The weekend

Friday morning I woke up about 10 minutes before my alarm was to go off. I got dressed, brushed my teeth and packed up my teeth stuff. I had a small bowl of cereal before heading to the bus station. The bus got to Midway at about 5:45. I found where I would be leaving from, sat down and read for a little over an hour. I had a bit of food before getting on the bus. We arrived in South Bend at 10:40 local (Eastern) time. I only had to wait about 10 minutes for Jen and John. We drove to Warsaw and they showed me around before we stopped at this really cute deli for lunch. We went to their house, which is also really cute, and dropped my stuff off. Jen got special permission to show me inside her group home so we stopped in for a few minutes. Afterwards we went back to the house and napped. After a power nap we went out for a walk. We all talked for a bit before going out to dinner, which was a buffet and was really good. I was pretty good with my food choices. We stopped at the liquor store after dinner and went home and fixed some drinks before watching "The Dark Knight."

Saturday I was up a little after 8:00. I went out for a run. By the time I had showered Jen was just waking up and John had stopped home for a bit before work. We had some breakfast before heading out to Winona Lake; the city reminds me a little bit of Elkhart Lake. We spent some time wandering the city before heading to the trails. We were on there for about 1 1/2 hours. We got back to the house and I had some toast before heading to dinner. We had a really good dinner and I had a beer! After dinner I got some ice cream and we headed to a park just to relax and enjoy nature. Jen and I hung out in her room for a bit, talking and watching TV. We headed up bed at a little before 1:00.

Sunday we were up somewhat early for church. Church was nice. Similar to some of the services I've been to that were your "non-denominational," even though this was Methodist. After church we went to the grocery store since I was going to cook lunch. I freaked out when I found the purple potatoes. Jen took a nap after we got back so John and I cooked lunch. That was really fun just talking and cooking. We were eating by about 3:00. After lunch Jen and I watched the earl race from Milwaukee. Boring as all heck, but no dangerous crashes. I took a walk after the race. Jen was napping when I got back so I did laundry, fixed myself some dinner, looked at some old racing magazines and called the folks. Jen and I had an Ice Road Truckers date at 9:00 so we watched that. Looks like it'll be a good season. We watched TV and talked before she headed to work a bit past 11:30. I watched TV in the room I was staying in and had Stormy on my stomach as I went to bed.

Storms woke me up early on Monday. Stormy and I had some more hang-out time in bed. Since it was storming I went on Jen's elyptical for a bit before showering and finishing packing. I had some cereal and had one last lap-o-Stormy before heading out at 9:00. We said our goodbyes in South Bend. I decided to go through O'Hare since I would be home at least an hour earlier than had I gone through Midway. With the exception of visiting Elaine I think I'll go through O'Hare from now on. There are more options and I don't have to pay almost $2.50 if I want milk. We left O'Hare at about 2:30 and were back in Madison just before 5:00.

Random thought: I had a shot earlier for the Brewers. I needed it almost as much as they probably will want one.

~Nicole