My very first mini marathon!

Hellllloooo. You know me. I did not run a mini marathon. But I did go to one and cheer and hold up witty signs.

Ruble, who could build a spaceship if someone told her she couldn't, ran her SECOND mini marathon on Saturday. We haven't been able to see each other much lately since I've been busy with school and she's been traveling with work, so I headed to Louisville to cheer her to the finish line much like she's been cheering me to the finish line of nursing school. Which is to say she meets me for drinks after every test.

Not the type of drinks we normally have together.

Luckily, Steve has some previous experience as spectator and he came with custom-made Bloody-Mary-On-The-Go Kits, which made spectating a lot more fun.

There were about 18,000 runners, but Ruble was easy to spot with her bright pink shirt and glowing attitude. I swear she sprinted to the finish line and barely looked like she'd broken a sweat. I think she could have gone at least another 13 miles. I also think she's probably thinking about smacking me for saying that.

 

The runners, who were all shapes and sizes, were pretty entertaining, if you like watching a horde of lunatics jaunting past you. We saw Spartans and Elvises and guys in tuxedo jackets with tails and girls in tutus. But none of those people were as awesome to watch as Ruble, who once again was taking a challenge head on and fighting her way through it with grace and laughter and the quiet motivation that comes from the promise of a cold beer.

Way to go Ruble! I am so proud of you!

I got nothin'. Except a need to stay up 3 more hours.

I'm transitioning to being awake a night so I can go do three 7p-7a shifts for school, and I can't begin to tell you the steaming pile of crap this is. All week I've been up working at 8am, and I'm so tired my eyes feel like bouncy balls and I keep losing circulation in my feet, but can I go to bed? Noooo, because I need to sleep all day tomorrow.

It's a good thing I'm not hungry or that little rant up there could have reached seriously bitchy proportions.

Anyway, I went to Indiana a couple weekends ago for that funeral, and I had the most amazing time. I really have the best family, such a funny, smart, loving group of people. I got to meet my cousin Ryan's new baby boy and my cousin Isaac's new girlfriend (she bites him!). I reconnected with my step-sister Christy, who always made trips to farm country a blast. I discovered that my 82-year-old grandma's ringtone is "Who Let the Dogs Out" because she likes the barking. I finally gave my cousins Josh and Kristin that hug they desperately deserved. I toured my dad's new cabin in the woods, a place Ben named "Grampa Greg's Forest Adventure Park." I played volleyball with my cousins Andrea and Tee and my uncle Vince, and we laughed over "Starfish Boob Power" and "Downtown Becky" and the fact that Vince was doing sports with a 24 oz. Mountain Dew in his back pocket. I sat on the back porch with Leiah and Betsy and Andrea while her kids climbed all over her and we lamented about life. I went mushroom hunting and saw a trio of 50-year-old women turn into 9-year-olds on stick horses playing "Shane, Kill and Miss Kitty." Uncle Tony cooked hot dogs on the grill, uncle Vince made a bon fire that could have wiped out a small town, and I got to tease my dad about his soft hands. Aunt Tina got Tony an ice cream cake for his birthday and out of niceness added "and Steve" to it, but then she realized it wasn't Steve's birthday so she scraped the icing off but it was so obvious it became the best part of the cake. Shannon finally let me win Kieron over with loud noises. Becky made me vegetarian lasagna and collard greens. We all crowded into the living room and watched UK make it to the final game. I learned how to make microwave popcorn in a brown paper bag, and Charles got a steam facial in the middle of the kitchen like a real man. Lilly greeted me every morning with arms open wide, a smile across her face, and a waddle in my direction. I swear, that is better than seeing the sunrise, and this group of weirdos that share my DNA are the reason that my heart beats.

Emoting.

My aunt Kathy died a horrific death last week. As part of my grieving process, I escaped the present and blanketed myself in old photos and 8mm video clips my dad, her brother Greg, gave to me a couple years ago. I didn't know Kathy very well lately, but the times I spent with her as a kid and a young adult were formative and are precious.

