I Wish and As I Suspected
Have you been to the My Heritage site lately? There’s a lot of fun to be had there. Take this for example: an 80% match with Jessica Alba??? I’ll take it. And, I don’t quite get why they always match me up with Asian women. Maybe they sense my inner karate. Who knows? Anyway, who wouldn’t be happy with these results?
I thought I’d try another picture and got these results. Lisa Ling? I think I’ll stick with the Jessica Alba one.
Also on that site, who could resist proving your husband’s family wrong? See that 10% more like me.
It must be true, because Lil C got the same results with the above picture with 10% and the below with 12%. Of course, I happen to think they are way off on this one as she is 99% me (including the attitude).
So, who do you look like???
By the way, awesome guesses so far on the German presents. I’ll be revealing the gifts in a future post. Keep guessing!
My husband went to Germany. . .
. . . and all I got was . . .
Well, what do you think? Think I’ll get anything at all (he comes back tomorrow)? I’m going with German shampoo samples from the hotel as my gift.
What do you think he’ll bring me?
Feel free to take a guess, even if you just rolled in here on a google search for scallop food poisoning. My visitor stats are going up like crazy, but my comments are not which means I have a lot of new lurkers. So, stop lurking and take a guess.
If this Post Doesn’t Bring in the Crazy Googlers, I Don’t Know What Will
Filed under: Just for Fun, Lessons I've Learned, Mental Strain for Mama
When I was in 5th grade, giving short drops to girls during recess was a favorite past time of the boys in my grade. For those who are not aware (and oh how lucky you are), a short drop is when someone comes up behind you and pulls your pants down to your ankles. It’s so not cool.
For weeks I had watched this terrible deed happen to my friends, and spent much of recess watching my back. And then one day, out of nowhere came a little punk, who grabbed my pants and ripped them down around my ankles. Thankfully, my underwear didn’t go along for the ride; but that didn’t mean I wasn’t completely humiliated. I spent weeks feeling horrified and embarrassed. My classmates had seen my underwear and it was awful.
Unlike many of the girls who didn’t report it, I made it my business to make sure that my short-dropper got the business, and he did.
Fast forward 22 years. . .
Mr. BBM got free Hershey Park passes for the entire weekend, so we took the girls and brought along our swimsuits since there’s a new water park called "The Boardwalk." Big I and I took a whirl down the "Whirlwind" which was the most amazingly awesome water slide I have ever been on (It’s the big yellow and blue one if you click the link and take a look). Mr. BBM then took his turn with Big I while Lil C and I explored.
It was during our exploring that we saw "The Waverider." If you’d like to see The Waverider in action, go here and click on Podcast 2. Go explore-I’ll wait. Come back because you won’t want to miss this.
(Tapping foot patiently.) Ready now? Good.
Lil C and I spent a ton of time just watching the surfers. It was awesome! There were tons of wipe-outs, an occasional seemingly pro surfer, and lots of in-betweens. I told Big I we just had to try it.
We waited in line for an hour. My original plan was to hang out in line with Big I and then skip it myself, but Big I kept insisting that I give it a try. Big I went first.
I have to be honest; I was super worried. I had watched kids her size get slammed back into the wall at the top of the ride. I had watched kids lose the board and literally eat the wave. Instead of wiping out, Big I rode that wave like a champion.
During her ride, the lifeguards decided to have a conversation about something, and she continued to ride that wave like an absolute pro for far longer than anyone previously had done.
At one point, she even turned around to smile at me as I stood watching her at the top of the wave. She was absolutely stunning and didn’t wipe out once. I was super proud of her, but she was a tough act to follow!
A couple VIP’s cut in line, so by the time it was my turn, I was super hot and wanted to take a dip anyway. I decided I’d try surfing for the very first time. The guy who went in front of me lost his swimming trunks completely and ended up standing at the bottom of the wave in only boxer shorts, so I figured there was no way I could do worse than that.
Here, the lifeguard is giving me instructions.
