suburban kamikaze

99 Reasons to Drink in the Suburbs #13: Sundays

Suburban Kamikaze Atlanta correspondent makes short work of dry laws 

Frankly, we were a little suprised it took her so so long.

But there was never any question about the outcome. Was the South ready for a hard-drinking, apron-wearing Midwestern housewife whose political skills were honed in the bare-knuckled, backroom brouhaha of the PTA cupcake wars?  No one ever is.

Our Atlanta correspondent hadn't even unpacked the last of her boxes when Georgia knuckled under to her prairie charm, overturning a ban on Sunday alcohol sales in county after county. The Georgia Scold Coalition was no match for her campaign: What Would Jesus Drink? 

Personally, we feel this would be a little sweet for Jesus' taste. But we do not like to argue over religion. 

Georgia Comfort

3/4 oz  Southern Comfort peach liqueur
1 oz peach scnhapps
4 oz orange juice
1 dash grenadine syrup 

In a highball glass filled with ice, add southern comfort, peach schnapps and fill with orange juice. Mix. Top with a dash of grenadine. Garnish with cherry and serve. www.drinksmixer.com

 

Suburban Kamikaze Atlanta correspondent: There were a million reasons not to recruit her. But who can remember any of them now? 

 

More reasons to drink: Teenage hair care, Seasonally dressed ducks

99 Reasons to Drink in the Suburbs #11: New neighbors

Just when I thought I would never run out of reasons to celebrate the Midwestern "way of life," my number one source of cheap wine inspiration - not counting weather - announces that she and her houseful of prairie-bred children are packing up and moving to the Deep South.

This is funny for all kinds of reasons, not least of which is the way her aversion to shiny things and affection for commie social causes will play in the South.

But for those of us left behind, the departure of the woman we call "Mary" will leave the Midwestern suburbs a hellish shell of the hellish shell they already were.

This is a woman who serves liquor at her kid's lemonade stand, styles herself after Napolean Dynamite and will do things on a dare that make your college sorority hijinks seem like an afternoon with the Junior League of Peoria. 

You can't really ask more from a school board member than that.

Midwestern Mint Julep

4 ounces of Kentucky bourbon

2 ounces of mint-infused simple syrup, from which mint leaves have been strained

Pour over crushed ice, garnish with parsley because you used all the mint to make the syrup and sprinkle with glitter.  Drink in Mary's backyard until the new owners tell you to leave. 

 

from the Something About Mary archives: Some people claim that there's a woman to blame, Trash talk from a woman in an apron, Your cardigan says "Merry Christmas" but your pedicure says "ho, ho, ho"

Real Housewives of the Prairie

There's a reason the mint julep never really caught on in the Midwest.

Even before the bourbon kicks in at my Real Housewives of the Confederacy party, the conversation has already taken a turn for the deep south.   

We are only a few juleps into the evening when the Midwestern belles who have gathered in my kitchen start goading the midwife into telling snatch stories. And not the fun kind.

I'm not going to repeat them here. Let's just say the concept of "Midwestern modesty" died hard. 

Also the ice never really melts in Chicago, so you end up with what is essentially a glass of bourbon with a little mint and sugar in it. Or what is known in the Midwest as a "weak drink."

The evening is organized as a going-away party/intervention for the woman known as "Mary," who is moving to Atlanta in a few weeks with all the wrong shoes. 

Mary interprets my instructions to come dressed as an icon of Southern womanhood as an opportunity to dress as Napolean Dynamite. She never misses the chance to wear her "sweet moon boots" in public. Which are only a little stranger than the shoes she wears on any other occasion. 

Still, it is only about five minutes before she is swearing like Scarlett O'Fucking Hara and we know that Real Housewives of Atlanta has its next diva.

Also, that no one will ever try to make a reality show based on Housewives of the Midwest. Because once you have heard the story about the breastfeeding mother, the boy and the hotdog, you are never, ever going to turn on the televsion again.    

"I think I am going to like the South," Mary says, discovering an affection for Kentucky bourbon that had apparently lain dormant throughout a lifetime of Midwestern winter drinking.

"Oh sugar," I tell her, "the South is going to love you." 

Photos: (Right) The face of the New South. (Below) The Fulton County PTA president; Real Housewives of the Midwest, footwear; Napolean Dynamite dance of awesomeness.  

We're definitely not in Paris anymore: I can't believe the swill they are trying to pass off as wine at Mary's house.

I'm pretty sure I will never refer to Trader Joe's as the "wine lovers' paradise" again. Okay "never" is probably not the right word. Let's just say "not this week."

My point is, can 14 days of non-stop wine drinking really leave your tastebuds so spoiled? Has "Mary" been serving swill all along or was it just a bad bottle?

Maybe I need to start getting invited into some others neighbors' homes.  Not that Mary is the one who typically invites me. Usually it is the first grader who insists that I come in. Just because I give her candy and encourage her to use as much glitter as possible.

I wonder if there are other first graders out there whose mommies are serving better wine? Why didn't I remember to tear the labels off the bottles I loved in France? That would have been a useful souvenir. Instead my purse is stuffed with Metro tickets, wine country maps and leftover Euros.

