5.07.2008

Day Eight: Knoxville, TN to HOME!
Number of Pictures Taken: 8
Quote of the day: "We are not taking pictures of our normal life like this" - all of us (chanting in unison of course. we were discussing the non-continuation of this blog upon our return home :)
Total Number of Miles Traveled: 2700







We. are. home.
We found this sign on our door waiting for us. Though we were all tired, and getting that end-of-a-trip/return-of-real-life feeling, we smiled. There were grandkids waiting:)
First the number of our photos dwindled, now our words.
God answered your prayers for us.
We had not one problem with the van.
We still love each other :)
We are grateful, and we are home.

"So keep 'em comin', these lines on the road. And keep me responsible, be it a light or a heavy load. And keep me guessin', with these blessings in disguise. I'll walk with grace my feet and faith my eyes" - Derek Webb

Signing off -
jenna sais quann
linz cap
and charlie

5.06.2008

Day Seven: Leaving New Orleans to Knoxville, TN
Number of Pictures Taken: 52 (we're getting tired ;)
Quote of the Day: "Is this like 'Georgia, Alabama', or like GEORGIA??" - Mom to Dad when we passed the "Welcome to Georgia" sign...Dad's response: "I...don't...really...know..." (we eventually figured out that the road we were on cut thru the corner of Georgia before we hit Tennessee...we weren't lost :)

This morning we checked out of the Holiday Inn Express, which has served as "home" these last few days, and took a few last notable pictures before leaving New Orleans.

We would like to show you our favorite New Orleans novelty...

Yes, ladies and gents, it is a DRIVE-THRU Daiquiris...and they wonder why they have problems with drunk driving (New Orleans: a city made by drunks for drunks :)


Before leaving the city, we went to explore the D-Day Museum downtown.

They had a special "Hollywood & WWII" exhibit...we enjoyed the red carpet.




We ate lunch at PJ's coffee before hitting the road back home...


(note the poster on the wall...it was quite inspiring)






Jenna saying farewell to the tall buildings that make her so happy...


Closed sidewalks were kind of a theme downtown...they don't all have these nice signs to warn you though :)







The museum was really good. We only had three hours, but we made it through everything. There were lots of pictures. Some made you want to laugh, and some made you want to cry. War is not an easy thing, even when its on the walls of a museum.

So we're on our way back home...8 more hours tomorrow.
We started listening to the audio book "To Kill a Mockingbird"...all of us kids have read it before, but the parents don't remember reading it (perhaps they did in school, several geological ages ago...:) It is good to hear it again. It helps make the hours go by a little faster.

And now, for a few short hours, we are in another Holiday Inn Express.
Tomorrow we will be home in our own beds again. What a wonderful thought :)

We love you all.
Goodnight.
-Linz

5.05.2008

Hey ya'll, this is Charlie. no one else wants to write the blog tonight, so the lot falls to me, as it were...

Day Six: Magazine Street & Sushi
Number of Pictures taken: 70
Quote of the Day: "Now would be a good time to start praying for us, since we have spent 6 days constantly being together, and we're about to start in on 2 days in the car together on the way home." - Jenn, to YOU, RIGHT NOW :)

oh, and leave comments so we know we're still loved by our friends back home :-) (because, of course, we base our self esteem on how many comments and props we get on our blogs. lol.)

ah, the beads from mardi gras hangin' in the trees.


pizza place on magazine street that we ate at. i (charlie) was the only one who ate pizza. weird.


beads and shoes hanging around the telephone wires. maybe they need to make a phone call.

jenn's lunch at the pizza place.
"y'know, i think i'd like a salad!!!"


the cool thrift store we went to; i almost bought another pair of plaid shorts. and no, they don't buy or sell buffalo. of course, i didn't ask them if they would buy my buffalo, that is, if i had a buffalo. but then again, i might have a buffalo and have just never told you about it. none of you, ever. i probably keep it in my room, under the mattress. or on the bookshelf. but, which one of the 3 mattresses is it? or which of the 4 shelves? you may never know. isn't that miserable and depressing?


after much agonizing study, thought and philosophical debate, i have come to the conclusion that this picture is of a car underneath a crooked magazine street sign. thrilling!


aww, jenna with her daddy.
(i was going to write: "i don't know who these guys are. probably weirdos from another planet." but i didn't :-)


this is Jenna, stealing beads from the bushes.


cool colors! i like colors in the city.


i think this says everything about me that needs to be said.


lindsey is still with us!


cool trashcan!


FLAMINGOS!FLAMINGOS!FLAMINGOS!!!


sushi.


jenn with erin, a friend of the O' Connors.


