Welcome to Lola's Diner.
At Lola's Diner we'll be sharing recipes and sharing conversation across a virtual lunch counter. Topics will be varied and can include current events, politics, parenting, mental health, and LGBTQ topics.
Do ya ever...I swear Andy Rooney has not hijacked my blog. If he did, maybe I'd have more people visiting and commenting.
Have you ever looked at your older posts and wondered things? As I've looked through my early posts I've noticed my writing style seems to have changed. I don't seem to be as witty as I thought I used to be. It makes me think my posts of late suuuuuuckkkk!
Where's the comment love? It's comment love month. I even started putting that cute pink post-it note at the bottom of my posts.
Is it maybe because I feel more depressed lately and a lot of my posts seem to be complaints, rants? Maybe because I don't have a 'social life' I've started using my blog differently?
Have I lost my mojo? Did I ever have any mojo? If I lost my mojo, how do I find it again?
The following is a re-post from last year. Hope you'll participate and comment.
Enjoy!
One of my more interesting Valentines Days was a blind date I had before I met Anastasia.
I met Michelle onPlanetOut. I have to say, some of my most memorable (and not in a good way) dates were from women fromPlanetOut. Maybe I should post my dating oddities. And WOW, were some of them odd! That would be except for the lovely Anastasia, cause she's da bomb! I'm so glad that I didn't give up on that site, if I had, we would have never met.
Michelle wasn't keen on the idea of going on a date on Valentines Day, but somehow I managed to charm her into it. After I made the date I debated over and over, what if anything special I should do because of the holiday. I ended up going with the standard. A rose bouquet.
We were to meet at an Italian restaurant in Andersonville. I would know her by what she was wearing. I went to the restaurant at the appointed time and met up with her. Her, AND...her straight friend! Yup, she brought a straight friend on the date! Who does that??? (Just wait, that isn't even the worst part of the date!) I've heard ofwingmenbut I thoughtwingmenwere only used to pick up women, not when you already had a date.
I gave her the roses. BIG mistake! She started crying. Apparently her ex, whom she was till carrying a major torch for, always gave her roses. And that wasn't the only time she burst into tears. This woman was seriously not over her ex and quite possibly may have had serious psychological issues. Clearly she had no business being on a date. It turned out everything I said reminded her of her ex. Well, what few words I could get in.
The restaurant service seemed painfully slow, though I'm sure it wasn't. It was after all a big restaurant night and I'm sure they were trying to turn the tables quickly. It felt like all eyes were on our table. It was like Michelle would not stop crying. I wracked my brain trying to think of things to talk about that maybe wouldn't continue the waterfall. Even a topic asinnocuousas the weather, brought back memories of the ex. All I wanted to do was leave. I considered several times ditching, but I'm really not that kind of person. I stuck it out, but it had to be one of the more painful dates of my life. (Not the most painful, but close.)
After dinner, Michelle and her straight friend wanted me to show them where Stargaze, the women's gay bar, was down the street. Against my better judgment, I accompanied them. (Seriously, how could this end well?) The place was the most packed I'd ever seen it and it was incredibly loud. At that point I really had enough of my date in bizarro-land and I had to leave. I made excuses about a headache and ended up walking the 6 miles home in the February cold.
So now it's your turn. Use the comment section to post your Most Bizarre Valentines Day from the past. If you want, post it on your blog, link back to my post, and post the link in my comments section.
The following is a re-post from last year. Hope you'll participate and comment. Enjoy!
Valentines Day is in 4 days. I thought I would do a little countdown and share some of my past Valentines Days. I'm hoping you will share your stories as well.
My first Valentines Day story comes from the 4th Grade. It was the 60's. It was common for many of our craft projects to start off with a cigar box. I think today, shoe boxes are more the norm because cigar boxes are so difficult to come by. We were decorating our boxes to hold the valentines that our classmates would be giving us. We had construction paper, paper doilies, glitter, colored markers and felt to work with. I worked diligently on my box. I thought my final product was quite artfully done.
Even as I worked on the box, in the back of my mind I wavered between being excited at the prospect of having a box filled with valentines from my classmates and having my box empty. You see I was not one of the popular kids in my class. I was the big kid, the overweight kid. For years I was teased constantly. The reason I wavered between a filled box and an empty box was because I thought it was common decency to give valentines to all of your classmates. That's what my Mother taught me and that's what I have always taught my children. Even though I didn't want to give valentines to the boys that teased me and called me names, I did.
Valentines Day came and we all displayed our boxes. The teacher took all the cards and placed them in the boxes. Excitement was in the air. When it came time to open our boxes, I opened mine slowly, not even completely. I saw inside a single card and a heart sucker. I closed the box and put it away until I got home. Everyone else was full of excitement and laughter. Many were showing off how many cards and candies they got. I kind of just sat there with a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach from the anger building inside me. I didn't let it show. I kind of sat there disinterested and prayed for the bell to ring to mark the end of the school day.
I got home and read the handmade card. It was from my teacher, Ms. Svacina. The card said that "beauty is on the inside and you don't need 30 valentines to know that you are special. You are very special."
In the years after that Valentines Day I had spent many alone. Somehow the memory of that 4th grade Valentines day made being alone seem not so bad. Looking back I realize that Ms. Svacina was trying to buffer the blow of that empty box. Part of me felt very special, because none of the other children got a handmade card from the teacher. The bigger part of me though, felt like a pathetic loser.
So now it's your turn. Use the comment section to post your Pathetic Valentines Day from the past.
Please, don't make me feel like I'm the only one with a pathetic Valentines Day in their past!
I was cheering on the Saints. Why? Because this was their first time at the SuperBowl and what better reason to cheer on a team that is not your home team? (Da Bears, you have a lot of work to do, don't you?)
The first half was disappointing. Ok, what am I saying...the 1/2 time show was disappointing. No wait...it was downright painful. Anastasia and I quipped back and forth how The Who was doing all the CSI theme songs. But after those chuckles I remarked how awful Roger Daltry sounded. I mean, he sounds much worse than Rod Stewart and Rod Stewart had surgery for thyroid cancer for cryin' out loud. Ok, so Roger Daltry is a year older than Rod Stewart. Still, he sounded awful. Pete Townsend basically played air guitar the entire show and he played it badly. Ok, so I'm no music critic, but come on, you don't need to be one to know that these guys have seen better days and frankly I would have liked to have remembered them in their hey-day than to now have to remember this awful show.
The beginning of the 2nd half started out with an on side kick recovery by the Saints and we were off and running. A controversial play to be sure and I don't think I've ever seen the refs take so long to decide a play. Then there was the other controversial play, scored in the Saints favor. To be honest, I kind of nodded off until the Saint's Tracy Porter intercepted Mannings pass for a td.
For me the best commercial goes to Snickers.
The Home Away commercial where Chevy Chase and Beverly DeAngelis reprise their roles from National Lampoon's Vacation movies were good, but so heavily edited from their extended version on Home Away's website that they kind of lost their appeal. I had watched the extended version before the game.
The eats were da bomb. The pulled pork sandwiches were delish. The Anytizer Boneless Buffalo whoozits were awful. What a disappointment. For a treat I had bought a package of M&M cookies from Meijer's bakery department. Our son found them before the game and thankfully he did not eat the whole 2 pounds of cookies.
So what did you think of the game, half-time show and the commercials? What was your favorite commercial?
