indiana: kokomo

After all the transit time of the past several days, it was really nice to sit and relax. Kelley's parents are fantastic, and they've always made me feel at home each time I've been able to visit. As soon as Kelley said she and Jon would be in Kokomo that weekend I was happy to join them.

I arrived mid afternoon July 3^rd. To get there I had to drive from Chicago, which was easy enough. (Thank goodness I wrote down the directions from google maps instead of just hoping my phone would keep the map.)

Since I knew ahead of time that I'd be in Kokomo over this weekend, I had scheduled an HIV test needed for the application for my Russian work visa. I did this, which only took 20 minutes, then drove to Chez McCoy.

It felt like coming home, in that I parked the car, walked in with my bags, and immediately took them up to 'my' room. I love that house.

We didn't do much for the rest of the day, which felt great. I was able to pick a book off the shelf and read for a while, and after dinner we all watched tv for a little while. I ended up falling asleep in front of the tv and had to drag myself up to bed in the middle of the night after waking up on the sofa. Hee hee.

The next morning was a lovely slow wakeup, though my first wakeup was really early in the morning. Stupid jet lag.

It was July 4^th, a major holiday, and I completely forgot. I've never been big on holidays, so this was fine with me when I remembered the next day. We did nothing to celebrate, though I did eat a couple cupcakes with red, white, and blue frosting.

Around noon we drove to a place called Wilson Farms, which sells homemade food, including a lot of Amish baked goods.

There was plenty I wanted to buy in that store, but somehow I held back and only got a few items. I'm a sucker for anything pie.

On the way back to the house I saw another place with pie, so we stopped there as well. Lisa's Pie Shop is apparently famous for pie in a jar. Who knew? Not me, so of course I had to try. This being Indiana, also on display were the many ribbons won at various competitions for their pies.

That night I fell asleep in front of the tv again. I'm also blaming the early falling asleep on jet lag.

The morning of the 5^th, Kelley dropped her phone on the kitchen floor a few minutes before we were supposed to head out the door to meet some friends for breakfast. The screen stayed on the phone, but it was shattered. (A beautiful spiderweb sort of shattered, but this was not the time to appreciate beauty.) She figured out she was able to make calls and text, but not much more than that. At that point we knew we'd have to leave Kokomo not long after brunch in order to get back to Chicago and get to an Apple store.

We met up with Anita and Chris and had a wonderful catchup. I first met them on the trip to Ireland, and we've stayed friends ever since. They are part of the Flat Ryan project as well, so when I pulled my Ryan out of my purse and put it next to theirs we all laughed. I'm sure the waitress was wondering a bit when she looked at the table and saw two large printouts of Ryan Gosling's face.

We ate at a local chain, which is what I always prefer when going out to eat. Why support a national or international company that already has plenty of money when you can support local?

It was fun to hear Anita and Kelley talk about people they knew in the Kokomo community, and to hear more of the local goings on.
We went back home and packed up and got on the road soon enough. The drive back to Chicago was easy for me, since I wasn't driving. I dozed off, even though I tried not to do so. Kelley took pity on me and stopped at Fair Oaks so I could have another of their shakes. Yum. That's always a good way to start or end a trip to Indiana.