Life is a Highway...

Somewhere, Loki the Calendar Trickster is laughing his bushy tail off. He's been preparing for this week for a while and I swear I didn't see it coming.

Where do I start? A very witty, very nice lady from an online community is coming to Nashville and wants to meet for drinks. Yay! She's coming this week. Boo!

A gaggle of older relatives want to see the magnificence that is Dollywood. The most available cousin has offered to take them. They hate her. They love me. They decided this week would be the perfect time to get their 'billy on. They let me know last week. DAMN it.

Back in April, Stuart and Keefer phoned me all breathy and giggly to tell me that one of the men whom I thought would cause me to stop breathing if he never loved me back is now a monk. In Kentucky. And he has read my blog and wants to get in touch. Do monks read blogs? Not being RC flavored, I'm still a little confused when I see nuns driving. (Yeah yeah yeah, too much Sister Bertrille, too little cultural literacy.) I did and he invited me up to spend some time in one of the monastery cabins to write and relax. I took him up on it and planned to spend some time feeling all holy and shit while I finish a play and get my squirrel-eater study ready to roll. Those plans were for- Wait for it!- this week.

Hold it. I'm not done.

Monday, Livy called to tell me she had a very sweet gig and wanted me to come along. She didn't fool me. It's June, so the sweet gig can't be Beale Street. It's Bonnaroo, which I have managed to avoid lo these many years.

I sent her footage of Lewis Black getting beaned with a bottle at Bonnaroo.

She countered with a demand for proof that it happened in Manchester.

I referred her to the fact that Black asked if he was the only Jew there.

She shot back that one need not assume that there is only one Jew or any Jews in any given venue in Tennessee.

"Yeah," I huffed. "Sometimes it's HALF a Jew."

"Well, it's the wrong half, which makes you a gentile bastard. With a tail. Lets go to Bonnaroo." She paused and I could tell she was lighting up, (something that she had resolved to quit last NYE, LIVY!) "Anyway, I frickin' hate Lewis Black. If he's there this year, I'll throw a bottle at him."

"How can you hate Lewis Black? It's not like he's Carrot Top."

"You like him because he reminds you of your Grandmother. Seriously, if he spoke Spanish and ranted about cats, I could close my eyes and not be able to tell the difference."

I offered to let her take my relatives to Dollywood if I went to Bonnaroo. She declined. I went to Kentucky and found out that the Monks of Our Lady of Purpetual Chagrin use a place in Nashville when their computers die. Don't they have misfit monks who love to tinker? Maybe I'm getting that mixed up with Santa's Workshop. Never mind. So, I trundled back home and waited and tomorrow I will trundle somewhere else, much to the vexation of the dog, who was enjoying something very like what the Cowardly Lion experienced in the Emerald City. Forget boning up on my French. There is the fine art of doggy massage to be learned.

There is also an email from my boss, who wants to know if I think I'm funny. I am pretty sure this is a rhetorical question. What she really wants to know is why I corrected someone from DCS when they complained about hearing one of the social workers singing a Guns n Roses song with a client during a session. I guess I wasn't supposed to tell her it was actually recorded by Pearl Jam. Offering the information that I'd used my knowledge of the lyrics to "Funky Cold Medina" for clincal purposes probably didn't help. I'll just pretend I didn't see the letter.

Oh, well. There's always Dollywood.


copyright 2008 Jas Faulkner