Bad Decisions Lead to Celluloid Catastrophy

Since I'm pretty much broke until my next paycheck (thank God that raise will be kicking in) my fun nights out have been turning into fun nights in. Friday night I spend 3 hours setting up Netflix on my Wii. Stop judging! I hadn't used my Wii in a long time and had a whole bunch of updates on top of the facts that A, I'm not good with any type technology and B, it just seems like anything that is suppose to be easy right now for me... not so much.

Last night my fun night in turned into a fun night in with Sarah. We decided to make dinner (i.e. I picked up chicken from HEB and she cooked the meal) and watch movies. Although, I brought over Congo which might be the best worst movie ever, we decided not to be total nerds and find something On Demand instead.

We first settled on Friends With Benefits. Now, I'm not going to lie or embellish the truth or throw Sarah under the bus. I totally was 50% of making this movie choice. I had a very mathematical reason to pick this movie. It went a little something like this...

Reasons for picking Friends With Benefits...
5% wanting to watch something I had never seen
3% wanting to watch something Sarah had never seen
17% remembering that the previews did make me kinda chuckle
29% knowing that I would probably get to see Justin Timberlake's butt
35% WOOD HARRELSON IS AWESOME
40% I have a giant girl crush on Mila Kunis

(I don't know if that adds up to 100, but hey, I was a liberal arts major.)

It was okay. There were parts where I laughed out loud and then there were parts that were totally predictable and made me remember why I don't like romantic comedies. But, on top of this I learned that maybe watching two beautiful people be all neurotic for 95 minutes only to end up all happily ever after is not a good idea when you just broke up with someone and you still remember what it feels like to be in love but you hate yourself for remembering and you kinda wish there was someone else to push those memories away and fuck Mila Kunis because you could spend 30 minutes doing your makeup and it still wouldn't look as good as her "I just woke up after screwing the hottest member of NSYNC all night" smokey eyes. FUCK! And my girl friends wonder why I've never seen The Notebook.

Then came our choices for movie number 2.



(Please note that it's "I Am Virgin" not "I Am A Virgin" so I'm thinking it must be about a holier that thou cave woman...)



That last one is a little hard to see. It was called "Walk a Mile In My Pradas" which I sure is the lesser know version of Walk The Line where June Carter goes to work under Meryl Streep, but uber bitch Anne Hathaway is fighting for her job and then Johnny Cash turns over in his grave and dies again.

But that's just a guess.

We decide on Drive. This is how we collectively came to this decision.

3% we had both never seen this movie
15% LOTS of people had said this movie was absolutely fantastic
163% it stars Ryan Gosling.

I'm pretty sure that one equals 100%...

So we watched Drive.

All of it.

And I'm super sad because I'll never get those two hours of my life back.

Wow! That movie was horrible! Like really horrible. Like what is wrong with humanity where some people think it's not only okay to make this movie but it's also okay to tell other people that it's good. I feel like this... There is a David Cross standup sketch where he's talking about how he's been an Atheist for a long time and he remembers being in synagog as a kid and hearing about God and angels and whatnot and looking around at all the other people there and being like, "Wait? You don't really believe all of this do you? God smiting the first borns... angels coming down... where are the unicorns?" That's exactly how I feel about Drive! Seriously? Did I watch the same movie everyone else watched? How did other people sit through that piece of shit and have the nerve to talk it up as one of the best movies of the year. I mean, I know people who were angry that it wasn't up for an Oscar. Also I know people who were angry that Ryan Gosling didn't get a Best Actor nod. Are you kidding me!?!?! He said all of 9 words the entire movie and for the other 2 hours and 13 minutes he was making this face...
Oh, making that face and wearing two jackets. The first was a classic straight out of 1987 slightly puffy, members only jacket with a scorpion on the back. And the second was a denim jacket so tight and so blue I'm convinced the costume designer picked it up from the girls department of Target. And then sometimes he wore them together... at the same time...

Things Sarah and I could have been doing for those two hours instead of watching the dumbest movie of the year?

