catheroominations

By now you’ve probably heard that Barack Obama and Brad Pitt are related. Allegedly. Well guess what.

They occupy branches on my family tree too. Yes they do.

During Christmas vacation in Wisconsin last year, I learned from Matte’s uncle Gary (who is into ancestry stuff) that I am related to Laura Bush. Laura Bush. Not Gee Dub. Well yes Gee Dub, but only by marriage. Whew! Dodged that bullet. Anyway, today when I read the article about Barack and Brad being kissin’ 9th cousins, I learned that Barack is also a distant cousin to Gee Dub. Sooo, as Gee Dub is husband to Laura, I am therefore related to Barack Obama. And Brad Pitt. Yeah, by marriage way down the line. Minor details. This also brings me one degree closer to Kevin Bacon.

Suddenly I feel the need for a family reunion. And I think Cousin Brad should host it. At his friend George Clooney’s home in Italy.

Once upon a time, my friend Beth sent out a note about her upcoming 30th birthday celebration. She closed the note with “you’re all great fiends” or some similar sentiment. And yes, she left the ‘r’ out of friends.

It stuck. Ever since that note, my circle of friends has been known as Fiends. When our fiend Julie passed away, we started a Yahoo! group to keep in touch and email daily doses of support to everyone in the group. It was a perfect way to keep in touch, especially with those that were far away. Those first few months after Julie’s passing were difficult for us all, but having the support of each other got us through it. Slowly.

Life has been moving very fast for the Fiends lately and we don’t spend as much time together as we once did. It’s hard to get us all in the same place at the same time. But we’re still close and would drop anything to help one of us in need.

Tonight I got to spend time with 2 fiends, Tracey and June. We have all had some stress in our lives lately and it was good to just be together and talk about things, catching up with what’s been going on in each other’s lives. Tonight we didn’t want the loud “nn-tch nn-tch nn-tch” music of a bar, or to get all dressed up to go somewhere fancy. We just wanted to be. So we went to an old skool type place, that caters to a more mature crowd (the Blue Hairs, if you will).

Because I had already eaten a dinner of stir-fried chicken, asparagus and brown rice, I forwent (is that the past tense of forgo?) the meal and went along for the company, my camera in tow. I still had to shoot my last submission for the 7 Days group in Flickr. While they dined on the fine cuisine (note sarcasm), I had a glass of Cabernet. And because this was a night where comfort food was much in need, the girls ordered hot fudge sundaes. I still nursed my wine, and rather than knocking them over the head with the jar of sugar and stealing their sundaes, I shot a photo of one instead. Much fewer calories that way. The best part of the night though, was when we were discussing our trails and tribulations, the song that our beloved fiend Julie asked to be played at her funeral (Green Day’s Good Riddance/Time of Your Life) came on over the sound system. For some reason, that song comes on at the most appropriate times. And since we all became such close fiends because Julie brought us together, it was perfect that the song played tonight. It was like a little “Hey” from Julie. Interesting that I haven’t heard that song in awhile, nor had I spent quality time with my fiends in much too long.

Below is a photo of the delectable hot fudge sundae that I did not eat (nor did I taste! How’s that for will power?).

And this here is my last self-portrait of the week. Next go round, you should play with us. Click on the link to in my sidebar to join the 7 Days group. You’ll be glad you did!

And this post is too. Go. Read it. It will make you feel all warm inside. I love this post. I love the “ding. ding. ding.” It put me right there with her and her bucket. I love the way she tells a story and you will too. Go visit her and read through her archives too. She’s talented, smart, funny, and she’s also a pretty hot babe.

I will never look at Salvation Army volunteers without remembering this post. I will even give them some change, and I will make eye contact and smile. Because this post had such an impact on me, I am giving mcgee at memoirs of a gee the Perfect Post Award* for January. Because she rawks.

*The Perfect Post Awards were created by Lindsay and Kimberly. The next time you see a post and think “Whoa. Damn. Wow.” nominate it for a Perfect Post Award.

Just after I posted this, I had a sudden change of attitude. I guess it took spewing it out on my blog to realize that the day was going to be only as bad as I allowed it to be. Sure, getting a speeding ticket sucked, but whatever. What’s done is done. And yeah, I ached after the long run, but I had a choice. I could sit on the couch, watching bad TV and whimpering while missing a fun wine tasting birthday party, or I could suck it up.

Aches and pains be damned! I sucked it up.

