Rambling Rose

bristol baby :)

2009-04-09T08:35:00.001-07:00

I woke up that day at 7:00, after only four hours of sleep.

I don’t know what kept me up all night. It must have been excitement.

The boys were foraging through the house like army ants, picking up coolers, koozies, grills, chapstick, chairs – anything they could get their hands on that we might need.

It was my first Bristol race, so they let me watch from the sidelines.

Everything fit into the Suburban and the El Camino like pieces of a well-crafted puzzle. I was highly impressed.

By the time us girls woke all the way up, attempted to eat breakfast and got ourselves ready, it was 9:30 – time for departure.

We made only one stop – at the Food City – to fill our coolers with beverages and ice and use the last flushing restroom we’d see for hours.

Traffic into Bristol wasn’t as bad as I’d expected. We pulled into the group’s regular spot at the Red Barn Campground and unloaded. By 11, we were settled in and warming up for our first round of Redneck Golf.

If you’ve never played this game, you might not understand the awesomeness of what happened next. But for you seasoned veterans, I’m proud to announce that my partner and I went undefeated that day. It was my first time playing, but I finally got the hang of tossing those strung-together golf balls onto the PVC pipe goal posts.

I was a natural athlete on a team with another natural athlete. I hate it for everyone who had to play against us.

As the day grew warmer, we watched helicopters fly the racecar drivers onto the grounds. That excitement was heightened as the qualifying rounds began, the roar of revving engines echoing through the campsite.

We grilled up some hamburgers and hot dogs and sat on Juanita’s tailgate (that’s the El Camino) for lunch. We made friends with our neighbors, who were nice enough to take our group photos and even let us use their rented port-a-potty. (It was only slightly less gross than the public ones at the bottom of the hill, but it was definitely closer.)

We searched the campground and our Blackberries, but never found a poll for the Nationwide Series race. We had to place our bets, however, so we all just threw in five bucks each and took turns drawing numbers that represented starting positions.

I didn’t realize at the time, but my numbers – two, four and 17 – were great numbers. Carl Edwards had qualified second and Kyle Busch fourth.

We headed toward the track, weaving through the vendors and campers and race fans. I’ve been to the speedway before for drag races and car shows, but it looks a heck of a lot different when it’s got that race day glow.

After unsuccessfully trying to catch a ride on a Roto-Rooter truck, one of the boys complimented a go-kart driver on his wheels and scored us two seats. Unfortunately, there were eight of us walking, and the rest had to keep hiking. (I’m counting the walk up there and back as my cardio for the weekend. Holy cow.)

We had great seats – Richard Petty Terrace, Section C, Row 28, on the second turn – and my adrenaline started pumping as the pace car took the track for the countdown to green.

There were my cars – number 60, Carl Edwards, in the neon green in the second position, and number 18, Kyle Busch, in the black car with the red and white letters, in fourth.

“Gentlemen, start your engines.”

Before I knew it, Edwards and Busch were in first and second. I was so excited that I barely spoke for the first 100 laps. Instead, I screamed at the top of my lungs, stood up, sat down, stood up again and took picture after picture.

I’d predicted I’d lose interest after a few laps and head back to the campsite, but before I knew it, it was lap 200 and my boys were still in the lead.

Sometime later, I had to take a bathroom break. In retrospect, I see I should have never left the stadium. While I was gone, Busch left pit row after his team let a tire roll out during his final pit stop, penalizing him to start as the last car on the lead lap.

I got back to my seat just in time to watch Kevin Harvick (not one of my drivers, in case you missed that) lead the last 10 laps of the race, with Edwards right behind him and Busch coming back to finish sixth.

Despite my disappointment, my first Bristol race was perfect. I had a great time with some great friends, and I won a really sweet Richard Petty pocketknife as a consolation prize.

I admit, on the ride home that next day, I even listened to the last half of the Food City 500. (Kyle Busch and his pit crew redeemed themselves, by the way. They took home first place.)

I can’t believe I lived right down the road from Bristol for 10 years and never attended a race. I had no idea how much fun I’ve been missing. I can’t wait till August.

just a lil update

2009-01-07T08:31:00.000-08:00

Hello.

I'm still alive... Just wanted to let you know!

Life has been crazy, with the holidays and all that come with them. I'm just getting over a sinus infection :*(

I have a lot of stories and photos to share, as soon as I get caught up on all the work I've missed.

Hope you're all doing well!

ox

Samara

Looking for love?

2008-11-20T08:58:00.001-08:00

So, at the ripe old age of 28, I find myself single and loving it. I'm testing the waters as far as love goes, but lately, I'm asking myself one dumbfounding question: Who is it I'm looking for?

After a couple hours of reflection, and a morning of instant messaging with my roomie Meg, we realized that we don't need much when it comes to a significant other. Then Meg wrote a blog about it. And then I went to her page and stole it.

For your reading pleasure.............

(reprinted, with permission, from my roommate Meghan's blog)

Summing It Up
Current mood: silly
Category: Romance and Relationships

It's tough to be a single girl (or guy, I suppose) these days. Especially if you're at all fond of spending QT with a member of the opposite sex. One person I know who seems to have it all figured out, is my girl S-train.

She can tell you what she's looking for in a mate...We talked about it this morning and wrote a personal ad that describes Samara's Mr. Perfect quite nicely:

swf iso sm 28-32 no kids/ex wives. must be a handy man & appreciate bluegrass. breakdancing & home cooked gourmet meals required.

How great to sum it up in less than thirty words! I think it should be quite simple to find a breakdancing, gourmet food cooking, bluegrass loving homebuilder. I mean, guys like that are everywhere, right? I wish her all the luck in the world. At least she has some idea of her specifications.

I, on the other hand, prefer to fly by the seat of my proverbial pants and watch what happens. Most often, things never get off the ground, but some times I wonder if I don't prefer it that way. While I'm not much for making lists (or sticking to the ones I actually do write down), in the spirit of capturing my Mr. Perfect in thirty words or less, I wrote an ad of my own.

sf iso m. uses good grammar. kid & dog friendly. must want commitment and not want commitment. trash & laundry service a plus.*

Talk about some high standards and tight pecs! I mean specs...Cross your fingers for me, okay?

*Note: Said standards are subject to change at any given moment depending on my mood and your behavior, or my perception thereof.

I had a morning rant for breakfast

2008-11-13T15:42:00.000-08:00

Well I'm pissed at myself this morning.

I am so forgetful.

Monday I attended a luncheon to honor all the judges of Hamilton County. I told my boss I'd make a CD of all the photos I took and take it to the executive director of the bar association so she could sort through them and pick out her favorites. (My deadline for the photo selection is tomorrow.) Today – Thursday – he asked if I'd done that. Of course, I forgot.

Yesterday, I offered – on behalf of my office – to buy a sympathy card for the publisher of my paper, whose mother died. I forgot.

Today, for lunch, I told my wonderful roommate to invite her friend to lunch with us – my treat. I purchased a $50 gift certificate for $25 a few months ago to a restaurant downtown. I'm supposed to be writing my column on it this week, and it would be fun to have a girls' lunch and spend it all in one sitting.

I got my tote bag out of the car – the front pocket of which has been home to said gift certificate for the whole three months I've owned it – and it's gone. I've ransacked my desk, my laptop bag, my purse, my tote bag. Nothing. I'm sure I took it out and put it somewhere important, only I've forgotten where that somewhere is.

Why is it that I have all these great ideas – these wonderful, thoughtful, fantastic ideas – and then I always find a way to screw them up?

Granted, I'm probably being melodramatic. I know that's my tendency and I embrace it. But I don't care.

I realize these three things don't seem like a big deal. But they are. To me. because they were totally in my control and I effed them up by not writing them down on a list or in a calendar somewhere.

(This is where the blackberry I want so bad would come into play, if only I had one.)

I think that's one big problem we all face, though, is figuring out what we're in control of and what we're not. A million things pop into my mind as I type this… should I get into it? Oh, why not… the election is over. I might as well spill my guts now.

I have had about all I can take with this economic bailout. This is one very obvious thing the government thinks it can control, but can't. (At least to me and a lot of other intelligent, logical people I know.)

Let's break this down to the commonly-known facts. We'll start with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

When the Clinton administration ran the world, the economy "boomed." Does anyone know why? Because the business industry became so deregulated. Do we know what that means? They took away the rules – the standards to which corporations were held. Democrats (and I mean this in the most loving, caring way) wanted everyone in the country to have a fair chance at wealth - a fair chance at becoming a homeowner and "living the American Dream." So they deregulated the housing industry… and by doing so, they inadvertently made it acceptable for people to be dishonest.

Do you realize? Banks were accepting "stated incomes" on loan applications. People were walking in to get mortgages, telling banks they made $200,000 a year and the banks were giving them loans without proof of income. These people's mortgage payments were then set at $2,000 a month, which they could not afford.

AND NOW THEY'RE IN FORECLOSURE AND OUR GOVERNMENT IS BAILING OUT THE BANKS WHO ARE SUFFERING AS A RESULT OF IT.

