Another Year, Another Dead Kennedy

2012-05-17T12:14:00.000-04:00

Well . . . another year, another dead Kennedy.

I tell you what, if I ever catch myself anywhere close to a ten mile radius of one of these cursed folks, I am running for the hills. Well, maybe not the hills. They seem to have a lot of trouble with those.

It's bad enough I reside in the same country. Every time I travel, I'm always like, "Hold up. Are there any Kennedy's on the slopes this week?"

Even craggy Maria Shriver makes me nervous. So far she seems to have escaped the Kennedy curse. Her only bad luck has been in marrying a bodybuilder/movie star/governor who's strangely attracted to ugly maids. But still. I'm not taking any chances.

And if I'm ever on a plane and a Kennedy boards, I am shrieking off that plane.

Their bad juju becomes your problem when you're trapped 30,000 feet in the air with them. Just ask Caroline Bessette Kennedy and her sister.

That poor sister. What did she ever do?

I mean, Caroline, I'm sure, was like, "Hey, Hey, y'all! I snagged America's handsome prince. Take that Daryl Hannah."

So I understand her being a little blinded to the fact that she was getting into a wee baby airplane. At night. A hazy night. With a husband who hadn't "technically" mastered night flying. A husband who was still on crutches, recovering from a broken ankle. A husband who didn't bother with a silly old flight plan. Or instruments.

I can understand her ignoring all those annoying details so they could get to the Kennedy compound, chop-chop, for one of their 456,000 cousins' wedding. Because, I can guarantee a Kennedy wedding is one rip-roaring good time.

They're Irish Catholic. Rip-roaring times are in their blood. I know of what I speak.

But even with all those glaring warning signs, the fact alone that your husband is a Kennedy should make any logical person put the kibosh on getting into a single engine airplane with him. No matter how hot he is.

And forget about one of those big-jawed Kennedy's driving past in a convertible. I wouldn't be waving. I'd be on the ground, hands over my head, screaming, "CHECK THE DEPOSITORY!"

Which by the way? I have never used the word, depository, in my life. And I used to be a banker.

It seems like a very formal word.

Sort of like vehicle. My sister's boyfriend is in law enforcement and he is the only person I know who refers to a car as a vehicle. It's kind of rubbing off on me.

So now I'm all, "I'll be in my vehicle cleaning out my purse for the next 5 minutes. If you kids are not in my vehicle by the time I crumple up the 78 old grocery receipts in the bottom of said purse, your asses will be washing said vehicle for the rest of your lifetime."

Anyway.

Since we're on the subject of American royalty, I was in Utah a few weeks ago. Salt Lake City, to be exact.

And I did not spot a single Osmond anywhere.

I figured I'd at least see Jimmy at The Cheesecake Factory in Salt Lake City's brand new fancy mall, the one with the retractable roof, but no.

They were probably all too busy flossing their teeth.

I did get to see someone much more amazing than any old Osmond, though.

The lovely Noelle of Because Nice Matters was kind enough to trek it on over to Salt Lake City from her town to have lunch. This meant a lot to me because Noelle has had one roller coaster of a year. Her sweet nine-month old daughter Emily was born with some serious health issues, namely a heart defect, digestive problems and a chromosomal deletion.

She's also had far too many major surgeries already in her little baby life. But even with all of that, Emily has been kicking all her problems to the curb and keeping up on her baby milestones. Look at that sweet girl sit up.

Go, Emily, Go! And thank you Noelle for meeting me. I'm sorry Emily couldn't come with you, but I understand. Besides, mommies deserve their own time.

We were in the beautiful city of Salt Lake City because my Tori Girl placed at the state finals of her high school DECA competition. (DECA is an organization for all the mini-Donald Trumps of the nation, those kids who have big plans to rule the world. And I have no doubt my Tori Girl will rule her own large corner of the world some day.) So, Tori was off to Nationals, to make her mark in Utah.

The parents of all the state qualifiers from our high school were required to go because we don't have a DECA sponsor. You see, our sponsor got arrested.

That's right, arrested.

For stalking an old girlfriend.

She had a restraining order against him and was so afraid for her life, she was in hiding. He was pulled over in the middle of the night and the po-po found printouts and maps to all of her family's addresses spread out over the front seat of his car, er, vehicle. The po-po also discovered a cache of weapons in the teacher's Datsun.

I do so appreciate the teachers union.

*Cough. Cough*

He's now in jail, probably teaching DECA to his fellow violent offenders.

Now, THAT would be one competition I'd like to see. Prisoner DECA. Gary Busey on the Apprentice couldn't hold a candle to tatted up criminals trying to outdo each other in a marketing prompt. I'm sure shanks would come into play which would make one fabulous finale.

