Epic Cruise Pictures

Wow, I'm such a bad blogger, you guys! Sheesh, I gotta apologize for how long it's taken me to update this one. As you know, we have had some life-changing events in that I am now, finally, pregnant. Yay! But - I can't neglect my 'fun' blog. Enjoy!

Who reading this has been on a cruise where they have the set-ups for you to do some awesomely cheesy photographs? They put you in front of all different backdrops. I think I've even seen some people use them as their official Christmas photos.

A few years ago, about two dozen girlfriends and I went on a cruise for Stacia's bachelorette party. It was Stacia's last fling before the ring! We have tote bags that say that, that's how I remember (just kidding, I remember way more than that). That cruise was such a crazy fun time. Tracie has video from the cruise somewhere. And speaking of that video, Trace - I think it's about time you have all the girls over so we can watch said video. I'm not sure if your reenactment of the Michael Jackson dance era was captured, but there were definitely some other memorable moments. I think I remember having a few pretty good one-liners myself on said video.

But I digress, back to the topic of epic cruise pictures. The other day I came across some pictures I had, quite honestly, forgotten about. You ain't seen epic cruise pictures till you've seen these, my friends. One of the nights on the cruise, Lisa, Tracie, British-Tracey, Kelly and myself decided to have some epic cruise pictures of our own taken. It's quite possible we may have had a few drinks before these pictures occurred. And yes, I've decided to embarrass us all by putting them on my blog. You're welcome!

Just a family picture, really. With Tracie showing off the goods.

Orange, anyone? And yes, Lisa is wearing a knee brace. She limped around the whole cruise. It's called dedication to the cause!

I wish I could tell you what the photographer was thinking...

Sassy starfish doesn't put up with any shenanigans.

It's important to stop and smell the roses...errrrr, sunflowers. (And for pete's sake, in the future, someone remind me to do skinny arm pose! Sheesh....)

Brooklyn-Norwegian

Some time ago, my mom's cousin began researching our family history. While we knew we were of Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Finnish descent on that side of the family, turns out we are also a little bit German.

My cousin has been able to trace the Danes and Germans back to the mid-1800s and it is all very fascinating. Our family tree is really coming together. Additionally, we know many of their birth dates, when they were married, their occupations and when they came over to America. Just the names themselves are so interesting. Hermine Friedericke Catharine Mansen was my great-great-great grandmother (I think that was the correct number of 'greats'). Hermine's son, Robert Thoede, my great-great grandfather, later helped build the stairs in the Statue of Liberty.

We even know what boats some of them came over on. Some of the members of the Thoede side of our family came over on the Wieland ship, which left Hamburg, Germany in 1882 arriving in New York some weeks later. When my other great-grandfather's family came from Norway to the US on the ship Furnessia in 1911, those checking them in at Ellis Island changed the spelling of their last name from Henriksen to Hendricksen.

Now that we have gone over a little of my family background on my mother's side, I also have to share with you what my family affectionately calls 'Brooklyn-Norwegian.' Many of you know that my Nana, my mother's mom, coined many, many great terms and sayings during her life (cement underwear, anyone?). She was truly one of the funniest people I have ever known. But the true originator of crazy terms was actually her mother, who was Norwegian and Danish. I'm beginning to realize I come from a long line of pushy broads. My great-grandmother passed away before I was born so I never got to meet her, but her legacy lives on because we all still use her vocabulary.

My great-grandmother coined these words that sounded like they were Norwegian and they all have their own distinct meanings. My grandmother and her siblings grew up using these words and most of us in the family still use them to this day. The best part is that when my mom married my dad - who is born and raised in Norway - she told him: "Oh, I know some words in Norwegian!" My father looked at her incredulously and let her know he had no idea what she was talking about. Those weren't Norwegian words. Turned out, my great-grandmother just made them up. Which is when the realization occurred...they are Brooklyn-Norwegian.

