Applefest 2010

Applefest is my favorite time of the year. It is something I look forward to. I'm not sure why. Daniel loves the fried apple pies and the huge"beer-steins" of soda that we get for $1. He also loves the barbecue in Ellijay. His love of the season centers around the food while I love the trees changing color, the first nip in the air, and the quaintness in the town (but I do love the fried apple pie).This year we had our timing was a little confused and we went up a week early with some of our friends. I was glad to beat the crowds to Ellijay, but this year we actually went to Blue Ridge to an orchard. It was still busy, so I was glad to be there before the real rush began. We ended up buying peach sparkling cider. I can't wait to try it. I bought and shared a peck of apple with my friend and made apple pie with it.

Thai dinner

I went over to my Yoga teacher house to make the Thai food that I learn to make in Thailand. We had so much fun. It took five hours, a lot of substituting, and some arguing on Daniel and I part. It ended up being some of the funnest times I have ever had. It also makes me wish I had a larger kitchen with more kitchen gadgets.

We made shrimp salad, Satay chicken, Cashew chicken stir fry, and Sticky rice with mango. A lot of my pictures are of tofu since that is what we did most of our substituting (Yes Jody I will have to come to your house and have a Thai dinner made by us and you can eat it too!) It really worked well which greatly surprised me.

Annual visit

For our new tradition we went to Dragoncon for Labor day. Our favorite part is the parade however it was a lot smaller than last year (pictures to come).

We were able to meet many authors and our favorite was the Canadian author Robert J Sawyer who wrote the novel based on the TV show Flash Forward. We meet another authors Jim Butcher, Laural K Hamilton, and some other best selling authors.

I was excited to see one of the actors from the Vampire Diaries (my total guilty pleasure), learn a little about how they film in Georgia. Daniel thought it was great because we got to see an armory with live weapons which drew every nerd possible from every crevice, but it was really interesting because he showed interesting evolutions of blades as well as some good research tools on different weapons.

What I will do for every vacation from now on.

Our next day of adventure brought us bright and early to the Bai Pai cooking school to learn how to cook some classic Thai dishes. It was so fun because it was such an international mix of people to hang out with for the morning. We met our first American, Mark, he had quit his job and was touring Southeast Asia and India. Then there was Gunther and his wife from German; this was their fifth time to Bai Pai and they loved Thai food. We first headed off to the market to see what kind of ingredients we would need. I learned to pick out the right rice, what all of their crazy fruit tasted and looked like. What kind of staple ingredients they used and all of the different curries they had. The even had chocolate curry! We then went to the school and learned how to make Satay chicken, a shrimp salad, cashew nut stir fry, and a sticky rice mango dessert. It was great because we learned how to do it, then made it, and ate it! We all got along marvelously and enjoyed learning something new.
After learning about markets and our new found knowledge of the city from our bike tour, we decided to brave one more market, the Chatuchak market. This market is suppose to be the largest in the world which is why I wanted to see it. We could only make it through about a eighth of it before we had to leave. I would say that it was all of the London weekend markets cramped into one. It was located in the middle of park and part of it was permanently a part of the park. I found some really neat comical T shirts.
After the market we took the night train to Phuket. Daniel was so excited because it was his first train ride. We got a first class sleeper which compared to Caldonian sleepers it was like a cheap dirty hooker hotel. We saw a few roaches which we killed and had no problem with because they were much smaller than Georgia roaches. We slept until Surat Thani at 7:30 (it was shouted many times to us) and then took a bus to Phuket. After the pretty miserable 4 hour bus ride, we had to take another pricey cab to Surin Beach. The best way to describe Phuket is that it is a larger Key West (Gay mecca and everything I'm told). Surin beach had the most incredible waves. It was goregous. I was easily able to body surf. We were able to eat right on the beach. It was so beautiful and awesome looking.The next day by far was our best in Phuket because we went to the Ko Phi Phi islands. We got up early and took a speed boat over to the islands. There was some major wave action. Most of the boat got sick and my back hurt from being slammed down on the sea. We went to Phi Phi leigh first and it is a small uninhabited island. We didn't get to go on the beach because tide was so high, but they took us to a cove and we swam. Daniel like this the very best. Then we went over to Phi Phi Don and saw monkey beach. This beach had the fattest meanest monkeys. No one knows how they got there, but they are fed by all of the tourist boats that come to visit them. I went snokeling after, my first time, Daniel kept getting water in his nose. We had lunch on Phi Phi Don then headed out to this tourist trap beach island. This is where we proceed to burn the snot out of ourselves (skin cancer will for sure result from this burn). Daniel made friends with our tour guide Peter. By the end of the tour he kept touching Daniel and talking to him and how cool he was. Daniel found out that men touch each other if they like each other, and here was Peter giving him a massage on our dumpy island (I think the only good thing about that island). After our adventure in Phi Phi the next day we spend the morning on the beach hoping to have breakfast on it, but we had to be at the bus station before any restaurants opened (10 am). We speed up to Surat Thani. My burn made me take off my pocket book, which had our passports. We got off the bus and five minutes later I realized I left it on the bus. I sort of freaked out and I got the idea to get into the taxi and "Follow that Bus!" (the taxi drivers attacked us as soon as we disembarked, so they knew which bus) Our driver drove like mad to catch up to the bus since it was the beginning of rush hour, our second driver spoke English and help to translate. We were so happy to see that bus that I got on grabbed my purse and drove our taxi back to the train station.
Once we were waiting for the train back to Bangkok, we found a family that was in our same car. They were from the Netherlands, and there daughter to quite a liking to Daniel and I. We had her in our room, I think she would have slept in there too, playing squish the spider. She was so much fun.

