NOT so Home Sweet Abilene

Found out this morning that Abilene will be my home for the next 12 months! To me this is not bad news at all. At least I now know that I will be here for a long haul so I can get comfortable here. Megan was super excited that she would be able to come back to this wonderful place and visit me! I was told that if another job comes up that there would be a possibility that I would be placed on that job and out of Abilene. I am going to stay in the company apartment for now. I see no need to make another trip home to bring back furniture so I will just keep on living in a place that is nothing even close to home. I was told that they hope to keep me in the southeast for any job that I might be on. They want to keep me as close to home as possible. For now I will have to settle in and get used to the Texas life. I really do not recommend coming down here for a visit…there is nothing to do just ask Megan. Give me some advance notice and I will meet you some place more exciting. If anything changes I will let you know.

Addendum

Megan informed me this morning that it had been “forever” since my past post. Which is not really true but whatever. As I am sure you all have read, Megan and I had a wonderful weekend in and around Abilene. Just a few items to note from Megan’s include in her wonderful account of the trip.

Believe it or not Megan had redneck in her. Megan may seem classy and sophisticated but take her somewhere there are games to play with tickets and it all comes back to her. Not only did we blow 20 bucks at this type place Megan would not let me play a game unless it gave out tickets! If there was any way to cheat and get more tickets Megan was doing it. For example: Standing by the ski-ball on the end to drop your ball into the 1,000,000 points hole. Yeah, she was that person you see cheating and you want to do it yourself but think you will get caught. What can I say I had a fun doing it with her. And the only reason that Megan gave our tickets to the kid was because there were not airheads, blowpops, or spider rings at the prize booth! All in all it was a great time and worth every penny.

Megan did do the super sweet thing for me by cleaning my whole apartment. (to her standards) What she failed to tell you is that I had already pre-cleaned it before she got there. But my cleaning job was not up to Megan’s unreasonable high standards. I just hate to think if she had seen the place before I cleaned it…. When I got home Friday Megan had already cleaned the whole place. She had to go buy at least 15-20 self timer air fresheners along with at least 10 of the manual jobs. I think I have a wonder natural odor but Megan begs to differ. She calls it my “Skanky’ Stank”. Agree to disagree right?


During out trip to Albany, TX Megan wrote about buying a book. She failed to tell you this….. Megan is a sucker for children’s books. She loves them and thinks she has to buy them all the time. She probably has just as many or more than any of my sisters who have avg 2.75 children. (come on Rachel you are bring the average down!) While browsing the local book store in Albany, Megan came across the book Goodnight Cowboy it’s just like the book Goodnight Moon but with a cowboy. Just a little 15 page hardback children’s book. Megan wanted to buy the book, so me being the 2007, 2008 and 2009 winner of the World’s Greatest Boyfriend Award, I told Megan I would buy the book for her. As the woman rang up the book I saw that the amount I owed an unbelievable $17.76!! I turned and looked at Megan and she had a look on her face that said “Please don’t say anything. Please just pay the woman and we can leave” So to keep my streak alive I handed over the cash and we were on our way. Under different circumstances I would have kindly told the woman that I would not buy that book at that unreasonable price. At least now we have a bit of Albany to keep with us forever.

All in all we had a wonderful weekend. Megan’s favorite thing about the whole weekend was Sharon’s BBQ and Taco Beuno. We ate at both them twice!

Now that my fun weekend is over I have to wait 3 more weeks before I get to have any fun again. Lucky for me I made it through one weekend already. Only 2 more to go!

This past weekend I went to the Buffalo Gap Flea Market. I will say that they come out of the wood works for this event. I saw at least two women in a bikini top walking around and more than I care to count kids running around in just a diaper. Other than that I did not I really did not do anything worth writing about.

Looking forward now to Max’s wedding on Aug. 8. ( I will be home the 7th)

Work has been much better staying busy putting together an inventory system to manage valves, instrumentation, and large equipment. Exciting I know.
I miss you all and hope to see everyone soon!

My (Megan) Visit to Abilene (and Albany--Home of the Hereford)

Just a fair warning before I begin—though my grammar and punctuation will fare better than Aaron’s (though he has been impressing us all lately), I do not remember details very well and am the worst storyteller in the world. Sorry so long!

Thursday:
Thanks to everyone who volunteered to take me to the airport—my mom still wasn’t able to drive and my dad was supposed to be on dayshift, but he took off and wanted to take me to the airport. Strange, I know. He unloaded my bags, made sure I got to the line, and was even still parked outside once I called him after I got through security. Last time dad dropped me off at the airport he got a parking ticket…he then searched the airport for the security who gave it to him, probably called him words that won’t be written here and told them he worked in security and knows more about things than they do (that’s his best line), and of course he got out of that $10 ticket. That’s the way he tells the story anyway…I see it likely that dad recognized the name who gave him the ticket as someone selling _____ that called into trading time yesterday, the deal goes down, and the guy takes off the ticket price. Who knows really.

