Thursday, January 1, 2009
Friday, December 12, 2008
Trip Up-Date #4 - Final Up-Date
We have been back home for a while now, I figured it is about time do the final posting.
We weren't what you call 'fans' of Louisville. It was a really nice city but just to much like Winston for us. We were plenty bored and there for a long time. It was really nice to have the extended stay hotel. We went to some great restaurants - especially Flanagan's Ale House, which was almost awesome enough to keep Louisville on the coveted list. We did finally find a cute area with lots of shopping where I bought the CUTEST bag ever!
We left Louisville for Nashville to visit Susannah and Frank. We got in and found the apartment, very cute apartment and big! Well decorated thanks to craigslist (yay reusing!!). We hung out and talked and caught up, then Suz, Ashley and I picked up Suzie's friend Lisa and went for mexican. What else would Suz and I have as our first meal? Then we went to a coffee shop and just hung out for a few hours. Lisa was fun and Ashley and I now feel like unofficial members of Vanderbuilt's nursing/midwifery program after hearing the ins and outs and what we love and what we hate.
The next day we had a yummy breakfast made by Suz and then we headed to the cute shopping area of downtown that I always forget the name of (good description, I know). We hit the cute shops, saw 'Vandy', ate at Noshville (my FAVORITE!!!), and went to a fabulous cupcake shop. Then we went to Whole Foods and the Whole Foods store dedicated entirely to body stuff (soap, vitamin, jewelry, and clothes), then we went to Trader Joe's and it was great!!!! We headed to Suzie's and watched Clue and ate pizza. Ashley and I headed out the next morning and made the looooong trek home.
We got back and were the only ones home. We spent a really long time with the kitties, golly we missed them. We headed out the next day for the outer banks to spend Thanksgiving at Ashley aunts house and my Mom came down.
Thanksgiving was wonderful and everyone got a long well.
My Mom is inlove with her boyfriend and I will be meeting him next weekend when I go to see her to celebrate Christmas and her birthday.
I am SO pumped about this Christmas, I am finally spending it with my Girl. :-) :-) :-)
Now I am spending my days looking for work and playing on line and being a lazy bum. Ahhhh.
We weren't what you call 'fans' of Louisville. It was a really nice city but just to much like Winston for us. We were plenty bored and there for a long time. It was really nice to have the extended stay hotel. We went to some great restaurants - especially Flanagan's Ale House, which was almost awesome enough to keep Louisville on the coveted list. We did finally find a cute area with lots of shopping where I bought the CUTEST bag ever!
We left Louisville for Nashville to visit Susannah and Frank. We got in and found the apartment, very cute apartment and big! Well decorated thanks to craigslist (yay reusing!!). We hung out and talked and caught up, then Suz, Ashley and I picked up Suzie's friend Lisa and went for mexican. What else would Suz and I have as our first meal? Then we went to a coffee shop and just hung out for a few hours. Lisa was fun and Ashley and I now feel like unofficial members of Vanderbuilt's nursing/midwifery program after hearing the ins and outs and what we love and what we hate.
The next day we had a yummy breakfast made by Suz and then we headed to the cute shopping area of downtown that I always forget the name of (good description, I know). We hit the cute shops, saw 'Vandy', ate at Noshville (my FAVORITE!!!), and went to a fabulous cupcake shop. Then we went to Whole Foods and the Whole Foods store dedicated entirely to body stuff (soap, vitamin, jewelry, and clothes), then we went to Trader Joe's and it was great!!!! We headed to Suzie's and watched Clue and ate pizza. Ashley and I headed out the next morning and made the looooong trek home.
We got back and were the only ones home. We spent a really long time with the kitties, golly we missed them. We headed out the next day for the outer banks to spend Thanksgiving at Ashley aunts house and my Mom came down.
Thanksgiving was wonderful and everyone got a long well.
My Mom is inlove with her boyfriend and I will be meeting him next weekend when I go to see her to celebrate Christmas and her birthday.
