On the road less traveled...

If Only...

...we were still here.  A vacation would do me a world of good.

[Metolius River.  June 2011]

Time Flies.

The last few months have been a bit of a blur.  Lots of life happenings.  Lots of changes and redirections.  Some good, some hard, some easy, some sad, some reason to celebrate, some reason to cry...some just a part of life.  Here's a glimpse at the last few months....

World Trade Center

I am momentarily fighting with my printer for it to print mosaic designs for a new project.  No details yet...we'll see how well it works!  :) And no, the painting is not done.  But the weather has been kind of cold and somewhat rainy...and you can't paint in that!  So I needed soemthng to do in the garage! 

So while I'm waiting for the printer to finally cooperate and print, I thought I'd post a few more pictures from New York.

 

[The former site of the twin towers of the World Trade Center]

 

[A church just across the street that was spared in the attack.  This was turned into a place where volunteers could seek shelter, food and rest as they worked through the rubble of the towers.]

 

[Inside the church were many of the things that were sent to New York from across the country, or left behind on the chainlink fence surrounding the site by friends, families, and strangers.]

 

[There were a number of tables in the church like this- the pictures and letters that had been posted as people searched for missing victims]

 

[And this was a very small selection of the hundreds, thousands of law enforcement patches that were sent from all over the world.  We found Portland's patch (bottom right corner of photo) and Forest Grove and Salem as we looked...]

New York, New York!

Okay, so here are some more pictures of the trip to New York.  I was there for a couple of days for a domestic violence court training program, and then a few of us took an extra day and a half to explore the city!  A few months ago Drew, the DDA that took my place in Newport, mentioned a training in New York, and I managed to get an application in on time.  So Drew, a new Lincoln Co DDA named Melanie, and Sheryl, who was an DDA when I was there but is now a circuit court judge, got to go.  We stayed in the Sheraton New York, which was between Times Square and Central Park.  We were in the middle of everything!

 

[Sheraton New York, and Times Square]

We arrived early in the evening on Monday and quickly dropped our things off at the hotel and headed for a place to eat!  One of the judges from Lane County was already there, and she and her husband had found a great place for dinner so we joined them for a great homestyle Italian meal at Carmine's.

The next night we followed the recommendations of the hotel concierge and went to a pizza place off of Times Square.  Then we all went to the broadway musical Wicked on Tuesday night, which was awesome.  Great story line, awesome set work, great acting and singing.  Just all around a lot of fun.  Afterwards we heaed out to a bar not too far from our hotel for drinks and dessert.  And while I can't explain why, there wasn't much picture taking going on up till now. 

On Wednesday, after the training was over, we walked up to Central Park and made our way through this gigantic park in the middle of the city.  When you're in the middle of the park, you wouldn't think that there is this hustle and bustle still all around you.  I knew that Central Park wasn't small, but I never imagined that it was as big as it was!

 

 

[Skate parks and playgrounds interspersed throughout the park.]

 

[And a whole host of ball fields.]

 

 

 

[Loving Central Park!]

From there we started on a list of places we wanted to see.  We had taken out the map, and just started marking places and things we wanted to see, and grouped them together for what we could do on this night, and what we'd have to save for Thursday and Friday.

 

[Rockafeller Center]

 

[St. Patrick's Cathedral.  Incredible to find this gothic structure in right next to a modern sky scraper.]

And from there we went to the Grand Central Station.

 

And while this has nothing to do with New York...you should check out this youtube video of a scene in the Antwerp Central Station.  They could pull this off at Grand Central too. 

 

Next stop was the New York Public Library.  The very library where Carrie from Sex and the City planned her wedding.  And speaking on Sex and the City- my single New York celebrity siteing was Mr. Big (Chris Noth).  As Sheryl and I were walking back to the hotel on Thursday night across Times Square he walked right past me!  Of course I wasn't fast enough to pull out a camera...and besides that would be have been silly!

  

 

 

From there, Sheryl, Drew, and I went to the Empire State Building.  We went in, trying to decide if we wanted to go to the sky deck.  Since it was already dark, we decided that we'd rather come back the next day during the day time to get the view of the city.  We ended up doing other things over the next two days, and never made it back.  But that's okay...we took in the city from ground level!  And with that we found an Irish Pub to stop at for dinner and then headed back to the hotel.

On Thursday we continued our exploration of Manhattan, and then headed to Liberty and Ellis Islands.  More pictures to come...this post is already pretty picture heavy!

In a New York Second...

