a totally tacky weekend

I’ll spare you from any excuses, and just give it to you straight. For the last two weeks, I’ve neglected blogging any new recipes. Sure, I’ve made a few desserts to take to various events, but they weren’t even close to Paleo. With such a busy schedule, I think I made sautéed fish and broccoli three or four nights last week. Nothing creative, but at least it was healthy amid all the holiday food. I’m getting back into my normal routine again, so look for a few new recipes this week.

Until then, I’ll recap our busy weekend. Friday night, we attended the birthday party of a CFA member. It was a tacky shirt party, but I didn’t get the memo. James, however, got several memos that must have mentioned it was a tacky shirt, tacky pants and tacky accessories party. I met him at the house party after the gym closed Friday, and was just as stunned as everyone else to see him stroll through the door with skin-tight black pleather pants, a guido shirt unbuttoned to his belly button and a thick gold chain. Too bad you can’t see the pants here.

Several tacky outfits actually rivaled James’. The birthday boy wore a blue onesie.

And his roommate borrowed another of his onesies and paired it with elf shoes.

Christy Kay strutted in wearing the most modern tacky sweater of the night. She found it at Goodwill for $5, but cinched it with a green velvet ribbon in the back and paired it with black leggings and black boots. Somehow, I began to question my fashion taste as I became envious of her outfit.

It was a fun night, even with a slight accident during a head-to-head burpee contest on the kitchen floor. But what party isn’t complete without a Crossfitter getting injured? Somehow, we only manage to incur injury outside the gym.

Saturday night, we were invited to a tacky Christmas sweater party in Decatur. (Love your new place Jamie!) Luckily, I got the memo this time, and ironically, that turned out to be disastrous. I found a red velour shirt/green sequined shrug ensemble at Goodwill last weekend. As I put it on Saturday night, I started to get a little itchy and blotchy on my neck. By the time we left for the party 30 minutes later, you’d think I’d just inhaled a vacuum dust bag. I got all the normal symptoms: constant sneezing, scratchy throat, watery eyes, overall miserableness. So on the way to pick up our friend Bair, James bought me some benadryl and I switched to another shirt, but chose to keep the green shrug. I’m certain that whomever donated the red velour shirt to Goodwill lived in a house full of cats.

So Bair, being the innovative thinker he is, decided he should wear the red velour top, while James showed up in a familiar tacky sweater. I tried to trade him for my velour top, but he stood his ground. And as you’ll notice, he’s become quite attached to that gold chain.

Sara Manning and I were in heaven with the assortment of cheese at the party.

And from what I heard, the punch bowl of spiked eggnog was so good it was drained well within the first hour. Of course, we wouldn’t know, because Bair’s expert navigation system on his phone took us 25 minutes south of the party. So we showed up roughly an hour after it began. All the while, I was stuck in the car with Bair wearing that red velour top…torture.

With her fuzzy Santa sweater, Sara kept reminding me that I’d better be good for goodness sake…

But that was before Bair stuck his animated elf hat on her head and pushed the button.

After that, it was all she could do to practice what she preaches about being nice as the top of the hat bounced from side to side with the bell ringing incessantly.

The invitation said to bring a white elephant gift worth no more than $15. James and I interpreted this with liberty, and scrounged up a few funny items we already had at home. I was the first to take a gift from the table, and, as you can imagine, my mouth dropped to the floor when I opened up a $25 gift card to Saks Fifth Avenue. Who gives nice gifts at a white elephant exchange? Once again, I didn’t get the memo.

I was really turning red after the first few gifts opened were all nice–Starbucks giftcard, foam roller, scarf and glove set, Best Buy giftcard, car detailing kit. James and I just looked at each other with widened eyes.

But it seems that our gifts, and the few other funny gifts, were randomly chosen last. From the way it seems things played out, the people who brought the nice gifts got the funny gifts, and vice versa. Oops.

When the backside mousepad I brought was opened, no one could contain the laughter. It took quite a while for people to catch on to it’s functional aspect–the mousepad. (Oh, and thanks for that gift for my birthday Gret. It was the perfect re-gift!) And believe it or not, that gift was actually stolen by someone else. I had no idea it would be such a hit.

James realized he didn’t have a gift to bring just minutes before we left for the party, and we scrounged the house to come up with a baby angel ornament, complete with a crocheted dress. Once again, when that gift was opened, people couldn’t get enough of it. So the key message here is: Laughter is priceless.

James stole the foam roller (no surprise there), until it was stolen from him. Then he stole the Starbucks giftcard, which was also swiped from his hands. He ended up with a mechanical bug…