$And… we\'re home.$

Written on January 15 2009, and filed under General

Dan and I arrived at home around 5pm on Tuesday afternoon. Not too shabby, since we checked out at 12pm, stopped at an ATM, two rest stops and a convenience store, pulled over to check on the car, and had to drive a little slower because of the weather. Speaking of weather — did I mention that it pretty much snowed during our entire time in Pittsburgh? We ran into flurries as soon as we went through the first tunnel on the turnpike, and didn’t encounter any clear, dry weather until we went back through that tunnel towards home yesterday evening.

It feels good to be home, in terms of being with Alyssa and Ryan, Leah, the cats, having our own bed (king-sized is nice, but a queen pillow-top with 300 thread count sheets is even nicer!), and just being in our own home. A motel room is okay for a few nights, but scratchy sheets, cold bathroom, teensy toilet area and no food accommodations besides a mini-fridge and a microwave can get really old, really fast. We didn’t bother to keep any food in the room with us, besides some water (me), tea (Dan), donuts and snacks. We ate out for the meals we didn’t skip.

I hope you don’t mind me going through a blow-by-blow of our days in Pittsburgh. I really want to get this recorded before the drudgery of everyday life dulls the memories.

Friday
We got up a little after 7am. Since we packed the night before, there wasn’t much to do besides shower, dress and throw last minute toiletries into our bag. We’re ready to leave by 8am, and as soon as Jason shows up to stay with the kids until Friday evening (when my mom would come to take over), we hit the road. We drop my car off at my mom’s, swing by McDonalds for a fast breakfast, and then we hit the highway. Dan drove for the first two hours, while I napped, and then we switched so that he could relax.

We arrived in Pittsburgh by 2:30pm or so, and found our motel (thank you Garmin!) and got checked in by 3pm.

After relaxing for a bit (driving for so many hours really does take a lot out of you!), we headed out. We decided we’d head down to the Waterfront and go shopping, get something for dinner, and maybe see a movie. Unfortunately for us, I put in the wrong address for the Waterfront, and we wound up sitting in some major traffic. What should have taken us twenty minutes or so wound up killing close to two hours. During that time I watched the near-empty gas tank nervously, whined about having to go to the bathroom and opened the sunroof so I could blow snowflakes at Dan.

When we did get to the Waterfront, we decided that food was top priority. We ate at Eat ‘n Park, I tipped the server with a necklace I had just bought from Fashion Bug the night before (to say she REALLY loved it is an understatement, since I left it for her!), and then we decided to kill time before our movie (Seven Pounds, 10pm) by checking out Target (the same one I worked at when we lived in Pittsburgh).
We also went over to the grocery store for a few snacks. By then I was really starting to drag. Excitement + four hours of sleep + lots of driving + car napping had me exhausted, and I really wasn’t digging the idea of doing a movie right then and there. But we went over to the theater anyway. Lucky for me, the time was reported wrong on the website, and we would have had to wait around for another hour. We said screw it, went back to the motel and went to bed. Yes, before midnight. I’m pretty sure the lights were out and we were under the covers by 11:30pm!

Saturday
We slept in until almost noon, and didn’t get ourselves together for at least another hour. I wanted to check out Avenue, since Danielle seems to have a lot of stylish clothes from there, but they closed at 3pm. Silly me didn’t know this. We found out after circling the downtown blocks several times, giving up on on-street parking and finding a $5 parking garage. Yeah, we pretty much paid $5 to park the car, head into the building and arrive about two minutes too late for me to do any shopping in the Avenue store.

But we decided to leave the car, and walk around downtown for a bit. Most of the stores were closed, which was somewhat surprising, but we did walk a few blocks in the rainy, snowy weather, and stopped at a Subway for lunch before heading back to the car. Dan wanted to do ice-skating around the huge Christmas tree they had set up in a little square, and was disappointed when I informed him that fat girls don’t go ice-skating.

After we were both thoroughly cold, and my short legs ensured that my jeans were sopping wet with slushy, salty water up to my knees practically, we went back for the car, and decided to go up to North Hills. We both worked up there — Dan at a Long John Silvers, me there for a little while, and also over in the mall — and did a lot of shopping/eating out in that area. After checking out Lane Bryant and the Fashion Bug that was no longer there, we went to Ross Park Mall, and did a bit of shopping (Old Navy, Payless, Sephora, GameStop). Dan fell in love with the Lovesac line of sofa/lounge furniture, and talked my ear off about it for quite a while.

