Flat Max Pays a Visit

Despite last week's influx of visitors, an overwhelming sadness loomed because of the absence of Maxamilian E. Hinton, my hetero-lifemate. Max couldn't bear to see me, Forrest and Strek's shenanigans on Facebook and even threatened to hide us from his news feed to prevent unquenchable sadness and incredible feelings of exclusion. With that in mind, and in an effort to preserve my personal policy of "No Friend Left Behind", I created Flat Max (in the same vein as Flat Stanley) to join us in on our Seattle adventures.


Flat Max was always at the ready, ever prepared for a good time. He woke up with Strek and I at midnight on Thursday (er...Friday morning) to go pick up Forrest from the airport.

Thankfully, Strek's pea coat is big enough for two

Telling an awesome joke just minutes before Forrest's arrival

On Friday, he was up bright and early to take me to work. He bought me coffee and brought along a car beer for the road. In my opinion, it was a bit chilly to go shirtless but it didn't seem to phase Flat Max in the least. 

7am PST means 10am EST...which is a slightly more acceptable drinking time

While I slaved away at my desk job, Flat Max played tourist with Forrest and Strek. They hit up the Monorail - Seattle's most decrepit and overpriced mode of transportation - the Flagship Starbucks and even the illustrious Space Needle, which clearly doesn't abide by the "no shirt, no shoes, no service" policy. 

Suns out, guns out...YA DIG???

ORANGE MOCHA FRAPPUCCINO!

Smooches from on top of the world, baby

Bro time with Forrest on the Monorail ride back

That night we had big plans to head to Bitterroot, Seattle's newest BBQ & bourbon hot spot. Sadly their wait was wayyyyy too long so we meandered over to Sam's Sushi. The wait was ATROCIOUS there as well but Flat Max helped us make the best of it by playing hide and seek in the foliage.

Brings that damn beer EVERYWHERE. So embarrassing.

Saturday morning Flat Max roused us all for family breakfast at Five Spot. Thanks to his charming kissy face, we got a table post-haste. We soon discovered Max was ALL ABOUT their Bloody Marys and guzzled a handful before informing us he conveniently "forgot his wallet"...

Who can say no to THIS?

Slurps McGee

Flat Max took some "me time" for a couple days (aka we might have left him on my kitchen counter) but returned Thursday night for The Last Supper at Christo's on Alki. After some tasty pizza, we stopped on the beach for one final photo op. 

The Emerald in all her glory, basking in Max's ethereal glow

Hottie alert. 

Max & Eggs hugging it out

All in all, Flat Max was the perfect house guest. He took up very little space and left no mess - we hardly knew he was here! He was a perfect gentleman and had no problem sleeping in the car since my apartment was at max capacity. Hopefully this isn't the last we'll see of Flat Max but, to be clear, the REAL Max is welcome any time (:

On Conquering

Remember when I said I had visitors coming?

They came (sts), they're here and we're conquering The Emerald.

And I've done my best to keep my social media to a minimum lately to preserve the delicate feelings of our Missing Comrade: Max E. Hinton.

But trust me, not only am I documenting their visit but I'm also planning a little surprise for the Blessed Absent One. Quite unbeknownst to him, Max actually did come to Seattle...in 2-D form.

Here's a peek at the Flat Max Project. Creep the final product later this week.

Maxamilian taking me to work on Friday

Weekending

DYING over here for the weekend. As I'm chained to my desk for 6 more hours all I can think about is this:

1. Tonight, these two guys land in Seattle.

2. Friday night we are going here for BBQ & bourbon. Helloooooo two of my favorite things.

3. And then we are going here to see Seattle's sauciest burlesque. YES.

4. Sunday night we'll hang here (one of my favorite parts of the week)

6. Adventures will also be had here, here, here and certainly here.

Weekend come quickly!

allen stone w. eternal fair

last friday night at the crocodile, i was that girl. you know, front row, sweaty, screaming and whipping out my iPhone every 6-9 seconds to type a longggggg ass note reviewing the allen stone show with openers eternal fair and special guests alessandra rose, kris orlowski, and ben carson of hot bodies in motion. blew my muthaeffin mind people. in case you were lame enough not to show, here's the rundown.

