So I Went On Vacation...

I've been off work for the last week; I go back to work tomorrow.

Bah.

Anyway, we went down to Ocean City last Sunday for the week. Of course, it was wonderful, even though I only went down to the actual beach twice. And even then, I only went down to take short walks along the water. I didn't really swim or sunbathe. But you know what? It was fine.

The weather was really hot and sticky, and it stormed off and on all day Wednesday.

But July 4th was great! We got together with family for the evening and enjoyed a great big fried chicken feast. My niece and nephew-in-law hosted the party. Their beach house is perfectly situated for watching the uptown fireworks, so we all gathered outside to see the show.

I'm amazed at how grown up my grand-nieces and grand-nephews are! The oldest of the crowd is working as a lifeguard at the beach! Another is off to college in the fall -- and he's about seven feet tall! All of them are teenagers!

How'd that happen?

Anyhow, we did make it to the Boardwalk on Thursday (I think), but we went in the morning before the rides opened. So we didn't get to ride the ferris wheel or go through the Haunted House (it's the cheesiest and most fun Haunted House ever), but that was fine. We also went to our favorite little shop up in Bethany Beach. We tried to go to the Dogfish Head brewpub in Rehoboth Beach, but the traffic was horrifying along about Dewey Beach, so we turned around and came back. This week was not about sitting in traffic!

I had a very weird experience when we went grocery shopping on Monday, though. We like to go to the Harris Teeter in Fenwick Island, because of the selection and prices. It's a really big store, and even though I've been there before, I felt kind of overwhelmed. I got confused looking for bacon and my confusion must have showed. A store employee asked if I needed help finding anything, and I said, "Bacon?" and he just looked at me, shook his head, and said, "You're a long way from the meat department!" and walked off.

I don't know why, but it kind of shook me up. I mean, yeah, he was snarky and kind of rude, but I normally don't get rattled by snark and rudeness.

So I just let Joe lead the way as I read off the items on our list. But even with that, I broke out in a sort of cold, clammy sweat as we shopped. I took deep breaths to stay calm. I managed to keep it together and the feeling finally passed once we got out of the store and onto the road.

I think it was a mild panic attack. I've never had one before. I don't want to have another one, either.

But anyway, that was the only glitch in an otherwise lovely vacation. Even the one stormy day was utterly lazy and relaxing. What do on a rainy beach day? You go to the movies! We saw Despicable Me 3 -- wonderfully funny, especially the Minions. Gotta love the Minions!

On Friday, we got together with my sister and brother-in-law for dinner at a nice little restaurant in Berlin, Maryland. My lifeguard grand-niece joined us -- I gotta give her credit for actually wanting to accompany the old farts to dinner! Then, the best thing of all -- SonnyeBoy even came down on Saturday! We had a terrific time with him.

We came home yesterday. It was a decent ride, too -- just a couple minor traffic jams in Delaware. I'm always grateful when we make it through the I-95 section of the trip without a hangup!

I also got an hour's worth of editing/writing every day, so I'm still on track for Camp Nanowrimo. Bonus!