WELP, I Tried. – Part Two

Disclaimer: I tried to not make this a 5,000 word dissertation, but I am a work in progress. If this blog is too long for you, please feel free to visit my Instagram and see the 5 curated & themed posts about this trip for a much shorter visual snack. That’s the family-friendly, ‘don’t piss anyone from the trip off’ version. If you want the more unfiltered (but still not totally unfiltered) version, keep reading.

Now onto the big solo adventure of June. This beach writing retreat was planned by an actress who splits her time between LA and NY and still has family in this area of Greece where she’s from. I found her on Instagram. Before you say YIKES that’s sketchy, please know that I already know that. I did everything I could to fact check this situation before just trusting the universe and 2025 being my mf’ing year and zelle’ing large sums of money to a woman I only know via the ‘gram. She had done several retreats before, and this one in particular was featuring an NYT bestselling memoir author to teach the writing workshops. After much back and forth about booking this trip or a different one with a Barstool Sports blogger, I ultimately decided to go with the author I didn’t know so that I could visit a country I’ve always wanted to visit. I mean, I was literally asking my dad at 13 when he was going to take us on family vacay to Mykonos. To which he replied, “what is it that you think I do for work?” We went to the Jersey Shore instead.

Anyway, I figured workshopping and making connections with other writers would be more than I’m doing now (avoiding further rejection and instead just word vomming all over this blog.) I also set a lofty goal to re-write my book from 2020 and self-publish. After doing some research on what an editor would cost, it seemed to be around the same amount as this trip and I thought the experience would be more rewarding for me. So, I venmo’ed the deposit, then bought the author’s memoir and read it for the first time. What I thought was a comedy memoir like my book draft, was the exact opposite. Her story covered years of drug addiction and trauma, which is a far cry from my tales about my tummy probz. The book was incredibly dark and I wondered exactly what type of writing we’d be doing in these workshops, but that was for future Ju to deal with. I was excited to A. call myself a writer and B. tell anyone who sniffed near me that I was going on a writers retreat to Greece because how creative chic is that?!

Here’s what I already knew about me going into this trip:

I connect more with individuals in quiet settings and small groups where I can actually get to know them.
I want to be spontaneous but I actually love routines, schedule, and control.
I enjoy looking up things to do in the places I’m traveling to and creating a detailed itinerary.
I’m a social butterfly on borrowed time, meaning I need ample recovery and recharging after social interactions or situations where I’m exerting a lot of mental energy.
My stomach is a literal friggin disaster and only gets worse when I travel.
I get overstimulated by noises very quickly.

Here’s what I learned from this experience:

Group trips are not for me.

Alright, here’s the deal, I’m going to add nuance as to why I came to that conclusion, but unfortunately due to legalities, I cannot get into the sordid day to day details of this absolutely bonkers trip. That sounded super official, right? I’m a writer who has legalities. Nah, for real, this is a public forum and I’ve built it upon punching up at celebrities who deserve to be mocked. If I were to really spill the beans on what went down on this trip, I’d be punching down in a big way, which I’m not stupid enough to do on the record. If you want the VH1 Behind the Music version, buy me a cocktail and I’ll regale you with stories that’ll have your jaw on the ground. Simply put, there were several moments on this trip where I wondered if I was on a hidden camera show or part of a human experiment where the humans were actually animals let out of their cages for a week. And given the fact that this was organized by creatives, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if a book, movie, or both are made based on this true story. If White Lotus season 4 just so happens to take place at a Greek resort…I better get a hefty payout.

That being said, I’ll give you the glaring red flags leading up to the trip, plus how the very first day went, and then we’ll all wrap around the campfire for some reflections and bay at the moon. I don’t take big decisions lightly and as a real penny pincher, anything that costs a large sum of money gets even more thought. When I finally decided to put the deposit down for this trip in November, I had a surge of adrenaline and something to look forward to. Having not traveled internationally on my own since college, I was eager to get my flight booked as soon as possible to secure a good rate and also make this feel real. I even got a credit card with travel points hoping that the sign-on bonus would be enough to cover the flight. To take it a step further, I was cocky enough to think I could treat myself to first class and really make this a dream come true. I figured a flight to Europe costs about $1000, so how much more could first class be? Oh baby, what a cold hard slap of reality it was to see that dirt-level economy flights to Europe are in the $2500-3000 range and thus just business class was hovering around $6K. Poor people seats it is! Having not heard anything from our trip planner, I reached out to get a sense of if flights should arrive around a specific time for airport transportation purposes. She replied that I could book whatever I wanted. So I did.

All was quiet on the trip organizing front until I get a text at the end of February asking where the rest of my money is. Um, was I supposed to know it was due? Apparently, yes. She tells me to just Venmo her again. Folks, this trip was thousands of dollars. Would you feel comfy tossing that over Venmo to a stranger? I ask if she can do Zelle instead because it seems a scooch more legit and she obliges. I literally have to move funds around to get everything set to send only to find out even Zelle is like, you good, ma? You can’t send that much money to someone in one day. Which is actually kind of comforting that there’s limits. Could’ve really used an alert when I Zelle’ed a crackhead $25 for fake Eras Tour tickets, but whatevs.

Once the money was sent and I was locked in for sure, I started to get even more anxiety when it was truly crickets about this trip. So far all I knew was the dates, how much I paid for it, and that there would be writing and beaches. I couldn’t even pronounce the name of the city we were going to so when people asked, I just showed them the name. Then they would inevitably ask if it was one of the islands and I would say, sure. It wasn’t until I got back and someone goes, “oh, so you were in Northern Greece,” that I actually knew where the hell I was. In fact, while I was there I said is Macedonia a region or a country? Truly thought it was a country. Geography’s not my strong suit. Neither is math. Neither is booking a trip through Instagram. At one point last winter, my fellow organized traveler of a friend asked me rapidfire questions about my trip that I didn’t have answers to and I had to politely tell her to stop inquiring or I would fall in to a panic spiral and be forced to face the cold hard truth: I paid for something that could be fake. This was also around the time my dad started referring to the trip as Fyre Fest.

In March, I finally emailed and asked for ANY details like lodging, itinerary, transportation, and who else might be joining. The reply had a “rough” itinerary with each date listed and ‘breakfast, workshop, lunch, dinner’ written underneath, copy/paste style. I DID get the name of our resort and was able to see that it had good reviews and looked nice. So, at least we weren’t staying in FEMA tents masquerading as luxury villas. TBD on if this “resort” would serve styrofoam containers of government cheese on bread for our meals. I also was told I’d be connected with the other travelers soon. Throughout March and some of April, both girls were still advertising open spots for the trip on their IG, which was sus as hell. It also looked like our trip leader was in a different country every week. The story I began to tell myself and others to romanticize the situation was that she’s a European easy breezy beautiful cover girl and not an American uptight wad like I was. I reframed my thoughts to tell everyone this is actually a lesson in letting go for me and trusting that it’ll all work out. Let the records show that I’ll tell myself any fairytale I need to in order to justify my decisions.

One month before we were due to be in Greece (my birthday), we receive an itinerary that is almost identical to the one I got in March, listing that we would be fed 3x a day, which SEEMS LIKE A GIVEN on a trip where three meals a day are included in the price. All of the girls were on this email, and if I really wanted to put on my detective hat, I could’ve pulled gov names from each email and looked them all up, but at this point I didn’t want to find any further damning information about this trip that I couldn’t back out of. We were 3 weeks out and I still had no clue what we were doing other than eating meals and going to a beach. The author followed up with an additional email saying “you’re probably wondering what to pack!” YA THINK? And said light clothes and comfy shoes. She also told us some tech items to include in our suitcases, including her favorite products, which she couldn’t remember the names of and couldn’t find on Amazon to link to. Both useless emails full of typos did nothing to give me more confidence about what was to come.

If you haven’t booked your flights yet for international travel 2 weeks away…

I tried so hard to be casj cool and only control the things I could (booking a ride to the airport, taking weeks to meticulously pack outfits into compression cubes not knowing what the F I was wearing said outfits to, buying backup battery packs and converters, creating first aid kits, etc.) One day before I travel, despite having sent my flight info several times and asking to be linked with anyone on the same flight, I still have no clue how I’m getting from the airport to the resort (a 2 hour drive I was already dreading due to my severe motion sickness). I messaged the Billy McFarland of retreats and said, “Do you have any details about the airport pickup?” There are several appropriate responses here that would adequately answer my question such as, meet at this spot, look for this person, look for a sign with the resort name/retreat name/your name…and yet the response I got was, “We will be there to pick you up not to worry, we will find you.”

I’m already a high-strung babe and doing a global trek solo dolo, understandably, was a nerve-wracking thing for me. Add in the drama of my flight not showing up on the app and then my name being “wrong” because I didn’t include my middle name, so how could they possibly know it’s me?! I had to call two separate airlines because even though they operate each other’s flights, they can’t possibly communicate with each other. Needless to say, I showed up to the airport ready to run through a brick wall and also shit my pants. My suitcase was 10 lbs overweight. When I asked what I was supposed to do about that the airline attendant said, and I may be paraphrasing here, “you can scoot your bulky suitcase over to the floor of shame, open that bitch up for everyone to judge how much you hideously overpacked, and move 10 lbs of outfits you won’t wear to your carry-on OR you can pay the overage.” Since I’d rather die than be judged, I said, “what’s the overage?” She replied, 250. As in TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS. I turned heel, wheeled my phat suitcase out of line and started extracting, I cursed my need for multiple clothing/shoe options and the fact that I only brought a shoulder bag carry-on thinking I would fill it with souvs for the way back and it would be basically empty on the way there.

Well, I filled that bag right up (after two rounds of the luggage scale perp walk because I got the cranky airline employee who wanted to be a stickler for two pounds over) and had to schlep it through Newark airport. By the time I got to my gate to see if it existed, I had pit stains down to my ankles and full swass. I got a well-deserved $35 Ketel Soda to cool down and cry about the fact that I now was riddled with this American Eagle duffel bag overflowing with clothes and shoes for the rest of my 15 hour travel day. *Note: I wore everything I packed except for the rogue pair of jeans I threw in with several top variations for potentially cooler nights, which there were none of. So suck it, airport Judge Judy.

Despite carrying a boulder on my shoulder, everything went swimmingly with my travels and if I pat myself on the back any harder for how well I navigated that, my hand would fall off. To the group of malákas who mercilessly mocked and berated me for asking where to find my train last summer during an NJ Transit snafu, LOOK AT ME NOW! Made it across the Atlantic Ocean and through Germany all by myself without once asking a fellow traveler a question for fear of being publicly stoned to death. And God Bless the Munich airport for having shopping carts. I got to drop my 800 lbs of carry-on onto wheels and cruise on over to the window for some natural light and self-care.

Even as a solo traveling champ, it was still a full day of sweating, not sleeping, eating the highest of sodium microwave meals (and one particularly dicey cream cheese relish sandwich), smelling airplane farts, and being touched by strangers because even the smallest human does not fit in what they constitute as an airplane seat these days.

When I landed in Greece, I had fuzzy teeth and BO. And wouldn’t you know…they did NOT find me. I walked slowly out of baggage claim looking for signs, or a group of girls, or really anything that indicated I wasn’t about to be stranded in a foreign airport or snatched into a Euro human trafficking ring and NOTHIN. I don’t mean to always be right but IT DOES SEEM TO HAPPEN A LOT. I had 2 emails in my inbox, one from the group leader and one from a girl who will end up becoming a friend asking me where I am. I then get a call asking me where I am. As if I have magically ethered after getting off of a plane in a very small airport that I was told it was impossible for them to miss me because there’s only one way in and one way out. BLOW MY BRAINS OUT. I’m told I gave the wrong flight info, which I surely didn’t, and then to stand still and someone will find me, something I was already actively doing. Finally, I am found. It’s a real Amazing Grace moment. And I meet 5 other girls, most of whom were on the same exact flight that I was. Wouldn’t it have been GREAT to meet some of my fellow group mates in the Munich airport when I had 3.5 hours to kill, thus also creating a buddy system for when I landed?! Just a thought. Seems rational thoughts were not a part of this trip as we all roll our oversized suitcases and 2 carry-on’s each to a sprinter van that will be taking us to the resort. The trunk of this sprinter van opens up and there is room to comfortably fit one large suitcase. SUPER!

At this point I’m loopy and I just have to laugh at the absurdity of not accounting for luggage with 6 women on a week-long trip, but also expecting jetlagged greasy babes to problem solve this pickle that we did not get ourselves into. As we stepped back and watched the chaos ensue, I learned via some side commentary that everyone was as concerned as I was about sending money to a stranger and receiving no details about this retreat in advance. So at least it was comforting to know that we were all duped as a unit. The final solution after 20-30 minutes of suitcase Jenga while we almost get hit by cars in the parking lot is two stacked in the trunk, two stacked in the front, and the remaining 20 bags to be shoved on laps and at feet throughout the van. We pile in and start rolling and immediately realize that the only source of airflow is in the front and being blocked by suitcases. We try to open windows and by pure luck, the one closest to me will not budge. I’m in the back row of the van and I tell these girlies that I’ve met five minutes ago, “this may be an opportune time to share that I get car sick, so I just wanted to give a head’s up that I’ll be closing my eyes and disassociating for the remainder of this three hour tour.” Someone asked if I might throw up. Only time will tell, girlypops!

This is truly one of the ugliest photos I’ve ever taken of myself but goes to show how dedicated I am to being authentic.

We stopped 4 times on this drive straight out of my nightmares. Stop # 1 was because the double decker suitcases in the front were getting in the way of our driver shifting gears, and there was a dicey moment when both almost went free falling out of the front window, which was rolled all the way down in hopes that a morsel of fresh air would make its way back to the bowels of this van. God Bless my seat mate, the same pal who emailed me, for suggesting we put the suitcases in the back and Ju up front since she’s probably going to ralph everywhere. I then got to take the Queen’s throne where I hung my head out the window like a dog and let that sea breeze smack me in the face while my legs were in a full contortion pretzel on the dash. I love my legs, they are my greatest feature, but boy do I wish I could chop them off while traveling because they quite literally never have a place to go.

Stop # 2 was to fill up the ole tank. Because of course when you rent a van that is just for transporting people to and from the airport, you wait until it’s full of people with suitcases digging into their side wanting to die to gas ‘er up. Stop # 3 was for goats crossing the road. This was the only stop I would’ve allowed (it was mandatory) and I got a front row seat for animal cuteness. I’m sure my homeslices suffocating in the back did not enjoy this as much.

Stop # 4 was 15 minutes away from the resort when two women insisted they wouldn’t make it another second without peeing. As someone with a strong bladder and lots of pee anxiety, I can hold my urine for a minimum of 5 hours, maximum of like 10-12 depending on the situation and how much I’ve had to drink. We all peed before we left the airport and knew it was a 2 hour drive and I don’t believe anyone was slugging water on this trip because in Europe water is not readily available and we basically spent a week dehydrated. So why we had two almost oopsie pee pants moments from women who have not birthed children and thus have not ruined their pelvic floor yet IS BEYOND ME. We pulled over on the side of this back country road where there’s a cliff down to the Aegean Sea and the rocky dirt becomes their toilet. One tucks herself behind a tree and takes care of business, the other stands directly next to the car and just lets it all wizz out, fully erect, no squat, no removal of skirt and/or underwear, if there was any. As my window was down, I saw and heard the thicc cascading waterfall of pee, and if I really wanted to, I probably could’ve reached out and touched it. And there is…no recovering from that. It was the most wild thing I’ve ever witnessed. The goats crossing the road wouldn’t have even pulled this maneuver. And that was only hour 3 of being in Greece.

This hot start was most obviously an omen for the trip. It was the equivalent of driving up a winding road to a creepy haunted house and there being a dead-eyed old man holding a sign on the side of said road that reads TURN AROUND in blood. Should I have seen what I needed to see at the airport and split in a cab for a week of solo trolling around Thessanoliki? Probably. But then I wouldn’t be able to write this blog and WHAT FUN WOULD THAT BE?!

Stray cats everywhere I looked, also an omen.

Alright, time for reflections. As it turns out, putting 17 women in a room together may be ABC’s dream to create drama for a reality dating show, but IRL, it’s overwhelming and overstimulating. I can confidently say, and this may be a hot take for some people, but big groups of women do not bring out the best in each other. I’m not one of those girls that’s like oh I get along better with men, actually. I get along with plenty of girls. I love that girlhood is complimenting each other’s outfits and becoming best friends in bar bathrooms. But I also think too many girls trying to out-personality each other in a confined space is what purgatory looks like and there were several moments when I wanted to chop my ears clean off my head. Knowing that I bond better in smaller circles, cutting that group in half would’ve been very beneficial to girls who don’t thrive in attention-seeking environments. We also reealllly could’ve used some Big Dick Energy in this pack of she-wolves to balance things out.

Greece is known for their dicks, yet none were on this trip.

Although there was no detailed itinerary for our week-long stay, there was no down time either. The only moments I was alone was when I was showering or sleeping, and oftentimes I was showering at warp speed to make it to dinner on time after staying at the beach later to enjoy it as much as possible. In order to get my family souvenirs, I had to literally skip dinner one night to go shopping instead. I’m honestly shocked I never went full irritated bitch mode and snapped at anyone due to a depleted social battery and only getting about 4-5 hours of sleep each night, although I’m sure my face showed my every gripe on more than one occasion. If you know me, you know I must sleep a tight 8-10 hours every night and also get my daily late afternoon cat nap or I turn into the Beast when Belle refuses to join him for dinner. This is probably why I’ll never have children. Unfortunately, my body rejected the time zone in Greece and never adjusted. It was like it knew I didn’t belong there.

Also, as it pertains to my bowels and overall potty anxiety, I learned that flushing toilet paper in old European cities is a hard no. Tell someone who has IBS that the ancient pipes LITERALLY can’t dissolve thin tissue paper and watch them panic right before your very eyes. The good news is I was perpetually dehydrated and existing solely on carbs and one water bottle per day that I greedily filled up at the beverage station each morning at the breakfast buffet (to many dirty looks of course.) It was the perfect recipe for constipation. Sure, I looked like I was in my first trimester, but at least I didn’t have a tummy emergency that shut down the whole resort.

I never got to order my own food (another point of contention) and was forever hungry so this late night dawg was not only necessary for survival but v satisfying.

Three hours later…I think you get the gist of why group trips go against every fiber of my being. But much like Coldplay taught me in 2005, “if you never try, you’ll never know.” I tried it, I turned it into a story to make myself laugh / hopefully entertain you all, and I know that the next time I travel it will be with people who pee in a toilet preferably behind a closed door. This retreat wasn’t a lesson in letting go of control, it was a lesson in raising my hopes to Jupiter for something and not crying when those unrealistic expectations are not met. Can confirm that I did not cry about any of my disappointing solo events in the month of June. And that’s on growth, baby! (TBH, I did cry on the last night pre-hot dog but it was because I was read for filth by the Greek Billy McFarland and those were justified tears and not wah wah my life sucks tears. BIG DIFF.) I won’t beat the “two things can be true” theme to death but obviously this blog was heavy on the things that went wrong on this trip and if you want to know what went right, go to my IG/FB and see me rave about becoming one with the sea, boating/beaching like a champ, and bonding with two girlies who were equally as horrified as I was at any given moment. #TraumaBond. I would say the takeaway here is to never book a trip on Instagram, but honestly I booked my airport ride on Instagram with a guy named Vinny and that was a 100/10 experience, so I’m gonna keep rolling the dice on socials. You win some, you lose some.

True test if we can be friends: if you laugh at this video that I spent way too much time making whilst in the Munich airport on my layover.

After ALL of that, traveling back in a total haze of overtired crankiness, I spent my 9 hour return flight furiously journaling everything I saw and heard on this excursion, with my gangly legs stretched out into the middle seat because the Lord took pity upon me and left that seat open, giving me a place for my greatest asset to belong. And as the aisle seat and I were waiting in line for the potty (matching potty times is super polite plane etiquette), he asked if I was a writer after noticing me nearly ripping the page with my pen velocity. I told him how I was just returning from a writer’s retreat (I’m telling you, it makes me sound SO LEGIT), and we ended up chatting for about 20 minutes. He published an academic book and shared stories about that process, including a juicy C&D he received from Julie Andrews for using her photo on the cover. He was easy to chat with and casually brought up his husband almost immediately, which I LOVED. The gays have an uncanny knack for immediately letting you know they’re an ally and not a predator. And since I’ve been preyed upon several times in the past month by gross old pervs, I very much appreciated knowing right out the gate that this man would not be cornering me for my phone number, making me want to swan dive out the emergency exit. In fact, he gave me HIS business card and told me he would connect me to his neighbor in publishing. I told him that clearly I was meant to meet him because he just gave me more writing advice and contacts than I got all week. He told me I was funny, so obviously I would die for him. And THAT’S what you get for trying!

