The day I met The Blob. (No, no, I really did!)

Serving up another update on this year’s Project 365.  Here we go….



Day 247 (2012-09-03) ~  I took a walk through Sculpture Park with Scope and Wednesday and this was one of the sights we stumbled upon.  What a wild and wacky place!





Day 248 (2012-09-04) ~  This was Wednesday’s first day of school.  Since, I didn't want to have to hand in my Cool Mom card, I didn't take pictures of her outside her high school.  However, the bus stop was totally fair game!





Day 249 (2012-09-05) ~  Just an interesting shadow our bamboo plant made on the wall.





Day 250 (2012-09-06) ~  Kind of the opposite of yesterday's picture, I guess.  This is a shot of interesting splashes of light that were on a window sill in our stairwell.





Day 251 (2012-09-07) ~  Just a string of bells we have hanging on one of our doors.  (Oopsie.  A slight cheat on this one.  This was taken on the 6th, not the 7th.)





Day 252 (2012-09-08) ~  Awww.  My niece's outdoor wedding.  It was GORGEOUS!!





Day 253 (2012-09-09) ~  Yeah.  It's me and Wednesday in a fun house mirror.  Ha!





Day 254 (2012-09-10) ~  Hey, look!  It's The Blob!  I stumbled upon this while out on a walk.  Cute.





Day 255 (2012-09-11) ~  An Autumn-themed bench at a local elementary school.





Day 256 (2012-09-12) ~  Up close and personal in a local garden.  I muted the colors a bit on this one.  Duh.  (A slight cheat on this shot too.  It was taken on the 11th, not the 12th.)





Day 257 (2012-09-13) ~  Just a quickie of a tree I passed under while out on a walk. 





Day 258 (2012-09-14) ~  The circus came to a local park.  We were out of town for the clowns, but it was still kinda cool watching the tent being set up.  (Dang it!  A cheat on this shot too.  It was taken on the 15th, not the 14th.  Sorry, I got my days all scrambled for a little while there.)





Day 259 (2012-09-15) ~  At a friend's (and former blogger’s!) wedding we were all given sparklers at the party's end.  Sooooooooooo much fun!!  :-)  (If you want to read Scope’s detailed version of the wedding with many, many more pictures that we took during the reception, click HERE.)





Day 260 (2012-09-16) ~  Driving back up from southern Illinois, we saw lots of little oil wells working away in the fields alongside the road.  We got up close and person with this one.





More pictures coming soon!






© Coracabana

On the road again….

Two weekends ago, Scope, Wednesday, and I loaded up our car with as much as it could hold and we hit the road for Ohio.  You recall how much we enjoy summer road trips, right?….  Like last August when we drove from Seattle to Chicago in four and a half days with our pet frogs belted in the back seat. Remember that?…. Total splendiferousness with THIS FREAKIN’ ROCKS!!!! sauce is what it was. (Need a refresher? Click HERE.)


Scope’s family had been planning a big eight day family vacation in a rental house on Lake Erie for nearly a year now. Ten of us were able to make it and we had an amazing time.


Here’s what it all looked like….


DAY #1:

We crammed ourselves and all our crap into our PT Cruiser like clowns in a circus car and headed out of the city. The typical sloth-like and headachy Chicago traffic was surprisingly light and delightfully non-existent—*insert the sound of angels singing “laaaaaaaaaaaaa”*—so, we made great time.




Aerosmith serenaded us on the stereo as we started out. I tried to convince Wednesday that the roly poly dude on the back of the CD was Steven Tyler in his earlier years.




And she SO wished that were true!


*snicker*


But anyway….


Soon we were zooming through Indiana.




We made a quick stop at the University of Notre Dame.




Wednesday and I had never been there before, so the three of us walked around for awhile checking the campus out.




(Awwwww, I know. Aren’t Scope and Wednesday CUTE?!?!)  :-)


We saw Touchdown Jesus….




….and a gorgeous war memorial fountain….




….and a pair of cutsie hugging statues….




….and this funny and fearless little fella.




After leaving Notre Dame, we made a two second hop over the border into Michigan so Wednesday and I could pick up another state. We opened our car doors, poked our toes out, touched the ground, and then—*whoosh!*—we were back on our way.         




Not too long after that, we crossed into Ohio.




In Ohio, we saw Batman running his Bat-errands with his Bat-kids in his Bat-SUV.




(Who knew, right?!)


And then about six hours after we began our journey, we arrived in Erie County.




We stayed with my in-laws in the “Buster Brown Shoe House” in Huron.




The Buster Brown Shoe House is this cute three story house just a hop, skip and a cartwheel away from the lake. All the way there I had been wondering why it’s called the Buster Brown house—????—but once we walked in, it clicked. Inside the house, the walls are covered with framed old retro Buster Brown ads, which was kind of cool.




