Anniversary Adventures

Pizza and chips. That’s all I want. Morning noon and night. I’m shoving down fruit, choking down peas and broccoli, pinching my nose and swallowing tuna and other fish, but all I want all I want want want want is pizza. It’s crazy. I’ll be giving birth to Papa John in 6 months, just you wait.

It’s raining outside – can I get a HEY YEAH for North Carolina! I’m working hard, catching up on all the stuff I didn’t do while chilling in the bathroom for the entire month of September, and it does feel kind of good, yes. So good, in fact, that I’m going to take a quick break from it and tell you about our anniversary weekend o’ fun.

The original plan was to leave Thursday night, camp at Carolina Beach State Park for two nights, then stay in a Wilmington, NC hotel on Saturday night so we’d wake up on Sunday, our actual anniversary, in the splendor of a king sized bed and complimentary, room-delivered continental breakfast. Well, old TWC (that’s The Weather Channel, thank you for playing) gave us the verdict of 80% chance of thunderstorms for Thursday. We’d have had to set up the tent in the dark, in the rain, in thunder and lightning, and we were not keen on that, so we decided to stay home the first night. Of course, it didn’t rain at all, but we weren’t to know that, so whatever. We went to bed relatively early, got up relatively early, and then took an absolute million years to get out of the house for some reason. Packed, dog dropped off at sister’s, lunch eaten, we were finally heading east on I 40 at 1pm. As our good buddy TWC continued to forecast 80% chance rain and thundershowers day and night for Friday, we decided to do our hotel splurge Friday night and camp Saturday.

So, Friday, we arrived in Wilmington at about 4ish and checked in to our riverside hotel. We had a lovely view of the Cape Fear river, and the room was small but well-apportioned, with the king sized bed (we are SO buying one of those when we move to our next house), a flat screen tv with cable, and shampoos that smell nice. Exhausted from riding in the car for a couple of hours (it doesn’t take much these days), I napped for a few minutes while the Professor scouted the maps of the area for good eatin’ spots. We got our walking shoes on and headed down along the riverwalk to check out our various dinner options – even though it was 2 days early, Friday night would be our big anniversary dinner, and we wanted to choose well. It was hot, hot, hot – I was melting into my shoes, and after doing a few laps around the town we stopped in a nice brewery for a drink. Wilmington – it’s ok. It had some cute shopping, nice bars, gorgeous historic homes, but it looked a little down at heel. A lot of those shopfronts were empty. A lot of those historic homes were crumbling and in desperate need of repair. A lot of the bars were empty. It’s the off season, and I’m sure it picks up a bit in summer, but even so – it just has an air of being past its prime. I’m glad we went, we both had a great time – – – but I’m glad we don’t live there.

We returned to the hotel and showered and dressed, and even though our dinner choice wasn’t a far walk, we decided to drive, because of the impending rain and all. Dinner was at the back porch of Elijah’s, a seafood place on the river, and I got a glass of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, my first in two months, people. It was like angels crying on my tongue. I sipped on the thing for about 2 hours, over the course of a large meal, so I know it was fine to drink it, and in the name of all that is holy it was a beautiful thing. Clearly I’m not an alcoholic, given my 2 months cold turkey abstinence – but I cannot deny I love me an ice cold glass of white wine. I think it was my favorite anniversary present.

I had stuffed shrimp, the Professor had fish and chips, and both were fresh, hot and delicious. We didn’t even get dessert, we were so full, and waddled home after our meal and went straight to bed. Oh, the indigestion, but it was worth it.

No rain. Not a bit. Grrrr.

The next day, we lazed around for much of the morning. We had our breakfast picnic of bagels, cereal, and fruit spread out on our massive bed, and watched Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes, and then college game day pre-game stuff for a while. In hotels we become t.v. junkies, since we don’t have it at home. Showered, dressed, and packed by noon, we headed out to check out of the hotel and set up camp.

Carolina Beach State Park is beautiful coastal pine forest, with a sandy ground and nary a hill in sight. We set up camp in two shakes, and then took off for the beach. We stopped briefly at a historical site (Fort Fisher), then paid $10 for a permit to drive down the beach, which is always so much fun! And I don’t feel guilty about it because it’s regulated by rangers and closed when necessary for recuperation! You can see how tickled I am with being able to drive NOT ON A ROAD because I took a bazillion pictures of the truck in the sand. It was boiling hot again, and perfect swimsuit weather, and we lazed around on the sand taking pictures, chatting, relaxing. It’s fun to do that in late October, when no one else is around.

After a few hours we headed back to a grocery store to buy stuff for dinner and lunch, and then went back to camp for a long hike to watch the sunset over the dunes. We almost didn’t make it, but just caught the last quarter of the sun before it blinked out. It was 3 miles round trip, and our return hike was pretty dim! But we were able to make it back, and cooked up a fine meal by lantern light, then settled in for a perfect night of camp sleeping. The weather was absolutely perfect, and since we “cheated” and brought real pillows, the sleeping was very comfy. We had a great time, despite a family with about a million raucous kids who kept everybody up late and got everybody up early (so rude, there were plenty of families with kids who could keep quiet, so I know it can be done).

That morning after packing up, we headed to the aquarium and got to see A PIRATE FISH. How cool. It’s like they knew I was coming. We then took off for home, and I was still feeling exhausted from our 3 mile trek the day before, so I slept the whole way. Once we returned home, and the Professor could wake my sleepy butt up, we pulled out the now-defrosted top of our wedding cake, and the Professor got out some latent aggression in the form of a food fight. It was so far up my nose, IT CAME OUT MY MOUTH. Is that gross? Yes, yes it is, and I nearly choked to death, but he enjoyed it so, that was my anniversary gift to him. After I washed the cake out of my hair, ears, nose, and clothes, I took my pregnant behind into bed and fell asleep at like 8pm on our actual anniversary. It was a wonderful weekend, lots of fun, and we’re already talking about what we’re going to do next year.

Now – back to work!