I'm sorry people, but I don't get it. Yes, I agree 100 percent that the fuckers who administered these loans should be fired – even jailed. As a matter of fact, in the fall of 2001, there was a nationwide federal sting operation in place to arrest each and every one of these crooks who were lying on the loan applications.

But then guess what happened – September 11.

And guess what would have happened, had Bush continued to focus on the housing industry instead of the war on terror – his ass would have been impeached.

You know it. Don't deny it. You'd have had his head on a silver platter if he hadn't infiltrated the Middle East and produced something – even if it was just Saddam's head on a platter.

So now, here we are – dealing with all these problems that are so obviously Bush's fault… only they aren't. In reality, we're dealing with things that are direct results of the CLINTON ADMINISTRATION people.

Don't get me wrong – I liked Clinton. Granted, when he was in office I didn't know anything about politics. I voted for him in my high school election and had no clue why my dad called me an idiot. (He loves me, I swear. He's just a no-holds-barred kind of conservative.)

And now, here we are. It's 2008. Another liberal has been elected to office and what are we hearing on the news? A proposed bailout for the automobile industry is on the table.

REALLY?

What are we teaching ourselves here? It's OK to make bad decisions because the government will do whatever it takes to clean up the shit trail you leave behind?

Do you know where this money is coming from? This money for the bailouts? Our country has an ENORMOUS deficit. That means we have more debt than money…. Get it? So where is this bailout money coming from?

The government is going to print trillions – yes TRILLIONS of dollars with NOTHING TO BACK IT UP. So, as we sit here and wallow in self-pity because our housing and automobile industries are crumbling, our gas prices are fluctuating and no one will help us, our government is cooking up bright ideas to "save" the economy. And those "bright ideas" include printing WORTHLESS MONEY.

And we wonder why the American dollar is losing value?

If I went home tonight and printed a trillion dollars of my own, how much do you think it would be worth? Geez…..

I guess if I'm going to bring this rant back full circle, I have to say that the government needs to realize this – THERE IS NO WAY TO FIX THE ECONOMY.

Economy, by definition, is a system of exchange and distribution, of buying and selling, of highs and LOWS. As horrible as things seem to be right now, there is no need to panic. As gas prices – and therefore food prices – come down, we will slowly start pumping money back into the economy. Cars will start to sell again.

Now that the housing industry is re-regulated, only people who can AFFORD homes are qualifying to buy them. Slowly but surely, the housing market is picking up again.

I'm worried about the state of our nation – not because we are in a recession right now. The word "recession" doesn't even scare me. It's a natural slope to the (as my ACCOUNTANT roomie Meghan puts it) "unhealthy peak" we've been enjoying for so many years now. SHIT HAPPENS!

What scares me is having a people-pleasing, liberal government who tries to put a VERY EXPENSIVE, UNREALISTIC bandaid on a problem that will fix itself if we just let it.

I would honestly love to hear thoughts on all this. I am truly intrigued by people who don't agree with, or at least appreciate, these views.

I am not a diehard Republican. Hell, I'm not even a Republican. I'm a registered Independent.

I won't even say I'm conservative. I'll just say this - I like to think for MYSELF, in my own logical way, not based on what a party tells me to believe.

And I think logically and can honestly say that a LOT of people in the highest offices of our country obviously don't.

Thoughts?

I'd especially like to hear from Obama supporters. Especially you, Howze. My aforementioned roommate is one of you guys. And she shares all the views about which I just ranted.... so there!

And don't get me wrong... I like Obama. I think he's great. His family reminds me of a modern-day Huxtable family and I am literally ALL FOR the Huxtables running the country.

But seriously though, I really want to know what ya'll think. Comment. Let me know.

Peace out, yo.

ox

Life is good.

2008-10-24T16:14:00.000-07:00

Hello world!

I'm feeling a bit Carrie Bradshaw at the moment... I find myself narrating life in my head as it happens - and I think it's because I'm so damn happy!

Nothing much has really happened lately... and by that I mean, "no drama!" I love my life right now. It's stress free, and for the first time in a long time, I'm living 100 percent for what makes ME happy!

Nowadays, as I walk down the street, I take the time to smile at the people passing me by. I can just FEEL the happiness transfer, from my face to theirs, as a grin crosses their faces... It's amazing!

I recently finished a new audio book - Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. It's my first Harry Potter experience (yes, I know, I'm behind the times) and I loved it. I popped it in on the way to Johnson City a couple weeks ago and listened to it nonstop the whole way there, the whole way back and every minute I could until I'd finished it! I can't wait to get the next one... I love audio books! I love J.K. Rowling!

I love my living situation. I'm lucky enough to have a wonderful roommate, who I can talk to every second of the day (literally - text, phone, email, IM) and never get sick of. Go figure! We get along great. Our personalities complement each other. And even when we disagree (mostly on politics), we do it in intellectual, respectful ways. More people need these kind of relationships in their lives.

I love my job. I've been working at the paper over a year, but I'm not sick of it! It keeps getting more interesting. My story assignments never get old. I'm using my own voice in my column more and more these days, and I even have a handful of readers who comment on the Weekly Indulgence regularly!

I love my family. Well, you probably already knew that. But I'm feeling so great right now, and I'm missing them so much, I thought I'd go ahead and share that too. :)

I'm looking forward to spending Halo-ween with my sister, Beth, and all my old friends... and spending the next night in Greeneville, and spending the next day throwing LeAnn the BEST 80S BABY SHOWER EVER! I'm looking forward to making a little extra cash, and getting caught up on my finances, just in time for the holidays. (By the way, I've already got most of my shopping done! What's REALLY going on here?)

Life is good. Life is real good. And I'm vowing to myself, right here and now, to never let it get anything less than good again!

I just had to share these revelations with you and whoever else wants to know. I hope things are great in your neck of the woods!

oxox

Prenup for Singles?

2008-10-09T10:05:00.000-07:00

I have never been married. I'm not saying that's a good thing or a bad thing – but either way, it's true.

That being said, I have suffered my fair share of breakups. But thankfully, that's always been done outside of court. (Although I think a mediator would have been quite useful a time or two.)

The one thing I'll never understand is why, when two people end a romantic relationship, their mutual friends feel obligated to choose one side or another. I know it is possible for people to remain friends with both parties. I've been that mutual friend before and, as uncomfortable as it may be at first, I know it is absolutely doable.

Perhaps there should be some sort of written rulebook about the division of friends after a breakup.

For instance, if only one party hung out with a friend, and the other party only hung out with said friend by default, then the original party gets to keep the friend.

However, if the second party establishes a relationship with the friend, making him or her a "mutual" friend, then the estranged couple should share joint custody of the friend after the split, making everyone happy (and only slightly uncomfortable).

Likewise, if both parties become friends with another couple, each relationship should stand alone, as its own separate entity. Obviously special occasions – such as birthdays and holidays – are going to be awkward. But, as in the case of child custody, it seems as though adults should be able to work out arrangements that are both fair and fun for all parties involved.

As I type out these proposals, they strike me as quite absurd. Surely grown men and women should be able to work out amicable resolutions to such simple disputes on their own, without any rules.

However, as I type this, I am thinking about a specific event – one that happened a mere two weeks ago, when my ex and I faced off for the 30th birthday extravaganza of my friend (who also happens to be his best friend's wife).

The day began with a series of text messages.

"Is he going to be there? I don't want to run into him. I really hope he doesn't come."

"I don't think he's coming. I'll call you later once I find out for sure."

As childish as this sounds, it was completely necessary. I knew I could handle any given situation, but I wanted her birthday to be one for the record books. I mean, you only turn 30 once. Heaven forbid some petty little fight mess that night's memories.

As her surprise dinner approached, the text messaging transferred from the wife to the husband.

"Why don't you meet us for dinner," read the text, "and then we'll go from there."

So I did. And it was wonderful.

Afterward, the whole group went to the bowling alley. I got to join them for a couple rounds of pool, but when the text message chain alerted me that the ex was on his way, I gathered my things and bid everyone adieu.

I'm glad I got to spend some quality time with my friend on her birthday. And while it was slightly awkward to be surrounded by a group of people who primarily consider themselves my ex's friends, it was comforting to know how happy they all were to see me.

Later on - less than an hour after I'd left - a text message came through, letting me know it was safe to come back out and wrap up the celebration at my friend's favorite dance club. Although my buzz had begun wearing off and I was getting pretty tired, and I was pretty pissed at my ex for the speed bump he'd put in my night, I obliged. And I'm glad I did, because we ended up having the time of our lives!

I guess change is an inevitable part of life. I'm thankful that I have true friends who will stick by me no matter what. I'm looking forward to celebrating many more birthdays to come with my friend, and I'm sure we'll get many chance to spend quality time together between now and next October.

Fun and games!

2008-10-08T13:22:00.001-07:00

I've always been a bit of a pool shark.

I grew up in the country - in Greene County - Mosheim, for any of you that might know what that is. And my house was down the street from a local pool hall... The Pantry House.

Now, granted, this was no place for a young girl to hang out. People got drunk and did drugs there every night of the week. Luckily for me, I was used to that crowd so it didn't intimidate me much.

I started sneaking out with my boyfriend at the tender age of 14. He and his brothers began taking me to the Pantry House and I quickly learned how to aim, how to break and how to apply backspin. Shortly after, we started hustling people.

