Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Where Am I?

This month has been so absolutely crazy, as evidenced by my lack of posts all month. I was in East Prairie just after the 4th for a couple of days, then I had a Saturday training, then I went to DC for a conference/mandatory meeting and now we're all in Arkansas. DC was wonderful, when I wasn't in the hotel (which was terrifically located at 13 and Penn. Ave). In spare moments I checked out the Library of Congress, the National History Museum, the American History Museum and the Smithsonian Castle as well as Union Station, Capitol Hill, an evening cruise to Alexandria, VA, and oh yeah, a bunch of really boring meetings. I got back Friday night and then Saturday we were on the road again, my parents in tandem, visiting Jason's parents and his grandmother (mom and dad missed out on our side trip to Magnolia), and now we are at Queen Willhemina State Park literally in the clouds. This is Arkansas' second highest peak and it's been raining for days so we have zero visibility, but it's sort of cool to be all out in what seems like fog, but is actually the cloud cover. Mom and Dad are finding it rather trying up here, but right now, I'm sort of just relived to be here, since we had a pretty wet and long drive from Magnolia this afternoon (we drove down there this morning and then turned around and drove up here this afternoon) and this on top of three days with the in-laws. I might find it a bit boring by tomorrow though if it never clears off. While there is no cell phone coverage up here and the lightening earlier today cut out the land phones, it's sort of amazing that we have wireless up here, but we do. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the camera cable when we packed though, so I won't have any pictures until we get back in a couple of days. Hope we don't fall off the mountain!

In other news, Nora out-fished both of her grandfathers by hauling in 4 bream and they came up with zilch. They should use the Barbie fishing rod (yes, Nora has a Barbie fishing rod), I've learned just how reliant and simultaneously incapable of using cell phones my parents are (If you called either of them today, they can't call you back, but they sure are spending a lot of time talking about how they want to), and Jason is watching the MLS all-star team play Everton. This is the happiest he's been all trip. Nora's done a good job managing all of her relatives and putting up with a lot of car seat time. I broke down and added to her my pretty pony collection and while I think keeping up with the miniature hairbrush will be tiresome, it was sort of worth the time she spent extolling it's greatness instead of screaming her head off while driving through some heavy rainstorms.