The things I remember most about Kathy are the giant birthmark she had on her arm, playing with her kids, my cousins Josh and Kristin, at her house on Otto Street, one time when I was very young and she used her food stamps to buy me Planters Cheese Curls, and a story she told me about slamming on the brakes in front of a cop that was riding her ass when she was 7 months pregnant. Why these moments with Kat keep bubbling to the surface of my mind more than any others, I have no idea. Memory is funny like that.

The thing I loved the most about Kathy was her wild streak, and that's probably what ultimately got her in the shape she was in at the end. Kathy joked after my grandpa had a fatal heart attack on the toilet that it was her criminal record that he'd chosen as reading material that did him in. She had a bright smile, one that squinted up her eyes and was usually followed by a deep laugh. She let me crash on her couch when I couldn't stay with my dad, she told me grown up jokes, and she refused to take herself too seriously. I think Kathy deserves credit for giving me the gift of self-deprecation, for shaping my sense of humor, and for that tiny speck of rebellion and criminal intent that is deep in my gut.

Because it's what I do, I set out to make a memorial video of my aunt Kathy. And because it is what I do, I started looking for some ideas to rip off, something that had music that really spoke to the spark that Kathy gave the world. My project isn't complete, but these things were just too amazing not to share.

Facts

I was helping Leiah paint her new pad the other day when Ben walks in and starts dictating to me proper paint technique and how he wants the closet to be blue. I swear I have no idea where he gets this brand of bossy, but I had already painted the closet yellow and I knew he was fighting a losing battle. To spare his ego, I decided to pull out the old tool of distraction and asked him about his girlfriend at day care.

"So who's this girl I hear has been kissing you at day care?"

"She's got yellow hair and her name is Sky." He gets right down to the nitty gritty, doesn't he?

"Sky, huh? Well, is she cute?"

"No," he said, exasperated that I would even ask such a thing. "Girls are pretty."

"Oh, so is she pretty?"

"Yes, girls have to be pretty."

"What happens if a girl is not pretty?" I sincerely asked.

"She goes to jail," he sincerely answered.

This was a serious talk, and even though the inside of me was rolling on the floor laughing, I knew if I wanted to get more of these delightful 5-year-old insights, I had to hold it together. Naturally, I switched the topic to boys. "What about boys? Do boys have to be cute too?"

"No," he says, and I swear if he knew how to roll his eyes he would have. That is how annoying I am. "Boys are handsome."

"But what if a boy isn't handsome? What then?"

Ben looked at me like it's a miracle I made it this far in life being so dumb. "They have to wear ladies' clothes."

There you have it. Ugly girls go to jail and ugly boys must dress as ladies.

Tweedle Lee Dee Dee.

St. Patrick's Day has got to be one of my favorite holidays. There's beer and day drinking and a parade and legends of tiny men with pots of gold and everyone dresses up in green and you get to pinch the non-compliant... all of my favorite things AND socially sanctioned violence!!

This year, at the invitation of Ms. Seana O'Neill (Irish names do not get more legit than that), we decided to participate in the Tweed Ride. We got all dressed up in tweed, hopped on our bikes, and took over the roads in downtown Lexington. Group drunk driving has never been so fun.

Luckily no one got hurt and no one got arrested. That's not to say that no one crashed their bike in the middle of the road or that no one got in trouble for laying in a stranger's yard to look for four-leaf clovers.

We met a few new interesting people, some with very old timey facial hair, some with toy cameras, and one who was driving her special kind of crazy around downtown to espouse the health benefits of smoking. Yes, you read that right. Her dad never would have died from COPD if only he'd kept smoking. Her van is a rolling campaign for smoking.

