vacation, all i ever wanted

I’m trying to stay on top of regular posts, but I’ve been a little sidetracked. Last week I was busy preparing for Devon’s fancy pancy tea party for her 6th birthday, which was ridiculously cute and a big hit. And, I’ve been working on some marketing materials for the blog and my freelance writing stuff. On top of that, I’m getting ready to go out of town and preparing for my mama to visit. So, cleaning, packing, grocery shopping, outfit planning, and working on writing jobs that pay me, these things have kept me pretty busy. Oh, and, yesterday I received a warrant for my arrest in the mail.

For what, you ask? Smuggling smack? Growing weed on my patio? Being awesome? Sadly, no. Apparently a speeding ticket I got several months ago was not paid, when I really, really thought it was. Like, in the pile of bills with the word “paid” written on it in my handwriting, tossed into the trash, checked off the to-do list, paid.

Now, I guess in Georgia, if you do not pay a speeding ticket, there is no friendly reminder or notice of any kind: just a good old-fashioned warrant in your mailbox. So, my son and I waited in the three-hour “warrant” line with other criminals (read: procrastinators) in a very hot, jam-packed building, where I paid the ticket. I then went home and heated up a Trader Joes dinner because cooking a real meal was not really a priority after almost going to jail. Ok, I wasn’t really in danger of going to jail, but I did wait in a line with people who have done time, presumably for things worse than speeding tickets.

So, like that Trader Joes chicken, my brain is fried. I am tired, not very clever, and not very patient with my argumentative children. My daughter has decided to go all drama queen on me now that she’s turning six, screaming things like “i don’t want to go to school/take a bath/eat dinner,” as if I were making her do something really horrible, like eat broccoli or something. As I type, my son is arguing with me over the name of our cat, which is Franny Francesca Francisco. He’s insisting her name is Gary and is pissed about it. I’m very much in need of this weekend vacation.

Though I don’t know if northern New Jersey qualifies as a vacation. I will definitely not be greeted with leis or alohas when I step off the plane at La Guardia. I’m pretty sure people will not say hello to me when I’m walking down the street like they do here in Atlanta, or offer to help me find the bus to NJ. People may even openly wince when I use the word y’all. That’s fine. I can handle it. I almost went to JAIL, after all.

And, I know at least two people will be really friendly to me, my cousin Ryan and my bff Melissa. They will escort me on my adventures on real public transportation (not this two-line MARTA business). They will not laugh at me when I order a sweet tea in a restaurant, and they will make me laugh and finish my sentences for me. And, if history repeats itself, Melissa and I will wear the exact same outfit at least once without our planning in advance. We plan to be lazy on Melissa’s new patio, drink beer, go to a show, and at some point will probably make a video ala drunken deceptacons style. So, you can look forward to us making asses of ourselves and sharing it with you.

Until then, here’s The Go-Go’s playing Vacation.