Chaos.

Normal people come back from a vacation feeling refreshed because they have had a break from reality, time to relax & unwind, recharge their batteries, time away from all the hustle and bustle of daily living.

But I'm not normal. I come back to work after vacation relieved that it is over because about halfway through it, it never fails...the lack of structure and routine sends my anxiety into a hyper-driven tailspin. 

I know this is going to happen every single summer yet, I still look forward to my week off in the beginning of July every single summer! It's frikken odd, man. 

Yesterday, thank heaven, was a routine Sunday for me. Lounging around, snacking, taking naps, finishing up shit around the house, prepping for the work week, and watching crazy shit on Hulu. For the last couple of days, I've been watching this show about EMTs, firefighters, and cops that work during the night hours in big cities. 

In one of the episodes last night, there were two female EMTs driving back from a call, and they started discussing their craziest/favorite runs to date. One of them said, "I got called out to a graveyard once, bunch of teenagers had eaten a bunch of acid and one of them freaked out. Which makes sense, I would have freaked out too. Can you imagine? Headstones and monuments and statues probably started moving around...I don't know why a person would willingly cause that much chaos for themselves." and there it was. 

Every single summer, in the beginning of July...I willingly cause chaos for myself.

But, why? Maybe it's so I don't forget that I need the structure and routine to stay sane? Or maybe I just like to watch shit get outta control so I have the challenge of whipping it all back into shape? Or maybe....I allow the chaos because it forces me to then find peace to level it all back out?

I have no idea. But what I do know is all I've been able to think about today are things that will bring life back to the peaceful side. Writing has always been a favorite of mine, so here this is. Being creative and making things pretty is another thing I love, so I've ordered craft supplies to start a project and I've decided to paint my doors if I can manage to decide on a color I like. I've always been a bookworm-dorkface so I've started making a list of books that people have suggested that I read recently. 

I've suddenly got a strange urge to see new places, do new things, eats food I've never tried, drink a damn smoothie, ride a bike, take a hike...I mean, some real strange shit has peaked my interest today. So I guess though it all happened ass backwards, the vacation has done what I needed it to do....again.

And I also think that the IT guy here at work was right this morning, when I tried to explain this nonsense on the smoke deck and he simply said "Well, you managed a good tan, but I think you need therapy." I can't even dispute that shit, for real. 

Anyhow, I'm glad to be back on the productive and functioning side of the fence today - and I'm glad it never takes longer than a week to show me that it's right where I belong. 

So long, #staycation2020. It's been real, but now I've got shit to do. ♥

Ballet Is Not My Jam.

So, y’all know that I work for a non-profit organization that a lot of times I cannot mention due to privacy and HIPAA standards. However, at this point I don’t really need to mention that place because if you don’t know where I spend my blue collar 40 and passion - I don’t know what to tell ya.  

Now sometimes, this place invites to me tag along on big adventures with the people we support, and 90% of the time I’m down for the ride. I’ve been to the state fair numerous times, to the circus numerous times, to Shine Prom 3 or 4 times, I’ve made multiple trips to Huber’s....I mean, we do a lot of cool shit.

A few weeks ago, I was asked, and I agreed to tag along with some folks to see the Nutcracker - that big adventure took place last night.

First, I need you all to know that I appreciate all kinds of art, I really do. Anything creative that stirs my emotions, man - I’m down with it. Also, I believe that ballet is very artistic and at the same time, very athletic. I respect what those dancers do, the skill they have, the work they put in, their dedication, all that... but y’all - ballet is not my jam!

For the most part, at the beginning, I stared at their feet. It really started to fuck my mind up quite a bit. Like, bless those poor little twisted up ankles, those poor toes...those bunions! A half hour in, I just wanted them to stop it and sit down.

I decided to stop watching the feet and focus on something else. But after a little while I became bothered by how extra the dancers were with their arms and fingers. I know it’s meant to add flair and look graceful and be beautiful and all that jazz, but damn...damn the ballet fingers! That shit is annoying.

And I also must admit, I don’t even know the story of the Nutcracker - so I was lost and couldn’t follow what the hell was happening to save my life. So really, all I had to get me through were the feet and fingers - that is, until the second grown male ballerina brought himself out into the light.

Now, the first grown male ballerina on stage was about as normal as any grown ass man in white satin tights doing ballet could be, I guess. I’m not all up to date on my ballet information so I have no idea what’s good or bad, but this guy seemed to be doing things as he should.

