Friday the 13th

The year was 1998. I (Tim) was in third grade, and I was a rock star. Okay, not really. But I was a really, really good speller. The third grade words were so easy that I had aced every single spelling test that school year. Naturally this went straight to my head because spelling is what the cool kids can do. And so, in a great act of academic arrogance, I asked my teacher for more of a challenge. I asked her to give me fourth grade spelling tests instead of the third grade ones given to the rest of the class. I was a punk, I know.

I continued to ace the tests, though. That is until one day in February. It happened to be Friday, and it happened to be the 13th.

The word was "carriage." I swear I included the "i" but somehow it was missing from my paper. And so, for the first, and only time that entire school year, I missed a spelling word. My mom claims it was because I never studied, but what do moms know? I never studied all year, so why would that test be any different?

I'll tell you why. It's because it was Friday the 13th! That's why!

And so I became what some people call "superstitious." I call it logical. If the only bad thing to ever happen to me happened on Friday the 13th, then of course I'm going to be careful on all other Friday the 13ths! To this day I will not take a test on a Friday the 13th, and I am very cautious in all my other activities on that day. You can never be too careful!

Except that bad luck struck once again.

It was Friday, 13 September, 2013. Shantel wanted to celebrate the day, and mock the superstition of it, by watching a scary movie. I thought we better not tempt Friday the 13th like that, but I also thought my wife was pretty excited about it and so I figured I should humor her like any good husband would.

We eventually settled on the movie Abandoned, simply because it sounded creepy. And creepy it was! See, this woman takes her boyfriend to the hospital, checks him in, meets the nurse, and then leaves while he is in surgery. She comes back a couple hours later and finds out he wasn't in the hospital's system and nobody knew the nurse who she met. Turns out (and here's your spoiler alert, but it's a stupid movie, so just do yourself a favor and never watch it) her "boyfriend," the "nurse," and some sweet old guy she met in the hospital restaurant were all in a scheme to steal money from the bank she worked at.

So we're watching this thing, and it was really starting to get to Shantel. It's getting particularly intense, we're not sure if what we know is real, the main character is imagining things that aren't really there, and suddenly she freaks out and says, "What was that?!"

Well I was just a little bit concerned about the effect this movie was having on my poor wife. Now she was imagining things, too. She tells me that she was pretty sure she saw a mouse.

Fortunately we had a flashlight nearby and I shined the light around and didn't see anything. I knew she had to be crazy because the path that this imaginary mouse would have had to take would have rustled some papers on the floor near the entertainment center. No such thing had happened, therefore my wife was being driven to insanity by this ridiculous, yet slightly creepy movie.

It happened two more times, and on the third time she said it went out in the hall. I shined the flashlight out in the general direction Shantel had pointed and lo and behold, there was a mouse peering out from under a mat.

Well, gosh darn it, Shanny, why did you have to tempt Friday the 13th with a scary movie? I had avoided bad luck for 15 and a half years on this horrible day! And now we tempted fate and brought upon ourselves a terrible curse.

So I put on my bravest face and set out to catch this thing. I thought back to my childhood and realized the only way I knew how to catch a mouse was to give it a cookie. But we didn't have any cookies. And so instead I got Shantel (who was standing atop our couch at this point) her socks, shoes, and purse. I cleared the hallway and watched every angle to make sure our furry little friend wouldn't come darting out as she raced past. And race past she did! I'm pretty sure she could out-sprint Usain Bolt if she thought she was being chased by a mouse. So she bolted (see what I did there?) out of the house and went to the store where she purchased some mouse traps.

Us at my grandparents' house. The next city
over from where that mouse was.

While she was gone I called my grandparents and asked if we could stay the night at their place. Now before you judge us for running away from a tiny little creature, you have to remember that out mattress was on the floor. We had no bed frame, and therefore this little mouse could come cuddle with us in the night if he wanted. But no matter how much that mouse loved us, we did not love it.

And so we spent the night at my grandparents (THANK YOU) and even took the time to finish Abandoned. And then a mouse showed up in my grandparents' house. Just kidding. But it was a really dumb movie. Seriously. Don't waste your time.

**********

IKEA should be grateful for the mouse that invaded our house. In fact there are conspiracy theorists out there that believe IKEA actually released the mouse into our house. Shantel and I had no intention of buying a bed frame or anything until we moved to a new place. For one thing, we can't fit a box spring down into our basement, so we would have to get a frame that didn't need one and IKEA is the best place to get one of those. Also, we're still poor, so we figured we'd wait until taking a couple hundred bucks out of our account didn't bother us quite so much.

