Going to Iowa

Well, I leave for Iowa in just a few short hours. I never blocked my mom's socks, but that's okay. Grandma's socks were a failure. I don't know what I was smoking when I thought I could get those done in a week. I didn't even finish one toe--and I'm doing them toe-up! It's okay, though. Grandma will understand.

In addition to family Christmas tomorrow, my nephew is getting baptized. And I get to be his godmother! I'm very excited!! Yesterday, I went downtown to the Catholic bookstore to get his present. It's hard buying a religious gift for an infant, let me tell you. I finally settled on a little pin that can be pinned onto whatever he's wearing for the baptism and some books. They're those kind of books where all of the pages are really hard so that kids can play with them. One is little prayers and the other is something like Baby Goes to Church.

But, before I can go to Iowa I have to:

• Pack
• Go to lab for lab meeting
• Pick up the rental car

That's a lot to do, so I'd better get to it!

Iowa trip

Last weekend, I went to Iowa for a craft festival. The festival was held in Van Buren County Iowa which is in southeastern Iowa on the Des Moines River near the Missouri border. This is the part of Iowa my step-father grew up in and he and my mom go every year. For the last four years, I have gone with them. The festival mostly consists of various craft and antiques/junk vendors who set up in the towns of the county. The towns themselves organize some events, including a parade and covered wagon rides and, in my step-father's hometown, a lunch consisting of bean and ham soup slow-cooked in a big black kettle over a bed of coals and cornbread baked over coals. And homemade pie. Yum.

None of Kelly's (step-father) family lives down there anymore (his parents have migrated to Arizona and his sister lives in Des Moines) so we stay at an inn/bed and breakfast in the town of Bentonsport. Bentonsport is home to about 35 people (and that's if you include the people up on the hill). The inn is less than 100 yards from the banks of the river has been there a very long time and on the side of the inn; there's marks on the side of the inn commemorating various floods and how much of the inn was under water.

While trying to navigate the roads to Bentonsport on Friday night, I got a phonecall from B who now lives in South Carolina and who I haven't talked to in quite some time. This is how our conversation went:

The usual hi, how are you's and what's going on, then

Me: Oh my God, that's a deer!

B: What?

Me: A deer just ran out in front of the car, oh wait, there's another one, is it going to cross the road?

I successfully navigate past the deer and we talk a little longer, then

Me: Wait, I think I'm supposed to turn here, but it's so dark, I can't see the road sign.

B: I feel like this is the beginning of a bad horror movie.

More driving and talking, then

Me: Hey, I'm in a town I recognize, I guess I'm going the right way.

B: Is it deserted?

Me: No, there are people here.

B: Are they zombies? (B has an obsessive fear about zombies)

Me: No, they seem to be perfectly normal people.

We continue talking and then I'm really close to Bentonsport.

Me: Okay, I'm getting close to town and in the past I haven't gotten any cell phone signal in town near the inn, so if you suddenly don't hear from me, that's why.

B: Where the hell are you?! Is this some sort of Bermuda Triangle of Iowa???

Me: No, it's just a really small town and the only way to get cell phone signal is to go out on the bridge in the middle of the river--Ben, Ben?

I had lost the signal. So, I go in to the inn, check in, then walk out onto the bridge, call B and leave a message saying that I'm fine but I have no signal in town. I'm wondering what he thought of this whole conversation.

It was probably a good thing I didn't tell him that the inn is haunted.

The sister, she is very pregnant

Due date: August 9 (the day before her birthday)

I went to Iowa this weekend for my brother's fiancee's bridal shower and as much family time as we could cram in without killing ourselves. And, of course, pictures.

It takes an amazing astological event for the circumstances to be right for my entire family to be in one place at the same time. Hell, it takes an amazing astrological event for me and my siblings to be in one place at the same time. Jason lives in Atlanta and I live in Chicago. Meghan is in Iowa and so is Eric. So, it's really getting me and Jason in one place at the same time that's the issue. Anyway, anytime we are all together, there has to be a picture to commemorate the occassion.

Left to Right: Me, Jason, Eric, Meghan

Even more rarely, we are all in Iowa and my stepgrandparents (stepfather's parents) are in Iowa at the same time (they live in Arizona and come back to Iowa for a couple weeks out of every year, but I am usually not there at the same time).

Me and my sibs, plus Mac (in the back), Derek (step-cousin), and Pat

While it was good seeing everyone, it was pretty damn exhausting.

Here was the schedule for the weekend:
Thursday--pick up rental car (it was cheaper to get it on Thursday than on Friday, very strange)
Friday--Go to post office to pick up I-pass that they are holding hostage there waiting for my signature (the I-pass is a device that allows me to go through tolls without change, it basically tells the toll that I have money in an account then deducts money from that account; John had it in California where it was useless, so he sent it to me) drive from Chicago to Grandma's in Iowa (6 hours due to traffic)
Saturday--drive from Grandma's to shower (2.5 hours), have fun at shower, go to aunt's for dinner (fortunately, she lived close to the shower location), drive to Ames to stay at a hotel for the night (1 hour)
Sunday--Go to church in hometown with Mom, Meghan, and Grandma (very close to Ames, that's why we stayed there), talk to people I haven't seen in 10 years, go back to Ames for family lunch, drive back to Grandma's (about 2 hours), sit and stare at the backyard for awhile because we are both dead tired
Monday--get up early and drive back to Chicago (5 hours--traffic was much better), return rental car, collapse in my apt. and go to bed early

One thing I have discovered about myself after living in cities for the last 15 years is that I really miss wide open spaces. Therefore, I decided to try to take some pictures of them as I was driving back to Chicago. All of these were taken while driving (drive-by pictures, if you will).



That last one is the Mississippi River. The pictures really don't do the landscape justice, but I think I'm going to make them the screensaver on my computer anyway, just to have a little wide open space in the city.