The Napkin Diaries

Okay seriously guys, you need to remind me that I am not 21 years old, I no longer can sleep through my first (three) classes, and I actually have to do real-life stuff.

READ: I cannot go to the strip club on a school work night!

How does this always happen? What started out as a friendly co-workery get together at the bar next door turned into a night with strange half-naked women.

I'd typically say "Let me 'splain," but really, there's not logical explanation for this. I went to happy hour with a group of co-workers. It was cool. We had some "team building." Had some laughs. Good stuff. And then we went home at 7:00 PM. I'm fairly certain this is where normal people would resume normal night time routines, like you know, eating dinner and going to bed before 11:00 PM.

Hi, yeah, remember me? I'm not very good at this whole "moderation" thing everyone keeps talking about.

Instead, I grab Husband and we go meet a couple of friends at a local bar, Carolina Crust, for some beers. And pizza. And apparently fucking tequila. We played some Bar Bingo (which is just Bingo with bar terms instead of numbers) and you'd be amazed at how crazy people get over needing someone with a microphone to say "N-Jagerbomb" and "B-Three Wise Men."

And seriously, why is it that after you have 3 buckets of beer, someone always says, "So. You guys wanna shot?" And everyone is all like "Yeah! That's the best idea evvvver." And then someone orders 5 shots of tequila. (BILLY.) So Billy ordered us some tequila, and then a little later we got our tabs from the waitress and Billy learned that each shot was $5. And that was just ridiculous. The shots were teeny, like didn't even make it up to the bottom line of the little plastic shot cup and the limes were disgustingly hard. (I don't have anything to say about the salt. The salt held up it's end of the deal.) So I mustered up some courage and decided I was going to argue with the bartender.

And by arguing I mean that I really went up to the bartender and said, "Soooo can I argue with you?" in the cutest voice I have. Asked him his opinion on how big a shot should be and how much he'd willingly pay for said shot. And his answer, as I'd hoped, was that he would pay less for more and then offered us another round of nasty ass tequila on the house. All the while, Husband was at the table saying "I bet Nicole will come back with free shots." I do my man proud.

So then, remember how we were talking about how someone always has the genius idea of ordering shots? Well, I always have the genius idea of going to the strip club. And sometimes everyone else is in that weird ass, dirty frame of mind where they just want to be balls-out ridiculous.

And apparently WEDNESDAY was that kind of night.

So Husband, Billy, and I venture to Jaguars. (I totally spelled it JUGuars at first.) And apparently a lot of other people were in a wild mood that night because it was surprisingly crowded. It was a typical stripper-y night. Lots of boobs. And beers. And judging. And laughing.

And okay, I have no idea how this happens, but it always does. Always. Somehow, I make eye contact with a stripper, and I smile, because I'm nice... and because I'm drunk. And then somehow "Eden" of Jaguars ends up on my lap talking thisclosetomyface about her life. And about how pretty my dress is. And all I'm thinking to myself is "Jesus Christ I do not want to see her garden." And then suddenly I somehow have a new stripper BFF. Every time!

So yeah, apparently I still act like I'm some lunatic college kid who can drink her face off until 3:00 AM on a Wednesday.

Since Valentine's Day is meant to be spent with the one you love, and I prefer to do things in excess... I chose to spend it with the ONES I love. Or at least a few of them... orrrr the craziest of them. Yeah that's it. For not just only V-day, but V-weekend. Oooh, sounds dirty. I like it.

And, not that I need an excuse, but this made for a really good excuse to party my face off.

So Laura and I started scouring the interwebs looking for cabins in the mountains a few weeks into the New Year. Because mountains are pretty. Then we realized that we don't really live near mountains. Then we realized we don't really give a shit what's near the cabin, we just want to be in one together. Then we realized that we kinda lied about not caring what was near the cabin, because there was now one crucial factor that NEEDED to be part of Cabin Weekend Extravaganza. It needed more than just a cabin. It needed to be a cabin with a mother.effing hot tub.

For a moment's time, we considered the sketchy rental home with a trampoline, but when it came down to it, a hot tub was necessary. Perhaps another holiday will be spent on a trampoline...

So we found a skeezy cabin on a dirty lake in the middle of South Carolina. With a frickin hot tub. Fist pump.

And then Joe & Laura, Brudder Michael, and Dave and me piled into our cars and met in the middle of SC in our little lake cabin with the hot tub.

Laura and I busted into a spontaneous dance party within 7 minutes of being in the cabin together. After we filled up our red Solo cups with wine... and ice, of course. Classy, right?

What's so awesome, is that when we all get together, it's like we never missed a beat. We just pick up right where we left off... which was obviously in a dirty college apartment.

After a few hours of stuffing our faces, sloshing our drinks, and hugging all over each other, the 4 of them suddenly decided I needed to leave. Whaaat?! They were all like, "Nicole. Go downstairs to the Time Out Room*. Now." I didn't understand. But apparently they had conjured up some kind of fantastic surprise and therefore I needed to get my wine-loving ass downstairs. Hmph.