Now, I'm not saying I could have played on EPSN or anything. I mean, I was 14 for goodness sakes. But I saw those boys win quite a bit of cash and I know I had everything to do with it.

As the years went on, my mom began dating a man who had a pool table in his basement. I refined my skills down there, playing everybody that wanted a run at me. Then, my mom started taking me out to pool halls with her. She'd drink and I'd shoot pool.

Ah, those were the good old days.

Once I graduated high school and moved to Johnson City, I quit playing. It wasn't until I began working at Applebees that I became interested again.

We'd head up the hill every night after work to slam back a few cold ones and play a few rounds. It didn't take long for me to get my groove back, and soon I was schooling folks at Bailey's.

Since then, I have been the most competitive pool player I know. I don't claim to be the best, but I am damn sure the most competitive. I win my share of games - well, not so much lately, because I haven't been to a pool hall in quite a while. But i also lose my fair share of games. And I'm OK with that... but I swear, I get madder if someone lets me win than if I lose a well-played game.

You best believe that.

This summer, I've spent a little less time in pool halls and more time hanging out with old (and new) friends. I've gotten to see my Vonni more times than I can count... and the last time I did, she taught me how to play darts.

I've played before, but I was always shit-faced drunk and could barely see the target. I assumed, based on what I barely remember from those experiences, that I hated playing darts because I sucked at it.

What I learned a few weeks ago, however, is that darts can be really, really fun when played in the company of great friends (and under the influence of smaller amounts of alcohol).

Maybe it was beginner's luck, but I wasn't half bad! I mean, I hit the wall behind the machine a few times. And I rarely hit the point at which I was aiming. But I kept a competitive score (even if it was by accident) and there were TONS of times when Von said "GOOD DART!" (which is darts for "nice shot").

So now I love darts and I've been looking forward to this upcoming weekend when I'll go back to the Grill (or "the Hyperion" for you new Greeneville kids) and get to play again. I know this time, there will be actual people there to make fun of me when I screw up. And I'm sure that I won't make it through two games before I get embarrassed and quit... but I'm looking forward to having a good time with my girls and giving it a whirl.

Speaking of having a good time with my girls, last weekend my friend Becca (as in, used to work at JC Applebee's, moved to Washington, then Myrtle Beach, then CHATTANOOGA Becca) invited me to her and Bryan's house for a cookout.

Bryan (the vegan) cooked us amazing steaks, potatoes and corn on the cob. We drank about a six pack of beer each and then they introduced me to my NEW favoritest game in the world (yes, favoritest)..... DOMINOES!

Now, I've got quite a bit of experience playing dominoes, but only the ones you buy at Target Dollar Days that have cats, dogs, pigs, frogs and cows on them. And I quickly learned at Becca and Bryan's that those type of dominoes ain't got SHIT on the real kind.

It was kind of hard to catch on at first, probably because I was already five beers in when we started... but once my practice round was over, I was hooked.

We played three back to back games that night and I swear, if I hadn't realized it was 1:00 on a work night, I'd have played at least three more.

I had a great time with Becca and Bryan and I am so pumped to get together with them again soon... and eat, drink and play dominoes! (And listen to Becca sing Van Morrison's "Domino" totally off key... lol)

This summer has been chocked full of good times with great friends and I look forward to seeing what the fall has in store! I'm pumped to have two new games that I am completely infatuated with... and to to have great friends to play them with!

: )

Bluegrass and weddings... what a fun time of year!

2008-10-06T08:51:00.000-07:00

Hello out there. I have some great things to write about, but I've been so busy lately I haven't had the time! I just wanted to say a quick hello and assure all three of my readers that I've got some great things to write about, as soon as I find time!

I spent weekend before last in Asheville for Haize and Cory's wedding... and it was AMAZING! We had a wonderful time at the bachelorette party on Thursday. We shopped till we dropped on Friday. We had the best wedding ever on Saturday, followed by the best reception! Can't wait to post pictures and give details!

Then this past weekend was the Three Sisters Festival here in Chattanooga. Of course, that means wonderful bluegrass music on the river... guaranteed to be a good time! I went with Meghan, Maiya and our good friend Catlett. It was hot as heck outside, so we didn't get to stay long. But we did get to see the Dismembered Tennesseans (our favorite) and we had a great time while we were there!

So anyway, I'm off to lunch. But hopefully I'll find time either today or tomorrow and I'll collect my thoughts and share them with the rest of the world!

Until then... have a great day!

It's great to be a Tennessee Vol (yes, even now)

2008-09-22T10:13:00.001-07:00

Oh, the joys and sorrows of being a Tennessee Vol.

How we love to get decked out in obnoxious, gorgeous orange, donning everything from temporary tattoos to fake flowers to neon nails.

How we tailgate all day in a Methodist church parking lot, chugging beer and eating chips and seeing old high school friends.

How cheer as we walk toward the hallowed Neyland Stadium, shooting dirty glances at anyone wearing purple or blue or whatever stupid, ugly color those Gators wear is. Our smiles don’t fade, as people sneak liquor and beer into the stadium but our water – our only source of hydration – gets confiscated and we’re forced to spend $4 a bottle to get another one, half the size.

We continue to scream as the band takes the field, as they form the Power T, as the players chest bump and Fulmer hobbles to the sideline. We continue to cheer for two whole quarters, until our punts are returned for touchdowns and we fumble on the two yard line.

We eat our hotdogs, loaded, and make nice with the old Florida fans. They can’t help it, bless their hearts. They were born there. They don’t know any better.

We don’t get mad anymore when we’re getting killed at halftime. We don’t leave, even though we know no Fulmer ass chewing could ever pull them out of this.

Instead, we ditch the game third quarter to resume tailgating – and have to walk 4.6 miles to get to the same church parking lot, where our same drunk friends are lying in the grass, still chugging beer.

As we watch the rest of the game on the television that our dedicated friends brought along, we make plans for the evening and collect fun souvenirs, like lip gloss rings and boys’ phone numbers.

We sit outside the stadium until the game is totally over, and the streets are packed with happy Gator fans.

Despite our losing record, low expectations and frustration with the coaching staff, we are diehard fans. Our loyalty never waivers. And besides, what kind of UT fans would we be if we went home and sulked after a loss? We have to go out – to the bars in the Old City – to show our support for the home team. We don’t want them to think we don’t love them anymore.

It’s amazing how many people we meet, as we hook up with old friends and dance the night away. Who knew Florida fans were so prone to buying UT girls drinks?

Who knew there could be such great music playing on a patio that’s not crowded and makes a kick ass dance floor?

Who knew that apple pie moonshine tastes like heaven in your mouth, unlike all other moonshine I’ve ever had, which was like swallowing battery acid? (Greeneville boys knew. That’s who.)

Who knew that people really still dressed like they stepped out of the 80s – not in a joking way or a trendy way… but in a real, dirty, mullet-y, crossdresser-y, living-in-the-past-and-don’t-have-a-clue kind of way.

Of course, with all these things we didn’t know, there were several things we did. Like, I knew I wouldn’t bat an eye if one of my girls needed me to heartlessly tell some imposing douchebag to find a way home because he can’t come in. I don’t care to do that at all.

And I knew that I’d pass out in the living room. I was preoccupied and up way past my bedtime. I’m too old for this staying up all night business. I might be a dedicated fan – one of the most dedicated, I’d say – but even I have limits.

And I knew I should have eaten more or drank less, because I’m too old to drink that way on a five piece chicken nugget and fries. But we had a great time at Wendy’s too. We needed that sober chill time in between drinking binges. Ouch.

And above all, I knew that getting together with my girls for a day and night on the town would be the perfect way to end a perfect summer. Saturday was nothing short of amazing and I feel so blessed to have made such great memories with such phenomenal company.

I don’t care that we lost. I expected it. Hell, I dreamed about it the night before (and I wasn’t far off on the score, I might add. I am THIS CLOSE to being psychic. :)

I am so happy to be a Tennessee Vol. I love orange. I love football. And most of all, I love getting together with my girls, dancing the night away and having the time of my life.

Ah, life is good.

The Summer of Change

2008-09-19T10:05:00.000-07:00

Yeah.

I should totally be working right now, considering it’s Friday and I have yet to complete any of my four stories of the week. Usually my deadline would be around noon today, but since my boss is out with a back injury, I figured I’ve got until Monday to get everything done.

I shouldn’t think that way, though. This is going to be one fun filled weekend and there won't be much time for writing. My unbelievable roommate scored 50 yard line tickets to the UT/Florida game and we’re traveling to Knoxville on Saturday to have a fun filled girls’ weekend!

This will be one of many I’ve had this summer. I’ve blogged about several, but I hope you don’t mind a recap. For those of you who don’t know, I recently ended a three-year relationship. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And while it took me several months and a lot of therapy to get out of “crisis mode,” I am proud to say I’m happier now than I have been in a LONG time.

I’ve reconnected to my old self. The giggly girl that used to have to sit on the front porch until she could regain her composure. The creative girl that could draw chalk pictures on the sidewalk for hours. The girl who makes time to read at least one book a week. The girl who puts her own happiness before anyone else’s, but still makes time to be a good friend to those she loves.

