Things that glow

One of my absolute favorite things about summertime in the South is the lightning bugs. We had them in Southern California, too - they were called fireflies there - but I don't think they came out at night en masse like they do down here.

Last weekend I was in D.C. celebrating the fourth. We were on the way to a cookout when we drove by an empty lot between houses that was completely alight with the incandescent insects. I love phosphorescence in all of its forms, and that's what this post is all about.

Also handy because then I don't have to talk about my job search or the fact that J currently lives hundreds of miles away...
Synchronized fireflies (ahem, lightning bugs) in the Smokey Mountains of north Tennessee and North Carolina.
I originally saw this piece in Southern Living yesterday in the dentist's office (heh) but since I couldn't find that article online, here's the phenomenon covered in the New York Times.

Basically, a whole slew of male lightning bugs blink in unison in order to attract females. Apparently it's like a symphony of lights. Not sure if it impresses their women, but I would love to see this. The NYT piece covers the bugs in Elkmont, Tenn., during the first two weeks in June.

The Dismalites of Dismal's Canyon outside of Phil Campbell, Ala.

Dismal's Canyon is also where they filmed the backdrop for When Dinosaurs Roamed the Earth on the Discovery channel

I actually have seen the dismalites before. We had a group trip in 2009 to see them and enjoy the canyon for a weekend. They have campsites as well as a couple of lovely cabins and a swimming hole. The canyon (and the dismalites) are the major attractions, though.

You go on a guided tour after dark in the summertime to see the tiny bioluminescent worms. Gajillions (this is an official count) of Dismalites light up the sides of the cave walls like a starry sky.

image via

Also, Dismal's Canyon is home to Burr's Hideout - apparently where Aaron Burr hid out for days after he shot Alexander Hamilton. Lots of old graffiti on the rocks too. Definitely worth a visit.

Cave graffiti at Dismal's dating from 1936

Phosphorescent plankton on the beach at Dauphin Island, Ala.
I've been fortunate enough to see this one, too, as a part of a field studies class I took my senior year of high school to Dauphin Island Sea Lab. My friend, Dustin of Spawning is Imminent (why can't I find your blog anymore, Dustin? Please explain this to me) was lucky enough to study there for a summer in college.

At any rate, it was amazing - standing in the complete dark and kicking up the sand in the surf. The entire area surrounding your toes lighting up as you disrupt the plankton.

Dauphin Island is a barrier island and quite remote - not very many city lights. So serene, and the glowing sand makes the experience otherworldly. I'd love to go back. No photos, unfortunately.

This completes my shortlist of favorite things that glow. I have no idea why I found it necessary to write this post.

Hi, I'm 27 and I live with my mother.

It's not so bad, really. She brings me coffee every morning with frothed almond milk. I actually get to work on time because of the coffee-in-bed ritual.

She's an excellent cook and great company. And she helped me clean out three years of abandoned hobbies and detritus friends have left behind from house parties and get-togethers. I feel guilty about that, but am so thankful that she was here.

So, it's been a while since my last post, and definitely not for lack of activity. Life activity increase = blog productivity decrease. C'est la vie.

I've been up to a lot! J finished grad school in December (yay!), schlepped through months of unsatisfactory work (boo) while searching for a satisfactory first-career job. He got an offer in May (yay!) right around our first anniversary. Who can believe I didn't blog about that one?!

J gave me some truly gorgeous anniversary flowers - birds of paradise, lilies and others - pictured here in case I never get around to dedicating a post to our anniversary... which is entirely possible.

Anyway, after months of anxiously awaiting news, a company that makes yogurt offered him a job! After ages of waiting, the usual "we need you to start... YESTERDAY." occurred. Chaos ensued.

Our anniversary trip to New York City turned into a frantic apartment search. We found a place; signed the lease; came home; rented a 22-foot Penske truck (her name was Penny) with a tow dolley; loaded almost all of our worldly possessions to said rental; drove in lightning storms and heavy construction maxing at 55 mph and listening to a crappy suspense book-on-CD through Tennessee, Virginia, D.C., Maryland, Delaware and finally Jersey; unloaded in the rain in New Rochelle, N.Y. (27 minutes by express train to the Big City and home of Dick Van Dyke on his show, apparently - things you learn from old people); unpacked; visited with our friends Christina and Daniel; and proceeded to sleep through three alarms and two phone calls from the airport cab driver at 4:45 a.m. on a Sunday morning.

