recap

we're back!
annnd burnt.. some of us worse than others.

i, having grown up a mcdonnell and granddaughter of the legendary grandma wolf, who spent 3 months every winter of my childhood in hawaii and i'm pretty sure has never used an ounce of sunscreen in her life but did at one point in my early years suggest some that contained paba, which i think was found to damage dna or something, actually wanted to get burnt so that it wouldn't fade too much before sarah's wedding this weekend. jeremy, however, did not grow up under this influence and i dare say that his skin having not been exposed to summers of repeated innsbrook scorching, felt the burn. friday night was quite a sight as his poor bright red and hot to the touch back turned cool wet washcloths into uncomfortably warm wet washcloths and soaked up aloe vera gel by the glob. i think it's getting better now, but a car ride with no air conditioner probably didn't help. the babe is tan now too.. is that bad? i haven't yet googled "pregnancy and sunburn"..

all in all, vacation was lovely. highlights from our travels include but are not limited to:
- a round trip on only 4 tanks of gas - thank you, wonderful honda accord.
- a room upgrade landing us in a beautiful 9th story pool-view/beach-view room with a balcony
- a mini-fridge in aforementioned amazing hotel room allowing snickers ice cream bars and ben & jerry's
- publix (yeah, i'll link to a grocery store chain), quite possibly the best grocery shopping experience of my life and the greatest generic branding i've ever seen
- awaking to natural light every morn around 7
- an early-morning beach stroll on one such morn followed by breakfast at waffle house followed by a 3-hour nap followed by laying out by the pool. yep.
- fresh catch-of-the-day dinner (or at least fresher than what we'd find in mid-mo) at the gulf shores steamer
- jellyfish! big jellyfish washed up on the beach!
- fool's gold starring matthew mcconaughey & kate hudson (please watch this movie if you get a chance)
- my travel (and life) companion, jeremy s. linneman, in all his vacation-mode glory encouraging 16+ hours of roadtrip conversational bonding (although at one point, after what seemed quite a lengthy conversation, i did resign not to speak but read for a while out of respect for the fact that his simply being in the driver's seat did not mean that i should necessarily use all 10,000 of my daily words before we made it home)
- taking a left out of our resort in search of a nice restaurant and ending up at a sonic 30 minutes away eating a chili-cheese hot dog in a dress
- discovering that perdido beach resort may actually be an old people resort as evidenced by nightly piano players pounding out showtunes on the lobby baby grand surrounded by sweet swing dancing elderlies

and many more highlights that made our pre-babe (although of course the babe was with us and not very happy that the mizzou-oklahoma game was not on espn) vacation very relaxing, refreshing, and rejuvenating.

and upon arriving home late last evening, we discovered upwards of 30 ladybugs/african beetles/terrors needing to be smashed on our bedroom window. and on our pillows. but such is life.