1. Thinking up the best new invention of 2012 so we both could retire to the beach
2. Sleeping (seriously a better use of our time)
3. Going out to bars like normal human beings on a Saturday and meeting our future husbands. Sorry future Mr. Haygood I really wanted to meet the man of my dreams but instead I choose to watch Ryan Gosling smirk at me and drive around wearing a cowboy tuxedo for 2 hours.

FML

Chelsea Handler, Being Late, and Another "This Is My Life" Moment...

A note before the real blog post… I don’t hang out with LSU Friend every day of the week. In fact sometimes there are whole weeks we never see each other and the only communication I have with her is a random text that says, “SAIL”. However, last week it was kinda like we were dating. I mean I saw her ALL THE TIME! Last Sunday we got drunk together over sweet potato fries, a bottle of wine, and a co-workers birthday. Oh, and it wasn’t a “dancing on the table” drunk. We got crazy emotional drunk… Can my life get any more awkward? Turns out it can. All I have to do is start downing moderately priced Cabernets and, oh… then ask my dear friend to tell me about her dad dying. Because who doesn’t like getting sloppy drunk and crying in public restaurants???

Anyway, so that was last Sunday. I saw her again on Tuesday when I was craving Thai food and didn’t want to wait for Boyfriend to get home before stuffing my face in some Tom Yum. I then saw her again the next day, Wednesday, for Blues On The Green. I then saw her the next day, Thursday, for kickball. I’m not telling you this because I don’t like hanging out with my friend. I love LSU Friend, and I’m crazy grateful to even have her as a friend since I don’t that than many to begin with. I just don’t want y’all thinking that my blog has become Lemon Lady and LSU Friend’s Crazy Adventures (oh and there’s a little Boyfriend thrown in there just for kicks). Because, to be honest with you guys, that just might be the name of our reality show we will be pitching to the Travel Channel real soon.

All that being said, this post is about LSU Friend and me.

About a week ago, I was taking a bath with one of my awesome bath bombs from LUSH when Boyfriend came in and surprised me with two tickets to go see Chelsea Handler on Sunday (yesterday). Reason number 4,284,119 why I totally adore him. Reason number 4,284,120 why I love Boyfriend, he told me he really didn’t want to go (because what straight guy would) and I should take a friend.

This awesome gift from Boyfriend is what led me to hanging out again with LSU Friend last night. She picked up at 5:20 and we headed to 2nd Kitchen for cocktails and food before the big show. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifThree drinks, 2 hours, and some majorly amazing carbs later I looked down at my phone and saw that it was already 7:00. I knew finding a place to park would take a few minutes because of the last time we went to the Bass Concert Hall. That was a few months ago when LSU friend, Cupcake, and I saw West Side Story. When we finally pulled into a parking spot in the garage just down the street from the Bass it was 7:25 and the play started at 7:30. We raced as fast as we could in our heals to walk in the door just as they were flashing the lights for everyone to stop over paying for wine in the lobby and find their seats. We then had to hike up the SIX FLIGHTS OF STAIRS to the very top of the highest balcony because we bought the cheapest seats we could find. Just as we sat down the show started and for the opening act my mind jumped back and forth between, “OMG I think I’m going to have a heart attack – I should totally start doing my cardio” to “Wait, are they dance fighting? This is gayest thing I’ve ever seen… ever!”

Anyway… My point is, it’s 7:00 and we are so going to be late.

Me: “LSU Friend, you need to chug your wine. We’ve got to go!”
LSU Friend: “Dude, Lemon Lady, I’m not going to chug my glass of 10 dollar wine.”
Me: “Look, LSU Friend, I’m going to need you to woman up and throw that glass back. We need to get going.”
LSU Friend: (drinking as much as she can) “Ahg… Okay, lets head out.”

We successfully made it into the car without LSU Friend getting run over by a bus, and headed up Congress where we got stuck at every single red light!