We decided we were hungry, and Dan picked out the restaurant for us — Church Brew Works. Yes, it’s an actual church turned into a pricey, alcohol-serving restaurant. Our dinner for two with an appetizer and tip was just shy of $100. Eep. That’s just a little too pricey for me, and not an experience I’d want to repeat, especially since a $17 pasta meal should come with more than seven shrimp.

After dinner, we headed back to the motel. We stayed up a little later on Saturday night. We were watching Man Vs. Wild, and I’m pretty sure we didn’t get to bed until after 2am.

Sunday
Sunday was the day of a football game for the Steelers. Pittsburgh is a BIG football city, and they go all out like it’s a national-fucking-holiday for football games. So when we got over to Denny’s around noon for nourishment, we weren’t surprised to see the place packed and adorned with Steelers colors and paraphernalia.

After breakfast, we went straight to the Duquesne Incline. After a few moments of slightly freaking out over the sheer height (we started at the top), we took photos, and bought fare for a round trip. We took photos at the bottom, then came back up.

After the Incline, we headed straight for our old stomping grounds — Oakland. Dan went to college at the University of Pittsburgh, and we both had fond memories of living in and exploring the surrounding neighborhoods. We walked around the campus, visited our old apartment building, and then decided to warm up and relax at a nearby Panera Bread with oversize mugs of hot chocolate.

At that point I had to switch out my contacts for my glasses. That morning, my right contact ripped a bit, but I was determined to try and deal with the irritation from the edge of the tear point. No-go. Within five hours, my eye was driving me batty. So, I’ve been geeking it out with glasses ever since Sunday evening (ironically, I had made an optometrist appointment for Friday morning, before Dan surprised me about going to Pittsburgh for the weekend). Once I adjusted to the glasses, we drove back to the Waterfront for a 7pm showing of Seven Pounds.

We stopped on the way for a few pictures of the Waterfront and river, taken from the bridge:

The movie was great. We had a little drama about halfway in. Four assholes, probably in their mid to late teens, came in and sat in the row in front of us, and immediately began talking, laughing, and playing with their cell phones, testing out ring tones, etc. Yes, in the MIDDLE OF THE MOVIE. Dan went to the bathroom, and while he was out there told an employee. An usher came in and read the assholes the riot act, and Dan came back a few minutes later. The guys turned around and glared at both of us, and left a few minutes later, calling out, “fucking rat” on their way out. Rat or not, we paid $10 apiece to see a good movie, as did everyone else in that theater, and there’s no reason for those shitty little punks to ruin in.

I was kind of nervous about them possibly waiting around to confront Dan after the movie, because they seemed like the type, and my fears were definitely intensified when I went to use the bathroom about fifteen minutes after that, and they were hanging out in the lobby, and watched me enter and leave the bathroom. When I got back, I told Dan that if they were still there when the movie was over, I wanted to request an escort to our car. Thankfully, we didn’t have to, because when we got into the lobby, they weren’t there. Also, a few other guys approached Dan and thanked him for speaking up, and one offered to watch out for us as we left.

After the movie, we went back to Oakland to grab dinner from The O. Then it was back to the motel, and to bed a few hours later.

Monday
I finally made it to Avenue! Dan helped me pick out a purple and silver outfit, and I also found a black top that I’ve been wanting for several weeks. After we left, we went to Dunkin’ Donuts for hot chocolate and muffin, and then we headed back to the motel to kill a few hours before dinner.

We had dinner at the Golden Corral. We usually don’t do buffets, but it was VERY good, and I emailed my mom and asked her to look up one around here (there is one, and we’re hoping to go to it at the end of the week). After dinner, it was back to the Waterfront movie theater for Gran Torino. Another very good movie, and this time with no shit heads trying to ruin it for everyone else!

After the movie was over, we went back to the motel, did some packing, and then went to bed.

