The One Where We Tried to Go on a Date

My mother came out to Wyoming on the plane with the Butterbean and me and stayed with us for the first part of our trip. At her urging, my husband and I were supposed to go out as much as possible while she watched the the children.

All right! We exclaimed, and at the end of the first full day in Jackson, I met my husband at the base of the gondola to go up to "The Deck" for happy hour. I was still stressed out from the flight with a screaming two month old and a clueless gate attendant who told me to put the stroller and car seat in the wrong place, which led to us arriving in the mountains while those crucial baby items sat on the jetway in Dallas. I needed a drink.

Here's the view from the top of the gondola:

So we had a drink each and some sliders and started on an enormous dish of edaname. Some clouds kicked up, which is common in the late afternoon in the mountains. Our waitress stopped by and mentioned that it might start raining in 15 minutes or so. Then suddenly BANG! A black cloud rolled directly on top of us. The wind kicked up and plates and glassware started flying off of the tables.

We ran for the empty deli that operates during the ski season. The wind whipped around so hard that the gondola shut down and the outdoor grill kitchen had to close. However, the bar was still functioning, and everyone got a second round on the house. To summarize: many people, stuck on a mountaintop, no food, much alcohol.

Husband and I gamely plowed through that edaname and a third round of drinks, because, hey, why not. We watched planes land at the airport and exclaimed, hey, there's our car seat and giggled. The people next to us started falling off of their stools. The waitresses started to look a little tearful.

Finally, though, the storm stopped. Look, a rainbow!