Jenn and Erin and Linz


me and Adam


adam and jenn



Today was fun. we slept late. i ate frosted flakes and fruit loops for breakfast. VERY NUTRITIOUS!!! and then we headed down to magazine street. ate lunch, and shopped. we didn't really buy anything, except food. i think linz bought a shirt for a buffalo. i mean, not for the buffalo, at the buffalo. or was it with a buffalo?

adam met us in the city, and me and linz and jenn headed out to pick up erin who jenna knew from online. and adam knows them. so then we all (adam, erin, jenn, linz, and my illustrious self) went to eat dinner. we ate sushi. i had never had sushi. i never plan on having it again. i ate it though. it really wasn't the raw fish getting to me, it was everything else in the stuff. i gagged twice, but "once you suppress the gag reflex, you open up a whole new world of culinary possibilities." including sushi.

then we came back to the hotel (after getting lost more than once, and driving through da hood (yes kevin, we were keeping it one-thousand gee!!)), and we packed up. tomorrow we will see the D-day museum, and begin our trek home.

so now i sit here in the dark, thinking of all that we have done. we graduated, well, jenna did anyway. we ate craw fish. we met new people, saw new places. (or, as i almost just wrote: we met new places...) somethings that we brought to do, school for instance, we have not done. but others we have. we listened to some books on tape. we have read books we brought. i read the far side, i read On the Run, i finally even wrote a few pages in the brink of delirium. but of all the things we did and saw, it's the people we will miss the most. for me at least.

there is something God put in us, which lets us know that even the importance of the seven wonders, pales to the importance of the people in our lives.

i don't know how better to end this post, which comes on the brink of the voyage home, than with a few lines by a fairly well known guy ;-)

I sit beside the fire and think
Of all that i have seen
Of meadow flowers and butterflies
In summers that have been

Of yellow leaves and gossamer
In autumns that there were
With morning mist and silver sun
And wind upon my hair.

I sit beside the fire and think
Of how the world will be
When winter comes without a spring
That i shall ever see

For still there are so many things
That I have never seen
In every wood, in every spring
There is a different green

I sit beside the fire and think
Of people long ago
And people who will see a world
That I shall never know

But all the while I sit and think
Of times there were before
I listen for returning feet
And voices at the door.

-J.R.R. Tolkien


a very contemplative "cheers"
-Charlie

5.04.2008

Day Five: From church in a Movie Theater to the French Quarter to the O'Connors
Number of Pictures Taken: 193
Quote of the Day: "Well I don't have my glasses on and Jenna kind of looks like a chinese person" - Mom (while reading this blog :)

Today we met our long-lost friends, the O'Connors. I say "long-lost", because we ought to have met a long time ago. Our families are joined by the bonds of the Princess Bride - and you can not track that, not with a thousand blood hounds - you can not break it, not with a thousand swords :)
You see, Jenna and Adam met 2 years ago at a TESOL course in Texas...and...well...then she "met" Adam's sister Kate online...and they were the only people we knew of who lived in New Orleans. Sketchy planning methods not withstanding, it all worked out great ;) They are fabulous tour guides. We had a blast hanging out with them today. And playing games at their house with their family made this place feel a lot closer to home. Much less than 16 hours :)


We spent the afternoon in the French Quarter...this is a big church :)


"There was guitars" (Hard Rock Cafe)


These pictures do NOT by any means do justice to the break dancing show we watched on the street. It was amazing.






you can't really see it, but there is a dude flipping over all those people kneeling on the ground...


These are the iron balconies our mother loves. Every time she saw them she'd tell us. They are ALL over the Quarter...


We went to Cafe Du Monde....

for Cafe and Beignets (aka coffee & little squares of funnel cake :)

and amazing street music...

and amazing street dancing :)

Mom and Dad enjoying the culture...


The French Market & Farmers Market were Hippie Paradise (...paradise for many genres, actually :)






That symbol which jenna loves but cannot say...fleur de lys, i believe :)


these are what they do with the roadkill...sell the heads as souvenirs...


for all our patchouli fans, here's your dream soap...


this is for Kent...it's Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville gift shop...


guess who :)






the three amigos together in real life for the first time...


living statues...there is really no way to describe how cool these are...



the superdome...because jenna REALLY wanted a picture of it...


my free souvenir...from the ground...in front of a cool coffee shop that we wanted to go to, but was closed...


a weird bridge...


back at the O'Connors, we were joined by Daniel (Kate's boyfriend) and various family members for a rousing game of Apples to Apples...




And to end the night, Jenn & Adam had wild and unlikely success in a round of "Wits & Wagers"...


A good time was had by all...
good nite. well done. i'll most likely kill you in the morning...

(a princess bride quote, lest any of you fear that New Orleans is putting murderous thoughts into our tired heads :)