We Had Visitors Again!

We had visitors this weekend. Tom's nephew, Steve, and his friend Jorge (pronounced George though). They came down to visit us from Ohio. They arrived on Friday. Steve is the son of Tom's brother, Jim. He is a really nice guy. I won't say he's a nice kid because I did call him a kid (he's 25) and I don't think he liked that. But anyone that could be my son is a kid to me. The depressing part is that technically even someone who is 30 could be my kid. Now, of course, that would make me a really, really young mom but still. As that threshold of age rises, it's not pretty.

Anyway, Steve has a twin brother, David, and a sister, Amy. Overall, they are great kids and very polite and cool. I think they like Uncle Tom and Aunt Carolyn because we are not your typical type of old folks. We are pretty cool. I say this because we don't have children so we are always pretty lax when kids are around. They had only visited us once before when we lived in Florida. I think the boys were 15 and Amy was like 13. Of course, I am going to ramble about their first trip to visit us.

So anyway, when they came to visit us in Florida they stayed with us a few days. Okay, I think they had fun but we had several incidents that were iffy at best. One day Tom decides to take the kids to the beach, great. I had to work so I didn't go. When they got back they come in and say "Carolyn, Uncle Tom took us to a gay nude beach." I was like WTF? Even I was shocked at this. The thing is that Tom decided to try a new beach where he had never been. I think the sign that said"Clothing Optional" should have tipped them off but it didn't. So they end up getting to the beach and looking around when they notice everyone is nude. And then on further investigation, they notice that there are only nude men on the beach. Very interesting. I had to laugh because I guess that was a good life lesson for them: Never go to the beach with Uncle Tom.

Of course, the fun didn't end there. The night before they were leaving to go back home, I got really, really sick. I woke up only to be land in the Emergency Room with a high fever and non-stop vomiting. While Tom took the kids to the airport, I was being checked into the hospital to get may gallbladder taken out. Fun Times. Funny thing is the kids never came back to visit us again after that trip. Hmmmm, coincidence?

The last time I saw Steve was last year in Ohio when we went up for Thanksgiving. Of course, I was on the couch doped up on drugs after I threw my back out. So it's all sort of blurry. But since I missed Thanksgiving de to my back injury, it was sweet to come the day after Thanksgiving to see me all drugged out at grandma's house.

Actually Steve was supposed to come out last weekend but didn't want to drive the whole trip alone so he waited until this weekend when Jorge could drive with him. Well, we found out that in the end Jorge drove the whole way while Steve slept. Dios Mio! But that's Steve. The boys got here and immediately Tom takes them on the nickel tour of the house. (I am going to digress again. I thought I would warn readers before instead of after from now on.) All guests get a nickel tour when they come visit us. If you ever visit us, you will get the freaking nickel tour of the house. Tom does not discriminate. You can be a child of 5, an old person, someone who has been here before or some random guy of the street, you get the nickel tour.

The nickel tour consists of you being subjected to a walk-though of the house and shown all the funky stuff we own. Tom narrates and I have to follow along to add various stock comments and be the sidekick. You will get a story about our friend Manny from MANO Fine Art and shown his artwork, which rocks by the way. You will see my Day of the Dead Collection and other several weird pieces we picked up in our travels. Next you will see the Red Lady painting by a young Russian artist we met in Vegas. Then you will see the painting of our house in Coral Gables painted by my mom, which is actually quite good for a woman who just started painting about 5 years ago. (see above) Then we run you through the kitchen (nothing to see there) and then down the hallway to see my autographed print of "Life in Hell" done by Matt Groening who is most famous for The Simpsons. You will a picture of men's butts (don't ask) and then shown the guest room and bathroom.

Next will be the Master Bedroom and then the weirdo room that is just filled with boxes, 2 bookcases, an old love seat and my giant Speedy Gonzales plush toy. That leads you out to the sunroom/Cat's room. Next stop the garage but not before you see a print of Old Brecksville, my signed M*A*S*H script sent to me by Larry Gelbart and pictures of Tom's family. At the garage, I am allowed to continue on or stop. I usually stop. From the garage you will be shown the side yard and my garden and then taken around the back to the outside patio/grill area and then the front yard with a view of the river and then the front patio. The house is tiny so it doesn't take that long. One day when I figure out my Flip video camera, I will take you on the nickel tour and post it here on the blog.

So anyway, with the nickel tour done and after some catching up, Tom took Steve and Jorge on the fascinating tour of Jackson County which consists of touring Western Carolina University and Tom's office, scenic downtown Cullowhee, Sylva and then downtown Sylva, followed by Dillsboro and then the drive back to our house down on the road that runs parallel to the river (beautiful drive). When they got back, we went out to dinner. Yes folks, El Pacifico. If you read my blog, you know that all visitors get taken to El Pacifico Mexican Restaurant the first night they are here. It's so freaking delish!!

