Why We Miss Louisville, part 2

So, Sarah and Brandon are getting married! This is not really news as they’ve been together a while. What is newsworthy, or blogworthy is that they just had an engagement party. It would have happened sooner, but they wanted us to be there, so they had been waiting to throw it until we were back in town. It was on the Sunday afternoon after the wedding we’d been to. It was a nice time. There were games to play and lots of food. Veggie trays, cheese/cracker trays, secret recipe family punch. For our part, we had made a huge bowl of red pepper hummos. Unfortunately it was barely touched (we guess) because we had no label for it and a lot of people thought it was some kind of pumpkin mush. It was about the right colour for that. Maya also made a fresh mozzarella salad which was really popular. For entertainment Matt’s Mom (in addition to all the other prep-work she did) had developed some games to play. We had a world jumble where things like “rahas” and “temganegen” turned out to be “Sarah” and “engagement.” She also had Sarah and Brandon act out the answers to various trivia questions about their relationship. How did you meet? How many people did you date before finding each other? What are your pet names for each other? Much hilarity ensued.

The next day we were at a 55th birthday party - for us! Since Matt’s birthday had recently passed and Maya’s was yet to happened Matt’s family gave us a party to celebrate both. Matt is 28 and Maya will be 27, thus we had 55 years to celebrate. Birthdays with Matt’s family are always a lot of fun. It’s always relaxed, informal fun. We cooked a big pot of chili and baked potatoes for out birthdays supper. Baked potatoes slathered in chili and topped with cheese is such an amazing meal! After that we had presents. Then we had cake (left-over engagement cake) and ice cream. All so good. Matt got Pumping Iron and Settlers of Catan! Maya got Have you Herd? and an Abba double album! Thanks very much to all the gift-givers!

Since we can never get enough fun, on Tuesday we went back to Sarah and Michael’s just to hang out with family, eat good left-over hummos and play games. Also, we wanted to visit little Maricanchi. He’s the best chinchilla ever. We started the games with a few rounds of Have You Herd? and then moved on to Lord of the Rings. This is a game that Matt has been wanting for a while. Back in California, on his actual birthday, we stopped in at a local comic book and game store to have a look around. They had the game and so it was a very happy birthday. Unfortunately, we had no one to play with. Matt brought it along to Louisville in his luggage just to play it with his siblings. It lived up to his expectations. It was quite a lot of fun for all. The full rules are somewhat complex but the gist is that you play as the Fellowship (the team against the game) moving across several boards as you cross Middle Earth. There are items to collect and cards to use, plus each player has a special hobbit-power. Hopefully you can move quickly before the worst of the events overtake you and before you get corrupted by evil. Ultimately, you want to destroy the Ring before the Ring-Bearer is corrupted. By all accounts it is not an easy game to win. The first time we totally failed. Sauron got all of us while we were still in Helms Deep. The second game went better. We made it to Mordor and appeared well-positioned to handle it. Then the random event tiles kept turning over as “next bad thing happens.” This happened six times in a row. Seriously! That’s all the bad events in Mordor. Our progress (and the game) ended with the event “The Ring is Mine!” Of course, losing so decisively only whets the appetite to try again! That’s a sign of a good game. For those of you keeping count, this game night makes for the fifth day of festivities in a row!
And still that’s not all! We also made a trip up to Huber’s. It’s no Avila Valley Barn, but it’s the closest thing we know of in the Louisville area. After so many days in a row being with other people, it was nice to drive through the Indiana countryside by ourselves. We also went to Queen of Sheba – still one of our favorite restaurants. They were really hopping at their new location. On the last day we were in Louisville, Maya’s brother and his family came over to see us. We had a big lunch with all her family. Then it was time to go. Our bags were packed, our fair-thee-wells said and we were off again. Leaving on a jet plane… We were missing Louisville before the wheels left the runway.