I’m back from vacation, and I have to say that I feel more rested than I have felt in a long time.  Coworkers from the office have said to me already that I look refreshed, tan, and happy.  Oh? I say to them, and wonder if the worry has really manifested itself that much on my face. Apparently, it has, and so this weekend is exactly what I needed.

We flew out Friday morning, then spent the rest of the day sitting on the beach at Sandyport Beaches Resort, the resort where we stayed. For a last minute booking, I feel like we did pretty well for ourselves.  The resort sat right on a small bay just off of Cable Beach that was opposite a lagoon-like pool.  This is where we spent the majority of our time, sitting out in the sand or alternately in the cool, clear waters underneath the bright sky.

Saturday was the only day we’d set aside for any real activities, and we spent it learning (for me, re-learning) to dive so that we could go out with a group in the afternoon to one of the dive sites nearby. Just as I knew would happen if I went ahead and made plans, my cousin agreed to come along with me. Originally claiming he didn’t want anything to do with diving (as it was a “stupid” and “pointless” activity that cost entirely too much money), he watched me late Friday make up my mind and call the diving place to ask for a pickup on Saturday.  I told them it had been three years since I’d been diving and that I was more than willing to take the refresher course and go down with an instructor. When I marched back to the room and informed my cousin that I would be out all day, he seemed to pout for a little while. By the time we decided to go to sleep that night, he grumbled that he would try it since otherwise he’d be bored if I left the entire day.

And so, on Saturday we piled into the van that came for us around 7:30 and headed off to the dive shop. After some initial paperwork and wandering around on the docks behind the shop–where hundreds of boats were anchored, many of them that cost at least ten times more than my entire annual pay–we got back into the bus and drove over to Paradise Island to do our pool training.

Sure enough, even as we were finishing the first tank of the morning, just paddling around in the pool, my cousin mentioned that he’d definitely look into an open water license someday. I knew it, I told myself, but was glad that he’d decided to come anyway.
The boat took us out around the north side of the island. I’m not entirely sure where we dived at the moment, as the afternoon seemed to go by in a blur. Our party (of two, three including the dive master) was joined by two pairs of snorkelers, a trio of Brits who were diving together, and then three other divers who wanted to experience the reefs as well. The other experienced divers were supposed to have gone out in the morning, but the first boat, the Dreadnaught, had blown its two engines and had to be towed back just before they’d reached the site.

Thirty minutes into the ride, we dropped anchor within sight of the island that was used for the opening credits of Gilligan’s Island. After we’d snapped the requisite pictures, we threw on our gear and sat at the edge of the boat, waiting for assistance in standing. I was first to plunge in out of our group.

As I’ve always found with diving, it is the anticipation of breathing underwater, such an unnatural feat even with aid, that is the worst part of the whole thing.  The only other aggravating thing about this particular trip was that they didn’t want me fooling with the BC, which was a bit ridiculous to me. Since I’d signed up under the refresher, they had told me not to mess with it (although I did, because I did remember from my certification, the importance of finding a correct balance in weight). Since I had a little over 12 pounds of extra weight (too much for me in salt water), I had a bit of trouble in the beginning getting situated.

After the cantankerous dive master adjusted everything for me, I felt fine, and was able to enjoy the beautiful reef.  All I can really say about it was that it was nearly identical to the large tanks at the Atlanta aquarium (the Caribbean exhibit), only you were there, in it. The coral was spread out at uneven intervals, built high up in some places and scattered in small islands of rock in others. But everywhere it was teeming with life: fish, coral, lobster.  We swam through giant schools of tropical fish, saw lionfish, angelfish, yellow stingray, and various crustaceans.  We took turns holding a sea cucumber that was surprisingly tender.  Once, while drifting slowly over a clump of coral, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. Perplexed, I swam closer and saw the familiar scales and curving tail of a puffer fish.