So, because I think they are hilarious and I use them quite often - so much so that many of them are now part of Ralph's vocabulary - I have decided to share them with you. Feel free to use them. Spread them around. My great-grandmother would be so proud! Please note that I'm not exactly sure how to spell them. And they should be pronounced with a Norwegian accent. I can teach you that at a later time. Likely over drinks. Please also keep in mind some are a bit vulgar. We don't hold anything back in my family.

Fnugg - a piece of lint or fuzz
Kliss - useless knick-knacks that simply take up space around your house, f.ex a shell you bought in the islands that someone wrote 'Bahamas' on with a Sharpie
Smat (or smatting) - chewing with your mouth open and making a noise while doing it
Smattehase - someone who continuously chews with their mouth open
Knasing - chewing something crunchy with your mouth open (my family cannot stand knasing. When I was a kid, they used to make me eat ice cream cones outside or in a separate room because they couldn't stand the knasing. God forbid you try to eat chips with one of them in the car while on a road trip. Also, Funions make the worst knasig. It's like nails on a chalkboard)
Kroka (I really don't know how to spell this one, I'll have to pronounce it for you in person) - female parts aka va-jay-jay
Dingsen - male part, the 'twig' of the 'twig and berries'
Musta - the female monthly curse, i.e. 'I have my musta'

I expect these to be used next time I see one of you. There will be a quiz! And I hope you got a good laugh!

A Pushy Broad Leans In

Some of you may remember I did an entry about Sheryl Sandberg and her ideas on women in the workplace last Fall on my other blog. Recently she has been all over the news and various media outlets promoting her new book, 'Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead.' I just finished the book myself and it had quite an impact on me.

When I was in college and first starting out in my career, I used to think that women had to act just like men to be be successful and get ahead. There is a book called 'Nice Girls Don't Get The Corner Office 101: Unconscious Mistakes Women Make That Sabotage Their Careers,' which basically tells you all the things you should not do as a female in the workplace. Don't bake cookies for the office, don't cry at work, don't sit with your leg tucked under you, etc. To be honest, the book makes a lot of valid points. However, I realized after reading Sheryl's book that a woman's place in the office doesn't necessarily have to be that rigid. Women are different and that's okay. It's okay if we get emotional. I've cried at work before and while it's not something I want to do on a regular basis, it happened and then I moved on from it. But we all have to lean in and understand that while men and women communicate differently, it doesn't make women any less effective as leaders. In fact, in many instances it probably makes us better.

While reading 'Lean In,' I found myself highlighting passages I wanted to remember, I was yelling 'yes!' in agreement out loud to no in particular and I have been talking about it to anyone who will listen. Sheryl's three main ideas are:

Sit at the table. Be an active participant. Keep your hand raised. Don't sit on the sidelines. Did you know that if there is a job opening, a woman will generally only put in for it if she feels she has 100% of the skills needed? A man will apply if he feels he has 60% of the skills needed. The problem is that this by doing this, we hold ourselves back because so many of the job skills needed are often acquired on the job. Pushy broads know this and are confident in their abilities to take on new tasks.

Make your partner an equal partner. Ladies, you absolutely can have a successful career and a family. But, while women have become much more active in the workplace, we still do the majority of the housework. Women must have the conversations with their partners, letting them know that if they are both going to work full time, the housework must be shared equally. And I fully admit that this is something Ralph and I have to work on, too. Especially when we have children.
Nora Ephron said: "It will be a little messy, but embrace the mess. It will be complicated, but rejoice in the complications. It will not be anything like what you think it will be like, but surprises are good for you. And don't be frightened: you can always change your mind. I know: I've had four careers and three husbands."

Don't leave before you leave. Women often start preparing to begin a family years before it actually happens. They sometimes pass up job opportunities because they think they might have children soon. But in doing so, women hold themselves back and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Take the opportunities now, because it will put you in a better position financially to handle family life later. Don't worry about whether or not you'll be able to juggle it all. When that time comes, you'll figure it out. Women always do.

