Day 235: 29 Days of Madness

Well, my readers have spoken. As Mindy so delicately put it in the comments section of my last post: "Time. To. Update. The. Blog." Message received. I suppose there's enough to update you with anyways. It's been 29 days since I last posted, so how about 29 things that we've done since, in semi-chronological order? Good? Good. Let's do this.

1. I slept really really well the night of November 19th. I'm starting small.

2. Before that, I traveled back from LA to Seaside, Florida on the 14th. Then to Miami on the 16th. Then to Dallas on the 19th. Now can you appreciate why I slept so well that night?

3. I saw Charles Barkley on South Beach. I'm pretty sure he was extremely ... well, I don't wanna start any rumors here. Let's just say he looked pretty turrible.

4. I rode on an airboat in the Florida Everglades (Remember, this is semi-chronological).

5. I saw 3 alligators on said airboat.

6. I wore hot pink sunglasses whilst viewing 3 alligators on said airboat.

7. I flew on my 8th plane in 10 days. And my favorite airport? Charlotte. They have rocking chairs. Rocking chairs!

8. I finally saw Gill again on Friday the 19th in the DFW airport. She was a sight for sore eyes.

9. My parents, Gill and I drove down to College Station for the A&M/Nebraska game, which was by far one of the best decisions I've ever made in my A&M fan career - if you saw the game, you understand why. It also didn't hurt that my dad was able to get us the best tickets I've ever had at Kyle Field: 40 yard-line, 2nd deck, 2nd row. Booya! So Pops and I actually went to the game, and Gill and my mom watched it from a Hilton Hotel bar after a quick visit to Post Oak Mall, a staple of the B/CS Metroplex. And if you've ever been to the Hilton in College Station, you know they were watching in style.

10. I was indirectly showered when Gill was thrown a baby shower at Lucy's house. I was in charge of making an appearance, hobnobbing with some of Dallas's (and Temple's) most upstanding ladies, and hauling all the loot back to Wade Manor. All without embarrassing myself or my wife, of course. Mission accomplished.

11. Gill and I loaded up the goods, grabbed one last Freebirds, and headed to Love Field. After making a short stop in Albuquerque, my 13th city in as many days, we finally arrived home in LA late Sunday night, where I was gloriously reunited with my long-lost dog/daughter, Lady. Awwwwwwww. That's just adorable, isn't it? Even with the horrendous glare. Is she not just the cutest dog you've ever seen? If you don't think so, it's simple: you're wrong.

12. So after all that, I traveled (pulling out calculator...multiply by 7.245, carry the three, divide by pi...) 15,825 miles in a span of 12 days.


13. Holy moly, that's a lot of traveling.

14. I mean, seriously, that's ridiculous!

15. Soon after, Allison (my sister) and Blake (her husband) came out to spend Thanksgiving with us. Unfortunately, we didn't get too much time with them – they were only here for 2 days – but it was great to see them and have some family here. And if you weren't already aware, Allison is preggo as well, due in the middle of May! So yes, Wadesy will officially have a cousin! Oh, and his name is Carter Wade Ezell. Wadesy will likely be named something other than Wadesy, but that's still TBD. Wadesy Wade does have a nice ring to it.

16. Okay, so Gill and I finally decided that his name will be ... (drumroll!!!) ... revealed when he's born. The Good Doctor wanted something to be a surprise, so...surprise! It's gonna be a surprise!

17. We topped off the night watching the Ags put the final nail in the Longhorns' coffin. And all was right in the world.

18. The day after Allison and Blake left, Gill and I painted the nursery. The color swatch was "Splish Splash", so we'll just leave that up to your imagination. I then put together a crib using bare hands and brawn. (Yes, I added a picture, which pretty much ruins your color imagination..ing.)

19. I then used those same bare hands and brawn to pick out a Christmas tree, string the lights, and decorate it with the most fabulous bows you've ever seen.

20. Then Gill and I worked.

21. A lot.

22. And then worked through the weekend...to find a new car.

23. I've never done it before, so I researched.

24. A lot. (I realize I'm cheating, but 29 is a lot more than you'd think.)

25. We ventured out to Carmax to have Gill's VW (Lemon) Passat appraised and to test drive a few small SUV's. We tried the Ford Escape, Honda CR-V and our favorite, the Toyota Rav-4. I mean, it just has a fun name. Rav-4. Just say it. Rav. If you can't have fun saying that word, I don't know what to tell you.

26. When we got the appraisal back, I tried to keep a straight face despite having the urge to literally hand her the keys that instant. It was much more than we anticipated, which leads me to believe that you should 1) Always sell your car to Carmax, and 2) Never buy a car from Carmax.

27. We spent all day Sunday searching dealerships for THE new Wade Family Car. Unfortunately, the only thing we found was an UNhelpful Honda salesmen, a high/disturbed Toyota salesman, and an entire family haggling with another salesman to the point where he stormed off after calling his client a liar. It was a nice show, but it produced no car.

28. In keeping with the "chaos" theme we've established over these past two months, Gill stumbled across an ad in the LA Times at 6:30pm Sunday night. 3 hours later, we were driving home from the Culver City Toyota dealership in the new Wade Family Rav-4!

29. I posted a new blog post entitled "Day 235: 29 Days of Madness". And you enjoyed it. Right? Right.