Salty Stories

WELP, I Tried. – Part One

Welcome to the summer of solo adventures that shall never be repeated.

A lie that I told myself to get through one of the loneliest and darkest winters I have ever experienced, was that 2025 was going to be my year. I fully convinced myself (and anyone around me who would listen) that this is the year everything clicks into place, even making my first ever vision board and writing down manifestations to really toss the good vibes into the uni. A big piece of that “this is your year” momentum centered on a decision I made last fall, to spend a sizeable amount of money (my entire savings) to join a writing beach retreat in Greece. It was something that had come across my desk more than once, and I kept revisiting it, clearly stuck on the idea that I needed to push myself to not only do a solo trip, but to go to a place I’ve always wanted to go AND tie it into reaching new writing goals. So, with much encouragement (and a sliver of financial support from parents who will literally never rid themselves of their youngest child), I booked the trip and had something BIG to look forward to.

Also during this time of utter despair short freezing days, two of my favorite artists announced summer concerts in Asbury Park a week apart from each other. What’re the chances?! Natch, I had no one to go to either concert with. Forever on the fence about doing a concert alone, I decided to pull the trigger and make June of 2025, the month of doing things alone and scared. It was either going to be forever, or go down in flames as an up and coming musician once sang about men. And now that we’re safely in July, I can now publicly declare…FLAMES. It went down in flames.

Let’s start with the concerts. What has stopped me from ever going to a show alone before, you might ask? The dreaded in-between time. Concerts are typically annoying parking situations, perhaps a long walk to the venue, waiting in line, not actually knowing when the band goes onstage so you get a drink, buy merch, maybe eat a snack, and yap. Then of course, there’s the dead air between sets as they switch the stages. When you think about it, there’s several wasted hours during a show that you barely notice when you’re with friends just yuckin it up. When you’re alone? It feels like 84 years have passed since you arrived. Well wouldn’t you know, this very specific fear that I had was 1 billion percent true.

My first solo show was Russell Dickerson, and there’s a reason his headlining tour of 2022 was called the RD Party. Boy knows how to put on a banger of a show complete with ripping his shirt off at the end, Chippendales style. He also happens to have some boppin beach songs and I couldn’t pass up the chance to be ON the actual beach jamming it up to the songs of the summer. Plus, both of his openers were singers I liked, which also never happens. Cut to me overthinking my outfit (in case a cowboy swept me off my boots), spending 20 mins looking for parking in Asbury, finally giving up and paying $25 for a parking garage when I could’ve found a street spot for $6, then getting into the venue and immediately buying an overpriced hat I didn’t need because, duh. A merch tent LOVES to see me comin. And then silence. For over an hour.

1. I hope the city council or whoever is in charge over in Asbury Park gets diarrhea at a super inconvenient time for the way they’ve monopolized parking in that dump.

2. I get that venues want you to show up early and give them money (cause who at this point doesn’t want to rip all of my money away from me) but HOW have we not made it public exactly what times each band graces the stage so concert-goers can plan accordingly?!

But I digress, I made my way closer to the stage, something I’ve never been early enough for in the past, and then I realized, I couldn’t leave that spot. I had no one to hold it for me and I certainly wasn’t going to get a drink and piss people off trying to get it back. I got dirty looks just for walking casually toward the front 16 hours before the show began. (Which is wild by the way. Sorry for existing?) So, for the next small century, I lived in that spot. I never got a drink, I never went to the bathroom, I just stood. It was BRUTAL. An hour and a half later the first opener went onstage. He was fun and I was reminded I know even less words to songs than I think I do. Another 30-45 mins of stage switching, then the second opener. Same deal. Then another what seemed like eternity of nothingness before the main event. I read all of social media that night. Everything. I was seeing tweets as they were coming through in real time because I was so starved for entertainment. I texted everyone I know and they were all busy not being a smelly loser cheese stands alone at a concert in white cowboy boots. I smiled at people next to me in the eternity of waiting hoping I might make a new friend. No one bit. I even tried the bonding over mutual hate tactic whenever a drunk guy pushed through by catching eyes with someone near me and doing a dramatic ‘get a load of this a*hole’ eye roll. Didn’t reel any pals in with that one either and that’s how I know I was not amongst my people. Russell commanded the stage as he always does but it lacked the glimmer for me. I had no one to scream sing BRING IT OVER HERE LITTLE MAMA, I’VE GOT A WHISKEY WAITING ON YA in their face and do the MGNO shuffle. It was a great show, and also incredibly disappointing. It was fun for 1-2 hours and excruciatingly boring and awkward for 3 other hours. Peep the content I created below because I wasn’t about to let that view go to waste after becoming a statue in the same spot for an entire evening.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DKm4jExAiVZ

Apparently WordPress is no longer friends with Instagram, so you have to click a link, which I know is asking a lot.

@gardenstategoofin
Literally just a Jersey girl who wants to have fun at RussellMania 💃🏻 #gardenstategoofin #stoneponysummerstage #russelldickerson #soldoutshow #sonicehesangittwice #happentome @Russell Dickerson
♬ original sound – Garden State Goofin

I left this show already dreading my next solo concert, but also didn’t really want to deal with the admin of trying to sell a ticket while I’m in another country. So this time, I posted in a Facebook group of girliecats looking for friends in Asbury Park and asked if anyone else was going and wanted to meet up. Four women commented separately that they were and I DM’ed all of them my phone number and told them to text me if they were open to meeting at the show. I received 0 text messages. One girl messaged me on Facebook and then when I reached out before the show, crickets. Which is worse, going solo and acting like it was a choice, or trying to meet up with absolute strangers and getting ghosted? You can get back to me on that.

Knowing that I absolutely didn’t care about this opening act and couldn’t do another two hours of standing in a crowd pretending to read tweets I’ve already read, I aimed to get there right as the band was taking the stage. This concert was for my good ole tried and true fave nostalgic musician, Andrew McMahon. The pop punk singing piano player I’ve been obsessed with since I was 16, and have dutifully seen live with each band he’s formed every time he swings through town. Well wouldn’t you know, I overcorrected my arrival time and didn’t account for the additional 40 minutes it took me to find a mediocre parking spot 5 blocks away (seriously, die a slow death, Asbury Park), so I was in line to enter as the band was getting onstage. You know what’s the perfect show to be in the dead last row for? The one where the lead singer sits at a piano the whole time. For realz, I could’ve been in a canoe bobbing in the waves of the ocean behind me and would’ve had the same view of the stage that I was catching inside this venue.

I got a drink to buy myself time on how to find a spot and then bopped from one side of the stage to the other, in the way back, craning my neck to see if I could ever actually get eyes on my boy Andrew. I finally settled into a spot by the fourth song and if the guys in front of me didn’t talk to each other, I could just make out Andrew McMahon’s tiny head in the negative space between these bros’ meaty necks. Sick view. The sound was even better. When they were singing, it was fine, although I could hear the crowd more strongly than them, but when Andrew talked, which he likes to do at shows, I got nothin. This was the 20th anniversary of their first album and he was telling stories about why he wrote certain songs, and all I heard was everyone around me’s conversations. Hey babes, if you’re going to just socialize, why spend $60 a head to do so? Why not just go to the bar and put that money toward boozin? I tried to push past groups that were literally facing away from the stage because WHY ARE YOU EVEN HERE?! Also, I realize I could’ve just gone full dick mode and done the “I’m looking for my friends” bit to push toward the front, but just the thought of pissing someone off and having a Jersey-style confrontation gives me the nervous poops. Not to mention the fact that I’m Jack the friggin Beanstalk and even just standing in the back I heard the slicked bun behind me grumbling to her tall hot boyf that I was too tall and she couldn’t see. Life must be rly hard for her.

The only time I could see him was when he jumped on the piano…

To add insult to injury, after 3 full days of a 100 degree heat wave, Earth was like my hot flash is over, let’s go back to fall, dropped down to 60 degrees and that G-D wind was back, BB! Challenge accepted though and credit to me: nailed it with the perfect amount of layers. Tee+hoodie+jean jacket. I wore a baseball cap with braids because I’d rather hurl myself off a cliff than have my hair repeatedly blow in my face. I never took the hood down. Should the chat monsters surrounding me ever close their gaping yappers, they would’ve wondered if I was the unabomber or JLo just trying to keep it on the DLow and not get recognized in AP. If you’re hating your current situation and everyone around you, highly recommend wearing both a hat and a hood. It was like having blinders up and also really came in handy WHEN IT STARTED RAINING HALFWAY THROUGH THE SHOW. Needless to say, I am done with solo concerts. BUT, I tried. I made the pre-judgement about why they wouldn’t be enjoyable that I was incredibly right about. And now I know for sure, seeing live music is only fun for me when I can share the adrenaline and joy with someone else, much like most of life.

TO BE CONTINUED because this blog was even too long for me so I cut it into two parts. And let me tell you, part two is a doozy.

Salty Stories

The Most Alarming Things Medical Professionals Have Said to Me (So Far)

I’ve recently been trying harder to get published again, which caused me to dive back into the old archive of drafts from my writing sprint a couple years ago. I know it may seem hard to imagine for any of you who have read my blog or my satire before, but they are almost one in the same. 99% of my humor pieces are based on real life scenarios and I write it in my own voice. Sometimes I look back at a draft I wrote and realize I don’t want to make something more fictional or satirical, I want to just tell it like it is…ya know, funny cuz it’s TRUE! So here’s a list of all the crazy shit medical professionals have actually said out loud to me, which may or may not be the crux of my distrust in doctors and my severe anxious attachment to self-diagnosing on WebMD.

*For the last three years I’ve churned out a birthday blog as a mechanism to fight the sads on aging. I felt like I got it all out last year (I should’ve for how long that blog was), so pls accept this unrelated blog that I was planning on posting anyway as my “birthday blog.” Realistically, when you get older, your body starts deteriorating and if you keep reading you’ll see that mine has been doing so since birth so I guess it’s still on theme. I’m actually terrified for what my later years will bring with medical care, but at least I made it to 33 without crumbling into dust. And that’s certainly worth celebrating!

In Chronological Order

Oops, let me just check where the sun don’t shine! Hot start, I know. The most important thing I learned growing up didn’t come from a textbook, it came from my childhood dermatologist repeatedly checking my butthole for moles. As it turns out, moles don’t come from the sun, and they CAN thrive in dark cracks. For whatever reason the first derm I had was obsessed with diving into my butt (not just mine, I double checked with my sister and she got the same scarring peek so it’s comforting to know I wasn’t being violated alone) and I’ve seen roughly 45 derms since this one and none of them have ever once parted my buttcheeks looking for cancerous moles. But one *did* have the balls to tell me that I had age spots near my vagina that often appear around age 30. 😑 I was 27 at the time. Even if I didn’t already have a complex about aging, THAT WOULD’VE DONE IT!

*Pulls saturated glove out from armpit* Well, you definitely have a sweating problem. Gee doc, my pit stains down to my ankles on a Tuesday in the middle of February might’ve indicated that or maybe it’s the fact that all the other 7th graders chant “SWASS” repeatedly when I walk into the cafeteria with a moist butt print on my terrycloth mini. JK they didn’t do that. But I have photographic proof that on the 8th grade field trip to Cleveland, OH, my tee shirt was soaked and discolored as I tried to flirt with a boy and sit on his lap while my Secret Light & Fresh wasn’t hacking it and I absolutely had BO and HONESTLY THAT’S PROBABLY WHY I DIDN’T HAVE A BOYFRIEND UNTIL 25. (I spent about 2 hours trying to find this picture and of course I can’t. But one day, when you least expect it, I’ll resurface it for gigglez.)

Also, I leaked in 7th grade during a visit from Aunt Flo and I WAS wearing a terrycloth mini and I didn’t think anything of it being wet because that was just an average day for me in my teens and therefore I went all day walking around with a giant seat-print blood stain on my skirt. The moral of the story is that all of this could’ve been solved if my mom agreed to let the dermatologist stick me with botox to block my sweat glands on this fateful day and instead she said I was too young and ruined my life. I’m even more bitter now because as a grown ass adult I still can’t afford botox and I have to buy new white shirts every quarter to replace the ones with browned armpits because I still pour sweat out of all of my orifices on the daily double. Even when I’m cold. #HyperhidrosisSurvivor

I need an even smaller speculum because you’ve got an itty bitty vagina. As if going to the gynecologist for the first time at 15 isn’t traumatizing enough, let’s add in a doc telling me to keep my American Eagle distressed jean skirt intact and just slide my undies off, which felt like something a horny teen would say as we snuggled under a blanket in his basement watching a scary movie. She then proceeded to conduct a full pap smear on a girl who had never even kissed a boy. Spoiler alert: even the small speculum feels like you’re being cranked open with a car jack and your hymen is being ripped out by a gloved hand. As adorable as it may sound, having an “itty bitty vagina” made my annual invasion a straight up lady bits massacre from ages 15-present day.

The trick is to pant like a dog and you won’t even feel me swab your throat. One would think a reference to a strep throat cult was from my early childhood but curveball, this was told to me when I was 23. Yes, that’s right. You heard it here first. I was a college graduate before I stopped hitting doctors and screaming when they tried to swab my throat. All it took was for a very skilled ninja in the Urgent Care to not judge me and to give me this pro tip so I didn’t feel like I was choking to death. I mean, realistically I could make dolphin sounds and clap my fins and I will STILL FEEL that giant wooden paddle piercing my hangy ball with reckless abandon causing me to gag uncontrollably. But this was the one and only time I didn’t badger the doctor administering the strep test. I also didn’t have strep, I had mono and because they couldn’t diagnose it for several visits, I turned into a lifeless corpse that eventually needed a Sammy Sosa dose of roids to bring me back to life.

Sounds like your boyfriend has multiple personality disorder. This sentence was uttered by a licensed mental health counselor about 20 mins into my first therapy appointment after giving a brief description of my boyfriend. That’s right, folks, this is someone who has years of schooling and certifications to help people through their darkest times and she’s tossing out a diagnosis for someone she’s never even met after two sentences from someone she *just* met. YIKES THAT IS SCARY. What’s scarier is that she ended the appointment by saying that she saw my reaction when she said that and wanted to walk it back, because therapy is just guessing and seeing what resonates. What’s scariest is that I continued to see her for several months and even brought my boyfriend in for an appointment because she asked to meet him and then she flirted with him for 40 minutes and told me to never let him get away. YOU CAN HAVE HIM, DONNA!

*Feels ice cold toes * Not much I can do for this, your best bet is to move down to Florida where it’s much warmer! So then it IS true what the brochures say, Florida is known as the Circulation state! Add my Raynaud’s Syndrome (freezing cold fingers and toes), to the laundry list of ailments that get worse as I age. Apparently I have my Nana to thank for passing the ole dead toes on down to me in the genetics pool. Ironically enough, her toes are dead as is the rest of her and has been since long before I was layering two pairs of socks to sleep at night in the winter. I can also thank my family for settling in the frozen tundra of Syracuse, which certainly hasn’t helped matters. But sure, as I put a space heater on my feet, invest in wool socks and wear Uggs everywhere, it certainly hadn’t crossed my mind that FLORIDA WOULD BE BETTER THAN THIS ICY HELLHOLE.

*Lifts shirt* You were the one with the abnormal mole, THAT’s right. You’ll just feel a pinch. Why do drugs when you can get simple thrills just from getting your back sliced and stitched up with the exam room door wide open and wonder if they figured out which patient you are yet. Puff puff pass or back alley biopsy, amirite?! This was hands down the sketchiest/most unprofessional experience I’ve ever had in a medical office. These clowns pulled up topless pictures of other patients on their double monitor computers in front of me (of course it was the oldest man on this earth, they couldn’t even treat me to a hot bod), complained about their jobs, bitched about other patients, scraped my back for a biopsy and let it bleed all over my white shirt, had me sign a waiver minutes before surgery on my own lap and took the pages with the actual info on it and told me just to Johnny Hancock the sig page, then conducted the surgery with the door wide open and my shirt off, chatting amongst themselves as they tried to figure out which patient I actually was mid-slice. And then I had to go back and have the stitches ripped from my body (also with the door open.) That was three total appointments from a place that was about as legit as a medic tent at Fyre Fest. So natch when they sent me a “HOW DID WE DO” survey, I lit them up. Don’t ask if you don’t want the answer, boneheads! As you might recall-in my 31st Birthday Blog, I googled how to report them as well. I hope someone far richer than me has sued the ever-loving shit out of them by now. That’s my birthday wish this year.

Has your nipple always looked like that? Ya, doc. I’ve been coming here annually for 3 years now and you ask me this exact question every time and instead of roasting the left nip I was born with and suggesting it could be a sign of breast cancer, maybe you could just make a fucking note in my chart. Another dermatologist. Go figure.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, I have been mostly traumatized (and tan-shamed) by dermatologists. BUT my most surprising violation (with very little verbal warning) came from my viz to the GI, which I detailed extensively here. In addition, of course, to the all-time classic, “you’ve been pooping wrong,” which belongs on this list right alongside the jarring buhhole examination. A two-for-one special of reasons to be in therapy from that Doc.

Your feet aren’t that bad, imagine what I see in Newark. Honestly, this was meant to be a comforting statement from my favorite doc I have, my podiatrist. He’s an old-school Italian, baseball lovin guy who takes care of me as if I’m his own daughter (including putting my shoes on at the end of each appointment and tying the laces for me, double knot style.) Most people would be irritated by this but I actually love being treated like a toddler when I visit him quarterly. Keeps me young, which I know I am anyway because judging by his waiting room, I am 50 years younger than any of his patients. But anyway, when your sister is telling you that you can’t come home for the 4th of July unless you wear socks at all times because she doesn’t want to puke at the sight of your toenail that LITERALLY WILL NEVER HEAL (it’s almost a full year later and we’re still rocking a very unappealing toe), hearing that the mangled dusty-ass tootsies of Newark are even being mentioned in the same sentence as yours is not very uplifting. Especially because HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO PULL IN FEET PIC MONEY IF MY FEET ARE HORRIFYING. My right big toe, AKA Moldy Toe looks like what I imagine a 95 year old woman’s crusty chunky toenail looks like and for several months of sandal season, Doc told me I couldn’t put nail polish over it to cover it up. And I told him that if I was ever going to find a husband we’d have to find a solution that wasn’t flaunting this bad boy around bare in a pair of flops. So yea, the bar is low as I wait for this thing to die away from me but at least it’s not STREETS OF NEWARK low.

PS The sad faced hospital gown cover photo wasn’t from any of these circumstances but was from a dermatologist who forgot about me waiting in the exam room in a paper gown one day. Doesn’t make the cut because they didn’t say anything questionable…they didn’t even remember I existed. My mom told them they were all dead to us and we stormed out of there and never turned back. I know, I know, ANOTHER DERMATOLOGIST. And while we’re on the topic of the most traumatizing type of doctor, I just want it in writing that I’m a FIRM believer in them scraping a mole every year strictly to say they did something. There has not been one single time that I’ve been examined by a derm and they haven’t said hm, this one looks a little iffy, let me just send a piece of it to the lab. Sure, doc. You go ahead and take a souv from my skin so you can charge me (and my insurance…if I happen to have any at the time) an extra lab testing/needles/numbing injection fee. WITHOUT FAIL. It’s like paying the toll at the dermatologist. Which reminds me, I’m due for payment in a couple months…I wonder where I’ll be hacked this time.

