Mary Bellamy

I'm still alive and kicking. When last we visited, I was in Anchorage. One small incident later, we returned to Fairbanks. (I may have caused a wee little security shutdown of a military base when I tried to pick MNB up for the drive back. Oops.)

So what are the updates?
My sister had a baby. Hmmm. I am a bad aunt, as I don't know if I ever mentioned online that she was pregnant. Anyway, she and her husband now have a daughter, Ashley Something Evenson. I got away with only seeing one of the nasty, placenta-y photos from birth. That was more than enough.
Spring is finally here. The snow is gone, it's getting warm. We have more than 12 hours of daylight. And I'm itching to get house projects down.
Speaking of house projects, I dropped a cool $1.3K on new windows. There's still one window left to purchase, but that requires talking with someone about patching the siding of the house, as I need to put in a much smaller window than what is currently there.
Also speaking of house projects, MNB has an air compressor. I plan on borrowing it for my bathroom renovation project. He was not too horrified at my behavior in the tool section the first time we went to Lowe's together. It helps that I showed restraint and did not purchase a dual bevel compound miter saw with a laser marker. But I wanted to.
And MNB? Yep, he's still around. He'll be heading south for the summer soon, though. I'm hoping to get down to Anchorage to visit him at some point, and am trying to convince him to convince the Air Force that they need him to install stuff at Eielson this summer.

In February, Gary and I made plans to to to the Loon this weekend. There was a DJ coming up last night, and we wanted to go dancing. In March, I regretfully declined a road trip to Palmer for dance this weekend, citing the aforementioned plans. On Friday morning, Gary mentioned that he might not actually be able to go out after all. So, like any sane person, I went home after work, threw some stuff in a bag, and drove 350 miles to Anchorage for the weekend. It helps that MNB had to go down for work, too.

Let me tell you about the drive to Anchorage. It is long. And boring. And not pleasant at night. I usually only drive the route in the summer, so I wasn't quite prepared for the tedium of driving it partially in the dark. I got on the road by 7 p.m., and it started getting dark about 3 hours later. There's pretty much nothing between Fairbanks and Wasilla at this time of year. There's still another month or so until the hotels and shops at Denali open, so it's just one long, straight road. That didn't stop one car from using their GPS as they drove. They were also driving the speed limit. Suckers.

I managed to make the trip in under 5 hours, including one bathroom break, a refueling stop and pausing for the most horrific nose bleed I've ever experienced. Basically, I got to town in time to go to bed. On Saturday, MNB got up bright and early to go to work while I planned my route of attack.

• Skinny Raven for new running shoes. $100 well spent, as I tend to destroy a pair within a year.
• Target. Don't judge me - we don't have one in Fairbanks.
• Modern Dwellers. Gourmet chocolate truffles. Like, wasabi-ginger truffles.
• New Sagaya Market. Sadly, they do not sell naan anymore.
• Title Wave Books.
• Middle Way Cafe.

The plan was to have dinner with MNB at Bombay Deluxe. The reality was having dinner with MNB's family at Bombay Deluxe. Also: I had only brought one dress. And it was the sort of dress that MNB might appreciate. I kept my scarf on throughout the meal.

This morning I got up after MNB left with plans for a run at the hotel gym. I got halfway dressed before I discovered that I left my running pants in Fairbanks. Argh. To add insult to injury, the breakfast today was crap. All nasty, unhealthy food. They didn't even put out the fresh fruit! So much for trying to be healthy. I'll continue the downward spiral with Moose's Tooth pizza for lunch.

For some reason, MNB has decided to skip flying back in favor of driving with me. I told him I'm going to sing Neil Diamond the entire time, but he is still going to do it. Just wait until I bust out a Star Trek podcast.

Last night MNB showed me an online game he'd designed. I had been drinking a beer, so I was only half paying attention as he tried to explain how to play, but it involved moving seeds along two rows of nine cups. There was something called a "home cup," and the objective was to capture your opponent's seeds.

I tried explaining to him that I was a sore loser. I told him how I would scream "Don't touch me!" when Tom tried to console me after games of Scrabble. But nope, he wanted to play this game anyway. So I agreed to do it.

Then I whupped his ass.

I whupped it so thoroughly.

And when I was done whupping it, I pointed out how he needed to redesign the program because the box for my score was too small and my score actually extended outside of it.

And thus he did learn that I am also a sore winner.

What makes a perfect spring day? Is it driving aimlessly on back roads with the windows down and The White Stripes on the radio? Is it sitting on the porch rail of a local bar in the sunlight, drinking a beer with the Grateful Dead drifting through the open bar door? Any way you cut it, Easter Sunday was a damn near perfect day. We'll get to that in a moment.

Saturday night was Scott's surprise birthday party. We met up at Lavelle's Bistro to ring in his 30th year (+11). He was a little taken aback that we were all there, and of course we sang loudly and badly. The plan was to go bar-hopping after that. For some reason, though, I started insisting that we should go to the Mecca. There is no way to put this gently or not sound racist: the Mecca is a Native bar. I knew this; I had been there before. But I thought it wise to go anyway. We'll always have the experience, but we downed our round of drinks and got the hell out of there. Next stop: The Big I. We took over the rear of the bar, and ended up bringing two GIs along with us when we departed for the Boatel. MNB was along for the ride, so he was my designated driver. We made the Boatel our final stop of the night, and then went home to sleep it off.

Neither of us remembered it was Easter until we were eating our lunch at The Bakery the next day. The holiday meant many stores and businesses were closed, so rather than doing anything useful, we just drove around. MNB only looked slightly horrified when I made him stop at the transfer station. He might have been OK with the visit, except I saw someone bringing a reel mower to the recycle deck. I hopped out to ask the guy about it, then picked it up and put it in the back of MNB's truck. We eventually made our way to Ester and the Golden Eagle. The sun was hitting the front porch, so we sat on the rail, drinking beer and talking. Instead of going straight home, we drove out along the Old Nenana Highway, looking for a good plot of south-facing land to build a house on.

Back home, I tested out the new mower on my front law, which is quickly emerging from the snow. I rounded out the day by raiding the Fred Meyer floral section for discounted Easter lilies (Maybe I can keep them alive for a little while. I <3 lilies!) and baking a batch of blackberry pie bars with lemon sugar. Ah, spring!