Okay, so maybe they don't say that - but can't you kind of picture that being said?
At the risk of making Arkansas sound like...well...Arkansas - I thought some time should be dedicated to describing our first crawfish boil...or as we were told later "bug boil".
What an awesome event. We were lucky to even be invited - but what a classic southern affair. First and foremost we were able to walk there (and to the other event we attended that night) which was a definite realization that we love where we live, and its proximity to the downtown area. We waited anxiously for the 'pot to be dumped' and see what this was all about. We snapped a few pictures of the cooking and preparations going on, and made like low level television reporters by 'interviewing' the hosts to find out what made their bug boil the best in town. Apparently, they order "high grade crawfish and clean them before they boil them". But let's be honest, he could have said "we wrap them in tea leaves and perform a traditional eastern seaboard dance around them" and I would have accepted it.
Then the magic happened - the preparations were made and the pot was dumped right on the table. Out came about a thousand creepy crawlers and a schmogousborg (like you know how to spell that word) of potatoes, spices, sausage, artichoke, corn on the cob, and plenty else. After a few early 'mishaps' we quickly figured out the process - although we stopped short of "getting the good meat" by biting the head off.
All in all it was a truly southern event - and we survived by saying things like "Yeah, Mallett totally should have gone first round" and "this'd make a great tailgate meal".
We actually started our weekend out by driving to Kansas City to see Katie, Jeff, and Emily Enger - and celebrate Katie's birthday. I mention this because I could go on and on about how great our night was - and how lucky we are to have such good friends - but I thought the blog needed the pictures of Jeff playing "Dog Whisperer" to all 5 dogs that were at the house that night.
However, I couldn't resist putting a picture of Emily on the blog - she is a beautiful baby and...seemingly just my type of child...low maintenance (at least for visitors).
Sunday we completed our first 'hike' around Lake Fayetteville. It is a 5.5 mile route that started out in the woods and ended mostly on pavement around the lake. To put it in horseracing terms you could say Nicki "came out of the gate a bit early" as she sprinted us through the first 2 miles. However, once we hit the quarter pole her pace slowed a bit and the willingness to take pictures dwindled.
All of that said it was certainly a bittersweet ending to the weekend. This marks my first Mother's Day away from home and while we were able to Skype with my family during the celebration it just wasn't the same. Among the many things I'm learning by leaving home, one of them is that it is easy to take the 'standard' events with your family for granted, until you aren't able to attend. All the time we spent living 8 minutes from my parents house and it took living 11 hours away to realize how good we had it.
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