when did our backwards podunk town in the mountains turn into new york city?

when? i don't know. and probably not new york city, but just pick any american city.
this week jarred and i are staying in the big city near us. so saturday night we took max to camp william for the week. william is a good friend here that lives even farther outside of the big city than we do. and max gets to spend the next 5 days (and maybe the whole summer) hanging out with uncle william and running crazy in all the open land out there. good deal for him. we are beyond thankful for will. and after we left his house we headed over to the new howard johnson an approximately 2 minute drive from our house. this place still looks out of place out here. they have hamburgers for $10, which is more than a usual meal here costs, but they are good, i don't have to cook, and it is western food out in the middle of nowhere. but when we got there they had their dinner buffet set up and only one couple in the whole place. so we upgraded and splurged on a $20 per person buffet. and check out what we ate over the next hour and a half:
jarred- prime rib and aus jus, steak cooked to order (yes, 2 separate things and he ate both), fried potato wedges, salad, steamed vegetables, fresh fruit, gouda cheese, dinner rolls, a grilled lamb chop, a cream puff, creme brulee, and 5 scoops of new zealand naturals sorbet
shelley- steak cooked to order, salmon fillet cooked to order, garlic butter fried shrimp, sushi, raw oyster, fried potato wedges, steamed veggies, salad, dinner roll, gouda, brie, and gorgonzola cheese, creme brulee, 3 scoops of sorbet, and the chocolate fountain.
it was the most amazing meal i have ever had in this country. all for about what it would cost to go to applebee's in the states.
and now since we are in the big city this week, we headed here:

i'm not even kidding. we started hearing rumors about 6 months ago when starbucks started investing in coffee here that they might soon open a store, but i didn't actually believe the rumors. and then it happened. last week starbucks opened a store downtown here. jarred stopped by a couple weeks ago before they opened at they gave him a buy one get one free card. so yesterday evening we went and got lattes and sat outside on the porch there. by the end of the hour or so we were there jarred was so sick of me saying "i just can't believe it. i can't believe we are sitting at starbucks here. this is unbelievable." when i said it again an hour after we had left he gently assured me that yes, by that time it has indeed sunken in for him.
this city is way different now. living in the big city this week and riding our bikes all around running errands and such just like we did 5 years ago has made it even more of a reminder of how much has changed. it's crazy. and i love it both ways.

someone is fatter

i don't like the phone. and i don't necessarily like texting. but, alas, both of these are a necessary part of life. texting is often more convenient, but can lead to unfortunate miscommunications like the one jarred and i had on friday:

(we'll use student a and student b instead of names)

jarred: student a (a boy) just saw student b (a girl) and told her you're fatter! You haven't been exercising?!
me: What?! Tell him that is rude
jarred: I laid down the law
me: And you shouldnt repeat stuff like that to me
jarred: Why not?
me: Bc it makes me self-conscious
jarred: Oh, i didn't understand what you meant

it is completely normal for students to comment on our weight. last summer a friend of jarred's from a few years ago came back to visit us and the first question he asked jarred was whether i was skinnier or fatter. thankfully over the past 2 years i had lost a few pounds and he noted that i was indeed skinnier. so students telling me when i have gained or lost a couple pounds is par for the course here. but it still annoyed me that student a would be telling student b (that i haven't seen in months probably) that i am now fatter. when we both got home a few hours later i started telling jarred that i couldn't believe he forwarded me a message about a student telling another student i was fatter. at least just defend me to the students and don't ever tell me it happened. he just stared at me with a blank look on his face for like 5 minutes and was adamant he didn't tell me that. and we both had to grab our phones to see what he sent. apparently quotation marks make a big difference. bc student a doesn't think i'm fatter, he thinks student b is fatter, told her this to her face, rebuked her for not exercising, and didn't see any problem with this. i didn't understand why jarred would tell me that a student told another student i was fatter, and jarred didn't understand why i would get self-conscious about student a telling student b she is fatter. needless to say, we might start using a little more punctuation in our texts :)