A Happy Hour | a short story.

Taylor was out of town this week so I treated myself to a happy hour or two in his absence. On Wednesday, I left the house where I’d been tutoring at about 5:30 and booked it into downtown in hopes of arriving at Eddie V’s with a good chunk of happy hour still remaining. I navigated the traffic and tight streets and by 6:00 found a decent spot for The Behemoth Tahoe I was piloting with deft skill and speed. Satisfied with the ample amount of remaining happy hour time in which I had to luxuriate, I jumped from Bruiser (The Behemoth) to pay the meter. To discover I had no wallet.

#fail.

What do you do? What do I do? I’m not meeting someone who can cover me and let me pay them back. I’m not calling someone to forge their way into downtown at 6pm to deliver my wallet to me.

I laugh at myself. And remount Bruiser my trusty steed. Take me home, Bruiser. Let us together leave downtown at 6pm with everyone else in the greater Austin area. Let us camp in rows alongside our idling friends with the sunset in our eyes. We shall not look at the clock nor into the rear view mirror as the minutes of happy hour slip slowly away from our (growing ever more) hungry grasp and the house of warm bread, tuna tartar and $5 wine fades off beyond the river. We were so close. This is not a happy hour.

Meanwhile, back at home, my wallet, snugly sequestered in my teaching tote, was oblivious to the strength of my desire to summon it with supernatural enchantments. Accio, wallet! I weighed my options and made a mental pro-con list.
Option A: Go home in traffic. Eat somewhere else.
Option B: Go home in traffic. Go back to Eddie V’s. Miss happy hour. Enjoy the ambiance and a $30 dinner
Option C: Go home in traffic. Go back to Eddie V’s. Miraculously not miss happy hour. Enjoy the ambiance and an $18 dinner
Option D: Enter Eddie V’s sans-wallet. Hope to not get carded. Hope to pay for drinks, dinner and parking by flashing bosoms sweet talking the bartender or removing my wedding ring and flirting with the gentlemen rationally explaining the situation shredding my clothes and begging on the corner of 5th street.

See, I had to eat dinner, that was conclusive, but for dinner I wanted warm bread, half-price tuna, $5 wine, a jazz band, dim lights and my Nook. (I’m reading My Name is Mary Sutter butthatsirrelevantrightnow) It was determined that if I were to go home, retrieve the wayward wallet and head right back to Eddie V’s, really the worst case scenario would be that I would miss happy hour. If I were to go home, retrieve said wallet and go somewhere else I would waste time, hungry time, trying to both decide where to go and wishing it were Eddie V’s. I decided to count my losses. I will toss out the high-quality-dinner-for-low-quantity-dough triumph of this whole experience, and I will go back. I’m looking at you, wallet.

(Did you know conversation hearts come in Spanish?!)

6:15. Traffic going home was miraculously not horrible. I made excellent time. Small buds of hope blossom. There is faint glimmer of possibility. Wafting wafting is smell of victory over wayward wallet.

Penny was confused by my brief return and rapid departure.

6:17. I rejoined Bruiser and we retraced our steps.

6:35. Friends. I made it back for happy hour. I scored an excellent parking spot, well located and free after 6pm. I entered the bar, or rather, ahem, the “V Lounge,” found a chair (on the pro list of flying solo), and subsequently thoroughly enjoyed my bargain dining experience in a lovely ambiance. It was everything I hoped and dreamed it would be and was made even more lovely by the sweet knowledge that, despite the unfavorable odds, I still been triumphant in securing a high quality dinner for low quantity dough.

Then it got better. They charged me full price for my wine and when I said something about it, (you better bet your britches I said something about it; I didn’t pilot Bruiser the Behemoth like a bat out of hell to get charged full price.) the bartender took one of the glasses off the bill.

That wayward wallet sallied out of le “V Lounge” a mere $15 lighter.

Con: husband out of town. Pro: notes. and solo bar chairs during happy hour.

battening down the hatches

I love the goodies, the fires, the warm, snuggly socks and cozy blankets this time of year. I love the music, the advent traditions, finding gifts for loved ones and sipping warm drinks.

I do not, however, love the cold.

This is our tree. I got a slim one for our apartment and in this larger space it looks a little, well, slim. But it will do and it even has presents!

Can’t beat big weekend breakfasts. This morning we had waffles from the old school waffle iron and after only the second attempt at learning how to use this thing, I’m proud to announce that they were perfect. I’m also proud to announce, again, that I’m a huge fan of cast iron. This thing was 20 bucks, makes killer waffles and doesn’t take up loads of space like a clunky machine would. Plus I can take it with us next time we go native. Winning.