In a moment of "better judgment," we ditched Lynda the Smoking Lover and headed to McCarthy's to toast the Irish. I thought I was drunk until I went into McCarthy's. One old guy talked to me for about 10 minutes before I finally had to say, "It seems like what you're saying is very important to you, but I literally do no understand a word coming out of your mouth." To which he replied, "grengngheljhlblarerebgbjljheerersnsghshsrghgh." I think the old lady he was with peed her chair too.

McCarthy's was just bad enough to give us sense and just good enough to be a good ending. We got to watch the UK game and as we started heading home, a real Irishman gave us the accent and wished us a happy St. Patrick's Day. I was in bed by 10:30, and my hangover was completely gone by the time I woke up. The luck of the Irish.

For those who care.

I have just a few weeks left of nursing school. That fact doesn't jive with the absence of knowledge in my brain, but somehow it's true. I have almost accomplished this bizarre idea that settled in my mind three years ago. I'm still not quite sure how it all happened, how nurse trumped graphic designer and professional organizer and party planner on the list of Things I Could Do to Make Money, but it did and so we are here.

The past three years have been spent getting used to poop and snot and giving shots and pretending to hear heart murmurs and trying to mask the look of disgust on my face when lunch comes to the unit. I have been completely annoyed with the woman thanking God for helping her stand while I cleaned the diarrhea off of her legs. I have been shocked by the drug addict whose arm had become so swollen it had to be cut open and left that way until she recovered. I have been heartbroken at the baby with CMV who was deaf and struggling to breathe and tragically inconsolable. I have been humbled by the man whose sinus infection went into his brain and took away the personality he always had. I have been astounded by the woman whose heart was being paced by the device taped to her throat. I have been mesmerized by the Congolese woman who clucked her way through childbirth. I have been scared of the wound-up man pacing the halls of the psychiatric unit with an animalistic look in his eyes. I have been grateful for the news that they got all of one man's lung cancer through surgery. I have been inspired by the 91-year-old woman with no children and no husband who had an endless string of friends at her bedside.

I have seen and been a part of things I didn't know were possible, and even more incredible, I have cared for people going through these things. Somehow, I managed to merge compassion, intuition, responsibility, knowledge, and common sense to a productive and useful end, even though that end was usually one lap around the nurse's station.

I can't believe how fast it has gone by, how much has been crammed into it, and how much I have yet to experience. And I can't wait for the part where I make money again. I think we should probably have a party to celebrate.

Another week in Kentucky.

Last Tuesday I got out of school and went to walk the Arboretum with Leigh. It was so gorgeous even Mack couldn't resist the Kentucky, and we met up with him at the field to watch him fly his airplane. The whole day felt like I was high on drugs and it was all because of warm sunshine. I even brought my scooter out of hibernation.

On Friday, the sky turned tornado green, pea-sized hail bounced around the backyard, and apparently West Liberty went from being a town to being a field of garbage. It was a strangely pretty day on Friday, with bursts of sunlight trading places with ominous clouds until the sheets of rain blew in and swirled up what's left of the leaves in the gutters and made fun of us for "new construction."

And then today. Today I wake up to four inches of snow on the ground. I feel like I live in a state of bipolar.

Babies belong in skinny jeans.

Because I have not seen her or her wonderful mommy in months, Anna granted me a play date last weekend while she was visiting her Gigi.

She showed me what a good zoo keeper she'd by closing the doors on all the animals on her Busy Poppin' Pals toy. Then she taught me how she keeps her petite frame by doing a quick jumpy workout. Then she got on all fours and demonstrated her new reverse-crawling technique, which is sort of like forward crawling but totally opposite. Then I taught her about those naughty little piggies that are always running off to do errands, and she got a real kick out of the weee-deee-weeeeee-weeeee one.

After about 45 minutes of casting her spell on me, Anna's Gigi came home. I know only an idiot stands between the baby meat and its Gigi, so I stepped aside while Jen's mom fed Anna her homemade lunch. She ate just a few bites, and then the baby angel whose soulful eyes rival those of Hanley got very sleepy. Her Gigi was going to put her down, so I moved in to steal one last cuddle.

