Keys To A Happy Birthday

We had a family vacation planned for a while, and it just happened to fall on my birthday week. My family came down from Georgia, my brother here in Orlando hitched up his boat

 and we all took a little trip, over the seven mile bridge and down to the lower Keys of Florida.

I knew it was real when I saw an iguana walking down the sidewalk as we passed by.

We rented a house which slept fourteen and was directly on the water.

My younger son hasn't visited us once, since he turned back around for Georgia after day three of moving to Orlando with us, but this trip got him down here as well and made it all the sweeter.

The Keys are quite the experience...and  all good.

All the time.

There's so much to do and see, yet is equally satisfying to  simply hang around and do absolutely nothing but enjoy the beauty of it all, as far as your eyes can see.

We ate like kings

and drank like we were really, really thirsty...

All the time. 

Every meal we ate out was great

and every meal we ate in was awesome.

Bonus points I didn't even have to cook one of them.

There was a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle of the Florida Keys, found in a drawer, and have never seen such dedication to putting together nine hundred ninety six pieces of a puzzle.

It was awesome.

It was simply and exactly what my tired, old skinny bones needed.

Tim (Ole Jed) as well.

I feel sorry for people who don't love and cherish their family the way we do.

Extended members always included.

Oh yeah...we took the Corn Hole too.

I could have stayed a month.

Then seemingly, just like that...

It was time to get the boat out of the water,  clear off the dock, pack up and go back to reality as we live it, the other fifty one weeks of the year.

If I can just have one week this great, to look forward to, every year,with all of our family and friends; I can easily make it through the other fifty one weeks...come what may.

Already planning next years' trip down, and having our oldest join us is a must in 2019. He was certainly missed this time, just couldn't get away.

There's always room for loved ones.

I don't think I have ever enjoyed a vacation more or spent one staying this close to Mother Nature...literally.

Moving to Florida was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I don't have a best friend here...not like I did in Georgia, where I had dozens.

I miss that, and hope they miss me.

Thank goodness I have had Massey here. 

She has and will always  be my bestie.

This transition, later in my life, has helped me to find out a lot about myself.

There is some poor, unsuspecting soul, somewhere in the metro area of Orlando, destined to be my new local Bestie.

I just know it.

I bet Massey hopes I find them sooner than later, but kudos to her for keeping me company until then.

I worry myself sick about my Lost Boy back home but luckily my sister is close by to help.

Everyone needs a friend.

For the first time, in close to going on two years now, am almost to the point of saying "I Got This."

I've fallen back, then slowly maintained, and finally moved ahead. I was in a dark hole for a while and slowly climbed out of it, not sure of what I would find.

I climbed out anyway.

I've been occasionally depressed but more often than not, impressed with kindness shown to me and my family after simply being  the person my parents raised me to be.

I intend to live, as long and large as I can.

You should as well.

Can't hurt.

Might help.

Till next time...COTTON

It's A Coke Icee

Slurpee is a rip off of the original Icee. There's nothing better than the "Coldest Drink in Town." When I was a kid, Coke was the only flavor. They added cherry when I was about ten or so, which seemed ridiculous to me. How can something taste better than a Coke Icee?

I never bought or tried one.

If I wanted a fruit flavored frozen drink, I'd stop by the DQ for a Mister Misty.

 You can't grow up in a city ten minutes from the heart of downtown Atlanta and not be a 'Co-Cola' lover. My mother never called it a Coke or a Coca Cola.

 She always called it a "Co-Cola."

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.


I was at work last night and had a party of four, total business meeting so didn't talk with them much during the dinner. The guy who paid gave me his corporate 7 Eleven card.

I told him I loved 7 Eleven because they always sell Coke Icee...not to mention there was a 7 Eleven on every corner in Orlando.

I told him when living back in Georgia I always stopped at Flash Foods because they sold them as well.

The one woman sitting with them cracked up when I also added "The only downside is when you go into the store, really wanting one, and the little red light on the machine is on...total bummer."

He told me the very next day was 7 Elevens' birthday and were giving them away for free all day long.