So they banished me. To the Time Out Room. All alone. For like 20 minutes! But they at least gave me part of my surprise to entertain myself with while hanging out in aforementioned creepy room of doom - they gave me a WAND! A Pretty Princess fairy wand. That lit up! Like a freaking rave, nonetheless. So I just swirled that around while I sat on the bed. Then I got bored and stood in the creepy step-dad corner for a bit, which gave me the heebie-jeebies, so I sat back down on the futon-bed and took a picture of my face and twirled my wand some more until Laura came to get me.

With a blindfold!

Ugh. Blindfolds.

So! She pushed me up the stairs, and took the blindfold off... momentarily. I opened my eyes to see a bunch of cute (read: PINK) cupcakes sitting on the counter, surrounded by 4 of my most favorite people in the world; so obviously they were like the best cupcakes ever.

Then they turned me around. To see the surprise. THE SURPRISE. Do you know what the surprise was?! A PINATA! My very own first pinata ever! 27 years old and never had a pinata! Let alone a frackin' surprise pinata! In the shape of a CROWN! That was pink and purple and said PRINCESS! Oh dear lord, do I have some amazing friends or what?!

So remember how I mentioned that they only momentarily allowed me to take off the blindfold? Yeah. That's why. So, back on the blindfold went. Husband spun me around and handed me a pool stick. Does anyone else see the potential for disaster here? Already clumsy girl, now tipsy and blindfolded, has been given a stick to swing into mid-air in hopes of beating the shit out of a cardboard crown hanging from the ceiling in a rented cabin on a dirty lake in the middle of South Cack. ::Shaking head::

I swung the shit outta that stick, too, let me tell ya. But I kept stabbing myself in the boob somehow. Meh? After a while of watching me fail miserably at knocking crap out of the pinata, they had mercy on me and let me take off the blindfold. I beat the hell out of that thing! And finally, all the goodies came flying out.

And can I please take this moment to say that Joe and Laura should be in charge of stuffing every pinata in the universe, because I'm pretty sure they put the best shit ever into mine. Oh? You want to know what they put in my pinata o' happy? Well okay, since you asked nicely:
1. Pixie Stix
2. 1 giant Slim Jim (that contorted into a ready-to-wear headband shape)
3. Ring Pops
4. Hershey Kisses
5. Glow Sticks
6. Monster Truck Stickers!!
7. Mini Bottles
8. 1 Cadburry Egg (that no one got to enjoy because Husband flushed it down the toilet!?!)
9. Pirate Eye Patches

Awesome. I dumped it all into my lap and played with it. Like a 5 year old.

Then it was hot tub time. And you know the one thing you need to make your hot tub time complete? Pasta Salad. And actually what I mean by that is that pasta salad is the one thing in the world you definitely do not need in a hot tub. Because when you try to eat it, or you know, feed it to Laura with a tiny plastic fork and a pirate eye patch over your eye and a plastic solo cup of wine hanging out of your mouth, there's like a 100% chance that you will dump that shit all in your hot tub on the back porch of your rented lake house on the dirty lake. Trust me.

So after our skin got pruney and we ran out of drinks, and dumped half the water out of the hot tub from sloshing around like idiots, we got out. And put on our Snuggies. And slept in our little creepy beds. And washed, rinsed and repeat the next day. (Well, that's not entirely true... we weren't exactly the cleanest of humans that weekend... but we at least did the "repeat" phase, sans pinata. And pasta salad.)

And really, there's only one way to sum up the entire Cabin Weekend Extravaganza. And it can't be done with words. Oh no. It can only be done with a picture. One perfect picture of debauchery, as perfectly displayed by Laura:

And that, my friends, is how you do a Cabin Weekend Extravaganza.

*Time Out Room: Creepy small "bedroom" at bottom of stairs with a futon and wood-paneled walls. Only one small window very close to the ceiling to ensure no escape possible. Also equipped with strange cubby area, likely used by a step-father to watch a small child sleep.

You ever find yourself wanting to stick pencils in your ears because you have some horrific song stuck in your head with no idea how it actually got there in the first place?

Yeah me too.

And we're talking really bad songs here people. Like "Tik Tok" by Ke$ha. Fucking Ke$ha...Or Jingle Bells. Or anything by Sheryl Crow. Or that wretched old folky "Someone's in the kitchen with Dina" number. Oh how I want to strangle Dina and whoever the hell is in the kitchen with her...

And the song always ends up in your head at like 9:oo AM on a damn Monday. A rainy Monday. While you have killer period cramps and a zit.

And you know why that song ends up in your brain?! Because my Husband whistles it to you! In his sneaky little Husband ways! He'll be in the shower and I'm trying to cover that aforementioned zit and shovel Midol and he's fucking shimmying around in the shower whistling. And I know he's shimmying because we have a glass door on that shower... And it's mindless for him. He doesn't even realize he's doing it. Hell, sometimes he'll ask me how some song got stuck in HIS head!