After about forty minutes, we came back up to the boat and waited for the other divers to finish.  Everyone was excited, giddy at everything we’d just seen.  The afternoon sun was pleasantly warm as we sailed back to the docks, and we arrived at the hotel with time enough to spare before the sun set behind puffy white clouds.

Sunday was as beautiful as Saturday was, but we spent the morning holding on for our lives as we rode the bus to downtown.  Downtown Nassau leaves much to be desired; the streets along the north side of the area are fine, catering to tourists and offering cheap souvenirs, duty-free alcohol, perfume, and knock-off Coach and Gucci bags.

After a short, $40 lunch, we went to the Straw Market. I have nothing very positive to say about that place except that it reminded me of walking through a slum in a video game, getting accosted by people who want to sell you drugs and things you don’t need. It was very depressing. Cousin got called a “mini incredible Hulk” and I had a little boy admonish me for not paying him $1 for his song about Jesus, which I did not ask for.

And so before we got back on the bus, I comforted myself by snapping pictures of the giant cruise ship sitting offshore, and  looking beneath the surface of the water for the little tropical fish that waited in schools for tourists to throw in bits of bread.

Sunday evening passed in a slow haze of dips in the pool and bay, short bursts of reading my book, and naps when the sun became too intense.  We walked to the beach and found it dirty, littered with broken glass. I suppose this only reinforced my image of Nassau as a touristy place. Beautiful, if you can go to a part of the island that’s not so heavily traveled by visitors or if you can go out to sea, but worn down and dilapidated if you go downtown.

Monday I flirted my way through customs and then sat waiting to board the plane back home.  Met a nice young man in first class who ended up being a doppleganger to another one of my friends, and then took a nice long nap before going to the gym later that night.

It was a good trip, although I do wish I was back there on the boat as we went out to the reef, the sun on my back and shoulders and a long dive ahead instead of here in Georgia, back to reality, where the things I feel the need to worry about include my unfinished Halloween costume, my lack of money, my relationship (or slowly failing one???), the laundry piling up on my floor, my ailing car.

Taking this trip was a good thing. I have a little more knowledge now about what it is to go to a different country where taxi drivers may prey on unknowning tourists (always settle your taxi fare before you climb in), and I have a better idea of how to effectively save for these excursions.

Because taking this trip has also made me want more, to go places (even if they’re close by, like Puerto Rico, where I’m thinking of going next), see things. More.

Looks like I’d better start saving.

What did we do this weekend?

Well, my cousin and I get the last two seats in first class. There is a woman who panics and says she has to go to the hospital and get off the plane. My cousin tells me not to be one of the rubberneckers, staring at her making a scene, and so I turn back to my vodka and tonic and waste the flight away with a Kim Harrison book and then Dracula.

It’s raining and cold, but we drive back to my house and watch The Killing Room, which is long and meandering. If you peel back the layers, it’s more than a little bit fucked up, but doesn’t seem to have a reason to exist.

In the morning we stop at a Starbucks and grab white chocolate mochas, and then move on breakfast at Friendly’s, around the corner from our friend’s house. My cousin seems to get along wonderfully with my friends, which is a relief to me. All we do is really watch TV and some movies on TV, and even though we don’t do much else, I enjoy the time we sit together on the couch, cracking jokes and generally just being present.

I always feel simpler when back there. I don’t have to feel that life is about making grandiose leaps towards some purpose. I never feel measured against them. These are some of the smartest people I know, some of the funniest. I don’t have to worry about failing to live up to something I’ve created in my head, or something that comes from comparing myself to the peers I’m typically surrounded with.

I digress.

After one of our friends leaves, we drive back over to Dave & Buster’s to play games. I meet up with a few more friends and we catch up, order drinks and sliders at the bar and just chat. The guys go off to play games.  My cousin and I obliterate zombies for a while, and then play a flight sim (I crash the commercial airliner), and then I rank 7th place in the sniper game, which I have never done before. There’s trivia and drinks and we try to buy something with the tickets that another friend has accumulated, but there isn’t much left to purchase.

