Last Leg

So we left the quartet (The B tireds?) in San Antonio, and after a long day's drive, they ate some burgers and then slept like dogs (though in S & W's case, that's just called "sleeping"). There was some highly ambitious talk of checking out some local disc golf action in SA, but this would have required Aaron waking up sometime before noon and it not being nasty thick humid and HOT out. None of which happened. So instead, I got up early and ran the LEGENDARY four mile route around my neighborhood and then lounged about all day, letting Wrigley run her laps around the yard (which were impressive but indeed, not as large nor quite as psychotic as Little Ann's Honey Putter aka Lightning Mop). After a hellacious amount of very complexly interwoven planning involving GPS satellites and no fewer than fourteen wedding / party event coordinators, we decided to get the whole family (Dad, Mom, Deb, Pat, Aaron, Beck, Tim and me) to go to see the romp-fest "Knocked Up." We headed to the new Santikos Palladium Cineplex and knew even before entering the theater that this would be a momentous occasion, as my dad had a patient , a little 9 year old blond patient, say hello and give him a hug in line for tickets immediately before Dad had the pleasure of ordering tickets for "Knocked Up" in front of his patient and her dad. Ah, when Worlds Collide, said George Pal to his bride, I'm gonna give you some terrible thrills - or at least a whole lot of movie queue awkwardness.

I'm sure by now your brain is wondering "Wait a minute, who is the Tim in the Johnson clan?" Surely not Home Improvement era "I don't think so, Tim," or South Park's martyr? Of course not, sillies, those are lesser Tims. This Tim, when walking around a movie theater for a matinée showing on a Thursday afternoon, invites gasps and prompts my brother to ssay, "Hey, is that Tim...

Duncan!!?!?!?!?!"

Why yes, yes it is. Tim, Timmay, The Big Fundamental, etc., joined us for Knocked Up with his wife, who looked perhaps not coincidentally titular. So that was sweet. Everybody and their mom stopped him in the foyer to congratulate him on the Championship - actually, not everyone and their mom, because we didn't (even though we watched the actual games in the Caribbean and on our honeymoon - sheez, I'm really disappointed that Tim didn't give us a shoutout). I just cracked the requisite "do NOT sit behind that guy" jokes and we all kind of stared in awe. Nice. And after the movie, Tim bolted and did not clean up his area at all. Takes a little of the luster off those rings, Mr. Didn't Even Finish his Jumbo Popcorn.

So we vaguely recovered from that brush to dine at Alamo Cafe with really the whole fam - Pat, Ron, Grandpa, Jordan, Frank, Paige, Mom, Dad, Aaron, Deb, Beck, Tim and me. Oh, wait, that's right; Tim couldn't make it. He was busy littering. But Grandpa ordered Margaritas and Aaron ordered Nachos and we all ordered way too much food. We then returned home to learn that Paige and Pat have been taking a cake decorating class and lucky us got to enjoy the result:

Those heads are theoretically representative of the family members, though I'd be the first to admit I could only pick out Grandpa (bald) and Aaron (goateed). But the cake was yummy, and we got to bed at a reasonable hour for the 6 AM headout the next day.

The poor, poor dogs had the incorrect impression that the driving was done, and they were a pair of sad puppies on that last 900 miles. Fortunately the speed limit in West Texas from pretty much Boerne to El Paso is 80 mph, so we blazed through the countryside in record time. I'll spare you the gory details other than to say that this time I took the morning shift, there is NO radio in West texas, and sunny sunny desert has the unconsidered effect of making the sidewalks so hot that the dogs can't stand to walk on them. The dogs actually go tpretty wigged out on thsi last leg - Wrigley panicked at one point and jumped into the front seat; Sparkle yelped for no apparent reason at another. No fun - this "oh my god when the hell are we going to get there" look from Wrigley puts a nice stamp on the day:

Well, after that huge drive to El Paso and another unceasing jaunt through only a swath of New Mexico, we finally started to see something resembling a destination. Not *really*a destination, since these pics were snapped a solid four hours away from Phoenix - but still, the end was in sight. I think in some moment of idiocy we had actually considered having our stuff shipped to the condo on Friday night; goodness goo that would have been silly. Anyways, the aforementioned pics:

I should clarify - those last two are pics of the Mr. Mackey action figure (Mr. Mackey of South Park fame, m'kay), a gift from one of my students, Danielle. I am supposed to take Mr. Mackey with me wherever I go - he's due to reside on the next desk of my professional existence - so I thought it appropriate that he get some early showing as we crossed into our new home state. Plus, I just like the ubergoofy Mr. Mackey on celestial backdrop show - you can almost hear the chorus of angel.

(Yes, that's "angel," singular).

So we rolled slowly into town, got some directions from Dan and didn't actually hit too bad of rush hour Friday traffic. That first night we just dragged our stuff up from the car and slept that night (and the next two, ugh) on our inflatable mattress. That Saturday we got our wedding gifts from D & C - and I got to meet this guy for the first time:

That's Elliot, Dan & Xtina's whirlwind of black. That's actually a puppy picture of him; we'll get a more recent one up there soon. That first day he tried to make a break for it, and Dan and I tackled him. So he didn't even make it past the first set of cuts for running backs. Oh, well. But he's a goofy, energetic pup and he keeps the days exciting.

That more or less catches us up - that Monday it was 115 degrees and beck and I spent the afternoon carrying our stuff across the parking lot while bikini-clad onlookers, um, looked on. The dogs are just now starting to get relaxed around the apartment - after three days of driving, though, you would be exhausted, too. Remember, they're only two feet tall, so 2900 miles is like 9000 miles to them. I'll leave you with their typical behavior on these sunniest of sunny days, again best exemplified by the WD: