Let's Burn One & Make It MEMORIAL!

Okay, so I've been a little MIA recently. Been busy living the dream, so I would have something to add to this great internet conversation.

So, before I can get into my last weekend out with Cora, I feel I should catch you up a little on what else is going on.

So, for the Memorial Day weekend, I figured I hadn't done nearly enough traveling, so I got in my car, and headed out on a 300 mile drive to southern Indiana for my cousins' kids' high school graduation. I figure if they are going to travel all the way to Seattle for my wedding, I can drive down for their graduation. Unlike my sister-in-law who doesn't feel like coming to my wedding, I understand the concept of "family obligations". (Just a little hostile 'bout that at the moment.)

I reconfigured my normal route so that I would pass through the home town of one "Ms. Sassy Britches".

Even though she had just gotten home from her own vacation, she donned the pretty little sundress you ever did see and a hot pink sweater, and met me at the local steak house. We talked about the wedding, her trip, her job, her pending trip to Japan, and just life in general. After we overstayed our welcome at the steak joint, we walked over to the bar where she occasionally bartends. Let me tell you, I've been in a number of bars in small towns in Illinois, but this was hands down the nicest.

At the bar, I made sure to tell one of the local barflies that we were talking to that I was just passing thru, and that I was getting married in a few weeks, hoping to help nip questions in the bud later.

Nope.

We sat around in the bar and talked for another good long while, but the clock kept ticking, and I had a long way left to go before I got to where I was going, so Sassy B. & I walked back to our cars and said our goodbyes. I headed off to Princeton, IN, and she went back to the bar. And as I understand it, got some questioning from her future sister-in-law's sister.

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Saturday was the day of the graduation ceremony. It was inside, in the old, un-air conditioned gym. It was hot, and steamy. Good thing I thought to bring a couple of bottles of water. I was real popular.

After the ceremony, there was a reception before the big party. I fielded a ton of questions about the wedding plans, and got everyone's travel plans. Which I promptly forgot.

I love Gregory Lee's expression in that picture as his wife, Tiffany gives his dad a shoulder massage. (You may remember GL & Tiff's wedding from the INCIDENT AT THE BOUQUET TOSS.) Afterwards, we all went back to Mike's, for the REAL party.

It was there that my cousin, Greg, introduced us to his new girlfriend, Felicia. His wife left him about a year and a half ago, and ran off with another guy. As two tall guys dating short hotties later in life, we were talking, and he said, "People come up to me and ask, 'Don't you just want to punch **soon-to-be-ex-wife's-boyfriend** in the mouth?' Hell, I tell 'em I'd like to buy him a present."

Sunday was a whole lot of hanging out with the family, napping, watching the Indy 500, more napping, more hanging. It ended up with me watching / explaining the plot of Avatar to a bunch of drunk college students.

Monday, after taking a shoe of Mike & Ginger, I got on the road.

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This time leg of the journey took me thru Olney, IL. Home of the white squirrels.

You would think that with a $70 fine for running over one of the pale, demon squirrels (Fargin Beastages have the right of way), that the place would be overrun. Not so much. In fact, just like my on childhood visit there: not a one to be seen.

I'm starting to suspect that it's all just a marketing scam, myself.

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All in all, a good weekend with the old family, setting me up nicely for a weekend with the new family the following weekend. But more on that, later.