twenty minutes from where we were

In about a half hour I'm leaving to pick up Tashina from the airport, it is her first time flying so I'm very excited for her. She will be here for about a week. I think it will be nice to have a friend here. :)

I was a tad feisty when I posted those audio bits, oops. Meridith said she likes them because its like I am telling her on the phone, its very genuinely me.

Friday was interesting. After stocking up on the necessities (you know, my Nintendo shirt, swimsuit, and 6 cans of diet Pepsi) I left to meet my RS group just after 6 pm. After deciding who would drive Janel followed me home so I could leave my car there overnight rather than at the church. (Actually she said, "Ok, follow me." uhhh, why am I following someone else to my own house? So I eventually passed her.) I drank one Pepsi on that leg of the trip, haha.
I climbed into the passenger seat of Janels big van; we had a lot less people show up than she expected so it was just me and her in that car. She made the mistake of asking how my day was, hahaha. I began a short rundown of my day that turned into me talking for and hour and a half of the two hour car ride. Oops! It started with my having to pay $2.99 a gallon for gas in the morning to Dorkhead giving me a box of chocolates and my begrudgingly having to be nice to him to standing in long lines and hitting every red light while running errands in the afternoon to forgetting about the copier technician at work, blah blah blah, to crying on the way home from work to Ruth asking "What's wrong with your face?" to having my room a mess to every other little thing.

We got on the subject of bad dates or something and I ended up telling her about every single date I've ever been on (which didn't take long [that's the "LiaB" series of links on the right ----> ]) and how they all sucked because of me as well as the many ways I've accidentally rejected people including the weird night coming home from a debate tourney. Gosh. She kept saying, "Well, you're young." It's fun to have 30-year-old friends, haha.

I asked her how long it was til we got to the cabin, she replied with "Twenty minutes from where we were." Uhhhh...I said, "Where were we?" Hahahaha. At one point she started singing a Barbra Streisand song so I asked if she liked Yentl, she said yes so I pulled out my iPod and we played some Babs then I introduced her to Jonny Lang's music.

The cabin was pretty darling. It had a lot of cowboy-ish decor that reminded me a lot of my grandpa. It also has an outhouse in the bathroom...random, but fun. The shower rocked.

When we reached the cabin we all gathered around the kitchen counter and started chatting. I noticed something interesting: there were a ton of little goodies out, unopened. Noone was touching it. I opened a package of Keebler Fudge Sticks and one of the other girls opened some sort of carmel chocolate thingy. Still only a few were eaten. Hmmmm. That is one thing I have noticed from my upbringing: all gatherings are around food of some sort. If we were all standing around the kitchen table and there were packages of cookies and stuff they would be opened the moment they were in sight and eaten nearly as quickly. They would NEVER go unopened. Never ever. And don't ever put a cheeseball near us if you'd like to see it five minutes later. I'm just sayin'.

After talking for about an hour one of the girls suggested we go into the loft, to more comfortable seating. I chose the La-Z-Boy for many reasons including not having to sit by anyone else. Always the social one, aren't I? They decided to go around the room at talk about each person, as to get to know everyone. There was about nine or ten girls, I only knew one of them. When it got to me I just kinda rambled for a few minutes. In typical ME style I got more personal about some things than I probably should have, and very vague about others. I was the only girl from Utah.

I never knew there are so many blatantly incorrect stereotypes about Utahns between worldwide Mormons. Sweet honk! I didn't know I had so many things I was supposed to be doing that I wasn't. I'd better get on that.

With each girl there was some random Utah Mormon stereotype brought up. Absolute lies. It bugged me to no end. The first time Janel had said something and ended her sentence with "like all Utahns." I said, "What? The was the most random stereotype I have ever heard." Each Utahn bashing statement got worse and worse. One girl went off about why we don't take our religion seriously because we are surrounded by it, and because we don't have early-morning seminary, like the rest of the world. Heaven forbid we get out of school to go during the day, obviously that makes us heathens. One girl was saying she was excited to go live in Provo. She went on to say that she, however, "will never marry a Utard!" And went on to talk about "All Utahn guys" and how blah blah blah they are all blah blah blah and they will never blah blah blah and how all Utah guys have Peter Pan Syndrome. Ah yes, you are in a singles ward in Nevada with guys in their late 20s and early 30s (before they're kicked out past 31) and it is ALL of the UTAHN guys who have Peter Pan Syndrome. And how all Utahn guys are ignorant. Oh yes, they are all the ignorant ones. Wow. You're all idiots, girls. Each and every one of you. Bugged me SO BAD. I stopped correcting them after the second time.

