Duba's Week in Review

Yup. This post is exactly what the title suggests it is. Come with me as I take a look back at the week that was (Monday 5/14/12 to Monday 5/21/12).

So, my coworker Matt and his fiance got married on Saturday, May 19 in the Outer Banks (OBX for you who like to write in douche-terms) of North Carolina. Matt Barrett ruined any potential thought I had about visiting this place after his tour de force review of Nags Head and other Outer Banks wonderfulness three years ago. "You know where they don't have cancer? Nags Head...In Nags Head, the sun goes down only when you want it to...Jesus' first home was in Nags Head because his second home was heaven." You know, that kind of excuberance.

So, when Matt said he was inviting me and my betrothed to his wedding in the Outer Banks, I thought to myself, "self, maybe it's time to see what Matt was going on and on and on and on and on and on and on about." Sure enough, we accepted the gracious invite, packed our bags, and started our trip Monday night.

Monday

The most boring of all the vacation days. Why? Because we left at 9 p.m. for a 7 hour drive. The drive down isn't the type of drive through the south I have ever been used to where I would take I-95 for miles and miles. This was a US Route 1/13 special that would be full of single lanes, traffic lights, bridges, and tunnels. During the summer months this path through Delaware is painful. This time of year at this time of night, the only thing painful about the trip was the $100 speeding ticket I got. They drop the speed from 55 to 45 to 35 back up to 45 then 55 in like a 5 mile stretch of this highway a couple times. I was going 62 and did not see any of these signs. Sure enough, a cop came from way behind me with his lights on, told me that I was 62 in a 45. But he "cut me a break" and charged me only 54 in a 45. Thanks, Deputy Bag (his badge read "D. Bag"). I pushed on, though, because that's what any good man will do. I was in or just about out of Maryland I believe by...

Tuesday - Part 1

This is "Part 1" because I was still driving. I continued on until arriving in Corolla, North Carolina, at 4 in the morning. The last 3 hours of this trip were brutal. I was rather awake, but there is a section of 13 that consists of like 20+ miles of a bridge/tunnel combination with no where to pull over. I had to urinate so bad when I entered the bridge. The only break I saw, after the first tunnel, was an emergency pull off. I felt like I had an emergency. I pulled off, only to see a cop car sitting just a tad bit further up the road, so I pulled back on and kept going. Finally, before entering interstate 64 I found a Wawa to assist in my bodily functions. Then, when I was on the last two hour leg of my journey, the off and on rain/fog started. Through the fog/rain/high beams/low beams combination, I saw several cop cars hiding in the bushes, looking for somebody like me. Luckily I was extremely careful with my speed after Monday's bullshit traffic stop. Eventually I made it onto the Outer Banks. The last hour of  my trip probably should have taken about 20-30 minutes, but it took over an hour. So much for it never raining, eh Matthew? The rain was so heavy it woke up Kim and took me another hour to get to the house. I couldn't see 10 feet in front of me.

Tuesday - Part 2

I woke up on a shitty bunk bed maybe two hours after we arrived. I tried going out to the pool (I just spelled it "pull" and stared at it knowing that wasn't the right word for about a minute), but we were so tired. There was not much that made us feel good. My coworkers Tara, Lisa, and Spencer were already at the house and up, readying for golf. A stranger, Jen, was there as well. All I remember was Tara dropping a cigarette ash in my ear from the third floor and me getting extremely pissed about it. I think the rest of the day played out with me switching from our house hot tub and swimming pool. I think I also went out to the Food Lion where Kim and I got some supplies. Eventually, the housemates prepared dinner which was extremely excellent. Kim and I did the dishes while watching Glee. This was a big episode, yet I couldn't convince Spencer of that so he turned it off to play his hippie bullshit and then walk outside. Kim and I resumed Glee watching in the basement and the rest of the night to me was a humongous blur. I heard my other coworker Michelle come in some time after everybody else went out clubbing. I don't remember Tuesday much.

