Penny and the Bird

Here are a few pictures of Penny chasing a big crane type bird out of our yard.  I will post pics of Oak Alley Plantation later.

She spots said bird.

 She inches closer to examine this weird fowl.

 She is thinking "I never saw one of these in Indiana."

 She tells the bird to get out of her yard.

On the mend

As usual, never a dull moment around here.  Since I last wrote Penny got really really sick for about 6 days.  She was so sick she wouldn't walk.  We had to carry her outside to potty and she didn't eat anything for 2 or 3 days.  We took her to the vet last Saturday and they gave her some medicine for her stomach and told me to bring her back Monday if she wasn't better.  Well by Monday she wasn't better, she actually seemed a little worse so I took her back.  It was one of the worst days ever.  I had to leave her there for a few hours while they ran tests on her and did x-rays.  I was on pins and needles waiting for the vet to call me.  I was seriously a total wreck all day sobbing in hysterics thinking about my little baby getting poked and prodded and her not being able to talk and tell the doc what was wrong.  When I finally picked her up I got a $411 vet bill and ZERO answers as to why she was so ill.  I was confused, scared and furious.  How could I just have spent over $500 on two vet visits in three days and they have no answers for me.  If I went to the doctor and was sick I would demand an answer!  But there was nothing we could do but take her home and hope that she would get better.  And Thank GOD she did!  She actually started getting better the next day.  Mills was right...Murphy's Law!  We took her to the vet and she instantly got better.  But if we wouldn't have taken her, who knows what would have happened.  I don't want to think about it.  But actually I have been thinking a lot this past week about how close I am to Penny and how much I really love her.  To some people who are not pet owners they may not understand.  I have pretty much been a pet owner my entire life.  I have had horses, ponies, dogs, cats, miniature horses, chickens, cows, guinea pigs, rabbits, love birds and even a rooster named Cecil as a pet.  I have probably had nearly 100 different pets in my lifetime.  But Penny is the first pet I have been solely responsible for.  Her well being depends entirely on Ryan and I.  And I think that it why I seem to have such a strong bond with her more than any other pet I have ever had.  I still remember the day he brought her home.  She wasn't even a pound and she was about the size of a hot dog bun.  She could easily fit in one palm.  She was so tiny and fragile and seriously the cutest thing you have ever seen.  Anyways, since that day she has become such a big part of our lives.  She is part of our family.  We would be devastated if anything happened to her.  I can't imagine her not being in my life.  She seriously brings us so much joy.  She has so much personality.  She makes me laugh numerous times a day.  I am so grateful she is back to her normal crazy self. 

On a different note I went to the New Orleans Museum of Art this week and City Park which is one of the largest and oldest parks in the US and also has the largest collection of mature live oaks.  It is truly a beautiful park.  And the museum was awesome as well.  I went on Wednesday b/c it is free every Wednesday and I was there about 3 hours and didn't get through all of it so I will be going back soon to check out the rest.

Friday Ryan and I drank three bottles of red wine and played a 4 hour game of Monopoly.  After spending a lot of the game not doing so well, I came back and ended up winning!!  Saturday we were so hungover from all the wine, we did absolutely NOTHING.  Literally, we didn't leave the house or our pajamas the entire day.  The only time we saw the light of day was to let Penny out back and when the pizza guy arrived that evening.  Today we went to Oak Alley Plantation for it's 5th annual Arts and Crafts Festival.  It was awesome!!  Since I didn't get to go to the Covered Bridge Festival this year (which is an annual tradition for my grandma, mom and I) this was the second best thing.  Plus we hadn't been to Oak Alley Plantation yet and I have been dying to see it.  A lot of people think it is the one of the most beautiful plantations down here.  The driveway leading up to Oak Alley has 28 live oaks (14 on each side) lining the road all the way to the house.  They are over 300 years old and absolutely stunning.  If you have never seen a live oak as I had not before I moved down here it is one of nature's most beautiful and mysterious trees.  It is absolutely huge and towering and a lot of the time the limbs are touching the ground and sometimes the trees are covered in moss.  It is almost sculptural looking.

