tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow

We have arrived! Our Virgin Atlantic flight was practically empty – probably 50 passengers on a 360 seat plane. Some people took advantage and stretched out and slept on the center rows, but there were so many good movies to watch, Aaron and I stayed in our seats. He watched Indiana Jones and I watched Sex and the City. I discovered that the pause and rewind feature was quite useful – I’m not saying whether that was because I could go to the bathroom and not miss anything, or because of the full frontal scene in the movie. (Kidding honey!).

We did hit some turbulence when the movies ended, but managed to catch some sleep. The food was not very good, but they were heavy handed pouring the wine, so all in all it was a decent flight. I also learned that Virgin considers knitting needles ‘dangerous’ and does not allow them in cabin baggage – they didn’t notice mine (TSA doesn’t have a problem with them so I carried them on) but I decided not to chance it and didn’t take them out during the flight.

Derek met us at Heathrow, although we missed each other at first and spent a little more time than necessary trying to find each other. He whisked us home – Aaron got his first sighting of sheep grazing on the grass right next to the highway – and Sheila greeted us with a huge lunch of homemade quiche and a cheese platter.

I tried to stay up and watch the rugby game, but I had to go take a nap after the first half. We had a lovely guinea fowl for dinner followed by a peach tart with double cream.

It feels good to be ‘home’!

We’re a little late this year, but we finally went camping. The plan was to meet up with Pat and Kelly at Mathew’s Arm Campground in Shenandoah National Park on Saturday, do some hiking, camp, and head home Sunday. I called the campground Friday and found out they were full, but if we got there early enough we could potentially snag a spot if people decided not to stay a second night.

With that in mind, we left a little earlier than originally planned, and we ended up arriving around 9.30am. I put our name on the list – about 6 or 8 people were already on it – and we took Illy on a short hike while we waited for them to figure out how many open sites they would have.

There was a nice little trail right by the registration office, but it was pretty steep. The leaves were gorgeous and Illy loved it.

I actually managed to get some reception on the trail, so I called Kelly and told her the scoop. We hiked a bit more, and then headed back to the office.

Luckily we were the fourth group called to get a site! They sent three groups out at a time with a list of the open sites, and when we found one we liked and staked a claim, we were supposed to go back and register and pay for it.

We headed straight for the open site in the Reservable section and snagged A 46. It was close enough to the bathroom, large enough for several tents, and backed up to some woods. So it was perfect. The ones across the street were nice and big too, so next year we might try to reserve those.

We set up the tent, unpacked a bit, and chilled out while we waited for Pat and Kelly to arrive.

Illy and I went for a jog/walk around the campground and tired ourselves out on the hills. Pat and Kelly showed up around 1pm, and we decided to go buy some firewood and do a hike somewhere in the park after they set up.

We stopped at the Elkwallow Wayside and bought 3 bags of wood, then parked in the picnic area right next door and went on a hike on the Jeremy’s Run trail (or something like that).

Illy was in heaven and even splashed around in a little creek.

I don’t know about everyone else, but I was exhausted by the time we got back to the car. Kelly spied a nicely sized stump for our fire, which ended up being key.

Time to relax!

Did I mention how cold it was?  It was freaking freezing. Literally.

We grilled up some hot dogs, s’mores, and burgers and tried to stay warm by the fire.

We basically spent all night huddled around the fire, talking and laughing and eating.

We finally went to bed when we were running out of firewood.

I think it must have dropped to somewhere in the upper 20’s during the night. I think I would have been warmer if I had noticed that the bottom of the sleeping bag we borrowed from P&K was unzipped. Since I didn’t, my feet were freezing all night and we didn’t really sleep well. I was worried about Illy since she kept moving and knocking her blanket off her. We definitely need better cold gear if we’re going to camp this late in the season ever again.

As much as Illy hated the tent in the beginning, by the time we woke up she was super happy and feisty and even climbed on the air mattress to snuggle with us.

There was lots of frost on the cars when we woke up.

I put some water out for Illy when we woke up, around 7am, and about half an hour later it had formed a sheet of ice. Yeah, we were cold.

We made a nice feast of hot dogs, bacon, eggs, and coffee. Then we packed up and headed home. We had so much fun, despite the cold, and I wish we had gone more earlier in the year. Oh well, there’s always next year!

We had an uneventful trip home, although we were both pretty sore from hiking.

Illy was tired, too.

Finally, here is the ditch on 211 that Aaron woke up in after he wrecked his motorcycle in 2004.

Whenever I dream, which is almost every night, the dream varies from being mildly unpleasant to being an out and out nightmare. Thankfully the extremely frightening ones – where I have to wake Aaron up to calm me down – only happen once every few months.

Last night’s dream was almost that bad, but I was in a state of almost-wakefulness where I knew I was dreaming. You’d think that would make it better, but it ended up being more frustrating because I kept trying to go back and relive certain parts to change the endings. Apparently my sleeping self had the greater willpower because things kept happening the same way over and over again. Not fun.

So the bit of the dream I can’t forget:

Aaron and I were in an obviously bad part of town, heading toward a door in a dark alley (straight out of a CSI episode, now that I think about it). Apparently it was the entrance to a club.

As we got to the door, a man stepped out of the shadows holding a gun. I was pressed up against Aaron’s back and the guy grabbed my arm and shoved the gun between us. I remember trying to grab the barrel with my other hand, so if he fired I could point it away from us. I was trying to figure out how to hold it so my fingers wouldn’t get blown off.

The first time I had the dream, the guy asked for our wallets and the next thing I knew, he had shot Aaron and taken off. Then Aaron was on the ground, and I was pressing down on his wound, trying to stop the blood flow.

I remember thinking, Doctors could save him if only they could get to us! But I couldn’t leave him because he would bleed out, and if I stayed he would just die more slowly because there was no one around to call the paramedics for us.

I can still feel his warm blood washing over my hand.

Then my waking self apparently won out because I made myself relive it, choose your own adventure style (I always hated those fucking books).

So this time were giving the guy our money and as Aaron hands over his wallet I suddenly *know* that since Aaron’s license is in his wallet (with our address on it), the dude is going to come to our house and kill us at home. As we hand over our wallets the guy smiles at me and this terrible sense of dread falls over me, because I know there is no escape from him coming to get us.

The alarm went off before I could re-enact it a third time with a happier ending.  So I’ve had a dream hangover all day.

When I told Aaron about it on the way to work this morning, he tried to reassure me by saying, “But that would never happen. We don’t go to clubs!”

Let’s hope tonight isn’t a repeat performance.

Before:

After: