The time Matt was a superstar. And I almost peed in a canoe.

We've all read about the time Matt and I tried to kayak together and how horribly awful it was. So it was no wonder that I put off canoeing with him for as long as I possibly could. I have canoeing on my 30/30 list and since I turn 30 in March we're pretty much in the last few weeks to canoe up in northern Wisconsin. I suppose you can go until November and December, but given how shallow the Brule River already was today.. I bet it'll freeze over in those months. So this weekend? I was pretty much faced with a "shit or get off the pot" situation.

So I obviously went because if you know me by now, once I've committed to something (no matter how stupid it is) I do it.

The fun part was that after we dropped the kids at my in-laws house and drove to the canoe rental place? The rain started. Which.. yay. It was about 50 degrees, a little windy and the rain was between a mist and a light sprinkle. But this bitch? Got her ass into a canoe while a lone fisherman was trying not to laugh at me.

 We took the short route which was about an hour and a half total? According to the map, it was 45 minutes from this starting point to the Bois Brule point, and then another 40 minutes to the Hwy 2 landing point where we were parked. So off we went.

 I got to be in the front and Matt was in the back. Which (brace yourselves) THANK GOD because Matt has canoed before and knew what he was doing. I was worried because A) I suck at anything athletic and B) I had never canoed before and C) I was incredibly tired which means I'm kind of useless but punchy.

The un-fun thing was that our little trek had several areas of rapids. Matt assures me that they were only class 1 rapids but I don't care what those fucking signs say. Rapids are rapids, yo. And since I was sitting in the front of the canoe, I'm not going to lie. I kind of panicked. Like a bunch. And I'm certain that one of the worse sets of rapids came before our half way point and not only were they scary and fast, but we got stuck on a rock. It was at that moment I almost peed myself. Thankfully, Matt told me to get my shit together and help. So I did.

 And yay! We made it to the half way point!

 And I was still dry!

So we paddled even more. We saw two eagles, one of them was just chilling in a tree. We saw a duck. We saw a turkey on the road on the way there. We did not see any bears.

The really great thing? Is that though I'm still grossly uncoordinated with a paddle or oar, whatever the damn thing is called, I had a good time. Matt steered our canoe better than he steers a vehicle and for that I was thankful.

 Because I made it to the end completely dry! And I have to say? That he was a canoe rock star. He really was. I was so happy to be in the front because I couldn't see him laughing at me when I freaked out like a girl when I saw a rock or a log. I didn't even get mad when he steered us into a tree and I hit my head. Or when a bunch of branches slapped me in my mouth. I also appreciated the fact he didn't tell me that our canoe was thisclose to tipping over until we were out of the rapids. I'm sure he knew I would panic and flail and probably clear the woods of anything still alive. And tip us over in the mean time.

But all in all? I would do it again. Granted, I would prefer it to be on a sunny summer day while wearing flip flops and a bathing suit, but I would do it again. Especially if Matt was steering because he was awesome at it.

I think this was a good exercise for us in communication anyways since the kayak trip only highlighted how bad we are at it. I also think it's kind of cool to think how we've grown as a couple since that trip to now.

Before I sign off for the night, if you missed Day one of the KY Intimacy Experiment, you need to go HERE to catch up.

I apparently like being Chicago's bitch.

Call me crazy but I love Chicago even with it's high crime, drunken and cracked out homeless people in the fetal position on sidewalks and obsessive honking for no reason. I do. I can't help it.

Which is where I was this past Friday and Saturday, which is why you didn't get posts either of those days. I had the laptop but I figured screw it because I was too tired to give you anything worth while anyways. But that just means I spent more time walking the streets of downtown Chicago to give you this post. I'm a giver like that.

So Friday it starts with us obviously driving the about 8 hours it takes to get to Chicago. Somewhere along the way I had to pee. Obviously. But the cool part is I *finally* got to stop at this food court (there are two of these on the way to Chicago but we stopped at only one of them) that is literally above the highway. It's like a giant sky walk food court and there is a gas station on the side. I've driven to Chicago three times now and I'm just happy to be able to say I've waved at cars like a maniac from the sky walk food court. Never mind we were almost run over by the guy cleaning floors with some giant machine on wheels. Like four times.

No, the thing to mention is that the bathrooms here? Have terrible walls. You know I'm a big critic of public restrooms and although Michigan wins the award for grossest bathrooms ever, this one had bizarre walls that made me instantly dizzy.

