Summer Wandering

I've been doing a decent amount of traveling this summer.  The places aren't necessarily ultra fascinating, but the memories and people are!

Over Memorial Day weekend, Chris and I ventured to St. Louis for a weekend with friends.  We had lunch with my mom, Julie and the kids on Sunday and it was super exciting to watch Jacob tackle corn on the cob.  Needless to say, it was a success and possibly a new favorite for him, probably because of the novelty of it.  That's one of the reason I love it!  He'd say things like "this is corn on the cob?"  and "what is this?" to which we'd respond "corn on the cob"...super cute!

School finished off nicely though I had to charge a kid for a moldy textbook that sat in water for I don't know how long and was still damp when he returned it to me, but it's no longer my problem.

Following my 30 minute school day, I promptly returned to Fairview where I spent time with family and went to a pretty awesome retirement party of a lady from my mom's office.

I returned to Jacksonville briefly before making my way to the greater Chicagoland area.  I was in Jacksonville just long enough to pack and go to a 6 hour training day at Bath and Body Works!!!  I actually just finished my first "real" day there today!  So far it is fantastic and I really super love it!  <lots of enthusiasm, I know.

I managed to pull off a fantastic day early arrival surprise for Chris.  He thought I was driving up on Wednesday, but really I got there on Tuesday.  I unloaded all my stuff while he was at work, hid my car and talked to him on his drive home like we sometimes do.  I almost ruined it when his dad said hi to me, which I hardly acknowledged.  It would be weird if I was talking back to the "tv"...duh.  So we finished our conversation, I tried to hang up the phone, (failed), finally acknowledged the greeting from his dad, and then I heard, "what did you say?".  I played it off like it wasn't a big deal and then walked out his front door while he was getting out of his car.  Really awesome and exciting...and overly cheesy.

That weekend, I went with Chris' family to Minneapolis to celebrate his grandma's birthday.  We stayed near the Mall of America and had dinner there on Friday.  I didn't do any shopping, but on the up side, I saved lots of money!  On Saturday we took a ride on the Mississippi and got to go through one of the locks.  While some might think it's boring, I think it's pretty interesting. 

This is a picture from the top of the lock and you can see the rapids.

And here's a picture from the bottom when we're about to leave. (I don't know those people, they were just kind of in the shot)

Later we returned to Northbrook where I ended up staying a week longer than planned because I didn't have to work.  I stayed until Sunday and on Friday we all went out to dinner to celebrate his dad's last day at his job.  He's moving on to another university and will be a dean there.  While pondering what to order at The Yard House, I spotted this is Chris' menu.

Part of me thought, why would $100 be shoved into a menu like that?  But I wrote it off as pure luck.  We were shocked at our good fortune.  At first I thought it was a $10, but then I saw the extra 0.  I asked if we should tell his parents, but he said no, we'd just buy dinner and we'd tell them later.  So we were really excited to have this extra money and be able to live it up and pay for dinner.  I felt like an idiot because I was really excited about it and felt like I couldn't stop smiling.  So about the time our appetizers arrive, Chris decides to take out the bill and revel in our luck.  (Do you know where this is going?) 

Instead when he opened it, he found this... 

He immediately hung his head and I burst into fits of laughter.  I'm not sure why the loss of what we thought was 100 free dollars was so hilarious to me, but I couldn't stop laughing which prompted his parents to ask what was so funny, to which he responded by sullenly throwing the fake hundred on the table.  We all laughed about it, but to be honest, it was disappointing, even though I laughed while writing this.  Looking back now, I realize the naivete of it all, but it happens.  I had to give the guy credit for a fantastic advertising idea...while Chris said he would never buy anything from there.

That's about all I have going on right now.  I'm headed to Moline this weekend with some friends and am excited to go to The Daiquiri Factory when it's warm out...instead of 20ish degrees.  Then it's just a few shifts at BBW and 95% chance of going to Fairview for 4th of July weekend!

Oh also, there's a boil order/water shortage in Jacksonville due to recent flooding.  I just found out today, but it's been in effect since Saturday.  It hasn't mattered much because I don't drink my water, but I feel bad for doing a load of laundry yesterday...oops!  I guess I'll start watching the news now.