Commercial Break: In Which I Tell You About My Weekend And Don't Even Mention Brighton (Except For Maybe Once...)

We will now have a brief intermission while I tell you some other things that are just as cool as Brighton but don't actually have anything to do with last summer.

What, are you kidding me, we got ourselves a family here.

Last weekend my Fall Break serendipitously (yes I did just make that word up, thanks for asking) coincided with UEA. Mom and Ash and Natalie drove down Thursday morning and picked me up and we met Angie, Katie, and Grandma at Katie's house in the quaint little town of Genola, Utah.
From there we packed ourselves like little sardines into our minivan and drove another four hours down to St. George. This part of the trip included a phenomenal ABBA concert performed by us (audience: us and the other poor souls stuck on the same desolate highway we were in the middle of nowhere) and some rigorous exercises outside a highway-side truck stop. (See this video for additional information.) All of this was in preparation for the play we were going to see at Tuacahn that night... Mama Mia!
A backstory...

Sometimes my excited face looks
maniacal.

Once upon a time my family went to the Draper Temple open house (or was it Oquirrh Mountain?) and I got to ride with my aunt Katie. I was probably like ten. On our way there, Katie turned to me to ask if I knew the song she was playing. I responded negatively, to which she replied, "WHAT?!" I then learned something that would change the course of my life forever: my mother had failed me by not seeing to it that my childhood included an exhaustive education in '70's Swedish pop culture. Luckily, that was soon remedied and ever since I've been a die-hard ABBA fan, and an even dier-hard Mama Mia fan. The play was So. Much. Fun. Somehow Mom had procured us front row seats and it was seriously incredible. I've never enjoyed a play so much.

Not quite the top of the world...
but almost ;)

But that wasn't the end! The next day we set out for Zion's National Park. If you are one of my faithful followers, (and I don't blame you in the slightest if you're not) you may recall that I've written a post about Zion's before. What I said two years ago holds true now: the sheer rock walls are breathtaking. I would even say I have a deeper appreciation for God's creations now than I did back then. Unlike the last trip, this time I was lucky enough to hike Angel's Landing. If it were up to Mom she'd have named it Hell's Landing but I say no one ever had to work to get to hell. And we definitely worked for this one. Two miles of steep switchbacks followed by a half mile of mountain goating up rocky terrain, gripping a single chain and staring at the minuscule buses and tourists a thousand feet below us. It was one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had. Every time I'd risk a glance up from the red sand and rocks, I'd catch a glimpse of the most majestic views I've ever been privileged to witness, which only improved the further we climbed. When we did finally reach the top, I was on top of the world. We could have been soaring with the angels.