Hometown Tourist

You’d think with all of the belly aching I do regarding Nashville’s ever growing population that I hate it here in Music City. That’s not true though – I love this city. I just wish other people loved it the way I loved it instead of moving here and trying my once (and still to some) mini city on for size for a few years before moving on to bigger and better.

OMG. Stop moving here. You are driving me to drink.

The job market is oversaturated, gentrification is becoming a serious side of living here (especially if your income is a single lady living on her own – cannot imagine what it’s like for families), high rises have already murdered the once charming Music Row, First Mate can count 18 cranes (she calls them sky birds and for the record, she’s totally fine with the havoc wreaking taking place) from her downtown office, every.single.fucking. bro country “music” artist has a bar in the once quaint downtown (from Florida Georgia Line to Blake Shelton to Jason Aldean). My once gem of a city is turning into a bonafuckingfide bigger Branson, Missouri, right in front of my peepers.

Country. When country wasn’t cool.

I digress.

When pals come to town, it’s always been fun playing tourist in my own city. Due to the massive growth the last few years, I haven’t taken advantage of seeing Nashville through the eyes of others lately (and because if one more fucking to-be bride drunkenly steps on my foot, I might lose my goddamn mind and kick her Taylor Swift wearing cowboy boots with skirt outfit circa 2015 to the fucking state line).

There’s enough crazy in town already, bachelorettes.

This past weekend, my college bestie, Tdawg was in town to get her giddy up on with some of her gal pals from Denver.

It was the group’s first time in Nashville and I threw caution to the wind, swallowed $40 for two hour parking (you parking lot people are seriously horrible human beings), and trotted my ample ass down to the swanky hotel on Friday and met the crew at the rooftop bar.

Gorgeous lobby.

Intricate ceilings.

Most importantly, the bar.

The views from this spot did not disappoint.

Three ladies and an asshole.

Because I must always be up to no good, I was more than happy to oblige photo requests.

Oh. Just you three in it? Sorry. Not sorry.

They had supper reservations Friday night and I promised (after she forced me to call the studio by literally holding the phone up to my ear to make an appointment while I guzzled rosé at the bar) Tdawg I’d meet her on Saturday morning for an exercise class at Pure Barre. If you wonder who the fuck works out on a two day vacation, look no further than Tdawg. I have enough trouble sweating in my own city, let alone when I’m traveling.

Unless I’m visiting Yoga Barbie in Denver, I DO NOT workout on vacay.

Needless to say, I overslept and missed the fucking class. It ended up being OK thought because Tdawg was overserved the evening prior and spent the next several hours in her dreamy hotel bed. But she was up and at ’em for the evening and after supper, I took the gals to my fave honky tonk on the planet – Robert’s Western World to see my fave country band on the planet – The Don Kelley Band.

Recovered.

I used to frequent Robert’s so much before the besiege of tourists take over every summer, the last time I was there, Don Kelley said to me, “you don’t get out much, do you?” while I was dancing for the 4,812,654 time in front of him.

You AGAIN?!

Usually, on a Saturday night at 8:30 it’s already asses to elbows on Broadway and it was no different when we were frolicking about downtown. However, luck was on our side and when we galloped into Robert’s, there was an open booth at the front of the bar waiting for our rear ends. This kind of magic hasn’t happened since 2014.

Yeehaws all around.

Tawg was beyond impressed with the twang and spent most of her time at Robert’s on one of many devices.

 

The owner of Robert’s, JesseLee Jones, is the leader of the house band, Brazilbilly. They play every Saturday night from 10pm – 2am. In all of my years going to Robert’s, every single Saturday night, his mom comes and watches his show. Every. single. time. She sits in the same spot and drinks either coffee or Red Bull. It’s the fucking cutest thing ever.

Mama Jones.

Tdawg called it an early night but No Digity, MoHo and yours truly stayed to see The Don Kelley Band’s famous rendition of “Ghost Riders in the Sky.”

We didn’t hate it.

Upon returning to the Noelle Hotel, I tried to fill Tdawg in on what she missed.

No pillow talk for me.

The ladies had to get up at the first sign of the sun to catch their 8am flight. Meanwhile, I was able to get some much needed beauty sleep in a quiet, cool, dark hotel room.

Not so sleeping beauty.

When my lids decided to fling open, I realized that this place was a whole lot fancier than the Holiday Inns in which I’ve grown accustomed.

 

This mastery was just a reach beside the bed and I honestly don’t know how much longer I can live without one.

Controls for the entire room.

 

Parched after my previous evening’s boozefest, I sauntered out of the room to get some water and didn’t know how many choices there were when it came to H2O.

 

I couldn’t figure out where the ice machine was until I saw what looked like a fancy refrigerator drawer below the water.

 

I would have taken some ice packages if I had a bigger purse with me. Because, I’m nothing if not white trashiness at its finest.