Thailand when it gets exciting

The next day we hoped that Daniel's sister, Christine would meet us, but she got stuck in Narita, Japan. After I pouted for a half day, we walked around Bangkok waiting for our night bike tour of Bangkok. We have never been to so many malls that are exactly like the malls in America, nor have we been attacked by so many scam artist. Bangkok is a complete capitalist town. Everything is for sale, and it is negotiable to boot. We had some lady, from the "tourist police" try to tell us that we needed to go see the temples in downtown because the mall was closed and so was the market. She would get a good rate for a Tuk Tuk for us (which wasn't really a great rate at all). Daniel kept telling her we just wanted to walk around. She could not understand the concept at all; finally we just had to walk off. Finally, we took a cab down to the temple area. It cost us two hundred fifty Baht because of traffic and our cab driver got lost twice. I was mad because a quick twenty min cab ride ended being an hour and half and we were getting close to missing dinner or our bike tour. The cab driver pulled over one more time and I said we were getting out. I didn't care where we were; we could find ourselves on a map and work from there. We took all of the cab driver's change because we only had a thousand baht bill on us. We ended up only paying two hundred of our bill. I was so happy because part of the reason I was so upset was because I knew that we were getting ripped off. We had to walk kind of far to get to our bike tour, but we found it, and had our first street vendor food. It was noodles and it was completely awesome.
Now our bike tour was by far the best part of Bangkok because we finally got to see something. Plus we had some awesome tour guides that explained things to us so we weren't so clueless. We first went through Thailand's oldest University, which it was graduation night which was why all of the traffic was so nasty, we crossed the old river into what is known as old Bangkok. Old Bangkok was were the city started, but then crossed the river for all of the industry and modern buildings. We saw how pumelos were preserved in this family's back yard that had been doing it for centuries on the same street. We then continued onto Wat Arun, Temple of the Dawn. It was the first temple that King Rama I restored in Bangkok. He found the temple at Dawn and used it as the most important spiritual center in Bangkok until the city grew across the river and the royal palace became it the most spiritual place. It was a beautiful temple we got to see the famous guards from the Thai Epic, Ramakien.

The best part was that all the temples were deserted because they are closed to tourist, and payment after 5pm, but are open to the locals. The next place we went to was the largest flower market in the city and was open at night. We had to bike through some tenements to get there. It was pretty cool and a little disturbing to cycle through and see people watching their TV on little chairs and cots. We crossed the bridge and was in the flower market. I have never seen so many flower in one area. The London flower market was nothing compared to this. It was cheap too two dozen baby roses for less than a dollar. It wasn't just roses, but orchids and jasmine and daisies. Any flower under the sky (or practically). Most people came here to get their flowers for their religious ceremonies. We then went to Wat Pho which houses the four Stupas that the first four kings of Thailand's ashes are housed. This temple also houses the Reclining Buddha (largest in the world), it also was where monks practiced yoga before it became a public temple. There are all these statues with different yoga moves you can learn to do. It also has a wall where the massage students would come and learn the massage moves for Thai massage. There were over a hundred and fifty different moves and what they were suppose to help the body. The Thai school became so large that they had to move it outside of the temple, but they will have field trips to look at the wall to understand the history.

My favorite part of this temple was the fertility statue. Daniel and I kept looking at the stupas and thinking they were phallic. But the fertility statue there is no mistake that it is phallic, since it is a penis. It has Buddha's face on it, and women who aren't getting pregnant or are about to start trying would pray over it and then pour water over top of it for symbolic obvious reasons. I took twenty pictures trying to get Buddha's face, but he is rubbed very smooth.
Nok was our tour guide. She was great because she had a great sense of humor and told about interesting things. She was training another guide. Daniel finally got to ask all of his political questions he wanted to because they actually knew English. He asked them if they like Burma and how they really felt about it. He got one of them to say that they liked Burma was fine, but they had a deep seated hatred and weren't really okay with them. They told us that the current king was born in exile in America. Daniel just responded with, "So, your king is American then...hmm I guess then America owns Thailand!" The other tour guide didn't get that he was joking, but Nok busted up laughing.