That's when Anna grabbed my face, leaned in, and gave me the sweetest open mouth kiss of my life. We are lovahs.

Feel the Love

Mack took me to a $200 dinner at Bellini's last night. We both put on fancy clothes and I had gorgeous hair. The seared ahi tuna tasted like bacon, but I'm going to believe the chef who claims bacon had nothing to do with that dish so that I don't have to toss the leftovers. The whole thing ended with tiramisu and a walk arm-in-arm to the car.

But all that was nothing compared to this.

That is a hand-drawn card of a bunny riding a unicorn with a tail that has a heart growing a flower on it. And a sun. So long Hallmark, hello HallMack.

The inside of the card was even more wonderful than the cover, full of the most wonderful things I've ever had said to me. I almost cried, but I was dressed all fancy and my mascara would run and Mack hates feelings.

Like most people on Valentine's Day, Mack and I ended the night laying in bed together, where he really put the moves on me.

(Apologies for the mental picture of Mack putting the moves on me. I know it's a big price to pay for the Words with Friends joke, but I appreciate your tolerance.)

I miss my pookie.

I was going through some pictures today and came across a bundle from New Years that just made me laugh. I spent most of the holiday break at my parents' house since that's where the babies are and my mom had her gallbladder removed, but I managed to make it home in time to see Sarah before she headed back to Ohio to school people in geography.

Sarah wanted to go to Chinoe Pub because there is karaoke and undeniably amazing people watching. And because, according to Sarah, it's a bar you can comfortably wear sweat pants to. Pretty much everyone there was in sweat pants, but THAT DOES NOT MAKE IT OKAY TO WEAR SWEAT PANTS TO A BAR. I had to issue a mandate that I would never let Sarah wear sweat pants to a bar before she is 80, which, according to Betty White, is the age at which you dress for the bathroom. Sarah may only be 33, but she has more in common with 90-year-old Betty White than you'd think.

For instance, both have played naked darts.

Anyway, we planned just to stay for a couple hours, but before we knew it, 5 had passed and Mack was pretty much owning the karaoke stage. Sarah and I  picked out a Who song for him to sing since he sings just like Roger Daltrey, and Mack took the stage, pointed our way, said, "This one is for those two lovely ladies over there," and then broke out with Fat Bottomed Girls.

If it wasn't so hilarious and kind of true, we would have been insulted.

Part of the reason I love Sarah is how much fun she is to pick on. Whenever I see her, it's sort of a secret goal I have to pick on her so much that she eventually cries, usually from laughing so hard. There have been one or two occasions where the crying might have been from cigarette burns, but that's ancient history now. Sarah is a great sport, bottling up any annoyance she may have that would feed the fire and taking it in stride until she finally gives in to the absurdity of it and sheds tears (of joy).

This time Mack started with the subtle taunting, filling Sarah's mug up to the brim so that she had to slurp it before she moved it. See, Sarah is so fun to taunt that even Mack, the man who hates fun, can't resist.

Sarah, in true Sarah fashion, flashed her "are you sure you're not 13" look, gave a chuckle, and succumbed to what became one of the best recurring themes of the evening. And that is why I love and miss her so much right now.

Dulywed

Says me: "Babe, if you need to have sex with me on the kitchen table later, I'll allow it."

Says he: "Do you know how tiny our kitchen table is? No way."

I think that makes this marriage official.

Rolls

These rolls go in my belly. And then I get rolls on my belly. I call it January-February Disease.

Thanks, once again, to the Pioneer Woman for the photo tutorial on how to make these delicious swirls of diabetes and the insanely fab recipe (which I halved and still got more than 30 rolls).

Jen, I'll be bringing you your very own batch of miniature ones the next time I see you.

In the mood.

Guess who has a test tomorrow? Which is why I also have a party mood board for an upcoming baby shower!