Speaking of finest, what about my departing outfit from the fancy Noelle Hotel?

 

I looked like I was a hot mess because I was a hot fucking mess. No Digity gifted me a Robert’s Western World t-shirt that I refused to take off. When I went to retrieve my car from the valet, the dude asked me where I was heading home to (since I looked like a confused, hungover bachelorette from Nebraska).

No shame in my game.

“West Nashville.” Ever heard of it?

I had so much fun being a tourist in my town, I can’t wait to do it again. So consider this your warning if you’re coming to Music City and staying at a fancy establishment. I’m crashing your party. Until then, I’ll be riding as high as the rooftop bar I was lucky to experience.

Oldies but goodies.

Party on.

CBXB

 

 

 

 

Weekend Winks – Tight Ends and Taylor Swift

Oh Nashville.

You used to be my hidden gem of a city. I’d lure people to visit because if someone didn’t like country music, they weren’t interested in coming. Nashville was never just country music and cowboys but only true peeps who lived here knew that. Now, the secret’s out. It’s been out for quite some fucking time since the overly dramatic television show Nashville hit TV screens and the last few years, one hundred people have been moving here per day, taking up precious space on my interstates (yes, the interstates here are mine and mine only) and causing housing prices to sky rocket (seriously stop moving here or I’m going to be unable to afford to live in my Mini Manse that is a 42-year-old, popcorn ceilinged, ratchety carpeted, brass hardwared apartment that has gone up in rent almost $100 per year the last three years).

After this weekend, it’s suffice to say that Nashville is a legit city. Music City hosted the NFL Draft (downtown), the Country Music Marathon (downtown), Jimmy Buffett threw a parrot head party (downtown), and Taylor Swift decided to make a surprise appearance in the city with an impromptu meet and greet at the same time regular tourists and bachelor/bachelorette parties invaded the city while regular events went on per usual.

In 2017, Nashville’s population was 691,243.

This weekend, 600,000 more people invaded the city.

A projected 340,000 people for the weekend. That number nearly doubled for the three day shenanigans in Music City.

Most folks that live here took heed from the warning below…

The traffic lights literally spelled NFL. Photo credit: Pedro Esteban Tellez.

Just because my city was inundated with NFL fans didn’t mean I wasn’t in the mood for the draft. Two Iowa tight ends were projected to be selected Round One. So naturally, I gussied up at work in support.

Tight End University, Baby!

Lucky for me, First Mate is a sports head too and she hosted a draft partay at her castle.

Do gators eat hawks or do the birds peck gators to death?

Nothing says football party like a little two boxes of rosé.

True to the projections, my Iowa Hawkeyes tight ends, T.J. Hockenson and Noah Fant were selections eight and 20 overall in the first round. The University of Iowa is the first ever to have two tight ends drafted in the first round, which is why we’re now known as Tight End University.

I’m a size medium if anyone is at Raygun in the near future.

Detroit for Hockenson.
Broncos for Fant.

Might as well have been downtown.

Or maybe we were glad we were in air conditioning.

Either way, we had such a ball that we accidentally killed two boxes of rosé.

R.I.P. Bota Boxes.

Did I mention it was Thursday night? I woke up with such confusion at First Mate’s Friday morning (because I usually stay over on a weekend), I almost lollygagged too long to make it to work on time.

As if draft day one wasn’t enough, Taylor Swift decided to grace Nashville with her presence the day she dropped her first single off of the upcoming album. Hint after hint was dropped by Swift’s camp and Swifties from all over the planet somehow figured the fuck out where she was going to be at 11am on Friday morning.

If you want to stand where Taylor is standing, this mural is in the Gulch area of Nashville.

For those of  you Swifties out here, below is a video (it’s grainy but you’ll get the gist) captured by a dude who misses nothing in Nashville and is hip to every.single.thing happening in town. Taylor apparently stayed and signed autographs and graciously took selfies for hours.

One thing most Nashvillians can unite on is our disdain for the “woohoo” girls who come down for bachelorette parties. Now of course they pay good money and stay downtown but are, quite possibly, the most annoying of all tourists. So this was an especially funny site to see.

Speaking of bachelorette parties, check out the best sign from the marathon on Saturday.

A big congrats to the 30,000+ runners who completed the half and full marathon. I’ve done both and they are hard as fuuuuuuuuuuck.

Run for the tacos. @rosepepper

Even though neither First Mate nor myself did any kind of running, we still decided we needed tacos.

So we ran to eat Mexican.

While Nashville was abuzz with all kinds of shit happening, my Iowa twins were all primped up for a wedding. It’s too bad they don’t enjoy each other’s company.

Nothing but love.

J. Crew model in the making.

Hair model in the making.

I mean fucking COME ON.

When Sunday rolled around, I was ready for some mauling by The Pussy Posse.