I left the house today and headed out to run errands and pay bills. I stopped at the 7 Eleven on the corner up from my house  and walked in to see six peeps huddled around the machine (thankfully without the red light blinking).

I asked the cashier if  the small crowd meant it was really free Icee day?

Very professionally she said, "Yeah".

The four in front of me got their drinks then I got mine. We all headed straight to the front door in a line.

AWESOME!

I asked the cashier before leaving if this was just for Orlando or nationwide?

She (once again) professionally shrugged her shoulders in a classic 'I-doh-no' gesture but smiled at us all as we all walked out together.

The young girl with three guys in front of me told me it wasn't just Orlando but everywhere.

Cool Beans!

I got into my car and immediately got on social media to alert FB'ers everywhere that free Icee was out there for the taking!

The four kids who had been in front of me were all sitting in the car next to me, all typing on their own cells'.

I wanted to toot my horn, have them roll down their window and me say to them, "I'll put it on Facebook. You guys take care of Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and that other one I can't think of right now."

"Cheers!"

It's the things that make me laugh every day. A chuckle goes a long way on a hard day.

 Smiling feels really good too, unless it's Massey asking for a selfie of us together. I have a hard time smiling on demand.

Maybe because I detest fake smiles. 

But I bet even you smiled when you saw this one!

Or this one.

Yeah, my older sister and brother make fun of me a lot and my daughter rolls her eyes at me even more . My husband just slowly shakes his head and silently walks away.

You gotta laugh, even when you feel like crying. 

Laughter uplifts you. Crying drains, and seldom helps you in the long run.

Love big and love large.

Karma is real.

Till next time ...COTTON

How Old Am I Getting?

Last night at work we had a horrible thunderstorm pass over the airport (right by us) around six. It only lasted about twenty minutes but was packing a mighty fierce lightning punch. Shortly after, the credit card system went down...and so did we.

We have a crash kit we keep in the office to process cards manually when the system goes offline and customers are waiting to pay with their card. Unfortunately the kit doesn't include one of these

and is probably a good thing, the younger servers and customers are quite confused simply by these slips of paper as a receipt...

They would think the manual imprinter was some sort of chip reading device connected to the Cloud somehow.

I had to show two different young couples how to read it and how to finish filling it out, and yes, which copy was theirs to keep.

Without the imprinter it took forever to copy each and every card number, expiration date, name and type of card on every slip before ever even filling in the amount to have it signed. Managers were helping us fill out slips for the more impatient customers and luckily the system came back on in about thirty more minutes.

Sometimes I'll say something at work to one of my younger co workers and they look at me like I've just spoken to them in a foreign language they don't know.

Apparently the word smattering isn't used very much anymore.

Neither is stove-up and for sure, not slap-full.



It's like a double whammy.

 I'm getting old and I'm a southern bumpkin.

Thank You Jesus for letting me at least stay slim.

I work mostly night shifts in an extremely dark dining room in a pretty nice restaurant. The lighting takes ten years off my face and puts an extra fifty in my pocket every shift.

My daughter, who is my (go to to be hip) girl , also reminds me every time I sound embarrassingly old.

I will say working with younger people has kept me a little more in the loop.

Yeah, I'm Woke.

I read something the other day on my childhood friends' social media page between herself and her recently grown son.

This was my 'Woke' moment.

Thank God I was alone...I laughed out loud.

The other day Sam looked at me and said where are your eyebrows. On my chin son. They are on my chin

Yeah, life is over half way done.

Better start making sure every minute counts.

Tim has taken on a new position, luckily with a new paycheck.

He led us while we were plush. He faltered through no fault of his own but  family and friends always had our back. Always.

Now he is taking care of all of us and working crazy freakin' hours and many times miles from home.

I 've been writing this post for over three hours, but when I got to the point about what Tim, Ole Jed, Ball and Chain, the father of my kids...has done and endures, this song came on the station I am streaming as I write. 

It used to be 'Still The One" and will always be special to our young life together.

For the grown up version of us?

It's the version after the decade which both of us worried about even making it through...together or apart.

We never cheated on each other in almost thirty years. To me that is hands down a win.

 Sometimes I didn't feel like being with him but I never felt like being with someone else.

