So Many Cities, So Little Time

In one week I've managed to visit eight cities! How crazy is that? I left St. Louis last Sunday morning, then arrived in Wauwatosa, then went to Milwaukee, then spent an afternoon in Chicago and later that night drove to Toledo, then stayed in Pittsburgh Thursday night, then spent a night in Syracuse and finally Wells, ME! I arrived in Maine safe and sound yesterday evening and I'm already having a great time!! But let's go back and talk about the end of my road trip first...

So I was in Milwaukee and Wauwatosa with Erin at the beginning of the week, then Wednesday morning I drove down near Chicago to meet up with Filip aka Flip and spend the afternoon seeing as much of Chicago as is possible in one afternoon. We did pretty well actually with seeing lots of good stuff. We went to Millennium park and found a shiny bean sculpture, probably the most random but also most awesome thing to find in the middle of a park. We also went out to Navy Pier after wandering around and coming across a few dead ends to get there and eventually giving in and taking a taxi for a 5-minute ride. We also, as was absolutely necessary on my first visit to Chicago, got a true deep dish Chicago-style pizza! Absolutely, without a doubt, the best pizza I've ever had and totally worth staying in Chicago longer than planned to wait for the pizza to be baked to perfection. Oh, and by the way, it was totally awesome to hang out with Fil again after a few years have gone by since the last time I saw him. His goofy voices and accents entertained me while we sat in crazy traffic in and out of the city. I also got to hear the new album Fil is nearly finished recording! He'll be famous someday and I'll be proud to say I heard him sing his hilarious and beautiful songs before he was "discovered".

My next stop after Chicago was Toledo, OH for a night. I didn't end up leaving Chicago until about 8pm so that put me in Toledo at 2am where I then got a room in a hotel and promptly passed out for the night. I didn't actually see much of Toledo because the next day I headed straight off for Pittsburgh! I took mostly toll interstates there and it ended up being quite pricey, so I tried the next stretch from Pittsburgh to Syracuse without using any toll roads. More on that in a minute. Pittsburgh was great! I was only there for a short time but I had a good time and I got to see the city and eat some deeeelicious ice cream! I was staying with a Semester at Sea friend, Ellen, and her husband. What kind and awesome hosts. They even drove me out to the city to see it and man what a cool city to see from the hills above! The Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers meet at a point in the middle of the city to form the Ohio River and Pittsburgh has tons of bridges throughout the city and a pretty awesome skyline, plus I saw it at sunset so all those factors together made for an amazing view. I also got to see the Duquesne Incline which is a funny-looking little trolley car type thing that transports people up and down from the main city to the hills above as part of Mt. Washington.

Overall, after my brief experience in Pittsburgh I was quite impressed and I'd LOVE to go back someday and see more of it. The next day, Friday, I had another experience that caused me to forever hold a special place in my heart for the people of Pennsylvania! I had some minor car trouble (nothing to worry about though folks, Baxter is doing just fine now and he got me to Maine yesterday like a champ!) but while I was driving on the interstate through rural PA the battery light came on in my car. After consulting with my mommy I called AAA to have someone take it to a garage and see what's wrong. I figured I shouldn't drive it all the way to the next town which was only 20 miles but who knows and I wanted Baxter to last me to Maine so I called AAA and they said they'd have a tow truck come get me in 30-40 minutes. After 30 minutes my tow truck driver called to tell me that he was looking for a good place to tow my car to (which I doubt is in his job description, so I was already impressed) and he'd be to me in 10 minutes to tow my car. He showed up promptly 10 minutes later and said he'd had some trouble finding a garage that would even take a look at my car even though it was most likely just a matter of replacing my alternator, and even Wal Mart didn't have time for me (which is good because I sure don't ever have time for them either! Psh. Yet another reason to dislike Wal Mart) but then he'd called up a guy named Joel who had proven to him before to be a good guy and he said sure he'd help me out. Now by the way, I was in way way rural PA so there were some super nice guys but they were quite hick-ish which was just awesome. So my tow truck driver took me to Garman's Auto Care which I would recommend to anyone who is ever traveling in northwestern Pennsylvania! They're good people. So the owner Joel checked out my car even though by then it was 3pm on the Friday before Memorial Day Weekend and every other place had turned me away but anyways then a little old man walked in with a new alternator in a box, so there was my part! He put the new part in and only charged $44 for labor plus the cost of the part. I mean to sum up...2.5 hours total from the time the battery light came on to the time I was back on the interstate on my way to New York! 2.5 hours, that's it! And met some pretty funny and awesome rural people. Oh that reminds me, my tow truck driver said his birthday is Tuesday, so...happy birthday tow truck driver from Cambridge Springs, PA! And thats for your speedy and excellent assistance!

