Arizona 2017 (8/28-9/02)

Saturday (9/2) we came home from a five day trip out to Arizona to visit Joe’s family and we brought Wookie with us.

His mom recently found out she has cancer for the third time, this time in her uterus, so we wanted to visit her before her surgery which was on Thursday, 8/31. Despite having to be admitted to the hospital the day before because she wasn’t behaving normally (she could barely stay conscious and had trouble walking), she was cleared for surgery and everything went as well as could be expected for an almost 80-year-old woman.

Since this wasn’t actually a real vacation (it was too hot to do much anyway as it was over 100 degrees every day), we didn’t plan any activities and spent most of our time just hanging out or eating at restaurants since Joe’s parents no longer cook. We ended up dining at Village Inn four times over our 5-day visit. It would have been five times if Joe’s mom hadn’t gone to the hospital Wednesday since that’s where his dad wanted to have dinner because he’s a creature of habit. The place is like a Bakers Square although the decor isn’t as nice. That being said, the food was decent, and the staff was friendly, so there’s that.

We were able to convince Joe’s day to accompany us and our niece and her family to Backyard Taco for Taco Tuesday where all he would try is the flan because he doesn’t care for tacos. It was a bit irksome when I asked the girl if any of their tacos came with cilantro, she told me no, and lo and behold there was cilantro all over the pork taco, but other than that the food was flavorful. Plus I don’t mind cilantro, but Joe doesn’t care for it and we were sharing. The pork had pineapple pieces in it and the steak tacos were pretty good as well. The only taco that was bland was the chicken. I liked that they had a salsa bar for any toppings you wanted to add. A funny thing happened there – our niece’s daughter, O, who is only two years old, chucked a plastic fork and it landed right in the crook of this girl’s arm at the table next to us. That girl has quite the arm! She managed to peg me in the forehead with a goldfish cracker sometime during the week and it actually stung!

Our Week

Monday afternoon – Arrived at Sky Harbor, got picked up by niece and her daughter, went home to drop off luggage, went to In-And-Out for food
Monday evening – Village Inn for dinner with Joe’s dad & niece’s family

Tuesday morning – Village Inn for breakfast with Joe’s parents
Tuesday afternoon – Drinks & a corndog @ Sonic; played pool & shuffleboard at clubhouse since internet was down
Tuesday evening – Backyard Taco for dinner

Wednesday morning – Lolo’s Chicken & Waffles with Joe’s dad (he liked the iced tea and waffles)
Wednesday afternoon – Joe’s mom was acting strange so we called Joe’s niece (she is medical POA)
Wednesday evening – Red Robin for dinner with Joe’s dad, sister, and niece’s daughter. We brought food to niece who had driven Joe’s mom to the hospital and had her admitted.

Thursday morning – Breakfast at Village Inn with Joe’s dad before heading to the hospital
Thursday afternoon – At hospital
Thursday evening – Picked up pizza from Salerno’s on the way home; woman who we adopted Wookie from came over to visit while Joe and his dad went to the clubhouse to use the internet

Friday morning – Breakfast at Linda’s Hoosier Cafe with Joe’s dad (we met the owner and her son), then accompanied niece & her husband to her ultrasound appointment (she’s 6 months pregnant with her second daughter). It was really cool seeing the baby! Joe’s dad left him an impatient voicemail just as we arrived back at the trailer at 10:35 to pick him up even though we had told him we’d be back between 10:30 and 11:00 am.
Friday afternoon – Visited Joe’s mom in the hospital, then after dropping his dad off at home went out for snacks. I ordered a tall green tea lemonade from Starbucks but they screwed up and charged me for a grande, then upgraded me for free to a trenta which is 30 oz! I shouldn’t have drank the whole thing but it was really good (I paid for it later at the pool when I almost had a panic attack so I’m guessing it’s either caffeine or sugar that could be a trigger). Joe got a shake from In-and-Out and we went to his sister’s house to hook up her Wii & computer. Despite having never peed in anyone’s house before, Wookie peed on her bedroom rug. Whoops! Afterwards we stopped at Jack In The Box to try their nuggets but they don’t know how to count and gave us 4 instead of 5 so we ended up with 9 total after Joe complained. They were decent but not worth $2 for 5 nuggets.
Friday evening – Dinner at Village Inn with Joe’s dad, sister, niece, and her daughter