Here is a poem I found about live oaks that I am quite fond of.

I SAW IN LOUISIANA A LIVE-OAK GROWING

“I saw in Louisiana a live-oak growing,
All alone stood it and the moss hung down from the branches,

Without any companion it grew there uttering joyous leaves of dark green,

And its look, rude, unbending, lusty, made me think of myself,

But I wonder’d how it could utter joyous leaves standing alone there without its lover near—for I knew I could not.

And I broke off a twig with a certain number of leaves upon it, and twined around it a little moss,

And brought it away—and I have placed it in sight in my room,

It is not needed to remind me as of my own dear friends,

(For I believe lately I think of little else than of them,)

Yet it remains to me a curious token—it makes me think of manly love;

For all that, and though the live-oak glistens there in Louisiana solitary in a wide flat space,

Uttering joyous leaves all its life without a friend, a lover near,

I know very well I could not.”

(Walt Whitman, 1860)

Home Sweet Home

Geez, the past week has been a whirlwind!  I flew back to Indiana for a short but fun trip and got to see some of my friends a family.  I drank way too much and stayed up way too late and even closed down the bars in Broad Ripple one night pretending like I was 21 again.  I stayed at my friend Kate's house on Wednesday night and got to spend some time with her and her son Aiden.  Thursday I took pictures of my friend Jennifer's baby, Jenson, and then I went over to my friend Wiseman's house for a big ole cookout/party just like old times.  Included were lots of good grilled meats, lots of cold beers and lots of dancing on the porch.  Friday I went to Bazbeaux for pizza with some of my girl friends and then out to the bars (Midtown Grill, OPT's, Average Joes and The Alley Cat).  Have to end the night at The Alley Cat of course with a nice old can of PBR.  Saturday I went to TWO weddings (my friend Jim Priest and my other friend Troy Gilbert).  I went to both weddings with Kate Z. so I didn't have to trek back and forth alone.  I kind of felt like Katherine Heigl in 27 dresses going back and forth from two weddings, timing everything just right.  I actually had three weddings on Saturday but only made it to two.  Who has three weddings in one day?!  Only me!  Anyways after the weddings I somehow talked everyone (who was going out to the bars) at both weddings into going to the same bar (Knickerbocker) to party the rest of the night away.  We closed down the bar and then 7 of us piled into one hotel room at the Holiday Inn, where I slept on the floor like it was Spring Break 1998.  What is wrong with us?  Sunday we got up and had a rather disastrous breakfast at Sunrise Cafe.  I have never really liked that place and am disappointed every time I go.  Should have went to Triple X.  I tried to talk Shane into getting "The Challenge", which is this massive plate full of all kinds of breakfast foods covered in gravy.  It is pretty disgusting but I always try to talk someone into getting it.  He refused.  After breakfast I drove back to the WC (Warren County) to see my mom.  I hung out in West Lebanon for awhile and then headed to Hoopeston, IL to my grandma's house.  My mom, grandma and my cousin Kelcie and I went to visit my Great Uncle Leonard and then went out to eat dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  We came back home and my Aunt Sherry and Uncle Bobby came over for a visit.  Monday my grandma and I went to visit more family and run errands.  I drove back to West Lebanon that night to see my mom one more time before I had to head back to NOLA.  Then Tuesday I got up and drove to the airport.  My trip was over as soon as it had begun.  Is this what going back to Indiana is going to be like from now on?  It was crazy, hectic and exhausting!  I had a great time but I feel like I hardly got any time to spend with anyone!  It all went by so fast and I was even there for 6 days!!  What will it be like when I can only come home for a long weekend?  Anyways, I was kind of glad to get back home to Millsy and Penny dog.  I missed them and they missed me.  The weather is changing down here and I love it!  It has only been about 80 degrees with low humidity this past week.  It is awesome!  Hopefully no more sweltering heat for a couple months!  I have a lot more to write but I am tired so I think I will go to bed and write more tomorrow.

A box full of travel guides...