I went to bed completely annoyed at everyone around me and wanting so badly to be in my own bed at home.

I put on my earphones and started my iPod on my "sleeping" playlist. I almost went through the entire thing, so I was lying awake for over an hour, ick. I woke up freeeeezing in the middle of the night and eventually found an extra blanket and fell back to sleep. I got up around 8:30, in a better mood than I had fallen asleep in. Meridith had called during the little "get to know you" and gave me a nice break, we laughed HARD at things that I've tried to explain the humor to but have failed miserably, so I won't post it here.

I wandered around outside the cabin for a little while. The St George marathon is run in that exact area. Its really a quaint little farm spot, quite cute.

We finally packed up the van and headed back South. We had two other girls in the van with us this time so I asked if they like stand-up comedy. I pulled out my iPod and we played Mitch Hedberg all the way down to Mesquite. Janel dropped me off at the hotel Elizabeth, Jayar, and the kids were staying at and I joined them by the pool. Much to my surprise I put on my swimsuit, haha. And after a few minutes of my legs burning from the heat Elizabeth convinced me to take off my jeans, too. So pigs were flying somewhere as I basked in the sun at a crowded public pool in a incredibly low-cut swimsuit. Bwa ha ha ha ha.

Its not every day that I'm believed to be a sister wife in a polygamous marraige...in fact I don't think I've ever been believed to be a sister wife in a polygamous wedding. But there's a first time for everything!
A couple Jayar had been talking to by the pool asked if we were Mormons and said, "We knew it by her dress. [pointing at Emma Kate and her peasant-style dress] We see things on TV about the...[quiet] you know...multiple wives...and they wear dresses like that." Elizabeth and I burst out laughing, hard. Liz said, "Oh they are not real Mormons!" but the couple didn't get it. While we were walking away Jayar said, "I think they think you are the 2nd wife, Susannah." Haha, they totally did, bwa ha ha ha ha ha ha.

We went to a Mexican restaurant then over to Deborah and Aarons new house. They were just pulling in right then, so everyone (uh, but me) helped them move all the stuff from the truck into the house. I played with the babies. At one point I was sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, watching Liz and Deb put things away into cupboards when Liz started wondering where Luke was. She called to the guys upstairs and asked if the babies were up there. She went outside and found them across the street, wandering through a construction zone, hahahahaha. The had both just wandered out the open front door. Made me chuckle, only because they were safe.

Liz and I took Luke and Hyrum to Wal-Mart and bought popsicles and other things to beat the heat (pushing 90, which isn't much for Vegas, I know, but it was icky still.) We saw a polygamist group (ok, total stereotype...but I don't know of anyone else in southern utah/nevada who has long dresses, boots, huge bangs, and a french braid.) I wore a huge lime green "Elegant Hat" for a bit, a lady told me she thought it was definitely me. Hahaha.

Liz and I sat in the front room and looked at Deborahs photo albums for a while; man that's depressing. There is not one cute photo of me in any of those 6 albums. And I found a few photos that proved I have definitely had my "rare in adulthood" leg bone deformity since childhood. Blech. I'm totally the ugly sister; I have such gorgeous sisters. I was OK until Deborah asked if I was OK then I started bawling, haha.
We went to a chinese restaurant for dinner, which was fun. There were a few poly groups near us; the women never spoke a word, the two men talked to each other the whole time.

We dropped the guys and the kids off at Debs house the she, Liz, and I went to Wal-Mart to stock Deborahs fridge. That was fun. I bought such random stuff including two boxes of cereal (new total in the pantry: 14 boxes), and 3 movies.
We didn't leave Mesquite until pretty late and arrived at my house just after 11. I climbed in bed really late and fell asleep while watching my new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles DVD.


Tashina is here now and we are watching "Bride & Prejudice", haha. TDawgYo joked that I was stalking her and had pictures of her asleep...so when she fell asleep I took a picture, bwa ha ha ha ha.