Mike showed up to the party late because he was working, and he had one thing on his mind - seeing his son graduate from high school. The problem was, his son lives 5 hours away from us in Lander, WY. (Quite possibly the most boring little town in the entire USA.) We had planned to drive up early the flowing morning, but Mike was worried about not getting enough time with his son, Daylen, because Daylen was leaving Wyoming immediately after graduation for a summer marching band tour. Hence, our hasty decision to leave Utah that night and get to Lander about 12:00am.
Five grueling hours later we arrived in Lander and were greeted by the Russian mafia. Ok, maybe it was only the motel clerk who checked us in who had a Russian accent and said, "Your room have two beds, but I only charge you for one so don't use other bed." Let the record show that we only slept in one of the beds.....one horrible, uncomfortable, bed.
Both Mike and I barely slept at all that night, and YES, that last picture is of the STAINS that were on the bed. I also never discovered a single towel in that hotel room that didn't have stains on it. But I digress. We were awakened in the morning by the lovely sounds of possibly birds and small rodents fighting in the next room. This was about 5:30 AM. We couldn't sleep any more than that because our bodies WOULD NOT TOLERATE ANOTHER SECOND IN THAT BED. We got dressed and practically ran to the check-out desk. We were surprised to find our car unharmed where we had parked it in the gravel lot near an abandoned washer and dryer. At least that hotel room had a nice t.v.
It's like the owner decided to skimp on everything, but God forbid he have crappy t.v.s. By the way, Mike took all the hotel pictures. I assumed he would turn off the t.v. before taking the picture. I assumed wrong.
The rest of our time in Lander was fairly enjoyable just because Daylen was there. I can't even describe how happy Mike was just to be with him.
The only other downside was our brief experience with Catholic church. Daylen's mom had him go to church that morning for a religious graduation ceremony, and Mike and I tagged along to support Daylen. Well I had never been to a Catholic church before then, and if I had known what it would be like I WOULD HAVE NEVER GONE. It's not that I have anything against religion. People can worship how they like, but that mass was NOT HOW I LIKE TO WORSHIP. It was all about repetition and chanting and singing boring, tuneless hymns. The best part was when the priest actually stopped chanting and gave a sermon. If I was catholic, I'm pretty sure I couldn't stand going to church more than once, IN MY ENTIRE LIFE. I think 90% of the mass is the exact same every time. Have some originality. Spice it up a little. That's all I'm saying.
The actual graduation ceremony was not bad except for the seating. We had to sit on bleachers which were not at all behind-friendly. It took all I had not to yell "FIRE!" during the ceremony just so I could stand up. As it was, I tried to distract myself by counting how many people in the crowd were wearing cowboy hats. A lot of people there wear cowboy hats. That is not because they are actual cowboys, but because they want to pretend they are cowboys even though they are really middle-aged men who work somewhere like Maverick.
Here are some pictures of the graduation. They are blurry for the most part because in spite of getting to the graduation an hour early, we still didn't sit close enough to get a decent picture.
On the way home I took this picture of the clouds because they looked really beautiful.
They are the one good thing left in Wyoming since Daylen will be leaving for college in Ohio. Congratulations Daylen! I know you will do great things with your life!
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