My friend Becky, who I met through the Lexington Art League, is having a girl, and she and her husband Nick are artsy types. They're designing a nursery based on Dave Egger's book It Is Right to Draw Their Fur, which has lots of drawings and sentiments that are funny/tragic/awkward/poetic. Here's one of my favorites:

I love the twisty darkness of the animals and the sayings, but it does make for a challenging baby shower. Lots of artsy types are on the invite list, so rather than typical shower games, we're going to do a Onesie printing activity, where guests get to block print an Eggers-ish animal or an unusual sentiment on a Onesie. I've never done this particular crafty project before, but if it works out, it could become an obsession. You have no idea the instant gratification of cutting stamps.

Now, isn't that more exciting than ulcerative colitis? Or, better yet, anal fistulas?!

Uno Año

I believe this sufficiently depicts the evolution of a sugar high. And the joy that is cake and babies.

Apples and trees and no, this isn't about gravity.

I made my New Year's resolution to watch 2 hours or less of television a day. I know, that is a sissy resolution and what am I doing watching that much television as an adult in nursing school anyway. But, you guys, have you seeeeeen Workaholics? And Gold Rush? And you know Jersey Shore is back on, right?

Anyway, I'm doing a pretty good job keeping to the 2-hour max... okay, there was a sort of hangover day where I watched way more than that, but to be fair, it did make me really annoyed. To fill the extra time, I've started a few good books, signed up to plan a baby shower, did a photo shoot with sweet little Iris, and have been going to the Y to do yoga. I'm also cooking a lot more often, the dishes stay pretty done, and I am way on top of laundry.

Learning pharmacology, though. I have not yet become that desperate.

Tonight, after I turned off the Betty White birthday special, I decided to go through some photos from Christmas. That's when I found this gem.

Much like having Renee was like being a grown up and getting to know Shannon all over again, except this time I was 30 years older than she, having Kieron is like getting to see Renee if she was a baby boy.

He feels so familiar in that video that I spent a couple of hours tonight going through Shannon's old blog and watching videos of Renee when she was a brand new baby. This just proves that genetic stuff is uncanny.

Renee was a little ham hock when she was a baby, so tight and stacked it earned her the nickname The Meat. Well, if she was The Meat, Kieron is The Sausage.

He is already more than 20 pounds, he eats in his sleep, and if babies could play football, he'd be a starting player. They have the exact same nose, the exact same disdain for being annoyed, and the exact same ability to make their auntie do ridiculous things to make them laugh.

Wishy Washy

Someone's got a birthday coming up, and since she's got the smartest auntie in the world, she is learning some valuable skills in preparation for the big day.

While "where's your nose" isn't going as well as we hoped, she's pretty much there with giving five and has basically mastered this vital skill...

Why does the fan have all that shit on it?

My "Uncle Ron" died of pancreatic cancer.

My mom got in a fender bender.

Charles lost his job.

Hey, 2012, lay the fuck off, okay. And just because you deserve it, here's me and Ben giving you a giant middle finger because THAT'S HOW HE DRAWS HANDS.

My List of Things that Are Destroying Humanity

Sorry, but I can't keep this in anymore.

1. Crocs
They're just rubber toe jam vessels. It's disgusting, just revolting, to think of cooks, dishwashers, nurses and surgeons wearing these foot condoms. Look, guys, tying isn't that hard, and if you "cain't bend," the last thing you need is a shoe to enable you.

2. Recliners
I like to lay down and watch TV as much as the next person, but when you're being that lazy, you shouldn't have an audience. You should be filled with a quiet shame that keeps you from making sitting on your ass in a Cadillac chair your favorite past time. The recliner is in the living room, where other people are living. You do not need to show off your sleep apnea and how close you are to death by sleeping in a recliner. 

