4:05 p.m. - 2008-11-06
I NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD BE THIS WAY..
YES, IT HAS BEEN OVER 3 WEEKS SINCE I LAST POSTED.....I have a good excuse because we often couldn't find a motel with Internet connections and also, many evenings we were out.
I didn't know when RH (retired husband) and I planned our vacation what would happen. And, now I do...
We wanted to go out West where we spend most of our vacation time. As it worked out, we were going to help our BIL pack and move from one home in a small town to another home in a larger town. I won't even try to get into that story until another time.
What was really interesting and the point of this blog today was my meeting with 4 other bloggers in Tombstone, Az. All the bloggers are connected through Diaryland.com and I had been reading their blogs for several months. When the invitation to go to the Great Javelina Cantina Hunt 2008 in Tombstone to meet with the bloggers was first discussed earlier this year, I had no idea what this was going to mean to me in my life.
First of all, Javelinas do exist! They do live in Tombstone and they are hunted.
The Javelina Cantina Hunt of 2008 was the name of the get-together that was planned. It was really a source of fun and was to be accompanied by giant flaming puffies which are gigantic marshmallows. We also had our own Trollop sashes to wear. (ok, you had to be there to understand.!)
The giant puffie marshmallow is about the size of six regular marshmallows!!!
The flaming puffies would be used to lure the javelinas out. They had to be set on fire by at least one of the town police officers to make it official. Don't ask!
The giant puffies were purchased in California and are about the size of 6 regular marshmallows. Picture trying to poke one of them into your mouth..... Some of the bloggers allowed pictures of that! I, myself, is too dainty to attempt such a chore!
Anyway, back to this meet.....When I first considered going, I thought there would be 15 to 20 people attending. There were going to be seminars on writing blogs and getting more readers. I was hoping to learn more about computers and how to make my blog better... Most of the seminars were to be held at Schieffelin Hall which houses the auditorium where the Earps and other famous people attended town meetings and plays back in the day.
The famous Gunfight at the OK Corral took place in Tombstone...
The town people dress up in the period of that era and stay in character as they greet the visitors.
So, I decided I did want to attend and then discovered that because of various issues, including the economy, personal reasons and some flame wars.....there would only be 5 of us in attendance.
The "flame wars" apparently were caused by other bloggers for their own reasons and may have had something to do with the lack of participants. These bloggers decided to cause trouble and copied and published protected blogs of 3 of the 5 participants to get people upset and angry and cause problems. A lot like being in high school...only more stupid because there was no reason to do this.
But I digress...... You know, when this meet-up was over...I had no Internet connections for over 2 weeks. I have been mentally writing this blog ever since and I must say that it was magnificent! However, now I am having trouble remembering all the brilliant and insightful things I had to say.
Anyway, there were 2 people from California.... Poolie and Beanie who had met the other two bloggers. Casa Rosie who lives in Tombstone and hosted this event. YankeeChick is from Arkansas and had never met Casa Rosie. In other words...2 had each met the other 3....., 2 had each met 2 of the others and then there was muah...
.....ME. I had never met ANY of them.
So, three of the bloggers arrived on Wednesday and were staying with Casa Rosie. I arrived on Thursday afternoon. RH and I were booked into a motel in Tombstone but we met them at a local hangout for lunch.
Let me just take a moment to say that it was instant love between all 5 of us bloggers. I couldn't have asked for a better reception or have felt any more friendship and connection than what I received from the very first seconds of our conversations. After lunch, we walked back to Casa Rosie's home and RH went on his way to settle in at the motel and do some things he wanted to do. He was told to come back sometime in the late evening to pick me up. Each morning, he would drop me off and pick me up late at night.
From that moment on, it was nonstop talking, laughing, sharing of all sorts of personal stories and feelings, emotions, and beliefs. It ranged from discussions on why we blog, when we started our blog and what we wanted to accomplish within the blog....to psychic moments, ghosts, spiritual beliefs....to what we wanted out of life and how to get it. The 3-1/2 days passed too quickly. We laughed so hard our ribs ached and our jaws were sore. We laughed so much that some people (ok, TWO of the bloggers) spit Coke out of their noses and then laughed about that. We shared so many stories. I learned about a lot of the back stories of some of the Flame Wars. We encouraged and supported and complimented each other for hours.
It was one of the best times I ever had in my life. And yes, on Saturday night, after Casa Rosie's first professional singing debut at one of the entertainment bar/restaurants and after Poolie and I did a private parody about the man who was headlining the show and after snippets of brilliance came out of my mouth and stunned the other 4....
We went back to Casa Rosie's to light the fire on the giant puffies. Even my husband got involved. As a retired police officer, he did the honors of lighting the first few puffies as we started walking downtown. We did find an officer on duty who was willing to light the puffies and have his picture taken. Even some of the visitors to the town got in on the fun and tried to eat the giant puffies before we went javelina hunting....and yes....we did hunt the javelinas.
We even sang a theme song as we walked through the town.
COME ON, BABY....LIGHT MY FIRE!!!!
All too soon, it was time for me to say Goodbye. I couldn't believe how difficult it was to say those words to these 4 women who I had just met on Thursday! We all felt that it was a perfect time....we were so glad to have gotten to know each other and we all felt there was something much more special about this then just the javelina hunt.
There was a deep and profound connection that we experienced together and some may think it has changed their lives....I KNOW I DO.
So thank you to Casa Rosie, Poolie, Beanie and YankeeChick. I will honestly never forget those few days we had together.