Now considering Baxter is 17 years old and has over 182,000 miles on him I'm impressed the first problem I had on this trip wasn't until Pennsylvania! Amazing. And after the new alternator he was good as new, or at least good as he was before, haha. And I successfully made it to Maine with no other problems except the price of gas!

Now although my little bout of car trouble was remedied very quickly, it did set me back 2.5 hours in my driving which was a lot since the drive was several hundred miles, going from Pittsburgh to Syracuse, NY and that was the stretch of the trip that I had decided to take smaller roads to avoid tolls so by the end of the day, despite my relative good luck with my car, I was a little grumpy and tired. I felt like Betty White in the Snickers commercial. But before my grumpy and Betty-like arrival in Syracuse I did get to see some gorgeous New York scenery. The only other time I had been in NY was in the city, so I'd never seen the nature side of the state. I was very impressed. I got some good sunset pictures. I also saw my very first amish person on a random little road in the middle of farm land NY!

So after I stayed a night in a hotel in Syracuse I wasn't able to work out seeing friends in Vermont and New Hampshire, although I'll catch them sometime later this summer, so I ended up heading straight to Maine yesterday from Syracuse and by that point I was pretty much ready to be done and be in Maine so I sucked it up and paid the tolls to drive the more direct route which was quite fast and I arrived here in the lovely town of Wells yesterday around 6:30 local time!

So...that's been my week. I'll have to write more later about what I've been up to so far in Maine! For now, though, I'm going to bed. Goodnight, all, and peace out! :-)

Midwest Madness

Hello from Wisconsin! I am currently in Wauwatosa, which is right next to Milwaukee. All I can say is...it's HOT. Well I guess that's not all I can say. But man, it sure is hot here. And also, did I mention that Wisconsin is hot?! I hear that Colorado has been getting lots of wind and even a little snow! Crazy!! It's the humidity here that's getting to me. The heat would be bearable if it weren't so humid, so whenever I step outside it just feels sticky!

Anyways, despite the intense heat I've been enjoying my time here in Wisconsin! The drive from St. Louis was slightly brutal, it took most of the day and driving through Illinois was boring with nothing but farms to look at. Finally I got to Chicago though and the driving got more interesting. I had to stop every few miles to pay 30 cent tolls and 80 cent tolls, and then add in some road construction, bumpy roads, unforgiving drivers, and a guy in a bright yellow Hummer with all kinds of bumper stickers I didn't agree with. But finally I made it to Erin's apartment in Wauwatosa which seem to be a pretty cool little town and it's just minutes from Milwaukee. Last night we drove and walked around downtown Milwaukee a little bit, coming across the bronze statue of Fonzie from Happy Days (did you know Happy Days took place in Milwaukee?? I forgot that) and then we had dinner at a restaurant that was right over the river that runs right through town. Today I plan to explore the city a little more while Erin is at work. I think I'll go see Lake Michigan today. I've seen it from the Michigan side once, and it was just...so....massive! It looked like an ocean because I just couldn't see the end of it anywhere. Lakes are something we just don't do well in Colorado. Mountains we can do, and snow we can do, and lax marijuana laws we can do...but not large bodies of water. haha. So I'm glad to be in places now that have water!

An interesting observation I've made while in Illinois and Wisconsin is that these people really like their vanity plates on their cars! I've never seen so many vanity plates in one place before. I was thinking it either means people are more creative here or more bored, and need to have interesting license plates to keep them entertained. Hmm. Just a random thought for the day.