Salty Stories

I’m A Side Hustlin’ Hack

As luck would have it, exactly two weeks before I moved to a more expensive apartment, I got shitcanned by my freelance social media job that I had for 3 years, a supplemental income that I very much needed. But bad things don’t happen in isolated incidents, they happen in three’s, everyone knows that! At the same time I got swindled out of that, I was also told by my therapist of 6 years that my insurance dropped her and I owed her $700 for appointments that they didn’t cover and we’d have to break up. And THEN I made a compelling stats-heavy presentation at my full-time job asking for a raise and was given a pat on the head and told keep up the good work. YAY! Suffice to say, fulfilling my goal of moving to the beach came with an inner voice in my head that sounded a LOT like that little shit Stilwell sneering “you’re gonna lose” and “you stink” over and over again. And since I’m doing life by myself, it’s up to me to pull a Jimmy Dugan and whip a glove at that voice.

The cool thing about my generation is that when we’re forced to work a minimum of two jobs to survive because inflation and the housing market/rent prices have soared to astronomical levels and an average salary for a job requiring a college degree (that most people are still paying off) is $40,000, is that there’s a plethora of apps capitalizing on the need for fast cash. And instead of calling it like it is, pure desperation to pay our bills on time and not go into further debt, we call it a side hustle to sound sexy and mysterious. And some of these apps ARE sexy and mysterious! OnlyFans and Feetfinder just to name a couple…but the rest: Rover, GrubHub, Uber, DoorDash, Lyft, Care, Wag, Instacart, Shipt…not so much. After serious consideration of the aforementioned apps (cause nudes and toes are where the money’s at) I realized that I’ve seen far too many true crime docs to trust that one of these pervs wouldn’t somehow track me down and wear me as a skin suit. And so I opted for the safer route of snuggling pups via the Rover app.

I paid the overpriced $30 for a background check, uploaded a bunch of delfies, and tried not to sound like the kind of gal that used to sneak-pet dogs in Italy when their owners weren’t looking. I succeeded because suddenly I had a hot weekend with 5 drop-in visits booked. It was during this weekend that I had to take a hard look at myself in the mirror as I was yelling at my own dog to HURRY UP AND GO POTTY so I could walk other people’s dogs. Only to come home cloaked in the scent of a cheater. The air was thick with betrayal as Charlee came to the realization that not only was she forced to squeak out a dump under extreme duress but I was rushing her so I could step out with not one but two strange dogs in the same day. Chuck, if you’re reading this, please forgive me, Mommy’s sorry! You’ll always be my favorite dog to smother.

Not worth the wasted travel time or neglecting my own pooch, I dropped my Rover distance down to less than 5 miles continuing to hope that someone down the street with a full-time job that pays them enough to live off of would scoop me up as their regular lunchtime dog walker. I had already collected three 5-star reviews from my knack for writing a super cheesy report card and snapping an array of portrait-mode doggie pics that belong in an art gallery. Eat your heart out, Annie Leibovitz.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t getting any hits so it was time to move onto a new venture. After a very nerve-wracking night where my mom convinced me a dog owner I was doing a meet and greet with was going to be an axe murderer rapist, I was extra vigilant about doing apps where my probability of getting snatched was on the lower end. After sharing my concern with a friend of the program, he quickly pointed out that anyone who snatches me would give me right back after 10 mins of me yappin. So I’ve got that goin for me, which is nice. I decided on DoorDash. I figured I could bring people their food and drop it on their doorstep (minimal human contact=slight chance of being adult-napped) Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy. DD hazed me by giving me a half hour shift 8 towns over to kick things off, which I took like a frat bro champ, desperate to pledge Delta Delta. In a half hour I delivered two Wendy’s orders to people who lived next door to each other and made $15. Needless to say, after this short stint, I had a real false sense of confidence that I could crush it as a dasher and make millions.

Which brings me to the real reason for this blog: my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day of panhandling on the apps. Still active on Rover, I happened to get pinged for a drop-in visit with 3 dogs, all above 80 lbs. I certainly don’t think I’m Cesar Milan but I figured it wouldn’t be difficult to let these dogs out into their own backyard. The night before my scheduled meet and greet, the dog owner reached out to me and asked if instead of dropping in at their house, I could actually just take their 2 year old husky to my house for the day. Exsqueeze me? I’m not on the app to bring strange dogs into my home, I’m on the app to see how the top 1% (homeowners and people who can afford a dog walker) live. AND obviously to overwhelm their dog with affection for a nominal fee. After a phone conversation where she explained this dog was fresh from the shelter and still “in a destructive phase,” I told her that I also have a dog and happen to like the things in my home, including my overpriced Christmas tree that I (my mom) had just worked really hard to put up. Charlee was destructive for one month when I rescued her and after she ruined this piece of rare art curated by Christmas Tree Shop before I even had the chance to hang it up, I nearly sent her packing right back to Mississippi. So no, I’m not willing to bring another chomper riddled with separation anxiety into my new apartment.

We agreed that I would bring my dog to her house to meet the others and we’d go from there AKA I’d tell her I would be more comfortable watching her dog in its own home where it belongs. So I brought Chuckles to meet some new pup pals knowing that she’d never see them again but just trying to repent for the weekend I cheated on her so hard. This did not put me back in her good graces, in fact, I think at one point she gave me a look that very clearly read, “what the fuck, mom?!” It looked kinda like this:

As it turned out, these dogs were A LOT. They were big and loud and immediately ganged up on my little Chooch. She hated every second of this playdate and snapped her teeth like a croc to get them to back off, to which they said NOPE! In this high-stress and very barky few minutes, I learned that the husky has escaped their backyard several times now by attempting an Olympic trial-level high jump over the fence and also tunneling under the fence. This dog was giving Andy Dufresne a run for his money. Legend says that before she dove below sea level to resurface on the other side of the picket fence she turned to her doggie sibs and said, “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.“

As I was processing these deets amidst the chaos of howling, snarling, and my dog trying to crawl up inside my womb, I was simultaneously being asked to commit my whole Sunday to watching these giant furry a*holes rather than the previously requested hour, for a paltry sum of money. As many loyal readers of The Salty Ju know, I hate confrontation and awkward stranger interactions. I’d rather deteriorate into a skeleton than politely remove myself from an uncomfy sitch and saying no has never been an option for me. So when faced with this ultimately terrible dog watching set-up, I was ready to be like, “sure, babes, whatever you need!” instead of, “I’d rather die.”

So I nodded along like an idiot and when my dog was literally about to be eaten alive, I suggested putting her in the car before it got ugly. I went to bring her to safety and who trotted right out behind me but the escape artist herself in her easiest disappearing act to date. I was in shock. I hadn’t even been responsible for this dog yet and I already set her free into the wild. Knowing she had about 10 seconds before her mom realized what happened, she said SAYONARA, SUCKERS and took off down the road. What ensued next was straight out of a movie. The dog owner and her toddler son were not yelling the dogs name but speaking it at a normal volume and walking toward it at a casual ‘I just recently learned how to use my feet’ pace. There was no air of panic coming from them, meanwhile I was THE MOST frantic. I hysterically asked the owner if the dog would chase me if I ran in the opposite direction, seeking any sort of resolution, even one that might show what an uncoordinated blob of mashed potatoes I am. It was so far away at this point it wouldn’t have even seen my chicken legs take off to chase.

Not knowing what else to do to be helpful in this scenario and also riddled with guilt from being the gate-opening monster, I joined the search and rescue team that had more of a ‘hopefully this dog just runs back toward us’ energy about it. Several friendly neighbors stopped as they drove by and made things even more awks as they asked me about tendencies of a dog I’d met 5 minutes ago and told me to hop in with them to get it. Uh no sir, I was taught to never get in vans with strangers. Feeling rather useless, I took over toddler duty as I realized losing a dog and also having your 2 year old clipped by a car as he weaved all over the road shouting, “DOGGIE FREE!” might actually ruin this woman’s life. I held his little hand and vowed to not also set him free into traffic. After what felt like hours but was probably 10 mins, one of the neighbors got the dog into her car and happened to have a leash in there as well to prevent ole Seabiscuit from gunning for the Triple Crown again. As we walked back to the house the owner asked me if I babysit as well since I was so good with her son (read: I didn’t lose him) and I had to break it to her that I only babysit for families who I’ve vetted bring their A-game with a fully-loaded snack pantry. I’m kidding, I told her I actually hate kids. No but seriously, there’s a reason I didn’t join the Care app and it’s exclusively because it would be inapprops to say in my profile that I would only be willing to watch sleeping children so I can get paid to binge Netflix and my non-negotiable rate is $35/hr.

After that whirlwind, I thought FOR SURE she was going to state the obvious: that I was not cut out for this dog-sitting gig. But unfortunately for us all, she was ready to give me a tour of the house when we got back and I had to put my big girl panties on and do a lil practicing of the word no. I shared that I did not have the experience required for a 90 lb dog who would rather roam free like a Quileute shapeshifter than be constricted to a home. And then I beat it out of there as fast as I possibly could but not before I could think to myself, why would anyone with two kids under two add a third large breed dog to their wolfpack, a SIBERIAN HUSKY nonetheless, which was literally BRED to run?! This MF’er is pulling jailbreaks just so she can stretch her damn legs and stay in shape should she ever be called upon to sub in for the Iditarod.

Anywho, although it may be easy to dwell on the fact that I went along with this FAR longer than I should have, it’s important to celebrate my ginormous win here. Sure, I traumatized my dog with a 3 on 1 gang bang and showed that I’m inept at latching a gate BUT rather than saying sounds good, super excited to get underpaid to wrangle your poorly-behaved mutts who may or may not also wreck your house or run away and then texting her a cop-out once I was safely in my home…I said NO THANK YOU MA’AM right at her face. Round of applause for me.

Ok, now hold your applause because later this very same day, I tackled my first (and last) dinner shift for DoorDash. Scheduled for 5-7, I took my cocky delivery driver ‘tude out to the mean streets of Brick and was IMMEDIATELY humbled. I think it’s important to lay out my disadvantages for you right off the bat: I’m not from this area or this state in general, so not only do I have no clue where I’m going and have to rely on the GPS, but also I’m still on a learning curve with all of New Jersey’s stupid traffic patterns. The jughandle being the biggest culprit of my frustration. Sometimes you can take a left turn, sometimes you can’t. There’s no rhyme or reason to if it’s allowed or not, I just know that I’ll forever assume incorrectly and have to do an emergency three-lane sweep. Also, NJ loves to make an additional lane for .45 seconds and then taketh away. I’ll move over thinking I have to be in that lane for said jughandle and then BAM, lane is gone. I mean seriously, look at this ole ballsac lookin’ route just to hang a GD Louie. Not to mention the handful of times I’ve gone to the wrong location and realized I passed the right spot on the same side of the road, starting the whole crazy eights over again. It’s a miracle I haven’t yakked while driving here. Get your shit together, Jersey.

Secondly, I don’t eat at restaurants. When you live paycheck to paycheck, the easiest thing to save money on is takeout and if I’m gonna splurge on a night out I’d like to drink my hard-earned cash in the form of an espresso martini. So that means I don’t even have a general idea where restaurants in my area are because I don’t frequent them. Thirdly, and this is one I genuinely underestimated, I’m night blind. In my teen years I went to the eye doctor and got a pair of placebo glasses. They had no prescription but “glare resistant” lenses that were supposed to help with headlights at night. Mmk. Obviously I stopped wearing them almost immediately because they were basically what we now know as blue light glasses and they didn’t do shit. I also just figured no one can see at night?! I mean, is anyone really crushing it vision-wise in the pitch black cloak of night that starts at 4:30pm for half of the year?! You can get back to me on that.

Now that you understand my disabilities, let me now point out that basically nothing is in my control on DoorDash. They send me orders, I accept them all so I keep a 100% acceptance rate and I can’t see where they’re going to be delivered to until I pick the food up. Could be 5 mins away, could be 45 mins away. I have no real control over the timing of anything as restaurants could be busy, traffic could be bad, etc. I have no clue where I am so I just have to listen to the GPS even when it stinks and tries to send me on the Parkway. I refuse to give the state of NJ any more money on my own day to day travel so over my dead body am I paying a toll so you can get your burrito 2 minutes faster. All that to say, I’m at the mercy of all of these external factors just because I’m hard up for cashola.

Ok, enough exposition, here’s where the night went off the rails. I was dinged for an order at a diner, promptly got lost on the way because it was on the left hand side of a divided highway and GOD FORBID we be able to get across the street in this state. When I got there the order hadn’t even been started yet. Being the good lil dasher that I am, I messaged the recipient to tell them it wasn’t my fault. In the time I spent waiting, DoorDash was like hey how about you pick up another order on top of this one that’s clearly not on time, making it even more late! OK, SURE! Eventually I scooped both foods then followed Google Maps 30 mins away to a gated community where I had to give the address to even be allowed in.

Naturally my cool confidence was still oozing out of me as I nervously blabbed to the security guard that I’m new to the Dash game and didn’t know what I was doing…did he need my ID or a crisp C-note to open the gate for me? He took pity on me and opened the gate probably sensing that I was about shout FIRE IN THE HOLE and toss the food out the window to get the hell out of there. As I’m winding through this elite village, I finally stop when the GPS announces in her holier than thou voice “you have arrived.” Oh, have I, bitch? I was in a cul-de-sac and most certainly had not arrived. I circled once in my car then said fuck it and started pounding the pavement to get my blind peepers closer to the numbers. None of which were the address listed. I can only imagine how much the NextDoor app was popping off with olds raising alerts for the chick in a full sweatsuit circling with wild eyes. (JK there probs wasn’t any commentary because I’m a white female.) I was stressed and knew I had someone else’s chicky parm sub still sitting in my car getting cold. And if there’s one thing I vowed to never be again, it’s stressed out by a job that doesn’t even give me health insurance. It ain’t worth it, BB. So I dropped the food, snapped a pic and hoped this person’s actual house was close enough that they could just walk two doors down and snag their food. As I’m whipping out of there to get to my next delivery, I receive the following text:

CRUSHING IT. What’s comforting to know is that at least we live in a world where everyone is super rational and very kind and forgiving to those in the service industry. SIKE! I woke up in a cold sweat later that night remembering that she could make my career as a dasher very short-lived with just one shitty review because I couldn’t find her dumb gate-kept house. And not for nothing but who orders disco fries for delivery? I did her a favor by delivering it to the wrong house and saving her from a styrofoam container of cold wet socks. After that peak dashing faux-pa, I closed out the night by paying a toll to deliver Chic-Fil-A and missing the road because I couldn’t see the street sign, again trolling very far on foot to circle back (because of course it was a one-way road.) Struggling to find house numbers, I finally stumbled upon the right one only to be plunged into blindness once again as a security flood light flashed my eyeballs right out of their damn sockets. As my corneas burned through my skull, I managed to snap a picture of their sogz waff fries and drink that I almost spilled on my little apartment 5K that I didn’t even get a medal for and ended my dash. At the close of this banner day, I was awarded $30 for a whole lot of sweatin’ and squintin’ and the harsh realization that I can’t hack it on the apps. UNLESS…anyone out there wants to pay to see what I’m workin with down below. 😏

Salty Stories

Year Two as The Jersey Ju

Today marks two years since I relocated to the glorious Garden State in what will forever be remembered as the most traumatic moving experience of my life. As you might recall, I made ambitious bucket lists (yes, that’s right, plural) when I first moved here to really adventure it up and explore my new home state. After recapping what I accomplished in my first year, I decided to keep up the tradish. Mostly because I’ve done more in this state than half the people who’ve lived here their whole lives and also because I want to Jersey salute the haters who thought I’d never last here. I’m still standing, baby! And guess what? I don’t think I’m going to die every time I drive on the parkway anymore. In fact, I get pissy with out of staters who think it’s acceptable to go under 80 in the left lane. MAMA, I’VE MADE IT! Here’s what I accomplished this past year as I settled in and started to put down roots in the ole dirrty jerze. (I was told by a native New Jerseyan that no one from here uses that phrase and it’s embarrassing but then this individual got that exact phrase permanently inked on their body so I’m guessing they’re not a reliable source for what is and is not cool to say therefore I’m gonna keep saying it, so HA.)

Bar A (Lake Como) If you’ll recall I had my big J.Shore night out planned upon publish date of last year’s blog. I picked a Thursday night in late August, recruited my college gal pal, and went ahead and took a sick day in advance off for Friday anticipating a Gnarls Barkley hangover. After much polling of my dog park crew and co-workers, I decided that I was far too old to try to Beat the Clock at Bar A, but a little Thirsty Thursday seemed more approps. Well as it turns out, it was approps…for a nursing home. After surveying the crowd upon entry and seeing 4 olds dancing to a live band who didn’t play one cover that I recognized, I assured myself and my friend that we were just early. We sure weren’t! By 10pm the place was still crickets and it was officially embarrassing to be there. I asked the tween employees on the way out why their bar sucks so hard and they replied, “you come on a Tuesday for Beat the Clock, or you come on a Saturday, and that’s it.” Ope, ok! We then asked for a recommendation of a bar that might cater to the elder millennial crowd who didn’t want to hit up a theme night and fist pump our faces off at D’Jais and were redirected to Joe’s, which was indeed our target demo. Unfortunately I did not get to shout CABS ARE HEA and I certainly didn’t need a day to recover like I so boldly anticipated. But even more mortifying than that, I was so excited to break free for my first night on the town in a whole year that I bought a new top from where the youths shop and went all out thinking I might snatch myself a huz at Bar A. YOIKES. If I had recalled the sound advice from the great philosopher Ronald Ortiz-Magro when he so astutely said, “Never fall in love at the Jersey Shore. Never, ever, ever.” I probably wouldn’t have gone so hard in the paint.

Citizens Bank Park (Philadelphia) I kicked things off in my first year by finally checking Citi Field off the ballpark list and then that’s when I really popped off with my need to tour all the ballparks in America. I realized Philly was the next closest one I hadn’t been to yet and then from there it spiraled to spring training in Florida and a trip to Chicago for Wrigley. The ballpark journey continues with my dad and has been a great source of fun these past couple of years, but I’ll tell you what wasn’t fun… waiting a solid 25 mins in line to finally order a game day dawg at the home of the Phillies and paying $17.25 for this charred monstrosity:

CBP was nice (they had a whole ass rock climbing wall for kids) but I’ll never get the taste of that trash ass wiener out of my mouth for as long as I live.

Whale Watching (Belmar) If you’re a friend of the program you know how excited I was for this excursion and what a giant letdown it was. If you didn’t already hear me tell this story 6,000 times, read it here. I’d rather die than go whale watching again and in fact I saw a crew of whales casj flopping in the surf one random October morning and that experience was a zillion times better and it was F-R-E-E.

Jersey Shore House Tour (Seaside Heights) I’m trying not to be super repetitive because I’ve been known to blab about my many adventures on here a lot, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention my viz to the iconic shore store and house. It’s important to reveal that I did visit the shore store in its heyday (2010) when I fully believed I’d walk in and The Sitch would be hand-pressing my tee. What happened instead was a hungover kid sold me a “Come At Me Bro” pinny, asked me if I wanted to customize it with my name and conveniently forgot to mention they charge per letter. Guess how much “Giantomasi” cost? So much that I still have that pinny in my dresser and refuse to throw it out because of how much I overpaid for it. I figure it’ll come in handy when douche-wear becomes trendy again. Unfortunately, back in that time, tours weren’t given of the house because they were living there. History was still in the making. I had wanted to reserve the tour for someone who would appreciate it as much as I do, and then I remembered I barely have any friends. So I waited until the off season and I booked it down to Seaside on a Friday to buy a onesie for a little meatball who was yet to be born and I got so overwhelmed in the store that an employee took pity on me and then talked me into a solo tour. No spoilers but his version of the tour included pointing out where Snooki peed her pants whilst drunk and asking me if I wanted to pose in Pauly and Vinny’s beds. I declined. I did accept every other photo opp and my biggest takeaway was that I couldn’t believe they lived in this rundown house with tiny bedrooms and bathrooms for as long as they did, but they sure are cashing in now. Also not to brag but Danny said “sup homie” to me while I lurked for far too long circling the store so I’m pretty much in.

See a Comedian at The Stress Factory (New Brunswick) I knew The Stress Factory was legit enough to get big names so I was quick to add this to my list, and even quicker to jump on the first comedian that I wanted to see (John Crist…not so much a big name.) I dragged a friend and her boyfriend who weren’t that into comedy, which always makes for a good time and definitely isn’t stressful at all. The good news is, I liked the comedian and it was a fun area and a club I’d definitely go back to if I had more friends who liked stand up comedy. Bonus: I got to fondle this weird Einstein statue in NB after perhaps being over-served.

