Fugitives

Kya and Pepper ran away last Saturday. Nathan had his MBA classes that day so I was home alone. I discovered a hole under the fence which at first did not look large enough for them to escape out of. When I went in the backyard though, and realized they were gone, I knew I was wrong.

The problem is that our new house is quite new. The two lots on either side of us are still empty. We also back up to an expansive green belt area which basically houses deer, raccoons and coyotes. I called up some friends to come help in the search. For three hours straight I looked for those girls. Our new neighbors were very helpful as well. One got his wiener dog on a leash and was basically using it as a bloodhound. It's pretty funny in retrospect. Anyway by noon I was exhausted and rather defeated. As I came back to a totally empty house the worry and panic set in.

I imagine my thoughts were similar to those of a parent who has lost a child though maybe not EXACTLY the same. At first I was worried I would never see them again. But then that paled in comparison to the thought that maybe they'd been hit by a car or had gotten into a battle with a pack of coyotes. I tried to comfort myself with the fact that they had their collars on, which includes my phone number. Surely someone would find them and call us. But what if they didn't call? What if they realized how great those two are and just decided to keep them? Worse yet, what if whoever found them was a horrible person and was in the dog fighting circuit and had plans to forever change their friendly personalities into unrecognizable aggressive beasts?

It was too much to handle. Eventually I fell asleep on the couch but even that was not peaceful. I dreamed that I discovered them in the back yard. At which point I actually woke up, got up and looked in the yard and of course found nothing.

When Nathan got home that evening we went out and looked in the wilderness again for about an hour and a half. It was difficult for me to actually get back to the to do list that I had originally had for the day. It was helpful to have Nathan with me again. He reminded me that we were hosting Easter dinner the next day. We decided to go and get the grocery shopping done to help take our minds off of the dogs.

About 10 minutes after coming back home, I received a phone call. The man on the line asked if we were missing two dogs. Long story short, Kya and Pepper and gotten about a mile and half away from the house. Somehow they got into this guys business building which is completely fenced off. He wasn't sure how they got in there but they were safe. Once we got there and packed the dogs in the car I was so overcome with joy I actually hugged that guy. That was pretty funny because he was like an awkward old man cowboy that doesn't know what to do when people show emotion.

We were definitely blessed that we got them back at all, let alone before nightfall that day. We pretended to be mad at them but if I remember correctly they got a pretty awesome meal of raw chicken that night.

EZ's

When I first moved to Austin in 2003, I lived fairly far from the UT campus. Occasionally I would shake up my driving route and drive south on Lamar. When I did that, I was always grossed out as I drove by "EZ's Diner".
It looked like a dive and the marquee reading "pizza, burgers and more" did little to convince me that I was missing out on anything. Anytime I saw cars in the parking lot I'd wonder WHO on earth would eat there?? So gross.
In time, I found out. My best friend,Erin. She and I wanted to go eat somewhere and she suggested EZ's, to which I said, "YOU eat there??" I knew Erin to be of discriminating taste and have not a small amount of class so I was obviously shocked but, decided to give her the benefit of the doubt.
I'm sure you know where I am going with this... EZ's is now my FAVORITE restaurant. Yes, yes, I learned a valuable lesson that day. "Don't judge a book by it's cover" for if you do you might miss out on it's fantastic alamo bowl, amazing calzone trio, delectable basil chicken pasta with foccacia bread so incredible it makes one want to cry, or the out of this world, so delicious it should have shrines built in its honor, chocolate shake (made with Blue Bell ice cream of course).
When Nathan and I moved to Utah back in '06, I had to be put on suicide watch when the reality of an EZ's free existence awaited me. Surely a life without the basil chicken pasta and a chocolate shake was not much of a life at all! :)
Our time in the Salt Lake area turned out to be just a mere 10 months. The move was long and arduous. Traveling in a moving van does not make for a speedy getaway. We arrived in Austin on a Sunday. The hottest Sunday that was ever created in the history of all mankind. We had to move the contents of our van into a storage unit because the van was to be returned that very day. Our new house was still not quite ours so we were in this horrible transitional state. Being that it was Sunday, we were also reluctant to call any friends for help with the moving because we knew they'd be at church and so forth. In short, moving into the storage unit was a heinous experience. Eventually we made it to our hotel and cleaned up. The question of where to eat was no question at all.
Nathan and I ordered enough food for a family of 10. Not only had we worked up quite an appetite, but this was a reunion meal with EZ's. It's very rare, and very special. As we looked at each other across the table, he with a mouthful of cheese fries and I with whipped cream from my shake on my top lip, we knew we were home.