I am SO pumped about this Christmas, I am finally spending it with my Girl. :-) :-) :-)
Now I am spending my days looking for work and playing on line and being a lazy bum. Ahhhh.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Trip Up-Date #3
So I left a bunch of cool things out of previous posts, it is so hard to summarize entire days of new stuff.
While in Philadelphia with N&L we walked by a church and just happened to catch eyes with the monk who lived there as he was crossing the door. He invited us in and gave us a tour of the church with lots of personal stories. He took our pictures and I got one of him. It was an amazing experience. He has had a rich life that started in Ireland and now had him in Philadelphia with a hundred points in between.
In Providence, RI Ashley and I ate a great brewery called Trinity (I think). We had their sample tray of beer and yummy food. In New Hampshire we ate at the Red Hook brewery, awesome food and a beer sampler, their beer wasn't really our style. We only spent the morning wandering around Maine, we had breakfast at a coffee roasters. The coffee was SO good.
Our reroute. As I said last time, we had to leave our liquor behind at the border crossing and come back through that one to pick it up. We decided to skip Buffalo/Niagra Falls to head back through the border and get our stuff, then go back to Philadelphia to visit with our family some more. Unfortunately, all the signs in Canada were in French and we weren't entirely sure where we were heading. We went through the wrong crossing and had to leave our liquor behind. We then proceeded to drive ALL of New York, which was pretty but L.O.N.G. on our way to Nadja and Lorien's.
We, of course, had a great time with them again and stayed a couple nights. We intended to stay one and then go of to Pittsburgh, but we just had too much fun. We got in late on Saturday and just hung out. Sunday we went to Nadja's championship kickball game (she is in the league). They were short a player at one point, so Ashley jumped in to play! It was a lot of fun, but, alas, we lost. The other team was terrible, personality wise. One guy was a real douche and there were a couple confrontations with him (go Lorien and Katie!). After the game, as is their team's tradition, we headed to Tattooed Moms (the awesome bar) and hung out. One of Nadja's team mates bought the first round and we just had a fun time hanging out with a bunch of new people. At some point during that night (whilst still sober on at least my part) we went to Infinity on South Street and I got my nose repierced!!! It looks great and the piercer was AMAZING. There was a group that went with me and we all just had a good time. Then we all headed back to Tattooed Moms where we drank the night away.
The next morning, Nadja went off to work and we spent the day hanging out with Lorien. We made a trip to Whole Foods, but other than that we hung around their apt. Two of their kitties weren't feeling well, so Lorien was keeping an eye on them. It was nice to have some down time. Ashley spent the whole day on the computer. Its how she rolls. We made dinner and ate all together then watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding. The next morning we got up in time to see Nadja off to work and then we got our stuff together and headed out.
We are at Tuesday at this point, for those of you trying to keep up. Ashley and I decided to head to Pittsburgh and stay the night in a hotel. On our way there we stopped of at Hershey!!! We went in their chocolate world and got some hot chocolate and wandered around. We got a chocolate bar that had our picture on it! FUN.
We got into Pittsburgh and we to eat at Primanti Brothers - the 'almost famous' restaurant that serves fries and coleslaw ON their sandwiches. It was delicious!!! We ate at the one in Market Square and walked around that area. We drove around the city a lot and then headed to the hotel. The next morning we decided to drive around more because we really like the city, we at Lebanese for lunch and then got back on the road. I really like Pittsburgh, so does Ashley. Our potential places to live list now has" Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and DC with the first two at a tie.
The drive to Louisville was LONG but we got to go through Ohio and see Cincinnati. We got to our hotel late and just crashed in for the night. Oh, side story. So we were supposed to be staying at a friend's uncle's unoccupied house while in Louisville. Turns out none of his utilities were turned on, so he instead 'took the liberty' of booking us 4 nights at an extended stay hotel. Yep, you read correctly. He paid and everything. Isn't that really nice? Of course it is. He has only met me once, briefly, and has never met Ashley.
