My Adventures and Places Life Takes Me: Labor Day Weekend

I wish I would have had something better planned like a short trip somewhere, but I didn't. It would have been horrible to travel anyway with everyone else on the freeways and roads. Just as well. Instead, I stayed home and helped Mom with stuff, did chores and went shopping. I mean, it wasn't terrible since I was gone all last weekend in Spokane.

Friday, September 2

I spent most of my Friday working and it was a pretty normal day, thank God. I hate it when Fridays are ruined by late transfers or broken programs. After work, I drove to the West Side and did some shopping at TJ Maxx to see if I could pick up anything for the upcoming holidays. I ended up buying a toilet paper holder because our bathroom is so small, we had to take the actual toilet paper holder off the wall so we could but a behind the toilet shelf in. We've been putting on toilet paper on the shelf and it has fallen in the toilet by accident several times.

When I brought it home, Ben said it was an excellent purchase. I went to Costco and Walmart for a few things and then went home.

At home, we made dinner and I cleaned most of the evening. I was kinda sad that I didn't have something fun planned.

Saturday, September 3

I got up around 8:30 a.m. and Mom picked me up and we drove to Puyallup to purchase green beans. I know, we were pretty late in deciding to can this year. We should have started weeks ago. Dad was a little indecisive about wanting to do it or not. She had called in a day before to find out if Duris had green beans or not. They said this was the last weekend they would have them because it was getting a little late in the season. Plus, we did have an unusual growing season this summer because of the terrible weather we had. I felt like we were never going to get a summer.

We got there quickly, found a place to park and went inside. We walked around for a few minutes to check out the place. Mom said she's been here before and I don't remember ever coming here but have been past it several times driving down River Road.

I bought some cool spoons and Mom purchased six boxes of beans. We loaded them up in the Expedition and headed back towards home.

We stopped by Costco (purchased a Battery Daddy), Walmart, the UPS Store, Mom felt like Tacos from Taco Bell, we went to Michaels, Famous Footwear and the Hallmark Store. We drove back to my house and spent the next four hours snapping beans. We got through 2 1/2 boxes. Thank God for football as the Cougs beat Idaho. We watched Sportscenter, I did the laundry, dishes and Instagrammed photos I got behind on. Doug fell off the wagon today and acted like an idiot for some reason. Mom had to talk to him for a bit to find out what was wrong. He didn't want to talk to her or me.

Mom went home and I continued to snap beans because I wanted to get them done. She did take a box with her so Dad could snap some. I was left with the rest. I did as much as I could and then went to bed late.

Sunday, September 4

I set my alarm for about 9:30 a.m., got up and ate some food. Ben finally got up and made himself some pancakes. We got ready and headed to Delphi to do a round of 18 at the disc golf course. We had a 12:15 tee time so we didn't get in any golfer's ways. I haven't been out this way in some time because there was no reason for me to come out here after I picked up most of the geocaches.

We parked, grabbed our discs and bags and Ben checked us in. Neither of us had been on this course before so we really didn't know what we were in for. We did read that there was a pond we would have to throw over and try not to lose our discs. It started out well and then we hit a couple holes that hurt our scores. There were a few that put us over par.

When we did get to the pond, I decided to take a stroke because I didn't want to lose my disc, Ben on the other hand, threw his and lost his disc. It made me wonder how many discs this pond has eaten so far. We got confused for a second on several of the holes when we didn't know which way the next launch pad was. Some of them were not labeled very well. We had to look it up the map on our scorecard.

Near some of the last holes, someone's dog got out of their yard and was running down the length of the golf course and we weren't sure who it belonged to because no one ever ran after it. Hole 17 was one of the mid-range distances we had to throw. Ben pared and I did it with one stroke over par. The pin was on top of a stump, and you had to throw it up int the basket, which was a challenge because I did not do it in one throw.