Wednesday

Everybody in the house minus Kim, Michelle, and me went on a fishing excursion. I am allergic to being on top of the ocean so I sat this one out. So, the three of us went to the beach. It was decently cool water, but I promised Kim and Rocco that I wouldn't get eaten by a bull shark so I stayed on land. See, as we learned the week before our excursion, this time of year is the bull shark mating season, and apparently shark-humping makes them even more aggressive and hungry. We sat on the beach, hoping to see crabs, only to see a storm coming instead. We got home just before a crazy ass storm came along. At 7:45 in the evening, we all went to a restaurant called Mike Dianna's. Fortunately it was restaurant week in the Outer Banks, and this place was first on Kim and I hitlist. I had a lobster bisque, followed by some asiany type of salmon, followed by peanut butter pie. Needless to say, a food coma soon followed thereafter.

Thursday

Thursday was a windy, cool, grey day. The exact OPPOSITE of anything Matt had bragged about. The golden coast had become the sandy crust, and tales of the bluest skies was a bunch of lies. It forced me to sign up for HBO Go and catch up with Game of Thrones. And East Bound and Down. And then McGruber, which finally helped me sleep. After our powernaps, we got all jazzed up and went to the Mee-Armstrong family barbecue. Spencer filled a cooler with his beers, and I filled one with Pabst Blue Ribbons and Michelle's Corona Lights. Thank Jesus it was in coolers with wheels and pull up handles. I followed Spencer up the driveway into the BBQ entrance, only to snag on a piece of mulch. Sure enough, I fell and the cooler tilted backwards, spilling out all the ice and beers. One of the cans punctured and the rest were completely shaken. I think only a few people saw it.

As I always expected, anything involving food and Matt Mee will always result in overeating. The food was plentiful and delicious. However, the wind got to be too much and we all went back to put on warmer clothes. By this point in time, Matt's boss, Chris, had arrived at the house and joined our crew. In fact, he was one of the few to see me fall. What ensued was a night of drinking, me looking like I was going to be good at billiards only to blow the game, losing two games of beer pong, and then stuffing my face with stuffed meats from the Armstrong-family house in the wee hours of the morning. Kim and I couldn't stop eating. We made our way back to the house and enjoyed some night swimming in the pool and hot tub.

Friday

Ah yes. Friday was still the exact opposite of the weather conditions Matt would have described three years before in his "Top 1,000,000 Reasons to Visit Nags Head" dissertation. However, Kim and I decided that this was it and anything we wanted to do outside had to happen this day. So, we shimmied on down to Nags Head to see what all the hullabaloo was about. In a nutshell, it was like Wildwood, New Jersey, without the boardwalk. It was less congested, but what I saw was the same old same old. We found Nags Head Water Sports and rented a jet ski for an hour. We have ridden tandem on a jet ski before so we looked forward to this again. However, five minutes into our trip, with brackish water blasting her in the face and the cold air making her into an icecicle, Kim asked me to drop her off at the shore. I did, and I took on the waves for the rest of the hour. I ran them all right. I almost flew off at one point, topping off my speed at 55 miles per hour. I absolutely love jet skiing. I want to win some money for the sole purpose of buying one. The instructors and safety crew were all very nice and helpful. The other 20 to 22 year old riders were lame and couldn't keep up with ol' man Duba.

After I pulled out and changed, Kim and I explored the outlet shops. She found a bunch of clothes for me, her, and Rocco, and we headed home. We later had dinner at a restaurant called Northern Banks. For the first time in my life, I ate a whole lobster. It was weird. I insisted on eating its face, but Kim eventually talked me out of it. I was enjoying it until I ate just enough meat past the tail where the green-black-purple guts of the lobster poured out. It looked like somebody shit an infection. I was not very good at cracking open the claws as Kim was squirted with lobster juices and I had lobseter meat all over me. This was a unique experience for me and delicious, but the "crab grenades" we had for appetizers were tremendous. I cannot recall what it was, but it had crab and teriyaki and wasabi, all deep fried. I had some good dessert too. We went home, continued drinking some of our beer, and engaged in more hot tub-pool transferring.

