Back in Business

Here it is--yesterday's damage. As you can see, the branch that hit the car wasn't very big around, and it probably only weighs 10 or 15 pounds, but it must have hit the windshield at just the right angle and with enough speed that it pretty much wiped out the whole thing. The actual point of impact wasn't too big, but the spider web crack effect covered the entire windshield. You can click on the pictures if you'd like to see a larger version of them. This was not a good surprise yesterday morning, but we're back in business today. Angie picked me up for work, then one of the local windshield companies came over to the house and fixed it while I was gone. It looks really nice--especially compared to how it looked yesterday! My car stinks like glue now, but if that's the extent of the reverberations from this little incident, I won't complain. I'm going to start parking out away from the trees a little bit. The culprit tree has been identified as a pecan tree. I was tempted to boycott pecans all together, but then I realized all of the good things I would miss: pecan pie, praline pecans, pralines and cream ice cream with pecans, candied pecans, etc., so I'm not going to boycott pecans. Today at work, Kathleen (she's the big boss lady at the park) was telling me that pecan trees are known to be self-pruning. I said, "Yes, that's what I figured out . . . the hard way." :-)

Today Miss Melissa wanted to take me to lunch--especially since at this point my car was still out of commission. So we went to Uptown Grocery and had some delicious pizza! They had this really good veggie pizza with artichoke hearts on it, but my favorite was the bacon and tomato pizza--it was kind of like a BLT minus the "L" and in the form of pizza. It was awesome.

The water is back on here at Routhland, although at times it turns this disturbingly brown color. Nasty! Needless to say, I won't be drinking any of the water here at the house. I usually don't drink this water anyway, because Mississippi water can be a little questionable (they frequently issue "boiling notices" when everyone is advised to boil their water--not a good sign), so I usually just pick up some water bottles at Wal Mart. Hopefully the pipes will clear out here pretty soon so that the water can not be brown anymore.

This morning at work I took pictures of the historic clothing collection. I've made it through the undergarments, vests, shirts, jackets, shoes, and military wear--now Angie and I just have to do the hats, gowns, work dresses, and accessories. There were some gnarly spiders up there today, and some cockroaches that have probably been dead in there for about seven years. I was getting a little grossed out, but I kept plugging away at things. I think what the clothing room needs even more than to be organized is just to be cleaned out! Angie said it would be a lot easier if we could just take a wrecking ball to the building, but we decided that we might get in trouble if we did that. I spent the afternoon at WJ's house and almost fell asleep a couple of times, but I kept myself busy working on the clothes database. Today is my Friday, so I'll have tomorrow and Thursday off. I'll probably be heading up to Vicksburg tomorrow, then Angie and I are going to go shopping over in Jackson on Thursday--good times!

Friday the 13th a Few Days Early

So, this Friday is Friday the 13th, but in my world, Friday the 13th took place today on Monday the 9th. It has definitely not been my lucky day today. First of all, last night Nathan, Kate, and I were watching "Lost," when Tim came by and said that the water was going to be shut off to Routhland. A pipe behind his house exploded, so they were going to shut the water down until the problem was fixed the next day. Nathan and Kate said I could come shower at their house this morning (they're on a different water line than me), so that's what I planned to do today. At about 2:00 in the morning, I heard a big crashing noise, but it sounded like something in the house had fallen off the wall or something and, with it being 2:00 a.m., I decided to wait until morning to investigate. So this morning I got up, threw my bath robe over my pajamas, got my towel and shampoo, and headed out to the car to drive over to Nathan and Kate's to take a shower. I was thinking that this was quite an inconvenience, but little did I know what was waiting for me outside.

I left the house, and there sitting on my car's hood was a gigantic branch!!! I was sure that the whole hood of the car was going to be smashed in, but I pulled the branch off and there wasn't even a scratch. I was extremely relieved until I looked up and saw the windshield of the car. The branch had struck it over on the driver's side, and there was a large, shattered indentation on the point of impact, surrounded by more shattered glass. The front seat and dashboard were covered with glass as well. I try to control my language, but about the only thing I could think of to say when I saw it was, "Oh crap!" Thankfully I had the presence of mind to tape a garbage bag over the windshield even though it was sunny, because we're having quite the thunderstorms this afternoon, and I doubt it would take very much rain to cause the whole windshield to cave in. Needless to say, the shower got put on hold, and Angie ended up coming over to pick me up for work. Mom and Dad helped me work out some details, and I got an auto glass place lined up to come fix it in the morning. Even though it was not a fun thing to have happen, I am grateful because it could have been so much worse than it was. It could have totally smashed the entire car, or at least severely dented the hood or roof, but there isn't any other damage to the car. I also figured that I would rather be safely and comfortably in bed instead of driving the car when something like that happens. So I am very grateful that it wasn't a very serious thing, and it can easily be fixed. I learned a valuable lesson though--don't worry when you're inconvenienced a little bit (i.e. the water being turned off) because, remember, it could always be worse (i.e. a branch through your windshield)!

