(7/4) If it looks like a bench, and it quacks like a bench...

(its a bench)

Hey Y'all! (See, now that we're legit in the south, I've decided that we should start speaking like it) Anyways, the Fourth of July was fun! How fun, you ask?

Well, we all got up and went rafting. And by "we all" I mean everyone but me (Diana). I was sleepy and exhausted, so I slept in the car, while Mayabea, Richard and Jake all headed off to Raft. Mayabea fell out of the boat, but I don't know too many details.

Then we headed off to Georgia. All fun stuff. Lots of windey roads, and stops to buy "Boiled Peanuts" though we didn't stop. We got to the Doziers, and met everyone. Luckily for us, they were already planning a big fourth of july party, so we didn't stick out and were hopefully not much of a burden. Amanda and her friends came over, and we all headed out to the local country club for fireworks.

Now, for people in New Jersey, Fireworks and Sparklers aren't illegal in Georgia!! Which is very very exciting! Oh, another exciting thing about Georgia (at least for me) is the fact that there are KROGERS HERE!! (Childhood memory of mine, of a Grocery store). Now, back to the fireworks. First we got to play with sparklers which was really fun, and then we played tag and took pictures to pass the time. And then the fireworks started. The fireworks were really cool and really up close, and really amazing. I pity all of you that are in Jersey. Jeerrrsseeeeyyy.

Anyways, fireworks were cool, and then we went off to Steak and Shake (thanks Amanda for taking us). It was super cool. I enjoy 24/7 restaurants. Then we went back to the Doziers to sleep. Glorious sleep.. More in the next post.

Day 3: In which the boys continue to be Men, and MayaBea relinquishes the wheel

First of all, I'll apologize for the lack of updates. Our campsite in North Carolina had no wi-fi (no big surprise there, though, that place was pretty legit camping) and we've had trouble connecting at the Dozier's house here in Atlanta.

Not very much of interest happened on Day 3- it was just the trek from Richmond, VA to Franklin, NC. After stressful drives both previous days, I relinquished control and gave Jake the wheel. Diana sat shotgun, and I finally got to sleep.

We stopped for lunch at a diner and, though it wasn't quite an NJ diner, it was pretty classic. We decided that Jake's Mr. Pibb was Dr. Pepper's less pretentious, title-less friend, and so we like him better. We made friends with our waiter, saw some girls with interesting curlers in their hair (at least, I think that's what they were!), and taught Ricky the phrase "whinging adolescent," before piling back into the car for another four hours of road time.

Prior to arriving at Rose Creek Campground, we had our first major debate of the road trip. I pose the question to you: In a world where "everything was exactly as it seemed," could there be "a man with something to prove, slightly bored and severely confused," as the lyrics to Sleeping In (by Postal Service) suggest? This debate lasted us all an hour and a half, and led to both Jake (the driver) and Diana (the navigator) missing our exit by 4 miles. Claudia helped us get back on track, though, and we arrived at the campsite with no problems.

For dinner, we had a vaguely mexican themed hodge-podge of foods. We sautee peppers and onions, made black beans and rice, and ate the whole thing all in tortillas with salsa. After that we headed to bed. As I said... not so interesting a day. Pretty fun, though!

Car Games

We declared the license plate game null today, because it was stressing me while I was driving and Claudia was contradicting our printed directions. The results of yellow car and slug buggy are in the shotgun binder, but Ricky's already asleep (or nearly so) and so he will post those results tomorrow.

Pictures from DC

This blog post will mostly be just pictures from DC. I figured you all would like to see them.


Ethiopian Place

White House

Vietnam War Memorial

Diana Loves Michigan

Washington Monument

We'll need a bigger tree!

As I sit now in our tent listening to the chirp of whatever bugs we've locked out with our super-duper zippers, it's hard to believe we woke up this morning to the view of mostly-naked British Marines and the capitol city in the sun.

With much deliberation over food (Ricky wanted to buy us all breakfast because he didn't want to eat the "free breakfast!" that the hostel offered), we finally departed, hungry still, from the hostel and headed to the parking lot at Union Station. We circled the gorgeous marble building several times to no avail, but finally found a parking garage beneath some official building referred to only as "Building Three." With Odysseus safely stowed away for the time being, we headed towards the national mall.

