Despite reminding myself to post on here over and over again, I still haven't made it here before now. I've been thinking of the year end post that I would post, but here it is a week into February, and I guess that aspiration is no longer relevant. Instead, I will recap some of the things I was planning to put in my year end post.
Since my last post, I've stayed busy as usual. I went to Louisville to visit Madison and the Kentucky contingent a few days before Thanksgiving. It was a quick fun visit that included going to a Railroad Earth show at Headliner's with Carter and Rachel, visiting Grandma with Maddi and Carter's crew, and taking Noah to the Louisville Sciene Center. Thanksgiving was an enjoyable event at Missy's featuring Andrew's highly successful fried turkey, which somewhat controversial in the planning stages. Madison visited Memphis for a few days then. It was great to have her here. While she was visiting, we went to Seize the Clay and painted a bunch of ornaments and Christmas gifts. We had a lot of fun, and the gifts were a great success when Christmas rolled around. The period between Thanksgiving and Christmas was characterized by a major organizational effort on my part (with help and support from Andrew) to get the house in order. I did manage to make significant progress that has held up so far.
The Christmas season got under way big way. Madison, Andrew, and I were going to visit Dad, Michelle, and the boys, and we were taking Noah along because he's my favorite pal. Meanwhile, Carter got a working interview lined up at a ski resort in West Virginia. It wasn't terribly far out of the way for us to "drop off" Carter at the mountain, but the road was very, very windy, and it was cold, snowy, and got dark in the 1.5 hour it took from when we left the interstate to get to the resort. We got Carter squared away and headed the rest of the distance to Virginia Beach. It was a long drive, but it was totally worth it. The next day, Jamie, Selma, Chris, and Tony came to Dad's for Christmas dinner. I was so happy to be with everyone, and, especially, to see everyone really enjoy each other. It had been too long since we had gotten together like that. Jamie and his crew had to head back the next day, and we stayed for a couple more days. We got to see Dad play music with his band at a Jewell Jam, visit Sandbridge, and go to the Virginia Marine Science Museum, my perennial favorite and a place that influenced my love of and fascination with nature from an early age. It was a great visit that packed in a lot of happy times. "On our way home," we stopped and picked up Carter from the ski resort and headed back to Louisville. Team Saunders continued on to Memphis the next day, but before getting on the road, we had breakfast with Maddi's boyfriend, Quinton.
I was happy to be home again; we were all off and together and Christmas was just days away. Christmas day came and we spent the morning at Missy's, the afternoon at Vicki's, and the evening together. The next day, I was back on the road to Kentucky to take Madison home. I had to compromise to work out Madison's time with Jerry's brother visiting from Kansas and their Christmas plans so that I could take Madison to visit Grandma at Christmas. Fortunately, it all worked out for the best. After dropping of Maddi, I stopped by my old friend Tommie's house. It had been alomst 10 years since I last saw him, and I was so happy to my friend hanging in there with his same attitude and personality. From Kentucky, I headed to Monteagle.
I arrived in Monteagle on the 27th, and Andrew was joining me after a couple of days to spend New Year's together. Unfortunately, the heater was broken in the bedrooms, and there was a cold snap. The repairman had to order the part from the factory which took several days. I got a couple of space heaters, and those along with the fireplace made things pleasant enough for the first couple days. When Andrew got there, we had a great time. We hiked and hung out and went to Modern Dave's for New Year's Eve dinner. We got to see the Northcutts when they came up the mountain to meet us for brunch on Andrew's last day. I hiked almost every day I was there, twice at Stone Door, one long burly hike at Fall Creek Falls, and just a bit on the Sewanee campus where there's some of the most scenic hikes anywhere on the mountain. On my last night, I watched a fantastic meteor shower. Thank goodness it was good because the night before the pipes had frozen at the house despite leaving the faucets on a slow drip as prevention. It was a pretty major debacle, but, on the whole, I had a great time clearing my head and making plans for the new year.
When I got back from Memphis, I had clocked around 3,300 miles on the road since Thanksgiving in about 3 weeks. I've never been so happy to be home, with no travel plans in the immediate future. In the new year, I've been implementing my strategies I devised for acheiving my goals, and I am pleased to say that I am finding a surprising amount of momentum with my progress on all fronts. I've been closely monitoring my diet and have found a friend in the recumbent bike at the YMCA. I've been working like all get out on that manuscript (no, Dr. Pezeshki didn't get it as a Christmas gift like I'd hoped). Then, suddenly, Dr. Pezeshki decided I should take his comprehensive questions as soon as possible, as in this week. I am glad to be getting it done with but it has been quite a sudden change of plans. I can't complain as I need to get this behind me and prepare for the growing season that is already upon us.