Originally, Louisville was the top of my list for places to move...but it has been cut. Don't get me wrong, it is a REALLY nice place and I like it a lot, but our wants have shifted. Suzie's mom described it as a bigger Winston-Salem and it really is exactly that. At one point we were renaming the streets after their Winston version. We have decided that we want to live in a city where we can just take the metro everywhere, and Louisville only had a bus service but most people drive.
Anyways, yesterday we spent most of the day in the hotel just puttering around and unwinding (we are both glad this is the last leg of our trip). We finally left around 2:30 and went to eat at the BEST RESTAURANT EVER. It is called Lynn's Paradise Cafe. There is a gift shop full of odd items and fun stuff and the cafe itself is just a burst of color and quirk. Everything is painted or decoupaged there is a fake tree in the middle with trinkets on it, including fish. The tables have toys on them and mad gab cards. It is just super fun and the food was amazing. Love, love, love this place. We then tried to find a farmer's market, but it didn't happen because of the snow.
Oh yeah, we have had LOTS of snow the last few days. Driving through PA and in Pittsburgh there was tons of it and there have been lots of flurries here and there in Ohio and Kentucky.
Instead of the farmer's market, we went to the visitors' center where I stocked up on literature (one of my loves in life). We drove around to get the feel of the city and scope out where we might want to go - it was just too damn cold for Ashley to walk around. We decided to spend another night in, so we went to Whole Foods and got dinner then had a nice dinner in the room and talked a lot about the cities we visited and their pros and cons.
Today we are going to explore more of Louisville and maybe go back to Cincinnati as a day trip tomorrow.
Whew!
Hope you all are doing well!
While in Philadelphia with N&L we walked by a church and just happened to catch eyes with the monk who lived there as he was crossing the door. He invited us in and gave us a tour of the church with lots of personal stories. He took our pictures and I got one of him. It was an amazing experience. He has had a rich life that started in Ireland and now had him in Philadelphia with a hundred points in between.
In Providence, RI Ashley and I ate a great brewery called Trinity (I think). We had their sample tray of beer and yummy food. In New Hampshire we ate at the Red Hook brewery, awesome food and a beer sampler, their beer wasn't really our style. We only spent the morning wandering around Maine, we had breakfast at a coffee roasters. The coffee was SO good.
Our reroute. As I said last time, we had to leave our liquor behind at the border crossing and come back through that one to pick it up. We decided to skip Buffalo/Niagra Falls to head back through the border and get our stuff, then go back to Philadelphia to visit with our family some more. Unfortunately, all the signs in Canada were in French and we weren't entirely sure where we were heading. We went through the wrong crossing and had to leave our liquor behind. We then proceeded to drive ALL of New York, which was pretty but L.O.N.G. on our way to Nadja and Lorien's.
We, of course, had a great time with them again and stayed a couple nights. We intended to stay one and then go of to Pittsburgh, but we just had too much fun. We got in late on Saturday and just hung out. Sunday we went to Nadja's championship kickball game (she is in the league). They were short a player at one point, so Ashley jumped in to play! It was a lot of fun, but, alas, we lost. The other team was terrible, personality wise. One guy was a real douche and there were a couple confrontations with him (go Lorien and Katie!). After the game, as is their team's tradition, we headed to Tattooed Moms (the awesome bar) and hung out. One of Nadja's team mates bought the first round and we just had a fun time hanging out with a bunch of new people. At some point during that night (whilst still sober on at least my part) we went to Infinity on South Street and I got my nose repierced!!! It looks great and the piercer was AMAZING. There was a group that went with me and we all just had a good time. Then we all headed back to Tattooed Moms where we drank the night away.
The next morning, Nadja went off to work and we spent the day hanging out with Lorien. We made a trip to Whole Foods, but other than that we hung around their apt. Two of their kitties weren't feeling well, so Lorien was keeping an eye on them. It was nice to have some down time. Ashley spent the whole day on the computer. Its how she rolls. We made dinner and ate all together then watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding. The next morning we got up in time to see Nadja off to work and then we got our stuff together and headed out.
