Saturday, August 3, 2013

Day at the Museum

What do you get when you combine three moms, a grandma, three cousins ages 2,4 and 8, and two teenagers, ages 13 and 16? A hell of a good time. We spent Friday at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science - that's why there was no post yesterday.

The Transporter transported us and that was a treat because I hate rush hour traffic, and Denver's is famous. Ironically, the museum is ½ mile from the hospital where I've been tortured, er, tested since April. I know the way very well. He did great, even though the construction was challenging.

We love this museum. It has great, classic exhibits, like the gems and minerals, which is my favorite. With a group the size of ours, you tend to move like an amoeba, as in S L O W L Y. We soon gave up on sticking together, though. My boys would go ahead, the 8 year-old is one of those who has to push every button and interact with every kids' interaction station, so she and her 6 year-old cousin tended to lag behind. I stayed with my friend, my high school friend who lives in Canada and had called me the night before to say that she was unexpectedly in town and did I want to get together. Such a nice surprise! (Her mom, who came with us, lives here in Denver which is convenient for me since I get to see my friend more because of it.)

Also along was my friend's sister visiting from England. Neither she nor her husband is English...but I can't tell you why he's assigned there. The whole “then I have to kill you” thing. Her kids were the youngest, but so well behaved and genuinely interested in all that was around them.

The body exhibit was a big hit. You get a little credit card like “pass” to put in the different stations, and they measure you're height, your stride length, test you on the treadmill, test your grip strength, do a computer “aging” simulation, and let you dress up like a scientist and do actual chemistry experiments. Just for the record, The Transporter is now 5'11”, and OYT 5'7.5”, leaving me, at 5'3”, as the shortest...You get a print-out of results at the end.

Catching up with old friends is great, especially when you have the kind of friendship where you just pick up where you left off, which was about four years ago. So much has happened in each of our lives since then, and we just babbled away about it, picking up the threads of the conversation in between the, “Have you seen the size of that moose?” and “Try these deer ears, you can really hear a LOT better!” The kids snaked around us as we saw amazing, life size dioramas of the worlds' animals, of ancient cultures. We landed the space shuttle, built models of airplanes, saw satellite imagery, and the kids played astronaut, complete with foam space suits and a pretend control module.

We are still the same girls who were on the gymnastics team together, who knocked over the oil display at the gas station when I first had my license, who played in band together, shared a math class, and have kept in touch all these years. We may look a little older, move a little slower, and have kids of our own, but our hearts are still the same, and we'll always be forever friends.


Now I need to go watch “Night at the Museum”...

16 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

It's cool to get together with old friends like that. You guys didn't knock over anything at the museum, did you?
And nothing wrong with short. My wife is short and it's really damn cute.

Andrew Leon said...

You know, I don't have any friends like that. Sounds like a cool museum, though!

Briane said...

This museum sounds amazing. But your post and the comments made me think: Do I have friends? I don't think that I do. I have people I work with, and I have the kids, and I have Sweetie, but beyond that, I really don't have friends. Or, rather, I do, but I try very hard NOT to have friends because friends always want to DO stuff, and I very rarely want to DO stuff. Or, rather, I do, but I very rarely want to DO stuff with other people. Or rather, I do, but usually the other people are my kids and Sweetie, so I forgot what I was talking about.

Anyway, the museum sounds incredible. Pictures? More explanations? The DEER EAR? What's that about? I'm going to assume that the space shuttle you referenced is a simulator, but if it's NOT, if you really get to land a space shuttle, TELL ME NOW because I think I'd be pretty good at that. Or rather, I'd be very bad at it but I'd still like to try.

Jo said...

Great post, sounds like you had a wonderful time. I had to check out exactly who the Transporter was. How great having a son who can drive you around.

D.G. Hudson said...

Unexpected visitors make us try harder, sometimes. Especially if we like them.

L. Diane Wolfe said...

I have friends that I don't see often and when I do, we pick right up like you did. That place reminds me of OMSI in Oregon. I loved doing all of the experiments.

Brian Miller said...

smiles...it is def cool to have those friends...ones we will never grow up with...haha...uh so what kinda band was that?

Michael Di Gesu said...

I love meeting friends I haven't seen for years. It's great just to pick up even though years have gone by.

Museums are great to have an afternoon of catching up and fun!

shelly said...

That sounds really nice. I went to a museum last Monday with my daughter and grandson. Lovely time.

Hugs and chocolate,
Shelly

Jeremy [Retro] said...

i don't think i have friends like that, but there are one or two that if we were in the museum or anywhere you would be hearing the word "security" a lot...

Anonymous said...

My mom used to drag us to museums when I was a kid; I'm glad she did. Don't visit them much anymore, but we have a whole slew of them here in San Diego. Glad you had a great time with your pals. I'll be meeting some of my buddies for pizza and pool tomorrow night; can't wait to catch up with them.

loverofwords said...

Museums, great for summer visitors. And even though the kids sometimes complain, guess what they say when they are adults, "I remember when I went to the ###Museum and saw###." I remember going to the Natural History Museum in New York as a kid of 5 or 6 and I still remember the dinosaur skeleton. The gem and mineral exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is amazing as well.

JoJo said...

Sounds like a lot of fun and kind of like San Francisco's Exploratorium museum which is very hands on.

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Tina .. how fabulous you were able to meet up with an old friend, who isn't old as such! It's great being able to slot back in again isn't it ..

The museum trip sounded a fun time with all and sundry and what a range of ages ..

I love that film too - amuses me!

Cheers Hilary

Anonymous said...

I love museums... I don't have any really close to me, but when I do go, it brings out the kid in me:)

Hart Johnson said...

Oh, sounds like a great day! I like natural history and sciencey museums.... I like Art, too, but alone--art is too personal to go through with somebody else for whatever reason. Glad your had a great day of it!