Saturday morning – Flew home

Flight Stuff

I swear the more I fly the worse I get. I thought after falling asleep on the flight home last year I would be less anxious but even with 1.5 mg of Xanax in me I was still very nervous during take off and landing. I can’t stand the low altitude turns and both flights had periods of turbulence which required them to turn the seatbelt sign on. Coming into Arizona there was one part where the plane felt like it “dropped” considerably which scared me enough that I made an audible noise so Joe teased me about that. The takeoff on the flight home freaked me out because there was considerable vibrating when we first got airborne that I don’t recall hearing/feeling before. Even Joe later remarked it was unusual to him. We paid extra to upgrade our boarding position on that flight and ended up sitting forward of the wings whereas on the way out we had sat behind the wings. I think ideally I’d like to sit over the wings in the future. I also had to keep going pee on the flight home (3-4 times!) whereas on the flight out I only went twice.

At least Wookie was very well-behaved in her carrier for both flights. More than a few people remarked how quiet she was when we were waiting for our flight home. Sky Harbor has a really nice animal relief area too. Wookie wasn’t interested in using it, but I liked how it’s located after you go through security. We met a cute black Brussels Griffon named Pickles in there. It’s a large room near the restrooms that has fake grass, a fire hydrant, poop bags, and a sink. In contract, Midway airport has an outdoor fenced-in concrete area over by baggage claim before you go through security. It makes no sense.

TSA Hates Me

The worst thing about our trip is that I was singled out by TSA at Midway. First they swabbed my hands but apparently they didn’t like the results so they pulled me aside for a full pat-down and went through my carry-on bag. I got picked for a hand swab at Sky Harbor too but luckily that’s as far as it went. The security lady was giving me attitude, however, because I was trying to keep an eye on my jacket going through the x-ray instead of walking all the way down to where she was pointing. She kept ordering me to leave my things alone even though I wasn’t trying to touch them so finally I yelled “I’m just trying to keep an eye on my stuff!” Seriously! Thank god Joe was there to keep an eye on my stuff since I had the dog in my arms too. Someone could have easily grabbed my stuff since no one was paying attention to it since they were so concerned about what a threat I apparently was. *rolls eyes*

Observations

It got so hot during the day the asphalt would bubble and pop when you drove over it.
None of the stores or restaurants were overly air-conditioned like they are here. Probably because they can’t afford it! The only exception was the hospital.

Final Thoughts

All in all it was an interesting trip but I would never visit Arizona in August/September again unless absolutely necessary. It was so hot you couldn’t do anything outside unless you got up super early or stayed up late, and even then it was already in the mid 80’s. We slept in the trailer’s Arizona room which wasn’t as air conditioned as the rest of the trailer so the flannel pants and sweatshirts I brought were useless. I purchased a very large suitcase the weekend before at TJ Maxx for $70 which was perfect for all my stuff plus Wookie’s.

We borrowed a crate and fencing from the girl we adopted her from who lives across the street but Wookie refused to step foot in the crate so she slept on some fleece on the ground. We also ordered a potty pad holder that we had shipped directly there and which she used faithfully. The heat seemed to affect her appetite like it did us and she only ate about half the amount of food I brought. For the most part she got along with everyone except niece’s daughter since she’s not used to children. She also would bark at Joe’s dad since he wasn’t home when we first arrived so in her mind he was an intruder. That being said, by Thursday she was running around his legs wagging her tail. She got along ok with Bella even though they didn’t play together, and she wasn’t sure how she felt about her previous mom’s (whom she didn’t remember) dog. Everyone seemed to enjoy playing with her, though, and she was mostly well behaved except when we’d leave her locked up to go out. Once she realized we were actually leaving the house entirely she would calm down, however. Hopefully next time we travel we can leave her with someone we trust because while it wasn’t a big deal on this particular trip, I can’t see having her with us on a real vacation. Plus it’s $95 each way on Southwest even though she takes the place of a free carry-on.

Arizona – Saturday & Sunday, November 19 & 20

Saturday was puppy day. Wait… what?!?!

