July 10th 2011, marked the second annual Fueled by Fine Wine One-Half Marathon held in Dundee, Oregon in the heart of wine country, and Team Bubbles was there to suffer and celebrate.

I picked up the Team Bubbles Captain (the birthday girl) at 5:30am to make the drive from Portland to Dundee, and we arrived with just enough time to drop off our post-race paraphernalia at a friend’s house, meet up with the other members of Team Bubbles and head to the park down the street for the 7am start. I knew I was in trouble when the first turn across the start line was straight up a 45-degree hill into a Dundee neighborhood. The paved road quickly turned into gravel when we turned off into a winery at Mile 2.

Then the fun began.

Running along dusty dirt paths between rows of vines reminds me of the fact that picking up the rear on a dusty road is never a desirable position to be in. I used the water at Mile 3 to wash the grit out of my mouth.

And Miles 4-12 weren’t much better. Some of the terrain was so steep that I could power walk it faster than I could run it. I heard more F Bombs uttered in this race than I have in any other race, including the three marathons I’ve run.

“Are you f*cking kidding me?! Another f*cking hill?!” was the mantra of the day.

At some point between Mile 12 and 13 we turned onto a paved road and encountered one of the few downhill portions of the entire route. Thankfully I still had a good kick left and sprinted the last mile of downhill to the finish line where the rest of Team Bubbles was already standing in line to collect their wine glasses for the after party. We quickly grabbed our glasses and went straight to the Argyle table for a glass of what else but bubbles.

I pity the poor people who chose this race as their very first half marathon. They have probably all hung up their running shoes and decided this whole half marathon thing just isn’t for them. Don’t give up! The Fueled by Fine Wine Half Marathon is just some crazy person’s idea of seeing how much torture runners will endure if there’s free wine at the end.  Apparently the answer is “a lot.”

We worked our way through the post-race nosh of salami, bread, cheese and brownies, and sampled plenty of wine. In the end we raised our glasses of bubbles in a toast to surviving the crazy course, and swore we’d never run this race again.

Epilogue

The day after the race I drove 647 miles to Lake Tahoe. When I stopped to get gas after four hours of driving I could barely get out of the car, let alone walk. I have been running for 30 years, and I felt like I had just run a marathon for the first time. I lived on Advil for three days after this race. But like childbirth, you forget the pain, and even though we all said we would never do it again I’m sure you’ll see us standing in line at the wine tent after the race next year with dirt on our shoes and smiles on our faces.

So I suggested we ditch the long run this past weekend and do a race instead. The only half marathon we could find in Oregon in January was the Cascade Half Marathon in Turner. Where’s Turner you say? It’s just South of Salem, four miles from Aumsville, which is now famous for having a tornado rip through town a few weeks back.

We all met in Wilsonville at 7am to carpool to Turner. There were five of us packed into the car, and all the way to Turner the conversation went something like this.

“This weather sucks.”

“This is really going to suck.”

“I think we should do the 10k instead of the half.”

“This really sucks.”

We arrive at Cascade Junior High School in Turner at 8:15am and it is still pouring down buckets. There is no real signage anywhere to indicate we have arrived at the right place, so we just follow the steady stream of cars around the corner until we see someone in a fluorescent orange vest directing traffic.

We park and reluctantly get out of the car to make our way to packet pickup. Once again, there are no signs as to where the packet pickup is or where the start line is, so we just follow the droves of people and hope they know where they’re going.

We finally find the gym and the 900 other soaking wet people who are also picking up race numbers and getting ready to get even more soaked. It is now about 8:50am and the race starts at 9am. At this point we realize that none of us has actually seen anything that resembles a starting line, and we have no idea where we’re supposed to be.

Then someone announces over the school P.A. system, “We’re going to have to kick y’all out now to get the race started. Just head to the front of the school.”

All 1000 of us, minus the elite runners who opted for the early start so they wouldn’t have to deal with this cattle call, file through the gym doors to the front of the school. Thank heavens it has stopped raining for five minutes. I look over at my friend Kelly and say, “I bet there’s just a guy up there with a Nascar flag, and he’ll just drop it and say ‘go.’ Or maybe they’ll fire a real gun with live ammunition.”

Two minutes later, the runners start moving forward. No bull horn. No starting pistol. I think I was probably right about the Nascar flag.

We get to enjoy about 30 seconds of rain-free running and then the heavens open up as if to say, let’s just see how you do with soaking wet shoes and a 30-mph wind in your face.

