May Vacation

Video of our trip!

Vacation video...can you tell i'm getting obsessed with this new feature???

Pics from our trip to TN and SC....I know it's an odd song choice but the song was long enough to make it work! 

Vacation

Okay, I know several of you (Nicole) are rather mad at me that I call this vacation and kind of just treat Vegas as a non-vacation and you all wonder when I work. I do work...i just happen to get about 20 vacation days a year and I happen to spend them. :)

Anyway, this year we went to Gatlinburg, Tennessee (I will explain where the heck that is in a second) and Charleston, SC. 

Beth's parents have a timeshare through BlueGreen and we asked if we could use their places for our trip. For all but one night, the rooms were available so we were in good shape! 

Gatlinburg, TN is right next to Pigeon Forge (home of Dollywood) and also next to the Smoky Mountains National Park. Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge are basically like Branson and Wisconsin Dells...lots of gimmicky stuff and Ripley's Believe it or Not stuff. 

The Smoky Mountains were amazing and the park is just so great and incredibly huge. I had no idea how huge it actually was. 

The other big highlight was that we went whitewater rafting. There are 6 stages of difficulty...6 being the most difficult and dangerous. We had level 4's so it was still very good. I don't think i want to do the 6's. 

When I have a little more time I will put a link to a slide show on here. Until then, I will just post a few pics from Tennessee.

After a few days in Tennessee we went to Charleston, SC. Neither of us had been there (or Gatlinburg for that matter) so we were both excited. 

Charleston is a quaint city that is just really southern. It's hard to describe. Everyone dresses up all the time. You have the beach but they aren't known much for their seafood. They have a lot of southern dishes like grits and stuff like that. So that was a little odd. We took a tour on a mule-drawn carriage that gave us a little history and a ride around the downtown area. 

The first night we didn't have a hotel room. We went out to Folly Beach (which was beautiful) and then we went looking for some free wi-fi to find a hotel on hotwire.com. I remembered that chick-fil-a has free wi-fi and we saw one on our drive. We pulled in, and voila. Free internet on Beth's laptop. Hotwire is awesome by the way. We got a place for $88 per night and THIS is it. I think normally it goes for $150 a night. They had wine and cheese from 5-6pm, free breakfast delivered to your room, and I think there was a time for milk and cookies?? crazy.

We also got the use of free bikes while we were at the Elliot House Inn. It was nice to look around the city w/o having to drive or walk. 

Our second night in Charleston we went to Isle of Palms which is another area of Charleston kind of like Folly Beach. Awesome beach. We found this really great beach bar called Coconut Joe's that had food on one floor and a bar on the roof. A great reggae band was playing and it was just great to hear music on a roof overlooking the ocean.

Finally, we were able to see a plantation on our way out of town. There were several in the area each offering something a little different. We had a great time there...they had some restored slave cabins (which is always depressing to realize existed), we saw some alligators, took a tour of the house there and pet a deer that was in their little petting zoo. I think Beth felt bad for the deer in the "zoo" but at the same time, they were taken care of and didn't have the threat of being killed by a hunter...so who knows. Again, I have posted some pics below. Hopefully I will get a slide show on here soon!

 

New Garden

Beth and I decided that we wanted a garden for our house. We're not 100% sure what we're planting yet but it will include tomatoes, peppers, and herbs.

I found some directions on building the garden frame online and created the garden box a few weeks ago.

Then we went and got our dirt! Our garden is 3 ft x 8 ft so it has a considerable amount of volume. We found that out quickly when we purchased the dirt. 

And the amount we purchased doesn't even fill it 2/3 of the way. 

I'll post about our vacation when I have time.

Viva Las Vegas!

Here are our pictures from Vegas. I finally broke down and used Picassa...and I love it! I didn't know you could make movies. I am waaaay behind the times.

Happy April Fool's Day

I thought I could make it through this day without getting fooled but it only took about 10 minutes. I didn't fall for the first one, which said that the L Word was going to do a "musical movie" which I thought was the worst idea I'd ever heard of...and then I remembered what day it was.

The one that got me was a friend of mine from h.s. who posted on his facebook page that after spending 9 years in L.A. he finally got his first acting gig, and posted a link to info about the gig. I clicked on it, and proceeded to get Rick Rolled. I think it's hilarious that he used the joke from last year to bring it back for April Fool's. Well played. 

This is the first week of the spring quarter (i'm already counting down the days til June) and work is nuts. Well, semi-nuts now. Softball is out of town and all the bball coaches are about to leave to go to their respective final fours. So hopefully i can get a lot of work done the rest of this week because.....

next week we'll be heading to VEGAS!!! We get there Wednesday (after a nice 6:15am flight) and will come back on Easter. WEEE! Can't wait. 

the perks of being a host city

Yesterday 2 teams practiced here for the tourney. I got to see Tennessee (but not my old asst coach, Coach Forbes, who was just getting to dayton from recruiting which made me sad). UT had their walk ons outside in the parking lot because the gym was so crowded. Their team must have 35 people on it. It looked like a basketball camp! Sienna also had a practice. Then today Eastern or Western Tennessee State was here...and then Louisville. Ugh, i hate louisville. All their coaches are so cocky. You could just tell they thought they were the shit. annoying. 

Well, i am going to head home to eat something and start packing my crap! then the driving begins! 

Crazy driving

So, as you probably know, UD (Dayton) is in the NCAA tournament. Poor Dayton...they are not picked to do very well. Actually, i watched a video clip this morning from Joe Lunardi (the bracketology guru) and he says that the game vs. West Virginia is going to be an ugly one. He already talks about how WV is going to do in the second round. haha! however, it is the tournament and anything can happen in the tournament. I feel like i felt when Dayton was about to play Pitt last year. Everyone thought it was going to be a blowout and Dayton ended up winning the game. I hope my "gut" is right again. Why, you ask, do i care so much? This leads me to  the title of my blog post.

Yes, I am driving to Minneapolis to watch the team play WV. Fortunately there are two other people going with me to break up the drive. it's an 11 hr drive. We leave after work tomorrow. We should get there around 3am ... yikes. So I really really hope they win because it will be a pretty short trip if not. I was going to try and fly but flights were ridic and with 3 people driving, we'll each only have to drive about 4 hrs. Wish us luck! 

I am most excited for Beth getting to experience this. I remember when my own team got to "dance" and how fun it is. It is fun to see the guys you work with get all excited about it and see how special things are for them. My personal favorite part was having a police escort to the arena. I don't think anything makes you feel more important than that! Anyway, these guys have become her own kids so I know how proud she is of them. I've told her several times that I want to adopt London when he's done with school...he just doesn't know it yet. 

wish us luck and pray for our safety!