Rocky and Fabio have snuggling down to a science.

The newest addition Scooch, is another story.

After watching everyone stand on their feet for three days downtown, my tootsies ached for them. Of course I remedied that the best way I know.

To all those that came in for a few days, thanks for coming!

But mostly, thanks for getting the fuck out of town.

Love ya, mean it!

 

 

 

How Many Bitches Does It Take to Open a Bottle of Wine?

At a recent bachelorette party, we wanted a little swig of wine before leaving (and to be honest, carry in our plastic cups during our walk) to the bar.  Being the oh-so-smart ladies we are, no one brought a wine opener for the bottles so we called down to the front desk. And after about 30 minutes (they apparently don’t keep them on hand…at a downtown Nashville hotel…WTF?), one arrived.  I thought my years of deep expertise uncorking bottle after bottle of vino would suffice and I offered to open the damn thing that we could hardly wait to get our tongues on.  But I was wrong. Way wrong.

Not a job for one…but two…

This cork would.not.budge. It seemed really crusty (if that is even possible for a cork) and we had the shittiest wine opener on the planet (the kind that makes a T at the top with a tiny spiral attached).

Coco’s leg power and my spaghetti arms were no match for this bitch.

If I had been wearing a skirt, I’d still have rug burns on my knees.

With all of the difficulties the two of us ladies were having, my gal pal G (you know, the one who yelled at the 80-year-old man) decided to bring her pull into this uncooperative wine bottle.

Tug-o-wine war.

Three ladies, no luck.

Realizing Coco was outnumbered by G and yours truly, LK entered the corking contest, pulling and tugging on the biceps of our resident redhead.

Eight arms outsmarted by one defiant jug of vino.

When it was all said and done (and I was thankfully not pulled apart into two pieces) this fucking cork refused to budge.

No luck but a great arm work out.

We then decided it would behoove us to push the cork down into the wine. And then it started disintegrating before our eyes, breaking in half and making me want to start bawling while kicking my arms and legs on the floor in true tantrum style. I WANT WINE DAMMIT!

All of that for half a cork still in the f’ing bottle.

Then Coco used what strength she had left in her arms to push the stupid piece of shit into the liquid we all needed so badly. SCORE!

Pieces of cork really add something special to a glass of pinot noir.

And that folks is how it takes four bitches to “open” a bottle of red wine.

I know, so classy. Expect anything else from this chick?

I didn’t think so.

Cheers!

CBXB

The Seven Month Itch

March marks my seventh month in the blogosphere, which I suppose means I’m still relatively new at this. When I started posting, I not only wondered what in the hell I was going to talk about daily (like I ever shut up) I also wondered who in the world would be interested enough (aside from my mother and the required family member readership) to come hang and take a peek into my life.

In celebration, I’ve decided to share seven random facts about myself. Sit back, relax and grab a cocktail (or three)…

#1. I have a really fun family that I love hanging around.

Trying to get a lift onto my dad’s back after honky tonkin’ for my sister’s bachelorette party.

#2. I often make an asshole out of myself on accident.  Labeling them as blonde moments makes me feel better.

It’s JAWS! Scary shark! Wait, where’d the shark go?

#3. Rarely do I drink ’til I puke. But when I was younger and didn’t know any better, thank god someone was there to capture the Kodak moment.

My bestie, Scooby holding my hair back. While laughing. Loudly.

#4. I’ve been crazy about cats my entire life.

Cray cray in training with Ernie.

#5. Richie Sambora (yeah, the one from Bon Jovi) once put a guitar pick he used during a show into my hand. I said into my hand! He didn’t throw it into the crowd and I happened to catch it, he walked over and handed it to me.  This was in the Heather Locklear vs. Denise Richards days. I was pretty sure I hated Richie for cheating on his gorgeous wife, Heather (I mean if she gets cheated on, where’s that leave the rest of us gals?) and knew I hated him for dating his ex-wife’s friend during the divorce. Then Richie’s hand touched mine and well….

I. DIED.

I fell so much in love with the stupid pick, I had it made into a necklace. It’s my personal heirloom to pass down to my cat children. Teddy refuses to wear it around his neck because he thinks it’s too “heavy.” CATS.

Not too heavy for this neck.

#6. I have a trashy habit (does this surprise anyone? Anyone?!) of cutting down bags of chips as I stuff them into my mouth.  This not only alleviates your wrist from getting greasy, this tactic is much more time efficient when trying to inhale the crumbs at the bottom of the bag. Trust me.

I know, I know…why didn’t you think about this before?!

Breakfast of Champions

#7. I couldn’t love my cat Teddy more than if I’d birthed him myself. Yeah, yeah, I know. C.R.A.Z.Y.

Crazy in love.

Here’s to seven more months of fun!

Cheers!

CBXB