So I make to Dallas with a layover for a couple of hours. I had a dozen cookies in my carry on bag from Ham-n-Goody’s because Aaron had been talking about them forever so I wanted to surprise him with them. Only 1 “pinch” was gone from one lemon cookie (my dad on the drive to the airport). But it was 5:00 and there were so many airport fast food places calling my name, but I knew Aaron was taking us to dinner as soon as I got to Abilene so I had to resist. I won the battle against the greasy French fries but lost against a pinch of that lemon cookie. Best thing I’ve ever had.

As soon as I made it to Abilene, I brought out the box of cookies to surprise him, even though he had guessed what I was bringing the day before. He saw the half of the lemon cookie gone, so he ate the other 2 ½ lemon cookies before I could even think about it. He said it was a sacrifice for my sake. Ha.

Our first stop was the famous “Sharon’s Barbeque”…a-maz-ing. I’ve had quite a few meals from Buddy’s BBQ in my day being as it’s my dad’s idea of a nice sit down restaurant (6th grade chubby, tomboy Megan still hates him for that). This place looked like a Buddy’s but was on a whole different level. So good. And all gluten-free! So good that I made Aaron take me back on Sunday. =) (For some reason my dad keeps coming up but when I called and told him about this barbeque place, he asked me to bring him home a souvenir…too bad my flight home is at 6:40am).

We made it back to Aaron’s apartment…I’m going to try not to say much about it because I could go on and on. It was pretty bad. Not all of it was Aaron’s fault. I will say that he bought some new sheets for his bed after I asked him where the ones he was sleeping on came from or if they were clean and something else about mites… He washed his new sheets first because I told him that would help them to not be so stiff. Now there are some crusty spots of laundry detergent and fabric softener on them. I’m not complaining because he actually knew to use “that clear stuff and the blue stuff”.

Friday:
I got up early with Aaron to take him to work so I wouldn’t be stuck in the apartment all morning. (I even made him breakfast—thanks to some wonderful cookware from Jeff). Side note—every dish I tried to use was dirty. Even the ones in the cabinet that Aaron said were clean. I learned that he just likes to run water over things and put them straight into their place. I learned that the crusty stuff on the spoons was peanut butter, on the forks was probably eggs, and the knives must be some kind of meat he had cooked. It took me a long time to wash every single thing in his apartment. And he got mad at me for washing the skillet on the stove because apparently it works better after you cook a few things in it and never clean it off. So after I dropped Aaron off at work I proceeded to Wal-Mart. Aaron had told me he had no cleaning supplies—he figured the place had been cleaned before he moved in. I’m not so sure it had been. I bought the necessary items. And a few Aaron thought were not necessary…especially when he threw the air fresheners on his balcony. I got a dish drain which he told me was useless because he just rinsed and put up, an air freshener that goes off every couple of hours…you know the rest of that story, 6 plastic glasses…he was furious that I threw away all the plastic bottles and Styrofoam cups he had been collecting as fine china, dish towels…he said his bath towel usually ends up in the kitchen and he just used that (this was true because when I did laundry I found 3 there…I was glad I washed everything in the kitchen already), the little smelly things that hang on the toilet bowls…these warranted my favorite quote of the weekend: every time we would walk in the door he would say, “My apartment smells like a toilet bowl.”, and to ease my mind a little bit, I bought myself some rubber gloves to do the cleaning. When I actually started cleaning and opening cabinets, I found tons of cleaning supplies that Aaron had no clue about (“Why would I ever need to open the cabinet underneath the sink?!?” was a direct quote I believe). Those brown and yellow streaks in his toilet are permanent I’m fairly certain. There is no vacuum or broom. I swept/mopped his kitchen with my rubber gloves. I could go on, but I think I’ll stop now. As for the laundry—except for a few towels and socks, I’m pretty sure it hasn’t been attempted since he was on expenses and took it to have it done. I washed, dried, ironed (I even creased the legs of those blasted pants!), and hung up everything in his apartment (and mated the 523 random socks he had washed and thrown on the spare bed—5 of which I found were mates to my socks at home that made me believe that the washer really can eat your socks). Hopefully he will be relocated before he runs out. I digress….

