I had lunch yesterday with Christopher’s mom and sister.
We walked in and the host asked me if I needed a kid’s menu.
Goodness.
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Archive for June, 2008
I woke up this morning to Chris pulling a tick off of my forehead. What a stupid place for a tick to embed itself.
We finally were able to go camping after a very busy beginning of the summer with getting settled into work.
Abed-nego really seemed to enjoy himself until it started raining, which made for a lousy fire, but nice sounds to fall asleep to. At least we were able to cook our dinner.
Our campsite in the morning….
Our view on the way home.
I was watching the the other morning while eating my breakfast. Some talk show was discussing the difference between good debt and bad debt. According to the guest speaker, good debt is debt that someone else pays for. This doesn’t mean the debt that a princess acquires which is then paid off by her dad. No, it is more like a house that you own and someone rents. Bad debt, on the other hand, is debt that you have to pay.
To further break down this idea, they flashed the definitions on tv. Next to the good debt, they showed a picture of a young, white couple embracing. Next to the bad debt, they showed a picture of an African American woman.
Come on, guys. Let’s think about these things BEFORE we put them on tv.
I recently finished giving Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close a second try. At first I felt like 9/11 was being used a tool to infuse emotion. I get angry as politicians try to make 9/11 into something it wasn’t. I also was frustrated with the charming child as the main character. What can I say? I don’t like kids trying to look cute and funny in literature. This is why I hated children’s literature as a child and adolescent literature as an adolescent. I hate the authorial force that tells me when to laugh. However, after I found myself more involved with the second story, I realized that Oskar (the boy) is definitely necessary in the story to keep it from becoming too dark. I enjoyed the grandfather’s story much more, but I appreciated the juxtaposition.
So, for now I am just going to let my ideas simmer and write an abstract that I plan to submit concerning American literature after the “American century.” I always wonder where our world is going, what will be recorded in history, what music will be recognized in fifty years. In British literature, the movements were categorized by monarchies (the Restoration, Victorian Age, Edwardian, etc), and then we have shifted to dividing movements by wars (Modernism is after World War I, Postmodernisn is after World War II). Of course, there is no clear, definitive cut off, but these are guidelines. So, is this current war marking a new literary movement? I guess there is no way to tell, but America has definitely changed since World War II.
Gus came to visit and so we took him to the falls.
The water was a lot warmer, probably about 80.
Me sliding down the small falls….
Getting ready to go down the larger fall on the small falls.
Chris going down.
Sitting in the big fall.
Gus jumping off the cliff. I was not so brave.
That place is like a water park.
Gus as we were leaving.
After grabbing some dinner and lanterns, we hiked to the top of one of Liberty’s mountains in the dark and looked at all the city lights.
Today Gus took a bus to Norfolk and then will be heading back to Florida.
Today was our first wedding anniversary and our fourth anniversary as a couple.
Christopher and Katie over the years…..
June 2004. Pagoda in Norfolk.
June 2005. Chelse’s wedding.
June 2006. Engagement pictures at the Botanical Gardens.
June 2007. Our wedding.
June 2008.
We’ve certainly grown up and come a long way from being a new high school graduate and college freshman….. To celebrate, we dressed up and went to a fancy dinner at a place where the waiters wear tuxedos. I had the best steak of my entire life. MY ENTIRE LIFE! No exaggeration. We came home and had the top layer of our cake, which was so much better than I thought. Everyone always says that it is gross, but it was pretty good for a frozen cake.
It’s been a good, challenging year. The challenging part just comes with territory of being poor grad students. We’ve bonded close together during this time of learning how to teach, write 20-page papers, and take our literary analyses to a whole new level. I’m looking forward to this next year of marriage and finding what will follow in the rest of our lives together.
It took us two hours of driving around searching and then only an hour to get home.
I am now reasonably good at driving on gravel roads with random pot holes.
I don’t know who these kids are in the photo, but hopefully it will give you an idea of the size.
People jump off those rocks into the pool, which is about 20 feet deep.
Today marks Abed-nego’s second birthday! I can’t believe that he is two already…. Time goes by so quickly. Later on, I think we’re going to buy some frosty paws dog ice cream for him to celebrate. If it stops raining, then we’ll take him to the park and throw the ball some.
We found our supply of bunny food running low. Getting food for Mr. Rufus has always been a bit of an ordeal because we strictly feed her Oxbow, which is the best food a bunny can eat. The problem is that not many pet stores carry Oxbow; the closest one was in Roanoke for a while and shipping is a bit ridiculous on their website. Luckily, a pet store in town has started carrying Oxbow, but they don’t have Bunny Basics in stock, so we order in bulk. This is actually a good thing because we can get the bags at about half price and no longer have to travel far away just to feed our rabbit! Anyway, our order came in and we went to pick it up today. Of course, we had to make a stop by the “reptile room” first. While we were in there, two girls ran in wearing their church dresses and said, “This place is off the hook! I wanna see some SNAKES!” It was hilarious.
The end.