I've got about one more week of traveling before I arrive in Maine, and this week is going to be quite a busy week of many states. Tomorrow I'm heading to Chicago for the day, then to Ohio, then Thursday I go to Pittsburgh, then New York on Friday and after Friday I'm not sure yet what my plan is exactly but it will involve New Hampshire, possibly Vermont, and definitely Maine. So by this time next week I'll probably be in Maine!

In other news, tragically, LOST ended on Sunday. Although I think maybe it's for the best because now I can move on with my life and be less of a slave to the addiction of LOST :-) but I was certainly sad to see it end. The ending, I thought, was quite good and I may have even cried a little bit, haha. My favorite thing was that the show ended exactly how it began 6 years ago, with a close-up of Jack's eye. The show started with his eye opening, and it ended with his eye closing. I love neat little full-circle things like that, it's so satisfying. So....I loved the ending. And now I bid farewell to LOST. Sigh.

That's all for now. Here are a few photos of my time in Milwaukee thus far: (by the way, if you didn't know, you can click on the images to make them larger)

Erin with the sushi we made!

Downtown Milwaukee

Erin and The Fonz

Beautiful Places to be Seen

Lake Hefner, Oklahoma City, OK

I have now transitioned from the southwest to the midwest and the landscape makes that obvious. But first, I'll finish telling Oklahoma stories.

Wednesday evening I got to go be all photographer-like with Todd at Lake Hefner in OK City. There was an exciting-looking storm on its way in and Todd being the great photographer that he is decided we should go out to the lake to photograph the stormy clouds and one really great sunset. I think sometimes I'm kind of lazy at seizing good photographic opportunities, so I was very glad that we went. I have also been lazy in trying out the capabilities of my awesome camera which, although not huge and impressive with large lenses, is quite good and has manual options I've never even tried. Sigh. I really need to work on that. In any case, using some basic auto photographic skills (involving not a whole lot of skill) I did capture some pretty cool clouds and a truly beautiful sunset over the lake. I like to tell myself that half the battle in photography is recognizing a good picture, not just the actual taking of the picture so at least I did that and fortunately my camera is quite good even using its auto setting. I was very impressed with the Oklahoma landscape I was introduced to at the lake. Overall Oklahoma has greatly exceeded my expectations. The people are great, the landscape is (sometimes) very pretty, and as long as you've got cool people to hang out with it's not boring!

Thursday I made the mistake of taking allergy medicine that rendered me completely useless which I feel bad about, because I was staying with my friend Amber and her family and sadly I fear I must have come across as the most boring guest ever. They were so unbelievably nice though and it was great to see Amber. The day consisted of a CSI marathon, a middle school band concert, and some really delicious pizza. A pretty good day overall, even if I was a little out of it. So the end of my time in Oklahoma came Friday morning as I filled my trusty Baxter with gas (which is slightly cheaper in OK) and headed off for Missouri. I had my first toll road experience which was not a very happy first experience to be had. It cost me $8 to leave Oklahoma, perhaps a strategy to keep people in? And there's just more toll roads to come unless I decide to be cheap and take the longer way...then again, that would take more gas so really there's no cheap way to do it. Hmm. Oh well, anyways...

I spent the day in St. Louis, I wandered around down town, saw the arch, stuck my feet in the Mississippi River, and stood in Missouri while making funny faces at Illinois :-) It was a good day! Allergies are slightly ridiculous, which seems to have started as soon as I reached states with actual foliage and nature to cause allergies.

Tomorrow I head to Milwaukee to visit the fabulously awesome Erin and I can't wait!

Oh, and by the way, I seem to have a new addiction since I've started this journey: Sonic. We don't have Sonic in Boulder so I never discovered just how amazing it is but man those cream slushes and tater tots and sonic blasts and chicken sandwiches...aaaah they're so good! I drove several miles out of my way to find a Sonic today. That can't be a good sign.

