Covington & Opelika

While my beautiful wife gets no sleep and raises our three hoodlums singlehandedly, I am off to the deep south this week doing training sessions in Covington, Georgia and Opelika, Alabama. (I'm sure my family in Birmingham felt my presence as I entered the state this afternoon. I bring my own gravity.)

I flew into Atlanta late Monday night, and it was a typical trip into ATL. We arrived 20 minutes early, only to find a broken plane stuck in our gate. Thus we waited 40 minutes on the tarmac in the sizzling Georgia sun with little air on the plane. Delightful. You really only get the full flavor of sweat when stuck inside an airplane.

My trip to Covington was successful, but uneventful. I did learn that the show The Vampire Diaries films in Covington on their lovely town square. I figure this means that Covington is a destination for my sister, as she's addicted to all things vampires. I deflated the enthusiasm of the individual who passed along this information by asking, "Is that something from the TV?"

After work, I drove from Covington down to Opelika, AL. Along the way, I got news from Erin that a) plumbers did a bunch of work on The Compound today, b) septic cleaners finished fixing our septic tank, c) a) and b) left big bills to pay and d) our adoption finalization is going to take longer than planned.

Obviously d) is the most troublesome item in this list. It's very difficult living with our current uncertainty, so please say a little prayer for our family. We have a lot going on, and Erin especially could use some support right now. I'm of little use when I'm home, but when I'm traveling, I'm even more useless to her.

So in an effort to relax tonight and let my head clear, I set off for the Cock of the Walk restaurant. This great little southern cooking restaurant is situated on a pond in what I'm sure was once a secluded corner of Lee County. Now it's about two blocks from "Tiger Town" -- a ginormous shopping complex decked out in full Auburn tiger gear.

As I sat and sipped my tea and stuffed my face with corn bread, fried catfish, and surprisingly delightful pickled onions, I watched as tables full of people went out to throw leftover cornbread into the pond. It appeared that I was missing some kind of ritual (and let's be honest, I'll be danged if fish are gettin' me cornbread), so on my way out the door, I stopped to look over into the pond, only to discover hundreds of turtles clamoring for the corn bread. Off to the side were several beautiful ducks, slowly choking to death on several pounds of corn bread. I strongly suspect that you could walk across the pond on the shells of choked turtles, but I didn't test this theory.

Tomorrow I do another training session, and then it's back to the Chateau du Leaks to be with my family and get through the tough times at home.

To make matters only slightly worse, tomorrow is our anniversary (the date inscribed on the inside of my wedding ring sears a little bit on the date, just to remind me.) So happy anniversary, honey. I wish I were home with you, and I hope you get a little bit of sleep tonight. G'night...