LSU Friend: (pointing to things outside the car and looking around) “Look, why do you think she’s wearing scrubs?”
Me: “I don’t know. GREEN! GO!”
LSU Friend: “Do you think that guy is homeless or just hanging on a bench downtown looking a little… rough?”
Me: (never one not to judge) “Um, I think he’s just a grungy dude…. GREEN LIGHT!”

For those of y’all who don’t live in Austin and who didn’t go to the greatest college of all time, Bass Concert Hall is on the UT campus and right next to the Frank Erwin Center, which is our large concert/sport venue. So, we start getting close to Bass and we start seeing A LOT of people. Too many people to just being going to Chelsea Handler. Too many people, parking way too far out to just be going to just be going to Chelsea Hander. Not only were there a crap load of people, it seemed like… well… and interesting mix of folks. Like there was a woman who had to have been at least 45 in pleather pants, chunky platforms, and a sequined tank top with not bra. Then we stopped at a light behind a pickup with three guys in the bed on the truck. One of the guys wore dreadlocks (which is SO not weird in my town) but they were arranged in the most beautiful updo I had ever seen on a dude. I mean they were woven into one of those ballerina like buns that I can never seem to perfect and he was wearing this nice scarf around his head. Beautiful…

At this point I know we are going to be late. I know we are going to be “those girls” who arrive in the middle of the opening act and smelling like wine and liquor. But, LSU Friend and I were now super curious as to who this um… eclectic group of people were going to see at the Erwin Center. So, being my mother’s child and being egged on by LSU Friend, I roll down the window, plop my head out, and start waving at the people on the side walk.

Me: (waving my arms wildly): “Hey! Hey! Hey you people!!!”
Random Dude: (looking at me and point back at himself): “Me?”
Me: “Yeah, you’ll do. Yes, you!”
Random Dude: “What?”
Me: “Why are you here?”
Random Dude: “What?”
Me: “WHY ARE YOU HERE? WHAT IS GOING ON?”
Random Dude: “Rush!”

That’s right readers… I was going to be late to Chelsea Handler because of the dudes that sing YYZ.

Okay and just for the record, I understand how bitchy this makes me sound. I understand how “that girl” this makes me sound. I DON’T CARE! I’m going to be late because of a Canadian Rock band that was formed in 60s! I’m going to be late because of a band had a Synthesizer Period in the 80s! I’m going to be late because of Mother F-ing Rush???

Oh, heck no!

I’m pretty sure if I wasn’t in a dress I would have gotten out of LSU Friend’s car and directed traffic myself to get us into the parking garage faster. Once we parked, I was out of her Accord and powerwalking to the concert hall as fast as I could. All while LSU Friend is moaning and whining about her legs being sore from some workout video she did on Friday.

Me: (pausing in the middle of the side walk): “Suck it up friend! We are going to be late!”
LSU Friend: “Wait, what?”
Me: “Late!”
LSU Friend: “What are you talking about? It doesn’t start until 8, nerd.”
Me: “7:30! It starts at 7:30, which was like 4 minutes ago.”
LSU Friend: “I’m pretty sure it starts at 8…”
Me: (pulling out the tickets) “It starts at seven thri… oh wait… okay you might be right.”
LSU Friend: “Is this why you made me chug a whole glass of red wine and almost mow down poor innocent rednecks and their mullets in front of the Erwin center?”
Me: “Um… maybe. I mean I would have sworn it started at 7:30.”

And then, instead of putting the tickets back in my purse, pausing to catch my breath, and calming walking to the theatre, I dropped the tickets (which were really just printed from the computer) and they started to blow away. FML

LSU Friend: “Holy crap! Get the tickets.”
Me: (running and trying to stomp on them) “They keep moving! Help! Help!”
LSU Friend: “Quick! Quick!”
Me: “Why do they hate me? Come back tickets! Come back!”

