The Beauty and the Mess

Today is my last workday for a whole week! It's been years since I stayed anywhere out of town for a week, so I'm excited. Tomorrow we fly into Boston, where Evan's parents will pick us up. Our plans are to: spend a day in Boston and do the Freedom Trail; take a cog railway up Mt. Washington; go to Maine for lobster; possibly visit Cape Cod; and my favorite- take a whale-watching boat tour. Of all the activities, that's what I want to do most. This trip will add a lot of new states and experiences to my list! And I'll be reunited with the ocean, even if it's not my usual part of it. Evan's promised me that. :D I'm kind of stressed about finances, though. With all the wedding stuff, and birthdays and other people's weddings, plus this trip, I feel like I'm tossing money to the wind lately. I'm afraid to find out what my checking account balance is. :( I am so glad we booked this trip and paid for the plane tickets before we got engaged, because if it had happened afterwards, I don't think we'd be going. I don't know where the money for all these activities is going to come from. Oh well...you only go to New England once. I'm sure I'll be back sometime, but let's not talk about that for my own sanity. Also, I'm hoping to hook up with Jessica and possibly Lauren (!) for lunch or something. We'll see.

I am convinced that the coffee provided at my work is the worst brand of coffee in the entire world. It's as generic as generic gets. It has no special flavor, and it has a bad habit of making me extremely jittery sometimes, yet not affecting me at all other times. Bleah.

I had my Mary Kay wedding makeup consultation last night. ( Lots of girly makeup talk. And a non-girly survey. )

Happy, happy, happy belated birthday to Sharon! She's such a great person. If you don't know her, you should. Her sense of LOTR humor alone is enough reason to friend her. :)

Well, I'm alive. I feel bad for my lack of LJ participation lately, but I can barely keep up with my non-computer life. The frenetic activity of the last few weeks is finally catching up with me. I'm drinking caffeinated coffee, on the official hottest day of the year, because I thought I might not be able to stay awake without it. The allergies I've had for three weeks returned as soon as I got back from Virginia, and today my eyes hurt. I even brought my glasses to work in case I have to take my contacts out. Tonight there's no band practice- thanks, God- so I'm going to stay home, do laundry, be restful, and go to sleep around 9:00.

( My trip to Virginia )

As the girls know, I found a wedding dress yesterday! I won't describe it in case Evan sees this, but it's beautiful and I'm so happy with it. Also, we talked it over and we've pretty much decided to go with the Jamaican honeymoon! :D I'm so excited. This means we'll have to get passports soon, on top of everything else, but it's a good idea to have a valid passport anyway. I got my last one when I was fifteen, so needless to say it's out of date. In the picture I have Brooke Shields eyebrows and am wearing a tie-dyed shirt. Ouch.

So far I'm enjoying having the apartment to myself. After getting back from the dress shop on Monday, Kathy and I went through piles of papers and junk from the dining room and threw a lot of stuff away. We're sort of going room by room, and things are looking good. In other exciting news, I had a nice talk with my landlady yesterday and it turns out we're allowed to paint! To think I've lived with my blindingly white kitchen for three years and could have had some color. Evan and I are planning to paint it and the bathroom (the only white rooms). Now we just have to decide on a color. I think we'll probably do blue. It depends on what bathroom stuff we choose for our registry. The Mills Apartment will look very different from the Brenda and Kathy Apartment. :)

Oh, and remember my busybody neighbor who works with our friend MaryElaine? A few months ago she had the audacity to ask MaryElaine if Evan spent the night at my apartment? Well, now she's complained to her that Evan is over all the time and she's certain that we're living together. !!!! I should laugh it off, but I get really angry at being accused of things when I'm part of the 5% of the population not doing them. I should leave her a note: In 139 days we WILL be living together. Legally. Deal with it. Anyway, Jesus was accused of things and didn't protest, so this is another area in which I fail to follow His example.

Okay, I've talked long enough.