Almost a month since my last post!  ouch.  I was trying to be better!!  Then life and work and a week in New York City and then a 5-day (!!) run of being terribly sick hit.  It's back to work tomorrow...andthen I can't wait to catch up with photos of the trip to New York.  What an awesome place.  I want to go back!

 

[Love the life that bustles through this city...even in the middle of the night!]

Weihnachtsmarkt and Christmas Cheer!

So I ended up spending the first week in Germany at my uncle's house...in bed.  I felt like I was battling the early stages of sars- the cold and cough only got worse before it got better.  What a mess.  I traveled half way around the world to drink tea and watch TV?!  Nice, right? I'm still not totally over it all, but it's certainly a lot better.  By last week Saturday it was good enough that I dared go to my grandma's anyway :)  So now, I've got some catching up to do...hopefully the pictures will all upload, they are a little smaller than usual, but they should still enlarge if you click on them.  It's a picture-heavy post!!

One of the best things about being in Germany around Christmas is the Christmasmarkets, or Weihnachtsmarkte, that they have here.  I love the spirt of Christmas that you can find at these markets.  The booths are all decorated and the smell of baked goods and german specialities along with the smell of the gluhwein is everywhere.  George calls it cough medicine, but I love it!  And they have all sorts of varieties now that I've never had before- made with cherry liquor and all sorts of things.  yummy!!

All of the Christmas markets were only open until Dec 21, so even though I was battling that cough, I braved it out there to be sure I got to take it in. My uncle Georg and I went to three different markets- one in Stuttgart and then in two surrounding cities, Esslingen and Ludwigsburg.  Each market was very different in style and atmosphere.  Each very cool in its own way!

The first was the christmast market in Stuttgart .  Typical at any German fair or holiday market are these gingerbread/molasses hearts, decorated with a variety of sayings.

 

["Greetings from the Christmasmarket Stuttgart"]

 

[Stuttgart Weihnactsmarkt]

   

[The tall building in the back is Stuttgart City Hall]

   

[The inner courtyard of the castle within Stuttgart, decorated with Christmas tress at each post, and lots of lights, with a huge tree set up in the middle.]

A few days later, my uncle and I went to the Weihnachtsmarkt in Esslingen .  There were actually two different ones set up there- there was a more typical German market, and then the one that liked the most of them all- a Medevial/ Renaissance Faire type market.  How cool!  They spoke the old German, were all dressed in appropriate garb...even the Gluhwein cups fit the theme!

 

[Entrance to the Esslingen Medieval Market]

     

 

[A table full of fresh spices and herbs.]

 

[A work-shop built up at the market.]

 

[The guy at this candle stand was dipping the candles on location in that big pot that can be seen in the back right corner of the picture.]

 

[Georg and I stopped at this particular Gluhwein stand twice- once as we came in, and again before we left.  SO good!!  And I absolultey love the cups that they had here- the guy at the stand made sure to pick out two that had "Esslingen 2008" on them for me to keep!]

 

   

[And there were small music groups that came through the market.  So cool!!]

 

[The medieval market in Esslingen was definetly my favorite!]

And here the traditional German Christmas market in Esslingen:

 

[City Hall of Esslingen.]

 

[Cookies, anyone?]

 

 

 

My uncle Georg and I also made it out to Ludwigsburg for their Christmas market.  Ludwigsburg is a Baroque town, which was home to the Residential Palace of the then King of Württemberg and the town's founder, Duke Eberhard Ludwig, and was built between 1704 and 1733.  The palace is often referred to as the Versailles of Swabia. 

Ludwigsburg is also host to a Venentian Nights Festival each year that I hope to attend sometime. 

    

[The market is surrounded by these huge Venetian angels.  Thier wings are made of strings of christmas lights, and have an awesome effect at night.]

 

[Christmas decorations out of the "Erzgebirge," the Ore Mountains that stretch through Germany and the Czech Republic.  Well known Christmas decorations...and they're not cheap either!]

 

[Lots of Gingerbread hearts!]

I didn't make it to the Ravensburg Christmas market where my grandma lives, unfortounately.  I didn't make it here on time.  But it's on my list for next time!

