theology&geometry

Yesterday was my dad’s 54th birthday. Everyone gathered at the new Mexican restaurant in Saltillo to eat, drink, and yell as loudly as we possibly could about the impossibility of pronouncing basic Mexican words for food.

It was a pretty good time, I have to say. Watching the brothers who run the place deal with the avalanche of crazy that comes with my family was fascinating. They were absolute professionals — no orders were botched, and we had chips and cheese dip and sweet tea and water refills coming like clockwork without ever demanding them. And they were super nice about all of it.

The servers were bringing out all the food and amid the fajitas and enchiladas and taco salads and beans and rice, they set down a hamburger and fries in front of my youngest nephew, Patrick. Everyone was all, “What is that?! You come to a Mexican restaurant and get a hamburger?” But our server, Adolfo, had Patrick’s back. “It’s a Mexican Big Mac!” he said before disappearing into the kitchen again.

My sister and I had schemed to surprise my mom with a cake and gifts too, since her birthday is the 12th. So after dinner, while we scurried out to the car to get the cake and stuff, we completely missed the restaurant staff coming out and singing to my sombrero-wearing father, which was kind of the one thing I was hoping to see yesterday. It’s okay, though, because my mother accidentally caught some of it on video.

Kahuna Grande from Lindsey Turner on Vimeo.

What she did not catch on video, however, was my brother mooning her as a way of saying “happy birthday.”

We coaxed Adolfo and Roger, a family friend, into taking a family picture for us. With five different cameras. Which took fifteen minutes. And was completely hilarious and chaotic. When it was time to pay up, I tipped heavily and thanked Adolfo and Jesus (both the Messiah and the dude at the restaurant) for putting up with all of us. They seemed happy to have the business but also a little relieved to see us suiting up and heading out. I mean, we unironically refer to ourselves as The Clampetts for a reason.

Full Flickr set here.

Eventually, when Vimeo deigns to process it, I’ll post a bonus video of everyone freaking out when some sizzling fajitas come out of the kitchen. And now, check out everyone in my family freaking out when the sizzling plate of fajita meat comes out!

IS THAT YERS?!?! from Lindsey Turner on Vimeo.

[Project 365]

In honor of my sister’s thirtysomethingth birthday today (she might string me up if I tell the whole internet her age), I have to share this photo.

This is one of the greatest pictures of all time. Not only is that blue and white outfit positively smashing, but the miniature VW Bug full of cigarettes adds some much needed surreality. I am obviously obsessively checking the top of my hair to make sure there are no weird lumps caused by my ponytail. And is that a busted fish tank in the background?

I’ll tell you how I know I’m getting old. Sunday night I spent some quality time with a magnum of pinot grigio and several episodes of My So-Called Life in the company of some of the funniest (and silliest-dressed) people I’ve ever met. There were rules. There were amendments. There was plaid and impossibly tall combat boots. There was angst.

And I remembered how when that show aired, Jordan Catalano was the hotness. And yes, that Jared Leto sure is pretty. But watching it in 2008? All I could think was how hot the middle-aged dad was. Lord god in heaven, how did I get here?

Well. We’re all on this ride together, and it ain’t stoppin’, y’all.

My baby brother turns 21 tomorrow (okay, today, the 26th). I bought him a 12-pack of beer. He and our cousin Jay killed it tonight. They’ve had practice, no doubt.

We look a lot a like, me and my brother.

We spent the evening chatting with Sarah and Tamara via webcam, and just to show how grown up he is, he kept trying to mack on them all night. I’m all for free love, but there is one thing in the world I won’t tolerate, and that’s my brother sleeping with any of my friends.

YEESH.

Freckleface and Gingerballs, that’s who. I tried a to put hats on them but it turned out as you might have predicted.

Let’s see … in cat years, this makes me eighty.

Here’s to many more years and many more pieces of furniture that will need re-upholstering.

Happy birthday, Fritz. I would watch Oprah AND The View, just for you.

And for some reason, I didn’t even mention the youngest nephew’s birthday on the 18th. Here he is, sporting a completely heteronormative tattoo I gave him.

People need to cool it with the mating in late June, sheesh.

Hint: It’s in her mouth!

Someone I know turned 27 today. I’m not sure, but I have a feeling that she spent the day in a terrycloth robe, painting her nails harlot pink and snacking on oysters and melba toast, watching reruns of Home Improvement and Designing Women, and occasionally tapping out nuggets of brilliance on her keyboard. At least I hope that’s how she spent the day.

Also on the birthday bonanza front, Harmony Brother No. 1 turned 28 today. Go on over to the band’s MySpace page and make him pheel bad for being so oolllldd.

Because the weekend was kind of a blur of zombies (both the undead and the liquid kind), rock ‘n’ roll, tequila shots, birthday dinners, friends visiting, superhero masks, talk of “squishing,” talk of cats, talk of sand fleas, talk of dolphins counting in English, talk of feminine drag, and me saying stupid shit and rolling around on my floor, and other people rolling around on my floor but saying much less stupid shit than I said, I’ll just offer up visuals.

