Family Weekend

I just really like this picture of my family.

I have never been away from my family for more than a few weeks at a time, including both Japan trips. So this past weekend, after not being home in two months, I was persuaded by my mom to drive up and keep the peace while she and my dad went to Phoenix. The premise of my trip all stemmed from my aunt's penchant for yard sales. She loves yard sales and since moving to a smaller house recently, had a very good reason to have one. Unfortunately she lives in a neighborhood which, my uncle made quite clear, is not used to the sight of a yard sale. Instead she decided to rent a U-Haul and drive all of her stuff from Phoenix to my house in Long Beach (a six hour drive). My parents planned to fly to Phoenix in the morning and return home the same day via U-Haul. While they were gone, it was my duty to see to it that my sister did not kill my grandma and vice versa.

Four things my parents did not tell me until the night I got home:
1. They decided to stay overnight in Phoenix, making me responsible for my grandma and sister for way longer than anticipated
2. I was expected to take them to LAX for their flight that left at FIVE IN THE MORNING, I was up at three.
3. Our TV is broken. This is particularly upsetting because I had planned to karaoke with my sister for the weekend, thus distracting myself from killing her
4. My dad's van, which I had to drive all weekend, had "UFCW Local 135/Please don't cross our picket lines/Thank you for your support" written on all of the windows. Thanks Dad.

I suppose it wasn't all bad, I did find one of my family's six TVs (keep in mind we have four people living in my house, yes that is one and a half TVs per person) that had the right hook-ups for the karaoke machine and the best part is that I was able to also hook it up to the sound system in the living room so my sister and I karaoked the night away in Dolby Pro-Logic 5.1 Digital Surround Sound on four celing mounted corner speakers. Oh yeah, there's always a silver lining.