Day 32

We are finally halfway through Bryan's training program; 4 weeks done, 4 more to go. It's been extremely difficult spending time apart, especially in the evening. You don't realize how much you depend upon the other person until they're not there over and over again. Every morning Bryan 'wakes' me with a Good Morning text, and I look forward to it every day. Some mornings he's running a little late and it takes longer, which gets me antsy, as I inherited the worrywart gene from my mother and start thinking of all the horrible things that could've happened. We spend all day sending short messages back and forth, even though we really shouldn't even have our phones out while at work. However, many of the short flurries of conversation are over life-changing decisions. Bryan's already been made a couple of offers for positions that would set him up to be the first pick of a new store. As I drive home from work, I always get a text, reminding me to call him as soon as I'm home. And I do just that. We usually spend 45 minutes talking, and then 'head' our separate ways for dinner and evening activities. We spend most of that time still texting back and forth, and then by about 9 pm I can't stand it anymore and have to hear his voice again. It's really hard to hang up on him. I now understand why my Ginger Nannie keeps saying "I love you, God bless" over and over again and literally makes my mom hang up the phone. She doesn't have it in her heart to hang up on her daughter. Most nights, I get a surprise text telling me good night and to sleep well. These small words always make me smile. :)
This past week none of this has happened, as I've been in California with him. The days actually go by pretty quickly while he's at work, and it's been nice having lunch with him again. I've been working on a couple projects that I haven't had time to get to, and I've actually completed quite a bit of both. We've also taken time to do some 'sightseeing' here in the Sacramento area, but honestly there's not much to see. I tried Googling some info, and I found a blog that had the comment "Round Table Pizza has been awarded the best pizza in Sacramento award 6 years in a row, if that tells you anything." For those who don't know, back in 2004 we did a trip of the west coast. After a long day of driving from Lake Tahoe, through San Francisco, and up the coast of the Redwoods, we finally arrived at our destination in a small town called Arcata. We saw a Round Table Pizza and decided it was a safe bet. Not really. The place was a little dirty, and we waited forever for our order. While we waited, Bryan noticed there was a salad bar, and was bummed as we hadn't realized when we paid. But then we saw something that made us glad we hadn't. One of the employees, who was really dirty, was filling the salad bar fixings with his bare hands. He then stopped, wiped his really runny nose and continued. We about died, and almost left, when our pizza showed up, hand delivered by the manager. She saw the same thing, and went over and proceeded to yell at the boy and tell him how that was inappropriate. But to our horror, the salad bar was not changed out!
Now that you have some background, you can see why there's nothing to do here. On Monday, I had the idea to drive around Folsom Lake. In the beginning it was a stupid drive. You can't see much of the 'lake' (reservoir), as the man made walls go higher than the road (you're at sea level here). We did cross a bridge that gave a good view of the dam, but nowhere to stop and take pictures. As we continued along, we saw a road labeled with signs for the lake, and it was called Salmon Falls Road. Bryan wondered if there would be a set of falls, so we started along it. We had a Corvette behind us early on, that blasted past. The road was curvy and beautiful, and would've been awesome in a hot car like that. But we're in a Dodge truck with horrible suspension. There was one part of the road where you could see car tracks that went off and it made us somewhat squeamish. And then a stupid little white car took a blind turn wide, and almost crashed right into us. It would have sent us off the road (luckily in an ok spot), but he would've been sent barreling off a ravine. Our hearts were racing forever, and we cursed him, hoping his heart was worse. We then rounded a corner and spotted a deer! He actually hung around long enough for us to get some shots. We then realized we were so far along the road, that it was best to continue on, rather than turn around. This is when we found a river with a new bridge, where you could see the remains on either side of the old bridge. The signs around the area warned of sudden flooding due to a dam further up that occasionally opened up. There was also another bridge high above, spanning a good distance that we took pictures of. As we headed out to wind up the 'mountain' road, we then saw the best bridge of all. Just around the bend was the old highway bridge, still intact! I made Bryan go back (as I knew he'd be upset if he didn't get pictures). And boy was I right. The pictures turned out wonderful! So somehow we ended up finding a stupid small drive, that had surprises everywhere, along with some of our favorite architectural features to photograph!
Last night we had a 'date' night and went miniature (pronounced men-e-ah-chure) golfing. It's the first time we've done this together, and it was fun. We actually got a little into it, trying to be perfect, but after skipping hole 18 to do another 17 rounds, we started messing about, winging the ball everywhere. At one point, we were next to the road, when Bryan got a hole-in-one. The kid crossing the road there yelled out 'HOLE-IN-ONE! YES!!! WOO-HOO!'
It's been really nice spending this week here, and with Thanksgiving next week, Bryan will be home all week, instead of a quick 2 days. It will be extremely difficult taking him to the airport the following Sunday. I just wish teleporting existed. Maybe when we're old someone will have finally figured that out.