Also, Happy Birthday to my mom, and happy graduation day to my cousin Irene!! :-)

Todd at Lake Hefner

Gateway Arch

It's flat and immense and the heat is intense

Well right now I am Sauced…wait, no, I mean I’m in a coffee shop called Sauced :-) I’m in the little artsy district in Oklahoma City called Paseo at the recommendation of the fabulous Amber, who I got to see today. This coffee shop is pretty much totally awesome, it feels a little like home! It’s just a funky little place with bumper stickers all over the counter and some very delicious chai! Totally cool. So I’m hanging out here for a little while (although I can’t seem to get the wifi to work so I’ll post this later) and then hang out with my next Oklahomans, Todd and the famous Olie.

So far I am totally loving Oklahoma! It’s great to make up for my last visit to OK several years ago when all I got to see was lots of flat, brown landscape and the little town of Stillwater where there’s just not that much to do. Oklahoma City is fun though. And I spent the afternoon in Edmond with Amber, Nate, and my new (old) friend Tyler who just got back from Semester at Sea! I met Tyler through a mutual friend when he wanted to get some information about SAS since I had just finished my trip, but he was in Oklahoma and at the time I was in Colorado so we talked via email and Facebook but today was the first time we’d met in person and now we’re both SAS alumni so…hence…my awesome picture! I look like a big dork but hey maybe I always do :-)

So let’s see today is Wednesday I think…so I got into Oklahoma on Monday evening and got the grand tour of Oklahoma City from Keith that evening, then Tuesday I wandered around the city on my own while Keith was at work and Steph was sleeping, due to her nursing job that requires her to be nocturnal!, so it was fun to just walk around and not really be in a hurry to be anywhere (except when I only had 1 hour on my parking meter and had to rush back and find my car to move it before I got a ticket!) but then I embarked on a great Oklahoman adventure on the recommendation of Keith: That’s right, I went to the American Banjo Museum!!! WHAT a hilarious place that is. It costs a mere $6 to go in and see the largest public collection of banjos in the world, complete with 300 banjos! I also came in right after a large tour group of old people who were getting a banjo performance in just a few minutes, so I wandered upstairs and got to see the performance along with lots of silly old people who sang along to the songs he played. After watching the performance and taking in just about as many banjos as I could possibly handle, I bought a cute little keychain souvenir and then headed out. But, of course, my life is now complete as I have officially seen 300 banjos in one building and learned a bit about their history. Whew!

Last night Keith, Steph and I made a delicious dinner and then called up Elizabeth and all went out for an evening of pub trivia! Our team (called the “Road Trippin’ Hippie”) did pretty well! We came in third, I think, in the end and there were quite a few teams. Most of it was probably due to Keith’s random but useful knowledge of things like the highest skydiving session and some knowledge about oceans and blues music…I knew a few answers though. We went to a very cool bar in which they had about 100 beers on tap. I tried to count how many but after about 50 I lost count and estimated 100. It was impressive, to see that many options of beer along one wall! I’m not a huge beer drinker but I felt that I had to try one so I got a “Snakebite” consisting of Guiness and cider and actually it wasn’t too bad! That was a fun night and it was great to catch up with old friends.

Today Steph and I went out for breakfast, after waking up to a huge rain storm. I guess the rain and storming is supposed to get pretty bad here today, it’s been an odd weather day. It’s pretty humid, but not too hot which is nice but there are clouds hanging above Oklahoma that just won’t go away today. It’s been raining on and off. Currently it’s not raining and the sun is out but there are clouds all over the place so in about 5 seconds the sun will probably go away. Speaking of ridiculous weather, I guess I just missed a huge hail storm here that happened Sunday night. Grapefruit-sized hail and some tornado warnings too! I’m glad to have missed that, even if it meant being in Amarillo. Anyways…let’s see what else have I done here so far..

Oh, I visited the memorial downtown for the OK City bombing which occurred 15 years ago last month, actually. The memorial was very cool, and very pretty, and sad to stand there and think about how such a random and senseless act of violence caused the deaths of so many people. I saw the memorial right at sunset, and then we came back to see it after dark with everything lit up, which was just beautiful.

That’s about it for things I’ve done so far, but updates on my trip and my car are thus:

-my car, Baxter, is still doing just beautifully. No problems yet (I’m knocking on wood right now) and despite Baxter’s slight dislike of humid and wet weather he’s still going strong and doing me proud. Yay!

