Are we having fun yet?: the reason for no pics

Jeremy got back from being in Laos yesterday afternoon. He's had the camera for 10 days. Now that he is back and alive, I feel safe putting that on the Internet.

He called it an adventure of a lifetime. I'm still not entirely sure what he did. I was trying to get him to tell me about his trip when he was very jet lagged and had only slept maybe 2 hours in the past 24 hours.

He flew from Seattle to Bangkok starting April 25, but I think it took 2 days to actually get to Laos. After giving him a hard time about not going to Thailand without me, he ended up going anyways. He says it's because he didn't calculate the dates right. Hmph. He spent a day in Thailand. He liked the papaya salad and seafood he ate there. Went to visit a big temple there. Mentioned he wanted to go to a seashell museum in his email to me saying he was still alive, but didn't recount that when he actually got back here. He did say he resisted the temptation to go to the beach or ride an elephant in Thailand. And that Bangkok was a bit of a disappointment to him since it was very metropolitean and there were so many people and tourists around from all over the world. Sounded a bit like New York in that respect. Apparently most people there looked at him and saw American, not Asian. Yep. I agree.

He spent most of his time with a guy named Jordan, who somehow knew him while they worked at Omniture. Do not ask me how they hooked up for this trip. I'm very confused about it, too, but somehow they did. And this Jordan dude knows another dude from his current work at REI here who set up some of the trips plans that Jeremy and Jordan did together. Some of the time Jeremy was with them and some of the time Jeremy was wandering around in the country doing his own thing.

Jeremy spent most of his time hiking from a nearby spot from the capital of Laos to another town Luang Prabang. Through the jungle. He said he saw some bears. I'll include the photo of that. They stayed between some mountains and a river for their bearings. When they would come into random towns, they would eat street food. He said he liked that.

Some other specific stories he had was a night he decided to stay in a hotel that had been converted from something else. It wasn't uniform. A lizard was in his room. I think Tucker would think that is cool. He kept slipping in the tub and the water went from hot to cold.

He got up to see the monks being fed in a particular town and had some pictures of that.

I know he went up and down the river in Bangkok and took a ferry to the temple (I think).

He also mentioned how he met a couple (I don't know where) and the woman was six months pregnant, miserable, and "snappy". I can only imagine, in that heat. Apparently Jeremy smiled when she made the comment to her hubby it was all his fault. Husband of mine, are you remembering that I'm eight months pregnant?

He said his favorite thing about coming home was seeing us get excited about the presents he picked out. And that I wasn't as grumpy as he was anticipating. Thank you grumpy woman half way around the world for putting into perspective for him how awesome I am! Whitney and Tucker were very interested in seeing all of his pictures and hearing about his trip. And he did pick some very good soveniers. Things that we would all like and not just candy that will be eaten and forgotten about.

If anything more cognicent comes out of his mouth this next week, I'll be sure to write it down, but I'm not too hopeful. He's back into the work schedule again this week, probably busy with being gone.

The other cute things Tucker and Whitney did this week that I haven't mentioned, I have no pictures of. But that's ok.

Tucker decided one afternoon to wear my flipflops instead of his to the mail box. Amazingly, he can walk fairly well in them. It made me laugh. I also got a sheet of masonite so he can practice tap dancing. He really liked it. Lots of noise that is ok to make. Jeremy also thought Tucker might be able to copy some of the stuff I do on the piano. He practiced with Tucker and was right. Tucker pushed the right keys after him.

I also didn't realize that I've never brought my kids through a carwash before and that I, myself, am a little rusty. You know what happens if you don't follow directions? The car wash stops, the guy comes to ask you to roll down your soapy windows while his mouth is full of food because he thought he was going to get a break while you were in the machine, and tells you to put it in neutral. Hah! I forgot about that. Apparently leaving it in drive puts you off track. And I didn't look for signs while I was rolling up all the windows. Whatever. Whitney got scared while we were in the carwash. It was kind of dark going through all those sloshing things. I held her hand. I later heard them playing carwash and part of it was Whitney holding Tucker's hand to comfort him while he put his car through the "carwash".

Whitney spent 40 minutes coloring in nursery yesterday. Apparently they talked about families and the family sheet they gave them to color matches ours. A brother, sister and baby brother. When I came to pick her up, she was showing baby brother in my stomach the baby brother she had painstakingly colored. Tucker did an amazing outline of his hand on his own. He went to nursery this time, but only with Whitney holding his hand.

I think most of the pics with people are in Thailand and the scenery ones are Laos.