South Mtn State Park

Five friends and I went backpacking Sat. morning through Monday morning in South Mtn. State Park, a little over an hour from Charlotte. (l to r: Josh C., me, Ben W., Daniel W., Ben Y., and Ben M. in orange hat) I think it's funny there are so many Christian names among my friends.
We camped at the same park and same spot as last year. The water was just as cold and the chiggers just as bad. This year, though, we had plenty of food and water.

We had a great trip and no one was hurt, though I had a bit of bad luck. While in a pool of frigid water, I lost my wedding ring. I didn't notice it missing until hours later and there was no way to
find it, being dark gray titanium. (Update...I bought a duplicate on-line today from the same distributor for less than the first one. My hand feels naked without it.)

Then a possum stole my bag of trail mix. (I left it out of the food bag we'd hung in a tree.) Finally, I brought a special type of rice milk for cereal that I had in a zip-lock bag that I left in the creek with a rock on it to keep it submerged, along with another guy's 2 gallons of water. While we were hiking Sunday, a 14 yr old kid from a neighboring camp decided to build a dam next to OUR site, taking the rock holding down my milk, then punctured the bag with a stick, and
contaminated the milk. Then he poured out one gallon of water and took the seal off the second. When we mentioned this to his dad, the dad said, "He's sorry, but he didn't take the cap off the second jug." He then went back to reading his book, leaving the kid in the creek. Great parenting skills.

Sunday, we were inundated with day hikers, mostly Hispanic, tramping through the park. Several dozen horseback riders rode trough our camp too. We didn't quite get the wilderness feeling we were looking for that day. Next year we agreed to try a different location, the beach or another park closer to Asheville, NC.

Life Group Sunday

We had lunch at Mike's house Sunday to celebrate his recovery from his 3rd shoulder surgery. Acutally, his mom and grandmother were helping him recuperate and he persuaded them to make us lunch.
Unfortunately, we ate and THEN sat down to talk, which is reverse of how we should've done it. We sent a card to Tana, the girl from our group who is currently traveling the world on a mission trip that is much like the tv show "Amazing Race". She's in S. Africa right now, having just been in Guatemala.
AF wasn't able to attend, as she was sick Sunday with the same stomach illness I had last Saturday. Her situation was much worse as she had to catch a plane Sunday afternoon to NJ for a meeting held Monday. She's looking forward to getting home for sure.

Lingerie shower Saturday

AF threw a lingerie shower Saturday for one of our Life Group friends who is getting married to another friend in a couple weeks. I quickly learned that hosting parties is Mandy's passion. I also learned that estrogen levels quadruple when involving seven women, veils, lingerie, wrapping paper, games, and balloons. I couldn't leave fast enough.

Car-sitting

Take a look at the Infinity G35 I'm "car-sitting" for a friend this week. His grandmother is visiting and either can't get into it or he didn't want to give her a heart attack from the speed, so he borrowed our, as Mandy calls it, "sensible" Accord.
The interior looks like the NASA control center with the built in GPS that extends when turned on. It's amazing the looks and comments it gets! There is one drawback though. You are prohibited by guilt from going certain places. Like the other night while driving home, I passed Aldi and thought, "Oh, I need some eggs and bread...but wait, I can't drive up to a discount grocery store in THIS and dressed in my black slacks/blue dry cleaned shirt. They'll think 'What is HE doing here?' "
The other drawback is that I'm temporarily a Chiefs fan, as literally the license plate is "CHIEFSFN". That's ok; I know my friend is riding around with my Steelers decals.