We are at Tuesday at this point, for those of you trying to keep up. Ashley and I decided to head to Pittsburgh and stay the night in a hotel. On our way there we stopped of at Hershey!!! We went in their chocolate world and got some hot chocolate and wandered around. We got a chocolate bar that had our picture on it! FUN.
We got into Pittsburgh and we to eat at Primanti Brothers - the 'almost famous' restaurant that serves fries and coleslaw ON their sandwiches. It was delicious!!! We ate at the one in Market Square and walked around that area. We drove around the city a lot and then headed to the hotel. The next morning we decided to drive around more because we really like the city, we at Lebanese for lunch and then got back on the road. I really like Pittsburgh, so does Ashley. Our potential places to live list now has" Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and DC with the first two at a tie.
The drive to Louisville was LONG but we got to go through Ohio and see Cincinnati. We got to our hotel late and just crashed in for the night. Oh, side story. So we were supposed to be staying at a friend's uncle's unoccupied house while in Louisville. Turns out none of his utilities were turned on, so he instead 'took the liberty' of booking us 4 nights at an extended stay hotel. Yep, you read correctly. He paid and everything. Isn't that really nice? Of course it is. He has only met me once, briefly, and has never met Ashley.
Originally, Louisville was the top of my list for places to move...but it has been cut. Don't get me wrong, it is a REALLY nice place and I like it a lot, but our wants have shifted. Suzie's mom described it as a bigger Winston-Salem and it really is exactly that. At one point we were renaming the streets after their Winston version. We have decided that we want to live in a city where we can just take the metro everywhere, and Louisville only had a bus service but most people drive.
Anyways, yesterday we spent most of the day in the hotel just puttering around and unwinding (we are both glad this is the last leg of our trip). We finally left around 2:30 and went to eat at the BEST RESTAURANT EVER. It is called Lynn's Paradise Cafe. There is a gift shop full of odd items and fun stuff and the cafe itself is just a burst of color and quirk. Everything is painted or decoupaged there is a fake tree in the middle with trinkets on it, including fish. The tables have toys on them and mad gab cards. It is just super fun and the food was amazing. Love, love, love this place. We then tried to find a farmer's market, but it didn't happen because of the snow.
Oh yeah, we have had LOTS of snow the last few days. Driving through PA and in Pittsburgh there was tons of it and there have been lots of flurries here and there in Ohio and Kentucky.
Instead of the farmer's market, we went to the visitors' center where I stocked up on literature (one of my loves in life). We drove around to get the feel of the city and scope out where we might want to go - it was just too damn cold for Ashley to walk around. We decided to spend another night in, so we went to Whole Foods and got dinner then had a nice dinner in the room and talked a lot about the cities we visited and their pros and cons.
Today we are going to explore more of Louisville and maybe go back to Cincinnati as a day trip tomorrow.
Whew!
Hope you all are doing well!
Friday, November 14, 2008
Been a Long Time, Shouldn't Have Left You
We have been traveling for quite some time now.
We spent Saturday afternoon walking ALL of Philadelphia with Nadja and Lorien as our guides. We ate at Marathon Grill for lunch, yum! Then we wandered and just took in the city. We went to Reading Station and tried great cupcakes and candies, I found my favorite bookstore in the world, and we took lots of pictures. We went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (for free/suggested donation) and we saw beautiful art (Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollack, and so on). It was amazing. We went to Tattooed Moms for dinner and beer, we broke into Nadja's friends apartment to use the bathroom (we had permission), we ate delicious Indian buffet capped off with gelatto down the street, and we watched Baby Mama at the apt. This is Saturday and Sunday all jumbled up. Then we left out Monday morning for the northeast.
