Mall!

Hmm...where was I.  Wednesday last week.  Minneopa State Park.  Well, I can sum up Spring Break Thursday in one word MallOfAmericaAmusementPark.  I read my book, drank coffee, and tried to make up stories about the various strangers I saw, and Eryn ran around and enjoyed the rides for 8 hours.  It was slightly more than 8 hours, because we were out of the ticket line before 10 and she was on the rides past 6, but maybe I have to subtract Chipotle time, DQ time, and Teavana tea-restocking time (it was our not-a-big-out-of-state vacation, so a $40 canister of tea seemed acceptable as an alternative to plane tickets and a hotel)?  For my part, I read a few hundred pages out of a book of post-apocalyptic short stories and took a lot of short walks.  The Mall gives me a serious case of the blahs.  I hate consumerism.  And I say that as someone willing to walk around Target and just look at things without buying anything while my daughter is at guitar lessons.  Heck, the other day I bought a green garden gnome, stealthily hid him in the front yard garden where he's almost invisible, and named him Melvin.  I'm willing to enjoy consumerism with a generalized purpose, just not hundreds of specialty shops that make no sense to me. Although other folks probably say the same things when they see me buying a Deadpool graphic novel at the local shop for Eryn, or a board game at FFG. It didn't help that a trip through Games by James revealed they're selling the same game as FFG for a $20 markup, $28 if you had pre-ordered it for a discount using the FFG pre-order program.  I don't find it offensive.  I find it completely nonsensical.  How can anyone with a phone not look up what they're buying at the mall and decide, "I'm not f-ing buying that here."

As a bonus, while we were eating our DQ Blizzards, the stars of The Longest Ride made an appearance.  There were people in line for over four hours in their cowboy boots and hats to see them.  Brit Robertson is cute for someone born after I graduated from high school, but I can't imagine standing in line four hours to meet her (man, that would be sort of creepy, although there were women there my age who obviously were there to meet Scott Eastwood, barely born before I graduated high school) and I'd much rather meet her pimping Tomorrowland than The Longest Ride.

Regardless, we had fun.  Eryn was exhausted but happy, and I was full up on post-apocalypticism (nice! that's a good word, even if it doesn't really exist).

Ramen

Tuesday was the laser tag and ramen stage of Eryn's spring staycation.  We went over to Grand Slam and I read David Duchovny's book about cows while she spent three hours laser tagging, using the batting cage, and playing skee ball.  The place was absolutely mobbed with children and I swear the smelliest ones (including one smelly father) felt it necessary to sit in my space.

Here's Eryn hitting some balls.


Not the best form, but she connected with a lot of them.  So good hand-eye coordination.  That wasn't always the case.


Afterwards, we drove up into Minneapolis to enjoy some Ramen (Dramen - half and half, black and pork) at United Noodles.  Best part about not showing up until closer to 3:00 p.m. is there was no line to speak of.  We got our bowl immediately.  I ate 95% broth and 5% noodles.  She ate 95% noodles and 5% broth.  We were both happy.  I took my Firefly hoodie off in advance to avoid any ramen splatter.  I learned something important last time.


I didn't have a picture of Eryn with her noodles, but I do have an older picture at United.  I'll admit to it, because that's obviously not dramen (1/2 and 1/2) in the bowl.


We also picked up some microwave/stoptop ramen that won't burn my mouth with the spices and a package of green tea Kit Kats.  Damn things cost $8.99 a bag.  Green gold.


And then we spun by Coastal just because I've always meant to go and never have (and it gave us a chance to put down the top on the car).  Seems like an obvious place to go for crab legs and sushi-quality fish, although we weren't in the market for anything at the time.