Secret Identity: B & B owner

This has been the week of visitors. Which is absolutely exciting, but also utterly exhausting. Let's start with the beginning of the week and take a quick visit to the Château Jenny.

Monday evening brought my first set of visitors. Laura and Mike came up from Hastings to see a game for the College World Series. Now, I don't really love baseball--in fact, I really dislike it and find it to be incredibly boring--but I do really like seeing my friends. So I went to the game with them. Amazingly, I didn't start getting bored until the bottom of the 6th. If you know me very well, you'll know that that is incredible for me because usually I'm bored shortly after the national anthem.

This bear hat is seriously awesome!
Go Bruins!

CWS Day One: survived

Tuesday was quite the exciting day. My good friend Alexia from a summer program I did in Cambridge, England came to Omaha to see UCLA in the CWS. It's been 6 whole years since I saw her last, but we've kept in touch through letters at first and Facebook more recently. She's the first of my CamTrad friends to come visit me (oddly enough people from large cities around the world, aren't super excited to come visit the-middle-of-nowhere Nebraska), although I have seen several of them over the years when I've been traveling.

It has been absolutely nuts seeing her and catching up with her. One of her friends/roommates/classmates from UCLA came with her, so I even get to meet someone else! Hooray. There's something about CamTrad-ers that it doesn't matter how long of a time frame has passed, but we just pick up with each other's lives like it's just been a week since the last time we saw each other.

Only separated by a single
state line after 6 long years!

They drove all the way from LA to watch their team in the CWS, so off to the games we went. I actually made it through most of the game without getting bored...maybe because we were sitting in the UCLA section and the game got more intense. But it's still baseball, so...

CWS Day Two: survived

UCLA didn't play on Wednesday, so I sent the ladies to the Omaha Zoo for the day and then we headed out for sushi at Blue and then walked to the state line...who doesn't love being in two places at once?! Alexia had never seen Pitch Perfect, so we had a quiet night in.

Thursday. Well I had another set of awesome visitors! My Uncle flew in from DC so half of my family could go on a quick trip to St. Louis this weekend. So we went to lunch while he and my grandma were in town. He saw an Omaha restaurant on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, so clearly we had to visit it!

Big Mama's Kitchen is on the North side of Omaha in an old school. And it is delicious. It definitely deserved the #33 (or was it #34?) spot on the top 100 Diners, Drive-ins and Dives! I had fried catfish, macaroni and cheese, slaw and SWEET TEA. Sweet tea is practically crack to me; I don't allow myself to have it very frequently--unless I'm in the south or eating soul food, because what Southern meal is complete without sweet tea?

On Friday, I didn't have any new visitors, but I did take the SMDEP students to Lincoln, so I did visit with some people that I haven't seen in a while. I saw my friend Lizzie for a bit at the dental school and then had lunch/ice cream with my roommate and her boyfriend. Megan has been on her rural rotation for school lately, so I haven't seen her in a few weeks. It was nice to catch up!

Friday evening was another UCLA CWS game, but I was too pooped to go. Miss Alexia and Miss Alex went to it though and seemed to have a wonderful time!

I was sad to say goodbye to my friends on Saturday morning, but there was no rest for the weary! I had a quick trip to the jail to educate and test for STDs, then a trip to the zoo with the SMDEP students and then mi madre came up for a quick visit! 

Carousel ride!

Squirt from Finding Nemo all growed up!

We got some churching, brunching, and shopping in on Sunday before she headed back to Hastings for work on Monday. What a lovely quick-trip from my mama!

As soon as I said goodbye to my mom, I headed out for Shakespeare on the Green in one of the parks in midtown Omaha. The performance was the Twelfth Night. It was a musical rendition, complete with modern hits such as "Call Me Maybe," "Hey Ho," "Some Night," and "All the Single Ladies." There was also an Arrested Development reference to Gob's chicken. 

We brought some blankets and some picnic food and enjoyed the sights, until the mosquitos started eating me alive. Some of the SMDEP students even came for a bit! Titus Andronicus will be the show next week, so we're heading back then!