Sandy Hook Lighthouse (Sandy Hook) Moving towards the sea has transformed me into a real lighthouse freak. Love a good phallic tower with a light at the top and will probably continue to visit as many as I can. Last fall I celebrated that old rapey white guy Christopher Columbus with a day trip to selfie it up with the oldest operating lighthouse in America. Felt right to peep something from the 1700’s on a day that glorified a man getting lost and then violently taking over the land he stumbled upon anyway. Classic Columbus. Anyway, there was nothing really to report about this lighthouse other than it was old AF. Forever trying to include my BFF Charlee girl in my adventures, I thought it would be swell to drive her an hour to Sandy Hook and that was a huge mistake on my part. I couldn’t figure out where the beach was, then tried to take her for a walk through the woods, locked eyes with a big ass deer and bootscooted right back outta there. When we finally found the beach, Charlee didn’t want to sit still and wrapped herself around my chair trying to strangle me with her leash. We left shortly thereafter but not before she took a steaming dump and I found out that Sandy Hook is a trash-can free beach and I had to drive home with her bagged shit stinking up the car. Can’t say I would recommend. (PS if a beach overlooks the NYC skyline, I’m immediately grossed out. I don’t care if that’s bougie but you can’t tell me water that close to a giant polluted city isn’t disgusting.)

Sea Bright Fall was aflush with paid holidays for ya girl and I made a point to bop somewhere new each time I had a day off. Election day brought me back to Sandy Hook for a bike ride (one that was much windier and colder than I had ever anticipated) and so I rewarded myself with a fancy lunch for 1 at the Rum Runner and traipsing through Sea Bright. The food was an absolute delight and the view of the water was perfect but I still haven’t gotten past the “everyone is watching you eat by yourself like a loser” insecurity and reading a book didn’t seem to help. Also this one lunch set me back a cool $50 so I decided it probably wasn’t worth it to go bankrupt for a bowl of soup and a glass of wine ever again. Sea Bright is cute as heck tho.

Yappy Hour at The Wonder Bar (Asbury Park) The minute I got a dog, I started hearing about the infamous yappy hour where humans get boozy while their dogs run around. Nervous to let Chuckletini loose in a bar patio, I decided to wait until late October to take her for the first time so it wouldn’t be crowded. I went solo imagining this would be the perfect environment for a single dog parents meet-cute. As I scooched my chair closer to a cute guy under the guise that I wanted to sit in the sun, he scooted away and our love story was over before it even began.

Charlee was timid at first and then seemed to have a good time so the next warm day I suggested a friend from the dog park join us. Well it seems Charlee got a little too comfy for her second rodeo, shouted bye mom and left me in a cloud of dust as soon as we walked in. What a teenager. If you know, teenagers were to run full speed in circles and hop up on picnic tables where people have drinks after splashing in the pool. To say she was cutting loose would be an understatement. Unfortunately, the dog bouncers were not appreciative of her giving drunk in the club at 4am vibez. She got a couple of warnings and then they told me to leash her up, to which I said do not punish me for my child’s actions. We left. And the very next day Wonder Bar posted this:

It’s a good thing Charlee’s not on IG cause she would not stand for being subtweeted like this. Here’s an idea, if you’re going to have a place designated for dogs to play in, maybe put a sign out front that only old and fat dogs are allowed. Because RUNNING IS WHAT DOGS DO WHEN THEY’RE OFF LEASH PLAYING. I could bring Charlee to a beach for 5 hours of running and then bring her to this bar and she’d see all the new dogs and a pool to dunk in and she’d be recharged and ready to go for round two. Cause she’s A DOG. If I wanted to be Tom Petty I could’ve commented that my dog got humped every 5 minutes while she was there but no one was stepping in to stop that. #VictimBlaming. Needless to say, we have not been back. The dog beach is less judgey.

Barnegat Lighthouse + Chicken or the Egg + Ship Bottom Brewery (LBI) What do you do when it’s 75 degrees in November? You go to an island that is typically a mob scene of bennies in the summer and live it up for the day with 0 crowds in complete denial that it’s about to be winter. My original calling for LBI was to climb Barnegat Lighthouse, but as soon as I moved here it closed for renovations and didn’t open up until Spring. Itching to fill the last beautiful day before my seasonal depresh turned all the way up, I decided it was worth the visit anyway and I’d circle back for the climb (which I did, recapped further down the list.) I recruited my ex-boyf to join me on this trip and that was the last time I saw him. He sleeps with the fish in Surf City now. Juuuust kidding, we had a bomb.com day of eating, drinking, and beeboppin around all different parts of LBI and tale as old as time, he decided a few days later that he never wanted to see my mug or talk to me ever again. Guess some guys just can’t handle a chick who can wear a plaid skirt that just barely zips and still manage to put away chicken wings and poutine at an alarming speed.

Chegg was as legit as everyone says it is and the ONLY wangz I’ve enjoyed in Jersey. I’ve sampled many a chicken wang since I moved here and they’ve all been saucy, soggy garbage, except for Chegg. Exxtra crispy just like mama likes ’em. I also fawned over a row of pastel townhouses in Beach Haven and manifested living there one day, got buzz lightyear at Ship Bottom Brewery and like always, made a merch purchase whilst under the influence. But I’d have to say the highlight of my day was driving past this little boutique covered in mosaics (Firefly Gallery in Surf City) and whipping the car over so I could photograph every inch of it. I went in and bought a cute seashell trinket and learned that the shop owner commissioned artist Isaiah Zagar from Philly to conduct a workshop in mosaics and what resulted was this beaut of a building that so many people had a hand in creating. I could’ve looked at it all day it was so cool and there was so much to see. Hopefully I’ll be able to do a day trip to Philly sometime this year and check out all of the mosaic art there, obviously with a cheesesteak in each meaty paw.

Life Changing Steak in Red Bank Look, it could’ve been the fact that this was my first meal post-colonoscopy and everything hits different when your intestines have just been wrung out like a sopping wet towel but I suspect Buona Sera lives up to the hype. It even earned a revisit for my birthday dinner with my godparents who are steakhouse connoisseurs. More importantly, after hearing all about how Red Bank is like the Saratoga Springs of NJ (or the closest to it) I’m happy to report I’ve made more than a few trips there now. It’s a cute downtown area with shopping, restaurants and bars but as my TogaTown peeps know, nothing will ever compare. (Also very cutely decorated for Christmas, shoutout to my dad for not only driving 10 hours for my butthole procedure but putting up with me making him pose in front of Christmas lights too.)

Christmas in NY & AC I make it my life’s mission to squeeze all of the Christmas joy out of the VERY short window that we’re allotted between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Last year I spent over $100 on a Christmas tree (the tree farms of Colt’s Neck bent me RIGHT over) but it was worth every penny to stare at that twinkly number in my living room and sniff its pine needles all month long. So if there’s a tree to be seen, or decorations to be appreciated you know I’ll be there. This Christmas I FINALLY got to Rockefeller and spazzed my face off with holiday sensory overload but before that I was in AC for a work trip and posed in front of every tree I could feast my eyes on. I also tried to dabble in a pop-up Christmas themed bar but apparently no one was working there the one night I was in town. Go figure. Didn’t stop me from sitting in Santa’s sleigh for the gram.

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Playa Bowls I can’t go anywhere near the ocean without stumbling upon a Playa Bowls so I knew I’d have to try one at least once. And folks, once was enough. For a whopping $14 I got the Nutella Acai Bowl (recommended as the most popular for a n00b like me to try.) It truly felt like a chore to eat. In fact, as much as it pains me to throw away money, I didn’t even finish it because my mouth was so tired from crunching granola with the consistency of lug nuts while getting brain freeze. Also, I was still hungry after all that.

Power Bottom Comedy Show (Asbury Park) I’m constantly trolling social looking for a new fun activity to do and I stumbled upon Asbury Park’s own comedy scene via IG. On the last Thursday of every month, there’s a comedy show featuring local talent, a more well-known “headliner,” and cash prizes. I happen to love cash and laughing, so I dragged my mom who was in town to a show. We had no clue what to expect but showing up stupid early because they threatened seats would run out and being placed DIRECTLY in front of the stage was a hot start. What then commenced was so much amateur comedy that my mom turned to me at one point with eyes wide and whispered, “Is this it? Is this the whole show?” I assured her that there was a main act and he had been on the Tonight Show, then I snuck to the bathroom and double checked. Not only do I not recommend you bring your mom to a show where the emcee’s line of jokes circled graphic abortion, sex, and sex for drugs all while she makes eye contact with you but it’s also a terrible idea to sit the two people who hate attention the most in touching distance of the stage. When the guy who gets paid to tell jokes finally made it up there what felt like 6 hours later, he decided to do some light crowd work and he started with us. After asking us basic getting to know you questions and getting stuttered one word answers with wides eyes of terror, I think he realized it was best if he didn’t make two grown women piss their pants and pick on someone else instead. Thx for the memories, Power Bottom, it was a bonding mother/daughter experience but we will not be back. Also thank you mom, for never asking what a power bottom is.

Is this not the most dive bar bathroom you’ve ever seen?

Broad Street Diner (Keyport) Jersey’s chock full of diners and this one was highlighted in an NJ.com article of top spots so I took their word for it and drove out of the way for my first diner experience since moving here. I was underwhelmed at best. Food was nothing crazy, atmosphere was somewhat chaotic and I got the sense from the waitress that if I lingered for one more second past finishing my meal, she’d dropkick me right out of there. It was also the type of diner that is the width of a sidecar and I felt like a bull in a china shop. I’m not a particularly wide woman, I’m draggin a wagon but it’s mostly tucked behind me, and I had to turn sideways to walk toward my table so I didn’t inadvertently knock someone’s coffee into their omelette with my asshole. Not pleasant. I did want to take a selfie with the Elvis statue out front (because of course) but it was only my third time hanging out with the person I was with and it felt too soon for my annoying over-documentation side to come out and play. Open to suggestions on what diner I should hit next…only ones that can accommodate my Big Bertha width, pls.

Liquor Store Bar I will explain this New Jersey phenomenon as simply as I can to all of my fellow NY’ers. There’s many liquor stores in shopping plazas that are also bars. You walk into the liquor store and it looks like your average small corner liquor store with jacked up wine prices and then you keep walking and BAM, dive bar. Having one in the plaza across from my apartment and seeing the type of clientele that frequent said boozy combo, I never intended to make it my regular hang. But then, after joining a friend at a brewery and her cousin swearing that there was a dece liquor store bar around the corner, I was down to clown. As it turns out, she wasn’t wrong. It was a very normal bar and even had live music. And everyone there appeared to have all of their teeth intact, so I’d say it was a great success.

Cherry Blossoms at Branch Brook Park (Newark) This was recommended to me by several people who saw how much I salivate for bloomz. Many comparisons were made between this park and the blossoms in D.C. I figured it would be a mob scene, but as mother nature goes, you get a real limited window for peak bloom szn. Not having plans for Easter this year, I figured it would be the perfect place of worship for Chucks and I. So did everyone else in New Jersey. First of all, I really didn’t know what I was getting myself into travel-wise. I checked the website 100 times and followed the official instagram account and they very much made it seem like there was ample public parking lots. LIARS. Not only is this park dropped in the middle of downtown sketchtastic Newark, but it has absolutely no parking. It took me over an hour to get there (with Charlee panting in the backseat wondering what the hell I signed her up for) and then I sat in standstill traffic for another 30-45 inching around the park looking for any morsel of parking. Finally on the second rotation I was able to slide into a spot, get Charlee out and see that there were HORDES of people here.

This was truly my nightmare. It was comparable to the crowds at Rockefeller for the tree except there was no Christmas magic. People hogged entire trees for photoshoots, plucking flowers and playing with the branches, there were tripods and selfies sticks and girlies dressed in their Easter best and anytime I tried to roll up on a tree and take a photo, I had unwanted strangers in the background or someone hovering to push me out of the way. I walked for about 10 mins then found a clearing for Charlee and I to sit on a blanket so she could have water and not be dragged through crowds with no room to take a beat. So naturally our little moment of peace had to be ruined by a guy dressed as a clown with white mullet hair, who stood directly on top of us and blew up balloons. After the third balloon that popped causing Charlee to launch into my lap, I gave this creepmaster a look that told him I would tie his limbs up like the balloon animals he sucked at making if he didn’t get the hell away from me. And thankfully he picked up what I was putting down and got to steppin.

I snapped as many bloom glam shots of my child as I could and then when I thought I might actually murder someone, I decided to call it and drive back through the hellscape that is Newark (the amount of times someone either stopped in the middle of the road and got out of their car or backed out of a driveway onto me were enough to make me never drive there again.) Word to the wise, unless you have the sharpest of elbows and a real ‘fuck around and find out’ ‘tude, don’t go to Branch Brook Park in the spring. Also, def don’t bring your dog. (Sorry, Charlee.)

Freehold AKA “Little NYC” I’d meant to make it on over to downtown Freehold in my first year, mostly because it’s so close and also because one of the top espresso martinis on my list was there. But as you’ll recall in last year’s blog, most restaurant or bar items remained unchecked because one must have compadres to do that with and I’m somewhat lacking in that department. But this year, I made my way out to Moore’s Tavern on a Friday night for my fave 90’s cover band aptly called Nine Deeze Nite and I truly questioned what kind of crowd lived in Freehold. In one night I saw the whole spectrum. From hood girls rocking Jordans to a woman wearing a plaid overall skirt and yellow crocs to bucket hats to a gentleman the height of a jockey wearing a wife beater, tight jeans, boots and the LARGEST belt buckle I’ve ever seen. It wast truly comical. I could’ve stood there all night and open-mouth stared at the creatures that surrounded me but they took that as an invite to speak to me and obviously that wasn’t going to fly.

A couple months later, I went to get my annual blonding, also in Freehold, and my stylist was telling me the different restaurants or bars I could check out that are more worthy than Moore’s and her young twenties associate added that downtown Freehold was like a little New York. And I was off to the races. This one off-handed comment has created an ongoing bit for me and I don’t think this girl even knows how much joy she brought to my life. To be fair, she quickly admitted that she hadn’t been to NY and my stylist told me how wildly inaccurate this comparison was. But I knew I needed to get my peepers on Downtown Freehold, STAT.

As I drove in to meet my friend for some birthday cocktails, she texted me asking if I could see the skyline yet. Then she grabbed a seat at the bar and told me she was sitting with a view of the Freedom Tower. On my walk down an alley to meet her, I found this mural and nearly peed my pants from laughing so hard. Please enjoy what I think was meant to be an ode to famous singers (perhaps that’s a Kurt Cobain on the mic?) but all I can see is that weirdly large baby with an adult face being held by a mom that looks like she would topple over with the disproportionate size of this monster. The culture! The arts! The fine dining! Some people call it the concrete jungle where dreams are made of, but us locals just call it Freehold, baby.

Fox Hollow Winery (Holmdel) I haven’t made it to as many wineries as I initially hoped I would, but I treated my mom to a day at Fox Hollow on Mother’s Day and boy, what a delight that place is. They had several rosé options, a spacious patio, and live music. The only downer was that there were only portapotties available so obviously I held it because I’d rather give myself a UTI than go in one of those hot plastic stinkboxes. My mom and I channeled Joan and Melissa Rivers and situated ourselves right near the walkway to the main building so we had a prime view of everyone’s fashion choices. We should’ve had our own podcast with the color commentary that was flying. To be fair, if you wear a sleeveless khaki dress with trench coat style buttons and a collar, paired with over the knee black winter boots on an 80 degree day, you deserve to be serenaded with the Inspector Gadget theme song. But anyway, solid winery, would definitely go back, might suggest they never hire that singer again as his voice was terrible and he told people to submit requests then promptly said he didn’t know every single request he was given.

Proof that we looked cute, cause obv you can’t judge others outfits unless yours are on point.

“Two States at Once” in (Lambertville, NJ & New Hope, PA) + Peddlers Village If you’re noticing a theme this year it is: “not worth the hype.” When I was looking for a nice day trip to do on my birthday, several people mentioned Lambertville & New Hope. It’s a town in New Jersey, and a town in Pennsylvania and there’s a bridge you can walk over connecting the two and pointing out where the state line is so you can do the classic “two places at once” photo opp that A Walk To Remember romanticized for bucket lists everywhere. My parents and I headed down in the morning (another hour plus drive) and guess what?! Nothing was open. Ghostown, USA. We walked over the bridge, took a zillion photos, heard a couple store owners say that this town doesn’t wake up until around noon, and left. To be fair, even if the stores were open, both of these towns were Suckville, USA. Even Little NY aka Freehold had more to offer than a couple of antique shops mixed in with old lady fashion stores and a very weird sex shop next to an even weirder shop called The Creeper Gallery. That’s it. I just summed up that day trip way better than anyone else did for me. If you want to stand in PA and NJ at the same time, do it up. Otherwise, don’t fall for it. Since we had already made the trip, we scooted over to Peddler’s Village for more old lady/jerky/popcorn shops and lunch. I am glad we went there because I bought an overpriced duster that a bunch of old women convinced me I looked like Cindy Crawford in and I’m eternally grateful because I’m obsessed with that article of clothing and have worn it no less than 100 times this summer. It also annoys my sister beyond belief which makes it even better. S/O Sunflowers at Peddlers Village for my main character energy duster that floats in the breeze and my sunflower necklace.

Continued Quest for Best Espresso Martini in NJ As always, the grind never stops (literally) to find New Jersey’s best espresso martini. My highest score this year was an 8.6 for the aforementioned Buona Sera in Red Bank. I continued to order a spressy at every establishment that will make one and as you can see by my list, there’s still notable spots to hit, and more being added regularly. For those who are new to my rating system, I’ll remind you that much like Whose Line Is it Anyway, it’s a game where everything is made up and the points don’t matter. If I get a nice bartender, score goes up, if there are an incorrect number of beans, score takes a dive, if I’m already drunk, well it could really go either way. One thing I can say for sure is that you should NEVER and I mean NEVER get the espresso martini flight at Asbury Ale House. I can quite literally still taste the crusty old strawberry creamsaver they dropped in the chocolate milk Bailey’s shooter they tried to pass off as a martini. BARF ALL OVER ME.

Continued Quest for Cool Coffee Shop to write in like a main character in a movie This year I was really seeking that kewl girl writer who is inspired by the crowd in an aesthetically pleasing coffee shop and writes a best-selling novel while sipping an overpriced cold brew vibe. I checked out Offshore Coffee Co in Long Branch where I spent 90% of my time there trying to snag an artsy shot of the cool neon sign behind me without getting caught and looking like a loser. Coffee Surf Co in Belmar, which I didn’t realize was just a Playa Bowls with a coffee tap in it. And Shore Pour in Sea Girt, which was my favorite based on friendly staff who tossed me compliments and a super comfy coastal blue armchair that faced out to the street for prime people watching. Unfortunately, I knocked my cold brew over on said armchair and had to skeedaddle before anyone noticed. Even though my trashy Dunks-lovin ass was clearly not meant for a bougie coffee shop, this will not stop me from trying to be a trendy hipster.

Yellowcard at the Stone Pony Summer Stage(Asbury Park) Thirteen year old Ju was OBSESSED with Yellowcard. I knew their album Ocean Avenue front to back and watched their concert DVD on repeat. When it went missing (probably because my parents hid it) I was BESIDE myself. I’ll never forget trying to plead a case for me to see them live and my dad asking if he could watch a little of the concert DVD to see what the show was like. Welp, there was a section where they parted the crowd down the middle and told each side to run at the other side as fast as they could. Den was understandably out on having his youngest child trampled to death just because she loved the sound of a violinist in a punk rock band. Natch, I jumped at the chance to catch their Ocean Avenue revival tour this summer, very comfortably from a rooftop overlooking the show. Good news: they still slap, I didn’t have to be moshed around to enjoy it, and hearing Ocean Avenue on Ocean Avenue was THE stuff.