It really irritates me when people, upon seeing that I am sick, hold things up in front of their faces while talking to me, even though I am standing a good five feet away. I have a non-contagious sinus problem...not leprosy. Thank you very much.

Yes, I am even sicker today. This is great because I will spend tonight and tomorrow smushing in the backseat of a car with my two siblings, who will likely talk nonstop and probably use me as a pillow. At the end of the journey, I will spend several nights sleeping on the couch in my grandmother's smoky, dark house. Then we will turn around and drive fifteen hours straight to get home. Did I mention I'm not happy about this trip? I'm really not happy about this trip. I want to leave now because the sooner we go, the sooner we can come back. I have to get a better attitude. My extended family is getting older and who knows how much time I'll have with them. And I guess the wedding festivities will be fun. I've just been torn away from my friends and a restful five-day weekend for all but two Thanksgivings of my life, and I am tired of it.

Evan is going off-roading in Arkansas while I'm gone. I'm glad, because he hasn't gone in a long time and I know he's itching for the trails. Unfortunately I didn't get to say goodbye to him last night because he had to work on the truck, in preparation. We will be apart for six days, counting today. This is the longest separation since we've been dating. I am very sad. If you find that sickening, rest assured that the small part of me not infested with cartoon hearts agrees with you. :) At least we'll get to talk. I love you, nationwide calling plan.

Anyway, I hope you all have great, fun, relaxing Thanksgivings full of love and turkey. As a parting gift, here's a poll.

( Poll Time )

Hey. I'm back. Here's the account of my Michigan Adventure. ( What? No left turn? )

Back from Louisiana, land of my birth.

I had a wonderful weekend. Kathy and I drove down to New Orleans on Friday night without incident. Saturday was one of the best days I've had in a long time. First we went to a two-story Target that Em frequents. Then we went to the mall for a brief visit to two of our favorite stores, followed by an awesome lunch at a seafood place on Lake Pontchartrain. Then we went to look at the water for a while, which made me very happy. By this point we were hot and tired, so we cooled off at the apartment for a while. Em took us to get Snowballs, the best shaved ice treats I have ever eaten, before heading out to the swamp for our long-awaited swamp tour!

I wanted to go on this particular swamp tour because they use smaller boats, so you can get closer to nature. And we did. While getting on the boat, we were a little freaked by a scary bridge nearby, but soon we were in the swamp communing with water hyacinths and alligators and old trees. We saw a lot of beautiful birds - herons and egrets and ibis. The boat captain was a native and knew a lot about the area. We also got to go fast in the boat a few times, which filled me with glee. :) We all felt very refreshed afterwards. I can't wait to go again. But wait- there was more! We had a tasty dinner at Cracker Barrel and went back to the apartment to play Friends trivia (the right way, which, as it turns out, is a lot more fun than just reading the questions). Then, we went to see Legally Blonde 2! It wasn't as good as the first one, but it was still hilarious. (I'm now compelled to get a Snap Cup for my cubicle.) All in all, it was a fantastic day.

Sunday morning we slept in, went to church, and had lunch at a great Tex-Mex place. Then we had to (sob) go home. I was sad to leave so soon, but I'm very glad we got to go on the trip. I needed to see Em, and I love New Orleans. Everything is so green there. On the way home, though, right outside of Jackson, Kathy's car stopped accelerating and eventually died. We called her dad and he said he would come and meet us. Thankfully, we got the car going again and as long as we kept it below 60 mph, it ran. Her dad met us in Grenada and followed us home. So we got home late, but at least we got there.

Okay, that's enough for now.

I'm still in Miami! I got horribly sunburned today after an hour and a half out in the boat. Yeah, it was dumb not to put sunscreen on, but it was such a short time and it was raining part of the time. Sheesh. Anyway, now I am on fire.