 Seriously imagine being surrounded by this. I was so dizzy I felt like a drunk trying to aim into the bowl since of course I'm doing the hovered stance because there is no way my actual ass is touching the seat. It was a challenge, let's just leave it at that.

Once we got to Chicago we checked into our hotel which was super great. It was the Double Tree on East Ohio, and it's great because it's in between Navy Pier and the Magnificent Mile so that's handy. After checking in, getting our kind of disgusting warm cookie (they say it's free but you know you're paying for it) we decided to ask the concierge how to get to Gino's East from our hotel since we were just going to walk it. It ended up being 10 blocks, but because I was all "I'm a lost tourist but I'm super friendly" to the concierge, she gave us this nifty pass to not have a wait time to get in. SCORE. It turned out to be a super score because while we waited maybe 5 minutes, we were able to eat and get out in about 90 minutes, and nobody had budged in the line when we came in. See? Being awesome gets you things in life.

 This is my crazy, "I didn't realize I was getting my picture taken face" while texting my friend Emily.

 But then I was all, "Aw.. picture with my friend Tammy!" and so I look normal. Plus, we look great together.

 And then I got a good one of Matt and Chad against the graffiti wall. And yet AGAIN I forgot to bring a neon puffy paint marker. Failure.

 But leave it to those boys to find the penis picture on their seat. AND point it out.

Finally, after like 45 minutes our pizzas came. Tammy and I (picky eaters) shared one and Matt and Chad (human garbage disposals) shared one. Oh, and our little concierge person gave us a ticket for free breadsticks. I can't speak highly enough about this woman.. she rocked out night for sure. Anyways. The pizza was delicious.

 mmmmm....

So after eating pizza we decided to walk around downtown a bit. I ended up getting a cute shirt at H&M along with a kick ass hair clip and some tights for Olivia. By then we were all kind of exhausted so we headed back to our room.

At this point, I was trying to return some emails and Matt was watching some TV when we get a frantic knock on our door. It was Chad to inform us that hey- you can't lift anything off of that little tray of snacks because you get charged for it. Which was kind of shit because we were picking them up wondering how they have the balls to charge $6 for a bag of M&M's, so Chad made sure that nobody was charged. ROBBERY, this is.

 Anyways. We slept great. We got up early, went to Dunkin Donuts for breakfast and headed to Navy Pier. And just an aside- but is there a rule that every Dunkin Donuts is fully staffed with people who barely speak English? Because poor Matt ordered a sandwich and they kept asking him about what donut. I think he ended up with a sad slice of egg (yes, it was a slice... ew) on some weird bread. Anyways. We started walking to Navy Pier only to find... Ohio Street Beach.

 Kind of awesome to have a beach in the middle of downtown??

 So from there we made it to Navy Pier only to find that there is a weird display of wooden signs that read "Fix-Ice Machene". Now, I don't know if this is something with meaning but they spelled machine wrong. Is the Chicago educational system that bad? And why has nobody said to the artist, "Dude- you spelled it wrong. People will think this entire city is full of uneducated dumbasses."?? I don't know. Nobody seemed to know what it meant either.

 But... Navy Pier! This was my first time there, but both of my previous trips didn't allow for time to see it so I totally put my foot down and said- we ARE seeing Navy Pier.

 And guess what? They have a Billy Goat Tavern! That serves Horny Goat mixed drinks!

 While I didn't partake in that since they weren't open, I settled for a picture under the sign.

The other reason I wanted to go to Navy Pier besides it's awesome was because I wanted to ride on a sailboat for my 30/30 list. And since I don't half ass anything, I rode on a tall ship (like a pirate ship.. and this one had a super awesome and knowledgeable pirate narrator!) with massive sails. It was great.

 And the view was kind of amazing despite fog.

 And I basically learned a lot about Chicago, the coastline, etc. Did you know everything east of Lower Michigan Avenue used to be the water? After their massive fires in late 1800's, the city basically flattened the ashes of the old downtown and that's what makes up the east of Lower Michigan Avenue. They also have a rule you can't build tall building there to ruin the skyline, but this black building? Gets around that rule because it's not built on the ground but rather on stilts.

 The sails!

 The view!

After the boat tour we headed to lunch where the boys got authentic Chicago hotdogs. *barf*

 I obviously had a hamburger. Then we took a bus tour of downtown where Chad's chest photo bombed our picture.

 We saw the bean.

