WEIRD & WONDERFUL DISCOVERIES

****please note dates to avoid confusion ****
this posting should've been up 2 weeks ago but i've had some technical difficulties...
hopefully i'll have all entries from past 2 weeks up in the next 24 hours

this week (Aug 25 - 26), we took our weirdness south of the border

in keeping with what has become a family tradition we headed to the Seattle,WA area
for our annual
"shoe and zoo adventure"

the shoe thing is for Taylor....
we indulge Taylor's shoe fetish and (thankfully the nike outlet sells size 13s at a semi-affordable price which makes this a wise indulgence!)
and
in return he endures the zoo with us



yes, it is probably the world's worst disguised bribe...
but hey Taylor had a rather unfortunate incident at a zoo when he was younger!
(the dramatic tale includes a rather large and annoyed black panther which possessed a rather amazing ability to take aim and "spray" the brash, young lad who was taunting it from 15 feet away - Taylor still is suffering some residual trauma -
however he learned a valuable lesson - cats actually do have feelings.)

we're glad he endures the zoo for us
after all, our family is just not complete without him... and his feet!
but not one of us stands anywhere near him when observing any wild felines.



this year, we deviated from our traditional trip to the Woodland Park Zoo instead opting for the smaller Point Defiance Aquarium and Zoo.
(which was nice but in our humble yet professional zoo viewing opinion Woodland Zoo is better)
however

i quickly discovered some of the most fascinatingly weird and wonderful signs along the way...



...and i might add, i discovered signs that were profound...


and signs that i could only wish applied to human species....




yes, i was almost more intrigued by the signage than the animals and my kids thought my obsession with photographing signs was very weird...


and so they mocked me every chance they got...



i just happily reminded them that weirdness is genetic.

note the sign behind us:
"Alien Invaders"
hee hee

we combined our great shoe and zoo adventure with a "drug run"

what is a drug run?

a huge portion of my medications prescribed by DR H are ordered and come from the states
the majority of them cannot be shipped across the line

therefore we have them delivered to a USA PO box just across the border from our house (thankfully just a 30 minute drive from our home)
and then
when orders come in, we pick them up at the PO Box, 'declare' them at the border and physically bring them across the line

we call these 'drug runs'
just a little lyme humor
obviously we do not refer to our drug runs as drug runs when speaking with border guards

b/c i am just getting this whole new treatment protocol underway, i had an order waiting for me, so on our way home we stopped by our PO box to pick up my latest shipment of drugs.

when the border guard asked us what we had to declare
we told him we were bringing back prescribed meds and supplements
we then declared the monetary total
it is a lot of money
a ridiculous amount
fighting lyme is not cheap

the border guard did a double take and disbelievingly queried, "HOW MUCH?"

once again graham told him the total

to which the border guard jokingly responded,
"WOW! What are you bringing back....medicinal marijuana?"


wow. a border guard with a sense of humor?
weird.
very weird
and
very funny

and then to top it off
all of sudden from the back seat of the van,

Avery yells at the guy,
"Hey, you, mister man, i sure bet you have to pee like crazy after being in that little booth all day!"

the border guard burst out laughing and said
"wow. that was random. you are free to go. see ya."

there you have it.
we declared our weirdness at the border.

one last weird and wonderful discovery to share:

this is a picture of a tidy room.
this is a picture of Taylor's room.
Taylor is a teenager

tidy room + teenager = weird... but wonderful discovery