reports of people watching, mostly

Caught the plane, okay, and some of the westerns turned out.

Today was Cookie Day. What that means is that all of the girl cousins (who didn't have work today) came by my mother's house this morning, and we baked what ended up being double batches of about 6 types of cookies plus a pie. i wore my kitchen warfare shirt (the woot one with a design that appears to be a gun until you see that it's made up of kitchen utensils). It was appropriate? The morning featured both Lady Antebellum albums drowned out by the cousins all singing along, and about 4 lbs of butter (plus various other lipids). Woo!

Last night, my best friend Shaw and i saw Bruce Robison at Floore's Country Store (actually a dancehall). It was purely awesome; i would reference a youtube clip here but there aren't any that match how good his shows are. Plus, dancing's so fun to observe. Parents teach kids to two step (a 7-year old in a cowboy hat and his grandmother, father and 12-year-old daughter, etc), teenagers spin around the floor, and older couples glide past who've obviously been dancing together the past 20 years (perfectly matched steps). It's wonderful to be home.

While retrieving my brother from the airport today (YAY!), my mother and i people-watched. His flight was about a half-hour late, so that gave us plenty of time. One of the more interesting scenes involved a young lady being met at the airport by a woman who looked to be her mother. The mother handed her a posted package, containing a pair of shoes. The daughter promptly sat down right there in baggage and tried them on. She had our entire attention, as this unfolded directly in front of where Mom and i were waiting, plus the shoes were this gorgeous pair of Louboutins. Delicately removed the right shoe from its fetters, slipped it on directly over a kelly green sock, strutted a half-length around the terminal (with her left foot still encased in a boot), and then carefully unbuckled and re-wrapped the shoe, brushing off the sole before returning it to its parcel box. This was narrated by my astonished whispering/freaking out to my mother on exactly what sort of shoe that was and various attributes - hidden platform, red sole, ridiculous price, the whole bit. Mom was like, 'i don't know that i've ever seen a shoe that cost that much in person', a sentiment which i share. i wanted to give the girl a thumbs-up, but didn't want to be so obvious a creeper.

Granted, trying on a pair of $1000+ shoes in an airport baggage terminal is a tiny bit odd, and i like to think it would have caught the attention of anyone instead of being an(other) indication that i have a shoe problem.

BARBECUE FOR CHRISTMAS DINNER!! The males of my family prepared it today. You may all be jealous (because, let's be honest, it's one million times better than just about anything else, ofcoursei'mnotacompletelybiasedTexanwhocannearlyconsumeherwieghtinbrisket).

Barbecue or barbeque? Also, interesting New Yorker article from years ago regarding the genre.