This blog is almost 17 years old! WHAT? How did that happen?

I only stopped by because 5 different bots signed up this afternoon. Because Russia.

I don’t even drink vodka anymore. WHAT? I mean, I prefer gin. And champagne. Sometimes together because French 75s are heaven. But you knew that already, right?

And little guy has been out of diapers for years now.

So this is the deal then. If I get nostalgic for it, I’ll come back and see how it fits.

Or I start right over somewhere else.

Or I take the cue that blogging is dead?

via GIPHY

And all the trees are ON IT.

Heading to Amsterdam for a week with my girls. Follow @txterryo on Instagram for the dutch insanity.

via GIPHY

I’m back in the States, mostly. My subconscious hasn’t hipped to it yet, as I keep waking up in an unsure haze of where I am or what I’m doing. This is prolonged, I’m sure, by moving from jet lag to flu-like virus and the accompanying medicines that cloud the brain. AND by not yet having sufficient time in my own bed. I’m at my parents’ house since Daniel flew out the day after we arrived on business and I immediately got sick.

I keep looking for light switches in the wrong places. This isn’t a metaphor, since the British keep their light switches outside their doors. I can’t tell you how often I stumbled into a dark bathroom at night and fumbled around the door jamb futilely.

In the space between dreamland and consciousness, I’ve been confused how I was getting to the next place, since I don’t drive in the UK. Or wondering if I have time to go to that old place I love so much that I keep meaning to revisit. Or if I have time to pack before our taxi arrives.

(My kingdom for a perfect cup of tea in bed, this minute.)

Tonight I’ll be sleeping in my own bed and my family will all be under the same roof and I’ll finally get unpacked and things will start to resemble normalcy. The hazy place will eek its way back to the ether and, with any luck, the days will start getting cooler. I walked miles upon miles while I was there, the weather and the landscape and the company so welcoming. I miss that so much.

I am happy to be here, though. Home. Spending time with my parents, even though I’ve been sick. There’s no one whose company I crave more than my mom’s when I’m sick, fact. (That’s probably true for 90% of you, I’d guess.)

Onward, September, into Fall. Please be gentle with us all.

My much cooler friends hipped me to some awesome things this week.

Chicano-Con — “… Like Comic-Con, But With Tacos and Latino Superheroes” (Seriously, the best tagline ever.)

Be Glammed — It’s like Uber, for your face. Now in the ATX.

The delicious menu at The Townsend — Dorsey and Susan over at HausBar Farms (one of the three urban farms in my hood) shared this photo of the menu and I almost fell over. Tea sandwiches and gin?! Be still my heart.

#Chingonafest — during Melanie Mendez-Gonzales‘ Periscope last night, I was introduced to Pauline Campos. She blogs over at Aspiring Mama and has reclaimed a chingona’s right to be a chingona while supporting other chingonas in fighting the good fight. Check it out and join the conversation.

I mean, THAT PHOTO!

And man, I am loving Nortico Alvarinho for these long summer nights.

SO. GOOD.

Every year I start Independence day by throwing a wet teabag at my very British husband in the shower whilst hollering, “NO TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION!!”

And then I run, because he’s known to throw them back at me.

Everyone has traditions, okay?

For my son, this year we tried one of those Pinterest cakes that surprisingly turned out looking like I intended. He’s my little chef and has been helping me out in the kitchen a lot. You’d think baking with a three-year-old boy would result in more mess, but then you’ve never seen what chaos I bring to a kitchen when I walk in.

SUGAR RUSH!!

Are you following me on Pinterest? All my recent insomnia has reintroduced my previous pinning addiction. If you catch me in the morning, you might see the pins I embarrassingly pinned before my wits got the best of me. (See also: drunken weekend pinning.)

The good, the bad, the shameful.

Terry Woodroffe

Two birthdays, one absurd piñata and a fancy-pants bottle of bubbly. (It pairs well with the Cheezy Puffs!) Cheers!

I never, ever throw photos away. Ever. Even of people I don’t know. It’s all rooted in some superstition that I honestly can’t explain.

My parents are like this. We have countless albums and boxes (and boxes) of photos and roughly one million and a half VHS tapes. We’re going through them and cataloging what we can, but there’s a lot of memories there that will remain unremembered.

You guys, I can’t even bring myself to throw away doubles. I have a whole MESS of doubles from a trip abroad with an ex of mine that I keep saying I’ll get to him one day. Only, we don’t speak at all, so it could very well be that I’ll still have them shoved in a shoebox in a storage unit when I’m 80.

You’d think that the digital age has made this easier. But oh, no.

I haven’t backed up my phone in months because there’s barely any room for me to transfer my photos to my hard drive.

And having a kid? Let’s just say he’ll never forget his childhood because I recorded all of it. And backed it up on dropbox. And Google. And YouTube. And two storage devices. And a time machine. And very likely printed out copies of most of it. (Not to mention the random memory sticks littering the bottom of all my purses.)

With a memory like mine it’s no wonder, but I still think this counts as hoarding.

I hope Bones and Scotty shine a beacon to guide him home.