Roaring River

So I'm posting for the sake of posting. What should I write about? Don't really know, but I do know that once again, I want to write on a daily basis on this blog. The trouble is that everything that happens, happens so quickly that it's difficult to keep it up and write it down. I have an app on my phone to also blog, but again, taking those few moments to sit down and type it all out is difficult. I figure it is just best to write about whatever is happening, so here goes.

Over the recent July 4th weekend, we went out of town with the Queen's family to Missouri, since her parents and grandparents have fifth wheel spots in the Roaring River State Park area where we also go fishing. I really don't like to fish. The Queen's grandfather has been having some heart related issues, and he has always been the one to "clean" (odd word for skin, gut, chop, and fillet fish) the fish for everyone. I refuse, so my brother-in-law, aka Darth Vader, volunteered to be the one to do it. He did a good job.

He and Padme then suggested we head over to Branson to a shopping center called Branson Landing so they could shop for a particular toy for Luke that they can only get there. The store is called Ridemasterz, or something, and is basically like Build-a-Bear with cars. You pick your chassis and customize it till your heart's content. They invited everyone to go as well, and then they took the longest road possible to get there (in total deference to both our GPS and theirs). We had the "privilege" of sitting through the longest five miles I've ever had to sit through to take in the horror that is Branson, MO.

We called it "Little Vegas" just based on how it was setup and the sorts of sights we took in during that five mile stretch. We had a lot of time to look while parked in traffic. If Vegas is where old stars go to wind out their careers with a steady job, Branson is where they go to die. We saw billboards for artists that seriously made their careers in the 50's. Bill Haley, for example, who is best known for the song "Rock Around The Clock" that came out in 1954. Yeah, he's still performing...in Branson. Also saw a theatre that does concerts of "The Legends" such as Garth Brooks, Liza Minelli, Stevie Wonder...Elvis and Michael Jackson. Oh yeah, they are all impersonators. The real artists don't perform in that theatre. No, when you watch "The Legends," you are watching a bunch of people sing and perform like the actual artists. And this wasn't the only Elvis show either. No, I saw at least three Elvis shows on that strip. In addition, if you're down with the old time photos, you have lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of choices of studios. Heck, there were two of them in the shopping center we went to. There were a couple of interesting amusement parks, but other than that (not to be overly negative) it really seemed like one of the most pointless places I've ever been to.

However, this shopping center had a candy store where we were able to call Rock Girl on something she said once. She said if she could get some Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, she would try them. Well, the Harry Potter promo item was made by Jelly Belly, and if their buttered popcorn flavor tastes that accurate, I shudder to think of the vomit flavor. Anyway, this store did not have Bertie Bott's, but they did have some every flavor beans with flavors like puke, booger, skunk spray, curdled cheese, and other equally bizarre and stomach turning choices. Rock Girl declined. So we got Margarita, Strawberry Daquiri, and Piña Colada instead. They were good.

The main lesson we learned from this weekend's experience was that we really need to get the princesses more practice playing Uno, Skip-Bo, and Phase 10.

Oh, and the resort we stayed at had unadvertised Wi-Fi that we totally jumped on.