A Colorful Lunch

I just had a very surreal dining experience. My boss, co-worker, and I went to Cypress Street Station, a nice restaurant in downtown Abilene, for lunch. It's a pretty fancy place, especially for Abilene. Well, we were enjoying our food, when one of the workers in the back started screaming at the manager. He was cussing him out, saying things like, "You don't (mess) with my daughter," etc. He must have said at least 15 cuss words before they pushed him out the back. This is a small restaurant, so EVERYONE heard. Afterwards, everyone was just silent for a few minutes. It was like being in a movie. Then, the manager came out and apologized to everyone. Our waiter kept apologizing over and over. I didn't think they had to apologize so much; it wasn't their fault. I just wonder what happened. Had the manager really slept with that guy's daughter, or was he just saying a bunch of stuff because he was angry? Anyway, it really was like something that would happen on a movie or T.V. show. And, hey, the food was still good, so who cares?

Marching Bands, Distant Relatives, and a Talking Bird

Well, guess what I did this weekend?

If you said, "watched 8 hours of a marching band competition," you are correct! And the scary part...I actually enjoyed it! For Darby's birthday (July 2), I got him tickets to the Drum Corps International (DCI) competition in San Antonio. So we saw 22 bands (just percussion, brass, and flags) made up of kids between the ages of 15-21. They practice all summer, and they are really, really good. They do a lot of cool visual stuff in their shows, so they're fun to watch. Mine and Darby's favorite band won, so we were happy. They were an all-guy corps, which I should be against, but I have to say, the all-guy corps were better. Mainly because every corps has flags, and the corps that have mixed guys-and-girls flags are scary. The guys have to wear really tight-fitting costumes and prance around. But the all-guy flag corps get to wear pretty manly costumes (as manly as flag costumes get) and do sharp-looking routines. I know I'm all about equality, but it is scary to see a guy wiggle his hips. Guys' bodies were just not made to move in certain ways.

Darby and I stayed with his great-aunt and uncle. They were so fun! They are 80 years old and have been married for 62 years. They argued constantly! If he said something happened three years ago, she said it was four. If she said we should take Highway 37, he said we should take Old Sulphur Springs Rd. But, right before she went to bed, he turned on the karaoke machine and sang "If Tomorrow Never Comes," by Garth Brooks to her. He has sung that song to her every night for two years! It was so sweet. And they were thrilled to have us stay with them. I got to sleep in the spare bedroom, but Darby had to sleep on the couch in the living room, and their bird woke him up with its squawking. Supposedly, the bird talks, but it was unintelligible to me. I couldn't tell the difference between, "I love you," and "Good morning," but evidently they could.

Anyway, it was a really fun weekend. It was the first time that Darby and I have taken an overnight trip together, just the two of us. We've been on church trips, and we've been on day trips to Schlitterbahn and Six Flags, but we've never planned a whole weekend trip together. Since we're both from Waco, we never stay in the same house overnight. I don't think we fought once. They say you shouldn't marry someone until you've traveled with them, so we can check that off our list.

One Wedding Down, One to Go

I survived my first stint as a bridesmaid. Actually, it was pretty fun. I'd do it again (which is a good thing considering I have to in just three short weeks). Kalyn and BJ's wedding was so beautiful and went off without a hitch. I had my doubts when Kalyn was still figuring out the music on Thursday night, but, like most things Kalyn does, it all came together in the end. Brittany and I defended our titles of world's biggest eaters by being the first ones (and the only girls) to go back for seconds at the rehearsal dinner barbecue. What can we say? We're growing girls!

Being a part of the whole wedding thing really made me impatient for mine to get here. Only 354 days to go : )

My scheming roommate

I have overslept the past three days in a row!! I have always been a morning person, so I almost never oversleep. It is so frustrating. Monday, my roommate came in at 7:30 to wake me up. (I usually get up at 6:45). I'm not sure what happened that day. Either my alarm went off and I turned it off without realizing it, or I had forgotten to turn it on. Tuesday, my alarm went off, and I pressed off instead of snooze. I woke myself up at 7:17. Last night, I told my roommate to check on me this morning and make sure I was awake because I didn't trust myself anymore. And sure enough, at 7:20, I hear, "Kayla, it's 7:20." Arrrggh! I know my alarm did not go off this morning because, if it had, I would have gotten up or at least thought very seriously about it. I did NOT want to oversleep again! The only solution I can think of is that Brittany is sneaking into my room at night and turning off my alarm clock, so she can laugh at me in the morning. Yep, that's it. I'll get her : ) I hate being rushed in the mornings! It just makes my whole day seem rushed. But, I have been enjoying the extra sleep, and I've still beaten my boss to work all three days, so I guess it's not all bad. Tonight, though, I am setting my cell phone alarm AND my regular alarm and hiding them so Britt can't get to them : )

New Blog!

Well, I decided since I just turned the big 2-1 and will be graduating in December, I should start a grown-up blog. No more Xanga for me : ) Really, I've just been envying my friends who host their blog on blogger. And I haven't been very inspired lately, so I thought a change of scenery might encourage me to write more. We'll see.

Yesterday, Darby, Brittany, and I went swimming at the Hardin-Simmons pool. Who knew they had an outdoor pool? And it's free for college students! That was the first time I had been swimming all summer, which made me sad since summer is already half-over. To me, summer is swimming. There's nothing like the feeling when you get out of the pool totally waterlogged and a little bit sunburned and go inside your nice, air-conditioned house and drink a Coke and eat a snack. (Swimming makes me really hungry.) And the water in the shower feels so good after you've peeled off your swimsuit. I feel cleaner after my post-swimming showers than at any other time. That's one thing I definitely miss about being a kid - going swimming more than once or twice a summer.

Another thing that reminds me of summer is Pop-Ices. I hadn't had one of those in years, but Darby and his roommate Ben bought a bunch of them to keep in their freezer, so I've had a couple this summer. I almost was poisoned by one, though. Darby gave me one from the freezer; I stuck it in my mouth and instead of tasting blue raspberry or whatever, I tasted some kind of chemical. I panicked and was like, "Darby, my tongue is burning." He remembered that Ben had cleaned out their freezer with Comet, of all things, and some of it must have gotten on the Pop Ices. So, there's a valuable lesson for you: Never clean your freezer with Comet (although who would really do that?)

What about everyone else; what is summer incomplete without?