-{Burnt Ink}-

Okay, wow, that road trip was difficult. Very, very, very difficult. The trip to Missouri was fine–no problem, traveling with a dad and a sister is easy. When you add an aunt and an uncle, it gets a bit rough. After a bit of political “debate” (it was BICKERING!) we turned on the Satellite radio and…

More BICKERING! “That’s so wrong, that’s anti this this and this, that’s inappropriate, why…” Blah, blah, blah. I put my iPod on some metal that they SURELY would love and zoned out. Okay, you have no idea how annoying it is to have to blast your ears off to get away from verbal hell. Anyway, we drove the nine hours to Tennessee (about halfway along, I got very carsick and we had to stop–luckily, it passed) and picked up my other aunt.

Well, lucky me, my iPod died as we picked her up. So I had to charge that for an hour plus I promised Lish a long time with the iPod. So it was now my turn to be tormented.

Somehow, I was able to convince everyone to switch to something we could ALL enjoy (my salesperson-like skills did me well!)–80s on 80! So the bickering ceased and I relaxed. I dozed off and when I woke up, we were near the destination–the Appalachian Mountains. We started up the windy road and about an hour later, we were at our beautiful 3 Bedroom, 3 Level, 3 Full Bathroom, 3 Deck cabin. How wonderful is THAT?

We went class 4 white water rafting, which was awesome, went for a brief hike, blah, blah…you get it, I had fun. Here are some photos:

As most of you know, California is a very, very dry place. And it doesn’t get much rain (and a thunderstorm happens, like, every third year). After having a top Ramen dinner (we add ingredients, like real chicken, cucumbers, etc), I kept hearing a faint boom, but I ignored it until it started pouring rain outside. The windows were open, because it was a pleasant night outside. So I got up to close the windows, but jumped back after seeing lightning light up the sky.

I am terrified of lightning near windows.

A couple years ago, I didn’t think lightning would hit our window or anywhere close to it. But one day, I was eating some cereal on a stormy day with Lish (my sister) and my mother. In Indiana, there are storms all the time. No big deal. We had metal chairs with cushions on them back then, but I was little, so I didn’t know that that was a very bad idea.
Another lightning bolt struck near the ground a couple miles away. I took another bite and shifted my legs. I had (and still have) a habit of sitting on my feet, even in restaurants. So, anyway, I sat on my feet and continued to eat breakfast.
After a loud boom from thunder, I looked out, then down the hallway. Mattie (I still had her back then) was whining faintly (she hates loud noises and wind). Lish and my mother shrieked at the same time, and I looked back at them to see what was wrong. I asked what happened, because nothing looked wrong.
They told me that lightning went through the window and struck my chair.
We rounded up our pets and all huddled in the inner most room (the tiny bathroom) and waited out the storm. Nowadays, they both say they saw the blue dance around on the metal chair. I am so lucky I was sitting on my knees and leaning forward.

And now I can look at lightning and say, “Cool!” because I don’t own a metal chair. But never will I shut a window in a thunderstorm. Ever.
So, back to the present, I had to have Lish close it for me. We unplugged the modem (I doubt it would have been fried, but better safe then sorry!) and the computers, and we sat down and had dessert and turned the fireplace on.

Also, I will be adding some blends, etc, in the following weeks. Tomorrow is my mother’s birthday, and then Sunday is when I fly out into Indiana (I can feel the humidity already) and so I’ll be busy, but I might be able to blog every now and then.

P.S: I like the layout now. Oy, I can’t code, so premade layouts are awesome!

Lish has ever so kindly helped me with her awesome, clever nature of “uploading!” (omg, that’s a BIG thing to do, eh?).

So Burntink is back in business.

And, AGAIN, I am back to a default theme!

I’ll edit it if I can, but dear lord, I’m going to throw the computer out the window if I EVER download a WP theme that doesn’t work again. “Elegant Grunge” looked promising–didn’t work.

Anyways, I’ll be making some articles, blends, etc in the next few days, but my mother’s birthday is June 6 and I need to go shopping.

I’m working on the commenting problem, but how do you all like my layout? I adjusted some stuff and now the layout is yellow.

Again, working on it! I’ll be busy almost ALL of today, but I might be able to tweak this later. Like at midnight.