So I went to see Eat, Pray, Love the movie a few weeks ago.  It is based off of one of my favorite books ever by Liz Gilbert.  When Sara and I were in Italy we went to the gelato place where Liz gets gelato in Rome.  I remember I had lemon and it was the best lemon gelato ever.  We also tried to go to Saint Michelle three times!  It is the pizza place where Liz goes while she is in Naples.  Long story but we never did get to eat there.  Now I have to go back to Naples again.  Anyways, Liz's friend keeps a box under her bed filled with baby clothes for that one special day when she finally has a baby.  Liz tells her that she has that same box under her bed only it is filled with travel books.  I am Liz, I have a box filled with travel books.  Well it is not really a box I keep under my bed.  More of a complete book shelf filled with travel guides and magazine articles and print outs of places I want to go in the world.  I don't have any box filled with baby stuff or anything of the sort.  Does this mean I don't want kids?  It has been something I have been thinking about lately.  I mean, I wouldn't mind having one child maybe two (maybe a Chinese baby) but I am not DYING to have kids like most girls my age.  I don't feel some biological clock ticking like everyone else does.  I feel like I am not ready yet.  I feel like I need a few more years.  I am not ready to give up MY life just yet.  Does this mean I am selfish?  I feel like I still have so much more to accomplish before I have kids.  Lord knows my career isn't where I planned on it being by the time I had a child.  And there are still so many places I want to travel to before I have kids.  It crushed me to have to cancel our honeymoon to Bora Bora this summer b/c I honestly felt like that was my only chance that I would ever get to go there.  Let's be honest, how many young couples with kids just go jaunting off to Bora Bora?  And Mills and I haven't even been to Europe together.  I want to take him to Scotland, England and Ireland in the next year or two.  And I haven't been to Egypt yet!  I want to go to Egypt so bad.  I am just so afraid of having kids and then never getting to travel again.  It is like my worst fear.  How am I going to be 31 tomorrow?  Where has the time gone?  How have the past 10 years just flown by?  Can I be like the women in Hollywood and wait until I am 40 to have a baby?  Is that acceptable anywhere besides Hollywood?  I doubt it.  But I just know that there will always be a list of list of places I am dying to go...even when I am 40 and 50 and 60.  So I guess there is no "right time"  to have kids.  I don't know but I still don't feel like I am ready yet.  So I guess I will wait a while longer. 

Crazy week!

So I had a crazy encounter with a wasp on Tuesday evening.  I went out to get the mail and got stung my a giant pterodactyl sized wasp.  I thought someone shot me in the arm it stung so bad.  I screamed and swiped it off with a magazine and ran in the house.  Within about 3 minutes my whole body felt like it was on fire and every inch of of my skin was itching like crazy!  I called Mills and he rushed home.  What seemed like 3 hours was only about 25 minutes.  By the time Mills got home my ears had completely swollen shut (weird I know but literally my ears closed up and I couldn't hear anything) and my eyes were almost completely swollen shut.  Not to mention I looked like a freak show!  We rushed to urgent care where the lady behind the desk immediately rushed me to the back where they started giving me a bunch of shots.  They didn't even make me fill out any paperwork first....I must have looked bad.  Almost instantly all the swelling and discomfort started going away.  The doctor then told me I am deathly allergic to wasps and bees and need to get to an allergist as soon as possible.  Oh and I now have to carry an EpiPen around with me everywhere I go in case I get stung again b/c apparently every time you get stung it is worse that the last time.  GREAT!  How am I 30 years old and just now finding this out?

Oh then Wednesday evening I was in our back yard with Penny and the neighbor came out to talk to me.  I told her about my wasp encounter and then asked her if she had been seeing a possum around lately b/c I keep seeing this possum in our back yard and then is crawls through a hole in our fence and then runs underneath their house.  Anyways, when I asked her this question she said "Oh yeah, we have a pet possum that lives underneath our house.  We named it Sandy!"  WHAT!?!?  Who lets some sick ass possum just live under their house.  Then she proceeded to tell me they like the possum b/c it comes out at night and eats their dogs poop so they don't have to clean it up.  SSSSIIIICCCCKKK!

