2-17-15
3 day weekends should be mandatory!
It truly was a magnificent weekend. It started strong since
we of course got to watch some soccer with the boys. They had a great game that
ended in a tie. We were holding back a bit, but I mentioned to Ken later that
going forward we should not hold back like that so early in the match. We need
to allow the kids to get a few goals and THEN we can maybe make changes.
We left right after the game. The drive was nice and really
a lot of fun. I was a little bummed that my voice was still recovering since it
meant that I couldn’t belt out the songs blaring in the car. Instead, I opted
to lip-sync everything dramatically, which was a decent compromise. It was also
entertaining discussing the purchased playlist with Ken. I tend to be the one
who downloads songs, and due to the recent song sharing awesomeness between my
mom and I, there has been a distinct change in the style of music that is
populating that list. Ken isn’t a huge fan of anything from the 50’s and 60’s
like Buddy Holly or even the Beatles, so I felt like I tortured him a bit. That
being said, I will instead refer to it as educating him on the wonder that was
that song period.
One of the random things we did was pass the intersection in
which James Dean died! I had always been under the impression it was more along
the coast instead of so far inland. We didn’t even plan on this landmark as it
just happened upon us. We were turning onto one of the highways when there was
a gas station that had giant cutouts of Mr. Dean. It was random, so of course I
looked it up. Turned out we were on one of the highways that had been since renamed
James Dean Memorial Highway since it crossed with the other one that he died
at. We also were heading right towards it. I was a little surprised at how
little fanfare there was there. Only one small sign marked its presence and
there wasn’t any kind of fan memorial, which was so strange.
We were able to meet up with Lyn for dinner since she lives
so close to the mission. She lives in Salinas, which was only maybe 15 minutes
from the hotel. It was perfect timing, really and it was cool to surprise her.
It also allowed us to hit up an Applebee’s, which are always advertised yet don’t
really exist near home. It’s like a mythical restaurant like Sonic’s.
The hotel was perfect for what we needed. The boys took advantage
of the downtime that night and rocked a bath. We also were able to find that
the second Harry Potter flick was on tv, so we watched that. I say we when in
reality my ass passed out before Harry and Ron had even gone to the Gryffindor
Common room.
Sunday morning we all got up pretty early. Let’s face it, no
matter how great a hotel room is, their bed is never going to be as comfy as
your own. It worked out ok, though, since it meant we got an early start. We
also took advantage of the continental breakfast which was quite extensive. You
could make your own waffles! Talk about a great and cheap meal!
We went and checked out the beach before heading to the
mission. We were able to watch some sea otters play which was super cute. As if
that wasn’t great enough, there were the sea lions lounging on a small dock. We
watched them for a while when one seemed to be in the midst of hacking up a
hair ball. We laughed and I said that that one was about to projectile vomit on
his buddies. I was only joking when as luck would have it, my prediction came
true. It was pretty epic, and I can tell you that two little boys will ALWAYS
find that sort of thing hysterical.
If something ever happens (knock on wood) to our beautiful
Steve, I found our new house. It was this large house that was up on risers
because it was in water. Mind you, it was on dry land everywhere else! It was
like a built in moat!! It was awesome. The place was for sale, and truly, it
was really I think a restaurant space, but it was cool. As if that wasn’t cool enough, it had an
adorable little cemetery behind it! It was so cool!!
We got to the mission where they were holding mass, which
was kind of fun to think of them as an active parish. We went into the gift
shop/entrance where the super sweet people behind the counter asked the boys
which one was in the 4th grade. It was so cute! They had a little
package for 4th grade students including a little map and question
book that was on a lanyard that allowed us to really look at the different
sections of the mission. We purchased the additional package that had postcards
and a magnet which was all fantastic. Bobby was quite thrilled at being there.
I have to say, I am impressed with how much the kid knew
about the mission and Father Serra. He rattled off so many facts and stories
while we explored the grounds. I was beaming with pride when he also corrected
us on the pronunciation of some of the names. It was really incredible!