It went something like this:
Lifeguard: Have you ever done this before?
Me: No.
Lifeguard: (handing me the board) Well, you hold on up here, tight. You stand on the star at the top of the wave and aim for the star at the opposite side of the bottom of the wave. If you want to go left, you lean left. If you want to go right, you lean right.
Me: O.k. but let’s get to the most important thing here. What happens if I have a wardrobe malfunction?
Lifeguard: Ma’am, that’s what the blankets are for. (He gestures towards the two blankets beside him-visible in the above photo.) I’ll cover you up.
Me: Promise?
Lifeguard: (With a completely straight face) Yes.
So, with much trepidation I took that board and walked to the star at the top of the wave. I watched all these kids go diving onto that wave with ease. I wasn’t sure I could be so graceful, but there was a line, so no time like the present.
I took the leap and surfed to the bottom of the wave.
The jets pushed me back up, and it was AMAZING! I was doing it! It was working! I lifted up the front of the board a bit and rode the waves with ease. I leaned left and slid across the wave. I leaned right and slid back to the other side. I wasn’t wiping out like the other people. I contemplated trying to spin or even get up on my knees. I wanted that "Look Ma, no HANDS" moment!
Then, the unthinkable happened. A jet of water hit the exact angle it needed to in order to dislodge my swimsuit, and within seconds I felt my bottoms. . . going south. There were TONS of people standing around the waverider area. There were men, women and children in line to my left. There was a crowd of on-lookers in front of me, another crowd to the right of me. . . and OH MY GOD. . . those people have a viewing angle from ABOVE me, which means. . .
ahhhhhHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! (Don’t you just know it that Mr. BBM would be all Johnny-on-the-spot with an opportune photo too! GRR!)
(Just so we’re clear, everyone who visits this site has an IP address. If you visit often, and/or have ever left a comment here, I know your IP address, which means I know when you’re here, how often you’re here, and exactly what you’re looking at while you’re here. Don’t believe me? Go visit Statcounter and see for yourself. Yes, you may think you’re stalking me unbeknownst to me; but actually I’m hip to your stalkerishness. You know how that creepy little kid in the movie sees "dead people"? Well, I see you. If you should attempt to click on the above picture, remove the strategically placed symbol in any way, or somehow blow up said picture, I will totally know about it. So do me a favor and just continue reading. . . Thank you.)
And now, back to our regularly scheduled program. . .
I reached back with my hand to keep my bottoms from ending up around my ankles. I caught them, but the reach did nothing for my balance of the board. The next thing I knew, the board went flying out from underneath my partially naked butt, back up to the top of the waverider. And then, my body did the only thing it could do. The powerful jets flipped me onto my back and I rode, Teletubby style right up the wave to where I had started. The water at the top of the wave was intense and started pulling my top down as well. I held on to my bottoms for dear life with my left hand, secured my top with my right hand and stayed there, flat on my back in the rapids, until I was sure I was covered back up again.
People were laughing (totally not at me people, with me, with me I tell you). I stood up, and there was the emotionally unavailable, non-blanket wielding lifeguard telling me I had another turn.
"DUDE! Where was the blanket??? Huh? You’re totally not doing your job!" I hissed at him while I continued to fix my disheveled swimsuit. "If I go again, are you going to do your job this time and cover me up???"
His face was completely unchanged as he said, "Yes Ma’am" and handed me the board that had been so violently removed from underneath me. People who call me "Ma’am" bother me greatly; but people who promise to cover up my butt and don’t follow through with said promise totally take the cake in the category of bothersome.
What’s a girl to do? Had this been 22 years ago, a devastated 5th grade BBM probably would have gone to cry in the bathroom. "Hershey Park just saw my butt! Waahhh!!!" But I couldn’t go out on that note, so I dove onto the wave again, and this time surfed flawlessly until my turn was over. Instead of ending my ride with a nudity-inducing wipe-out, this time I leaned to the left and surfed over to the safety of the padded wall and non-jetted water where I was able to get out with my dignity in tact.