Tim is the one for me.

 I've waited on him and he has waited on me. Luckily I seem to be the one for him as well.

Sometimes ya get it right.

He's my first, my last, my everything.

It's the song. It's the orchestra, it's his voice...it's the lyrics. It's the man I married...a pasty white dude who loved me, with all my faults.

Everyone should be lucky enough to feel this way about someone.

Till next time, COTTON

Grab life, hold on and roll with it. We got one shot.

I Don't Have Time Left For Wasted Energy

A bird can't fly on one wing. I'm neither right wing or left wing...I fly with my own two wings.

People constantly forward and post things that aren't true, from both sides of the aisle, every walk of life and from each far reaching wing. If they agree with what it says, it must be true!! If they hate what it says, they ignore it, give it a frowny emoji or emoji thumbs down and move on to the next posted article, which also may or may not be true.

It's a vicious, embarrassing cyber cycle we live in.

Everyone who knows me, works with me, follows me or reads my blog pretty much knows my way of thinking and my take on life.

But here's the thing.

It's my thinking, no one Else's.

Who am I to spew verbal, written or typed hate and venom towards others simply because they don't agree with MY  way of thinking?

That just seems to be flat out hate.

My own mother taught me at a very young age,  you catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

Here's my thing.

You can make a point on your own without bashing people who don't happen to agree with your line of thinking. There is no reason to make it a right or wrong decision or you're going to hell thing. There is no reason to act like opposing opinions belong  exclusively to idiots.

To each their own.

Views and opinions are best used in a polling booth. 

But if you gotta click 'Like' on every single thing you agree with, at least do some research to see if it is factually correct.


Spoiler Alert:

Hate to tell you but most things on social media aren't.


My last job in Atlanta, before moving to Orlando was at the world's busiest airport and I was lucky enough to meet literally hundreds and hundreds of people from all over the world on a monthly basis. Some were passengers I'll never see again or employees I'll probably never work with or see again, but each and every one made some impact on my life in one way or another and I  feel grateful to have had the opportunity to meet such a diverse slice of the planet in such a short amount of time.


I posted something on social media the other day about the vicious attacks people like to post and how quickly others seem to click on and Like, whether it is true or not or whether it is a horrible personal attack, totally unwarranted.

A young man I worked with at the airport, who actually followed my blog before we ever met or worked together, made a pretty succinct point in a comment response to what I had posted about all the hate.



"People really need to get the hell over themselves and REALIZE THEY DO NOT OWN AMERICA AND THEIR OPINION IS AS USEFUL/WORTHLESS AS THE NEXT PERSONS!! (I typically avoid all caps but I’ve been needing to get that one off me 😓)

The most important (and possibly only) non-disputable fact is that our lives expire and can be incredibly short, so for the LOVE OF WHO YOU MAY, imagine yourself in someone else’s shoes, give as you’d wish to receive, live and freaking let live!! People and their simple bitch-assed mindsets are really making me sick!"

Touche' and well said, my tall friend.

(and I still miss you)

Extend a hand, cut someone a break, never assume.

Karma has an excellent memory.


Words to live by.


Til next time,

COTTON

...Careful What You Ask For

It's been a change for me, living here in Orlando. I've been a 'waitress' for almost forty years.

In other words, been there,  done that, seen that... more times than I've cared to.


Now I'm suddenly living in central Florida at the age of almost sixty and still a waitress.

 'Server' always creeped me out.

I'd rather wait on you...

Anticipate needs before you have to ask for them and hopefully wow you because I did,  during your time sitting at my table, in a freaking restaurant...  rather than feeling like I'm a  servant, begging for a scrap from royalty.


The better job I do the more I get paid.

It is a job which has served me and my family well. I think every person should be a server  at some point in their life. It is a humbling profession.

Suddenly I've looked up from the tunnel vision our life has been  the past decade and finally realize what our saving grace has been all along.

We don't always get it right but we always try.

Working full time was beginning to wear me out so I took Tim's advice and dropped to four days a week. It has made a world of difference and was perfect timing...Tim just got a pretty significant promotion.

Go Jed!

Granny needs a new pair of combat boots!