Our new bed frame!

But sleeping on the floor while at least one mouse is in your house does not sound even a little bit fun. So we weren't even going to consider it. But before we went to get a bed frame we went home and checked the traps. And by we, I mean I. I tried to claim a seat at the top of the stairs while Shantel went and checked the traps, but apparently as the man of the house it's my job to deal with mice. I think we need to reevaluate gender roles in our society (kidding).

So I checked all the traps and discovered I had set them wrong. These aren't your traditional mousetraps. They're the ridiculous kind with a fake cheese pallet that come with vague instructions on the back. So I reset them, properly this time, which I can attest to as I almost killed my finger.

After resetting all the traps, Shan and I made our first ever trip to IKEA in search of the perfect bed frame. IKEA is a cool place!  When we get a more permanent home we're thinking of going back and furnishing our home with nice looking stuff that isn't unreasonably expensive. Unless we find out the conspiracy theorists were right. Then we're going to release thousands of mice in their store for vengeance. And I really hope nobody ever does that or we'll be the number one suspects now...

We then went home so that I could watch the Texas A&M versus Alabama football game. I missed it last year and I wasn't about to make the same mistake twice, with or without a mouse running around our home.

So close!

Well Shantel fell asleep and even I was fading during commercials. Apparently it took a lot out of us to run away from a little rodent the night before. I opened my eyes at one point though to see the mouse just resting in our hallway. So I grabbed a couple of partially filled water bottles, fully intending to sneak up on it and smash it dead so that we could carry on our normal lives.

So I crept forward, careful not to disturb this restful creature. I was ready to launch the water bottles the second it tried to dash away. But it never bolted like I expected it to, but rather it began to slowly meander away from me. Regardless, the movement startled me into pulling the trigger and launching the first bottle toward him. I missed that poor creature by a fraction of an inch. I quickly threw the other water bottle at it and narrowly missed once more. But the mouse didn't dart away like I expected. Instead, it started walking like it was completely drunk.

It wandered aimlessly in little circles, occasionally tripping over itself as though it was absolutely hammered. After a few minutes of struggle, the poor thing just keeled over and died, right in front of us, right in our hallway.

The video is really shaky (I apologize for that) and I didn't start filming until the most entertaining bit was over, and I stopped filming before it actually died, but this will help you visualize what was going on:

What we think happened is that it chewed on the little D-Con cheese pallets the night before when we first set the traps and poisoned itself. It must have been dying when I started throwing things at it, and the close encounters must have given the poor little guy a heart attack and killed it. 

What a wonderful blessing, though! It came and died right in front of us so that we wouldn't have to wonder if it was still wandering around our home. I still had to clean it up, however. I did, with work gloves on, and by picking it up with a shovel. I wasn't going near that thing!

**********

We rejoiced, knowing that this mouse was no longer wreaking havoc in our home! But a few days later we discovered he had a friend. Or maybe a lover out for revenge, we don't know. 

Once again we settled in to watch TV, and once again it was Shantel who said she thought she saw another mouse. And once again, I thought she was losing it. I thought she was still feeling the ill effects of a Friday the 13th gone wrong, and that the first mouse had freaked her out to the point she was imaging another one a few days later. 

But then I saw it. It ran into the corner of the room behind our couch, and then it would try and run toward the doorway but I would force it back. Since we knew where it was trying to go, I went and grabbed one of our mouse traps we now had scattered throughout our house. And since it had worked out so well last time I also grabbed a water bottle to throw at it.

See where it says "GUARANTEED
TO KILL"?!?!??!?!?!?!?!

But you'll never believe what happened. My plan worked to perfection. The mouse started toward the door, right toward my trap. Then it started to sniff the cheese pallet. And then it CLIMBED RIGHT ON TOP OF THE STUPID THING AND IT DIDN'T SNAP!!! So that is why the first mouse had lived. And I was so stunned that the trap failed that I forgot to chuck the water bottle on the rodent's head while it was sitting contently on top of my trap. I did yell though, angry that the trap didn't work. And I startled the mouse back to it's corner under our couch. 

At this point Shantel decided she was going to hide in our room, so she darted past, closed the door behind her, stuffed towels under it as tightly as she could, and barricaded it closed with the bookshelf or something, though I don't know that part for sure.

