The Monday After...

The Monday after...

The Monday after Christmas, that is.

And glory, glory, I don't have to go to work!

OH JOY!

lol

I do need to get up out of this bed and go do something. These past few days have been marked by sleeping late and much lounging. Waaaay too much.

My Christmas holidays. We are still in the midst of those, right? Right. But I think we're more geared toward the New Year, than not.

My christmases have been a bit uneventful the past few years. I don't spend them with family, due to the stress involved, and the older I get, the less I like dealing with stress. So I hope to see some relatives this week. I usually go over to my Bff's house, but she and her family spent the Holidays in Helen, a small alpine type village up in the North Georgia mountains, so I was basically on my own. Me and Kentucky spent Christmas at the house.

Our mother wailed about this. Kentucky usually does whatever she is told, and I always call her the "good perfect child". (I am the black sheep, the no good heathen). But she is like me these days... neither one of us could stand the holidays while we were growing up (they were very competitive- who bought the biggest gifts, were they wrapped right, etc). And Kentucky is realizing that she can do whatever she wants for holidays, and that's what she does now.

As I said, we hung out around the house and ate, and watched movies. We exchanged gifts... I gave her some bath stuff. She gave me a hot air popcorn popper, and underwear and a gift card. And we were happy and content.

There was a small amount of drama that pissed me off. But I won't get into that. It didn't unfold. Let's just say an Oldgirl knows how to head mess off. Really though.

Now the best Christmas gift came the day before Christmas: Getting a chance to hang out with the Queen, the baddest writing diva in the Solar system,

My favorite celebrity, Tayari Jones., aka "Miss Celie".

Author of the award winning novels Leaving Atlanta and The Untelling.

*Lee falls prostrate on the hard concrete*

Ya'll know I worship the ground she walks and spits upon. I am part stalker stan, part #1 fan, lol.

And she is a globetrotter. I was really surprised that she was coming home. She is a SWATlien (and so was I in my early years). You can take the girl out of SWATS, but I guess you can't take the SWATS out the girl.

But we have become friends, and we text, email, and talk on the phone from time to time. I read her latest blog post, and was a tad bit, uh, I don't know the word... perplexed over it. I sent her a text message, and lo and behold, she wanted to do brunch. I was NOT expecting to see her, so I was shocked, dazed and confused, lol.

We wanted to meet at the Watershed, a place I learned about through one of her good friends a few years ago, but it was closed for the holidays. So I left my car at that place and jumped in her ride and we rode through downtown Decatur and we found another eatery, Parker's on Ponce.

Now, I've passed this place a few times, as downtown Decatur is my cutthrough when I'm going to the farmer's markert after work. I DO remember the name of the place, as Parker is my last name, and I wanted to take a pic of it and post it. But I thought it was a gift shop or something.

But we walked up on it and saw that it was a steakhouse. Hmmm.

It was a very nice place, with the cherrywood decor and fireplaces, looking like a ski lounge. The food was the bomb. I had some calamari (Celie forced that on me, lol), and the best lettuce, goat cheese and tomato sandwich in the world (sounds lame, but it was very good). She had something called "pops" aka slider sandwiches, which looked pretty interesting. She sipped sparkling wine, and wanted me to have sparkling water. (I have no idea what either of those is. This is my slowness at it's best

We must've spent a good two hours in there talking. I know that chick think I'm slow, but heck, she talk fast, and I talk slow, so we have to work it out, lol. But we had a good time, good convo, and always, like a good mentor does, she gave me some good writing advice.

I gave her a gift of bodycology bubble bath and cocoa butter lotion. She liked that!

We perused a very interesting antique shop afterwards. It was expensive as hell, but there are several little shops all around downtown Decatur and it's definitely worth the excursion in the future.

She had a party to attend that evening, and needed to bring something sweet, so we found this amazing bakery called Southern Sweets. It is near the farmer's market that I frequent once a week (not sure why i never noticed it). I wanted a slice of cake, but they were only selling whole cakes that day. (I'll hit them up after Christmas). She bought a coconut cake for her party, and a caramel cake for her Mama and 'em. She stayed on that side of Decatur, while I delivered the caramel cake to her fam in SWATS.

What a fun afternoon we had.

It always perplexes me that she lurks heavily on this blog, and now she thinks I should do some memoir pieces. We talked about that, and we talked about the happenings in our lives in general.

I like that Oldgirl. She's a diva, but normal... a regular chick with the same isshas us commoners have, lol. I think that's what I like about her best. I always come away with some sort of plan -personal and professional -after hanging with her, and that's a good thang.

So it was great hanging with you, Miss Celie. A true Celie-and-Nettie adventure indeed.

Plans for the week. I am off all week. I have a TON of stuff to do. Anyone who is expecting mail from me will get it this week. Believer, I need your address, girl. Drop it in my oldgirl email, PLEASE. I plan to do much writing, and I plan to hit up the movies, go bowling etc. I got a whole list of things to do, and I'm going to work that list!

40 posts. Tomorrow is December 29th, exactly 40 days before my birthday. I plan to do 40 posts, more food for thought, really, looking at who I am and what has shaped my life over the past 40 years. I am a tad bit nervous about that, but 40 is a milestone, and I didn't get here by just staring blindly into thin air. I have a lot on my mind that I'm trying to deal with, and hopefully by looking at the past and present, I can be a little clearer about my direction in the future...

Does that make sense? I don't know. It barely makes sense to me.

But there are many things - people, experiences, events, regrets, emotions, idiosyncracies, beliefs - that shape our lives. Many. I've been pondering these as I quickly approach this age of 40.

Fabulous prizes and giveaways galore. Hmmm.... I already hinted at what they may be, and I won't mention them anymore. Like I said, I am not a comment whore, but I want to do something special for my readers.

So stay tuned for that. I am nervous about it, but I think it will work out fine.

I hope you all are enjoying your Christmas holidays...

And I hope you're getting ready to take on the next decade!