For the long weekend D and DQ had their hearts set on going to the rodeo; we agreed to go on the Saturday, bringing Mike with us, because he's pretty much up for anything, any time. My kind of mate really.

By the time we got there, after hanging out at Mike's mum's place and getting stuck in traffic and separated it was pretty late. Like 11am. I'm very much a "start early and make a full day of things" person. I don't know why I told you that. We went and got all-day passes for the rides, which was a total waste of money. We should have checked the rides first. They didn't even have a roller coaster, and I didn't have my sea-bands or any travel sickness meds.

Interesting fact (the science nerds already know this I'm sure)... When we went to the Royal Easter show in Sydney we went on this ride "Abduction" it looks like a UFO, you go inside and stand against the wall and it spins so fast you stick to the wall, which slides up so your feet are dangling. You know the one? Anyway, we saw it at the rodeo, so we went on.... And they spin the opposite direction in Canada! So there you go. Might have been a coincidence, of course.

There was a psychic too. This lady had newspaper clippings about herself on a board outside of this caravan, so when I went in and saw her I was a bit shocked by her appearance. I guess the clippings were very old, because she was a lady way past her prime (Which is neither here nor there). Apparently this is her home, and she lives her life traveling with the rodeo. D, Owlet and I hung out in her trailer while she finished her breakky. I bought the baby with me, because we thought if she was good we'd get her to read for Isis too. You can't canvas a baby

I paid for a full service - a tarot reading plus a palm reading.

Let's see if I remember everything she told me. I'm pretty sure some of it was bogus. Like when she asked me if I used to be close to my mum. I said that I was, and she told me that whatever had kept us apart or caused us to be distant was about to be solved and we'd be close again. Er, well I kind of hope not!!

She said that there'd been trouble with Obi's mother or another woman in his life who had almost caused us to break up. Well, it wouldn't be his mum, and we have never really come close to breaking up, but at a stretch I guess it could mean Amanda? Issues with that person are also apparently over now. Well, that's nice, I guess.

She told me a house is coming my way and asked me if we're looking to buy. We're not for several years now. I said I'm trying to sell a house and she said that when you sell it's so you can buy, and that I'm buying a house soon. Well, alright then.
The legal matter I'm dealing with will be resolved soon too, and favorably. Er, what legal matter? I guess that could mean the house will sell and we can pay off our lawyer? Or Obi will be granted his PR early?
She told me that Obi's going to make lots of money (Woo), that I'm going back to school soon and that whatever I do there will pay off. I should have asked more about that when she asked if I had any questions, but I just don't form questions that fast I suppose.

I wasn't terribly impressed by the card reading. The palm reading I had a lot more faith in, which is odd because I've never been into palmistry. My sister is a big fan, but I'm like "yeah, as if the lines on your hands tell you anything". I don't believe that our lives are set on a course that we can not change. But here's what she told me:

* I will have three children, two girls and a boy. Woo!
* I will live til my mid-to-late 80s. Woo! Better than I ever hoped.
* My family will never suffer a major tragedy.
* I will cross the ocean many times and have a home in two places (That might have been canvased.)
* I will never be divorced from my husband!!!
* I will have twin grandchildren.
* I will go back to school. I really really should have asked what for! And I ahould have asked about my writing. I regret not thinking of it.
* I currently do not have any illness/disease/tumors. That's nice to know, guess I don't need that pap this year.

There now I've written it down so I can come back and see if it's true. It was a bit of fun anyway.

I kind of want Obi to get his palm done. If it says he will only have three kids as well does that mean we can just never worry about birth control ever again?

D left and took my baby with her before the end of it, so I'd have to come back if I wanted Isis done, and I never got there.

The group of us just hung out after that, went on some more rides. There was a tilt-a-whirl. Mike isn't big on rides so he was hanging out with the baby. Obi went with D, so they could spin their carriage really fast and I rode with DQ because we both get motion sick and didn't want to spin it any extra at all.
This was a great plan. Except once we were on we figured out D had misjudged the type of ride it was, and we in fact had no control over the spinnyness at all. There was a ride instructor on one side who would whip the seats around as they went by. It was fun for the first three circuits of the track and then after that it was a competition to see which one of us could make it to the end without barfing on the other. We stayed as far away from each other as the seat would allow.
Somehow we both made it but at the end of the ride we had some trouble getting off, our loves came and pull us out of our seats... laughing. The instructor guy apologized to me, saying he was just doing his job.

DQ and I didn't ride anything else after that, but Obi and D did find the ride where you spin yourself and off they went. DQ was sitting on a bench with his head between his hands, and I'm trying to be polite and spend time with Mike, but it wasn't happening for me. I'm like "If I lay down can you make sure no one steps on me?" and so there I was laying in the dusty white gravel, curled in the fetal position, beside the pram. I felt a bit better after that. DQ didn't. He felt better an hour later when he finally gave into the urge to empty his guts in the porta-potty. Poor bastard. I didn't know that motion sickness could effect people like that. Once motion stops, generally I crawl back to feeling human, but he got worse before he got better.

I was ticked off with D actually, not just that day but on the previous ones as well because she has nothing nice to say to that poor boy ever. Other than "I love you," which she says constantly but it just doesn't ring true when it's directly before or after an insult. I know she thinks it's fun to pick on the boys, always saying "boys are dumb/stupid/useless" and inviting me to bitch about Obi with her. (Which I don't) No one should be treated like that.

We found a mechanical bull that was free to ride too! I love the mechanical bull, though I can't manage 8 seconds One day I will! I beat both Mike and D who went in with me. All in all, the rodeo wasn't as lame as I expected.

We left really early though. We knew all along that D and DQ had a dinner with his granny that they had to go to, but what they didn't tell us was that they were supposed to be there at 3:30pm. For dinner. WTF? We suspect that's just because DQ's family know that they are never ever on time, so they gave them an earlier arrival time to compensate. (We do the same thing when we invite them anywhere. They are always at least an hour late.) So we left the rodeo at like 4pm, which I suppose is a good effort. The boys were a bit bummed though because the four of them DQ, Obi, Mike and Bestman, had wanted a chance to hang out as a group like back in the good old days, but for some strange reason Bestman asked for the Sunday off rather than the Saturday so he had to work (When we asked him, he said he would hang out with Mike and his family on the Sunday, but Bestman works nights and doesn't get up til 2pm generally, and Mike flew out at mid-day. I hope he did get a chance to hang out after all.) so could only join us for dinner - a dinner that DQ wouldn't be at.

It was a bit lame because we'd all hoped we could spend some time planning our Japan trip, but we were never all together to do so. But we ate at their all-time favourite mateship restaurant (red robin haha) and then headed back to the parent's house to play munchkin (trading bestman for DQ and D once again). It was a really great night, we played til 2 in the morning, rocking Isis in the car capsule on a chair to keep her entertained. And then it was time for everyone to go.

We were standing downstairs by the door and Mike and Obi have this long brother hug and they thank each other (for coming/for buying tickets) and it was just ridiculously beautiful, I can't even explain. I nearly cried watching them and I'm teary now thinking back to it. At least this is one friendship I don't have to feel guilty for Obi missing, because Mike isn't living in BC anymore. He did mention that when he and Jen have kids they would like to settle down in BC, so if their timing lines up with when we go back that would be too perfect.

It sucked to only see Mike for one day, and he was tired as all hell for it too (yay jetlag) but it was worth every damn penny to see those boys together.

See, told you Saturday would be a blog of it's own. Stay tuned. I'll try and wrap this up in a series of ten lol.