I’m still trying to wrap my head around all the things we did on our vacation, and find time to write about them. It’s just so overwhelming.

Friday evening, we arrived in Charlotte and went to dinner with my friends from college, Michael and Laurel. He is now an attorney, and she works for the Opera. We went to a Persian/Turkish restaurant and had a delicious meal. After that, we went back to Laurel’s apartment, had some drinks, and caught up on what’s been going on in each other’s lives. Sarah had never met Laurel before, and they seemed to hit it off pretty well. Among other things, we simply had to try some carbonated wine in pink cans with straws that Laurel had found somewhere. This brilliant product was apparently created by Sofia Coppola.

A toast to the manliest drink of all time.

After being up probably far too late, we went to Michael’s apartment (which is within walking distance) to crash. We got up the next day and got some breakfast. Michael took us by the house he’s having built, and it’s obviously going to be very nice. It was cool to see it as a work in progress.

After we ate some breakfast, we headed toward South Mountains State Park for a hike. Sarah and I were a little underprepared, as we were expecting to do a fairly easy hike. Instead, we ended up hiking the Chestnut Knob trail, which ended up being the second-hardest hike on our entire trip. It’s not a terribly long hike, about two miles each way, but it’s steep most of the way and goes right up the side of the mountain. It didn’t help that it was very hot, in at least the mid-90s.

Also, Michael has always been one to walk fast, and they took off at quite an impressive pace. A little too impressive, as we didn’t feel we could sustain that pace, and prefer taking our time anyway. So, we slowed down and told them they could go ahead if they wanted to. They were cool about it, though, and slowed down to stick with us.

 
Me, on the way up / The trail had a lot of wooden steps

The first overlook on the trail

We reached one overlook and were probably halfway there at this point. Sarah wasn’t sure she could make it, but some encouraging words from me seemed to help a little bit. We got to what seemed to be the end of the trail, where there was supposed to be another overlook, but there wasn’t one. However, there was a hiker icon on a sign, so I figured we ought to continue on that section of trail. It went sharply down a rocky area for a ways, but we followed it to a rocky area you could climb out on for panoramic views. It was fantastic.

Panoramic view from the overlook (worth viewing large)

Sarah and me

Never had I felt cooler than this, standing on a high rock, looking down on some other mountain ranges

Part of the trail on the way back

It was a fantastic hike — more strenuous than we expected, and we should have brought more water and other supplies. However, it was manageable once we slowed down. I was really glad that we got to go hiking with Michael and Laurel, as it was very different from how I had interacted with them back in college. It was also a good introduction to the hiking we’d do on the rest of the trip.

Thanksgiving was pretty interesting this year, being the first year that nobody in my family had to travel. That didn’t mean that it was easy, though.

The day started out great; Dave and I went for a ride at Brown County, meeting there at 9:00 am. It was still below freezing outside at that time, and as we started riding, the trails were pretty frozen. They thawed some during the ride, and as that happened, things started to get muddy. The parking lot connector was pretty muddy, but the North Tower and Aynes loops were in pretty good shape. The connector between the two was really muddy.

The weird thing was that although it was below freezing when we started riding, and probably close to 50 degrees by the time we finished about 2 hours later.  I wore my shorts and long-sleeved jersey, with my Wal-Mart jogging suit on over those things, and my full-fingered gloves. I ended up taking the jacket off at the top of the Aynes loop. I was about as comfortable as you can expect, given that the temperature varied by some 20 degrees over the course of the ride. We ran into a few other riders, all of whom seemed to be in a great mood due to the great weather, and of course, Thanksgiving.

After my ride, I called Sarah to let her know I was on my way home. I asked what she was up to, and she said “We’re trying to get the XBox working,” or something like that. I didn’t expect anyone else to be there, so I asked what she meant. She said that Avery (my nephew) was there — my mom had taken Becky (my sister) to the hospital. At first, I wasn’t surprised, as it’s not unusual for Becky to go to the hospital. I called back a few minutes later to make sure Becky was at least physically OK, and it seemed like she was, although Sarah wasn’t told much.

I’m not going to go into detail about what happened, but let me say this. My sister is doing OK, to whatever extent that’s possible. She’s not sick, and she doesn’t have any very major injuries.

But Becky is not truly OK, physically or mentally, and I’m betting that most people know someone who is like this. Someone for whom things never seem to go right — something is always going wrong in their lives, or their friends’ lives, that touches them either directly or because they care too damn much. Someone who gets sick or injured often and who, it seems, is always trying to overcome something. That’s Becky. It really goes beyond that in her case, but let’s let that be.
Anyway, the end result of all of this is that we still ended up doing our Thanksgiving dinner, just a couple of hours later than planned. I actually thought I didn’t want to do our usual Thanksgiving celebration once all this stuff happened, but I’m glad we did — it was far more normal than I expected it could be, given what had happened, and also the fact that it was our first Thanksgiving with both of my grandparents gone.

Mom’s turkey turned out incredibly juicy and great, and her gravy-making skills are constantly improving, even though she will never be able to compete with Grandma’s gravy. We also had broccoli, corn, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and pumpkin muffins (which Avery helped make). There was also pumpkin pie, but we didn’t eat any immediately after dinner. I really stuffed my face — I was starving, in part because I’m always hungry, in part because dinner was later, and in part because I had ridden 10 miles earlier in the day. And dinner was that much better because of it!
Despite everything, all in all, it was a good day.

Last week, a coworker invited me to go out to lunch with him and one of the accountants. I agreed to go, and he started talking about restauraunt options. I told him I didn’t really care where we went. He suggested a cajun place called DATS, which he explained is actually a house that’s been converted into a restaurant (that’s not unusual for downtown Bloomington).
Interrupting himself, he said, “Oh wait, that’s right … you probably don’t like rice.”

“What?” I asked, confused.

“Most Americans don’t like rice.”

I had never heard that theory before. I don’t eat rice with every meal or anything, but I do have it on a fairly regular basis. I think of it as fairly interchangeable with mashed potatoes, and if I’m eating something with sauce, some sauce will probably go on the rice. And of course, I’ve had it in the context of many different ethnic foods.

My coworker pointed out that most American restaurants don’t serve rice; now that I think about it, I suppose that a lot of them don’t, but I don’t think that’s evidence that Americans don’t like rice.

What I want to know is, is this a common stereotype? Do most Americans really not like rice? Or am I correct in thinking that my coworker has an isolated misconception?