Since I was car-less today, and I was too upset to make a sandwich before leaving this morning, Angie took me over to La Fiesta and we had some yummy food there. On my 1:00 tour today, I had this drama queen guy from Key West who is writing a play about Mammy's Cupboard and the lack of political-correctness surrounding the building. Now that's a can of worms I wouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole!!!

Singing Girl in Bathroom

Today I had probably one of the most random experiences ever at the William Johnson house. I wasn't able to go to church today, but I did enjoy having a quiet day to get things done there at WJ's. So, I was sitting there at the front desk working on the historic clothing database, when this family of four came in. They had kids who looked about 13 and 11, and they (well, the parents, at least) were really interested in everything, so they spent quite a bit of time going through the exhibits. The kids were just running around and acting kind of dumb, but then the girl--the 13-year-old--went into the women's restroom. She was in there for quite a long time, but I didn't really think anything of it until the singing began. Yes, it's true. All of a sudden someone is belting out tunes from the women's bathroom. I thought to myself, "You have got to be kidding! Is that girl really in there singing?" It wasn't even like just quiet little singing either. She was full-on trying out for American Idol or something. She sang for a few minutes, then she came out. I was thinking to myself, "Am I the only one who thought that was strange?" But she must do that all the time because the family didn't even seem to notice.

I have found some delicious new snacks! They are some reduced fat Pringles chips, but they are zesty guacamole flavored. They're delicious! Well, I'm off to Nathan and Kate's to go start Season 2 of "Lost" and eat chicken, so that should be fun.

Time Flies When You're Having Fun

I can't believe that a month from today is my last day of work! (tears and sobs) Though it feels like I've been gone from home for a long time, in many ways it feels like I just got here to Natchez. It is going to be really hard to leave all of my friends here next month, just as it was really hard to leave home in April, but I'm glad that Mom will be coming down here to travel up to school with me in August. I really don't do well with change once I get into a routine, but I'll just remind myself that there are surely new friends and adventures awaiting at grad. school. When I first got to Natchez last year, I was sure that I was not going to enjoy this place or make any friends, but I was proven wrong--so I hope I can remember that when I head up to Illinois. I'll try to fit as much as I can into these last four weeks here. It's definitely true that time flies when you're having fun!

Today was a good day at work, although I had some people on my 2:00 tour with a little kid who liked to scream and cry. We survived though. The weather has been really weird here today--it will start pouring outside and the wind will blow like crazy; then a few minutes later it's all sunny and the birds are singing outside. Well, I'm off to go grocery shopping, but I will write again tomorrow.

Good Times in Natchitoches!

Hello everyone! Angie and I returned from our totally fun road trip to Natchitoches, Louisiana yesterday, and it was off to work bright and early this morning, so I'm just now getting to the computer. We had an awesome time! Here's a synopsis of the trip:

On Tuesday night, Angie and I went and had dinner at King's Tavern--the oldest structure along the Mississippi River. I had a divine dish: crab-stuffed flounder. It was sooooo yummy! Then she and I went searching for the ghost, Madeline, who supposedly lives upstairs. She was the mistress of the King guy who originally owned the place, and supposedly her skeleton was uncovered underneath the building back in the 1930s . . . with a jeweled dagger next to it. Word on the street is that she still lives upstairs. The hostess lady told us to go into Madeline's bedroom and look for the rocking chair to be moving, or to see if we could see anyone else besides ourselves in the mirror. We were also supposed to run our hands over the bedspread, and if Madeline had recently been on the bed, it would feel hot. Well, Angie and I were unsuccessful in our attempts to find Madeline--probably because we didn't believe we would, although being up there in her room kind of creeped me out. There were two hand prints on the mirror, that I'm sure were supposed to look scary, but anyone could have put them there. There was also a large indentation on the sofa in the room--so it looked like someone was sitting there--but again, not too hard to fabricate that. That evening we watched "Steel Magnolias" and got in the mood to head to Natchitoches.

