aka Chesty LaRue

15! 15 Anniversaries, AH AH AH

 Today is a special day.  Let me tell you a little story about it.

Many years ago, there was a girl..

Ok, not THAT many years ago.  (But wasn't I the cutest in my little pigtails?)

Many years ago, back in the 1980's, there was a girl:.

A girl who loved hairspray, Wham! and apparently Jessica McClintock faux velvet dresses with big portrait collars.

There was also a boy:.

Who really hated wearing ties. 

They grew up in different parts of the country, but at one point, each of them had the same thought:  Screw this college thing, I'm going to join the Army and have an adventure!.

So skinny those cheekbones could cut glass..

Cropped to protect the innocent.

His best friend and her best friend thought that they should meet, as the Boy and Girl would probably get along great.  However, his best friend was actively pursuing Girl at the time.  Girl was not interested, as she had a boyfriend over in Germany, and their love was going to LAST, BY GOD.  As only the love of 19 and 20 year olds can. 

However, Girl and Boy met, and Girl was smitten.  But she thought Boy didn't like her because he was SO MUCH OLDER THAN HER (in her head) - by 5 whole years, even.  She was convinced he thought of her as a sister.  She was wrong.

She moved in with him, and waited.  .

Christmas rolled around and they had a tiny little tree in their tiny little apartment, and there was a tiny little box under the tiny little tree.  Girl was convinced Boy was going to propose to her.  On her birthday (shortly before Xmas, which has always been sucky in terms of gifts) he gave her the little box.

It was a watch.

She sobbed and he, being a guy, had no idea what was going on.  She brought him up to speed on where she thought this was going.  He said very little.  .

 

Boy claims that at some point prior to Christmas Girl woke him up in the middle of the night and essentially told him to shit or get off the pot where marriage was concerned.  Girl has absolutely no recollection of this at all.  Really.

Girl then brought Boy home to meet her family, and Boy brought Girl home to meet his family.

It seemed to go well..

(Boy bonding with Stepfather in the bar while Girl and her mother enjoyed the musical stylings of The Sound of Music at the local dinner theatre.)

Then Boy's friend from college was getting married and he and Girl decided to go to Long Island to the wedding.  After a little liquid courage and a boisterous dancing round of "Feeling Hot Hot Hot", Boy followed Girl out to the front of the hotel, afraid she was leaving.  (Girl again asks, where was she to go on Long Island with no car?)  He then dropped to one knee and proposed.  Girl was so shocked (thinking she was going to be an Old Maid at 21 and he would never ask her, never, because she was stupid that way) that she yanked him up off the ground and said, "Yes, of course!  Let's go back inside."

It was more romantic than it sounds..

Engagement night.  And no, I don't know what is on my face.

And thus they were married, on June 19, 1993:.

There was dancing:.

And YOU were there, and YOU were there....

And the Chick was there:.

aka Chesty Larue would like to apologize to the Chick (and to her other bridesmaids as well) for making her wear a heavily flowered large portrait collared dress with lace, from the Jessica McClintock wedding line, which several years later was featured in the Jessica McClintock upholstery line. 

There was also a cake, which Girl requested NOT have crystal swans gliding on blue gel, and NOT have little firecracker looking decorations, and not listing in the blistering NC heat like the Leaning Cake of Pisa:.

Girl would like to let Boy know that this cake STILL traumatizes her, she is not over it, and to expect to hear about it until we die.  Even though it did taste good.

And thus Girl and Boy did increase their family over time, having two lovely girls, one resembling her mother, and one resembling her father (I leave it to you, Reader, to figure out who is who):.

The children grew up too damn fast:.

.

.

And Girl is happy that in spite of the fact that she cannot categorize houses she likes in terms of "3 bedrooms, 3 baths" like Boy does, but rather "character", and that she loves change and Boy doesn't, and that there will always be fundamental disagreements about all kinds of things, she is still happy she married Boy.  And she freely admits that no one makes a margarita like him, and that his food is FABULOUS.  .

And that after 15 years together (and far too many sentences beginning with "and") he's still got the mojo.

Happy Anniversary, Honey.

He Was Young, He Needed the Money

While out to dinner the other evening, I mentioned to El Jefe that he should go over and comment on the Chick's blog for Thursday, as it was Group Therapy Thursday, and she wanted people to confess something that others wouldn't know about them.  I asked El Jefe what he might contribute.

"Well, I could tell them about my Cosmo spread." he said.

And I started laughing because I had forgotten about it.  And because it was TRUE.

First Cosmo Cover Ever, 1972.  A bit before El Jefe's cover spread.

Back in the day, El Jefe was a young studly soldier in the U.S. Army.  Tall, blondish, lovely eyes.  Cosmo magazine swept into town to do a photo shoot about unusual occupations for women, and they chose being a soldier as one of them, in particular the Staff Sergeant of the Year.  (This is where I should probably be insulted over the phrase "unusual occupation for women" having been a soldier at that time myself, but I have gotten over it with the help of a lot of therapy, chocolate and margaritas.) 

