Or:

The Ensuing Hilarity May Or May Not Have Anything To Do With Free Margaritas

Did I use the word tomorrow in the last post? Oops. My bad. Sorry.

Erin and I went to market on Saturday. Week ago Saturday, not the other day. I swung by her house and picked her up. She lives south of Atlanta and takes a different route from me causing a little confusion trying to find a Marta station. Going up I-85…. was that the Marta exit? Darn. Passed it. Turned around at the next exit…. Oh, no! Was that it? Darn. Passed it. Turned around at the next exit. This went on a couple of rounds before we “landed”. Then there was the problem of trying to figure out how to buy a pass. I’d just done it the day before, why was I stumbling this time? Oh, yeah. A security guard did it for me the day before. The last time I’d ridden Marta we bought tokens. Simple, straightforward.

We did get our passes and boarded. Found a seat and a few minutes the train started. Each of us solemnly looking straight ahead, relieved to finally be on our way. About 20 seconds into the ride:
Me mumbling: We’re going the wrong direction aren’t we?
Erin mumbling: Yes, we are.
The giggles have begun. We’d forgotten we started at the second station. She says she was just following me. That she thought I knew what I was doing. OK. If that’s what she wants to believe, so be it.

We arrived at the airport. Not our intended destination. The loudspeaker voice told us we were at the end of the line and for us all to get off the train. We dutifully obeyed then thought how stupid. It’s going to start up again in a few minutes, so we got back on, but in a different car with one other person. One we watched very closely to make sure he was breathing. I do regret not taking a picture, but if you’ve ever looked at People of Public Transit you’ve seen similar sleepers.

First up at market was to take my candle tester program card to the candle people. I don’t think they knew anything about it. They tried to say that it was if I bought $350 worth I got a free candle or two. Hmmm… They’ve always had that offer. That doesn’t sound like a “tester program” to me. But oh, well. Let’s go see if we can find people giving away stuff! (Since neither of us could afford to place orders.)

On the way to free food, while in the elevator, the button puncher guy – yes they had elevator attendants – said free sunglasses right now in building 3, floors 1, 3 and 5. Or some such. Free sunglasses?! Gotta go! Half an hour later we’ve worked our way to that building and were in front of the table with free sunglasses! Groan. They look like cheap, ’80′s flourescent, soft plastic sunglasses with America’s Mart written on the sides. Pooh.

Back to find the vendor who would fed us.

Got our food, wandered around a bit and what’s this? Cupcakes? Free? And….. no way! Free Margaritas?? Woohoo! And they were good. Drinking our yummy drinks, we took off to the temporaries. I wanted to show her the “no photos please” booth and a painted furniture booth. Walking onto this floor, a worker lady asked if we’d had the free Mexican food, yet? OK. Wait. Free Mexican food, too? Where? She handed Erin a sheet that showed the booth numbers with the food. Erin’s looking at the sheet, trying to figure out exactly where to go for this free Mexican food when I heard a clamor. A crash. At first glance, it looked like she was on the floor and I heard the words, Ow, that hurt! She’d bumped into a rusty angel and had tried to catch it, almost hitting the floor, but not quite. Everybody within 50 feet heard it, turned around, and more than one person said, Are you all right? Two raced over there. Then my giggle box got turned over. It was funny, but was it really so funny as to cause the kind of laughter that is so intense it comes out as a wheeze and won’t stop? But I had to stop. Walking, that is. If I’d kept going there would have been a piddle puddle trail following me.

We did get a glimpse of the Mexican food, chips and dip. We passed. But wonder of wonders, there are more free Margaritas!

Next up was the antique and one-of-a-kind floor. Lots of industrial items. Things I was excited to see that I’ve been buying for a while now. Yes! Staying on top of the style.

We did some clothes sample sale shopping and gave up the ghost. It was time to leave. Right at busy Marta time.

Boarding was easy enough, but there were no seats. A kind young man stood up to give Erin his seat and later, when the young man next to him saw what he’d done, he got up to give me his. But, nothing is ever that easy. As we were making our way the 5 feet to the seat, the train started. Erin fell into me, stepping on my just healed, broken, little toe. She was trying not to hurt me which put her more off balance and I had totally lost my balance and was helplessly lying on some poor man just sitting there minding his own business. And there was no moving until what seemed like HOURS later when the train leveled out. Oh, sure. It was only a few seconds, but when you’re lying on some strange man, your daughter is lying on you and some other strange man is trying to help, it seems like a lifetime. I swear, the whole experience, beginning to end, felt like country mouse visiting city mouse.

And this concludes the story of the Atlanta Gift Mart Adventures. In the interest of brevity, several things were left out. Didn’t want to bore you too much.

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I’m spending the week at home this week keeping two of my granddogs. Excited to be finishing up some projects around here and excited to share. Maybe before next week.