We reached hole 18 and again, Ben did it within par and I was one stroke over par. The total for this disc golf course was 57. Ben got a 74 and I got an 84. We walked back to the Edge and Ben went to go find the cache at the golf course. I had gotten it several years ago. When he got back, I asked him if we could go get a couple more of them and he said sure.

I really wanted to get Delphi #2--Heroes (GC3TJDQ) because the last time I was there, I didn't have a lot of time to look but I didn't end up finding it. Now, I had two sets of eyes looking for it and as luck would have it, Ben made the grab. I didn't even think to look there last time. Oh well, at least we made the find finally. We got our names on it and put it back exactly how we found it.

I navigated Ben to Kenneydell Park. We did stop along the way so Ben could pick up two more that I've already found. The one at the grange and the one near the camp that girl scouts frequent. I let him get out and find them. After grabbing those, we followed the roads to the park. We parked in the lot and walked to Zodiac Series: Sagittarius (GC8FZK3). It was along a hiking trail with bridges and plenty of foliage. We followed our phone's directions and then got to ground zero. The hint said, typical PNW hide located about ten feet off the trail. I think we were looking for a stump. We checked a couple different spots and found the stump we were looking for. We signed it, took a picture and put it back. We went back towards the parking lot.

Ben used the porta potty while I looked for Bear Den (GC4B00Q). I saw it had a DNF, but I was going to look anyway. I did not find a thing that resembled a container. I was bummed out because I was trying to clear out this area. Ben got done and I walked over to him and told him that it was missing and was upset that we might have to come back again someday. We hopped into the Edge and made our way to the Black Lake boat launch.

Cell service was spotty here, but I was able to get what we needed from the boat launch sign to complete this field puzzle, Black Lake Boating (GC22QRM). The cache itself was hidden up near the entrance to the boat launch. It had not been found in about three months, but I knew it was there. I had Ben pull over so I could get out and search in the brush for it. I found it quickly as the container was covered up with tree bark, so it stood out.

I was pretty bummed out that the paddle cache was archived a few days ago. I needed it for my fizzy grid. Oh well, that's what I get for waiting so long to do it.

We were getting hungry, so we went home and made steak on the grill, a baked potato and salad. It hit the spot after being busy through most of the day. After I ate, I watched some football and random shows while I snapped the rest of the two boxes of beans by myself. I didn't get done with them until after midnight.

I showered and then went to bed.

Monday, September 5

I was so happy for the three-day weekend. Ben got up for a 12-hour shift at the fire station. I slept in and it felt good. I ate some breakfast, got ready, picked up some stuff at the store and then went into Rainier. I helped Mom with the canning of the beans while she watched tennis off and on. I ate a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch and filled up the water jugs. She had gotten a few batches done but many more to go.

The ones that were done, we labeled and boxed up. We figured that everyone got four boxes of 12 each. The four boxes should last everyone for a while too. I packed up the Escape with boxes of beans and canning things that Dad found at Grammie and Grandpa's house, he wanted Erika and I to have a set of them. I told Mom I was going to go do some errands and she said to have fun. I fixed my Roy cache and picked up a recently published cache, A Little Stroll Down a Little Path (GC9ZBC6). It was in my friend Shauna's old neighborhood in Yelm. I parked the Escape on the street in hopes no one would notice I was here. I wanted to make this as quick as possible. I found it but noticed it was in a very odd, very obvious place. It may go missing a lot and was glad I found it before it did. I signed my name, put it back and walked back to the Escape.

I called Dad to see what he was doing, and he told me he was at Grammie and Grandpa's house going through stuff and getting ready to build a pump house. I asked if I could stop by and look at one of her cabinets. I wanted to find one that I could eventually store my dishes in. He said he would be there. I stopped by and took a look at the one in the dining room and put my name on it for later on. We just didn't have the room for it currently. I told Dad I would see him later and I went home.

I unpacked the Escape, got in a shower, did the dishes, a load of laundry, made zucchini bread (with the zucchini I bought at the farmer's market), watched some shows, worked on the blog and made the changes on the cache pages.