another epic vacation - part 1
I didn't get too wound up Tuesday night while packing and got to bed at a reasonable hour. Which was good since I had to get up at five am.
WEDNESDAY
I remembered everything except my breakfast that I was going to eat in the car. :/ I was annoyed. There is traffic at 5 AM for some ungodly reason but it was moving fine so I got to airport parking with no issues. When I got on the shuttle bus I finally got to check my email and stuff, and Lillian wrote me a story for my birthday! It was about me meeting Henry Cavill, hahaha. So I was laughing like a maniac and the other people on the shuttle bus were side eyeing me pretty hard.
I don't think I've ever been to Logan terminal B? It's way nicer than the others. Like a fancy cafe with nice seating and fancy lighting. There was a locovore shop across from my gate so I got a lox bagel and a muffin and ate breakfast while the sun rose.
I got three compliments on my bat dress by the time I was in my seat on the plane. That was cool. The first flight to Denver was okay, I watched Superman III on my laptop and started Return of Superman. They don't even give you snacks for free on United anymore though, and even tv cost money.
In Denver I had a long walk and just enough time for that, to use the bathroom, and to scarf down a Lunchable. We got on a tiny little plane in the commuter terminal to go to Redmond, but the seat next to me was empty so that was nice.
Cassie was waiting for me just on the other side of security there, not that the Redmond airport is big. I had to check my carryon in Boston because the flight was full and I was the last zone to board. Like, they were forcing everyone in my zone to check stuff, which seems unfair. Anyway, with a small flight it doesn't take long.
We got outside and it had been raining, and guys, IT SMELLED SO GOOD. The juniper and sage and desert petrichor is something I have missed so, so much since leaving Utah. The high desert around Bend is not that different than the high desert in much of Utah, so that was familiar and nice. I thought it was just as pretty as she always says. The elevation makes the sky seem so blue and it's just huge in that way that western skies always are. They're not claustrophobic and closed like back east. Everything just feels open and you can see for miles.
We went to Smith Rock Brewing right there in Redmond for a round before going home and picking Tom up. Oh yeah, we swung by the barn to see Archie in there first. The boarding facility is like right around the corner from their house, it couldn't be more convenient.
After we got Tom we started hitting brew pubs, having dinner at the first one, playing three-handed cribbage at the second (on the board I carry around in my purse because I'm a dork). At the third we actually got carded and the server pointed out that my driver's license was about to expire.
I still can't believe I did this. Your license here is only good for five years and expires on your birthday, but apparently unlike registration and such the RMV doesn't warn you it's coming up.
Anyway, both Cassie and Tom are pretty much expected, with the exception that Tom is more outgoing than I would have guessed. He asked me lots and lots of questions so I got to talk about myself. It was a bit one sided because as Cassie will tell you, I have a really good memory, and it was hard to think of questions for them I didn't already know the answer to. And I guess I expected Tom to be more like my other friend's husbands, who took a long time to warm up to me. I told Cassie I think Tom said more to me that first night than Josh has said to me in the six years I've known him. I also thought they were really great together. They have an obvious chemistry that I think is pretty unusual. At least, my other married friends aren't as cute as they are. (Sorry, guys.)
Also, Cassie is the same sort of ridiculous as Aida's bf Chris, and believes hosts should treat their guests to every meal. Every time we eat or have beers out, imagine us fighting over the check and scaring our poor waitstaff, haha.
We got home about 10 and I promptly passed out... for all of an hour. I woke with a stomach ache and toss and turned for the rest of the night. I sort of assumed it was airport lox, but I figured out later I actually had altitude sickness. Who knew that being nauseous was one of the symptoms? I wasn't dizzy or anything. But on reflection the same thing happened when I went to Denver a few years ago and now how crappy I felt for that entire trip made way more sense.
Also, I'd like to mention that no one but Lillian, Melissa and of course Cassie acknowledged my damn birthday. Not Judd, not mutuals on Tumblr. That's so uncool but I was also too busy to really care.
