A Long Week in Topeka

By Tuesday, it felt like a long week.
Floods, tornado, displaced residents and more add up to a crazy news week in Topeka. One the phone with some network folks in Chicago, they told me: “All the news in your region. You’re hogging it all.” I told her I wouldn’t mind spreading the love.

Really.

Last night, Mark and I did margaritas on the rocks with Tequila from our honeymoon. We ended sleeping with similar dreams: an epic adventure, royal conspiracies in a Dune-like setting. I woke-up without a hangover. Good times.

This is a shot of Crestview Park on Monday. Last week, I ran about two miles by the trees on the other side of the temporary ocean. By now, the creek as receded to normal levels and residents in the area are trying to clean-up the flood damage.

Before my crazy work week, I had an entertaining Cinco de Mayo weekend.

I picked up Mark from the airport on Saturday night. We headed to Lawrence to do dinner with Fally. We ended up taking a drunken tour of downtown Mass. At the replay lounge, Mark stayed with the Latino spirit with his choice in cerveza. I was sipping on a greyhound, in honor of my drinking buddy in SF, Susan.

Yummy Filipino food in Topeka! On Sunday night, we went to the May Festival at Christ the King Church. I bought tickets from a Filipina I met at the gym. She asked me if I met my husband on the internet. Than I realized she I thought I was one of those internet brides, marrying for a visa. I set her straight, explaining I was born in this country…and she invited me to the party. I loved this lichon. They also served up adobo (chicken and pork), lumpia, pansit and more. But they were running low on rice. I ended up having a good time at the party, chatting with a family who just finished up a trip to Manila. We also met a priest from Ghana, who was catching up with his tennis partner; an older Filipina who used to be a teacher.

Filipinos doing country-line dancing….Mark said that was when he knew he was back in Kansas. One lady told me they learned how to do the synchronized dancing at a family reunion. How about that. This was the electric slide and the one dance I recognized. So, yeah – I gave in to the mob mentality and clomped my way through the dance. Good times.