My trip to Nashville was fairly short in the whole scheme of things. I arrived on Thursday night and was back home by mid-afternoon on Saturday. Caroline was so excited to see me that she elected to stay at Mimi and Bops’ house and help them finish cleaning their garage instead of riding to the airport with P to pick me up. I’ve never felt so loved.
The LifeWay Women’s Forum was great. Sophie picked me up from the airport and we arrived just in time to hear Travis lead worship. We saw a couple of sweet friends, ate some delicious tomato basil soup and grilled cheese sandwiches (shout out to the chef), and called it a night because we were both exhausted.
We headed over to conference the next morning to teach our sessions and tried to mentally prepare ourselves because we’d been told that they were going to put us on the live webcast around 2:00 p.m. to do some “witty banter”. Live. Witty banter.
Adding to the stress was the memory of the last time they asked Sophie and I to do some “witty banter” after a Living Proof Live event in San Antonio or as we like to refer to it “Remember the Alamodome”. It was the most painful eight minutes of my life as we struggled to come up with even ONE THING to talk about and ended up discussing how we slept the night before which is always a riveting topic. The silence was deafening but you could hear every woman in that place saying a silent “Bless their hearts”.
But for some reason they thought it would be a good idea to give us another try and we spent all morning throwing out potential topics we could revert to if we got desperate. Our list consisted of Thanksgiving foods, Christmas shopping, hair and the dress that Priscilla Shirer had on that morning. And because we are extra nerdy and obsessive, we also had a super secret list o’ conversation topics that we didn’t share with each other so we could create the illusion of spontaneous conversation if times got hard.
Fortunately we ended up getting to interview the delightful and talented Kelly Minter about her new Bible study on Ruth. I think it went pretty well although I did have a moment of desperation and panic where I asked her about her favorite Thanksgiving food. It was turkey by the way, which I find fascinating because you don’t really hear anyone talk about how much they love turkey at the Thanksgiving meal. Personally, I could just get rid of the turkey altogether and just carb load on the dressing and broccoli-rice casserole. And the pies.
And then eat a whole bowl of whipping cream.
Anyway, after our portion of the live webcast was over, we went back to the hotel to recuperate. I had a raging headache (probably from concentrating so hard on my list of super secret conversation topics) and just needed to lie down for awhile. Eventually Sophie called my room and we decided to venture out in search of dinner.
If you’ve read this blog for any length of time then you know where this is heading.
We drove towards the Vanderbilt campus in search of nourishment but we were both totally indifferent about what we wanted to eat. Then all of a sudden we spotted the San Antonio Taco Company and we were powerless to resist. We were compelled to carry on our time honored tradition of eating the most mediocre Mexican food that the Southern United States has to offer. It’s like a sickness.
Exhibit A: Huevos Rancheros in Woodstock, Georgia
Exhibit B: Restaurant with a rat on the sign in Charlotte, North Carolina
But I thought this time might be different because the restaurant had San Antonio in its name. I felt that it lent an air of credibility.
After one bite of the guacamole (and I use that term loosely), I immediately regretted our decision. Yet, I pressed on and finished eating my beef fajita taco.
Later that night I was talking to P on the phone and said, “I don’t feel so good”.
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“Well, Sophie and I ate at this Mexican restaurant and the food wasn’t very good.”
“Why do you do that to yourself? I can’t even feel sorry for you.”
“But it was called the San Antonio Taco Company! I figured it might be good, but I think the city of San Antonio should sue them for defamation of character.”
“I think you have only yourself to blame. Anyone who actually lives in San Antonio should know better than to eat at a restaurant in Tennessee called the San Antonio Taco Company.”
He is a fount of sympathy.
By the time I made it home on Saturday I was in dire need of real Mexican food to cleanse the memory from my palate so we picked up dinner from Teka Molina and all was well.
Now I’m just glad that I’m home to stay for a while. I’ve traveled about once a month for the last four months and I’m ready for a break. It’s not that airline travel isn’t glamorous, I mean where else do you get the opportunity to take off your tall black boots and reveal to the world that you’re wearing white tube socks with your black leggings? It will just be nice to unpack my Ziploc full of 3 oz. toiletries and enjoy my people.
Even though some of them would rather clean the garage than meet me at the airport.