Captain Log: Star Date Part III Rest of Sunday night and Monday

Upon arriving to the home of our host family we were engaged from the get go. I told Riri all the details I could about the two girls and their parents. I said, "I won't be surprised if PGG (Princess Girly Girl) is sobbing in tears when you leave. She'll love you. PS (Princess Seriously) loves to tease and is boy crazy. And the parents well...they are amazing." I was being teased from every member of the family the moment we walked to the door (except PGG who likes to tease as well but was too excited about our arrival and couldn't understand why everyone else in the family was making us wait in the doorway insisting we couldn't come in). I always get nervouse about bringing strangers to this family, I get even more nervouse when I'm not in the room. I know the world isn't about me but this family is very good at making it clear that they love to find MORE reasons to make fun of me. In a kind loving way of course.

Luckily for me I make it a point to be open about the silly/annoying/airheaded things that I do. Laugh at your self first and the world laughs with you sort of thing. Also, neither Riri nor the host family have had much exposure to my various quirks quite yet. That I'm sure is yet to come.

The host mother and I have a love for Grey's Anatomy and since I haven't had TV for about three months I haven't seen many episodes lately. Even if they are being recycled right now I still haven't seen them all. So we stayed up for a while said family prayer, which, by the way, they make me say the first night of EVERY visit I make. Which makes me feel wonderful because they want me to feel part of the family but nervouse because I'm still very shy about praying in front of people.

It's good for me, builds character from what I hear.

So while Riri hit the perverbial hay, I stayed up with host mom to chat and watch Grey's Anatomy. And got some advice as well.

So we had every intention of going to Disneyland on Monday, California Adventure on Tuesday, Seaworld on Wednesday, the beach Thursday, and Universal Studios Friday (if we felt the need. It wasn't a priority).

When we got there the only part of our plans that stayed the same was our scheduled beach day. The people who I've stayed with every time I've gone down to California since returning from my mission were instrumental in the change of our plans. As they are So-Cal vetrans we heeded their every bit of advice and infinite wisdom. Well almost every bit of advice. When we didn't take their advice we always said, "They are always right. We need to remember that."

So the weather around there was a bit cloudy which equals cooler then usual. Since Universal Studios is more inland they suggested me do Universal on Monday and do Seaworld (which is close to the coast) on Friday. We took there advice and had tons of fun.

There's something about being in theme parks that just makes you feel like a kid. But when you are an adult, who thinks clearly and plans neatly without the fears of tantrums you can get though a suprisingly large amount of activities. We planned our day so well we only missed one or two attractions. The 4-D Shrek movie was awesome. The chairs move. Backdraft was cool cause this time around (I've been in once before) I actually got what they were trying to say about the fire. It was pretty cool and makes me want to watch the movie now.

The best though in my opinion was the Back Lots Tour. Everything else was cool but there's something about the special effects that makes it way cool. We also went on The Return of the Mummy. Which at one point makes you feel like you have sarub beattles crawling around your feet (it's all in the dark too) and I kicked my feet so much and so hard that I ended up needing a bandaid cause my little two was bleeding. It was no small cratch either a good hunk of skin came off. Only I have the talent to do that.

The rest of this post will show some pictures and I'm going to try and get a movie clip on here too.

Didn't trust anyone with my camera so we took seperate pictures. This is Shrek's home. That little girls is totally going to bust his chops for being late when he comes out.