I had heard this would be a nice flat race on country roads and it is. I am running by cows, and chickens, and sheep, and getting into my groove until someone yells, “Car!” WTF? Car? It seems that the race course is not closed to traffic, so we are sharing this 2-lane country road with all kinds of motor vehicles, including the one that is nipping at my heels before I hit the 1-mile marker.

Now that I know we’re sharing the roads with motor vehicles I am no longer able to bliss out on the lovely array of farm animals and hillbilly road kill. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that. The entire race course was a Technicolor display of frogs, lizards, moles, and various other creatures who had picked the wrong time to try to cross the road. Who knew they had such vibrantly colored innards.

The halfway point of the race is a guy standing by an orange cone telling you to turn around. I have never been happier to see a turnaround in my life. I am soaked to the bone, and when I make the turn I am running directly into the wind. Oh goodie.

Remarkably it stops raining for 20 minutes, just in time for me to look up and see a pilot car coming down the road, followed by a double wide being pulled by a semi. I’m looking at how much space there will be between me and the multi-ton mobile home when it passes by, and quickly make the decision to get off the road all together, and run in the gravel until it passes. It turns out to be a smart decision when I see that one wall of the mobile home is just about directly lined up with the shoulder of the road when it passes by, and is probably going to take out a runner or two down the road if they’re not paying attention.

Four miles to go, and the rain starts again. Yeah, whatever, bring it on. I can’t get any more soaked than I already am.

Two miles to go. Nice headwind of about 30mph. So, yes the course is flat, and the scenery is lovely, but the weather sucks!

I finally see the high school up ahead, and there are no signs to indicate a finish line. I am dodging the cars of the 10k runners leaving the parking lot, as I try to make my way back to the front of the school. I started there, so I assume I finish there?

Ah yes, I see a row of plastic flags and a digital time display. There are no timing chips for this race, so there’s no such thing as an official time. If you cross the finish line first you get a prize. If you cross second, nobody knows or cares.

I sprint to the finish line, grateful to be done, grab my medal and head inside to find the rest of the gang.

We head to the cafeteria to get some post-race food, which turns out to be cafeteria chicken noodle soup and oatmeal cookies, which sounds just fine when you’re chilled to the bone.

We bitch some more about the weather, the cars, the wind, the roadkill and the mobile home. We change into dry clothes, jump into the car and head for home. And there’s one thing we all agree on, the Cascade Half in Turner will now be forever known to us as the Hillbilly Half.

I was not looking forward to running 11 miles in the rain on Saturday morning, but I knew I would be a cranky bitch if I didn’t do it. I checked the radar on Wunderground and it looked like the first hour would be dry, and then the rain would start. I can deal with that. We started right at 7am, and as predicted it started raining promptly at 8am. I needed that runner’s high to get me through property tax hell.

I honestly don’t remember what I did between the time I finished my run and the moment I left the house to head downtown to walk with zombies, so it must have been totally irrelevant, but probably included laundry and other domestic drudgery that will not be documented here for the sake of brevity.

My friend Salena had advised me that the zombies would be gathering promptly at 4pm in Pioneer Courthouse Square, and that we should get there by 3:30 to get a good seat. It was going to be hella crowded this year because they were attempting to set a Guinness World Record for number of zombies worldwide, simultaneously dancing to Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Yes, this was a worldwide event.

This is what I saw when I arrived at Pioneer Courthouse Square:

Zombie Walk Portland

Imagine trying to find someone in that crowd. Thank goodness for cellphones!

The zombies were fantastic.

Random zombie

The Jolly Green Giant Girl

Two zombies fighting over lunch.

And then there was this guy…

Check out the contacts.

And then we ran into Eddie. He thinks he’s Jimi Hendrix. He insisted on taking a bunch of pictures with Salena and me and then asked for money.

Eddie as Jimi Hendrix.

After the zombies dispersed Salena and I headed back to her car so she could give me a ride to the Distiller’s Festival. This was to be the final chapter of the distraction from the property tax bill.

The Distiller’s Festival had started at 11am, and it was now 5pm, so I figured I’d be walking into an event not unlike a drunken frat party at this point. I paid my $10, got my wrist band, picked up a shot glass and went inside to meet a few of my friends. I didn’t have to walk far to find them, because they were seated near the entrance taking a break, and looking like they’d already sampled half of the offerings.

You really half to pace yourself at these events, because if you don’t you will be passed out within 30 minutes. The trick is to not take a full shot at every booth! I think I probably tasted eight tequilas, five vodkas, one absinthe, a few liquors and a whiskey or two, and I did just fine.