Free Pizza at Johnny Mac’s (Asbury Park) Johnny Mac’s is a dive bar I went to in my first year when I did the trials and tribs of online new friend meetups and at the time they were doing a speed dating night, which was equally as mortifying as my reason for being there. JMac’s claim to fame is that you get a free personal pizza with purchase of a drink. I stumbled back into this bar in March of this year as the second to last stop on my very first marathon of drinking night out in Jersey and it was packed with youths and I got a water and left scream-singing Taylor Swift. Probably could’ve used that pizza but it completely slipped my booze-soaked brain. HOW-EV-ER, I ran it back with my second impromptu AP bar crawl when my sister was here this summer and I DID remember the free ‘za and ooh baby did that come in clutch. Why you ask? Because the state of New Jersey doesn’t want to feed you while you’re drunk. Bars close early AF and there isn’t a pizza joint in sight and honestly that should be illegal, especially for a state that prides themselves on their pies. So shout out to JMac’s for doing it right. Nothing soaks up a night of spressy marts and cukes vodka like a hot and cheesy treat that you don’t have to share. I was so invested in shoving it in my pie-hole that a girl 1 billion times drunker than me locked eyes with me and goes “are you ok?” What a humbling moment.

Brunch and gallivanting in Hoboken I had heard of Hoboken all throughout my college years as the mecca of post-grad living. Full of bars and adjacent to the city, but less expensive, it was a rite of passage for my fellow Marist grads to bunk up in Hoboken and try on adulting for size. Obviously, I’m a little late to the party to pretend I have a carefree city lifestyle, but I was more than happy to spend a day there trolling around and pretending. The cherry on top is that I got to do it with my college TV production girlies as we reminisced on the good ole days when we would film each other fighting with lightsabers for an actual grade. We started with brunch at City Bistro which had a flower walkway and wall that seemed to be put there just for me to fawn over, then busted into an open house where I criticized every aspect of this million dollar gem as if I have any business doing so, and then hit up the pier for an overpriced cocktail and a billion tourist trap photo opps that I happily fell right into. Great first impression of a city. It’s a much smaller and more appealing version of NYC with greenery and adorbs brownstones and almost every storefront had some sort of floral decor, which I could barely contain my boner for. In another lifetime I definitely would’ve kicked it there in my youth but I’ll settle for exploring it on day trips.

Climb Ole Barney (LBI) I separated this out because my type A ass wanted to list my events in chronological order, and also this was a completely different viz so no sense in grouping the two togets. I’ve never been a hiker but for whatever reason I’m down to climb a bunch of stairs for a scenic view. Seems pretty stupid but it’s the life that I’ve chosen. On my last week before the 2 year anni, I kicked it into high gear going to LBI on a Tuesday and Margate on a Thursday to climb some shit. And whoa buddy, these 217 steps were a harsh reminder of how out of shape I truly am. Also, not to be critical but for a place that was just closed for renovations for almost a year, one would think they’d find a way to make the narrow spiral stairs into a friendlier two-way traffic sitch. Ain’t nothin worse than huffin and puffin your way up, watching your feet the whole time so your jelly legs don’t send you stumblin backwards only to feel a presence on top of you and realize it’s a whole human trying to come down at the same time. Lots of “ope, sorry’s” and flattening against a curved railing whilst wheezing and having a strangers arm hair tickle my bare skin. But other than that? What a rewarding view! Wish I could’ve popped open a chair and read my book up there to really make that calf grind worth it.

After stomping my shaky legs down and out I thought I’d check out Viking Village known for shops and seafood and when the GPS dropped me at what looked like a private boating slip, I kept on driving. Ain’t nobody got time for that. I did, however, have time to treat my stems to a relaxing day at the beach followed by a bike ride into town checking out all of the cute little boutiques (where store owners talked in not-so-hushed tones about how Kevin Jonas was just there) and ended the day with a twist on a cone like our dear Lord intended. Despite the fact that I didn’t find a public bathroom all day long and almost wet my seat on the drive back, cruising around LBI reaffirmed my lifelong belief that I belong in a beach town. (And coincidentally was a perfect way to celebrate the first day of “salt air & the rust on your door” month.)

@thesaltyju
Celebrated August 1st accordingly. #saltairandtherustonyourdoor #swiftie #maincharacterenergy #jerseyshore
♬ August The Summer I Turned Pretty Version – ⸆⸉

Lucy the Elephant (Margate City) I don’t think anything on my bucket list has been as polarizing as Lucy. She was added as soon as I moved here and realized I was merely an hour away from a national historical landmark. But I quickly realized whenever I brought her up with New Jerseyans the reaction was either what the hell is that or I’ve heard of it, sounds dumb. YOU UNCULTURED SWINE. So after many months of floating a Lucy viz out to innocent bystanders and not getting any bites, I figured I’d force my niece to do it when she came to visit. Well she’s visited three times and we’ve managed to push Lucy off the list of activities all three times. So finally I said ENOUGH IS ENOUGH I BETTER GET INSIDE THIS ELEPHANT’S BELLY IMMEDIATELY and I called out sick with a severe case of elephant fever and got that shit done myself. If I’ve learned one thing about wanting to explore and do all of these things it’s that I can’t rely on anyone else to be interested or actually make a plan to join me, so solo is usually how I operate. Although may I add that 100% of the time I’d enjoy each of these activities more with a partner in crime, and I’d certainly appreciate not having to rely on strangers to take my photos. Lookin at you family who declined my offer to take your photo which was OBVIOUSLY code for “take mine too” and also at you, old lady who I then circled back to after a respectable amount of time and the grand finale was a picture that cut out half of Lucy. Obviously asking people to be my personal paparazzi is embarrassing as hell. I might have to start traveling with a tripod.

Anyway, back to my bae Lucy. I once again did ample research and nowhere in my readings did it say that I’d be charged a separate toll to get in and out of Margate City that could only be paid by cash (not EZPass.) That $2.25 entry fee set the tone for this day trip of gettin the treatment. There were about 4 parking spots at Lucy’s feet, kinda slim pickins for a self-proclaimed “roadside attraction”, so I had to do laps searching for a spot and when I found one it had a two hour time limit. Then taking the tour of Lucy cost $9 (round up to donate of course!) then I bought a stupid $6 magnet (round up again) because I’m a sucker for a souv. Then I bought a $16 belgian waffle sundae because I was hungry and deserved a lil treat. TAKE ALL MY MONEY, MARGATE! But cheapskate rant aside, Lucy is cool as hell. The tour, not so much. They jammed way too many people (mostly kids, probably should’ve rented one for the day to look less like a creep as I was the only adult not accompanied by a child) up a narrow spiral set of stairs into Lucy’s belly, where they flipped on a 7 minute video circa 1998, substitute style. Kinda a racket to make people think they’re getting a special tour when really you’re just paying for the money shot–atop Lucy’s “howdah” overlooking the ocean. That’s the word for her basket, that’s 9 bucks worth of education there, BB’s. I also learned that Lucy is older than both the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, and she was a speakeasy during prohibition #Rebel. She is truly the world’s greatest elephant and all y’all who laughed at me wanting to go MISSED OUT on her magic so I hope Lucy’s creepy eyes that watch the ocean haunt your dreams at night.

@thesaltyju
Sometimes you just gotta drive an hour and climb inside an elephant. NJBucketList LucytheElephant NationalLandmark JerseyShore beatouristinyourownstate
♬ original sound – The Salty Ju

I may never get over that there are pizza chains calls Tony Boloney’s and Johnny Pepperoni here. Way to lean into the stereotype, youse guys.

Staten Island FerryHawks Game Can’t say I ever had catching a Staten Island FerryHawks game on the list but I AM in my baseball era and checking out what is commonly referred to as the Staten Island dump seemed like promising people watching at the very least. What I didn’t realize is that I’d get a free tee, a front row seat to a game that overlooked the city skyline next to a dugout full of baseball babes, AND be entertained by half of the group I was with taking part in a balloon-popping game on the field between innings. What a solid first time as a Ferryhawks fangirl! If there’s one thing you can count on from me (other than googling every player that I think is a babe soda and finding out their age and height) it’s taking way too serious artsy photos when not one person asked me to do so. Pls enjoy me moonlighting as Ansel Adams in between selfies with a wiener hanging out of my mouth. Next time I grace SI with my presence, you bet your bottom dollar I’m taking a ride on that ferry!

That’s all she wrote (she says as if she didn’t just write 100 pages worth of words.) I still have many hot spots waiting to be checked off my NJ Bucket List (and more than a few lukewarm spots that I can’t seem to recruit a buddy for), but the good news is, I’m not leaving anytime soon because switching states is a real bitch oh and also, I finally got my beach condo so I’m gonna hold onto that sucker for dear life. I’m ready to embark on year 3 of touristing my face off every chance I get so follow along for more adventures of The Jersey Ju! Last year I asked if I had earned the right to call myself a Jersey Girl yet (how Upstate of me to ask permission), but now I don’t really care if I’ve earned it or not, which ironically makes me fit in here most of all. I’m a Jersey Girl, bitch.

*Unless of course one of those scary North Jersey girliecats tries to throw hands with me, then I’m obviously just visiting from humble little cowpoke Upstate NY and I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean it. Love you, bye.

Salty Stories

Open Letter to Everyone Working From Home But Really Just Running Errands (Julia’s Version)

If you feel like you just read a published piece with this same title, you’re not wrong. If you didn’t read it, WHY AREN’T YOU SUPPORTING MY ART?! Here’s the version that got published in Greener Pastures Magazine. I wrote the first draft of this piece in November of 2022 full of rage after yet another stressful mid-week shopping experience. As I circled the parking lot for a spot and got cornered in aisles by people who didn’t learn that 6 ft of space should be the norm, I thought to myself, WHY IS NO ONE AT WORK RIGHT NOW?! This being my first hybrid job, I quickly discovered how much more peaceful it is to shop in the middle of a Monday. Unfortunately, once everyone else also had this revelation, going out any day, at any time, turned into my worst nightmare. Anyway, fueled by my hate-fire for fellow WFH shoppers, I blasted out a draft, rant-style. Not really knowing a ton of comedy writers willing to edit, I tossed it over to my dad who made some suggestions. I submitted that version to the three publications I typically submit to and they all rejected it. I simmered on it for 6-8 months, took a humor writing class that made me drown in imposter syndrome thinking I have no business calling myself a writer, and finally resurfaced this number in a feedback group that came out of the aforementioned class that made me spiral. The general consensus was that I needed to pick an angle to make it funnier rather than just bitching about crowded stores. I get it, airing grievances isn’t really a refined form of writing.

But guess what? I LOVE complaining and I have a sneaky suspicion that my followers will get a kick out of the original piece and maybe find it more relatable. So here it is! This is what happens when you get super attached to a piece and everyone rejects it…you publish it yourself because you have a website and there are no rules when you pay WordPress an annual fee for a public platform, so HA. Also, this is a fun way to show y’all that these cute lil published pieces that I spam all over my socials sometimes go through 1 zillion versions and I toil over them for months. What a fun hobby I’ve chosen! In fact, I’ve been sitting on a piece for almost 2 full years now that I’m dragging my feet to get up to snuff. Maybe one day you’ll get to read that! (PS If you notice some jokes are repeated in both the published Scooter Braun version and the self-published Taylor’s Version, no you didn’t.)

Hey There,

I know that you have the best intentions. You’re probably just telling everyone that you’re strengthening our ever-crumbling economy by scooping up all the Rae Dunn kitchen utensils the second they hit the floor in this suburban T.J. Maxx on a Wednesday. However, you’re really cramping my style. I’m not about to point out the fact that your boss has noticed your Microsoft Teams icon has been idle for the past three hours, because mine has mysteriously been the same. We can play it off like some worldwide glitch if you want. But I’ll only agree to play along if you immediately stop running errands on workdays and go home.

Oh, I get it, the horrifying pandemic that shut down the world and plagued everyone with terror and illness for two years also ushered in one of the greatest revelations of the modern era: nobody actually *wants* to work. Everyone realized that there was no use in slogging in a daily commute to sit in a corporate jail cell for 8 hours doing busy work and having weekly check-ins on the progress of that busy work all while smelling the leftover scallops Janice microwaved for lunch. Those days were a real hellscape. But I gotta tell you, nothing compares to the fiery bowels of showing up to Wegmans at 10AM on a Tuesday and battling Sunday-before-Thanksgiving like crowds. If I pull my cart over to collect myself and get bumped into one more time because I’m blocking the romaine lettuce, I might just WANT to be stuck in the office doing nothing. And that’s a very slippery slope, my friend.

I’m not suggesting that you go back to a traditional workday. (At least I’m not suggesting that for me.) Let’s not be ridiculous. I just think there must be a better solution here where I don’t feel a stranger’s breath on my neck while I’m buying myself a new mug for my home “office” that reads “Boss Babe”. Perhaps a new plan that doesn’t subject my ears to your personal phone call on speakerphone about your recent bikini wax while I’m testing out squeak-toys for my dog. Now hear me out, what if there were a few designated hours at my top five stores each day of the week where I’m allowed to shop by myself, uninterrupted! I mean, we did it for the olds during Covid, why can’t we do it for the sensible Millennial woman who knows how to juggle a Zoom call and her deepest desire to spend money on things she doesn’t need. A true Modern American Icon.

Sure, I can see how this could be coming off a scooch hypocritical and selfish, but my therapist (another Modern American Icon) IS always telling me I need to learn how to advocate for myself. So you know what? I deserve to shop during the week! It is my given right to collect a full salary with pension and benefits as I sip a Starbs refresher and lazily browse Bullseye’s playground for the latest seasonal deals. Because that’s what this country was built on, right? Life, liberty, and the pursuit of buying myself a lil treat with Kohl’s Cash while I “keep an eye on my email.” NONE of these blissful workday moments include someone like YOU starting on the opposite side of the clothes rack rabidly flicking hangers, inching closer and closer to me hoping I’m chicken enough to flee the aisle. Or reaching around me to grab the last pair of wine-themed pajamas in the Aldi bonus aisle. I mean, I can’t even find a parking spot at the Dollar General these days. What has the world come to? DOES ANYONE HAVE A JOB ANYMORE?! The drive-thru line at my local Dunkin’ would suggest “NO.”

Anyway, I gotta run, my boss just called and overheard the Costco register beeps and I can’t pass it off as my downstairs neighbors role playing as cashier and customer again. So, it’s settled. I’ll take Monday through Friday for stress-free store sauntering, and you all can take Saturdays and Sundays with the rest of those people who actually work. Hope you have sharp elbows, you’ll need them, I heard those weekend crowds are ROUGH!

Warm Regards,

A Boundary-Pushing Employee Who Enjoys (and Demands) A Quiet Shopping Atmosphere

Salty Stories

Death & Taxes at Walmart

“The Only Two Certainties in Life are Death and Taxes…and you don’t want to have either event occur at a Walmart.”
Benjamin Franklin, probably

This is a cautionary tale for tax season. A real ‘do as I say, not as I do’ number. And seeing as the general public isn’t as neurotic as me trying to file their taxes before February is over, I’ll be able to save a few of you from thinking the very thought that struck me just a few days ago. And that thought was: should I file my taxes at Walmart? You most certainly should not. And this is why.

I’m a big believer that any Joe Blow can file taxes. Most people fire up TurboTax on their own and if they don’t, they’re just paying someone to enter the numbers from their W-2 into the very same software. Taxes are stupid as hell. They’re in that grand scope of things that I probably should’ve learned something about in school rather than spending several years studying geometry or memorizing the periodic table of elements. Guess how often I’ve used the Pythagorean theorem in real life? I’ll take NEVER for $1,000, Alex. (RIP) And as with anything that I have no knowledge of, I’m happy to pay someone else to do it for me…minus the happy part. The year during Covid when I was unemployed and living with my parents, I took a stab at doing my own taxes and upon answering their little pre-screening questionnaire I was informed by the Turbo Robot that I’d need to purchase the “Full Service” version in order to file. So like everything else in this cruel, cruel world…FREE was a big ole lie. And thus it was back to paying an older gentleman who knows how to enter numbers into a computer hundreds of dollars to type in those lil numbers and tell me that I owe more numbers. Yay! ADULTING!

So, as my first full year in New Jersey comes to a close (and my accountant being a New Yorker), I thought it was time for a fresh start. Last year I had to file federal, New York, and New Jersey. I owed all three, thanks for asking. You know what’s fun about moving out of state mid-year after collecting unemployment and also having an un-taxed side hustle? NOTHIN. NOTHIN I TELL YA. I also had to find a way to send all of my secure documents to my accountant in Central NY who told me email was cool. I know how Nigerian Princes steal your identity, my guy. After googling “secure portals” and texting him a password to access the docs, then paying him and all branches of the government all of my monies, I told myself 2022 was going to be my year. THE YEAR OF THE THICC TAX RETURN! How many times have you read this blog and cackled out loud when I declare that things are looking up for me? Be honest.

For reals though, I was super financially responsible last year. I paid off my student loans, bought out my car lease, managed to hang on to my state job, and hustled as a marketing maven on the side for straight cash, homie. And after the harsh realization that when you don’t have taxes being deducted from a self-employed paycheck, you still have to pay those…I PRE-PAID taxes. That’s right, baby! On four separate occasions last year I cut the IRS a Monsters Inc check. All signs were pointing to a meaty tax return and I was very excited to see those dollar signs cha-ching in front of my very eyes. Did that mean I was willing to pay a lot to file that return? Absolutely not. So when faced with the challenge of finding a tax guy here, I thought, wait a minute…don’t they have a jabroni stationed in the front of Walmart for all of tax season?! If it’s good enough for the people of Walmart, it’s good enough for me! And let me be clear, as I dive in to the stereotypical creatures of Wally World, this is very much coming from someone who loves shopping at Walmart. Those rollback prices *speak* to me and anytime I’m popping in for coffee creamer or dog food, I often find myself perusing the clothes department and leaving with a little treat for myself just for being alive and finding all of the deals. (DISCLAIMER: Even though I’m a woman of the people, I still feel it is my duty to warn you to never go to a Walmart on a Friday night. It’s House of Freaks up in there. I don’t know why Friday night specifically is the “don’t feed them after midnight” crowd but once you happen upon it one time, you’ll never want admission to that circus again.)

Now that we’ve established that I’m not above Walmart, let’s just go ahead and say what we’re all thinking here…there’s no way a tax professional doing business in a pop-up tent 10 paces away from the front door greeter is going to be charging an arm and a leg for filing the return of any commoner who happens to zip on by with their paperwork. And that’s how I found myself making a 4PM appointment on a Friday to file my taxes at the Walmart on 66. It was a little uppity of me to make an appointment but I was immediately humbled when I decided to sneak a return in beforehand. If you’ve ever had the unfortunate luck of visiting the customer service counter at a Walmart, you know that you will wait in a line of no less than 10 people, there will be 1 cashier, and the 3 people in front of you will most certainly always be wiring money to another country with minimal deets and a heavy language barrier. Bonus points if someone gets off line, asks the cashier if they can use their phone and stands at the front gabbing with their friend about how they’re waiting in line. (Shout out to East Syracuse for providing me with that very special experience.) I got there 15 minutes early and after waiting those entire 15 minutes to return an electric can opener that didn’t work, I rolled up to the tax tent right at 4 on the dot. Which meant nothing, as this fella had absolutely no clue I made an appointment and thought perhaps I took a number at the deli counter and it struck me that maybe I should also file my taxes while I’m here.

I’d like to paint a portrait for you, if I may. The man that was behind this blue curtain was quite possibly the most disheveled creature I’ve ever seen. If you had told me that they went out into the parking lot, saw someone living out there and asked him if he would perhaps like to type numbers into a computer, I would’ve absolutely believed you. He had dirt under his fingernails, bruises also under his nails, was wearing many many layers of clothing and had a real chaotic energy about him. Never judge a book by its cover but if we were to be in the book cover judgin game, this one was a scooch concerning. And instead of my internal sirens blaring, I pulled up a chair and handed him a folder of secure information about myself. Classic Salty Ju. I was planning on asking many questions before we kicked things off, one of them being, “how much is this going to cost?” and then I got flustered because stranger human interaction. The website said filing would start at $70 and seeing a number that low on top of the fact that this makeshift office was stationed directly across from a Subway, I anticipated this would cost $100 AT MOST. So I let her rip.