I was in St. Louis last week at our corporate office for a Diversity Team meeting, which I'm part of for my division, Fleet Management. Having just read 'Lean In' and feeling very fired up about it, I asked to make it a part of our agenda and I presented the ideas to our team and our corporate leaders. I was delighted to find that they took to it even stronger than I expected them to. Having a discussion like this in a room filled with mostly men - there were only three women there, including myself - was interesting in that they often don't realize that we have these thoughts and that we worry about these things. While many of them know they have fantastic women working for them - strong salespeople and strong leaders - some of those women might need a little push occasionally in order to pursue that bigger opportunity.

As a result of the Diversity Team meeting, we are going to be starting Lean In Circles for our female Fleet Management salespeople and managers around the country and I have been tasked with making that happen. Lean In Circles are groups of women coming together to discuss different topics and also support each other in their success. More info about it is on the website www.leanin.org. Depending on how our company Circles go and if they take off, I'm considering starting one for friends I have outside of Enterprise here in Orlando. I feel very, very strongly about a woman's ability to lead and be successful in the workplace. It's imperative that we support each other and continue to lean in to our careers. So - after reading this, hopefully I have inspired you to pick up Sheryl Sandberg's book. I really think you will like it. I'm leaning in to my career...are you?

Thoughts From Another Pushy Broad, Vintage Bentley

Vintage Bentley aka Mrs. Gus aka Tracie is guest blogging you guys! Enjoy, as this is a story for the ages!

As the one who encouraged Britt to share her funny stories with us in this blog, I thought it only right to share the funniest story, to date, that has ever happened to me. I appreciate her letting me be the first guest blogger on her site and hope you enjoy this as much as I did. And still do. And will forever. Because I will never let Duke live this down.

 

 

It was a typical Friday night, about five years ago if not a little longer and Duke and I were getting ready to go downtown to meet up with friends. I had been texting Lisa Hurst back and forth about where we were going, when we would meet, who else is coming…you know the routine. I had the new iPhone and was excited to play with it and all its new features. So was Duke even though he didn’t really know how to work all the apps or games.

 

Anyway, he’s patiently waiting for me to finish getting ready and I remember walking out to the patio to ask him how I looked in whatever outfit I was wearing that night. He’s got my phone in his hand and says, “I did something really bad."  He’s turned white as a ghost and is staring at me with a look on his face I’ve never seen before. I’m thinking that he deleted apps or contacts or dropped and broke my new phone or something of that magnitude. I say or yell rather, “WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY PHONE?” and grab it out of his hands. He says he decided to text something to Lisa. “What the hell did you text to Lisa that’s so bad?”

 

**Ding Ding** I get a text at that moment and ask him to tell me what I’m in for.

 

He says, “I was just being funny and typed out to her  'I love to rub sweaty ballbags across my forehead over and over again'”. I laughed and said, “you’re a jackass, let me see what she’s texting back”. But he stops me and says, “but the message didn’t go to Lisa, it went to your mom!! And now I’ve been trying to delete it and it made that whoosh sound and I know it’s gone and I can’t get it back."  See, in between texting with Lisa, my mom texted something to me and was the most recent name in the texting cue, which Duke hadn’t noticed.

 

I lost it! I laughed so hard I think my neighbors heard me. I literally fell on the couch with stomach pains knowing that my 'funny-man' sent a lewd text to my Mom about wanting sweaty ballbags on my forehead. “So let’s see what Mom has to say about that funny-man.” I looked at my phone and Mom writes back “what are BALLBAGS?” Now I’m even more hysterical because I somehow have to explain what a ballbag is to my mom. So I call her. She’s at dinner with my dad, in a fancy restaurant, and I hear my dad laughing in the background because she’s obviously read him the text by now. And then she starts to laugh because she realizes, FINALLY, what a ballbag is. My folks were great sports about the whole thing and even toasted at the next family gathering to 'sweaty ballbags.' LMAO!!

 

While Duke was completely mortified by what had taken place, there was a part of me that was happy. This was precisely what he needed to teach him a lesson about playing with other people’s stuff. And from that moment five years ago, he has never touched my phone again. 

