Link to Phoenix, AZ Facebook Pictures

We spent Thursday and Friday nights in Phoenix with Brittny and her family.  They truly treated us like family – feeding us both nights, giving us a comfortable bed to sleep in, and providing lots of tips / life experiences about the various places we are going to visit.  Brittny’s mom lived in California for a large portion of her life, and was telling us all about what it’s like there – what we can expect, where to see, etc.  

She reminds me a lot of my mom!  Extremely upbeat, very nice, and easy to talk to.  Her dad was able to give me a LOT of insight into different regions within the US – we were talking about everywhere from California to Colorado to Arizona.  He is extremely knowledgeable and really put the whole “California being EXTREMELY expensive” aspect into perspective for me.  If my dad is reading this, he knows it is not an easy task (my dad has tried many, many, many times to convince me of the same thing – I guess it just took me hearing the same thing from someone who has actually lived / experienced it to fully convince me – sorry dad =p)

We spent Thursday night driving to Phoenix and surprising Brittny at her work.  In Arizona, instead of having Kroger’s, they have a place called Fry’s.  It’s basically the same thing, and you can even use your Kroger card at Fry’s because they’re both owned by Kroger.

We didn’t do anything too exciting Thursday night, except unpack and RELAX.

On Friday, we woke up and rode around the city of Phoenix with Brittny.  Ryan really wants to his Saguaro cactus antenna topper.  We went to a souvenir shop downtown, and the Capitol Building Museum and couldn’t locate it.  We went into the wrong side of the capital, and we were entering the area where the security x-ray check it.  We asked if we could cut through the building, and the cop said that was fine but we would have to go through security.  

Molly put her purse on the x-ray conveyor, and the cop immediately noticed the knife she was trying to smuggle inside.  She didn’t even come close to getting away with it.  We had to leave the building and walk around to the museum on the other side.

Later in the afternoon/evening, we went to watch Alex practice Muay Thai at the gym.  It is a Thai style of fighting – there were 5 students there, as well as the teacher.  They took turns punching and kicking pads that the other one held – the next day, Alex had black and blue marks on his arms!  It looked pretty intense. Good thing I wasn’t a part of it.

After practice was over, the two took us to a place called In-and-Out. We each had the “Animal” style burger. It was DERRECHUSS.  If you haven’t had In-and-Out, it is kind of like a Steak-n-Shake, except not nasty.  It’s got a very similar design on the inside, and they wear those little fold-up hats.  It’s almost like Five Guys mixed with Steak-n-Shake.  If you’re ever in the West, try it.  You won’t regret it!

When we got home and cleaned up, we managed to watch 30 minutes of Michael McIntyre’s stand-up comedy before passing out.  Michael McIntyre is a British comedian, and he is pretty damn funny.  I would recommend checking him out if you’re not familiar with his comedy!