Then last night a purple and orange lizard hopped in the door right behind Mills.  We ended up having to move the China cabinet and just about every other thing in our dining room trying to catch that damn lizard.  Mills finally captured it in a tupperware container but he accidentally tore off the tail in the lid of the container.  Ok folks, I am not even kidding...the tail proceeded to move around squished in the lid for about 5 minutes.  Mills and I both danced around the room freaking out at the possessed freaky lizard tail that wouldn't stop squirming around.  It reminded me of how they said when you cut a chicken's head off, the body will still run around for a few minutes.

I feel like every night there is some weird animal, reptile or insect sighting around this joint.

Back from the beach!

It has been a little while since I last wrote.  Lots of exciting things have been going on!  We left last Saturday morning for North Carolina and got back on Wednesday night.  We were there for Mills' friend from High School Ben Chandler and his lovely fiance, Kara Nunn's, wedding.  It was 5 days of awesomeness!  We flew into Myrtle Beach and drove about 30 miles north to Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina.  We shared a condo with Ryan's brother, John, and his wife, Betsy.  Basically we laid around on the beach for days on end.  It was glorious!  I LOVE the beach!  Even though when you get home everything you own is covered in sand it is still great.  I just love that absolute tranquility that comes with laying on a beach.  I usually have my I-pod, a few new magazines, and a cool drink.  What more could you ask for?  Just laying there soaking up the rays with not a care in the world.  I can't think of many other things as carefree and relaxing as laying on a beach.  And who knew that North Carolina has some of the best beaches in the US.  Forget about Florida, go to NC!  Last year we were in Ocracoke, North Carolina, which has made in onto the Top Ten Beaches in the US and also Top 100 Beaches in the World lists.  And then this year we go to Ocean Isle Beach, which has equally white, smooth and silky sand scattered with lots of beautiful shells.  I mean...pure heaven.  And it was HOT!  I mean really hot!  I am SUPER tan right now, which I am loving b/c it is middle of September.  Plus it was great fun to be in the presence of family and good friends.  We also got to meet all of Ben and Kara's family, which was nice.  Smaller, more intimate destination weddings are so personal and you really get a chance to know everyone who is most important in the bride and groom's lives.  Everybody left on Monday night except for me, Ryan, Ben and Kara.  Ryan and I had to check out of our Condo so Ben and Kara were so gracious to offer us a room in their "mansion".  And I mean MANSION!  It was 4500 sq. ft., 6 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, right on the beach and listed at 2.5 mil.  It was seriously like a house on Cribs...quite possibly the nicest place I will ever stay in my whole life.  Anyways the 4 of us hung out Tuesday night and polished off a half gallon of whiskey and a few brewskies.  Then Wednesday it was time to nurse our hangovers and head back to Louisiana.  We got home late Wednesday night after the WORST flight I have ever taken in my life.  Don't really care to go into the whole story but it involved sitting on a sweltering hot plane smelling two disgusting uncleaned toilets for over an hour and a half before take-off.  Needless to say that was the first and last time I will ever fly Delta.

Then this weekend was fun as well.  Got to spend more quality time with my Millsy.  It has been weird living in a city with zero friends besides each other.  We do things that we never would have done back in Indiana b/c we would have been too busy hanging out with our friends.  Yesterday we went to the bank (which was one of the worst experiences, why do the most simple things suck down here so bad), went to this coffee shop we have been wanting to try, went to Tuesday morning, went to two different greenhouse/ pet supply stores to look for a house plant, went to eat at Blue Tomato (this glorious dive bar/restaurant with yummy Mexican food), went antique shopping and went to Triange West (the bar down the street from out house).  The bar was filled with usual patrons (old men mostly).  During the day it is much more of an older crowd than it is at night where it is mostly 20 somethings bumping and grinding and singing karaoke.  We were there for a couple hours knocking back some cold ones and watching college football.  Every time someone new would walk in the whole bar would yell "HHHHEEEYYYYY!"  It kind of felt like Cheers or something.  Fun filled day for sure.

