Cuz' I Got Friends In Low Places

For Memorial Weekend, Dallas and I traveled home to surprise his mom, Becky. You can read about that experience here. Unfortunately, Dallas and I had to return to Lynchburg on Sunday night, because he had class on Monday morning, as usual, despite the National Holiday.

My office was closed on Monday for Memorial Day, and even though we weren't able to spend this day with our families, I was excited to have this day to relax after our many hours of driving back and forth from Georgia, and to top it off, this was our 2 year anniversary. I decided to pamper myself on Monday morning and sleep in- 8:30 a.m. - YEAH! A few minutes before I had set my alarm to wake me up, I received a call from Lauren, asking if I wanted to go tubing down the river. I instinctively said no, worry about the heaps of laundry from our trip, our floors that needed vacuuming and the homework I had been putting off.

I hung up the phone and decided to get out of bed and beginning getting ready for the day. As I was sitting on the couch, watching the Today Show, I thought, "Why did I do that? I would love to go tubing!" I called Lauren back, and told her of my change of heart. But, I made sure that we would be home before lunch, so I could use my free Chic-fil-a coupon for a spicy chicken sandwich. A free trial!

Lauren picked me up a few minutes later and we headed to Heidi’s house, where we would be picked up by her friend, who we still don’t know what his name was. He drove up in this:

The four of us climbed into the truck, and Lauren and I made our way to the back, pushing aside MOUNDS of junk. Some of the items I identified were a travel guide of Vietnam, a set of Apples to Apples cards sprinkled throughout the truck, 100s of country and bluegrass CDs, a soccer coaching manual, baseballs, loads of trash, and many MANY more items. We basically laughed the entire ride.

This driver of this truck, who I noticed was not wearing any shoes, let us know that he needed to make a short Wal-Mart run. The three girls decided to wait in the truck, for fear of an avalanche if we tried to climb out. Meanwhile, time was ticking, and I started to worry that my spicy chicken sandwich might not be a possibility. I asked Heidi if she thought we would be back before 2:00 p.m., when my coupon expired. She thought we might not make it, so when our shoeless driver returned, I requested that we stop by Chic-fil-a on our way to the river. While ordering our food, Lauren told me she was beginning to worry about the time too, because she had a lot of homework due by the end of the day, and she had to be home before 3:00 p.m..

I know this story is getting long- but hang in there with me!

Finally, we arrived at a beautiful old, stone farmhouse with an incredible view of the mountains. So beautifully decorated, such an elegant design, and this is where our shoeless driver calls home! His roommates must do ALL of the housework.

As it continued to get later in the day, and we had yet to see any river, I decided to go ahead and eat my spicy chicken sandwich. DELICIOUS! I will definitely be ordering these from now on! Yum yum yum. It makes me hungry now just thinking about it. If you haven't tried one- you should!

So back to the story. As I was finishing my delicious sandwhich, I was brought back to the reality of our situation when a large group of guys came into the house. Not just any guys, but country guys. Really country. But surprisingly, they seemed to have amazing style. So these must be the decorating roommates. With a taste for IKEA. They looked like they were walking straight out of a country boy band. Maybe that's what all the CDs were for.

So once again, we loaded into a truck, this time a much bigger, much nicer truck and headed down the road. Lauren let me borrow a green polka-dotted tube for the day, and I sat in the back seat, blowing up my tube. I jokingly ask, "How long is this drive going to be? I don't want to have to hold this tube the entire ride!"  Our new driver, Clint, told me it would be "'bout an hour." An HOUR?? Just to get to the river! Hahaha. Oh no. Now we were stuck in the back of a truck, with a group of crazy country guys, for who knows how long! Clint said we could be back by 7:00 p.m. Oh geeze.

I looked at Lauren and she had a petrified look on her face. I couldn't help but to laugh and I told the guys that this just wasn't going to work out. Lauren and I needed to find a way to get back to Lynchburg. Sorry- no river for us today! We were already a few miles down the road, but the guys were nice enough to drive us back to their house, where we had left our things. They also let us borrow a vehicle to drive ourselves back to Heidi's to pick up Lauren's car, who would then take me home.

Guess which vehicle it was??

That's right. The little truck we first arrived in. I'm sure you can't tell in this picture, but one of the bumper stickers says, "Beef: It's What's for Dinner." Haha. Lauren and I took the truck, and made our way back home, and we still had time to spare to stop by Joanne Fabrics!

What a crazy day!