West Palm Beach

Howdy all! I'm here in West Palm Beach, FL and loving it. The weather is perfect and so is the company. We've just been chillin', swimmin, and watching movies since we got here...its great. Monday was our first full day here when we picked up Rob and finally had our full compliment of craziness.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we did some tanning yesterday and then some napping and then we went go karting!! And played laser tag and video games at a local arcade! It was fun!!!

We've all been sharing the duties as far as cooking which has been a lot of fun. As I type, Greg just put down a huge plate of waffles that smell really good. I made tacos and spanish rice monday night, Ashleigh made amazing baked ziti last night, and a combined effort for steak/shrimp/and veggie skewers are on tap for tonight. And of course...Rob is bartending... :-)

Oh, I seem to have forgotten the transfer cable for my digital camera, so my photos may be limited till after I get back, but we did buy a waterproof camera that has yielded some really great pictures. Blogger is being weird right now, but I'll post some later. As for me, I'm off to shower, I think we're going to the Palm Beach Zoo today!!

Goin South

Hello there faithful readers!

I haven't written in a while due to a lack of travel, but that is all about to change. Tomorrow I jet off to West Palm Beach, FL for my spring break vacation...with my boyfriend and my three best buddies!! There will be lots of stories and pictures I'm sure, so stay tuned for the next week or so for those.

There may also be a trip up to New York City in the works for this summer combined with a lil trip to visit the relatives.

And this is a bit far off, but I'll go ahead and intrigue you with it...I'll be headed off to CHINA next summer!! I was recently selected as a Kirk Scholar, which at my university means that I will spend the next year studying Mandarin Chinese and then the university will pay for me to go to China! I'll be visiting places like Beijing, Shanghai, and Suzhou, all while studying Chinese language and culture. Not too shabby, eh?

Happy Trails!!

:-)

So How Many Student Media Leaders Does it Take to Jump Start a Car?

Eight actually. Seven to push the car and yell and scream at each other a lot, and one to photograph the event for posterity...and for later use in humiliating people at the Student Media Banquet.

So as you may have guessed, my rather blah excursion to St. Louis ended with the crew having to jump start Jenny's Jeep in the long-term parking lot at the Greensboro airport. Or rather, the crew had to push the car out of the space to position it to be jumped, then had to wait for assistance since neither of the cars we were riding in had jumper cables. There was lots of yelling and it was quite obvious that despite our bonding over the last five days, we had really about had enough of each other. Once we've slept in our own beds, cuddled our sweethearts, fed our respective vices and had some time apart, I'm sure we'll all be laughing in Dalton again in no time.


As for me, I'm off to bed after a long and exhausting trip. Thanks St. Louis, its been real.

Ciao!

Last Night in St. Louis

Man, I'm so glad to be headed home. I do love to travel, but St. Louis just ain't that great. World Series night was really the highlight of the trip. Other than that its just sort of boring.

I spent my last day here doing lots of shopping with Ashleigh. We slept late after last nights partying, had some lunch, then headed down to St. Louis' Union Station to do some shopping. Union Station is an old converted train station with tons of shops and restaurants. It was just what the doctor ordered for me, I really needed some shopping therapy. We went in and out of funky little stores and then headed over to the nearby Hard Rock Cafe. I bought a nice hooded sweatshirt there and we also grabbed some dinner. Overall, I had a really great time just doing that stuff today. It was very relaxing.

After that, we decided to call it an early night and headed back to the hotel. We've spent most of the evening here watching TV and packing for the long trek back home tomorrow. I can't wait! I'm looking forward to my own bed and I must say, I do miss my boyfriend... A hug would be great about now.

Check back for a couple more days and I'll post the remainder of my pics when I get home.

Peace n love people...see you soon!

World Series Pics

As promised...pics from our insane world series night. Enjoy!

CARDINALS WON THE WORLD FUCKING SERIES....AND I WAS THERE!!!

Dude...the St. Louis Cardinals totally won the world series...and I was there! My friends and I had dinner and then walked back to Busch stadium at the top of the 9th. We stayed....and a short while later, the St. Louis Cardinals won it. The entire city went apeshit. There were fireworks and swat teams and people dancing and honking car horns and high fiving. It's like nothing I've ever seen!

And then...to totally make it even better...they opened the stadium gates! So the Cardinals won the world series and I was inside the fucking stadium!! How cool is that? We took great pictures and screamed and even bought cardinals shirts. It was totally amazing. What an experience!

You know, earlier today, I was having a really shitty time here. The weather has sucked, there's not much to do...and I really just wanted to go home. I was just really down. But then, call it karma, kismetk, or god, or whatever...decided to intervene and I had one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Wow!

I'll post photos in a seperate entry tomorrow morning, 'cause right now, I'm really sleepy.

Peace out, and go Cardinals!!

I'm Walkin, Yes Indeed

Whew! What a day....I've been doing so much walking today! This morning, I was off to my first convention sessions of the week. I attended two really cool lectures with my friend and fellow broadcast media nerd, Rob.

Our first lecture was on HD radio, which was very cool in that its really the future of radio, I think. Then we attended an amaaaaaazing seminar on audio editing. We learned great new techniques and even watched the instructor enhance audio from a wire tap....just like CSI! Very cool.

After all that, the RU media crew trecked down to a deli and had some very yummy lunch. St. Louis is an interesting place in that we seem to be in a very business-y part of it, and there's not really much in the way of stuff to do, so we kinda have to wander around aimlessly and hope to find something.

My friend Ashleigh and I did just that this evening. We found the St. Louis MetroLink, which is a light rail system here...and took that to a couple different places that were supposed to have things to do. They weren't really that exciting, but it gave us time to chat and we found a great restaurant at which we had some incredible dessert. Mmmmm....chocolate mousse cake...with ice cream....mmm....

Then we walked around near Busch Stadium and just kind of absorbed the electric atmosphere of the world series. And after all that walking, we decided to head back to the hotel to chill and watch movies.



So, here's the photos for today...hope all's well at home! :-)





Oh, and PS...the arm with the signature....that's Ashleigh's and she got is signed by Dr. Drew from Loveline...apparently its the first body part he's ever signed. How cool is that??

First Day in St. Louis

It’s about 9:30pm here in lovely St. Louis, Missouri. It’s been quite a long day, but overall, not too bad. We had to leave Radford at about 3:30 this morning and drive down to Greensboro, NC to catch our 7:40am flight. We flew from Greensboro to Atlanta then on to St. Louis. After a brief scare at baggage claim (it took waaaaaay too long for our luggage to appear) and some issues with our university issued credit card, we were on a shuttle on our way to the hotel. Downtown St. Louis is hoppin’…what with the World Series being played here and all. Our hotel, the swanky Adam’s Mark St. Louis, is literally on top of the St. Louis arch and the stadium where the series is being played. The hotel itself is goooorgeous… and packed.

The atmosphere here is simply electric! Cardinals fans are out in force to support their beloved team and you can just feel the excitement. Even though its ice cold, windy, and raining, we simply had to venture out to get some photos of the stadium. It was incredible! We walked right up to it and as you can see, got a few photos. At the time, the game was on rain delay, but as of about 9 ish, it got canceled. After a few photos of the stadium, Rob, Mike, Ashleigh and myself found a TGI Friday’s and had some yummy dessert. Between us we tried Vanilla Bean cheesecake, Some sort of massively gooey chocolate cake thing, and a brownie with ice cream and caramel sauce….mmmmm…

I’m sure they’ll be some hanging out this evening, then much sleep to catch up on…then we’ll start attending conference sessions at the National College Media Conference – the real reason we’re here.

More to come I’m sure, but for now, enjoy the photos!

Nelly Bly Would Be Proud

So, here it is...the travel blog. My London blog has inspired me to start a blog dedicated entirely to my travels, both in the US and abroad. It will begin with my trip to St.Louis that I'll embark on tomorrow, and I'll update whenever I'm about to head off on a new adventure.

(for those of you not getting the Nelly Bly title...Nelly Bly was a stunt journalist who made a name for herself working for the infamous Joseph Pulitzer and his paper...the New York World. In 1889, she made a trip around the world in 72 days, shattering the record of Jules Vern's fictional character Phineaus Fog, who went 'round the world in 80 days. I thought the reference appropriate...)

Stay tuned! Pictures and stories from St. Louis will be soon to follow. After that, my next projected adventure looks to be Dublin, Ireland for spring break.

:-) See you tomorrow!