There was plenty of room for all ten of us…. well, most of the time anyway. Unless we were all in the kitchen at once, in which case it was pretty much a claustrophobic fright fest. (Yeesh.) But otherwise, it was perfect. There was even enough room for Wednesday to have a big bedroom all to herself, and she was thrilled.


But even more thrilling?….


All the shy wee itty bitty baby ducks that kept walking through our garden!




*Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!*


After looking around the house, we went out to the lake in the backyard.




The lake was absolutely stunning. I couldn’t believe it—we even had a gorgeous view of Cedar Point Amusement Park! (You might want to click this pic to enlarge it to get the better view.)





DAY #2:


Our second day in Ohio started with Wednesday and Scope getting their ping pong on in one of the sunrooms.




After all the ping pong-ing, the three of us broke off from the rest of the group for a couple of hours. It was important to everyone to make sure that everybody got to do the things they most wanted to do during our stay, and the thing that Wednesday most wanted to do was visit Ghostly Manor Thrill Center, a year-round haunted house which was voted one of the scariest in the country. No-one else was in a get-your-pants-frightened-off kind of mood, so off we ventured as a trio looking f-f-f-for t-t-t-terror.


This is what Ghostly Manor looked like on the outside when we arrived.




The dragon outside the building was spectacular! We spent a lot of time squealing, jumping around, and taking a zillion pictures of the dragon before actually setting foot inside the manor.








We missed getting a picture of the dragon spewing steam out of his nose though, unfortunately—*sniff*—so I borrowed one from Google for you.




(You’re welcome.)


A talking skeleton inside Ghostly Manor told me I wasn’t allowed to take pictures in there, so all I have to show you is this shot of a massive, creepy, black-lit eye from the lobby. CreeEEeeEEeepy.




Our run through the haunted house was sheer bad*ss awesomeness! Like A LOT!! There was blood, gore, demons, monsters, horrors leaping out of the shadows, vibrating floors, flashing lights, a maze of grody body bags, and—most surprising of all—inflating walls which rapidly pressed in on us from all sides at once and tried to crush us as we ran screaming through the hallways.


Wow.


Just WOW.


I loved it. LOVED!!!! IT!!!! It was phenomenal and, hands down, the best haunted house I have ever been in. I just couldn’t stop laughing our entire way through. Laughing, screaming, and running through the dark—what bliss! I felt utterly exhilarated at the end of it. It was so much fun!


Or at least I thought so.


As for my darling Wednesday? Well…. the haunted house turned out to be a bit too intense for the poor girl, who had been hoping to see something more along the lines of the cutsie Haunted Mansion in Disneyland, not something straight out of a horror film. She’s still glad she saw it, but she has no plans to set foot in Ghostly Manor again.


Ever.


She still loved the dragon though and was perfectly happy to pose with Scope for a mock screaming picture as we left the manor.




(Hee hee hee.)


Once we got back to the rental house, Wednesday and I went looking around the place at all the knickknacks on display. We found a super-snazzy pair of old binoculars.




(God, I love that picture!  *giggle*)


And—hey, looky!—we also found a Harry Potter-ish cupboard under the stairs! AWESOME!!!!




That is sooooooooooo going to be my new Facebook profile, by the way. :-)


And then we relaxed on the swing in the backyard for awhile, whilst plotting our plans for Day 3.





[….to be continued….]





© Coracabana 

Tales from the Road Trip: The day I was a mutant freak and—taa-daa!—the day we made it back home

Our fourth day of the Road Trip, Scope, Wednesday, and I awoke in Oacoma, South Dakota. Remember Oacoma? No? Where the millions of mayflies swarmed all over us and watched us all Peeping-Tom-like through our motel window? Yeah, that’s the one. You got it. In fact, I wrote a little song about Oacoma. Mm-hmm. Wanna hear it? Yeah? Okay. (Don’t worry, you’ll get the tune.)



Ohhhhhhhhhh-acoma where the bugs come swarming in your face
And as they pass
It sure sucks @$$
’Cuz those little pervs go for second base



Well, that’s all I’ve got so far. It’s a work in progress. But anyway, back to the story….

Those millions of mayflies that had violated us like perverts in the parking lot the night before, well, they were all dead now. They were all sprawled out on the ground around the motel doorways like giant, grotesque welcome mats.

Nasty.

(Sorry, had to borrow that picture from Google. I was too busy standing there like a dummy, torn between my utter revulsion at the sight of that many dead bugs and my euphoria that, hey, the little things couldn’t crawl all over me anymore—score!—to bother taking a picture, but it looked just like that shot there, I swear.)