This chooch pawed through my paperwork, licking his fingers and tossing sheets back at me that he “wouldn’t need” at an alarming speed. He then manically starting throwing them in a scanner. We were about thirty seconds in and my papers were strewn all over his desk, dangerously close to his Mountain Dew and grease-stained five dollar foot long. He wrote down my social security number on one of them like he was adding milk to a scrap grocery list on the kitchen counter. Papers were flying as he fired questions at me–Are you filing jointly? Single? Any dependents? Seems like a touchy inquisition for a stranger to ask right on the heels of a holiday full of “my forever valentines” husband and baby Instagram posts shoved down my throat but ok sir, I’ll play along. Let’s just address all of my shortcomings up front: I’m single, I’m sure you peeped my DOB on my license, and I also rent, so no tax break for being a first time homeowner either. We then moved along to the tapping portion of this little sesh where the man with visibly shaking hands aggressively tapped the enter key over and over and over again. Another couple of shoppers lurked near the tent flap and he told them he’d be with them in 10-20 minutes, which is honestly a quicker turnover rate than the customer service line so look at him showing off!

Then we hit a snafu. “Enter” was not being finger-blasted and now he was looking up a number on his cellphone to call from his desk phone. Yeah that’s right, this folding table was decorated with not only an office-grade printer/scanner combo deal but ALSO a landline! If you’re impressed, feel free to take it down a notch by learning that his corporate office screens the Walmart satellite office phone calls. No answer so he called from his cellphone, which was immediately answered. As it turns out, bro needed to phone a friend. The software wasn’t behaving in the home office square footage portion of the entertainment. Through moral support and some more hammering of the ole enter key, we arrived at the grand finale. And wouldn’t you know…I OWE.

I asked him how this could be possible as 2022 was MY YEAR. The year of the juicy return! (And the return of the Juicy sweatsuit. Coincidental? I think not.) Where shall I vacation on my bonus money?! Evidently I should take a little day trip to the bank to make a hefty withdrawal from my savings to pay the gov. The same gov that’s in trillion billion million dollar debt and keeps porking us with inflation as a big bad recession looms overhead. Do I sound bitter? GOOD. I was beside myself at this little revelation that for yet ANOTHER year of just snaking by on two jobs, I’d be forced to fork even more over. My dude obviously did not care that I was about to turn on the waterworks in a Walmart and felt that this would be an ideal time to drop another bomb on me. He confidently declared that I owe that, PLUS the $500 for his services. Ex-squeeze me, hombre?

You mean to tell me that in 15 minutes of rat-a-tat-tatting, you earned FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS?! The math ain’t mathin, homeslice. And folks, it deserves to be repeated (forever and ever times infinity) that he is at a WALMART. Bananas to his left, cashiers on his right, a blue curtain separating me from staring right into the burner phone storefront. I’m sure there’s an actual business name for this little spot but we all know this is where drug dealers and thieves stock up on their un-traceables. My jaw resided on the sticky floor. I’d been bamboozled. By a very unsavory looking character nonetheless. I told him under no circumstances could I afford to shell out $500 for this ordeal and he phoned his friend again to “see what they could do.” Friend of the program said he could lower it to $400. I’m sorry am I in a furniture store negotiating the price of a sofa sleeper or filing my taxes? If haggling is on the table, does that mean I can call up the President of this godforsaken country and do the same for my return? “Sup, Bides! While you were busy spending all my dough on flying spy balloons over China (yea that’s right, we did it too) and taking face-first diggers off your bike, I was working hard and I deserve about 2,000 buckeroos to take a tropical vacay at a time when my skin is translucent and my mental health is below sea level. Thanks so much, babes!”

Since neither the unpolished turd in front of me nor his slimy compadre on the phone would go any lower that four hundo OR give me a direct line to Pres Biden, I knew it was time for me to get the hell out of dodge. For once I could use my ignorance to weasel my way out of this kerfuffle. I recalled that price was never discussed up front and I imagine he saw my income and got creative with the quote, so without agreeing to anything, I didn’t think he could hold me to it and force me to file. I dug my heels in and firmly told him I wouldn’t be completing any transactions today. AKA I squeaked out no thank you while dripping in a flop sweat. He then told me he could put my return on hold and I could come back closer to April 18th because “it’s not like I was getting any money back anyway, so it didn’t matter when I filed.” Thanks for the reminder, Tax Satan. He also pointed out that by then, their price will go down even more. SCAM. SCAM I TELL YOU. He didn’t skip a beat in admitting that they’re gouging lovely people like myself to do about 15 minutes of work but if you wait it out a little longer, they’ll gladly give you a hefty dissy. He should’ve just outright said: Come back in April, bring me a liter of Cola and a fresh pretzel from the Philly Pretzel Factory next to the Patio & Garden department and we’ll call it even, hon.

I gathered my highly sensitive docs that he already had digital copies of (damn you, modern world), my dignity, and moonwalked out of there and right into the Subway where I got a FL Chicken Parm, Baked Lays and a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. Just kidding, I shamefully scampered past the receipt checker out to my car where I immediately speed-dialed my parents and cried. They told me to get my stuff–especially my social security number back from this hack and call their accountant. Nothing puts the fear of God in olds quite like my generation handing out our social security number like candy. My hopeful visions of skipping out of Walmart with the promise of an Italian Job level payout on April 18th and a cocky “I took care of it all on my own” vibe were trampled to death by a guy who could be mistaken for a meth dealer but apparently was a CPA. So in conclusion, if you’re thinking about boot scootin over to your local Walmarts for some budget-friendly accounting…maybe do anything but that.

Editors Note: Having my own blog has become an unruly monster of an excuse to demand family and friends take my photo wherever we go, because you never know when it’ll apply to a ridiculous salty story I’ve decided to tell and come in handy. I was stuck on what should be the feature photo for this little ditty when I remembered that in 2019, my family and I went to Walmart at midnight on Thanksgiving in our pj’s to mix and mingle with the Black Friday deals. I knew I looked like a trash panda and therefore said SNAP A PIC CAUSE I LOOK EMBARRASSING. And lo and behold, it was the perfect photo for this blog. I also wanted to make the clear distinction that although I’ve gone to WallyWorld in pajamas on many occasions, I was wearing my dressy sweats when I went last week to file my taxes. Had I gone to see an actual accountant I would’ve worn hard pants. I honestly felt like even sweats had me overdressed for the occasion, but I’m self aware enough to not insult the process by wearing Men’s Christmas punchbug fleece jammies for such official business.

Salty Stories

Bend Over and I’ll Show Ya

I haven’t written a probably *too* personal essay in a while and what screams “holiday season” quite like some buhhole talk? As I’ve divulged before in blogs here and there, I’ve had stomach problems my entire life. Self-diagnosed as IBS, I’m either going an alarming amount of time without pooping or I’m having an emergency mad dash before you crap your pants situation. There is no in between. Hence, why I’ve pooped my pants 3 times as an adult. After years and years of trying different pills and powders and probiotics. Eating more fruit, drinking more water…you’ll recall what a big pile of nothing that did for me. Keeping a food diary. Wearing a diaper. Just kidding. It hasn’t gone that far although I have seriously considered it on days when my cheeks never leave the seat. Oh how nice it would be to just be able to go while I lay on the couch or run errands. And then I’m hit with the cold harsh realization that festering in your own poop as an adult is not something to daydream about. So after 30 years I finally decided my PCP telling me to “try to work more fiber into my diet” wasn’t cutting it and scheduled my very first appointment with a gastroenterologist. I was excited and hopeful to find a solution that didn’t involve removing cheese from my daily intake. As a firm believer that life without cheese is not a life worth living, I was prepared to tell any doctor that suggested that right where they could stick that suggestion.

I scheduled my appointment with a female GI (sure, I’ll share my poop stories with the whole world, but talk to a male doctor about them face to face? YUCK.) and made a detailed list of the years of trials and tribs that I wanted to share with this specialist to be thorough and make sure she knew my butthole inside and out to give me a proper diagnosis. Within 2 minutes she had diagnosed me with IBS-C (for constipation), told me she didn’t need to hear all of the things that I’ve tried as this is very common, touched my tummy for about 45 seconds like I was the Pillsbury dough boy and slid over a prescription for Linzess. Big Pharma, baby! Why get to know your patients when you can just push the latest expensive drug that you’re getting a kickback on? I asked if it made sense to maybe do a colonoscopy to rule anything more serious out and was met with a hard no because I’m not shitting blood. Mmmk, doc. Drugs it is. I was warned that these pills could cause cramping and diarrhea “at first.” Not knowing what the scientific definition of “at first” is, I went an entire week spewing out of my blowhole. 7 days and 7 nights of explosive diarrhea. For anyone who’s opinion is “better out than in”, you obviously have never almost busted down your bathroom door Kool Aid Man style to make it to the toilet in time once, let alone every damn night. When I finally got ahold of the nurse (several days of phone tag later), I was told to take a lower dose of the drug. Guess what the lower dose did? The same damn thing. Order up! One more week of Hersey Squirts, coming right atcha! I kept a note in my phone of the happenin’s of my bowels. Here it is for your entertainment. If you laugh out loud at the word diarrhea like my sister and I do, you’ll enjoy. If you’re a grown up who doesn’t enjoy potty humor…what are you even doing reading this blog?

As someone who’s never desired to have a remote office from the commode, it was time to lay down the law. No more Ms. Nice Butthole. (How many times can I insert butthole into this story? The limit does not exist.) I ditched this doc who clearly didn’t give a shit about me and went for a recommended GI. Unfortunately, this one was a man and I was forced to face my fear of letting a male doctor all up in my biz. Obviously I was really desperate for solutions other than taking expensive laxatives on the daily. The good news is this doctor actually did care, the bad news is caring also means a full examination with a side of casj butthole fingering. After some light getting-to-know-you conversation, my new doc showered me with compliments about how I’m too young to be having these sorts of problems. He also added in that I’m beautiful and look just like Sophia Loren. I would’ve preferred a movie star from this decade but who am I to split hairs when I’m being complimented for my youth and natural beauty? And then he told me to pull my pants down just enough so he could have access to my “sphincter” and jammed his digits right up in there. WHAT A TACTIC! Lubricate the patient with a healthy dose of flattery before literally lubricating your gloved fingers and diving right in. So now I’ve got a new life motto: if you’re going to wedge your fingers in my asshole, at least tell me I’m pretty first. Stick THAT on a t-shirt. The downside is that after ole poop fingers finished the exam, he announced “you’ve been pooping wrong.” Ex-squeeze me? Is there a wrong way to poop? Jury’s still out on that. His reply was inconclusive but he did recommend using my Squatty Potty more, which has become a real chore in such a tiny bathroom. Hopefully by my 32nd year I’ll have learned how to poop. He also pressed on my stomach and goes, “hmm, full of gas.” DON’T I KNOW IT, DOC. I’ve had a slow gas leak since ’91. My work from home days are scored by a steady symphony of toots that my dog has learned to sleep through. But I digress…the Doc then shoved me a paper towel and told me I wouldn’t want to go to the grocery store after this and have everyone see it all over my pants. I don’t know what “it” was but mopping up my backside with a Brawny post-plunder while he watched was truly a humbling moment for us all. I was forced to overcome my fear of male doctors and butt stuff all in one appointment. Baby’s first rectal poke was almost as traumatizing as the time my gynecologist gave me a pap smear with my jean skirt still on. ALMOST.

New doc told me to start from scratch with over-the-counter remedies for 2 weeks and report back. So every day I was taking 2 stool softeners, fiber powder 2x a day and Miralax 2x a day. My insides probably looked like this:

True to my Type A personality, I created another list to keep track. This one didn’t have as many “diarrhea” notes but after a few dicey days in my office with a plumbing system created by the original settlers of New Jersey and an incident where I was driving to meet my friend for brunch and dared to sneeze and nearly had a real messy poopsie daisy, it was safe to say the concoction of powders weren’t helping matters either. I’m genuinely shocked I didn’t shart once during this two month period of GI experimental diagnoses. When I went back in for my follow-up, it was clear that the next logical step was to do a colon invasion and rule anything major out. AKA the thing I suggested on the very first day of seeing a specialist. But what do I know. On the spot, my doc suggested the day before Thanksgiving for my colonoscopy. I was weary but he assured me that this was the BEST time to do it as I’ll go into the holiday empty and ready to fill up on turkey. Since he’s the expert, I agreed, mostly just wanting to get it over with. My plan to pregame turkey day with a colon cleanse went sideways when I realized that I didn’t have one soul on this earth to drive me to said colonoscopy and also I would have to make the 4.5 hour trek home for the holidays in the same day. For someone who feels the effects of NyQuil a full 12 hours after taking it, I assumed the hard stuff they give you to go lights out would probably render me disabled. Unfortunately, I didn’t come to this realization until I was halfway through the prep day of fasting. With a belly full of chicken broth, STARVING, and sobbing on the couch because I’m 31 and don’t have a huz to take care of me and my b-hole, I had to reschedule the procedure for a time when my parents could come into town and take me. #RockBottom. I obviously coped by driving straight to McD’s and shoving a mcchicken, cheesburger and medium fry down my gullet as fast as my body would allow. If I could have injected it right into my veins, I would have.

Finally, the day had arrived for the real deal with my dad traveling in to be my escort to this very special occasion. I knew the hell that I was in for as fasting from 8AM to 1PM the last time nearly sent me to my grave. Everyone told me my insides vacating my body would be the worst part of the process. Joke’s on them because that shit’s a walk in the park for me, literally. I’m prepped for a probing on a regular Wednesday by the amount I’m rushing to the potty. The ACTUAL hard part is the liquid diet. As a big believer in three full meals a day and snacks every hour, fasting is very much not for me. I am a shell of a human when I skip my mid-morning snack and have been known to get the shakes or even pass out in the shower when my blood sugar is low. I used to bring snacks into gym class with me in high school. Needless to say, by lunch time I was in DESPAIR. My dad was on his way into town and when I told him not to call me again on his drive as I’ll be putting myself down for a nap because I can’t bear to be awake and not be eating, he reminded me that there’s people who feel like this every day and to put it into perspective. Dear ole dad always knows just what to say to comfort me. Because as I’m considering what Charlee’s dog chow would taste like, my stomach growling ferociously, thinking of starving homeless people really gave me the reality check that I needed. NAHT. I was able to snooze through the afternoon dreaming of hot dogs and cheese fries and woke up at dinner time to begin the real treat, my toxic sludge that would stir up quite the poopstorm. Always looking for a way to make laughs out of a grim sitch, I made a video of me mixing it like a cocktail.

@thesaltyju
iykyk. #hotgirlshit #literally #gorgeousgorgeousgirlshaveibs #colonoscopyprepday
♬ busy doin girl –

Then I took my first sip of the 64 oz I was supposed to consume over the next hour and the joke was very much over. Opting out of the additional lemon flavor so as not to feel like I was downing Pine Sol for an entire evening, this cocktail tasted like metal and oOoh baby she was thicc. I was not expecting that consistency and almost projectiled it straight across the room. Things started moving almost immediately and I was shocked at how easy breezy this process seemed. That was until the taste of this bevvy clung to my mouth for the rest of the evening and made me the most nauseous I’ve ever been. When it came time to finish that MF’er, I would’ve rather drank actual poop than saddle up for another half gallon of this poison spritz. I gagged down the first few sips of round two and ran to the can at lightning speed. From 10pm until 1am, I was the queen ogre of my swamp, sitting atop the porcelain throne, taking gulps, feeling those gulps immediately blast through me like hot lava and dry heaving into the sink whenever I reached the last sip of the cup. It’s important to note that I’ve never been the gal who could just toss a shot down the hatch without tasting it. Everything takes a spin on my taste buds before cruising on down my throat and I hated it when I was doing shots of warm Svedka in high school and I hated it even more on this particular night. By some cruel twist of fate, the second half of the gallon was like a bottomless mimosa pitcher…if mimosas tasted like lighter fluid. Every time I thought I was pouring the last glass, by pure magic there were 3 more glasses still left. After tossing the last few drops down the drain because I physically couldn’t do it, I crawled into bed, wrapped my shivering body in flannel sheets, only to have to bolt back to the bathroom several more times throughout the night and again as soon as I woke up. And twice more after I showered. And again when I got to the doctor the next morning, clenching the whole car ride there. I THINK THE GALLON PLUS 4 LAXATIVES WAS OVERKILL, DOC.

The next morning I dressed to impress in my most festive sweatsuit. Just because I was about to be violated doesn’t mean I couldn’t stunt on em with a lewk. I requested my father take a before and after pic. It took three tries for him to get my sick ‘fit AND my head in the same shot. It’s important to note that my dad is not here for the nonsense. He’s here to call me a baby bitch and roast me for how long it took me to choke down that half gallon and remind me of my privilege when I tell him I might die of hunger.

Lucky for me, the Home Alone jumpsuit was much appreciated and complimented at the doc’s office. More importantly, it added quite a sassy accent to the paper shorts they told me to hop into pre-procedure. What a fashion statement those bad boys are and tearing a hole in the crack for easy access was the cherry on top.

After the exorcism of my bowels and gag reflex for 12 + hours the night prior, the probing itself was really just a solid nap where ripping farts immediately afterward was not frowned upon. As I recounted the tale later that day to my mom, I told her how embarrassing it was for me when they walked me in my ripped paps shorts through the open waiting area to get to the room where I could eat my little snackie. My dad quickly interjected to share that under no circumstances did they walk me out with my buhhole flapping in the breeze but rather wheeled me out with my eyes half shut. I guess that was some good shit they gave me. Not as good as the paper shorts, tall red buffalo check socks and white high-top sneaks combo that I was rocking. Woo baby, I looked HOT. Again, I demanded Den document this peak babe moment for me so I could immediately upload it to Hinge to lure a lifetime mate and natch dear ole dad left the footwear completely out of frame. Maybe one day he’ll learn that my life is merely lived for others to laugh at me and HOW CAN OTHERS LAUGH AT ME IF IT’S NOT DOCUMENTED PROPERLY?!

So I survived my first butthole invasion and I’m here to share the gory deets for any fellow ladies who also have IBS and have been avoiding getting this procedure done like the plague. If I can do it, so can you. To all you regular poopers, I envy you and your ability to just shit on command. But your time shall come…it might not be for another 20 years, but everyone must succumb to the anal plundering (of the medical variety, I’m not here to kink shame) at some point. As for me, my colon was clean as a whistle and therefore I face the cold hard truth that since there’s nothing “wrong”, I’ll just have to continue with the alternating belly full of rocks and surprise trots when I least expect it forever and ever until I DIE. So the butthole saga continues. And remember, Gentlemen, I am available. 😉 I may not know how to poop, but at least I’ve got jokes!

PS Special shout out to my dad for driving 5 hours through the snow and the rain to put up with my dramatics. And also for picking up the tab on this juicy life-changing steak that I mowed through at record speed. I told you, girls gotta eat!

Salty Stories

One Year as The Jersey Ju

For anyone who read the angry novella of the worst moving experience of my life, not only did I somehow make it through that, but it was ONE YEAR AGO! I survived a whole ass year in New Jersey. And let me tell you, after almost dying every time I dared to get behind the wheel in my first few months, I did not think I would live to tell the tale. Luckily for all of us, not only did I survive, but dare I say THRIVED? I dare not. I’m totally kidding. I did not thrive in my inaugural year as The Jersey Ju. I waffled at best. And even though I believe I’ve become a more aggressive driver, and grown thicker skin (just a touch) like the combative people of my new home state…I have not forgotten my roots. And if there’s one thing I’ll do no matter where the hell I live, it’s create a bucket list in order to force myself (and unwilling victims around me) to explore and take a bajillion pictures. Since I haven’t blogged about my life in a hot minute, I decided to chit chat about all the things I’ve done in my first year as a Jersey Girl!

Can we call me a Jersey Girl now? That’s for you to decide and me to find out. I suspect no one truly becomes Jersey until they’ve completed a “locals only” journey of experiences much like Robin on How I Met Your Mother became a real New Yorker. What Maury Povich is to NYC, The Boss is to New Jersey and I trust that as soon as I catch that sweet goatee trolling around Asbury, I’ll be well on my way to being a true New Jerseyan. (Good news I have this hilarious Bruce shirt I got at a boardwalk tourist shop that definitely doesn’t scream BENNY and one can only hope I’ll be wearing it when I see him.) But for now, please accept the fact that I embraced my new home state in bucket list form as a giant first leap to becoming JERSEY STRONG.

