Well.
We have now been away from home since Friday. And I’ll tell you my biggest concern at this point. Other than the laundry and massive grocery store trip that awaits my arrival home.
There is a 99.6% that I’m growing black mold in my purse.
On Sunday we went to a baseball game at the new Blue Bell Park at Olsen Field to watch the Aggies. And it had been raining to beat the band ALL WEEKEND. But I decided the ground under the bleachers where we were sitting couldn’t be that wet because why would it be wet after forty-six inches of rain? I guess I also believed that my genuine pleather bag was waterproof.
But it’s not. I picked it up and everything in it was soaked. Two packs of Eclipse gum were totally ruined. Not to mention that my lipsticks were all very damp.
The smartest course of action would have probably been to dump everything out and let it dry. But no one has ever accused me of doing the smartest thing and so I didn’t. I reasoned that I planned to throw out the purse as soon as I switch to a summer purse on Easter. However, I failed to really comprehend that Easter is still a month away.
And now my purse is a health-hazard.
I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do.
Anyway, Gulley and I loaded up the kids on Friday afternoon in the rain and the cold to venture out for some Spring Break fun. Even though it’s hard to embrace Spring when it’s 50 degrees and raining outside since that’s what people who live in South Texas call WINTER.
We made a quick stop to load up on road trip snacks and everyone chose candy. Except for Will since he’s not allowed to have candy on road trips anymore now that we’ve discovered the bulk of his carsickness is caused by eating an entire bag of Gummy Bears by himself. So he chose Cheesy Pringles instead.
Caroline and I planned to leave Bryan for Houston on Monday so we had to take two cars. So the kids all decided to ride with me for the first part of the trip. I’m still not entirely sure why since it’s a universal truth that Gulley is more fun than me, but they must have forgotten that. And I’m glad they did because I was able to question them all about their hopes and dreams. And steal a few of Will’s Cheesy Pringles.
I discovered that Caroline would like to live on a ranch someday. Jackson hopes to grow up and play professional baseball. And Will. Will writes songs in his head all the time. He’s currently working on a song called “Just Do It” that’s going to be his first big hit. He just needs to find someone who can rap really fast to do the middle part. But he sang the slow part for me and I think it has promise.
After he makes a bunch of money (like maybe twenty or thirty kajillion dollars) he’s going to buy a bunch of alligators for Caroline to keep at her ranch. Which is what I’m pretty sure J.Lo bought for her friends after she made it big and explains why she wrote that song about not being fooled by the crocs that she’s got, she’s still Jenny from the block.
(I know. Crocs aren’t alligators. But how could I walk away from that?)
We also listened to that Party Rockers song about sixty-eight times on the way and I’m afraid I’ll never get it out of my head. It’s also when I discovered that I’d slept wrong on my neck and was moving like I was Joan Cusack in Sixteen Candles. I’m almost back to full neck rotation at this point but it was dicey there for a while. Only my torso moved.
By the time we got to Honey and Big’s house it was late and we were tired. We ate some pizza, visited a little bit and all went to bed with big dreams of going to watch the Aggies play baseball the next day.
So you can imagine our disappointment when we woke up to a torrential rainstorm the next morning. Fortunately Big eased our pain with enough Shipley’s donuts and kolaches to feed thirty-seven people. Then Gulley and I went to pick up Nena so she could spend the afternoon with us.
Nena.
Y’all. Nena is a miracle. She had heart bypass surgery less than two weeks ago and is back home and doing great. In fact, she’s not even sure she needed that surgery. She isn’t even convinced she had a heart attack because she had no pain. NO PAIN. Even though the official EMT report showed that she said she felt heavy pressure. But she’s sure they made that up because she doesn’t remember feeling heavy pressure and is sure she didn’t say that. WHY WOULD SHE SAY THAT?
But she told me the whole story. She’d just eaten lunch in the dining hall. And was walking back to her apartment and her feet felt weird. So she took an aspirin and laid down. But then still felt funny and pushed her medic alert bracelet. And I wouldn’t even BELIEVE how quick they showed up.
Honey said all the doctors and nurses at the hospital adored Nena and the cardiologist even stopped her in the hall the day before Nena left to go home and said, “I checked on your mother and asked her if she was feeling okay. She asked me if there was any way I could bring her a trashy magazine.”
So Honey had to explain that meant Nena wanted the latest National Enquirer because how are you supposed to recover from major surgery if you can’t guess which celebrity has been caught with all their cellulite hanging out at the beach? And who better to bring it to you than your heart surgeon?
Gulley and I knew Nena was definitely on the road to recovery when she announced she had a purse that was way too big for her and she wanted Gulley to have it. Nena has always shown her love by offering various extra items she happens to have lying around. And so she handed Gulley a shiny patent mustard-yellow purse.
Of course now that I’m catching a whiff of my purse from the corner of the room, I’m kind of wishing she’d had two.