Memorial Day Weekend 2020

Well, we didn’t go to a Rockies game or do any gardening or run the Bolder Boulder or host a family BBQ, but MDW 2020 was the best it could be considering the circumstances.  We still ate Blue Pan pizza, watched a bunch of movies, spent some time with family, grilled bratwurst and to top it all off, I got to attend our virtual book club, so while it may have been different from any other year, it was still good and happy ♥

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Um, how is Blue Pan so good?!  Well worth the indigestion I had after eating it (a fun new daily pregnancy symptom :P).  Afterward, we watched The Lovebirds, which I won’t say is a good movie, but is at least a funny movie.  I laughed SO HARD at that milkshake monologue Kumail gave.

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Andi was busy taking 300 naps on Saturday, while Joey was busy doing a little project in our back room.  We’ve been trying to rent out our house and a huge drawback seemed to be our “second bedroom,” which is already small and probably felt even smaller since we had a bunch of boxes we’d packed stacked up in there.  Thursday afternoon, Joey felt inspired to clean out the boxes, then that turned into re-flooring the room somehow.  I wasn’t going to interfere and I’m glad I didn’t because it turned out so nice.  WHY DIDN’T WE DO THIS YEARS AGO??  We made black bean + tempeh tacos for dinner and watched Laggies, which I’d seen recommended last week after the death of the director, Lynn Shelton and… I’m sorry, but it was really not good.  Oh well!

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Sunday morning, Joey went golfing (I finally gave in!) and we had showings from 9-noon, so Andi and I hid out at my parents’, where my mom fed me a blueberry scone and bacon quiche that were both SO GOOD, my dad entertained me with Quarantine Life videos and my little sissy even joined us, which was the happiest surprise.  My mom showed us this box of our baby stuff, including our baby books and this teensy t-shirt one of us had.  I cannot believe how small newborns are! ♥  Back at home, I sat outside for a little bit until the rain clouds rolled in and when Joey got home, we watched the 1994 version of Little Women (which we’d watched a few years ago after I finished the book, but had to watch again now that Joey’s finished the book).  Gotta say… it’s pretty damn good!!!  We also watched Shoplifters and it was really interesting and sad as hell.

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Memorial Day!  Felt weird to not wake up early and run the Bolder Boulder but also pretty nice, plus Joey had made us buttermilk waffles.  I don’t know why we make any other kind because these are clearly superior!  I spent a good chunk of the day finishing my book club book, Circe by Madeline Miller and I absolutely LOVED it!  If you’re into Greek mythology (or even if you’re not), I highly recommend it.  Then I made us some potato salad for later and did some yoga.  We grilled bratwurst to have alongside our potato salad for dinner and then Joey went to watch some scary movie while I “went” to book club.  I hadn’t been in months (um, reading is hard when you’re falling asleep on the couch at 8 PM every night), and it felt SO GOOD to be back!  I was in the best mood for the rest of the night ♥

I hope you made the best of your Memorial Day Weekend too!

Weekend Things: SPOILER ALERT

WHAT A WEEKEND!!!  In short, we rode the G Line, saw Avengers: Endgame, had an incredible dinner, attended a performance of Cats, ran outside and watched the much anticipated third episode of Game of Thrones.  But, not in short, I have SO MUCH more to say about all of those things.  Stick around for it or don’t, but you’ve been warned 🙂

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The light rail station a mere two blocks from our house has been built for something like two years and they’ve just been testing this whole time.  I get it because safety first, but dang!  That’s a long time.  The G Line FINALLY opened Friday, it ran free all weekend AND we were headed right where it runs, so obviously we had to ride it.  We grabbed a quick casual dinner at Illegal Pete’s first, then walked (WALKED!) to the train.  As luck would have it, the wind kicked up right before our walk, so what should have been a pleasant stroll turned into an assault by tiny bits of dirt and sand.

SPOILER WARNING!!!!!!!!

BUT SERIOUSLY, SPOILER WARNING!

