Hot springs adventures

I've known for a while that there exist certain crazy people who like to go hot-tubbing in the winter, but I never thought I would ever do something so obviously dumb. Guess what? I didn't! But I did go with my family to Lava Hot Springs (you may think Lava is pronounced like "Lah-vah," but that's because you're dumb - it's clearly pronounced like "Laaaa-va," as though an obnoxious sheep is baaaa-ing in your ear) where we all jumped into the volcanically heated water, only to immediately start melting/fainting from the heat and demanding that my dad go get us ice cream to cool us all down.

Who would have thought that water could ever be so hot that even air chilled by the cool Idaho weather can't counter it? I didn't take a picture, so I can only describe the scene: seven of us Kearls sprawled out across an entire stair/entryway (more than once I saw people approach to get in the water, only to decide that a different staircase would be a better idea), all of us trying to put our legs on each other so that more skin could be exposed to the air. We were like some sort of horrible human/octopus mutation. Then my dad finally found a suit and joined us. He's like some sort of super human who thought the water felt great, and he kept diving under to grab some hapless sibling's foot and drag them in. I remained safe by holding my sister's glasses; too expensive to risk damaging them, mwa ha ha ha!

In the end, though, even our icy drinking water and ice cream sandwiches weren't enough to keep us from melting entirely so we all gratefully climbed out of the pool to head home. Two of us, I'm not saying who (okay it was David and me), were thoughtful enough to wear clothes over our swim gear, but not thoughtful enough to bring underwear for when that swim gear was all wet and uncomfortable. So those two people went commando during the trip home WOO HOO! After a quick stop at Cold Stone's for MORE ice cream (yes, the water was just that hot) we finally got home only to see the dog sitting shivering by the garage door. Someone had put her out and forgot to let her in, so she had been roaming the snow-laden streets the whole time (like 3 hours!!) looking for someone to buy her matches - no I mean waiting for us to come home and let her in. The worst part? It was her birthday! Happy 9th birthday Mati, try not to freeze to death because we're off to enjoy our boiling water and ice cream, and you can't come. Fortunately she forgave us, as dogs usually do (with the exception of Cujo).

All in all, it was an awesome way to start the new year.