The Road

We drove down to my sister's house for a holiday get together yesterday.  For those unfamiliar with NC highway routes, there is literally no good way to drive to my sister's house in Sanford from our house in Lenoir.  The route looks like a giant zig-zag across the whole state from the Blue Ridge foothills to the Sandhills towards the coast.  Suffice to say, a 3 1/2 hour snaky wandering through scrub oak, long-leaf pines and rolling bumps of sand make for a long, slow slog of a trip.

I shut down the shop and jumped into the car with my dad and headed down the road towards the Sandhills, my ancestral home.  We passed through areas of snow on the ground, but luckily were not in any active winter weather.  The trip was uneventful, but my creeping dislike of long car rides was in full bloom with about a half hour to go in the trip.

We got a ride in yesterday morning despite the chilly temperatures.  Dubbed flauhute Saturday, 7 of us headed out, bundled up and eager to generate some body heat.  The ride was a welcome break from my overly bundled, weekday hard man commutes as I was able to get away with wearing half the layers.  It was a nice change to do a ride with more substance than my 20 minute commuter blasts, even if I had to turn off early to open the shop up.

Sister Futs Cafe hooked me up with some post ride food (cold fried chicken, baked beans, green beans and coffee) while a healthy dose of Flight of the Conchords on iTunes made for a nice transition into the retail day.  A little bike building, a little chatting with friends and some regular, old bidness made for a nice, relaxed Saturday.

Today is my eleventh anniversary with Golden.  Between the long shadow of the holidays and a make-up school day tomorrow, our anniversary is wedged into a tight, stressful spot this year.  We might hit up some Korean or Vietnamese restaurant outside of Fayetteville before we head back since we don't have access to any Asian restaurants of the caliber that you find in my hometown.  Heck, we may even hit up some pawn shops, scope out used cars and play "name that military weapon" to round out our Sandhills adventure.