Conepocalypse Cow

[spectralbovine]

It had been over a year since I'd gone up north to visit Sophia (sophia_helix), Alex (actoplasm), Ariel (lodessa), and Tris (sainfoin_fields), so I was excited! We had plans and everything. Okay, the plans were mostly to play lots of games and see Toy Story 3. Time for gerunds!

• leaving work around noon and driving to Petaluma to pick up Tris
• running a stop sign to fit in with the terrible Petaluma drivers, who I'd just seen reverse through an intersection
• exploring the downtown Petaluma lunch options and deciding on Bella Luma because some dudes outside were setting up to jam on bass and drums
• eating the melty goodness of mozzarella on focaccia with a salad with beets and oranges and feta
• getting called "Cow" by Tris's mom as we left
• hitting crazy traffic on 37 and taking Tris's suggestion to get on 121 since it could be faster and it would definitely be prettier
• being punished for our bad life choices by crawling along and possibly going around in circles courtesy of Magiben
  • at least we saw horses and cows and sheep and a giant blue artsy chair and a metal horse and some market in a random town we were ironically pleased to see
• playing the Alphabet Game and Botticelli to distract us from the fact that we were an hour behind schedule, thanks to traffic
• trying to incorporate Toy Story 3 into our evening plans because that had been my wish except it had only been my wish to see it that weekend and I thought that evening was more convenient for everyone else so then we moved it to the next day which freed up our timeline for dinner and, hey, here's Ariel
• deciding to have dinner at Islands, which I had really liked the first time I'd come up...and looking up that post to see what I had ordered to make sure I got something different this time
• playing Forbidden Island in honor of Islands and defeating the island soundly
• going to dinner in Alex and Sophia's fancy new car with satellite radio, which had a station for pretty much anything
• having a very tasty black pepper-crusted turkey burger with jalapeños and pepper jack with endless fries that were not too potato-y but just potato-y enough and nice and crispy-and a cola lime ice to drink-and declaring that my memories of Islands being really good were valid
• playing Botticelli until Sophia and Tris went out to get root beer and Mexican vanilla to satisfy Sophia's craving for a root beer float
• playing a game of Dominion in which we discovered that Sophia had married a Thief, although Alex's thieving ways did not keep him from losing to me
• sleeping in the next morning and then watching some of the World Cup so we could hear the Spanish announcer cry, "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAALLL!" or "GOOOAL! GOOOAL!! GOOOAL!!!"
• hearing the sound of a text message being received...followed by another one...and another one-at which point we guessed it was Ariel-and finally my own phone
  • Alex texted that he was watching us all text her, and Tris, Sophia, and I all texted Ariel back at the same time
• playing another game of Dominion-this time with Intrigue-and discovering that Sophia had also married a Torturer, but Alex's torturing ways did not keep him from losing to, I think, Tris
  • we did not buy Gold; we bought "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLD!"
• going out to India Oven to eat the dregs of the lunch buffet
• smelling the smells of Lush
• getting to the theater ten minutes before the 4:20 showing and finding out it wasn't even matinee price, so we might as well buy tickets for a later show and get there earlier
• playing Red November once Ariel and Pink the Person arrived
  • we were very terrible at fixing things because the object is to roll low, not high, and we kept rolling nines, but every time we actually succeeded in putting out a fire or averting impending disaster, we were SO HAPPY
  • but in the end the reactor exploded and killed us all
• playing six-person Dominion, which was a lot of fun, except for poor Sophia, who was trapped between two Torturers (I would torture her before her turn, and then Alex would torture her after her turn)
• going to Wendy's for a quick, cheap dinner and playing Thief on Alex's fries while he played Torturer on Sophia's chicken nuggets
• seeing Toy Story 3, which was not as good as the second one and almost as good as the first one but still pretty awesome
• sleeping in again and putting on the World Cup, but in English this time, which was sad because it was Brazil vs. Ivory Coast, and Brazil scored THREE GOALS, which was terribly exciting for us but not the announcer, who had three opportunities to yell, "GOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLL!!!" but failed, even when Ivory Coast scored one
• making the Father's Day calls...including one to my actual father, which was non-traumatic and did not make reference to recent events
• driving Tris to Ariel's place in Folsom, where she would be chilling the rest of the week
• meeting the cat Tiberius, who is the worst, as I discovered later when he walked all over our Dominion game
• going out to Yummy Kitchen to make up for our previous terrible Chinese food
  • oh dear, I did not consult that post and thought I had ordered orange chicken, when in fact I had ordered General's chicken, but in any case the orange chicken at Yummy Kitchen was pretty good, if a little burnt
• hanging out with Pink the Person on his break
• watching Doctor Who off Cameron, Tris's computer, on Ariel's TV
• playing Dominion with Tris while Ariel worked on her paper and racking up a huge score by running Dukes
• taking a break for sharp white cheddar and crackers
• playing another game (now with 70% Intrigue!) in which I discovered the effectiveness of the Scout/Wishing Well combo
• driving home in the dark after a great weekend of games with friends