Summer officially begins this week but it has been summer here in Orlando since late February after our three week winter.

The restaurant where I work has several different dining rooms, one by the bar, a huge open dining room in the back, a nice solarium where the windows, screens and walls can be raised or closed and we also have an outdoor patio area.

For the life of me I can't understand why people ask to be seated out on the patio on a hot steamy Florida day.

I'll see the hostess guiding a group of people to a lovely booth in the comfort of our air conditioned dining room but when they pass that patio door often ask if they can sit outside instead.

Great...just great.

NOT!

So the hostess of course happily complies, sets up a table for them outside in the sweltering heat and goes to find the unlucky server who has to go wait on them.

Then what really kills me is when they suddenly start complaining about the flies or heat once food begins to arrive and asks if they can move inside instead.

I feel like saying "Instead of what? Instead of eating where we tried to seat you to begin with? No, I'm sorry, that boat already sailed so you just sit out here sweating and swatting flies like you're on a picnic and enjoy the seats you chose for yourselves...you know what they say, the customer is always right!"

It's a running joke with us at work.
On a really hot day when they veer out that side door wanting to sit on the patio instead, we feel like locking the door to keep them out there...idiots.

If the hostess comes up and tells you that you're seated in the 300's that means outside...dammit.

It would be different if we were in tank tops, shorts and flip flops but we aren't. We are in long pants, socks, shoes, long sleeve shirts, a long apron and constantly toting heavy dishes to and fro.

Lucky me (not) I suffer from hot flashes as well.

I realize it's Florida and most people are tourists wanting to enjoy the warm weather and that's all fine and dandy...just not while you're trying to enjoy a nice meal on a sunny ninety degree afternoon.

The one thing I can say about waiting tables is that it has given me plenty of laughs over the decades, along with a few tears but all in all a wonderful experience getting to know the public and letting the public get to know me.


On another note, Father's Day was this past weekend. I've been (literally) working on a present for Ole Jed for about a month now.

They had a contest at work. The server who signed up the most customers for our rewards program in a four week period would win a $100 gift card to the  recently opened PGA Drive Shack right up the street from our restaurant.

I can win some contests in a restaurant...been there done that, time and time again!


When they have contests, all you have to do it push or promote whatever they ask you to and you'll win.

I've worked with servers who come into work and do absolutely nothing until someone comes up to them and tells them they have a table. Then as soon as they are told they are cut, do nothing more than what it takes just to get them out the door. If they have to aimlessly hang around an hour or so while everyone else does the bulk of the work, that's okay too...as long as they don't have to do it.

Pathetic at best, and totally don't understand how much money they could potentially make and walk out with after every shift if they did the job right.


If they ask me to sell something...I sell it. It's not like they have asked me to dig a four foot hole with an espresso spoon.

Needless to say, I won the gift card for Tim. He doesn't know it yet, he's working in Virginia this week. I told him I was getting him an awesome Dad's Day gift but may not be here in time for Father's Day.

We (me) may or may not tell him I won the gift card instead of buying it, but I know Tim...it wouldn't matter to him either way.



I remember one time many years ago, they had a sales contest at Longhorn when I worked there. The grand prize was an Xbox and I really wanted to win it for my younger son, Zach.
 We had to push all our new appetizers and push them I did.

Specifically I remember waiting on a couple, about my own age. I told them, in great detail, all about the two different shrimp appetizers we had and asked if they would like to try one of them?

The husband slowly took a swig of his beer and said "Sure, why don't you just surprise me."

I didn't miss a beat and calmly said "Okay then, I'm pregnant with your baby."

His wife's margarita, which she was currently sipping, shot out of her nose but her husband took another sip of his beer and said "Well that did surprise me!"


My husband tells me I have a PhD in BS.

I think he may be right.

Now that I only have to put on four shows (what I call shifts) a week, it is so much easier to laugh and enjoy the work.



It's almost like I'm young again.

I still look young, don't I?




Plugging along down the road of life like an ole fart, just happy to be on this side of the dirt...


COTTON

  

Laughter...The Best Medicine Ever

If you've never watched this show, you should...and sooner than later. It's a joy to watch.

