The Day I Took Out a Palm Tree and Broke My Face

 Here is a little story that happened many moons ago….many, many moons ago. 

I was 13 years old and living on a military base, we were stationed on Anderson AFB on the tiny island of Guam.  Which by the way I hated and I do not recommend anyone go there to visit, but that is a separate subject.

As a military brat, living on the security of a military base, I rode my bike pretty much anywhere on the base, as long as it wasn’t a restricted area.   One sunny hot afternoon I went for a bike ride with a boy that I had a little crush on.  Looking back I have no clue why, he had a rat tail and wore those “Hammer Pants” with a tank top.   I know, makes not sense to me either, so glad my taste improved. 

Ok back to the story.  Guam has a lot of steep hills and cliffs, so you can get a workout riding your bike.  I am chilling trying to act cool because you know I have a crush this boy and then he proposes that we go to this one particular hill on the base. He says it is really cool.  I was down with that.  Although I had no idea what I was getting myself into or what was about to occur. 

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Back From the Mountains

Well I am back and in one piece….almost. First I was surprised to find out that this little cabin was in fact in the mountains. Who knew there were mountains in Oklahoma?

We arrived at our very charming little cabin on Monday afternoon.  Here check out our cabin ain’t it cute?

Here let me give you a tour of the inside.

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Stretched, Balanced, Breathed and Pretzled

Lead Foot Under Threat of Being Amputated

This is not my proudest moment but it was bound to happen.  I mean really it was a matter of time.  At 29 years old I received my first speeding ticket and man was it a dozy. Now this is not the first time I get pulled over, but it is the first time I get a ticket.  Apparently I am not as young and cute anymore…..LOL

Hubby had been out of town for a few days at a conference and flew back in on Tuesday.  I was excited when he called to tell me that they had finished early and were catching an earlier flight.   The plan was he was flying into the airport and carpooling to his office where I would pick him up.  I told him to call me when he was about 15 mins out from him office.  Well he got distracted and called me 5 mins. out instead.  So excited to see my husband again and in a hurry I jumped into my 4 cylinder Honda Element and jumped on the Polk Parkway. 

Now indulge me as I make excuses.  First I live in Florida which is pretty flat and the highways maximum speed limit is 75.  So I jump on the park way trying to reach my customary 80 mph, because 5 mph over is usually no big deal.  Well big stinking mistake because apparently the Parkway is very different from the highway….because it is 65 instead of 75.  As I am “flying” down the Parkway and a little distracted this Sheriff’s car comes out of no where and pulls me over.  I was informed then that I was doing 78 in a 65….that is 2 mph below reckless driving.  To top it off I could not find my registration. 

I called Hubby to let him know that I was going to be running a little late.  Oh, and that I would be greeting him with 2 tickets one for $183.33 for speeding and one for $75.00 for driving without my registration.  On the plus side if I take the ticket and show my registration they will wave the $75.00 fine.  I am also very lucky to have a husband that can chuckle and my special surpises and just threaten to cut off my lead foot. Considering I have to go to traffic school to avoid getting points on my license they might as well cut off my foot.  SUPER FUN!

I Am Engaged: How it Happened (and how I messed it up)

#1 Most Embarassing Moment

Now we all have embarrassing moments and there are different degrees of embarrassment, but I can tell you which one was my #1 most embarrassing moment.

I was 13 years old and my family had just been stationed in Guam for a few months. I was going to the local middle school off base which was a dive. I living in Guam and the entire time I was there I hated almost everything about it, it is not a place I would encourage a person to move to, in the 9 months I was there I went through 2 typhoons and many other insufferable trials.

Anyway, being 13 years old I of course had a crush on a boy. The boy’s name was Damon and looking back at pictures now I wonder how it was that I had a crush on this boy, but they were different times, times when the rat tail was cool. So after school Damon asks if I want to go out and ride my bike with him….I’m like….um YEAH! I grab my aqua green 10-speed and off we go. We are hanging out riding around having fun, going up and down hills, the base takes up the entire northern point of Guam which is pretty elevated and has steep hills and cliffs. So we are riding our bikes down these steep hills really fast and Damon turns to me and tells me about a really cool hill over in the officer’s housing area, do I want to go? (Um….hello…..crush…..yeah of course I want to go!) I say sure and off we go. Allow me to describe the landscape to you, we come into a circle with houses all along the side and grass in the middle of the circle, he then points to the hill for me, off to the left there is no hill it is practically a CLIFF, really steep and looks like it goes straight up and at the top is the base commander’s house, with the American flag in the front yard and everything. The idea here is to go to the top of the “hill” careen you bike down the “hill” and go around the circle at the bottom of the “hill” as many times as possible. So being that I was a not so wise…..or coordinated….13 year old with a huge crush I said, “Sure I can do that!” So we start to ride our bikes up this “hill”….but it is so freaking steep I have to push it up the “hill”. We get to the top of the “hill” (notice my over use of quotation marks) and I kid you not I might as well have been on the top of Mt. Everest….but remember I am in a fog because of my crush. Damon says that he will go first to show me how to do it, not to worry, he does it all the time, no sweat, off he goes down the “hill” and around the circle at least 2 times. Here I am at the top of the “hill” still, extremely nervous and with a horrible knot in my stomach, something is telling me not to do this…..ah yes…but I am in a “crush fog”, so I get on my aqua green 10-speed and off I go…WEEEEE…….AHHHHHH…….NOOOOOO……….HOLY COW!…….OH MY GOSH!…….(did I mention the brakes on my bike hadn’t been working properly)………A TREE!……….THUD!……..

About a second later when I came around, I am laying on the ground and I look up and there are about 4 mothers and Damon looking down on me. Damon has a goofy smirk on his face like he is trying to keep from laughing, all the moms are in a panic asking me if I am ok. So I get up and I feel a little dazed but ok. I look and my aqua green 10-speed is wrapped around a palm tree, I am then informed t
hat I rode my bike…..and my face straight into the palm tree….if I looked hard enough I could see the imprint of my face in the trunk of the tree. So I grab my bike and I notice that behind the tree there is nothing….but the edge of a cliff and the roof of a concrete house 10 feet below….um yeah! I try and take my bike home, but the wheels are all bent and it isn’t going anywhere, the moms offer to give me a ride, but I am feeling ok, I say I can walk (I am about a mile away from home). Damon and I start to walk home and he keeps asking me if I am ok, and being the cool chick that I was I played it off, sure I am fine…all the while spitting blood.

I finally get home and walk in the door and I though my mother was going to freak! She went into a panic, asked me what in the world happened, she frantically tries to get in touch with my Dad, but he has left work early (this is before the time of cell phones), so she calls and ambulance. Ambulance pulls up in the drive way, my father pulls up in the drive way, freaks out and the ambulance carts me off to the hospital. I am still in shock feeling no pain yet…30 mins later, I am in tears, my entire face if throbbing and bruises are forming all over my body. Finally I get medicated and the pain starts to go away. I get my x-rays done and the doctor informs me and my parents that I have broken my jaw into 3 pieces and dislocated my jaw, if I hadn’t had braces, I might have lost half of my teeth. FUN! Ultimately my mouth was wired shut for 1 month. I spent an entire month sucking soups and protein shakes through a straw.

#2 most embarrassing moment, when the hot Orderly came in with a questionnaire and had to ask me when my last bowel was…..I was 13….I wanted to die!

What? You ask what happened with Damon? Well Damon and I never happened, when I got back to school after breaking my face on a palm tree trying to impress him, I found out that he was going out with Kat, the home schooled girl with the pre-pubescent overdeveloped chest……Go figure!