Shiver Me Timbers!

Today is National Talk Like a Pirate Day. This is my best "Arggh!" pose showcasing my temporary pirate tattoo.
I have another pretty sweet one on my ankle! To celebrate the day, the FISH Committee (aka Fun Committee) at work, which I am a member of, ordered eye patches, mini pirate swords, and temporary pirate tattoos for everyone on staff! We also found a pirate name generator and replaced everyone's names outside their offices with their pirate name. Mine was Misty the Disgruntled! And of course we printed out a list of pirate terms so everyone could actually talk like a pirate. It was quite fun seeing how creative my co-workers could get when it came to locations for their temporary tattoo!!

Thankful

I have never been more appreciative of my DVR than in this dreadful election season. The ads on TV have gotten completely out of control. Are voters actually swayed by these things?! They must be since they run NON STOP. How can the non-DVRer handle it? I take much pride in hitting the fast forward button three times (yes, I'm awesome at the DVR control) as quickly as I hear that dreadful voice mention how terrible Candidate X is and all of the horrible things they have done. Ewww!

Since the new fall TV season isn't totally underway just yet, I ran into the dilemma of nothing to watch on the DVR during my big unscheduled weekend (it was perfect, and LONG overdue!). So I switch to Animal Planet and snuggled in when I realized that my all time favorite episode of Animal Cops Detroit was on. It was the one where the guy hoards 247 cats in his small fecal matter and cat hair infested home. No joke about this episode - 247 cats!! I've probably seen it at least 4 times, it's an 'oldie but goodie' and has been around since I've been in college. I am amazed every time at the conditions this man lives in! Yes, it is sad because he does have some mental issues to deal with and they have to put all 247 cats down because they're all feral but I really do recommend watching if you ever catch it - really amazing stuff. BUT, this time the episode was ruined by political ads during the commercials. How do you find me on Animal Planet, mean Candidate X?? Leave me and my Animal Planet alone! Isn't anything sacred?!

The Block

I am totally having a blogging block right now! I cannot think of anything interesting or exciting to share. Yikes!

NOLA

I've been back from New Orleans for almost two weeks and it's taking me a while to blog about it. I've been trying to think of ways to give the experience the justice that it deserved and I finally realized that the trip will not fit into this little blog! I will try to summarize it as eloquently as I can. Here goes...

The People
To make sure that you didn't feel lost in this big group of 300, they broke everyone down into GO Groups of 10-12 peeps. I understood why Crossroads took this approach but I wasn't totally digging it because I was doing this trip with my husband and I selfishly wanted to experience it with just him. I can happily report that this plan of mine didn't stick for too long! After traveling everywhere with your GO Group and bus mates, working on homes together, and experiencing the same extreme emotions, the people really start to grow on you! I truly cherish the new relationships that we formed while on the trip - it was a very unexpected, yet welcome blessing! You can totally see Gods hand in forming these groups of people with all of the unique personalities and skill sets that come along with them. I have especially come to appreciate these relationships now that we're back in Cincinnati! No matter how hard I try to convey the awesomeness of this trip - it's not the same unless you were there. I like having 300 other people around who really get it!

AND, I finally made a strong karaoke debut! Word on the street is that this place was one of the best karaoke bars in the U.S.! My friend Mandy and I pulled off a stunning rendition of Ice Ice Baby to a packed house! We were a total hit! I can't wait to find a local place in Cincinnati to keep the tunes coming!!


The Mindset
Pre-trip we had a lot of preparation meetings. There was a lot of talk and excitement at these meetings and yes, I was "excited" to go. I thought we were going to do a good thing and aid in building a house and we'd feel good about it. And it was fun that Brian and I could go together and I'd always have a comfort zone buddy. For the bus ride and most of the first day, I was right on track. There were nice people and everything went smoothly and at the end of the day (Sunday) it was business as usual.

The Monday morning came and it rocked my world. We started at breakfast viewing a video of an older woman going back to her house for the first time after Katrina to find it absolutely destroyed. It was very emotional! The emotion continued as we embarked on our Katrina tour. We traveled for three hours around the ENTIRE city of New Orleans and almost ALL of it had severe flooding after the storm. From all of the pictures and video I'd seen on the news, I had no idea it was this bad and that the scope of the damage was SO large! You would just go by so many different neighborhoods that were completely abandoned without a person or car in sight! And even if someone was fortunate enough to get their home back, there weren't services around: grocery stores, fast food, doctors offices, target - none of that exists anymore!