 Oh man. It was about 4pm by the time we got into my van to go home. I was kind of exhausted from walking. Which was unfortunate, because it took us exactly one hour and 15 minutes to get out of Chicago.

 We drove for hours until we decided it was time to eat dinner. But by god.. like a beacon on the horizon I saw a Cracker Barrel. You'll remember from my Tennessee trip the amazingness of such a place. And you know I beelined for the jar of sugar suckers. I literally spent my last $12 on ten of these bad boys.

 Matt wouldn't even walk next to me because he was embarrassed. But after leaving the restaurant it was a long drive home. I can't even emphasize how long that drive home was. Usually I get home from Chicago around 10 or 10:30 at night but since we left so much later than usual, we pulled up at our house at 1:30 a.m. Ugh. To say I was a lazy fat ass on Sunday? Understatement.

Overall it was a great trip. I had a lot of fun, I enjoy being a tourist, I learned a lot, and best of all- I'm itching to go back. This time I'd like to go back in March for St. Patricks when they dye the river green. AND I want to go to a play at the Chicago Theatre or somewhere. So we'll see. ;)

Weight Loss Monday... or that time I didn't research enough and almost died.

I know you all want a major update on my weight loss and I have no numbers for you. In fact, it's been MONTHS since I've weighed myself, and I'm OK with that. Mostly because I've been eating shit and so I'm sure that will only reaffirm I'm a fat ass. But I *am* exercising. In fact... I ran a 5K bitches.

Yeah, that's right. Your lambwhore leader is a BADASS who ran (almost all) of a 5K. In under an hour.

Bow Down.

So basically, my friend and coworker Emily and I are training for a half marathon that happens in June. In order to train for this, we're working on our running skillz and figured it we run a series of smaller races, we'd be better prepared for our half marathon. We'd kind of understand the rules, etiquette, and just general feel of different races so we A) don't make assholes of ourselves or B) hurt ourselves and/or others. We're good girls. The race on Saturday was our first, it was a 5K so that makes it 3.1 miles, and it was the Run Like An Animal race.

 Pre race, just happy to have numbers. We feel super official. And I wore my "Fainting Goat Whisperer" shirt for you, Jen!

When we looked up the race it clearly said it was a run "through the zoo", and having been to the zoo I know it has paved sidewalks that are generously wide. I also know it has some hills that suck ass pushing a double stroller up, but it's not horrible. So when they have us line up facing the forest... I was kind of taken aback. The gun goes off and the runners start, they gave us a 15 minute lead before the walkers got to go. We start off strong thinking we've got this shit.

 Meanwhile, Emily's husband and her sister are lounging in chairs. Matt and my kids are playing in the park.

 Completely unaware Emily and I are getting our asses handed to us. Here are some facts about the race course we did not know:

• It was mostly a TRAIL run. Trail = hard. Trail running really means you should have special shoes with say.... traction on them.
• The race is almost entire uphill.
• Having the ability to hurdle giant areas of mud and/or puddles as well as tree branches is a plus.

I basically felt like this was some kind of sick relay. Emily and I were running and running and running, almost dying as we hurdle over things in the completely ungroomed path. There are steep grassy hills we're going down that are completely slick as shit because it's wet from morning dew, the other steep embankments are just loose gravel so you kind of slide down it. And as we're heading toward the start/finish area, I'm like, "praise baby jeebus" because we thought FOR SURE we were almost done. Um, no. The lady was like, "You're almost half done!" I'm sorry- jigga say what? "Almost" half done? So we decided we were going to get to the half way and then walk a bit.

 So that's us getting to the half way point.

 And me trying to look like I'm not going to die.

 And this is me swearing that I am going to die. But back into the bowels of the forest we go for *yay* another 1.5 miles.

That leg of the race was even worse. I'm not kidding you when I say that a good mile of it was completely uphill a mostly dirt/gravel/mud/uneven surface area. At this point we were doing the run/walk alternating and that was going fairly well. She's a much faster funner than I am, but I was able to keep up pretty well and in all, I'm glad I had her with me because I would have said "fuck this shit" at the half way point.

We got passed by old people. And kids. But we passed the bridal party (yes, there was a bride and her bridesmaids running) and we stayed ahead. We also finished before a bunch of skinny bitches who looked like they knew what they were doing, so that's kind of awesome.

