Thanksgiving

In a surprising moment of luck, I managed to talk Bill into going to Yosemite for Thanksgiving. This is surprising because it was excruciatingly last minute, and he's feeling a bit on the broke side.

I called up Mumsy to ask if she'd be ok with me coming home for the holiday. "Of course! You're always welcome to come home. Are you and Bill going to Yosemite?"

That, folks, is enabling that you can't buy. I hadn't even mentioned Bill, 'we', or Yosemite, she just knew.

So, Bill and I hit REI, I made Mumsy buy me some maps (our REI, oddly enough, doesn't stock maps for national parks two states away), and then we hit the road.

Thanks to holiday traffic, the drive down was long, and (oddly enough) involved a 1 1/2 hour nap at a rest stop in the middle of nowhere. We hit Fresno around 11 am. Mumsy and Dad had to work for a couple of hours, so they left Bill and I in charge of cooking all of Thanksgiving dinner. I cooked. Bill worked.

Then, the folk came home, we ate, cleaned and headed out. We spent Friday and Saturday in the back country, and come home Saturday night/Sunday morning. Took care of our gear, and then relaxed.

All-in-all, this Thanksgiving I'm thankful for many things, some of which include: a mother who encourages me to do the crazy things I love; parents who love me; a best friend who will take a road trip and go back packing with me, even when we spend almost as long in the car as we do hiking; and the means to be able to do all that.