And who says “steady” anymore!

I slept the whole flight back to South Carolina.  My mom was gracious enough to pick me up when I arrived at 3:30am. I was walking out of the terminal, and my phone rang.

 

“Hey, ma.  I’m just walking towards baggage check.”

“Oh, okay.  I’m leaving the house now.”

“Oh… okay.  I’ll be here. [No, it's cool.  I can wait another 20 minutes to lie down in an actual bed.]”

Speaking of the airport in Columbia, SC, can we have a short conversation about the following ad?

Damn right, it's the only way to fly.  Especially since there aren't any other airports within 90 miles of Columbia.  And no, Owens Field, Augusta Regional, and any other airport that doesn't accommodate 747s and the like on a regular basis (and cost an extra $200 to fly into) do not count.  Shit, that almost describes Columbia Metro.

Anyway, the whole reason I was flying home was because my mom was throwing my sister a surprise 40^th birthday party.  We spent the whole next day gathering food and supplies, packing both cars, picking up more stuff from Publix (the high-class grocery store in Columbia), unpacking 2 carloads of stuff at the venue (the same venue where my sister’s wedding reception was held over 10 years ago), and going back across town to pick up my niece, nephew, and more stuff.

 

List in my iPhone:

Food on the stove

Mat in the cedar closet

Accordion folder with clips and other supplies

Thermos

Real plates

Hanging fake ferns

Black socks for mom

 

At one point, I took a trip to the local Wal-Mart Supercenter (according to Google Maps, there are 6 in Greater Columbia now).  I saw a bad omen in the parking lot

but decided to continue.

 

The whole experience was slightly surreal and extremely hilarious to me.  Especially the strategic placement of merchandise.

My favorite was the row of shops in the front of the building that spelled out a Missy verse.

If you a fly girl, get your nails done/ get a pedacure…

 

…get your hair did!

Don’t I look like a Halle Berry postah!

And I couldn't resist this paradox.

Nothing goes better with church than lube.  And I'm 12.

On the way out of my former favorite store (except for clothing... back then, it was a tossup between pre-Express Structure and Target), I saw something that baffled and confused me.  In Columbia, everyone has cars.  I mean, it may be a clunker that barely runs, but it gets you around.  There's little public transit (none on my side of town), and things are far apart.  So when I saw this,

I was utterly confused.  Did your car break down?  Could you not wait to get to Wal-Mart?  Are you drunk?  I mean, we're a good 8 miles from downtown, and cabs aren't exactly cheap outside of NYC.

Anyway, I picked up the kiddles, and we arrived just in time to help with final preparations before guests began to arrive.  Many of them were friends of my mom’s that I hadn’t seen in 5-10 years.  Here’s an awkward conversation for you:

“D. Kareem!  How are you?!”

“Oh, I’m doing well.  Loving New York, of course.”

“I bet!  And you look so good!”

“Oh, well thank you… So how’s [person not present]?”

How the hell do you respond to “You look so good” without sounding insincere (especially if the person in question doesn’t look so good).  Though, I'm rarely comfortable giving a "You too" response.  And to be fair, many people looked exactly like I remembered them from breaks during my early college years.

My favorite conversation of the night happened as I was

 sitting with my dad and my parents' double-date partners.  You know how every couple has another couple that they do couple-y stuff with, but it’s quite possible that none of them would be friends if they weren’t in their respective pairs?  That couple.

The wife is yabbering away about everything under the sun (including about how she yabbers away at everything under the sun), and then she asks me, “So, do you have a steady girl?”

“Excuse me?”

“A steady girl.  Do you have one?”

I had heard was she’d said; I was just hoping I'd heard wrong.  Do you not see the tight-ass jeans I’m wearing?  And I can barely sit down without popping a button on this shirt!  I guess you haven’t watched me walk.  And who says “steady” anymore!  

“No, I don’t.  No steady girl for me.  I’m more concentrating on myself right now.”  I took that opportunity to segue into career talk and not make eye contact with my dad (we haven’t so much talked about the whole gay thing since his not-so-ideal reaction to my coming out about 6 years ago).

We danced.  We did the 'Lectric Slide.  We shuffled Cupids.  And it ended up being a nice, somewhat low-key party.  I even drove home.  

God must have been mad at me for not going to church with the 'rents: did I mention that my Sunday-afternoon flight didn't leave until Monday morning, so I had to go directly from LaGuardia to work?  Yeah.

Last time I went back to Columbia, SC was for Christmas.  Click here to experience the ridiculousness.

Note: you may find the "Topics of Discussion" on the right and the  Cast of Characters to be of help in navigating this blog.

Oh, just a final note.  Someone commented a while back that I "must like white guys".  I responded that I just like hot guys.  Please refer to the picture above.  Just make sure you don't make your keyboard too sticky.