Day One

The Adventures of Sar Ka Tal and Deb A Hens

Day 1: In which we see Dumbledore and mysterious clouds, and also in which we learn how cattle are really just like humans.

Editors’ Note: We realize this is a long first entry. As English majors, we both tend to be rather verbose. So we don’t require—or even expect—all of you to read all the way through. BUT, if you want to know the answers to these important questions, read on!
• Where is the London Bridge REALLY?
• Where is Dumbledore’s latest hideout?
• How are cattle just like humans?
• Why is so much temple work done in Provo?
• Where is the only place on earth where you can build a tunnel to the center of the moon?
• And the question you’ve all been waiting for…why is California REALLY the best place ever? (As if you didn’t already know 42 reasons…)(as a side note from the non-CA-native, whilst I am warming up to the place, I hardly think it qualifies as “the best.” My compadre is just biased.)
• Or maybe the question you’ve really all been waiting for…what is the point of this blog?

Today was the first day of the rest of my life. Seriously. Tomorrow will also be the first day of the rest of my life and so on and so forth.

And thus begins the epic documentation of the epic adventure of I, Sarah Katherine Talley, and the other I, Deborah Ann Henderson, in the far off mythical land called London.

Even though there are no epic children.

Well, except the ones on the plane to California this morning. We were treated to verbal gems, such as “I see the ocean!” in regards to the Great Salt Lake and “Look! London Bridge!” when looking at the Golden Gate Bridge. Haha. Aren’t children great?

The answer is yes, yes they are.

We also spotted a man in purple robes. That’s right. A man. In purple robes. The scene went something like this: we were sitting on a bench outside the airport waiting for Mother Henderson to arrive. I, Debbie (hereafter to be referred to as iDebbie), heard sheTalley (in this case referred to as sheTalley and in other cases referred to as iSarah depending on her role in the narration of this adventure-blog) speak the following words: “There’s a man in purple robes.”

And the first thought to come to mind? “What’s Dumbledore doing in San Francisco?”

But what came out of my mouth instead was, “Really?” Boring.

But what wasn’t boring was that there really was a man in purple robes. And a purple suit coat. And some very interesting jewelry. And perhaps a priest collar. We can’t be certain. He was kind of far away.

So either Dumbledore has come back to life and is lying low in California— which is perfectly plausible (as iDebbie pointed out, San Francisco would be a good place for dear old Dumbles)—or the clergy has done some drastic refashioning of “the cloth.”

But Dumbledore-the-Priest got in a car and drove away before we could investigate the matter more fully so we are left with fruitless speculation. There will be no apples, oranges, or pears produced as we speculate. Which is a shame. Because fruits are tasty. (Please don’t mind the sentence fragments, they were done for dramatic effect. As the authors of this blog, we reserve the right for artistic license when it comes to spelling and/or grammar. Take that for what you will.)

Mother Henderson arrived shortly thereafter and we piled into the car and drove around and iSarah discovered how beautiful the bay area is. It’s like a cross between the river valleys of Ohio and the Appalachians in West Virginia/North Carolina, plus ocean, plus awkward—but only awkward when lonesome, kind of like humans (or when they stare at you . . . also like humans) (as a side note of cattle being like humans, iSarah mentioned that if I were a cow, I’d like to spend my time on grassy hills with trees and river-bits, just like these cows, and then iDebbie pointed out that we do like spending our time on grassy hills with trees and river-bits, and in fact we were at that very moment . . . whilst the awkward cow stared awkwardly at us)—cattle on beautiful hills, plus walking paths, plus the gorgeous smell of spring time. Yeah, it’s really that awesome. We decided that California basically Smells Like Life. And that Provo therefore must smell…like death? Or at least it is void of the smell of life. To which iSarah added that that must be responsible for the plethora of temple work that is done in Provo, because the smell of death reminds us all that we need to redeem the dead…in a surreptitious sort of way. (If this isn’t making sense, don’t worry, it doesn’t really make sense to us either. And we’re pretty exhausted.)