In between it all I got to meet up with my friend Laurel and her boyfriend Fabian.  Eons ago, Laurel and I played together in the Metropolitan Youth Symphony (MYS).  We met as stand partners in the Concert Orchestra.  When we were younger, I would spend summers in Germany at my grandparents' house, and the two of us would write weekly novels to each other- literally 20+ page letters every week!  We actually saw relatively little of each other in Oregon, other than at symphony rehearsals.  But we knew a LOT about each other from all of those letters.  (And we're going to have to find a time to sit down with a bottle of wine and all of those letters...we both still have them all!)  Now, years later, she went to Australia (or maybe it was New Zealand?) on a study abroad and met Fabian.  She then moves to Germany and has been living here for 3 years!  We saw each other when I was here 18 months ago...and we still can't get over the fact that between the two of us she's the one that is now living here!  So good to see her and get to catch up on life a bit!  After I got to see her (super cute!) apartment, we met up with my uncle again and went to a "Besen Wirtschaft."  It's really just a farm that has turned a barn into a restaurant, and with time they're really full blown restaurants, but only open during certain parts of the year.  They mark thier existence with a broom ("besen") that is hung outside.  Usually you can only find these places by word of mouth- as they are usually tucked away in fields you would never think to look for a place to eat!  In the summer they will often serve new wine and asparagus.  And in the winter, they serve a traditional christmas meal of goose, red cabbage, and knodel. 

 

[Laurel and Fabian in the "Gaense Besen" (literally, "goose broom"]

 

[The three of us out in front of the "besen," the broom!]

Tonight I spent a few hours watching old family videos with my grandma over a couple of glasses of wine.  Love being here, love spending this time with her.

Happy Christmas!

10 Hours in Amsterdam

As utterly irritating as my seat-mate was, the flight between Portland and Amsterdam went by relatively quickly.

I arrived in Amsterdam at 11:15 local time.  I had a 10 hour lay-over.  I knew this when I booked it, and was excited about the prospect, because it meant I had 10 hours to explore Amsterdam, someplace I had never been before.  I got maps and ideas and recommendations of places to go from a number of friends.  I was set!  What I didn’t consider in my brilliant plan, was that when I arrived in Amsterdam my body would still be on Oregon time, and it was 2am.  If I had been able to sleep on the plane for the duration of the 10-hour flight, it wouldn’t have been a big deal, but I overestimated myself there as well.  I can never sleep for more than about 2-3 hours on the overseas flights.  So I did considerably less exploring than I had originally envisioned.  But I got to get a little bit of a feel for Amsterdam…and I guess I’ll have to go back to explore more another time! 

When I arrived in Amsterdam Schiphol, I made my way though the passport controls and began looking for the train station.  As in all good European airports, there is a train station attached- allowing you to go just about anywhere!  With great instructions from Paul before I left, I knew exactly where I was going: Amsterdam Central Station.

 

I boarded the train without any difficulty, and sat down in a small area that had 2 seats on one side, and 3 on the other.  Another girl about my age boarded and sat down in the seats across from me.  The train was not full, and there was no need for anyone to join the two of us in that little section.  But Mr. Creepy did- he sat himself down right across from this other girl.  If there were ever going to be a movie about two American girls traveling in Amsterdam that were abducted off of a train and brutally murdered by some crazy person…this is how it would start.  I wish there had been a way to get a picture of this man so you could truly see the level of crazy that this man exhibited.  Imagine a man that you don’t ever want to encounter at an isolated truck stop.  Somewhat disheveled, his hair all over the place.  He has sort of a dazed and crazy look on his face and asks bizarre questions.  Yeah, we were on a train with this guy.

 

He asked her where she was from? Texas.  Asked if they have oil and cows in Texas?  Yes.  And lead?  No, no lead.  George Bush is from Texas.  This is good, this Obama?  Yes, it’s good.  How long you live in US?  Forever.  Yes, so you were born in the US?  Yes.  How old you are?  We don’t talk age.  Yes, well I think you are 25, maybe 30?  Maybe 25.  Yes?  … I am 54.  Yes.  You are maybe 25, I think?  (ahhhh!!!! We’re going to die.  I know we’re going to die!!)  … Yellow.  You know the color yellow?  Yes?  This is a nice color, yes?  Sure…I don’t understand.  Yellow.  You know the color yellow?  This is a nice color, yes?  (He said this 2 more times…and the color yellow may forever creep me out now).  Where you staying?  In Amsterdam….with friends.  I’m meeting friends.  This is nice.  Are you on holiday?  Yes.  Are you enjoying your holiday?  I don’t know.  I just got here.  Well, you like what you see?  All I’ve seen is the airport and the train.  (and she doesn’t say it, but I know she’s thinking and you, creepoid).

