A lovely trip

Author's Note: This entry was written in between 30-second bouts of welcome-home kissing from Brian, so if you wish to have the full authentic experience, take 30-second breaks from reading every minute and a half (even if you're in the middle of a sentence).

Had a wonderful time in Anchorage - it was great to see how happily my mother has settled in after her
five-year exile in Barrow. Also fun to hang out with Ian again - he may not be the most self-aware person in the world, but I've missed the boy, nonetheless. =)

My mother's apartment is very cosy and has a lovely view. Her sofa is very nice and comfortable but the hide-a-bed inside had a mattress so atrocious (even on the scale of hide-a-beds, which aren't exactly high-standard to begin with) that I just ended up sleeping on the sofa itself. She's promised to find a better mattress and/or a memory foam topper so that Brian and I will have something to sleep on when we both visit.

I enjoyed driving my mother's RAV4 - it's rather like a giant-sized version of my car, and it felt really funny to be driving something similarly shaped but half again as big. She and Ian and I drove out to Girdwood on Sunday morning for sourdough pancakes (something we used to do as a family every fall when I was a kid). I also got to stop by the candlemakers' shop there (somewhere else we used to go regularly) - I got Brian a candle in the shape of a fat little owl, and myself a very hopeful-looking Husky dog.

Other swag I brought back included two almost-new pairs of jeans and a shirt from Value Village, some lavender bubble bath, a really nice new comforter set and matching sheets to replace the cheap (and now threadbare almost to the point of unusability) set we've been using, some DVDs my mother foisted off on us, and a "Rainy Day" scented massage oil bar from Laura's Bath and Body - one of my favorite stores to visit, just to breathe in the different fragrances. The clerk also gave me a pamphlet with their website - apparently they do out-of-town orders, now. Yay!

I also picked up a copy of The Nanny Diaries from a bookstore in the Anchorage airport, and am enjoying it quite a bit - it's not funny in the way that makes you giggle every five minutes, but it is a very biting look at the upper crust of New York. I have a lot of admiration for the main character and the sort of thing she deals with every day, but I can't quite say as I understand why she puts up with some of the crap that her employer dishes out. If I hit my head hard enough to apply for a job as a nanny, I certainly wouldn't work for someone who didn't have respect for me as a person - but then, perhaps it's expected that one treat one's servants that way. I'd like to think that if I had that kind of money I wouldn't, but I couldn't say for certain.

I'm reminded of a funny quote I read somewhere - "All I ask is that I be rich enough to learn for myself that money can't buy happiness." Wish I could remember who said it...

In any case, I'm very glad to be home, even though I'm getting the ignore-her treatment from Dexter, who seems annoyed that I abandoned him yet again. Hopefully I won't have to clean up any kitty-puke in the second bedroom this time, since I was only gone for two days (as opposed to two weeks)...

A lovely trip

Author's Note: This entry was written in between 30-second bouts of welcome-home kissing from Brian, so if you wish to have the full authentic experience, take 30-second breaks from reading every minute and a half (even if you're in the middle of a sentence).

Had a wonderful time in Anchorage - it was great to see how happily my mother has settled in after her
five-year exile in Barrow. Also fun to hang out with Ian again - he may not be the most self-aware person in the world, but I've missed the boy, nonetheless. =)

My mother's apartment is very cosy and has a lovely view. Her sofa is very nice and comfortable but the hide-a-bed inside had a mattress so atrocious (even on the scale of hide-a-beds, which aren't exactly high-standard to begin with) that I just ended up sleeping on the sofa itself. She's promised to find a better mattress and/or a memory foam topper so that Brian and I will have something to sleep on when we both visit.

I enjoyed driving my mother's RAV4 - it's rather like a giant-sized version of my car, and it felt really funny to be driving something similarly shaped but half again as big. She and Ian and I drove out to Girdwood on Sunday morning for sourdough pancakes (something we used to do as a family every fall when I was a kid). I also got to stop by the candlemakers' shop there (somewhere else we used to go regularly) - I got Brian a candle in the shape of a fat little owl, and myself a very hopeful-looking Husky dog.

Other swag I brought back included two almost-new pairs of jeans and a shirt from Value Village, some lavender bubble bath, a really nice new comforter set and matching sheets to replace the cheap (and now threadbare almost to the point of unusability) set we've been using, some DVDs my mother foisted off on us, and a "Rainy Day" scented massage oil bar from Laura's Bath and Body - one of my favorite stores to visit, just to breathe in the different fragrances. The clerk also gave me a pamphlet with their website - apparently they do out-of-town orders, now. Yay!

I also picked up a copy of The Nanny Diaries from a bookstore in the Anchorage airport, and am enjoying it quite a bit - it's not funny in the way that makes you giggle every five minutes, but it is a very biting look at the upper crust of New York. I have a lot of admiration for the main character and the sort of thing she deals with every day, but I can't quite say as I understand why she puts up with some of the crap that her employer dishes out. If I hit my head hard enough to apply for a job as a nanny, I certainly wouldn't work for someone who didn't have respect for me as a person - but then, perhaps it's expected that one treat one's servants that way. I'd like to think that if I had that kind of money I wouldn't, but I couldn't say for certain.

I'm reminded of a funny quote I read somewhere - "All I ask is that I be rich enough to learn for myself that money can't buy happiness." Wish I could remember who said it...

In any case, I'm very glad to be home, even though I'm getting the ignore-her treatment from Dexter, who seems annoyed that I abandoned him yet again. Hopefully I won't have to clean up any kitty-puke in the second bedroom this time, since I was only gone for two days (as opposed to two weeks)...