Hello, Florida.

The two weeks of winter was too much for me and Matt, so we decided to escape to Fort Lauderdale.

Now, to be fair, it had been just as cold in Ft. Lauderdale as it had been in Savannah. And Miami even had snow flurries for Christ's sake! (Oh, Miami gets snow but Savannah doesn't? That's fucked up if you ask me.)

But as we drove farther and farther south, it got warmer and warmer. (Fortunately our trip coincided with the departure of the arctic blasts.) By the time we arrived at Matt's godfather's house, it was tropical and breezy and, well, perfect.

Plus, there were oranges on the trees. That's like an exclamation point on perfect.


The Godfather, Gary, has made of his home a tropical escape, a place where people to go escape the stresses of daily life. Oh, and he makes you eat about 200 brownies a day. I agreed. (Knowing what was awaiting me in Florida, I put off those New Year's "I'm going to eat healthy and stop being such a fatass" resolutions until after MLK weekend.

Even the coconuts at Gary's look like they want to eat.

One of the cool things about visiting Gary and Bill (Matt's godfather and my soulmate) is that we stay in the guest house. The guest house isn't fancy or anything, but it's got a bed, TV, bathroom, refrigerator, and a mirror on the ceiling, so we're set.

We went to the beach, and enjoyed the warm weather.

And we enjoyed a full weekend of quality time with Matt's parents. This is actually one of my favorite things about our annual weekend in Ft. Lauderdale. When we visit them during the holidays, it's always hard to get in a full conversation that's not cluttered with talk of wrapping and gifts and cookies and interruptions. But during that Florida weekend, we can talk, enjoy each other, laugh, drink margaritas, gamble, and just have fun.

Matt's parents aren't wild about having their pictures taken, so I'll just put this one up from when they were younger. Glamorous, huh?

But the best part about the Ft. Lauderdale weekend (it really is our favorite part of the year)?

Soulmate, a.k.a., Bill. Bill pretends that he hates me and I pretend that he's pretending.

I decided, years ago, that we are soulmates and then proceeded to harass him for years. He's a good sport. Most of the time, anyway.

Oh, Soulmate. You and your funny gestures.

(Other awesome things about our weekend: we won $300 playing poker, I scored at Ikea, and I ate so much that I puked my guts out. Well, that last one isn't awesome so much, but it did motivate me to to start eating healthy and exercising. For a couple days at least. Oh, and I saw my best good friend Tanya. She and I are like peas and carrots, or, to translate to our language, cake and icing. Just stay tuned for more exciting details.)