But then this second grown male ballerina made his way onto the stage. And y’all, I don’t even know what the hell you are supposed to call male ballerinas for real, but I know if I had to pick a name for this guy it would be “ballewiener”... because this guy totally forgot his dance belt. Which, I didn’t even know was a thing until this morning.

For those of you who aren't aware...

...a dance belt is a is a kind of specialized undergarment commonly worn by male ballet dancers to support their genitals. Most are similar in design to thong underwear. Dance belts were developed and considered desirable for male dancers and others to wear because various choreographic moves can otherwise result in pain or possibly even injury to the male genitalia which are not supported nor held snugly in place against the lower abdominal area, as well as skin-tight, body-hugging ballet tights would otherwise reveal the contours of the male dancer's anatomy to a degree of detail which could be considered distracting to the audience.

So “ballewiener”, in all his distracting glory, leaps and flies out onto the stage, lands with a swirl & a twirl...and I realize immediately that at 34 years old, I’m not mature enough for ballet.

...I may or may not have blushed.

...I may or may not have laughed a tad longer than I care to admit.

...And then I may or may not have thoroughly weirded out.

For real, I am not making this up - this man had his dingus straight up in the 12 o’clock position, his satin white tights were splitting his balls in two, and the head of his dingus looked like he stuck a damn bouncy ball in his tights right below his belly button.

And there were children there! So many CHILDREN!

So now, for me, the ballet consists of twisted feet and fancy fingers getting on my nerves, and a flying dingus -  just swirling & twirling & jumping about - right in front of me!

It was awkward, y’all. Really fuckin’ awkward....me and the ballet just weren't vibing.

So, in an effort to walk away from this adventure with some sort of positivity, I moved my focus away from the dancers and over to the props...and I must say that I really, honestly, enjoyed that part of the show.

And just so you know - despite “ballewiener” being a tad absentminded with his costume, I think he ended up being quite an impressive dancer. I can’t be real sure because I didn’t watch him much, but when the show was over and they all came out to take a final bow...I'd be lying if I told ya he didn't get the biggest applause. 😉

- Crow

We’re not allowed in the Porn Store anymore.

Okay y’all - surely by now you have seen the picture of Cousin Eddie in our front yard, right? Yeah, man - he’s basically the coolest thing to hit 202 since Dale moved in.

(Unless you ask Slim, she’s absolutely against his whole entire existence.)

But just let me tell y’all a little something about this Cousin Eddie project - because of it, I’m about 96.7% sure that we are no longer allowed in Love Stuff.

So last Thursday we go on a spontaneous adventure for some good ass food, which for me translated to Ginger Chicken & Broccoli from P.F. Changs. I don’t remember what the hell Dale & Jason ate, but that’s neither here nor there, just minute details for dramatic effect. Anyhow...

On the way back home I’m spouting off plans and wishing I could locate a mannequin for said project, so we decide to stop in at Love Stuff - because porn stores ALWAYS have mannequins, right? I figured that maybe, just maybe, we might be able to charm the owner and come out with an old dusty ass tired ass mannequin from the shed out back. I had legit dreams here, y’all.

So, we put on our sweet faces and walk in on our mission. Jason knows the guy who owns the place, so he goes straight back to the corner to his office. I follow behind.  

Dale, being the hot damn mess that she is, lolly-gags and piddle-dicks around for a minute and comes up behind us at the door of the owner’s office. I see her walk up - oh, there she is! - and I turn back around to the discussion at hand.

And it happens...

She somehow slings a hip into a stack of boxes...which would have been no big deal.

Except the box on the top fell the fuck off the stack...which would have been no big deal.

Except the contents of the box were glass, and very fragile...and everything in the box shattered when it hit the floor.

Me and Jason exchange a look of “what in the solid fuck just happened?” and turn around to see her standing there, frozen with panic. The owner rushes out of his office past us, grabs the box up off the floor and begins to open it.

...I’ll admit, at this point, I’m starting to panic.

And y’all, you can’t make this shit up...it was a box of METH PIPES. Fuckin’ meth pipes!

...and she broke the. whole. fuckin’. entire. box.

Upon seeing the contents of the box, I decide that we can’t even worry about that shit - I’m totally seeing it as divine intervention that just saved some poor asshole’s life - or at least hindered him or her from making it worse, right?

...but this is where Dale tucks tail and hauls ass out of the porn store.

...and sadly, this is also where our mannequin mission failed.

