Vacation officially over

I took an unintentional break from blogging during the rest of my time in L.A. and then the three weeks I spent at my parents' house in Indiana.  There was just a lot going on, and I was too tired to open my computer most days, let alone write a blog post.  That's alright since I saw most of the people who read my blog.  To those of you who do read and I did not see during my almost eight weeks in America (which is a shame and it would be nice to meet in real life sometime) you can catch up with my picture journal below.  Because, I just know you are dying to know what I did.  My life is, after all, intensely interesting.

Here we go...
I studied a bunch with my friend, Naomi, and we drank a lot of coffee together, just like true graduate students should

Regan arrived home from Nigeria (yea!), and finally after many years of cajoling she convinced me to go to Disneyland. Ask Regan about Disneyland sometime.  She will tell you all about her happiest place on earth.  It was actually way cooler than I thought it would be and it was lovely to have one last day with Regan and Naomi.  Thank you, Regan, for convincing me to go.

After leaving L.A., I was reunited with Niek in northern Indiana and spent three weeks relaxing and helping my parents finish some home improvement projects (no photos of those, though).  I was also in a wedding on the banks of the Ohio River.  My friend and her family made all the food for the reception, and it was delicious.  The bride and I had a nice laugh about the local culture down in southern Indiana.  She pointed out that the reception hall was located conveniently next to the Royal Order of Rednecks Lodge complete with a rebel flag hanging proudly in the mayor's yard...I wish I were kidding about that, but I'm not.  At least Niek got to experience another side of America.

We managed to squeeze in a trip to Chicago for a few days where we marveled at Frank Lloyd Wright architecture, walked around the city, visited the Art Institute, ran along the lakefront, and I introduced Niek to the joy of a deep dish pizza.

And then it was back home just in time to celebrate my town's festival.  Niek and I ran the 5K (Niek's first, and he was amazing) and ate an apple dumpling (the only real reason to be at the festival).  We declined the polka dancing and missed the yodeling contest (my town was founded by Swiss immigrants), but overall had a good time in small town America.  And since you know how much I love to eat, rest assured we took advantage of summer's bounty (sweet corn, blackberries, blueberries, tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden, cantaloupe, etc, etc, delicious).

And just for fun, here is how I poured milk onto my granola every morning.  I never tire of watching the Delftware cow vomit up milk.

That is, in a nutshell, what I did over the last seven weeks.  There were plenty of other things I did not document with my camera, and I would say it was a successful trip for my work and as a vacation.  I was sad to leave, but I'm happy to be home.  Thanks to the Gladware I insisted on buying and bringing back with us, we even got to enjoy peaches fresh from the tree and tasty, Michigan blueberries one more time before the plane touched down.  Way better than the "breakfast" the flight attendant tried to give us. 

Hope you all have had a nice summer.  It's back to work and back to blogging.