I'm not sure it still couts as MIA when you tell everyone you'll be MIA!
Anyhoo, today was my last day in work for a while, I am heading back to the Emerald Isle tomorrow. I am super excited about being back, not least because I get to go to a wedding (actually the wedding of one of the nicest girls you could ever hope to meet). Yay!
I'll maybe see you at some point over the week, and if not, well, I was probably hoping not to run into you anyway!
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Things I love about the USA / North Carolina / the lake
I doubt I’ll get to 100 but here goes…
1. Free refills
2. Phone calls with Megann
3. I live 5 miles away from a ski slope, fair enough I’ve only been there once but it’s still pretty cool
4. Summer ends in November and arrives in April
5. Petrol is dead cheap, although nobody else thinks so!
6. With cable TV I am finally living the dream if having more than five TV channels (yes, even though it’s ten years old you still can’t get Channel 5 in Whitehead. You tell me it's crap, I tell you I want to see for myself!)
7. People instantly like me because I have an accent
8. You can get cinnamon everything
9. Even though I live hundreds of miles away from the sea, there is a lake
10. Some country music isn’t that bad as it turns outs
11. Old Navy
12. The undiscovered art of texting means I actually talk to my friends using my mobile
13. Wal Mart
14. When it rains I actually have to look for my umbrella
15. The Biltmore
16. Pillsbury Cake and Ice Cream
17. Things are cheaper here
18. Waiters and waitresses are trying to impress you and so nothing is too much trouble for them
19. It’s actually quite handy to be able to turn right on a red light
20. All you can eat buffets are common place
21. Mackinac Island
22. Peanut butter is a recognise food group
23. The Mall in DC
24. Y’all is a useful word
25. If I ever have a feel-fat-day, a trip to Wal Mart makes me feel like a supermodel
26. They look after me like a daughter
27. Target
28. A programme like 7th Heaven can actually get made and last for ten years
29. Macaroni and cheese
30. Camp Kinawind
31. I discovered my love of frozen grapes
32. Weather men/ladies actually call themselves meteorologists
33. It’s not one country, it’s a collection of 50+ countries
34. SUVs are nice to travel in
35. They like to confuse foreigners by never making the state capital the city you immediately associate with the state
36. The cross at the lake
37. When you ask for water in a restaurant they don’t immediately assume you mean bottled water
38. It feels like home
39. Names like Y’Lon, Brickhouse (still funny) and John De Ron Johnson don’t even raise an eyebrow here but I can laugh at them
40. I finally know more about football than boys, albeit on a technicality (football/soccer debate)
41. Metaphors don’t exist in country music, they sing it how it is
42. Downtown Greenville
43. Taco Bell
44. You can talk on your mobile and drive legally (and it's really not dangerous because of automatic gears)
45. Getting IDed at bars makes me feel young
46. I can play the ‘Ireland card’ when I don’t understand something, even if being from Ireland has nothing to do with it
47. They don’t believe in parallel parking. Hell, they don’t even trouble you with the effort of turning the wheel all the way because spaces go at slanted angles not perpendicular to the road
48. New York City
49. There’s all sort of nature I’ve never seen before. I’m no ornithologist as I’m about to prove – birds are all sorts of pretty colours, not just the brown kind we get at home.
50. With Extra Watermelon gum you can blow big bubbles
Getting to fifty wasn’t a bad effort! I should imagine they'll offer me citizenship any moment now.
1. Free refills
2. Phone calls with Megann
3. I live 5 miles away from a ski slope, fair enough I’ve only been there once but it’s still pretty cool
4. Summer ends in November and arrives in April
5. Petrol is dead cheap, although nobody else thinks so!
6. With cable TV I am finally living the dream if having more than five TV channels (yes, even though it’s ten years old you still can’t get Channel 5 in Whitehead. You tell me it's crap, I tell you I want to see for myself!)
7. People instantly like me because I have an accent
8. You can get cinnamon everything
9. Even though I live hundreds of miles away from the sea, there is a lake
10. Some country music isn’t that bad as it turns outs
11. Old Navy
12. The undiscovered art of texting means I actually talk to my friends using my mobile
13. Wal Mart
14. When it rains I actually have to look for my umbrella
15. The Biltmore
16. Pillsbury Cake and Ice Cream
17. Things are cheaper here
18. Waiters and waitresses are trying to impress you and so nothing is too much trouble for them
19. It’s actually quite handy to be able to turn right on a red light
20. All you can eat buffets are common place
21. Mackinac Island
22. Peanut butter is a recognise food group
23. The Mall in DC
24. Y’all is a useful word
25. If I ever have a feel-fat-day, a trip to Wal Mart makes me feel like a supermodel
26. They look after me like a daughter
27. Target
28. A programme like 7th Heaven can actually get made and last for ten years
29. Macaroni and cheese
30. Camp Kinawind
31. I discovered my love of frozen grapes
32. Weather men/ladies actually call themselves meteorologists
33. It’s not one country, it’s a collection of 50+ countries
34. SUVs are nice to travel in
35. They like to confuse foreigners by never making the state capital the city you immediately associate with the state
36. The cross at the lake
37. When you ask for water in a restaurant they don’t immediately assume you mean bottled water
38. It feels like home
39. Names like Y’Lon, Brickhouse (still funny) and John De Ron Johnson don’t even raise an eyebrow here but I can laugh at them
40. I finally know more about football than boys, albeit on a technicality (football/soccer debate)
41. Metaphors don’t exist in country music, they sing it how it is
42. Downtown Greenville
43. Taco Bell
44. You can talk on your mobile and drive legally (and it's really not dangerous because of automatic gears)
45. Getting IDed at bars makes me feel young
46. I can play the ‘Ireland card’ when I don’t understand something, even if being from Ireland has nothing to do with it
47. They don’t believe in parallel parking. Hell, they don’t even trouble you with the effort of turning the wheel all the way because spaces go at slanted angles not perpendicular to the road
48. New York City
49. There’s all sort of nature I’ve never seen before. I’m no ornithologist as I’m about to prove – birds are all sorts of pretty colours, not just the brown kind we get at home.
