Blip.

It's weird nowadays to not immediately be connected to someone. And not that hypothetical connection, but social media connection. How many times do you go out on the weekends, meet someone new, and within the hour have instagrammed photos with their twitter handle and snapchat name all in your phone?

I was flying home from Vegas on Southwest a few weeks back. I did what every single (or not so faithful person) does, hopped down in an empty row, holding out hope that the next attractive person who steps in the cabin chooses seat 14b.

And he did. And after he slid his bag under the seat he rubbed his temples and sighed the loudest sigh I've ever heard for a Sunday evening flight. I tossed my phone into my lap and decided to pry. 1591 miles is a long trip, might as well strike up conversation. When I asked him about his rough weekend, the adorable southern twang that replied was the last thing I expected.

Three hours later I literally knew more about him than any first, second and third date I had ever been on. He actually works in my industry, for my competitor a few states away. I learned about his family, his friends, the bachelor party they had, his dog, how he spends his holidays, his trips to Costa Rica, his absence of a girlfriend, his hatred for Texas. Literally.... everything.

And when we touched down in Indy and deplaned, he waited for me at the end of the gate and the conversation kept flowing all the way through the terminal and down to baggage claim.  When I headed toward carousel 3, he smirked and thanked me for entertaining him the flight back. And like that we parted ways with a "have a good one!"

And it was the weirdest thing. Not that I necessarily wanted to keep in touch, but I guess it was just caught me off guard that he didn't even try? (yes, I realize how conceited that sounds, but I'm just being honest).

Looking back though, I like it. It makes me smile. He was just this blip that popped up on my radar, made me laugh for a few hours, and then faded off into the distance.

So... you've never met her in person?

Sometime in the Octoberish era of 2011 a string of blog comment emails, as they tend to do, turned into g-chatting. I didn't really know who this chick was, but she was funny. And we seemed to see eye to eye on a lot of things.

Following my natural trajectory of meeting people on the web (ahhem, boyfriend), it should really come as no surprise that she quickly became one of my best friends.

Fast forward to a few weeks back when I casually mentioned going to visit LT as we were chatting one day. She immediately pointed out the close vicinity of LT to her. Queue the great big 'finally meet at long last' plans.

Saturday morning LT was getting ready to go to work and I was getting ready to meet Whitney for the first time. He didn't know that. Non-bloggers don't get it. I had always referred to her exactly as what she was, my friend, not as "some chick from the web" or any other equivalent. He knew we met through blogging, and after brushing his teeth he stood there puzzled, deep in thought. "You've never met her in person... have you?" he finally uttered. A grin spread across my face. "All the best relationships develop that way, don't they?" He gave me a goodbye kiss and with the most serious face told me to be safe. Silly boy.

Not long after my phone lit up. I headed down the hotel stairs into the bright Maryland daylight and there she was posted up against her Equinox like some sort of Clint Eastwood movie. It's so funny in retrospect. We hugged, said FINALLY! and hopped into her car to chat the entire drive to DC, like old friends.

LT text me a few hours into it, confirming I wasn't cut up dead  in a dumpster. I eased his worries and we carried on. She drug me all over Gods great East-Coast earth the next two days, leaving me with souvenir shin splints as I hobbled onto my plane at the Baltimore airport Sunday night.

So funny how paths collide in this crazy world. Let's just hope it doenst take another 12 months for ours to cross again!

So... how'd you two meet?

You all keep inquiring on where the heck LT came from, ask and you shall receive my friends!

So here's the thing, I refuse to make my Twitter private. Protected. Whatever it's called. Partly because I think it's just plain silly. Also partly because it's connected me with a lot of people I know through other people. And I love that part of it.

With that being said, I get a lot of random new followers. Like a handful every week. Sometimes it's just spammers, sometimes its mutual friends. So one day back in the opening scenes of 2012 when I had the email come through informing me of a new follower I saw 'Indiana' and 'racing' on his profile and figured it was someone I had met in passing.

At some point a DM convo was struck up in which we were trying to narrow down our 6 degrees (which ended up being the million and twelve mutual friends we had) and when he threw the flirty "you look familiar, I think we've met" out there, I shut him down with a "nah, but I can pretend we have if it makes you feel better"

He was quick with his words and had a good sense of humor, he somehow managed to hold my attention. When 144 characters weren't enough the DMs graduated to text messages. A lot of them. Like, every day. About important things and nothings and most things in between.

Then one day in March he was flying back from a race in Florida, and asked if I would be interested in hanging out? (I live like 10 minutes from IND) Gasp, meeting someone off the internet?? I'm pretty sure I said no at least 6 times.
Especially after I learned his flight wouldn't get in until like 1030 that night.
He wouldn't accept my no for an answer though.
So I warned my friend Whitney that if she didn't hear from me by 8am the next morning to call the cops and tell them I was probably cut up into a million pieces in a dumpster somewhere, I proceeded to accept his offer to 'chill'.