Of course no good woman soldier should be alone in her photos - she should be surrounded by buff men in uniform (this I completely support) and this is where El Jefe comes in.  He was the right height and build (i.e. Tall, blond, blue-eyed - they were going for a very WASPy look) for what they were looking for, and he got to be one of the nameless buff men to hang with the hot Army Chick Representing For Those of Us Who Wore The Uniform Back Then.  So he actually was ORDERED to participate in a spread for Cosmo. 

He said it was interesting, and that they had to do all kinds of poses.  He spent half the morning (or 20 minutes, it just seemed like a long time) hanging half-way up a rope.  Apparently when he was done he had huge guns ("Talk about this way to the gun show!").  I asked him about if he did his best "Blue Steel" and he said no.

"I'm pretty sure there's a lot more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good looking. And I plan on finding out what that is."

There is a rather sad ending to this story, though.  Not a single picture of El Jefe made it into Cosmo.  Apparently it was too much hotness for the masses.  That and they only used one picture from the photo shoot. 

G and S thought this was all very interesting, and wanted to know why he agreed to have his picture taken for Cosmo.  He thought for a second, and then said, "I was young, I needed the money."

Oh El Jefe - The Pipes, The Pipes Are Calling...

The other night El Jefe and I were discussing the day's events as we were drifting off to sleep (translation - El Jefe was listening to me babble about the days events while he was TRYING to drift off to sleep, unless said conversation involved poker) and he brought up my trip to Ireland this coming November.

Back-story - my lovely Aunt M is having a Very Significant Birthday this year and has decided that she wanted to spend this Very Significant Birthday sitting in a pub in Ireland, having a beer.  All of which seems like a great idea to me.  I heartily endorse this plan, and along with my Mother, my sister JMa, and her girlfriend LR, invited myself along to partake in the fun. 

El Jefe is our trip planner and was telling me about some of the cool places he had found for us to stay.  I started to reminisce about our family trip to Ireland in 2004 that we took with some good friends from our Army days.  We had spent a day in Toronto (exploring El Jefe's old stomping grounds), a couple of days in London, and about 8 days in Ireland.  G loved it because of the excessive amount of potatoes she was able to eat, and S loved it because there were lots of things to climb on.  El Jefe made his pilgrimage to Jameson, where he was made an Official Taster, and I bought sweaters.  A fun time was had by all.

(#10 in a series titled, "S pretending to do what the sign forbids you to.")

Me:  We stayed in some pretty nice places in 2004.

(The Fairmont Royal York.  I HIGHLY recommend Fairmont hotels.  I've stayed at 3 of them, and while ungodly expensive, they are FABULOUS.)

El Jefe:  We stayed in some DIVES.  Seriously.

(Not actually open to the public.)

Me:  What?  I don't remember that.  I mean, we stayed in a palace, for Pete's sakes!

(Brooke Shields and Princess Diana stayed HERE.  Probably not at the same time though.  Or together.)

El Jefe:  Don't you remember the rooms over the bar?  And the place in London where I put my foot through the floor in the hallway?

(We didn't actually stay here - it just felt like it.)

Me:  No.... oh yeah!  (giggling) I do remember the place in London.  We had 4 single beds, no air conditioning, and it was an old Army barracks or something.  Wasn't it condemned originally?

El Jefe:  You're laughing at my pain?

     (You don't know how many pictures I had like this on the camera when the film was developed.)

Me:  (still giggling) No, no.  What about that place we stayed in Dublin?  That was pretty nice.  Within walking distance of everything.

(Not where we stayed.)

El Jefe:  You mean the one with no AC, one fan for the whole building, with stairs that went in 14 different directions and you had to go through the bathroom to get to the right floor? 

Me: (outright laughing now) OK, maybe it had its eccentricities, but the breakfast was good.

(Helpful street sign.)

El Jefe:  It was very centrally located near all the main stuff - Grafton Street, that famous Pub, etc.

Me:  I guess we did stay in a lot of dives, but that was probably due in part to paying for the Fairmont Hotel in Toronto and staying at the Palace.

(From the Toronto portion of the trip:  The Stanley Cup is like the Holy Grail - you must not look directly at it - like the sun.)

El Jefe:  You're complaining about staying at a PALACE? 

(Blarney.  Every family has at least one.)

Me:  Its not like it was an actual Palace.  It was the stables.

(Ye Olde Time Out Bench.  Very effective.)

El Jefe:  Jeez... beat you with a new stick and you still...

(Yo, Cheap Chick!)

Me:  What? 

El Jefe:  (Snore)

(Note:  Being a redhead I was excited to be going to Ireland - seeing my people and all.  However, in the entire time I was there I only saw 1 redhead - and she was an American.  If you want to go see The Redhead in its Native Habitat, I suggest you go to Scotland instead.  But that photo essay is for another day.)