There was a maid on corpse duty outside the motel, sweeping up all the mayflies into massive piles as we hauled our bags out to our car. Every step we took made a sickening swishy kind of muffled crunching sound. So freaky.

And speaking of freaky….

Have I ever mentioned I’m a mutant? No? Well, I am. There, I said it. I don’t know why, but my skin is extremely sensitive (read: overdramatic to the point of ridiculous, Jim Carrey-ish proportions) to lengthy sun exposure. Even with sunblock. If I’m in the sun for long periods of time, sunblock or not, my skin swells up painfully. And after sitting in the sunny car and loitering around 95 degree sightseeing spots for three days straight, my skin had had enough of me and my audacity.

Thus, when I woke up Thursday morning, I discovered my hands and arms had started to resemble inflated rubber gloves overnight.



Not good. At all. I knew from past experience that it could easily get waaaayyyyyyy worse if I didn’t take it seriously, and that if I didn’t stay out of the stupid sun until the swelling went down, I would find myself in the ER, which was SO not on our sightseeing list!

So, how does one stay out of the sun on a sunny Summer Road Trip, hmm? By wearing winter gloves and a hoodie all day, that’s how!



And by hiding in the shade in between cars when one is feeling too much like a freak to wear one’s winter gloves and hoodie out in public on one of the hottest days of the year.



(As if hiding in between cars is somehow less freaky than wearing gloves!)

(*rolling my eyes*)

(Moving on….)

We only had one big sightseeing adventure on our list for the day: The Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD. It only took us about an hour to get to Mitchell.



When we arrived, they were setting up some sort of street carnival right outside The Corn Palace, which was kind of annoying because it made getting pictures of the thing kind of difficult. But I did my best (whilst hovering in the shade between the carnival booths).






We didn’t bother going into The Corn Palace. It was just the outside we wanted to see. And I have to admit, I don’t really get it. Mmm…. nope. Not at all. The purpose of The Corn Palace is…. what exactly? I’m just not sure. Okay, it’s kind of cute and silly and there’s nothing wrong with that, but…. no, I still don’t get it. Sorry.

We walked by a few little stores (on the shady side of the street), including one that had a real Snoopy Snow Cone Machine in the window! WHEEEEEEEE!!!!



I wanted one of those SOOOOOOOOO BAD when I was in third grade…. until my friend, Nikki, got one and I realized what complete and utter slave labor it was to grind up ice cubes with that little plastic handle for 20 minutes—and that’s only if you're doing it with psycho killer rage! If you’ve got a gentler touch, my friend, forget it! The ice will have melted, evaporated and rained down over Switzerland by the time you’re done!

20 minutes of grueling work just to get the world’s dinkiest little snow cone, when I could go over to the freezer and make a big, fat ice cream sundae with a mere spoon in 20 seconds flat instead? Umm…. no thanks. (C’mon, Snoopy! What’s the deal?!) But still, slave labor whining aside, I got a kick out of seeing the snow cone maker in the shop window.

*nostalgic sigh*

Anyway….

We hit the road and along the way we passed a sign for Laura Ingalls Wilder’s home.



Once again, my inner third grade self quivered with glee! Slap my behind and call me “Nellie”, I was in Little House on the Prairie-ville! Yeah, baby!

We saw a funky cow pasture with huge random sculptures in it.




And then soon we were saying goodbye to South Dakota and hello to Minnesota.



I had never been to Minnesota. I’d heard the stereotypes (that they talk like Bob from That 70’s Show and that they are all super duper uber nice) but how come no-one told me they welcome Cylons there?! What the--?!



(That’s a little TOO nice, if you ask me!)

And how come no-one told me the sky in Minnesota looks just like the wallpaper in Andy’s room in Toy Story?!….




….And that there are stick-bug-ish, alien-looking windmills slowly spinning in nearly every direction you look?!




(Personally, I suspect they’re Cylons, Eeep!)

We stopped at a little rest stop, so we could say we actually touched the Cylon Minnesotan ground.



Then we drove on…. while Wednesday took pictures of her spiffy socks in the backseat.



*snicker*

We crossed the Mississippi River….



….and then—hey, looky!—we crossed the border into Wisconsin, just one itty bitty State away from home!



Now, we COULD have made it home to Chicago that evening, of course, but we would have been pulling into the garage at about midnight or later, and we were already tired from driving on next to no sleep for the last four days, so we decided we would only go as far as Tomah, Wisconsin and get ourselves a well deserved decent night’s sleep and then make it home the next day refreshed instead of thrashed. Yeah, we were almost to the finish line, but we really needed the break! So, off we headed for Tomah. Along the way we saw some dude hovering in the sky with a parasail powered by a MASSIVE fan….

….and we saw this guy who was all ready with his snowplow for the first snowfall of the season. IN. AUGUST….



