Buffalo! Buffalo!

We went to Yellowstone a few years ago and Little Chick was determined to be the very first one to spot a buffalo. Armed with some fancy Zeiss binoculars she kept a keen watch...


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This Deal Doesn't Pass The Sniff Test

Little Chick is obsessed with Webkinz and Neopets. If you don't have a child who's into these online "pet" worlds, I will spare you the detailed explanation. But trust me, they're huge. It's a big deal for the kids to log on and earn points they can spend on digital toys & treats for their virtual pets. Yesterday Little Chick came screaming down the hallway completely thrilled and shouting that she had the greatest news ever.

“Mommy mommy mommy!! I was just on Neopets and I was racing against all these other people to get free specials from the Money Tree and I got one! I got one! I got one! I got a Rainbow Doug!”

“A Rainbow Duck? That sounds cute…” I replied without paying attention.

“No. Rainbow Duuuuug.” As she corrected me I could see she was beginning to realize she had no clue what she was saying.

“Spell it for me, baby” I asked.

And she did very clearly, “D-U-N-G.”

DUNG? I went to the computer to see what amazing deal she had just procured on behalf of her online pet and this is what I found:







With this caption:

“IF IT WASN'T SO SMELLY, EVERYONE WOULD WANT IT”

This is when I had to pull out some old power point presentations from my consulting days and explain to Little Chick the concept of “perceived value”. It may be rainbow colored and completely free, but when no one else wanted it, she should have researched this 'great deal' a little more closely.

But not too closely because after all, it is a steaming pile of manure.
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Angels Don't Work For Nothin'

Unfortunately musicians sometimes do.

Which is precisely why I must take this opportunity to evangelize about my current obsession, Will Hoge. I first learned about Will Hoge last September when I was getting ready for the Austin City Limits Music Festival. Each day for about two weeks I would work on my ACL strategy, reviewing the band schedules and stage locations. I would highlight my open timeslots and engage in expansive research to determine which band would make the cut for one of my precious openings. That’s how I found Will Hoge. I downloaded some of his early songs from Bird On A Wire and listened to them everyday. In my car, on the treadmill. I was totally hooked. By the time the festival arrived, Will Hoge was no longer a placeholder. He was highlighted on my personal ACL schedule as a MUST SEE.

Unfortunately there was a fire at ACL that day and it took several hours to get inside. I missed him.

I’ve tried to stalk him on his tour for the past few months but my real life persona as a homeroom mom and marketing consultant has utterly squelched my time on the road as a band groupie. So you can imagine my delight when I saw the listing: Will Hoge / Austin Texas / at Antone’s / Saturday January 19th.

I’ve had my eye on that show for weeks.

Somehow I thought I could squeeze in a little fishing adventure before the show. I woke up Saturday about 5 am, pulled my gear together and drove an hour south of Austin to fish on the Guadalupe. Amazing day. Great day. Cold cold cold day. I was chilled and completely wiped out by the time I got home. And in no mood to venture out for some live music. No possible way. I was in for the night, bundled-up under a comforter on the couch.

But something called to me. Some sadistic rock-n-roll angel spoke to me and said, “Go to Antone’s. Go see Will Hoge.” Oh no no no. Who was this annoying voice from beyond? Are you kidding me? I’m soooo cozy, and it’s soooo cold outside.

The voice prevailed and I pulled myself together. I knew I had about five nanoseconds to get the hell out of my house before I changed my mind. No time for a shower. Don’t tell, but I wore the same turtleneck and sweater I’d worn fishing all day. I know, I know, so gross. But I balanced it out with some smokin’ hot jeans & boots and gobs of lip gloss. Good Lord I was headed to Antone’s after all. I’m too old for this.

I navigated parking downtown. Found an ATM. And waited in line. Waited and waited and waited in line. I started reading flyers on the wall next to me. Hmmm, what was this picture of Janis Joplin? Whoa! A flyer that said “HAPPY 65th BIRTHDAY JANIS!! BORN JAN 19th 1943.”

Holy shit it was Janis Joplin’s Birthday.