The second trick to surviving these events is to plan to walk to dinner afterwards. My friends, who just moved here from New York, suggested Mediterranean food, Blue Olive to be exact. The restaurant just happens to be owned by a friend of mine whom I haven’t seen in a couple of years, and I wasn’t even aware that he had moved his restaurant from the Beaumont area to NW 21st.

Homayoon, owner of Blue Olive.

Blue Olive was the perfect choice for a post Distillers Fest nosh. We ordered a cold mezza to start that included baba ghanouj, humus, tzatziki, and olives. And of course the wonderful housemade Moroccan style bread. We then ordered a Greek platter to share: lamb kabobs, lamb chops, spanakopita, mousaka, dolmathes, falafel and the most amazing Basmati rice. My friends said it was better than anything they’d ever had in New York, and they are picky customers.

The only leftovers we had were two lamb bones, which we took for our dogs.

We rolled ourselves out of Blue Olive at about 10pm and started to walk back to my car, which was about 15 blocks away. We made a quick stop at the Backspace Cafe, which was hosting a poetry slam. The current contestant was just finishing his amazing delivery, and was about to get scored by the judges. At least two gave him a perfect 10.

We finally made it back to my car, a little soaked from the rain, but happy nonetheless. I dropped my friends back at their place in the Pearl District and headed back home to face the reality of my property tax bill. But for 12 glorious hours I had successfully managed to forget all about it.

• Sing karaoke in Tokyo while wearing a pink wig like Scarlett Johnasson in Lost in Translation.
• Hot air balloon ride over Napa with someone I’m madly in love with.
• Win an Academy Award.
• Win an Emmy® award.

Well, okay, those last two aren’t very specific at all when you think about it. I never specified what kind of Academy Award or what kind of Emmy® I wanted to win. I just put it out there for the universe to chew on.

I spent last weekend in Hollywood: at the 62nd Annual Primetime Engineering Emmy® Awards, as the recipient of an Emmy®. Yes, really.

There are three  types of Engineering Emmys, and these are the definitions:

The Engineering Emmy®: This award is presented to an individual, a company, or an organization for developments in engineering that are either so extensive an improvement on existing methods or so innovative in nature that they materially affect the transmission, recording or reception of television.

The Engineering Emmy® Plaque: This award is presented to those achievements that exhibit a high level of engineering and are important to the progress of the industry.

The Philo T. Farnsworth Award: This award honors an agency, company or institution whose contributions over a long period of time have significantly affected the state of television technology and engineering.

This year they awarded ONE Engineering Emmy®, TWO Farnsworth Awards (one went to Desilu Studios if that gives you an idea of how prestigious this award is), and FOUR Engineering Emmy® Plaques.

Ensequence and Showtime were awarded the Emmy® Plaque for Outstanding Achievement in Engineering Development for the Showtime Sports Interactive project, which I have been the technical operations lead on for the past 18 months.

I have submitted my application to become a member of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. You either have to win an Emmy® or get signatures from two sponsors in your peer group (mine is Interactive Media) to get approved. I did both just to hedge my bets!

I am still on Cloud 9.

Right before I walked in.

Accepting the award with Showtime.

Standing on the stage after it was all over.

Our hosts for the evening, Kunal Nayyar and Simon Helberg of Big Bang Theory.

The Emmy Nomination…

A few weeks ago I wrote in a Cheers and Jeers blog that a project I’m on had been nominated for an Engineering Emmy. The category we were in was tough, and the enthusiasm was tempered because of this. Nobody expected us to win.

And the Emmy goes to…

Well, we won! Ensequence (the company I work for) won a joint Engineering Emmy with Showtime for “Outstanding Achievement in Engineering Development” for Showtime Sports Interactive. I have been the technical lead on this project for the past 18 months so this is what I have been living and breathing for over a year.

Word in the hallways was that we would probably only get a few seats at the awards ceremony, so there was no way I was expecting to go. I assumed the CEO would go with the project manager or something.

Fast forward to last Thursday.

L.A. Bound…

I get an email (from someone I won’t name) asking if I’m available on August 14th to go to L.A. and attend the 62nd Primetime Emmy® Engineering Awards. Holy sh*t! It took me less than five seconds to reply, “YES!” And I spent the next three hours bouncing off the walls like a 5-year old on a sugar high, and texting all of my friends.

My company got two seats at the awards. TWO. And they decided to send me and the project manager, who is also a woman. That is so cool.