(In case you were wondering, Cousin Eddie came from the Helping Hands store in New Castle.
I ventured into that establishment alone the next day.) 

Imagine.

Imagine:

You're at a concert. At a relatively nice place. On a Sunday. And it took all you had to even entertain the idea of going, much less to actually get up, get dressed, and go.

And then your best friend acts like this:

Now, also imagine:

That door was locked. A great big brute biker chick was on the other side droppin' a big stinkin' load. Your best friend acts like this, blows her knee out, and lands on her face. The big brute biker chick comes out mad as 10 motherfuckers. And is fixin' to beat her ass.

And there you stand.

And you have to take that ass whoopin' because your best friend is injured. And you have to pack her bummed up ass back through the crowd to get help to get her to the truck. And the homie that's there with y'all refuses to help, because he's holding all the beer, and trying keep a random creepy concrete guy from Wisconsin occupied and away from you.

And then....you miss the best two songs by Candlebox.

Just imagine.

Thank God the door was unlocked, right?

Ash Trays & Bad Decisions

“You girls are so funny on Facebook!"

“If I’m sad I just go on Facebook and see what
you two have been doing.”

“You should start a blog or do more live videos on Facebook.”

We hear this all the time. And by “all the time”, I mean like - we probably hear it more often than we wash our hair.

We hear this everywhere we go. And by “everywhere”, I mean like - once, a grieving mother at a funeral home said this to us with a snot rag in her hand.

Our reply to comments such as these are usually something along the lines of, “You should see the shit we don’t post!” or “The fun never stops!” And that’s the truth, y’all. Every single day, we find a way to make the best of whatever we are doing, or we manage to land ourselves right up in the middle of a shit show that leaves us with a story tell. Either way it goes, we’re gonna find a way to laugh with, or at least AT, each other.

We do find it crazy that we can positively impact so many other lives by just doing what we do...because honestly, we are nothing more than a couple broke, coarse, smart ass bitches who have a love for life, laughter, adventure & live music; who were somehow blessed with the exact same inappropriate & ornery sense of humor; who managed to cross paths one day...and immediately decided to be best friends.

(Please note that all impacts are not positive, some of you fuckers hate us and we know it!)

I mean, we have the same first name, we both have family tradition middle names that suck ass, and we both have our mother’s maiden names, we both have brothers that we didn't know about for our whole entire lives, we are both Pisces, we are both Steelers fans, we are both assholes. Why would we NOT be best friends? This shit right here was fuckin’ meant to be!

Anyhow, the point.

We joke about writing books about our adventures all the time - so far though, we've only managed to come up with the titles for the first two. (Low Fuel, followed by Slow Leak) However, this past Saturday morning, as Dale returned home from her routine weekend morning trip to McDonald’s to get us “so many McMuffins and so many hash browns”, she walked in the back door and said “Damn, it smells like a fuckin’ ash tray in here!” And from my bed, I followed that statement up with “...and bad decisions, don’t forget those.”  I cracked up - thinking that we had just come up with our third book name. 

Then today, somehow that conversation inspired me. And man, do I love me some inspiration.  (It also helps that my Madre has been all but begging me to write more since the weather sucks and I’m good at it...and I promised her that I would.)

Shortly after I began feeling inspired, my best friend shoots me a message....“Man, we should really start that blog.”  and my mind ran straight out of the gate.

So here it is - we’ve got our title, you've got some back story, we’ve got shit I’ve already written in my personal blog that we can copy over to get this thing going...

....and we've still got so many stories to tell.  

With that being said, y'all - welcome to our shit show.... "Ash Trays & Bad Decisions". ♥

Throwback: Clitoris-Rex.

All of a sudden, last Friday - the Christmas Spirit hit me like a snowball to the ear. Due to this sudden burst of holiday cheer, I decided that I needed to go to the Mega Cavern and see the Lights Under Louisville. I figured since I was going no matter what, I might as well take a car load of kids with me to share the awesomeness of the millions of Christmas Lights. I immediately called my best friend and my boyfriend, and rallied up some kid troops.

On Saturday, we loaded up and took off to Louisville. We stopped at McDonald's to fill our bellies, then we had to make a quick stop at the mall to grab some last minute presents before we went to see the lights. We decided to use the moment of silence as they ate to lay down the law. Jdale, being the great disciplinarian that she is, took charge. "Now, you little turds listen up. When we get in this mall, all three of you are gonna have to pipe down and stay close. It will be very easy for us to get separated and for you to get lost or kidnapped. Don't make me have to karate chop every one of ya, because I will!"