What a cool Austin moment. Standing outside of Antone’s, on Janis’ birthday. Clearly she was the angel that kicked my ass into gear. And thank heavens she did…

Will Hoge far exceeded my bizarrely high expectations. He literally exploded onto the stage, putting a whole new spin on southern rock. The melodies were crisp. The lyrics haunting and poetic.

On the wild songs he would devour that guitar to the point of sublime. Like Otis Redding all jacked-up, he was kicking, sweating, spitting, and spewing out the passion. At times he seemed possessed. I couldn’t tell if I was at a concert or a revival. He was mule-kicking and knocking the mic stand like…like…well frankly, like Janis. Ultimately the crescendo of these big numbers would come to an end. The sounds of the guitar and drums melting away. I was left beaming, and exhausted just from watching. It was hard to imagine he had an ounce of voice left in him. And just at the point I was convinced he must be completely hoarse, just at that very moment he would open his mouth and these beautiful slow songs would just float out effortlessly. Like butterflies. Like syrup. Flowing right along with a soft fiddle and a lovely harmony.


It was magic. I was in love.

I mean the guy has an anchor tattoo on his arm. An anchor! How classic is that.

Needless to say I am so glad I went. Thank you Janis. But heavens, what if I hadn’t gone? What if I’d been too tired and too cold? What if I missed hearing him sing 'Silver Or Gold':

angels don't work for nothin'
i ain't askin' for silver or gold
one day you'll wake up to find that i've left you behind
and it'll just be 'cause you were so cold

Obviously this is a love song. A love lost song. But I can’t shake the notion…what happens to a band like this if the fans grow cold? What if we are just too tired to show up for the show. These bands aren’t asking for silver or gold. Or platinum. They’re looking for gigs. And fans. But what if we don’t show up and one day we wake up to find our favorite band is just gone. We’ll be left with nothing but big labels and mega pop stars.

So do me a favor and check out Will Hoge. If you like what you hear, spread the Word. Then step out and see some of your own local live music. Support the musicians that are slugging it out on neighborhood stages night after night after night. Sing along…shake your tail feathers…

Oh, and don’t forget to tip your waitress.

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Icebreaker

ice•break•er (noun) a ship specially built for breaking navigable passages through ice

The other night I stubbed my toe so hard that I almost threw up. I’m certain the neighbors heard me screaming. Little Chick was eager to be a hero (not to mention escape her homework) so she raced to the kitchen to find something in the freezer that would ease my pain. She returned not with a paper towel filled with icecubes, not a useful bag of frozen peas, but with a hard plastic carton of cookie dough that has been in our freezer since December of 2003.

Yet another causality of divorce neglect. The cookie dough was from a fundraiser at Little Chick’s preschool. My ex-husband handled the order forms and when the damn cookie dough finally arrived I was in such personal turmoil that delivering it to everyone was pretty low on my list. I just never got around to it and I still feel terrible. My freezer is like this evil little time machine. When I see that cookie dough I travel right back to that unhappy era and it chills me to the bone.

Every so often I still have moments where I just freeze up with guilt. Or anger. Like when I have to fill out a form that asks for a person to contact In Case of Emergency. I am continually stumped by this one. I don’t have a husband. My parents live in Tennessee. Can you just list a friend willy-nilly? Is there a protocol for that? Shouldn’t I ask them first, like you’d ask a trustee for your will or a godparent? Is it impolite to offer their name and phone number without their knowledge?

A few years ago I heard about this I.C.E. campaign (In Case of Emergency) that advises you to put an emergency contact number in your mobile phone under ‘ICE’ so first responders can notify them if necessary. This totally threw me for a loop. It’s such a great program but once again, whose number should I use? I still go back and forth. Some days I feel impenetrable and cheeky so I will scour the internet to find the phone number for Britney Spears’ law firm. They’ve got experience in a crisis, right? Or I will put in the number for Domino’s Pizza. I often turn to them when I am stressed and they are usually there in 30 minutes or less. Sometimes I feel like I am co-parenting with my ex pretty well so I will list him. But most of the time it’s my mother, although I feel guilty that her name comes up under ICE. Plus she doesn’t know how to check voicemails on her mobile phone.

