Technically, we were still home for this pathetic display. But I always find Milo’s defiance regarding our family travel both entertaining and pitiful.

Here’s where we stayed. (Note: I’m lying.) Pictured is the historic Peabody Hotel in downtown Memphis which is directly across the street from our hotel, the Holiday Inn Express. For the record, the HIE was perfectly adequate. Plus it rented for only one-third of the price. But for old world charm and pageantry … there’s no place like the Peabody. (clicking heels)

Well, yeah. Of COURSE we visited Graceland. Remember the Elvis play Viv and I did together last month? It was sort of the whole reason for this ~~pilgrimage~~ trip.

And it did not fail to impress. Not one bit. It’s now officially added to my time travel list. (Yes, I have such a list.)

Seriously, I am standing in Elvis’s kitchen … fighting the crippling urge to rifle through all the drawers and cabinets. And run up the (off-limits) stairs to say hi to Elv-I mean, “whoever” is up there.

Here’s where he makes his smoothies, you guys! Okay, fine. Where he MADE his smoothies. (rolling eyes)

And here’s the swing set where Lisa Marie spent her childhood. (Does anyone else hear a creepy, off-key music box and ghostly whispers?)

Interesting fact: Elvis died two years before his own father (Vernon Elvis) who, in turn, died a year before his own mother, Elvis’s Granny (Minnie Mae). That’s some weird family chronology.

I can’t tell you how glad I am to have gotten the chance to see Elvis’s planes (especially the interior of the Lisa Marie) before they’re removed from Graceland by their new owners next year. With 24K gold seat belts and a phone that could call any landline in the world (how was that even possible back then?), I’m sorry I didn’t buy it first.

We also visited the FedExForum, home of the Grizzlies, in honor of my boy, Dean …

… and Beale Street, where Viv and I taught Gigi how to take a selfie (Viv did it in one try, it took me two and Gigi three – guess that’s a sign of the times) …

… and, of course, the March of the Ducks at the Peabody Hotel. They hold it twice daily. We went so many times (cough … five!) that I’m now suffering from withdrawal.

Because me in a girly red jacket prodding Milo and Herve with an old umbrella to waddle down the hallway in single file to a Sousa march just isn’t the same.