Penny

I eventually made it home, exhausted, just in time to work on Monday to a cat on hunger strike. At my mother's house.

It's only temporary.

Holy hell, I need to find a job. I'm working on it.

It's only temporary.

More to come...

In the meantime:

• this is hilarious
• J started a blog! About food! We can blog together. Because, obviously, we don't live together right now.
• It's only temporary.
• I'm looking for work. if you're hiring.
• Charles is eating again. Her backbone still feels like a xylophone, but she is definitely perkier and eating her nom again. Phew.
  

Did you know that there are mobile truckers' chapels at certain truck stops?

It's beer-thirty

Did you know there was such a product?


I had no idea. I saw them at a quickie-mart last Saturday in Nashville.

You learn something new every day.

Hope they're not as nasty as this beer/malt liquor caffeinated concoction. Yikes.

Spoiled rotten

Marrying a cook has its perks. Sure, the hours are unforgiving and after his slow Monday and Tuesday we pass like ships in the night most weeks, me trying to stay up to see him when he gets home and him waking up earlier to have some coffee as I bolt out to work.

But sometimes, he pulls out all the stops and cooks for me. And a girlfriend. At his restaurant. I'm talking a multi-course fiasco here, complete with sorbet palate cleanser and full wine pairings.

How 'bout a course-by-course review of last Saturday's epic tasting menu to end all tasting menus?

Like an idiot, I forgot to take pictures of the first two courses, so you'll have to use your imagination...But here is a nice sunset one overlooking the putting green and the rest of south Huntsville I got before I was distracted by our first glass of prosecco:

Course one:
Six fresh shucked oysters on the half shell - three Island Creek (tiny and fatty and briny - in a GOOD way, these were my favorites) and three Savage Harbor (also delightful, larger) - with a champagne mignonette, which is quite possibly my favorite condiment ever. Can I call it a condiment?

Course two:
Butternut squash soup, drizzled with a lemon agrumato and garnished with fresh parsley. Hey - this was a learning dinner as well... Did you know that agrumato is made when olive oil presses are cleaned with fresh citrus and the cleaning oil? Well it is.

Course the third:
A lovely, palate-cleansing lemon sorbet with mint leaves.

(Hey, guess what? I finally remembered to take photos starting... now!)

Course four:
Warm purple cabbage salad with goat cheese, walnuts and chicken sausage. I had a version of this salad at Mezza Luna last fall and let me tell you, it embodies everything that is the best about fall. Perhaps Mezza will feature it again this fall? You should definitely go check it out if this is the case. Purple cabbage reminds me of this Norwegian side dish my Grandma used to make (and my mom does now... surkal... better believe I had to look up the spelling on that one. Amazing dish.) The goat cheese/walnut combination added some delightful creaminess to the dish and the chicken sausage tasted homemade. Mmmm.


Course five:
The most amazing fried fish I've ever had in my life. This course reminded me of a fish fry, but the best possible fish fry ever. The flounder itself was everything I love about fried food (crispy, lightly bread-y, crunchy) but underneath the crust was amazingly cooked fish. Like, perfectly cooked. With the amazing fish was a honking hunk of grilled cornbread (the hush puppy), some super tart slaw with julienned granny smith apples and shaved fennel keeping the green cabbage company and some surprise sugar snap peas hidden under the flounder. This may have been my favorite course. Maybe.

Course six:
Braised short rib with fried gnocchi (which, as it turns out doesn't have to be made of potatoes can in fact be made of any sort of starch... who knew?) and roasted root vegetables, including turnips, parsnips, carrots, rutabaga and some other rooty veg. The whole thing was topped off by an amazing gremolata (another new food term for me) and the best, most concentrated jus you've ever tasted. The jus was everything that made the short rib amazing, combined with red wine and reduced down to its most intense form and drizzled all over the plate.

Remembered to take this photo before I demolished the short rib. Not in the most pristine state, but Kris give it thumbs up nonetheless.

Dessert course (course seven):
Pumpkin cheesecake. I'm not gonna lie. For me, sweets are typically an afterthought. If I get to eat an amazing meal, I'm usually so stuffed by the end that I don't have an intense desire for dessert. But as they were only six courses into a seven-course tasting, the dessert was inevitable. And wonderful. The cheesecake was incredibly light and airy and whipped. Not like the heavy brick-like ones you find sometime smothered in cherry goop. We got tiny little pieces and ate every last bite because we had to be polite. Naturally. The final glass of prosecco made those last bites go down quite nicely.