You see my dilemma.

When I was first separated I was literally obsessed with this emergency contact problem. It really bothered me that there was no longer a designated person whose J-O-B was to be my very own I-C-E. I remember talking about it with my then-husband. We had just decided to get divorced a few days earlier and we were sort of navigating through some of the logistics in a weird, numb conversation. Nothing was getting solved, I’m pretty sure we were both in shock. The conversation ended abruptly when he suggested it was time to take off my wedding ring.

I felt like I had stubbed my toe so hard that I was about to vomit. My ring? I loved that ring. It was my own beautiful icy little diamond. Suddenly my heart had brain freeze while my brain was pounding against my skull with regular and violent palpitations.

I had to get out of there. I couldn’t handle any more of this so I decided to take Little Chick to a movie.

Thank God for movie theaters. When things got really, really bad, I could still look like a good mom by taking Little Chick to the latest kiddo flick, when really it was just a chance to sit in the dark and not speak to anyone. The Nanny Diaries 2 got the job done as I recall. I calmed down a little and Little Chick was blissfully entertained. After the movie we were debating whether or not to get some ice cream as I pulled out of the movie theater parking lot. That’s when a 16-year old first-time driver sped through a stop sign and nailed the side of our car. Hard.

It all happened in hideous slow motion. My Jeep spun around 180 degrees and then flipped. I was screaming Little Chick’s name frantically as we went over. I ended up with my face in a heap of broken glass which strangely looked like piles of beautiful crystals. I twisted my head around to see Little Chick dangling upside-down by her seat belt. She assured me she was okay but was completely freaked out because I was covered in blood.

The ‘first responders’ were some people getting ice cream nearby. We were extremely lucky that one was an off-duty police officer who carefully extracted Little Chick from the car. It took a little longer but eventually he was able to help me out of what was left of the back window. It was all so surreal. Sitting on a curb with total strangers. Looking at my topsy-turvy car, a wrangled mess. All my things spewed out across the pavement. I think I remember a nice woman giving Little Chick a stuffed animal. The police started to arrive. And people kept asking if they could call my husband.

I literally did not know what to say.

Did I have one? Technically he was still my husband. I still had a ring on my finger, although it was covered in blood. Should I tell them the truth? Should I tell them that I had no one to call. That my life was more of a topsy-turvy wrangled mess than that heap of metal sitting in the road.

Of course I pulled myself together and gave someone his number. And of course he showed up immediately and took us to the emergency room. The three of us went in there as a family, one of our last performances as a trio before the band broke up.

Amazingly, Little Chick walked away without a scratch. I was basically okay as well, all things considered. But I had cut my elbow pretty badly and my left arm was a mess. They picked out glass and asphalt. Everything seemed like it was going to be fine but then I sensed Doogie Howser and his entourage were having a little chit chat outside my curtain. Sure enough they needed to ‘discuss’ something with us. Apparently my hand was swollen quite badly and my ring was limiting circulation to my fingers. They needed to cut off my wedding ring.

My then-husband glanced at me quickly and then gave them the nod of approval to saw away. I don’t know why, but I falsely expected the emergency room to have some high-tech piece of laser machinery expressly designed to remove exquisite diamond jewelry with the utmost precision. Instead they returned with a crude, medieval device that looked like it came from the shelves of Home Depot. This couldn’t be happening. For heaven’s sake, we registered at Home Depot when we got engaged! I thought about how silly I must have looked as a young, sweet little bride-to-be, all dressed up to go register at Home Depot with my fiance. So how did we get here? In an emergency room with someone who looked about fifteen years old sawing the blood diamond off my inflated hand. I’m not even convinced the med student knew how to work the damn thing. It hurt! But he just grinded and grinded and grinded away until eventually he broke through that ice once and for all.

Lawyers were a mere formality after that.

But thank heavens for Time because it heals all wounds, right? Little Chick refused to go to that theater for quite awhile but eventually returned because she wanted to see Ice Age 2: The Meltdown and it was only playing at that theater at the specific time we needed to see it. So technically it was a Time Slot that healed that scar. For myself, I just try very hard not to think about that day.