The important thing is that we finished. We finished that bitch in 47 minutes (though Matt believes it may have been closer to 45), and our goal was to finish in under an hour. And considering that the race route was everything we had not trained for I'm thrilled that we did as well as we did. I'll tell you one thing, running in a skort is SO much nicer than shorts. Except this one was spandex-y and I was sweating so bad that I literally could not tell if I was just sweating and it was pooling or if I peed. But I'm like 99% sure it was sweat because I peed a lot when I got home. So.. win. The other awesome thing is that the first people to finish were done at 20 minutes and they were all hard core runners who said the route was brutal, so that made me feel even more badass. Like we should have gotten more than a damn shirt.

So thanks, Emily- for not letting me give up even though I felt like dying. I promise to actually call the race people and specifically ask if we're on 100% paved road or not the next time!

Our next race is the Minnesota Mile in September, and then the Gobble Gallop in November.

But you should know that my badassness was short lived. Mostly because after I got home to shower, we were supposed to go to a family picnic but yeah. I could barely move. Horrible planning. I fell asleep and wasted the ENTIRE day sleeping and being in pain. Yesterday was even WORSE because I felt like my hips were completely out of their sockets. My shins and ankles hurt like bitches today yet. But.. no pain, no gain? The daunting thing is knowing that Saturdays are going to be my long run days and ugh. Am I going to feel like this every single Sunday? Because that kind of blows shit.

Las Vegas.... Last Day

Our last day in Vegas was last Thursday and already the trip seems like it was forever ago. Our flight actually left on Friday, but our airport shuttle picked us up at 5:05 a.m., so Friday doesn't really count. So let's talk about Thursday. It was a pretty chill day overall since we were kind of exhausted.

We started our day off by going over to Mandalay Bay which was next to our hotel and I had wanted to see it. Mostly because from our helicopter ride their beach/pool area was by far the best on the strip. It has a lazy river and freaking wave pool. Come on.

 This was the entrance. Seriously- I need to stay here next time.

 Inside of Mandalay Bay they have the Shark Reef Aquarium which I wanted to go to because I'm a sucker for aquariums and ocean/underwater stuff. But I have to say- Mandalay Bay not only looks awesome on the outside, but the inside is amazing. It's at the end of the strip so it's quiet, but there are still people roaming around. It has everything all of the other hotels do but it is just so much quieter and more relaxing. Anyways.

The aquarium was fun.

 I thought the jelly fish kind of looked like sperm.

 Probably my favorite picture of us.

After Mandalay Bay we took the Monorail over to MGM because I wanted to go to the M&M store. On the way we met Michael Jackson. And his twin. Neither are dead but both smell of b.o. badly.

 After walking around and making our stop at the M&M store we headed back to our hotel to get ready for dinner and our free show (courtesy of timeshare people) which was the Criss Angel "Believe" show.

I freshened up. We decided we had an hour so I caught up on email, Matt watched some Billy the Exterminator and we were basically resting and hanging out. When all of a sudden....

(did you really think I'd get through an entire vacation without incident? Silly bitches.)

.... the door to our hotel room opens letting in two people with luggage who apparently have just checked into our room. Obviously, they were stunned the room was not empty and they just stood there. So Matt went over and explained to them that hey- this is our room but *shocker* they speak very little English. So Matt tries his door key, it no longer works. We call down to the desk who are completely confused and have no idea what to do. First they asked if we'd like to switch rooms which we said no to. Not only because it's completely a pain to pick up everything after we've been there for a week, but regardless, the room is dirty and those people paid for a clean room. So the desk figures out someone checked us out on WEDNESDAY (keep in mind, this is Thursday) but nobody knows how our keys still worked. <--Let that be something to think about when you check into a hotel. So they check us back in, get us new keys and those poor people had to wait an hour before a room was cleaned for them. Also keep in mind, it's about 5pm at this point.

So once it was obvious everything was figured out we went to dinner and the show. And I've got to be honest. Criss Angel's show was AWFUL. It was probably the worst thing I've ever seen? I've seen birthday party magicians, community plays with 5 year olds and nursing home sing a longs be more entertaining than the hour and half show we sat through. First off, our seats were in the way back and I didn't mind. But when you can see the stage people unhooking him from cables? That kind of sucks. If I can see it from row PP than by god I have to feel sorry for the people in the way front. Or the people who paid money for this show. It was really bad. It was basically 90 minutes of him talking, way too loud of music, and him pacing back and forth. Not to mention this is pegged as a family show- but he's not only swearing left and right, but there are obvious sexual innuendos and he made a rather lewd joke about his assistant sticking things up his ass. So basically- don't waste your time or money. He did *maybe* five or six tricks or illusions and they were all really bad. I mean, REALLY bad.