Hello there, Kris (and pumpkin cheesecake). The bubbles were the best.

I concur.

Since J will graduate in December, we hope that he will transition from cook to some sort of 8-5 food scientist position. I will miss the restaurant ambiance and J in his starched white chef coat (complete with embroidered name... le sigh), but I hope this will bring about a new round of experimentation in his free time that he's never been able to attempt previously due to a rigorous work/school schedule... I'm thinking charcuterie, bread making, at home canning and pickling. If all goes according to plan, there will still be plenty of ways for me to remain fatter than I would like to be. But happy. Yum.

Here's one of the man in action, making ravioli (not from tonight, but some other time. See what I mean about the starched white coat?) He's on the right.

Thanks J!

And because ALL I have been doing this fall is eating, stay tuned for my Taste of Atlanta recap.

Outstanding in the field

So, I found out about this program (organization? movement?) via a design*sponge post and now I'm riveted. How do we get these guys to come to Huntsville, anyway? Naturally, Alabama superchef Frank Stitt (of Bottega and Highlands Grill in Birmingham) has already participated... I know this thanks to OITF's handy Google map of everywhere they've ever had a farm dinner:


View Outstanding in the Field Dinner Site Map in a larger map

(I created one of these for our educators visits of all of the Alabama Math Science Technology Initiative hub sites across the state - love them!)

Anyway, thinking of starting a social media campaign to get them to visit Huntsville.
I'm thinking a Ledges/Mezza Luna collaboration. But of course I am biased. Nowhere in their FAQ does OITF break down how to get a meal in your area, so I'm going to go ahead and assume it's all contacts and convincing.

I would definitely save (and save, and save) $200 for an experience like this:

Outstanding in the Field is a roving culinary adventure - literally a restaurant without walls. Since 1999 we have set the long table at farms or gardens, on mountain tops or in sea caves, on islands or at ranches. Occasionally the table is set indoors: a beautiful refurbished barn, a cool greenhouse or a stately museum. Wherever the location, the consistent theme of each dinner is to honor the people whose good work brings nourishment to the table.

Ingredients for the meal are almost all local (sometimes sourced within inches of your seat at the table!) and generally prepared by a celebrated chef of the region. After a tour of the site, we all settle in: farmers, producers, culinary artisans, and diners sharing the long table.

The dinners generally begin at 3 or 4 p.m., depending on the time of the year, and wrap up around sunset. As the days get shorter in the fall, the dinners last until candlelight is required. Length of each event is four to five hours, and guests often linger at-table well past sunset, reluctant to have the magical evening come to a close.

So, who's with me?! Let's get this campaign started so we can have a fabulous meal at a table like this one, in the DC area...

Miscellany

Hello there, blog.

I seem to be leaving you in the lurch all the time lately, don't I? I really do feel guilty on one level. But on another, a neglected blog means a busy and full real life. So yeah. That's a good thing. What have I been up to...

View from a deck at the event space.

Lots of tours and layout and web at work. Lots of plotting and scheming outside of work for this little event we have coming up in May. Got quite an impressive amount of work done this week on that front.

• Ordered a wedding dress
  
• Picked a venue (um, gorgeous?!)
• Ordered bridesmaid dresses (Aqua on super sale at J.Crew. I am trying to be a good, recession-conscious, bargain savvy friend...) The J.Crew customer service rep informed me via email how nice "my girls" are to work with and how great my friends are. I couldn't agree more, Veronica. But hearing someone else appreciate them in the way I do makes me feel even better.
• Made an appointment for deposits on the food, photographer and venue.

I am so looking forward to this low-key, understated (gorgeous, fun) observation of the start of our marriage and most of all recognizing this huge event in our lives with our nearest and dearest: Veronica's "best friends ever" and family from all over. And family friends.

We start "how-to-handle-your money-now-that-you're-attached-forever-and-ever classes" early next month and pastoral counseling sessions start in December. Is it strange that I'm looking forward to this? I guess these are so attractive to me because I really feel like we're entering into this with eyes open, and minds open. Ready to not just love each other unconditionally and eat lots o' good food, but aware and ready for the real world stuff. The paying off grad school loans and saving for retirement stuff.