Mr. BBM said that the consensus of the crowd was that I had been "good." There was no shortage of kids, especially boys, giving the waverider a try. I definitely think I got some cool Mom points today.
As I made my way out of the ride, there was some cheering. A couple little boys told me I was "awesome." (Geez, it’s practically becoming a trend.) Of course, we’ll never know if they were talking about my surfing skills or my butt; but either way, it was a compliment and I’m taking it.
Rehab
This weekend was just the rehabilitation that any stay-at-home Mom needs. I spent the afternoon sitting in a beach chair, watching the waves, surrounded by good friends, good conversation, and good entertainment. . . .like this for example. . . a self-burial job:
Did you know that British men can turn into leprechauns? I sure didn’t. After this little beach stunt, "RV" (the very cool new husband of my very cool friend) went running off to the sea because he said he had, "sand in me pants." You gotta love the British sayings and accent. It’s just so darn cute. Here’s the very happy couple with a bit less sand. . .
After the beach, we had some refreshing drinks on the porch, before being picked up by some crazy cab driver to go to dinner. We went to a very nice restaurant called "Mia" inside one of the resorts nearby.
This is one of the four servers we had while in the restaurant.
Sheila was awesome, right up until she brought the check and I almost passed out. Can’t read it? It says that the gratuity is $77.48. The total check amount was $493.48.
This restaurant marks the very first time that I spent that amount of money on dinner, but still left hungry. My dinner consisted of about three slices of chicken and two tablespoons of lobster risotto. It was fabulous, but may have been more suited for a little leprechaun (who, by the way, happened to come along for the night out).
We then made our way down the boardwalk to a comedy club. Heels and boardwalks don’t really mesh well, so a couple of the girls and I negotiated a good rate on this "royal rolling cart." The first guy didn’t want to take four of us and was asking for a ridiculous rate, so we huffed off with attitude and were chased down by this lovely man Ali from Turkey who truly got a workout pushing the four of us down the boardwalk. I include the "before" picture of Ali because afterwards he was in need of some CPR, fluids, etc.
Since we didn’t arrive early enough at the comedy show, (and also probably because we were WAY younger than the median as far as the audience went), we were seated in stadium like seating with leprechauns in mind (Are you sensing a theme here?). We spent much of the comedy show wiggling around trying to figure out what to do with our legs. Luckily, my shorter friend switched seats with me so I could hang my legs out in the aisle.
When we weren’t wiggling, we were trying to figure out why we weren’t laughing very much. Tickets to the show were pretty expensive, and all three comedians disappointed. When the second comedian starts almost every joke with "I’m from Oklahoma" you know you’re in for a rough night. "RV," the only man in our crew, actually began to shout pleadingly for him to leave the stage, as in "You suck. Get off the stage." There’s a certain charm when you hear a man with a British accent saying those types of things, which probably explains why we didn’t get kicked out.
We should have all joined in the heckling; we certainly all felt the same. But we were hoping for something better with the headliner (I must also state here that although the comedians were a big disappointment, the complimentary popcorn was not).
When the Oklahoma man was finished with his dismal routine, the headliner came out. By this point, we were all feeling tired and not amused in the slightest. The comedian took one look at his audience, noticed all the white hair and proceeded to make almost his entire routine about viagra and cialis. I don’t know about you, but I get enough emails about that stuff. I certainly don’t want to hear about it in a room full of old men. It was just wrong.
We all needed some pumping up. Our choices were to either wait in line for a dance club and pay a $20 cover, or pay nothing and go hang out at the karaoke bar, Planet Rose. Karaoke it was. . .
While it’s fun to watch strangers singing, it’s more fun when it’s someone from your group of people who gets up there. I’m a good friend like that, so I put my name in and recruited my back-up singers and dancers. There was an hour wait, during which time my back-up girls and I warmed up our vocals on "Girls just want to have fun" and "Livin’ on a Prayer." We were ready, and then it was our turn.
