MadMup.com

I took a trip this past weekend to visit my 20-year friends Josh and Dave (previous meeting chronicled here). Josh is moving to Colorado in a couple of weeks, so this was the last time we’ll easily be able to get together for a while. We met at Dave’s in Ohio and then I went to the Detroit area, spent the night at Josh’s, and came home Sunday afternoon.

There’s nothing quite like having friends you’ve had for twenty years or more – half our time was spent reminiscing about “that time we…” The three of us have been friends through some of our darkest days, and if ever we don’t communicate for a while, we’re able to pick back up like no time has passed. I love these guys and I’m better for knowing them.

Here are a few picture highlights from the weekend:

Sure, I went out there to meet my friends, but when a kitten’s this adorable, pictures must be taken!

Dave normally has a bunch of snakes in his basement, but for now he’s just got the one slightly-chewed salamander. Clarification: the salamander was chewed by Murphy, the older family cat, not by Dave or any of his kids.

I don’t remember what sort of knowledge Ella was trying to impart to Josh, but it looks like it was very important.

Seriously, how could dudes that look this young have been friends for more than twenty years?

Josh and Aundrea share a spare moment of relaxation after having gotten their five kids off to bed. It should be noted that this moment of relaxation didn’t happen until northwards of 11:00 p.m. Apparently, managing five kids is a lot of work. Who knew?

This has nothing to do with Josh and Dave, but this has amused me for years. I used to pass this sign occasionally for work, but hadn’t seen it in a couple of years. This weekend on my way home, I had to stop and take a picture. It’s one building, half of it is a furniture store and the other half is a funeral chapel. I’m guessing they had to put the sign up because one too many people looked at a coffin and said, “This’d look nice in the front room, wouldn’t it, honey?”

I also have three very short videos from the weekend up over at YouTube:

• Reliving the glory days – Post Pattern
• Not so much with the glory – The Running Back
• The camera was set to “video” instead of “picture.” Oops. That’s Dave’s wife Angela that you’ll hear in the background, and that laughing you see us doing is pretty much what we do the whole time we’re together – 20-Year Friends

I still hate driving, but I’m glad I went.

On Tuesday I went down to Indy to meet my brother (and Dr. S.) for dinner. They were in town for a two-day training seminar and Tuesday night was the best night for us to get together. Michael (mi hermano) emailed me where they were staying, so I Googlemapped it and printed out the step-by-step instructions. I studied the route a few times and obsessively looked at it every few seconds once I got to Indy, on the off-chance that I had missed a turn. I arrived at their hotel without incident, and Dr. S. knew the area well enough that we found the mall and places to eat without too much trouble. After dinner and walking around the mall a bit, I dropped them back off at their hotel and Dr. S. gave me directions back to the interstate.

In, out, no problem. Home by 11:30.

Now rewind to last week…

A friend of mine (who shall remain nameless) put up a “Hey, I’m going to Indy to get some camping gear, anyone want to go along?” post on his blog. “Sure, sounds fun,” I said. “Hey, while we’re there, can we stop by this one other store?” Sure.

So on Thursday I find the address to my store and print out the directions, making sure to get the phone number, just in case. He (let’s call him “L”) and another fellow (“B”) picked me up around 7 and we headed out.

About ten minutes into the trip, I ask L, “So, what’s this store we’re going to?”

L: “Oh, I’m not really sure.”

Me: “I’m sorry, what?”

L: “Well, I know it’s on 86th Street near the mall.”

(It should be noted at this point that there are about a grillion stores on 86th Street.)

Me: “Um, so you don’t know the name of the store?”

L: “It’ll be fine. We’ll find it.”

Me: “. . .”

L: “And if we don’t, it’ll be fine. We’ll be fine.”

Me: [strangled noise emanates from throat]

L: “If you’re so worried about it, call W. and have her look it up.”

Me: [dialing W. before he’d finished the sentence] “Okay.”

At this point, the conversation becomes downright surreal.

L: “Have her search for xyz.”

W: “Nothing. Oh, wait – is this it?”

L: “No… that doesn’t sound right. Wait, have her search for abc.”

W: “Is this it?”

L: “No… I don’t think so. Here, let me talk to her.”

Me: “You keep driving!” (We were, as they say, making good time. I didn’t want L. to be distracted.)

L: “Oh, wait, I remember. I went to the site and used their Site Locator!”

Me: “This information could have been handier twenty minutes ago.”

W: “Here is the address and the phone number.”

Me: “Bless you. You may have saved L.’s life and me from a lifetime in the joint for murder.”

Whew. That was a relief. Now to call the store to confirm their hours and where they are.

Disconnected. No alternate number given.

At this point, I am, of course, envisioning that we will be lost forever and I’m wondering how long it took the Donner Party to take extreme measures and I am kind of hungry already…

L: “Hey, we’ll just go to this other store. It’ll be fine.”

So we ended up going to the other store. And they didn’t have the stuff he was looking for. But then we went for Italian food and came back home and everything was fine. And we had a great time, to boot.

I’m not sure when I turned into this guy, but the idea of driving without a specific destination in mind just about killed me. I don’t do so well with the “no plans” parts of life, but not in every “no plans” part. That’s the part I really don’t get – why am I so OCD about some stuff, but not all stuff?

This past Sunday night my church had “Ministry Options Night,” which is a fancy way of saying “no church.” It’s specifically meant to be a time when you can get together with family or friends and “fellowship,” which is church-speak for “hang out.”

The Career Class opted to have a get-together, hosted by Abby W. I took my new digital camera (a Canon PowerShot SD600, which I am loving) and told people to just go ahead and take random pictures throughout the evening. At the end of the night, there were a few more than 100 pictures taken.

Sure, it might be easier for you if I’d set up a gallery so you could see just the pictures you wanted to, but it was more fun for me to set it up as a video with music. Since this is my blog, I won out. Sorry. Maybe you’ll have better luck next time (but I doubt it).

The video comes in at a sorta-lengthy 7 minutes and 26 seconds, but it includes music from The White Stripes, Brian Wilson & Paul McCartney, and Randy Newman. So even if you don’t care to see the pictures, you could put it on in the background and listen to some nice music for a few minutes.