The drive home is exhausting, although we do stop at a 7-11 in hopes of finding a Domo hat. We find two different types, some t-shirts, air fresheners, and other paraphernalia. Jackpot!

But I have trouble sleeping when I shouldn’t, probably because of the sliders, and maybe because of the wings, or the mojito. I don’t know.  Either way, it is a rough night, although we get good seats on the way back, too, and get to see another friend for the last time before leaving.

It was another whirlwind weekend, a good weekend. Another group of good memories to keep stored away, safe.

Saturday: cardio kickboxing with that nutty teacher again, and then the Candler Park fall festival, the one I remember going to ages ago. Now I know why I have memories of driving on Freedom Parkway six or so years ago, and now I know why the hill looks so familiar. Ages ago, on Halloween, we sat in nearly the same spot drinking Sweetwater (back when I was still years away from the legal drinking age) and listening to bands play.  My boyfriend then purchased me a necklace, and it was then that I formed my first impression of Atlanta, that it was a beautiful and temperate place, a green and peaceful city, and I never suspected that I would someday live there.

Sunday night: crab fritters with apples and a champagne sauce, and then wood-roasted duck with rutabaga and wilted greens. There is white chocolate mousse cake with bing cherries and somewhere in there a bread basket with some kind of dip made from edamame and garlic and olive oil, and an espresso martini.

This weekend was a good one, although I got less working out and reading than I wanted to get done.  Next weekend looks to be just as promising, and although I won’t have my new camera, I’ll be spending time with good friends, and that’s more important.  I love making new memories, after all.

Okay, last month I definitely finished Every Witch Way But Dead by Kim Harrison. It’s safe to say that I enjoy that series as a guilty pleasure, even though witches in general do not have as much pull with me as vampires do.

This month though, the only book I have 100% settled on is Dracula, which I am in the midst of reading. I have to say that it’s different than I expected. Not that I had expected much, having never seen the movie and never read even synopses of the book. I love picking up on the small nuances though, the ones that defined an entire generation of vampire fiction (you can leave  the Twilight series out, as I do not consider it worthy vampire literature literature at all).

So what else this month? I guess I have a few ideas:

• Dracula – Bram Stoker
• A Fist Full of Charms – Kim Harrison
• The Colour of Magic – Terry Pratchett
• Eragon - Christopher Paolini
• A Feast for Crows – George R. R. Martin
• Magician – Raymond E. Feist

Thoughts? I will be reading the first two, at least, and then my goal is to incorporate at least one more book from the BBC’s Big Read (our reading contest at work) to keep working towards reading more off that list. And to keep working down the pile of books that have been loaned to me.

Looking ahead, I think November will be a particularly rough month for books. By rough I mean nonexistent. Nano, you know?

But I have some days on a plane up ahead, so I’m hoping I’ll get a lot more done in the next three weeks before our book group and what not meets for the second time (for me)!

It is my new HP netbook.

And I think I love it.

This weekend my self esteem suffers because I realize that if a zombie apocalypse were to set in, I will not be among the survivors.

Even after seeing Zombieland, I’d still believed I’d be adequately prepared. After all, the apocalypse is something I enjoy thinking and writing about, and I’ve read enough books on various instances of the end of the world to have a good sense of what to do.

The first instance, however, that has now disproven my theory that I would survive occurs on Saturday. The cousin and I met up and prepared for the apocalypse by watching Zombieland, and then drove up to Cartersville together with the ex-roommate. I’d like to say that this ride is especially awkward considering I had my cousin sit in the bitch seat–the middle seat–in the other roommate’s truck. I carry two boxes of ammo in my lap while reading Dracula, while Cousin jostles the rifle around, trying to balance it so he can read Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, while the other roommate drives. I have never felt more like a redneck in my life.