We did not get past Union Station's food court before getting sidetracked by the delicious smells of our lunch-to-be. Our stomachs thus satisfied, we moved on to the Library of Congress.

At the Library of Congress, or LOC as they refer to it on most official looking documents, we wandered about the various reading rooms and took in all the literary goodness. One exhibit was a recreation of Thomas Jefferson's library, complete with his methods of sorting the books and computers displaying scanned pages from the untouchable collection.

Next stop made me very super over the top happy: the Folger's Shakespeare Library! There was an exhibit about the ocean and its portrayal throughout English Literature. More importantly, the entire building felt like a shrine to Shakespeare. My highlight of the day was the ring Diana bought me, which says "All the world's a stage" around it. Thanks so much Diana!!

After we left Shakespeare, we made our way past the Capitol and Supreme Court buildings, plus lots of other official stuff, and made for the Botanical Gardens. There Diana really thrived (pun intended?). We split off from the boys for much of the time as Diana took literally hundreds of photographs (circa 500). If you're lucky, she'll share a few in her blog post (speaking of which, Diana and I have just conferred and decided that she will add to my story-post and in her post just share photographs, so assume both of them are vaguely joint efforts). After Jake, Ricky, and I spent a quarter of an hour being "couch potatoes" in the spud exhibit in the conservatory, we opted not to go to the Air and Space Museum and just get on the road early.

It's a good thing we decided to leave early, because after the pit stop for a camping stove and extra fuel, we hit major traffic. We didn't arrive at the campsite near Richmond until half past eight, and set up camp in the very last few minutes of daylight.

Upon reaching the campsite, the boys decided it was time for them to become men: they ran off to some secluded area to pee on trees, then returned to play with fire. Meanwhile, I orchestrated setting up the tent and Diana cooked dinner (ok, so she poured two cans of tomato soup into a pot and heated it up... don't underestimate the talent it takes to set up a camping stove in the dark, though!). After we ate (the girls used spoons, but the MEN had to drink their soup in a manly manner straight from the bowl while Ricky grunted happily at us), Diana and I ventured off to find more lady-like places to do our business and also somewhere to wash our dishes. The boys opened a flashlight battery case, to prove they weren't wusses. They weren't.

Now my post has gotten very long, it is late, and we have only limited battery power. Surprisingly enough, there is free wifi at this site. No electricity or water near our tent, but plenty of free wifi. Oh the great outdoors...

So anyhow, I suppose that's all folks. Glad you stuck with me this far. Enjoy Diana's pictures. See ya.

~MB

camera in car....

Everyone has said most of all my thought about the Ethiopian place, but left out the beauty of the place. Yeah, I know it's all about the food, but everyone has already covered that. It was a spacious place, I couldn't ever imagine it all the way full. The tables were as tall as the seats of the chars and were like a giant wok-shaped bowl with a tablecloth on top. Beautiful colors, intricate designs, "meh" food. Again, pictures coming some other day. Next time we don't order another dish, we just snack. I'm pleased to say that we really are eating up those granola bars and car snacks, just as I said.

I was the only fevernaut that hadn't actually been to our nation's capital previously. I can't say I was that impressed. I did like the WW2 memorial, but the rest just sort of looked like the pictures. I'm not a history buff, but I do feel that I have achieved something by actually coming here and seeing a lot of it all. My feet hurt very much by the end of the night, but then again, I'm in new converse.

Uber-thankfully, we got a cab back home and gave up on Ben and Jerry's. I am the ice cream snob of the group, and I have probably eaten or been around icecream much much more than any of the other fevernauts, so I didn't really care. Thank you MB for the cab home.

Sadly, I left both the SD camera card, and my iPod safely nestled inside Odysseus. But that may be a good thing-- they're not something I have to pay close attention to in the morning. I got some really nice pictures though, and when I can, they shall be posted.
I'm beginning to think that the best idea with the pictures is to upload them to facebook, seeing as it would be mighty obnoxious to put them directly here.