My work has improved and so has my social life. I’ve made some great friends this summer… friends I’m sure will be in my life for many years to come.

I’ve made time to spend with my family that I hadn’t made in years past. I’ve gone home on a whim, whenever I could. I've spent quality time with each member of my family. I’ve even had a couple nights out with my mom, whom I’ve neglected to see for some time now.

I’ve rekindled friendships that were more than a decade old. I’ve brought old circles and new circles together and I am so pleased that everyone meshes so well.

I consider myself a very lucky girl at this point in my life. My dad has this belief that every seven years, people reinvent themselves. He claims it has something to do with the DNA regenerating on a predictable cycle. I don’t know if I’m down with all that, but I can testify that this year – my 28th year on this earth – I have become exactly who I want to be.

I have a great family, great friends and a great career. Whatever the future holds, I can only hope it keeps getting better.

The Art of Vision

2008-09-18T12:36:00.000-07:00

Hello out there. Sorry it’s been so long since I last blogged. I promised myself I’d write two of these suckers a week, and here it is… a full month since my last post.

I’ve been really busy. Well, no busier than usual, but my how time flies when you’re having fun. I’ve been doing a tiny bit of freelance work, helping my acupuncturist get ready for her open house. (Which, by the way was a huge success!) And I’ve also been going through a pretty drastic life change.

I’ll get to that in a different blog. Maybe.

But where I’d like to start today is what propelled me back into the blogosphere.

This week is the Tennessee Association of Realtors’ annual convention, held right here in lovely Chattanooga. (Or Chattavegas, as the t-shirts they’re selling call it. I personally think that makes us sound like we’re a city full of 12 year olds. But I digress…)

The week’s festivities were kicked off with a keynote speech by international speaker Erik Wahl. His presentation – The Art of Vision – began at 9:30 in the morning. Approximately 600 people (that’s my approximation, so it was probably more like 200 or 1,000) gathered in a huge auditorium and were blown away within the first 10 minutes.

He said he wanted to begin with something just a “little bit different.” The lights dimmed. U2’s “Beautiful Day” blared over the speakers. He began dancing in front of a black canvas, flicking droplets of paint and smearing yellows and reds with a paintbrush.

The guys beside me made jokes about his apparent sexuality. And then this happened.

As soon as the crowd realized what he had created, it erupted into applause. It was spectacular.

Erik Wahl travels the country, motivating people to tap into their creative right brains more often. He says that business, no matter how mundane, can be enhanced if we only allow ourselves to think about things differently.

He spoke about past leaders, whose willingness to think against the grain marked great changes in history.

He spoke about his children, who he encourages not to be perfect, but to be extraordinary.

I left that auditorium feeling embarrassed for many reasons. I am one of the few people I know who is making a career out of what I love. I get paid to write about things I enjoy – events I attend and restaurants I patronize – and I have a ton of spare time to write about everything I love. And although I have no good excuse to avoid my own creative urges, I have allowed myself two or more hours of TV a night and no time for writing.

That’s just unacceptable.

Erik Wahl said some of the most influential people in the world were those who allowed themselves to be different. They allowed themselves to think in ways that weren’t popular, or even accepted. Then he painted this, upside down.

I was so inspired by his speech that I am vowing to myself – right now, in front of you and God and everybody – that I will dedicate more of my time to giving a voice to my inner self. Otherwise, how could I possibly inspire those around me?

I think it is my job, as a writer, to share my thoughts with anyone who will read them. I apologize to myself for keeping them inside, and I hope you will come back and read more in the future.

Peace and love.

(check out Erik Wahl’s Web site at www.theartofvision.com)

One man's trash is another man's treasure

2008-08-19T11:26:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago, The World’s Longest Yard Sale stretched right through Chattanooga. Its Web site boasts that the concept of the event is to “pull people off the interstates and back into the heartland of rural, scenic America.”

The Alabama-to-Ohio event, created by tourism officials in Tennessee, lasted from 8:00 a.m. until vendors just couldn’t take it any longer. I really wanted to go check this out, but alas – it fell on the same week all my bills were due. So I took the responsible route and stayed home.

But all the fuss about this yard sale made my wheels start spinning. In my college years, Saturday morning yard sales were one of the few things that were guaranteed. My sister, Beth, our friend, Javan, and I would wake up shortly after dawn and hit up the wealthiest neighborhoods in town.

According to Javan, these neighborhoods would have better things for sale. And he was right.

Never before had the adage “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” been so accurate. We found everything from furniture to vintage wall hangings – and our houses were better for it. We sometimes resented Javan for dragging us out of bed so early in the morning, but we always thanked him by the end of the excursion, since we had so many new treasures to show for it.

Johnson City’s biggest yard sale occurred every year, the same weekend as the Bristol NASCAR race. Near East Tennessee State (my alma mater), there is a neighborhood in which each street is named after a tree.

Every year, the Tree Streets have a humongous yard sale that attracts upwards of 30,000 people – from other neighborhoods, surrounding cities and the race.

Even for seasoned veterans, the Tree Streets yard sale is like an Olympic event. The best deals come early – sometimes before the sun rises – and the key to success is to get there before the rest of the bargain seekers.

Over the years, Beth and I furnished two houses from the Tree Streets yard sale alone. We purchased a blue velvet sofa, a vanity, end tables, coffee tables and small kitchen appliances. We bought baskets and books and anything else you might imagine.

The Tree Streets encompass nice, expensive, historic houses. So, as Javan’s theory states, their trash was considerably tasteful.

A lot has changed since those college yard sale days. Javan has since passed away and I moved to Chattanooga. But the Tree Streets Yard Sale continues on.

My dad now lives on Maple Street. He sets up every year, selling merchandise from the video store he owns, along with a hodgepodge of other things he’s picked up here and there.

Every year, he recruits the members of our family to work the sale with him, usually turning quite a profit.

This year was no different. Dad instructed me to arrive at his house around 6:00 a.m. Being the responsible adult I am, I decided to stop in Greeneville the night before and have an innocent night out with friends. We ate, drank and karaoked until the wee hours of the morning.

Before I knew it, we were eating breakfast at Tipton's (home of the world's best breakfast special) at 4:30 in the morning.

I got in my car at 5:00. With exactly zero hours sleep, a slight hangover and a full belly, I drove to Johnson City to begin my Saturday. I got to dad's almost right on time.

Then, in the early morning haze, we set up tables and tarps and made cardboard price tags and everyone located their “station.” As far as family goes, we had a pretty good turnout. My grandmother was in charge of the money. Dad set up halfway between his movies and collectibles. One sister worked the store for Dad and my brother floated around to help us all out.

I was set up with a half-acre of Beth’s clothes. (Perhaps that’s a little exaggerated, but not much.)

People were out perusing by 8:00. By noon, the sun was beaming and my fifth or sixth wind had completely disappeared.

The turnout was a fraction of what it usually is. This may be due to the economy or the fact that the sale was held the weekend before the Bristol race. Either way I was slightly thankful that I could sit around and do nothing. My dehydration and lack of sleep was throwing more than a few kinks into my sales pitch.

Despite my condition, we stayed fairly busy. Dad’s house has become known as “the one that always has the cheap movies,” and apparently, that’s a deal too good to pass up. We played music from the back of a van – everything from Dion’s “Runaround Sue” to Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Gimme Three Steps.”

It was a pretty good day.

Dad also put me in charge of an assortment of Stetson cowboy hats and an “everything’s a dollar” bin. Those were two really big hot spots.

I sold the majority of Beth’s clothes and dropped the rest off at the Salvation Army after the sale. I got to leave around 2:00 and take a nap before spending the rest of the night bartending one of the slowest nights in Halo history. (That's an exaggeration too, but it sure felt like it... I'll tell you that much.)

Today is Tuesday and I've still not fully recovered from my sleepless weekend. I'll probably be paying for my escapades for at least a week or so... but it was worth it.

As always, it was great to spend some much needed time with my friends and family. And overall, the Tree Streets Yard Sale was a huge success. We ended up selling quite a bit of merchandise, despite the low turnout, and I’d been just busy enough to not walk around and spend all our profit.

Times like this, I reminisce about those college days when Beth, Javan and I would wake up before dawn and begin our hunts for hidden treasure. I’m glad I have those memories to hold onto, and the Tree Streets Yard Sale to come home to year after year.

What's in a name?

2008-08-04T14:09:00.000-07:00

I’m sure everyone on earth already knows about this site, but I just discovered iGoogle and it is amazing. I really don’t know that much about it yet, but I can already tell I’m going to fall in love with it once I learn. Within one minute of being on the site, it let me personalize the best categories all on one page – temperature, clock, movie listings, news feed – and it gave me a folder for every category I told it I wanted.

I got so excited with the site that I decided to get a gmail account so I can just check my email directly from that same page (a marketing strategy that clearly worked on me and a whole bunch of other people I know).

So I went to the gmail setup screen and typed in my full name. I also typed in my screen name, which is just my full name with no spaces. There was an option to “check availability.” I did, and for the first time in my life, “samaralitvack” is already taken. OK, so then I try “samararose” and IT’S already taken. THEN I try “samararoselitvack” and IT’S already taken too.

People, I call bullshit on this. I understand that Samara is not really as unpopular of a name as I once thought it was. It is a unique name and I am very happy with it. At least once a week I hear, “Oh, Samara… what a pretty name,” and I am appreciative of everyone who says that, because I agree that it is a very nice name. I love it very much.

But getting comments just about every week for my whole life… it actually gets quite awkward at times.

“Oh, Samara. What a beautiful name! What is that?”

My response is always the same.

“Thanks. It’s Hebrew. It means ‘guarded by God.’”

A few years ago, when Saddam Hussein was arrested in Iraq, he was arrested in a city called Samara. (I know, not a great thing to be famous for, but there are some even cooler things coming up later.)

I looked up the Arabic meaning of my name, and it means “belly dancer.” I can deal with belly dancer. Belly dancer is cool, sexy even.

Don’t get me wrong, being guarded by God is amazing. But being a belly dancer is AWESOME, so it was pretty exciting news, to say the least.

“It also means other things,” I’ll say, if there’s an awkward silence. I’ll search the stranger’s eyes for interest. If the silence continues, I’ll hit my schpeel.

“In Arabic, it means belly dancer.”

I’ll smile and nod. They’ll still say nothing.

“And you know those little things that fly down from maple trees? Those little helicopter things that kids love? That’s called a Samara too!”

I’ll smile and nod.

Usually at this point, the conversation comes to an awkward end. Sometimes, on rare occasion, a light bulb will go off above said stranger’s head

“Isn’t that the city where we caught Saddam?” someone who didn’t fight in the Iraq war will ask.

“Yes,” I will answer.

“It’s also that psycho girl from that movie! What was that movie?”

“The Ring,” I will say, mind racing for some other topic to discuss.

I’m not very fond of this movie. I don’t like scary movies, for one. I have a thing about adrenaline rushes – I hate their guts. But this movie in particular, which I have never seen, really ruined an entire semester of my life.

I was waiting tables at Applebees and boy was it fun. Of course this was one weekend when our general manager was on a “wear your nametag” kick, so I was stuck putting it out there for the world to see.

It would have been a total waste of breath to complain about said nametag, because it was a corporate rule and I was on the corporate training team. Any rule I complained about would have been thrown back in my face. I probably wouldn’t have said anything anyway – I only complained about things that were really stupid and unnecessary. I understand the necessity of nametags; I couldn’t refute it.

Imagine trying to keep your cool in a job you already don’t like (but you have to take because you need the money). Imagine keeping a smile on your face as you wait on high school kids after-football parties, groups of gender-divided college coeds who just left the movie theater across the street.

“Oh my gosh! Look at her nametag! Did you do that for the movie?”

My smile becomes a grin. “No. That’s my real name.”

“Shut up! That’s your real name?”

Grin becomes blank stare.

“I bet that sucks, having that name! I bet people keep asking you about it, huh?”

Blank stare becomes frown. “So do you guys want virgin strawberry daiquiris and half-price appetizers or what?”

(A little restaurant humor for anyone who’s ever worked an Applebee’s happy hour.)

I guess my point is, having an unusual name has its ups and downs. But these days, celebrities name their children the most random nouns and verbs and adjectives... I can only imagine what these kids will go through, however I believe I may have a better idea than most people.

I spent the last two weeks of every elementary school summer vacation dreading going back to Hal Henard. I loved the school and I loved my friends but I was horribly shy. That first day back to school – with a new teacher and new classmates – was very intimidating.

I would sit with someone I knew, even if I didn’t know them well. As the teacher would call names off her roster, children in the classroom would raise their hands. Sometimes they had to say “here,” but that was nothing compared to what I’d have to say.

At about the Js or the Ks, I would start holding my breath. Sometimes there were several Js, but K and L almost always went quickly. The teacher would stop her methodical name-calling. Her face would scrunch up and her head will cock to one side.

“Sssss… Sssss… Suh…. Ssss Samra? Samra Livik?”

I would raise my hand, praying she’d go on to the next name.

“Samra? Am I saying that right?”

“No, ma’am. It’s Samara.”

“Samaria? Speak up. Samaria Livick?”

By this point, my olive cheeks are burning and the eyes of 20 students all turn to me.

“Samara… Litvack…”

It was mortifying.

After various amounts of banter, each of my teachers eventually got my name right. I’m happy to say I never met a teacher that didn’t take the time to learn it perfectly. (Until college, where teachers could care less what my name was. Half the time I didn’t know theirs either, though.)

But there was one instance, where people kept screwing up my name so badly, I changed it.

When I first moved to Chattanooga, I was ready to get out of the restaurant industry. I got a hit on careerbuilder.com for a sales manager trainee position at a furniture store. It seemed an unlikely fit, but I figured if I could wear real clothes instead of a uniform, I’d be happy.

Anyway, none of the guys that worked there could say my name. Well, the warehouse guys could, and the other manager trainees could too. But the two managers just couldn’t get it right.

So one of them suggested everyone call me “Sam.” I wasn’t too tickled with that – it took away a great conversation piece with customers. (I needed ice breakers. I was horrible at approaching people.) But they said Sam would be easier for customers to remember – which I understood the logic of, so I didn’t complain.

I felt so liberated when I landed my job at the paper a year later… for many reasons, the most relevant of which is that I got to become Samara again. Ah, what a sigh of relief.

The point of all this (yes, I do have a point – I just keep getting sidetracked) is that having an unusual name has its ups and downs. And I believe some parents-to-be could gain a little insight from my perspective.

I can only imagine the excitement a parent feels at this stage in the game. My creative side would be in HEAVEN if I got to pick a child’s name… not to mention painting a nursery, buying clothes and toys… enjoying the last few solid nights of sleep I’d be getting for several years…

But before the parents-to-be get whisked away in all the excitement, they should consider the fate they’re assigning their child when selecting his or her name.

My name is not that weird, in the grand scheme of things. If you google me, you will find a few things I’ve done and a lot of things other Samaras and other Litvacks have done. Thousands of other people have either the same first or last name as I do. On a broad scale, it’s not so different.

However, if your child’s name is Harley Davidson, you can guarantee a google search will never land you what you are trying to look for!

(I use this example in honor of my favorite Guiding Light character, Harley Davidson Cooper. I love Harley and I love GL and I really miss watching my stories every day.)

I’m not totally against weird or random names. I’m good with Apple. I absolutely love Cash. But I think Orange and Cheddar would be totally out of line.

All I’m saying is perhaps parents should consider the effects eccentric names will have on their children. For me, I think my name forced me to speak in front of people at an early age. I think that while I remained shy, I had an underlying sense of confidence that was a direct result of that first day of every school. But if I’d had a name that kids would have laughed at, I would have burst into tears in front of them every year.

Unique names can be a great asset to children, if they’re chosen tastefully, respectfully and with a lot of consideration.

I guess the biggest point I should stress is that a lot of parents are Michaels and Ambers and Melissas – and Joneses and Smiths and Johnsons – and they may have always wished they had more eccentric names. Unique names are an amazing gift to give your children. But keep in mind that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

Mr. Sandman... bring me some zzz's?

2008-07-30T08:59:00.000-07:00

Sleep is one of those things that you don’t truly appreciate until you’re not getting it… kind of like hugs or vitamin D or compliments. For the last three or four months, I’ve been waking up several times a night. I can usually go back to sleep but I wake up the next morning feeling exhausted because I haven’t been asleep more than a couple consecutive hours.

When I was younger, I was a sound sleeper. I guess you have to be in a house with four younger siblings. There were always two to ten extra people running around the house, usually drinking alcohol and speaking or screaming at an octave that echoed downstairs to my room. I didn’t care. I could sleep through it.

I could sleep fully dressed, sitting up if I had to. I think I learned how to do that through my years of camping. My mom used to lug us to either Paint Creek or Horse Creek the day that school was out for summer. You may have heard me tell this story before, but it’s just because camping played such a huge role in molding who I am today.

Have you ever tried roughing it with a family of six, all crammed into only one tent, one camper or one mini-van? There are only so many places to sleep and hardly any of them are comfortable.

In these formative years, I learned to sleep with rocks as pillows. I curled up with the family dog, Shadow, who I loved very much but smelled to the high heavens. I'd have random muddy boots by my head, wet clothes bunched up in a pile near my feet and drunk hoots and hollers piercing through the windows. Somehow I slept through each night of camping and managed to keep my eyes pressed shut as everyone woke at the crack of dawn to start cooking and drinking the next morning.

After I graduated high school and escaped this campsite prison, I moved into a dormitory. I had a room by myself, which creeped me out. I had nightmares for the first month I lived there. Then, after purchasing a can of pepper spray to keep on my keychain, I found myself sleeping comfortably through the night again.

As I got older, my partying habits matured. Even though I stayed up late most nights (and didn’t even go to sleep on others), I could sleep through anything when I tried. When I lived beside my dad in a strip mall (long story), I can’t tell you how many times he would come beat on my door to tell me to wake up and either get my butt to school or turn my alarm off. (That was when I began staying up ALL night, instead of going to sleep. In retrospect, I see he should have smacked me upside the head or something.)

