Week 25 - On to Birmingham, AL with a pitstop in Atlanta! Go Cubs!

Well, lucky me! We had a few days off and had to travel from Greensboro, NC to Birmingham, AL. And it just happens that I had to travel through Atlanta and had a few days off. I've been so busy with work that I didn't know there were tickets left, but Gen told me so I got tix for the first two games at Turner Field!! But first, I visited Courtney Cauldwell in Atlanta. For those of you that know her, and don't know...she moved there a few months ago for work. She has a great apartment about 15 min. north of the city, and sounds like she's loving it! We went out to dinner and to watch the Bears vs. Packers debacle. At least we have the Cubs to cheer for!








Cubs WIN!



I had some time to kill during the day before game 2, so I just did some running downtown to see some Atlanta's sights including Georgia Tech campus. Atlanta is a beautiful city.

After a crazy two days, I had to get to Birmingham for yet another Southern Women's Show. And, of course, there was another "Bachelor" there. This time it was Jamie from Chicago. He actually lives at North and Wells of all places. I also met Carter from Trading Spaces. Both very cute! ha ha





I am now in Ft. Lauderdale, FL and my vacation officially starts tonight! I have the weekend off to go to my friend Todd's wedding and a bunch of my friends are flying in for it. It's a much needed vacation and it will be great to catch up with everyone. Nothing better than celebrating my birthday on the beach with friends!

Oh...and I almost forgot...on my way down to Ft. Lauderdale Carolyn and I stopped in Tampa for Monday Night Football. I'm catching some luck with witnessing sport games going down in the record books with the addition of the Colts comeback against the Bucs! It was an amazing game. Carolyn is friends with Dwight Freeney and he gave us some tix in the Colts section. The Bucs fans were just livid! Afterwards, we met up with Dwight and some players after the game before boarding their bus. It was pretty cool...and felt weird being at a football game in 80 degree heat! I haven't downloaded the pics yet, but they'll be in my next update.

I hope everyone is doing well!

Week 24 - Greensboro, NC

After rafting I made it to Greensboro for the next show. One of our temp staff from the Charlotte show, Christy, actually lived there. So we ended up going out to dinner one night and then I went with she and her friends to see Sam Bush play in Winston-Salem. What I love about traveling is meeting local people who can show me the true experience of the area. Sam Bush is a rockin' bluegrass band which was great. We met some great people. As Christy would say, "I have just enough hick in me to be fun!" And she definitely was fun! Stay in touch Christy!




After a long weekend of work, I decided to take an hour ride up and do some hiking at Hanging Rock state park. It's a beautiful area in the mountains with loads of hikes to choose from that were very desolate. It may have not been the smartest thing to go by myself, but I loved it. Here's a few pics. If you're ever in the area, I highly recommend it!






We have our first long drive in a while...going from North Carolina to Birmingham, AL for yet another Southern Women's Show. We have two vehicles now since we load in our vehicle to the shows every weekend.

Week 23 - Charlotte, NC

I figured that North Carolina and Alabama were going to be a little less than exciting, but found that I had a great time. It's definitely slower paced than home, but I took advantage of doing some things that I'm not able to do in Chicago.

We had a long weekend of work at another Southern Women's Show in Charlotte, but we were able to get out one night with one of our temp staff. A couple of the places we went were pretty cool, and I met some people that have recently moved from Chicago so it was great chatting with mid-westerners! The city is pretty small, but clean and beautiful.

Since there wasn't much to do exactly in Charlotte, for my day off I decided to travel a bit to do a 6-hr whitewater rafting trip. It was incredible! I've only been once before and this was a level 3&4 course with a drop 5 at the end. I had some great people in my raft from Seattle who were fun. Here's a few pics:





I decided to take the scenic route out to Greensboro, NC (to our next SWS show) and I drove through the Smokey Mountains and made a few scenic pitstops along the way. I'm really liking driving across the country, and I never thought I'd say that considering I don't even own a car!