Meet the In Laws

Oh boy, this is a classic Kate story.  I can't believe I haven't shared it before. 

I couldn't sleep last night.  I tossed and turned, wiggled, twitched, elbowed Doug, and kicked him a few times because he was sleeping- loudly.  At one point, he sprawled out and was all up in my space!  I threw the old elbow and I said, "HEY!  You're taking up the whole bed!"  Doug was pretty asleep and slurred back, as though he was drunk (but I assure you he wasn't) "Well, if your butt wasssnn't tho big, . . ."  The rest was pretty unintelligable, or I just didn't understand as I was in shock.  Well then.  I guess he got the last word.  I just wiggled more.  While I was laying there with my too big butt, wiggling, I thought of blog posts.  And the weekend I met Doug's parents is a good one. 

First you need background info: before I even met Doug's parents- Doug had told his parents about me- his description of me was that I weighed 295 and played linebacker at Winthrop.  His parents knew that description wasn't accurate, but I can't imagine what they were anticipating.  Surely not a beauty such as myself.  hahaha 

Here's more information- Doug's family is pretty similar to my own: family is very important, our parents love each other and enjoy one another's company, we both have siblings that are quite a bit younger than us.  However there is one big difference:  Doug's family lived in the country.  Truly.  Miles away from the grocery store.  They had to take their trash to the dump because they didn't have a truck that drove to their house.  Sunlight was pumped in.  Ok.  Not really.  But they did live on 60 acres of undeveloped land- and it was awesome!  When Doug was growing up, he helped work in the tobacco fields, chopped wood, canned produce from the garden.  I bought that stuff at the store (well- not the tobacco). 

So- on to the story.  The first weekend I met Doug's parents, they were in the process of building a barn for his sister's horse.  This was all new to me.  Building anything, especially a barn, having a farm animal at your house?!  (FYI- Doug's sister used to show Palomino horses- which I now know is actually very competitive and highly thought of, she was pretty good at it too!)  So, here I go out to the country to build a barn and make a good impression.  I really liked (still do too!) his family and felt perhaps more at ease with them than I should have- as I had only just met them.  They liked to tease me about being a city girl.  That just made me laugh because I am pretty sure Spartanburg, SC is hardly considered a big city.  They had me hammering and throwing bales of hay.   I entertained them by singing one line of a song over and over and over again (a nasty habit I have that I tend to do unconsciously. Karma has given me Andrew to pay me back for that habit).  I embarrased my mother by my shock that you could make pudding from scratch.  Amy fixed the most fantastic homemade banana pudding EVER!  It was this recipe that I discovered pudding doesn't have to come from a box (sorry Mom- I am embarasing you again).  (When I got home and reported to my mother my shock at discovering pudding didn't have to come from a box- my mother groaned and said, "I hope you didn't share your amazement with Amy!"  Of course I did.  I was amazed.) Oh, and I bled on Amy's dinner plate.  Whoa.  What?  Yep. 
We had gone to this delicious restaurant for dinner.  The service was a little . . . lacking that evening.  One of Doug's greatest pet peeves is for his tea glass to remain unfilled.  And unfortunately his tea glass had been empty for a very long time.  He was impatient.  Annoyed.  And to be silly- but hopefully get some service, started quietly banging his steak knife on our table.  I was embarrased.  The restaurant was busy and we had some young, dope of a waiter, banging our knife on the table seemed mean to him.  So I reached for the steak knife.  Well I grabbed and pulled the blade, and Doug pulled the blade back.  My thumb was in the crossfire.  I sliced it open and it immediately started gushing blood all over the table.  I don't remember how it happened- but in all of the hubaloo of gushing blood there was a significant amount of blood on Amy's plate and in her water glass and on my napkin.  Oh- and thankfully Doug got his tea refilled.  (note to self- if your service is lacking just cut yourself- you get much better, fast service!).  So after dinner we went to the pharmacy and I loaded up on bandages and hydrogen peroxide.  And my thumb is totally fixed now. 
I must not have made too bad of an impression because as I was leaving, Amy slipped me a substantial amount of cash so I would keep hanging out with Doug.  Ok not really, but she does let me come back to her house- and I haven't bled in her water glass or on her dinner plate since. 

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