THURSDAY
I wasn't really asleep anymore when Tom got up and started banging around, so I got up too, after renewing my driver's license online. In MA they don't give you a temporary, they just email saying "print this email and you're legal to drive". After showers Cassie and I went to this little cafe for breakfast and I had eggs, ham, hashbrowns and a scone. It was too much food but I made a dent in it.
Then we had to run over to Josie's school for their parent-teacher conference. I just hung out on my phone outside the classroom getting weird looks for the whole half hour. Finally someone asked me why I was there. Guess I don't look like a parent! I was wearing a weird tshirt, my denim skirt and cowboy boots.
Then Cassie took me over to the Mill District and we poked around shops and looked around. It's right on the river so it's very pretty. We took photos and then went downtown to look for postcards and such. Neither of us were hungry so we skipped lunch and drove around, going up into the mountains to look at the views. The pine trees smelled so good too. Cassie is a good tour guide, she told me about the city's different issues with different parts of town. I think she thought she was boring me but I found it pretty interesting since I also work for a government planning body. Bend is also a really nice town and I understand why people want to move there now.
We got over to the tattoo shop where I prayed they wouldn't notice my driver's license was expired. They didn't notice or didn't care, thank goodness. We had to wait about half an hour before Ryan came out with my fish. I had sent him a bunch of reference materials including pictures of the species (striped marlin), species guide image (which points out how many fins and what not) and the other tat that inspired this one. It was so detailed and realistic looking, exactly what I wanted, although I had him shrink it by about 25% from his original drawing. I had seen lots of bad fish tattoos so I wanted this to be good. But I picked Ryan because I had looked at his portfolio and saw that he did lots of cool fish. The starting point:
He likes doing fish, too. He seemed pretty cool, I told him why I was getting this and why on this trip and he's 34 too, and he asked me lots of questions about work and climate change and stuff while he worked on the tat. Also they were playing 90s classic rap and hiphop in the shop so we bonded over being the same age and the memories all these songs came with.
Cassie sat with us while she waited for her appointment and I had her send progress shots to Melissa. This is the first tat of mine Melissa wasn't there for! So she kind of got to see it anyway. The tattooing itself was fine. It didn't hurt as much as I remembered, although there were some spots he'd hit with the gun and I'd feel an electric pain jolt all the way down my arm to my elbow. I used to get a pretty good endorphin high from getting tatted but not this time.
Cassie got hers done and came back before we were finished, although it went quicker than either Ryan or I expected. "Your skin likes color," he told me. I like that! The background he added after, he actually spent a good ten minutes or so drawing on my skin with a special pencil to figure out what it should look like, making little frustrated sounds and erasing and re-drawing. I actually really liked how that felt? I started to wonder if I could get someone to come draw on my back as I was trying to fall asleep at night. But it might have just felt nice because it was so much more gentle than the tat gun and my skin was hyper sensitive right then.
People kept coming by and admiring his work which was a little weird since I couldn't see it, but it made me pretty excited. One guy was like, should have done your whole back like that, ha. I told him I didn't have time for that. When he was done Ryan declared it his favorite of the week and took lots of pictures.
Honestly the worst part was sitting on a hard chair with good posture while trying to relax. And not fidigiting. That was way more difficult than the tattoo part.
Afterward I felt kind of loopy, probably low blood sugar. So we went over to Worthy brewing and had dinner (at like 3:30, haha). Tom joined us and it was pretty good. I still wasn't able to eat much but it just meant that I got to take my pizza home for breakfast.
We hit Crux brewery afterward and I was flagging hard, between jet lag and not sleeping and altitude sickness. We went home (at like 7 PM) but then they had to double back to Worthy to pick up Tom's car and Cassie went to check on the horse. I took a bath in their awesome jet tub and went to bed.
I slept for awhile and then woke up at 5 AM or something dumb. FUCKING JET LAG.
Part 2 later, maybe tomorrow. I have to go do laundry and Nanowrimo is on so I have to get another chapter written today. I wrote 4341 words yesterday though, so it's off to a good start.