50. With Extra Watermelon gum you can blow big bubbles
Getting to fifty wasn’t a bad effort! I should imagine they'll offer me citizenship any moment now.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Presentation is everything
Went to lunch with Maggie today and I got this salad (a salad Mum! See how I am growing up!)
Good presentation can sometimes be trying to hide shoddy work, but this salad was mmmn mmmn!
Good presentation can sometimes be trying to hide shoddy work, but this salad was mmmn mmmn!
Monday, April 24, 2006
Thank goodness there weren't more Europeans
So this weekend I was once again in Greenville. I wasn’t planning on going down but Maggie was studying all weekend so there wasn’t going to be much entertainment at the lake.
We played crazy golf last night, which has reminded me to tell you about my 21st birthday. I was working in the summer camp where I know Megann from. I decided at the beginning of the summer that when my birthday came playing crazy golf would be fun. So that’s what we did. Yes, I am well aware that turning 21, especially in America, is a big deal, but it was my birthday so deal with it. Plus I had been able to drink at home for 3 years and didn’t ever take the opportunity.
If my memory serves correctly (and it does) there were 6 of playing. We divided along country lines with Megann, Amy and Heather against me, Stephen and Jamie, or USA versus Europe (technically it was just GB & NI, but USA v. Europe has golfing connotations too good to avoid).
So there we have it, USA on home soil against the Old World. It was good natured fun but there was a prize at stake too. We were playing for the Slurpee Cup. The losers had to buy the winners a Slurpee. I know, high stakes.
I honestly don’t remember that much about the game, who was winning, who was losing, who was good, who was crap, except for the last hole. The 18th hole was biggest and most impressive of the entire course. The green snaked around and down three levels and from where you started you couldn’t see the hole. But my moment of glory came and I got a hole in one! [In a film of this event it would be tied and everything would depend on my putt. I don’t think that’s how it happened but Hollywood would embellish it so.]
In the end, in part thanks to my hole in one, Europe triumphed and won the inaugural Slurpee Cup. In fact they are the holders as there has never been another.
Last night we paired up boy/girl. Sadly there was no moment of triumph for me. I sucked. Apparently my ball had a magnet which was repelled by the hole. I actually lost count of how many times the ball would circle around the hole and not go in. The pairings were random but it just so happened Jason, my partner, sucked too. We lost so badly! But that’s ok, although I did have to buy the winners an drink, the Slurpee Cup remains in the hands of Europe.
We played crazy golf last night, which has reminded me to tell you about my 21st birthday. I was working in the summer camp where I know Megann from. I decided at the beginning of the summer that when my birthday came playing crazy golf would be fun. So that’s what we did. Yes, I am well aware that turning 21, especially in America, is a big deal, but it was my birthday so deal with it. Plus I had been able to drink at home for 3 years and didn’t ever take the opportunity.
If my memory serves correctly (and it does) there were 6 of playing. We divided along country lines with Megann, Amy and Heather against me, Stephen and Jamie, or USA versus Europe (technically it was just GB & NI, but USA v. Europe has golfing connotations too good to avoid).
So there we have it, USA on home soil against the Old World. It was good natured fun but there was a prize at stake too. We were playing for the Slurpee Cup. The losers had to buy the winners a Slurpee. I know, high stakes.
I honestly don’t remember that much about the game, who was winning, who was losing, who was good, who was crap, except for the last hole. The 18th hole was biggest and most impressive of the entire course. The green snaked around and down three levels and from where you started you couldn’t see the hole. But my moment of glory came and I got a hole in one! [In a film of this event it would be tied and everything would depend on my putt. I don’t think that’s how it happened but Hollywood would embellish it so.]
In the end, in part thanks to my hole in one, Europe triumphed and won the inaugural Slurpee Cup. In fact they are the holders as there has never been another.
Last night we paired up boy/girl. Sadly there was no moment of triumph for me. I sucked. Apparently my ball had a magnet which was repelled by the hole. I actually lost count of how many times the ball would circle around the hole and not go in. The pairings were random but it just so happened Jason, my partner, sucked too. We lost so badly! But that’s ok, although I did have to buy the winners an drink, the Slurpee Cup remains in the hands of Europe.
Friday, April 21, 2006
Anticipation
I’m really not sure what sort of picture I have painted of where I live. If you imagine some sort of small backwater where there aren’t many people my age then I think I have done it right. Having said that however, there are always people coming and going as the Lake is like a retreat centre for the United Methodist Church. Living here, you get a good indication of what it would be like to live in Castlewellan.
You know instantly when there is a group in from out of town. The big buses kind of give it away!
When I see the buses I always get a bit of nervous excitement for them. You know that feeling when you are going away on a weekend or retreat and you know that you are going to feel God’s presence.
I like that feeling.
You know instantly when there is a group in from out of town. The big buses kind of give it away!
When I see the buses I always get a bit of nervous excitement for them. You know that feeling when you are going away on a weekend or retreat and you know that you are going to feel God’s presence.
I like that feeling.
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