Yesterday (the 4th) was an odd day. Fun, but not the best 4th I've ever had. We had a big party here at my grandfather's house, and a bunch of my extended relatives showed up...and one of my more, um, "interesting" relatives invited about ten of his "interesting" friends, none of whom any of us had met before. Yay. However, we did order in some great Italian food and Publix cake, I got to take a brief boat ride, and I learned a card trick from my aforesaid relative's cool 78-year-old grandmother. :)

Today we went out on the boat, as I've mentioned, and went to a sandbar in Biscayne Bay to swim around. The tide was coming in, and the current was so strong that we had to hold onto ropes behind the boat to avoid being swept away. My siblings and cousin and I had several rope relay races, pulling ourselves up the rope to the boat and then letting go and swooping to the end again. It was fun. Then we had lunch at Shuckers on the bay, one of my favorite places to eat in Miami. We came back to the house and by the time we had cleaned up, it was time to go to other family friends' house for another dinner. That was fun, too, except for my pain from the sunburn.

Tomorrow morning we're going to the beach again so my sister can attempt, again, to go parasailing (long story), and then I have to go back to the airport and go home. I'm annoyed about getting on another plane, but not so annoyed about the going home. Surprisingly. I'll see you guys on the flip side.

Happy 25th birthday, Jeremy! I hope you have a great day. I'll have something for you when I get back from Miami. Till then, my present can be the memory of me eating okra for you on your birthday many years ago. :)

Have you guys heard of Josh Kelley? He has a new song out that I really like. He went to Ole Miss, Danielle, so you might want to check him out.

The two people in my department who weren't on Weight Watchers joined today. It makes me wonder if I should, too. :P

I am so ready to leave for Miami. I wish I had time to meet up with nikichick4 while I was there, but my parents would probably flip out. And since it's a family trip, I have no idea what our schedule is like. Nicole, I'm planning to come back with my friends sometime, and then we can hang out. :) I'm glad my dad is there for this vacation. Every summer since we've moved here, he's driven us to Miami, caught a plane home, flown back to Miami when we're ready to leave, and driven us back. It must have been awful for him. Now he has a lot of vacation time, so he's able to actually stay with the family, and I'm the one who has to fly and cut it short. (But I don't have to spend four days in the car with them. Yay!)

Anyway, soon I will be enjoying the beach, eating Publix cake, lounging in the hammock by the canal, racing across the bay in the boat, listening to my grandfather tell us about the American Airlines Arena for the tenth time, stuffing myself at Mario the Baker, and seeing people from my childhood. I will be Home again at last. I'm especially looking forward to the boat. I never feel more myself than when I'm on a fast boat with my hair being thrashed by the salty wind. :)

Behave yourselves while I'm gone and have a great Fourth!

Hello all! I am updating from Jessica's apartment. Just because I can. :) We're having an awesome time. More to come when I get home!

I'm home!

My trip was wonderful. I love Las Vegas, which was a surprise. I expected it to be sleazy and kind of scary and dirty. I certainly didn't expect to see such beauty everywhere. I know it's all funded by dirty money, but the creativity and over-the-top-ness of everything just amazed me. And the weather and the scenery were beautiful. In that regard, it almost pained me to come back to flat, cold, overcast Memphis. :P

Here's my Vegas photo album. There were way too many pictures to post, plus I wanted non-journal people to see them.

There's so much to tell about the trip, but here are some of the high points.

- Cirque de Soleil was absolutely amazing. The show is called O. It's a water show. We had sixth row seats. There's so much going on during the show that you can hardly keep up with it all; people are diving and flipping and dancing all over the place. The water tank has platform-like things that rise and sink as needed, so that sometimes the whole tank seemed to disappear under the platform. At one point some guys dove from the rafters, and all I could think was, What if they forgot to lower the platform all the way? But nobody died, and I was very glad. :)

- My meetings were generally painless, even informative! I learned some valuable things! Then, on one of the afternoons, they had a comedian come in. His name is Chris Bliss, in case some of you have heard of him. He's apparently famous in the juggling world; he once juggled as an opening act for Michael Jackson. :)

- We went to the hotel brand conference Wednesday morning. The speaker there was Jamie Clarke. He climbed Mt. Everest in 1997. He was probably the best speaker I have ever heard. His story was amazing. Men were crying. I heard that he wrote a book about his experiences; I definitely want to read it.