Can't remember who - whether it was mom, dad or both, who always said something to the effect of, "money can't buy you happiness, but a lack of it can make you miserable." I want us to be real happy, like comfortable in our lives happy. And I have faith that this will come together for us. With lots of work at it.

Hrm. Aside from financial rants, other interesting things -

Headed to San Francisco in November! I booked airline tickets yesterday and will be spending some time out West. Half with the fam and the rest at a Dreamforce conference. Exciting.

Also, my friend Michelle started a blog! She's too cute and I loved her inaugural post about creative uses for leftovers. Totally keeping an eye out on her for posts like this... extremely useful. She's an entertaining writer, too. Check her out!

Still totally enjoying Glee. For those who haven't watched yet, please do. I am aware that I have a fixation with anything dance and/or musical-related and that not everyone dies over SYTYCD like I do. I can honestly say that this show will be a perfect Wednesday night pick-me-up for anyone. Musically inclined or no. Campy and hilarious. And current/relevant. Quality viewing.

Heading to the Monte Sano art fair this weekend. I love it up there (even more now... :) and the art show is always a blast. It's become one of the first signs of fall here, probably because it's a bit cooler up on the mountain... delightful.

So, blog, again - I apologize for the abandonment. But as you can see, I've been a busy lady. I think less frequent, more action-packed posts are acceptable. And they are going to have to work for a while. This is a fun hobby. Not another job duty. Thankfully.

Me and my zombie alter ego.

It's been a busy few weeks. Social South was amazing. I met a ton of people that I look forward to keeping up with in my circle of social network friends. I reunited with some great old friends, including Katie and my Style & Design teacher Robert, who taught me everything I started out with about Web design. All in all, a great weekend of new and old friends paired with novel and familiar concepts in the world of SM.

Immediately upon returning home, J and I took engagement photos. We're not usually huge on over-hyping life events (a few photos at the wedding itself would have been fine for us) but a good friend of mine, Meghan, is quite the hobbyist photographer. Anyway, Meghan took some fantastic engagement photos that she posted on her Web site and we got to keep. Win/win!

Here's Good Melanie:
The pictures were lots of fun, but quite honestly, neither J nor I are the most comfortable with these intentional, posed photo sessions. I was feeling a bit... hm, precious, after we got our really cute, newspaper announcement-worthy images.

Enter the Thriller dance. Huntsville's Dixie Derby Girls roller derby team hosted a Thrill-HER (uh, MJ, anyone?) themed final home derby bout for the 2009 season and put out a call for Thriller dancers. About 10 of us responded. We practiced hard though, had a blast and performed for the masses (seriously, about 700-plus people) on Saturday, August 29. It was incredibly fun. And now I have a new party trick. Everyone needs to know the Thriller dance, I've decided, to be a functioning part of society. Ironic, since MJ himself was a bit touch and go at the end. Let's remember him fondly in his pre-creepy days...

Here's Bad Melanie:

My makeup job was AWESOME. A girlfriend happened upon a professional makeup artist out the night before the dance. My face was covered in liquid latex. I had craters and bruises and it looked like my nose had rotted off. My mother was horrified. Like I said, awesome.

Here's the video. Two full minutes of MJ-80s-hayday-fabulousity. Enjoy!

Unfortunately, the vid was originally posted on Facebook. Hope everyone can get there...

SoSo 2009

...is not the name of a conference featuring all things mediocre.

According to them,

SoSo stands for Social South - the Deep South’s Social Media Conference. It’s your chance to hear nationally recognized social media professionals at an affordable and easy-to-get-to location.

Their tagline is "Deep Fried Social Media", which cracks me up. The conference is next Friday and Saturday, so I'll be roadtripping to Birmingham for the weekend.

Other good things about the conference?

• It's close - Birmingham. And I get to reunite with (and crash with) my good friend, fellow blogger AND Auburn classmate, Katie!
  
• A whole slew of my Twitter friends (I WILL NOT use the term Tweeples) including @burhop, @lorimillerwhnt and @southernplate will be in attendance!
• My Style & Design in Public Relations messages teacher and social media mentor, Robert French will be presenting. This will be the first time I've seen him since college as well!
  

Tracks include:

• Social Media Tools – You’ve probably heard that you have to be on Facebook or Twitter, but has anyone told you why? This track explores not only the why, but the rest of the tools out there.
• Social Media Communications – Talking to your clients though social media using traditional media language won’t work. Track 2 explores why and how to change your message.
• Social Media Strategy – Learning the tools of the trade and the new language is just the first step, without a strategy neither have much of an effect. Track 3 explores how to tie the two together into something effective.
• Social Media Case Studies – Are you a business in the Southeast that is seeing results from social media? We want to hear your story – apply here to present it at Social South.