Thailand

So I have totally slowed down on the blogging, hey one of the reasons could be because I was taking girls to girls camp and then two awesome weeks in Thailand.
Girls camp was nice because it was only three day and the girls got along, so I didn't have to spend my time putting out fires. So onto Thailand...

Our first day of our Thailand adventure we spent a lovely 21 hour plane ride in coach, much to my disappointment because I was dreaming about getting first class for two months. We arrive in Bangkok at midnight totally excited and ready for a real bed. The next morning we went into town to check into our real hotel and get a spa treatment with a real Thai massage. Thai massages are sooo different from standard American massages. They get up on the table and use their body weight to help massage you. They have no problem with butts or chest areas (I love to have my butt massaged, I can't help it I have a big booty and it likes to be relaxed). It was nice because after all that spa treatment you got an hour massage. The really cool part was after they even fed us a little meal of fruit. I think our total time at the spa was about 3 hours for about a hundred buck. It was awesome.The next day we went to Ayutthaya the old capitial of Siam/ Thailand. It was so cool because we got to ride an elephant and see some pretty neat ruined temples. In some of the temples you have to take off you shoes to show respect before you can enter to pray. It was kind of fun to see all of the shoes on the steps. The best was the photo of a Buddha's head with a tree over growing it and the wall it was sitting against even though we weren't suppose to take a picture of it here it is! We had a cab driver take us up there because it is just north of Bangkok. Daniel kept asking him political questions that he couldn't answer because he only knew tourist English. He was laughing at Daniel because he kept saying things like Thailand is hot, and can't we jump the fence to get into the temple. After the temples we went on an elephant. We each got to ride on the elephant's neck, and we got to feed him too. While we were on the elephant we saw some kids that were really excited to see us and were practicing their English by screaming "Hello how are you!" They seemed really happy, but it seemed funny because they lived in slums right next to ruins. It was the craziest scene to turn your head and see hundred of years old building and turn your head the other way and see shacks that could barely stand up.

Lake Wedowee

I am recovering from the weekend at the lake. It was a beautiful lake in Alabama. Our friends invited us, and we were able to take our friend's dog Bridget with us. She loved the out doors. I tried wake boarding. I got up, but paid for it the next three days with sore muscles. Daniel tried wake boarding too, but the boat couldn't pull him fast enough. He did get a nasty sunburn for his efforts too.

I should write a post for the month of May. Even if I have gotten out of the blogging business for a bit. I should first say that I did finally signed up for Facebook. My Yoga ladies convinced me plus my most favorite first officer at work was transferring to Dulles. I must say that is not the reason that I am lacking in my blogging because I don't really get Facebook or understand what is so addictive. I am on to try to get gossip, but I don't think that I get it any faster than when I was Facebookless. I am still sticking it out because my favorite Facebook "friends" are my Yoga ladies and my Dulles buddy.

I went to a wedding for my parent's army's daughter. It was so much fun because we got to dance. I LOVE to dance. I never get to dance anymore because now I am an adult. Social dance is no longer done as an acceptable form a interacting with people. I do wish that I have lived a little bit in the past were people always danced when they did things. My two favorite things together music and dance.

March Madness

I took vacation in March. The first week was spent in Virgina and DC. We had Daniel's brother's family "crash" our vacation. It was great because I learn to surf in one of those indoor surf waves. I stayed in a cabin, called house over the pond, in the mountains where there is no cell phone reception. Went into the underground caves of the Northern Appalachians. We went to DC to the natural museum and learned where our common ancestor came from. Our cousin the ape thought that it was pretty kickin' cool too. The best part was that the Butterfly hot house was free that day, so Daniel, my niece, and I got to go in.

We went to Ben Chili which is famous because of all the celebrities that go there including Barack Obama! The food wasn't as good as everyone claimed it to be, but it could have been better had it been made out of fresh ingredients.

We went to the zoo, but it was like going to a University with sports while other Universities are research. Hogle Zoo had more animals then this zoo, and the elephants were depressed and didn't move for the 15 min. we sat there. Daniel and I were bummed because we wanted to see the white tiger, but they didn't have one. One cool thing is we did get to hear the lion roar which I have never really heard before.
Later on in the month for my birthday I wanted to go to the ballet. I saved my Christmas money and birthday money to get really good tickets. I made a new dress from my "project runway" fabric. I made a hair piece that day, and made Daniel get into his suit. We went to the Melt Pot. I hadn't been in a long time and Daniel had never done fondue. He ended up with our friend's opinion of "that is just too much work for your food."

Now you know why I haven't blogged because it has been an effort to get all of my pictures downloaded and then explain. I have just been on Hulu instead of on blogspot.