Jetlagged

You may have seen my Facebook posts of pictures from the West and cryptic statuses posted from odd locations, and then posts from home and then from California again. The whiplash you're feeling from that sentence is the feeling I have right now, as I reflect upon the last month of my life. 

Phillip's internship is in Los Angeles (super cool, right?), and we had to get there. In 3 days. Plans changed and I ended up going last-minute. We flew to Kentucky to get Phillip's car. Stayed with my roommate and her family and took off the next morning to Nebraska, where my aunt Sally lives. 

From there we drove to Colorado Springs, where Cindy, my first cousin once removed lives. 

Because it was our shortest driving day, she and her husband drove us around the Air Force Academy and Garden of the Gods. Phillip had never seen the Rockies before and fell in love with them and their snowcapped peaks. 

He was a little cold in his shorts.

We then had our longest, most awful driving day through Utah, Arizona and Nevada to Los Angeles. We stopped at a lot of the scenic stops in Utah. The rock formations were beautiful in their own way, but my skin missed its humidity. A lot. 

We stopped in Las Vegas for Phillip's first In-N-Out experience. (He's not a big hamburger fan.) After dinner we drove straight to Burbank and we stayed with my uncle, David. 

I flew out the next morning (Sunday), and we each started our internships on Monday. What a whirlwind! 

But I'm not done...

I had already booked a ticket to come and visit Phillip previous to knowing that I would be his cross-country traveling companion. Last weekend my mom and I flew out to San Diego because of a Christian Librarian Conference she had there. We drove up to LA to visit Phillip and David. I stayed in LA for a few days.

It was a good visit. 

My sleep pattern is still recovering. 

I'm Back

Let's just say, this school year was busy. When it all ended a few weeks ago, I found myself asking "Where did the time go?"

At family gatherings I was asked why I hadn't blogged since August. While a big part of the reason is personal laziness, here are a few other, little reasons why I have neglected my blog (in no particular order):

1.) Club Swim
One of my talented friends created an online mockumentary miniseries for an independent study that has been syndicated on Swimming World magazine's website and has gained attention from the swimming community. You don't have to be a swimmer to love it, too! Visit Club Swim's website for episodes, additional information and a super interesting blog. Seriously,  read the blog ;)

Logo courtesy of Club Swim, LLC

2.) Collegian
The Asbury Collegian had another great year, winning several national awards. It's always a good time in the News Bureau.

OK, so these aren't our national awards. Photo courtesy of Melissa Landon. 

3.) AU Swimming
Collegiate athletics take up a lot of time, but most of the time it is worth it. I finished up my last season with Asbury as a NAIA Scholar-Athlete and Appalachian Swimming Conference Scholar-Athlete.

I will say I won't miss tech suits. 

4.) This kid. 
He's the best.

Taste of Home

After my London adventure, I was lucky enough to be able to go home for a little over a week. Only, my parents had moved so "home" became more of a concept instead of a location. Even though we live fairly close to where I grew up, I had a hard time adjusting. I had to use my GPS to get everywhere, and I still missed turns. As always, we crammed a lot of activities into my short time at home. 

I was alarmed when I came home to find a sonogram on our counter. Luckily, it did not belong to any human in our house. Instead, it belonged to Lola, our new cat. When my parents moved, my sister's cat got out and in the process of trying to find it, we ended up with another cat. A week later, we learned of the kittens. On my last full day at home, Lola gave birth to six kittens. My family now has eight cats. They don't need eight cats. If you would like a cat, please volunteer yourself! 

Aren't they cute? 

Food is the best at home. As a tradition, some of our close family friends had us over for our annual Nashadilla feast. Nashadillas are yummy quesadillas with chicken and peppers (and for the cheese eaters of the world, cheese), named after our family friends. Aren't we a creative bunch of people? It was awesome to catch up and eat real, really awesome food. 

We started off with homemade Pico de Gallo. This stuff is the best. I could eat it with a spoon.

While I was stuffing myself with Pico de Gallo, someone else was hard at work on the Nashadillas!

Alas, the finished product!

I spent a lot of time resting, putting my new room together and visiting family and friends. We live fairly close to Rock Springs, so we went tubing in the refreshing spring water (it wasn't as cold as I anticipated). It was beautiful and has been nicely maintained. The water was very clear and very different from the other murky springs that I have been to. 

My friend, Miranda, came with us!

I visited my high school friends, the "success group", back on the coast and we ate breakfast at Louis's and I had the largest bacon egg biscuit that I have ever seen. It was delicious and left me full through our time at Playalinda, our local beach. A lot of my friends were already back at school or are seeing the world, so I was happy to catch up with a few people who I haven't seen since Christmas!

We eventually got used to the water!

My family also spent the day of my parents' anniversary at my grandparents' cabin in the woods. Bobo, my dog, loves it and loses his laziness and runs crazily while he is up there. 

He likes to stand up when we're driving up the driveway! 

I was sad to go, but I was blessed by my time at home. I've kind of realized that home is where your dog is. 

Oh, and your family, too.

A few years later

Happy 23rd anniversary, Mom and Dad! 

Taken by Tom Branan at Lee's Lakeside

In 23 years you've:

• changed jobs (a few times)
• lived in seven houses
• been instrumental in the life of five churches
• had three biological children and have helped many others
• gotten some grey hairs 
• "made some memories"
• stayed together
• put God first

You're the best! 

-Hill.

Getting home in one piece

Some of you have probably seen snippets of my lengthy travel experience on Facebook. Let me tell you:  it was a long day. 