3. Snuggies
Really? Is it that hard to keep the blanket up by your neck? Are your arms really so cold all the time that you simply have to have a backwards fleece robe to keep from getting hypothermia? Is a throw blanket seriously not cutting it for you? If you put on a Snuggie, even if it's at an outdoor sporting event, someone needs to slap you.

4. Forever Lazy
These actually have a way to zip open the ass. ZIP OPEN THE ASS. Why bother? If you're in a Forever Lazy, you're probably shitting your pants anyway because getting up to go to the bathroom, sitting down on the toilet, and squeezing out a loaf is just something you're too lazy to do. Forever Lazy ought to be called Mostly Dead.

5. Fast Food
This shouldn't even get to be called "food" anymore (except Wendy's, which does actually manage to cook some things themselves). It's chemically engineered mouth garbage, and it's worse for our humanity than meth. I'm convinced that both of them make you mentally retarded if overconsumed. I know the deliciousness of a McDonald's French Fry, and even knowing they're toxic, I sometimes succumb to them. By sometimes I mean once every 5 years. Some people consider this cotton candy shaped as burgers and fries as suitable for breakfast, lunch, and dinner... for themselves AND THEIR KIDS. We tax cigarettes and alcohol and those are now killing fewer people than fast food. That fast food isn't being taxed is a sin.

6. Walmart
Just going in to Walmart gives me anxiety. I usually last about 3 minutes before I've got to get out of there or else I'm going to start buying stuff to make bombs. I don't even care that Morningstar Sausage Patties are $1.30 cheaper there than at Kroger. I would pay $6 more just to avoid seeing those people driving their carts and filling them with ice cream, pork chops, and Mountain Dew, knowing they have health insurance and I don't.

7. Suburbs
Strip malls and cars and sameness, oh my. And I don't know why, but people triple in size in the suburbs. I grew up in the suburbs, and the suburbs of my youth are not the suburbs of today. We moved to the suburbs so we could ride our bikes and play in the safety of a cul de sac. Now when I end up in the suburbs, I never see a kid riding a bike or shooting basketball. I see fences and rigidly landscaped yards with Japanese Maples and giant garages. I know people live in the suburbs, but you never see them. 

8. PINK Sweatpants
I used to think PINK Sweatpants, the "college"of Victoria's Secret, were kind of cute. That is, until 90% of the women in my college starting wearing them to school. Sweatpants are fine if you're prepping to kick Creed's ass by racing up the stairs at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. They're even fine if you're wearing them at home so that you don't resort to wearing a Forever Lazy. Sweatpants, however, are not appropriate attire for the public. Has the fashion sense of women really devolved so much in 50 years that sweatpants and Ugg boots are the best we can do? Am I crazy to think that jeans and a shirt aren't that hard to put on?

9. Cigarettes
These are worse than fast food by like a millimeter. Maybe even a micrometer. Maybe they're just as bad. As a past social smoker and an intermittent drunk smoker, I just wish they'd do me and everyone else in the world a favor and ban these things already.

10. Cars
People drive these 4,000 pound missiles like their riding in a little red wagon. They text and fiddle with the radio and talk on the phone and then they try to kill me in a crosswalk or run over me on my bike. Not to mention their contribution to our environmental woes and our sedentary lifestyles. We have one car, and when it's 17 degrees outside, I'm incredibly grateful for it. But I don't use it as a kitchen, I understand how a 4-way stop works, and if it's 17 degrees out, I'm conscientious enough to give way to the pedestrians.

Endings and Beginnings

My dad's oldest brother, Uncle Bobby, passed away just before Thanksgiving. I don't have too many memories about him, but I adore my cousins Magnolia and Shannon and once pretended I was Scarlett O'Hara at his sprawling country house in Simpsonville.

