well maybe not all of you, but at least julie. a couple of weeks back i picked jules up so we could run some errands then go see the magnificent 7 play later that day at what was being referred to as a "punk rock garage sale." whatever the hell that is. so as we're driving around, julie regales me with funny stories about her students and even funnier stories about their parents. see julie teaches in a rather economically depressed area of okc and some of her parents have interesting professions. like a few of them are "waitresses" at the red dog. "waitresses." yeah, like they just serve the food or something? wait a minute, they serve FOOD? at the RED DOG? *shiver* anyway, one of her parents is actually a bone fide prostitute. i'm not sure if she put that in her kid's file, or if it's just common knowledge, but there it is and everyone knows it. apparently her son was misbehaving and she was called in to discuss the matter. the boy is about to turn 12, and his mother has determined the root of his problems.

"he just need to get laid."

mother knows best. what the ...

then jules tells me about seeing a hockey game with a friend of hers who works for the blazers (yes, okc has a hockey team, what of it?!). they're walking around the stadium before the game, julie being horrified by all the children there screaming for blood and violence, when they see a kid just kind of standing around looking bored. julie's friend attempts to get him excited about the game:

"hey! how ya doing?"

bored kid: "alright."

"you ready to watch some hockey?!"

bored kid: "yeah, as soon as my mom gets a Bud Light, we're gonna sit down."

i think it's just a short hop from there to "honey, be a good boy and go get mommy a Bud Light, a pack of Camels and a hot dog."

so we're cracking up about that. "as soon as my mom gets a Bud Light ..." trying to work it into every possible conversation, (and i assure you, we succeeded) when we pull up to the location for the aforementioned punk rock garage sale. first of all, for some reason, every single person we invited assumed it was going to be an outdoor thing. i guess all garage sales, when you think about it, despite the moniker, take place outside. so everyone was just a little ... weirded out when we arrived it and it was all going down inside a dark, dingy, scary, smoky, typical-bar-type club.

let me take this opportunity to make the point that i have magnolia with me. she's going to hear her daddy's band play since this is the first time they've had a show that wasn't way past her bedtime. i know it's not going to be the ideal place for a kid, but i also know how much she loooooves it when the band plays in our garage; i've got earplugs in her ears, and i'm determined to make this work. scary or not.

and i assure you, it was scary. i was scared and we hadn't even entered the building yet.

the band was standing out behind the club, waiting to get their stuff set up, so we wandered on over to them and i set mags down to run around under my very close supervision. i'm so narrowly focused on her antics that i don't even realize quite what's going on until julie points out the humor in it.

"you do realize that we're standing in an alley ... behind a bar ... near the dumpsters. the place is covered in broken glass ... and oh look! an abandoned refrigerator!!"

my middle class suburban heart was frozen in fear. a little voice in my head kept hearing magnolia saying, "as soon as my mom gets a Bud Light ..."

and it gets worse.

cause then we went inside. it was everything you would think a punk rock garage sale would be. i didn't remember punk kids looking so morose, however. where does punk end and goth begin, i ask you?

and still worse ...

pregnant tama was going to bring her son Tiny E to the show as well cause two things that Tiny E loves are music and jeremy. i was confident that tama, pregnant or not, and Tiny E could handle the weirdness of the situation.

however, i was not prepared for tama and Tiny E to show up with rusty (whom i adore but is not capable of handling the weirdness of the situation) ... and a car full of kiddos fresh from a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese.

yeah that's right.

"come on, kids! let's all head over to the bar!"

or maybe, "hey kids, as soon as i get a Bud Light, we'll head over to the bar!"

so how did it all turn out, you ask? well, rusty and the fam turned their butts around and headed someplace more appropriate. maybe a crack house, i don't know.

magnolia and i ended up running around in the alley most of the time bc it was safer for her out there than in the actual club. it's okay, she could still hear the music and danced in the broken glass and gravel.

julie's the only one who actually watched the show. she tells me it was great. i'm sure she's right. and as soon as i get a Bud Light ...