cheers to the black rhino

it was one big dog party-- Harv was a hit.

Spending the weekend with vet med students, I sure learned some crazy things about animals. For example, how many toes does an elephant have on each foot? This question was the topic of debate with Alina and Carl during the car ride down to Ames to visit Jess and Matt, who moved south when Jess started vet school at Iowa State this fall. (If you answered 2, you're right. But if you answered 3, you're also right--they have 2 on each of the front feet, and 3 on each of the back feet. Who knew?!) We arrived Friday night, and spent the night catching up, playing with the dogs (people to dog ratio = 1.5:1) and devouring Orange Leaf fro yo (just like Red Mango. LOVE.). 

On Saturday, Jess, Alina and I ventured to West Des Moines to go shopping at one of the nicest malls I've been to (ok, Iowa, I'm impressed). Even though (to our dismay) Cheesecake Factory had an unbearable lunch wait at 2pm (not worth it), the trip was a success-- rocked out in the car, bought new shoes, found Kristy's birthday present ;) That night, we rounded up the boys (Tyler got in late Friday night), and checked out Hickory Park, a local fav, for dinner. The delish BBQ--pulled pork, rotisserie chicken, ribs, sausage, sweet potato fries, mashed potatoes-- was absolutely worth the long wait. Plus, we played a lot of I Spy, were thoroughly entertained by the games on the kids' menus, experienced the fastest service ever, and the boys (who planned ahead and wore plaid shirts, by the way) all managed to finish their ridiculously large meals. 

110,000 calories and 23 pounds of consumed meat later (not as much of an exaggeration as you'd think), we headed home to play games and meet up with some of Jess's school friends before hitting the town. A handy dandy bus took us downtown, and with the exception of a mild left ankle sprain I sustained on the way home (which I didn't care about, btw, because we were done dancing at that point), it was a totally awesome night. A few highlights: we made sure to drink to the recently-extinct black rhino, Carl kicked me out of his wedding four times, Goph hockey beat the Badgers, the bus smelled like maraschino cherries, and of course, the dancin' was awesome.

pure. love. 

Truck fire in Albert Lea on the
way home

I couldn't have asked for a better Sunday, either. Slept till 11, got Jimmy Johns for brunch, and lazily laid around watching football all afternoon. SO much fun to see Jess, Matt and Ty, who I hadn't seen in months! The drive home was long, though, as I felt yet another weekend slipping away... At least I have some great pics and a sexy limp to show for it.