It was at that time that I withdrew from college and succumbed to the lifestyle of the night owl. Then somehow, after a two-year hiatus, I got back on track and started sleeping normal, human hours again. And even though I lived in the biggest party house in Johnson City at that time, I went to bed on school nights (despite the raves in the living room) and woke up in time for school the next day.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t happy to leave the party and go to bed. I enjoyed every second of those two years off school. But when I decided to go back, I set my mind to it. And somehow, my determination overruled my desire to party. And my ability to sleep through anything began working in my favor. The THUMP, THUMP of techno music coming from the living room became my lullaby. My jealousy toward all my party friends fueled my determination.

Eventually, I moved out of that house, into a quaint two-bedroom apartment near campus. My ability to sleep through anything came with me, thank goodness, because my sister moved in with me shortly after. For the first time in her life, she was living on her own. She discovered the fun of alcohol soaked nights and started living the life I had been for the past few years. I’m not saying I wasn’t partying with her, because I was. But again, I was in school and she had not yet started… so our sleeping patterns were slightly different.

As we moved to each apartment and house (there were three rentals, total), we acquired noisier friends and a couple roommates. I somehow graduated college during that whole mess and I even woke up in time for my commencement ceremony, despite the party that went on the night before.

Fast forward now through Beth and I buying our first home to 2005, when I started spending weekends in Chattanooga, Elia was a kitchen manager for Applebee’s back then and this meant his alarm started going off at 5:00 every morning. I say “started going off” because he didn’t actually wake up until at least 5:30 or 6:00. I can’t tell you what time he had to be at work, but I do know his alarm went off forever…

So I’ve faced a few sleeping obstacles in my lifetime... and I’ve ROCKED them all. (Sorry, I can’t pass up the chance for a Bon Jovi lyric.) But now, I find myself with a real job - one that I have to wake up consistently early for - and I'm going to bed at 9:00, taking a natural sleep aid called Melatonin, sleeping with a black eye mask… and for the first time in my life, I'm consistently waking up multiple times a night.

I’m getting acupuncture regularly to try to alleviate this problem. I had a treatment yesterday and I slept through the whole thing. It was the best sleep I’ve gotten in months, and I would have bet money that it lasted twice as long as it really did. I don’t understand what the heck is going on with my jacked up sleep cycle, but it’s really driving me crazy.

So, in short, this blog has no quips or words to live by. It is simply an expression of frustration with my body’s newfound resistance to sleep.

As I sit here at my desk, baggy-eyed, tapping away at my keyboard, I close my eyes and imagine myself drifting off to sleep. But I know as soon as my head hits the pillow, or this wrist rest in front of my laptop, and the gears in my head creak to a halt, my body will only let me sleep a couple of minutes. Then I’ll snap back to reality and drag myself through the motions of the day.

And by the time I lie down tonight, after my work day and evening meeting are over, I will be exhausted. I will take a Melatonin, cover my eyes with a mask, prop a pillow under my knees and gratefully drift off to sleep. I will dream vividly before waking at 2 then 3 then 4 in the morning, each time counting the minutes until my alarm goes off and I have to start another under-rested day.

:*(

Suggestions? Please?

Rules of the Road

2008-07-25T06:47:00.000-07:00

Change is inevitable. It is constant. It is always occurring, even when you don’t realize. So it’s no surprise that every so many years, you find yourself in the midst of a change that you can’t really do anything about.

But before I get too deep, and talk about things that shouldn’t be discussed in the blogosphere, I’ll tell you one thing I’d really like to change – I wish people in Chattanooga would use their signal lights. And I also wish people in Johnson City drove the speed limit, or at least stayed in the appropriate lane, according to their speed.

I’ve been driving back and forth between these two cities for three years now, and it still blows my mind how their drivers can be so different yet drive me the same amount of crazy.

The first time I ever drove on the Interstate, I was 16 years old. I bought my mom a ticket to see Lynyrd Skynyrd at the World’s Fair Park in Knoxville. (I know, I’m a kickass daughter.) On the way there, a moving truck ran me off the road. At that time, I was driving a 1989 Mercury Grand Marquis. Ladies and gentlemen, that was quite a ways past 1989 and that car was one embarrassing hunk of metal. I hated it.

And then, when I got pushed off the road, onto the median, with my drunk mom in the passenger seat stomping a nonexistent brake, squealing at the top of her lungs… I was mortified. Perhaps this little incident scarred me for life. I wouldn’t be surprised, nor would I blame myself. That’s a traumatic experience.

Anyway, let’s just say I had always had a thing with Interstates.

When I lived in Johnson City, I avoided the Interstate at all costs. Really, I didn’t drive on it, not one bit. Then, for a few years I lived in a house on Cherokee Road, more near the Interstate than any other main road in town. I loved that house, but I hated taking the Interstate to work at Bennigan’s every day.

Then, because I’m a slight control freak, I took it upon myself to drive the whole way to every spring break vacation I ever took. I drove as far as Miami, Florida, where there is literally a sign that says “The end of the Interstate,” or something like that.

I had a close call with construction in West Palm Beach, and then I got stuck driving through Atlanta at rush hour… you know, where they still go 90 even though it’s bumper to bumper? And each time I returned Johnson City, I still avoided the Interstate and took Roan Street every single place I went.

But when I started driving back and forth to Chattanooga, I had to get over it. There is no “other route” here… I had no choice but to get used to the Interstate. I conquered Knoxville construction, then I got introduced to Chattanooga’s treacherous Ridge Cut. Holy shit. I’d rather drive through Atlanta’s rush hour with a car full of hungover college girls than run out of gas going up the Ridge Cut at 5:00 on a Friday. That was one of the worst driving days of my life. I’ll never do that again.

Anyway, I got used to driving on I-75 and I-24 and I got used to driving fast. I went from cussing the people who cut me off and rode my ass to BEING the person cutting off and riding asses. I think I even made Chattanoogans nervous with my newfound driving tactics… But I have calmed down quite a bit since then…

My point is, I now understand the reason people ride bumpers and switch lanes like maniacs. There are basic rules to the road that a lot of idiots just don’t follow. It’s frustrating, because they’re simple, really. These are things that every one of us has the opportunity learn in Driver’s Ed – things that you really have to know to pass the written driver’s test.

For example, do you know what the left lane’s purpose is? If you are nodding your head, I’ll know you don’t live in Johnson City. I swear, I can tell I’m in Washington County when I have to hit the brakes (and come off cruise control for the first time since Jeff County) because the morons in the right lane and left lane are both going 60 in a 70.

I am not exaggerating, ya’ll know who they are.

And what makes it sucks even worse is that you can ride their asses all day long and they won’t get out of your way. Neither car will budge because they don’t think they’re doing anything wrong. No matter how close you get, they will steadily stare you down in the mirror like you’re doing something wrong.

See, in Chattanooga, some idiot might be blocking up the fast lane, but if you get really close to their bumper, they look up and realize they need to get the heck out of the way. But don’t get me wrong – these big city drivers are no angels. If one of them decides they want to be in your lane, for any reason at all, they will not give you a second’s warning. They’ll just swoop over in front of you without even glancing in their rearview.

In my eyes, this is about the rudest thing a driver can do. I mean, I’m driving along, minding my own business, obeying all known rules of the road (which you should know by the end of this blog), and you cut me off for no good reason without even a glance, much less a turn signal? What is the point of a turn signal, if not to communicate with other drivers? It’s certainly not for that clicking sound effect. That is the most annoying sound…

I can’t tell you which bothers me worse, fast lane slowpokes or rude lane changers. I just wish there was one city I could drive in that wouldn’t drive me so insane.

And don’t get me wrong – I don’t think I’m the perfect driver. I tend to multitask while I’m behind the wheel, but never with anything too dangerous. I don’t put on makeup while driving unless I’m stopped at a red light. And even then, I’m constantly glancing up at the light so I won’t get beeped at when it changes. And even then, I only apply quick things, like mascara or lipgloss.

And I ALWAYS wear my seatbelt. It’s an easy habit to get in and I really believe that anyone who isn’t in that habit is being completely lazy. This is such an easy way to prolong your life… I just don’t see any excuse for not doing it. However, not smoking cigarettes is also a way to prolong your life, but I don’s see many people I know getting into that habit either.

I also check my air pressure and oil levels regularly. I will admit, I have blown up an engine in my lifetime. I didn’t know about changing or checking oil and I blew up my most favorite car ever – the 1990 Ford Probe, with the digital dash. Oh, how I loved that car. And I drove it for over a year, never changing or checking the oil, and one day it exploded with a big black cloud of smoke.

I’m sure I really did know about oil, I’ve just told this story so many times that I really believe it’s true. I’m sure my dad explained the importance of oil changes to me a million times before I even got that car. I’m sure he gave me some long, drawn out lecture. But that was in my younger, stupider days when I didn’t realize how valuable those lectures were. Back then, I tuned my dad out when he went on a tangent – much like Dr. Cox does every single character on Scrubs, my favorite TV show.