Tuesday
Tuesday was pretty much wrapped up with my last blog entry and the beginning of this very long post. We packed the night before, so when we got up we just showered, dressed, packed up the car, checked out and began the long drive home.

The only “excitement” we had on the way home was not of the good variety. Out of nowhere the Check Engine light came on. I pulled over at the next emergency pull-over section, and Dan got out to check out the car to see if anything “obvious”, like low oil, transmission fluid or a loose gas cap, might have triggered the indicator. No such luck, of course.

While I was sitting in the car and Dan was fiddling around under the hood, a guy in a blue sedan suddenly pulled over right next to our vehicle. He started at me for about five or ten seconds, and then inched the car forward, still looking at me in the rear-view mirror. Then he saw Dan in front of our car, and he suddenly pulled out and got back on the turnpike. Honestly, it was pretty creepy. As soon as he pulled up next to our car I felt a little nervous, and Dan confirmed what I felt when he got back in the car and asked if I noticed the guy. I said I did, and he said that to him, it seemed like he pulled over because he thought I was alone, but then he made eye contact with Dan and hightailed it out of there. Sure, it’s entirely possible that he stopped to see if I needed help, but if that were the case, why didn’t he stuck around to see if Dan needed help? It’s kind of fishy to me… and I don’t know about you guys (girls, really), but if I’m alone and approached by a man, my first thought isn’t that they’re there to help, but that they’re there to see what they might be able to take, if you get my meaning…

So, home sweet home. The kids and Leah were happy to see us, and we were happy to see that the house was in decent shape, despite us being gone for nearly five days. I had a lot of laundry to do, between our dirty clothes and what the kids and my mother’s non-housebroken (surprise, surprise) dog messed up, but it was still a lot less than what I was expecting to have waiting for me!

… Kudos to anyone who read all 2200+ words of this very long blog entry! ♥

heart (0)spiffy (0)durr (0)

, on January 15 2009 at 1:04am:

The guy who pulled up next to you seems incredibly creepy! I’m glad you enjoyed yourself ,though

Cole´s last blog entry: What’s Going On

, on January 15 2009 at 1:04am:

Very pretty pictures. I’m glad you two got to go out and spend sometime alone. :yummy:

, on January 15 2009 at 1:05am:

I read it all. Sounds like you had a great trip, but the last bit with the guy was kind… really creepy. Luckily Dan was there and the guy saw him, I’d hate to think that such a nice trip could have potentially ended on a very sour note. You took some really pretty photos though, especially the second to last photo with the city at night, I thought that was gorgeous.

Michelle´s last blog entry: And they’re off to the races!

, on January 15 2009 at 1:05am:

Wow, it sounds like you had a great time Jenn. I really want to go on a little surprise vacation myself soon. I’m just sick of the same old, same old. Glad you had fun on your trip!

Ashleigh´s last blog entry: Cough!

, on January 15 2009 at 2:03am:

Oh wow, I had no idea that Pittsburgh was so beautiful! Those photos tempt me to want to visit!
.P.S. Can you help me out with something? The sidebar on my webpage has a habit of floating all over the place, such as in my subpages and whenever I post a new blog entry. Could you take a look at my CSS and see if theres a problem I am unaware of? I asked Ranee and she suggested you. Thank you.

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, on January 15 2009 at 3:26am:

Glad to hear you guys a had fun trip! Pictures are beautiful and wow that last creepy guy.. gosh I’m so happy Dan was there!

Johanna´s last blog entry: Out with the old, in with the new

, on January 15 2009 at 4:58am:

Sounds like you had a nice mini vacation! I don’t blame Dan for saying something to those punks. I don’t mind the occasionally whispering, but I can’t stand it when people start acting obnoxious or talking on their cell phones during a movie. I mean if someone wants to do that, they should wait until it comes out on DVD and watch it at home LOL….

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, on January 15 2009 at 9:46am:

I read all 2200 words. Since I have never been to Pittsburgh, it’s neat reading about all the things there are to do there. It sounds like you had a really nice mini vacation. But I agree it’s always nice to come home.

, on January 15 2009 at 1:04pm:

I read it all It sounds like you guys had a really great time! I would be seriously creeped out by that guy, what if you had been alone or something? I’m glad everything was okay!

Jenn´s last blog entry: More animals?!