We had a great time in beautiful Utah. Tori didn't win, but:

**She traded all her Florida pins for the states with light-up pins.

**She also traded her Florida hat for the most coveted hat of the convention, the Texas Cowboy hat.

**She attended every DECA dance party.

**We ate at the Red Iguana twice. Those mole sauces? Oh My Lawdy.

**We went to a minor league baseball game, The Salt Lake City Bees, where Tori befriended some of the boys on the Bee team. We were sitting behind home plate amongst a sea of ballplayers who had the night off from playing and were recording stats and ball speeds with their cop-looking radar gun. Halfway through the game, this was my Tori.

I don't know who she might get it from. Hmmmm.

**Our hotel kept platters of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies in the lobby.

**And every morning, room service would wheel their little cart into our room with the chef's special triple stack of blueberry and strawberry pancakes with guava butter and homemade whipped cream. And we would eat every bite.

So, I'd call that a great success.

While the hubs and I were whiling away the hours waiting for Tori to finish testing, we stumbled upon a lovely cemetery. We have always loved old graveyards, so we decided to take a look around. We weren't there long when we spotted a herd of deer resting among the tombstones.

Actually, it was more like a group of mom and baby deer. Maybe it was a play group. A graveyard deer play group.

My hubs saw them first and said, "Look at the deer!"

I pulled out my phone and started snapping away from the confines of our car.

My hubs was all, "You should get out and take a picture. Get a little closer."

And so I did. Treading carefully around graves, moving cautiously as the deer watched me with wary eyes.

My hubs called from the car, "Get closer!"

And because I never need much prompting to do anything remotely dumbass, I edged even closer.

My hubs kept egging me on from the car. I noticed he had his own phone out and it looked like he was filming me as I crept slowly up to the deer, saying things like, "Hey Nice Deer. How's it going Nice Deer? Say hi to your mother for me, Nice Deer."

The deer never took their eyes from me while my hubs coerced me into going closer and closer and still, closer.

Finally, one of them stood up and I thought: That is the biggest freaking deer I have ever seen.

He didn't run away, just stood tall, staring me down with his big brown eyes as if to say, "Bring it on, Crazy."

My hubs was still yelling, "Closer! You can get closer!"

When the second one stood up not looking afraid, I thought it might be wise to go back to the car even though my husband was still yelling at me, this time saying, "Why don't you try to pet one of them?"

I climbed back in the car and said, "I didn't want to scare the deer away. They were starting to look a little nervous."

And that's when my hubs said, "They're not deer. They're elk."

And I was like, "Aren't elk dangerous?"

My hubs answered simply, "I'm pretty sure they are."

Yes, he did.

It's why I have to watch my back every second of the day. Even in my sleep.

I googled elk and the first words I read were: Elk are dangerous—no matter where or when you see them. (I guess this means graveyards.) Stay at least three bus lengths away from elk at all time. (I was about a Smart Car's length away from them.) Cow elk are especially dangerous during calving season which is April through June. (This was the last week of April.)

You know he sells life insurance, right?

I'm quite certain, elk mauling would never get questioned when it was payout time.

I need a Ryan Gosling in my life. Ryan would have realized his mistake and rushed out of his Bugatti, swept me up, out of harm's way with one strong muscular arm, all the while offering me a flute of champagne with his other manly hand, to calm my nerves.

I get Mr. "Let's see if I can get the elk to charge her, so I can make it into the finals of America's Funniest Videos."

Whatever.

In other news, I'm headed to the Lone Star State this weekend for my writer's convention.

I'm super excited! Wish me luck, that I won't sit down during my one-on-one with an agent and go brain dead when they ask me that one important question: "What's your novel about?"

Because, with me, and my rapidly firing brain that is constantly going off into thousands of tangents— This?

Is a huge possibility.

Today's Definite Download: One of the biggest things I miss about blogging regularly, besides missing all you sweet, sweet friends, (By the way, I PROMISE TO GET BACK TO ALL OF YOU. SOON. VERY, VERY SOON.), is not getting to share all my fabulous music loves with you. Today, here's one of my new loves, Alabama Shakes. These kids are all about, bluesy, gritty old-fashioned rock and roll with a gravely voiced singer who just makes me dance all over my house.

"Hold On" by Alabama Shakes. Check it out, right here.

I'll be holding on, to my crossed fingers, praying I don't do a Miss South Carolina on my agent pitch.

I'll let you know. Such as, how it goes.

Laundry Hurts My Feelings

Another Year, Another Dead Kennedy