One of the reasons I didn't want to stay in Indiana yesterday was that Meter was coming over to visit me this morning. We had talked about getting together, and she agreed to convince her mom to drive her over this morning, where we could garden, feed the dogs, and chat about life in general.

So, when she arrived this morning, mom Megan in tow, I figured the day was going to be good.

Megan handed me Meter's new toy when she arrived. I have to say, I was a little freaked out by it. It's a mechanical duck that quacks when you feed it its bottle. It isn't the soft, cuddly duck like Aunt Jemima from my youth, oh no, it's a plastic duck that contained in its feathers hours of entertainment.

Yes, entertainment. Tasty, tasty entertainment.

Bella was quickly intrigued by the tasty entertainment, and came over to investigate. In reality, I think she was interested in the possibility of eating a small duck, which happened to be quacking over in this general direction, but that's part of the tasty entertainment, eh?

Meter was fabulous with Bella. She petted her without grabbing. The two were quickly fast friends.

Part of me can't help but wonder if Bella had moved on from eating the small duck to eating the small child next to her. I mean, come on, anyone that cute HAS to taste good, no?

After a while, I decided that Bella needed a treat for being so good. I don't know if Bella really understands the concept of rewards, or if life is just what happens between rewards, but she was good enough to reward.

As I was in the kitchen, I heard a roll of thunder outside. The sound had me perplexed, as sun was shining in through both the front and the back windows. I looked around me, only to realize that Meter had followed me. The thunder was her announcing, yo, lady, here I am.

We played with the various balls I have around the house. Meter liked the basket ball, but I have to tell you, the 4.4 pound, soft, squishy ball I have really confused her. It was smaller than the other ball, but ugh, she couldn't pick it up very well.

She did, try, though. And managed a few times. After a while, though, the basketball was more fun.

Eventually, though, even the basketball can be boring, so we went outside to garden.

Although we did make it as far as the garden, and smelled a lot of flowers, the act of walking seemed to entertain Meter best. We walked around for a while...

until Annie joined in.

Then it wasn't so much fun.

Except that it was.

Annie and Meter became the best of friends, having in depth conversations comparing and contrasting foods and health care, swapping tips on hair styles and what to do about excess facial hair, even the best way to convince "the others" in the household to do their bidding.

I felt so left out.

Eventually, Megan came by and rescued me from the loneliness.

I swear, it is impossible for me to take a bad picture of Megan.

I want that superpower.

So, the weather isn't particularly good today. After dropping Gab off at school, I wandered to the Starbucks as planned, but later purchased a pumpkin spice latte for Jessica and drove back to her house. Her conference call had run over, and another call was scheduled, and you know what? I totally understood how frustrating work can be when you want to do something and work just keeps piling up.

This morning, I woke up on Jessica's couch. I had intended on falling asleep in "my" bed in the bedroom, but I'm still very much on Calfornia time, and wasn't much awake when I passed out on the couch while working last night, trying not to wake Jessica and Gabby.

The house had a warm hustle and bustle that happens on school mornings, where the kid wants to sleep as long as possible, the school bus comes at 8, and the weather outside is cold.

Jessica had a conference call very soon after Gab was to leave for school. I asked if I could drive Gab to school, then head over to the closest Starbucks, Jess could me up with me over there. I've been reading Scalzi's Old Man's War, which Mike dumped on my 12' stack of unread books, at the top no less, and I have to say that I'm glad there are at least three of these books. I very much enjoy his writing style.

Now, I'm not quite sure how it happened, whether the begging and pleading to let me drive Gab to school (that would have been me) or Gab's "accidently" missing the bus (that would have been Gab), but Jessica relented, and the two of us jumped for joy, then bundled outside with the dog close on our heals.

We made it to the car before I realized just how much ice was on the car. Uh... yeah, now I'm glad the car rental agency thought to include the ice screaper in the rental.

Yeah.

I scrapped for a while, with the car running (haven't left the car running and hopped out of a car in a LONG time), while Gab made faces at me from inside the car. She hopped into the back seat of the car, not quite being tall enough for the front seat. I'm looking forward to when she can be in the front seat, that's for sure. It's strange to have a conversation with someone in the backseat, when you're in the front.

Eventually we were off, and the drive went quickly. There was, indeed, ice on the road. I'd like to add that I pretty much found every piece of it, too, with the car, on the way from the house to the school.

I know that dropping kids off at school is a chore for their parents. I also think that many parents are FAR too protective of their kids, especially the ones who drive two blocks to wait 15 minutes in their SUVs to drop their kid off at the school front door, never quite realizing the amount of pollutants they're pumping into their kids' lungs with their morning ritual. I walked to school starting in kindergarden, and the distance was farther than the two blocks people drive in Sunnyvale. Sometimes I really wish those parents would be hit with a clue stick.

I'd also like to that, if you don't have to drop kids off at school every day, the times you do get to drop them off are pretty darn special.

Instead of staying in the City today, I decided to head out to look at the house. Having not been able to visit the house in the last few weeks since the tenants l'horrible moved out, I've been worried about the condition of the house. Dad says he's been over to look at it, but he didn't do much other than verify the heat was on. I was hoping to see Dad this weekend, too, but he's out at Chris' house (which cracked me up, that we're going to completely miss each other).

I had made this decision before I had realized there was a wedding brunch this morning. I met up with Lea in the lobby, where she offered to drive us to the brunch. I declined, since I already had made arrangements with Jess to hang out with her this afternoon and evening, but took her up on her offer to take me to the train station.

See, I was carrying the base of the wedding cake: a wood disc about 24" in diameter. Outside, the weather was windy and snowing and windy and blustery and did I mention the winds? Imagine how perfectly a 24" disc of wood becomes a sail in high velocity winds, and you can see just why I preferred a car ride with Ken and Lea to becoming a kite on the way to the train station.

Somehow I made across the street from where Ken and Lea dropped me off, dropping the disc a few times and running after it as it rolled down the street. If Ken wasn't laughing hysterically at my antics, then he has no appreciation for physical comedy.

An hour and a half of trains, followed by more delay because I chose the bad car rental agency again (made better only by the fact that I knew where I was going this time), a couple hours of driving the speed limit or more slowly, through (did I mention the) bad weather, and I was finally back in familiar country.

I can't say that driving in this weather is particularly comforting to me. I know the basics of driving in bad weather and snow and ice and dark and other various hazardous driving conditions (including the safest way to drive in these conditions, which is to say, don't drive in them), but, hey, I did okay, arriving at the house, checking it out, then heading over to Jessica's to stay the night with her and Gab.

I was immediately greated in Jess' dog's neurotic style which is to run up really fast, sniff my leg, then run away just as fast, as I'm determined to be a Stranger™ and Dangerous™ Jessica laughed at the dog (her laugher is always great to hear, I don't think she laughs enough), knowing full well that I would win the dog over before I leave tomorrow.

Jessica, bless her heart, immediately suggested we head over to Panera.

I have to say, I really (as in, really really) like Panera. It seems each time I head out to Indiana, I have at least one meal at Panera every day. If the people working there stayed longer than a month (they might), and see me on my visits, I suspect they'd be weirded out by my binging behaviour.

Gabby joined us later, and the three of us went home to play a rousing game of Skipbo!

Gabby let me know that I take too many pictures, so I handed her my camera for one of those elusive shots that is rarely seen on my camera.

A shot of me.