So please just close your eyes and picture this. Two women in their late 20s running down the street screaming for pieces of paper to “not hate them” and “come back to your home, why do you hate your home”. And here’s the thing, sometimes people drop things, and I’m sure I’m not the only person that has ever dropped important papers to have them start blowing away, but it’s just another one of those things that would happen to me. Like every other group of girls that attended that show were all perfectly poised, had on perfect outfits and perfect heals, and were all standing outside the concert hall talking about their perfect lives… and then there is us, LSU Friend and me running wildly down the street chasing our hopes and dreams of seeing Chelsea Hander, hair going everywhere, already sweaty from power walking from the car… I mean the whole scenario just sums up my life.

But the show was AWESOME!

And now some fun videos and photos

In case you didn’t get the “SAIL” joke from earlier...

And here’s some Rush for your lovely Monday…

LSU Friend and I before the ticket chasing…

Oh and last night, after the show, Boyfriend and I dressed up the dog in Boyfriend’s company’s sweatshirt. Isn’t he adorable?

The Night I Gave Myself a 3rd Degree Burn And Hung Out With My Boyfriend Instead of Going To The Hospital...

Okay, the time has come. I can’t continue with all these frivolous blog posts about fashion and cookies and TV Shows. It’s time to get back to the roots of my four month old blog. (Yeah, deep, deep roots.)

It’s time for another ultra embarrassing, ultra awkward, ultra “OMG! Is this really my life?” story. I mean there’s nothing like a little embarrassing story to make your Monday, right? I call it the story of the night I gave myself a third degree burn and then decided not to go to the hospital and hang out with my friends instead…

It was Friday night sometime around the end of February of my junior year (still living in Germany) and I was looking forward to hanging out with my new boyfriend, Matt and some other friends. Matt and our other friends, Sean and Kristen, had been a good influence on me and when I say “hang out” I really do just mean that. I think our big plans were to go bowling or maybe see a movie… on base which meant no ordering beer mixed with soda at the German movie theater off base. (And yes, beer mixed with Coke was on the menu and not some weird drink the local American teenagers wanted.) So, yeah, there I was 17 and all excited to do very PG activities that Friday night.

I got home from school around 4 and the plan was for Matt to pick me up around 6 to go grab a bite to eat and then hook up with our friends. So, I got home and since there was no way I was going to do homework on a Friday night and since we only had five English channels on our TV, I decided to take a long bath (something I still love doing) and actually do my hair and plan a cute outfit instead of just throwing it in a ponytail and wearing jeans and my Ramstein Royals sweatshirt.

So I took a bath…

Me: (in the bath) "Ahh…"

Bubble Bath Bubbles: "Pop! Pop!"

Me: “I love baths.”

Hair: “You should wash me. I’m dirty.”

Me: “But I’m taking a bubble bath hair. I can’t wash you in my bubbles.”

Hair: “But I’m dirty…”

Me: “But if I wash you, you will not have enough time to dry and then you will be wet and I will get sick because there is still snow on the ground and duh, it’s cold. (No, I didn’t own a hair dryer. In fact I still don’t own a hair dryer.) I know! I won’t wash you, but I’ll curl you and make you all pretty and then Matt will fall even more in love with me and we’ll live happily ever after…”

Hair: “Yeah… I don’t know about that… I was really just looking for a wash…”

(Note to readers: I do not actually have conversations with my hair. The previous conversation was for blog humor reasons only… moving on…)

I got out of the bath and immediately ran to the thermostat on the wall and cranked it up to 90 degrees. I did this whenever my parents weren’t home and I was cold. (Sorry Mom and Dad and your check books.) So, with my room all nice and toasty and my curling iron warming up, I started looking around my room and closet for something fun to wear even though it was like 12 degrees outside and I would be forced to wear a coat over anything. I couldn’t decide on an outfit, so I sat down at my vanity to do my hair instead.

So, here’s the mental picture… I’m sitting at my vanity. I’ve put on makeup and pants, but I haven’t done my hair yet or put on a shirt. This is honestly something I can’t remember. I can’t remember why I was sitting at my vanity topless. Well, not completely topless. I had on my favorite bra from back then. It was lavender and had little butterflies on it and I bought it at H&M and it had matching panties and I loved it and wore it all the time. Okay, so I’m sitting in my bra, curling my hair, probably jamming out to Linkin Park or New Found Glory or some other God awful band when disaster strikes.

As I am curling a front section of my hair I DROP MY CURLING IRON for no apparent reason. I didn’t drop it because my music skipped or because I heard one of my parents walking in the front door and the heat was still jacked up to 90 and it felt like a F-ing Amazonian jungle in our house or because the phone rang or because I have some medical condition where, although thousands of people have looked for a cure, I just randomly drop shit all the time and it’s really quite sad because I honest to God can’t help it. No, the was no reason at all except my hand just let go of the hot iron it was holding near my face.

It fell. The curling iron fell for what seemed like minutes as I tried to get my hands to keep working. Mentally I was yelling at my arm to move faster and my thumbs to do what evolution had made them do which was grab on to things… but I wasn’t fast enough and the hot curling iron landed. It landed right on my left boob.

Here’s the thing, too… I had zero boobs back in the day. Seriously I was barely out of an A cup until I turned 22 and the damn things just grew over night. But, on that horrible, horrible night I was wearing my favorite bra. It had cute butterflies and was a pretty color, and (I don’t think I mentioned this) was padded like I was fearful of drowning and my bra would be the only thing around to save me from dying a watery, cold death. The clamp on the curling iron got caught in the padding and underwire, thus trapping the hot medieval torture devise in my “cleavage” and not letting it keep falling like gravity, and my boob, wanted.

By the time my hands and thumbs remembered how to work and made it down to save my beautiful, soft, booby skin… it was too late.

Me: “OOOUUUCCCHHHHH!!!”

My Left Boob: “HOT! HOT! HOT! Very Fucking HOT down here!!!”

Me: “OMG! What do I do? What do I do? OMG? Shit! Shit! Shit!”

My Left Boob: “Help me! Help me! So hot! Help me!”

As the skin on my left boob is burning like Hell (yes, that pun was intended, thank you very much) I did what any 17 year old girl would do, I put a cold wash cloth on it and slathered my breast with Vaseline because in my mind Vaseline cured everything. Kinda like the Dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Except he was all about the Windex and my love was petroleum jelly. Sitting on the couch half naked with a cold towel on my chest, I started to feel better pretty quick.

Me: “Okay Lemon Lady, calm down. You are okay. Life is okay. Crisis averted.”

So what did I do next?

Did I…
A: Call off my fun night with friends and lay face and boobs down in a vat of ice cold water.
B: Call my mother crying because I totally disfigured myself for life.
C: Call my mother asking if we had any drugs for burns because I “had a little accident”.
D: Continue to curl my hair and get dressed for the fun night we had planned.

If you guessed C and D, you are right. I did call my mom and she told me we didn’t have anything, but I wasn’t too worried because I had slathered my wound in Vaseline and I figured it would be all cured up by the morning. I wasn’t until I had gotten completely dresses in my jeans and cute sweater when I realized things might be a little worse than I thought. My left boob was on fire! It felt like the curling iron was still attached and would always be there burning and burning my flesh.

Me: (to myself) “Wow, this really hurts. I hope I didn’t do any lasting damage. I wish the Vaseline would work faster and make it stop burning. I wish we had some burn cream.”

IDEA!!!

So, I called my new boyfriend, who I really, really liked, and told him I burned my boob and did he have any burn cream because I’m pretty sure it’s going to fall off if I don’t do something to help it out. Then I hung up the phone and died just a little bit on the inside.

Doorbell: “Ring ring!”

Me: (opening the door) “Thank God you are here! Give me the cream! I need the cream!”

Matt: “Oh, were you serious? I mean I know you were serious, but were you serious, serious? We didn’t have any. I did look! But, yeah we didn’t have any… Should we go to the Shoppette (corner gas station to you non-military folks) and see if they have any? I’m so sorry… Is it that bad???”

Me: “No, I’ll be okay. It’s not that bad.”