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Guys, I love love LOVED Avengers: Endgame!  If you’re going, please do yourself a favor and see it in a theater packed with other MCU fans, who will cheer, laugh and cry along with you.  Okay, I did not actually cry (or go to the bathroom!!!) but I don’t know the last time I felt as electrified as I did during that battle scene.  Cap wields Thor’s hammer!!!! Oh my god, I died!  And then Captain Marvel had the infinity gauntlet and all the lady warriors assembled around her and I died again.  And then for real, Iron Man died.  I maybe would have felt more sad about if I hadn’t been distracted by someone in the theater moaning “Nooo!  Nooo!  Nooo!”

In all honesty, the thing I’m most sad about is that I just got into all these films and only just discovered how fun it is to anticipate and watch these movies with everyone else and now… it’s over.  It happened too fast!  Also, shout out to how funny this movie is.  I laughed A LOT.

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I got up Saturday morning and ran 5 miles!  I try to ramp up the mileage around this time every year so I can make it through the Bolder Boulder but also because running the Cherry Creek Trail while it’s still cool (a bit too cool, if I’m being honest) and quiet in Denver gives me such joy.  And when I got back, Joey had coffee and waffles and dishes washed and now “joy” doesn’t seem strong enough a word ♥

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The rest of the day was spent doing a little bit (for me, but a lot for Joey!) of yard work, a trip to the grocery, walking our pup and then cleaning ourselves up for date night.  First, we hit up Spuntino for dinner and oh my god, why had we not been there before?!  We grabbed two seats at the bar and two VERY GOOD happy hour drinks, then feasted on warm focaccia with ricotta, fettuccine and the most beautifully striped ravioli.  I felt like we’d discovered a Denver dining secret and I can’t wait to go back!

Cats was… um, well, it was cats.  Throwing a cat ball.  In which a gumbie cat, a railway cat, a broken woman cat (???) were in attendance.  Look, the dancing is fabulous and the performance of “Memory” in the second act was PHENOMENAL — we immediately went home and listened to other versions of it and thought the one we’d heard live was by far the best — but WHAT IS THIS SHOW??  There’s basically no action, the songs are just okay and it was incredibly difficult to understand any of the words in the songs.  Which means I still have NO CLUE what a “jellical cat” is.

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Joey got up Sunday morning and ran 9 miles, so I stayed in bed to cuddle our dog and read, then when he got back, we took ourselves to Port Side for breakfast and May planning.  How is it already so booked??  I’m sort of sad April is almost over already, but I’m thinking May will be a good month 🙂  After, I made lunch salads while Joey started building us some flower boxes and then we made a trip to Mike’s Camera to order a picture we’re going to hang over our bed.  It felt so good to finally get that done!  I bottled a new batch of kombucha (Mango Cayenne!) before heading out to yoga.

GAME OF THRONES SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!

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Back at home, we made Buffalo Chicken Tenders for dinner — they were good and spicy but not quite crunchy enough for me — then watched Game of Thrones and I’m sorry to be a total bummer, but I did not like that episode.  For starters, I had a REALLY hard time seeing any of the action.  I think those dragons fighting in the air was cool, but I don’t know because I could barely see!  Narratively, it was a miss for me as well.  I was excited to see a Dothraki Horde fight and then I didn’t get to.  I have no idea where Bran warged to.  I just did not care about Beric dying and felt literally zero emotion about his connection to Arya.  I did not understand how Jorah was just right there to save Dany.  I wanted so much more from Jon, who I usually love to watch fight and I felt the Night King’s demise was so anticlimactic.  I’m still working out my thoughts on Arya being the one to kill him, because yes, Arya is badass, but for some reason, this just didn’t really feel like her fight to win.  I don’t know.  I really didn’t care for the scene ending on old Melisandre.  Please tell me your thoughts and arguments, because I’d honestly love to be talked into liking this episode.  I’d prefer it to the disappointment I currently feel.

All I’m saying is, I saw two epic battles this weekend.  One was utterly thrilling and one was not.  All GOT letdown aside, this weekend was amazing!  More please!