I also have to tell you about our hotel. I will start off by saying it was not the worst hotel I've ever been in but it certainly won't be a place I stay again. Our room was pretty clean for a hotel room but the first two days housekeeping never came. I'm pretty sure they only came Wednesday because they thought we checked out. Our towels stunk. And I mean they STUNK. When I called the desk to complain they told us it's because they recycle water. Which I knew Vegas did because every bathroom has a "we recycle water" sign so that's kind of gross when you think about your towel being washed with watered down urine. Anyways. And the hallways?

This lettuce and tomato plate was there when we got there on Monday afternoon and it was there when we left Friday morning. Not to mention room service carts full of left over food sitting in hallways for at least two days. I mean, it was pretty damn gross and you can just imagine what the smell walking down the hallway was like. And two of the elevators would just stop working while you were in them. I don't think we encountered anybody in the elevator who had not been stuck in it at least once. We only got stuck once and it was only for about 5 minutes, but still. Not fun.
**
So Friday we left to go home. It was a long week and we packed a lot into our week so I was ready to go home. I'm notorious for being red flagged at airlines so we make sure we are there at least two hours before because I hold everyone up. It's truly awful and I don't know what it is about me that screams "terrorist". But I thought I was doing well because I had no problems getting to Vegas and made it through the first area in Vegas with no problem. But when it came time to go through the scanners?

Yeah, they basically thought I had a fake I.D. The guy (who easily was in his 70's and had Coke bottle thick glasses) is looking at my I.D, at me, trying to scrape the I.D. to see if something comes off, he calls over a few other people, etc. This goes on for a good 15 minutes before he says, "Your hair is longer here." To which I reply, "Well, it's in a pony tail today, do you want me to take it out?" He says yes so I do. Voila- long hair again. Then he says, "You look too young to be 29" and I'm like, "Seriously- I can't help it I'm aging well." Meanwhile, Matt's laughing because he's waiting for me on the other side. They finally let me through but I went through the scanner and got a pat down. Oh well. That's the least invasive thing I've had so I was fine.

And then we came home. The flight was boring and long, and when I came home I totally took a nap. And proceeded to sleep ungodly amounts all weekend. It was glorious. :)

Domestic Bitch Saturday will be here tomorrow... watch out.

Vegas- Day Three

On our third day of vacation in Vegas we did something I've wanted to do for a very long time. And it was on my 30/30 list and I decided that come hell or high water, I was going on this trip. It was pretty much the splurge (OK- so the entire trip was a splurge, but this was a big splurge) of my trip and in the end, I only got to go because of a really good deal I found online a week before.

Bitches- we went to the GRAND CANYON.

In a bus.

It was as glorious as it could be.

The day started with getting picked up at our hotel in a shuttle bus at 6am. There was quite a bit of confusion about which bus we were supposed to be on because there were two different canyon tours and everyone figured out we must be going to a holding place first. In my eagerness, I almost got onto a bus before I realized that the entire thing was full of Chinese people and nobody (not even the driver) spoke English. I was fairly certain that was not my bus. And finally, our bus did come, only a half hour late.

Once we got to the tour place, they made us sit on this bus for (no kidding) an HOUR. Every other bus got to get off, and get onto the bus that was taking them to the canyon. Seriously, after an hour I was kind of cranky. So we get off, we get organized into which group goes where (we were doing the South Rim tour and the other people were doing the West Rim tour, which is more expensive but I think would be more fun, more on that in a bit), and you get "breakfast".

 Matt and I picked seats on the top (it was a double decker bus), near the back. We weren't the dead last row, but the one in front of it.

 This is my breakfast. The name looked Swedish, but the thing was awful. I'm marking this as my "eating internationally" thing on vacation. It was the closest I came.

From there, we drove like two, almost three hours to the Hoover Dam. Which was actually kind of awesome.

 And this is the new bridge they made for it for cars to go over since you can't drive over the Hoover Dam anymore because of terrorist prevention. The cool thing was that they said the concrete in this wouldn't fully cure for at least another 100 years. Kind of awesome.

 And these angel statues were pretty neat. The one on the left is for the first man who died while working on the Hoover Dam and the one on the right is for the last man who died working on the Hoover Dam. Coincidentally, it was a father and his son. Amazing?

