The other day, I actually got Colleen up early enough to do an activity during the daytime. Of course it required stealing her blanket and picking her up off the bed and setting her on the floor, but it worked.

We had talked about going ice skating. I thought it would be cool to go to one of the outdoor skating places down in the city. But we decided that it was too damn cold and ended up going to the indoor one at Rinkside Sports in Gurnee Mills. It was our first time skating together. When we got there, the employee advised us that there was only 45 more minutes of public skating time. I had a feeling that it would be more than enough time. We were very slow starting out on the ice, but eventually got used to it and we were able to pick up some speed. Colleen fell down once. I played it safe and didn't try any fancy moves, so I never fell down. After 40 minutes of skating, we called it quits.

From there, it was on to the food court for some Auntie Anne's soft pretzels. I got an original and Colleen got a garlic pretzel. I was not impressed by the garlic one. It was basically a plain pretzel with garlic powder thrown on top. Additionally, the intense garlic taste in my mouth ruined my chocolate chip cookie from Great American Cookie Co.

Next up, it was back to the Rinkside arcade where Colleen kicked my ass in Tekken 5. I also played my favorite arcade game of all time, Top Skater, but was very disappointed when I discovered that the skateboard was kinda broken, making it impossible to skate forward. The screen was also cloudy, making it hard to see. Waste of a dollar.

After that we passed a Ritz camera and dropped off Colleen's disposable camera at the one-hour photo, which we would pick up later.

A trip to the mall with Colleen wouldn't be complete without some clothes shopping. She bought 2 pairs of shoes from Payless, I bought one.

Wondering further through the mall, we passed a Chinese massage kiosk which I had noticed last time we were at the mall. Colleen said "Go get one" and pushed me over there. The Chinese lady didn't waste any time. She quickly unbuttoned my shirt (I was wearing an undershirt) and sat me in the massage chair. Meanwhile, Colleen accomplished more shopping. The 20 minute massage was great, and the Chinese lady didn't hold back. She massaged pretty much everything. She even smacked my ass at one point which was kind weird, and must have looked weird to passers-by. But I was so relaxed, I let her do her thing. It was $24 for 20 minutes and well worth it.

We went back to Ritz Camera to pick up the pictures, which were kinda disappointing since they did not come out very well.

Most of our clothes shopping time was spent at Kohl's, where I had 2 gift cards from Christmas. There was this shirt on a mannequin that I really liked, but the only one on the rack was size small. We checked the mannequin and it was a size large...just what I was looking for. Colleen was tempted to strip the mannequin, but I talked her out of it, as it looked hard to get off since the arms where place behind it's back. I said that she would probably rip the arms off in the process. We asked an employee if they could strip the mannequin for us, but we were denied. They said that there was only one employee that could touch the mannequins, and they weren't working at the time. I didn't know that striping a mannequin was a specialized skill, but whatever. I found a similar shirt in a different color. I ended up spending well over my $50 giftcard, buying 2 shirts, 3 pants, boxers and undershirts.

Next we hit up the 7pm showing of Pan's Labyrinth at the Gurnee Cinema. The movie is entirely in Spanish with subtitles. It took a little getting used to. But it was a great movie. It had a good story and was visually interesting. But I really wanted to see more of the freaky monster guy with the eye balls in his hands, he was only in one scene.

Our final stop was at the Gurnee Baker's Square. We had the Grown Up Grilled Cheese and Tomato Basil Soup which was SO GOOD...and on special for $4.99. Yum.