Life coming at me

OK, here's a slightly more detailed version of my weekend.

I drove to Atlanta Friday night after work. Thankfully, I managed to leave out ahead of the bad weather, and our fundraiser for the Tokyo trip was postponed, so I didn't miss that either! I had a nice drive, even managing to enjoy the 30-minute traffic jam, during which I rolled down my windows, put on my iPod and serenaded anyone else who happened to have their windows down. I think I got a few weird looks, but I had fun! I made it into ATL around 9:30 EST and stopped by Lauren's office to say hi and pick up her keys, since she didn't get off until midnight. I got to her apartment around 10 and took Puck for a walk. Then Pucky Poo peed on the floor FOUR times. No warning. And after the third time, he winked at me. I am not making this up. I was glad when Lauren finally arrived home, even though she did laugh at me when I told her about the incidents. It really was pretty funny.

Well, we ended up staying up and chatting until about 1:30/2 p.m., then getting up at 6:30 Saturday morning to go work at the soup kitchen downtown. It was so early, but I am so glad we went! We met Lauren's friend Kevin there and set to work making lots and lots of sandwiches. I got really good at putting sandwiches together extremely rapidly! Once the guests (as the staff members called them) started arriving, I served them juice. I really had a great time, and I liked being able to interact with these people. I hope that I was able to bring some happiness to their days; I just tried to treat them as if they were customers at any normal restaurant, showing them a lot of respect and offering to get them anything they needed. I really want to find something like that around here to do on a regular basis. I don't think we have a soup kitchen in Tuscaloosa, but there are lots of other things I could do, I'm sure.

We stayed at the soup kitchen until about 12:30, then Lauren, Kevin, Matt, Brandon (I think?) and I went for lunch at a place called Ria's Bluebird. It was SO good. I had strawberry pancakes, and they were phenomenal.

Saturday afternoon, Lauren and I took a nap before heading over to Melissa's for a girly sleepover. I got to meet some more of Lauren's friends (Jackie, Rebecca, So Young, Angela ... I'm forgetting someone! Sorry :(), and we had a blast cooking eggplant parmesan and cookies. We watched Emma, and Ken, one of the cool kids from NPCC, left AMAZING cookies for us on the doorstep.

Lauren and I got up early Sunday morning and fixed breakfast. I learned how to fry eggs, which was exciting. After breakfast, we went back to Lauren's to get ready for church. We went to KidStuf, which was so incredible. I was pretty much floored by how talented all the people were and how well done the whole thing was. We went to the 12:30 service, and Andy Stanley basically talked his way through the whole Gospel, which was pretty cool. Another of Lauren's friends, Joseph, was baptized at the 12:30 service, so afterwards a whole TON of people went to Ken's for his baptism party. The party involved many things: soy burgers, cookies, water balloons, frisbee. It was fun!

We took another nap on Sunday before heading out to eat Mexican. It was yum! I had a couple of enchiladas and a taco. After that, we headed over to Ken's to play cards with Ken, Phil, Josh J., and Juan Carlos. Apparently Lauren had told them I was really good at Nerts, so I felt that I must prove myself. Then I felt bad because I won by 40 points, and we only played to 100. :) We also watched some Homestar and looked at pictures from Ken's and Lauren's trip to L.A. to see Anberlin.

Lauren and I spent some more time hanging out Monday morning before she had to go to work. We ended up at the Pier 1 clearance store, where we actually said our goodbyes. It was altogether a fantastic weekend!

Some good buys from my weekend in Atlanta:
CD: Flying Into Daybreak by Charlie Hall (Highly recommended!)
CD: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy soundtrack ($.98 at the Pier 1 store! And it has some fun techno/dance music on it!)
Book: Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World by Joanna Weaver
Random: Placemats from Pier 1 for $.98 each!