 From there we drove another six hours to our first Grand Canyon stop point. We saw the Grand Canyon IMAX movie (kind of lame) and had "lunch". Lunch was included with our tour and honest to baby jeebus it was awful. First off, there are signs everywhere saying they have no running water because of a water main break. One of the workers said it had been that way for TWO WEEKS. No, I don't know if they mean the break, the lack of water, or both. But... gross. The bathrooms? I won't even talk about and you better be appreciative I don't have a picture for you.

So we get our food (Matt gets some faux Chinese food in a box under a warmer and I get a turkey and cheese sandwich) and get back onto the bus. By this point, we were running way late since we started way late so we had to eat and drive which was fine. Matt scarfed down his lunch and I took one bite and decided my gum had to do it because the sandwich was hard. The bread, the turkey and the cheese had all very clearly been hanging out together on that counter for quite some time. I'm going to say picking up food from a gas station would be better. Approximately 15-30 minutes after Matt finished his food, his intestines were clearly unhappy and it's probably good there was so much cold air blowing because everyone would have suffocated. I'm not even kidding.

But we finally got there. And it was worth it.

 Nothing can really prepare you for how incredibly massive the Grand Canyon is. You know it's huge but seeing it, and knowing you are seeing less than 1% of it? Is just amazing. And being a kind of Geology nerd I was in total nerd heaven.

 Another thing off my 30/30 list for sure.

We drove another half hour to the second (and last) Grand Canyon stop off point and that place was even more gorgeous.

 This lookout point had a pretty huge cliff that you could walk fairly far out onto, and so that's where I got this one. Look at those striations in the rocks!! How cool is that??

 After that stop we got back onto the bus for the long ass drive back. We stopped at a McDonald's for dinner (thank god- I was starving) and we encountered probably the stupidest and rudest McDonald's worker by far. First off, this place gets hit with a minimum of 10 buses daily, so this makes me assume that the staff here are pretty accustomed to working a large crowd in a short amount of time. I've worked fast food, I know getting a bus sucks, but you do it and you do it fast. Nope. They have two people working registers and our gal is kind of young. I'd say early 20's. For every single customer, after they ordered something, she'd say, "Are you sure? Because you should get something else." Just to be an asshole. Then the lady in front of us had to look at ingredient labels of EVERYTHING, but wouldn't move over so other people could order while she decides. Needless to say, we stood in line for 20 minutes, finally got our food only to *barely* get onto the bus and realized, that she rang us up wrong. I got the wrong meal all together and then half the stuff wasn't in our bag. Awesome.

It was a really long day. I got one picture of the sunset as we drove. OH! I can't believe I almost forgot the best parts! OK, so our neighbors on the bus? The four seats ahead of us (two on each side of the aisle) were gay boys from England. VERY gay boys going on an American tour of sorts, who spoke no English. Anyways. So they were going through their camera looking at photos (which I can clearly see because there is a huge gap in the two seats) and I see a TON of pictures of all four boys doing.... very sexual things. If I ever had questions about gay relations, those questions were answered.

The people behind us (two Chinese people and two people from Mumbai nobody speaks English well) were a trip, too. First off, the Chinese people made out almost the entire trip which completely offended the people from Mumbai. Only I think it did because the Mumbai people were an older married couple (I'd say mid 50's) and the guy was yelling at the Chinese couple (young 20's) and I kept hearing the word "Mumbai" which makes me think they were from Mumbai. It was entertaining for about an hour.

The people in our row on the other side of the aisle were nice, they were from South Carolina but have a vacation home in Lake Nebagamon, WI (which is like 30 minutes from me, if that) and they were lovely. But they (mid 40's, not married) yelled at each other. When they weren't, the guy snored and the lady read a romance novel and moaned a lot.

Not to mention? The Mumbai lady behind me? Well she was using the spring loaded foot rest and kept letting go of it. Not a big deal (aside from the annoying noise) except when she let go, it smacked the ass part of my seat. So for the ENTIRE trip, I was basically getting spanked by a foot rest. Not only that, but she chewed gum the entire time and was smacking it like a cow. AND? On the last leg of the trip she kept putting her feet in between my seat cushion and back cushion, completely fondling my ass with her foot. FINALLY, I had enough so I slammed my hand on her foot and she smacked the back of my seat like I was the asshole.

It was a long day.

I also should mention? This trip lasted an entire 16.5 hours. So.. put all of these people on a bus with me for 16.5 hours??

Miracles do happen.