Okay

I know it’s been a minute.

Still struggling with anxiety and considering another ketamine treatment.

I am getting through my days and still trying to live a life that extends beyond my cubicle and my bed.

For instance, tonight I am taking the 12 year old granddaughter to a concert to see an artist she is very excited about. I am not so much excited to see the show, but I am excited to see her happy. I just hope the heat isn’t too bad. I’m getting crankier and crankier in my golden years.

Randy and I went to Tennessee early this month to celebrate birthdays. We didn’t stay in our usual cabin on the mountain. Our friends, Lizzie and Ruel, had other house guests who didn’t have a vehicle, and we stayed in a hotel in town.

So, this hotel is a lovely old building. The rooms were beautiful and the bed was comfy.

We had a few issues though.

First, when we checked in, the lady at the desk gave me a parking pass to put in our windshield. I asked Randy to take our bag up to the room and I would run back out to the car to deal with the parking pass.

You guys, I was gone for about a minute. One minute.

I get up to the third floor and Randy is standing outside the room.

Me: Dude?

Randy: I locked us out.

Randy had shoved a few cold beers in our suitcase when we left our friend’s cabin and didn’t zip the suitcase shut. When he unlocked the door, the suitcase fell on its side. The beers rolled out and down the hall. Randy shoved everything, including the room key, into the room and went to retrieve the wayward beers. The door shut behind him.

So, I went to the front desk to get another key.

We successfully entered our hotel room and I went into the bathroom.

I’ve literally never seen anything like this in a hotel. I mean, in a daycare? Sure. But not a hotel.

The toilet was toddler sized. It was the dinkiest toilet ever. And when I tell you there wasn’t enough space between the seat and the water, I mean it. There were incidents.

First, I had to pee really bad. I am a short person and I felt like Shaquille O’Neill on that toilet. My knees were almost even with my shoulders.

Which is a total exaggeration, but it felt like it.

What isn’t an exaggeration is what I did next, which as I was finishing up as one does, I shoved my hand directly into pee water. Like full on splash.

I washed my hands in hot water for about an hour then went out to tell Randy about the fucked up situation in the bathroom.

Turns out, Randy’s issues were worse than mine.

When he came out the bathroom, his head was hanging a little low. He looked like a sad toddler.

Randy: My balls went in the water.

Me:…

Me:…

Me: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

There is a lovely restaurant in the hotel, Randy and I met Lizzie and Ruel and two of their guests for dinner. I loved meeting Lizzie’s friends, a mother and daughter. One spoke nearly no English and the other spoke wonderful English, but as a second language.

At one point, Lizzie looked down the table and noticed Randy and Ruel turning purple while obviously containing laughter. She leaned over to me and asked what was happening to our husbands. I assumed Randy had just told Ruel about the ball dunking incident.

I quietly told Lizzie what happened. Her laugh got everyone’s attention. At this point, we had no choice but to tell the story to the other guests. I told the daughter what happened and she cracked up. Then she translated for her mom and her mother cracked up.

I mean, I know it wasn’t comfortable for Randy, but the story just brought so much joy.

The next morning, we decided to go to this diner across the street from our hotel for breakfast. What isn’t to love about a decades old diner in the Smokey Mountains?

Our server was a young woman who was obviously quite unhappy with another server. I’m pretty sure they were all from the same family.

Randy was ecstatic to order a fried bologna biscuit. The weirdo.

I told Randy to leave our server an extra big tip since she seemed to be having a rough morning and thought it might cheer her up. We picked up our bill and made our way to the register.

There wasn’t a total or prices on the bill, just what we ordered and the girl behind the register was struggling. She finally looked over her shoulder at the woman working the grill “Momma! I don’t know what this is.”

The older woman came over and looked at the bill, then asked us what we ordered. Randy told her and they rang us up.

As we were walking out, I heard the older woman tell the younger woman “She just didn’t know how to spell bologna.”

So what happened next? I will tell you. What was next was a crazy ass couple in their sixties walking down a street in downtown Greeneville, TN singing “Oscar Mayer has a way with B O L O G N A.”

Sorry it’s been a while, but I am super happy to be here today sharing this story about my husband’s testicles. Also, I am always going to wonder why. Why on earth did that hotel install daycare sized toilets in their rooms?

I hope you all are well.

I have a big trip coming up. I will tell you about it when I get back. My mom and I are meeting my sons in Hawaii. We’ve never been. We’re nervous, excited and really hoping for no bizarre toilet issues.

Full disclosure. I had to sing the Oscar Mayer song in my head every time to get bologna spelled correctly.