We went through all the states up north. Drove through CT, stayed the night in Providence RI which I loved but Ashley hated, explored Boston MA, ate at the Red Hook brewery in Portsmouth NH and loaded up on discounted, tax free liquor, spent the night Providence RI and explored it the next morning (loved it), went into Vermont just for the Maple Syrup but it was crappy weather so we got the syrup and peaced out to Canada. We crossed the border but got in trouble for all the liquor we had, so we had to leave some behind and thusly have to change our driving plans and head back to that border stop to collect our left behind alcohol. So now we are working out a reroute.
Montreal is nice, but not our taste. Our host is really nice (a little too exuberant for our taste), but at least our first couchsurfing experience was super duper positive. We are watching a movie now and about to eat our leftovers from the lasagna she made us last night.
More updates later.
We spent Saturday afternoon walking ALL of Philadelphia with Nadja and Lorien as our guides. We ate at Marathon Grill for lunch, yum! Then we wandered and just took in the city. We went to Reading Station and tried great cupcakes and candies, I found my favorite bookstore in the world, and we took lots of pictures. We went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (for free/suggested donation) and we saw beautiful art (Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollack, and so on). It was amazing. We went to Tattooed Moms for dinner and beer, we broke into Nadja's friends apartment to use the bathroom (we had permission), we ate delicious Indian buffet capped off with gelatto down the street, and we watched Baby Mama at the apt. This is Saturday and Sunday all jumbled up. Then we left out Monday morning for the northeast.
We went through all the states up north. Drove through CT, stayed the night in Providence RI which I loved but Ashley hated, explored Boston MA, ate at the Red Hook brewery in Portsmouth NH and loaded up on discounted, tax free liquor, spent the night Providence RI and explored it the next morning (loved it), went into Vermont just for the Maple Syrup but it was crappy weather so we got the syrup and peaced out to Canada. We crossed the border but got in trouble for all the liquor we had, so we had to leave some behind and thusly have to change our driving plans and head back to that border stop to collect our left behind alcohol. So now we are working out a reroute.
Montreal is nice, but not our taste. Our host is really nice (a little too exuberant for our taste), but at least our first couchsurfing experience was super duper positive. We are watching a movie now and about to eat our leftovers from the lasagna she made us last night.
More updates later.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
On the Road Again - Trip Up-Date #1
Hello, hello!
We left Wednesday for our trip. We were a little late leaving and had to make a stop in Winston, so we decided to cut Richmond and see if we could hang out with Paula a bit in Greensboro. And we could! We just got some coffee with her and caught up, which was great because it had been forever.
We left G'boro for Washington DC. We got to Melissa's around 8:30pm and just hung out at her house catching up. The next day we slept in, really really in, while she went to work. We spent that day getting a Garmin lead tour of DC and saw a lot landmarks and just drove around. Ashley took a million pics and we had a great day. We stopped and bought some $5 Obama/Biden shirts from a street vendor - woohoo - as we were checking out Barack's new place. We also got CakeLove. Heaven. The BEST cake ever. Thursday night we met up with Melissa and her boyfriend Dan at Old Ebbitt Grill, a very traditional DC place. It was great! We all had cheeseburgers and laughed a lot. Then we walked over to see the other side of the White House and we saw the residence. Nice digs, Obama. And Melissa drove us out to Georgetown and walked us around there.
Friday morning we woke up (late in the morning) got all our stuff together and headed out of DC. We were going to head to Hershey, PA but decided it wasn't worth it, so instead we hit Baltimore to get some marshmallow donuts. You have no idea how good these are. I can't even describe and they are a Baltimore tradition. YUM! While in B. we went to the American Visionary Art Museum, one of our faves, and saw the new exhibit and loaded up at the gift shop. Then on to Philadelphia to see Nadja and Lorien - our family!
We hit Philly at 5:01PM on Friday. To be brief (me?!?!) - what should have taken 25 mins or so took an hour and a half because of bumper to bumper traffic. It was miserable. But then we were with our family, so it was completely worth it!!!