I think it's on season five by now, but  I will re watch any episode which happens to come on. The first couple of seasons were all shot on location in Atlanta, one of the first things which piqued my interest after my nephew turned me on to the magic of Michael Carbonaro.

Life's been going pretty great for us after a pretty long struggle, which turned out to be totally worth every year of it.

Losing fourteen year old Sir Charles was a a blow...

Then we had a scare with Ham, also almost Charlie's age.

He obviously just had a bug which luckily went away within twenty four hours, but was preparation for what will ultimately happen, sooner than later.

Ziggy needed some (hopefully) fatty tumors removed and we finally took care of them, unfortunately later than sooner.

His was a rocky recovery at first but almost three grand later, the boy is less than two weeks away from being once again a care free idiot chasing anything that is stupid enough to wander into our back yard after we've lived here for almost two years with our dogs.

So yesterday (my day off) I washed Zig's wound out with saline, squirted hydrogen peroxide on it, waited thirty seconds, applied the ointment he thinks is Cool Whip but luckily can't lick off anymore with his 'bumper' on and watched him bounce and scrub around, unable to get to that one spot he wanted to get to but for the life of him couldn't figure out how to.

 Inflatable no bite collars?? Best thing ever invented.

  The smaller (also) cheaper one worked fine until the shock of it being around his neck wore off and he figured out how to turn it  by scratching, around to the opening just big enough to get to that sweet one spot he so desperately wanted to lick but we so desperately wanted him not to lick.

Then ya gotta bite the bullet and pay for a big boy collar which while unfortunately comes with a big boy price tag, gets the job done...much sooner than later, which in the end saves you future vet visits.

So we still have go through go the cleansing and medicating three times a day...no fun for anyone.  Plus I still have to shove a pill down his throat once a day, now using tough love and my index finger as opposed to begging him with treat covered pills,  always taking three or four tries... if I'm lucky.

I  have gotten pretty good at it.
And he is healing nicely.

Anyhoo...

Back to me!

I was watching The Carbonaro Effect with Ziggy  beside me on the couch, after pushing his pill halfway down his throat, giving him some love to make up for my 'tough' love on my day off.

The episode was a newer one, shot in Chicago. It was in a store kinda like a "Scientific Hobby Lobby". Michael Carbonaro played the part of a cashier, unknown to people who came to the counter.

As usual, in the episode he amazes people with magic tricks while explaining how he is doing something newly discovered by technology and easily gets people to believe and be astounded by his  ingeniousity and seemingly (kinda) plausible explanations.


Basically, the dude's full of crap but an excellent slight of hand artist with a personality so nice he makes it hard not to believe him, and most of the time always does.

It's great television and if you haven't watched his show, you should.

So Ziggy and I watched a big ole burly younger dude wander into a scientific hobby store just to look around. Michael Carbornaro quickly reeled him in with a jar of marbles which he soon warmed one up in, in  his hands and blew the marble into the shape of a test tube, because it was a new, blow able glass product just on the market.

The guy believed him, and was astounded.

Trust me, you would be too.

The guy is awesome at what he does, highly entertaining and one of my favorite 'go to'  smiles in my every day life.


The guy in the video?

My favorite "Dude" of all time.

It was like a Bill and Ted's  Excellent Adventure moment...extremely memorable...for decades.



The line which got me, made me laugh for days.

Still does.


 He was all alone after being blown away by something he was having a hard time wrapping his head around. Carbonaro left the room with some lame excuse and my man said, to no one in particular,  "I gotta get out more or at least do some puzzles."


Till next time, COTTON


#doapuzzle

Random Things Are The Best

I was dropping off a load at the local Goodwill Emporium today. When we moved here from Georgia I bet we lugged about twenty comforters, blankets, quilts and bedspreads along with us. I'm tired of seeing them stuffed everywhere and having to wash them when someone uses one for some random reason.
I also got rid of a lot of clothes, boots and jackets we'll never wear again in Forida weather. I also tossed out the little cabinet I'd been using on the back porch for plants and grill accessories. I looked around Goodwill since that's where I picked up the little cabinet about seven years ago. I didn't find anything but started smiling to myself the minute I walked in the door.