It all started on Wednesday morning when one of the neighbors was walking by with this little puppy in her hands. I was inside getting ready to head to the zoo when Joe spotted her and asked what she had. Then he poked his head in the trailer and called for me to come outside to see the puppy. Unbeknownst to us this would set off a chain of events that ended with us adopting a puppy. I know, I can barely believe it myself.

Basically the puppy was an 8 week old, female Schnau-Tzu who the neighbor was originally only watching for another neighbor who ended up in the hospital. The woman was a breeder/horder and the puppy was later given to the neighbor by mutual friends to help her get over the loss of her own dog in September. Except as much as she liked the puppy she wasn’t ready to move on or for the responsibility. She asked if we knew anyone who wanted a dog, or if we would be interested ourselves. We thought about it for a day or so and on Thursday decided to adopt her. We didn’t actually take her until Saturday though because we had so much going on we wouldn’t be able to watch her anyway.

Saturday morning we went back to the Mesa Swap Meet to look for a collar and leash but it was a total bust so we ended up at Petsmart where we purchased those items plus two cans of puppy food. (We also ordered a travel carrier on Amazon which was delivered to M’s house and she brought it over that afternoon).

When we got back to the trailer Joe’s sister, T, was in a mood for some reason because immediately she was all “where’s the puppy going to stay? I don’t want her on my bed. I don’t want her messing up my rug and if she has an accident you’re going to clean it up”. I was flabbergasted with the way she was talking to us since a) we didn’t do anything to provoke it and b) she was implying we are inconsiderate assholes. Joe got so mad that he started yelling at her and they really got into it and she left.

Then we went out to breakfast with Joe’s parents and when we came back we went to the neighbor’s house to get the puppy. We gave her $150 (to cover previous vet costs) and borrowed her crate and some other supplies. We also got info from her on what vaccinations the puppy has had and her birthdate which is September 21st.

Basically we spent the rest of the day hanging outside and playing with the puppy. I just about had a panic attack that evening telling Joe I’m not sure if we should have agreed to the puppy since it’s so much responsibility, plus the costs involved while he’s still out of work. As a result I ended up not sleeping most of the night and we were up at 2:30 am to ensure we made our 6 am flight home. Since Joe and his sister weren’t speaking M drove us to the airport.

They tell you to get to the airport two hours before your flight. What they don’t tell you is Southwest doesn’t open their ticket counter until 4:30 am on the weekend so we arrived earlier than necessary and had to wait. We used the automated kiosks (which an employee had to turn on one by one) to print the tags for our bags but we had to visit the counter to pay for the puppy. It’s $95 each way even though it’s a carry-on just like anything else. For whatever reason my boarding pass had the TSA pre-check so I got to bypass the regular security line and not have to take off my shoes. I walked with the puppy through the metal detector and she got a lot of attention from the security guy as well as another passenger who went through the line behind me. Both made a remark that she doesn’t even look real but more like a toy. Here’s a few pictures I took a few days after we got home for your perusing pleasure.

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Isn’t she adorable? We’re still trying to pick an appropriate name for her.

Our boarding positions were A 32 and 33 which was awesome: we scored seats in the exit row where there’s only two plus extra legroom. Once everyone had boarded I went up front to use the bathroom and say hi to the pilot (since just like on our flight to Phoenix, the other pilot went into the bathroom right before I got there). When I tried to get out, the stewardess was on the phone and wouldn’t let me past her. When she hung up she said they had to move us “a few rows back” because we weren’t allowed to sit in an exit row with a pet. Well, it was more like several rows back on the other side of the plane and Joe was not happy. I had to grab our carry-ons from the overheard bin and move them as well. We went from choice seats to the crappy ones in the back surrounded by kids. Oy! That’s on me for not reading the pet policy though; it does state you can’t sit in an exit row. Oh well, lesson learned. On the bright side I was so tired from no sleep and taking two Xanax that at some point I fell asleep. Also, the puppy behaved perfectly. She didn’t whine or have any accidents, so it could have been worse. She was good about not having to pee until we got back to the car and I was able to put a puppy pad down so it didn’t get on the floor mats.

