An Odyssey

Homer's Odyssey is epic.

We don't really come across a journey like that in our everyday lives, and if you happen to come across Medusa it would probably be all over the media.

Our move from NJ to GR was somewhat of an odyssey, it certainly was epic.

Then there was my trip to the credit union Monday.

Let me premise this story by stating for the record that Bill does not have direct deposit.

I know, I know.

Let's move on or we'll get stuck in the twentieth century.

This means one of us has to take a physical paycheck to the credit union. It is usually me. This is not a big deal until I point out that our nearest credit union location (the c.u. that we belong to anyway) is in Holland. Which is a solid forty minute drive from our home.

Fortunately, credit unions have co-ops. We can make a deposit into one of several ATMs of another credit union and the money goes into our account fee free.

The closest co-op ATM is blocks from our house.

Except that for some reason, the last two times I have tried depositing at that one, it won't take it. That's okay, there's another one about two miles away. However, that ATM is frequently down (as in every time Bill and I stop there, it's not working). But again, it's okay because there are other choices.

Let me also say they are building a new branch of our credit union in GR.

I cannot wait.

Especially after Monday.

First, I went to broken ATM credit union. Guess what? The ATM was down.

I didn't even bother with ATM that stopped taking our deposits. Why waste the gas?

I looked up another one of the myriad of ATMs and found one in close proximity to our house. As I drove toward it in the pouring rain, it became clear I was headed into a sketchy area.

I arrived at said ATM only to discover there were no envelopes. I was flustered, it was raining hard, and a car pulled up behind me.

Forget it. I drove to Holland.

Did I mention every time a person pulled out in front of me, they would go slow. Of course the closest car behind me was nowhere to be seen so these people could have waited. But they didn't.

Then, on my way out to Holland, traffic inbound was backing up because of construction. I took the back roads home. I drove through parts of our fair state where I could have come across some interesting characters (like in the Odyssey).

I made it. And I found out that we can use the mobile app to deposit checks. I'm going to try that out next time, instead of driving all the way to Holland. Of course the new branch will be open in December.

Picture Post

We went to Mount Charleston today. We can see it from Don and Judy's backyard, but have never driven up to it.

Here are a few pictures (we took 79 photos, so literally this is just a few, you're welcome).We pulled over at the Desert View Overlook in the Spring Mountains National Recreation Area. It was quite a view.

Same place just lower down; there was a wall along the path that I sat down on while Bill had climbed up the rocky "hill", seen behind me, for his photo.

This is the entrance to the Las Vegas Ski & Snowboard Resort. So we didn't make it to the very top of Mount Charleston but I think this was close enough. We came all the way to Nevada to see snow in January!

The last elevation sign we saw was for 8,000 feet. According to the map, the mountain goes as high as 11,000 feet!

Here's one picturesque view as we drove through the park.

It was 48 degrees at our highest point (the Ski Resort). Bill said he didn't need his jacket. It was beautiful. It wasn't too chilly. Although, as we were up at the resort, I heard a man say that once the sun went behind the mountain the temperature would drop. The temperature down on the Strip was a balmy 63 degrees.

This is in the pool area at the Tropicana.

Nashville, Part 2

Heather and I went to Nashville for the Youth Worker's Conference. The Conference started on Nov. 21st and we flew in the night of the 19th. That gave us one day to see the sites.

We started at this wonderful place called The Pancake Pantry. If you ever go to Nashville, check it out. It's worth the wait. Although we got there at the right time. We walked in and sat right down. About ten minutes later, the line was out the front door! Heather and I both ordered this delicious dish, the Swish Chocolate Pancakes. They had regular syrup on the table, but they also had this cinnamon buttery type syrup. Oh wow! It was amazing! Needless to say, we didn't eat again (except for the gelato) until that night. And even then we weren't really hungry!


After our breakfast, we went over to the Belmont Mansion. It used to sit on a wide-open property, but now the front yard is home to Belmont University. We took the tour of the grand home. Other then the Biltmore, it was the largest house museum I've ever seen! They were in the process of decorating it for Christmas, which was fun to see. We also got a peak into the "master" bedroom, which is going to be renovated as soon as they raise enough money. (it was a behind the scenes kind of peak, very exclusive. Boy, do they have a lot of work ahead of them!) That took almost two hours.

Then we went over to the Parthenon. We decided we'd had enough culture for the day (the mansion was full of art and sculpture), so we did not go into the Parthenon. But we did take a few pictures outside.

It is not small!














Here I am, next to the ginormous column.











The we went over to Union Station. Here's the exterior...













We just ran in quick to see the interior. It was beautiful!


















Next we went over to the State Capitol building. This was a bit different then in Austin. There was a security guard and a metal detector. We had to check in, and he checked our purses! yikes! There was an info desk, and the nice gentleman there gave us a guide book. We didn't have too long, because we'd found a meter, but only had about a half hour's worth of change!