I hope I can use them at Office Depot.  It's school supply week and we are celebrating by spreading out our purchases over as many individual trips as possible. It really seems to bring the cost down.

  Photo: Wine on the vine, somewhere on the Loire.

Trash talk from a woman wearing an apron

My neighbor, the one I call "Mary" because they're pretty much all named Mary in these parts, gives me about five minutes notice.

"We're coming over for margaritas, baby girl," she says. "Get your lime on."  She's bringing the one they call "Kate." 

"I'm going out for drinks in the city," I object. "With grown-ups."

"We're grown-ups," she says.

Yeah, they're grown-ups all right. Grown-ups with about 11 kids between them. Some of them theirs, some of them strays. I have never seen her with fewer than four.

"How many?" I say.

"How many what?" she asks innocently.

"How many children are with you?"

"They will just play in the backyard," she says, an evasion that suggests double digits.

"Fine," I say.  "But I can't drink margaritas in the afternoon and go out for drinks in the evening."

"And you call yourself Irish," she says.

"I call myself Kamikaze," I say. "I'm pretty sure that's Japanese."

She sits on my deck a minute later drinking Mexican cocktails in a woodland-themed apron she has worn deliberately to provoke me into saying something about Midwestern women. As if her shoes weren't enough. 

I refuse to take the bait. Even when she starts telling me I made the drinks too weak. "Someone needs to teach you how to make a margarita," she says. 

But I do take her picture. She's adorable. She looks like she should have a tray of cupcakes in her hand.  They would be terrible cupcakes, and she would break them into little pieces and scatter them among the children like chicken feed, but still.         

 from the Something about Mary archives: Some people claim that there's a woman to blame

Just don't care now available in family size box

From the just-don't-care archives: The secret is pretending to care

Some people claim that there's a woman to blame

It's not Mary's fault that she married into a vast publishing empire of some sort. But when she writes to me from a recent junket to South Beach, I can't help but feel she is deliberately pouring salt water into my wounds. I used to live on South Beach and it is no secret that my current life in Middle America is but a hellish shadow of the sun, fun and margarita-soaked days I spent there as a childless, barefoot and arroz-con-pollo stuffed beach babe. Not that mommy blames you.

Even so, I am gracious with the tips when Mary asks.

I give her the names of places only the locals know. I tell her what to pack, what to order and how to get past the bouncers at the gay dance clubs. I pretend to be happy for her.

Then she starts e-mailing me from Margaritaville.

"The sun is so bright it hurts my eyes!" she writes on Day One.

"How much do you tip a cabana boy?" she wants to know on Day Two.

"Tropical fish are nibbling at me," she complains on Day Three.

On Day Four I decide I will walk down the street to her house and teach her kids some Miami gangsta rap.  The kindergartner catches on fast. She is adorable.   

"The margarita I had at lunch is making me so sleepy," she whines on Day Five. By Day Six, I am thinking about having sex with her husband when they get back. At the very least I will stuff a red bra under the seat of his car. 

But I don't. After all, it's not like she is ever going to get into those clubs. Also, the red bra is one of my my favorites.

She brings me back a souvenir coffee mug.  Hah!  So Funny Mary! I can laugh now because you are back in Smallville and I am drinking margaritas at a salty little beach bar just off the interstate out by the Super Target.

Also, I know where you live.

Cheers,

 

- SK

More from the Something About Mary archives: Your Cardigan Says Merry Christmas But Your Pedicure Says Ho, Ho, Ho

Your cardigan says Merry Christmas but your pedicure says ho, ho, ho.

I am folding laundry in my sweat pants when the phone rings.

I am adjusting the straps on a plunging red push-up bra when the phone rings. 

"I am a little embarrassed to be asking you this," she says.

I am laughing before she even gets the words out. She wants to know what I am wearing.

"Don't talk dirty to me unless you mean business," I say.

But she is serious. She wants to know what I am wearing to the party. "This is not fair," I whine. "I promised Mr. Kamikaze I would stop making fun of Midwesterners and you guys just keep serving this stuff up. What am I supposed to do?"

"I know, I know," she says.  "But seriously."  

"That is what makes it so funny," I say. "You know we aren't required to do this anymore, right?"  I say. "It's right there in the manual under 'grown-ups'. Oh wait. There is an asterisk here ... something about a 12-state region between the coasts..." 

Still, I take pity on her. I share with her some tips from my forthcoming book The Underachiever's Guide to Holiday Party Dressing in the Midwestern Suburbs:  1. Build from the shoes up.  2. Make them fabulous. Go tall for house parties where you won't have to do much walking. 3. If you feel you simply must wear your appliqué Christmas sweater, make sure that at least your toenail polish says slut.

Then  I say, "I have to go. There are people I need to call to start mocking you right away."

"I know," she says. Then she adds, "But it seems to me that you have actually put some thought into what you are going to wear to a Midwestern Christmas party. Why couldn't I make fun of you?"

"Don't be ridiculous," I tell her. "You don't even have a blog."

Botticelli family's Christmas display called "weak"

*Inflatable penguin on a timer leaves neighbors limp. Controversy lingers over whether three-ornament tree display included any manly feats of ladder usage.