I wouldn’t say I’m over my fear of flying (I’ll always fear the worst case scenario) but I don’t think I’m going to panic months before our next flight like I did this time around. There’s definitely something to the whole exposure therapy thing since this was the first time I’ve flown two years in a row and I’m getting a little more comfortable with the idea even though I still really hate take off and any time they bank the plane to turn since it’s always at a lower altitude. We’d like to visit Joe’s parents more frequently so there’s a good chance we’ll be flying again in six months or less so it will be interesting to see how I feel then.

Two things –

We met a really nice woman at the airport who was flying with her dog too. She was very helpful answering my questions about how she handles letting the dog relieve itself before the flight although our puppy wasn’t interested in doing that anyway.

Our plane home was the sporting Southwest’s special Illinois livery. I couldn’t see much of it other than the word “Illinois” as we boarded since it was still dark out (I specifically scheduled day time flights because I didn’t want to fly in the dark but forgot that it’s still dark at 6 am in Phoenix. Oh well, it was’t that bad). I mentioned the design to the pilot and he commented that it’s ugly, LOL. Then I looked it up on Google once we got home and he wasn’t wrong. Ew!

Southwest Illinois Livery

Arizona – Friday, November 18

Friday we headed over to Arizona Mills in Tempe so I could check out the Arizona Sea Life Aquarium while Joe met up with a friend for coffee. The aquarium was definitely geared toward kids so despite me doing my best to take my time I was done touring it in 45 minutes. I thought I got some decent photos by messing with the settings on my little point-and-shoot, but most of them still came out crappy. Here’s a couple of the decent ones. Funny that they both happen to be species of fish in Finding Nemo.

Blue Tangs

Moorish Idol

I spent the next 45 minutes or so killing time. I went to the food court and posted a bunch of Yelp reviews and then walked around the mall. Joe met up with me when I was looking at a store called At Home which is like Garden Ridge here.

After a quick walk around the mall we went to Corleone’s for Philly cheesesteak sandwiches. They were almost as good as I remember from seven years ago.

Later that evening we met up with M and her family to see the Lights of the World Festival. Trying to find the parking entrance was a nightmare, however. We were driving all over the place able to see the festival in the distance but unable to figure out which actual road would take us there. On top of that, no one seemed to speak English so stopping and asking people who were standing around wasn’t very helpful.

To add insult to injury, once we did find the correct road, we had to pay $10 to park in a completely dark parking lot. Yea, that’s right – they hadn’t turned any of the lights on at a light show. WTF?!!? We were both so pissed. I posted on their Facebook page and they just deleted it so I posted it on my page and tagged them. A few days later their response was “#fixed”. No apology or anything. So despite how cool the light show itself was I would never attend one ran by that company again since they have the worst customer service and planning skills. How no one thought to put up some signs directing traffic to the entrance is beyond me.

Anyway, here’s a few of my favorite displays from the festival.

Lights Of The World Festival

Lights Of The World Festival

Lights Of The World Festival

Arizona – Thursday, November 17

Thursday morning Joe’s parents took us out to breakfast at another one of their favorite places called Mickey D’s Cafe. The food was ok, although I only ordered potatoes and a cup of fruit since by the time they asked I had eaten my BBQ leftovers from Wednesday as my breakfast.

Later that afternoon we met up with M and her daughter at TopGolf where M’s husband works as the executive chef. We got a nice 2nd floor stall where we were able to hit some golf balls. I actually did better than the last time I tried many years ago. They have nice couches in the area and a TV. It’s pretty sweet – I can certainly understand the appeal. Everything was really clean and new looking; I think the location is only a couple of years old.

We didn’t order any food at TopGolf, although we did snack on the chips and guacamole M had them bring out. We wanted to stay hungry since we had lunch plans to revisit this Thai place we discovered and loved on our last trip. So around 2 pm we did just that and it was the most disappointing meal of our vacation. I don’t know if they changed chefs since our visit seven years ago, or we just happened to pick all the right dishes last time, but my Pad Se Ew was nothing special at all and Joe wasn’t impressed with his Pad Thai. I briefly considered ordering the Thai fried rice I enjoyed so much last time but was afraid to spend any more money there, so we just left. What a bummer! I was literally excited for days to go back too.

