Thursday, October 15, 2009

Another Hunt, Memories, and Laughs

Today I had some business to do around the University of Minnesota Campus (Hospital) I had a meeting and some training to get done. So I took this opportunity of validated parking to conduct a little campus Peanut Hunt (if you're not familiar with my continuous peanut hunt... check out my post about the Peanut Characters around the Twin Cities)  I'm up to a total of 44 now!!!  44 out of about 518.. yeah I'm real close ;-P

Anyway it was rather nice being back on a college campus (well besides walking around in the rain), it brought back lots of fun memories. Sleeping in the library or student union, being young and on top of the world, feeling like I have something to do with my life, or that I'm continually doing something... important. Well I'm still young... just not that young and I guess I do important things... I fed the dog this morning, that's important right?

Now if you're not familiar with the UofM campus, then I need to tell you there are tunnels EVERYWHERE!!! I knew there were one or two peanuts located in tunnels somewhere... luckily I had a vague idea of where they were so I asked the information desks I came to. (oh btw I added the five I found today to my main list, link above)

Now to give you a little back story to this next part, when I go to the U (that's what we call the university hospital) I have to park in a ramp and get a ticket and get it validated by my boss when I meet with him. Well today I had BLS (basic life support - just a fancy name they use for CPR) review training and then a meeting with my boss. The training was on the Riverside campus (west side of the river) and the U is on the University campus (east side of the river) So I went to my training and then took a shuttle over to the U side, I got my parking validated by the training class which is good because I always feel guilty asking my boss to validate my parking. He does it no problem... but see since I work at Maple Grove I get free parking, where as all the Child Lifers that work at the U have to pay for it everyday... yes one good thing about working in the suburbs (the only good thing).

Okay I'm getting off track, anyway my point is, this is a BIG campus... and I took a SHUTTLE across the river from where my car was to the other areas. So I get done with my meeting, walk around find a few peanuts here a few there... I know there is one in the Andersen Library which is right on the other side of the river (west side) so I want to make sure there is a pedestrian path across the river before I trek all the way over to find out, in the rain. So I go in a building. I find the info desk, and they have a map, which I stick in my pocket because maps are good.

Oh I should also point out that during this whole hunt I am carrying around a baby aquarium thing that hangs on a crib. The U got a huge donation so a co-worker gave me one to use out at my clinic... I made a handle for it out of duck tape and I'm carrying it around like a brief case.  But I don't think everyone else thought it was a brief case because I noticed college students staring at me funny as I walked around in the rain with it :-)

Okay so I am at the info booth and it's always helpful to ask around to see if anyone knows of any Peanuts, because well they could be ANYWHERE. I have asked around to a lot of people and usually get great responses like:
"Um I don't know what you're talking about"
"Oh I've seen those, have you tried over in St. Paul?"
"Ummm they quit doing that a few summers ago"
"I haven't seen any since Camp Snoopy"
But this time the info guys said "Are you talking about the Charlie Browns? There is one in this building"  My heart jumps and I get super excited! It's so fun finding an unexpected Peanut (as Kyle and Matt know from last Saturday when I saw one by surprised and scream super loud almost giving them and myself a heart attack). See most of the ones I have found, I have had hints from online searches, or friends tell me they think one is there, it's so fun to find one unexpected. So he tells me how to get there "go down the escalators, turn right, then left, then right then right, then left... then you'll come to a tunnel called 'the gopher way' and it's before the tunnel... but don't go in the tunnel or you'll get lost." WHOA okay... so I ask if there are signs to point me to the tunnel and he said yeah (okay it would have been easier to say just follow the signs to the tunnel and it's right there). So I make my way and about, oh, 20 seconds later I come across THIS:

Charlie Peeing Painting

Hanging on the wall!!! I literally laugh out loud... but get a picture anyway - not exactly what I was looking for, but at least it's the same subject.... hmmmm.  And I take a look into this tunnel he told me not to go in... yeah I could definitely see myself getting lost in there... it was like an underground world, pretty cool if you ask me. Reminded me of the 'EAC' in Finding Nemo.

So I go back up to the main entrance info desk with a huge smile on my face cuz I couldn't stop laughing. I thanked him for mentioning that one but asked if he knew of any of the statues, lol. He couldn't think of any. But I continued across the river, got one more that I knew of, and then WALKED back to my parking ramp.  I was going to have to walk pretty much the same distance back across the river to the shuttle so I just figured I would head to my car, I was wet and cold and ready to get home. And as my luck would have it, as soon as I got in my car and sat down I had to pee!


Thanks for reading!
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