Bobby's was the second funeral for me in November, the first being Sarah's sweet, wonderful mom Sally. In the weird twists of life, I actually knew Sally better than my Uncle Bobby. She brought me a set of screwdrivers for a housewarming gift when I bought my first home on Picadome, and I brought her a cake for her 43rd wedding anniversary. I know she thought I was the reason Sarah always smelled like smoke in high school, but despite my bad reputation, she trusted me to flush her IV and thus was my first patient that I nursed without supervision. I barely recognized my Uncle Bobby at the family reunion/Pa's 100th birthday party in April.

Family is immensely important to me, and not just my immediate family. I have Scotts that I am bound to, Hensleys that I have adopted, Bachmans that I grew up with, and friends who are so close they feel like family. I'm not always as good to them as I should be, but when it really counts, I try to be there. So when Uncle Bobby died, when that loss left my dad with an oozing sadness, I headed to Louisville with chicken noodle soup, crusty bread, pumpkin cookies, and my camera.

I sat with my Aunt Cindy, my dad, and my cousins and poured over pictures of Uncle Bobby. I listened to stories of limo rides in New York City, laughed at all the what-were-we-thinking hairstyles, stared in disbelief at how much he looked like James Caan, and got to know the man who sent all of us those sweatshirts with the Manhattan skyline when I was in elementary school.

This year has been saturated with endings -- Uncle Bobby, Sally, the Onheiser's dad, Jess's dad. But it's also been one filled with beginnings -- Lilly, Kieron, Elly Gail, Charlotte, Anna, Hanley. I don't know what 2012 holds, but if 2011 taught me anything, it's to live every day like the end of the world is on its way.

Belize dat. This might be my first novel.

The first big trip I took as an adult – my first voyage to California, actually – took me 5 months to plan. The trip Mack and I just took to Belize? We spent all of 30 minutes on it.

Basically we decided we needed someplace warm, someplace where we could get by with English, someplace cheapish, and someplace we could fly to LA and Kentucky from that wouldn't take either of us a day and a half. Belize fit that criteria the best and won the honors of a visit from us. Belize is so lucky.

We decided to rent a car and drive inland for the first leg. I'd read about a cave where Mayans used to do human sacrifice and desperately wanted to check it out, and Mack wanted to lay on a beach and pretend he wasn't a med student for a week. I won... at first.

We hopped in our little Suzuki Sidekick and headed to San Ignacio. The highway was great and it was only a couple hours drive from Belize City. As I happen to do, I got hungry and decided we needed to stop and get some local snacks, so about an hour in, we pulled over at a little roadside market. I bought fried plantains and Mack was offered a special green juice from a toothless guy on the steps that guaranteed his penis would be bigger and harder, and probably faster and stronger too.

We got to San Ignacio just as it was getting dark. I always get a little nervous when it gets dark and I don't know where I'm going because, well, I'm blind. Mack started to cross a bridge to head into town AND THEN WE REALIZED IT WAS ONE WAY.

See, how lucky is Belize?

 
Some locals helped us save a little bit of dignity, and we eventually made our way to the Midas Resort, a little complex of huts in the middle of the jungle along a river. The place was adorable, but the best part of it was the breakfast, which is where we met Marie Sharp and her boyfriend the Fry Jack.

 

Marie Sharp's habanero hot sauce is HOT, and the Fry Jack is like a puff of unadorned doughnut, but when you put them together and sop up your black beans and eggs with them, commence addiction.

With full bellies we headed out to do some exploring. The side roads were a little rougher than the highway, but we figured we'd be alright with our trusty Sidekick. We took our time heading down Belize's backroads, and that is when we spotted them.

The Amish. On a horse drawn buggy. Just a riding down the road. Like it's Minnesota or something.

Apparently a group of Mennonites from the Netherlands went wandering around in the late 1700s and eventually decided Belize was awesome. It's probably a good thing too, because their little colonies feed a lot of the country with their farms and without them, there'd be no dairy. How anyone lives without cheese is beyond me.

We saw a sign for 1,000 Foot Falls and headed off the main side road like true adventurers. Mack was at the wheel and getting pretty good at dodging the major potholes and navigating through mud, so I just sat in the passenger seat like a happy idiot on vacation.

