Road Trip Weekend #1

Drive south 90 miles. Then you're in the land of debauchery and weird people and beautiful architecture and puffy little sugary pillows that I had been deprived of for 30 years.

New Orleans.

Yes, it's true. I've never been there. Unless you count the time my church youth group stopped on the way home from a mission trip in Texas just to get Hard Rock Cafe t-shirts while my youth pastor told of the evils of Bourbon Street.

Walking around the French Quarter on a 99 degree Saturday afternoon is quite a different experience. The place was packed. I'm the kind of person who likes to stop and look in store windows, take in the scenery and just take my time looking around. I quickly found out that that is next to impossible in the Big Easy. If you stop to look, you get trampled from the masses of people behind you on the sidewalk. Being short in a large, moving crowd isn't the best.

I lovelovelove the buildings. The balconies. The history.

But then we found it. The oasis in the middle of all of the hot, sticky, stinky inebriated bodies. It's green awning waving hello in the breeze. Powdered sugar dust coating the sidewalk in all four directions.

That's right. Cafe du Monde. Home of ridiculously thick black coffee and fried dough covered in powdered sugar.

Heaven.

Totally worth whatever time I will have to spend on the elliptical to minimize the damage.

I did the entire experience. The tiny little table crammed next to other tiny tables that can barely seat one person. The coffee that I could barely drink because, as my sister told me, it will put hair on my chest by morning, and the beignets. Oh, the beignets. Sigh.

Yes. I'm a naive little Midwestern girl, transplanted in the Deep South, enjoying every minute of it and not worrying if I look like a complete idiot tourist.

I need to quickly remind myself to say "ya'll" though. Every time I say "you guys" I get someone who asks me what part of the Yankee North I'm from. Fabulous.

Today I love: Fresh cut pineapple and Chocolate Truffle coffee.

A Lot Can Happen in 60 Days. With a lot of Pictures.

So yes. In response to my last post (in MAY, for crying out loud), I did graduate from nursing school.

My adorable niece sent her congrats.

I took a hiatus from all things facebook/twitter/internet/life to study for my boards. I passed my boards. I'm officially an RN.

I started my new job as a medical oncology nurse and began the New Grad Residency program at the hospital. It was pretty cool. My preceptor was great. She taught me more in a month than I learned in an entire semester of nursing school.

Then, if graduation/boards/new job training wasn't enough going on in my life, my husband, my dear, sweet husband, decides to accept a new baseball coaching position in Hattiesburg, MS.

Roughly 536 miles away.

Did you all know that M was born and raised on the coast in Gulfport, MS? Yes. When I first met him, he had the sweetest little southern accent that was quickly decimated by the Missouri Ozarks twang that surrounded us. (He still teases me about my Yankee ability to put a "y" or "ie" sound in the middle of any word. Hi comes out as Hiiiieeee. Oil is oy-el. Etc.) He hates snow and ice, and I think the last couple winters of nothing but ice storms and snow days brought him to his breaking point. This position was just something he couldn't turn down - bigger school in a big city? With restaurants and movie theatres and a mall? And a Target?

Yes please.

So, I gave my notice at work, we packed up the house, and we moved. I've now been in Hattiesburg for one week. It's been a little bit of culture shock for this Midwestern Girl - namely, just now stinkin' nice everyone is. I'm not used to complete strangers coming up to me in the store to see if they can help me reach something on the very top shelf. If that happened in St. Louis, you make sure you have your mace handy. Actually, I wouldn't know, because no one ever took the time to stop to offer to help me before.

However, I'm sorry. I cannot put my groceries into something called a buggy - it's a shopping cart. A buggy is something you put a baby in to walk it around the block. I'm not throwing groceries on top of a baby.

I love where we live. We decided to rent our first year here just to scope out the area before we buy a house. Our apartment is sweet. All credit goes to M - he came down before we moved to look at several different apartments and secured this one for us. It is beautiful. Pool, fitness center, gated, and the best part - we are about five steps away from the Longleaf Trace, a 41 mile paved walking/jogging/biking trail. We get to have our dogs, and our apartment has it's own private entrance. Love.

See the lamppost in the middle of the picture? The door with the overhang right to the right of it is our front door:

View from the kitchen window:

My book nook! Knuke loves it.

Walking the dogs on the Trace.

Yes. We live two hours from NOLA. We also live one hour from the beach if you drive south towards Gulfport.

My new place of employment as of August 1. I'll be a post-surg RN.

I would show more pictures of the inside of the apartment, but we sold our furniture before we left Missouri, and Haverty's is supposed to be here today to deliver the new goods. If it's anything like waiting for the cable guy, I'm not going to hold my breath.

On a final note, southern humidity and my hair are not compatible. I look like I have the frizzy, puffy hair of my middle school days - not a good look for me. I really don't want to re-live that awkward time in my life, so any suggestions of anti-humidity/smoothing hair products would be greatly appreciated.



Today I love: Folgers Chocolate Truffle coffee and air conditioning.