The 62nd Primetime Emmy® Engineering Awards will be hosted by none other than Simon Helberg And Kunal Nayyar of Big Bang Theory. It doesn’t get much cooler than that.

The Super Secret Silversun Pickups Concert…

Oh, I almost forgot about the second reason Thursday was so surreal. My friend Peter sent me a text asking me if I was going to the secret Silversun Pickups show, and he forwarded me the email with the clues from 94.7 KNRK. I had received the same email but hadn’t had any time to even open it. I read the clues, “Take the trolley to the Pearl…lips that are hot…” I immediately knew it was Hot Lips Pizza in the Pearl. So, I recruited my friend Joe to walk over there with me at 5pm to see if the Silversun pickups were really going to play a concert in the parking lot of the Ecotrust Building (where Hot Lips Pizza is located).

I think the pictures below speak for themselves. They came, they played, they jumped in a tinted-windows van immediately afterwards and headed to the Crystal Ballroom for sound check (they were playing a regular sold-out show there that night).

So let’s recap:

1. I woke up and found out I was going to the Engineering Emmys.
2. The day ended with a free concert by the Silversun Pickups,who played in a parking lot in the Pearl District.

SSPU take the stage in the Ecotrust parking lot.

Three cyclists powered the show.

If I tell my kids that I have errands to run, and then ask them if they’d like to join me, their normal reaction is to just pretend they didn’t hear me, which is exactly what happened on Saturday.

“Okay then. I’ll just see you guys when I get back from Fry’s,” I said casually as I grabbed for my purse and started heading for the door, knowing full well what their reaction would be.

You would have thought I yelled “Fire!”

“Fry’s?! Wait! Hold on! Just let me finish this level. I want to go,” said both of my previously deaf children.

We drove down to Wilsonville and pulled into the crowded Fry’s parking lot to find…red white and blue streamers and…a petting zoo. WTF?

“Is that a llama in the parking lot?” my daughter exclaimed.

“No, I believe that’s a miniature donkey,” I said, wondering what the connection was between the petting zoo and the anniversary.

We skipped the petting zoo, and walked through the front door to be greeted by a Fry’s employee who handed me a raffle ticket to win some huge TV, and pointed me in the direction of the live music and free popcorn.

I had my list. I was on a mission. How dare they try to distract me with live music, free popcorn and mutant animals in the parking lot. I put on my blinders and headed straight to the cell phone kiosk with my daughter, while my son headed straight to the game aisle. We all had our priorities.

My daughter’s phone contract had expired with AT&T, and I had been pretty stealth about making sure the mailers that showed up in my mailbox weekly made it to the recycle bin before she had a chance to see them.  I was enjoying the fact that the contract was expired and I wasn’t beholden to AT&T at the moment. But, one day she went to the mailbox before I got home, and there it was: the AT&T mailer showing the latest touch screen phone that could be hers if I just signed a new 2-year contract.

So, here we were at the AT&T kiosk, two weeks before her birthday, Mom caving in. She walked right up to the AT&T display and said, “I want that one.”

We were quickly approached by a Fry’s employee who’s name rhymes with Bill.

“Listen,” I said. “Is this phone really free or do I have to sign up for some data package or messaging package to get it? Because when I went into the AT&T store they said this required a data package if I wanted it for free.”

Bill informed me that the AT&T stores operate under different rules than resellers like Fry’s, and that Fry’s did not require a data package, and by the way this particular phone was part of the 25th anniversary special and was indeed free.

Score.

“Great,” I said. “We’ll take it. And do you have a replacement battery for this Blackberry Bold? I know it’s considered ancient by your standards since it’s an older model.”

Bill walked us to the battery aisle, found a replacement battery and walked us back to the phone kiosk so we could complete our phone upgrade.

“I need this phone battery, because I’m leaving for Italy on Tuesday and I don’t want my phone to die every two hours,” I said.

“I’m going to Finland in a week,” he answered, and then explained that his brother had been signed to play on a professional football team in Finland, and he was going to visit him in some city that started with a “J”  and was a couple of hours north of Helsinki. “Oh, Jyväskylä?” I said, because it was the first city I thought of that started with a J. He said he thought that was the place, but I think he may have been thinking of the word “jalkopallon” which means football in Finnish.

Back to business. He started trying to upgrade my phone, and noticed the AT&T plan I had. “Wow. I’ve never seen this plan before.” He called his colleagues over to take a look at it, and they were all scratching their heads.

