Good morning! Welcome, please come on in and help yourself to a cup of hot or cold beverage and join me for a quick chat.

We have been under a High Wind Warning for the last two days and are currently still under a High Wind advisory until noon today. I am so over the high winds. No matter how well I’ve built my hoop structures to protect my plants, the wind will just come and pop all the clips off one by one and eventually take the entire structure with it.

When I heard there would be wind gusts of up to 85 miles/hour on Thursday, I ran to the window to check my garden infrastructure every time I heard the wind howl. The worst part was the crosswind, which worsened everything because it was like two forces colliding to form a super gust. I should know, I was out in the garden trying to secure everything while feeling the wind pushing and pulling me in two directions.

Thankfully, my garden survived, even the crocuses didn’t get blown away.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you we went to Malad City, Idaho last Saturday. Malad City is the first city after crossing the border into Idaho from Utah. I’ve been there quite a few times but never explored the town. It was always a restroom stop on the way to Yellowstone.

I was the driver on this trip. Mom wanted me to drive because the balance of my car is better than hers and my car uses the cheaper grade of gasoline than her car. It’s about 80 miles to Malad from home and to make the trip go faster and me less anxious, I decided to play my music in the car.

“Turn down the music,” mom requested less than 5 minutes after she got onto the car. I turned the volume down but then she went and turned the dial until I could hear nothing but the low thumping of bass. “This music is making my head hurt.” Funny, she’s never complained before and how does country music causes one’s head to hurt? Something told me she just wanted attention like when a child throws a tantrum, demanding candy.

For the next hour, she talked and talked, both like a nagging parent and a college professor lecturing to the class. I don’t think she was talking to anyone in particular, my aunt (her younger sister) was in the backseat dozing off while I was trying hard to concentrate on driving. Except for when I took my driver’s education class in high school, I’ve only ever driven a few times without listening to music. Music relaxes me while I’m driving, without it, my anxiety was spiking.

At last, we arrived. I was going to stop at the usual gas station, use the restroom before trying my luck at a couple of lottery tickets, but mom told me to go straight. She wanted to explore. I turned at the end of the road and arrived in Downtown Malad.

It was very quiet that day. There was hardly any cars. I pulled into the first parking I saw, figured I could stretch my legs after driving for more than an hour. Downtown Malad reminded of those towns I’ve seen in Christmas movies. You know the ones – all the shops on a single street, everyone knew one another.

I didn’t bring my camera that day so I had to settle with taking photos on my phone, which wasn’t the end of the world. My new phone actually takes much better photos than my previous phone and I mostly take photos using the Pro Mode so I’d have an uncompressed version to edit in Lightroom.

It was a good short day trip and, unfortunately, no I didn’t win the lottery. You probably wouldn’t hear from me if I did as I would probably panic while attempting to get life to return to the way it was ASAP. I don’t feel I have the capability to handle such a thing. I only wish the trip was more enjoyble with music and that I didn’t nearly run out of gas on the way back.

#weekendcoffeeshare is hosted by Natalie of Natalie the Explorer. I appreciate you stopping by. Until next we chat. 🙂