friday eve my arse!

man, i don't think today could get any longer. i'm in hiatus right now on my board stuff and haven't started ANY grant writing, so i've just been researching and taking notes on foundations that fund in the areas i think i'm going to be applying in. bor-ring. i'm making all of these tedious lists, and i'll pobably never use them. but i really don't have anything else that i can really work on until next week when staff reports come rolling in...
i took my first sick day on tuesday because i thought i'd be cute wednesday and do some rockette-rockette kicks in between my jazz and ballet segments on my "dance it off" exercise video to boost my calorie-burning. yeah, i couldn't sit tuesday morning. my lower back hurt so bad, that standing and lying down were about all i could handle. which doesn't really work at a job where you sit at a desk all day. and so, today, my entire middle back is killing me, and now i'm all squirmy in my chair. i just want to go home...
i am really looking forward to the weekend, though. tomorrow i get my first salary paycheck ever! now that's cause for celebration (especially since we've totally depleted our "savings" and have no money). saturday we're going to little rock to "shop" for a ceremony/reception site. we've got appointments at the lafayette building (left), the manor house & gardens (below) and the albert pike hotel (last...though i don't think i'll have that bride there!). then we're off to perry for will's birthday party...old married man! hopefully i can get in a swim at the watershed on sunday and some sushi at some point...

bad mood

man, i'm in such a nose dive. time of the month, feeling left-out, living in batesville with no friends, blah, blah, blah. thinking i'll eat a candy bar that megan brought me back from the netherlands (nuts bars--think snickers but with hazelnuts--i'm rationing them) when i get home to cheer myself up.

on a less somber note, there's this woman that works part time here in the office that totally reminds me of the creepy little lady from poltergeist (carol anne, go into the light...yeah) in both looks and sound. it's kind of freaking me out. i don't like it when she talks--i know, i'm a terrible person, but it's a really scary movie to have to be reminded of all the freakin time!

just words

i've now successfully gotten up at 6:27 for two mornings in a row. many may say "pish posh", but to me this is quite a feat. we decided that we'd rather our work hours be from 8 to 4 than workin the 9 to 5. and this is really the first time trevor and i have had to share a bathroom to get ready to leave at the same time. hence the almost 7:00 posting.
the jobs are going to be good. trevor's doing more maintainence-type work, which at first bummed him out i think (he was looking forward to being a farm-boy), but he's come to realize that he's going to learn a ton working under his supervisor...like welding and laying tile, etc. yeah, build me a house, buddy. i've finally got a long and snazzy title: i'm the executive assistant to the ceo for program development. oh, and i'm also now the board relations gal, which means i'm starting to spend much of my time at the copy machine printing stuff on the wrong side of the 3-holed paper and saying "well, i guess i've got more scrap paper now!" there are effectively 4 different types of boards. yeah.
the house is kind of coming along. the spare bedroom is not quite living up to that name, however, because we don't actually have anything on which a guest could sleep. unless they're a cat. we're looking to get a futon, once the cash gets a rollin, but until now it's kind of the room where all of the yet-to-be-used decor hangs out.
well, it's about time for me to get ready for work. oh, and we're cooking up a houswarming idea...probably next weekend (not this father's day weekend, of course). any interest???

a series of fortunate posts

whew, i've just finished the following 3 posts with accompanying pictures. it seemed easier to split up the post into multiples. but it sure took a long time to get them just right. so take a look at what we've been up to the last 2 weeks. busy as the bees. i, of course, didn't get shots of everything, and we sure did a lot.

in fact, there's a whole lot that's left out. so here's a little list of other things we did:

*ate. and ate. and ate. meat at lunch and dinner...and i don't mean deli slices. pie. dinner rolls with homemade strawberry jam. i'm fatter, for sure.
*spent lots of time with trevor's family. and his best pal, rick.
*saw x-men III
*went to the bretheren young adult conference in pennsylvania. saw my grandmother that lives there (haven't seen since 7th grade). did not, however, see any horse-drawn buggies. bummer.
*tried to get chanda's vw bug posted on ebay. yeah, if you're looking to buy a baby blue bug, let me know.
*watched a lot of tv. animal planet. the little zoo that could.
*went contra dancing. man, i loved it! i wish i could find something like that going on around batesville.

i'm sure there's loads more that i'm leaving out, but i'm sure you're already bored to tears, and you've still got 3 more posts to go!

coming soon: pictures of the house with (ghasp!) furniture and the like. kitchen: check. dining/living room: almost check. rest of house: negatory.

oh, and call if you want the really big news...

home, home on the range

well, it's not exactly a range, but it sure is enough for me. trevor's "homeplace" is just about perfect. his grandfather built the house in the early 50s, and it sits on about 10 acres or so. yeah, the new plan: put a house on the back end of the land and start homesteading and maybe a goat dairy...mmmmmcheese (his oldest sister, chanda, is on board as well). just have to find jobs in northeast tennessee...

here's the "treehouse" trevor and his sisters grew up playing in. it's actually built on top of the well pump. sweet.









this is a morcel of the amazing farmland across the street that, very sadly, has been sold and split into a 97-lot "planned residential community" called red foxx run. snazzy. and the worst part is that the showy entrance will be directly across from trevor's family's house. poop on that.


a dark shot of trevor on the porch swing. it's really shaded and hard to believe how much cooler it feels hanging out on the porch than anywhere else.





this is a round hay baler. i'd actually never seen a round baler--only square. the baler kind of "poops" out the bale. man, i love farm implements.

a day of hiking

on wednesday of last week trevor took me to linville falls in western north carolina for a bit of a hike. it was a short, but difficult hike down to the falls and back, but it was totally worth it. the pictures i took don't to it any justice. the falls aren't all that tall, but it's a beautiful sight.
to make the trip more adventuresome, my knee and then hip were in some serious pain by the end of the day, and trevor's car's (the faithful red jetta) windshield wipers decided to poop out on our way to grandfather mountain. and, of course, it was raining. it took us an hour longer to get home because we kept having to pull the car over because trevor couldn't see. yikes. but it was still a great day.
ahh, i am the master of the squinty, chubby cheek face!
no, these aren't quite the smoky mountains. more so the blue ridge. but they sure do look smoky...

blue plum festival

good times were had by all at the blue plum festival in johnson city, tn. i sweet-talked ellen into coming into town from nc to hang out for a night, and she even brought a new pal, jessica. when we met up with them, ellen's car was on the fritz, and trevor's dad ended up replacing 2 belts! he said she wouldn't have made it back to nc without having caught those problems. thanks, hollis!
the festival was good fun. lots of art, food and music. i bought some pottery, ate an organic black bean quesedillia and a bloomin onion (by no means organic!), and listened to martha scanlan (formerly of the reeltime travelers...think soundtrack to cold mountain), the waybacks and railroad earth (both non-native bluegrass bands. love it).


in this picture we've got trevor's bff, rick; ellen's friend from "the farm", jessica; and miss ellen herself.
and here we have trevor; his sister, gwen; and gwen's bf, ben (aka "gwenjamin").

i'm baaack...

and will begin the dubious task of unpacking boxes and putting everything in its place (because, baby, it's got one). let the madness commence.

will post later with photos and tales from the two week adventure that was tennessee (and pennsylvania, and north carolina, and maybe some virginia).

oh, and i'm off until thursday when i start my new job, so give me a call and help me fight the boredom.