Monday: Slept "in" and by that I mean we got up at 8a. Amazing what sleeping in entails when you're used to 6:30a! We sat around and watched some Discovery in HD, then Sarah went back to bed for a while (her stomach was giving her problems) and Josh and I went with Uncle Matt and Grandma Traylor over to the Mennonite store to do some shopping. I picked up a couple of little embroidered doilies for mom's belated present, some snacks for the car (yogurt covered raisins and figs!) and Matt got me some fig preserves to try out. We went to another Mennonite store, Yoder Bros., where the meat processing takes place and I bought more stuff! Matt had never tried Muscadines, so I returned the favor with some Muscadine preserves and picked up some Habanero pickles for Jeremy. Josh picked up some Habanero cheddar for us to enjoy, and enjoy we did! It was soooo nice and creamy, great flavors, and we still have most of it left to munch on for the rest of the week!
We got back and Jeremy started making yeast rolls, Josh and I watched more Discovery HD (seriously, Discovery channel is awesome, it's even better in HD!) and I went out and took some pictures of the dogs, turkeys, and birds. The neighbor Dan (Dan, Dan, the CIA man) came over for dinner and was a real treat. He doesn't talk about his CIA past much, but you can tell he's worked in the area.
After dinner, Earl took us back out to the pasture and saddled up the horses! He took me out on Buddy first, the easier horse, then I swapped out to Earl's horse Dago and Sarah got up on Buddy and we walked them around the yard; for those of you unfamiliar, the yard is reeeeeeally big! I walked us up to the porch so everyone could see Sarah on the horse (it was only her second time up on a horse) and they both spooked big time from some of the birds in the trees! I got Dago under control pretty quick, and Earl hopped off the porch and got Buddy out from under Sarah-- she was scared, but she held it together pretty well!
I rode around with Earl a while longer, then we put the horses back to pasture and went back to the porch to watch the storm come in. Then we got wise and went in to take showers in case the power went out! We watched some more Discovery channel, and fell in to bed.
Today: Woke up after a rough night's sleep (this cough just won't go away! Thankfully, Jeremy's seems to be getting better) and went with the boys in to the Suzuki shop after breakfast. We went ahead and stopped by Enterprise because the scraping noise in the car just got super loud! Poor little Paris, TN Enterprise only had about 8 cars on the lot and they were all going out, but they called the Decatur branch to try and swap it out for us. One of the guys at the Decatur branch (shockingly) said to send us up to get it checked out. So, we got in the car with the suspected brake problem and went up the street. The guy got us in and checked it out perfunctorily and sent us on our way. "Well, I don't hear anything and the brake pads look good so must be ok!" After wasting an hour there I said fine, we'll drive it back to Memphis, but if it makes one more noise I'm swapping it out.
We got back and had lunch, packed up and said our goodbyes and hit the road. The car was still making noise, so I called the airport and asked to come in and swap out. I gave them a little time to get some new cars in and went on up. They got me set really quickly, and even gave me the Hyundai Santa Fe (my dream car) and then... Atlanta wouldn't answer the phone to approve the swap. For over an hour. Today alone, I wasted 3+ hours on the rental car! This is the second one that broke, and if I don't have my Hyndai in the morning there will be even more hell to pay. I missed dinner with the family, Jeremy missed dinner coming to get me, not to mention the hassle.
Now I feel kinda sick again, but I'm trying to stay in a decent mood and stay up to finish the Deadliest Catch tribute to Phil Harris. So sad that he's gone!
Pictures later, and more vacation updates. Hopefully I'll come home with the right car tomorrow!
