The alarm goes off at 5:30, entirely too early for it to not be a school day. I'm not still in school, but my wife teaches school and has to be at work at 7:00, so we get up a good bit earlier during that time.
I actually didn't snooze it this morning, because I think I was excited about going and doing some things at my friend's duck camp. It is a cabin on Lake Albemarle and was flooded a few months ago, despite their best defenses against the rising flood water. By putting this cabin on stilts fifty-four feet in the air, you would think they guaranteed flood prevention. Not the case though. After you climb about 40+ stairs and enter the cabin, you can still see the water mark where flood waters stood a good 4 or so feet up the walls. They reused a lot of the same wood that was in the original, just for the historical nature...and memory. Memory of this ordeal they have gone through with a place that they love.
Today, we were helping two of the cabin's proprietors, my friend's dad and his good friend, move a refridgerator and leather couch into the cabin.
We started off the morning, meeting at my friend's house. Three of us loaded up in his 4Runner and headed...to McDonald's. We pull up to the order window, already having talked about how it is one of the worst serviced McDonald's in their fleet, and ask for three medium coffees. Immediately we hear, "Hold on." Unbelievable. After about five minutes of waiting, we continue the order and pull around to pay. Before we got down the road well, we were all adjusting our coffees to be just how we prefer. I prefer mine with only a bit of sugar in it, so I proceeded to pop the lid off of my cup and pour in a smidge. Just then, white hot paid was felt in my crotch area, as tons of this molten hot liquid was poured into my lap. What we all think happened, in retrospect, is that they put the lid on the coffee cup and THEN filled it with coffee, actually exceeding the height of the cup with coffee. I was wondering if this was an omen for the day.
Once at the camp, we managed to unseat the couch (pun intended) from the trailer and carry it and the fridge up the long line of stairs...not at the same time of course. Those were both quickly settled, although some of the guys swapped which way the doors of the fridge opened. (I actually didn't even know you could do that)
After that, we did some odd jobs around there and positioned some pictures and artifacts where they were to be hung. Then, we drove to their other camp and visited the Mississippi River Flats. What a beautiful place! It looked like a giant, white-sand beach. I'm sure it was muddier (in fact, I slipped on some of the slimy stuff a time or two) than the beach, but it sure looked like one. The day was beautiful and you could really see far. We even spotted some of the huge barges coming down the Mighty Miss-sip'.
The trip would not have been complete without some mud riding, and we did not have trouble finding a few mud holes. Overall, it was a very enjoyable day. I'm tired, but some memories were definitely made.
(the photos below kind of tell a story of the day)
