She got in late (LATE) Wednesday night and once we got home we both went straight to bed. Thursday we got up, had a little breakfast and headed out to unleash our crazy on the unsuspecting world. We drove down to Orem, washed my car (crazy girls!), got mani-pedis then we started our real outing - we drove to our old stomping ground, Nephi. Holy crap that place is small-town U.S.A. It hasn't changed much in the last 23 years. Sure, they got a new hospital, and a few more housing developments, but the place is a hole. Seriously. We went to our first home which has not been well maintained at all. We drove by the 2nd home which is a lot smaller than I remember, but at least they're taking care of it. The Christensen's old truck is still outside that house, we drove across (and then got out to look at) the 'crick' (creek for normal people), and saw our incredibly depressing elementary and middle schools. They don't have windows. To finish the trip, we went to Vards, masquerading as some place called Glenns or Garys or something, and got ice cream! We told the girl about the little plastic animals they used to put on top of the cones and she looked at us like she was crazy. Whatever, WE remember. Heading home we stopped at a fun shop in Spanish Fork and made friends with one of the workers, then drove home. Busy day.
Friday we went to the Animal Inside Out exhibit at The Leonardo. I find that stuff fascinating, at least when I look at it online. In person, my body had a very different reaction - fascinating was not it. Nausea was the overwhelming feeling I got. It was weird. My mind was totally into it, my stomach - not so much. Afterwards (and after my tummy had calmed down) we talked Jeremiah into taking us to Siegfried's for lunch. We got take out sausage plates and picked up sandwich stuff for - dum dum dum....THE ZOO! Another family tradition we wanted to re-created. Finished the day out with a movie, Godzilla!. It was good, though maybe not worth watching ever again.
We were supposed to go to the zoo on Saturday but my dear J was tired and slept through the day, so we just laid around the house and relaxed. We went to the zoo on Sunday. We got there in time to have a decent parking spot (by that, I mean we got a spot in the first lot, not on the street or the back-up lots...it was still at the end of the lot though) and went to see us some animals. We saw the lions sleeping, the tiger sleeping, the monkeys sleeping...not a lot was going on. We did catch a little show from the grizzlies - they have 3 teenage bears who were chasing each other around their area. They seemed to be having fun at least. The elephants were also fairly active. We saw the oldest elephant in the US (maybe North America?) kick the little 5-year old elephant for no good reason. Good times. We had our sandwiches from Siegfried's, though I'm not sure I bought the right meats, and then went home - but not before J bought me a stuffed polar bear. Without me even asking for one. I think that boy likes me.
Sunday evening Linda came for dinner and we enjoyed roasted chicken thighs with cherry/thyme compote, sweet potato casserole (I had a lot of sweet potatoes I needed to use up), and spinach/kale/strawberry salad - yum! After dinner we played a came that Jud and Angela gave us for Christmas called Dixit, then enjoyed strawberry shortcake for dessert. A lovely evening filled with laughter.
On Monday Andrea and I went to the Living Planet Aquarium with Cathy, Rosalie and Emmett. It was pretty cool except for fall the field-trip kids running around like monsters. The penguins were especially cute, as was the river otter. The shark tunnel needed cleaning so we couldn't see a whole lot in there, but it looked like it would have been interesting had we been able to see through the haze. Then Andrea and I went to IKEA where she purchased 20 kitchen towels. She liked the ones I had and just had to have some of her own. I myself picked up a nice wooden cutting board, and we both got old-school popsicle molds.
Tuesday I drove Andrea back to the airport and we said our sad goodbyes, though we didn't cry like teenage girls having their hearts crushed for the first time like we did last year when she visited. After visits like that, it's hard to remember that there was a time in our lives that we really didn't like each other very much. That's a good thing - such feelings shouldn't be remembered when you can make new memories filled with laughter, sarcasm and just enjoying each others company.