We drive way out into the country. With the windows down, the wind blows the acrid smell of cow crap into the car. Ahh, the country. Pulling into the dirt driveway of a small little rancher, we see horses and a brown little pond. We meet all the residents of this house, and the one gets out his hand guns and pulls the other truck up the hill so we can shoot from it. The targets are pieces of notebook paper and old pizza boxes with crooked circles drawn on them and stapled up to a wooden shipping pallet. There is a small lesson on gun safety and then the first person steps up.

My cousin shoots off the 9mm before I do. It looks easy, although it is much, much louder than you’d think. Absurdly loud, in fact.  When it is my turn, I walk, shaking, to the spot where we’d picked to shoot from and wait through another mini lesson. You’d think with all the movies I’ve seen that include weapons that at some point I’d have learned how to load and shoot one. And I do, in theory. When it comes to practicing that theory, I find myself staring at the handgun without a clue what to do.

I hit the target a few times, but when I finish, it takes about ten minutes to stop shaking. It is the adrenaline, I guess. And I have no desire to shoot the rifle. All in all, as we drive away back south towards Acworth, I realize that firearms and I do not mix. Strike one against surviving the zombie apocalypse.

Sunday gets worse, even after I put on my ass-kicking shoes. They are sensible boots–not entirely flat (which can throw off your arches more than a slight heel can), but with a normal stacked heel. I can run and jump and climb and do mostly everything in them.

But fail number two was going zombie hunting with those boots and… a khaki skirt. I have yet to purchase pants that will fit down into the boots without bunching up around the tops of them. But how can you run for your life in a skirt? Furthermore, in a skirt that can get so dirty? You just can’t.

Incident three is obvious; we head to a cemetery to look for the undead.

I further prove my ineptitude as we walk around the cemetery and I end up tripping several times on the uneven paths. So much for an agile getaway if I am grabbed by an undead hand.

And lastly, as the horde of shambling undead invade, I let one get me.

For shame.

I spend the rest of our time brooding in silence about my imminent death, wondering how the transformation will take place and who I should say goodbye to first, depressed that out of all the people I had gone with and had known, I’m probably have read more literature and seen more zombie movies than them and would be the first to go. I can’t wield weapons, stay on my own two feet, and make terrible decisions about where to spend my time.

Well, I suppose all I can do now is hope to be one of the few that boards up the house and waits for the end. No travel, no groups of people.

Just me, alone with my inability to fire a gun.

Well!

It is now the first of October.

Yesterday I stayed home from my main job because I felt so terrible. The previous night I’d lain in bed unable to sleep because of a strange, recurring fever dream about the restaurant I’m opening. In frustration, about three in the morning, I hauled myself out of bed for the fifteenth time and yelled at myself, go to sleep. You don’t even want to open a restaurant!!!

The morning was difficult, as I had turned into a zombie. I stretched out on the couch but all I could find on TV were reports of swine flu. One was a spot about a couple whose thirteen-year-old had just died from H1N1, even though the parents had been told by the doctors that she would be fine. Naturally, this added to my delirious paranoia.

In my zombie status, somehow I managed to shower myself and change into presentable clothes. After a tasteless meal of Cocoa Puffs, I decided to drive up 85 to the JoAnn Fabrics there, to start looking for other supplies for my Halloween costume.

I got lost (how is this surprising?), and ended up driving around Pleasant Hill Road for a while until my trusty Blackberry Maps application found for me the store. Somehow I walked away with not only the zipper I needed, but also an oils set (which I may return) and a Cooking Light magazine.

And then I got some toys for myself. They may or may not include an iPod Nano in green, a Canon Powershot S90 (the new one, yes), and an HP Mini-Netbook.

I… cannot wait to use these items. Although I think I’ve spent enough money this month already to last me the rest of the year. Whew. Hopefully this being sick thing will pass so I don’t make anymore silly purchases.