Filed under: Exercise, Food/Drink, Posts | Tags: alcoholic, bars, chardonnay, drinking, drinks, Exercise, lactic acid, wine, workouts
What my friends give me when I get uppity and ask for a buttery chardonnay…
Chardonnay is the perfect substitute for an intense workout.
Yeah, you heard me. I said it.
Now let me work my way around to it and you’ll see how my flawless logic enabled me to skip many a workout, guilt-free.
When you workout, your body converts sugar into energy. During intense exercise, there may not be enough oxygen to complete the process, so your body makes lactic acid in response. But this can build up in your body more rapidly than you can burn it off. Symptoms of lactic acid build-up are cramps, nausea, weakness and exhaustion.
Chardonnay’s delicious buttery taste comes from lactic acid produced after the first fermentation. Too much Chardonnay can leave your crampy, weak, nauseous and even exhausted the next day.
So…if you don’t like to exercise, stick with a buttery Chardonnay. You’ll be fooling your body into thinking you had a workout!
You’re welcome. That is all.
Filed under: Food/Drink, Middle Age, Misc. Humor, Travel | Tags: adulting, bars, beach, crime, drinking, fun, girls, hot tub, lifeguard, north carolina, Outer banks, relationships, rental, vacation, Virginia
Dear Rental House Owner –
Thank you so much for your nice letter and for helpfully providing your lawyer’s name and address, although I don’t think it will be necessary. We had a great girls’ weekend staying in your beach house, and everyone was so friendly! It’s nice when a bunch of middle-aged women can get together for some relaxing quiet time at the beach. I hope you saw that we replaced the wine glasses and re-stocked the liquor cabinet. The combination for the replacement padlock is written on a sticky note by the phone.
And thank you for asking if we got home okay after our night out. We had no idea that your friend Jim owns the _________________ Bar – he was very sweet to escort us personally to our car after Sarah twisted her ankle on the stage. It was also very kind of him to kick that married guy out after he said, “I like your rack” to Lisa. Those drinks the married guy sent over for us that tasted like liquid Skittles were nasty – give us good wine or bourbon any day – what was he thinking? Please tell Jim we hope we didn’t drive too many of his younger customers away with our dancing. Those millennial girls just don’t have the moves we do, and I think they were embarrassed at how much better we were. (They sure do know how to roll their eyes though.) But one nice girl came up to Cheryl and said it must be nice to trust your friends enough to let them hold while you hang upside down like that.
Your next-door neighbor was also very nice, letting us come up on one of his balconies to watch the sunset. When Terry fell and broke her wine glass because she miscounted the steps, he asked if she was okay and didn’t even comment on her speech impediment (it’s often confused with slurring). We cleaned up the wine and broken glass for him, but he had already gone inside so we couldn’t say thank you in person.
You must have a lot of crime in that area – that explains all the cameras. We would greatly appreciate it if you would please tell your other neighbors we were only trying to be helpful when we checked that their hot tub was clean and the heater was working (it was). You might also want to pass on that the cleaners didn’t do a very good job. There was lots of sand in the bottom of the hot tub and two bottles of Fireball had been left on the porch rail. We didn’t want the cleaners to get into trouble so we finished the Fireball off – hence the empties. There wasn’t much we could do about the sand. But if your neighbors find a diamond stud earring, they can put that towards the next cleaning fee.
We noticed that things were a bit dry in North Carolina, so we decided to save water for you by bathing over there. Lisa’s suit color tends to run, so she thought it might do better in the pool. Oh, and by the way, the neighbors also might want to have their pool deck leveled out. Apparently, what they saw on the camera was Lisa falling on the uneven pavement as she was putting her clean bathing suit back on. She must have bumped her head, because she put it on upside down and inside out. We still haven’t figured out how that’s even possible, but that’s Lisa for you. But don’t worry, she says she doesn’t have any interest in litigating the injury.
Yes, we did have one extra person stay overnight. The nice lifeguard we met at Jim’s bar offered to drive us home, and it’s a good thing he did because there aren’t a lot of Ubers around on the off season (none seemed available that late at night – we kept getting declined). I wonder if you know him? There can’t be that many lifeguards who also have a degree in tribal mating dances – that’s probably what you saw on your cameras. But it was extremely fortunate he was there because Cheryl must have had some kind of reaction to the food at the bar – she required mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. The lifeguard was very concerned for her privacy so he took her into the other room and managed to revive her after several minutes. After that, it was late and he was tired, so the least we could do was let him spend the night. He was a real gentleman – he even fixed us all breakfast the next morning.
