From the Desk 7/12/2008

This morning I woke up around 8:15 and proceeded to get ready to travel to Chickamauga for the day. I gathered up an extra change of clothes in case hiking got too dirty and I needed to save my car from contamination by mud. I checked the weather and though the chance of rain was slim, I knew that it would undoubtedly rain as I would be outside. My phone was ringing off the hook Saturday morning as I received a call from dad, then he passed me to mom. While on the phone with mom both Amy and Stacy beeped in and I eventually hit the road at 9:45, about 45 minutes later than I intended. The directions were simple enough on how to get there, but I knew there would be a couple of confusing areas as Hwy 136 seemed to zig-zag between different roads in several places. I only missed one turn and soon realized and corrected my mistake. I arrived at Aunt Paula's around 11:15 making fairly good time. (It's not that I sped a lot, its just that there's not much traffic on the roads once you venture away from I-75).

After getting a few things together, we loaded up in the truck and headed to Pigeon Mountain for our planned hiking excursion. I noticed a dark cloud looming overhead on the way to the mountain and made an advanced apology for being on this trip as I would guarantee that it would rain after we got on the trail. We arrived and sprayed ourselves down with bug repellent before hitting the trail. After we had been on the trail for about 10 minutes, it began to sprinkle drops of rain. I had to laugh at my unfortunate accuracy in predicting the weather. We followed the wooden boardwalk path until it ended shortly after a section was broken down by a fallen tree. The path from then on got a little rocky and more slippery. We arrived at what was supposed to be the base of the waterfall, but as evidence of the drought, there was not even a small stream flowing down the cascading rocks. We encountered a group of repellers that were climbing the face of a rock wall to the left of the waterfall's supposed location. We finally picked the trail back up and climbed up a steep section to make it to the road that took us to the the end of the trail. The trail ended in a field that reminded me of the top of a bald in the Smoky Mountains. We also crossed a pond that was home to several snapping turtles. The rain had stopped before we reached the top of the waterfall area, but as soon as we made our way back towards the car, the sky opened up and gave us all another shower. The rain felt cool and it was actually refreshing to feel it soaking into my clothes as a natural cooler. We reached the truck and headed to grab some lunch at Wendy's. We ate a quick bite and then made a brief stop off by Walmart to pick up food for the rest of Amy and Laura's stay. I stayed and talked briefly with everyone before I had to head back home to prepare for my party.

I arrived home at 6:00pm and after showering off from the hike and getting ready to go the the grocery store for party supplies it was 6:30. My party was supposed to start at 7:00 so needless to say, I felt a bit rushed. I drove to Super Target and sent a text to my party attendees to let them know I was running late and not to arrive before 7:30. I bought all the necessities for the party and then made my way home to finish setting everything up. I was carrying all the bags at once and my neighbor Joe was standing outside with some of his friends and was kind enough to unlock my door for me. See, good neighbors do still exist. I ordered the pizza, set up the snacks and got everything set around 7:45. My new tray with several sections that mom bought me worked out great (see picture for visual). Stacy showed up first around 8:00, then Christina and Tausha around 8:30. We ate some food and then played some Guitar Hero. It was hilarious to watch everyone else in their own way playing the game. I will definitely have footage of the next gathering as it could net me the million dollar prize on America's Funniest Home Videos. Tausha and Stacy left around 10:30 as they both had busy days tomorrow. Christina stayed and we watched Casino Royale. I walked her to her car and then said goodnight after after making plans to pick her up in the morning for His Hands. I went to sleep replaying the funny images of people dancing while playing the game and quickly drifted off to sleep.

Meditation for the day: Galatians 5:13 "You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature ; rather, serve one another in love."