Grace'm

Next year I will be getting a new sister, and another Grace at that! My little brother Micah and Grace'm (a rather lame nickname I've used to distiguish my sister, Grace Elizabeth, from my future sister-in-law, Grace Marie) are engaged, and she was with us on our vacation. Grace'm is a wonderful girl, yet pretty much different from any girl I've met. It's hard to describe, but she is very "Moxie" but remains very feminine. I'm sure that's not the best way to put it, but it's better than she could say with a straight face. Of course, she can't keep a straight face.... ever. And I think that's funny.
So on Saturday Micah, Grace'm, and Grace went skydiving for their "Senior Trip", so to speak. And this is the kind of people that they all are. To me, paying to jump out of a plane with a guy strapped to my back for no practical purpose doesn't appeal to me. I'm sure it's a rush, but I'll find a rollercoaster and be happy with my seatbuckle around me. But extreme sports are made for people like Micah and Grace'm with an occasional Grace alongside. It was to Micah and Grace'm that I gave mini snowboards to, when I gave matchbox cars as gifts to all my other classmates. It was Micah and Grace'm that were doing backwards dives and backflips with 180 degree twists off the diving rock at the pool. Even the first time that Micah drove Grace'm around was on his motorcycle.
To put it shortly, I think they are going to be a great couple. They will the people to go to when we need to have a little fun. Not to minimize the fact that they are both people who I greatly respect. Both of them are mature beyond their years in how they look at life, friends, relationships, hard situations, and controversial issues. They don't have all the answers, but they understand that, and are not afraid to ask for advice when it is needed. I love you both!

Leigh (pronounced "lee")

To celebrate the occasions of the day (my sister's graduation and my mom's birthday) our family decided to get a little Texas culture by visiting the Texas Roadhouse. What an experience. I know that these resaurants exist across the country, but there was just something about going to one that was actually in Texas. For those of you who have not been so privileged to dine at such a fine establishment as this, you are greeted first by the sound of some good ol' country music shaking the walls even before you enter the building. As you enter the door, the next thing to note is a diamond shaped yellow sign warning you that there are peanut shells on the floor. Next thing you find is peanut shells on the floor with a big barrel of peanuts in the corner of the waiting area far from any trash recepticle. To greet you is a black girl named BobbyJoe who asks you if y'all would like to sit down for a spell till a table is clear. After cracking a few goober peas, and discarding the shells on the floor between your feet, you will be seated by another polite girl in jeans who asks you where y'all are from and if there's anything at all she can do for you. Your waitress, whose name is Leigh (pronounced "lee") then comes by and makes similar small talk till she pulls a pad of paper from her denim pocket to jot down all your drinks. After all the sweet teas, lemonades, and cokes are recorded she heads off and you get a chance to really look around. First off, you notice that you have a new supply of peanuts in a tin bucket on your table. You have an extra empty bucket as well, but I don't know what that was for.

If you have not guessed yet, this is exactly what happened to us. So from here on out, I'll describe it in the first person retrospective viewpoint, rather than the second person play-by-play viewpoint.

The pounding country music was as loud as ever, and really immersed us in the atmosphere. All across the wall are caricatures of country singers, NASCAR racing hoods sponsering several beer labels, as well as the neon signs for the various beers supported. Were it not for the undesirable taste and smell, intoxicating nature, and poor associations with beer, I just might have gotten one. Leigh came back quite promptly, along with a couple of unnamed guys to help pass around the drinks. She then took our orders, chatted for a bit and headed off again. (random comment: Just as I'm writing this, I burped and it tasted like the peanuts that we had there) We chatted, took a picture of a stuffed armadillo, tossed some peanut shells on the floor. Leigh returned with our soups and salads, while looking out for any refills she could give on drinks. "Could I have a Sprite instead of a Coke?" I asked her. "Sure thing, honey... was there something wrong with your Coke?" She returned with our drinks, including my Sprite. "Hope that tastes a bit better!" she remarked. After waiting a bit longer, anticipating our meals, I commented how I find it frustrating that whenever I go out to eat, I will have just about finished my drink when the meals come. They will forget to ask about refills right then, and won't come back for a while, because we are busy eating: so I get stuck being thirsty for fifteen minutes or so. No sooner had I finished saying that, Leigh comes up from behind me with a refill for my Sprite, with our meals following shortly after. What a wonderful place! Not to mention the food was incredible. And plenty of it too. For the first time in a while, I actually had enough food on my plate to pack it up for later. We were almost finished when darling Leigh came around with some friends to sing something that resembled a "Happy Birthday" to my mom and some congratulations to my sister. All in all it was an awesome experience. It was a great way to taste Texas!

