The Aftermath…

You probably think I am writing about the election but I am referring to the Super Bowl Finale in Houston, Texas. I work for a variety of companies who organize events here and occasionally am contracted to meet and greet VIPs at the airport. Well this year there was so much work for everyone and from all accounts visitors loved the welcome they received in Houston.

It is a friendly, if ugly as a bug, city and the weather was damn near perfect. The Bostonians must have thought they were in Mexico! One day I worked a 13 hour shift in every terminal (there are 5) and on the drive home, couldn’t remember which foot worked the brake or accelerator. Muscle memory kicked in… There were so many funny moments. Volunteering is very popular in Houston and everyone was represented by ethnicity, disability, age and gender. After 13 hours of little girls cheer-leading at the terminals, I and my colleagues had nightmares about H O U S T O N!!! The older volunteers were just as enthusiastic. I was meeting a VIP coming from Mexico and the volunteers had lined up to greet them, shouting welcome and giving out free maps (with discounts). Watching the Mexican flight, I was curious about the reaction – head down, no thank you – until I realized that they probably thought they were timeshare vendors! As we all know, football is really soccer or ‘futbol’… The American version is based on a very rough Irish game. Oh, I can hear the boos over the internet!

At another terminal, I nearly got a new husband. A handsome silver fox came in with a Stetson, jeans and a BIG belt buckle. I couldn’t resist asking him, “Are you a genuine cowboy?” “Why, yes ma’am, I am”, he responded while doffing his Stetson. We started talking (he was not my VIP) and I found out that he had a farm in East Texas. “Oh”, I said excitedly, “Do you have Brahmins or Longhorns?” By then he had caught the Scottish accent and you could see that I had become his ideal woman. Blonde, with an accent and loves cattle. Given the argument I had with Teddy this last week, I should have taken his card. I am just jesting – 13 hour shifts make one testy…

Like every major city, immigrants come and join in whatever business their countrymen have gone into. After the WWII in Scotland, many Polish people came and set up as cobblers. Jews became tailors and Italians opened cafes. In Houston, Iranian and Iraqi immigrants often become limo drivers. They had all been chatting with me over the days and one Iraqi driver said hello. His cheeky friend asked why I hadn’t said hello to him, so I responded, “Salam Alaikum”. He then accused me of profiling him and we all fell about laughing. It was a light moment in an otherwise somber week at airports. This week I saw some Patriot fans heading home and asked them if they had enjoyed their visit. Their eyes lit up and they said, “Houston is AWESOME!” I laughed, bid them farewell and thought, ‘so you got laid, too’.

Bunny and the dungarees

I wish I had a photograph to illustrate this little tale. My childhood soft toys lived with me until I was about 40 years old (then they went to the dump toy heaven). I was particularly fond of Bunny who was given to me by my aunt Gretta. It must have been very expensive, plush white fur bunny with pink silk lined ears and the topper was that she was wearing blue striped dungarees! Bunny even held a little plastic bouquet of carrots. The stuffing seemed to be like fine sawdust and over the years it went down to her feet. Every so often I would give her a really good shake to distribute her stuffing properly.

I married young and the toys came to bed with us. My husband (aka Teddy) bought me endless new soft toys and his first gift to me was a human sized stuffed Panda as a late 21st birthday present. Then we got cats, so the poor old toys had to sit in Nana’s rocking chair. During the ’80s we lived in an old bank in the North of Scotland and the proportions weren’t quite right for a regular house. The upstairs hallway was as big as a bedroom with a huge window. I loved to see Bunny, Teddy (the toy) and all the others basking in the sunshine as I went up the stairs.

Bear in mind, I was in my ’20s so my hormones were raging with really bad PMT AND a mental illness… The first batch of cats was young and very, very naughty. They chased each other up and down those stairs like fairy elephants and also loved to bask in the sunshine. One day they had just pushed me to my limit – fighting and playing noisily all day, throwing up on the stairs, a stray poop on the carpet and general mayhem.

It must have been close to dinner time and I went upstairs only to see the upstairs hallway in disarray. Worst of all, poor Bunny had been taken off the rocking chair and somehow those bad cats had taken off her dungarees. Teddy (the husband) came home to find me sobbing inconsolably holding my poor naked Bunny in my arms. Through choking sobs, I said, “They took Bunny’s dungarees off”. He looked perplexed and said, “Who did it?” “Those bad cats!” was my snot filled response. I could see so many emotions passing over his face. “WTF?” “Oh Lord, she has her period!” “The cats??” He was struggling so hard not to laugh while kneeling down comforting me.

We both ended up laughing, of course. Bunny had her stuffing redistributed and the dungarees put back on. Order was restored to the upstairs hallway and the cats were forgiven…eventually.