Looking forward to learning how to wrangle all of the social media outlets we use at work into one cohesive message that will drive traffic to our Web site. Also looking forward to seeing old friends. Social media is a funny thing for me because I've been neck deep in these applications since I was a sophomore in college, but that doesn't necessarily make me the best manager for outreach and business uses. I think that a meeting or two on the topic will help me reign all of these outreach efforts in to form something more functional.

mini vacation: 21c Art Hotel

Ever since I heard about 21c on NPR during my morning commute to work last winter, I've been dying to check it out. Finally, in June, thanks to a combination of factors including J having an unheard of weekend off work and me being employed (whoo!) we're heading to Louisville (Louhvul?) Ky. for the weekend. A minibreak, if you will. And I couldn't be more excited...

Really what makes 21c different from all other hotels is it's vast private art collection, amassed by owners Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson. This is modern art: crazy paintings of men caressing mannequins, conceptual films with accompanying dioramas. Red penguins everywhere. Modern art, like my favorite - the Hirshhorn - oh how I would love to work there...

Our agenda for the weekend:

• leisurely, five hour drive from Huntsville to Louhvul with a potential stop in E-Town (as Mr. Addis calls it)
• if we can swing the work schedules, an organic wine dinner featuring french bistro food at 610 Magnolia
• perusing the downtown Louhvul art scene, including two(!) glassblowing workshops
• more eating, at Proof on Main, 21c's on site (and apparently fabulous) restaurant and wine bar
• troll the Urban Bourbon Trail
  
• music and dancing?
• and brunch. no vacation is complete with out at least one brunch.

This "itinerary" should pretty much sums up my idea of a perfect vacation. Leisurely road trip, eating, eating, wine, eating, dancing, distillery tour, eating. Repeat.

Woohooo Friday!

Ca$hville in photos

I've been feeling more visual than literary lately. So, here's Nashville in photos. Friend Michelle told us about cheap Opryland Hotel rates. Once we got there we were able to upgrade our room to an atrium view... lovely. If you get the chance to go, you should try to finagle an atrium room. It made the stay.

View of the Cascades from our room balcony.

Balcony view #2 - the waterfall. We originally were in a third floor room and asked to move because we were directly at eye level with everyone walking by on the walkway. Awkward.

We (and by "we" I mean "I") took a lot of time farting around in Opry Mills. Found a bunch of cute stuff... Just about made J terminal until we hit the end - the Bass Pro Shops outdoor store. That place is huge. And terrifying. Totally packed with taxidermy critters of all shapes and sizes. While J was examining the kayaks and gear I spotted this little beaver vignette that someone cleverly enhanced. It's hard work hacking logs with your teeth. Every beaver needs a value-sized Diet Coke to quench its thirst every once in a while.

So, the outdoor store was just terrifying on the whole. Behold, the biggest effing catfish I have ever seen. Apparently it's not unusual for them to get this large. Who knew? I was sharing my newfound knowledge with a kickball buddy, who then told me about catfish noodling (!!!) WTF. One more note about the great outdoors. J informed me that all the stuffed (and live) critters were strategically placed to remind shoppers what the real outdoor camping/hiking/fishing experience is like. And on that note, I've decided that my as yet unrealized camping career will never come to fruition. How about a block party instead? Or some bocce. These outdoor activities are more my speed.

Eventually we made it out of Natureland (alive and unscathed by the ginormous bottom feeding fish). After another prolonged wine and cheese session on our balcony, we headed out to eat. When in Nashville, check out Sunset Grill. We had an amazing prix fixe three course meal there for $20. It was quite the recession friendly vacation.

I am thoroughly enjoying traveling in this economy! You can do so much for so little expense. I'm thinking girls' weekend soon. The end.

Finishing out 2008 in photos

Typically, when I want to mark memorable occasions, I take lots of photos on my snazzy digital camera (thanks, J!). I take tons of carefully posed photos and calculatedly candid ones to recreate as exactingly as I can the mood of the day or event.

Ever since I got my iPhone (again... thanks J. That man keeps me in the technology, that's for sure) I've discovered that my phone's camera roll depicts a much more realistic and organic perspective on my daily life.