Usually our guests are our age or older so after dinner we would come home relax, have a few drinks and yak it up. On occasion, we do movie night for the guests. Most are satisfied with this. But when we got home with Steve and Jorge, Steve says I want to do something outside. Okay, we don't do things outside. Well at least I don't. My outside consists of me going out to my car and getting in and then coming back and getting out of the car and coming into the house. My other outside consists of my garden. I tolerate this outside only because I have to for the garden and veggies, otherwise, I don't so outside. So Jorge says he has a Frisbee so they go outside and play Frisbee. Tom joined them but I passed and opted to play a little Wii tennis, INSIDE.

It's then I started to realize then that we might be considered boring. We are homebodies and having young people in the house sort of highlighted the fact that we live a pretty sedate, easy-going existence, which I love but others may find dull. So they played Frisbee, drank beers, smoked cigars and then we went to bed. I think the boys stayed up way late playing Wii and drinking more beers. The next day they didn't get up until 11am.

Luckily, Saturday was a SPECTACULAR day that I even broke my own rules and went outside and not only to the garden. I actually grabbed a cup of coffee because the weather was so much cooler than usual and sat in the sun room and did some reading that wasn't on the computer!! I finally got around to reading Estevan Vega's book The Sacred Sin. Some of you might remember that name. Estevan was the featured author on the Virtual Latino Book Tour I hosted a few weeks ago. The book is fantastic and I really liked. I promised a friend of mine, Barbara, that I would send it to her once I read it. So Babba if you are reading this, expect it soon!!

Technically the sun room isn't outside but we have the windows open so it's like being outside. We just got some new patio furniture out there so it was terrific. The boys went hiking. I didn't join in because we all know I HATE HIKING! We had planned going tubing down the Tuckasegee River but because the weather cooled, they went hiking. Like I said, the day was gorgeous. We had a mini cold front come in so the weather cooled down and the humidity went away. We turned off the A/C and opened the windows and still had them open on Sunday. It almost felt like the beginning of Fall. OMG I can't wait for Fall.

So the boys had a perfect day to hike off the Blue Ridge Parkway on the Richland Balsam and Black Balsam Bald trails. According to the boys, it was fantastic hiking. It really is beautiful around here. Like I said before, this area is great to visit if you enjoy a lot of outdoor activities because there is not much else to do in town. If you like Fall, it is also a great place but for the most part it's pretty low energy.

The night before we found out that Jorge worked at a restaurant so when they got back from their hike, he made us dinner. I had planned on making steak and baked potatoes already but Jorge offered or was guilted into making us dinner. And can I say what a treat that was. I am so NOT used to having anyone cook for me. So to be able to sit back and have someone else cook a great meal was heaven. Luckily, I had everything he needed including corn. Believe it or not, some corn came in and it's absolutely delish. I couldn't believe the corn worked. We are so planting more next year.

First, Jorge made us some bruschetta with some tomatoes, garlic and fresh basil from my garden. He put it on bread and baked it up with Parmesan cheese. Doesn't that look good? It was absolutely delish!! I loved it and saved what was left and then had it for breakfast the next day. Then Jorge baked up some potatoes and corn on the grill and then the steaks. He made a simple rub of just salt, pepper, garlic and onion salt and they were so good. What more do you need? We even ate outside on the back patio for the first time since we lived here. It was a fantastic night with good friends and good food.

We immediately made Jorge our honorary nephew and gave him an open invitation to come visit anytime he wants!! He cooked the whole meal and I really didn't have to do a thing except butter up the corn. There is nothing like having a guest who is a good cook and then have said guest cook! He even tried to help clean up but I said no that Steve and Tom should clean up. Tom did his part but Steve, oh Steve, just ate the remaining corn. You gotta love Steve.

The rest of the night the boys went outside, smoked more cigars, drank bourbon and talked boy stuff. Then one of Steve's friends from Brecksville who now lives in Asheville came down and visited for a while. By this time I was in bed with Tom following close behind. The boys stayed up late again although they had to leave early Sunday.

Sunday came and they rolled out of bed, drank coffee and left. It was really nice of Steve to come down and want to visit us. It was sweet and we had a great time with them here. They were easy-going guests that you don't have to do much for. And I loved that Jorge cooked for us because that was super duper nice of him to do so since he was our guest! Plus, they were a lot of fun and made us laugh. I think Tom had a great time as well. It's nice that he can bond with his nephew.

The rest of Sunday was lazy, how unusual, right? I picked more veggies from the garden. My squash plants are dying and I have no idea why. I don't know if they ran their course or the critters got to them. The tomatoes are totally out of control but there are so many more green tomatoes on the vines. I can't wait until they get ready to eat. I might even get crazy and pick some before they ripen to make Fried Green Tomatoes. YAY!

So that was our adventure this weekend. It was a lot of fun.

Last picture: Steve and Uncle Tom.