- We couldn't go to Hoover Dam because it's closed this time of year. I was kind of glad, since we wouldn't have had time to go anyway, and that way I didn't feel bad about it. :)

- I played two slot machines. I lost both times. I did not feel the need to play any more. :)

I'll post more later as I think of it. Now I will try to catch up on my friends page.

I'm back! I had an interesting trip. On the whole, it was very good. Evan took this picture of me at large group one morning. It's not too clear at this size, but it's proof that indeed, I was at summer conference. :)

The trip did not get off to the best start. My plane to Tallahassee was late, and it was one of those commuter planes that seat about 20 people. My seat was right next to the wing, and there was a hole in the engine cover which was patched by- I kid you not- a piece of tinfoil. I watched that tinfoil for the entire flight, wondering what I should do if I saw it come off. But as we landed, I started smiling and smiling. It always happens to me when I go to Florida. Something in my body knows that I am going Home, and I am full of joy, and my heart is singing the Orange Blossom Song. (Phillip, you might understand. :))

I was amused by the Tallahassee airport. I had been concerned about finding Harris, but the place was the size of my office building, so I sat down in the hallway to wait. (Yes. THE hallway.) After a few minutes, I saw Evan coming through the door. I had just seen him the night before, but I was happy to see him, and so pleased that he came to get me. Silly, but it was one of the better moments of the trip. :)

We went back to Harris's parents' house, where we all spent the weekend. On Saturday, we went skiing. It was fun. On Sunday (Mother's Day), Ryan took me to Publix to get a cake, due to my obsession with Publix and its bakery. (Yes, Steve, Publix is only in Florida and Georgia, and no one is sadder about it than me. :)) I was upset at the time, due to events which I will not document in this journal, and Ryan could see I was in need of cheering up. He suggested we have something fun written on the cake. After much consideration, we ran back to the bakery.
Brenda: Do you write things on the cakes for free?
Bakery Girl: Yes, what would you like?
Brenda: (laughing) "Happy Mother's Day, Harris."
Bakery Girl: (puzzled) Harris?
Brenda and Ryan: (hysterical, unable to get words out) Yes!
Bakery Girl: May I ask what's so funny?
(Ryan, later: "You're putting a man's name on a Mother's Day cake! Do you not see what's funny about that?")
So we got our cake. Everyone laughed. Harris was, um, surprised. :) That night, a few of us sat up late singing RUF songs, and it was a really special time.

On Monday we drove over to Panama City for the conference. And so began five days of good teaching and hanging out on the beach (and inter-group conflicts, but I won't talk about those here). I took some wonderful seminars, which I will talk about later. The main speaker was Jeffrey Lancaster, a pastor from New Orleans. He was incredible. I wish I could go to his church. :)

On Wednesday night, there was a talent show. It was undoubtedly won by a band from the Oklahoma RUF called Where Are My Pants? I can't express in words how hilarious they are. Think early Barenaked Ladies. They have a song about a man who is a clown, but insists that he's not. I was hurting from laughing so hard. They have a CD, which I have ordered, and as soon as I find their website, I will be linking to them. :)

Thursday night was our group night out. We went to Buffalo Bob's for seafood. I got shrimp and crab cakes, which were very good. Then we went to an arcade that we go to every year. Evan and I were the only ones who vaguely remembered where it was, so of course, we got lost. It was a beautiful night, and there were a whole bunch of us in the van with the windows down, all dressed up, lost, and singing along to "Hard to Say I'm Sorry" by Chicago at the top of our lungs. It was fun. :)

So I had fun, but it was definitely a "growing" trip. I did a lot of thinking, realized a lot of things, and dealt with a lot of problems. It was not like the carefree summer conferences of old. But I don't think that's bad. I am very glad that I had the experience. Maybe I will share some of my reflections later.

Congratulations to anyone who made it this far. Hey, I have to make up for my absence, right? :)