Damion says: "Okay."
Abby says: "Okay."
Hunter says: "If someone tries to take me, I'm gonna kick him in the balls."


Jdale, being proud of her son for having a solid stranger danger plan of action, nods and says: "Good plan...but what if its a woman?"

Hunter replies: "I'm gonna kick her in the clitoris."

At this point, I've managed to suck a whole fry down my throat and almost choke to death. Jdale is laughing hysterically and can hardly breathe. I'm thinking that at 9 years old, if he knows that word, he should probably think it's a dinosaur. Hunter's face turns red, as he's realizes that maybe, just maybe, he shouldn't have said that word. Jdale snaps her head around to look him in the eye and asks: "son, what in the world do YOU know about a clitoris?!"

Hunter, not to be made to look dumb or embarrassed any further, tells us matter of factually:  "I know that it looks like a butt, and it goes like this..." He takes his finger and draws a curved line in the air and goes "muuuuuuuuurrrrrrrpppppp".

We both let out a sigh of relief that this child really didn't know what a clitoris was, that he had just randomly spat out the word because he's that cool. Not knowing if it was appropriate to give the boy an anatomy lesson of that nature, we just let it ride...all the way to the mall, where they all stayed close and no one got kidnapped.

And plus, the Christmas lights were uh-mazing! :)

Throwback: Happy Anniversary, Jdale!

A little over a year ago, during one of many White Trash Wednesday events in the Trailerhood, I pulled out the old trusty Burn Book. It was the first time I'd had it out in 8 months. As I flipped through it, page by page, recalling every splendid memory and laughing candidly about each and every random quote, I thought to myself..."Damn, I miss Jdale." Of course, being all tough about it, what I said to everyone was...."Too bad she sucks ass these days..." and I brushed it off and carried on. That same night, we brought the Burn Book out of retirement, and wrote a ton of hilarious shit down on a fresh crisp page. A new beginning of sorts.

The next day, I received at text that said "I think you need to call Jdale. You miss her and you can't say you don't because I saw it in your eyes when you opened the notebook last night." I replied with, "Of course I miss her, but that don't mean shit...I still ain't talking to her." All tough again.

Turns out, this mediating friend of mine was very persistent. He kept on and on trying to convince me to call her. Even after I cussed him out and had tantrums about it, he still kept on. When my stubbornness proved to be impenetrable, he took it upon himself to contact her instead....and convince her to talk to me.

Later that night I received another text, this one a forward. "Please tell her I love her and I miss her. And I'm sorry. She's my soul mate, and I'd give anything to have her back." I was at work, and the only thing I knew to do was rely on Nikki to give me sound advice...she had never failed me. After we weighed every pro and con, and went back and forth for hours - I was still torn about what to do. (And I was also mad as hell, because it was all stupid-head Casey's fault for even putting this all on the table in first place!)

After that, I don't remember exactly what happened. I'm not sure if I texted her or if she texted me or what...but we spoke and made plans. EBG's Saturday Night, we'd have a beer.

Saturday night, there I sat - by myself at EBG's, kicking myself for even agreeing to the dumb shit, but even still - an hour early. I ordered a bucket of beer, sat there and drank. The band started, I sat there and listened. And then the door opened, and like a beacon of light in the night...there she was. My long lost best friend. My Jessica #Koff. The Executioner to my Mastermind.The Bubba to my Forrest Gump. The Ren to my Stimpy. The air drummer in my air band. My soul mate. My non-driving, loud-mouthed, obnoxious, ridiculous, intellectually-challenged....best friend.


"...the Jessica's are back. Tell a friend."
Immediately, it was fine. We were back together like we'd never missed a beat. We made it official with a picture on Facebook.

Today, we're celebrating our one year anniversary. We never thought that the stupid green 5 subject notebook that we purchased to document our epic adventures in, would end up being the one thing that would eventually bring us back together..but it did. And it now holds a whole new year's worth of memories.

I also feel compelled to thank Casey Chadwell once again, for battling it out with me through my most stubborn and conflicted times. He forced me to get my head out of my ass and made me realize that what I really needed in my life at the time, was her. Of all the gifts this man ever gave me, giving me my best friend back is the one thing I'll be forever grateful for.

I love you, Jessica Delaine Dale. Now, put yer titty back up, we've got celebrating to do. :)