Well, maybe not so much intrigue, as way too much to do, and way too little time with my family and friends.
I got together with the friends who expressed interest in seeing me, and as for the others, well, there just wasn't time for me to reach out to them and make suggestions.
The coolest part was that I got to see my grade school best friend for the first time in 38 years.
The trip to the wedding was a fun caravan on Friday, with stops along the way at distilleries and breweries, and our GPS sent us a different way than everyone else, and we ended up in a traffic jam somewhere in Indiana for almost 2 hours.
But, we got to Michigan safely, and our Air BnB house was perfect for us. We noticed that something was wrong with one of our tires, though, but had no time or opportunity to go get the tires replaced.
Dave kept saying he wasn't worried about it. I kept worrying about it.
Friday night, we went to the party at a local roof top bar, and met everyone there, including the wedding party, and all of the families.
It was cool and very windy up there, and that's possibly how Dave managed to get a really bad cold, that hit him as we were headed back to Oklahoma.
The wedding day dawned beautifully, with clear skies, sunshine, and a high in the mid 70s.
The chapel was beautiful...
... and the ceremony was really cool. They did this thing called a "letter box ceremony," where they put letters in the box that they wrote to each other, and sealed. In the future, when they have a fight or other difficulty, they are to open the box and read the letters, to remember why they got married.
If they don't have any issues in the first 5 years, then, on their 5th anniversary, they are to open the box and read the letters.
I love this idea!
Instead of rice or bird seed, we all had little wands with ribbons in the wedding colors, and tiny bells on them.
When people were gathering for pictures at the chapel, I approached the photographer and asked who was to be included in the family pictures.
She said "Parents, grand parents, and siblings only."
I was crestfallen. I had gotten 6 inches of my hair cut off, and had a new bob style done so that I would not look like a mop in the pictures. NOT TO MENTION, we came all the way from Oklahoma so I could be at this wedding.
SO... we left....*sad face*
The reception was held at a distillery. The room was pretty cool, and the tables very pretty....
The favors were little bottles of house made spirits, and the theme was national parks We were put at the Rocky Mountain National Park table, which was the only choice for our family.
There was also a table for the deceased grand parents and one great grand parent (my parents and grandma are on the right, and another pic of my parents on the far left in color)....
When my brother found us at the reception, he asked why we were not there for pictures at the chapel with the rest of the family.
I told him that the photographer had turned us away. He insisted that it had been a dire mistake, and was not acceptable.
SO, the groom set up a shoot for us there at the reception hall. He expressed that I had helped raise him (I lived next door to my brother and ex sister in law when John was born, and I babysat him on a weekly basis), and that I needed to be included, along with his Aunt Elsa.
This is NOT one of the official pictures, obviously.... this one was taken with my phone as we were setting up for the photographer...
It was a wonderful, happy day.
I even got up and danced a little at the reception. There was much merriment....the people downstairs at the distillery even complained about the loud party up above. The staff said something to the effect of "that's what the party space is for. Deal with it..."
Unfortunately, we had to get up and leave in the morning, so we did not go to the after party. We headed back to the BnB by ourselves.
Next morning, we were up and out by about 8:30, and our GPS told us we would get to our friends' place in central Missouri by about 5:30.
Perfect.
We got underway, and noticed that the GPS was not sending us back the way we came, and we ended up on rural two lane roads with no places to stop.
We pulled over, and Dave realized he had the device set up wrong, to avoid highways. He re-set it, and we got back on the road.
When we got up to speed, though, that was when Dave decided to start worrying about the tire.
There was no way to tell which tire it was that had separated on the inside, so we would have to get them all replaced. The danger of a blow out was imminent.
On Sunday morning, in rural Illinois.
It took 4 hours to find an open tire shop. After several frustrations, long distance help from my friend Nancy, and a google search, we finally found a place and got to it an hour before it closed.
They charged us $750 for a set of 4 tires, balancing, and installation. We had just gotten paid on Friday, thank the Gods, because neither of us had a credit card with us.
We were absolutely starving, so we walked over to a fast food restaurant and had lunch at 3:30 while the tires were being installed.
When it was all done and over, we were still 5 hours away from our Missouri destination, and the GPS sent us across through Hannibal MO, instead of back to 44.
It was a harrowing, aggravating, and exhausting day. Another reason Dave got sick, I think.
We arrived safely, though, and they fed us dinner at 10:30 pm.
Up and out the next morning, and the stupid GPS sent us the longest way possible back to Oklahoma.
What should have been a 4 hour drive was an 8 hour drive.
We weren't sure how to get back to route 44 from their rural home, so we trusted the GPS, and instead, it sent us out route 70 toward Kansas City, and then broke south..... but we didn't know where it was going to take us, so we kept hoping it would lead us back to 44 eventually.
It didn't until we were back in Oklahoma.
NEVER again with that GPS!! It's never failed us like that before. There are better apps available for our phones. We will use those from now on.
We rolled in at about 7:30, tired beyond reason, unloaded the car, and just had snacks for dinner, since there were no groceries in the house.
We WERE supposed to have been home by early afternoon, with time and energy to do grocery shopping.
Thank goodness, we had taken Tuesday off!! We both woke up feeling ill, Dave more so than me, and we still had much to do.
Got the bills paid, and the errands done, Tuesday morning, and then rested the rest of the day.
I was able to move money from savings to our regular account, to replace some of the money spent on the tires, but it wiped out our savings, and didn't cover the full amount we'd spent on the tires.
Then, we got a bill for the plumbing work that was done a couple of months ago.... and the money that had been left aside to pay for it was gone!
A friend sent me $250 to help out.... I sent that to the plumber, and he is being merciful with us, after hearing the story. He's letting us delay paying the rest of his bill until we can recover a little.
All in all, I am VERY glad that we were able to be at the wedding, and that I was able to see some friends, and of course, my family....
but that homeward trip was AWFUL, and it removed all of our "vacation buzz."
I went back to work depressed, frustrated, and worried about money, not feeling at all refreshed or restored, like I should have been.
BUT, I DID get to the beach for about 15 minutes on the wedding day, and took a minute long video of the waves, and a seagull walking along the water's edge.
If I watch that video, and look at the pictures from the wedding, it does help a lot!
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