(I know it’s Wisconsin, but seriously, dude?! It’s over 90 degrees out!)

We made it to a motel in Tomah—there were no perverted mayflies there! YAY!!!!—and the lady at the desk gave us a coupon for dinner at The Ground Round just across the street….



….so that’s where we had dinner (which was delicious!) and then we hit the sack.



The next morning, Day 5 of our Road Trip, we had breakfast at the motel. Wednesday and I split a waffle just like we did at all the other motels during our trip. (Minus the icky dead hooker motel in Montana—eww!)



Then we headed for home on the same road we started our trip on back in Seattle, I-90 (which happened to be Siamese Triplets with I-39 and I-94 at that point; weird.)



We passed a lot of signs for cheese, ‘cuz—hey—it’s Wisconsin and all.




(Pffft! “Fireworks and cheese”—that kills me every time! *snort*)

And then we started seeing signs for Chicago!




In next to no time, we left Wisconsin behind and crossed the border into Illinois….



….aaaaaaaaaaand, right on cue, Illinois immediately held out it’s hand and said, “pay up, punks!” by hitting us with a toll booth.

Nice.

I-90 is free to drive on the whole 2000 miles from Seattle to Wisconsin; won’t cost you a penny. However, the second you hit Illinois—BOOM!—I-90 morphs into a toll road, and you have to pull over and cough up cash every few miles or so, or invest in an I-PASS transponder, as Scope did.

As our I-PASS wasn’t mounted in the car, I had to hold it up every time we drove under a toll scanner.



(Yep, still wearing my gloves.)

(And, yep, that’s my iPod hanging from the sun visor, playing The Chipmunks or something awesome like that through the radio as we drove. Poor, poor Scope.)

We hit a bunch of road work….



….and then another toll booth.



We passed by O’Hare Airport….



….and then another toll booth.



And then when traffic got claustrophobic and ugly and made us wanna start punching unicorns, we knew we were home! *le sigh*



We exited I-90 and wove our way through the side streets.



(Hey! Watch it there, Grandma!)

And then within minutes we were parked in our garage.



(No, those aren’t our bikes. We share the garage.)

(And, yes, I blocked out my license plate. That way, hopefully, none of the Wyomingites I offended in my two previous posts will be able to successfully hunt me down and drop an Acme anvil on me.)

(*fingers crossed*)

And soon I was opening our front door with my big, giant, swollen, mutant balloon hands (ewwwwwwwwwwwww)….



….and then we were introducing our pet frogs to their new home in Chicago!



For those who are curious, the frogs are happy here in their new home and are doing well. Wednesday is THRILLED to have her pet frogs back after living without them for a whole year. Yes, my swollen hands are totally back to normal now. No, we never got in any fights or got sick of each other during our five days in the car together; Scope and Wednesday were WONDERFUL! And, yes, we are still looking for a buyer for my car, but hopefully that will be resolved pretty soon.

All in all, it was an AMAZING trip! It truly was! I am so glad the five of us (don’t forget the frogs!) were able to share the experience together. We saw some spectacular things and we took roughly 2000 photos during those five days on the road…. which is the reason why it has taken so darn long to blog it all; soooooooooo many photos to sort through and edit! But I’m really glad we were as snap-happy as we were because now it will be UTTERLY IMPOSSIBLE for us to forget the adventures we had on our trip across America.

:-)

DAYS 4 AND 5 STATISTICS (FOR THE NERDY)

MILES DRIVEN ON DAY 4: 475
MILES DRIVEN ON DAY 5: 168
MILES DRIVEN TOTAL: 2233
MONEY SPENT ON GAS ON DAY 4: $64.72
MONEY SPENT ON GAS ON DAY 5: $15.04
MONEY SPENT ON GAS TOTAL: $212.57 or $239.60, depending on whether or not you believe the first fill up counts.
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN WA: 15 (Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington, and Alberta)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN ID: 3 (Nevada, West Virginia, and Quebec)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN MT: 9 (Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin, Wyoming, and British Columbia.)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN WY: 6 (Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, New York, and Ontario.)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN SD: 6 (Georgia, Missouri, New Jersey, Tennessee, Manitoba and Saskatchewan)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN MN: 1 (Pennsylvania)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN WI: 4 (Indiana, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and Virginia)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD IN IL: 2 (Mississippi and North Carolina)
LICENSE PLATES SEEN ON THE ROAD TOTAL: 46 (40 USA/6 Canada)
US LICENSE PLATES WE MISSED: 11 (Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Carolina, Vermont, and Washington DC…. although, we did see a couple of those in parking lots, but Scope said they didn’t count because they weren’t “on the road”. New Hampshire, I’m looking at you and shaking my fist menacingly!)

© Coracabana