My fabulous friend from Yelp that I went to the Food and Wine Festival in Disney texted me recently, and asked-hey you wanna go to the fair and drink free wine? Well yes, yes I would like to! So we arrive at the “wine down” which featured free wine from San Sebastian Winery in St Augustine Florida, and also one of those companies that lets you paint like a pro while drinking. When you hear “complimentary wine” you think of a tiny sip sized glass..this was not the case here. We were drinking wine in the afternoon at a rate that even surprised me. Now when we first got to the fair, I had seen and poked fun at a man wearing a smokey the bear hat. He was in the agriculture area where I also may or may not have jumped a couple feet in the air when a large pig moved and I was CERTAIN I was a goner. Don’t worry, no livestock were hurt in the making of this blog post. We laughed at his hat, and continued on our way. I also spied a member of the fair work crew that I quickly dubbed as “worker man” and we (ok I ) watched as he set up gates and what not with an intense curiosity that became more hilarious as the day wore on.
A little while later when we were drinking and painting, and also keeping an eye peeled for worker man, I saw a couple sitting at a table and said-they look fun, lets be friends with them! Sure enough they were super fun, we ended up spending the rest of the afternoon hanging with them, laughing and talking and enjoying front row seats to a concert by the Lovin’ Spoonful! We had snacks and told stories and then went to watch a piggy race, which was totally cute! After the pig race, after the free bottles of wine, is when it happened. I was tipsy and had a purple tongue, and I saw a smokey the bear hat sitting unattended on a table. I decided at that point, why not sport it?! I also had a whole conversation with worker man, much to the astonishment of my friend who was laughing a few feet away. We had to get some food, and we couldn’t find anything suitable down town, so we made the small trip to San Marco and settled in at Taverna. The combination of us being a little on the drunk side, and me wearing a smokey the bear hat soon caught the attention of someone who walked over and realized the two giggling messes dining at the bar were in fact friends of his! Our friends Nate and Nate were there filming for a promotional video and hung out with us for a bit. The night was still young, but I had to get home so I could go to bed..something was about to go down early the next morning.
A few months ago someone at my kickboxing gym made me think that it would be a good idea to sign up for something called Savage Race. I was determined to train and prepare, and I can tell you now I did not do an adequate job of that. The group of us were set to meet at the ungodly hour of 0500..this is normally a time that I would be winding down and heading to bed, or just about to get off work. Well we all met up at the gym, and got our fun team shirts and loaded into a huge van to road trip down to Tampa for the race. Some of us were nervous, some of us were scared, all of us were tired, and there was an interesting energy among this van full of strangers. Something happens when a group of people are thrust into a situation, even when they signed up willingly. By the time we got to the race, we were friends now, we had a gang name, made a super funny video, and all had equally thuggish nicknames. We had eye black on and bandanas tied and ready to take on this beast of a race.
Ya’ll listen..this race was 7.4 miles…29 obstacles…there was mud, there was water, there was different mud, there was ice water, there was grass filled with mud, and there was a light rain that only made it all the more-muddy. I climbed stuff, I fell off stuff, I swung wildly from a rope 20 feet in the air only to fall down. I met muddy strangers that helped me out, and I cried in the dirt. Just when I thought I could not walk/run/stumble another mile, I found more strength to continue on. People I had never met before in my life became allies. I can not explain to you the feeling of accomplishment that came from this race. Afterwards, we looked like refugees. We stood gathered together, The Knock Out Kings, clutching our free beers, and all in awe of what we just accomplished. Some of the crew are avid runners and kickboxing instructors, but had never done a Savage Race before, one member had done one before but not with a whole team, and there was me that didn’t think I could actually finish. We were all bound together there in that cow poop smelling place. Even when we were attempting to clean up and change clothes in the field our van was parked in, we were all still reveling in the fact that we had just accomplished something that most people are too scared of. We were officially Savage AF.
We piled back into the van and headed out in search of food; near starvation and tired, we all decided Outback Steakhouse was our destination. When we arrived, I think that we underestimated how much we were able to get the dirt and smell off of ourselves. We reeked, I still had dirt coming out of my eyes, and we all looked slightly homeless. We sat at a large round table, me with my back of the van mates Diablo and Miss Kitty on either side, and started ordering massive amounts of drink and food. Angel Face even telling the server, we just ran Savage Race, we are thirsty and hungry! Soon the cold water was arriving, and Mike the Butcher got his half coke, half diet coke drink. We were all talking and joking and interrupting each other like we were at a Family dinner. Now, normally nothing would be all that funny about endless shrimp, but that day it turned into what would be an epic joke. Myself and Diablo both ordered the steak and endless shrimp, I went crunchy shrimp at first, and he went scampi…we traded a few with each other and dug in. Then more came, and more, and more. I had to tap out eventually but he just.kept.eating.shrimp! I had to take a picture of the shrimp boat caravan because it just became too comical. Someone ordered a dessert that made rounds around the table with us all diving in with plastic spoons. For some reason the restaurant was out of spoons, and to go cups, and bread..and something else. I said later that it seemed that they were plotting and trying to come up with ways to get rid of the mud creatures!
The rest of the trip home was more hilarious fun, even Diablo and Miss Kitty getting in some good jokes about my head being big (it really is a large head). When we all finally fell out of the van back at the kickboxing studio that night, we were weary-but we were warriors. I went home and took what was the most intense shower I think I have ever taken. In the next few days we all kept in close touch, talking about the dirt we were still cleaning off ourselves, the bruises we were finding, and the hurt shoulders we were rocking. In one day, I created memories to last a life time, and made friends I will have just as long. We are looking forward to lots of bad ass things in the future! What is the craziest thing any of you have done-is it more like Smokey or Savage? How will you challenge yourselves in the coming New Year? Whether its a wine down, or a throw down, ya’ll enjoy! XOXO
Diaries of Suzy Doozer 
What a wonderful story about your life! So much fun.
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