So I am a little behind in updating you on my life, my apologies. Here is a brief summary:

Independence Day

My fourth started out with the scrap exchange, which was helping kids decorate their bikes for a fourth of July bike parade. It was nice, though a bit more yuppie of an affair than I would have prefered. Later Dana and I went to the Eno River festival, a big music festival on the river. The music was great, very blissfest-esque, and all the money made went towards buying more land along the river to preserve it from development.

That afternoon, my roommates and I threw a little BBQ for some friends. Look below! me lighting the grill. It went off without a hitch, and yes, we did move the grill away from this wooden corner, quickly. It was so fun and tasty with our kroger clearance-item condoments: jalopeneo ketchup, artichoke relish, dejion mustered...

















We then did sparklers and had strawberry-blueberry shortcake, with neopolitan and mint chocolate chip ice cream. By this time (9:30) I was quite anxious to get to the fireworks-- If I couldn't be in Northport on the fourth, I'd be damned not to at least watch the fireworks in Durham! We heard them start and all piled into one car, chasing down the explosions before they finished. I ended up on a roof garden of sorts, which was a really neat and caught the finale. Overall, a very enjoyable day, although I cant say I thought much about our country's independence. Perhaps more of my own.


Cumberland Gap
a couple weekends ago I went to Kentucky to meet Phil for a hike in Cumberland Gap. We met up in a small coal minning town called Benham, where we stayed the first night in an old school house that was converted into an Inn.




Literally- a school, with a gym and lockers and classrooms/bedrooms. Though everything I have ever learned from all the horror films I have seen told me to turn around and go home-- no cell phone service, creepy little mining town that was accessed by going over a huge mountain, with no signs and stumbling across the town contrarilly to the mapquest directions, creepy old school house with creepy receptionist telling me to park in the back of the building, abandoned mines, getting dark, no sign of Phil-- everything that evening turned out fine. We had a long chat with some of the locals. They were great people, it seemed. For sunset we took a drive up Black Mt, the tallest mountain in KT, and found a fire watch tower mentioned in one of Phil's books. Again, several red flags: not clearly marked; local rough men in big trucks telling us it did not exist; the local math teacher saying that HE would never go up into that mountain, "who knows about those people up in that mountain;" finding it in amongst lots of shady machinary; climbing up it anyway, dispite no tresspassing signs, and the rickity nature of the structure. But it was definetely worth it:


































The next morning we decided to sneak around one of the closed mines, which, though we did not see any tresspassing signs, was clearly not for tourists. Still, it was probably one of the coolest things I have ever done. Here are some pictures, I'll tell you the details some time if you would like.










The Hike was really nice and not as hard as the park people said that it was going to be. Of course the fact that I wasn't really carrying anything might have had something to do with that :-). It was beautiful and perfect. Some highlights: hearing a bear in the darkness and not being eaten by it, the White Rocks cliff overlook, cows mooing in the distance, the Sand Cave, which was a cave with an opening about 200 feet in diameter filled with peach colored sand. Again, there is so much to tell, and I promise to have story time with people if they want when we see each other:


Since this trip, went to Boone, NC with intention to see the bluegrass band Old Crow Medicine Show. Unfortunately, it was sold out, but I still had a great time visiting Julia friend Molly and seeing another part of North Carolina. Tomorrow Julia and I are going to Ashville for a music festival called Bele Cher. Its free, and we know some people there, so it should be a good time. Other than that, trying to work a lot, read (sip) a lot, and enjoy this hot weather and new friends.