It all started out in confusion when the person I was meeting to go to the airport with and I mixed up the times we were going to meet. Eventually we found each other at the train station after each of us hauled our luggage through the tube, switching trains (climbing stairs) several times.

Once getting to the airport, I got checked in and my bag barely cleared the weight requirement by .04 kg. My bag was overweight going to London so it took a lot of moving around and throwing out of old things to make the cut. My carry-on items weighed a ton. 

The people at my carrier's counter said that we had a brief delay of 10-15 min. After sitting in the gate for over an hour past take-off time, we boarded. I still am not sure where the problem was.

My layover was going to be short anyways, but with over an hour taken out, I only had about 45 minutes to get off of the plane, grab my bag and go through customs and security. I was really nervous about it but all of the people of the Toronto airport assured me that I would have plenty of time multiple times.

In an ideal world, I would have had plenty of time. But there was a baggage jam, so I ended up getting my bag as my Orlando-bound flight was taking off. Waiting in the long line of passengers in the same boat, trying to get on other flights was eye-opening. It is amazing what stress can do to the individual. At the end of the line, a woman was screaming at the Air Canada employee who was not meeting her requests. Other employees had to be called in. Around me it was much more calm. I was surrounded by travelers who were exhausted from hours of traveling from India, Vienna and Scotland. The girl, a year older than me, coming from Vienna, had a chance of staying alone in a hotel in Toronto because of full flights. She cried when she overheard the airport officials say this. We all just wanted to go home.

Goodbye, Toronto!

I would consider myself fairly fortunate to have snagged a flight for several hours later that night. I had a few hours to burn at my gate, but we boarded right on time. There were a lot of storms and turbulence during my flight but I mainly slept and watched an in-flight movie, What to Expect When You're Expecting. Of the parts I was awake for, I was a little confused. I'm pretty sure international adoptions aren't a candlelight service. I could be wrong, though.

We landed right on time in Orlando. I was anxious to get off of the plane and leave but a voice came over the intercom and said, "Passengers, we have had a situation arise where public officials need to come on board. We need everyone to stay in your seats. It'll take about 30 seconds." 

I immediately plopped back down in my seat as the Orlando Police Department marched on board and arrested a man about 10 rows up from where I was. He was very calm during the whole process, knowing what was coming. I still don't know what he was arrested for even though I have looked. 

My bag came on time and I met up with my mom and we drove to our new house, that I have never been to before. It is something else. Yesterday when I woke up I didn't know where I was, and my mom found me frantically searching for my passport.

This story joins other crazy flight situations of missing flights, getting sick on board and meeting other people. My college roommate said to remind her to "never fly with [me]". I guess I have a history of strange airport happenings. It's one big adventure. 

London bucket list

We started yesterday, our last day in London, with an agenda. Our bucket list. While we were really optimistic about what we could accomplish, time kind of got away from us. We did knock out some of our activities, though.

We started the day headed to the  Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. After a late night the night before, it was hard to roll out of bed in time. We were all so yucky and tired so Cassie suggested Starbucks while on the Tube. As a recent Starbucks-convert and a part of a group of eager Starbucks-goers, I didn't need much convincing. We were trying to decide when we should get it but after climbing the stairs from the underground to the street, we decided it was divine providence when we were greeted by a Starbucks employee offering us free mini Frappuccinos and a discount at the store across the street. 

Poor Courtney didn't get a name. Also, my name is misspelled! 

We then went to Buckingham Palace and waited for the guards. Only, the guards never changed. 

Here we are waiting. Aren't my friends beautiful? They're also super talented and love Jesus. 

The reason why we couldn't see the guards was because the Triathlon was going by! 

It was neat seeing the bike portion go by in waves and hearing the crowd cheer. 

Cassie and I stayed to watch the Triathlon and Courtney and Becca met someone for lunch. Later we all met up at the Westfield Mall, the mall of all malls. It's 3 stories and crammed with people. It is overwhelming. It was neat to be constantly rubbing shoulders with Olympic athletes from all over the world. I can't even begin to name all of the nations represented that I have seen. After buying a few things, and forcing myself not to buy everything from the British equivalent of Vera Bradley, Cath Kidston, we decided to do some more sight seeing. 

Don't worry, we took the crosswalk picture. I just don't have it! Photo by Cassie.

We took the tube to see Abbey Road Studios, the studios of the Beatles, this small band that no one's ever heard of. On the tube we were scared by this guy who was on edge, threatening the woman and child who accidentally brushed past him, mumbling under his breath. After we got off, we were so relieved. We joined a group of other crazy people who took turns running out to pose in the famous Abbey Road crosswalk for a picture. Abbey Road is just a street. It isn't blocked off in any way. There were some close calls! 

We then met up with everyone else at the Tower Hill tube stop to get our last group dinner. We walked across the beautiful tower bridge that has the iconic Olympic rings on it right now for the games. It was starting to rain and the Thames matched the grey sky. 

Tower Bridge with the Olympic rings. Photo by Cassie.

We knew we wanted something authentic and we eventually ended up in a cozy pub, watching the games alongside lots of Team GB fans. Our food hit the spot and we had to go back to clean and pack. 

I hate packing. 

On another note, here are the links to our work:

Kentucky Monthly blog 

     -My Sharrieffa Barksdale article

LEX18 page

     -Watch the videos on the right hand side, there's lots of good stuff!

Asbury Blog

Last day in London

Today was my last full day in London. It's bittersweet. So much packing and cramming activities in. More detailed post to come, I promise. Please pray for safe travels for all of us. Thanks for following :)