I am going to stop there.

Boys must be chemically engineered to seek fulfillment from experimenting and building. Thanks Bill Nye.

Blog Virgin

According to a statistic I read online (because all things are true on the interest), a new blog is born every half second.  That statistic was dated back 5 years ago so I can assume the number has increased.  Apparently, I am a late bloomer and have not entered into the world of blogging until now.

I do not really have a purpose for my blog nor do I have a lot of significant things to discuss.   However, I enjoy writing about the small things that add value in my life.  I like to share opinions, vent, babble, reminisce on my crazy childhood, etc.  I find humor in my writing and I am not afraid to laugh out laugh over my own stories. So, after much internal debate and with the assistance of Robert Mondavi, my first blog is born.

At some point, I should probably define an objective, identify potential characters that may be presented and determine entry frequency.   One thing I have learned about myself is that I need to set specific goals and milestones.  If projects are left open ended, they are bound to result in procrastination and complete failure.  Although, this approach is too much work and just adds stress if a deadline is missed.  I’d rather use my dad’s infamous K.I.S.S. model:  Keep It Simple, Stupid (and by Stupid, he means Sweetheart…at least in my mind).   So for now,  I’m simply going to write…