So, with that, I present you my fall and winter 2008 in photos. Looking back, it was really quite lovely. And looking forward, I can't wait to take more meaningful snaps in 09.

September 2008 at the Auburn/Mississippi State game. Amazingly fun? Yes. Depressing loss? Also, yes. And, I know the photo is trippy looking. I like it specifically because of this.

A visit to the Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg, Tenn. on the way to Nashville for a tourist trip with the family and visiting Canadians. Of course, this stop inspired to drink only Jack at the honky tonks in Nashvegas. Led to an interesting weekend...

Enjoyed Thanksgiving with family and lots of friends. Even got a "brothers" reunion in - this happens less and less often as the years progress.

The Revival Tour at WorkPlay in Birmingham. The lead singers of a of my favorite bands played solo, acoustic, folk-y sets. Amazing. Moving.

Spent time with my mom and brother (and the other set of siblings in the house, Nisse and Loki - above. They. chew. on. everyting. And use each other as furniture) over the holiday season. Lots of nice meals and Food Network/HGTV watching and great company.

Received lovely, just-to-be-nice, flowers at work from J. Made my week, and they lasted such a long time!

Decorated my very first Christmas tree. I know I blogged about turquoise and lime green decor. It looks way more green and blue, now. I'll take a new photo and repost soon.

Since DC was an "event", and a reunion and lots of other things, I actually took real camera photos. This will warrant it's own post soon, I'm sure.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Back to Athens...

This year, Halloween weekend is also the 2nd annual Athens Storytelling Festival! While I will definitely be otherwise engaged partying it up somewhere on Friday evening, I am looking forward this on that Saturday.

I love fall events and I LOVE Kathryn Tucker Windham. Does anyone else remember her from the "13 Ghosts and Jeffrey" book series? I devoured those stories when I was a kid. They featured most Southern states and discussed the hauntings of historical homes all over. I actually need to pull them back out for a look sometime soon... They weren't too kiddish and historical aspect was really interesting.

Athens is pretty cool... I just went there for the Fiddlers' Convention a couple of weeks ago and thought it was a really charming little place.

Hear stories that tell of a time that used to be. Glimpse into the past and live the imaginary. Learn more about your parents, your children, yourself. Discover all this and more at the second annual Athens Storytelling Festival.

Stories will be told on the courthouse square in Athens, Alabama within close proximity of an eclectic mix of shops offering a wide variety of antiques, gifts, gourmet foods, clothing and hardware. The courthouse square boasts several warm and inviting restaurants, and food vendors will be present for good old-fashioned festival fare.

I took a Stories and Storytelling course at Auburn that also inspired my appreciation for the art that Mary Helen Brown taught... What a great class. Wonder if she's coming?

So, Saturday, November 1, you will find me in downtown Athens, listening to Kathryn and soaking up the fall atmosphere. Sounds good, no? Come join me!

Pickin' and grinnin'. And freeing the hops. And planting.

If I was worried that I hadn't done enough to enjoy the fall weather so far this season, I made up for any lost time this weekend. J and I hit the Tennessee Valley Old Time Filddlers' Convention on Saturday in Athens. Athens State is a gorgeous campus (no Auburn, but nice) and the weather was amazing. As were the fiddlers.

The convention was broken down into competitions for lots of different categories of musicians - fiddlers of all ages, mandolin and banjo players, old time singers, and... buck dancers. Yeah, not sure either. Didn't see them

We didn't hang out all day, but we did see a big part of the group competition - with competitors from all over the southeast. Very cool - some of it verged on hokey, but lots of it was very reminiscent of Nickel Creek (a favorite of mine) and the more melancholy stuff reminded me of Jack White's Cold Mountain music.

Saturday night was the Free the Hops event at the Lowe Mill (my friend Alice designed this site, btw, if you're looking for a graphic artist/web designer...) back in Huntsville.

Today I just got back from more old time country music - accidentally. Went to Bennett Nursery to pick up some plants for my deck and to ogle their mums-on-steroids. They always have complimentary sodas in those fun old glass bottles and water and stuff, but they also randomly have chicken, as it turns out. So we ate chicken and listened to an old couple play more music.

So, Huntsville might not be a bustling metropolis, but I do seem to be finding enough to keep myself entertained. It's been almost a year here, and it truly has flown by.

I like it when time flies... that means I'm having fun.