the sold-out show kicked off with emile hirsch's long lost cosmic twin, andrew vait and his band, eternal fair. i nearly shed a tear when he said they didn't have any albums available yet BUT that didn't dampen the golden set these indie rockers flawlessly executed. though definitely harnessing his own sound, andrew had the innate ability to conjure phil collins, kings of leon's caleb followill and panic! at the disco's brendan urie all at once. other times, he just let his fingers do the talking with some face-melting guitar solos (although i was strongly tempted to let MY fingers do the talking in his gorgeous mop of hair...le sigh). all in all, a rousing set by a group hitting their musical stride. do yourself a favor and see them next friday, july 22nd at ballard's own sunset tavern.

now, where do i even begin with allen stone? he's a black voice trapped in a white body. stevie wonder's gestures and head sway with john mayer's facial expressions. he's got a ridiculously soul-filled sound that would make the likes of elvis and jackie wilson roll in their graves. he's that damn good. he opened with some crowd pleasing folk covers further enhanced by the bevy of friends including some of seattle's finest up-and-comers. when he finally did launch into his own arsenal of songs there wasn't a bystander in the house. hundreds of literal hot bodies in motion were funking the shizzzzz outta the place as allen brought the house down. big ups to the two wasted girls to my right who shoved and spilled beer on me roughly 23 times. you weren't annoying at all. allen ended up performing (with a costume change and ever-present prospector's hat) for just over two glorious hours and i couldn't wipe the grin off my face. he's a master at what he does - born to perform and croon to the masses. for an encore, allen KILLED ITTTTTT with his fan favorite, "last to speak". video of that and my favorite song "figure it out" below.

with alessandra rose and ben carson from HBIM

with alessandra rose, kris orlowski, and andrew vait of eternal fair

golf

a sunset and PBR-filled night at the driving range. almost too good to be true.

interbay golf course

work BFF's

the upswing

the tongue of concentration

the fourth

puh-raise the Lord for friends who take pity on you and let you bandwagon their 4th of july festivities. enter: aaron jones - who invited myself and other pretty people to his aunt and uncle's gorgeous home on mercer island. his lovely family not only let me parade around in a freedom-kini but allowed my little black child to frolic around the property and even managed to convince me that the girl cousin with two black eyes was actually a gold medal cage fighter. unaccustomed to being openly lied to by someone i just met, i fell for it hook line and sinker. only after repeating the story to my freshly-met soul sister, noelle, did i realize how ludicrous it sounded and realize the error of my ways. i digress.

it was the perfect day - open water, red/white/blue in abundance, good friends, nitrogen-riddled meat in a bun and my dog sporting a sexy american kerchief. i got to satiate my need for speed on a jet ski with kramer, aaron and andria. big ups to kramer for teaching me how to sail over yacht wakes and making my legs feel like tonya harding just took a pipe to them. now, two days later, i'm still walking like the tin man. L-7 weenie right hurr. all in all, it was my 2nd best weekend of the year (i honestly do keep track of these things) and i was the happiest i've been in a long time. like, shit-eating-grin-plastered-on-my-face happy. like constantly screaming in kramer's ear while jet skiing, "I'M SO HAPPY RIGHT NOWWWWW!!!" happy. life just doesn't get much better than this...

trusty steeds

my cute friends at the dockside fireworks show

sunset on lake washington

candidate for my future home

most favorite thing in the world: fireworksssss

davy bean sleeping through the fireworks with uncle kramer

completely unrelated to my fourth of july, but hysterical nonetheless...dad put mom to work on america's birthday mowing fields. thank God the man learned how to send picture messages because he sends me the occasional show stopper that just kills me.

edna j.

so i took a trip home to OR this weekend and visited this little raisin, edna j. drydale.

vintage braves cap courtesy of spencer barnes' minors team

spencer's closet - dallas, OR - circa 1997

she's my 92 year-old great grandma and is totally outrageous. i took davy crockett to pay her first visit to GG and edna was enamored with my little ball of sweet black lovin'. the best thing about grandma is hearing what comes out of her mouth. since her days are exclusively filled with eating and TV (primarily COPS, major league baseball and the occasional episode of matlock), reality gets strangely garbled for her and she ends up regurgitating outlandish tales that paint her and my great grandpa as american folklore. lucky for y'all, i committed these tall tales to memory for your viewing pleasure.