You could kidnap me, blindfold me , put me on a plane or in the trunk of a car and take me around for hours then walk me into a randon store in a random town in a random state, and I'd know exactly what store we were in before removing the blindfold if you happened to choose a Thrift Store.

How come all our old junk combined has that one distinct funky smell when all displayed in one big room together?

It's not that it's a bad smell, just a distinct smell and not often confused with another smell.

Go figure.

So after the Goodwill Scentporium I went to one of my next often visited haunts, Aldi.

It's like Whole Foods and Walmart had a baby together on a no frills budget.

Once you get over fixating on name brands and realize how good the brands are which they do stock, you can relax and enjoy the pleasantries of an Aldi check out line.

They don't play. You gotta be ready and have your cards on the table (conveyour belt) the minute the cashier removes that bar separating your order from the one in front of you. Aldi products have bar codes on almost every side of a package or item for easier scanning. They can zing through an order in no time, not stopping to bag but rather simply toss into another shopping cart, leaving you to the task once you've cleared the line and paid.

I love it!

They also charge a quarter for a shopping cart and get your quarter back when you return it to the corral by the front of the store.

Love that even more!!

It's not like your gonna run into a Kardashian in Aldi or even people who speak the same language as you but is an even playing field where every person, no matter what, is welcomed.

I always keep my reusable Aldi shopping bags in the back of my car, they don't provide plastic or paper bags either.

Maybe my favorite thing!!!

So today I only picked up three or four items but always take my bags in anyway. You never know what they'll have at a great price. I've picked up large, washable dog beds for twelve dollars and they hold up extremely well.

There were only two cashiers open, which is fine, the way they whisk you through the process.

Then it happened. I heard someone mumbling on a cell phone in front of me, loud enough to understand the nonsense of the conversation whoever ahead of me was having...in a checkout line, at the cash register on a busy Friday afternoon with about ten people behind them.

Then I spotted her. 

She had her cell crooked between her cheek and shoulder and was getting her change purse out of her front pocket as she told everyone what time she'd be "Gettin' there" for dinner...she only had two more stops to make and the rain just let up.

Shut.The.Front.Door.

So we're all standing there waiting on this tiny older (about my age) woman who has never heard of the phrase "Lemme call ya right back" and the cashier is patiently staring at her as well. The old woman finally covered the microphone of her cell and said "I wanted to pay cash, what do you want me to do?"

The cashier (a younger girl) politely said "I'm sorry, I thought you heard me say that would be forty two fifty."

The old broad, skinnier than me with a long gray ponytail, separated by four different scrunchees down her back, making Crystal Gayle look like Sinead O'Conner said "Naw, I didn't" and slowly counted out her bills, all the while still chatting about her day to who ever was (or wasn't) listening on the other end.

Next up was the Asian lady in front of me...nice, efficient and ready to speed up everyones' progress. The Latino lady behind me had her three items in one hand and money in the other.

I started to get tickled just thinking about it all. When I get my own self tickled, it gets worse before it gets better. The more I think about it, the more Iwant to laugh about it.


So it quickly became my own turn.

Old Chick was still accross the way trying to get situated to carry her things to her vehicle, finally making a slow exit.


As the old chick slowly pushed her cart out the front door, with the cell still crooked in her neck and still yacking away about absolutely nothing.  I looked at the young cashier who breifly glanced at the older woman leaving and very seriously said "Well in her defense , it did seem like a pretty important phone call"

The sweet young girl kept scanning my items, shrugged her shoulders and said "Guess it coulda been".

By the time she started to get the words out I was already slowly shaking my head, smiling and told her I was totally kidding and that had most certainly not been an important conversation she was having.

Just stop, observe and listen to people every once in a while.

Sometimes you witness something hilarious or sweet. Sometimes you witness something pretty upsetting or disappointing. Sometimes you meet random really great people and try your best to stay away from random idiots along the way. Every person has a story, some are really worth hearing, some need to be heard and some seem to never be heard.

I may not have life all down pat, but have lived a pretty good story, so far.

Till Next Time, COTTON