Making my list & checkin' it twice

If you haven't talked to me in a while you may not know.... BUT

I'm WAY over the top excited about our little vacation to the lower 48 (hehe that's what people in Alaska call the rest of the United States.)

I haven't been outside of Alaska in ummmm.... almost a year now... i believe.

Barry and I have been use to living an hour from the Mall of Georgia, 20 minutes from the outlets, 2 hrs from Nashville, 30 to Chattanooga, 6 hours from the beach... it was great. Restaurants, shopping, concerts galore.

Fairbanks... ehh, not so much. We have Walmart, Fred's, Sam's, McDonalds, Taco Bell, and a few local places here and there.

On TV they play this REALLY mean trick on us... they advertise Dave & Busters, Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Target... ALL THE TIME. Seriously, it's like someone waving your very most favorite of all time candy in front of your face and then eating right in front of you... repeatedly!

SO..... I am compiling a list of places I will go as soon as I get home.

1. Chickfila...on the radio they call it... "chick fill uh" HA! I'm not gonna lie. I will probably eat here a dozen times the first week we are there. Yes, I miss it THAT bad!

2. Zaxbys... the fries with that special seasoning on them... I'm giving a good week of unhealthy eating and then on to the "eat healthy so I don't look pregnant the rest of my life eating habits".

3. Real hibachi Japanese... we recently got a Japanese restaurant here but they give tiny portions... well probably healthy sized portions. Everyone loves to go to Japanese and get completely full and then have some left over for lunch the next day, I mean, hello, duh!

4. Mexican... WHITE CHEESE DIP.... my mouth is watering just thinking about it

5. Target... enough said

6. Every mall I can get to... even the Albany mall, which isn't that spectacular, but I want to go to it anyway. I don't even have to buy anything at these malls. I just want to SEE stuff.

7. Panama City Beach... I LOVE this place. I grew up going to the beach here. I would bet money on the this beach having THE top 5 whitest sand in the world. I have NEVERRRR not gone to the beach during the summer, uuuuntil now. Barry told me "that's because I'm spoiled" and I told him "That's the way my Daddy likes me, so ha!"

8. Any restaurant that serves "a meat and 2 or 3 vegetables". You know, like one of those little local places that is packed for lunch time and you go through the line with your tray and point to what you want.... yummmmmmm!

9. Dairy Queen-- strawberry cheesecake blizzard. Wasilla has one of these, but Wasilla is like 6 hours SOUTH of where I live. I did get to cheat on this one. When I was traveling to Anchorage I stopped here.

10. Outlets in Dawsonville... In college, Barry and I could just hop in the car and get to the outlets in 15 minutes. Oooo I miss that... Our checking account probably doesn't though. The outlets have EVERYTHING I could ask for. Baby Brandt told me that he is REALLY needing to experience a shopping trip. He's gonna be a shopper like his Daddy :)

I.CANNOT.WAIT.FOR.VACATION.

Funny thing

So late last night, Baby B was sound asleep, I was doing my usual late night thing...
facebook, pinterest, etsy, reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond and Riley started going crazy barking. It wasn't his normal "I think I might see something out there" bark. It was his "there is something RIGHT there" bark.

Of course, I thought it was a person about to break into the house. I was TERRIFIED. The quote from pinterest popped into my head...

I am so the 1%.

Anyways, Riley would not stop barking so I went over to the window, slowly peeked around the curtain...

It was a HORSE!

At first, I thought I was mistaken and it was really a moose, but then I saw it's long, swooshy, black tail & living in Alaska I know moose definitely do not have long, swooshy, black tails.

Our neighbors have horses in their back yard so I am assuming this was their horse.
It was 11:30 at night and VERY dark so there was no way I was going to knock on their door. I tried calling them and of course no answer. So I did the only other thing I knew to do...
I called 911

The woman answered and said "Do you need a fire truck, ambulance, or police?" in the fastest voice I've ever heard. I explained to her that I didn't need any of those things that this wasn't REALLY an emergency but it could TURN into one if this situation didn't get handled and this animal ran into the road.

She was not as amused by the situation as I was...

She told me to call the state troopers. So I did. They said they would send someone out to help the horse....

By the sound in her voice, I doubt they sent anyone.