OOOOH-Klahoma

So my mom treated Josiah and I to a mini-fall vacation to Oklahoma this past week. My only contribution was sitting in the passenger's seat...which I can tell you becomes more involved when one travels through Oklahoma (more on that later).  We visited Baby Sister (mine) and her lovely little family. Instead of boring you with the play-by-play, I decided to share a few thoughts...about OOOH-klahoma, Baby Sister and Buffalo. With visuals. Taken mostly by my momma.  Who am I kidding. I took like 2 pictures. And both of them are bad.

1.  My first thought does not have a picture to go with it. But imagine with me a very long, very bad, very expensive road. I would like to know why these Oklahomian people think everybody else needs to pay to drive on their roads. They really aren't that great...in fact, once we were back in Missouri it was like driving on 'butta'...It's highway robbery I tell you! (literally) And because Baby Sister lives in the Southwest corner of OOOH-klahoma we had to pay 8 tolls coming and going (actually, my mom paid them...but I am righteously indignant for her sake).

2. This is Baby Sister. She is actually 32. She is also exactly 6 years and 6 months younger than me. But I'm not telling how old I am. Isn't she cute? I know you can't tell 'cause of the shades, but take my word for it. She got all the good genes. Mine started oozing out of my pores when I hit my early 20's. She is standing in front of some lake in the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Reserve. I'm not sure which one...I wasn't paying attention. I was too busy trying not to step in Buffalo poo.

3. See in Oklahoma they let the cows wander all over the place. If this happens in Missouri you get a bunch of farmers chasing after them in pick-up trucks and golf carts waving their hands and yelling. I was told that this is actually a Longhorn (What-ever) and they are allowed to wander the Animal Reserve. There was all sorts of road work being done here...This cow (or Longhorn) didn't seem to care.

4. So one day we thought ('we' is used loosely) it would be fun to drive up Mount Scott...which is located in the Wichita Mountain Range.  I can tell you that I've been to Wichita, Kansas and there aren't any mountains...by far. So imagine my surprise when everybody thought this sounded like a great idea. I had the  unfortunate pleasure of being on the side of the car where this lovely view was being played out.

5. A little higher.

6. And higher. At this point I am looking through my fingers over my eyes....It's a good thing I wasn't driving!

7. And we reach the top! My favorite adventurer is asked by his grandmother to pose for a picture at the edge of a cliff...He's all about it. I (on the other hand) am clinging for dear life to the antenna on the car.  Like that is going to save me from plunging to certain death. Keep in mind that Josiah has been telling his own adventure story the entire trip up the mountain. "Wouldn't it be cool if we crashed into the rock and the car got all crushed up and we had to hang from that tree and bounce off that cliff and we broke our legs and had to crawl down the mountain." Thanks, Bubby. If you look really close you can see windmills behind Josiah.

8. And this is what vacation means when you are 8. Doing battle with your cousin in the backyard. I would have joined in if it weren't absolutely ridiculous. I would have pulverised them both.

9. One of the highlights of our trip was supposed to be this great buffalo hunt.  This was as close as we got. Is this the best you can do OOOH-klahoma? Pahleease. How do we know those are real buffalo? Looks like some park rangers got mighty desperate.

10.  We went to a delightful little place called Medicine Park. This is the old jail. Everybody looks happy enough...except for Josiah. He said, 'nobody should be happy in jail.'

11. If I could have gotten away with it I would have packed 2 little girls in my suitcase to bring home with me. If their momma wouldn't have called the po-lease on me...despite the fact that I am her big sister. And she owes me one for writing all over my desk with my favorite pink nail polish when she was 6. I think claiming her 2nd and 3rd born children for my own sound like a fair trade-off. I would let her come visit...maybe.

A few more thoughts...sans photography

12. Baby Sister and her hubby don't have the internet. What! They are both younger than me. What kind of young hip people don't have the internet. They have it at work and they have iphones...is that supposed to count? What about Internet Addicted older sisters who come and visit? What are they supposed to do? I was without FB for like 162 days..it was like being without water or something like that. Very traumatic. I have been online the entire time in the 7 hours I have been home today. So there.

13. We had takeout from a place called Yummy Yummy. It was a Korean BBQ place. It was delicious. We had something called Bouca-Buuka or something like that. I considered taking the leftovers home in my suitcase...along with my nieces. And my sister's bedding set and her dining room furniture. And her good knife. 

14. Baby Sister did have cable. Which means that my mom, Sister and I sat around watching HGTV for days. 'Cause we could. We did have to wrestle the remote away from my channel surfing nephew..who just turned 9! Yes, ladies. It starts young.