First fire! We need more firewood and a screen (Hi, Dad, yes, I’ll get one to be safe:)

Big nativity on the big table! This thing is so sweet and intricate, and I was thrilled to finally set it up after we got it last year, or maybe even the year before? But had no space in our yurt of an apartment.

Who says we need children to do a kid-friendly advent calendar? Apparently the little drummer boy and palm trees were present at the manger scene.

…And by children I meant human children, of course. Sorry PennyGirl, don’t be offended. We will make it a good Christmas for you, too even though you can’t help with the Advent calendar. You can help leave treats for Santa’s reindeer and  your Christmas present waiting for you under the tree will be {because your parents got impatient} the only gift opened in our house on Christmas morning!

slap bracelet watches + kalamata olives

…and other interesting links of note.

If neon slapbracelet watches aren’t channeling your 90′s nostalgia enough, JTT reunited with his costars.

Among the many brilliant and time sucking posts over at Bored Panda, you must check out the national food flags collection.

I found this thanks to the site, and I’m ordering it as soon as I’m done with this post and adding it to my teacher supplies.

Torrentially rainy College Station would be a great market for the SamuraiSwordNinjaAutoRelease, the friendly Dual or the handy Backpack.

Speaking of College Station, we set up a tailgate for the first game last weekend. It was fun albeit hot, windy and primitive as most tailgates are. I’m moving more towards this set up.

Did you see the supernova? Did you sip champagne? {sorry, had to}

A truly fantastic {read: interesting, factual, historical, poignant} article about why you have The Most Amazing Material in the World protecting your wine.

Do you know your slang? and more word games.

true life: woe is penny

It’s a hard knock life around here sometimes. In addition to the partial bath she was subjected to the other day when she wandered into something smelly, Penelope had an unfortunate experience yesterday as well.

I was working on my syllabus for the year and on the phone with a coworker for at least 30 minutes. P is always nearby during the day, either sleeping at my feet or chewing a bone on top of them (Yes, on my feet. If you’ve been a guest in my house, you know bonetoy on foot chewing is P’s stamp of approval.) Anyway, whenever I wander into another room, she follows me. As long as I’m there for at least 90 seconds, she will usually lay down on the floor wherever I end up, folding laundry or even just reading something from the printer in the study.

As I was on the phone, I walked into the study a few times and then back into the “kids wing” of our house that we keep closed up and at about 80 degrees since no one is ever in there except if we’re retrieving books from our excessive collection on bookshelves in one of those rooms. During the phone convo, I headed back there to look at some books we were discussing and shut the hall door again when I left. We usually keep this hall door closed, but sometimes if it’s not closed all the way, it will pull shut with a knock each time the air conditioning kicks on in that part of the house to maintain its balmy 80. As you can imagine, it doesn’t kick on very often. Phone convo ended and I resumed working on my syllabus. I heard the familiar door knock back there sometime well after the convo ended, but didn’t feel like getting up and leaving my train of thought to fix the door. When I heard the ol’ knock again, about an hour  or so after the convo ended, it sounded different. More like a knockscratch. little doubleknock.
Was that the dog? Why’d she go back there? What’s that door doing?

Wait, not on her bed. Not under my chair.
Dangit.

Two little feet on the floor behind the door making two little shadows in the sunlight coming from the other side. Little sniffy nose moving around.

Oh well hey there! Guess you knew I’d find you and didn’t feel like making a racket. Thanks for the tiny little scratch after an hour had passed to patiently request exit from the lonely sauna back here.
Sorry you have a bad mommy.

Let’s hope I’m a better mother to humans.

Why you lock me up?

monday sweet treats

Whammy of a weekend for y’all who follow my food blog too! Sometimes when I have too much time lots of ideas…I schedule a few posts out. Saturday’s post was supposed to post Sunday night, but I guess I messed that one up! I had to go in and change a few things when I got the email that it had posted. Oh well. You had the treat and privilege of three blog posts from me in one day! You’re welcome. I hope it made for an extra special weekend.

Because we all need some sweet treats to get us going for the week ….

1. sweet little ballerina 2. little people mocs – do they come in my size? 3. clutch -  just simple and unassumingly lovely 4.bruschetta – what to do with my homemade bread and farmer’s market tomatoes! 5. lovey just lovely peonies -  today i bought ten buds for $8. serendipity. no shame. 6. major case of eReader case lust – my nook is in the mail!