Nowadays, I know that my dad speaks the truth. He is a very wise man with a lot to say about a lot of things. And even though I don’t get my oil changed every 3,000 miles, I do get it changed regularly. And I even get my air filter changed, because some guy told me once that it helps out with gas mileage.

Which brings me to my next point… one that my dad would be proud to know – I don’t wait until my gas tank is empty to fill it. I sometimes find it hard to wrap my brain around fiscal issues, but I understand that if the gas tank is fuller, the gas runs out slower. And that’s all the reason I need to fill up as often as possible. Gas isn’t cheap… but even when it was, filling up sooner puts money in my pocket. Why would I not save myself some money every single chance I get?

And now that gas is freaking $4 a gallon, people should really pay attention to this. It is far less traumatic to spend $20 at a time than it is to take the CRV to the pump and drop freaking $50. I don’t mean to sound cheap, but spending $50 at a gas station really hurts my feelings.

Well, I guess I can stop with this lesson any time now. Like I said, I know I’m not perfect… I don’t even think I’m the perfect driver. But I do think I understand basic rules of the road and I wish more people understood them too.

(here’s a recap, in case you missed it…)

1. The left lane is for passing. If you are in it, you best be passing somebody. After you pass that person, be kind enough to get back in the right lane so anyone that needs to pass your slow ass can do so safely.

2. Use your turn signals. They have two purposes. The first is to let the person behind you know that you will be slowing down to make a turn. The second is to let everyone around you know that you need, want or are going to switch lanes.

3. Only apply makeup when completely stopped. Even then, be completely aware of the cars around you and don’t do anything makeup related to piss anyone off to the point of beeping.

4. Wear your seatbelt.

5. Keep your levels where they need to be – air pressure, gas, oil, everything. Your car can’t take care of itself. Ignoring things will only make them get worse.

Thank you.

GHS Reunion & Haize's Bridal Luau

2008-07-22T06:24:00.001-07:00

I know I’ve said this before, but last weekend was the best weekend of my life. Like, my whole entire life. I knew it was going to be – I’ve been planning the details for months. And I’d be willing to bet that hundreds (yes hundreds) of other people will say the exact same thing about last weekend. They’ll each have their own spin on it… things that happened differently, from a different perspective. But this weekend was definitely one for the record books and I am so happy to be able to share it with you!

Last September, I realized my brother starts his senior year of high school in the fall of 2008. After some serious mental strain to calculate how old that made me, I realized it was finally here – the day had come to celebrate my ten-year high school reunion!

At that time, I was becoming seriously addicted to Myspace, as many people I knew had already were. I had just settled in to my job at the Herald and I was finding myself with free time, in front of a computer for several hours a day.

I’m not saying my job is easy, because it’s not. But I absolutely love every thing about it… and once I get started writing a story, I can have it written in no time. It is kind of like this blog, currently spewing from my fingertips. If I can truly wrap my brain around something, it just spills all over the paper. (I think any writer will understand this phenomenon.)

Anyway, so with my new Myspace addiction and hours of free time on my hands, I became reacquainted with several friends back home – from college and from high school. After I posted a few bulletins, asking if anyone knew about or was looking forward to a reunion. Almost immediately, I started getting some response!

Some people were excited. Some were in denial that it had actually been ten years. A couple even volunteered to help spread the word. One girl, Tabitha, my partner in crime for many years back in my younger days, got in touch with our class president, Nat, and his wife/high school sweetheart, Courtney. As it turns out, they had been discussing that very same thing! Before long, a reunion committee was born.

We recruited the help of Rachael, another one of my best friends from more than a decade ago, and Paige, my cheerleading friend and our class reporter, and we got down to business. We met monthly until our agenda was set – then we distributed the workload of everything from locating names and addresses to physically mailing out invitations. Just when we thought our work was through, only 18 people were motivated and organized enough to mail in their RSVPs by the cutoff date.

The reunion, as we knew it, was cancelled.

But thankfully, so many people had already made plans to come in that weekend (as I had) and so many people wanted to still see each other (as I did) that the reunion was salvaged (as I’d hoped it would be).

We met up for dinner last Friday night at the Italian Village – one of the few restaurants in town big enough to hold a significant amount of people. They had already promised us their back room for the original reunion, so they were prepared to accommodate us.

I met up with my best friend since kindergarten, Yvonne, whose wedding I will soon help plan and whose bridal attendant I will soon be, and Rachael (who I mentioned earlier). We got there only 30 minutes late (a new record for Yvonne) and had the most amazing time!

It was breathtaking to see all the faces – everyone had changed so little, yet grown up so much! It seemed as though everyone was having the best time, smiling from ear to ear the whole night, catching up, hugging, talking about careers and showing pictures of kids. Of course, Yvonne, Rachael and I were the only shot-takers of the night, along with our friend Kelli, who I’ve known since the first grade and who I roomed with for nearly three years in college. Actually, Kelli’s parents and my parents hung out regularly when we were young. We had family barbecues together and we went camping on the river. I still see Kelli’s parents every year at the Blue Plum Festival in Johnson City.

Anyway, our little group of drinkers took shots and then most of the group drank beer. Before I knew it, our dinner party had come to an end. But, in true Greene County fashion, an after party was quickly coordinated. Like clockwork, cars filed into Kerns’s driveway one at a time. He went to the same elementary school as Yvonne, Kelli, Lindsay, Nat and I… good old Hal Henard. Man, I loved that school.

His mom, who will always be Mrs. Kerns to me, taught there too – for some reason I’m thinking she was affiliated with the gifted program. She also did something at the high school, although for the life of me, I can’t currently remember what. Anyway, she was as happy to see us as we were to see her. She cooked us teriyaki wings (which I ate about eight of) and sat with us until at least 1:30 or 2 in the morning.

Then, Yvonne and I left the after party to meet up with some non-high school friends at a local bar. The rest of that night is totally unrelated, yet pretty interesting... but that's a story for another time...

The next morning, Yvonne and I were quite impressed when we woke up an hour before the scheduled tour of the high school. We arrived at the front steps (not the old ones that we posed on for our senior group picture – these were brand new steps) and we were about five minutes early. We beat many of our classmates there. (This was an even bigger landmark for Yvonne, I might add.)

We saw some faces from the night before, a little less chipper, smelling slightly of alcohol. I’d say some of these people hadn’t been up past 10 or 11 in quite a while. (I know I hadn’t…)

The high school was incredible – the whole place had been redone. It is like five times the size it was when we were there – literally. The only things I remotely recognized were senior hall and the field house. But, these are two places I hold very dear, so it was just enough to leave me consumed with a sense of nostalgia. I couldn’t believe how much money had been poured into that place. It was nicer than any school I’ve ever been in. Nicer than any college most of the classmates had attended. I think we have a couple that went Ivy League, but I’d be willing to bet even they haven’t taken class in a building this fancy.

The football field was in the process of a renovation too. They’re putting astro turf down, and (ha ha ha) the joke was on me when I expressed my concern about the gravel all around the field. Apparently, that gravel will be covered up by more astro turf, before anyone actually plays on it.

I thought it was a valid question, and I am not the only one who asked it. (That didn’t stop everyone from laughing at each of us, though.) And I still think those poor boys are going to get their faces smashed in if a helmet happens to pop off, with that gravel underneath there like that. They said the people would put some foam underneath it, or rubber, or something. To be honest, I still don’t really know what’s going to happen. But if they want to impress people with that fancy new field, they need to give those rust covered bleachers a facelift with some green paint or something.

After our tour, Yvonne and I hit McDonalds on the way to a picnic at Hardin Park – the place we all grew up. We had our picnic at the pavilion beside the Caboose. Anyone that grew up in Greeneville, or any small town for that matter, knows how sentimental certain pavilions at certain parks can be. Walking up to that park, seeing the silver elephant slide that burns your legs and butt so bad in the hot summer sun, and the Wizard of Oz swings, and the rickety bridge that crosses the creek… I felt an overwhelming sense of homesick. But I wasn’t longing to live in Greeneville again – I was longing to feel like a kid again.

Speaking of kids, everyone brought theirs to the picnic. Some I’d seen before, like Nat and Courtney’s clan (Jackson, Bryant and Ally), and some I’d only heard about, like Genny’s newborn. Some weren’t even born yet – like Lilly, Lindsay’s unborn daughter (or son… but I’m banking on a girl. Only three of the classmates in attendance had girls, I think. And there were at least ten who’d had boys.) Lindsay was my friend through elementary school, through girl scouts. She used to come to my mom’s house for family barbecues, too. Her nickname was Lizard, so she called me Salamander. She played volleyball and I took dance. I went to her wedding a few years back, and we still stay in touch through email. I hope to travel to Charleston to see her really soon.

Anyway, these kids at the picnic were the cutest kids I’ve ever seen all in one place, and they played together wonderfully. The boys from our class, and even some newly introduced husbands, played catch in the yard beside us. Then, as the kids became interested, they broke off into small groups and these grown men gave every single one of them their undivided attention. It was awesome to see that dynamic. All of them – even the once macho high school boys – were so happy and carefree…

We took lots of pictures. Each of the girls had a camera. Everyone was pretty much used to it from the night before, so no one seemed to mind that we were in constant photo shoot mode. When I realized it was time for me to go, I started saying my goodbyes. I had to high tail it to Johnson City for the second leg of my weekend – my friend Haize’s bridal shower luau.