And honest to God, it wasn’t that bad. When I opened the door and saw Matt standing there I did feel better. I felt the pain slipping away and I knew everything, including my left boob, would be okay. In my retarded 17 year old mind the reason for this was Matt. My amazing new boyfriend had saved me from the fire of my boob and we would live happily ever after. Yeah, no. Love was not the magic that caused the burning under my sweater to stop, THE FUCKING FREEZING AIR OF GERMANY IN FEBRUARY caused the burning to momentarily cease. I learned this three minutes later when we got into his still warm car and the fire started again…

Me: (to myself) “Oh, God, it’s getting all hot again. No, no more burning. I can’t handle the burning. I need the magic burn cream. Fuck Vaseline! I need the cream…”

Matt: “You okay?”

Me: “Yeah, of course… What could be wrong? I’m fine…”

Matt: “It’s just you’re kinda squirming around a lot and sweating. Are you hot?”

Me: “Yes! I’m so hot!” (rolling down the window and letting the snow blow in) “Ah… so much better…”

Matt: “Okay…”

I found out from Matt the plan of the night was to meet up with friends Sean and Kristen at Popeyes and then go bowling because Kristen wasn’t going to be able to stay out very late that night. I was feeling great when we arrived to Popeyes because I had the windows rolled down the entire car ride there (all of four minutes), so it wasn’t until we arrived and walked inside when I started to get uncomfortable again. To top it all off, half of my high school was there. (Okay, not half, but Popeyes was one of like three places to eat on base and it was Friday night, so there were like eight or nine other people I went to school with there.) I couldn’t eat. Putting hot fried chicken in my mouth just seemed to make it worse. If my mouth got hot, then my left boob got even hotter. About half way through my first piece of chicken I just couldn’t take it anymore and I just up and ran outside. I didn’t stop to tell anyone where I was going or to put on my coat, but Matt, Sean, and Kristen all watched me sprint outside in relief. And what relief it was. The cold air was my drug and I needed it. I put snow in my hands to get them really cold, I danced around to create wind, anything to stop the burning!

Matt: (walking up to me) “Are you sure you’re okay?”

Me: (holding my sweater away from my body fanning cold, freezing air down my shirt.) “Me, yeah sure… I’m doing great.”

Matt: “I don’t think you’re doing so good…”

Me: (grabbing snow until it melts making my hands super, super cold and then putting them down my shirt) “No, really I’m okay.”

Matt: “Lemon Lady, you’re feeling yourself up with icicles.”

Me: “Okay you’re right. I’m not okay. I burned the shit of out of my left boob trying to get all pretty for you and now I’ll probably be all permanently disfigured at age 17. And I feel like it’s on fire. I feel like my boob is on fire. No, I’m not okay.”

And then I showed my wonderful and amazing new boyfriend my scalded left boob outside of Popeyes in the snow.

...yeah...

I sucked it up and managed to get through the night, but I had to tell Sean and Kristen why I was acting all weird and keep running out of the bowling alley to rub snow up under my sweater. All those other kids I went to school with who were at Popeyes or later at the bowling alley just thought I had lost my mind. And by the time Matt dropped me off back at home that night, it really did feel better, although I slept with a cold washcloth under my T-shirt that night. I told my mom, kinda what happened the next day. She asked me if I found the burn cream I had called her about and why I needed it in the first place, so I told her I dropped my curling iron on my chest, but that I was fine. She didn’t understand the magnitude of the burn until we went to the island of Crete for spring break and I had to make sure my bathing suit top covered up the huge scab on my boob so it wouldn’t get re-burned in the sun. (The scab itself was about the size of a quarter… a kinda stretched out quarter.) She was pretty horrified and told me I should have told her and we should have gone to the doctor. Um, my bad mom, but I wanted to eat fried chicken and bowl with my boyfriend.

The scab fell off months later, but left a very sexy, very attractive white scar (again about the size quarter) on my left boob just where my bikini top would start. It finally faded away about two years ago. Meaning whenever I was naked, whenever I showered, whenever I wore low cut tops for five years, I was always reminded about that time I tried to be pretty and curl my hair for my new boyfriend.