I jumped so high when Gideon and Mom woke me up this morning that I am surprised I did not hit the ceiling. So, to answer the ending to yesterday's blog, yes. I got to sleep in.
After a quick little run around to get dressed, we set off on our mission of the morning: getting me, Mom and Gideon some nice sandals for our upcoming adventures. But first, no morning is complete without coffee. We made a stop at Dunkin which I think the whole family was happy with. A little taste of home!
Then, it was on to buy sandals. We tried an athletic trading post first, but weirdly all they had was slip on Birkenstocks. Who is hiking long distances in slip on Birkenstocks? Like, imagine you slip and fall by the edge of a trail and your shoe flies off your foot and back down the mountain. Not good enough material for us, personally. Luckily, there was a Ross nearby that had some good quality sandals for all of us!
With that problem solved, we headed back to our hotel (which so graciously gave us a late check out) because Mom had to work a bit. We figured we could kill two birds with one stone and get the laundry done while she worked, so we stopped at the front desk for some quarters, too. But for some reason, our key card wouldn't let us into the laundry room. We tried going back to our room to drop our stuff off before investigating, but that door would not open either. Oops, I guess they forget to actually add the late check out.
No problem, the front desk woman got that all fixed for us, and we scanned into the laundry room. Every single machine but one was out of order. I mean, why would the front desk woman even give us quarters for which we declared the purpose knowing what she clearly must know? But oh well, we have time.
With that, we left Mom to work, and me and Gideon decided we were going to drag Dad to an arcade. A nice indoor afternoon avoiding the humidity and sun. It was small, but it was so dope. Me and Gideon won about 7 things from different claw machines, including 3 more rubber duckies. Gideon also beat me in air hockey several times. But that's ok cause I beat him in ski ball. Oh, and Patick dominated at Mario Kart.
With our pockets laden with prizes, we headed back to the hotel to pack up. But Mom wasn't done with her meeting, so we stood outside the hotel room door like creeps for 5 minutes waiting for her to let us in.
After that, we were packed in the car and ready to head on the road! Except that Mom was hungry, and I was kind of snacky myself. Personally, I would have gotten Steak and Shake, but the group decided to try Zaxby's.
While parking and waiting for our order, a Jeep pulled up in the drive through that had a ton of ducks on the dash. I took it as a sign, and handed over one of our arcade duckies to the passenger. She was ecstatic and squealing thank yous the whole time.
It turned out to be a good thing we tried Zaxby's, because their grilled cheese, fries, veggie egg rolls and milkshakes were all pretty good! I would certainly go again! We were sooooo full, though.
After Zaxby's we were planning on driving to Boca Raton and getting there early once again to work on blogs and photos. However, a billboard on the side of the highway had other plans.
Yeah. We had to go. And a good thing, because as we walked in it started pouring and thundering! Some of that weather continued throughout the day, but at least we dodged this part of it! We ended up exploring the whole museum, most of which was pretty cool! The cryptid part itself was actually quite light on Mothman, but they did have a lot of cool stuff on Bigfoot! I would say not exactly what I was hoping for, but still really cool! They didn't have any cryptid merch, either, which was disappointing. But what made up for it was the mirror maze! They had these disorienting glasses they made you wear, and there was even a little dance room at one point in the maze! It was sick! Oh, and Patrick loved it, too.
Anyway, after that it was seriously down to business. Our ETA for Boca Raton was 9 PM and getting later fast. Turns out there was a pretty bad car crash on the highway while we were in Ripley's. The GPS took us some odd backways for part of the drive, but we didn't mind because we got to see lots of cows on the way.
We had to make one more restroom and gas break before we got to the hotel, which Dad had booked after the museum just to be safe. Nice call, Dad! We pulled into this Mobil, and the first red flag was the advertisement for the Mediterranean restaurant inside. Right, like I'm trusting any food genuinely made within your establishment. Jokes were cracked and inside we went.
The bathroom was for customers only, fine. We always buy something anyway. It smelt weird in the general store. Fine, as long as it's clean. Wrong. When I tell you the toilet looked like someone purposely went anywhere but in the bowl, I am not exaggerating. Oh, and, they might as well have shaved there too. Disgusting. I definitely caught something wiping up that seat. Needless to say, I executed an excellent squat. I went to vigorously wash my hands and pump a ton of soap, but it came flying at me much faster than expected. Why, you might ask? THE SOAP WAS JUST WATER. AHHHHHH. Me and Mom ran out to the car and hand sanitized so heavily. When the boys came out of the bathroom they both said, What was so wrong about that?
I'm never trusting that those men use soap again.
Anyway, we got back in the car and finally made it to the hotel. No check in issues this time. They had laundry and Mom planned to do it in the morning. Finally not haunted and in the right hotel, me and Gideon slept like babies.
Nice deed for the day: In person Jeep ducking! Her happiness was contagious!
Boy Meets Comb:
No episode today. Gideon has decided doing his hair is an every other day activity. Hopefully he sticks to that and I will have something to write about tomorrow!
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