Mr. Sometimes I Like My Family has been yammering about wanting to see the Festival of Lights at Oglebay this season. We had gone once when he was much younger, actually it was the night after our beloved cat Speck had passed away, so that trip was more of a means to comfort him (not distract though – he brought a framed picture of her with him) and less of a “Yay we’re a family that loves the Christmas season, let’s chug some egg nog and jingle some bells.”
Anyway, we kept trying to plan for this on a weeknight when it’s less crowded but idiot Chooch and his idiot j-o-b kept fucking up plans. We finally were able to go on Wednesday, and left as soon as I logged off from my idiot j-o-b.
(JUST KIDDING, JOB, I LOVE YOU. PLEASE DON’T CAN ME. I NEED YOU BIGLY.)
We stopped at Sheetz for MADE-TO-ORDER dinner which is always fun because who doesn’t like building sandwiches from a screen at a glorified gas station. Henry got a cookie and I made him give me half so he was being a bitch boy about that. Then Chooch was watching videos on his phone in the backseat WITHOUT HEADPHONES which I hate so we fought like cats and dogs until Henry made us stop.
“Well, he’s being annoying!” I shouted at the same time he was also stringing together a bitchy, disparaging sentence about me. Then he fell asleep because aw, boo hoo, widdle baby so tired, get up early for him school, workie workie at McD’s, wah.
Oglebay is about an hour or so away from Pittsburgh, in West Virginia. I guess it’s like a resort or something but my only run-ins with the place involved Girl Scouts and learning about nature shit. They have a little zoo there. That’s the only thing I have ever cared about. Apparently you can ski there? I learned this because every time I asked, “are we there yet” Henry would mumble some words about how we “hadn’t gone up the mountain yet” and I said, “oh ok calm down mountain man, I wasn’t aware of any imminent incline in terrain” and he snapped, “wow how do you think people ski at Oglebay??? It’s on a mountain!!”
I didn’t know people skied there. Maybe that’s where the disconnect lies.
Then we argued because according to Oglebay’s website, they advised AGAINST following GPS and instead provided their own written directions to use and it was apparently my responsibility to read him the directions. I started to but it was boring so I just glazed over some of it lol. He wasn’t a fan of my navigational decision making skills so he started mouthing off but obviously we made it there just fine or I wouldn’t be sitting here writing about it now would I????
Once we started “going up the infamous mountain” which was definitely just more of a hill, I started incessantly chanting, “Chooch, wake up. Chooch, wake up. Chooch, wake up” which is the equivalent to sticking your hand in a wasp’s nest, let me tell you. So now he’s in the backseat bitching, and I’m like, “No, YOU stfu!” and Henry is like, “I AM GOING TO DRIVE THIS CAR OFF THE MOUNTAIN” and then I’m like, “IT’S NOT A MOUNTAIN!!!”
Wow, and now you were basically just along for the ride. YOU’RE WELCOME.
Yeah, so….we made it to Oglebay and it was, you know. Pretty lame. We paid the suggested donation of $25 and then Henry spent pretty much the whole time counting all the ways we could have bypassed the entrance gate while still seeing all of the lights. He should start a YouTube channel. Hank’s Hacks: How To Have White Collar Fun on a Blue Collar Salary.
I got really mad because there was some dumb AMURRIKKKKA light display and the people in the truck in front of us PULLED OVER to get a longer patriotic gaze at the dumb thing and I started raging about how they were probably sobbing into their trucker hats while chanting the pledge of allegiance.
Then we pulled over at some welcome center thing and looked at fake light-up flowers. That was pretty cool.
I was dying because “You’re a Mean One” started playing from the Christmas tree as soon as Henry approached it LOLOLOL.
We made fun of Henry A LOT that night. It was so much fun. Worth the suggested donation of $25.
Chooch was so gung-ho about SEEING THE LIGHTS and then he barely even cared. I told him he had to write a report about it on my blog and he was like “you have a blog?”
I like how it looks like I’M HAVING AN IDEA.
Chooch was so put out when I asked him to take this idiotic picture.
Then we got ICE CREAM. It was OK, but very expensive, I felt like. It wasn’t even, like, designer ice cream or artisanal or whatever the fuck they call the fancy FARM TO TABLE trendy hipster stuff. But it was OK. The guy at the ice cream counter legit hated us though. I can’t tell you why exactly but it was a vibe that he was sending with extra stamps to make sure it was properly delivered.
Well, that about concludes our feeble attempt at Family Fun Night Looking at Xmas Lights. It was pretty lame but we had fun laughing at Henry and acting like basic city assholes in the NOT-MOUNTAIN of West Virginia.