-I head to St. Louis on Friday and that will be the first place I’ve never spent any time in at all, followed by several more such places, as well as the scenery will soon be getting a little bit foreign too. So far it’s all been pretty similar to Colorado (although it’s gotten flatter since I hit Texas) but soon enough I’ll be getting into the Midwest and then the east coast which is just a whole different place. I have, however, been to the east coast so I know what a beautiful place it is and I’m very excited for it!!

-I’m not entirely sure what my schedule looks like for the last couple weeks of my trip. I’ll be in St. Louis Friday and Saturday, then hopefully Milwaukee on Sunday and I’ll stay there for a couple days, then Chicago, then…who knows! I’ll need to make my way east finally so I’ll wander into New York and Pennsylvania and then visit friends in Vermont and New Hampshire, then finally Maine! I haven’t figured out yet though how much time I will spend in each of those places so we’ll see when I actually end up getting into Maine. I’m shooting for no later than June 5. It’s great to have the time to just wander around, see places, visit people, but have no real timeframe to stick to. I can leave a place early or stay an extra day and figure out places to stay as I go. I’m trying to keep up on warning people when I’m arriving though so as not to be TOO inconvenient :-)

Well that’s about all I’ve got for now. Hope everyone’s well, and please stay in touch!!!

Messing with Texas

I am currently sitting in a Barnes & Noble (for the second time today) using the free internet in Amarillo, TX. My Texas experience began yesterday around 6pm, well actually 7pm because I passed into a new time zone on my way into Texas. As I transitioned from New Mexico to Texas the land got flatter and perhaps more boring, as well as being a place I've never ventured in a car before. So I guess now marks the point at which this trip becomes something of "the unknown". Texas is certainly a strange land that I won't be sad to leave behind, but in all fairness everyone I've come into contact today has been very nice. I did, however, just overhear the following conversation:

B&N employee #1 (holding up a book): "Is this a picture of Obama and Gandhi?"

B&N employee #2: "no, that's Obama and the Dali Lama"

Well anyways today has been a good day for regrouping myself and my brain. So far this trip hasn't been too bad because I've managed to split up the drive into 4-6 hour days, so I don't get too exhausted or bored. The landscape is a little boring though, so I'll be glad when I get farther northeast. Today I did a little bit of wandering around Amarillo, spent some time in Barnes & Noble earlier today when I wrote my NM blog post, made a visit to Target (Wal Mart is closer to my hotel but...well...shopping at a Wal Mart in Texas? Are you kidding me?! Please.), then went back to my hotel and discovered that it would cost me $3 to do one load of laundry in the hotel's laundry room so I proceeded to do laundry in the sink in my room for free. Then I gave myself a pedicure and did some old-fashioned correspondence (writing letters and preparing a few cards for special occasions to send along to family) and I have now returned to Barnes & Noble because it seems to be the only place with free wi-fi.

Tomorrow I head to Oklahoma City to hang out with some pretty awesome people for a few days and I'm very excited!!

I think I'll go find some dinner now. But I'll leave you all with a list of strange things I've seen in my short time in Texas:

-a bumper sticker that said "Keep your choices out of my wombs. -God"

-an entire aisle in Barnes & Noble of nothing but Bibles (everyday bibles, specialty bibles, children's bibles...)

-enormous hair

-perhaps more to come, we shall see...

Santa Fe and Albuquerque and saying goodbye to familiar things

Well it's been a few days since I've written anything here and that's because I've been in Santa Fe and Albuquerque! (I'm in Texas right now but that's a whole other blog entry, coming soon).

