Just Drove Six Hours to Say Hi!

There are a few things in the world that are quintessentially American.  These include, but are not limited to, football, copious light beer ingestion, cheeseburgers, cowboys, reality television, New Jersey and Easy Cheese.  Also quintessentially American are State Fairs.  Rides, every fried food imaginable, freaky carnies.  Yup, that's America in a nutshell.  I love every bit of it.

This weekend, I had the amazing luck of performing at our State Fair.  This was most epic as much for the opportunity to perform as it meant that I would be able to enjoy a good footlong corndog.  And as a very healthy eater I look forward to my annual footlong corndog.  Let me just go ahead and say now that it was a culinary dream.  Of course by culinary dream I mean it made a delicious mockery of everything decent in the world of cooking.  But it tasted good so who effing cares.

In addition to clogging my arteries, I also saw Leann Rimes perform.  For free.  That's right, Leann Rimes performed a free concert in Great Falls, Montana.  Think what you will.  Anyway, while I am not a fan of Leann Rimes her voice blew me out of the water.  And she looked really sexy.  And she was wearing a pair of my favorite Guess by Marciano shoes.  And she was cute as a muffin.  It was totally worth free-99.

But I'm done blah-blah-blahing about nothing in particular.  My real story has to do with my performance.  Or rather after my performance.  After finishing my set - which I rocked the crap right out of - I proceeded to sit with my friends and family and contemplate which fried delicacy I would enjoy first.  That's right about when I got that creepy sort of feeling that someone, somewhere is staring at you.  Now as a side note, when I told one of my fellow Hooters Girls about this she said, "working here has totally made me immune to that feeling."  Exactly.  That's just how intently I was being stared at.  I was uber uncomfortable.

Naturally, almost immediately as I felt I was being stared at I turned around to locate the culprit.  And then I spotted him at the top corner of the stands.  If he'd been any further away he'd be falling off and breaking his neck.  There he was, my ex, smiling awkwardly as I met his gaze.  It was one of those moments where you're not sure what to do.  Do you talk to him?  Do you avoid him?  Do you beckon him?  Do you pretend you've mysteriously gone blind and you're not actually noticing him but rather simply accepting being blind?  I settled on talking to him.

The first thing I notice was that he was shaking uncontrollably.  Second, I noticed that he had absolutely no idea what say.  As such the whole thing was incredibly awkward.  So awkward in fact that I couldn't even tell you what we talked about now.  I'm sure it had something to do with music and how awesome I am.  Other than that, I have no effing clue.

After a period of awkward conversation followed by even more awkward silence, I decided to rejoin my friends and family and offered he come with me.  He declined and stared longingly as I sat down and began to explain the situation to my incredibly curious "fans."  The first to look up at him was Ariel and though she tried to not be obvious he was so honed in that he immediately saw her.  And the look of bewildered surprise on her face.  Which he of course mistook for Ariel hating him because drama and assumptions just are so much more fun than real life. 

So off he stormed texting me all sorts of less than flattering things all while I was kindly attempting to invite him to enjoy the fair with my parents - who he'd never met.  It became clear almost immediately why we broke up as the texts rolled into my phone nonstop claiming love and hate and love and hate and a little more love.  I was not impressed.

Now all of this may seem relatively normal until you take into account that my ex drove over six hours to see me play a ten minute set just to turn around and drive right home again.  That is just plain weird.  Especially when you consider that we dated for a whole three months.  Yup, it all sounds way more than weird now.  So thanks for stopping by.  I guess.

The Invisible Scar

Today I spent three hours enjoying a little self-inflicted pain.  Mind out of the gutter!  No S&M here, boys.  I spent three whole hours at a local tattoo parlor getting a most glorious tattoo.  Now you might wonder why in the world I would get a tattoo of such a size that it would require hours of incredibly fast needles painfully stabbing parts of my body.  You see this was not just any tattoo, but a tattoo meant to cover another tattoo.  Prepare for a story of woe and warning.

When I was eighteen years old I was a very shy young girl.  Having just graduated high school, I was still recovering from the effects of being an ugly duckling that was all legs and about thirty pounds underweight for her height.  I loving refer to myself as having the body of a "twelve year old anorexic boy" during this stage in my life.  Needless to say I was shamelessly picked on.  Thinking myself not worthy of a boyfriend and having never been kissed, I was most surprised to find myself garnering male attention when I arrived on campus for my freshman year of college.  This was a most pleasant change.

Not being used to such things, I immediately started dating the first guy that came along.  I had never had a boyfriend and I could hardly contain my excitement.  I felt cool and wanted and normal.  I had always wished for a boyfriend and suddenly, poof, I had one.  Of course being young and stupid, the thrill of simply having a boyfriend masked all the shitty traits said boyfriend possessed.  He was controlling and alienated me from my best friends.  He cheated on me and used me.  He took advantage of my innocence and kindness.  Suddenly, he'd taken over my life and I couldn't get it back.

Now, I'll spare you the very, very, very grizzly details of our dating history, but when it was all said and done, I had wasted three years on a boy that ruined in me in nearly everyway a man can.  I was devastated and shocked, but in the end I was better for it.  I emerged more confident and self-reliant and proud of the beautiful woman I was.  I also found myself growing into a beautiful, filled out woman - call me a late bloomer.

Realizing that I had narrowly escaped spending my life with a man that would have ruined every part of me, I began getting rid of all the things that held a connection to him in my life.  I got rid of the emails, the gifts, the songs.  I threw out boxes full of broken memories and forgotten promises.   Finally, it was all gone and I felt lighter and ready for my life to really begin.