Since I am nothing if not extra, I split my list into 4 categories. The first three categories I ripped EXCLUSIVELY from an NJ.com series that was published when I first moved here where Peter Genovese pointed out *the* thing to do in every county in New Jersey. I furiously scribbled down the ones that were up my alley (wine, food, biking) and then let friends and co-workers add in their own recommendations.

Obviously you have a set of eyes and can see that these two lists remain largely unchecked because both eating and boozing in public require an iota of a social life. I’m fine going out alone when I’m traveling because I’m moonlighting as a work jetsetter AKA #TheCorporateJu. Going out alone because I have no friends to join me?! MORTIFYING. There will never be a time where I’m out solo dolo and do not think every single person in that establishment has turned their chair to stare at me and wonder why I’m such a smelly loser. This is a hump I am yet to overcome and it would be cool if you could just support me in my insecurities here. If you recall, I did boldly show up to Taylor Swift Trivia alone. And it didn’t go well so that really set me back on my progress. Regardless, here’s a highlight reel of the Eats and Booze bucket list items.

Pete & Elda’s (Neptune City) Staring out hawt by ruffling some Jersey feathers…WHAT THEY SERVE HERE CANNOT BE CALLED PIZZA AND I WILL THROW HANDS WITH ALL OF THESE CENTRAL NJ NUTS WHO TOLD ME I JUST HAD TO TRY PETE AND ELDA’S IF I WANT TO KNOW WHAT REAL PIZZA TASTES LIKE. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. The sauce was weird, the crust tasted like a sweet croissant with flaky pastry consistency and I honestly could barely choke down my normal 2 slices that at a good pizza place I can delete in mere minutes. Sorry, not sorry.

Laurita Winery (New Egypt) is bumpin with events. I attended 90’s night in the dead of winter where I dressed like it was ’97, drove 45 mins with 2 brand new friends only for them to promptly tell me upon arrival that they actually don’t really like 90’s music and we should split. I drove more than I grooved in my overalls that evening so we’ll guh ‘head and take an L there. Still looking for any takers who want to attend line dancing night at Laurita so I can check line dancing off of my master bucket list (much alcohol will be involved.) Hit me up if you want to boot, scoot, & boogie.

@thesaltyju
90’s dance party? Yeah I think I’ve got something to wear. #dresseswellforatheme #90skid #thebestdecade
♬ Good Vibrations – Marky Mark And The Funky Bunch

Windmill Hot Dogs is the Hoffman’s/Heid’s of the Jersey Shore. If you know me, you know why I absolutely NEEDED to go there. A hoffies hot dog, cheese fries and a medium birch beer is my death row meal and I don’t think I’ve ever gone more than 3 weeks without tossing that five star cuisine down my gullet.* So it was time to see how the Jersey version fared and folks, it was NOT good.

*I just received my routine bloodwork results from my annual physical and my cholesterol was high. Can’t imagine why. My doctor noted that perhaps I’d had a greasy meal or alcohol in the days prior to the test. Uhh…yeah babe. All of the above. She also suggested I eat more leafy greens & legumes. I’ve never laughed harder at a doctor’s note in my entire life. A LEGUME?!

Not only was the hot dog about a solid foot longer than the bun, but this wrinkled ween looked like it was not a day under 100 years old. That dawg was on the rollers for a cool 8 hours just shriveling out of existence yet ironically, not getting any shorter THUS CREATING MY NIGHTMARE OF A HOT DOG. What am I supposed to do with that? Just take a raw dog bite until I hit bun a foot later? Get outta here with that trash. This wiener was so hard to stomach that I did something I’ve never once done during feeding time, I shared. Charlee Girl got to try her first two bites of hot dog (after I bit it off and peeled the skin because I was terrified she was going to die eating it) and you know what? She approved. So at least someone liked Windmill. Wasn’t a total loss but rest assured I will not be returning (sober.)

Alright, now we’re cooking with gas, a list exclusively of things I can do without companions! Although, the most disappointing discovery this year: both climbing activities have been ripped from my greasy little paws. Barnegat Lighthouse AND Lucy the Elephant are currently undergoing renovations and will not be open for climbing in the near future. My legs thank them, my excitement for taking a photo from the inside of a metal elephant trunk does NOT.

Manasquan Reservoir is not for casual bikers who take their beach cruiser out for a stroll as my vagina may never recover from the uneven gravel and overgrown tree roots for all 5 miles of this trail. Also I had Covid when I went so I really deserve bonus points.

Mantoloking Bridge County Park is actually just a boat slip (Thanks, NJ.com 🙄) and I really wish I hadn’t driven 40 mins with an over-eager pup looking for a walk to learn that. Even Charlee was like this place stinks.

Ocean Grove is the cutest G-D Victorian house beach town and I creeped the HARDEST on all of the adorbs porches and front yard gardens. (I’ve also been touring each beach town with Miss Charlee Pervs and so far Ocean Grove is #1 for quaint views & vibes.)

Thompson Park (Lincroft) became one of my go-to bike routes in the fall except for the fact that I still never figured out how to loop around it and got lost in it more times than I’d wish to admit. One time someone stopped me as I was putting my bike away and asked me which way to go on their bike and the jig was up. I was forced to confess that even though it was maybe my 5th time there I am directionally challenged and shouldn’t be allowed to bike without a GPS guiding me every step of the way. Gr8 golden fall views though.

Visiting Cape May Historic Lighthouse was the byproduct of REALLY wanting to see NYC at Christmas for the first time ever (an unchecked item to come in the next category) but Omnicron taking a giant dump on those plans. I settled for Christmas in Cape May instead and of course had to squeeze in a beach visit for lighthouse views on a freezing December day (after warming up with espresso martinis first obvs.) 10/10 would recommend taking the trip to Cape May regardless of the weather. Their downtown area was beautifully decorated for Christmas, they had lots of cute restaurants and bars to pop into and catching the sunset at the beach was the cherry on top. I took about 15 billion photos in the 6 hours I spent there and *not to brag but definitely to brag* my shot of the lighthouse from the sand has been posted on Cape May Point’s Insta & a random Cape May fan account no less than 3 times. So I am basically a Cape May legend. I mean this was their Christmas social post:

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Not sure why they didn’t want to post this Buzz Lightyear selfie with the lighthouse instead, but whatevs. I accept.

Here’s a small sampling of photos I snapped that day:

Holland Ridge Farms (Cream Ridge) found itself a new seasonal sucker in me. A farm full of in-bloom flowers and photo props? SIGN ME UP. Fall gave us a Salty Ju birthday sunflower photoshoot (and a lesson learned that cutting your own sunflowers is basically an arm workout.) And Spring transported us right to the Netherlands with Tulips as far as the eye can see and a full day of Mother/Daughter flower bonding and modeling.

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Mt. Mitchell Scenic Overlook (Highlands) has a nice view of New York City across the water (I confirmed this after texting a fellow Jerseyan because I would’ve hated to be the nerd who’s like check out those city VIEWZ and it was a peek at Red Bank or something.) There was also a 9/11 memorial and patriotic flower arrangement that I especially thought was cool as I was exploring it near the 20th anniversary of the attacks. I took about seven thousand pictures for such a small spot so clearly I enjoyed it.

And last but certainly not least, the bucket list that I created from my own brain, the experiences that I decided were vital to becoming a Jersey Girl AKA shit that I wanted to do now that I live 15 minutes from the ocean and one hour away from two major cities.

Eat a Philly Cheesesteak in Philly was my first check off the list at a social media summit last August, and it felt right to kick things off with a greasy food item. It felt even more right that after INHALING this cheesesteak, my boss witnessed a mouse scurry across the floor behind my chair. We were just starting to get to know each other and she got to learn real quick how afraid I am of creatures as I played can’t touch the ground and Usain Bolt’ed right down the stairs and out onto the street without a backward glance. Grateful the rodent waited until AFTER I finished my meal to show himself. Could’ve really ruined the experience at Jim’s South St.

See a show at The Stone Pony, a seedy rock club known for its affiliation with Springsteen. I knew I wanted to see a live show there but the usual suspects who perform there are *much* cooler than I will ever be. So all I had to do was wait for my middle school crush and favorite musician (former lead singer of Something Corporate/Jack’s Mannequin) to swing through. Happy to report I didn’t have to wait long because Andrew McMahon stops at the Stone Pony on every tour. I got to see him stomp all over his piano for the first time in four years and also learn that this historical music venue looks and smells like the basement of a frat house.

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Place a bet in AC. Pretty spicy of my job to send me to both Philly and AC so that I could mix business with pleasure and accomplish two items on the BL. Knowing that AC is the epicenter for white trash gambling addicts, I was not all surprised to walk into Harrah’s on a Wednesday afternoon and instantly be smacked in the face by a cloud of cig smoke and a bunch of degenerates placing bets. Other than my tried and true $1 WPS bet at the Saratoga racetrack, I was a gambling virg and wanted nothing more than to have a very main character-esque on a heater at the blackjack table movie scene. I recruited my boss to document this which resulted in walking around looking for the easiest game to play but having no clue what we were doing and eventually asking a pit boss to direct us to a table for baby’s first gamble. He pointed us to craps and said they would explain it to us because there wasn’t a big crowd. They did not explain it but thankfully a fellow gamblin librarian held my hand and told me what to do. Within seconds of a stranger rolling the dice, I lost $10 and was frowned upon for bringing a paparazzi with me to the table. (Peep the pit boss holding up his hand, the universal sign for “cut the shit.”) If there’s one thing that I know about gambling, it’s to always walk away on top. I had a taste of the juice and I needed to finish my glass. So we found the ever-classic slot machine so I could feel the rush of pulling a lever and seeing dolla dolla bills, y’all. And lo and behold, I won $22 on my third spin. It’s a miracle I didn’t quit my job right there, saddle up to this machine for the rest of my visit and yank that lever on repeat with a fag hanging out of my mouth. Instead, I collected my cash (to be spent on a rubbery bagel and a water the next morning) and rode the high of being a winner for the rest of the week. See below for my US Weekly, Stars They’re Just Like Us photo spread.

Also important to note that I talked MAD shit about how boring this conference was going to be because there’s no way librarians get turnt, and then was proven very wrong when I took advantage of the awards ceremony open bar, got fuzzy on the deets, made a bunch of new work friends and stayed out until 1AM. Took me two days to recover. #IssaVibe AC, BAYBEEEE!

Go blueberry picking. Once I found out that the NJ state fruit is the blueberry, I knew that plucking my own was a must to become at one with my new roots. Turns out no one cared to share this experience with me, so I went ahead and did it by myself on the very last day of the season. And it showed. Pickins were real slim. But I got to dress like an actual blueberry, saunter around a farm on a Sunday morning and pick a healthy snack for the beach later. Win, win, win.

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Try pork roll sammy. I learned immediately upon moving here that one of Jersey’s greatest and most fiery debates is over a piece of meat. South Jerseyans (and most of Central) call it Pork Roll, North Jerseyans call it Taylor Ham (a brand of pork roll.) It’s basically like calling those things that hold your boogz a tissue or a Kleenex. As a tried and true crispy bacon lover, it was going to take a lot for me to invite in a new breakfast meat…especially one that looks exactly like Canadian bacon. (Yea I got a lot of dirty looks for that, but I stand by it, COME AT ME BRO.) I asked several people how to order my pork roll and practiced it in the mirror so I didn’t look like a noob at the deli and there was literally no reason for me to get so worked up because the second I stammered out “pork roll egg and cheese on a bagel,” the guy behind me ordered a Taylor ham egg and cheese and the owner goes “A WHAT?!” The guy immediately apologized and said he just moved down this way and hasn’t adjusted to calling it pork roll yet. I giggled nervously thinking the owner was just messing with him. He WAS NOT. The owner legit almost kicked this poor soul out of his shop for ordering his breakfast sammy wrong. He shouted, “TAYLOR HAM IS A BRAND, YOU KNOW, SO IT’S JUST WRONG.” And before I could bear witness to a pork roll slapping, my sandwich was ready. I scurried out of there to enjoy my first PR with a side of fisticuffs over the name. I’ve grown to love a good pork roll egg and cheese, salt and pepper on a roll (bagel is too thicc) so I’m glad I gave it a chance.

Find Jersey’s best espresso martini. I got the best espresso teens on LOCK in Saratoga, so it was only natural that I begin the quest for the best in New Jersey. Since spressy marts (workshopping some sassy names here) are all the rage with the millennial crowd right now (may I remind you, I’ve been drinking them since I was in college, trendsetter 4 lyfe) NJ.com curated a list of the best spots. This was a good start for my list (see below) but I also like to go off the cuff and just order one anywhere I go for a full rating. This bucket list item is checked off because it’s a work in progress. I won’t stop until I reach the top, but trust that I’m working on it every chance I get. Very sorry to report that I got lost in the sauce and forgot to formally review at Wharfside, Birravino, The Shrimp Box or the second bar whose name I don’t remember in Cape May. Guess I’ll just have to go back and get anotha.

Eat crab legs. This one got added to the list after I admitted to my boss that I’d never tried a crab leg because I was intimidated by all of the tools needed to eat it and never want to be stressed while eating. Shouts to my girl Tiffany who was like oh we’re going to getchu some crab legs and I want to walk you through this v. buttery experience. So that’s how I found myself having a big ole plastic bag full of crab legs and shrimp for lunch on my birthday and then going back to the office with butter stains on my dress, smelling like a crustacean. Did it taste like buttery garlic deliciousness? YUP. Did I struggle the most to get even a morsel of meats? Also yes, which is why I don’t think I’ll be a regular crab-eater. If I can’t toss food down my gullet at warp speed, I don’t want it.

Mets Game @ Citi Field. Having been to a game at four major baseball stadiums, but not having checked both NY teams off the list, I knew seeing the Mets at Citi was a must and waiting until they were having a hot streak of a season really worked in my favor. Despite my dad peeling open a nanner on our drive to the train station and almost ruining the day completely with this stench-filled car snack, I’d say my first Mets game was a great success. Even though they lost, they held their own against a top MLB pitcher and I got to see what Mrs. Met is twerkin’ with when they brought in the trumpets for Diaz. Also GREAT game day dawg. WAY better than Windmill’s trash wiener. Next up to round out the Northeast: Citizens Bank Park in Philly.

Nascar at the Wall Speedway. Never even knew what the Wall Speedway was until I switched up my route to work and passed a sign that said Nascar was coming soon. As a born and bred people watcher, I knew this was a can’t miss and just needed to rope someone else into it. Luckily, I made a new friend from the South who was itching to watch cars spin around a track and we got ‘er done. Before I even entered the stadium I saw a gentleman wearing jean cargo shorts and I knew I was about to be in for a real visual treat. Follow that up with a kickoff prayer over the loudspeaker (because, and I quote: we put God before country) and 5 hours of cars driving in circles and spinning out, it was surely a sight to see…one time and one time only. Unfortunately I didn’t do my research and learned when I got there and looked to buy a beer that the speedway is BYOB, so I had to raw dog this night on pure exhaust fumes with no alcoholic lubricant. Fear not, I channeled my inner Ricky Bobby and got through it. SHAKE N BAKE, BABY! I saw a wife lap her husband in a race (who run the world? GIRLS) and this guy pictured below in a wheelchair yelled at my friend and I for standing too close to him. A true Jersey night.

Oh, did you think this marathon blog was done? YA RIGHT. Those were my formal lists so that I could get that orgasmic satisfaction of physically checking a box every time I accomplished something. But OBV I haven’t lived exclusively by a list for the past year. So here’s noteworthy things I did that didn’t come from a list! Honestly if you’re still reading at this point, God Bless.

See a show at Starland Ballroom. This venue has no historical significance and it’s on an old country road across from a VFW (I’m not sure if that’s true or if that was just one of the many jokes my sister and I made when she asked me where the F I was taking her because it looked like deliverance out there.) We caught Breland and Russell Dickerson on a cold wintery night and it was without a doubt the most fun, high energy concert I’ve ever been to. If you ever have the chance to see Russell throw it down onstage, GO. There’s a reason he calls his shows the RD Party. Also FWIW, this venue was way better than Stone Pony–ample parking, space to stand, and multiple bars for booze refueling.

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Do a Jersey Shore Vacation fit for a 5 year old. The last time my family and I did a beach vacation was the summer before I went to college where I was fresh off of my wisdoms being pulled (still swollen) and we all wanted to murder each other on day 3 of sharing a rental. So it’s been a minute since I’ve seen the magic of a beach vacay, which I got to do when my niece came to visit. It was her first vacation and pretty much first time doing every single thing we did. We quickly learned that she’s a woo girl in training by all of her excited outbursts for each and every activity. It’s cool when you get to do childish things but no one gives you dirty looks because you’re with a child. From finding treasure in the Metedeconk River (not worth the $25 ticket price if you’re over the age of 5) to almost ralphing on the Himalayan and learning that I’ve finally aged out of theme park rides, this viz was easily the most jam-packed 3 days of activities since I moved here. If you want to see pure baby’s first vacay joy, check out the home video I made like it’s 1993 and I’m Uncle Joey carrying around a camcorder to document everything my nieces and nephews do. Honestly there’s never been a better description of me, so whatevs. Everyone will thank me someday, probably not after wasting 14 hours getting through this blog, but SOMEDAY.

PS save yourself from Jenks Aquarium…I’m not sure we can officially call this place an aquarium as it was giving basement apartment of a guy who lives with his mom and keeps a bunch of snakes vibe. I should’ve known from the second I walked in when they had a guard at the stingray tank and told everyone they could only go wrist deep and only touch the rays that come to the surface. BRO. What stingrays are coming to the surface at a crowded boardwalk aquarium? Ya gotta get your grabbers down there and rassle em up. Amateur hour.

Beach it up at least once a week…even in the dead of winter. Look, you can’t talk a big game about how you’d be infinitely happier if you could just live near the beach and then get here and not take full advantage of that. I specifically chose to live 45 mins away from work so I could be as close to the beach as my bank account would allow and even that hasn’t been satisfying. That 15 minute drive is a real boner kill when there’s people who can just walk outside their home and hit sand. I couldn’t manifest living at the beach harder if I tried. Anywho, I walked, biked, lounged, swam, peeped many sunrises and photographed the beach like nobody’s biz this year and if you don’t believe me, here’s proof of my love affair with all things sandy and salty. (For the elite few who received a Christmas card from me, I wasn’t kidding, I basically lived on the beach like a crab this year.)

P.S. When I went in January and the only other soul on the sand with me was a seagull that was keeping pace with me on a walk, I legitimately questioned my sanity. I also may or may not have cried because that was the terrible day that I got my mugshot NJ license photo and Roz from Monsters Inc wouldn’t let me smile or switch my registration over and my only companion was a damn sky rat on a deserted beach. Real talk though, this was easily the loneliest year of my life so big ups to that salty bitch the sea for being there for me on good days and a whole lot of bad days too. Yup, sure did just personify ocean water like a total looney toon but there’s a reason waves crashing is auto-programmed onto every sound machine…it’s soothing as hell. It’s also super loud and great for drowning out the sounds of an ugly cry, jus sayin. All in all the beach is my favorite place on this earth and is probably the main reason why I’ll be sticking around here for years to come.

Champagne spray on the beach. Seems fitting to address this activity after yapping about how I pretended to own beachfront property all year rather than shoving a beach cruiser into my car and driving into the land of the rich from sketchy Neppy. I paid off my student loans this year which means ya girl is 100% debt free and ooh baby is it sexy to be financially stable for the first time in my life. So I celebrated by tossing on a tutu, buying a bottle of champs & hitting the beach to give myself a little extra in a rap video booze-soaked dance. Best part about the beach in the winter? No one else is there. So I got to take a bunch of champagne spraying videos and sashay around like an idiot without any witnesses. It was a good time until my hands were sticky and frozen so I scampered back to my heated vehicle to regain blood circ.