But I stubbed my toe and Little Chick hurled that frozen tub of cookie dough back into my life. And it led me here. I have to say, this is the first blogpost that has me crying. Tears dripping into my keyboard as I type away. Drip, drip, drip. I feel like an ice sculpture that is finally starting to melt, long after the band has quit playing and long after all the wedding guests have gone home.

I suppose the façade of strength, much like pain itself, has to thaw out one layer at a time. I’m not exactly sure which layer I’m on in this game of emotional strip poker, but I am certain it’s time to clean out my freezer. Time to break through the ice and discover what might spring up in its place.


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VIII is Great

Yesterday one of my closest friends threw a spectacular party for her daughter's eighth birthday. It was an Ancient Greek feast so each of the kiddos dressed as a specific goddess or god while the parents - I mean Titans - sipped on Greek wine and dined on tasty kebabs and delicious spanakopita. The guest of honor was Athena and there were little versions of Zeus, Pandora, Ares, Demeter, Poseidon, Aphrodite plus many many more. They took chariot rides around the sun, roasted marshmallows and ran wild to the equivalent of what seemed like several marathons. It was a truly creative birthday party and a delightful afternoon. Luckily I had my Olympus to snap some pics of Mount Olympus. Enjoy...






















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Seven Things You May Not Want To Know About Me

My friend BD over at The Busy Dad Blog tagged me to write Seven Fun Facts about myself. I’ve been wrestling with this one because I keep confusing fun facts with true confessions. I’ve decided to stop over-thinking this and am just going to pull the trigger on what I’ve got. I’ll leave it up to you to interpret which are Fun Facts and which ones should be True Confessions.

#1 - Thursdays Are Maid For Fibbing

I never understood why my mother always wanted me to clean up before the housekeeper arrived. This made zero sense to me. Well, now that I’m a mom, I totally get it. They can’t really vacuum the floor if it is covered with Polly Pockets, DVD cases, dog toys, dirty clothes, yet-to-be-unpacked-suitcases and the latest art project. But Thursday (Maid Day) comes around so quickly and sometimes I’m too stressed to clean up for their arrival. Lord knows I would die if they – or anyone – could see how messy my house can get. So I just call on Thursday mornings and tell them my daughter is very sick and home from school and we simply have to skip service this week.

Let’s just say they probably think my daughter has a chronic illness.

#2 –It’s Not ‘Just Like Riding A Bike’ For Me

I can’t ride a bicycle.

I did learn how to ride a bike when I was six-ish, I just didn’t like it all that much. I preferred the low-density, earthy power of The Big Wheel. And I don’t really remember riding bikes with friends in elementary and middle school. So I had no idea that I had actually unlearned how to ride a bike until I was at the beach in high school and we all rented bikes. I simply couldn’t do it. I couldn’t turn, couldn’t stop. I was so frustrated I ditched it in some bushes and hitched a ride with my friend’s dad who was passing by in the family station wagon.

#3 – Delta Delta Delta…Can I Help Ya, Help Ya, Help Ya?

It was so long ago that it seems like a dream from a far-off mystical place….but yes, I was in a college sorority and it was a blast. I loved the parties. And the friends. And the songs. I loved playing Elvis in our skit and I was even Rush Chair our senior year.

I’m still best friends with these delta girls. In fact one of them is celebrating a birthday...Happy Birthday Darlin! But her 37th birthday means it is the 16th Anniversary of Whiplashgate.

Whiplashgate. Yikes. Let’s just say I was a bit overserved the night before my friend’s 21st birthday. Beer…boy…hickey. I wore a neckbrace to my friend's formal birthday dinner the next night. Her whole family was there and I had everyone convinced I was in a carwreck and had suffered whiplash. Yeah, I had everyone convinced…for a little while.

#4 – I Love To Decorate Cakes and Cupcakes

I am not a pastry chef. My delectable designs are not very sophisticated. But I love doing it. No one believes I actually decorated the football cake for the Sugar Bowl but I really did, I swear! I also got bored last summer and started doing rainbow trout and other flyfishing themed cupcakes.

