Daniel's Little Sister Gets Married

On Friday we drove to the Nashville area via Chattanooga (we were dropping off a car for a friend). This made our drive longer, but it was much prettier driving along the Nantahala and Ocoee Rivers on the way.

We made it to Woodbury, TN just in time for the rehearsal and then we all drove back to Murfreesboro for the rehearsal dinner. We spent the night at Daniel's Grandmother's on Friday night. She was up early on Saturday to finish prepping food for the wedding. We enjoyed breakfast with her, before we all got ourselves ready and headed for Woodbury.

The wedding was small, but very pretty. The best part was filling their car with balloons and decorating the windows.

I wanna make you smile whenever you're sad
Carry you around when your arthritis is bad
All I wanna do is grow old with you

I'll get your medicine when your tummy aches
Build you a fire if the furnace breaks
Oh it could be so nice, growing old with you

I'll miss you
I'll kiss you
Give you my coat when you are cold

I'll need you
I'll feed you
Even let ya hold the remote control

So let me do the dishes in our kitchen sink
Put you to bed if you've had too much to drink
I could be the man who grows old with you
I wanna grow old with you

This song from the Wedding Singer was the song that Emily and Josh walked out to after saying their "I do's." It is a sweet song - maybe one of my favorites.

After the wedding, we headed back to Murfreesboro to have dinner with our friends, Matt and Melissa, who we have not seen in about a year. Matt and Melissa have been renovating their home, so we had a lot of stories to share. We stayed up until midnight catching up on life.

Afterwards we headed to Daniel's Grandma's house to spend the night. Early this morning, Daniel's Dad woke us up so we could have breakfast with them before we hit the road. We actually were so tired that we went back to bed when they left for church.

Anyways, we are home now. It was nice to get to see so many people.

Bleeding

This post is not what you think. There have been no accidents and no late night trips to the ER. Instead, Daniel spent the afternoon changing out the rear drum brakes and shoes on the Altima... it needed to be done before our back to back trips across the mountains (Nashville this weekend and Searcy next weekend).

The bleeding has to do with my part in the job. Once Daniel has the new brake parts installed, I get the glamorous job of sitting in the driver's seat and gently pushing the brake peddle in order to bleed out all of the old brake fluid.

Tomorrow morning will be an early one for us as we head to Nashville via Chattanooga. Some of our friends are moving to Chattanooga and we offered to drive their extra vehicle there.

Bike Log

You may be wondering how Daniel and I function with just one car between us. Here is an example of what happens when Daniel has to go in early to work AND he has an all day seminar in a different part of town.

5:30 a.m. Daniel bikes to work.
7:45 a.m. Cheree leaves the house to drive to LandDesign with a bike loaded on the bike rack.
8:15 a.m. Cheree picks up Daniel and we add his bike to the bike rack.
8:20 a.m. Daniel drops Cheree and bike off at Enventys then drives to University for his seminar.
3:00 p.m. Daniel drives home after his seminar (with his bike still locked to the bike rack).
6:00 p.m. Cheree leaves downtown and bikes the 10 miles home.

So that is how we do it...

Comments on today's ride:

• It was extremely hot to be riding. The kind of hot where you can feel the heat radiating up off of the road.
• I almost got hit by a car - the driver was not paying attention.
• I made it home in exactly an hour - this is a new record for me.

High School Reunion

My 10 year high school reunion was this past weekend. It's still is hard to believe high school was that long ago. I decided not to go for a variety of reasons - distance, gas costs, just not feeling it. It is odd that I don't really feel bad for missing. It would have been nice to see people, but I don't feel terrible for not going. Maybe next time...

Biking Log

Here's a clear map:
http://www.mapmyrun.com/ride/united-states/nc/charlotte/884506610284

 

Tonight was the first time that I biked home alone. Daniel had something come up and had to go home early. So my choices were to bike alone, ride the bus home or wait for him to come pick me up.

I have biked the route often enough with Daniel that I decided that it was something I could do alone. Thankfully I didn't get lost (the route is mostly through neighborhoods that wind their way through Charlotte).

In the hour that I had to ride I had a lot of time to think. I have come to the conclusion that I really love biking. I remember the when we first bought my bike and Daniel took me on my first real ride. To be honest, it was petrifying. The entire trail was gravel with steep hills that were tough to go up and had me scared-to-death coming down. I grasped the brakes the entire time and the gravel made me feel like I was going to crash at any moment.

