I hate that you experienced a loss. I hate that you had to cancel your trip to Atlanta for Brian’s birthday celebration, and thus the stay you booked in my Airbnb. But instead of reselling the wristbands, you (amazingly) sent them to me.
I will be honest here: I had never been to a multistage music festival.
I really didn’t know what to expect, besides lots of music and people.
Lovejoy on the main stage: Peachtree.Here’s Spacey Jane at the Piedmont Stage.Illuminati Hotties at the Criminal Records Stage.
And among 40K people, what is the chance I would run into someone I know?
Very high, apparently.
Look: It’s Renee and Brian! Renee and I worked together in Atlanta.The swanky wristband had many perks.
One of the biggest perks to me was the use of air-conditioned bathrooms in an RV-type structure. No porta potty for this lady!
Another perk: Free beer and water.
You know what else was free? People watching.
Let me say that I have mad respect for people wearing whatever the hell they want to wear.
Unlike this brave girl, however, I prefer to keep my bum covered unless I’m at the beach. And even then not so much.
I enjoyed seeing a medley of concert and other kinds of T-shirts. This one was my favorite:
I also loved that parents brought their older children (12-16 or so). As someone who indoctrinated exposed her children to music early on, I approve. (My kids’ first concert was The Police.)
Jennifer and I packed in as many bands as we could.
Be Your Own PetCypress HillRickshaw Billie’s Burger PatrolJoey Valence & BraeThe Front BottomsTrash Panda
All put on a good show. And I know most people were there to see Muse, The Lumineers, Hozier and The Killers.
People love The Killers.
But I was there to see two artists:
Peaches, in all her weird envelope-pushing glory (Yes, that’s an outfit featuring many breasts)And Tenacious D
Those two made the festival worth it for me.
Though I’m not a fan of crowds, everyone was well-behaved.
We had a great time!
So thank you for your generosity.
I hope you will be able to make the trip next year. And if you do, I owe you a deep discount on your stay.
“Fake” ones rely on jump scares, which are too much like pranks for me.
However, when your children — whom you haven’t seen in almost two weeks — want you to go with them someplace, you say, “Yes.” Or at least I do.
Our group consisted of three moms and five teenage boys, ages 15-16.
Someone needs to shave.
Here are the things that I found scary upon arrival:
The ticket price. It was $30 each. Yikes!
The porta potties outside didn’t have lights inside them.
The lack of masks indoors. COVID isn’t gone, y’all!
Once inside, there were other things to scare me:
Just as I started to walk in, the dude pulling back the curtain stuck his hand in front of my face. I screamed from shock. Then giggled because HOW DUMB?!?
A huge animatronic demon face bum-rushed me and shoved me into a wall.
The floors were designed to match the “rooms.” Squishy flooring to represent grass in a cemetery, for example. What’s scary about that? The broken-ankle potential. I don’t need that again.
There was a corridor of clowns. HORRIFYING. I loathe clowns.
Each of the two haunted houses ends with a chainsaw-wielding madman. Or three. I loathe chainsaw-wielding madmen. (That comes from a certain movie seen at an impressionable age.)
One of the boys’ friends putting on a badass act. “What? I can’t help it if I’m not scared.” OK, then, Buzzkill.
I did have a good time, though. One of the best things was the boy banter.
Dominic: Gideon, be careful they don’t put you in one of the exhibits. Gideon: What? Dominic: “Oh, here’s another skeleton.” Dylan: More bones, all Fernbank style. Gideon (laughing): My superhero name can be Bones. Dominic: I feel like this right here is a villain origin story.
Dear Chandler, Joey, Monica, Phoebe, Rachel and Ross,
We’ve been together for more than 25 years. I know some people don’t like you, but I do. (Yes, I know some parts of your lives are problematic.)
It took me a while to start hanging out with you. But after Episode 6 of Season 1 (“The One with the Butt”) in Fall 1994, I couldn’t ignore you any longer. We have my friend Heidi to thank.
Heidi: Do you watch “FRIENDS?” Me: No. Should I? Heidi: Yes. You are Monica. Monica is you.
That is the episode with the shoes.
Heidi isn’t the only one who has made the connection over the years.
In my defense, I lived with a complete pig my first year of college. She was the kind of person who would spill milk and just leave it. She wore my clothes, got beer all over them, and put them back in the closet.
I don’t like to clean, though. I just hate clutter. If everything is put away, it doesn’t LOOK dirty.
But I digress.
Artifacts from your lives arrived in Atlanta, so I had to go see them. I took the family. I’m definitely the biggest fan in the group as I met you when I was at the same stage in my life as you.
And yes, I do see myself in Monica. I also like to cook.
I am sure you are a lovely person. I appreciate your commitment to football. I am impressed by your communication skills.
However.
I am not as committed to football as you are. I never wanted to be a sports mom. But now that I am one, I want to remind you that my son is in school to get an education.
Practices five afternoons a week and three mornings is a bit much, don’t you think?
You don’t?
Ok.
Have you seen No. 27’s grades? Granted, they were on the downhill slide before football entered the picture.
But now he’s really got an excuse to be behind.
And for what? So he can stand around for a few hours on a Friday night?
Yes, yes, I know. He needs to learn. To pay his dues. To wait his turn.
I guess it will help him learn teamwork and time-management skills.
And there are worse places than a stadium to be on a pleasant Friday night.
I hope you are better than 2020. (2020 can suck it.)
I’m not one for resolutions. I usually declare things I won’t do or won’t give up. Just to be contrary. (Look. Listen. Give me this one rebellious thing. That’s about the only one!)
Put up with less than I need/deserve/worked for, etc. I am not a “Welcome!” mat. Mixed progress: I occasionally washed other people’s dishes and clothes, but I got better about calmly explaining what was bothering me.
