World's Largest Prairie Dog!

Well, I made it out to Denver yesterday around 5pm (mountain time, of course). The drive was totally doable, although by the last five hours or so I seriously wanted to drink a bottle of Bleach. It got rough. Kansas, however, was surprisingly peaceful for me. I kind of liked the state, in a super weird way. First of all, it is totally underdeveloped, which after dwelling in the Fredericksburg area for over two yers, was a welcomed change. Plus, how can you not love cities that have signs on the sides of the road that say things like "Come see the world's largest prairie dog!", "Come see our cow with two udders!", and strategically placed in front of a cattle field, "Beef. It's What's For Dinner." There was even a sign that said, "American Lamb. Try it, you'll like it." Very, very cool. I am a meat loving girl so I felt right at home. (Keep comments to self, smart asses...)

As I approached Denver, right around the 60 miles mark, a huge storm broke lose. It was very strange because storms out here are a little different than back home. I guess jsut because the land out here is so flat and everything is so open, you can totally see the entire wall of the storm cloud, and then when lightening strikes, you can actually see it hit the ground. I didn't really like it, actually, it kind of scared me. So I pulled over. Eventually I survived it and got thorugh, which was wonderful, because by the time I got to Denver it was sunny with just a little bit of a drizzle.

So I got here and met up with the other intern, Shannon, who turns out to be super cool. She's from Hickory, NC so we have the East coast, southern girl flair going on. We went to dinner last night and then met up with one of her sorority sisters and some guys she works with at the Fox and the Hound. Some bar ourside Denver, I don't know, I'd never heard of it but apparently it is a chain.

I think this afternoon we are going to go chill by the pool for a little bit and then I guess I need to get home and shower and get ready for work tomorrow. My first day! I need to get a few things together and figure out where the office is and all that good stuff. I'm pretty psyched, from what I hear it's a very cool place. I'll keep this updated with how that's going. Peace out! :)

And what a fantastic 1000 miles it has been...

August 11, 2006 and I am en route to Denver, Colorado. I drove a phatty 500 miles yesterday, putting me just beyond Louisville, KY where I spent the night, and I drove another 500 today and ended up just outside of Kansas City. (Blue Springs, Missouri, to be specific.) It was a rather long, miserableish drive today. I honestly thought that I would never get here. And to make matters even more exciting...haha... I have another 500 to go tomorrow. The good news is, tomorrow at this time I will be in Aurora, finally meeting the other interns, emptying out my car and getting my life back in some sort of order. I'm pretty psyched.

So for the record, St. Louis may be the most hellish city I have ever driven through in my life. Perhaps it is just because I didn't know where I was going, but it felt even worse to me than northern Virginia does. First of all, I sat in traffic, not moving, for quite some time. St. Louis is not a good city to ever have road construction in, particularly at noon on a Friday in the summer time. It was about 3985738943 degrees, I was sitting on a bridge about 3943 miles above the ground (which, by the way, I hATE) and I was surrounded by every car in the city. Very, very scary. I got a little stressed and had a brief "what the fuck am I doing" moment, and considered turning around and returning to my heartsong, Forest, VA. But I realized by the time I got back there I would be nearly 48 years old (yes, I have driven that far), so I decided against it. Instead, I pulled out the book my mom gave me when I left (full of serenity prayer type stuff) and read that, chomped on some gum to control the impending panic attack I felt coming on, and sang really loudly to Kenny Chesney's The Road and the Radio. Eventually traffic resumed and all was well again. Also, Robin felt my panic vibes and called in the midst of the disaster, which was good. She helped in talking me out of ending the quest early. :)

Strange sidenote... I am watching a Lifetime movie (since I haven't had cable in a year, I have a lot of them to catch up on!) and I don't know it for a fact, but I suspect that it is based on the story of that girl from JMU who got her boyfriend to kill her dad. Straight ghetto. It also stars Melissa Joan Hart- yes, that's right, as in Clarissa from the 1990 Nickelodeon hit Clarissa Explains It All- and she is a phenomenal fake crier. Pretty amazing, folks. Pretty amazing.

What else. Yesterday I made friends with some women from Illinois standing in line for a bathroomj in a gas station in Kentucky. They were very nice. I drove through West Virginia and surprise! Nothing has changed. Illinois and Indiana are both very incredibly flat states. Not a lot to look at, interesting or otherwise. Yesterday when I drove into Kentucky there was this hellish storm brewing and so I called my sister who watched the weather channel and confirmed for me that there was, indeed, a tornado warning in effect. Lovely. I am incredibly hopeful that I can make it through Kansas without a tornado dropping down.

Did you know that if you lose your debit card, it will invariably take SunTrust a minimum of two weeks to send you a new one. TWO WEEKS! Not incredibly helpful, seeing as I needed the card the day I discovered it was missing. Oh, and by the way, I located the card about four days later- it fell out fo the pocket of my shorts and it fell under the seat of my car. Of course...

It is starting to occur to me what I am actually doing, here. I mean, don't get me wrong, I am SO excited about this! It's going to be awesome. First of all, I can't wait to be working for Campuspeak, I think it's going to be pretty awesome. Just all of a sudden, I'm kind of like WOW. OK, now that I've driven it I ralize how freaking far away Denver is from VA. This is great. I totally need a change. Or everything- people, environment, occupation, everything. It just feels very permanent, you know? Like, I very definitely won't be seeing anyone until Christmas time, at best. It's just crazy. I have GOT to find a part time job, STAT. I can't wait to be in a new city but I also can't wait to figure it out some and know where I'm going and stuff. I realize it's going to take some time to get settled but I want tob e on top of it NOW. I know, I'm being totally neurotic.

OK, well I guesss I will close for now. Lots of stuff to do tonight, lots of reading to do. Plus I need to watch the rest of this movie and find out whether they bust JMU girl's boyfriend. OK, OK, so I know that eventually they bust both of them. But this movie is like a surprise, becasue I haven't yet figured out whether it is actually about her or not, so maybe they won't bust them! It might be a totally different couple. So far the only difference I see is...didn't that girl used to wear a trench coat? And Clarissa is NOT wearing a trend coat. Although perhaps Lifetime took some editorial liberties... who knows. Stay tuned! Definitely many exciting updates to follow. :)