do you like depeche mode?

So this past Friday was one of insanity and stamina. I awoke to my alarm before the sun was even awake. I drove to San Antonio to give my support to my step mom, Mel, before her major surgery. She had a tumor near one of her kidney's and they had to remove the tumor as well as the entire organ. At that point they still were not sure if it was malignant. So after a few hours at the hospital I hopped back in Loofa and headed home.

Rex and I made it to ACL that afternoon just in time to see Gogol Bordello. This is a band that has sparked some interest in me over the past year or so and they blew me away with their energetic live performance!

So earlier that day I figured I would try wearing a skirt and leggings so that I would be comfortable walking around and probably cooler. Well of course my rare idea of a skirt is black as turned out to be the rest of my ensemble. So there I was in black from head to toe with the exception of two purple flowers I plugged in my pigtails. (start wearing purple - wearing purple! - this is a line from one of Gogol Bordello's songs - hence the purple flowers)

Rex is taking a quick restroom break and I'm alone in line for another margarita. I'm already low energy and a space case because of the long day and a guy turns around and in front of his friends looks at me and says "do you like Depeche Mode?"

I kinda smiled and just stared at him as if he were speaking a foreign language. Normally I'm quick to chime in in most conversations, I just didn't have it in me. I admittedly, was very confused by the short question. He turned around to his friends and they all laughed. Another one of his comrades comes up to them and he says to him, you missed a good one! Ha ha the joke was on me... and I was too dazed to have a quick come back. It was actually hysterical. I suppose I looked like a little goth kid, mary janes and all, lost without her lunch box purse.

He later turned around and apologized, which almost made it all worse. I will however give him some credit as mean/funny as it was. I think most of us are guilty of assuming things about random strangers and how we perceive them. He just was a big enough ass hole to say it directly to the target instead of out of ear shot. I still wish I would've said, "Why, are you the president of the Death Cab for Cutie Fan Club?"

On a much lighter note (no pun intended) I have officially lost 12 pounds as of my Monday morning weigh in! And that was fully dressed and with wet hair!

sin tax

So as mentioned in my last blog I started Weight Watchers this past week. First off, counting sucks! According to WW, a margarita is worth 5 points... well the simple math would be 5X7 margaritas = 35 points, WRONG. Apparently when one item is consumed in large quantities they have to add on a "sin tax"and so 7 margaritas at once is close to 40pts! Good thing I didn't eat much earlier in the day and a good thing I didn't drive home that evening!

As far as activity - This past spring right before it got really hot, Rex bought me a pretty new cruiser bike. All summer I would literally pet it and promise it that as soon as it cooled off we'd be best friends again. So Monday night, first night of WW, it happened to be a cool, nice evening. So I hopped on my bike (who still needs a name) and we headed off for a nice 30 minute ride. So like I said, it is a cruiser and that's usually how I ride it - nice and easy peddling here and there. Well I figured to make it count I'd pedal the entire time long and hard. So I take off through the neighborhood and went up and down hills - which is a bitch on a cruiser! I finally make it home, panting and covered in the hives - I get the hives if you look at me wrong! I am convinced I'd been riding for hours, or at least 30 minutes! WRONG - I get back, strip out of my sweaty clothes and look at Rex and pushed out the words, "so how long do you think I was gone for?!" "Ten minutes!" " What?!" So yeah, the next bike ride I didn't kill myself and though I only lasted ten minutes again, it went much easier. Maybe by next year I can ride more than 5 times around the block! :)

The rest of the week has been pretty good other than I am peeing more than a woman who is prego! Damn those two liters of water a day! I just hope I've lost at least a couple of pounds - if anything I've pissed it out!

Back on the wagon - hang on!

So I blogged years ago. It mostly was about travels, booze, & bitches. My, my how life changes. I have been inspired to give this another go by one of my new favorite bitches - LizzObitch.



So this weekend my kid sister, now 22 , spent some time with me. We are 7 years apart and we've always considered ourselves to be quite opposite. We barely spoke for years after a falling out in her late teenage years. I started to say that she has finally grown into maturity, but I must admit - we both have.



Due to our age difference we have never been super close. I feel that this is changing, yet it is such a strange process. We are connected through blood - would we be friends if not? Maybe if we were coworkers or classmates but we run with different crowds. She is currently living alone on a military base, her soon to be ex-husband is stationed in Iraq. Most of her friends are military families and she likes Palin. I on the other hand run in a much more liberal circle. I have a girlfriend who is pierced, tattooed, and sports a mohawk on occasion. Several of my good friends have the same M.O.



So having a sister just seems strange at times. I have always felt that I was the black sheep of the family and yet when we were talking this past weekend she's always felt like the black sheep. Out of the three biological siblings, two of us are queer. A bit ironic that her being straight makes her different in our family. So when we are together we have a tendency of comparing strange defects that we either both share or lucked out that the other one got the short end of the stick. We look at each other and it's like a "fun mirror" where you can see yourself in the image yet it's distorted in one way or another. Our mother passed away 14 years ago and our grandmother shortly there after. I think that's why we might compare our genetics so harshly with each other. Both of our big asses, her bunions, my coarse dark leg hair, she tans, I burn and how we grew up on junk food. Which leads me to the next part of this novella.

So after spending most of my weekend with the little sis, Rex & I ended up at our friend's Starr & Liz. We had dinner and discussed our lives as usual. I spoke of my sister inspiring me to "get back on the wagon" and really begin to pay attention to what I eat, and activity so that I can shed these ridiculous pounds that I keep packing on. Starr & Liz both have been on Weight Watchers off and on and swear by it when they keep up with it. I actually was a member back in the day as a third grader - yes a nine year old weighed in on a weekly basis with 20-70 year olds. I remember my grandmother would take me and all that I wanted was the pretty beach towel on the wall. I think it was $15 which was ridiculous at the time to pay for a towel. But I wanted it and my grandmother said that if I hit my goal she would buy it for me. I have no clue where this beach towel with large stick figures, in bright colors, biking, swimming, and horseback riding but I do know that I eventually earned the damn towel.

So here I am twenty years later back on Weight Watchers. Admittedly, I have not attempted a diet in several years (other than the break up diet which consisted of booze, bitches, and cartons of smokes) so obviously this will be a major change for me.

The first day went pretty well. Other than giving myself gut rot this morning from too much coffee w/ half the normal cream and yes - no sugar. Lunch was actually the easiest thanks to McDonalds. Who would ever think I'd be thanking them on a diet?! Side Salad, Paul Newman's low cal dress, and a yogurt parfait - 5 points. It's now much later in the evening and I realize that I could've added the granola to it for the extra point - which at the time I thought was insane for such a small little packet.

Tonight I met my good friends, Chris & Helen at Macaroni Grill for dinner. I showed up with the dietary information from the entire menu and geezus christ was it difficult to eat anything there! I settled for a bite of bread instead of my own personal loaf. Instead of shoving my face with their delicious pasta followed up by a 1,000 calorie piece of tiramsu - yes a 1,000 calories!!! - I had fish, grilled asparagus, & broccoli... and I actually got full. The waitress was a bitch - she saw my little list and basically made fun of it the entire time - however I tuned her out, rolled my eyes at her and conquered my goal of a healthy dinner at an Italian restaurant.

Tomorrow, as my sister says, "a new battle".