So I flew up to Dallas on Thursday, April 20th so I could go to an Appraisal Institute seminar on appraising hotels in this distressed market. Believe it or not, it was actually pretty interesting. If you are in the the appraisal world, I would definitely recommend it.
The flight was TERRIBLE. Probably one of the worst I've been on in quite some time. One of those where you don't just bounce around, but you drop and then shoot back up and seriously start feeling sick to your stomach. I fly enough that I don't get nervous about crashing or anything, I just get motion sickness pretty easily. The Tea Cup ride at Disney World and I are NOT friends. I also recall getting sick at Penny Whistle Park once in the parking lot after going on some kind of spinning ride. (Dallas peeps ought to LOVE the PWP reference!). I couldn't get the dang air thing to blow on me, and I was really starting to feel queasy. That poor lady next to me was probably very thankful I wear deodorant. I probably stuck my arm up there 10 times trying to adjust it, but every time I managed to FAIL. It was kind of funny because I think Tater could tell how rough the flight was too. He was moving A LOT. He always does though, so who knows. My verdict after that flight - I'm done flying until after Tater gets here. Between the dealing with luggage, uncomfortable and cramped seats, and the motion sickness... I'm DONE!
Anyways, Friday was the hotel appraisal class and then my dad picked me off to go to a Rangers game. Growing up, we went ALL THE TIME because my dad was the keeper of the company tickets. We used to sit 4 rows behind the plate. I remember the last game at the old stadium, the first one at the Ballpark, Nolan Ryan's last game, the All-Star workout/home run derby in 1995 (he wasn't quite high enough up on the food chain to get the tickets to the actual All-Star game), and many, many more. One of my favorite things about the All-Star work out was getting to chat (albeit, very briefly) with Cal Ripken, Jr. while he was waiting to warm up. That was before there was a pop-up that landed one row back and across the aisle from us and the drunk dude behind me spilled his beer all over me. The last game we tried to go to was Memorial Day weekend several years ago... the same weekend I almost killed myself, Andrew, my brother, and his sister in a massive spin out on 635 after it had rained. I would really not like to re-live that moment, but will say that God was definitely looking out for us that day because there was no logical way that we didn't hit anyone or the concrete median... typically when you are spinning in circles back and forth all lanes of holiday traffic on westbound 635 three times and end up literally inches from the concrete median (which you already nearly hit once), you would have hit someone or something. Anyways, that night we were supposed to go to the Rangers game and it ended up getting rained out. So, back to this Rangers game. We were playing the Cubbies and I swear there were just as many Cubs fans there as there were Rangers fans. It was a beautiful evening and the Rangers pulled out a 2-1 win. We enjoyed a Whataburger on the way to the stadium and I opted for a Lemon Chill for dessert. My dad had his "goobers" so we were all happy campers. Not the best pics (camera phone), but here we are at the Ballpark in all its glory.
I forgot how much I missed just going out to the Ballpark on a beautiful evening. Watching a good baseball game and eating ballpark food, especially with your dad, is just good for the soul. The fireworks display afterwords was just the icing on the cake!
Saturday morning I made pancakes from scratch and then ran around with my mom while I was waiting on Andrew to get in. My sweet husband pretty much drove all the way up just to drive me and the shower gifts home. My crazy pregnancy brain didn't sense how much of a pain in the rear that would be for him. I selfishly did want him to be there though because Saturday night we were celebrating my dear friend Meghan's engagement to Ken. We headed out to Plano for a lovely evening at Ken's aunt's house. I enjoyed water (although the wine and beer looked much more delicious) and a fantastic fried chicken and chicken fried steak dinner, complete with some of the best mashed potatoes I've had in a long time. We had fun reminiscing and sitting outside and enjoying the beautiful weather. It's still relatively pleasant in the evenings in Texas, but those days will sure enough be gone soon. I don't think I'd seen Richardson's parents since they picked us up at Fish Camp nearly 10 years ago... how wild is that!?! I miss Richardson and all my Dallas friends!!! :-(
While I was in town, I also got to go visit Nina twice down at Baylor Hospital. A couple weeks ago she had herself a little heart operation...repairing an aneurysm in her aorta.... kind of a big deal. She looked great and was feeling much better. She's actually already been to the rehab center and is now back at home. It's just so amazing to me that you can have your chest cut open and they can be "playing" with your heart and then in two weeks, you're back at home. WOW. She probably could have been home sooner, but they wanted to watch her a little longer. I definitely was feeling some anxiety about the operation even though they do this kind of thing all the time. When it's your grandmother that you love more than anything, it's just scary. There were LOTS of prayers involved, and I am SO thankful that she is doing just fine! She's got SO many years left in her, and I can't wait for her to meet her great-grandson! :-)
Sunday we got up and went to church at Wilshire. I got to see a few people, but was a little disappointed I didn't run in to more. Andrew and I went to the hospital afterwards to see Nina since he didn't get to see her on Saturday. It was a quick trip because we needed to get back for my baby shower! :-) I'll save that for the next post. We headed out of town around 5 or 5:30 for the LONG drive back home. Luckily, Andrew had taken a different route up to Dallas and was planning to take that same route home. I say luckily because about an hour or so into the drive I realized that my car was at Hobby Airport in Houston... can you say DETOUR!!! UGGHHH! We were already not going to get back until late, and this just added another hour or hour and a half to the drive. A few pit stops and a Bucky's stop later, we finally made it home around midnight. Man, it felt good to be home and to sleep in our own bed. It was a great, but long, weekend!!!
