Lightning May Not Strike in the Same Place Twice, But What About Trailer Hitches?

With the car packed and ready to go, Sarah and I stopped by Dollar Tree before driving to St. Louis for Thanksgiving.  Sarah needed a few hundred popsicle sticks for a primary Christmas craft and what better place to get popsicle sticks than the dollar store?  

As we pulled into the parking lot, there was a truck in front of us that had stopped right in front of the store.  Someone had just walked out of the store and got into their car, and said truck happened to be right behind this person's car.  Not realizing that we were behind them (and I think hoping to take the soon to be available prime parking space), the driver of the truck began to back up.

Unfortunately, I couldn't put our car into reverse fast enough and honking the horn was to no avail as the crunch told us it was too late.  We had become the proud owners of a trailer hitch dimple.

 

December came and went with no resolution from the truck driver's insurance company.  Sarah and I decided to go to an OU basketball game the second weekend in January.  On our way to the game, we stopped by Dollar Tree to restock on birthday cards since there were a number of birthdays upcoming.

As we drove from the dollar store to the basketball game, we started talking about the car and whether we would have the bumper repaired to just take the insurance money.  We pulled up to a stop light behind a truck in the left turn lane.  Then, inexplicably, the driver of this truck went in reverse, undeterred by our honking horn and gave us a matching trailer hitch dimple on the opposite side of the front bumper. 

 

Sarah and I couldn't believe the irony of what happened and laughed at our fortune.  Hopefully we have learned our lesson: Don't drive to Dollar Tree together in the Mazda.  Two dimples are cute enough.

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Visit from Jennie, Quinn, and Delcie

Jennie (Sarah's sister), Quinn (Jennie's husband), and Delcie (their almost 2-year old daughter) came out to visit us between Christmas and New Year's.  The faithful readers of our blog know that whenever someone comes to visit us, we take a trip to the Oklahoma City Zoo together.

The first stop on the zoo trip was to visit the lorikeets and feed them some sweet, sweet nectar.

   

  

 

From there, it was off to the petting zoo with the friendly goats. 

(Although some of the goats looked a little scared with toddlers nearby.)

 

There were many different cats that were out and active.

  

 

And others that were out, but not as active.

 

One of the gorillas wasn't too impressed with the visitors, so he turned his back on us and gave us a show.

    

The elk showed us that to be happy, all a male needs is a ball.

  

  Last, but certainly not least, were the baby animals at the zoo.  

First was the baby rhino (I've also included a picture from a few months ago when Sarah went to the zoo with some friends where the mom and baby rhino had been rolling around in the red dirt.)  

  

Then the baby elephant, born only a few days before we were there.

Finally, the baby Delcie, who we were just trying to contain.

 

  

 We had  heard from multiple people that the science museum was really fun, so we decided to get an annual pass for Christmas.  Turns out, those people were right.  The science museum was a lot of fun.

 

 

Sarah even found her favorite room in the museum.  The museum has something for everyone.

Other highlights of their visit included going to the park, watercolor painting, and playing lots of games.  Delcie didn't like leaving the park (even though it was below freezing with a nice cold wind blowing) and cried all the way home.  Some parents, concerned about her health and all that.

   

 We also visited the Oklahoma City Memorial, which was lit up because it was later in the evening.  Visiting this memorial reminds me of how we can always remember the good and forward move despite any challenges we may face.

   

   

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