So after we went to our dinner thing on Friday night, we met up with our friend Jamie. She lives in College Station and her boys had an 8 a.m. soccer game the next morning, but she met us anyway. And despite my warnings, she had a new hairstyle with bangs.
However, she doesn’t have my unfortunate cowlick issues, so it totally works for her.
We caught up with Jamie until the waitstaff at Ninfa’s began to sweep under our table to let us know they had better things to do than bring us corn tortillas.
Whatever.
We finally took the not-so-subtle hint and left the restaurant. Jamie headed home, but Gulley and I decided it was our duty to explore some Texas A&M landmarks such as The Dixie Chicken. Granted, we were a little overdressed, but we figured we’d also be the oldest people there so what difference would it make.
And this won’t mean anything to any of y’all that aren’t Aggies, but Northgate is completely different. I mean it has paved parking and parking meters. And even a parking garage. It’s come a long way from a couple of mud lots behind The Chicken.
We walked up to the entrance, optimistically hoping to have to show our ID’s, and the guy working the door looked at us and said, “Y’all are good, I don’t need to see ID”.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
A hint of uncertainty would have been nice.
Once we walked in we saw that everything was EXACTLY the same. The smell, the smoke, the old guy passed out while sitting upright. It’s as if time had stood still.
We walked through just to absorb the ambience that is exactly what you’d expect from a place called The Dixie Chicken. And, we ended up meeting the ESPN crew who were in town to cover the game. One member of the crew was a girl who had recently graduated from University of Kentucky.
We discussed how they had stolen our basketball coach, Billy Gillispie, from us and also her ambitions to marry him and become the mother of his children. She asked us when we graduated from A&M and we countered by asking how old she thought we were.
She took a long, deep breath and said, “Please don’t be offended, but I’m going to say 27”.
Gulley and I were thrilled, until we realized that when you’re 22 you cannot even conceive of an age as high as 35 or 36. I mean, do people even live that long?
And if they do, they certainly don’t do anything other than lug their 18 kids around in a minivan and watch “Matlock”.
We decided it was probably time for us to head home and walked back to the car. We had parked in one of the new lots and put enough change in the parking meter for an hour. I was worried we were pushing the limits of our hour.
Now, I need to give y’all a little history about me.
While I was a student at A&M, parking was a mess. It was like survival of the fittest just to find a spot to park every day.
And yes, I could have taken the shuttle bus, but if you honestly think I’d take public transportation then you haven’t been reading the blog for very long.
Since I was always running late, I usually just had to park wherever I could find a space. Staff parking. Twenty minute parking. University President parking. Wherever.
Let’s just say I might still owe Texas A&M several hundred dollars in parking tickets, unless there is some kind of statute of limitations. I had a complicated relationship with UPD, otherwise known as University Police Department. They were my arch nemesis.
Well, other than the Whataburger taquitos that singlehandedly caused me to gain 20 extra pounds my sophomore year.
The point is that due to my constant parking issues with UPD, I am very sensitive to parking tickets and expired meters.
So, Gulley and I are walking back to the car when I see a policeman standing in the vicinity of my vehicle. I immediately lose my mind and start racing over there to let him know “HERE I AM! PLEASE DON’T GIVE ME A TICKET!”
As Gulley and I round the corner, we get the full view of the policeman that I think is about to give me a ticket.
I’m not sure if it was the mirrored sunglasses or the shorts that gave away the fact that he was, in fact, not UPD, but rather a fraternity boy dressed up for Halloween.
But I’m pretty sure it was the shorts.
They seemed to lack the professional, I’m a University Policeman vibe.
Although the belt and the gun were a nice touch.
Needless to say, Gulley and I collapsed into hysterical laughter. I mean doubled over, can’t breathe laughter. And as soon as we recovered we asked his girlfriend to take a picture of us with him.
As she took the picture we told them that we were former students back for a reunion and the game. The girl squealed “OMIGOSH, y’all are SO CUTE. What are y’all? Like 27?”
I said, “No, we’re 36.”
And I’m not exaggerating when I say she recoiled in horror.
I think she was afraid we’d escaped from the nursing home.