Saturday

The big day, well, at least for Matt and Nicole (not the Matt who steered me wrong about the wonderfully beautiful Nags Head/Outerbanks but rather my coworker Matt and his future wife). Kim departed to get her nails did by one of the few Asian nail salons probably in all of North Carolina. As she was out, I put on my beach walking shoes and walked up and down, resulting in most of these pictures. It was uneventful, but nice. Actually it was kind of cool. I like the beach and admire the power of the ocean, and so I enjoyed this little time to myself. I came back, Kim had gotten home, and most of us were doing last minute sunning by the pool. I boiled in the hot tub, then the pool. Four people were sharing our bathroom, so I opted to use one of the outside showers to prepare for the wedding. As nice as our house was, the outdoor shower was terrible. It was clearly meant for pre/post-pool washing only, not sanitary washing. The wind was blowing so strong that any part of me that was not in the water stream was freezing. The water pressure very lightly pushed the soap off my glistening body and arm hair. Plus, there was no way to latch the door shut, so every gust of wind made the door open slightly and slam shut. I was worried about exposing myself. Luckily, it didn't happen, and Kim and I were ready like an hour early. Except I had no belt. Fortunately, Chris had a spare belt that I was able to wear comfortably.

The wedding was fantastic. It was basically outdoors, and the Mee-Armstrongs had the most beautiful day of the week and best temperature. Very fitting for their day. The scenery with the sunny skies, calm water, and varied landscape was picturesque. The wedding started right on time as both the Groom and Bride were already standing together with the bridal party. There was probably half a mile between the wedding area and the last building at the Whalehead Club so they all had to be together. They played some music and the bridal party did some quirky dancing all the way down aisle, and again and again and again. It was very funny and cool and unique for a wedding. The ceremony went great, they both agreed to be married, and then cocktail hour started. I do not remember much of what was there, but they had what I could possibly call the GREATEST crudite ever. A buffet style meal of a couple fancy plates of food followed by a cake made up of cupcakes completed our week of gorging. I enjoyed several beers, whiskey and coke, and champagne as we watched everybody gracefully enjoy the party. Really good wedding, in a nutshell.

There was an after party, but Kim and I were trying to go to Virginia Beach early the next day to make up for lost beach time, so we left after the wedding. We packed and tried to watch some SNL, but it was game over pretty quickly for us after the wedding.

Sunday
Nothing much to report on this day. We woke up early, checked the weather and saw that the entire east coast's weather was not suitable for shoregoing. We hopped in the car and made the long drive back. I think leaving vacation is always longer and worse than going to vacation. I left a tip for the chamber maid and packed the last bag and away we we went. We stopped at some fly-ridden diner in Maryland that had food that was just good enough to be edible. We almost went to some farmer's market in Delaware, but at the last possible second Kim read it was closed and I was able to make the I-95 Exit. We got home mid afternoon. I went on the trampoline with Rocco at his grandparents house and we were treated to another great meal by Karen that was a good sign of "welcome home."

FINAL THOUGHTS
I think, therefore I am.

I do not understand that phrase, but oh well. Overall, the week as a great break from the norm. Had Rocco been with us, I do not know if he would have had the time of his life like he did at Wildwood, NJ, last year. I heard a pretty stupid rumor that a lot of people were mad about the weather conditions and would express these useless thoughts to the bridal party. I know when we went to the BBQ, Nicole came up to Kim and I to apologize about the weather, but that did not upset us in the least. The most important thing is that the right weather occurred on the right day for the right people. Besides, it is still just the middle of May. It was not like August or mid-summer. I cannot imagined the things people would say if this was in the heart of hurricane season.

The Outerbanks, well, if I had enough money, I still do not know if I would make that my vacation destination. The legit seafood was good, the lack of people was great - yet it just felt like a random isolated beach town. It is mostly geared towards tourists no matter what part of the banks you stay at. We saw one school on the whole place, and it was not even that big. The Dunkin Donuts by our house had a small sign that read for the first time in 60 years, Corolla will have a school again. It was a one room school house, but hopefully by now you get where I am going.

Like I said, no matter what I think about the Outer Banks itself, the scene was perfect and everything fell just right for Saturday's wedding and I could not be any happier for Matt and Nicole. Best of luck to them both and safest of trips to them as they travel on their honeymoon.