If you find the following items we would appreciate it if you would return them:
2 black bathing suit tops
1 pink thong
1 blue bathing suit bottom
1 floral eye mask
3 pairs of readers – black, navy blue and hunter green, varying strengths
Thanks again for your letter of concern, and as you can see, no lawyers will be necessary. We are happy to pay for any damages we didn’t already repair, but I don’t think the tire tracks in your front yard were from us. Sadly, there were a lot of drunk people out that night – some people just can’t handle themselves on vacation. Even the nice police officer who stopped us on the way home said the lifeguard was just driving a little fast. After looking into the car when Cheryl starting yelling “Don’t slur your driving!” and seeing that Lisa was a bit green around the gills, he decided to let us go. What an understanding young man! He even fist bumped the lifeguard. Your beach town is such a friendly place! You must feel so proud to have a house there!
Until next year,
The Girls.
Filed under: Food/Drink, Middle Age, Misc. Humor | Tags: 80's, bars, cover bands, dance, Dancing, dating, Dirty Dancing, drinking, Enzos, guys, Johnny castle, Middles, rail drinks, Roadhouse
There are very few things scarier than a bar full of horny, sweating 40–60-year-olds. Unlike college kids and 25-year-olds who are up front about what they’re doing there – drinking and trying to get laid, Middle-Agers (a.k.a. Middles) try very hard NOT to look like that’s what they’re doing. Oh, some put it all out there, with their backless turtlenecks (not a good look on anyone over 30), or the open-necked shirts showing off all that non-millennial chest hair. But for the most part, when you look around a bar full of Middles, its full of copious amounts of eye liner and hairspray, missing wedding rings, annoyed spouses who hate dancing, and lingering (but squinting) glances that border on being creepy because Middles don’t realize they are old enough now to look like rapists and pedophiles.
A couple of weekends ago we were invited to go see a great local 80’s cover band at one of the bars in our area, located in a Food Kitty parking lot. Usually the music there is geared towards the older crowd (think Carolina beach music), and when we go, we are the youngest by at least 15 years. This time, there were Middles like us happily re-living their high school and college years, but with better drinks and an Uber app on their phones.
While there are a few differences between going to bars in your 20’s and bars as a Middle, there are still the same bar guys – they’re just a little older:
Roadhouse is either an ex-Frat Guy or a Redneck just out looking to start shit. He looks like he reads Maxim and goes to the gym more than he reads social cues. Roadhouse is the guy who will start a fight with the smaller guy in your vicinity by looking your way and saying things like, “This guy bothering you?” or giving the guy a shove and saying “The F*&K did you say?” The beauty of being a Middle is that this is no longer impressive. In reality, it means I’m probably going to get a drink spilled on me, and frankly, I’m not drinking rail drinks anymore, so that’s going to piss me off.
About 15 minutes after the band started up, Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze’s character from Dirty dancing) started dancing…or at least some guy in his mid-50s who thinks he looks like Patrick Swayze. Johnny Castle sports a form-fitting black vest (no short underneath) and skin-tight black pants, and a black fedora on his shaven, balding head. And, he is clearly on the hunt. Johnny Castle spends the entire evening gyrating, twisting and generally trying to grind on anything female that moves. He thinks the empty circle of space around him that appeared while he put on his Michael Jackson moves was created out of sheer awe, not from fear that he might grab one of usand pull us in for a Dirty Dancing grind.
Several feet away from Johnny Castle is Colonel Sanders. At least 70 years old, Colonel Sanders is also on the hunt, lurking around the edge of the dancers, looking like an old Rutger Hauer (see above reference to pedophiles). An 80’s cover band event it really isn’t his scene, but the alternative of watching pat Sajack is too depressing for him. He eventually either finds someone age-appropriate or hangs out with the bar owner in the corner looking cynical and hopeful at the same time.
Of course, no matter what bar you go to or what age the patrons are, there are the Wall Props. These guys don’t like dancing and are usually too drunk to do more than hold up the wall near the bathroom and hit on women as they wait in line. They might slur and try to cop a feel, but they’re easy to slide past. But ladies, if you want a free drink – that’s your guy. No expectations on either side – he’s just happy to be there.