Since then, I have biked countless dirt trails and last summer, Daniel even convinced me to ride on the Cherohala Skyway (my first real attempt at road biking with skinny tires). I never imagined that I would be able to go close to 40 mph on a bike, coming down a hill. It was terrifying and thrilling all wrapped into one.

Today, as I rode, I thought about the freedom that riding my bike brings. The power that it takes to push up the hills. The feeling of flying when you are just coasting along or rushing down a hill.

I am not always crazy about traffic or the random people that feel the need to honk or yell at you. But overall, there is a peacefulness that comes with riding. It was nice to have an hour to just enjoying being outside with my thoughts.

The images aren't the greatest, but they show the route I take to get home. It meanders through many neighborhoods and parts of Charlotte. The red line denotes my route - starting at work, cutting through the Panther's Stadium. Making my way down Trade to CPCC. Going around the hospital. Cutting over across Randolph, through Myers Park. Coming out briefly at Providence Rd before cutting back to Wendover on Vernon. Taking Wendover to a short ride on Randolph, before going up Sharon Amity to Addison and finally making my way into the Stonehave/Waverly Hall neighborhoods. All of this in about 10-ish miles, one way.

Sunday Breakfast

My little brother had a layover in Charlotte this morning. He is on his way to be a counselor at Camp Ganderbrook in Maine for the summer. It worked out that we were able to go pick him up and take him out for breakfast at The Original Pancake House (one of my favorites). I am glad we were able to see him since he is missing our family reunion later this summer and it is unlikely that we will see him again before Christmas.

 

Everyday Edisons Season 2 Premiere

This is a note to brag on where I work. I think that I work at a pretty great place and I want to share that with all of my family and friends...

About tonight's premiere. I am glad that our internal premiere was low key and a not red carpet extravaganza. I like that I can show up in blue jeans and flip flops and enjoy good food with friends. Last year they did go to DC for the red carpet premier of season 1, but as far as I am concerned, it was nice for it to be here.

Anyways, after dinner we enjoyed watching a reel of the last 3 years of what Enventys has accomplished with this little PBS tv show. As someone who is a fairly recent addition to the company it is amazing to see a group of people genuinely like each other so much and generally enjoying working together. I have never had a job where I enjoyed showing up every day. I know it has its ups and downs, but it is hands down the best place I have ever worked.

After the reminiscent reel, we watched episode 5 that showcased a lot of our staff. There were some comical scenes and I enjoyed seeing what the film guys had put together. Overall it was a nice way to spend a Thursday night AND I didn't have to cook which made it even better.

If you are interested in watching the show or just interested in seeing some of what I do, where I work and who I work with, the first episode of Season 2 of Everyday Edisons airs this Sunday (June 22). Note that I am not actually in the show since I did not start working there until late in the season.

A schedule of show times is below. If I didn't list where you live, feel free to look it up at pbs.org.

In Charlotte the show will air SUN at 7pm & FRI at 10:30pm on WTVI.
Statewide in North Carolina the show will air on UNC-TV SUN at noon.

In Memphis the show will air on SAT at 3pm on WKNOHD (Channel 10.1)

Unfortunately the show does not air in Arkansas or Nashville.

Would You Do It Again?

This is the question that Daniel just posed to me. Actually, the entirety of the question was, "You know, when we drove to Mark & Carolina's wedding in Mexico? Would you do it again?"

This led into a conversation about tiling our shower (which we are still in progress with). Well, we really had a interesting/fun experience driving to Durango, Mexico, but due to the length of time we took to drive there (72 hours round trip) we probably would not do it again (especially with gas prices where they are now).

We have come to the conclusion that tiling a shower pan and stall (mostly the pan) may be in this same category. While we are glad we are doing it, it has become such a time consuming hassle, that we probably wouldn't do it again.

Whenever we finish the bathroom, I will post pics of the entire process... don't hold your breath for it to be any time soon though. We have several weekends left of work and the last 2 weekends in June we will be gone.

Crazy Week

It seems like life always seems to be at one end of the pendulum or the other. In recent weeks I have had very little to work to do at work. But then this past week hit with a vengeance. Thankfully I prefer the craziness of having too much to do verses having little to do.

The week started with wrapping up the August issue of Inventors Digest. With the editor out of town, this made things tricky. I had some last minute craziness with Photoshop corrupting a good portion of my images as well as some other occurrences of Murphy's Law coming into play.

