the weekend

As I drove home on my last day at the office, the sky was blowing up gorgeous. So I pulled off to take some pics. The rays were pretty. My camera isn't awesome, but it does surprise me sometimes with decent images. Natural lighting is always a plus.

Tractor Pullin'

Ok, I have to tell you about an experience that was almost life-changing. 

On Friday night, my parents took me to the FFA's National Tractor Pull right here in town. All I can say is, wow. Of course I left my camera in the car, but the memories will remain. 

First of all, upon entering the Carolina-clay-encrusted stadium, I became strangely aware of how I was dressed. Almost immediately I felt over-dressed and wished I had opted for jeans, boots and too-small camo John Deere shirt that I don't own.

I had no idea a group of people could be so completely satisfied and entertained by paying $15 to watch modified tractor trailers, pick-ups, farm tractors and mini-dragsters with tractor wheels on them pull a load weighing anywhere from 35k-74k pounds 200-380ish feet! As my friend Dan put it: "Oh, Lordy..."

My favorite part was when a vehicle came out with a flippin jet engine attached to the front end and orange flames were exploding from the pipe on top. Pretty incredible experience. Redneck? Absofreakinlutely. Would I go again? You bet!

Dancing

Last night I met up with some friends from high school to go swing dancing. There was a live band and it was at your typical legion-lodge type joint. The kind where you usually have to be a "member" to enter. The floor was lame because it was new... messed up the bottoms of my shoes. Ew.

I wouldn't call myself a great dancer by any stretch of the imagination. Decent perhaps - - capable, teachable and ready to have fun for sure! I absolutely love dancing.

The guys were all pretty good. One guy in particular. He flung my body in circles, twisted my arms in pretzels. launched me into yo-yos and dipped me so fast -twice- I came out with my head spinning. No joke. It became one of my top 3 dance moments ever. The guy was GOOD.

The way I rate people's skill level may be completely inaccurate. But I tend to see it this way: if they have good dance etiquette, make eye contact, smile, do a new move more than once so I don't feel like a dolt for screwing up, make up a move or two, recover with no hesitation and can keep me moving... they're GOOD. :) I had a stinking blast.

I'm still looking forward to shag dancing in Raleigh again. Apparently it's called Carolina Shag and is fairly easy to learn because if I can do it, pretty sure anyone can.

Sunday's

To end my overly random, poorly edited and not-so-exciting train of thought I'll leave you with a short snapshot of my afternoon... 

The parentals purchased a hammock. I consider this a worthy investment, so I woke up around 10am today (after getting to bed around 3am) and proceeded to lounge in the hammock, in my pjs until about 11:30am.

Then I watched my favorite part of the Brickyard 400: the last 6 laps. Why? Because anything can happen! Jimmie Johnson pulled it out today, with Jeffy-Jeff Gordon at #5. I was a little sad Kyle Busch only made 15th... oh'well.

I act like I really care. But, honestly, unless I'm at a race... I have no idea what's going on in the NASCAR world.

Get me some SEC football and it's on! Only five more weeks! Or you could ask me about the next tractor pull coming to your area...