GG: how's your job overseas going?
KT: oh, i live in seattle now. my job's fine.
GG: no, you work overseas...
KT: uh, no, rem does. he's flying airplanes overseas. he gives people gas. his wife is in spokane flying helicopters.
GG: rem got married?!
KT: uh, yeah grandma. last year. you have a picture of it right there. see? that's rem and that's ashly?
GG: that's REM?!!?
KT: ha, yes. yes, it is. they live in spokane.
GG: oh so you bought a house?
KT: no, rem and ashly bought a house. in spokane.
GG: ohhhhh yeah. it's right next door to our house in spokane.
KT: come again?
GG: yeah, we have a house right next door. with six foot fences so the dogs can't jump out.
KT: niiiiiice. that's gotta be super convenient for you.

grandma LOVES reminiscing about colorado. her and great-grandpa used to live there as kids and adults. my grandpa even literally got stuck in the kissing camels at garden of the gods and the fire department had to come get him down. that one actually is true. the following tale is 69% false.

GG: you know your grandpa laid curb in colorado. all of colorado springs.
KT: really...
GG: he was the best cement finisher in all of oregon (ah, i see we've jumped states here)
KT: doesn't surprise me
GG: and he built the air force academy.
KT: by himself?
GG: pretty much. and he built fort kit carson.
KT: wowwwwww. that's awesome. so he pretty much built all of colorado springs.
GG: yep. best cement finisher in all of oregon

and have i mentioned she's addicted to MLB?

KT: what are you watching?
GG: the world series (in actuality it was a recap of baseball in the 70s)
KT: who's playing?
GG: my boys!
KT: ahhhh, who's your boys?
GG: oh i can't remember right now. america.
J: isn't america always in the world series?
KT: (just go with it)
GG: america and japan. we're killing them.
KT: oh reallllllly.
GG: oh yeah, i love the dodgers. (she has zero affiliation with the dodgers)

i wish i would have taken pictures of her wall decor. someone (cough*grandmamatie*cough) has cut out kitschy pictures from her boston terrier calendars and pasted them on HUGE pieces of posterboard. they now masquerade as "tasteful wall hangings". great grandma swears those are her champion bulldogs - and she's kind of right. my family has raised bostons for 4 generations and she did have at least one champion, sampson.

GG: those are my champions
KT: i see that. which ones are those?
GG: oh, you know, that girl.
KT: you mean chica?
GG: no...
KT: sampson?
GG: i don't know. that girl.
KT: i remember chica & stubby. wasn't chica mom's dog and you took her when rem was born?
GG: that was your grandma matie's dog. i took her because i had a big backyard. 6 foot fences.
KT: ohhhhh yeah...in spokane. next to rem and ashly.
GG: exactly.

i promise you she's not crazy, just hysterical to listen to. i used to try and correct her stories but it's wayyyyyyyyy more fun to just roll with them. when she used to live in her own house and watch COPS on heavy rotation, she'd swear up and down that the dallas PD visited her neighbors on the reg, arresting them and getting them "facedown on a tarp with their hands cuffed behind their back". literally directly seen on COPS. it's a shame too, her poor neighbors were actually really nice people too.

i can't only hope to be this badass in 68 years.

i kept marveling at how still davy was sitting and how she kept looking directly at the camera.

come to find out edna had an iron clasp on davy's windpipe for the better part of a minute.

picture this

by some mysterious form of magic, my iPhone refuses to die. although it persists in constantly jumping out of my hand and landing on the hardest surfaces imaginable, dropping every single call at least 4 times, and being super ugly, the thing still takes a decent picture, tweets and texts like a fiend - keeping me relatively happy. here are snippets of my past week in pictures. i've been spending inordinate amounts of time at discovery park beach (my most favorite place in seattle) with the puppy getting some good think time in. even managed to hit up the fremont naked, ahem, solstice festival this weekend (no pictures...you'll thank me) and inhale some buca di beppo this weekend with new friends, home friends and texas friends.