WEDNESDAY
I remembered everything except my breakfast that I was going to eat in the car. :/ I was annoyed. There is traffic at 5 AM for some ungodly reason but it was moving fine so I got to airport parking with no issues. When I got on the shuttle bus I finally got to check my email and stuff, and Lillian wrote me a story for my birthday! It was about me meeting Henry Cavill, hahaha. So I was laughing like a maniac and the other people on the shuttle bus were side eyeing me pretty hard.
I don't think I've ever been to Logan terminal B? It's way nicer than the others. Like a fancy cafe with nice seating and fancy lighting. There was a locovore shop across from my gate so I got a lox bagel and a muffin and ate breakfast while the sun rose.
I got three compliments on my bat dress by the time I was in my seat on the plane. That was cool. The first flight to Denver was okay, I watched Superman III on my laptop and started Return of Superman. They don't even give you snacks for free on United anymore though, and even tv cost money.
In Denver I had a long walk and just enough time for that, to use the bathroom, and to scarf down a Lunchable. We got on a tiny little plane in the commuter terminal to go to Redmond, but the seat next to me was empty so that was nice.
Cassie was waiting for me just on the other side of security there, not that the Redmond airport is big. I had to check my carryon in Boston because the flight was full and I was the last zone to board. Like, they were forcing everyone in my zone to check stuff, which seems unfair. Anyway, with a small flight it doesn't take long.
We got outside and it had been raining, and guys, IT SMELLED SO GOOD. The juniper and sage and desert petrichor is something I have missed so, so much since leaving Utah. The high desert around Bend is not that different than the high desert in much of Utah, so that was familiar and nice. I thought it was just as pretty as she always says. The elevation makes the sky seem so blue and it's just huge in that way that western skies always are. They're not claustrophobic and closed like back east. Everything just feels open and you can see for miles.
We went to Smith Rock Brewing right there in Redmond for a round before going home and picking Tom up. Oh yeah, we swung by the barn to see Archie in there first. The boarding facility is like right around the corner from their house, it couldn't be more convenient.
After we got Tom we started hitting brew pubs, having dinner at the first one, playing three-handed cribbage at the second (on the board I carry around in my purse because I'm a dork). At the third we actually got carded and the server pointed out that my driver's license was about to expire.
I still can't believe I did this. Your license here is only good for five years and expires on your birthday, but apparently unlike registration and such the RMV doesn't warn you it's coming up.
Anyway, both Cassie and Tom are pretty much expected, with the exception that Tom is more outgoing than I would have guessed. He asked me lots and lots of questions so I got to talk about myself. It was a bit one sided because as Cassie will tell you, I have a really good memory, and it was hard to think of questions for them I didn't already know the answer to. And I guess I expected Tom to be more like my other friend's husbands, who took a long time to warm up to me. I told Cassie I think Tom said more to me that first night than Josh has said to me in the six years I've known him. I also thought they were really great together. They have an obvious chemistry that I think is pretty unusual. At least, my other married friends aren't as cute as they are. (Sorry, guys.)
Also, Cassie is the same sort of ridiculous as Aida's bf Chris, and believes hosts should treat their guests to every meal. Every time we eat or have beers out, imagine us fighting over the check and scaring our poor waitstaff, haha.
We got home about 10 and I promptly passed out... for all of an hour. I woke with a stomach ache and toss and turned for the rest of the night. I sort of assumed it was airport lox, but I figured out later I actually had altitude sickness. Who knew that being nauseous was one of the symptoms? I wasn't dizzy or anything. But on reflection the same thing happened when I went to Denver a few years ago and now how crappy I felt for that entire trip made way more sense.
Also, I'd like to mention that no one but Lillian, Melissa and of course Cassie acknowledged my damn birthday. Not Judd, not mutuals on Tumblr. That's so uncool but I was also too busy to really care.
