joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea

Saturday morning (and, OK, early afternoon), Joe and I were catching up on our stories (The Office, Archer, etc) and in the middle of my grousing about Brian the Boom Mike Guy, I declared that we should go on an adventure. Not an outdoor adventure, mind you, because it's been below freezing pretty much every day for the past million and a half years, and I couldn't think of any outdoor activities that wouldn't involve me whining a lot or one or both of us losing a body part to frostbite. I did some quiet Googling and thinking (it was hard, you guys) and decided that we should definitely go to Newport Aquarium, which I was PRETTY sure was all or mostly indoors. I didn't verify this before I bought tickets, though. I just bought them. BECAUSE PLANNING IS FOR LOSERS.

[Note: This is so untrue. I plan things like crazy. I plan them so much that it annoys even ME and so one of my goals is to be more spontaneous and not worry if, say, we get to an aquarium and it turns out to be all outdoors and it's 20 degrees and snowing CARPE DIEM SEIZE THE DAY THANK YOU MR KEATING.]

My gamble paid off, luckily, because we only had to be outdoors during the walk from the parking garage to the aquarium. And, I don't know, maybe during the warmer months, they have stuff going on outside (dolphins? manatees? SHAMU?) but just the inside was fine, really. There were, like, probably at least 100 fish inside. MAYBE EVEN 200.

I'm kidding. I'm sure there were more than that. Unfortunately, it seemed like there were as many children running around as there were fish in tanks. I wouldn't have minded the kids so much if they were in tanks, too (ZING!), but really the majority of the children were either well-behaved and/or adorably excited, which I couldn't fault them for BECAUSE OMG PENGUINS OMG SEA TURTLE OMG GIANT ALLIGAAAAATOOOOOOOOOR AHHHHHHHHHHH!! If anything, I was mad because these excitable children were all up in my business while I was trying to get my face as close to the glass without either A) smearing it or B) scaring the fish.

While we were there, not only did I get to watch penguins frolic for half an hour, but I also had the opportunity to A) scare a small child who I thought was lost by asking him if he knew where his mom was and B) bond with with another kid over spider crabs. This is a spider crab and, even if you're not Ron Weasley, I think you'll agree that it's the creepiest fucking things you've ever seen:

Oh my god! Expecto patronum EXPECTO PATRONUM!

On the way home, we stopped and had dinner with Joe's brother and sister-in-law and our adorable nephews, which was the perfect way to end our adventure, mostly because there were no spider crabs at their house.

Joe and I tend to be hermit-like (LIKE HERMIT CRABS) most of the time, though Joe is slightly more prone to leaving the house than I am. I consider sitting at home in my pajamas and not talking to anyone to be one of the most enjoyable things a person can do, but sometimes I have to make myself put on pants and leave the house like a normal person might, if only so I don't turn into Nell. And anyway, I made up for all my pants-wearing on Saturday by sitting in pajamas all day Sunday, binging on TV and junk food while I waited for the Super Bowl Puppy Bowl to start. AMERICA!