Month: November 2017

#14. Do an Escape Room

IMG_2494While in town, June, Linda and myself decided to spend an hour one morning at The Escape Game in the Berry Hill section of Nashville. We chose the first one of the day at 10am but apparently we were the only ones interested in doing an escape room as soon as they opened. I was hoping for a few more people to join us to multiply the brain power, but no luck. We had to depend on just our three – which combined is at best only about 2 ½ brains.

We chose the Nashville themed game and were given one hour to find the “lost recording contracts” and escape the room. The “gamemaster” watches you (only a little creepy and intimidating) and offers clues as you need them. If you ever do an escape room, ask for the clues! I won’t give away the details, but suffice it to say we had to find clues to open locks which provided more clues. We had to sing into a mic, wear sunglasses, use a blacklight flashlight, read a bible verse, put together puzzles and about 30 minutes into our adventure, a magical thing happened…a giant wall mounted speaker opened and we’d escaped! Uhm…into another room! Yeah. We thought we’d cracked the case in record time. Not so much. More clues, more challenges, and math. MATH! It’s truly amazing that we escaped, but we did! With a minute to spare. AND I got a free t-shirt ‘cos it was my birthday! All in all lots of fun and I look forward to doing more. Who wants to join me?

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Suggested by Me
Completed 11/2/17

#13. Visit Nashville

IMG_9164I’ve wanted to go to Nashville ever since my trip to South Dakota changed my life in September, 2016. Really. South Dakota. It was there I found my people (though my friend and travel companion Suzanne would disagree). I fell in love with Deadwood, SD, saloons, and country music. I know. This former punk who used to get hives at the first sign of a twang embraced all things country. So it made sense that music city would be a high priority and trust me, it didn’t disappoint.

We stayed about 8 minutes outside of downtown in an Airbnb type place in East Nashville. The house was great and the company (June, my sister Linda and my friends Dana and Jerry from Georgia) was even better.

Weekend insanity outside Tootsie’s
Insanity INSIDE Tootsie’s
A bunch of drunks!

Downtown Nashville is a country girl’s nirvana. It’s got all the B’s. Bars, Boots and Barbecue. Start off with one Honky Tonk after the other with live music from morning til night spilling out of each one, sprinkle in a good amount of boot stores and a splash of barbecue joints, and you’ve got the recipe for both retail AND liver damage. There’s drinking. A LOT of drinking. We found that the weekdays were awesome and the weekends a little more than this 57 year old cowgirl could handle. In came the bachelor and bachelorette parties and Broadway became a slightly smaller scale Times Square. It was fun to watch the professional partiers on the “Off the Wagon” street barges and pedaling their way through town on the Pedal Tavern. Of this madness we did not partake.

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I saw my 57th birthday in with great music Printers Alley’s Bourbon Street Blues and Boogie Bar and took in a burlesque show next door at Skull’s Rainbow Room. We ate delicious barbecue and Nashville Hot Chicken. I danced with a young man who clearly had a cat in his backpack (don’t ask). We took a line dancing lesson at The Wildhorse Saloon, spent a short amount of time in the ridiculously overcrowded Tootsie’s World Famous Orchid Lounge and took in The Grand Ole Opry at The Ryman Auditorium. We jumped on (but not off) The Old Town Trolley and saw all of what Nashville has to offer, including learning that artists don’t record their hits in tall glass office buildings, but in little houses up and down Music Row! And I bought two awesome pairs of cowboy boots!

Nashville proved to be all I hoped for and more!

Suggested by Me and inspired by beautiful South Dakota!
Completed 11/1/17