#5 – A Regular Annie Oakley

I used to go hunting with my dad, mostly for deer and antelope. And I was actually a pretty good shot with a rifle. I’ve also been bird hunting half a dozen times or so, and while I’m not that skilled with a shotgun, I really enjoy it.

I went to an all-girls high school, and junior year my friends and I decided to join The Riflery Team. I have no idea why we decided to do this. I suppose we were bored with modern dance and cheerleading and basketball. Our initial goal was to beat our brother school, which we did handily if memory serves. But we quickly outgrew worrying about high school boys when we learned we would get to practice on a college campus, ooh la la. Granted it was a dark underground bunker where the Vanderbilt ROTC practiced target shooting, but we thought we were hot stuff prancing across The Vanderbilt campus in our plaid kilt uniforms and saddle oxfords…carrying a rifle case.

After practice we’d go to this dive bar that seemed more than eager to serve underage girls without fake IDs. We would actually go in there in our high school uniforms to drink beer and commandeer the jukebox.

Needless to say that place is no longer in business.

#6 –Like Zoolander, I Can’t Go Left

I don’t like to take an unprotected left in traffic. It makes me feel completely panicked. I will go around the block and out of my way to enjoy the calm, predictable experience of a Left Turn Arrow or a 4-way stop. Life is just too stressful as it is. Seems like a simple way to eliminate a touch of anxiety.

#7 – I’m a Fairly Decent Public Speaker

A few years ago a former colleague of mine enlisted Gov Ann Richards and me to do a presentation to her division/team on public speaking. She wanted us to help them with their presentation skills as well as improve their client pitches in smaller settings. Ann decided we should kick things off with a skit, showing the team all the things NOT to do in a client pitch. Ann felt women in our firm dressed inappropriately in client meetings so to prove a point she convinced me to dress up in super slutty clothes and pretend to do this fake client pitch in a black leather miniskirt and giant gold hoop earrings. Ann shot one-liners at our fake client, interrupting him, talking over him, confusing every detail of his pretend business. She was a natural comedienne and literally had the room doubled over with laughter. Meanwhile I just looked like a tacky streetwalker and didn’t get a single laugh. But hey, not many people can say a former governor of Texas dressed them up in fishnet tights and videotaped it.

Well, okay, maybe some other people can say that, but I did it legally and it was all on the up and up.

So that’s it. Seven oddball facts about me. Surprised?

Let’s here from someone else in the class…

Mimzie's Musings
Jogging In Circles
Daily Blessings

Here’s the assignment:
-- Share 7 facts about yourself
-- Tag 7 random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs (I know, I petered out at 3. but they are 3 good ones!)
-- Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog
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Grass Skirts, Grits & Guitars

Happy New Year!! I know, I know -- it’s been awfully quiet here at CFT. Well you’ll be relieved (hopefully) to know I was not abducted by aliens or placed in the witness protection program. I’ve been visiting my parents in Nashville for the past few weeks and was swept up in the holiday frenzy. It was great to see family friends and high school friends and tour Little Chick around Nashville. We even had a brush with country music fame when we saw Lee Ann Rimes at lunch. She was on her way out so I can’t confirm that she actually ate anything. But she should because she is itty bitty. I mean teeny!

So we have just returned to Austin, and I am thrilled to get back to my blog. But before I jump into the daily ramblings of life in Texas, I thought I would share some highlights from our time in Tennessee…

The Sugar Bowl was a big time for us. Of course everyone in Nashville pulls for the SEC so we were surrounded by Georgia fans – including Little Chick who loves those Dawgs. But my dad was rooting for Hawaii so we decided to throw a Hawaiian Luau to watch the Sugar Bowl. It was hysterical. We worked like dawgs to transform my parents’ house into an island feast.