It was at this point that I dropped all previously made judgements about the city and its leaders and realized that it just comes down to the people. People whose homes have been destroyed. People whose families have been torn apart. People who have lost the only life they've ever known. No one deserves to lose all of this. I had so much emotion in my heart for these people and I wanted to really make it better. This tour really set the tone for the rest of the week.

The Work

Tuesday through Friday the day pretty much looked like this:
5:30am: Wake up
6:00am: Breakfast and some singing
7:15am: Load buses
7:45am: Arrive at work site
8am-3:30pm: Work and sweat your butt off with a joyful heart!
4:00pm: Arrive back at hotel smelling so very very disgusting!
Seriously, I didn't think working on a house could be this fun or educational! Despite the crazy heat and total exhaustion, everyone worked like there was no tomorrow, and had the best time doing it - smiling, laughing faces all around! And I never thought I would learn so much about construction! I feel like I can put up siding on a house with the best of them!

We even had a soon-to-be home owner on the site behind us bring us a fantastically seasoned New Orleans style lunch! It was so touching to see these people who have lost so much (she, in fact, lost her sister) still have such a giving and gracious heart!

We really did kick butt working on our house! As we were packing up on our final day it was really hard to leave with so much work still needing to be done, not only on our house, but all over the city.


The Impact
I really want to bring back from this trip a sense of love for anyone and everyone. I feel that I have been given a servants heart and I want to be able to give whatever I can: a listening ear, friendship, service, love!

I really can't wait to return to New Orleans and continue the restoration effort! Thanks for sharing in my journey with me!

Happy Anniversary

On Wednesday, Brian and I celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary! Hooray! We were both bogged down at work trying to get ready to leave for vacation so this year we couldn't take the day off and get caught at the video store in our pjs and greasy hair for everyone to see on the local news. No, this time around we just went to dinner and watched a movie.

We went to Hugo for dinner. The food was supposed to be southern inspired so we thought it was appropriate since we are heading to New Orleans. I felt kinda uncomfortable at first because our table was the highest in the dining room and we were both seated facing out like we were the King and Queen looking out over our Court. I quickly got over it once I started eating because it was the most delicious meal EVER!

Course 1: Scallops in some wonderful sauce!
Course 2: Hugo Salad - it had goat cheese, need I say more?
Course 3: Duck in a white bean and tomato broth - perfection!

Skipped the dessert course because I had picked up our wedding cake from Bonbonerie. Not to float my boat, but we had the best wedding cake ever! It's dangerous that it is available pretty much every day and all I ever want to do is eat it.

Now we get to leave for New Orleans. We're hoping that since we're both so exhausted we'll sleep the entire 17 hour bus ride! While we're gone there will be people blogging about our trip at www.crossroads.net/goneworleans Check it out!

Vacation Recap

I spent last week in Virginia Beach with my family. It was a great beach vacation with lots of sun, sand, and salt! I also learned a few lessons:

1. Skin cancer is bad. I'm not sure if the picture picks it up well (the iPhone cam doesn't zoom) but all this girl bought to the beach was a towel and a giant sized bottle of baby oil. She took the cap off and just poured it all over her. I mean she was slathering this stuff on like she was about to go down a slip n slide! So gross! Anyway, if you can make it out in the picture, that giant bottle of baby oil is almost empty.


2. Tattoo sleeves are fun! It's fun to pretend you're all tough and tatted up for awhile. But it's even more fun to take it off and have your nice clean arm back.


3. Don't fall asleep in the middle of the day. I will take a picture of you drooling all over yourself.



4. Buy trendy shades when they're cheap. $6.99. I call these my 'stunna shades'. They're one of the more trendier things I own and will probably never wear because they don't exactly go with my work polo that I wear everyday. Still, they're fun!


5. Enjoy time with your family. Yes, it did get stressful at times with all 6 of us in the same room but overall it was a great week of constant family time. And when you live 200 miles away from them, these times are few and far between.

Coolness

So last night we had our final meeting before we leave for GO New Orleans! We went over the usual last minute details and what not, then just spent some time getting exciting for what we were about to experience. So our group of 320 peeps is sitting in the Crossroads auditorium (main stage) area and we bow our heads to pray and the lights lower. When we open our eyes, our group is surrounded by a circle of people holding little candles - the people we had chosen as our prayer partners for the trip! It was one of the neatest things ever and just a tad emotional! What great encouragement as we get ready to embark on this exciting journey! T-minus 4 days!!