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See the Twin Towers Lights on the 20th Anniversary. As someone who grew up 6 hours away from NYC, I had a very distant perspective of 9/11. I was 10 years old and I couldn’t quite grasp the magnitude of what had happened and instead of observing and shutting my yapper, I decided to ask my parents to take me out to dinner that night to celebrate. Before you can compare me to a terrorist, I quickly backpedaled when I saw the look of horror on their faces and added “you know, to celebrate the people that survived.” I’m not gonna try and dig deeper on what was banging around that middle school brain of mine but it was obviously nothing profound. Regardless, I was able to go to a park in South Amboy that overlooks the NYC skyline and see the lights of the twin towers and talk to someone who had a much different perspective of that day, which really opened my eyes to how people were affected far beyond the site of the attack. It was a very cool night and although my pictures are absolute dogshit, and it wasn’t the clearest of views, it was nice to step outside of my idiot child brain and see the bigger picture. I’d still love to go to ground zero and walk through the museum, so maybe that’ll be on my list for this upcoming year.

Drink out of a stein at Oktoberfest. I always wanted to go to the real Oktoberfest but also didn’t have any friends that could be trusted to control themselves and not die of alcohol poisoning, so I’ll settle for a local version at a biergarten. Mostly, I’ve just always wanted to drink out of a honkin stein while wearing a trendy Euro hat and I feel like the extra I paid to get said stein of a beer that I didn’t even like was well worth it for the photo opp. PROST!

Get solicited for feet pics on Facebook marketplace. This one is really a reward (happy ending, so to speak) for the few, possibly none, that read this entire blog which pretty much turned into a scrapbook of my entire year. It doesn’t surprise me that it wasn’t until I moved to New Jersey that an innocent posting of brand new Sperry wedges catapulted me into the seedy underbelly of foot fetish internet.

And since I’m me and I live for content, rather than immediately blocking my podiatry perv, I played it through.

I’d like to say I’m a comedian who’s committed to a bit, but realistically, if I can snap a well-lit photo of my tootsies in a pair of trendy wedges and cash in on $50 without even leaving my couch, I’mma do just that. As it turns out, my man Tito decided after looking at my profile picture, why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free. What I thought was a tasteful sneak peek (the first one’s always free, it’s the next one that’ll cost ya) apparently was enough to get the job done without exchange of currency.

I’ve changed my profile picture to one with closed toed shoes and going forward, I’ll drive a harder bargain. YOU WANT A SHOT OF THESE POINTED PEDICURED TOES? WIRE ME $100 OR KEEP IT MOVIN, FREAK. DON’T PUSSYFOOT AROUND THE DEAL. So whatdya think? Am I a Jersey Girl yet?

If this ratchet flip phone shot circa 2011 of me in my authentic Seaside Heights Shore Store pinny (personalized with my last name on the back) tells you anything, then yeah I’m JERSEY, bitch.

Salty Stories

Things I Googled In My 30th Year On This Earth

Proving that you do not get wiser with age, you just learn to trust the internet to be smarter so your brain can hold onto important things like every lyric to an NSYNC deep cut.*

We’re closing in on the first anniversary of my 30th birthday. Please send your condolences in the form of straight cash to my Venmo, homies. (@Julia-Giantomasi) Since last year I dug real deep and got vulnerable with all of my insecurities about aging and accomplishments (Thirty, Flirty & Full of Anxiety.) I thought I would keep the tradish alive and bare my soul again. Everyone knows revealing your search history is more embarrassing than admitting in a public-facing blog how many times you’ve pooped your pants so you can bet your bottom dollar I’ll be ousting last year’s edition. I started this piece during a comedy writing sprint (where you write every single day) in February and when I reviewed it for submission, I realized there was nothing satirical about it. I just straight up copy/pasted my Google searches and then roasted myself for them. So in the spirit of making fun of myself no matter how much closer I get to being an Old Maid, here’s actual things that I Googled this year to prove that we don’t need to grow up or even be smart to survive this thing called life, just as long as we have the World Wide Web at our fingertips.

Name of (insert ‘actor/singer/character/title’ as needed)

This has because almost a daily occurrence. As much as I religiously check IMDB to refresh my memory, it’s hard to admit but sometimes I don’t even remember enough to plug into IMDB and find the answers. But at any rate, about 99.9% of the time I can’t remember the name of something or someone in whatever I’m watching at that current moment and I want to fire off a funny tweet about it but I don’t want to have egg on my face for misspelling or mixing up actors.

Natural ailments for memory loss / How young can you be to start showing signs of dementia

Were you concerned when I just said 99.9% of the time I can’t remember something? Yeah, me too. Hence this very real Google search. Seriously did my brain just fall out of my head when I entered a new decade? Is this normal? Should I get an MRI? LMK, because my mom banned me from checking WebMD and I think this is a cause for concern. Also, if your only recommendation is fish oil pls see yourself out because the thought of taking a pill that either smells or tastes like fish makes me want to be braindead for the rest of my life.

What’s it called when you start to fall asleep and have hallucinations?

Turns out this one is “hypnagogic hallucinations” and the cure for it is to be less stressed. LOLZ. Guess I’ll be seeing bugs in my bed or on my walls as I drift off to dreamland forever and for all of eternity. I even started blind folding myself for bedtime (ya I know they’re called sleep masks but let’s call a spade a spade) and what’s fun about that is I now have a prop to rip off of my face when I wake up with a jolt, launch from my bed and yell, “WTF IS THAT?!” (referring to the made up creatures sharing a bed with me.) At least I provide a midnight show for my dog, so there’s that.

Can you mix Sudafed and alcoholic beverages?

It is not recommended, but research shows (2 sudafeds followed by 2 rum and cokes and a bud light) that you’ll probably survive, you just might feel like a real snoozy suzie at the bar. Probably still safer than the time I took my heels off in the middle of the bar on Halloween then proceeded to walk 5 blocks home barefoot.

Things that are cheugy

Thanks, Gen Z, you’re all a buncha judgmental a*holes. If you are also above the age of 25 and don’t care enough to fire up the ole Google to find out what this means, I’ll give it to you straight, it’s a stupid made up word that the youths created to describe every single trend, personality trait and interest of humans in their late twenties and onward. Parting your hair on the side? Cheugy. Using the crying laughing emoji? Cheugy. My ENTIRE persona? C H E U G Y.

Matching your coordinates to your environment? Cheug City.

What’s a BENNY

Welcome to New Jersey, where they created a nickname specifically to insult anyone who didn’t grow up at the beach. Bayonne, Elizabeth, Newark and New York. Let it be known that Bayonne, Elizabeth and Newark ARE IN THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY. These people bully their own! You live 40 mins North of the beach in the same state? L O S E R. Within one month of living in Jersey, I bought a table off of Facebook marketplace and the seller told me that she’s from North Jersey but has lived at the Jersey Shore for 20 years…TWENTY YEARS…and her husband’s family still calls her a Benny. RUTHLESS.

How to make new friends as a single adult

Honestly there were many variations of this search and all of them were equally as weird and sad. No answers were found, yet many cringey efforts were made. 10/10 DO NOT recommend joining BumbleBFF unless you want to feel like you’re courting someone just to have a gal pal to talk Housewives and drink wine with.

How old is someone if they were born in 1970?

The ‘how to make new friends’ search and this search go hand in hand because after joining “meetup”–an app where you can find groups of people also seeking new friends based on your interests, I sashayed into a “Young and Fun in Monmouth County” group. Judging by the title, you’d think it’s a classic group of whippersnappers who are looking to grab drinks and sing karaoke and do game nights, count me in! I RSVP’ed to the new members meet up at a dive bar AND 90’s dance night right off the bat feeling like this was an easy layup for friends. Until I saw the collection of members out in the wild and immediately wondered if there was an age cutoff to “YOUNG and fun.” I doubled back and read the fine print. Members have to be born in 1970 or after. Hence this search because no matter what the decade, math will never be a strong suit of mine. FIFTY TWO. THIS GROUP OF YOUNG AND FUN PEOPLE ALLOWS PEOPLE WHO COULD BE MY PARENTS. NO OFFENSE TO THE OLDS, BUT IF I WANTED TO MAKE SOME FRIENDS IN YOUR AGE GROUP I’D SIT ON A BOARDWALK BENCH IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY AND CHAT UP THE RETIREES THAT ARE SWARMING THE BEACH ON A WEEKDAY ITCHING FOR SOMEONE TO DISCUSS THE WEATHER WITH THEM. I WOULD NOT HIT A DANCE PARTY WITH A GENT WHO COULD BE MY DAD AND FEEL ALL SORTS OF UNCOMFY WATCHING HIM GYRATE TO GOOD VIBRATIONS. So as I previously said, meeting people your age in a new city NOT through work? Insert fart noise here.

@thesaltyju
90’s dance party? Yeah I think I’ve got something to wear. #dresseswellforatheme #90skid #thebestdecade
♬ Good Vibrations – Marky Mark And The Funky Bunch

Crushed the 90’s dance party wardrobe tho, too bad there was no one young enough to appreciate it without readers

How can you see if someone unfollowed you on Instagram / How can you tell if someone blocked your number

Breakups in 2022, man. So many avenues to contact or check in on each other and since I’m probably still Facebook friends with the kid who bullied me on the bus in 7th grade, I clearly don’t have a grasp on what it looks like to cut anyone from social media. Listen, at the end of the day, anyone who unfollows me on social is missing out on quality content–flowers, beaches, sunrises, and the occasional video shaming my dog for being an uncoordinated doofus. Their loss. Quick PSA though: if you are the dumper and you block the dumpee’s phone number for literally no reason, you are a real flesh dumpster. (Say dump again.) I don’t make the rules, I just enforce them. Who made the rules, you may wonder? Taylor Swift, Queen Bee of breakups, obviously.

Was this just an excuse to post the GOAT of breakup song music videos? YUP.

How do you spell Jake Gylenhall/Gyllenhall/Gylenhaal

And speaking of…honestly couldn’t Taylor have shaded a man with an easier last name to spell? November was FRAUGHT with spell checks on this man’s name. He’s one notch below Matthew McConaghey(sp?) as my most googled name for spellcheck.

@thesaltyju
To ALL of my friends begging me to hang out…I’m booked on Friday night. #redtaylorsversion #swifttok #alltoowell
♬ All Too Well Taylor Swift – TaylorswiftxFolklore

What do you report doctors to when they’re bad?

After seeing a dermatologist who confused me with another patient then proceeded to cut me open and stitch me up with 0 explanation, my shirt pulled up over my head and the door wide open, I was FIRED up to report this doc to the medical version of the Better Business Bureau. Unfortunately if you choose to spend half of your life in school and the other half of your life paying it off, you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want. What a letdown to find out that I couldn’t pull the ultimate Karen and tattle on this doc to the reigning doc association, so instead I used my PHENOMENAL writing skills to blast off a very detailed response to the office’s “how did we do?” survey. Guarantee no one read it, but it made me feel a teensy bit better even if I will forever have a raging scar in the middle of my back from the drive-thru hack job biopsy I received. Whoops, guess I’m still not over it. (Peep a snippet of my scorched earth feedback below)

Do dolphins rape people?

I actually googled this in 2014 (see tweet below for proof) after visiting a particularly sassy dolphin named Nick at the Clearwater Aquarium. However, I included it in this list because if I hadn’t searched this exact phrase then, I absolutely would’ve this year as I planned my dolphin swim excursion to check it off the ole bucket list. I swam with a female dolphin and she was quite a lovely lady, but I will say out of all the whistles that were blown that day, none of them were rape whistles. So I think we can officially put the rumor that dolphins are feisty rapists to bed once and for all. I cannot vouch for dolphins in the wild so protect your bishop, Glen if you ever find yourself in the open sea.

This is a real thing. Killin dinner convo with the dream team about dolphin rape. pic.twitter.com/KbGFpWdVnI
— Julia Giantomasi (@TheSaltyJu) March 24, 2014

Everything was consensual here, but tbh I really would’ve appreciated a face smooch. Hand kisses are for prudes.

Iodine smell after Covid

Couldn’t tell you one single thing about iodine except that it’s the word I pulled directly out of my ass after an entire afternoon with a weird chemical smell stuck in my nose a whole 5 months after I had Covid and recovered from it. Google was also like, do you really mean iodine, boo? This one remains a mystery.

Praytell

No explanation and absolutely no memory of this one. Other than using the interwebs as spellcheck sometimes I just pick a random phrase that I don’t really know the definition of or where to use it but I feel like it might work somewhere in my life. I’m assuming this was for a blog but who knows, maybe I was just trying to spice up my everyday conversation vocabulary, I do declare!

What time does the Super Bowl start?

Honestly throwing the super bowl in a day before Valentine’s this year really messed up my internal clock. It’s never that late in the month, right?! Football is stupid. At least I didn’t need to look up anything associated with that Halftime show because it was TAILOR-MADE for my age demo. Make that lineup into a tour and I’d buy tickets faster than an upside down Fiddy can say, “Go Shawty.”

The girls who get it, get it, the girls who don’t, don’t.

Shocking to no one: I don’t. Another stupid Gen Z thing. When will I stop googling young people phrases? WHEN I’M SIX FEET UNDER, TRICK. Seriously, there’s a reason friends and fam text me and ask me what these sorts of things mean. They know I hate having FOMO and have no shame in my Google game. So if you’re ever embarrassed about searching something on your own, just shoot me a textie text. (This also applies to celebrity nudes or sex tapes. Chances are I’ve already done the dirty work to search such smut and I’m happy to share and keep your browser history clean.)

Opened my photos today and forgot that I screenshotted a pic of Orlando Bloom's willis and doodleberries. That's one way to wake up.
— Julia Giantomasi (@TheSaltyJu) August 5, 2016

My sister just requested that I text her Chr*s Ev*ans d*ck p*c and when I immediately stopped in the middle of Wegmans to do so, she replied “What a wiener”. And yet for some odd reason we still don’t have our own reality show. 🤔
— Julia Giantomasi (@TheSaltyJu) September 18, 2020

Can I pop the white bump on my eyelid?

At first glance I figured the makeup artist who had a severe issue with gluing my fake lashes on for a wedding this past fall left a glob of glue behind…then three weeks later when it was still lingering on my eye, I was excited to find out if I’d discovered an inconvenient pimple to burst. Seriously, I think I salivated a little at the thought of embarking on new pimple popping real estate on my face. As it turns out, it’s ill-advised to pop and guess what is still living rent-free on my eye 6 months later? THANKS FOR TELLING ME TO LEAVE IT ALONE, MOM, NOW I HAVE PERMANENT CHUNKY EYE.

Can I get pink eye from my dog?

For those of you who have had the pleasure of knowing me for many years, you’ll know that 2018 was the year I couldn’t seem to stop getting pink eye. I’ve been a ferocious eye rubber my whole life (not sorry bout it, my eyes be itchin) and it turns out itchy eyes doesn’t mix well with touching people’s dirty towels at a spa. The summer I worked at the spa I picked up “the pink” twice and then had PTSD for anytime my eyes watered that I had it again and would immediately started splooging cream into my eyeball as a precaution. It also coincidentally was one of the times in my life I was sans health insurance and that goopy eye cream was EXPENSIVE so I really wanted to get my money’s worth. But I digress, back to the real issue here, my dog licks her butthole roughly 900 times a day. I’d say if her tongue isn’t caressing me with sloppy kisses, it’s cleaning out her nether regions. So when a rogue lick caught me in the eye when I wasn’t paying attention, you bet your bottom dollar I was hopping on over to Google in fear. Happy to report dogs cannot pass pink eye but also it is not recommended to let their tongues grace your moneymaker because they carry a whole lot of bacteria. Whatever. Respectfully, I decline. I didn’t get a dog to not get on the ground with her and let her all up in my grillpiece with smooches.

*Also I refuse to reveal everything I’ve googled since procuring the pooch because the limit does not exist to what I won’t ask the Internet. From “what can’t dogs eat” to “why is my dog dipping her paw in the water dish while she’s drinking” to “how do I get my dog to stop biting me” there is not one thing this dog has done that hasn’t been researched. And boy oh boy it’s a slippery slope, you’ll go from thinking you’re a great dog mom who wants to be proactive and knowledgeable to feeling like you traumatized your dog because you pushed her butt into the crate one time. The great news is I’ve had her for almost two months and she’s still alive and thriving so shout out to me for that. I also rescued her from living on the streets with a homeless drifter so I’m not saying I’m a hero, but I’m not NOT saying it either.

Bonus: A behind the curtains peek into the Google shitstorm that occurs just to write ONE blog. Here’s my search history from the night I wrote the Met Gala Red Carpet blog:

Does gilded mean gold

Are flappers in the gilded age

Does the gilded age include the 1920s

When is mid century

Did cars exist in the 1800s

The British are coming meme

Honestly I would feel embarrassed about how LITTLE I paid attention in History (Sorry, Mr. Muench) except for the fact that judging by that red carpet no one in Hollywood paid attention either and they pay people to make them look smart and good so, HA. The Salty Ju would not exist without the power of the Internet (both to answer all of my dumb questions and to publish all of my idiotic words) and I wouldn’t have it any other way! Seriously if an apocalypse happened and I didn’t have an iPhone with 5G in my hands at all times, I would die within 5 minutes and I don’t care who knows it. Onto 31–excited to see what another year of a deteriorating brain and body will bring me 🎉

The Salty Ju

#NoFilter

Tag Archives: Humor

WELP, I Tried. – Part One

Welcome to the summer of solo adventures that shall never be repeated.

TO BE CONTINUED because this blog was even too long for me so I cut it into two parts. And let me tell you, part two is a doozy.

The Most Alarming Things Medical Professionals Have Said to Me (So Far)

I’m A Side Hustlin’ Hack

Year Two as The Jersey Ju

Open Letter to Everyone Working From Home But Really Just Running Errands (Julia’s Version)

Death & Taxes at Walmart

Bend Over and I’ll Show Ya

One Year as The Jersey Ju

Things I Googled In My 30th Year On This Earth

Proving that you do not get wiser with age, you just learn to trust the internet to be smarter so your brain can hold onto important things like every lyric to an NSYNC deep cut.*

Name of (insert ‘actor/singer/character/title’ as needed)

Natural ailments for memory loss / How young can you be to start showing signs of dementia

What’s it called when you start to fall asleep and have hallucinations?

Can you mix Sudafed and alcoholic beverages?

Things that are cheugy

What’s a BENNY

How to make new friends as a single adult

How old is someone if they were born in 1970?

How can you see if someone unfollowed you on Instagram / How can you tell if someone blocked your number

How do you spell Jake Gylenhall/Gyllenhall/Gylenhaal

What do you report doctors to when they’re bad?

Do dolphins rape people?

Iodine smell after Covid

Praytell

What time does the Super Bowl start?

The girls who get it, get it, the girls who don’t, don’t.

Can I pop the white bump on my eyelid?

Can I get pink eye from my dog?

Bonus: A behind the curtains peek into the Google shitstorm that occurs just to write ONE blog. Here’s my search history from the night I wrote the Met Gala Red Carpet blog:

Here’s what I already knew about me going into this trip:

Here’s what I learned from this experience:

Welcome to the summer of solo adventures that shall never be repeated.

TO BE CONTINUED because this blog was even too long for me so I cut it into two parts. And let me tell you, part two is a doozy.

Proving that you do not get wiser with age, you just learn to trust the internet to be smarter so your brain can hold onto important things like every lyric to an N*SYNC deep cut.

Name of (insert ‘actor/singer/character/title’ as needed)

Natural ailments for memory loss / How young can you be to start showing signs of dementia

What’s it called when you start to fall asleep and have hallucinations?

Can you mix Sudafed and alcoholic beverages?

Things that are cheugy

What’s a BENNY

How to make new friends as a single adult

How old is someone if they were born in 1970?

How can you see if someone unfollowed you on Instagram / How can you tell if someone blocked your number

How do you spell Jake Gylenhall/Gyllenhall/Gylenhaal

What do you report doctors to when they’re bad?

Do dolphins rape people?

Iodine smell after Covid

Praytell

What time does the Super Bowl start?

The girls who get it, get it, the girls who don’t, don’t.

Can I pop the white bump on my eyelid?

Can I get pink eye from my dog?

Bonus: A behind the curtains peek into the Google shitstorm that occurs just to write ONE blog. Here’s my search history from the night I wrote the Met Gala Red Carpet blog:

Proving that you do not get wiser with age, you just learn to trust the internet to be smarter so your brain can hold onto important things like every lyric to an NSYNC deep cut.*