That evening Joe’s mom treated us to BINGO at Lone Butte Casino. I hate casinos, and this one was no different – loud and full of cigarette smoke. The BINGO hall was much quieter and we sat in the non-smoking section so it wasn’t too bad. We sat across from the restrooms so that Joe’s mom and sister could smoke when they wanted. We got the electronic BINGO devices which, while expensive at $39 (!!!) each, are pretty cool.

Electronic BINGO Machine

The machine keeps up with the game for you and even lets you know when you’re close to getting BINGO. They allow outside food and drinks which is cool too, although we purchased some food there and took advantage of the free (non-alcoholic) drinks in the BINGO hall. We got there so early, and we had a free $15 for joining their casino program, so we played on the Poker machines for a bit but cashed out before we lost any real money. They make you put at least $5 of your own money into the machine before you can access the $15 they give you. I hate gambling so it was just something to pass the time before BINGO begin.

M and her mom (Joe’s sister) got into it less than halfway through the evening so that put a damper on things. Plus none of us won even though a woman two tables away won twice! THAT is why I could do without casinos altogether. I don’t get the appeal but old people really seem to love going there. Most of them look miserable, however.

Arizona – Wednesday, November 16

Macaw

Wednesday we got up early to heard to Wildlife World Zoo in Litchfield Park, Arizona. The drive is about an hour from Joe’s parents’ but wasn’t too bad thanks to the awesome HOV lanes – we flew past the traffic! I love the expressways in Arizona because they are all in fantastic shape thanks to the lack of snow and ice. Plus they are all absolutely free; no tolls whatsoever. Gotta like that!

We were meeting M, J, and O so we had time to stop at the nearby McDonald’s for a quick breakfast since we were due to arrive at the zoo ahead of them by at least twenty minutes. We arrived at the zoo about fifteen minutes after they opened and they were already there. Doh! Turns out their GPS overestimated how long it would take them to get there.

It was a rare cloudy/overcast day – our first one since arriving – which turned out to be perfect since it got into the mid 80’s throughout the day but without the sun beating down on us it felt very comfortable.

The zoo didn’t seem that large at first glance but it turns out they have a ton of animals. The highlights included the zoo show where they introduced some of the more intelligent animals such as Ollie the Otter and an African Grey Parrot. The baby animal nursery was awesome too – they had a white tiger cub, a leopard cub, and two lion cubs.

White Tiger Cub

Lion Cub

Included in the admission price was the chance to feed the lorikeets.

Lorakeet

They only allow the feeding at certain times but we were able to attend the first feeding. Before going into the enclosure it was explained to us that the green bucket of apple pieces were to feed the birds and the red bucket was for any pieces eaten or that have fallen to the ground. We were also warned that anything that went into the birds would be coming back out within fifteen minutes and that we’d get a two minute warning so we could clear the enclosure in time. Feeding the birds was fun although a bit stressful when you have three of them digging their claws into your arm while picking apart a quartered apple in the palm of your hand.

I also got some great photos of the resident leopard which was exciting since most of the time they are sleeping.

Leopard

Leopard

Oh, and for 50 cents (per handful of food) you can feed the giraffes. You can’t get as close to them as at the Phoenix zoo, however.

Giraffe Feeding

I finally got a sharp photo of a meerkat too!

Meerkat

Around 2 pm we were super hungry so we decided to take a break and eat at the on-site restaurant, Dillions KC BBQ. I had the half chicken and Joe had the beef brisket, both of which were good. Their $2 onion rings were awesome as well.

After lunch M and crew decided to leave while Joe and I stuck around to look at the aquarium portion of the zoo which was the only section we hadn’t seen yet. I toured the majority of it alone, however, since Joe had a phone interview (his second of the week; he had one on Monday for a different company while we were at the Botanical Garden).

We left the zoo around 4 pm and made a pit stop at Walmart for a couple of things.

Later that evening everyone met up at Joe’s parents, including M and crew, who bought a Nothing Bundt Cake for Joe’s mom’s birthday. M had asked for lemon but apparently someone screwed up because we ended up with white chocolate raspberry. Luckily it was delicious anyway!