Christmas Comes Early

This being the holiday season, Trueman and I have come into a little bit of extra holiday money, courtesy of our loved ones, and thus decided to treat ourselves for the holidays over this past weekend by getting some things that were needed and some that were wanted.

First and foremost, we've finally put some new tires on the car. This was something we've been putting off because we've just put new tires on the front this past spring after the Gods of Recruiting were trying to kill Trueman on his last day at the Fort Meade MEPS by having him run off the road doing five miles an hour on the ice, damaging not only the tire but the rim in the process. We now have shiny pretty new tires and also had an alignment done, so now the car rides smooth, just like new. *Inhales new tire smell*

On Friday night, we went to dinner at Joe's Crab Shack, which was very nice with the exception of the fact that I seem to attract the world's most unruly children whenever I am inside a restaurant. This particular restaurant had us relocating from the first table we were seated at because the toddler next to us was coughing all over our table (yuck). And later on we were treated to two young girls below the age of five running amok through the restaurant, almost plowing head-on into a waitress carrying a huge tray of food for a table of six. What a disaster that would have been. Their parents, of course, were blissfully ignorant or simply didn't give a damn what their kids were up to.

I see this more and more often - exactly when did it become socially acceptable for kids to run amok in a restaurant while their parents completely ignore the situation and continue on with their dinner?

After eating at Joe's, we headed next doors to Saddle Ridge, which is a "Rock-n-Country Saloon", according to its website. It's a pretty nice place, even though that's not really my kind of music or my kind of dancing. I'm sorry, but seeing the same people doing the same line dance to twenty songs that sound exactly the same does get somewhat boring after awhile. (And did I mention that's so not my kind of music?) But I did have a good time.

I even had a go at the mechanical bull, which turned out to be a lot wider than it looked, which made it impossible for me to properly hold on with my feet. At least that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Trueman had a go as well (that was my stipulation for giving it a try myself) and ended up scraping up his shin on the way down. Just goes to show...

On Saturday, we headed out very early in the morning because we had to go meet a lady from North Carolina who was buying the old sewing machine I'd listed on Craig's List. She came up with her mother and we met at Value City in Newport News, which turned out to be going out of business, so we ended up doing some shopping as well. We found brand new Adidas running shoes for Trueman for $20 and a nice pair of dress shoes for me, for $5.

Afterward, we headed out to the antiques shop, went to a couple of other antiques stores in the area, caught part of the local Christmas parade, and stopped at WalMart and the thrift store on the way back. I ended up getting a new outfit - new underwear, a new bra, a new pair of jeans, a purse, and a new shirt - as well as a haircut. And a good deal on all of it, to boot.

That night, we decided to head out to The Wave in Norfolk, which is a whole lot smaller in person than it looks on their website, but is the type of club I remember from my days in Germany - packed to the bursting point with everyone dancing and having a great time.

Never having been to The Wave before, we didn't really know what to expect. The website listed Saturday simply as "Dance Wave - featuring the latest dance music that everyone can enjoy". So we dressed nice and arrived around 10 o'clock to find the parking lot to be empty. Apparently, this place doesn't get going until 11 and then becomes packed - and quickly. The first thing we found out after getting there and getting our bearings, was that it was gay night. Which was actually really cool because everyone was really nice, very courteous, very outgoing, totally nonjudgmental, and nobody came on to me. There was also fairly little drinking and nobody got drunk and stupid. People were just having a really good time.

I asked the bar tender to recommend a good drink to me since I don't usually drink, don't like drinks that are very strongly alcoholic, and prefer drinks that are not very acidy or citrusy since I have a sensitive stomach. The bar tender rocked. She made me a drink that is similar to a Cosmo, except that it is supposed to have pineapple juice and a maraschino cherry. Since I don't do well with pineapple juice, she substituted Ginger Ale, and that made for a great drink. I loved it. The drinks were pricy but so good.

I tried to get Trueman to dance, but he is really self-conscious and doesn't do well with "dance" music like that because, so he says, he doesn't have any rhythm. He does like to people watch, though, so eventually, I got him to go to the edge of the dance floor where we could watch everyone dancing, and I just started to dance and he kind of fell into the rhythm for a bit. I still didn't get him to go out onto the dance floor, though, and eventually headed out and hit it on my own where I quickly found myself in a sea of shirtless gay men. It was pretty entertaining.

Needless to say, we slept in on Sunday morning since we didn't get home until three.