 

 

Lesson of the day: Always double-check who you're sending sweaty ballbags to! 

 

Redneck Activities

I rode a swamp buggy for the first time last weekend. This happened:

That is the chassis and motor of, I believe, a 1985 or so Ford F-150 converted into a swamp buggy. It broke down a lot. Riding it was still fun. For the most part. Our friends have named it the Kooter Intruder. I would say that's a fairly appropriate name.

Admittedly, I was supremely embarassed when Ralph pulled up to our driveway Friday night towing it. If the times when we had to pull our Nissan 300ZX into the garage with the four wheeler didn't make our neighbors think we are rednecks, they definitely think we are now (the Nissan doesn't run and is insanely heavy to push, hence the towing)!

Guys think driving swamp buggies and four wheelers through various mud holes to see if they can make it is fun. Personally, I have a bit of a different definition of fun, but hey, give me a Tervis Tumbler with some vodka and Fresca in it and I'm up for a lot of different things. And there, my friends, is my husband's strategy for how to get me to have a good time while out in the woods!

One can rest assured, however, that I do make four wheeling look good

 

 

Contrary to popular belief, I do actually enjoy four wheeling. It's fun as long as I don't wind up completely covered in mud. It's the spending the night (even if it is in campers) and some of the people that frequent the four wheeling places that make me uncomfortable and that's why I don't generally go. But like I said above, if you give me enough vodka in my New York Yankees Tervis Tumbler, things will generally be okay. I'm very fun to drink with. In case you weren't already aware.

Songs That Take You Back

I come up with blog topics at odd times. I am in the middle of a cleaning spree. When I'm on cleaning sprees, I usually blast Frank Sinatra music (as long as Ralph isn't home; he isn't as much of a fan). And while I was mopping the floor, I was thinking of songs that take you back to a specific moment or they make you think of someone or something.

I have a few songs like that. Flo Rida's 'Low' makes me remember my bachelorette party. The song had just been released, but Stacia had it on a CD and we carried it around to all the clubs at Hard Rock in Hollywood, asking them to play it, yelling 'applebottom jeans, boots with the fur!'

50 Cent's 'In Da Club' makes me remember the trip to Cancun with Katie senior year of college. Debauchery. Complete, amazing, memories for a lifetime, so much fun, debauchery.

Sublime's 'Caress Me Down' brings me back to high school when Jennie and I would drive around Lake Worth Beach in her black Toyota Celica convertible while we scoped out guys.

Many wonder why Jessica and I call each other 'Walrus.' A guy I dated briefly in college once left me a message at approximately 2:30 am singing the Beatles' 'I Am the Walrus.' Jess was there. It stuck.

I can't listen to The Cranberries' 'Zombie' without laughing hysterically. Lisa and I did a horrible rendition of that song one night while playing 'Sing Star.' We laughed so hard we couldn't breathe.

Michael Jackson's 'Bille Jean' now makes me think of Vintage Bentley and her outrageous reenaction of the entire MJ era on a dance floor at Stacia's bachelorette party.

And, of course, there's Journey's 'Don't Stop Believin'....the Lodge....singing at the top of my lungs with Kindra, Courtney, Ralph and the rest of our Lodge crew.

But, going back to Sinatra, whenever I hear 'My Way' I think of my Uncle Raymond. My other name for him was Uncle Bean, or Uncle Beanie. When he was born, he looked like a bean and so his entire life, everyone called him Beanie, the Beanman, etc. That's what my family does. We come up with odd names. He used to call me Britteronski. Ronsk, for short.

My Uncle Raymond passed away in August 1999, two days before my 19th birthday. It was completely out of the blue and unexpected. Even though it's been over 13 years, I still think about him all the time and I miss him very much.

My uncle was my mother's younger brother. He was one of the funnest, most charismatic people I have ever known. Everyone always wanted to be around him. He had a way of drawing people in. He was so confident. I wanted to be just like that.