You see, I have a plan that AT&T doesn’t have listed on their website, doesn’t advertise, and would probably deny its existence if you called and ask for it. It’s $19.99 a month. I got it because I called AT&T to try to reduce my daughter’s monthly phone bill somehow, and I just kept pushing and pushing until I had whittled down the phone plan to the bare minimum. My daughter wants to text her friends. They all live in the 503 area code. That’s it. She can call and text anyone she wants in the 503 area code for $19.99 a month. Excellent.

Because this plan doesn’t actually exist in their upgrade screen it required some manual intervention, which gave Bill and I some time to chat. Turns out Bill is going to law school, and judging from the way he finagled that free phone upgrade I’d say he’ll make a fine lawyer.

We swapped out the battery in my Bold, moved the SIM chip from my daughter’s old phone to the new phone, said our goodbyes and went on our merry way.

Next stop, laptop accessories. I needed a power adapter for the airplane. No, not because I want to work the whole way. I have Rosetta Stone on my laptop, and I want to practice my Italian.

Need an extra storage card for my camera. Check.

Time to head to the check out counter, which as you know requires you to walk the gauntlet of temptation. Fry’s knows geeks and their children well. You came to buy a wireless router, but they know you have a weakness for peanut M&Ms while you install that router. They know you’re going to take that new XBox 360 game home and play it for hours, and you will need sustinence. And they make you wait in that aisle for the next available register, giving your will power ample time to crumble.

I quickly walked through the candy gauntlet, kids behind me saying, “Mom, can I get something,” to which I replied, “No, no and no.”

By the time we got out of Fry’s it was nearly 5pm and the petting zoo was gone, which begs the question, was it really every even there in the first place? Was there really a 25th Anniversary celebration or was that just my alternate reality that day? Was Bill really an adorable law student working at Fry’s for fun while he lived off student loans and got his law degree? Does professional American football really exist in Finland?

If I win that giant TV I got a raffle ticket for I’ll believe it was all real. Until then I’ll believe I was in the Twilight Zone for a few hours that day.

I got up at 5:30am on Saturday morning to do what I thought was going to be a 12-mile run. But when I met my faithful running buddies in the parking lot of the Centerpointe Starbucks, they informed me they had re-mapped the route and it was now well over 13 miles. “Fine,” I said, “Can you spare an Advil?”

It was a beautiful morning, and the route was fairly flat, so who am I to complain. I love my Saturday runs and my girlfriend time.

By 11am I had finished the run, caught up on all of the gossip, showered, and I was in a little private room at La Belle getting the hair ripped out of my legs by my favorite sadist Cindi. We meet for this special event about once every two months or so. I haven’t had to shave my legs since the 80′s. It’s a beautiful thing ladies. And guys, get that hairy back taken care of. Just take a Valium and have a friend drive you.

Two of my girlfriends recently mentioned a women’s clothing store called Barbara Johnson in Lake Oswego. It’s a samples clothing store, and well, it happens to be oh so conveniently located about a block away from La Belle. So after I got off the torture table I headed to check out this supposedly fabulous samples store.

I had heard that this store had samples from Pategonia and other activewear companies, and I was on a mission to get some quick-dry clothes that I could wear sailing. I explained to one of the women working there that I was looking for clothes that would look fabulous even after they had been wadded up in a little ball in a duffle bag and been out to sea all day. She somehow knew exactly what I was talking about and started to bring piles of clothes to the dressing room.

The one thing you need to be aware of at a samples store is the sizes are not true. They are samples after all. I tried on everything from a size 4 to a size 12. The DKNY Golf line size 12 was like a regular size 6. And the Exofficio size 6 was all over the map.

My favorite purchases: a black low-cut hoodie dress from Exofficio, navy quick-dry pants from Exofficio, and shorts and hoodies from Nautica.

As I was paying for my purchases I noticed the clock behind the counter. “Oh crap!” I blurted. “I have people showing up at my house in 15 minutes.”

I raced home and pulled into my driveway just as my friend Beth was pulling up to my house. I quickly got dressed as we waited for the third musketeer (Jim) to show up. We were spending our afternoon at the Sixth Annual Portland Indie Wine festival.

We had decided we would take a cab to be safe, so I called the Lake Oswego taxi service since I figured they’d probably have a driver in the area. Here’s how the conversation went after I dialed the number:

“Hello?”

“Is this Lake Oswego Taxi?”

“Yes. But not today.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m in California visiting my 92-year old mother in the hospital, so I’m not available. But I’ll be back.”

“Okay. But I need a taxi now.”

“Let me give you a tip…”

“No, that’s okay. I’ll just call Radio Cab. Thanks.”