I quickly showered, got ready, and looked up the wineries that were included in the bus tour everyone was on. I had enough time to meet the party at the second winery, so I headed back down Hwy 17, passing the scene of my earlier crime. This time, I passed it going just over 50 miles per hour with the cruise control on.

As soon as I saw everyone on the gazebo, I knew I’d made the right decision by getting off my sorry ass and joining the party. Everyone was happy to see me, as Matte had told them about my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. No one expected me to show up, but I surprised everyone by doing so. And I love surprising people. Someone said “you should sit down!” so I did, while sipping a lovely Burrell School pinot noir. And then someone handed me some lusciously rich dark chocolate. Awesome.

The next stop on the bus tour was Savannah Chanelle, but Matte and I took my car so I wouldn’t have to pick it up at Burrell School later. At Savannah Chanelle we got to hear the interesting history of the winery, and saw a split-root tree on the property that sits RIGHT ON the San Andreas fault. Friggin’ cool. I tried jumping up and down to trigger it, but I don’t think I was able to make it rumble.

Wine-tasted out, we headed for Rachel (the birthday girl) and Shawn’s house for some eats. The menu consisted of gazpacho (I blew on the first spoonful in case it was too hot, out of soup-eating habit. But duh.) and paella (with sausage, chicken, shrimp, and bigger shrimp). Sweet Jeebus, that was some mighty fine food! We drank more wine…a fabulous 1991 something-I-can’t-recall-nor-pronounce-but-was-Spanish. Dinner was followed by a creme brulee-like dessert (also Spanish, the name of which is also escaping me). I was almost falling asleep into my dessert (at 7:30 pm), so Matte and I left for home so I could get a foot massage.

My day ended so much better than it started. Because I was not going to let the crappy day stay crappy. I would not let it beat me. And today I am sore, but it’s the good kind of sore, that reminds me that I went beyond my physical comfort zone and ran double-digits yesterday.

Whoa. We just got home from wine tasting. It started at 5 pm. It is now 10:30 pm. Granted, we had dinner afterwards, but we tasted and tasted and tasted some more for around three hours. I highly recommend tasting events at wine bars. They are quite lovely, especially when the Italian guy from Jersey who’s pouring goes on break and you can go back to the tasting table to tell his relief person “oh, I haven’t tried that one yet!” Even though you have. Twice. And then a third person comes to cover the second person, and well, I mean. The wine was GOOD and I wanted more, so I tasted the same wine four times. Is that so wrong?

And as a person who is classically trained in wine, I kept copious notes on my tasting sheet. I just looked at it now, and noticed that I wrote things like “YUM!” “OMG!” and “***” I’m serious about this stuff. For reals.

Afterwards the work winos, Matte and I went to eat some pasta (and possibly some semifreddo made with hazelnut cappuccino something or other) to absorb the alcohol while we blew into someone’s portable blood alcohol level checker thing from Kragen Auto Parts. According to the highly accurate scientific device, everyone was below the limit (except for that one time, instead of displaying a number, it just said HI, and was not meant to be a friendly greeting) so we took our stuffed happy selves and parted ways in the parking lot, hiccuping all the way.

And now I must slumber. Damn, I love sleep so much. And what’s funny is when I’m doing it, I’m not sure I even know I’m enjoying it. I mean, I guess I am, but I’m asleep, so, who knows if I am aware that I am having a good time? But really. It’s like my most favorite thing to do these days. Probably because I don’t get to do it often enough. I love everything about it. My jammies, my Tempurpedic pillow that is old and needs to be replaced. I love my jersey sheets, and the comforter that I fling off of me when I start swimming in sweat. I love that my socks get all twisted up, or fall off at the foot of the bed, and I love when I wake up, look at the clock, and realize I get to sleep for like five more hours. Those hours go by way too quickly though. Every single time.

Enough talk. I’m off to catch some zzzz’s and to see visions of long finishes, notes of blackberry and tobacco, and $110 bottles of 2004 Cabernet Sauvingnon dancing through my head.

Or, maybe my head is just spinning.

The cupcakes were delicious, the girltalk was fabulous, the wine was flowing, and fun was had by all (look, I just used passive voice, which I HATE). I highly recommend cupcake parties.

One of the myriad of photos I took with Stacy on Sunday. Half of what I took turned out pretty good, and half of those were taken while tipsy, and therefore are a bit out of focus. Why can’t my camera correct for inebriation?

See that new header up there? It was born of that Photowalk Photostumble as well.