Save money. Yeah, I know I should, but let’s be honest: I won’t. Success: I didn’t.
Stay home. I want to say “absof–kinlutely” to adventures near and far. Dream scenario: I get paid to write about it. Fail: I think we all know what happened this year.
Continue procrastinating on my book. This is the year I finish it, write the proposal, and find an agent. If E.L. James can become rich and famous off her trashTwilight fan fictionwork, so can I. Fail: I did absolutely no work on it. Lack of motivation, thy name is COVID-19.
Lose more than just five more pounds. I’m calling that my “wine cushion.” Success: I found a few pounds more of me. Pandemic pounds FTW!
Stay in this place with the small kitchen. When it’s a pain to make things as fairly easy as Scotch eggs, it’s time to upgrade. Success: We moved to a larger place with a slightly larger kitchen.
Ignore show suggestions from certain like-minded people. I resisted watching “Killing Eve.” I was stupid. Success: I’m even taking suggestions from randos on Twitter. I’ve got some issues with “Bridgerton.” Who wants to chat about it with me?
Let people try to make me feel even slightly embarrassed about my love of bad taxidermy. Those uptight people can shove it. My obsession is Hando approved. Success: I let my freak flag fly this year to positive results.
Vote for Trump. Duh. Success: Duh.
Stop writing blog posts at least twice a week. I’ve been keeping this pace since April, so I’m pretty proud of myself. Success-ish: I was doing well until the holidays. I blame Netflix.
In 2021, I will not:
Take for granted the ability to hug friends, see a movie in a theater, see live music, eat in a restaurant, travel, go out without a mask, work out at the gym, etc.
Take for granted physical mobility. (This was the year I broke my ankle and damaged my rotator cuff. So that’s been fun.)
Lament a packed schedule of in-person meetings.
Ever get off political mailing lists, apparently.
Be able to wear real shoes again without dealing with discomfort. (I wore flip flops for six months straight.)
We all knew Zeta was coming. We all knew there would be rain and high winds. We all knew the power would go out (because it goes out here if someone coughs too violently).
As a result, this family has a propane stove, a generator, hurricane lamps and many portable phone charging blocks.
So it was not a surprise to wake up yesterday at 6:13 a.m. with no power.
What was a surprise was that there were no updates from you on your website ALL DAY LONG.
There is no ERT.
I looked at Twitter, expecting to find more information.
Nope.
Your first tweet was at 10:05 a.m. — nearly four hours after 600K+ Georgians lost power.
And this ridiculously late attempt directed people to the outage map that had NO INFORMATION.
Much later, you tweeted this gem:
No shit, Sherlock.
I couldn’t resist replying.
Here’s the thing: I do not doubt your crews in the field and in the office are working very hard to restore power.
But in a crisis, you have to communicate to your stakeholders. This is PR 101. And THIS is why I’m dogging you.
Whoever is handling your Twitter account tweeted only 13 times in the space of 24 hours.
People are freaking out and you traffic in sporadic platitudes?
Come ON!
You can do better. You should do better. Millions of Georgians rely on you.
Next time, I hope your response team includes a dedicated crisis communicator.
And it was then, 30 minutes in, that someone finally explained why religious folks would support Trump:
It’s not about four more years. It’s about 37 more years. It’s about two more Supreme Court justices who are pro-life, pro-Israel, freedom of religion and freedom of speech.
Without that, according to him, “We won’t have the freedoms we grew up with.”
“What freedoms are those?” I was wondering when the dude brought out his saxophone.
I’m not kidding.
Jentezen Franklin plays “America the Beautiful.” He didn’t follow with “Baker Street,” sadly.
I guess he didn’t want Cain to upstage him.
This was getting a talent show kind of vibe, so I was excited to see what Bishop Harry Jackson would do.
But he just promoted his new book and explained racism to a room of mostly white people. Y’all were polite, but unenthusiastic.
Bishop Harry Jackson didn’t show off his musical talents.
Interestingly, he was the first person to mention the president by name: 45 minutes into the event.
Pro-life: Just unborn babies, apparently
Pro-marriage: Only between a man and a woman
Pro-freedom: Religious freedom to discriminate
Pro-constitution: A Tea Party battle cry regarding the expansion of the federal government (maybe)
She talked about squash plants and chipmunks. I was a little confused. But then she said:
Some things never change. Some things do change. There was a change of the guard in 2016.
And then she said something about Planned Parenthood “ripping little babies up.”
I see. Abortion. That’s the main driver.
OK, then. Let me say this about that:
No one is hyped to get an abortion. It’s a last resort. Also, no one is “pro abortion.” So let’s agree on one thing: The goal is to reduce abortions. How do we do that?
As we’ve seen with prohibition and the “war on drugs,” making them illegal won’t work. People will find a way, but it makes it very dangerous for women. So to me, the solution is to put more money into sex education, healthcare and contraception.
If you are pro-life (and really, aren’t we all?) then you should be supporting organizations like Planned Parenthood that actively help women with the above needs.
Alright.
Moving on to the next speaker, Richard Lee, who is as orange as the evening’s celebrant: the Cheeto in Chief.
He didn’t address abortion like everyone else. His main beef seemed to be with what is being taught in school: “garbage.”
Oh, and the Antichrist in the form of Democrats.
The Democratic Party has been taken over by the Antichrist. It’s an evil party.
I thank God that he sent Donald J. Trump to us. He is a gift to the church of Jesus Christ.
As much as you seemed to like this statement, I could tell you were restless. He willfully went over his allotted time and joked about it.
You were ready for the final act: Pastor Paula White. I found out later she is married to Jonathan Cain. Ah. He’s her third husband. With overlaps in relationships. So she’s truly taking those commandments seriously.
Observe and report 