So after an awesome few days at Sonlight I loaded up on chips and goldfish and cookies and scored myself the new Sonlight '10 T-shirt which I may or may not be hip enough to wear, but we shall see... anyways, then on Wednesday I set off (after almost being held hostage by Dani) for Albuquerque! Turns out the drive from Pagosa Springs to Albuquerque is actually quite pretty and way better than the drive from Denver to Albuquerque via I-25. So as I listened to my newly downloaded podcasts I drove along into New Mexico and took a few pictures along the way. I then ventured into Albuquerque where I thought I was all set with my google map directions to get to the house of the fabulous Gorvetzian family. This is when things got tragically interesting. First, I missed my exit. So I thought "ok fine, I'll go to the next exit and get back on the highway and take my exit from the other direction" So I did this and ended up on the longest road in the history of the world (Tramway Rd.) and after about 50 years of driving on Tramway I thought to myself "I must have passed my road by now. Seriously." So I gave up and turned into a very wealthy-looking neighborhood where rich people and their slightly pompous but cute dogs stared at me in my dirty Chevy Cavalier with a bike with the duct-tape seat...I parked in front of a gigantic house and pulled out my map. Of course, the road atlas people made a close-up square of Albuquerque and I seemed to be about a milimeter off from that square so I was nowhere to be found on my map. I decided to get back on the highway and try again. So I got back on the highway going back towards Colorado and...yep, you guessed it, I missed my exit again. I then discovered that it was pretty much the last exit to Albuquerque for another several miles, so I traveled a lot farther than I needed to and finally got back on going in the right direction and paying uninterrupted attention to where my exit was. I got off on my exit and of course ended up, once again, on the Longest Road In Albuquerque. I finally gave in and called the lovely Dr. Nancy for help since I'd told her about an hour and a half ago that I was an hour from their house. Anyways long story slightly shorter, I found their house (after accidentally driving a ways up into the mountains and calling Dr. Nancy again) and turns out when I'd first given up on the Longest Road In Albuquerque I had given up one block short of the road I was looking for. Sigh.

After that things got much better. I got to hang out with, and stay in the house of, the Gorvetzians which was tons of fun. I got to walk around Santa Fe for an afternoon which I've been meaning to do for a long time! And I got to visit some of the other awesome people in Albuquerque. I unfortunately didn't get to see everyone, including my awesome roommate from Semester at Sea, because she was busy graduating from college! Would have been great to see her, but I did seem to be in the 505 at a sort of ridiculous time of year and people were busy. BUT I had a great time, saw cool people, went for an exhausting bike ride, hung out with an awesome dog named Lotus, and generally had lots of fun! I did, however, seem to fail at taking very many pictures. I'll try to do better in the future.

Unfortunately my computer battery is running low and this Barnes & Noble I'm sitting in doesn't seem to have power outlets so I guess I'll just upload a few pictures and then leave my Texas blog for another time, perhaps later today.

I hope you're all doing well and please send me emails and things so I know what you're up to!

My trusty car Baxter in New Mexico

Me at an art garden in Santa Fe

Sonlight

Hanging out at Sonlight for a couple days has been amazing. I'm going to miss this place so much this summer!! And the people, I'll mostly miss the awesome people. Yesterday I helped Brett and Dani organize some program and kitchen things, then the fabulous Shelby and Kayla showed up to start their training as Dani's successors so I got to hang out with them!! We all went into town for the evening and ate at Kip's, an amazing restaurant famous for their fish tacos and for being visited by Oprah (I like the tacos are better than Oprah though)

I was too lazy to get my camera, so this is me at Sonlight, taken with my laptop :-)

Mmmm camp! I'll miss this place this summer.

I might even miss the deer

Colorado Photos

Ah, Colorado...I'll miss you this summer!

Boofalo! :-)

Correction

actually, the blueberry brunch cake will be made by the amazing Mary and the hashbrowns will be the culinary masterpiece of Dani. But either way, with the two of them in the kitchen there's no going wrong! I can't wait for breakfast :-)

First Stop: Sonlight

Quick update:

So far my car is doing beautifully, although it's pretty packed full of stuff so it's riding a little lower than usual and it took an hour longer than usual to get to Sonlight from Boulder due to my heavier load. Although in my defense, part of the heavy load is my bike on the back of the car. But admittedly, I do seem to have brought a lot of stuff. In any case, my car Baxter is doing amazing and has gotten me to my first destination!