 

As she tried to just ignore him, I was desperately trying to figure out a way to interrupt to save her.  He kept looking at me, but I had put my carryon in a luggage compartment, so he didn’t really have a reason to think I was a traveler rather than a local…and he didn’t try to talk to me.  But short of grabbing this poor girl and getting off at the next stop, nothing came to mind on how to save her! 

 

And he continued: I did something very very stupid.  (think, crazy serial killer kind of “regret”…she tries to ignore him).  I did something very stupid.  Hm?  The judge tell me that I can’t leave for a year.  (oh shit!)  I get very drunk and I hit my sister.  I hurt her.  She has two small children.  It was very stupid.  The judge says I must not go for a year.  (ho-ly crap!  How did we end up in a train with this psycho!!  Anyone that tells a perfect stranger this, less than 10 minutes into a conversation….serial killer.)

 

Luckily, about then, the train came into Amsterdam Central.  He got off right away, and I was able to apologize to this poor girl that I couldn’t come up with something to say to try to deter the conversation from going any further, and we all went our separate ways.  So, for all you friends that thought I was going to die in a hostel in Prague two years ago…I made it through the Czech Republic without any problems.  But Amsterdam is an entirely different story!

 

So with that, I headed out into Amsterdam, hopeful that my first 2 hours in Amsterdam were not a sign of the remaining time there! I got off at Amsterdam Central Station, and headed into the old town area.

[This just looks like a postcard, doesn't it?]

 

The weather played along nicely.  It was cold, but it was sunny.  There were bikes everywhere.  Truly, I think they could take over the town.  I mean, this is the “parking garage” next to the train station:

And so I headed down the streets and canals of Amsterdam. I love the old houses, built so tightly together. 

 

    

 

 

I probably should have stopped in a Café somewhere and spent some time going over a map…I felt like I went through Amsterdam with foggy glasses.  There were a bunch of places that I remembered that I wanted to see as I headed back to the airport.  I was just so tired!  I had been warned that “Coffee Shops” were marijuana bars, where as “Cafés” were your typical coffee house.

 

 

I made my way down to the Anne Frank House, now a museum.  George had recommended going in, and I had planned on it, until I saw that the line stretched well around the building.  I stood in line for about 30 minutes, but it wasn’t moving at all, and by this time, my body was at 4am PST.

 

[Anne Frank Huis]

 

I walked past the Magna Plaza, a 19^th century building that used to be the main post office of the city, but is now one gigantic shopping center.

 

And on into the Dam Square.  There used to be an actual dam here that diverted the Amstel River to create the canals of Amsterdam. Off the square were the New Church and the Koninklijk Palace.

   

 

[Dam Square, yes that is Batman standing there!]

 

[Koninklijk Palace]

 

I ordered French fries with mayo from a street vendor, and took a turn towards the Red Light District.  There are truly little rooms with windows in which there are women dancing and waiting to invite you in for a private show.  However I didn’t dare take pictures, because there were the “no picture” signs everywhere, and guys waiting outside each establishment that I can only assume are the pimps.  Although, maybe they don’t call them that there, I don’t know.  But I wasn’t going to find out.

 

[See the guy in the overcoat?  I wasn’t going to piss him off by taking pictures of his girls in the display window!!]

 

 

 

 

And as the day started to close on Amsterdam, it was time for me to go back to the airport.

 

I went back somewhat earlier, hoping I might have some success at getting moved to an earlier flight to Stuttgart.  There were two leaving sooner so I was hopeful.  After being sent back and forth to various terminals, I was finally told that since I had checked baggage in transport, that I could not change my flight.  (The kicker of course being that one of my suitcases didn’t make it to Stuttgart anyway…)  I managed to sleep for a little bit on a not-so-comfortable chair just outside my departure gate.  I struggled to stay awake so as to not miss the boarding call.  I was ready to crawl into bed at my uncle’s!

 

The flight from Amsterdam to Stuttgart went by in a heartbeat.  By the time I got on the plane, I was so exhausted I was able to sleep on the plane.  I remember sitting down and getting buckled, and the next thing I knew, we were landing in Stuttgart.  Now that’s my kind of flight!  At the baggage claim, I was a suitcase short- the suitcase that contained all of the gifts for the family.  That was of course irritating, but in the mean time it has resurfaced and they delivered it to my grandmother’s house.  (Which actually works out great…one less thing I have to schlep with me on the train!)  My uncle was there to pick me up, and we headed back to his place for a hearty dinner and all the best of German Christmas baking!! 