Today we went grocery shopping and the store had the cinnamon scented brooms and pumpkins and gourds all over the place and it was 93 degrees when we were driving home.  It feels weirdly not like Fall is approaching at all.  I don't think there is a Fall down here.  I hate that b/c I LOVE Fall!  It is my favorite season.  I am jealous b/c I keep seeing everyone post stuff on Facebook about how it is cooling down and feeling like Fall up north.  Some local the other day told me that the seasons down here are HOT and HOTTER.  Grrreeaaattt.

Ok, I need to go to bed.  I am exhausted.  Will write more later.  I feel like I had other interesting things to write about but I can't remember right now b/c I am too tired.  Ciao!

Up too late...

So my nights and days are backwards lately.  I am innately a night owl but this is getting ridiculous!  It is after 2am and I still up jacking around.  What is my point?  I am still up partly due to the fact that I ate my first bad meal down here tonight for dinner.  Millsy and I went out for dinner b/c he has been working so much this week and we just felt like going out for dinner.  He worked today from 7 to 7 and he didn't get home until 11pm one night this week!  Geez, his job is stressful and hard work.  I don't know how he does it?!  I am just not cut out for the kind of job he has.  Anyways we went out for dinner and I had a BBQ shrimp po-boy.  Normally I like po-boys but this one was greasy as all get out!  I was ravished b/c I didn't eat anything all day (except drink coffee) so I scarfed it down even though it wasn't very good.  I felt sick almost instantly after eating it.  I have been nauseous and munching tums since we got home.  Yuck!  I talked to a good friend on the phone tonight for a bit and it was nice.  I feel kind of sheltered down here.  I haven't talked to anyone forever I feel like.  It is my own fault though.  I have cut myself off from my telephone for the past month....not really intentionally.  I just haven't called anyone.  I don't really know why.  I guess to get settled and just take a break from everything...everyone.  I need to get calling my friends or else I won't have any!  Speaking of feeling sheltered, culture shock is starting to set in a little bit.  The newness has wore off and I am starting to realize I am NOT on vacation.  I live here.  It is weird.  It is sort of like a different country down here.  A mish-mosh of lots of different places.  Downtown the architecture is very European and the people sort of have this "laissez-faire" attitude about things.  Which is sort of nice in a way.  No one is trying to be something they are not down here.  No one is trying to impress.  Everyone just kind of lets it all hang out (literally and figuratively).  But everyone and everything is sloowww.  I feel like I am constantly in a hurry (to get where or do what I don't know).  But I often find myself annoyed at the slowness of things down here.  (Oh and by slow I don't mean the driving....the driving is crazy, but that is another topic all together).  I have nothing to do most days or nowhere to be but I find myself being like "What is taking so long?  What the hell are they doing up there?"  I need to start getting used to the new way of life I guess.  Another weird thing is people talk different down here and refer to different areas of town (which can not be found on any sort map that I have found).  Lots of french references and words pronounced with a french inflection and dialect.  I think it is referred to as Cajun English (derived from Cajun French).  Like Richard is pronounced 'Ree-shard' and Herbert is pronounced 'air-bay'.  There are tons of french words and phrases used down here.  I need to brush up on the ole French!!  Good thing I was somewhat fluent at one point in my life.  Now only to get back to that point.  Oh like one word for example that you see a lot of places down here is "geaux".  They use the word "geaux" instead of "go".  Like in the word "bordeaux".  You see Bud Light billboards that say "Geaux Saints!" and stuff like that.  And I went to a furniture store yesterday called "Comeaux" and had to ask the lady how to pronounce it just to be sure and she laughed and said "Como!"  Sort of like "Duh, you silly girl...what a dumb question!"  Weirdness everywhere.  Surrounded by weirdness.  Ok, I will write more later about the weird and strange happenings of my life.  Like another lizard crawling up the wall my the front door tonight.  I don't think I will ever get used to that.  Ok, signing off.

Amanda