We saw Phillip (their kitty who we used to live with) again, met their new kitten Rory (NOT named after Gilmore Girls), and met their foster kitty William, who we want to adopt. We were also here when they adopted out their little rat, Brianna. A very touching moment.
We ordered pizza (great pizza) and just talked and laughed all night. It is really great to be around them again. The kitties don't hurt either! ;-)
Nadja and Lorien had some stuff to take care of this morning - hence my time spent posting. We will be off to see the sites of Philly this afternoon and who knows what we will do tomorrow.
Hope you all are well!
We left Wednesday for our trip. We were a little late leaving and had to make a stop in Winston, so we decided to cut Richmond and see if we could hang out with Paula a bit in Greensboro. And we could! We just got some coffee with her and caught up, which was great because it had been forever.
We left G'boro for Washington DC. We got to Melissa's around 8:30pm and just hung out at her house catching up. The next day we slept in, really really in, while she went to work. We spent that day getting a Garmin lead tour of DC and saw a lot landmarks and just drove around. Ashley took a million pics and we had a great day. We stopped and bought some $5 Obama/Biden shirts from a street vendor - woohoo - as we were checking out Barack's new place. We also got CakeLove. Heaven. The BEST cake ever. Thursday night we met up with Melissa and her boyfriend Dan at Old Ebbitt Grill, a very traditional DC place. It was great! We all had cheeseburgers and laughed a lot. Then we walked over to see the other side of the White House and we saw the residence. Nice digs, Obama. And Melissa drove us out to Georgetown and walked us around there.
Friday morning we woke up (late in the morning) got all our stuff together and headed out of DC. We were going to head to Hershey, PA but decided it wasn't worth it, so instead we hit Baltimore to get some marshmallow donuts. You have no idea how good these are. I can't even describe and they are a Baltimore tradition. YUM! While in B. we went to the American Visionary Art Museum, one of our faves, and saw the new exhibit and loaded up at the gift shop. Then on to Philadelphia to see Nadja and Lorien - our family!
We hit Philly at 5:01PM on Friday. To be brief (me?!?!) - what should have taken 25 mins or so took an hour and a half because of bumper to bumper traffic. It was miserable. But then we were with our family, so it was completely worth it!!!
We saw Phillip (their kitty who we used to live with) again, met their new kitten Rory (NOT named after Gilmore Girls), and met their foster kitty William, who we want to adopt. We were also here when they adopted out their little rat, Brianna. A very touching moment.
We ordered pizza (great pizza) and just talked and laughed all night. It is really great to be around them again. The kitties don't hurt either! ;-)
Nadja and Lorien had some stuff to take care of this morning - hence my time spent posting. We will be off to see the sites of Philly this afternoon and who knows what we will do tomorrow.
Hope you all are well!
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
On the Road Again
Here is the situation with Ashley and myself - no jobs, out of work for 2 months and counting (by choice), and no plans to get a job soon. What do we do? We decide to go on a month long road trip - of course.
We are leaving tomorrow and doing what I am now considering our victory lap around the northeast.
With out going into all the details - that will hopefully come later (if the internet would ever stay consistent) - we are leaving tomorrow AM and returning on the 25th. We are heading up through DC, Philadelphia, Boston, Montreal (ah!), Niagara Falls, Louisville, and Nashville with lots of other cities in between. So. Excited. We are going to see a lot of friends and hopefully make some new ones via couch surfing.
I may post some from the road - if not, see you at the end of the month.
PS - YAY Obama. Thank God.
We are leaving tomorrow and doing what I am now considering our victory lap around the northeast.
With out going into all the details - that will hopefully come later (if the internet would ever stay consistent) - we are leaving tomorrow AM and returning on the 25th. We are heading up through DC, Philadelphia, Boston, Montreal (ah!), Niagara Falls, Louisville, and Nashville with lots of other cities in between. So. Excited. We are going to see a lot of friends and hopefully make some new ones via couch surfing.
I may post some from the road - if not, see you at the end of the month.
PS - YAY Obama. Thank God.
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