welcome to my mind ...

The Saturday that I left for Vegas was quite the early morning, compared to what I am now used to. My friend/coworker was gracious enough to be up before the ass crack of dawn to have me to the airport by 5am. He lives a bit farther away from me so I was really appreciative of his assistance. He was also nice enough to fix me delicious dark hot chocolate so that I'd have something to warm me up, as it was in the 40s at that time of day.

Once at the airport, it didn't take long to get through security, but I had a 10 minute walk to get to my terminal. I made sure that my electronics were charged up so that I'd have something to occupy my time until boarding. Once on the flight, which was on time this time, it was a smooth ride to Vegas. We took off in foggy, rainy weather and it was entertaining to see the rain going exactly horizontal whist flying 300-400 mph. It cleared up about an hour in to the flight and the sun rose as we were flying. I was on the wrong side of the plane to see sunrise, which I was okay with. I didn't want the sun in my eyes that early in the morning.

On the ground, I'd checked my carry-on at the gate {for free} and so I had to go to baggage claim. I waited there for my sister, her boyfriend, and my nephew to meet up with me. My nephew knew I was going out there for Halloween, but he didn't know that I would be arriving a week before, or that I'd be staying with them. Which, will never happen again. Hotels from here on out; that will be explained in part two.

Since it was fairly early still, and no one had eaten yet, they decided that we were going to stop somewhere for breakfast. We ended up at some restaurant/diner type place, with a separate bar area {it's Vegas; most places are like that} and enjoyed some good breakfast foods. Back at their place, we just hung out until it was time for me to pick up my rental car.

I was able to get a Hyundai Elantra, which I quite enjoyed in the 2 1/2 days I had one in VA. This one, however, was not from Canada and I found quite a few things I didn't like about the car in the two weeks of renting it. It's still a really nice car. I like Hyundai, but the blind spots were the worst part. I think I could rent it again, but I'll never buy one.

Once the vehicle was obtained, my sister, nephew and I went to go visit my mom. We only hung out there for a little bit. I was drained from having been up for much longer than I was used to so mom and I made plans to get together later in the week.

I honestly don't remember what we did that Sunday. I have absolutely no recollection of what happened that day. Clearly it was memorable.

Monday morning I went to their community fitness center, because I didn't want the vacation to keep me from losing too much track of my recent weight loss. After a shower, I think I went to the store to get some snacks for while I was there, so that I didn't end up eating all of their food. Since all three of them were sick, I also got some vitamins {which ended up only slightly helping; will also be explained in part two.} The remainder of the day, I think, was just hanging out.

Tuesday, I made plans to hang out with Jacob. I hadn't seen him in two years, since he'd moved away from Seattle. We just met up to get sushi. It was alright. The sushi out here is actually quite a bit better. It's possible it's because the fish is probably fresher. Or we just happened to go to a place that wasn't the best. Either way, it was nice meeting up with an old friend. I spent the rest of the day just kind of hanging out.

Wednesday was the day I'd made the plan to hang out with mom. We went out to play bingo, which was a mother/daughter tradition we'd started on my 21st birthday. Every time we get together, we go play bingo. Of course we didn't win anything, but it was still fun. After that we went to a different place for lunch. The food there was good and there was some leftovers. It was a late lunch/early dinner, but afterwards I decided to just drop her off and head back. See, the problem with sleeping on someone's couch is that you get woken up every time someone needs to leave for work. Let's just say I didn't exactly sleep very well in the two weeks I was there.

Thursday was the day that I headed out to Los Angeles to visit another friend of mine. I was trying to go out there on Wednesday, but he had another friend in from out of town so we were waiting until he was supposed to leave. Well, there was a fire on a plane at the airport he was supposed to fly back to, so the flight got canceled. I didn't find this out until after I was already in California, so there was no turning back. The two days I was in Cali turned out to the best part of my entire trip.

After I got there, the three of us decided to walk up and down Hollywood Blvd and ended up getting some dinner, since I'd not eaten yet {it was now almost 5.} We bought tickets for Ripley's Believe It or Not museum that night and since they allowed admission to Guinness Book of World Records and the Hollywood Was Museum, we decided to go do those the next day. We also decided to do the Warner Bros studio tour as well. So Friday was a pretty packed day. I was leaving that evening, but it was so worth staying out later. The brief trip ended up with a fancy dinner, courtesy of the friend who got stranded in L.A.

Because of the packed day, I ended up leaving much later than previously anticipated and ended up not getting back to my sister's until almost 4 in the morning. Which is what caused the turning point in my trip.

I woke up Saturday morning, Halloween, with a sore throat and that feeling you get in the back of your nose to indicate that you were getting sick. As the day went on, it continued to progress. I went with my sister and her boyfriend to my sister's boss's house so that a large group of neighborhood children could go trick or treating. I was excited to be able to walk around with him, but the group decided that the fathers take the kids around so I ended up just hanging out with a bunch of people I didn't know, just sitting there. We had free food, but that was about the only highlight.

The next morning I woke up feeling like shit, but that's for the next entry. This one is long enough.

Until then. . .