Our epic first "date" if you want to call it that, consisted of awkward 'hi nice to meet you, welcome to my house' hugs, a Matthew McConaughey movie, and us both falling asleep on my couch not even halfway into it.  We woke up to my 6am work alarm and the credits rolling and I sent him on his way. With a little bit of a crush and a bad case of bed head.

My drive to work was consumed with thoughts like 'Who is this character and where did he come from?' 'He does have an awfully cute smile though. Thank god he wasn't some internet predator on bath salts coming to eat my face off ' 'What was his name again??' (kidding on that last one, sheesh)



So now you can all stop asking where he came from. And you can point fingers and laugh because I swoop my men on social networking sites. Naturally, instead of telling people we met on Twitter, we stick with the "met through mutual friends" line.

Weekend at the Drags

I hung out with some people I met on Twitter this past weekend.

Hehe does that sound creeeepy or what?!

In all reality, we've met before and have a bunch of mutual friends but never really hung out... but the NHRA drags were in town this weekend and when they offered up an extra ticket to me I happily obliged. I guess bantering with folks on Twitter is a great way get you into some pretty cool situations, huh?!

J, myself & K

I had never been out to the drags, and K and S knew a TON of people in the industry, so it was a totally overwhelming weekend! We spent a lot of time bouncing around from trailer to trailer to driver RV's, enjoying ourselves and chitchatting.

K snuck me into the suites Saturday night

  They introduced me to a lot of people, one of whom was their good friend, Mike, a driver for John Force Racing. We hung out with him Saturday evening, and his family most of the weekend.

S, Meathead, Mike's wife, E, K, Mark, myself & Wheeler RIGHT after Mike won!

Then Monday night Mike ended up winning the whole thing - which was way cool! Our clan was cheering sooo loud in the stands, everyone was turning around to look at us!

Mike's car pulling into winners circle

Mike, his team & JF

K & S with Mike and his trophy

I convinced everyone I was the good luck charm! We were able to go into Winners Circle with Mike & his crew and also the other winner, Antron!

S and friends with Antron in winners circle - S's company built some of the parts on Antron's car!

It was a really fun weekend doing something totally different. I'm so glad K&S let me tag along!! Drag racing is such an interesting sport, these guys put so much heart and physical work into literally 4 seconds of full throttle speed! Plus, it makes my first time that much more special since I can say I fraternized with the winner!! ;)

Chance Encounters

Do you ever meet someone in a random chance encounter, and then can't help but sit and laugh looking back on it?

The last weekend in May I had a friend (Jeff) of an ex boyfriend from college send me a facebook message asking if I was going to Carb Day, and if not, would I want to go with him. He said he had suite passes as well as garage/pit passes.

Maybe I should back up to tell you that that ex-boyfriend had cheated on me, and I had only met Jeff maybe 2 times before that relationship had dissolved… and hadn’t really talked to Jeff since then, up until we randomly became fb friends and we would throw the occasional smart-ass comment at each other. I should also state that Jeff is probably in his late 30s. Slightly full of himself, and owns his own company so he’s rather well-to-do. Kindaaaaa random. Not the typical person I expect to burn a PTO day with.

But for some reason, attributed to my newfound ‘roll with it’ attitude, I decided I could work with those kind of benefits (plopping my butt in a suite rather than romping around with the thousands of drunkasses in the infield… muy bueno!), and agreed to tag along!

(Here's a great photo montage of Carb Day for all you non-hoosiers. Biggest party day in May) 

We got to the track close to 8am, and by the time early afternoon rolled around we decided to take a little golf cart ride into the 'Driver RV' area to see some friends... and there, amidst the IRL drivers frolicking amongst their families, and drunken hollering from those not allowed inside the gates, we locked eyes and the heavens opened up on that chilly May day.

Only kidding, we were introduced. He was a friend of a friend, but a fresh face....  I knew TK, he knew TK, but the two of us had never met. 

The main thing I really remember (freecocktailstendtodothistoyou) is that he complimented my watch immediately (ticket to my heart right there)... and then when my ex, whom I spoke of above, somehow found out I was there and tracked us down, instantly turning everyone's mood sour;  Scott took it upon himself to bounce around and cheer me up.

Honestly I didn't talk to him any more than I did everyone else, but there was something about him that made me smile; so as Jeff and I were leaving that evening, and he told me to find him on Facebook, I made a mental note to do so just as soon as my now-dead phone hit a charger.

Barely 48 hours later, a hot little red Shelby Mustang was pulling into my driveway and a handsome fella was opening the door for me to get inside.  After dinner on a patio and a stroll along the canal I decided he was an alright guy, and that I might let him stick around!

That was nearly 4 weeks ago... some of you caught on in yesterday's SWW post when I mentioned the guy I was dating was wearing one of my bracelets.  Smart cookies, you are!