another country heard from...

Okay, so I guess it's not another country, it just feels like it. And people do speak another language around here that is very difficult to understand. Anyway, HIIIIIIIII to everyone. So nice to meet on here again. I don't really know where to start. I could post 900 pictures of our fabulous trip, but we don't yet have Internet at the homestead so that will not be happening for awhile. I'm sitting at some random computer lab at some very large campus doing things online while waiting for my hubby to finish whatever he's doing. So I thought, hey what's keeping me from updating my blog? And I could think of nothing. So that's what I decided to do. I can try to give you a few highlights of the last couple weeks. Gatlinburg, TN was amazingly gorgeous. We had a cabin I guess you would call it, but it was more like a really nice house, in the mountains - a hot tub and balcony with a stunning view of the mountains. some fun stuff we did -- went mini golfing at this place where we got to ride up the side of a mountain (or maybe really big hill would be more accurate) in a cable car like thing, and then golf up there and ride down. It was nice and shady and cool and lots of fun. Hey, come to think of it, I don't think we ever added up our score, but he beat me, this I know. We also rode over 2 miles in a much bigger and more secure cable car to this park area. The view was awesome and the car went right by our cabin. After watching it go back and forth all week, we really wanted to ride it. We also spent some time one day in the Smokey Mountains National Park - did a bit of biking and saw a nice waterfalls and pretty scenery. I was expecting more places to be able to see the mountains, but honestly, the best place to see the mountains in Gatlinburg was from our cabin. (or the cable car) We also spent some time in downtown Gatlinburg wandering in and out of shops. Honestly, so much of the stuff was very tacky, glitzy, airbrushed non-sense (I feel so old and mature using that word) but then here and there we would find really nice, tasteful places, you just had to look a little harder. We went to a really nice Thomas Kinkade um... I don't know what you call it - a place that had a bunch of his paintings. Also, we splurged a bit on things that, well, I've been saying - when we get to Baton Rouge, no more ice cream whenever we feel like it - we're eating salad and exercising every day. So yeah, there's good ice cream in Gatlinburg. Also, there are tons of fudge shops. That's something that I see from time to time but never buy. Well I thought to myself (and to Dave) it's our honeymoon, dang it, we're buying fudge. (this is probably hideously boring to some of you, but maybe some of you will find it mildly entertaining) So the idea was to buy 3 little pieces and share it with Dave's aunt and uncle. Well, we got 3 "little" pieces and then the guy says if you buy one more you get another one free. Well what good Mennonite can resist a deal like that? So I said sure and then one of those ended up not being very little and we walked out of there with an obscene amount of fudge, some of which is sitting in a Baton Rouge apartment. And in case you are wondering - maple, choc. peanut butter, coconut (ugh - that one was for Dave), gatlinburg mud (which was a wonderful concoction of vanilla fudge with choc. and carmel), and choc/carmel/cashew were the flavors of choice. Yes, you might have gained 5 pounds just reading that.

From Gatlinburg we headed to Asheville MC to spend a day there. And here were all the amazing views that I was missing in Gatlinburg. Oh my. There's this road where there are lookouts all over the place and it's just awesome views of the mountains all over. took tons of pictures. The next day we went to the Biltmore house which was fun and neat to see and again, have lots of pics. Then we headed to Dave's aunt and uncle's place in Georgia. Some might thing it odd to spend time with family on one's honeymoon and I sorta did myself, until the time came. At this point we were starting to feel like the only humans alive on the universe (other than the ones we were giving our life savings to, of course). And I had been feeling sorta sad about going to Baton Rouge and opening wedding gifts all along without any family around. Well, dave's car with all the wedding gifts had been parked at their place so we ended up hauling them all inside and having a big gift opening party with them. It was so much fun!! wow - what a party. So then we spent the next day driving and arrived in Baton Rouge last night. Wow, it sorta feels like a year ago. I could go on and on about all our adventures and mishaps since being here, but let's see, what are the highlights.... well, we arrived at 10 to a pitch black apartment. The power was supposed to be turned on, but we didn't have any. I called the power company on the way into campus to take care of some things. When I FINALLY talked to someone who could help, she said, oh, you just need to turn on your main breaker. Easy enough. So we got a few groceries, went back to the apartment, and flipped everything we could find with a switch. Still nothing. So I called back. Finally got through to someone and she said, oh, you need to turn on your meter (it's an apartment building, there's meters all over the place!) and gave us a very specific number that belonged only to us, followed by specific instructions of what we were supposed to do. HELLO!! Now you tell me, how in the hiffalump we were supposed to know that??!!?? I mean, this would have been very useful information to have been communicated to us before 10 that evening. Anyway, we got power around 1 I think. I was so fried I could barely function. Dave very very graciously unloaded both cars (which contained a lot!) while I slept. Yeah, what a sweetie. And in the middle of that mess, I was stumbling around the apartments saying... I hafta pee, and do you think we have toilet paper... no, of course not... so he runs to the store to get some... only to find that we did have a little bit in the place. ANYWAY, this is getting very long and boring. We arrived to an apartment that was, um, shall we say, quite filthy and not exactly what we were expecting. I was hoping to be able to get right to unpacking, but I'm about to even start that until certain parts of the place are scrubbed very good and proper. And I refuse to use either of the showers until they are cleaned (and have a shower curtain... ) so yeah, I probably smell really good about now. There's something about someone else's dirt that really grosses me out. In the kitchen for instance, between the stove and counter top, there's too much of a space, and there's tons of crud on both sides. It just grosses me out. So we're hoping to pull out the stove and scrub it down. Yeah, that's what's waiting for us when we get back, which might have something to do with the fact that we're sitting here on the computers. Anyway, I wish some of you could just swing by and help me! = P The places just looks hopeless right now, but I'm sure in a week or 2 it'll look better. Congratulations if you're still reading. Come see us sometime, eh?