Well I was going to write a longer post about my summer so far, but I haven’t really done much so I’ll mention a few things and then set up the next phase of my summer.
Directly after that I accompanied my mom to pick up Emily. That would be my sister Emily, the (former) inhabitant of Africa. June 13th was the day Emily returned from her latest several year stint working in Tanzania. Home for now, to work the Washington DC side of global health. Next, Emily’s BFF Mike came to the house for a little while b/c he had to leave for New York the next day. This meant going out for ice cream at the ice cream shop Toby’s formerly known as Scoops Beauregard. Mmm cinnamon ice cream. Mike said goodbye and Emily managed to stay up till 8:30pm despite horrible jet lag. Next to join the reunion, that evening, was brother David. And with his arrival the Churchman were reunited for the first non-Christmas time since 2004. It only lasted for a week, as David had to leave the 19th to be the director at Shrine Mont’s Music and Drama Camp. Bow Down! Sorry, just channeling my MAD year.
The next day Mom and I attended the Grinnell in Washington picnic. I awkwardly (but not as awkwardly as I could have!) made small chat with unfamiliar current Grinnellians until I spotted ELYSE! She bounded over from the people she came with and we spent the rest of the picnic together catching up and talking. And did I mention the eating. The hosts backed out of providing cooked food, so I was FORCED to eat only desserts. I was just ecstatic to see someone I knew from Grinnell, and not only that, but a friend. Woot!
But that’s enough about friends and family. Lets get to the really important part…baseball. If you’ve been paying any attention to DC sports recently, or baseball in general, you have no doubt heard of the potential-laden new pitcher for the Nationals. Stephen Strasburg. The man with the 100mph fastball. I was mucho lucky to get to attend the much-hyped Nats game for Strasburg’s major league debut. I went with both parents, as well as a woman, even taller than me, who had never seen a game before. It’s been said before by all who were there that his first game was amazing (and Strasburg is well worth the hype) Not just because of his arm and skill, but because of the excited atmosphere that filled the stadium that fateful night. The night they ran out of room on the strikeout counter. As one Twitter user (though I read this in the newspaper as I refuse to become a real Tweeter) so accurately and hilariously stated- “Strasburg’s curveball just punched physics in the eye and stole its girlfriend.” I’ve never felt any real loyalty to the Nats before and I don’t know if I would call myself a reformed Nationals fan now, but I am definitely a Stephen Strasburg fan. Now, if the rest of the Nationals would give him some offense to work with. Where is the law that says all Washington DC teams have to suck? I also went to another Strasburg Nationals home game with the entire family on Friday the 18th. It was the first Nationals game we all saw together and although the Nats lost AGAIN, Strasburg rocked it AGAIN, and we all (The Churchmans!) were there having a good time. The night ended with fireworks. Literally.
So that stuff happened and then it was time for my family vacation to Alaska (sans David). I woke up around 4am on because our flight was scheduled for 7am. Fun. We made it to the airport in good time. We went to the air Alaska booth, but they sent us to American Airlines for our first flight to O’hare because I simply cannot escape flying on American although it always sucks in some way. This day it sucked by only letting us print out some of our necessary boarding passes. We did not panic or yell however like the woman/jerk in front of us. I will never understand why people think yelling at service people will make the travel process go faster. I know not everyone can laugh it off like I can at this point, but come on, basic human decency. Anywho, our problem was resolved and we headed to security. While we were in line the security people kept telling the other travelers that this was not the security line for Delta flights. Sister Emily and I started joking around saying things like “Wait, but what about Delta flights?” or “Yes, but I’m going on a Delta flight.” Ha ha ha. Then the woman directly in front of us, sort of murmured she was in the wrong line and walked away. Oops. Yay foot in mouth! Before we knew it we were in Chicago.
The Chicago to Alaska plane ride was good. I actually had Internet for a good hour in-air, which I treasured b/c I knew that I would not be getting any type of internet on our upcoming cruise. I also actually helped “solve” a crossword with my sister and mom because of a crazy random fact I learned from The Question in the Justice League Unlimited cartoons. “The plastic at the end of shoe laces are called ringlets. Their true purpose is sinister.” !!! When we arrived at Anchorage I got the strangest sense of déjà vu because the airport was very similar to the one I arrived in last summer in Montana. Also, for the whole car ride to our hotel all the scenery looked exactly like Montana. Even the city around our hotel reminded me of a city in Montana. Therefore, I have discovered they are the same place. Your secret is out Alaska!
We decided we should wonder around the town of Anchorage instead of falling asleep immediately, which my body was screaming to do for reasons mentioned soon. We first stopped for a snack in a little square. Emily stumbled upon a little, amazing ice cream cart. There was local ice cream bars, hand dipped in hard chocolate shell. A very nice surprise. The weather was beautiful too and all the locals were outside in their tee shirts and shorts, despite it being Alaska. Next, we walked to an overlook where you could see salmon swimming upstream. In one section of the water dozens of people were fishing. Ten feet away from the fishers swam almost all the salmon, beyond where the fishers were legally allowed to roam. Next was dinner, probably my eighth meal of the day because of the time changes and jet lag. We went to a nice pub, though we discovered far nicer restaurants mere feet away after we had already eaten.
I should mention, because it was so important for the rest of our trip, the Alaskan sun. So, we had woken up at 4am in Arlington Virginia. It was now late afternoon in Alaska and there was a four-hour time difference. Therefore, we had been awake for a very long time and were much jetlagged. To make that experience ten times more “enjoyable” and confusing we were traveling on the summer solstice! The longest day of the year. Did I mention that during the solstice in Alaska, the sun is up for more than 21 hours. When we walked out of dinner the sun was almost in the middle of the sky. It was truly the longest day of the year. Oof. When I finally went to bed at 10pm to rest up for our upcoming cruise, the sun was still shining.