 

Not a lot of pictures to show from Germany just yet.  I think I literally slept the first 24 hours that I was here.  Then I got hit with a reoccurrence of the nasty cold I had a few weeks back.  Chest cough, headache, cold nastiness, the whole nine yards.  So now I’ve been doing my best to completely rest up and get this kicked as quickly as possible.  I can’t bring these germs to my grandma’s, so I need to get rid of this fast!  But the good thing is that I have no where to be, nothing that I need to do.  I have been getting to just completely unwind and rest.

Airplane Etiquette

1. Don’t wear perfume or cologne when boarding an airplane with a lengthy flight time. Bathing in it really isn’t going to make your seat partner like you any more.
2. If you’re unhappy with the seat you’ve been assigned, it does not help to call each flight attendant one by one to your seat to explain your entire circumstances surrounding your ticket purchasing process on Orbitz, and the 20 reasons that you are unhappy.  By the time you’ve finished explaining it to the second attendant, the people around you already can’t stand you.
3. Telling the person sitting next to you that you will be a pain the entire trip, and will be getting up every 20 minutes or so to get things out of the overhead compartment is not going to win you points.  It doesn’t make them (ahem, me) feel sorry for you…it certainly doesn’t make me think to offer to switch seats with you.
4. When they send the airline customer service representative on the plane to try to calm you down, and you tell him 6 different ways that you booked an isle seat and didn’t get it, you sure look like a fool when he looks it up, and you selected the very seat you were sitting in…don’t you?  Now is a good time to stop complaining.  Your fellow row-mates, not on your side.  We’ve already had to listen to you complain for far too long, and we haven’t even left the gate yet!
5. It is of little benefit to anyone for you to start calling through your phone book to tell everyone that you know that the airline has messed up the seats, and that you are so irritated, and that you just don’t know how you’re going to make it through the flight.  Oh, and by the way…as you call each of these people and discover some other crisis, the whole plane is really not interested in hearing you get into a knock-out fight with whoever you are on the phone.  “I can’t even TELL you how important that was?!  I ask you to do one thing, ONE thing, and you mess it up.  How could you…you know what??  …oh my God, oh my God.  I am going to be so stressed out now this entire flight, how could you mess that up!?  I guess I’ll have to call Elsa now.  Just forget it.  I’ll have someone else take care of it.”  Then you have the same fight with Elsa.  “I asked him to do this one thing, I can’t tell you how important that was…well, I can, but I can’t…not right now.”  Lady, nothing you’ve said so far is secret, why stop now!?
6. While you’re waiting for each attendant to personally cater to you, may I remind you that you booked your flight in economy class?  I’d love to have them fluff my pillows too…but I am aware that I am on the wrong side of the curtain for that.
7. During meal service, when the meals are chicken and rice or pasta and vegetables- don’t ask for chicken and vegetables.  It’s not an option.  This isn’t a restaurant.
8. When the cart comes down with a tray of pre-poured glasses of orange juice, and you are asked “would you like some orange juice?” the question is not synonymous with  “what can I get for you, your majesty?”  Sparkling water with 2 lemons is not on the cart.  Seriously,  not an option.  And hey, when it didn’t work the first time she came through, chances are, the next time…still not an option.
9. Hitting the attendant light to call her up to let her now that you still haven’t gotten your sparkling water and lemons is just annoying.  You may be close to the curtain that leads to the world of business and first class…but close, is not good enough.
10. Making me get out of my seat so that you can get out, only to stand next to me, hover and talk to your son, who was sitting NEXT to you is irritating and unnecessary.  Why couldn’t you talk to him when you were sitting next to him?  No, you have to hover over me and include me in it??

Thankful for my ipod this trip.  Even though it ran out of juice about 3 hours into the flight, the headphones clearly served as deterent to being chatted at for 10 hours!

 

Just about ready...

(okay, so I'm going to be playing just a little bit of catch up.  So I'll post a couple of times today...)

From Dec 13...

For the first time in a number of years, I accomplished something that I am pretty proud of myself for!!  I got my Christmas cards done AND actually sent out before Christmas!! That meant that on Thursday night, as I should have been packing, this is what my kitchen table looked like:

  

[pack?? who needs to pack?]

 

 

[And that's what 97 stamped and addressed christmas cards look like!]

