99 Bottles of Milk on the Wall
It looks like we’ll be ringing in the new year tonight in the same hedonistic fashion as last year, only this time Amelia is mobile and not just available for lap dances and the girls have a plastic echo microphone from the dollar store that will provide some fantabulous impromptu karaoke moments. I’m certain our revelry will rival the throwdown Britney Spears is hosting in Las Vegas. If we get really crazy we might play a round of Candyland and break out the microwave popcorn with extra butter. We know how to party.
Ten years ago we would be contemplating what champagne and beer to buy, what party to attend, and setting out the jumbo bottle of Ibuprofen for the day after. Tomorrow morning I’ll be doling out chewable zoo animal vitamins instead of hangover relievers and yet again procrastinating on the official tear down of operation Christmas. I mean will it really hurt anything, except my OCD pride, if our tree stays up another week?
One of my favorite New Year’s Eve celebrations was twelve years ago. I boarded a ValuJet plane from Nashville to visit a cute boy (aka now the hubby) in Jacksonville, Florida. After breaking up and getting back together more times than I can count in melodramatic angst ridden episodes that would make a great movie on the Lifetime channel, he moved to Jacksonville in 1993 in a quest of self discovery, leaving small Southern town America with nothing but his truck, a guitar, and a few clothes. (OK, OK, he had a little bit of money in his wallet, but not much.) I went to visit him in the spring of 1994 with my roommate and the rest, as they say, is history. The hubby had made wonderful plans for us to attend a New Year’s Eve party at the Marriott at Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach that night in 1994. I wore a little black dress and he wore a suit. He had to work late that night so while I waited for him to get home I got ready, listened to music, danced around his apartment, and drank. And I danced some more and I drank. And then I drank some more. By the time our wonderful dinner was served at the hotel party late that night I was practically crying drunk and almost did a face plant in my meal. But somehow I pulled myself together and I never got sick (I think I just needed some actual food in my stomach to absorb the alcohol) and as we were leaving the party we had someone snap our picture.
That New Year’s Eve in 1994 we were on the cusp of our “oh my gosh we’re adults with a mortgage and homeowners’ insurance” phase. We would be engaged one year later. Tonight, twelve years later, we’ll be “partying” with a blonde and brunette who will be overindulging on juice and cookies.
Happy New Year!
Actually they are more like blonde episodes. Ha!