Another update is the additional occupants of the hostel room. 4 are the fevernauts. 3 are young british marines that are out of base for a 5 day holliday. 1 is still unknown (he's actually in the room right now. x.x) Seems like a chill dude. Quiet and reserved.

Pictures coming tomorrow. Quite happily, I am going to try to go to sleep now. Last blog of the night, Yo.

(Aww.. fuzzles.. I think I wrote too much..)
~diana

Sore Feet

There were big plans for this blog post. Diana and I have been scheming all evening to deliver to all of our readers (assuming you're out there) an amazing photo-and-story combo that would truly knock your socks off (assuming you're wearing socks). Sadly, in the late hours of the evening (10pm) the camera memory card has been left behind in the safety of Odysseus' locked interior. Thus I bring you a very abridged story*, with photographs tomorrow.

After leaving the hostel, we walked across the street to the Ethiopian restaurant. As it was around 4:30, we decided this probably counted as dinner and not lunch, and therefore ate accordingly. We got a big meal to share, with lots of different dipping things which we scooped up with interestingly spongy bread. We all got greasy fingers, and when we'd finished, both Ricky and Diana were still hungry. Ricky decided to order some raw beef dish that apparently sounded very good. When the waitress brought it to the table, she had no place to put it, as the dinner dish took up the entire tabletop. Unsure how to proceed, she took the bowl and a spoon, and glopped the entire thing on top of the dish that still had some sponge bread left. It was significantly less appetizing after that.

When we left dinner, the real odyssey began: getting to the National Mall and Monuments area. We've decided to see the monuments today and hit up a bunch of museums tomorrow. We visited Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam War Memorial (and the Vietnam War Women's Memorial), the World War II Memorial, and the Korean War Memorial, plus a memorial that I believe was for the residents of Washington DC who were killed in the first World War. We took lots of pictures, which you will hopefully see tomorrow.

We made a valiant effort to find a Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream on the way back to the hostel, but eventually had to concede to our sore feet and take a taxi back home. Here we are bloggin' and chillin', and getting ready for tomorrow, which promises to be another full day!

*it's very abridged if you know me and know how I tell stories

dc and final scores

hi

first thing we did after my last post was eat ethiopian food, and i can't recommend it. i think they gave us really crappy food because we were white, and clearly had no idea what we were doing. i will admit, that it tasted amazing, but the only utensil we were given was the horrible spongy batter cake, that tasted and textured so poorly.

so, after a brief attempt to find a wachovia (win) and a dramatically longer attempt to navigate the dc metrobus system (fail), we hit the monuments. in order:

wwii
vietnam
lincoln
korea
washington

there are hella pictures but i'll let diana explain why they won't be uploaded here, today.

we searched in vain for a ben and jerry's but to no avail.

the single additional occupant that i mentioned earlier has now become four additional occupants, none of which have made contact

two of them have union jack blankets. (and have made contact as i type (they seem cool)).

here are the final scores for high way shenanigans.

license plate game:
diana (18)- pennsylvania, new york, rhode island, florida, ohio, alabama, massachusetts, iowa, deleware, ontario, vermont, california, wyoming, illinois, south carolina, wisconsin, washington dc, diplomat

jake (11)- connecticut, maryland, virginia, montana, maine, idaho, west virginia, quebec, texas, oklahoma, kansas, government, -1 for false guess

mb (2)- oregon, north carolina, georgia, -1 for false guess

ricky (0)-

yellow car game:

jake 16
diana 12
ricky 2
mb 0

slug bug:

mb- 6
jake- 4
diana- 2
ricky- 0

ricky is upset that we're imposing a no night life policy. oh well. probably new orleans will be his time to shine. but we just got started, and those of us who didn't sleep in the car are exhausted, so we need him to behave.

jake

Hallelujah, it's Raining Danes

Hey y'all

We've left NJ and arrived at our glorious capital. The rive through Baltimore was nice, there were a lot of cool buildings and the harbor was pretty....oh and a midget with one finger. We would of gotten out and explored but apparently we would of been instajacked. After getting to DC we found the hostel which is apparently populated solely by supernaturally attractive Danes who showed us our rooms but nothing else. More to follow tonight, with love and regards

Ricky