8 years ago

This is the time of year when everyone remembers how our country was attacked and thousands of civilians lost their lives. People have been including it in their facebook statuses, and some are poking fun at those who do. This week is when Discovery Channel, NatGeo, A&E, etc does all their 9/11 specials, about various topics like engineering, architecture, personal stories from survivors, and even conspiracy theories. For many of us, it is still very fresh, and no matter who you are, you were in some way affected by it.

That morning started like any other for me, as pretty much everyone, I guess. It was my first year at A&M (junior year). I got up, ate breakfast, and watched the morning news with Liz (one of my housemates) for a few minutes. I remember her saying that not much must be going on b/c the biggest news of the day was that Bethel Johnson, an A&M football player was out with an injury. I pedaled to my first class, HLTH 331 with Dr. Wylie in the insanely cold GRW 267 classroom. After class we went outside to thaw for a while before Dr. Dorman's HLTH 210 class immediately following. Someone rode past us on their bike, telling us what had happened, that the World Trade Center had collapsed. We chalked it up to a rumor or a story blown out of proportion, and headed back to class.

When we got back to class, Dr. Dorman came in and announced, "Due to the cold temperature in this classroom and the recent turn of events in our country, class is cancelled today." Wow. He never cancels class.

My friend Alicia and I went across the street to the Koldus building to where her mom worked in the Office of Student Activities. The Director of Student Activities was actually stuck in Newark, trying to get back to CS. We sat in that office, glued to the TV for several hours. After a while I went home, biking alone on the A&M campus... nobody was outside. It was so weird. At home, the TV was on, and because we spent all that time in front of the TV, the housemates got a little stir crazy and we re-arranged the living room. Ma was not happy about that.

Like I said before, we have all been affected in some way by it... politics, safety, air-travel (what a pain!!!), war, lost loved ones... but something my Dad said that day stuck with me: "You know, God was not surprised by this." Wow! He has our lives in His hands and cares about the big things and the small things. This is something that we may know, but often times forget.

Don't we serve a great God?

Hittin' the road with my best friend

When you're saving for a house as furiously as we are, life can get rather dull. So that's why we got out of town this weekend and explored the incredibly boring countryside of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.

On Saturday, I suggested that we do something fun, and with no money, and the fact that we've done everything free that Indy has to offer, Mike decided to hit the road. He absolutely LOVES Jack in the Box tacos, even though I am quite repulsed at the sight of them. So we drove to Illinois to get Jack in the Box. Yes. However, we ended up traveling much further than intended, and ended up in Troy, IL, which is about 15 miles from St. Louis. And after Mike got his tacos and I ate a pathetic chicken pita, we hit the road again. 6 hours total for the day!

So happy

We like spending time in the car together. Sometimes it's good to talk and have no interruptions, but there is also a time to be silent. Both were experienced on this trip. It's a good thing we like to do this because we are planning to drive down to TX this year for Christmas.

I spent most of the day Sunday (day of rest? yeah right) baking and preparing for our journey to Mike's Aunt Sandra & Uncle Keith's home in Cincinnati... which is a much more reasonable 2 hours away.

And on Monday morning, we slept in, ate a nice breakfast courtesy of a coupon from Chick Fil A for a free chicken biscuit!! Around 11am, we hit the road, bound for Cincinnati! Indiana is incredibly boring and flat, but once we entered Ohio, I was taken aback by the beautiful rolling hills! I hope we get to go that direction in the next month or 2 when the leaves start to change! That will be just gorgeous! We spent the day at Keith & Sandra's, laying around, taking advantage of "Labor Day," enjoying some good conversation, Rutgers vs Cincinnati, and of course an NCIS marathon. Here are some pics from the day:

Welcome to Ohio!

Uncle Keith, Aunt Sandra and Shawn

The Sweetest In-Laws to walk the earth

Me with my one and only!

I hope everyone else had a safe, fun holiday weekend. Now it's back to the grind... grrr.