I called my best friend Ben and had him come over and help me because I didn't really have the thing cornered by myself, but was pretty sure we could do it with two people. So he hurried over and I sat by the door to make sure that stupid thing couldn't sneak past me and escape. When Ben arrived we tried to force it out so we could catch it or kill it, but it wasn't budging. After multiple attempts we lifted the couch to force it out of its hiding place but somehow it was gone. We checked for holes along the wall, inside the couch itself, and found absolutely nothing. Somehow it had slipped past me and disappeared somewhere in our house.

We never saw him (or her, if it really was a rage filled lover of the first mouse) again.

**********

Our house is now armed with spin traps, glue traps, D-Con, and noise making rodent repellents. We haven't seen a mouse in our home since those first two, but from time to time we hear one in our walls, generally the wall just right behind our bed (naturally). They scratch and claw and scurry around. It's really a terrible way to live, so you can bet your bottom dollar we aren't staying here a day beyond our contract's completion.

And you can also bet that we aren't going to tempt Friday the 13th ever again. On an unrelated note, does anyone want to have us over all day tomorrow?

After Reading This, You'll Think We Went on the Longest Vacation Ever

The story of this vacation begins last summer when Shantel and I were first dating. Watching how much she loved her family made me think that maybe she would have an easier time falling for me if she could see tangible evidence that I love my family too. I do love my family. I love them a lot. But being on the other side of the country from them isn't as hard for me as it seems to be for others, so I don't go back east and visit them all that often. After all, they kept coming out to Utah and seeing me here, so why go there, right? (Although my dad was just in Utah and he failed to see me while he was here, so maybe it is a good thing we went there, huh?)

So in order to produce that tangible evidence that I am a family man I decided that I should go to Maryland and see my family for Christmas, something I hadn't done in two years. I called my dad, and we made the arrangements for me to fly out.

I even considered the possibility that maybe Shantel and I would be far enough along in our relationship that it would be time for her to meet my family come December. I figured she could come out for a few days and then fly back home to be with her family for Christmas. I thought it was a brilliant plan on my part.

Now I recognize that you are all laughing at me at this point, but plans change, alright?! In a relationship still considered slow by Provo standards, we got married in November but I still had a plane ticket I had to use within a year. So I bought one for Shantel and we planned a trip for immediately following her graduation, and that trip was a blast, I must say.

In spite of my terrible planning abilities it turned out to be great. I mean, who plans a trip to Maryland for a week without consulting the schedules for the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Nationals? How did I manage to pick probably the only week of the season where both teams are gone the entire week?

I did however succeed in planning one thing: a layover in Colorado. I wanted to introduce Shantel to my favorite state in America.

I'm thinking this was a terrible way to do it.

From start to finish it was the worst flight I have ever been on. Takeoff was ridiculously steep and enough to make even the most iron stomached individual a little queasy. Then it was like the pilot remembered in midair, "Oh yeah, Denver. For some reason I thought we were headed to Idaho!" He then proceeded to turn the plane at a 90 degree angle. I'm no pilot, but a nice, easy curve would seem to make sense to me.

Being a short flight we never really leveled off, and as soon as we reached our peak we began our descent. And then we encountered an unbelievable amount of turbulence. I seriously think we may have flown upside down for a little bit. But we made it. Although it may have come at a cost: Shantel may never want to travel with me again.

There was a bright side to this brief visit to Colorado. It was Purple Monday, so we wore our Rockies shirts while in their home state.

Reppin' the Rox in Colorado

Okay, let's be honest for a second. We would have done it whether it was Monday or not. Also, another moment of honesty: my wife is awesome for humoring me and wearing her Rockies shirt on Mondays so much. I try and pretend I've converted her to loving the Rockies, but I think I need to start with getting her to love baseball, then she'll have no choice but to wear that purple with pride! Also, she's the one who noticed that our shirts spell "Colorado Rockies" when we sit this direction. Awesome.

The next leg of the flight was significantly better. Although, Shan was already feeling sick from the first flight so it probably didn't feel much better to her, but I promise, it was actually really smooth.