The thing about Belize and driving is this: everything is 4 times longer than it says it is. The 1,000 Foot Falls were supposed to be 7 miles off the main road, but I swear we drove 15 and... nothing. I knew we must be getting close when we saw another car of tourists on the road. Mack scooted the Suzuki to the far right to dodge the mud, and then this happened.

If you've never had the privilege of getting stuck in the mud with other tourists, let me just tell you about it. It's actually pretty wonderful. You don't have to feel like a total moron all by yourself. You don't lose your shit on your spouse because there's an audience. And there's a real sense of camaraderie that comes from trying to push a car out of the mud and getting splattered in the face.

After about an hour of feeling worthless physically, we started using our brains and paired our cell phone with their fancy resort to call for help. 

Once we were rescued, the only thing we wanted to do was drink a beer. We dropped the car at a car wash, popped open a couple of Belikins, made buddies with the car wash owner and his family, and literally washed down the dust.

At the end of that day, Mack was pretty fed up with my inland adventure and wanted to get to a beach. I managed to talk him into one more day to go on the cave hike human sacrifice adventure, and even though he started off mad, I know he absolutely loved it because he smiled ALL DAY LONG. This does not happen. See above.

The hike to Actun Tunuchil Muknal, which they kindly refer to as ATM since no one can say those other words, involved traversing three rivers with water up to your waist, skating down a mud trail, and learning how not to kill a whiny woman named Mary who insisted her husband John hold her hand ALL THE TIME. I'm not gonna lie, I kind of wanted her to drown.

Once we got to the cave, we discovered we'd have to swim in. Like can't touch the ground swim in. It was absolutely one of the most awesome things I've ever done and one of the most mysterious places I've ever been.

We wandered through the cave for about an hour, and I showed off my amazing butt climbing skills. Eventually we came to a "cathedral," a giant dry part of the cave that's like an enormous room just asking for human sacrifice. We looked at some tumped over pots and learned that they were only used once and then even they were "killed"by breaking them or putting holes in them and arranging them a really special way. Then we saw bones. Then we saw skulls. Then we had to climb a ladder, Mary whined about it, I sacrificed her, and we saw an entire skeleton of a teenage girl who was like a princess who was sacrificed because, clearly, the Mayans were getting desperate and the convicts and children they'd been sacrificing were not making the gods very happy.

There are no words decent enough for this experience, no photos that really do it justice, but my god I am glad I got to do this in my life.

Feeling sufficiently satisfied by my inland adventure time, Mack and I headed to the cayes the next day. We hopped a ferry to Caye Caulker, a little strip of land with two dirt roads, no cars, and plenty of restaurants. It was a little touristy, but Mary and John were nowhere to be seen and that's all that mattered. Well, that and access to a hammock.

We managed to snag a room at Da Real Macaw for the night and sat on the porch looking out at the ocean while Mack won some kitty love from a little guy who'd been in so many fights his ears were round. There was a bar right next to our hotel that had swings, and that's when I discovered that the pace of life on Caye Caulker is equal to that of a swing blowing in the wind, preferably a wind scented by mojitos.

 

Having mastered the art of absolute relaxation, it was time for another adventure. We booked a snorkeling tour to the Hol Chan Marine Reserve. Not only did we get to tickle the belly of nurse sharks, pet green moray eels, snorkel with giant sting rays and sea turtles, and wander around a coral garden, we also ate fresh-from-the-ocean conch ceviche and finished 2 gallons of rum punch before the day was done. It was incredible.

Belize taught me that breakfast really is the most important meal of the day, getting your heart beat paced by the waves is pure therapy, and any time you can get a man in a snorkel to give you the "blue steel" look, do it. But most importantly, it taught me that 30 minutes of planning leaves you plenty of time to find the most extraordinary surprises.  Belize Navidad!