We put the OY in Oyster Festival.

 It started out innocently enough. Me and KB, a nice New Jersey Jewish Girl, with me, the NY/CA/NH/PA/GA girl. There were lots of signs telling us where to go. Uphill. OY!

 There was the handbag check. False bottoms would have worked, as she barely checked and the guy in front of me snuck in his water bottle by jamming it under his flabby gut.

 This dude thought he was pretty cool. And the angry chick? She was just singing. She only dropped one beer and fell down once while we were near her.

Look, deer and beer. Get it? I got a free Jagerbomb from the biker dude at the Bloody Mary tent. You do not want to know more.

 This guitarist was sort of like Ozzy. Well, in that he had bad hair and was British. The band was called The Whizzers and Something?? OY!

 These guys grilled a whole truckload of oysters. they were hot. The oysters. not the guys. The guys were sweaty.

 These girls are saying, "But that's not what an oyster looks like. It's supposed to be on a plate with lemon and a fork, and a side of rice." OY!

 There were fancy table coverings everywhere. I felt like a Princess!

 KB found the ugliest oyster ever. We mocked it, then we sliced it open and ate it. Sorta like a girl fight.

 The celebrity anti-tongue salute. OY!

This is my finger 8 hours later, waiting for the MARTA train. The knuckle swelled up and bruised in another 3 hours. We are blaming the Oyster shucking knife. OY!

 This is our bucket of remains. Some others added to it and one guy came around and tried to steal our previously stolen lemons. Hey. What happens at the Oyster festival, stays at the Oyster Festival... unless you're reading this.

 We walked away from this place when it had a thirty person line. and then came back to try again, because hello? your tents are only serving BUDWEISER. OY!

This girl was telling her date how she wants him to um, dance with her later.

Maybe she will dress like this. Wait. Is that a snow shovel? OY!

  We went to a corner bar first. Across the street was this beautiful sight. I took bets on how many Midtown Hipsters would try to drag that back to their loft.

 We went to sit in the sun, up there, with some new friends. We ate meals that we forgot we ate. Thanks to the receipt crumpled in the bottom of my purse, we remembered later, and also noticed we paid for a shitload of drinks and someone's lobster roll. OY!

I won this shirt. Some old man tried to knock me down and take it. I gave him the stink eye and he backed off. Later, I gifted it to a guy at the bar as a prize for having the bushiest beard not on Duck Dynasty. I don't think he wanted it either.

 Here we are trying to look at two different cameras for a photo op. We had just tried promo Fireball shots. Yep. OY!

 This. Is. A. Midtown. Bartender.  You may look away now.

 It gets prettier at night, you notice?

Artful attempt number 503, according to my I-phone camera roll. OY!

 So that was an early start to my birthday month. Next up, Comedy night and strange dancing people: When Highland legs meet Latino feet on a skinny white girl. Stay tuned.

Welcome to 2014

I used to get reminders from BlogHer when I didn't post anything for a two week span. It helped, those reminders, sort of like a homework assignment, or a work deadline.
 Left to my own devices, I was probably spending way too much time skimming pages on Pinterest for decor ideas, or sending away for land brochures and bookmarking fashion pages for shit I don't need or can't afford.
 Or maybe I was doing this.

 There were those chunks of days I dedicated to writing, and even bigger day chunks spent editing, submitting, revising ... so, that's something, because it's all about the AMOUNT of creative work you produce over your lifetime that will lead to greatest success ... according to a recent NPR episode that I chose to listen to rather than study my Spanish lesson.
 At least I wasn't doing this.

 So, that's something.

I have managed to corrupt, I mean entertain, a whole new group of players by starting a monthly Girls Night Out. I love these ladies. We laugh. A lot.
 There's also Book Club and Bunco, Poker for the boys and of course, a regular schedule of yoga and weight training, because some days I need to go out in the world and eavesdrop to get the perfect combination of imagination, dreamland and reality into a scene.
On that note, things are progressing with the pitching of the book/s. All good news and all very exciting. I've got the right people around me and the cards are finally in place.
 And I've got a bunch more flash fiction in the stack, now that I've decided once and for all to write without the self-editing/inhibiting questions of what would that person think or how would that group of people feel... 

 I encourage you to go out there and attack life this year. Find your passion. Seek what fuels you. Enjoy life, don't merely go through the motions. Dump negativity and surround yourself with people and things- if that's your kick- that make you feel good.

I'll be back in a few. Stay out of trouble. Dance. A lot. And eat healthy.

Maybe get a Roomba.

It's just like high school, or is it?

A woman said to me today, "This is ridiculous, isn't it? It's just like high school."
 I laughed, and wondered what she'd been like in high school and if she realized even speaking to me about the issue made her seem the most immature of all the involved parties.

For many women, high school was a horrible experience that they would never choose to re-live-- as seen on a recent Glee episode, where the OCD Ginger chick felt ostracized, the powerful bitch wanted even more power and the fame hungry talented girl just wanted her recognition.

 Reality check. That's not just a high school mentality. That's corporate world positioning. That's teachers vying for tenure. That's a political fight between Democrats and Republicans. That was me trying to make a point a few weeks ago in a room of print happy writers.
And strangely, that's probably the same thing this broad has to deal with on her job with men and women all day long.

To tell me I can't mention the people in the story by name- ever... is fun. Really thanks for the story idea. To say something is high-schoolish is to say it won't matter in another four years... but doesn't EVERYTHING matter?

 Every time we hurt someone's feelings, every time we act out of impulse or anger, every time we made a bad decision about a friendship or a lover, every time we lie. These decisions - made as a high school aged person, or an adult will not only matter in the here and now- but in the future.

Of course, in the moment, I listened. (while taking notes - call it character study for the novel). I tried to tell the woman that I was sorry she'd felt it necessary to waste her time and mine, that if she would take the time to read through the lines, ask the right questions and actually make a committed decision, she could have laid the problem to rest long ago.
When she'd let me, I told her the truth, I inserted my opinion, and mostly I chuckled to myself, that A. she didn't want to hear any other sides of a story, except the one she was choosing to believe and that B. some ass- backward uneducated people in the world feel like it's their right to abuse authority, in any shape or form.

Don't you hate the guy who drives up in the Mercedes to collect the free turkey at Thanksgiving, the woman who sues for the hot coffee she spilled on her lap at the fast food drive-thru. Don't you despise corruption at any level and those people who imagine they are above it all?

Mostly, I guess I am disappointed in mankind. That the idea of freedom of expression, of personal communication and private interaction and even, a good old-fashioned tossing down of the gauntlet in the most polite way ever to say,"Oh yeah. Bring it!" has been pushed to the wayside in favor of some dumb-assed sophomoric life approach wherein one feels abdicated by saying "you tell him that she told her that I said that to them and now, I don't want to talk about it any more, so it's over."

All that says to us, the wiser ones is .....you're a fucking moron.

Some Marketing Advice for Jenny the Caterer?

If you want to cater my party or special event, don't advertise by throwing your wadded up cheap ass menu in my driveway- 

even if you did place it in a dollar store baggie and add white rocks.

 Seriously???






EPIC FAIL.