Grace

So the primary reason I was in Texas in the first place was for my darling sister's graduation. She graduated August 4, incidentally my Mom's birthday as well. It was a big graduation for what I am used to. In my highschool graduation there was only one other graduate. Basically, and not to belittle the occasion in any way, I was there to hear a name, and that was about it. "Graduating Magna Cum Laude, Grace Elizabeth Blake!" It was good. She is officially the only one in our family to receive her Bachelor's degree (though Caleb and Benjamin received degrees in Bible School). So in congratulations to you, Grace, here is a really bad picture that I took of the event.

Abel

Darling Dork of a brother you are! Thursday was my first full day in Texas... ever. It was nice, hot but nice. If there was one thing that I had purposed to do before this summer was over, was to swim more often than I did last summer, which was only once. So when I heard that there was going to be a swimming pool there, I was very pleased. On Thursday morning, several persons has determined to go to Wal*Mart for some reason, leaving behind Mom, Grace, Abel, and me. We decided that it would be a good time to go swimming in the pool. I got the impression (not having looked around the place much yet) that the pool was not terribly close: I figured it was a little ways behind one of the houses we were staying at. Grace was busy, so Abel told me to get ready and we'd go ahead of them; they could catch up later. So I put on my swim trunks that I bought last year for my one swim, grabbed a t-shirt and towel, and followed Abel outside. (It was somewhat ironic, I thought, that my last and only swim of last summer and my first swim of this summer were both with Abel.) I realized that this was the first time in a while that I'd walked around outside barefooted. But I figured that I wouldn't have any trouble, Abel was barefoot as well, "No worries!" My bad. I followed Abel to the road and realized that the pool must be at the house of our other second cousins down the road. "It's only about a quarter mile down the road," Abel says. But it was more like a half a mile down a black paved road who's surface temperature must have soared over 100 degrees; or we could walk beside the road in the stones and terrible coarse grass and thorns. I don't remember my feet being in such agony before, or ever feeling such relief in a pool before. The bottoms of my feet had burned slightly, making the next day or so uncomfortable to walk. I also discovered after I got back that I had cut the bottom of one of my toes, but didn't realize it at first because of the overall agony of my feet at the time. I did feel it somewhat later through the week, but blamed it on my new shoes.

To end this on a more positive note, that was the first of something great: and I'm speaking of the pool. I swam most every day of my vacation, twice a day on a couple occasions. It was a beautiful pool with an interesting diving platform (You can check out pictures of it using the link to the right). Growing up I was not nearly as home in the water as many of my brothers and sisters. It was at a family camp that I really started having loads of fun in the water. I guess you could say that I re-found that joy in that pool over vacation.

Long live buoyancy!

