Joe's Wedding

So here's how the week went down.  While the narrative is complete, the pictures are not.  After this trip, I lost my cell phone and most of the pictures I had on it from this trip that I hadn't yet downloaded.  I recovered a few from texts that I sent people, but that was it.  Dohnele has more on her phone, but there are literally 11,000 photos on her phone and I've given up trying to get her to organize them.

DAY 1.  July 14th.

We got up super early in the morning and drove to Portland.  Parked at a private lot and shuttled to the airport which worked really slick and was ten bucks cheaper than parking in the economy lot at the airport.  Got on the airplane and flew up to Seattle where I snatched breakfast.  Dohnele wasn't hungry.  After an hour or so we got on our connecting flight to Columbus.  The flights were really nice because six months ago, I cashed in all of our air miles and got "free" tickets in first class.  Worth it!  Landing in Columbus was amazing because of how green everything was.  And the humidity...  Ooof.  Downright tropical.

Anyway, we landed and when we turned on our phones, mine was blowing up with messages from Emma who was in hysterics about our hot water heater which appeared to have gone kaput.  Of course, why not?!  Why would it die when we were there there to take care of it?!  So anyway, we got our bags and rentacar while I tried to find a plumber.  Finally found one who would respond within the hour.  And of course I'm doing all this outside the rentacar center while I'm sweating my literal ass off.  Fortunately, I was able to talk Emma through turning off the water and gas to the heater.  I also got the kids to move everything that had gotten wet to the other side of the garage and clear a space for the plumber.  Unfortunately, the price of hot water heaters has gone up a ton since the last one I replaced in Rogue River.  In fact, the price had gone up so much, I actually got a smaller unit because the same size unit was astronomical in price.  Back to the rentacar: when I made the reservation months ago, I reserved a Ford Mustang because it was only a smidge more expensive than a regular 'ol sedan.  I was so looking forward to it.  Two days before the trip, Avis contacted me and said the vehicle was sold out.  I was furious and was ready to chew someone out.  The lady behind the counter was awesome though and hooked us up with a Camaro!

So with the hot water heater situation taken care of, the rentacar in hand, and our bags, we drove to our Air BnB which was a cute, old bungalow in Westerville.  We didn't have too much time to explore because we had to quickly head over to Marysville to meet up with Dohnele's family.  We missed the family dinner because of the hot water heater fiasco, but we met up with them afterwards in the hotel parking lot.  And that's where we saw fireflies and bunnies on the lawn.  Dohnele became obsessed and took a billion pictures.

After we socialized for over an hour, we realized that we still hadn't eaten dinner.  I was excited to try some of the local fare, so we went to a Waffle House!  A billion calories later, we left satisfied and returned home to sleep.

DAY 2.  July 15th.

Woke up this morning and Dohnele wanted to go see "the giant basket" at the Longaberger's Factory which as it turns out closed several years ago, but the building remains.  Dohn and Ben accompanied us.  After the basket stop, I wanted to go get barbecue and I had found a place on Buckeye Lake called Porthouse Lounge and Smokehouse.  In searching, I found that a lot of places in Ohio all looked the same: kinda shabby and run down, but still offered decent food.  Anyway, this place had a nice covered outdoor picnic table which was nice since it had started to rain.  Unfortunately, the smoking obviously happened offsite because the food I ordered came out of a cooler meant to keep the meat warm.  That was kind of lame, but the food was good.

After barbecue, I wanted to go try the local beer.  On the way, Dohnele found an artisan's market and we stopped for a bit, but most of the stuff was kinda kitschy.  The beer at Buckeye Lake Brewery, however, was very tasty and refreshing.  It was weird because even though the brewery was on the edge of the lake which was right next to a lighthouse, we never actually saw the lake because it's so flat that the reservoir actually had a dam built all around it.  So we saw the dam, but no lake.

