The Halls

Ok, consider yourself forwarned, mega post ahead.

First of all, you probably clearly noticed that the site was down for a couple of days. I'm sure you hardly knew what to do with yourselves without me. Well, I had updated the server, and it did update everything except apache correctly. So I spent some time tonite getting that all back in order, including beginning to transfer the website to yet another computer. At least this time it's going to be one I'll have physical access to whenever I need it.

So when was my last post? Friday? Ok, lots happened since then.
Friday nite, I cannot remember what I did. Not much, I'm sure, but it completely escapes at the moment.
(This is a spectacular start, right?)

Saturday:
It was 90+ out, and I decided to to the 12k mile service to the GS. This involves changing the fule filter, which is inside the gas tank, changing the air filter, and the spark plugs. And I had to change the oil as well.
I started around 10:30am, by 2pm, it was too hot to continue, so I went into the basement to work on the shower. I got much of the little things left done, in ~30 minutes, so I worked on bringing up kde on the new basement desktop, but didn't get very far.
BJ and Shelly came over to introduce their dog to ours, as they were going to watch our dog while we went to Adventureland. BJ also needed me to look at his cdrom, which was quite dead. We talked about the shower for a while and how to get the spark plugs out of the GS, because I had managed to get a bunch of rocks down in the tube, which was a pain.

After they left, I finished the GS servicing, and decided I needed to change the oil in the vehicles too, especially the van before we left, as I realized it was overdue.

So off I went to Wallyworld to get filters and oil. Of course, I'm a terrible person to send to that store, because I just start getting anything that tickles my fancy, so I got 3 bottles of booze, tonic water, and milk.

Then I changed the vehicles oil and filters, and it was getting dark. I finished up, went inside showered, and packed my stuff for leaving the next day.

Sunday.
Got up, went to church, and went home. We packed up the van, and took off around 2:30pm, got to Des Moines around 5:30pm. I took my trusty new hotrod GPS

with my newly loaded mapping software. It was not the latest and greatest mapping software, it was just what I was able to get ahold of quickly. But it seemed to work pretty good as I had used it here and as we travelled out there. I made several navigational blunders that the GPS helped me discover quickly.

We checked into out hotel and called Jerry and Vonna, whom we wer planning on meeting for dinner. He gave me directions to a place called Claxtons, a barBque place. We were meeting his kids there too.
We actually managed to find the place as a Point of Interest (POI) on the GPS, and I followed the GPS's directions, which led me back to the interstate. I got about 10 miles outside of Des Moines when I thought, "there's no way this can be right" even though the icon on the GPS map is clearly showing me heading towards it. I call Jerry again, and he gives me brief instructions on how to get there, which primarily are based on turning around. I get back to the main street he told me to look for, and now what he said and the GPS are actually in sync. We get to the GPS's destination, and nothing. I see several things, and grocery store, gas station, and 2 strip malls, but it is noticely missing any restuarants, and nothing called Claxton's. So I start driving behind strip malls and grocery stores, while Ann calls the place and gets their address, which it turns out to be about 20 blocks from what the GPS had. So my not entirely-up-to-date GPS POI info didn't know that Claxton's had just moved down the street a couple months ago.
Nice.
So we're 20 mintues later than anyone else because of my hotrod new navigational equipment.

I order a green chile pulled pork sanwich, Aburey orders a rack of ribs, and Ann gets fish. I didn't like our waitress right from the start, she wouldn't even walk over to my side of the table when I ordered anything or asked any questions. The girls were very hungry, and we ordered appetizers, but Ally didn't like any of them, so had to sit hungry until the food showed up. The appetizers got there in ~10 minutes, which seemed reasonable, but the food took 45 minutes. We saw the waitress several times, and we asked several times about our order, and no real info was given. When it got there, over half the items were either cooked wrong, or flat out stone cold. We griped, and got 3 new sandwiches in < 5 minutes, which made me think, "If that's all the longer it takes to make these, what took so long the first time?"
At the end of the meal, the tickets came out, and everything was full price, no acknowledgment of how late everything was. This sparked everyone up, most notably all the Des Moines Hall girls. All three of them marched up and asked to speak to the manager, which was apparently was a situation Jerry had been in before, because he ran outside and pretended he didn't know us anymore.
Vonna (his wife) explained that we were trying to haave a nice meal, and our waitress sucked, and the meal was very late, and cold, etc, etc.
He said "give me your tickets and I'l adjust them for you", at which point I've said nothing, but shot my $60 bill up there to be adjusted too.
Suddenly, it came back from behind me, as it had been stealthily dropped off at the table while we were still standing there waiting for this guy to come back. Ann came up and gave it to me, and said "here's the new bill" which was $36.
Ok, $25 off, better than nothing.
Now Brianne and Jessica demanded to see the manager and they really started in on him. I didn't really even hear everything, but I caught a lot of "I've been working food service for years, and she has too, and there is no way this level of service is accetable, and another thing..."
I kindof looked around expecting to see the cops show up.
Suddenly the manager throws his arms up in exaspertation, and says "Fine!" and turns around and walks off. Brianne, who .5 seconds before was less than 6 inches from this guy's face, little bits of angry spittle flying on him as she tore into him, suddenly turned around to me, smiled, and said "let's go, it's all taken care of"
"Mine too?" I asked
"Yes. Let's go"

I thought we were going to be shot.

We said our goodbyes, and went back to our hotel, which it turns out was about 300 feet away, and I drove about 30 miles to get there.

The kids spent the next several hours swimming, and I didn't have a suit with me, so I went to the casino that was about 100 yards away, and played some $1-2 NL, but I caught no hands that connected with anything, and got blinded out way too much money so I quit.

Monday
11 solid hours of Adventureland.
You can do most everything there in about 4 hours. So the next 7 hours are doing your favorite things over and over and over.
The girls rode a few roller coasters at Disneyland (oh yeah, we went there too, a mere 4 months ago, we're vacationing fools), but weren't real sure how much they liked them at that time.
Last year, they were too short to ride many of the rides at Adventureland, but this year, they could do most of the rides.
We did the tornado first, and Ann said she'd do it too, so each of the girls would have someone to sit with. Ann hates roller coasters. She actually started crying on the way up, she was dreading it so much. That's a good way to put the kid your sitting with at ease. I couldn't believe Abby, who was sitting with her, didn't start freaking out too.
But by the end of the ride, Ann had calmed down, or had it scared out of her, and the girls loved it. From that point on, all they wanted to do was roller coasters, including the big steel one they have that has two loops, that was their favorite. We must have rode that one 8-10 times. It got to the point where I had had enough of it.
Finally, it was park closing time, and we made our way home. 3 hours later, and I was at home in my bed.