Yes, that was the actually conversation.

We did finally get our cab, and we made our way to the Bison Building in NE Portland for the Sixth Annual Portland Indie Wine Festival. What a perfect venue! Forty wineries and 15 local restaurants providing fabulous food and drink in a light and airy warehouse. The sun was streaming through the skylights and it was just a gorgeous day.

There were 40 wineries and 15 food establishments to sample, and we only had three hours in which to get through them all. It was a daunting task to say the least, but we were up for the challenge.

The more responsible side of me knew we would be in a world of hurt if we actually tried to sample every wine from all 40 wineries, so we picked a few “must-tries” and started with those. I won’t ramble on about every wine we tasted, but I will say we had a most amusing time when we dropped the pretentious wine snobbery adjectives and started to describe the wines like we would describe a man.

There were the wines we didn’t care for: “Bag over the head.”

And the wines we did like: “Ooh, he’s still wearing pants, but I want to take them off.”

And the wines that were a bit too young yet: “I don’t want to date him right now, but he has potential.”

A wine with a stinky nose: “This one is like a software engineer who has been wearing the same shirt for five days.”

And the wine that just blows your mind: “Wow. This is 9 1/2 Weeks in front of the fridge with the fruit.”

We ran into some old friends, some new acquaintances and some people who just defy description in this blog.

And did you know that no one liked Mike Erickson’s previous girlfriend, and that he’s getting married to Nurse Katie over Labor Day weekend? And , wow that’s a big piece of meat! These are the kinds of conversations you will either overhear or be directly involved in when you are shoulder to shoulder in a room with a few hundred people with a wine buzz. Okay I confess, I was the one who made the comment about the big piece of meat, but get your mind out of the gutter. I was referring to a big hunk of meat that was being carved up on a carving board.

At 10 minutes before six we realized we only had a few minutes to get one last taste of a favorite before we would get kicked out. I opted for the Barking Frog Syrah.

We finally called a cab—Radio Cab not Lake Oswego Taxi—and when they finally answered the phone I said, “I need a cab at NE 10th and Flanders,” to which the dispatcher answered, “You’re at the Bison Building aren’t you. I’ve already sent all of my available cabs to that location. Just go outside and flag one down.”

Sure enough the first cab came down the street about two minutes after we walked out.

Beth and Jim and I climbed into the cab and reviewed the afternoon:

• No one knew it was Jim’s birthday until right before we left, so I admit to being a lame friend when it comes to remembering birthdays.
• Beth and I decided that the wineries need to hire hot guys to pour the wine.
• Stiletto heels are not the best choice in a warehouse with a cracked concrete floor. We both opted for wedges.
• It’s not against the rules to go back to the Moonstruck chocolate booth multiple times to “clear your palette.”
• Not all men and women are like wine. Some age better than others.
• The Cattail Creek lamb ragout, Bob’s Red Mill polenta and salsa verde at the Wildwood booth was heaven.
• We want Phresh Organic chef Rob Leon to open a late-night food cart that serves nothing but the Griddled brioche, wild Oregon mushrooms, vintage extra sharp white cheddar and fresh goat cheese sandwich.

Take my advice and attend this fantastic event next year. And don’t make evening plans because you will probably too wiped out to keep them.

Inside the Portland Indie Wine Festival at the Bison Building

Beth and I about halfway through the tastings.

Hydrating at the end of the day. Kelly, Beth and Kevin (a work colleague of Beth’s whom we ran into).

Always take a cab.

Birthday boy Jim, who preferred kisses to spankings once we found out it was his birthday.

I must admit, it’s been about 20 years since I’ve been to a bachelorette party, so imagine my surprise when I recently received an invitation to one. My first thought was, oh God I hope this doesn’t involve young men dressed up as cops showing up at the door with a boom box. Thankfully no.

The plan was to take the bride, whom we’ll call Kate, to happy hour at a nearby restaurant, and then whisk her away to a secret location for a secret activity—that activity being a pole dancing class!

First of all let me point out that the median age of those in attendance was probably 48, with our friend Kate being the youngest at 32. And just to give you an idea of the personalities in the room, we all either have engineering degrees or work in engineering. Not your typical pole dancers.

I’m going to skip the happy hour festivities and go right to Diva Den, or the Den of Sin as I like to refer to it.

Unlike me, most of my female friends are very organized, think ahead, and prepare for events such as this. One such friend actually packed a cooler with iced tea, sweet tea vodka and some fruit for us to snack on during our pole dancing session. I personally don’t have a lot of inhibitions when it comes to trying new things, but one of my friends announced, “I’m a good Catholic girl. I think I need a drink before I try this!”

We all changed into our pole dancing clothes. What? You didn’t know there were pole dancing clothes? Okay, they weren’t really pole dancing clothes. I wore some Lycra running shorts and a tank top.

And then there were the shoes! Diva Den has a variety of “Hooker Heels” as I call them, that you can wear during your pole dancing lesson. Our instructor Brandi handed me a pair of 6-inch high silver platform stilettos and said, “Here, try these.”

If you’re going to learn how to pole dance you might as well look the part.

I have been threatened with legal action (okay not legal action, just verbal threats) if I post any of the party pictures here. But I think it’s okay if I just post a few that only include me.

The class started out with some stretching and “floor work.” Baby steps people! You can’t just start swinging on a pole without warming up and getting the basics down.

Brandi taught us how to walk sexy, crawl sexy, and generally move like you mean business. None of us were big fans of the floor work, because frankly, crawling across a wood floor on your knees is painful.

“Brandi,” I said with a look of utter desperation on my face, “how do you do this without the pain? My knees don’t like this.”

“You get used to it,” she said matter of factly. “You have to toughen up your body to do this.” And then she went on to explain that when she started attending and teaching these classes a year and a half ago, her arms and legs were covered with bruises for the first month. And I can tell you that when I woke up this morning I was sporting my own array of black and blue patches after just one lesson last night.

After the floor work, we finally got to pick a pole. Pick a pole? Aren’t they all the same? No. There are standard stainless steel poles, poles that have a smaller diameter for those with smaller hands, and even a copper pole, which is stickier (for those who get sweaty palms). I chose a standard stainless steel pole in the front of the room.

We spent the next 30 minutes doing the “Fireman,” the “Pinwheel,” and learning how to get up from those maneuvers without looking like a clutz.

The final session of the evening was a lap dance lesson. Brandi went through a lap dance for an imaginary friend on the couch, and then we each got a turn to try the routine.

“Who should I imagine on the couch?” I asked my gal pals. The consensus was that Johnny Depp would be the recipient of my lap dance, and I’m pretty sure he would have enjoyed it.

After our lap dance lesson we had some time to take pictures of each other doing our newly acquired pole tricks, which for the most part I can’t publish here. We then changed back into our street clothes.

We gave Brandi a nice tip, and headed out for a nightcap and a bite of this: The “Cock ‘n Balls” from Voodoo Doughnut (which happens to be two blocks from where I work).

If you are looking for an alternative to your daily, boring workout routine, I highly recommend adding pole dancing to your cross training. Many aerobics studios offer it, or you can find places like Diva Den that specialize in it.

Diva Den Studio

You can see me practice my pole dancing skills at Comedy Sportz on Sunday. Oh wait, wrong venue. Comedy Sportz is for improv comedy not pole dancing. But I am in the show on Sunday, and we have AC! It’s a minor league show so the cost is only $5 with a can of food for the Oregon Food Bank or $6 without a can.

Address here: Comedy Sportz Portland

Tomorrow is my youngest son’s birthday, and he asked for a Nintendo DS, to replace the one he lost last year. I agreed to pay for half since he lost the previous one, and off to Target we went tonight.

We arrive at the Target in Wilsonville and get Rock Star parking, which never happens at Target. The place is nearly empty.

My kids bolt from the car before I even have a chance to open my own door, and make a beeline through the front doors of Target, and straight to the Electronics section.

We quickly locate the Nintendo aisle, and the three of us stand there staring at the locked glass case, well stocked with Nintendo DS’s in red, blue, silver and black. Black?! Ooh new color.

We grab a friendly Target employee, because we know she has the keys to the Nintendo kingdom, and ask to see see “the black one.” It costs $50 more than the other DS’s and I want to know why.

I read the display card to my son, “It says it has a much bigger screen, a music player, and a built-in camera. Is that worth $50 extra to you?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” he says, then turns and looks at friendly Trarget employee Lisa. “Can we open it up and see it?”

“No,” she says. “Once we open them we can’t sell them anymore.”

“Okat,” I say, “Do you have one on display we can see, so we can compare the screen size?”

“No, we don’t have one on display,” she says. “But, let me see if I can open this without damaging the packaging.”

My son’s eys light up as we follow Lisa to the counter. She carefully lifts the tape with her fingernails, careful not to rip anything, opens the box, pulls out the documentation, and pulls out … a blob!

“Uh, that is not a DS,” I say. “What is that?”