 

I managed to leave work a whole 30 minutes early yesterday by the time I got everything taken care of there, so I didn’t feel like I was leaving colleagues with any messes, and I didn’t feel like there was something I had to majorly stress over while I was gone.  I think I accomplished that.  I guess we’ll see.  I headed home, and started (yes, started!) to pack.  There wasn’t really all that much to fuss over, so it went pretty quickly.  I don’t like packing (almost as much as I don’t like unpacking), so it’s something I always put off till the very last minute. The great thing about traveling to a place where I have so much family, and know my way around is that if I forgot something it’s easy to borrow something or just pick it up somewhere. 

 

I made a quick stop at George and Noah’s before I left town…which ended up being not so totally “quick” since I had a hard time tearing myself away.  The weather report touted snow and ice up I-5, which wasn’t making the impending drive any more appealing.

 

On my drive up I-5, I pulled off on the Woodburn exit to get something to drink, and quickly discovered that I couldn’t actually take the exit, but I also couldn’t continue onto the off-ramp back onto I-5 North.  My only option was to take the off-ramp to I-5 South, requiring me to backtrack some 10 miles until the Brooks exit to turn back around and head back North.  All I could see was that on the right side of on-ramp, what turns into Hwy 214, was surrounded with patrol cars and emergency vehicles.  I knew that it couldn’t be good.  I called my brother to see if he could find any information online.  It didn’t take him long to discover find out what happened.  A bomb had gone off at one of the two banks late that afternoon.  At the time, the reports were that a number of officers and a bank employee had been injured, some seriously.  The rest of the drive up to Beaverton was a rather somber one.  I knew all too well that these were just the initial reports, that the news that would follow could be so much worse.  Whoever planted that explosive device did so with a complete disregard for human life, complete disregard for the lives they would effect.  In fact, probably did so with that purpose in mind.  Why?  For the sole purpose of destruction.  There were two fatalities in the explosion- both officers.  The news coverage can be found here.  I don’t think that I knew either of them personally, but certainly I know and have worked with their colleagues.  Their friends and families are in my thoughts and prayers, especially as we head into the thick of the holiday season. 

 

As I got home to my parents’ house, the snow had started to fall.  There was a blanket of white over the house and the streets surrounding the house.  It was as though it was official, my winter vacation had started.

On the Road to Sturgis...

So I left with Vegas...on to two weeks later!  This spring I got sent to all sorts of training programs through work.  Love it!!  First and foremost, it's really exciting to get to meet people across the country that do the same kind of work as me.  It's always gerat to go to these progams, they get me totally refocused on my work, and energized.  Plus, I get to see places across the country that I probably wouldn't get to see otherwise.  In May I went to South Dakota for a week-long training program.  Amelia was my travel partner from Eugene, and we got along just great.  We had a fun trip over, and then quickly found lots of things to do.  First stop, was Sturgis- just a couple of miles out of town.  It was absolulty 100% DEAD out there.  We're talking,shut the doors, board up the windows kind of dead.

[The streets of Sturgis, South Dakota]

The first day that we went out to Sturgis, we were just hoping to make it into the Harley Davidson store out there.  The online website said they were already closed, but we decided to head out anyway...at least we could say we were in Sturgis!  And score!!  The HD store ended up having just switched to summer hours and were still open!  I found a couple of fun shirts, and a great sweatshirt.  It made me want that bike EVEN more!  The landscape out there is absolulty incredible.  And while I don't know about actually being in Sturgis during bike week, that might just be complete insanity...I would love to drive through that countryside out there.  Sturgis to Deadwood.  Incredible.  I am going to get my endorsement before the year is over.  That is my goal.  Because next spring, I am getting a bike...and I can't wait!!

Amelia and I went out there with another one of the girls from the program, an absolute riot of a girl from Oklahoma named Katie.  We drove our fancy little rental car out to Deadwood for dinner. 

[Downtown Deadwood...looks like a movie set, huh?]

We found a great local restaurant, where we had great buffalo steaks,  Yum!  I was the designated driver, but Amelia and Katie had quiet the time with thier little mini bottles of wine.  And then we went out and tooled around town for a couple of hours before we headed back into Rapid City to the hotel.

[Amelia and Katie downing thier not-so-classy bottles of wine!]

[And Katie quickly made friends with the Wild Bill statue outside one of the casinos.]

The best part was when this older couple came out the casino and couldn't help but stop and laugh at us girls being silly!  "It's alright! We're card carrying tourists....just move along!"  Katie seriously was a total riot.  The three of us had a really good time!

okay, it's late.  I was going to try to get all caught up with this post..but there shall be another!

Peace out.