Our Series of Unfortunate Events

Friday, May 30


Today was just an off day. I guess its bound to happen at least once on a month long trip, it just still took me by surprise since everything has gone flawlessly the entire trip up until now. First thing this morning Kelsey and I both cracked our new coffee mugs. I was bummed! My new Badlands retro mug! There goes $10 down the drain. But that was the just start of our off day. We traveled through Beartooth pass into montana to study some geology formed by volcanic activity. There were some spectacular views that we all enjoyed too, every turn on the winding mountain road brought into view a range of snow capped monstrous mountain tops. We pulled over at a place with one such spectacular view and played around. There were snowball fights of course. That's when the next unfortunate event occured.

Tim walked a little further towards the edge of the snowy slope and layed down, then proceeded to sink chest deep in snow. I laughed. A lot. Then we went to pull him out and realized his foot was wedged between tightly packed snow and a rock. Oops. It took about 20 minutes for Elly and Kathryn to reach down in his small hole and dig around his legs and feet in order to free him from his self induced snow prison. It wasn't all that funny towards the end, although I felt I had to capture it on Dr. Suresh's camera so that eventually we can all look back an laugh. We got him out of his wet boots and all chipped in a pair of socks, jackets, a blanket, and hand warmers as Tim muttered the quote of the day, "I'm a dumbass."

But it doesn't end there.

When we get to the top of the canyon loop and start heading back down, Tim realizes he doesn't have his nice newish camera with him. Oops. We turned around and went to the site where he had gotten stuck in the snow. After looking for about a half hour with no luck, we all felt pretty defeated. Not to mention, we had all been looking forward to driving over to the pay showers, but with the sun setting soon and a long road ahead of us, we just wanted to get back to camp before it got too late.

At about 9pm we rolled up to the Yellowstone lodge and the professors surprised us with a meal from the cafeteria! It was just what we all needed, and I plugged my dead cell into the wall outlet while I pigged out on a pesto wrap and a side of mac n' cheese. After we all practically licked our plates clean it was just about 10 o'clock. I realized my phone wasn't still plugged into the wall..... Oops.

The cranky manager had picked it up and had it taken to the visitor's center and put in the lost and found safe, all while I was sitting about 20ft. away from it. I was a little frustrated. I walked over to the office and patiently waited in line, then patiently waited for the right person to be free, then patiently waited for her to find the key to the safe. I was still a little frustrated when they asked me to identify my phone and then sign not one but two release forms.... I didn't lose it! But still, I had such a happy full stomach I couldnt stay mad for long and had to laugh about the whole thing.

What an off day.

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