I finished cleaning in time to go pick up Aaron from work. I will say I am glad those windows are so tinted in his truck because I felt like I needed Wranglers, a hat, Texas state belt buckle, and boots to be driving that thing around town. After lunch Aaron took me to Prime Time (aka Celebration Station) to play some ‘ticket games’. I know that’s the most redneck thing in the world, but I love it. I should probably never go to Vegas…and there’s a reason you don’t gamble or play ‘ticket games’ with real money…because I never really think it’s real when I slide those cards to play a game! Anyways, $20 later Aaron and I had about 500 tickets. Instead of taking the whoopee cushion, we opted for giving our card full of tickets to a little boy who was extremely excited…well worth the money, plus I got to put all those tickets into the counter and see how many I got! Friday was a great day…Aaron even found an old timey theater that was playing Casablanca that night (my fav)!! We had dinner at a really cool place downtown then immediately had popcorn and coke at the movie. I failed to mention that neither of us have ever eaten out this much ever. Aaron didn’t want me to cook in his kitchen and fuss about things. All weekend Aaron reminded me in many ways that his stomach was “torn up”.

Saturday:
Our adventures began very early. Since I fall asleep at about 9:00pm every night, I’m a pretty early riser…7:30 on a Saturday morning is pretty normal. I love the mornings, especially when the afternoons are 105 degrees here. After gas station coffee and coke, we were off…and for some reason our first stop was Wal-Mart (a different one than the one I had gone too). Nothing else is open at 8:30 and we needed inspiration for an adventure. Plus, I had seen an ad for all the school supplies on sale and I love looking at it all. From Wal-Mart you could see tons of windmills down the road—that was all the inspiration we needed.

We saw a sign that said “Albany 31 miles” near the windmills. On the handy dandy Storm, I googled said town to see if there was anything interesting to do there. The Chamber of Commerce website is deceiving. After a very flat, very straight 31 mile road, we made it to Albany. The welcome sign was hand painted and read “Welcome to Albany, Home of the Hereford”. We passed a non-operating gas station that I’m pretty sure was the inspiration for the ones in the Cars movie. We then recognized that many things were non-operating in this town. We parked on “Main Street” and started walking around to places we thought were shops and little places to eat. None of which were open on a Saturday afternoon. One building said it had books and information so we went inside to a bookstore that was surprisingly open. (The information part of the sign we learned was only from the woman working there who spoke about 2 words per minute—most of the information about how mistreated George Bush is, especially after the hard time he had fixin all Clinton’s mistakes…imagine how long this info took). I always feel really guilty walking in a store that I don’t really want to be in and then walking right out…and I could see this town need the economic stimulation. I found a cute Texas children’s book and couldn’t leave without it. (Aaron will be gifting it to the boys as a souvenir). The owners of the store (not the woman working there) we learned pretty much own the whole town. Personal friends of George Bush and worked to get him elected we were told. I doubt they lived in Albany very long. Being as there was no information to get about the town apparently, the lady gave us a newspaper (funniest thing I have ever seen) and told us they just got a Mex-ee-can place down the street. (I later saw the ad for said Mexican place in the newspaper—it had name of restaurant and clip art of a man with a gun and a huntin’ dog in the center and clip art in a circular formation around the man of: a deer, a rabbit, a duck, another deer, and some kind of bird. As much as Aaron likes Mexican, I had to tell him no. I was very apprehensive about the ad in relation to their food selections). The place we did choose to eat at, I dare say, could not have been any better. Aaron was all excited about some authentic food at a ‘hole in the wall’ place…we found it. The Eagle’s Nest. We walk in and of course the one waitress and two men dining stare at us…Aaron said we looked too high dollar. Not to be rude, but I think Aaron’s worst would look high dollar…yes the “Oak Ridge Police Department” shirt even. Our waitress had about 4 front teeth missing. And had on a shirt that said something about Texas girls…There was no way we could walk out. I knew nothing on the menu was going to be safe from the deep fryer that you could smell when you walked in (and I could smell til we made it home to change). We ordered and hoped for the best. When our waitress walked over to the refrigerator (smaller than most people’s home fridge) and got our ice and water from the door, we knew there was no hope. After peeling back layers of breading and grease, I found enough chicken to eat to make it look like I ate my food. I would say this was the worst $20 ever spent, but they probably needed it. Not much else happened on our trip to Albany. We did read in the paper that the COUNTY population was about the size of Clinton Middle and High school (roughly 3,300) and they had 1 full time law enforcement (whom we dined with at the Eagle’s Nest). The advertisements in this newspaper/guide were the best. Aaron and I found an ad (with photo) for a Bed & Breakfast (mind you, the picture was of a small brick house with what looked like a garage apartment): “Private Bath, Private Sun Porch, Honeymoon Suite with (oh yes) a 2 person heart-shaped jetted tub, and pet friendly.” Let me know if you guys need the phone number for reservations—credit cards are accepted and gift cards are available. I have nothing more to say about the little town of Albany—it made for some great memories.