Here's the interior.









Heather suggested we go down to this park that is at the "foot" of the building. It has the entire state history (in text) on stones, all around this park. And there was also the War Memorial.











Where there was this giant stone earth, spinning in water. If you were strong enough, you could turn it. I did manage to get Michigan in this photo!










Our next stop was Opryland. We spend three hours walking through the Conservatories, admiring their Christmas decorations. Who puts all of these up? And when do they do it? It was amazing!


This backdrop reminds me of White Christmas.






This is the Cascade room. I'm actually standing to the side of the waterfall.












Then, at night, outside, they have all of these lights!






The Nativity, all in white










Mary and Joseph












The giant tree of lights, and all the lights on the trees.








We found a Krystal! I was so happy. I introduced Heather to the Krystal chik. I was happy, because it's not a lot of food, for not a lot of money, and we weren't too hungry!

And yes, you see me in my coat because it was cold there. The next night it got down to 19 degrees! Brr.














Then we took the rental car back to the airport and as we went over to the taxi stand, I spotted these cute mosaic sculptures.












This was probably our front row experience for Jars of Clay! Yes, it's true, we waited for an hour and a half to get these seats. In the ladies room. We were going to wait outside, but one of the doors wasn't closed all the way (we couldn't cut through the tunnel like we had been doing all week, because all of the vendors were packing up, so the tunnel was closed off). So we got into the vestibule area. Then there was a woman walking around inside and she let us in. We heard their sound check! We were hanging out in a hallway, but we didn't want to get kicked out, so we eventually went and hid in the ladies room. We did a few Mad Libs, ate our dinner.... chatted. And eventually walked into the arena like we belonged there.
And it wouldn't be fun if you don't get a set list. The rude stage hand did not get it for me. The video guy did. He was super nice! And there were two stuck together, so Heather got one too!

The rest of my trip to Austin

I am going to skip the boring details like how my flight got delayed due to a mechanical problem and I rebooked myself so I made it to Austin closer to the original time, and because of that got to fly first class from Atlanta to Austin. Instead, I will jump right in to the other half of the trip (the non-ACLFest):


Friday morning, when I was finally up and ready to go, Brad came and picked me up. Alisha had some work to do (preparing a grant proposal), we met her for lunch. We had Indian food (I can't remember the name of the restaurant). I got a small tour of the UT Austin campus. It's downtown, and it reminded me a lot of SCAD, only it was more localized and not spread out like SCAD.

Everything is orange, even the meters (this is for you greg!)

Brad, Scott, Anil and I headed down to ACLFest with Lizzie. Alisha came later, after she picked up Maddie from school. By the end of the festival on Friday night, Lizzie had enough. She was sleeping in her stroller, but wasn't strapped in. She likes to move in her sleep and was basically wiggling her way out of the stroller. It was a little chilly that night, so I put her on my lap to keep me warm, and to keep her from falling... this is how she finally fell back to sleep.

Saturday was Maddie's birthday. She's showing off the new shoes that had Dora on them! She opened a lot of presents that morning (from Brad's parents).

One of the things she got was a princess crown. She was wearing it in the car, but then put it on me. (not like I'm used to wearing a tiara or anything...)

By Monday, we were pretty tuckered out. Maddie went to school, Alisha went back to work and Brad took me on a longer tour of Austin. Here's the Capitol building. (Capitol as in the state is spelled with an "o" like the shape of the dome. Capital as in a letter, is spelled with an "a". Just in case you wanted to know!)

This is me on the front steps of the Capitol building with the rest of Austin in the background.

Inside the Capitol Building, looking down (from the second floor) at the mosaic under the dome.


Looking up at the dome!


The door hinges.


The artisan well outside of the Capitol Building. It did work, a slow trickle of water finally came out.

This is the staircase inside the Visitor's Center. There was a main staircase too. We just happened to find this one first.

This is the Texas State History museum. It had a large, beautiful mosaic tile floor right inside the door. But it was so big, like everything in Texas, that I wouldn't have been able to get a good enough picture of it. I liked the Lone Star out front.

Brad wanted to show me this beautiful fountain, but there was no water running that day. The tower is in the background.

Chuy's, where Alisha and I ate lunch. Yum! It was a great lunch.

Maddie opens her birthday card from Bill and me.

Bill and I bought Maddie the Skippyjon Jones books for her birthday (Skylar loved these). They are about a Siamese cat who thinks he's a Chihuahua and the adventures/mischief that he gets into. She loved them both. I read them to her, Brad read them to her, and I think she would have let everybody read them to her if she hadn't fallen asleep!

So that was my trip to Austin. Oh I should end with this: when I got to the airport Tuesday morning, they offered the last first class seat available for $50. Nobody went for it, so I did. I could get used to that!