Southern Hospitality

I just got my first *true* taste (quite literally!) of southern hospitality last Saturday night. My neighbors invited me for dinner with their family. Little did I know that they meant ALL of her family! There must have been close to 30 people that showed up! Her grandfather cooked - and he is from New Orleans - WOW!!!! We had gumbo, and for dessert - bananas foster. The bananas wouldn't light - so they just kept dumping more rum in to speed up the process! It's a very good thing that I only live about 50 feet away - I was in no shape to drive any where after that!!

On a different note - I'm "dating" someone. I say that loosely - we haven't met. He lives 550 miles away. I must be crazy. He is coming up (I think) for my birthday weekend, and we've already got the plane for Thanksgiving - and yes, he will meet my dad. This is kind of a big decision for me. I've never let any guy that I've dated meet my dad - not even Jim. I guess in my heart I knew he wasn't going to be "the one", but really just didn't want to admit it because I loved him (note the past tense there). This one is different. I miss him and we haven't seen each other in 14 years. He dated one of my best friends in high school, which made him off limits back then. No such problem now! He still talks to her (they live in my hometown), but there's nothing there. What he doesn't know is that I'm actually coming down next week to visit early - he has no clue. I'm really hoping he has not found this blog, but I don't think he has or he would have given me shit about some of the stuff on here already. This is weird - we've already had all of the "important" conversations - we just haven't seen each other. I've begged, and I mean literally begged, my stepsisters (2 in particular) to behave themselves at Thanksgiving. We are also going to a Thrashers game Sat. night of Thanksgiving. I am going to an NHL game - WOOHOO!!!! I'm glad he's going too, but I'm REALLY excited to finally get to a hockey game - it's been wwwwaaaaayyyyyy too long!