Travis and Vicki were an asthmatic devil (namely, the Prince of Dimness - he wasn't altogether too bright) and Madame Garlique, a communicator of departed souls. They had the BEST props... Travis would pull out his "inhaler" and take a long puff anytime he was questioned or threatened, and Vicki would change the subject by fortune telling and tarot card reading.
I would definitely recommend hosting one of these parties, to all of you who have told me that you've been wanting to. It was a lot of fun (as long as the people you invite are as much fun as we all were)! 
Oh, and by the way, that mess you see in the background was the state of my house when my VT's tried to come over!!! I had just kicked a huge pile of clothes out to send to the laundry room, and Mark had a huge set up for working on his denture - what a nightmare...
Well, it seemed that the witch was quite a bit too small for Starkisha (it wouldn't snap together by about two inches!), so we tried to swap costumes and put Daisy in the witch and Starkisha in the skeleton to see if it was a little roomier.
Well, it was a little roomier. But apparently Starkisha is not a "small" dog anymore - her belly was way too big for both costumes, even though they fit her length-wise. Rather than try and exchange the size, we just returned the costumes. But we made sure to get pictures of them first. That's all that really matters anyway...
Anyway, it was nothing to write home about, but we thought we'd blog it anyway, just another tribute to how odd Indiana (and it's population) is.
If you can't tell, this is a pillow that once had tassels all around it (and that once was placed nicely on the couch). Daisy reduced it to a pillow with a few tassels, and millions of strings strewn across the living room floor. At first we weren't sure which dog did this - they have both had their way with toilet paper in the past...
We thought we would do a little test to see which one was the culprit. Mark sat down with Starkisha and tried to get her to play with the shredded tassels. She wasn't too keen on that idea - here she is spitting out the strings Mark shoved in her mouth, and giving him a look that says, "What am I supposed to do with that?"
Next, I called Daisy into the living room and started playing with the mess to see if she would catch on. She caught on alright...
And then she began shredding more tassels off the pillow, showing us exactly how she must have accomplished making this horrendous mess earlier that day. I even caught her in the act a few minutes later, as we were going to get the broom to clean up the mess. 
That is Daisy's guilty look... Needless to say, our pillows are now tassel-free (so ghetto, we just cut all the fringe off), and we will not be buying any more pillows with tassels in the near future.
And, of course, Mark had to take pictures of the "Corvette Parking Only" row gracing the parking lot of the museum. Someday he thinks he'll be parking there...
Once we got into Nashville, we dropped our dogs off at the hotel and headed downtown to check it out. First we drove down "music row," which is a collection of just a few streets where recording companies are just lined up and waiting to sign the next big thing. It was pretty crazy to see, and I'll bet pretty overwhelming for people who are trying to break into the music business. After our trek down music row, we decided it was time for dinner - this is me on the phone with mom, walking toward Joe's Crab Shack, and finding out that she "outed" me to Brent. Just kidding, mom.
We walked all over downtown - there were tons of bars with live country bands, one right after the other. It was pretty crazy to see all the people trying to "make it" in Nashville. After our long walk, we drove over to the state capitol. Mark always takes pictures of state capitols - I guess it's his proof that we have been there...
On our way back to the hotel, we decided to drive by the river. Of course, Mark wanted to stop and snap a picture, since there was conveniently a little park area complete with benches. It was actually quite pretty, and there was a huge concert going on just across the river.
This is actually a piano that was commissioned by Priscilla Presley as a gift for Elvis. She had a Kimball piano placed in 24-karat gold leaf. Seriously. And if that wasn't extravagant enough, Elvis' diamond-crusted cadillac was also on display. It was gold plated on all the fixtures too (including the back-seat television set), and the paint job was done using 40 coasts of crushed up diamond and fish scales. Bling, bling!
And this room was full of plaques dedicated to all the country music hall-of-famers.
After the parthenon experience, we went to check out Belle Meade, a very exclusive neighborhood just outside of Nashville where a lot of the stars live. Some of the houses were just spectacular, but it was hard to see many of them thru the thick landscaping. That's what I would do if I had a house like that, too. Here is the famous Belle Meade plantation - it had "slaves quarters" and the works, since it was once a functioning plantation. Now it is just a tourist trap.
And this was the community park in Belle Meade... I want to live there.
This is another view of the park. It was seriously one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. It makes Indy look ugly - even springtime Indy.
And last but not least, this picture has become a new addition to our "tour of the temples." We like to check them out wherever we go - this one was quite tiny. It was next to a bunch of farms, but the neighborhood was beautiful. Typical of a temple...
She decided she would place the peppers into a plastic bag and then broil them. As you can see, that didn't turn out to be the best method of attack. About 2 minutes into her project, I began asking what was burning. It didn't take long to find the plastic bag of peppers melting in the oven. It turns out that she very consiously placed the peppers in the bag before putting them in the oven. Her defense was, "I knew it sounded strange, but I thought I remembered that being the recipe." Maybe next time when your common sense is telling you something, babe, you should listen...
