Louisiana Trip

Members of the trip:
Leslie- Best friend from high school. We actually figured out the other day that we have been friends for about 10 years now. (back right with short hair that she just cut for locks of love)
Peter- Leslie’s hubby dub dub in a tub. Ok, sorry about the nonsense, but it’s way more fun than just saying husband.
Diana- Leslie’s little sister who is starting her first semester of college at LSU and plays the clarinet in the marching band. (The band part is an important feature for this story) (She is in green)
Carole: Leslie and Diana’s mommy. Also our (kyle and my) assistant mommy ☺
Vanessa: Me, the coolest blogger ever.
Kyle: Vanessa’s hub dub, who isn’t quite as cool as Vanessa, but is making headway ;)

Leslie, Carole and Diana while we wait for breakfast

Because Leslie and I have known each other for so long, I have known Diana for nearly 10 years as well. However, our relationship was not always what it is today. I cannot actually remember the exact moment I met Diana but I would bet my life savings (-$5000) that she was either crying or whining at the time of our meeting. It is common Carole tells me, that the children in the family suffer from colic, the unexplained crying disorder, not to the age of 6 months as most children do, but till the age of 10 YEARS old. Leslie and Diana have 6 years age difference, so when we were 15 years old were invincible and could conquer the world without any help from those silly adults, Diana was just leaving her colic stage. At nine years old, to us she was just another little bratty, whiny kid. As the years flew by, however, Diana chipped away at her colic tendencies and transformed from an unidentified crying creature that might be of the same species or was more likely an alien to a little human that we could speak with and even with whom we could hang out. In fact, as she entered into middle school, we soon realized that she was gaining strength in her coolness capabilities. We began to enjoy her so much, we (Kyle, and I) moved from being assistant siblings to the dignified position of Diana’s groupies. Yes, you heard correctly, we as college kids, became a high school kids groupies. Weekends we could make it back to San Antonio from our obviously awesome college lives, we would attend a musical Diana was playing in, or a football game in which she was marching.

All of this is to explain why we decided to take a weekend trip consisting of two days from San Antonio to Baton Rouge and back again to see Diana play in the LSU band at their football game.
Leave time for San Antonio: (attempted time) 9:00 am (actual time) 9:20. Pretty good considering past trips.
Pick up time for Leslie and Peter in Houston where they currently live: Noonish
Time Kyle and Carole spent discussing politics: Forever. Political conversations became against the law (we in the back seat decided) once we left the state of Texas.
# of alligators we saw: 10
# of alligators we wrestled and beat with bear hands: 8 (kyle lost two fingers, and Peter lost a big toe, but it was worth it!)
Amount of alligator meat we brought home: one tonrillion pounds

We arrived in Baton Rouge, kind of on time, ran into our hotel rooms to bundle up and got in the car to head out to the game. For those of you in sections of the world that use heaters consistently in the winter might think us Texans and southerners crazy wimps and maybe we are, but I personally enjoy not being afraid of hypothermia when I step outside. However, we had our second cold front this particular weekend. The high in San Antonio was 60 degrees and in Louisiana the projected low was to be in the 40’s. List of clothes I wore to the game: Long johns, jeans, long shirt, sweatshirt, jacket, hat, scarf, but silly me forgot gloves.

Yes, I am wearing my "Don't Mess with Texas!" sweatshirt in Louisiana.

Me and hubby dub

Peter was excited to get the opportunity to wear his Parka. It was certainly cold enough sitting up there, unprotected from the wind.

Leslie however decided that they needed to change jackets for a while to warm up. Doesn't Peter look nice in his girly jacket?

When we arrived to the game and spent 20 minutes going round and round up to the top bleachers, Peter handed our tickets to the man directing ticket holders. He glanced quickly at Peter and said in his Louisiana drawl, “Son, who bought these tickets?”
Peter: “My mother-in-law.”
Man: “Your mother-in-law doesn’t like you very much. Go all the way up to the top and when you get there, say ‘Hi’ to God for me.”

We were looking for Diana. A needle in a haystack.

We found her! It is pretty amazing the zoom powers of cameras these days!

Sure enough we were on the tippity top of the bleachers. You couldn’t any higher than our seats unless you were entering the gates of Heaven. We didn’t meet God up there unless he was in the form of freezing, butt numbing wind! (Butt numbing because you know it is cold if you can’t even feel your butt after short exposure) Luckily for us, our terrible viewing seats didn’t bother us since we don’t give a damn lick about football. In fact, I am ashamed to admit this sense I am a Texan and all, but I don’t even understand the rules for the most part. From having to attend so many games, I have learned certain things such as, touch downs are good, each team wants the ball, and hitting each other’s butts is an acceptable manly act only in football. From our position, it didn’t seem to matter. We saw what was the equivalent to ants building a nest on a big green field, when really LSU, a nationally ranked team was shamefully loosing to a team with no standing or rank and all we could think of us was how to make our icicles of bodies defrost without breaking off a frozen arm or leg in the process. We left the game after the halftime show since we had traveled 8 hours to see little, tiny, indistinguishable ant Diana play her clarinet in the marching band. At half time the score was 27 Troy (from Alabama) to 3 (LSU). LSU did make history that night with the largest comeback of their history, but I can honestly say, I was not sad to have missed it. Rather we enjoyed the televised game in a restaurant with comfort of gumbo and ribs.

Me and the BFF

I am feeling a bit ridiculous in my outfit. Glasses, Ireland cap, furry scarf and a pink Don't Mess with Texas Sweatshirt. I was sporting the dorky look!

We saw Diana for 30 minutes or so around 12:30 am that evening, and then again for breakfast and then got in the car and headed back towards home.

Total amount of time spent on the trip: 38 hours
Total amount of time spent in the car: 16 hours
Total amount of time sleeping: 8 hours
Total amount of time in waking hours not in the car: 8 hours
Total amount of fun: Ubber gubber amounts of fun! We loved every minute of it!

Mike (who we renamed Ferocious Velociraptor Tiger to give him a more appropriate name for a scary mascot) the mascot living it up in his $6 million dollar cage, errr... I mean habitat.