Applebees, Rangers, and the Prom....

Yes, this is out of order.  I know I’m supposed to be posting the R-rated version of my Coz trip.  However, I’ve had this as a draft in Outlook for weeks now and thought I’d better post it sometime. 

 

So Friday was my big five year anniversary…yep, that’s right, five years of wedded bliss or something like that anyway.

My dear husband and I decided to go to Fort Worth for the weekend and stay at a nice hotel and take in a Rangers game.  We left town around 6 pm on Friday.  I knew my husband would get hungry so I asked if maybe we could eat at Mary’s (they have the best chicken fried steak in the world) and he’s like, no, it’s not very good.  Whatever.  We’re heading to Sundance Square where they have some great places to eat.  You wanna know where we ate for our anniversary?  Stinking Applebees.  I’m not hatin’ on Applebees, I’m just saying on our five year anniversary, I can think of about a million other places I’d rather eat.  But I have decided to be nicer, so I went along with it, thinking we’d eat somewhere good/interesting like PF Chang’s or the Brazilian place (love me some Brazilian food) on Saturday night.  Sounded good in theory anyway.

 

We finally get to the hotel at 10 and do the self-park (remember this point as it becomes key later) because I was feeling cheap (after all, I’m heading to Cozumel in just a few days) and I didn’t want to pay $15/day for valet parking.  I head to the lobby desk for check in and I’m happy to be there…It’s a beautiful hotel, great location, and I had requested a king bed.  The little guy at the desk says we have reservations for two nights (check) with double beds (WTF!?!?!?!).  I kindly tell him I had called and specifically requested a king bed as it is OUR ANNIVERSARY.  No luck.  We get the two double beds, which are apparently smaller than full size beds.  The room is very nice and the beds are comfortable.  I quit with the details for the remainder of the evening at this point and leave you to your imagination…. 

 

Saturday morning I get up earlier than J (as usual), take a shower and start to head out the door to the nearest Starbucks.  J wakes up and wants to go as well.  I’m not sure why, he hates all things coffee, but since I’m trying to be nicer, I wait an extra 20 minutes for my latte.  We head to lobby and inquire as to where the closest Starbuck might be located, which is just around the corner a ½ block.  It’s a nice morning, but it’s already scorching.  I order my latte and J is just floored that they don’t have soft drinks at Starbucks.    So we stroll around Sundance Square, sipping our drinks (he got some water, oh the horror of having to drink something non-carbonated and sugar/caffeine free).  After about 15 minutes in the already sweltering heat while drinking a rather warm latte, I suggest heading to World Market and the Omni Theater. 

 

World Market is the greatest store.  I got a really cute Eastern looking metal elephant that holds a votive candle.  You literally insert the candle through his butt. J was amused by that.    He really is cute though.  And I bought a ton of incense.  J is sweet and offers to stop at Ann Taylor.  I decline, making a strategic decision that I’d rather keep him out of the store and away from the price tags for future shopping preservation. 

 

So we head to the Omni and J immediately starts jonesing to see the fighter pilot Omni thing (what are those? Movies? Documentaries?) and of course I want to see the Aliens of the Deep or the Living Sea.  It turns out neither of us got our way as none were showing on Saturday…silly things like Mystery of the Nile and something else were playing.  So I drag J to the Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame…I think we both actually had a good time there…it really is worth the $6 admission price.  By this time we’re both starving, so we head over the Purple Cow Diner (great place, you should try it sometime) and grab some food and head towards Arlington (aka Hell). 

 

I have to admit, when I bought tickets to the game, I never even considered how hot a 3 pm game would be.  Arlington set a record that day at 99 degrees.  I’m sure all the metal and concrete of the stadium (aka the baseball oven) was about 50 degrees above that.  I have to say it was miserably hot, but I was not going to be a weenie like the other females in my section.  By God, I’m tough and I’ll have a heat stroke to prove it.  The game was great, the Rangers smacked the Astros and I heard one of the funniest things I have ever heard in my life…it was quite obvious the three guys behind us had gotten suckered into taking their kids to the game.  From time to time they’d slip and like forget the kids were there…the best example of this happened when one of the Rangers hit two homeruns:

Dad #1:Man, his old lady ought to take her teeth out for him tonight.

Dad #2: You know it….

5 year old daughter: Dad, who’s going to take their teeth out tonight?  Grandma? Grandma’s going to take her teeth out?  How come? 

Dad #1: Uh.  Uh.  No one.  No one’s taking their teeth out…

Daughter: But, but you said…

Dad #1: Hey, you want some ice cream?

It was pretty freaking funny. 

 

After leaving the game, J calls some friends (we’ll call them the Nascar family for our purposes) of ours as they wanted us to swing by.  Keep in mind I wanted to say hi, but I also had other things I wanted to do.  J calls Daddy Nascar and he’s like we’re not home yet, can you wait two hours to come by?  My response would have been NO, I HAVE TO TAKE MY WIFE TO DINNER AT PF CHANGS TONIGHT.  I PROMISED.  What does he say in reality?  Sure, we’ll see you then.  So by time we visit and leave it’s 9 pm, I’m sweaty, tired, and dehydrated.  I had given up on decent food for the evening and just wanted a cold shower and a gallon of water to drink.  Of course nothing in life is that simple. 

 

So here’s how I ended up attending prom during on my fifth anniversary.  We return to the hotel, go to the parking garage (remember, I’m too cheap to valet) and it’s closed.  What?!?!  So we go to the hotel entrance.  There is a limo in front of us.  A kid with a top hat and a pimp stick steps out.  He’s in purple.  Not kidding.  If I hadn’t been so tired I would have laughed hysterically.  Anyway, there’s a prom at the hotel, but the valet says to follow him around and he’ll let us in the garage.  Seriously, I will so pay $15/day to valet from now on. 

 

This gets better…as we enter the hotel from the garage, I start seeing lots and lots of formal wear.  BTW, apparently pimp sticks are the accessory of choice among high school boys.   Keep in mind, I’m in a white mini, orange tank top, and I’m sure I smelled horribley.  You know it’s bad when you can smell yourself.  Anyway, to get from where we parked to the elevators we had to walk straight through these kids’ prom.  Not around, but dead center.  I was dying.  Then we had to cross a roped off section.  Chaperones started freaking out…one chased us down and wanted to know where we came from….it was great. I hope to never repeat that incident EVER EVER again. 

 

All in all, we had a nice weekend.  I’m still a little hacked we didn’t get to eat at PF Changs…guess I can use that as a good excuse to go back.