Surprise!

I made my mom cry on Friday night when I showed up in Salt Lake City for Mother’s Day. She’s down there for a few days taking care of my grandpa while my grandma is exploring Europe, and I decided a couple of weeks ago that I wanted to pay a surprise visit. Annie picked me up from the airport at about 8:45 in the evening on Friday, and 20 minutes later I was bouncing towards my mom, who had had no idea I would be there (amazingly, considering the amount of people that knew about it once The General caught wind.)

I only got to spend about a day and a half there, since I can’t take any more work off for a while, but it was definitely worth it. On Saturday, we woke up bright and early and drove up to Heber (AKA The Most Beautiful Place in North America…I want five homes there), ate breakfast at a fun local spot called The Hub, then dropped by Annie’s cute townhouse briefly while she gathered her work gear. She trains horses at an amazing dressage facility, and we got to go watch her in action. My mom brought her new horse down with her for the weekend, and after her lessons for the day, Annie spent some time working with my mom and Sky in a round pen. Sky’s only four and still growing into herself, but she’s absolutely beautiful when she gets to moving well. So that was fun. During Annie’s lessons, my mom and I went on a drive through the area. My mom got a couple of things at a cute market, and we stopped at “The Crater”..this creepy 80-foot-deep geothermic pool inside of a weird round cave-like hole. After Annie was done for the day, we went and got gelato at a resort there in Heber (mmmm, red orange…mmmm) then went and dropped Annie off at her house to shower and change. My mom and I went to the grocery store for a few things, then picked her up to go back to Salt Lake. We made up a quick dinner for my grandpa, then headed out to Spoon Me, a Pinkberry rip-off (but almost equally as good. And if you’re keeping track, that’s TWO ice cream stops in a row. Gelato, then frozen yogurt.). Last Christmas at Spoon Me was when my own mother accidentally called me “Jerry”, which has become one of the biggest family jokes of all time. Annie made me laugh until I cried and my abs burned when she quietly mentioned that one of her “rasjerries” had dirt on it. Yep. Still laughing. After that we headed to a restaurant called Epic for dinner. Last Christmas, Corinne, Kyle, Jon, and I went there and had a waiter named “Klutt”, and would you believe it, we had the same poor soul THIS time around, too! I’d told Annie and my mom about the waiter named Klutt before we got there, so when he first came and introduced himself, we had try hard to control our faces. I got a delicious salmon, Annie got pork medallions, and my mom got a yummy pasta. Then for dessert, we shared a mascarpone cheesecake that was one of the best things I’ve ever tasted.

Sunday was less eventful but still fun. We took a walk in the morning, then prepared for a special Mother’s Day dinner with my Aunt Marin, and Cousins Sarah, Rob, Ellie, and Brandon. My flight left at 7, so I had to leave the gathering at about 5, and I didn’t get back into Tucson until 11.

On a sadder note, my parents decided this weekend to put our sweet little dog Scout to sleep. My junior year of high school, someone abandoned two puppies in the yard of a vacant house across the street from us, so we went and collected them and kept them in our dog run for a few days, looking for someone to adopt them. My mom declared we couldn’t possibly keep either of them, but when I took Scout into the house and she curled up on my mom’s lap, it was all over. She was the sweetest little dog for about two years, and then she started to go weird. She became snappish and mean with strangers and other dogs. She sent my dad’s old lab Cricket to the vet more than once for stitches. I had to quit doing agility training with her because she was so hostile (it was sad, too, because she was really good at it). With the addition of little Gunner to my parent’s pack, she completely lost her mind, quit eating, viciously tried to bite a little boy, and tried to murder the new puppy TWICE. Anyway, here are my fondest memories of Scout - the meanest, sweetest little dog I ever knew.

1.) Giving her piggybacks around the house.


2.) Thinking back on her dragging my cousin Meg down the road. I wasn't actually there, but I'm pretty sure the way I imagine it is at least as good, if not better, than the actual event. Apparently, 8-year-old Meg was afraid that if she let go of the leash, she'd be in trouble, so the poor kid hung on as long as she could, and returned from her walk all scraped up. What a little champion.

3.) Jon's account of Scout backing up into the living room (beep, beep, beep), peeing on the floor in front of him and my extended family, then running out.

4.) Rhyming her name with funny words to see if she'll still come running when you call them out. My personal favorites: Flout, Trout, and Gout. Worked every time.

5.) Scout falling over and squealing every time my brother-in-law Steve reached out to pet her. And then hearing his comparisons of her to his perfect childhood dog, Remy. "Remy never squealed when I tried to pet him..."

Anyway, so poor little Scout caused one too many problems and was a huge liability, so my mom made the choice to put her down. And all dogs go to heaven, despite whatever Jon tries to tell you. It's in the scriptures for crying out loud.

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ALERT- I'm putting this tangent in at the very end, because I couldn't quite seem to fit it in above. When Annie and I were planning where to meet out on the curb at the SLC airport, I couldn't help but remember of one of the single-most funniest moments of the entire past year. I had completely forgotten about it until a few days ago, but here you go. Just this past Christmas, we all gathered in Salt Lake City, but Kyle, Corinne's husband, had a conflicting schedule (I can't remember why) so he ended up flying in a couple of days after the rest of us, so Jon, Corinne, Annie, and I all piled into the grey Impala that we had rented and headed off together to pick him up. When we got there, Corinne spotted him right away, waiting in the center median, so we pulled over to the right, and slightly behind him while Corinne dialed his cell number to let him know where to look for us.

Corinne: Hey, we're behind you in a grey Impala.
Kyle: [looking everywhere except at us] Oh, okay, I can see you.
Corinne: No, you don't, you're not even looking at us.
Kyle: I can SEE you, you're right over there! [begins to move quickly towards other grey Impala with arm outstretched]

Jon: He's going to get in the wrong car!!!!
Jessie: [inhuman screech] NOOOooooOOOOooooOOOOoooOOOooooo!!!!

I don't know what came over me. I was seriously panicked at the thought of Kyle getting in the wrong car. Anyway, we all laughed for an hour over the entire thing, and I know it's really random, but I had to put it somewhere, and I couldn't make it fit anywhere else.

Hope your Mother's Day was awesome.