Also, I've just discovered podcasts. They're free on itunes! What a great idea! So after helping serve dinner to the work group staying here at Sonlight, and trying out the new teeter totter (which is amazing by the way, and I'm kind of bummed I won't get to use it all summer long) then I have been spending the remainder of my evening subscribing to tons of podcasts so that I can have things to listen to on my drive!

That's all for now, it's definitely bed time. Blueberry brunch cake for breakfast tomorrow made by the amazing and talented Dani Lynn aka Dan Dan Noodle Bowl!

(pictures tomorrow!)

And So It Begins

My bags are (mostly) packed and I'm ready to go! My car is washed inside and out (so if it breaks down along the way at least it will look good!) I've got lots of new music on my ipod that was suggested to me by all kinds of awesome people, and a fun new playlist thanks to Kira. I've got cookies baked by my grandma and more food etc from Mom and Colin!

So I guess with my car packed full of clothes, shoes, my new rain boots (I mean seriously, it rains a lot in Maine), food, music, audiobooks, road atlas, and a million other things, I think I'm about ready to hit the road tomorrow morning!

My first stretch of trip will be a 5 hour drive to Sonlight to visit my amazing friends out there who I will miss immensely this summer, as it will be my first time in 14 years that I haven't spent at least part of my summer there. Wow! I'll spend a couple days there helping out and visiting and whatnot and it should be good times!!

I also had a great mother's day spent having breakfast "in The Buff" with my mom and Colin, then mom and I went over to my Grandma's house for a visit. The rest of my day was full of laundry and packing with a little break in the evening to watch M*A*S*H which I feel is always a worthwhile thing to do :-)

Oh, and congratulations to Heidi, Paras, Tanya, Stephanie, Leya, Brandon and everyone else who just graduated college! And congratulations to my cousin Irene who will graduate from high school later this month! I'm so proud of all of you and I wish you the best of luck and unbelievable amounts of fun in your future!

Time for bed now.

Peace!

Back to Blogging and on to new Adventures

Well hello there!

Welcome back to my blog (especially you, Tanya)! It's been quite a while since I've updated this bad boy but that's because I've been waiting for something interesting to happen so I could write about it. But by now, lots of things have happened so I think I'd better get busy on updating!

I am currently trying to get my things and my scattered brain together to leave on my road trip across the country! I leave Monday, and I have yet to pack or even think about packing...so that's my goal for the next few days. I'm also just sending my trusty old car Baxter good thoughts all the time to make sure he gets me all the way to Maine :-) He's still going strong at this point but he's getting closer and closer to 200,000 miles plus he's 17 years old!

Some very big news in my life is that I've finally finished my job in the campus parking garage! haha. Five years in a booth is perhaps far too much, but on the other hand it was a GREAT work-study job for college. Minimal thinking involved, lots of free time, internet access...yeah, it was pretty good. But I'm SO glad that time in my life is over now! I've got a job lined up when I get in Maine, I'll be working at a summer camp as a program coordinator for an adventure camp for middle school aged kids. It should be pretty fun, and hopefully a great experience! I can't wait to live a couple blocks from the beach and be in beautiful Maine! This week I've been saying goodbye to people, and to Boulder. I went on a great hike up the Royal Arch trail in Chautauqua yesterday!

Other big news: my mom got married in March! I'm very happy for her and I can see how unbelievably happy she is, which she absolutely deserves. So congratulations, Mom and Colin!

I plan to update this blog as often as possible while I'm traveling across the country and then living in Maine. Hopefully I'll have some great stories and lots of pictures! I hope you come back and visit my blog and see what I'm up to, but also I really want to hear what you all are up to this summer too! As far as keeping in touch with me, the internet is a good system. Find me on Facebook, or email me at kinimaleka@gmail.com or give me a call on my cell phone!

If you want to send me mail of the "snail" variety (which I would LOVE!), let me know and I'll give you my address in Maine!

Oh, and for your information, my (very) tentative road trip itinerary is:

Pagosa Springs, CO

Albuquerque, NM

Oklahoma City, OK

St. Louis, MO

Rockford, IL

Milwaukee, WI

Chicago, IL

New York

Vermont

New Hampshire

Maine

(leaving room for changes in plan, unexpected adventures, delays, etc)