My dad picked us up in the airport and it didn't take long for this to turn into a sports vacation. Actually, it may have started with the Rockies shirts. But it continued in the car as we listened to a couple of baseball games. We were listening to the Nationals playing the Braves, but then suddenly they were talking about Matt Carpenter and I was so confused. I was baffled that he had been traded from the Cardinals to one of these teams we were listening to. Turns out he hadn't, but my dad had switched games on me while I wasn't paying attention. Not that this has anything whatsoever to do with how awesome our vacation was... Back on point!

Our first full day in Maryland we spent in Baltimore, and it was a lot of fun. It was one of those days that we saw a lot, but it was relaxing at the same time. It was definitely less stressful than DC (though DC was still awesome, but we'll get to that).

The pictures will tell most of the story from here on out:

We first went to Ft. McHenry, the birthplace of America's National Anthem.

We had a little fun:

I feel like my job would have been to check the cannons
in the event they got jammed.

Is anyone really surprised Shantel ended up
behind bars?

We tried to replicate a picture that was taken at Ft. McHenry when I was a kid:

Adorable, right?

Speaking of adorable, the best picture of our trip to Fort McHenry:

After Fort McHenry our day in Baltimore turned into something I would love more than Shantel: a day of sports!

Oriole Park at Camden Yards

Me with The Great Bambino

Me and Brooks Robinson

My hands on a bat actually used by
The Sultan of Swat.

Look, Ma! I made the cover of Sports Illustrated!

The wheels on the bus go round and round...

Don't worry, Shantel found ways to
have fun, too.

And with the 15th pick of the 2013 MLB draft,
the Baltimore Orioles select...

I'm going to Disney World!

Nice to meet you , Poe. I'm Shantel.

My dad fulfilled his dream of calling the play
in an NFL huddle.

After having a sports filled day (which also included lunch at Camden Yards with a beautiful view of the stadium), we finished it off with a beautiful walk around Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

I even got to high five the old mayor.

My dad would like it known it was the ground that was
crooked, not the picture.

The next day we stuck a little closer to my family's house. We went to Bryce Harpers Ferry and then explored downtown Frederick a little bit before going to a Minor League Baseball game that night.

Bryce Harpers Ferry was a nice old town with some cool history and beautiful scenery:

She loves me, she loves me not, she loves me...

I believe a "Twankey" was the Twinkie of the past. Although
now the Twinkie is the Twinkie of the past, too...

It took forever to take a nice photo since we were
constantly swatting at all the bugs.

But we did it!

We also got some nice shots in downtown Frederick. I think we got some nicer ones on a different camera, maybe some where we weren't slouching, but look at how beautiful it is! My family lives there! Well... the next town over, but still! Pretty!

Hmm... Maybe you wouldn't have noticed we were slouching if hadn't said anything?

Nat with her foul ball. My dad leaning away from the picture.
Kind of like he did when the ball came his way...

Then we went to the Frederick Keys (Minor League Baseball - Single A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles) baseball game that night. It was a lot of fun! The Keys' pitcher took a no-hit bid into the sixth. In fact, the opposing pitcher had a no hitter into the fourth inning I think, so it was kind of a pitchers' duel, but it was fun!  The Keys' first baseman threw a ball right to my dad. He missed it. Don't worry, we recovered it, but the event staff guy came and threatened to confiscate my dad's mitt on account of his error. What is that? E10?

I think we look even better with a baseball field behind us.

In my mind, this vacation had four purposes: 1) Convince Shantel that I really do love my family, 2) Introduce her to Colorado, however brief an introduction it was, 3) Convince Shantel that there are nice places to live outside the state of Utah (not saying we're going to end up outside of Utah, but it's nice to know it's a possibility...), and 4) Begin her conversion to the game of baseball. I feel like the first few days were mostly oriented towards that. Which means they were mostly oriented towards me. Oops!

There was no baseball the remainder of the trip. Well, I'm sure it came up. In fact, I know I watched parts of some games on TV. But other than that...

We spent Thursday in Washington D.C. and came away with a couple conclusions: D.C. is really cool to go see, and driving there is awful so we will never live there! Here's some highlights from our day in Washington:

That's us with Abe Lincoln. And a couple from Armenia
(or something) in the background.

See Shan! Utah is everywhere!

We couldn't go inside, but I suppose the Washington
Monument was still cool to see.

While at the White House, Shantel decided that she
wants to be the President's event planner.

Shantel wishes I was this huggable.

Some kind soul offered to take a picture of us in from of the FBI
building. Unfortunately he didn't get the sign right above us...