The lovely Eagle's Nest Apparently everything in Albany is "historic"

Dinner at Perini Ranch that night—excellent. Such a cool place for a restaurant (not literally cool because it was not air conditioned). But awesome nonetheless. I think this was the main reason Aaron wanted me to come visit—he hadn’t eaten there since Mitchell moved, and he refuses to eat by himself. The Armadillo at Perini...we didn't do any cool self-timer pictures here.

Aaron wanted to go to the drive in that night, but it didn’t start until, naturally, 9:30 when it gets dark. Guess who was asleep before it got dark outside…
I realize this is a problem. Any ideas, please let me know.

Sunday and Monday:
The rest of the trip we were lazy. Or shall I say lazier than the first two days. I think Aaron had shown me all the town of Abilene had to offer. We did watch all 5 Harry Potter movies, in preparation for the 6th coming out on Wednesday. Umm….this was all Aaron’s idea. Ok, not really. Oh, and I got some new cowboy boots!! I kept asking Aaron if he liked them or if they looked goofy and he told me, “I know you’re only gonna wear them with those dresses, and yeah, I’m gonna make fun of you. It’s goofy.” They’re good quality and I doubt I’ll wear them out, so when the tight jeans and cowboy boots look comes back in style (my uncle Lynn and all of Abilene will tell you it never went out), I’ll be ready. See, I’m just saving money for the future already! Aaron loves the way my brain works.

It will be sad to leave Abilene (as I am writing this while Aaron is at work all day today). I hate that Aaron has to live here by himself, but he’ll be happy I’m gone no longer to “mess up his routines” or to encourage eating out so much and getting his stomach all “tore up”. Only 3 more weeks til home again!

I love you (and Taco Bueno) and thank you for a fun weekend in Abilene. You are the best/dirtiest boyfriend in the whole world. I’m kidding about that dirty part, it was way better than I imagined.

For the rest of you—book your trip to Abilene (or Albany) and you too can have these fun adventures in the blistering heat. Save room in your suitcase--don’t bother bringing your running clothes/shoes or a bathing suit. Heat combined with greasy food makes neither of these activities a good idea.

The Joys of Flight

Well going home always feels great. The only way it can be any better is a weekend home at the lake. This past weekend I was able to get off work early Thursday and fly home for the Jenkins 4th of July camping trip. I loved every minute of it. It’s really cool/exciting to see all the grandkids growing up and being wild and crazy children. I am already looking forward to the lake next year. I am thinking next time I will be able to take a few days off to fully enjoy the experience.
Only bad thing about the lake was leaving. I had to leave Saturday night to go run some errands around town. When you don’t live in town it makes it hard to get everything done that you have to do while you are in. Megan and I were in “do work” mode Sunday and all went well till it was time to leave.
As we pulled into the airport the sky broke open and an east Tennessee thunderstorm rolled through. I said to myself that it was going to be a long evening. Little did I know that this evening would last well into the next day…. After having the flight delayed for 20 minutes while sitting in the airport we were able to board the aircraft. Upon boarding we were told that we had to wait for the storm to pass, so we sat. After about 30 minutes of not moving we were told that the weather was clear enough to take off. As we were taking off I looked at my watch and realized that there was no way I was going to make my connecting flight unless it got delayed…..
It did not get delayed….As we landed in Dallas I turned on my phone and looked up my flight to Abilene. Hoping it would be delayed I was disappointed to see that it was already “in transit” After exiting the plane I went to the ticked counter. As anyone who has traveled before knows, the airline is not liable in cases where weather delayed the flight.
After booking a hotel I walked down to the waiting area and waited for the hotel van to come pick me up. When the van got there it was about a 15 minute ride to the hotel. On the way my driver proceeded to tell me that I really need at have at least 2 firearms and enough ammo to make it through a war. As I was, I am sure you are asking “why?” Well according to him Obama just might be the anit-Christ and the end is near. I am not saying I disagree with him too much but it was funny that he knew me for all of 5 minutes before he told me all of this. God bless America.
After spending the night in a crappy hotel I made my flight the next morning. Got to work and tried my best to get through the week.
This weekend well I guess today Megan is coming to Abilene. Not sure what all we are going to do but I am sure I can show her the sights of Abilene. I hope next week I can get her to write about her Texas experience.

I'm Such a Sentimental Blogger...Love, Megan

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