Hello, continuous readers and newcomers to my blog! No, I have not dropped off the face of the earth. However, a different (and only slightly less astounding) thing has occurred: I only thought about Star Wars three times in the past week.
No, really. Really.
But, to catch you all up; I attended the March for Life in Washington, DC, and if you have not checked out their Twitterfest with the hashtag #whywemarch, then by all means, DO SO! Virtual cookies and bonus points (not to mention visits and likes on your blog!) to those who do so and then comment! I don’t have social media but all you people out there who do, get out and shout out! Here’s my first shoutout: To Erin of Laughing at Live Dragons! Unfortunately, I did not see her at the March this year, but IÂ did see the Santorums, the Duggars were there too! And then there was an entire spirit squad, no less!!!
It was cold, but fun. I made the stupid mistake of wearing dress shoes instead of boots. Iris was smarter. (But she always wears her boots anyway, so she don’t count. ;-P She wanted to wear her combat boots, but her mom wouldn’t let her. :’-( )
We went to the March with seven boys and three girls from another Latin Mass parish, and (including us) seven girls and three boys from our parish. Add in three deacons and an Italian priest and you have unbelievably awesome chaos!!! We rode in three vehicles: The Deacon Buggy, Eagle One (the girls’ van), and Donkey Zero (the boys’ transport.) Note from Sgt. Sprite: The boys’ van was aptly named. Lots of them were donkeys. And they all had crushes on Elsa, of Frozen fame. *shudders* I was tortured for all the trip by songs from Frozen and merciless teasing about not having seen The Hunchback of Notre Dame or The Little Mermaid. (By no means am I normal. Huff. I still question how people could take thirty minutes just to decide to freaking go to bed! Taking twenty minutes to decide what to order at a restaurant, on the other hand…) It took us two very full days and about three more hours to get there; it snowed on Monday night, so we wound up going an extra few hours to get to Richmond, where we were staying. We rode a charter bus into D.C. and visited the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History for an hour, not nearly enough time, in my opinion. Iris bought two post cards, and I tucked them in my purse. I lost them that afternoon. :’-( She’s mad at me for “apologizing too much” and “having tardiphobia.” (That’s the fear of being late, for those who were wondering.) We lost her hunter-orange stocking cap at the Smithsonian; if anyone has visited the Smithsonian recently and found a hand-knitted neon orange hat somewhere, yep, that belongs to Iris. You’re welcome to whatever bugs and/or dandruff are left on it. (Just kidding! :-P) I am officially tired of Subway and all cheap pizza. And the second shout-out goes to the housekeeper for the FSSP priests of St. Joseph’s in Richmond. That was the most delicious beef stew EVER!!!! đ
On Thursday, we visited the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. The artwork (especially the murals) was incredible. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to touch the murals/statues/other artwork, and I am a very tactile person. *sob* Then we visited the Holocaust Museum. It was much more intense than I had expected, and I had a hissy fit at one of the boys who was joking around right after we had to rush through the last exhibit due to time concerns. This is one of my favorite all time quotes; I have to thank my history teacher for introducing me to it, even though I can’t remember who to attribute it to. The reason why we need a Holocaust Museum in the United States, which did not take part in the horror, is:
The recuperative power of innocence in a liberal society
Which basically means that the reason why we need the memorial is because otherwise, due to our own complacent stupidity, we’ll forget, because our society is a free society (aka, “liberal.” This has nothing to do with Republican vs. Democrat. It just means free.) That’s my deep thought for the day.
We went to the house of a lady who had offered to let us use her house to shower up for showers and while we waited in line, someone turned on the TV. They started watching Duck Dynasty (which I had never seen before, or even heard of) and I said, “Bored!” (Sherlock quotes for the win!) and worked on my knitting instead. (Don’t judge. I really was bored. But the endings were sweet…) Anyway, I got ten merit points for being bored with the show. Teehee. I took a very cold shower.
After sightseeing, we ate out at the China Buffet (I don’t remember where it was. Yummy food, though. Almost as good as the beef stew!), where we got merit points for trying new things. I tried sushi. The stuff which was made with fake crab wasn’t that bad, but the salmon stuff just tasted odd. I didn’t have a gag reflex problem, though. And I also tried oysters. MMMM! We tried to talk our Youth Group coordinator to try calamari (read: adorable baby octopus, heehee), and she almost did, but she had all this drama with bringing it to her mouth, and when she finally popped it in it shot out again! Like a bullet. Like the sound of Father’s former ringtone. (Which was a machine gun and bombs before he changed it to some demented music from Psycho.) And I have the photos to prove it.
When we headed back out for Omaha, Iris and I (who had sat in the VERY BACK of the van before) switched out our seat assignments and rode towards the front. We played lots of games and had a sing-off (which was FUN! :-D) Iris proved to be the champion of a game which has the point of making “it” laugh, and she was “it” and only laughed THREE TIMES among the many games we played. I replied “Get Sherlock” at one point and had to say that to everything. It got me farther than before, but I still cracked up. People teased me about Moriarty wanting to marry me, and I said “No way! I’m probably way taller than he is!” (I’m taller than Ewan McGregor, for crying out loud!!! Why are most British actors so short???!)
We stopped in Notre Dame, IN and visited the Church of the Sacred Heart. More subdued than the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, but just as beautiful. The ceiling murals were the best part, and their high altar was amazing.
We stayed in the most iffy motel I’ve ever seen on the way back. Breakfast was blah and the shower had poor pressure. One of our room doors was 1) frozen shut, and 2) had a broken handle. Another one smelled like smoke, so we switched on that one. Who wants to smell tobacco all night? Eugh. But at least we could lock our doors, and there was no balcony door to become loose and begin to break away from the wall. (That was at the second hotel we stayed at, fyi. Since there was a connecting door that led to one of the boys’ rooms, the girls in that room traded assignments with the other guys. Also, that was the same time I had my first temper tantrum. Everyone forgot ENTIRELY about my brother!!! He had stayed in his room to go to the bathroom and he had NO IDEA where we were meeting! I wound up crying, but that was partly low blood sugar and sleep deprivation… I’m still embarrassed about it though. Though I think I WAS JUSTIFIED!!!)
Anyway, we arrived safely back home at 9:10 p.m. central time. The St. Francis youth group still had an hour and a half to go, though… I feel sorry for them.
We did get in some good prayer time and soul food, though. We went to Mass every day, Confessions on Thursday, and had a full Rosary (three sets of mysteries!) a day.
All in all, it was a good trip, and my first big adventure since 2008. Hope you’ll forgive me for dropping off the ether, and also hoping that you’ve enjoyed my story! Thanks for reading, as always, and may God Bless you! Have a better than awesome day!
The Upstairs Archives 