(I know, it keeps getting better and better, right?)

My sister Beth and I are going to be the bridesmaids in Haize’s wedding, which is coming up in September. We decided a long time ago that we wanted to have a luau. I think that was Beth’s idea, actually, and I just got really excited when we started planning out the details a few months back.

I could not believe the day had finally come… We’d done all the shopping and prepping the two days before, so we just had to decorate and cook and pull together all the loose ends by 3:00.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get to the house until 2:00. While Beth’s sanity and mine were slightly thrown off kilter, we pulled it together and quite possibly had the most successful bridal shower in history. As soon as I got to the house, I apologized to Beth for my crappy attitude on the phone… and then we worked as a team to create a tropical bachelorette paradise in our backyard. (One fun fact about the Litvack family: we can accomplish anything, seamlessly, when we put our minds together. We’re kind of like army ants.)

We grilled up skewers of barbeque chicken, peppers, onions and pineapple. We drank mojitos, Blue Hawaiian, Pineapple Upside Down Cake and Purple Haize. We duck, duck, drank shots every hour… we held hula-hoop and diving contests, and Haize busted a piñata right before sundown. Every girl left with a handmade koozie and a shot glass that read “I got smashed at Haize’s birthday party.” All in all, I don’t think any of us could have asked for a better time. Especially Haize. She had the best time ever.

I think it blew her away to realize how much we all love her. We had come together and pulled off this amazing party in her honor. She received several gifts from her registry, and a lot of gift cards that weren’t on her registry… but she’d have been happy just knowing we all were happy for her. That’s why it was so much fun to make a big deal about her wedding. She’s humble like that, and I love it.

By about 11:00 that night, we decided that any boys who wanted to join us could come help wind the party down. Haize’s fiancé, Cory, and his birthday boy brother, Cody, came by for cake and cocktails (and apparently to beat me in a game of pool, dammit – oh wait, that may have been Hans…)

Anyway, by the time I realized the party was over, I was entirely too intoxicated to drive to Greeneville and close down the field party at Uhls’s house. I had missed the Astros game my high school class had attended that evening, but I had still been considering the drive down to meet them later. However, as I said, I was in no shape to go. Instead, I curled up in my sister’s room and slept soundly for the next six or seven hours.

My fantastic weekend ended when I stopped back in Greeneville that next day to say goodbye to Yvonne and see her son, Donavan, who has been my nephew since he was born nine whole years ago. We ate at Pal’s. I get a chipped ham with cheese, no pickle, add tomato, every time I head up that way. Thank goodness they were hungry too – I’d almost completely missed my window of opportunity!

Then, around 4:00, I headed back to Chattanooga to prepare myself for another week at the salt mine. (Like I said, don’t get me wrong, I love my job. But my dad calls work “the salt mine” and I do too…)

I could not have asked for a better weekend. Here it is, Monday night, and I’m lying in bed, writing this blog at 9:00. There are sitcom reruns I want to be watching right now but I can’t make it to the couch to turn on the TV. I will probably be recovering from last weekend for the next several days, at least. I realize that I probably shouldn’t have entered that limbo competition on Saturday… and I would have been smart to catch a little extra shuteye before my drive yesterday evening… but all in all, I don’t have one single regret. I had an amazing weekend, full of old friends and wonderful new memories.

I’m hoping we can recruit some people from the class of ’98 for the Greeneville High School Greene Devils homecoming game this year. I’d love to keep in touch with them – and I don’t think I can wait another ten years to see some of those smiling faces!

And I cannot wait to be a part of Haize’s wedding this fall – it’s going to be so amazing to share such a wonderful week with her, as she marries the true love of her life.

My hair evolution

2008-07-11T13:02:00.000-07:00

Long hair runs in my family. A true hippie at heart, my dad has worn his silvery hair in a ponytail for years. Two of my sisters have long, straight locks and my other sister has shoulder-length, curly hair that hits her shoulder blades when she straightens it out. Even my little brother, the 17-year-old drummer, wears his hair long and wavy. The girls and I agree that he has the best hair in the family – not too thick, not too thin, just enough wave and body. He’s so lucky.

Anyway, I tell you all of this for a reason. Until recently, I’ve had pretty long hair myself. In elementary school, my ponytail reached my waistline. As I got older, I convinced my mom to let me cut it, little by little. When I left for college, I cut it off to my shoulders.

I’ve always been the more adventurous one in my family, as far as haircuts go. I’m the only one who has ever intentionally taken risks in that department. (I say “intentionally” because I vividly remember my sister Rachel getting gum stuck in her hair when she was about 5 years old. To avoid getting in trouble, she cut the gum out. After my mom got home, before she beat Rachel within an inch of her life, she punished her severely without even realizing it. She cut the rest of her hair as proportionately as she could, resulting in the only recorded mullet in Litvack family history. And that, I assure you, was not Rachel’s intention.)

I’ve sported quite the variety of hairstyles in my day. There was one I called the “rock star hairdo,” with choppy bangs that hung right past my eyebrows and sharply defined layers all around. I loved that haircut. It was so much fun.

I have colored my hair blue and blonde (yes, you read that correctly) and I’ve worn it curly, frizzy, bone straight, wavy, crimped, braided, swept up, straight down and sideways. (Don’t you remember? Side ponytails used to be very in… and I jumped on the wagon when the low ones became trendy a couple years back.)

On my 22nd birthday, I went to a new salon and told the hairdresser to “do whatever would look good.” I left there with the shortest haircut I’ve ever received, with tufts that stuck straight out over each ear. My friends told me I looked beautiful, apparently not wanting to ruin my birthday. But I have the pictures to remind me that haircut was anything but cute.

After my streak of trying new things, I settled in to a safe zone of just-past-the-shoulder length hair, with my natural color and a few loose layers. I’ve been in that zone, or well within the vicinity, for the last few years. Earlier this year, I started feeling a little wild again and I got about 5 inches cut off. The lady cut my hair into a cute little bob that I really liked. Soon after, I began taking notice of other short cuts I saw.

One recurring ‘do that I really liked was really short in the back with jaw-length hair framing the face. I thought about it for several weeks, taking pictures of more than one person who had that cut, and then I began searching the Internet for a salon that I felt could make my vision a reality.

I decided on a quaint little salon downtown. My stylist, Rose, seemed as excited as I was when I told her what I wanted. She played with my shoulder length locks while she looked in the mirror, envisioning what the cut would look like on me. She decided the shape of my face was just perfect for the style I wanted, commenting about my “cute outfit,” adding that anyone with that much sass needed a sassy hairdo. (I love the service industry, always telling you just what you want to hear.)

She sent me over to a girl named Angel, who washed my hair and gave me an incredible scalp massage. Then, before I had time to chicken out, Rose commenced to cutting. As she snipped away, she told me a little about herself. She asked me questions about myself, too, but I couldn’t take my eyes away from that mirror long enough to answer. As I’ve said, my hair was pretty short already – or so I thought. I sat in amazement as clumps of it continued to fall to the ground.

As Rose continued with her story of training in New York and Europe, I watched as she pulled out her razor and a steady haze of shavings floated from her hands to the floor beneath me. When she reached a stopping point, she explained each product as she used it – the volumizing spray, to be applied at the roots, will keep my hair from laying flat on my head; the styling cream will control flyaways without weighing my fine hair down.

She dried my hair with a round brush, finishing it off with cool air to further prevent frizz. Then, she did what she referred to as the “fun part” – texturing the cut, to make it more personalized. I think I held my breath until she was done. Either that, or I had eaten some bad tuna at lunch. Either way, I felt very nauseous as I watched even more hair fall to the ground. She snipped away at the front of my hair, where I could have sworn I’d told her I did not want any bangs… She must not have heard me say that, or she must have thought I was just joking.

I have to admit, I wasn’t sure I loved it when she was done. I mean, call me crazy, but for $40 I expect to get exactly what I came for. Plus, there is just something about the way someone else fixes your hair that just doesn’t sit right – at least that’s usually the case for me. She hadn’t used a flat iron to straighten my hair out, either, and I’m sure I told her my hair is naturally curly. Didn’t she see the curls that surrounded our feet?

Later that evening, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. The July humidity had transformed my sassy new hairdo into an uncanny resemblance of the aforementioned mullet of 1993. I felt sick… My high school reunion is next week. I can’t show up with a mullet. What will people say? How can I possibly pose for the million pictures I know will be taken? I wonder how much extensions cost…

But now, three days later, I have the styling of my new cut down to an art. I bought my own brand of volumizing spray and use my own styling crème. And I’m pleased to say that I have never been happier with a hairstyle. For the first time in a really long time, my hairstyle reflects who I am. Fun, professional, relaxed. I absolutely love it.

Rose had a vision when she was texturizing my hair that I couldn’t yet appreciate. She took a lot into consideration, cutting shorter layers underneath to give my hair the body it needed for this cut. I am so excited to have a stylish new ‘do that is easy to fix and fits me perfectly.