On top of that we have been preparing to pitch campaign ideas to March of Dimes (MOD) this coming Tuesday. As a group, this has meant extra meetings to hone in on the three best ideas and then more work to continue to tweak those ideas. The concepts are the MOD equivalent to the Red Dress Campaign for the American Heart Association... except our campaign revolves around awareness of what MOD is doing to make sure every baby is born healthy. Hopefully the presentation will go well and we will get the project.

I am also working on rebranding a non-profit organization called Harvester's International Ministries (HIM). They connect churches with indigenous missionaries in Africa and India. I am very excited to be working on this project. I have a presentation to them this coming Thursday so this week looks like it will be hectic as well. Like I said, I would rather be busy that not.

This weekend we are continuing work on the shower. We are on phase three - installing a Kerdi liner. Once this sets up we can start tiling... probably next weekend at the earliest.

Deal Of The Day

Last Friday, Daniel and I went to a local tile shop to pick up some materials we needed for our bathroom renovation project. While we were there, we checked out their selection of tile because we were still looking for the perfect 2x2 inch tile for our shower floor.

The sales person showed us their tiles and happened to mention that one type was actually on sale. We are always up for a bargain, so we took a look at the sale tile. Out of all of the tiles in the showroom, this particular tile was pretty much what we had been looking for. However, we wanted to take a sample home to make sure before we spent any money.

The sales person said they had about 100 square feet of the tile in stock and that we should have no problem coming by and picking up the 30 sq ft that we needed. We went home and sure enough it was the perfect tile.

So fast forward through the weekend to today. Today, during lunch, we ran out to the tile store again to make sure we got our tile - we were nervous that it might sell out.

After ringing us up, the total for our 30 sq ft came to $200 (and this was the sale price). We went around back to pick up our order. When we made it to the back, Daniel noticed that there was a pallet of our particular tile sitting outside with a sign that said "Verona - 180 pieces for $150."

We thought it was strange that we had just spent $200 for 30 pieces when we could get 180 pieces for $50 cheaper. So we went back to the sales desk to see what was up. The clerk who rang up the order told us that he didn't know what we were talking about and sent us back to the back.

We were a bit annoyed that we had spent extra money and there seemed to be this great deal just sitting there. So Daniel asked the guy that would be loading the tile for us what the deal was. It eventually came out that the guys in the back had been told to throw out the tile and that they had decided to sell it on the sly (to possible contractors) and pocket the money without the employer's knowledge... Let's just say that the three guys responsible for loading the tile are probably in a lot of trouble.

Finally Daniel went inside to talk to a manager, who was nice enough to refund our money and give us the cheaper price as well as give us ALL 180 pieces of tile. On a side note, while Daniel was inside talking to the manager, the guy he was talking to about the sign went and threw the sign away in a dumpster and then went and got a forklift to move the pallet of tile inside. I guess he didn't notice me sitting there watching him do this. I suppose it was his way of trying to cover up his mistake.

We figured out that if the tile was selling at its full price, it would have cost someone over $3000 to purchase it. We got the entire lot for $150 - a 95% off discout.

Daniel unloaded all of the tile tonight while I cooked dinner - all 700 pounds of it (just a tad more than we need, right?). We are thinking about altering our tile design somewhat to incorporate more of this kind of tile. We are also considering selling some of it... who knows.

It was a great deal - not only did we get an extra 150 pieces of tile, we saved an extra $40 that we originally spent!

Do you suck the heads?

We just got back from spending the afternoon at a crawfish boil. It was a lot of fun, although spending a Saturday afternoon outside when it feels like 100 degrees and eating Cajun-spiced crawfish had us all sweating profusely. Thankfully there were a lot of cold drinks to keep us cool (the hurricanes were especially good).

The big question of the day was whether or not to suck the heads. I personally have a hard time putting something that looks like an over-sized insect in my mouth, but Daniel tried it.

80 pounds of crawfish (crayfish, crawdaddies, mud bugs, whatever you wanna call them) were flown in live from New Orleans on Thursday. Then today, they were boiled in a massive pot, along with lots of cajun spices, potatoes, sausage, onions, garlic, mushrooms... the works.

I think that the 30 of us only managed to eat about a third of all of the food. So, do you suck the heads when eating crawfish?