Micah, Dad, and a Bike gone bad

These events occured before my flight. However, since I did not hear of them till after I arrived in Texas, and since I wanted to start this series with me (haahaa), I am posting it with a retrospect view of a retrospect view.
My dad, Micah, and Benjamin had been planning months ago to drive their bikes down to Texas for Grace's graduation. When they were first planning, neither Benjamin nor Micah had their motorcycle licenses, and only Benjamin had a motorcycle. As circumstances (or providence) would have it, only Micah rode down on his own bike with my dad. Micah told me that they were planning on leaving a couple days before the rest of the group would head out in a car. To my knowledge, this happened as planned. I don't recall hearing any important events between Maine and Memphis, Tennessee. Dad described going through a lot of traffic, and after emerging from the bulk of it in one section, he did not see Micah in his mirrors. Finding a place to exit, he got a call from Micah, who said that he was in the median of the highway with a broken chain. Turning around, and getting back to him, Dad discovered that the chain hadn't broken, but rather had fallen off. However, it was still irreperable, and Dad set off to buy a new one. A good deal of time and seventy-five dollars later, Dad returned with the chain. With the help of another friendly biker, they got the bike back together. Friendly Biker and Dad, seeing the traffic open for a ways, merged right back onto the highway. Micah followed. Again, as Dad looked into his mirror, Micah was not seen. Having not gotten too far, Dad turned around and drove back to find Micah's bike dumped in the middle of the road, holding up both lanes of traffic. "It won't move" Micah said, and Dad felt bad... assuming that the chain had seized up or something of the sort. The truth was that when Micah pulled out into the lane, following Friendly Biker and Dad, that a car was coming up on him faster than he expected. Being in the left lane, Micah proceeded to merge right. The speeding car did the same, and rear-ended him as they both were changing lanes. To add color and drama to the story, I'll say that the one who hit him was an off-duty police officer. Micah was fine with minor scrapes and scratches. In fact he got a road rash wound on his right elbo that looks almost just like mine! As they waited for an on-duty officer to come, and for other stuff that takes a long time during accidents, Dad was talking with someone (it was either a truck driver or Friendly Biker, I don't remember) and made the comment "Two bikers from Maine.... Tennessee cop.... Who's fault do you think this accident is?" And it was pretty much true, for Micah was given a ticket for not yielding. So getting the bike in somewhat running order, they were escorted by the on-duty police officer to the nearest exit where Dad and Micah considered their options. One was to fix the bike enough to make the rest of the trip. Two was to transport the bike back to Maine somehow and fix it there. Three was to get rid of it right where they were. The first two options were just too impractical and expensive to worry about. Conveniently they saw very nearby a pawn shop. So they decided to give it a try and sell it to them. They walked in, and I'll add a bit more fun to the story by saying that the person who attended them was a big black woman named "Chiquita." Sadly, she said that they could take it because it was considered machinery, which they could not buy and sell, I guess. Dad told her that all they wanted to do was get rid of it. To this she said that her husband would love a motorcycle, so Micah wrote her a bill of sale, and sold the bike for $0 even, the exact amount he paid for it in the first place. From there they continued on to Texas, uncomfortably at that for they had to where a lot of their luggage now including their leather jackets in 90 degree heat. So Grace decided that she didn't have much to do, so she would drive out to meet them. Benjamin and the rest of the gang were already on the road, and were in fact catching up with them. So somewhere in Arkansas, they all met up pretty much the same time, and finished their journey in a boring and uneventful manner.

Bad Start

I had only flown six times in my life: three trips to Mexico and back. I had never before flown by myself. Neither had I ever switched airlines during a layover before. These few things made me moderately nervous on August 2nd when I stepped into Manchester Airport. Things seemed to go smoothly as I got my boarding pass and got through security hassle free. I was quite early, so I wandered around, getting something to eat at McDonald's and getting some gum for too much money. The plane left slightly late, due to someone's baggage mixup. "No worries" I thought. I had only an hour layover in Chicago, but there shouldn't be an issue being a few minutes late. That flight went fine, with an only slightly annoying kid and his polite mother beside me. Oh yes, and an angry woman near me swearing at the flight attendants for not giving her a beer. We landed to a wet Chicago, and the lightning caused the ground crews to stay indoors, leaving our plane one hundred feet from our gate. Knowing that the entire airport was in the same situation as our plane, I wasn't too concerned with making my next flight, even though we sat there for an hour... as long as my layover was supposed to be. When we finally got off, to my dismay and concern there was no display for my next flight, or any flight from that airline. I didn't know if I had missed it or what, but I wasn't sure what to do about it. Without information of the flight, I had no idea where there gate was either. So I wasn't sure who to talk to. I decided to go to the front desk area, knowing that would be an easy place to find who I wanted. Oops. Now I was outside of the security, and being late at night there was no one at the desk. After talking around, I found that there should be someone from the airline at the baggage claim. Finding it and talking to the woman there, she informed me that the flight had not left yet, but she couldn't get me a boarding pass because her printer was down. So she left to the front desk and came back with a handwritten boarding pass. I finally got back in and found out where the gate was that I needed to get to. However, it showed that the flight was now boarding, and that the gate was a good distance away. I ran... then my shoes started to fall off.... then I ran in my socks. Then I got to the gate and eventually boarded the plane. I seated myself next to a fellow who was complaining and swearing over his cell phone about the late flight and the weather and such. Then after taking off, drinking some awful smelling beverage. Then jamming to some music, thus jostling my seat. He general made the trip much more miserable than it should have been. But it was over soon enough with my sister Grace and my Dad to meet me in Dallas, only two hours late. It'd be nice to end the story happier like saying that I found five dollars on my way out, but my week improved so much after that night that I don't really need to lie to cheer you up.

Vacation Stories

There is just too much to talk about concerning my last vacation that I could not practically fit it into one post. So I will update with a new story every couple of days for a while covering the highlights of my trip. To sum it up right now though, it was incredible... possible one of the best vacations I've ever had. Some of it might be because I'm working a full time job, so vacations are much more precious than they used to be. Despite doing a lot of fun stuff, it was a very relaxing time for me. Most of the stories and events will be titled by a person's name, as most of the fun centered around people, more than just events. Hope you enjoy them as they come out!