Now it is nearly three years later and the only thing left of him was a tattoo.  A tattoo I'd let him pick for me off the wall at a local tattoo shop; the tattoo that reflected me in no way whatsoever.  It was his last mark upon me.  So I spoke with an artist, had something personal and meaningful drawn and got a new tattoo.  Not even a faint image remains of the old ink below the deep blue of the tattoo that now rests in its place.  It is a scar invisible.

Note to self:  Don't allow others to make your decisions.  Or pick a tattoo off a wall, ever.

Conversations with an Ass

My ex has a way of calling me at awkward times of day. Specifically, he enjoys calling me when I am asleep and he is less than sober. I always answer. Now before you write me off as a really stupid individual, realize that he’s calling me when I’m asleep. The funny thing about your phone ringing in the middle of a sweet dream featuring the one and only Chuck Wicks is that you will answer it no matter what. You won’t even look at who’s calling. You will grope around your nightstand in the dark, knocking shit over, finally find your blaring phone and you will answer it. It’s just a fact (and before you say I’m stupid again for not putting my phone on silent, it’s because I use it for my alarm and my alarm only setting is broken…so hah!). Thank you, ex, for barging your dumbass face into my lovely, lovely dreams.

Now these early morning – or late night if that’s your preference – phone calls are all the more interesting because more recently my ex got a new phone. This has had a dramatic effect on my sleeping patterns. The owner of a new Blackberry Pearl, the ex is unfamiliar with such exciting new features as “key guard.” Yes, just like the commercials I am a constant victim of butt dialing.

“Hello?”

“Gargle blah gargle…take a shot…blah gargle gargle…so drunk….blah blah.”

“Nice to talk to you, butt.”

The thing I don’t understand about my constant conversations with my ex’s ass is that I am not at the top of his contact list. My name is not Abby, hell my name isn’t even Beth. My name doesn’t start with an A or a B or a C – it starts with an S. How does one butt dial someone in the middle of his contact list? How does one butt dial someone that they have not called in well over a month (meaning I am not at the top of his recent calls)? How is my ex’s ass so very smart that it picks me out of all his contacts? You, dear ex, have an ass that should belong to Mensa.

Maybe it’s just your ass’s way of letting me know that you’re a drunken idiot and that I am so much better off single. If this is the case, your ass is doing a phenomenal job. Thank you, ass, for pointing out my ex’s shortcomings, he is even more of an ass then you. Oh and for the record, you probably don’t need that shot of Jager you were discussing with your buddy; it’ll go straight to your ass.

Ode to a Tool

One of my ex boyfriends, we'll call him "Small Town Boy", is a total tool. Now Small Town Boy (STB) is not just a regular tool, but a tool of such epic proportions that I would go so far as to call him a tool bag; for those of you not in the know this is similar to "biggie sizing" your value meal.

To better describe STB, I decided to look up the word tool on the ever handy Urbandictionary.com:

Intellectual pursuits are not of any interest to a tool, and people who are interested in them are "stuck-up" or "faggy". A tool just likes to have a few beers, watch and talk about sports constantly, and refer to women as "sluts" and themselves "players". Tools are usually borderline retarded, but hide it well because they have the uncanny ability to conform almost perfectly to social norms.

If a movie, or song becomes popular in society, the tool will quickly adapt said movie or song as one of their favorites (see Lil' Jon, Souljah Boy, Boondock Saints). Their "social commentary" is often crudely taken from the last episode of South Park.

A tool can usually be spotted wearing a backwards baseball cap and athletic attire, playing beer pong at any large, obnoxious party where loud mainstream rap music is played.

Thanks Urban Dictionary, you have effortlessly captured STB in all his toolish glory; I couldn't have put it better myself! I shit you not, that is literally an exact description of the college dropout, ultimate mooch, beer pong table in the living room, Boondock Saints loving cliche that is STB. I mean the guy dumped me while drunk in the middle of a camping trip of twenty people - tool for sure.

Recently though, STB raised his level of tool bag to a height of such epic proportions that I'm not even sure there is a word for it. STB jumped on the ol' bandwagon and got a tattoo that he has advertised incessantly on facebook (a classic tool move). Now I have several tattoos so I'm not judging him on the act of simply getting inked. The thing is that my tattoos all have a definite and dramatic connection to my life, for example I have Mercury wings on both feet. This is because I not only ran track for 15+ years of my life but my parents met at a track meet - basically my life is one big track meet.

Now STB's tattoo, on the other hand, has nothing to do his life on any sort of meaningful level. First I'll give you a little background. STB and his current sugar momma just took a trip to Hawaii after a month of relationship bliss. And basically that's it, STB has been to Hawaii once and there stretching from elbow to wrist is a map of Hawaii (please also note that it is every tool's favorite tattoo color, black, and the toolish arm in the air). WHAT?! OK, I've seen some shitty tattoos, but why on Earth would a white boy from Montana get a tattoo of Hawaii after visiting the place once? I've been to Minnesota for a layover, maybe I should get a tramp stamp of the land of 10,000 lakes.

I can see it now, "Daddy, what are those blobs on your arms?!" (please note that this is dramtization, heaven help us all of STB procriates)

"That's Hawaii, Timmy." Then enevitably STB will have to tell Timmy all about it and it will come up that the trip wasn't with Mommy but with the current flavor of the week. Poor, poor Timmy.

Thank you STB for reminding of yet another reason why I am glad we are no longer dating, as if your unemployment and constant inebriation weren't enough. I hope that you and Haiwaii are very happy together.