Hairspray!

By nine a.m. Saturday morning we were on our way to Chanhassen to enjoy some fine dining and theater!  I have seen two movie versions of Hairspray, the one where Rikki Lake plays Tracy, and the one where John Travolta plays her Mom, Edna.  I like both of those, so I knew I would love this, and I did!  The food was great, I had the fish, and the musical was energetic and hilarious.  I especially loved the gal who played Motormouth Mabel.  Her name is Aimee Bryant, and apparently she has a cd out.  I'm going to have to look into that. Wow did she have a set of pipes.  When she sang "I Know Where I've Been" she almost brought me to tears.  The man who played "Seaweed" definitely fits Kerri's definition of "sexual chocolate".  When the cast came and danced with the audience he stopped about five feet from us!  Five feet too short, the story of my life. 

At Chanhassen they deliver your dessert during intermission, which is a good plan.  People would definitely be too full to spend any extra cash right after dinner!  Vicki and Kate had some ice cream things, and I had a grasshopper.  MMMMmmmmm is was minty smooth and so delicious!  The theater itself is spectacular and we spent a lot of time exploring it before our lunch.  Unfortunately my phone camera doesn't have a flash (that we have found yet anyway) so we couldn't get any pictures at all from Chanhassen.

Funny story about the drive over, which I believe took about forty-five minutes.  Vicki has GPS, so we put in the coordinates and away we go.  When we arrived in Chanhassen the lovely lady told us to turn onto Amrstrong and "in two blocks you will see your destination to the right."  Well, we were talking and drove right on by, or so we thought.  Vicki turned the car around and back down Armstrong we went.  One would think you couldn't hide a dinner theater........ Turn the car around again, and back down Armstrong we drive, eyes peeled for a theater, and nothing.  Then we headed to the gas station on the right side of the street.  Vicki gets out, heads on in, and proceeds to get laughed at.  When she asked where the theater was the man pointed out the window, right across the street.  Now in our defense, we did also look to the left, because GPS can definitely steer you wrong. (pun intended)  The theater is somewhat set back behind some construction.  I have no excuse for not seeing the big sign......

All in all we were there for five hours.  Tons of fun, and I would definitely go again!  Now that I know it's on the left.....  So we piled into the car again, and headed off toward the Mall of America!  Kate had never seen the aquarium, so that was our next destination.

On Our Way

Wow, what a fun weekend!  I can't tell you how good it felt to get the heck out of here and spend some time with old friends.  I didn't want to leave today, and I'm not glad to be home.  I could have easily spent the day visiting with the kids.  I don't get to spend nearly enough time with them, and had nothing to rush home to. Of course my sister, who was driving, had CeCe (and Tom) here waiting for her.  It's the first time Kate has gotten to go anywhere since CeCe arrived six years ago, if you don't count hospital trips, and that is a very necessary part of being a good parent.(She says like she has a clue.)  Having a bit of your own time, I mean. 

Kate picked me up on Friday at eleven, and after some banking, and running to Kmart to purchase a coffee maker, we were on the road.  When we arrived in North Branch we were met with a car coming straight at us down the off ramp.  Luckily he/she moved over, and then realized they were going the wrong way and turned around at the bottom without incident.  After that we scoped it out and decided to grab a bite of lunch at Denny's first.  This is what greeted us.

Yes, that is Denny's.  Yes, that is a hearse to the right.  We had a good time playing "Who is the driver of the hearse?" while waiting for our food, and we guessed it right.  It was the gentleman dressed in sweats and a tank top, with shoulder length hair.  His bangs were pulled away from his face with.....a scrunchy.  Yes.  A scrunchy.  This dude kept eyeing me up, and was making me nervous.  My sister had her back to him.  At one point she went to the ladies room and I begged her not to leave me.  I did not want another "incident" to blog about.  I just kept really busy on my phone while she was away.  When she came back she got a good look at him and said "Oh, is that why you didn't want me to go?"  I nodded and she agreed that he must be the hearse driver.

We downed our lunch, palatable patty melt and a bacon cheeseburger, and headed over to the outlet mall to do some shopping.  I exercised my self control and only bought a few little bubble baths at Bath and Body Works.  It also helped that my sister followed me around saying things like "This is the first store, do you really want to spend ALL your money here?"  Thanks Kate.  Well, my checkbook thanks you anyway.....  CeCe scored some excellent pants and t's from Oshkosh B'gosh though!

After a few hours, don't worry Kate, I wont tell about you getting stuck on the low couch, we continued on down the road to Vicki and Bob's.  Nice drive and it felt so good to be out in the world!  When we arrived at the Bed and Breakfast (after only one wrong turn, that was the direction givers fault) I asked the proprietor where my suite was.  True to form Bob pointed my way back out the front door.  Some things never change. 

We had a great dinner, prepared by Bob, and then some time visiting with all of them.  I got to play the piano with Meg, and Thaniel and I played with "Littlest Pet Shop" toys.  Meghan also gave a crash course on Greek Mythology (Yeah, she's just like her father.) with a quiz to follow.  I payed close attention to the things I didn't already know as Meg decided there would be a trivia contest between Vicki, Kate, and myself.  Now, I have NEVER lost a trivia contest of any kind to those two, even when they team up on me, so I had to be prepared!  After the kids went to bed we visited for another hour or so and then called it a night.

Part two to follow. :)  Otherwise this would be WAY too long.

Wait!  I almost forgot about Spike!  I can't put the kids in my blog, their father doesn't want them on the net, and I respect that, but that doesn't include the pets!  Meg and Thaniel have a dog, Belle, a cat, Sam, and a bearded dragon named Spike!  I could not bring myself to touch the creature, it kept looking at me like it wanted to take a bite out of me.  *shudder*  Here he is on Vicki's lap, and Kate is being the brave one.

Getaway!

Tomorrow my sister Kate and I are heading off to the Twin Cities for a long weekend!  This is the first time Kate has been away from her family since CeCe arrived six years ago.  This is the first getaway for me (if you don't count dating someone in Two Harbors for a couple of months....four years ago)since my honeymoon!  Sad to admit, that was almost six years ago.  Of course, we were in the the Twin Cities then too.  I just don't have the time right now to go, and when I did have the time I didn't have the money.  Also, a good portion of my vacation time tends to be eaten up by family things.  I take plenty of "me" time, but I guess it's always close to home.  I truly didn't realize until I was talking with *"Officer Dave" the other night how long it had been since I have gotten out of here!

We haven't set the plan for tomorrow yet, which is surprising because my sister likes to have anything and everything planned out months in advance.  You think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not.  She ought to be asking me about Christmas any day now. :)  We are going to do some shopping at Tanger, which I hear goes by another name now, North Branch something or other.  So I guess it depends on where/when she wants to have lunch what time we will head out. 

Kate and I are traveling down to "The Bob Bentz Bed and Breakfast" which is what I like to call my friend Vicki's house.  Bob would be her husband.  It isn't a very good Band B since she can't even tell me if they have a coffee pot.  I am in a semi panic about this, because I MUST HAVE COFFEE.  I have my old maker in a box in the garage, and if I don't hear back from Vicki, I'll just bring it along.  She has known me my entire life, you would think she could fathom how important this is!  They are in a pretty rural suburb.  It's isn't like I can skip on down to the gas station, or Mc D's for a cup.

Saturday we'll head down to Chanhassin to enjoy a delicious lunch and matinee performance of "Hair Spray".  That is my "pick" for what to do, and I'm very excited about it!  Then we'll head over to the Mall of America and go to the Aquarium, which Kate has never been to.  I also need to do some birthday shopping for the girls, and Vicki's daughter Meg, who had a birthday this week.

I'm hoping to convince Vicki and Kate (my tea totaling friends) to hit a happy hour down that way on Friday night!  We haven't talked about it, so I'm not sure if Vicki already has something planned for us.  I'm all for going with the flow.  I'm just glad to be going!

* I have so many Dave's that have come in and out of my life, that for people "in the know" I wrote "Officer Dave" :)  For you enquiring minds out there....... mind yer business. ;)  Just kidding.  He's a good friend, who I happened to graduate with.  He might shudder when he sees the word friend (then again he might be relieved) but it's a distance thing, per usual.  "Friend" just doesn't seem to quite cover it.  Stay tuned. :)

Woo Hoo Text Message

Oh brother.  I finally graduated to a smart phone.  To say that I am obsessed would be putting it very mildly.  I went from "Why does anyone need a phone like that?"  straight to "How does anyone live without a phone like this?"

The phone, of course, is smarter than me.  The people who make it assume that everyone knows how to use one of these things.  They don't even point out where the "on" button is until two pages from the end of the manual.  Yes, I had figured it out long before that.  However, they never told me how to do something as simple as add a contact, and  it took me three and a half frustrating hours to figure it out.  It took two days to understand that if I wanted to grab on to a picture sent to me in a text all I had to do was put my finger on it, and I found that one out by accident.

I love the apps.  I spend way too much of my time paging through free ones.  I did find a tip calculator, which I will definitely use.  I also have two Jane Austen novels downloaded to read at my leisure.  My new obsession is "Zedge".  It has tons of free ring tones.  By the time I'm done everyone on my phone will probably have their own tone.......   The title of the blog, "Woo Hoo Text Message" is from one of the notification tones.  Lisa has it on her phone, and it's cute, so I put it on mine.  It's already gone, because every time I hear it I jump five feet.  I also put The Chipmunks singing "Bad Day" on my default ring tone.  It was the first one, so everyone had it.  I think the song is cute, and I thought it would make me smile.  My phone doesn't ring that much anyway, it's mostly texts.  Well, Friday was a bad day, and after work my phone was ringing off the hook.  The fifth time I heard "Cause you had a bad day" in that little chipmunk voice I almost pitched it through a window.  Finding "Teenage Dream" last night was a bonus!!

I did have the phone set up to blog straight from it, which would work well this weekend while I'm on the road.  It isn't working now, for some unexplained reason.  I'll have to look into that.  She says like she knows something about anything.  If I push enough buttons something is bound to happen.  Right?

Heck, my clock radio (that is literally 20 years old....at least) just decided to break, so now the phone is also my morning alarm.  I almost had a disaster with that this morning.  I pushed snooze and went back to sleep, but my finger didn't really hit the snooze, and I didn't realize it.  Luckily I woke up on my own because I'm so used to snoozing for ten more minutes.  The calendar in the kitchen was replaced almost immediately by the one on the phone.  How easy it is, becasue i have it with me all the time, and it even will give me reminders.  Every day I need more of those.

The camera on the phone takes pictures that are almost as good as my camera, and again,it's always with me.  I don't have to remember it, and the batteries don't go dead mid birthday party!  I have wanted to take pics of the kids at work to put up in our learning centers for so long, but can never remember the camera.  Now I have the pics, I just have to print them off and get them back to work....... too bad there isn't an app for that.....

Went shopping on Amazon tonight for another charger (dang the battery goes down fast on these phones), a protective case, and a screen protector thing (technical term).  I could not believe how cheap that stuff is on Amazon!  I bought a car charger just because it was so cheap.  I'm not even sure I have that capability in my car.  I spent $10.88 with shipping.  Unbelievable!  No more Amazon.  That doesn't need to be my next obsession!

Then there are the Angry Birds.  Why are they so angry?  A better question would be why can't I put that stupid game down??? 

HeeHaw Happy Hour

It has been a few days since Happy Hour, so I'm going to have to think back to the particulars.  It has been a busy weekend, but Happy Hour was pretty tame.

Lisa and I met at five over at Keyport.  The server, who doesn't wear a name tag, actually remembered me from the Friday prior, and even that I had Opulent (vodka) and pink lemonade!  Impressive, since I didn't do anything worthy of remembrance that evening. :)  That is a good sign when we are looking for a home base.  The fact that they carry UV pink lemonade is another!  Which is what I had to drink.  Lisa had Miller Lite (shocking I know) and the deep fried cauliflower.  I had the chicken strips and fries.  We were both pleased with our choices.  Great service, good food, and the prices are perfect. 

I called this blog Hee Haw Happy Hour because of the patrons of the establishment.  I would not be surprised to see my old next door neighbors (The hillbillies) out on the deck.  I am trying to remember one of the lines of conversation that almost made me choke on my drink, but I can't. It is an excellent people watching venue.  The average age of the clientele is probably 55 though.  Definitely not a young crowd.  We seem to say that a lot, and I said to Lisa, "Well, when we stop noticing how old they are it will probably be because WE are that old."

Lisa and I parted ways for about a half hour.  I had to run home and finish cleaning the apartment for my weekend house guests.  We met back up at V.I.P at about seven-thirty to watch the Packer game.  The Lounge Hounds were also playing, and they are a fabulous group!  Kind of old a.m. radio tunes from the seventies, but we like them!  If you have the chance you should definitely check them out.  Christina was also at the bar and we had a good time watching the game and listening to music.  Barry the bartender was in rare form, and that's all I have to say about that.  Well, that, and subtlety is not his strong suit.......  I did learn a new joke, but of course I can't tell you cause it's x rated.  I think I surprised him when I told him one back.  :) 

My evening ended at nine.  I had to scurry home to let the relatives in!  It was good to see Melanie and Les again, even though we didn't have much time to visit.  They were great house guests, and not only did I get a brand new berry bowl, I also got another vase!!  I squished Milkie good-bye and begged her to behave, then went to stay at Kate's with Sky.  Nothing like sleeping with a one hundred pound dog who finds great  joy in bounding into the bed at all hours of the night to wake me up.  Plus they took the good computer.  OH, and the good breakfast sandwiches are NOT in the freezer.  I will be taking it up with the customer service department!

So now it's Sunday evening and I'm spending some time at home before going back up to my sister's for one more night.  I thought maybe Milkie would like to spend some time together, but apparently her nap is more important.  That and the fact that while she was a good girl for company, she bit me.  When I got here it was all lovey dovey for about ten minutes, then she just bit my hand.  Not hard, no marks, just a little shot to express her displeasure I'm sure.  So I expressed my displeasure right back and then she went to bed.  :)  *sigh*  I'll be home after work tomorrow and we can begin again.

Happy hour this week (if it happens) will be on Wednesday or Thursday.  Kerri and I are both heading to the cities this weekend. 

OH I almost forgot.  The girls went and watched the baseball team from "Players" on Thursday night.  We went back to Players for a bit, but it was boring with a capital B.  Then over to Grizzlies in Superior for their late night Happy Hour.  I'm not going to Grizzlies again.  Too expensive, and Lord in Heaven........WHO puts corn in guacamole?????  So much corn that if you took out the corn there would be nothing left.   YUCK   Plus, the regular price of a titanic tea is now $6.00.  No, I'm not kidding.  So at Happy Hour prices they are $4.50.  Which in my opinion are what they should be regularly priced at.  The end.  :)