And last, every bar containing Middles has “married-guy-on-the-prowl.” This guy looks harmless, but has the suspicious white skin band around his wedding finger where he just took his ring off. His posse of married guy friends are sheepishly drinking craft beers in the background, having given up on deterring him from his mission: to hook up with someone other than his wife. Usually this guy is from out of town, but sometimes he is stupid enough to go poaching in the local forest – inevitably he will be caught by his wife’s network of friends, and the drama that ensues is fodder for suburban cookouts for weeks to come.
And like any good night at a bar with a band, there were groupies, a fight, a guy who stood like a stone doing the head nod while his girlfriend twisted and swayed around him, and at least three couples who left in a huff.
So, after two bourbons and three straight hours of dancing, I had somethings confirmed:
- Rail drinks are not my friend – I’m better than that now
- I still suck at dancing – Hubby’s got the moves, not me, but the beauty of being a Middle is I don’t care anymore;
- The White Man’s Overbite is alive and well
- I’m grateful I have Hubby to go home with – the Middles’ dating pool desperately needs some chlorine; and
- Blister in the Sun is still crazy-fun to bounce in a circle to, like one of the characters in A Charlie brown Christmas!
Filed under: Middle Age, Misc. Humor, Posts | Tags: adulthood, bars, bourbon, Dancing, drinking, elderly, Enzo's Chop House, humor, Middle-Age, parenting, parents, sandwich generation, sex, south, southern, subourbonmom, Twerking, Viagra
Being part of the Sandwich Generation is more than just taking care of both your parents and your kids—you’re also the ground wire between those two high-voltage groups.
Now y’all, I am well aware that I have lately slipped into a routine of going to work, coming home, fixing dinner, and mindlessly binge-watching Grey’s Anatomy. Somewhere between the patient being diagnosed and the amazing procedure that miraculously saves her, I fall asleep. I know my mouth is hangs open and I probably snore, but no one has made it into a Vine yet (that I know of).
Until the other night, I assumed my flagging energy is a sign of age—then I was proved oh, so wrong.
A week or so ago, Hubby and I broke the mold and went out at eight o’clock on a Wednesday to meet some friends—we hadn’t seen them in a while, and they were going to Enzo’s Chop House.
Enzo’s is known for three things: great food, stiff drinks, and fun dance music from the 60’s and 70’s. We’d been there before, and knew there would mostly be older folks out having a good time before going home and bathing in Ben Gay—we were confident we would outlast them.
This time it wasn’t just an older crowd—it was a scene out of the movie Cocoon.
Our mere speckles of white hair and ability to walk without hitching one hip up on one side were not the only things that set us apart — was the dancing.
As I said, Enzo’s is also known as a fun place to dance to the oldies—and by that I mean Motown and good ol’ Southern Rock. (I’m not sure exactly when it happened, but Southern Rock is now classified as “classic.” When I was growing up it was just “Rock.”)
Usually, when Hubby and I dance, we do the high school sway back and forth thing, because the one time we took dancing lessons, it was pointed out (to me) that both people can’t lead. So while we shifted our weight back and forth, the rest of the crowd was doing the Shag, the Swing, and the Two-Step, and even throwing out some disco moves that would make John Travolta look bad.
It was humiliating.
And if the dancing wasn’t enough, watching those reliable social lubricants, Viagra and Bourbon start to take affect was just scary. Like any bar filled with 25-30-year-olds, the bourbon goggles eventually came on, and couples that had begun the evening together started mixing it up. Men in their 70’s shuffled over to tables occupied by younger women and began chatting them up. Eventually, one of the women would stray from the herd and find herself out on the dance floor shuffling and kicking her feet to Al Green and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Hands sometimes wandered a little lower than they should, and meaningful, myopic stares stretched across the dance floor from table to table.
It was almost like watching your parents twerk.
By ten o-clock, the Highball Shuffle took over as the dance move of choice. The music wound down, and Styrofoam water cups began to replace bourbon glasses on the tables. By 10:30 we were done with a capital “D”. We were sober, and I’ll admit it—a little jealous—we left those rascally retirees to their own (sometimes medically required) devices and went home to the next generation of bar-hopping, dancing romance-seekers.
Subourbon Mom 