Celebration of Community: Andrew Grey, BA Tortuga, and Rhys Ford

Andrew Grey on Rhys Ford

Last year at the Los Angeles Book Fair weekend, I got to spend some amazing time with Rhys Ford, and let me tell you that she knows food. The first evening she took a group of us to Little Tokyo for ramen. And I sent a picture to Dominic. See, at home I don’t eat Asian food because it’s awful there. But the real thing is amazing. The next night Rhys took us to BCD Tofu, and I sent him pictures of my Korean food. Dominic sent a note back of how jealous he was and that he wished he’d come with me. The next evening it was Korean barbeque. We all got in Rhys’s SUV and headed to the restaurant. The food was amazing, and of course I sent Dominic another picture. Once I did, Elizabeth’s phone chimed. She checked the message, showed it to Rhys, and both of them giggled before passing the phone around. The message was “What have you done with my husband?”

This year, I’m looking forward to the Los Angeles Book Fair, the food, and my time with Rhys. And Dominic loves Rhys because now he gets to eat Korean food more often, and he’s ready to erect some sort of statue to her. Maybe one with her leaning over a grill at a Korean restaurant, cooking bulgogi. Dang, this story is making me hungry. Is it book fair time yet?

BA Tortuga on Andrew Grey

Andrew Grey and the Redneck Family of Happy Doom

So, I have to tell y’all, right off the bat, that Andrew Grey is one of my dearest friends and I love him more than my luggage.

Why? Besides the bananas and the fact that I can call him crying and he knows EXACTLY what to say?

He survived my family.

The Romantic Times Convention in 2015 was in Dallas and there was another convention in Austin a bit later, and we (we being Julia, Andrew, and me) decided to have the Great Texas Road Trip in the ten days in between. *grins*

My daddy lives sixty-three miles northeast of Dallas and so, post-RT, we all loaded up in Daddy’s truck and headed home. Andrew got the whole thing—Molina’s nachos, bbq, floods, birds, dogs, cows, horses. Mud. Lots of mud.

And the family came for a cookout.

*grins*

Why do I tell y’all this? Well, we’re all sitting around outside, late, and David Allan Coe’s “You Never Even Called Me By My Name” came on the radio. Y’all know it? The perfect country song?

If you don’t, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAOVRkSCWmg. I’ll wait.

Well, we’re all singing—me, the wife, Daddy, Tiff, Sam, Jeremy, Dee, all the kids. We’re just bellering away like the biggest rednecks in Greenville, Texas (and let me you, there are a LOT of rednecks in Greenville, Texas, and I’m only related to half of them). Then Andrew joins in, just like he belonged there under the carport with the Christmas lights still up in April and the bug zapper going.

*grins*

Andrew made an immediate friend of my daddy and is now, and forever will be, part of the Squires clan. I don’t know whether to be tickled or sorry for him.

Much love,

BA Tortuga

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See other authors celebrate community here:

Celebration of Community: Clare London and Sue Brown

Celebration of Community: Ariel Tachna and Nicki Bennett

Celebration of Community: Mickie Ashling, Damon Sude, and B.G. Thomas