I was rather quite on Facebook after Emily and I arrived at Uncle Larry’s. This was because we had a rather chill time. As Emily described it, “it was like a beach vacation without the beach.” My mom thought this was hilarious and calls my uncle a beach bum. We did manage to leave the house three times. Once to go to the grocery store, once to visit my cousin and lastly to visit Shelly and her family.
I met Shelly in 2011. She was training with fleet feet and a friend of J-Ho’s. They met at fleet feet. I had met her at the Halloween 5K a couple weeks before my big Dr Veronikis surgery. Shelly and her husband and I believe his sister had signed up for the Arnold turkey trot. Their babysitter cancelled at the last minute. J-Ho knew we both lived in Arnold so she had Shelly contact me. They actually lived within walking distance of us. (Maybe a 1/4 of a mile~normal people walking distance). Brian took Emily over to babysit and I went with to pick up. I still felt like hell but must have not looked too bad, because Shelly asked me if I ran that day. A couple years later Shelly was transferred to Kansas City for her job and Emily ended up being her kids “nanny” or babysitter. Whatever they are called these days. Emily loves Shelly’s kids and was always excited to babysit for her. She would be bummed when school would conflict and she wasn’t able to help out. Shelly was transferred to North Carolina around the time the school year ended. (At least I think, I can’t keep my own dates straight these days). Emily was so sad because she had to give up seeing the people she loved.

A couple months ago I came up with the grand idea to visit my uncle, cousin and Shelly since they all live about an hour and a half from each other. And I did airport checks and we could fly southwest for 150 round trip into Charlotte NC which was also in the one and a half hour radius. It was perfect. And thanks to all the silly cake hunting, my fear of not knowing where I’m going is much less. As Emily pointed out I had the radio volume on 17 dropping the rental car off when normally it would be 8 or less. Although when the freak horned me in the drop off spot my anxiety shot through the roof and I looked for my tranquilizer gun to shoot the dude.

We had a great time at Shelly’s. Her kids are so well behaved and polite. Emily knew what she was talking about. I hadn’t seen her husband Arick in such a long time. I had forgotten how much I loved him. I was reminded of the love dare days in which I was to identify a couple with a great relationship that I would want to use as a model. Herc and Christy Noblitt were who I chose. Had I known Shelly and Arick at the time, they would have been included. Shelly shared with me after I first met her that there were six girls in line for Arick if Shelly died. I immediately announced I’m number seven and started calling myself that. I conveniently forgot that the entire time we were visiting. It’s a good thing too or I might have not been able to speak to Arick. I really am shy in a lot of ways! They really are a great family and I hope one day they are brought back home to Saint Louis (because life really is all about me).

My fitness was horrible this past week. When I say chill I should have said never moving off the couch. I usually average 12,000 steps a day (I have a competition problem) and yet this vacation it was like 3000. I forgot my charger for my fitbit so I went a good 24 hours without data input and yet the world did not come to an end. Full marathon training starts tomorrow. I was going to use the coach portion on my Nike plus app but that starts off with an eight mile long run. That is ridiculous so while sitting on the couch at uncle Larry’s a found a much more reasonable 16 week training plan. So watch out Fitbit friends the step monster will be back on track. While at the charlotte airport I decided to walk the length of the airport for steps. Now I know why they say Lambert is tiny. Concourse E had 50 plane slots. Not sure what they are called. I got in about 2500 steps. I’m a crazy nut job.

As my mother daughter trip with Emily comes to an end, it’s time to start planning my mother daughter trip with Kayla. She wants to do a four day cruise so that means I need to work a little extra. She also wants to fly instead of drive so I better start working on that anxiety. How are we getting from airport to boat. Now I’m thinking taxi or über. I think I need a drink stronger than the diet doctor pepper I ordered on the plane.

Mole moral~ Despite all the yelling and fighting Emily and I had a great time at Uncle Larry’s and once again not seeing anything in Greenville South Carolina. Maybe the fourth trip I will actually leave the couch. Probably not!