After having a delightful run-in with some Chinese food at an Asian market where iSarah learned that 1) all Asians have an affinity for soft, fuzzy, cute things, not just Emma 2) Asian food isn’t as bad as I thought and 3) sheHenderson inherited her attraction to coupons and the use thereof from Mother Henderson, we then proceeded to lull about California and explore paths and have run-ins with awkward cows and horny squirrels (it is spring time, after all, and they were chasing each other in pairs). We concluded our lull-about session (ie basking) at a school play ground where several things of interesting note happened.

One: The Mysterious Shadow.
As we swung and thought brilliant swinging thoughts and discussed the meaning of life, the universe and everything (or just how to catapult ourselves over the hill tops) we noticed that a shadow was rapidly encroaching upon the hills to our right. It was a rather large shadow, presumably from a rather large cloud. False. There was no cloud. None. At all. Except for a little one in the other direction that could not (and did not) cast such a mysterious shadow. iSarah was convinced it was the younger cousin of the mysterious fog-cloud-thing that had encroached upon the mountains last year during a night hike and vanished the city of Provo for a few moments and was therefore convinced that the mysterious shadow was signally the eminent demise of us and our epic adventure. iSarah told sheHenderson to say her last words, which she didn’t.

And then the mysterious shadow went away.

Rapidly.

Without saying goodbye or leaving a forwarding mail address.

Two: The Lonesome Cow.

That same hill was then occupied by a single black cow. Not that I’m racist against cows or anything. This one just happened to be black, just like all the other cows. All the other cows, however, were not lurking awkwardly by their lonesome on this hill. All the other cows were on the hills to our left, grazing and not staring at us. We watched the cow meander away behind the other hills, and we never saw it come back. We’re not certain where it went.

Perhaps it was following the mysterious shadow.

Or perhaps it was responsible for the mysterious shadow. Which is not to say that such a small cow could cast such a large and mysterious shadow, but that such a small cow could (and perhaps did) control the supernatural forces that produced said shadow in the first place.

Three: The Two Young Girls on the Swing Next to Us with One Young Girl Giving the Other a “What’s My Favorite . . . ?” Quiz.

Which prompted iSarah and iDebbie to have their own impromptu “what’s my favorite . . .?” quiz. sheHenderson correctly knew that Harry Potter was iSarah’s favorite book (followed by Anna Karenina) and sheTalley knew without hesitation (okay, maybe a little hesitation) that iDebbie’s favorite cartoon was Food and Blode. Watch it. It’s good. But only when you’re tired, otherwise you might not appreciate it the way you should.

Whilst on the topic of Food and Blode, we then decided that if there were any place possible to build a tunnel to the center of the moon, it would be on top of the hills that saw the mysterious shadow and the lonesome cow, because it was already the source of such supernatural things. And if that weren’t to work out, we could always just go to the seaside.

No, really. We’re in California. And the seaside is about half an hour away.

When we were done basking, we made a very important discovery for the holders of Blockbuster giftcards EVERYWHERE! And by everywhere, I mostly mean California, but this is good information for the rest of you too. So Blockbuster giftcards expire. That’s right. Like milk and other dairy products. We discovered this when about to go to rent a movie and Mother Henderson provided us with giftcards. Cousin Cameron, however, noted that they expired on December 31, 2002. As noted on the back of the card. We figured it didn’t matter, hopped into the bat-mobile (id est Mother Henderson’s Camry) and started on our merry way to the movie rental place (which is like a library for movies!). We were not gone five minutes before Mother Henderson called iDebbie and informed us that the expiration date was void in California.

Indeed. Void. In California.

That was the only state listed on the void list, which makes CA pretty special. (Nota bene: that was iSarah speaking! Rally together, Californians, we are quickly converting the world!)(through voids on expiration dates) So, the moral of the story and the whole day and the meaning of life is that if you have a Blockbuster giftcard, and it’s expired, find a friend from California and send it to them.

And thus we see that we have gotten to the point of our blog that is akin to the point in the essay where you realize you’ve rambled on for six pages and still haven’t made your point. Or even know what it is.

And thus we see the point.

Or not.

Or do you???


The End.