Tall Chick In The City: #124 Tall Chick Flying South

Last Friday I left for Auburn, Alabama, home of my alma mater, Auburn University. I walked by the Vera Bradley store at the airport and was nearly blinded by the bright material. The bags are moderately tolerable one-at-a-time, but seeing an entire store is sensory overload. It looks like Vera herself threw up in there.

After passing through security I stopped at the little girl’s room, then heard my name over the PA system to come back to security for a lost item. Hmmm, I had my license and my backpack with lap top…what was I missing? I approached the security “office” and the little cubicle room held about eight people. One man asked me, “Are you missing anything?” I knew whatever my answer was I would feel stupid, and I was right. I had walked off without my carry-on luggage! I usually check my bags when I fly, but that is really no excuse. Maybe I can blame it on the muscle relaxer I took last night. My doc prescribed it for some low back pain and I did see memory loss as one of the symptoms. Holy cow – a great start to the weekend. At least I gave them all a good laugh.

As I drove from Hot-lanta to Auburn I heard one of my first favorite country songs on the radio – “Too Cold At Home” by Mark Chestnut. I resisted country music for most of my years at Auburn. The head trainer used to put the radio on a country station and then lock his office, with the music playing in the entire training room. Finally, my senior year I was dragged to a country bar two hours away in Dothan, Alabama - Cowboys. It had a huge dance floor and we learned how to two-step. It was so fun!

I met up with friends in Auburn, mostly former teammates, for a mini reunion/surprise 40th birthday party for Kendall. I played with Lisa, Kendall and Lynn. Steph was a trainer. Kendall married Stacy (a guy) who played football at Auburn. In all there were 11 people at Lisa’s house over the weekend, including her two boys and Kendall’s two boys. Whoa!!! We caught a women’s basketball game at the new arena, ate at Momma Goldberg’s, surprised Kendall with a stop at the Supper Club (the Velcro Pygmies are still playing!?) and capped off the weekend with the Auburn-Georgia football game Saturday afternoon. I saw people I hadn’t seen in almost 20 years! I think I laughed the entire weekend.

I got up at 4:30 a.m. Sunday to drive to Atlanta to catch a 9 a.m. flight. I had to get to work early Sunday and had also forgotten about the time change between Alabama and Georgia. I tried to be as quiet as I could in a house full of people. When I started the car my favorite college song started playing on the radio. The timing was perfect! It was the exact beginning of “Just Like Heaven” by the Cure. Too funny! I had a fabulous weekend with some great friends, the football Tigers won, and even though I didn’t get much sleep it was definitely worth it. War Eagle!

Hayes and Jake messing with (grandpa) Joe's picture at the arena museum