He used to take me to baseball games when I was a kid and sometimes let me have some of his beer. He's the reason I love dive bars as he used to take me to his favorite one in Lantana. I'd sit with him at the bar and drink Shirley Temples and listen to him make friends with everyone. I just recently let this slip to my mom that he used to take me to The Duke; she wasn't too happy about that. When I was a kid, he told me the pulp in orange juice was flies' wings. To this day, I can't drink orange juice with pulp. We used to talk about how we both loved Guns 'N Roses and we'd debate Axl Rose's voice and if he sounded different when he talked from when he was singing. He's the main reason I'm such a big Yankees fan and why I know so much about them. Mickey Mantle was his favorite player - and mine.

My uncle had this great voice and he was a pretty good singer. Every once in a while, he would sing karaoke at the above-mentioned dive bar, and when he did, it was Sinatra's 'My Way.'

Not only was that his favorite song to sing, but it exemplified him.
I've lived a life that's full
I traveled each and every highway
And more, much more than this, I did it my way

That was him.

Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all, when there was doubt
I ate it up and spit it out
I faced it all and I stood tall and did it my way

And that's what I want to be able to say about my own life. That I stood tall and I did it my way. And if I'm ever lucky enough to have a son, his middle name will be Raymond after my uncle and my grandfather.

Does anyone else have songs that take you back?

How a Pushy Broad Came to Be

How a pushy broad came to be, let's see....well, back in August 1980, my parents welcomed me into the world. Screaming, I'm sure. They couldn't decide on a name and my uncle suggested Britt as he happened to have an obsession with Britt Ekland at the time. Not sure who she is? Consult the Google. Now, she was Swedish. I'm Norwegian. Big difference. But she was pretty hot.

That all being said, I'm not sure I was considered a pushy broad during those early years. Unless you consider throwing the cushions off the couch every morning when I woke up during my toddler years being pushy. There was this period in my life where I didn't believe in having cushions on the couch. To each their own, you know?

But I digress. I believe it was a few weeks ago when I became enlightened to this new name. This new term of endearment, if you will. It was a day back in December actually, now that I think about it, and I was hassling a customer for an answer on a vehicle I had been working on for them. We'll call the contact at said account 'Joe.' Anonymity is important, people. Mind you, they originated this request but were taking forever to make a decision. I'm in sales. It's my job to follow up. Otherwise I don't make money. And I like making money. So I called Joe up and I believe the conversation went along these lines:
Me: Joe! What's the word on the street? Do you need me to secure this truck for you, or what?
Joe: I'm working on it, I'm working on it! Waiting for a final answer from (we'll call him Matt) Matt. It's an expensive vehicle.
Me: Okay, well I'm just trying to help you out by not having to harass you anymore.
Joe: Oh I know you're a pushy broad, I wouldn't expect anything less.
Me: Excuse me?
Joe: You're a pushy broad. I mean that in a good way!
Me: Really? So you're saying I shouldn't be offended you just called me a pushy broad?
Joe: Not at all. It just means you're good at your job. I appreciate pushy broads.
Me: (perplexed silence)

We hung up the phone and I really had to think about that conversation. Now, let me just explain that Joe is from Brooklyn. Half my family is from Brooklyn so I do understand how his mind works. But in the words of Carrie Bradshaw, 'I can't help but wonder' if I had a twig and berries, I would likely just be commended for my persistence and my follow up skills. Instead, I'm a pushy broad.

After much thought, I have decided to embrace being a pushy broad, though. Pushy broads get what they want. Pushy broads get ahead in life. And I don't see anything wrong with that. As long as you do it with a little bit of finesse. Right?

And now you know how this blog got its name. Although I have another blog, that one is a bit more serious. While I've tried to incorporate other blog entries to that one, it just seems to flow better when I keep that one to the topic of 'The Baby Quest.' I'll credit the idea of creating a separate blog to Tracie, who also challenged me to write the first entry before Valentine's Day. Never one to miss deadlines, I decided to get the first entry up well in advance.

If you're reading this, I hope you enjoy it. I hope you leave comments. Because there will be more - hopefully funny - entries. I've got plenty of ideas.