Saturday morning started like any other. I got up and readied myself for work while Obi snatched as much extra sleep as he could. He didn't get up early enough and the car was frozen solid (Thanks Canada,) as thus I was late to work.
As he drove I told him that as his "event" I'd set up a treasure hunt for him. We have a typical special occasion formula: Event + Dinner + Gift = Special occasion.When we got to work, I gave him the key and said "This is your first clue." He's like "Is that DQ's car key?!" Wow. I thought he'd at least need to read the tiny car brand letters on the key, but no. And off I went to clean toilets. I didn't hear from him until about 2pm.
So much for keeping me updated! But then, he was driving a lot, and that shit is illegal.
Apparently he was smart enough to phone DQ, and so didn't drive half way around the neighborhood to get the first book, then looking at the pictures it was an easy deduction to visit Chicka. I had told her she could hint a little because number three was by far the hardest. (It was the geek poem) And she did. I think it made her day to be involved so that's good.
At first he went to the wrong EB games and managed to embarrass himself *giggle* but then he got the right one. The people working that day smiled as soon as he said "I'm on a treasure hunt..."
It was cool though, because I asked him if he considered this other place, that's technically a video store, because him mum and chicka had both suggested I put book three there rather than EB. He's like "I did actually, but I knew you wouldn't think like that," Aw!
Then he racked his brain to figure out what we'd done on our first new years together. His memory is quite poor with a lot of things, so that would have been interesting. I actually reminded him about it a month or so ago, because I'm aware his brain doesn't have storage for the trivial things like that. But he figured it out (later commenting "When I look back I realise that wasn't very romantic") and went to the right hotel on the first go. The guy behind the counter gave him a bit of grief however. At first he pretended he didn't know what Obi was talking about, until Obi was actually leaving thinking he'd been wrong and the guy holds up the tissue-paper wrapped book and asks, "Is this it?". He checked Obi's name and asked for mine, and then made Obi hand over his ID. And even then Obi had to demand him to give him the book. He said "I don't know what he thinks I do... does he think people randomly go to hotels and ask for black or red tissue wrapped bundles just in case some stranger is on a treasure hunt that day?!" He reminded me of me!
He really liked the list of places clue apparently. He thought that was clever. He figured out what the places had in common, and then was like "My parent's couch? I don't think we've ever done it on my parents couch - but I'm sure we'd want to." But apparently, as one of the places on the list was "Back seat of the car" he checked there (because he was in the car) and found book 8. Luckily I'd numbered them for my own convenience, and he knew he wasn't looking for 8, so didn't open it.
Now, book 8 was supposed to be in the trunk, but Obi had plans to return our recycling on Saturday too (though I should have know it would slip his mind again) so I didn't put the book there in case he found it while recycling. Besides, I doubt I'd have gotten the trunk open. It was 12:20am on Saturday morning when Obi finally got to sleep and I could creep out to put the last piece in place. Only problem being, the car was frozen shut. Literally. I didn't know that shit was possible. But there I am in my pink dressing gown and his huge man sandals, book on the road at my feet, one hand holding up the door handle, the other worming it's way under the bottom of the door. I was scared I'd break the damn handle heaving on it that way. Eventually there was a satisfying suction sound and I got the door open, so I cut my losses and just stuck the book on the floor behind the driver's seat (in a plastic bag to make it slightly less obvious.)
Anyway, he drove to his parent's house and got the book, and explained to them what he was doing (his mom hadn't filled dad in so he was clueless.) and opened the next clue. This was the only book he needed help to retrieve. He said I didn't need to label the tree or the rock on the map, he knew what they were. So off he goes with a spoon from the kitchen draw and starts digging at one of three places that looked disturbed. Nothing. He tried the second, nothing. But the spoon wasn't going very deep. So he came back in, and texted me asking how deep he needed to dig. I was surprised he got that far without needing a single hint! Then he rinsed off the spoon in the sink and noticed the dirt and sand mixture left behind was the same as the mess I'd forgotten about in the sink the day before, and he remembered Pete asking me about it, and me joking that it had something to do with a hatchet. That lil axe is the closet thing to a shovel in the house. So he took the hatchet and got to work, finding the book soon after. My plastic wrapping job was thankfully exceptional, and the mud didn't get through to the book. Yay!
He found book 7 without incident and already had book 8. Book 8 had a love letter telling him to drive us to dinner for his last gift, and he noticed that I'd sprayed it with perfume. *lopsided smile*
This is already really long, so I'm going to write dinner in a separate entry. Stay tuned lol.