Somewhere along the way my mother sliced her finger and landed in the emergency room with stitches so I had to come off the bench and help with the cooking. [Gulp] Typically I try to stick with creative direction – table décor, flowers, music – but cooking for a luau was actually pretty fun. Mai Tai’s, pupu platters, pork with lime mayonnaise, baked rice with pineapple, tamarind flank steak, homemade coconut cake. I also decorated a football cake, while Little Chick made sugar cookies for Hawaii and Georgia to keep things fair. I have to say it was a hoot to set up a luau on January 1st while it was snowing outside. I just wish we had a video of my parents’ friends arriving to find us in Hawaiian shirts, grass skirts and sarongs.

Another highlight from the trip was our big southern country brunch at The Loveless Café. Just on the outskirts of town, Loveless has been around for over 50 years and has legendary slap-your-mama-southern-fried chicken and old-school comfort food. My parents used to go there on dates in college, and when I was little we would go for dinner after the Vanderbilt football games. So I decided we needed to take Little Chick to the famous Loveless Café to keep the family tradition alive.

Now if less is more, then Loveless is more more more. I wasn’t feeling so svelte after Christmas so I was determined not to overeat at Loveless. (Ha!) I was determined not to order the fried chicken and three sides.(Ha! Ha!) I was convinced that the fried chicken would be my only downfall. What a silly, silly girl. I should have been praying to the Patron Saint of Lost Causes. While I did order less than usual, I somehow managed to eat more more more. I just ordered one little ole steak biscuit! But my fork traveled all around the table and I had cheese grits, hash brown casserole, biscuits, sweet corn, green beans, more biscuits, banana pudding, fudge pie, and the rest of my mother’s fried chicken. I’m here to tell you that fried chicken was sublime. I should have just started there and then stopped. We were all stuffed and miserable for hours. My dad said it best as we drove away, “I don’t know why they call this comfort food because I am not at all comfortable.”

But we had a few days to recover from Loveless and the luau before the next adventure. My mom’s friend Kaye had given me a copy of her son’s CD and tipped me off that he was playing downtown. I was missing my Austin live music scene and really wanted to check it out but there was just one problem… I had no wheels.

This presented a challenge throughout my visit. My mom kept trying to drop me off at cocktail parties. I felt like I was fifteen getting dropped off at a party with older kids who all had their drivers license. One day she deposited me at the country club for a workout and didn’t come back for me for like, EV-ER! It was humiliating sitting at the club entrance, watching people I was supposed to recognize from high school coming and going…asking if I needed a ride…wanting to know if I was okay. When some high school boys raced past me, piled in their jeep and sped away I began to feel quite pitiful.

So I had to draw the line at my mother driving me to hear a band. My ego could only handle so much. I protested wildly, but she was relentless. Finally I did a little research on the venue, 3rd & Lindsley, to discover the show was at 6 pm, they served food, and my daughter could come along that early in the evening. So I invited my mother and Little Chick to go with me. I wish I could have seen the faces of my mother’s friends when she told them she had to leave a sip-n-see tea party to go hear a band downtown.

We had a ball.

Rick Huckaby is not your average Nashville singer-songwriter. He played original music from his new CD ‘Call Me Huck’ (save one badass cover of ‘Beast of Burden’) and tore up the guitar for the 6pm dive-bar dinner crowd as if it were midnite and everyone was wasted. The place was packed with his fans and he had the whole joint jumping. Call it rockin’ country or southern rock, either way it was soulful and loud and just what the doctor ordered.

And he’s a nice guy to boot! Before the show we introduced ourselves and asked him to sign a CD for Little Chick. She was over the moon. She was mesmerized by his electric blue electric guitar and utterly convinced that he looked right at her two whole times when he was singing. Afterwards he gave her a big hug on-stage. Little Chick is now a huge Rick Huckaby fan (we all are!) and she wants to know how much it would cost to have him play at her 9th birthday party.

I suppose our trip home was not your run-of-the-mill holiday with family and friends, but then again ours rarely are. No worries, because I‘ve already learned some valuable lessons in 2008. First of all, always support your local musicians even if you’re the one on the road. And when you go to The Loveless Café just order the damn southern-fried chicken and enjoy it. And finally, if you’re wearing a really cheap grass hula skirt, don’t stand too close to a tiki torch.

~ Aloha Nashville ~










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