One night I just couldn't get "Someone's in the (fucking) kitchen with Dina" out of my head.

And I was all like "Ohhhmah gahhhh HUSBAND! I need to strangle you!!"
And he's all like "Why?"
And I'm all like "Because you made "Someone's in the kitchen with Dina" get stuck in my motherfreakin' braaain."

And do you know what he said?!

"I don't know that song."

What?! What the SHIT? Are you talking about?!

Apparently the man is so oblivious to his own whistling that he can pick songs that he doesn't even know.

Needless to say, I belted out the best, and by best I mean worst, rendition of "Dina" that I could in an effort to successfully secure the horrid tune into his brain also.

The verdict? No more Dina.

Win.

Yeah yeah, so I've been a MIA. You would be too if you rang in the New Year in the effing ER because someone decided to tackle you in the middle of the dance floor. In the middle of a really crowded bar. While you were wearing fucking 5 inch platform shoes.

Seriously.

I got knocked out on New Year's Eve. Like, black-out knock out. Scary, huh? Had to get some X-rays and a CT scan - luckily I just got the shit knocked out of me. No broken bones. Just a really bruised ass and a splitting headache. (Yay for pain killers though!)

Between that and some other not-niceness I've incurred lately from some not-nice people, I've been a bit under the radar lately. But it's time to come back out and play. And do it right, damnit.

And well, if you ask me, there's obviously only one way to get back in the game of all things ridiculous and fun. One Big. Gigantic. Obnoxious way... And that is:

Monster Trucks.

Dead.Serious.

Husband got a text from our friend Adrian that said, "Monster trucks? Next Friday?"
Husband showed me the text to me immediately.
My response? "That's asinine! ... Let's go!!"

So we totally bought sweet tickets to the Monster Truck show coming to Charleston next Friday. Oh dear sweet baby Jesus. Now THIS is going to be entertaining...

Lately I've been miserably tired... it's this vicious cycle that I've accidentally sucked myself into and can't get out of. I totally blame Christmas.

Basically, I'm all nuts about Christmas and presents and being somewhat festive (by "somewhat" I mean that while I will decorate the shit out of my house, I absolutely REFUSE to listen to Christmas music while doing so. I'd rather stick pencils in my ears...) and so I've been shopping for, buying, and wrapping presents like every single day for the past 2 weeks. All while simultaneously decorating the house, inside and out, with all kinds of Christmas-y crap.

Being the OCD nut I am, I dump out all of my Christmas present wrapping supplies all over the living room floor and do not put them away until I wrap every single gift I happened to purchase that day. And sometimes this process goes on until 1:00 AM. Because in the middle of wrapping presents, I also do things like vacuum the 900 new pine needles that have fallen to the ground because our little kitties like to think the house is a RACE TRACK that they can tear ass around and they run under the tree and knock the lower branches with their fat tails or fat heads, for that matter, and thus create a pine needle 'splosion all over my damned living room.

So I vacuum mid-wrap sometimes. Other times, I bake brownies mid-wrap, because sometimes I like to pretend I am fucking Betty Crocker. Wait. Er, not actually fucking her, but you know, being her. Although I doubt Betty Crocker listens to "Shots" by LMFAO while baking. And she probably doesn't wear giant fleece fat pants with little bunnies on them while baking. She probably doesn't say "fuck" either. And she probably doesn't generally resemble me in any way. Whatever. Sometimes I bake. Shut up.

So yeah, my "wrapping" time tends to take like 5 hours because apparently I like to multitask. Or maybe it's just that I don't know how to NOT multitask. Meh?

SO. This is causing me sleep deprivation... all this Christmas shit. I stay up, wrapping, and vacuuming, and dance partying in the kitchen until 1:00 AM. And then I wake up the next morning all pissed off that I slept for less than 9-10 hours (yes, I said 9-10 hours. I need SLEEP, people!), and then I drink a fuck ton of coffee to counterbalance the super-tiredness from all of the "wrapping" the night before. Damnit. Dahmet. Bleh.

This morning was no exception. After my escapade last night (shopping, tanning, cooking steak dinner, wrapping, picture taking, vacuuming, brownie baking, laundry-ing, kitty playing, and bubble bathing) I was especially tired.

Usually, I wait until I get to the office to crack open my new favorite coffee: Starbucks Mocha Lite (woohoo less fat and carbs and calories! Win!). Today I waited only until I got out of the shower to open it.

So I sat on my little wobbly vanity stool with squinty eyes and attempted to shove some contacts in them and start the "get pretty" process.

Well, these little coffees come in a glass bottle from Bilo, so they have a little teeny lid. So I put the little teeny lid on the counter in front of me. Almost immediately I had two too many bad kittehs in front of me as well, that are not so teeny. And these two too many bad kittehs were LICKING my little teeny coffee lid.

Who knew bad kittehs liked to nom on Starbucks?! I can only imagine the havoc they are wreaking on my freshly vacuumed living room.

Oh vicious Christmas cycle, I feel we will meet again tonight...