“Oh my gosh!,” she exclaims. “It’s a rock covered in black electrical tape! I don’t know how this could have happened.”

Someone had purchased the DS, taken it home, removed the DS, and replaced it with a rock that weighed exactly the same as the DS. It was covered in black electrical tape so it would look like the black DS, just in case the person at the returns counter actually opened the box and looked under the documentation.

Can you just imagine buying that for a birthday gift, and seeing the disappoinment on the kid’s face when he opened the box up to find a rock!?

Needless to say. Lisa was happy to open every other DS we wanted tp look at.

My son ended up choosing a regular silver DS, because the “much larger” screen on the expensive black DS wasn’t actually that much bigger.

Oh, but the story doesn’t end here. As we checked out we saw this on the counter:

I looked at Lisa and said, “This just isn’t your day is it?”

Clarifications before you read the story:

CSZ: CSz is short for Comedy Sportz, which is an improv comedy
spot in NW Portland. We play games like they do on the show “Whose Line
is it Anyway?”

Andrew B.: A long-time friend and Comedy Sportz veteran, who was teaching one of the workshops on this particular evening.

Continue…

Last Wednesday night I had plans to meet my friend Andrew for a spot of
hot chocolate before the Comedy Sportz Wednesday night workshop. We
were supposed to meet in the CSz parking lot at 6:45pm.

But before I met Andrew I had to pick up a couple of cases of wine
glasses from my friend Julian in NW Portland. I texted Julian to tell
him I was my on my way, and he texted me back saying he wasn’t home.
And that’s where our story begins…

I started by sending the following text message to Andrew at 6:30pm:

Me: The person who has my wine glasses is not home. He forgot and went to happy hour. So I’m on my way to CSz.

“Andrew”: LOL. What? Who is this?

Me: Kelly Jo!

“Andrew”: Kelly Jo? Do you know who I am lmao?

Me: Not sure now! Who did I text?

(Holy crap! Who has Andrew’s phone?)

“Andrew”: Paul the auctioneer.

(WTF? Paul the auctioneer?)

Me: Ha ha. Well you’re programmed into my phone as Andrew. LOL

(Now I’m really confused)

Paul: Ha ha that’s pretty funny! Well I wonder what Andrew is doing now.

Me: I have no idea why your number is in my phone, but this is all pretty funny.

(Andrew and I met up for dinner before a workshop two months ago,
and I put his number into my phone. I swear it worked two months ago. I
wonder if he changed his number?)

Paul: Well do we know each other? What area are you in?

Me: I don’t know any auctioneers. I’m at Comedy Sportz in NW Portland. Where are you?

Paul: I’m in Salem area. Did you punch the number into your phone address book or is the phone your other half’s maybe?

(I’m texting n auctioneer in Salem. Really? What are the odds?!)

Me: It has been programmed into my phone for two months! I swear it worked last time. ;^)

Paul: LOL! Hmmmmm, are you male or female?

(Okay, we seem to be headed somewhere I don’t want to go. The next question will be, “What are you wearing?”)

At this point Andrew pulls up next to me in the parking lot.

“Andrew! I tried texting you to tell you I was early and I got Paul the auctioneer!,” I said, totally confused. “I’m pretty sure I have your cell phone number in my cell phone from last time.”

I read Andrew the number, and it turns out I had the area code as Portland not Vancouver. Right number, wrong area code. DOH!

“Hey!” I said, “What kind of auctioneer do you think Paul is? Do you think he auctions livestock or stuff?”

“What? Are there only two categories?” Andrew said.

“Let’s just ask and find out.” So I texted Paul…

Me: What do you auction? Livestock or stuff?

Paul: Everything but livestock.

“See Andrew!” I said, “Two categories. Livestock and stuff.”

“What do you think he looks like?” I said.

Andrew just looked at me, totally deadpan and said, “I think he has an unfortunate mustache.” And if I had had any hot chocolate in my mouth at that time it would have catapulted out my nose!

“Hey! How do you think one becomes an auctioneer? Is there a college degree? Associates degree? Does it run in the family?” I said. “Let’s ask.”

Me: Awesome. How do you become an auctioneer? Do you get a degree or was your dad an auctioneer? How long have you been doing it?

Paul: Ten years. I went to auction school in Missouri. I love it!

Auctioneer school in Missouri! No kidding. Andrew and I got a lot of
mileage out of our exchange with Paul the auctioneer that night. It
still peppers our conversations.

Not all wrong numbers are wrong. Some are informative and entertaining!