THURSDAY
I wasn't really asleep anymore when Tom got up and started banging around, so I got up too, after renewing my driver's license online. In MA they don't give you a temporary, they just email saying "print this email and you're legal to drive". After showers Cassie and I went to this little cafe for breakfast and I had eggs, ham, hashbrowns and a scone. It was too much food but I made a dent in it.
Then we had to run over to Josie's school for their parent-teacher conference. I just hung out on my phone outside the classroom getting weird looks for the whole half hour. Finally someone asked me why I was there. Guess I don't look like a parent! I was wearing a weird tshirt, my denim skirt and cowboy boots.
Then Cassie took me over to the Mill District and we poked around shops and looked around. It's right on the river so it's very pretty. We took photos and then went downtown to look for postcards and such. Neither of us were hungry so we skipped lunch and drove around, going up into the mountains to look at the views. The pine trees smelled so good too. Cassie is a good tour guide, she told me about the city's different issues with different parts of town. I think she thought she was boring me but I found it pretty interesting since I also work for a government planning body. Bend is also a really nice town and I understand why people want to move there now.
We got over to the tattoo shop where I prayed they wouldn't notice my driver's license was expired. They didn't notice or didn't care, thank goodness. We had to wait about half an hour before Ryan came out with my fish. I had sent him a bunch of reference materials including pictures of the species (striped marlin), species guide image (which points out how many fins and what not) and the other tat that inspired this one. It was so detailed and realistic looking, exactly what I wanted, although I had him shrink it by about 25% from his original drawing. I had seen lots of bad fish tattoos so I wanted this to be good. But I picked Ryan because I had looked at his portfolio and saw that he did lots of cool fish. The starting point:
He likes doing fish, too. He seemed pretty cool, I told him why I was getting this and why on this trip and he's 34 too, and he asked me lots of questions about work and climate change and stuff while he worked on the tat. Also they were playing 90s classic rap and hiphop in the shop so we bonded over being the same age and the memories all these songs came with.
Cassie sat with us while she waited for her appointment and I had her send progress shots to Melissa. This is the first tat of mine Melissa wasn't there for! So she kind of got to see it anyway. The tattooing itself was fine. It didn't hurt as much as I remembered, although there were some spots he'd hit with the gun and I'd feel an electric pain jolt all the way down my arm to my elbow. I used to get a pretty good endorphin high from getting tatted but not this time.
Cassie got hers done and came back before we were finished, although it went quicker than either Ryan or I expected. "Your skin likes color," he told me. I like that! The background he added after, he actually spent a good ten minutes or so drawing on my skin with a special pencil to figure out what it should look like, making little frustrated sounds and erasing and re-drawing. I actually really liked how that felt? I started to wonder if I could get someone to come draw on my back as I was trying to fall asleep at night. But it might have just felt nice because it was so much more gentle than the tat gun and my skin was hyper sensitive right then.
People kept coming by and admiring his work which was a little weird since I couldn't see it, but it made me pretty excited. One guy was like, should have done your whole back like that, ha. I told him I didn't have time for that. When he was done Ryan declared it his favorite of the week and took lots of pictures.
Honestly the worst part was sitting on a hard chair with good posture while trying to relax. And not fidigiting. That was way more difficult than the tattoo part.
Afterward I felt kind of loopy, probably low blood sugar. So we went over to Worthy brewing and had dinner (at like 3:30, haha). Tom joined us and it was pretty good. I still wasn't able to eat much but it just meant that I got to take my pizza home for breakfast.
We hit Crux brewery afterward and I was flagging hard, between jet lag and not sleeping and altitude sickness. We went home (at like 7 PM) but then they had to double back to Worthy to pick up Tom's car and Cassie went to check on the horse. I took a bath in their awesome jet tub and went to bed.
I slept for awhile and then woke up at 5 AM or something dumb. FUCKING JET LAG.
Part 2 later, maybe tomorrow. I have to go do laundry and Nanowrimo is on so I have to get another chapter written today. I wrote 4341 words yesterday though, so it's off to a good start.