Well, everybody slept in, which is to say Grandma slept in so I did too. Who knows what Philip does. Philip having called the paper yesterday to say we keep getting two papers and it's rather a nuisance, please stop, there was no paper this morning. Typical, and not unexpected.
It was a long afternoon. Sid was here when Philip and I left for Denver. We made it to the Botanical Gardens at perhaps two, the iPhone having been used to good purpose in that area. We parked in one of those areas where all the houses are really huge and really nice, in an antique sort of style. Lots of lovely dogs, although not to speak to. Anyway, we got into the Gardens and started taking pictures. The first gardens was, I believe, the water-conservation one, showcasing plants that do well on little water. We took some nice photos there, and quite a lot in the Japanese Garden of the Winds, the Shoku-En. There was a tea house where you could take part in a tea ceremony, but it was closed today. There were water gardens, and an Asian garden, and a knot garden of herbs, and a rose garden, and romantic and fragrant gardens (they were doing weddings in the Romantic and South African gardens--I think we went through just after them both) and an indoor jungle garden which was wonderfully humid. One thing that was really cool was that there were dinosaurs throughout the gardens, so there was an Edmontosaurus in one, and a Kritosaurus in another (yay duckbills!) and the most prominent was the Daspletosaur, a relation of T. Rex. We both got pictures in front of that. Anyway, from the map, we missed a few, but we saw the Bambiraptors, the Daspletosaur, the Edmontosaurus, the Kritosaurus, the Oviraptor which was right out front, the Placerias which I remember from the first chapter of Walking with Dinosaurs, the Dimetrodon, the Quetzalcoatls, and the Syntarsus in the jungle. Please note that the only name here acknowledged by Spellcheck is T. Rex. Although they put up with Velociraptor too. I was getting pretty hungry by the time we finished, so then we went to Red Robin for either late lunch or early dinner, at about four or so. I remember they played "Viva la Vida" while we were in there. We both had hamburgers, and I had a Barq's in hopes that the caffeine would be adequate. I suppose it was, but I was still pretty tired when we got home.
This was not for a long time. After Red Robin, we went to Elitch Gardens. It was like an alien planet. The buildings, when you walk in, have a vaguely Wild Western Main Street look, and when this effect is combined with crowds of unfamiliar big-city people and the unfamiliar music, the result is something like the beginning of the movie, when the main point is to emphasize where this is set and that it's somewhere you've never been. The life-forms help--there was a group of three guys with long dark hair that, when gelled, produced spikes ranging from three inches to a foot tall. I tried to take a picture, but we were in line for the Sea Dragon and the guys were behind a tree. You can see them if you look, but it's not a great picture of anything but a tree.
The Sea Dragon was the first ride we went on. I think we were in line maybe half an hour, although since this is Philip's average and I think one of the others was longer than that it may have been less. That one Gorillaz song, 19-2000, was playing when we got in line. The sound quality was fairly awful, but it was nice to hear something familiar in such a strange place. That ride was just plain fun, as Philip said we were starting out tame. It was, I suppose, but it was fun, like a really big swing. There was something of a bonus in the location, too, as it was right next to this ride where a boat went down a water slide, and we had a great view of the splash.
The second ride was the roller coaster. It was the oldest, tamest one they had, with no loops or anything, the Twister 2, successor to the first Elitch's roller coaster. The frame was wood, white paint peeling. It was fairly scary. I clenched my teeth, braced myself, and rode it out. Philip filmed the whole thing--it turns out it was only about two minutes, but two minutes is pretty long when you're on a roller coaster. After the Twister we went and got in line for the Boomerang. For the Boomerang, what more or less happens is you go up the incline, it drops you, you go around the loops and up the other incline, and then that drops you and you do it all again backwards as well as upside down. Lesson: don't bother opening your eyes when you're upside down. You can't see anything anyway if they were shut that hard. Also I think my ears popped multiple times, but that may have been from clenching my jaw. Anyway. They sold us a picture--I think it's from right when you start down the first drop. Philip was grinning like an idiot the whole time, except when he was laughing. There was a third coaster, the Mind Eraser, which involved hanging in a seat from the rail. That had a pretty loopy course, but fortunately the parking meter had expired and we had to go. I fell asleep in the cars making notes and, eventually, narrating a Miles story in my head, until the radio took over with a story about cell phone viruses and how they won't become a problem until there are enough people with smart phones that all use the same OS. I tried to get back to Miles, but no luck. We got home at nine or so to an overwhelming welcome from Lark. She was so wound up she came back inside to check on me without even being called. Philip showed Grandma our pictures and video, I sat down to write this, and one of the cactus spines I picked out of Lark's nose this morning somehow managed to get me in the back and the foot when I sat down. Gack.
The end of all this is that Lark didn't get walked today. Uh-oh.