week in pictures

it's rebecca black's FAVORITE DAY OF THE WEEK! and to be honest, it's almost mine - thursdays just can't be beat in my book. anywho, i'll keep this short and sweet with a few pics of my week. seattle finally got the memo that it's almost summer and my sweet alabaster face saw the sun on repeat. YOU have yourself a great weekend! hopefully i'll see you tonight @ the hot bodies in motion show. oh, and make sure to think happy, happy thoughts for my dear friend erica saarloos and her groom, nate elmenhurst, who are tying the knot tomorrow in los olivos, california. wedding bells be ringing for TGS!

davy crockett has made her first kill, much like the original DC who killed him a "bar" when he was only three. in other news, my photoshopping skills are coming right along.

persistence pays - if you bug your receptionist long enough you WILL get tickets to the company's diamond club private suite fo' free. that's how it's done, son.

the aforementioned sun had me running to the rooftop of my building with davy in tow.

drinks, good company and a really good book just sweetened the pot

the fruits of our (me + davy girl) 4 hour sunday morning stroll around magnolia.

homegirl had the time of her young life chasing every crow alive.

cold, hard proof that the sun did indeed shine on ma face

end of an era

hands down, my favorite people on earth are my family. the barnes clan has it all - rugged good looks, brawn, brain, adorable dogs and humility. strong silent type? look no further than my dad. brainiac? rem, ashly and mom. perpetual servant? grandma matie. adorable, 4' 9" raisin with a sharp tongue? great grandma. and the crown jewel of the clan - our resident leaf blowing in the breeze of life (with perfect bone structure to boot) - spencer. my main squeeze just quit his job, bought a Lezbaru and has pulled chocks to go conquer the wilds of Colorado as a river rafting guide. i realize this sounds like the plot of another van wilder installment but such is the life of my baby brother. college graduation, shitty seattle weather, a dead-end job and one heaping dose of wanderlust combined to create the perfect storm for spence's emerald city exit. he left today with all his worldly belongings and a huge smile on his face.

i'm genuinely excited for him but also horribly sad at the same time. spence and i were thick as thieves in high school and after suffering through a whole year without him freshman year, i managed to connive him into going to the same college as me and living three floors above me. booyah. brave little soul even shacked up with me and my four gorgeous ladies for a summer in our magnolia estrogen pit. suffice it to say we are close. reallllllly close. moving to texas was so awesome for me but also was the longest i've gone without seeing spence and the furthest i've ever been from him. upon my return to seattle, i posted up in my boss' basement for 2+ months until spencer and i could move into our postage stamp condo together. though i cringed at the smell of his man cave, the lack of mennonite cleaning skills and being forced to watch reruns of "las vegas" every day on our lunch hour (oh yeah, did i mention we worked for the same company?) - i already miss him SO MUCH. eesh. he's been gone for 6 hours and i've cried three times already. woe. is. me.

all this to say - i'm super bummed. it breaks my heart to think that now the three barnes children have officially gone their separate ways and spence and i will never live together again. but this isn't about me. i hope that colorado is to spencer what texas was to me - eye opening and life changing. even more...i hope i can convince him to chuck deuces to seattle for good and move with me somewhere new. i just can't imagine this being the end of our era! we've got a lot of living yet to do and there's no one else i'd rather do mine with. so, if you're holding a glass, raise it to spencer the river rat and send him some love as he starts a new chapter.

oh, and i have this shiny new guest room (that smells so fresh and so clean, clean). so come visit me! seriously. i'll feed you, i'll let you play with my adorable smush-faced pup and i'll play tour guide to perfection. see you soon?

now, enjoy a surplus of kt & spencer pictures. i HIGHLY recommend you scroll all the way down. there may be a blast from the 1998 past where i look like a man child in my loony toons shirt, breakaway pants and adidas sandals. yeah, the kind NBA playas wear. NBD.