On Wednesday, Angie and I drove for just over two hours across Louisiana and ended up at our first stop: the Grave of the Unknown Confederate Soldier in Marthaville, Louisiana (shown at the left). This site was a state park, but it was truly the funniest, most cheesy place Angie and I had ever seen. The grave site was adjacent to the Louisiana Country Music Museum, and we had to laugh when we went inside the guitar-shaped building. We were surely the only two visitors the museum lady had seen in several months, and she was quite excited about us being there. The museum tour included a really hokey movie, and it consisted of some very scary-looking country music costumes from back in the day.

We had planned on going to the Alligator Park next, but it was raining pretty hard, and we were both hungry, so we decided to head to Natchitoches (about 25 miles from Marthaville) and have lunch. Natchitoches is a quaint little town along Cane River Lake (formerly part of the Red River). It has some definite French roots, so everything in town is very French--kind of like a New Orleans that is about the size of Natchez. We decided to eat lunch at this restaurant called the Landing. They're famous for their fried green tomatoes, and I had the best lunch ever: a fried green tomato BLT with sweet potato fries. It was SO GOOD!! (At this point you may be thinking that all I ever talk about is food, so surely I must be putting on the pounds like crazy, but I try to maintain my active lifestyle so as to offset the generous availability of tasty eats here in the South.) After lunch it was raining pretty hard, so we decided to just skulk around the shops there in town until we checked into our hotel: the Church Street Inn (the picture above is of Angie standing in front of our very cool hotel).

After checking in, the rain let up a little bit, so we decided to go visit the Fort St. Jean Baptiste state historic site. The funny thing about the fort though, is that it is not the original French fort, nor was it built on the same site as the original fort, nor are any of the artifacts in the museum original. We wondered why we would go visit a fake fort with fake artifacts, but it was a good chance to learn about the French occupation in the area, and it ended up being kind of a fun place to visit. They had people dressed up like the French settlers there at the fort, including this guy pictured at the left, who was stuck in the stocks. It was really funny because the next day, Angie and I ran into the stocks guy at a shop in town. I said, "Hey, you got out of the stocks!" He thought that was funny.

After the fort, we walked around town some more and had some tasty French bread pudding at this place called Pioneer Pub. Then we went down to the riverfront to await the light show and fireworks. While there we snacked on some chicken and funnel cake--typical 4th of July food in the South. The light show started at about 9:00, and it was hilarious (because it was so cheesy!). Angie and I were cracking up because the "light show" we had heard so much about consisted of a few strings of Christmas lights placed underneath the bridge spanning the lake (which isn't very wide), that changed color along with the beat of several patriotic songs. We decided that they need a little help with the light show--maybe some lasers or something. After the light show, the fireworks started (shown here) which were, especially after the light show, surprisingly good.

After the fireworks, we walked back to the hotel and went to bed. On Thursday, we had planned on going on a carriage ride and things like that downtown, but it was raining really hard, so the carriages were not out. Instead, we headed about 12 miles south of town to visit the Oakland plantation, part of the Cane River Creole National Historical Park. The ranger who took us on tour there was named Dominick Metoyer, and he was soooo nice and handsome, and he was very knowledgeable about history! Angie and I decided that I should marry him, but we haven't figured out how we'll arrange that yet. Here's a picture of him :-) The plantation was really cool to see, and because we were fellow park rangers, Dominick gave us the behind-the-scenes tour. He even took us into the overseers house, which is currently undergoing renovation, and showed us the original oil cloth (like we have at Melrose) on the floor.

There are seriously towns in Louisiana, right by each other, named Natchez and Melrose! We of course had to drive through these two places, and they were both right on the way to the Melrose plantation--which we wanted to see just because it has the same name as the place where we work. Natchez, Louisiana didn't have much going for it, and Melrose, Louisiana had even less. The Melrose plantation was cool (it isn't part of the National Park), but it was raining when we got there, and the tour, which included walking around outside in the mud, lasted over an hour, so we opted to go get lunch instead. But, we had to at least take a picture while we were in the area! For lunch we went back to Natchitoches and ate at this French restaurant called Merci Beacoup (which the locals pronounce as: Mercy Boo Coop). I had a famous Natchitoches meat pie, and Angie tried the Cajun potato. We topped off lunch with some vanilla bread pudding--yum! We want to write a book about the South's best bread pudding. So far, though, the title for the best bread pudding still belongs to Magnolia Grill here in Natchez. After lunch, we drove home, hung out around here in Natchez, and went to Cock of the Walk for dinner. We were both pretty pooped, so we went to bed soon thereafter, and then it was off to work this morning. It was such a fun trip! Angie really is a great friend, and we saw and learned a lot of cool things during our jaunt across the river.