I belted out Amy Winehouse’s "Rehab" the best I could (I could have also received a dental exam apparently). My back-up girls did a fabulous job singing the "No, No, No" chorus, and danced like there was no tomorrow.
I’m guessing it was at least a decent performance because I got several high 5’s on stage, and after the performance one very slurred "awesssoomee" from some guy who could hardly open his eyes.
Anyway, I think I have a new karaoke song. If you’re not familiar with the song, here you go:
Here’s another karaoke performance of "Man in the Mirror" by some of the girls in the crew, with some random guys who offered to help out.
I’ve never been out to a place that stays open past 1 or 2 a.m., but this place did and the next thing we knew, it was after 3 a.m.!
We got another crazy cab driver to take us back to the beach house. "RV," being the British gent that he is, grilled up some hot-dogs (I was sort of surprised he wasn’t serving up Lucky Charms) and we all eventually made our way to bed around 4:30 a.m.
We spent the morning eating bagels and rehashing the nights events. I got home yesterday around dinner time after hitting tons of beach traffic on the way home. I didn’t mind though. It gave me plenty of time to work on perfecting "Rehab" in a car with good acoustics.
When are we doing this again???
The Ultimate Break
I can hardly contain my excitement. I have not had a single night to myself (away from Mr. BBM and the girls) since. . . well. . . I’m thinking somewhere about 1996. This weekend changes all of that.
A college friend of mine got married in June. It was a surprise wedding, and we never had the chance to send her off in true bachelorette style. So, her sister organized a weekend at the beach for her and a bunch of her friends from college. We are all going to hang out at the beach for the day. Evening will bring drinks on the beach house porch, dinner at some swanky restaurant, and tickets to a Comedy Club. I’m hoping for some dancing action after that (We all know that BBM likes to get her groove on).
I didn’t think that guys carried the same jealousy gene that girls do, but apparently I was wrong. At dinner tonight, I told Mr. BBM not to give away all of his one dollar bills because I teased, "I might need those." "Ye-ahh," he grumbled "same rules apply to you as they always have for me." "What rules?" I responded and laughed. Mr. BBM didn’t find it so funny. Heh, heh, heh, it’s always entertaining to mess with a man’s head for a bit.
Then I told him I needed to do some laundry before I can pack my bags. I told him I have no suitable underwear in my drawers. "Who’s going to be seeing your underwear?" he yelled up the stairs at me. "No one! I hope!" I screamed back. Seriously, at this age, it’s all about comfort and not looking like an idiot in case they happen to stick out the top of my jeans or something stupid like that. I’m no teenager; I do have pride. But apparently, he’s a bit worried about this all girl weekend.
I’m guessing that this weekend will probably be pretty tame. After all, most of us have husbands, kids, and a couple wrinkles by now. I haven’t seen many of these gals since I graduated from college back in 1997. I just hope none of my college buddies have traded in the low-rise jeans for Mom jeans and the Mom hair-cut. I sure haven’t. Mr. BBM’s worries are truly pretty silly.
His attitude could be because the last time I went to a bachelorette party, things got a little crazy. I’m always the designated photographer; and I have multiple pictures of a certain cousin of mine dancing with about 30 different guys. I also came home relaying this funny story about how a few of us gals took a rickshaw ride and decided we’d sing Ice Cube’s "You can do it, put your back into it" to the bike rider the entire time he lugged all of us up a huge hill while we laughed hysterically. We weren’t laughing at him; we were laughing with him, I swear. We also gave him a giant tip for treating us to such an entertaining ride.
For some reason, Mr. BBM was not amused when he saw my pictures. I told him he should just be glad that I was the one taking the pictures, not the girls in the pictures (I won’t include those here in order to protect the innocent err yeah, not sure what to put there).
We didn’t just party though that night. I also spent a lot of time discussing hair gel with this dude because seriously, where was that stuff in the 80’s when I was having issues with my bangs?
Have a great weekend everyone! You and I both know I will!
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