Pennsyltucky Adventure

I find it extremely redundant to recount our entire trip to Mechanicsburg, PA since Doug has already done so. Do me a favor and read his account first, and then come back to mine. I'm just going to add my twist on a few things and touch on a few things he left out. Every story needs a woman's touch! Especially when 3/4 of the group of us are girls. Here we go:

DAY ONE

Amy stopped by my house around 9:00 to begin our adventure. She caught the tail end of a clip about Abby Cadabby I was showing my mom. Don't worry, there will be more on Abby Cadabby later in this blog entry.

Amy and I set out to go get Doug. On the way we played with Amy's interestingly named playlists on her iPod and listened to some old school music. Tis the only way to travel! Amy and I also kept getting ominous signs that we were going to be attacked by a buffalo at some point during this trip. Reasons being: 1. One of the CD's in Amy's front seat visor case kept jumping out at us randomly on our way to pick up Doug. What picture was on the CD? Why a picture of a buffalo of course! 2. When getting change for one of the tolls, I grabbed a quarter. It happened to be a state quarter (Kansas) with a buffalo on it. Ahh!

When we got closer to Doug's house, we started to follow Amy's not-as-detailed-as-Megan's directions and somehow ended up in Jersey. I really don't understand how because we followed the correct sign. I guess it was misleading. Doug did the same thing going home from my house so I guess I can't tease him about it anymore. Oh well. When we finally arrived at Doug's house, we pulled into the only open spot on his street and proceeded to search for his house number. While Amy was strategically scanning the other side of the street, I noticed the house we pulled in front of happened to be Doug's. This was Amy's blonde moment on our trip. Don't worry, we all had one.

We picked up Doug and, as he mentioned, shoved a huge candy cane in his face and forced him to finish it by the time we got to Megan's. Too bad that didn't go as planned. Amy and I did talk about dancing, but it wasn't nearly as boring as Doug made it out to be. Now, Megan and I talk about dancing in a literal sense, but Amy and I merely discussed the hilarity of some of the cheesy songs we danced to, dumb props we had to use in some dances, and some old outrageous costumes that probably would have disgusted Prince. Had Doug been listening in, he probably would have enjoyed the hilarity of it all.

Next was Doug's blonde moment of the trip which he recapped fairly well. What he missed was the part where Amy and I were screaming for him to give us the phone as he was attempting to hang up with Megan. Thus the reason for me extending my hand back to him for the phone. The high five was priceless! My blonde moment was pronouncing Weis Market incorrectly. What can I say? I is smrt.

The State Museum, although extremely outdated, was very entertaining. At one point we were discussing whether the "dog machine" was used to grind up dogs, or was simply dog operated. Luckily, it was the latter! Also, Amy and I came face to face with yet another buffalo. This time it was life size! After that, Amy and Megan learned what life would be like as a mole, Doug goggled at the gigantic spider, and I identified as many PA birds as I possibly could. Good times, good times. When we had our fill of the museum, we stopped at the gift shop. Amy got red and blue flat taffy and the rest of us got a candy stick. You're never too old to get candy at the end of an outing!

Back to Megan's for some gift exchanging. Pictures are posted on Facebook if you wish to view them. The McGee family Christmas tree is absolutely adorable with very cool ornaments. We had fun playing with those cute little ornaments! Gift exchange was a hoot and was topped off by a quick speaker phone convo with Jess.

As Doug stated, Megan's friends were so much fun! And Balderdash? Let's just say I fell for Amy's answers like a sucker. The worst part about it was that half the time I knew they were her answers. Better luck next time I guess. My personal favorite was "What does C.C.A. stand for?": "Crispy Catholics Anonymous".

We finished the night out with some of "The Birdcage" because I'd never seen it. We went to bed somewhere around 1:00 I believe. Well, we were supposed to go to bed around then. Amy and I stayed up talking for most of the night. We probably fell asleep somewhere around 3:00. I love chatting with Amy! We come up with the most interesting things to talk about! The again that's probably the result of a conversation held at 3:00 in the morning after a long, fun day.

DAY TWO

After a breif musical interlude (compliments of Doug on the ivories) we headed over to Gettysburg. We brought along some serious brain food: gold fish crackers, honey buns, and fruit by the foot. After visiting almost every monument on the self guided tour, we finished at PA's kick as monument. We payed our respects to Private Fangboner and Private Woodcock. We also learned that Isaac Newton and Eddy Murphy served in PA's infantry. And for those of you in the Masque, we found Private Sullivan, Private Costello, Private McGee (with multiple spellings), Private Henderson, Private McBride, and Private Neff. Amy and Doug were frantically trying to find a Nickerson or a Phelan on the infantry list. I took one look at the names and came to the logical conclusion that "My people weren't here yet." Amy came close with a Nickleson.