Evil Wizard Eyes @ the Memphis Zombie Massacre benefit show from Lindsey Turner on Vimeo.

Deadline from Lindsey Turner on Vimeo.

Stop filming me! from Lindsey Turner on Vimeo.

“Um, I ordered this one without the extra crazy, okay?”

Today’s my mom’s birthday. Once again I’m stuck here and can’t celebrate with her, but I guess we already technically celebrated over the weekend. It’s moot anyway, since she’s in Nashville at the doctor checking yet again on the status of the cyst on her kidney, which is enough to ruin anyone’s birthday. I’ve got every possible digit crossed in the hopes that the doctor will say, “My bad, it was just dust on the negative!” But, alas, we all know that it doesn’t work like that. So, we wait.

Oh happy day, I actually had a really good weekend. I know that this in no way has any bearing on how the remainder of my week will play out, nor does it indicate that the Universe is going to take it easy on me or anyone else for a while (the Universe don’t roll like that, y’all), but I still would like to recount the ways the past few days have not pissed me off.

• The snow Friday was gorgeous, and gave me an excuse to go strolling through the park at midnight and again the next day, taking pictures of strangers building snowmen. I don’t stroll in the park nearly often enough, snow or no snow.

• Saturday, Sarah came into town and listened to me pine and bitch and moan and kvetch about everything I normally pine and bitch and moan and kvetch about. She even endured my pleas to her to help me fix my life, all while politely refraining from pointing out that I was at a Circle K at 3 in the morning wearing fuzzy purple socks and red polka-dot shoes. She also introduced me to my new favorite band, Beirut:

• Sunday I woke up fully clothed and on the couch. At noon. Still somewhat drunk, but thankfully not technically hungover. I realized that I was WAY behind schedule — we were having a birthday dinner for my mom, dad, and youngest nephew later that day. I steadied myself and answered my phone. It was my dad, asking if I was on the road yet. Uh, no, I said with horrible wine breath. Well, dad told me, you best hurry up because we eat at 2. (It takes two hours for me to get there.) Turns out my mom had been assigned to call and tell me when we were eating, but never did. I had just assumed it would be late dinner, because I always forget that in the South, “dinner” means “lunch.” Duh. So we trucked it and got the eff out of Memphis and I was only two hours late. No one seemed to mind too much, though. We ate at River Heights Café, which has to be the most overpriced piece of crap restaurant in Hardin County — no offense if you Google the place and find this blog, but yeesh: $10 for this? — but it has a killer view of the river and it’s birthday tradition to eat there every spring. We Turnered it up for a while, demanding bowls of cheese and condiments out the wazoo, and then retired to Saltillo for an evening of shooting pellet guns and rifling through the bookcases in the hunt for my sister’s high school diploma.

• The weather was absolutely gorgeous Monday, so I roamed around Triple T Farms, taking pictures of rusting heaps of scrap metal and decaying farm equipment. My family’s land has to be my favorite place to take photographs, even if it’s a little bittersweet to find beauty in decay (is that a song lyric?). The horses are great fun (even if the one named, ironically, Lady always, always, always farts in my general direction; this time she did it twice!) and love the attention. Osama bin Llama, not so much. He kind of sucks, even if he’s fun to look at. Also, the random crap you can find on the Turner compound fascinates me to no end. I’m sure I wouldn’t be so interested in it if it belonged to some random family. But when I step quietly over coils of barbed wire and oil cans and election signs and boxes of video tapes stored haphazardly in the shed behind my grandmother’s house, I feel like I’m getting filled in on part of our story that no one might ever think to tell me. And that inspires me. I came home with 700 pictures to sift through.

• The paint on my car from the door that I was so pissed off about? My dad Magic Erasered it off. Seriously. THE ERASER IS NO-SHIT MAGIC, OMFG.

• On the way back to Memphis, I stopped at a gas station a few miles from my parents’ house, and some guys in a truck pulled up beside me. The strapping young man on the passenger side got out and did a doubletake and said, “How YOU doin’?” like that gross dude on that commercial for sour mints or whatever. That made me laugh. And then he said, “You from around here?!” Which made me laugh even more. I normally would have shot that guy the dagger eyes, but I was feeling frumptastic and had no makeup on, so it perked me right the fuck up. I’ll cop to it: I am a tool of the patriarchy sometimes. But come on, getting hit on by a teenager?! That’s like an ego superpowerup.

There is nothing in this photo that could have existed outside the vacuum that was the mid-’80s.

That man on the right, the Turner patriarch, has a birthday today. I’m two hours away and can’t be there to give him hastily acquired gifts that he probably already owns, but I’m sure sending him good birthday vibes until I can get to Saltillo to give him a hug next weekend.