We were at the mission maybe 90 minutes, which was plenty of
time to get some awesome photos of everything. Dax wanted to be in every photo
with Bobby, which sadly frustrated Bobby. He wanted some with just him for the
report. I had no problem with that and managed to take one with both of them and
then one with just Bobby. I was just glad he was so patient overall with his
little brother’s adoration.
We opted to take a more scenic route home by going along the
1. What we didn’t anticipate was the mobs of traffic! Leaving the town of
Carmel was crazy since apparently not only was it a three day Valentine’s
weekend, there was a giant golf tournament going on. It was crazy! Along the 1
seemed to be gobs of people, too, which also meant gobs of idiots. I am always
shocked at how many people don’t understand that it doesn’t make them bad
people to pull over when they are holding up traffic on one lane highways. It
makes them idiots when they don’t. It was crazy how many people were going 15
miles per hour less than the speed limit and were holding up lines of cars. I
started making up random funny comments about the cars which left our car in
stitches. Gotta make the most of the bad situation, right?
As if the traffic wasn’t bad enough, we also hit a stretch
of about 2 hours in which there was no signal for the internet. We were using
Waze to navigate, and try to find better ways to avoid traffic, but sadly you
can’t use the service if you can’t connect.
We then spent a couple of hours trying to locate food. At
first, our hunt was a Burger King since I had promised the boys that we would
stop there for lunch. We couldn’t even find other food, let alone a Burger
King. Finally around 3 we found one and it was glorious!
We got home around 7, but overall even with the delays
coming home, it was a lot of fun. I wonder what mission Dax will get next year.
Hopefully it is a different one as it will be cool to rock a new location for a
family adventure!
I ended up calling out on Monday since I was exhausted. I
slept for like 10 hours straight. It was blissful! Ken, Stephanie and I ended
up spending the morning watching the SNL special, which we enjoyed thoroughly. It
also allowed the kids to play uninterrupted for several hours.
Ken and I had one outing to the cannabis doc to renew our
prescriptions. We had a different doctor that highly (no pun intended) recommended
I look into some of the other vaporizers that would use the actual plant
instead of the pre-packaged ones I use now. He said since everything is not
regulated that I am at risk for inhaling a large quantity of chemicals due to
what they might use to extract the drugs from the plant. I am game to try these
things so I will spend some time to look into it. Don’t get me wrong, I love my
vapor pen since it works brilliantly, but it doesn’t hurt to explore.
Bobby and I spent some time in the afternoon on his report
and we put it together. He had to type up some paragraphs on Father Serra, and
I was so impressed that he barely needed the book or internet. The only things
we needed to look up were actual dates. Otherwise that kid knew so much! I
formatted his paper and added pictures to the actual text which looked cool.
The folder we picked out had little slots that you could put things in, so in
addition to the report itself, we put in the postcards and other paperwork we
got from the mission. We knew Mrs. Van Wie would enjoy all of it. It occurs to
me that we didn’t put his name on his report. Of course, everyone will know it
is his since his picture is on it. Ha!
Now I am back at work, basking in the glory that will be
three days sans Trusty. YAY! It makes for stress free awesome work days, which
I am thrilled about.
I also now have a new plan for a new blog. As I sat with
Stephanie and Ken I was shocked at how not up to date both of them are when it
comes to pop culture. I joked that I need to put a little blurb in my regular
blog if some celebrity couple splits so that they know. This evolved into the
idea of me doing my own “entertainment” blog that is just things I find
interesting. I will be putting this together over the next couple days because
it will be a lot of fun, but I want to do it right. I may do it as a weekly
report since even though, yes, a lot goes on daily, not enough would be
happening for me to make it interesting daily. I can however, truly rock a
weekly column in which I discuss random things that is not filled with the
evils that are Kardashians or Kanyes.
Now I should probably get my butt to work!
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