After dinner we continued our sing-a-long with Doug on the piano. We sang nearly the entire musical of Avenue Q, some Ben Folds, some of Andrew Llyod Weber's greatest hits, and some of Billy Joel's greatest hits. I was very grateful that Megan was nice enough to play some of my requests. My boyfriend would not (boo!). So I like "She's Always A Woman To Me" and "No One Is Alone". I admit it! At least Megan appreciates my taste in music...

We ended the night with the remainder of "The Birdcage" and "1776". I had no idea that Pennsylvania was almost responsible for America not being independent from England. Ain't we just a bunch of jackasses? And I didn't know that some of the founding fathers were so hot, especially Thomas Jefferson! Or that they could sing! Just imagine if everyone in the House and Senate was good looking and had theatrical background. Gay rights would surely be passed!

After our movies we watched a little YouTube. What did we watch? 1776 spoofs of course! They were absolutely hilarious, especially the music video to Men In Tights. After a few renditions of "Dick in a Box", we decided to call it a night. Now, tonight Amy and I went right to sleep because we knew we had a long trip home tomorrow. However, things did not go as we planned. I don't know exactly what time in the morning (only that it was dark out) is was when we started to hear a banging on our door. At first I thought it could have been Megan, but as I opened the door I discovered it was Megan's cat, Grace. She ran in the room and decided she wanted to sleep with the gals. She ran between my legs, between Amy's legs, and chose a comfy spot between us to nestle up and go to sleep. So what did Amy and I do? We got up to pet the kitty! She was so cute and cuddly, how could we resist?

We woke up the next morning and played the "let's keep Val away from us so we can look at each other's Masque Baby Books" game. I have a feeling I lost. We also had one last sing-a-long with Megan and Doug on the piano. And as an added bonus, I got to see some of Megan's absolutely precious dance pictures. She was lucky. Her studio knew how to pick nice costumes! We also got to see a few scenes from Megan's high school performance of "My Fair Lady". Little Megan and her little cockney accent were so much fun to watch!

After saying our goodbyes to Megan and her family, and Doug ripping me from the front seat, we headed home. What a fun trip!

Which brings us to today...an entirely different story. It started out with Sesame auditions. I was excited to see some of the people that I haven't seen since August. I filled out my paperwork as usually and went to stretch and warm up with the rehires. I learned that the show Abby Cadabby is in has been officially changed from and actor show to a dancer show. I'm beyond excited! However, there were quite a few short girls at audtions this year. Actually there was a boy in my group who was small enough to be Elmo. And he was good! You know, a 16 year old who could pass for 12 and probably weighs half of me. I think in the entire history of Sesame Place, there has only been one boy Elmo. Technically this boy was perfect Zoe height, but that would be cruel and unusual to make him be Zoe. As far as auditions on a whole, I really enjoyed the routine this year. It was the fastest it's ever been. I don't exactly know why, but it was just really fast. And the 2 eight-counts worth of improv dancing was quite hilarious. I was in a group with all rehires, so before they started the music we kind of made up a beginning 4 counts which included all of us crouching in a circle on the ground and then standing up with spirit fingers. Our bosses asked us to do something amusing, so we did! Why would we dazzle them with skills they already know we have when we could make them laugh with something silly? It's not like they won't rehire us. What upset me was the fact that the NBC10 guy never showed up. For the past 2 years I've been on NBC10 at 11:00. Not this year I guess.

Now all I have to do today is run to Color Me Mine and pick up Doug's frame. It's pretty sad that the person who put the backing on the frame put it on up-side down. I mean, there were words on the front of the frame. It wasn't like she had to guess which end was up. After that I have to find some stuff at AC Moore, get some stuff together for Disney, and I planned on cleaning my room a bit today. Hopefully I'll get to that.

And for the rant portion of the day: I hate my dad. I know it sounds terribly angsty, but I honestly wish he would fly out to Conneticuit, Canada, or where ever the hell he spends 5/7 days of the week working and just goddamn stay there. No one likes when he's home. I sure as hell can't stand it. He chose to have a high stress job so that does not render him the right to take it out on whoever is in earshot. I don't care how many people he had to step on to be in the high job position he's in today, he has no right to step on this family. It's become a huge problem. I'm sick of brushing it off and "having respect for him" because the only thing that has done has made him worse. And it's why I hate coming home. However, I'm in a bit of a pickle. My dad is seriously threatening to give away or kill my bird. At first he wanted to give it away, now he's seriously considering killing it. No this is not a harmless threat. As hard as it is to believe, he's dead freakin' serious. This bird is my pet and he means the most out of all my pets to me. He's not doing anything wrong. If my dad kept his stupid dog away from my bird's cage then maybe the bird wouldn't be so loud. That's his problem. My bird was here first. How would you feel if you had to go back to school knowing your dad might kill your dog or your cat while your not home?

LaTeR