TJ has a beautiful view from his memorial.

DINOSAURS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After the FBI building, we tried to go see the International Spy Museum. Then we remembered we were poor and paying 20+ dollars a person didn't sound real cool. Then we tried to go to the History of Crime Museum. I'm not sure why I thought that would be cheaper. So then we went and got lunch.

In front of the Capital building.

With our buddy George Mason.
I respect your Final Four run, man!

We really enjoyed our day in DC. Some other highlights included the Library of Congress, including Thomas Jefferson's personal library, and seeing the actual flag that flew over Fort McHenry at the time the national anthem was written. We really enjoyed the Natural History Museum and were sad we didn't get to spend more time there. Unfortunately, we forgot about seeing those really old pieces of paper... Oh, what are they called? Oh, yeah. The Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. Yeah, we walked right past them and forgot to return until just after they closed. So while all the stuff we saw was really, really cool, we felt sad that we were leaving without having seen those important documents. We also wished we had spent more time in the Natural History Museum, seen the Holocaust Museum, and maybe put on some sunscreen. Poor Shantel.

Ouch.

Fortunately my family is awesome. My mom drove us back to DC the next day, too. She was kind enough to show us the Pentagon, which we hadn't seen yet. Then we made sure to hit all the sites we wished we had seen the day before.

See! The FBI Building! (I had to make the picture big so you could actually read it...)

We also went back to the Natural History Museum and spent some more time there, as well as the Holocaust Museum. But most importantly we made sure to stop by and see the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence! And it really made us want to watch National Treasure. Which we did upon our return to Provo. But seriously, it was one of the highlights of the trips. It was so cool to stand in front of those pieces of parchment which have shaped our lives so tremendously. Unfortunately we couldn't take any pictures, but feel free to go to http://www.google.com and type in "Declaration of Independence" for more information.

We also met a really nice black man from Detroit. He talked to us about a lot of things, including the black population in Utah, the white Mormon missionaries he's seen in his neck of the woods, and all sorts of things. He was a really nice guy. And then he walked over to his wife and excitedly pointed to us and said "They're Mormons!" She didn't seem half as interested in meeting us as he was. Oh, well. He was still awesome!

The following day we made the trip to the one thing that Shantel had been dying to see: the Washington Temple. It was gorgeous! And the sky made all of these pictures beautiful.

Later that night we took some family pictures. There are a lot more out there, but here's some we have so far:

What a cute family!

The kids and kid-in-law.

Why yes, we are the best looking couple
in the entire world. Thank you for noticing!

The rest of the trip was very picture-free unfortunately. Kind of a shame too (I doubt you agree. You're probably sick of all the pictures at this point) because we spent some time with my cousin Krysta's adorable children, Boston and Fischer, on Sunday evening. Boston and I are gonna be sports pals when they move out here in a couple weeks. We also gave my mom a way awesome Mother's Day present (one week early). Natalie did about 99 percent of the work, but it was a sweet family history book of some of my mom's side of the family.

Monday was a nice day of travel which included the last of three trips to Chipotle on the week. (Come on, Provo. Get your act together and make me happy by getting a Chipotle!) The flying was much smoother this time for a couple of reasons. 1) Shantel took motion sickness pills and was knocked out pretty much the whole way, 2) It was a straight flight to Salt Lake, 3) we had a pilot that seemed like he actually knew how to fly an airplane, and 4) I had a sweet book about the history of baseball to read.

So did I succeed in any of my objectives? Let's evaluate:

1) Convince Shantel that I really do love my family: I think so. I mean, my smile in those family photos looks pretty genuine, right?

2) Introduce her to Colorado, however brief an introduction it was: Introduction? Check. Positive first impression? Dang... Pretty ridiculous failure.

3) Convince Shantel that there are nice places to live outside the state of Utah: I thought it went well. She loved all the shutters on houses in my family's neighborhood. She loved how beautiful and green it was. I think she enjoyed all the sites we saw. But she still recently remarked, "I still wouldn't want to live out there." WHAT?! I blame the DC road system and horrendous traffic.

4) Begin her conversion to the game of baseball: Well... I love baseball even more than I already did. Does that count?

Regardless of how my personal goals for the trip turned out, I think the trip was an overwhelming success! It was a lot of fun and I think it has made us excited to travel more together!

And maybe next vacation Shantel will do the report at the end and she'll make it easier on the eyes and brain.