Remember how I went to Ohio on June 8th for my cousin Bethany’s graduation from vet school? No? Me neither. But here are some pictures that prove I was there or am at least really good at Photoshop!

My best friend, Tracey, was teaching a papercrafting class at the Columbus Museum of Art’s Craftacular Spectacular event, so we arrived early to take lewd pictures of her

in the “Don’t Eat the Art” exhibit

before giving in to our basest desires and dipping our hands into the rhinestone, glitter, and button bucket:

Apparently all of the students at the nearby Columbus College of Art and Design hated this sign when it went in outside the art museum (I believe it’s referred to as the “FART sign”), but I love it:

That night, we were supposed to go dancing at Skully’s as always, but I realized I’d only brought flip-flops and heels home. You can never have too many Chucks, so I was naturally pleased for an excuse to buy some new ones to leave at Tracey’s house. She was naturally pleased to be given an opportunity to step all over them with her own beer-drenched Chucks as we danced, because nothing looks so disgustingly new as new Chucks:

The next afternoon, I went to the HISTORIC Marcy Diner near my childhood home–which amazingly has a website that includes mention of the “pop” they sell–with my dad to eat $1 coney dogs. AND SOMEHOW DID NOT TAKE A SINGLE PICTURE OF THE EVENT. But you can bet it was a better hot-dog-eating experience than any I’ve had in fancypants New York City.

That night, I went to a big swanky vet school soiree with my cousin, Bethany, that Ohio State president E. Gordon Gee seemed to randomly happen upon, like he was taking a shortcut through the ballroom in the student union without realizing there was anything going on in there. Everyone was taking pictures with him, and I was all, “Wait, why?”, but this is for Bethany:

The next night, I went to dinner with Bethany and her family, and we spotted this gem in the Barnes & Noble parking lot:

Afterward, we went to her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine hooding ceremony. I guess this is a hooding:

I call it a choking.

She was simultaneously totally annoyed by all of the pictures I took and secretly thinking she was Wonder Woman:

Then we went to Applebee’s (!) for drinks (!), and Bethany’s brother paid for the whole shebang but not before complaining about Bethany’s $6.50 cocktail. I was confused until they informed me that $6.50 is actually expensive for a drink, and the $16 I’m now used to paying in NYC is offensive.

The next day, my dad and I skipped church (!) and went to Rooster’s for lunch instead of our usual Bob Evans. Adventurous! Then we came back to the house and watched my stepsister, Jenny, shave her girls’ 4-H pigs, which are being kept in my dad’s and stepmom’s back yard. Appaaaaaaaaaarently, 4-H judges think they look better when they’re hairless:

I think they’re the cutest things ever no matter what:

But especially when they’re being fed marshmallows:

Before I’d come home, a giant storm took out trees and power lines all over Ohio, and my family’s compound suffered some wild damage. Not only did a tree fall over onto the front porch, but the limb of another blew off onto the garage, revealing that it was hollow inside! And full of bees!:

That night, Tracey and I went to visit our longtime other best friend, Katie, her daughters Maria

and Evelyn (who looks like Toby from Labyrinth, Tracey decided this week),

and her husband-whom-I-introduced-her-to-because-I’m-the-best-matchmaker-ever-but-only-because-I-tried-to-date-him-first-and-he-totally-rejected-me-but-I-still-love-him, Nick:

After being served dinner by Katie, we all went to the backyard so I could take wildly adorable family pictures of them:

and then we watered Katie’s garden.

Well, Katie watered her garden.

The rest of us played in the water.

Well, some of us played in the water while some of us licked the water from the watering can:

Then we went back inside to enjoy the Cheesecake Factory desserts Tracey had brought (the only Cheesecake Factory I had on the entire trip!) and to watch Katie play with her new toy:

Until Tracey got too jealous and needed to see how much she remembered from her one quarter of string instrument training while getting her music education degree at OSU:

And that was it! Tracey and I spent the next day chowing on pizza and Graeter’s ice cream at the mall, and then she dropped me off at the airport so I could return to my babyless, pigless, expensive-drink world.