After the beverage, we had an argument about what clothes to wear to Joe's wedding Rehearsal.  I had talked to Joe who confirmed twice that it was an informal event so I was going to wear t-shirt and jeans.  Dohn and Dohnele both wanted to dress up.  So we headed home for Dohnele to dress up.  I stayed in my t-shirt and jeans.  When we arrived in Delaware at the church, I totally won the bet!  Everyone was in t-shirts and jeans!  Anyway, the rehearsal was quick and easy and then everyone proceeded to a rehearsal dinner in Raymond.  On the way, Dohnele had to stop to take a picture of an old barn and then we drove through an intense rainstorm.  After dinner, Joe took us to his property where ground had just broken for new house construction!  It was right at sunset and the neighbors were clearly annoyed that so many people basically standing on "their" cul-de-sac.  Whatever.  We all parted ways after that and Dohnele and I went back to Westerville with several stops along the way for Dohnele to photograph fireflies.  Once back in Westerville, we went out for drinks at a local taphouse and got to try some local beer.  Dohnele enjoyed boozy slushies which were much more refreshing.  Craving food, we went to a place that was recommended to us: Steak and Shake.  And it truly was amazing.  But again, another billion calories down the hatch.

DAY 3.  July 16th.

Today was the the day of the wedding.  We got up, cleaned up, and dressed up.  And then drove to the church in Delaware to take wedding pictures.  Fortunately they had air conditioning blasting in the church.  There was also a fair breeze outside.  But it was hot and humid.  And the slightest movement made a person break out in a sweat that wouldn't stop.  I more or less found an AC vent and just stood next to it.  The poor bridesmaid I escorted down the aisle was probably disgusted by how sweaty I was.  Then again, I think everyone was pretty saucy.

The wedding was great because it was short and sweet.  And quickly folks packed up and headed over to the Reception in Marysville which was also air conditioned.  The afternoon was spent talking and taking pictures.  We stuck around too long at the Reception and ended up having to put away tables and chairs which caused profuse sweating.  We finally left and went back to Westerville to put on normal clothes.  Then we met up with Josh, Hannah, Dohn, and Ben in Columbus for dinner at Dirty Frank's Hot Dog Palace which was next door to 16 Bit Arcade.  Both were fun.  There were a million kinds of hot dog to choose from.  And at the arcade, all the games were free as long as you bought a drink which suited me just fine!  On the way home, we totally stopped at Steak and Shake again for another late night snack (meal).

DAY 4.  July 17th.

This was the one day that we had to ourselves that we gave ourselves to do our own thing.  While everyone else left town for Michigan, we instead drove southeast towards Athens because of another recommendation.  We were to visit Hocking Hills State Park and Athens.  So we said "why not?!" and took off.

We drove first to Hocking Hills State Park.  The last 30 minutes were through a rainstorm, but we didn't have anywhere to be, so we didn't mind getting wet.  When we parked, the rain had actually stopped for the moment and it was steaming.  Just hot and saucy.  Like a sauna.  The State Park was super impressive, actually, and free!  I had picked out a loop trail that was a couple miles long that was super neat to see.  The stream, the forest, the geology was all so unique!  Plus, another storm rolled in and we got thunder, lightning, and rain as we went on our sweaty little hike.

After we finished the hike, we headed towards Athens and Jackie O's Brewery.  I opted for the Production Room which had a much better selection of beer, but no food.  Later we went to the other site which offered food, but a poor selection of beer!  I tried a flight of beer which was amazing because I wanted to try their stouts and barleywines.  So glad I did because they were truly amazing!

After Jackie O's, we went to Ohio University and walked around the campus which was a beautiful place.  For dinner I wanted to do fried chicken since that was the last sin I hadn't experienced in Ohio.  I found a place and it was delicious.  I actually - quite sadly - wasn't even able to finish my chicken which is a darn shame.  After wrapping up for the day, we headed back to Columbus for cocktails at The Alibi (another recommendation) which was tasty.  This time, Dohnele got to drink and I drove.  After drinks, since we were downtown, we decided to walk around a bit which was fun because another thunderstorm had rolled in.  Dohnele spent a lot of time taking pictures of lightning and videos of thunder.  Finally we headed home to Westerville to get packed for the flight home the next morning.

Intense thunderstorm in Westerville (above) and sunset in Wayne National Forest (below)

DAY 5.  July 18th.

Woke up early to get down to Columbus in time to return the rentacar, get checked in, and fly home.  The flight was easy because we slept through most of it.  Unfortunately, they lost our bags so we ended up going home empty-handed.  They arrived later that evening.