Tuesday, September 19, 2006: Go Oilers, I mean, Titans!

Dan and I got to go to our first NFL game last Sunday. It was an interesting experience. Half of the fun was being around folks that we never would have been around on a regular basis.
The Titans lost, and it started to rain a little, but it was still fun. Mostly it was fun because we rode our bikes downtown and bypassed all traffic and parking issues. We earned the right to be smug by riding our bikes.

We were literally in the next to last row...of the entire stadium. But, that's fine with us. My boss rewarded me with the tickets. She seems to like me...

Monday, September 11, 2006: Discovery of the Patio...

Since we have decided to start inviting people to visit this winter, we need to reclaim our bedrooms from the piles of stuff that are stored in them currently.

So we bought a shed. We started by clearing away some dirt to level out the ground. Thud, thud...as we dig. Turns out, there's already a huge concrete slab under about a quarter of our yard where a garage once stood. How convenient! We kept digging, and it's large enough for the shed to sit on, and for a little patio on the side. We were excited until we couldn't figure out how we would anchor it to the concrete. We're taking suggestions.

This picture shows Dan digging out the slab, and Maddie eating dirt. She loves to chase anything that moves, including dirt that's being thrown onto a pile. She had so much fun chasing and eating dirt.

She did get tired after a bit, and just wanted to guard the pile of dirt. I'm glad somebody was having fun while Dan and I were shoveling and assembling metal pieces...

We're not finished. It will be a couple of weeks since Dan has to travel to Missouri next weekend to visit his ailing grandmother.

Keep Dan and his travels in your thoughts and prayers. He will only be there Friday night through Sunday afternoon, so it will be a crazy trip.

Wednesday, August 9, 2006:

We're singing at the Ryman! We're real Nashvillians now.

Tuesday, August 8, 2006:

Dan's week is improving after the lawnmower debacle. In fact, I learned this week that having your lawmower stolen in East Nashville is really a rite of passage. Check out this story by my NewsChannel5 reporter colleague about East Nashville's sense of humor regarding or quirky neighborhood:
http://www.newschannel5.com/content/news/21250.asp

His week didn't just get better because of the news story. I have been making friends with Dan's fellow Vanderbilt sociology grad students. One, Emily, used to work with the Center for Biomedical Ethics in Society at Vanderbilt. After I told her about Dan's research interests, she dropped his name to the director, who contacted him. He will be able to work with her on research within his interest, get paid and get published. And since many professors at Vandy don't expect their TA's to do a lot of work, he will have time to pursue these other opportunities.

Things are going well--we are still piecing together the house and getting settled in.

Don't forget to start planning your visit to Music City!

Thursday, August 3, 2006:

Nashvillians are serious about their music. I knew this in theory before arriving, but now I have undisputed proof.

Dan and I attended our first Music City concert at the most iconic venue in America--the Ryman. The Mother Church they call it here claims to have the best acoustics in the world second only to the Mormon Tabernacle. So, when folks pay for a show there, they expect to get one. We got one from Ryan Adams, my favorite musician. As a member of the former band Whiskeytown, he was a pioneer of the Alternative Country movement in American music.

At the show one front row audience member tossed an open bottle of liquor onto the stage. It bounced around spewing liquor on Ryan Adams, and he was not impressed. He stopped playing, pulled a candy bar out of his pocket, and started eating it. He stood there while his band stopped and said, "I don't need this." Spectators started booing, and screaming "Kick him out!" Security guards found the perpetrators and escorted them down the aisle. As they were walking down the aisle, the girl sitting beside us told us to lean back because she planned to spit her drink through her straw at the disruptors. We leaned back, but she wasn't fast enough. They were whisked out of the building quickly.

As soon as they left, and the audience was still cheering, Ryan and the Cardinals started back up again. Not 15 minutes later, Ryan stopped again. Apparently a drunk fan in the front row was taunting him verbally and physically. He yelled, "You wanna come up here and say that to my face?!"

Again, the audience was pissed that this disruptor was cutting into precious Ryan Adams time. They chanted to kick him out. Again, the Ryan Adams waited until his disruption was removed before he continued.

The concert was amazing, and not just because it was the most anticipated concert of the year for me. He really put on a great show mixing easy sing-alongs with new tunes, danceable beats with slow ones. The entire show (audience and performer) was great until the last song. His last song was reminiscent of a Wilco concert I attended recently. Ryan moved into an experimental ending to his last song that lasted way too long. It was painful at the end, after the novelty wore off.

After his too-long experimental ending, he walked off the stage, the house lights came up, and security came out onto the stage. No encore? No encore. How disappointing....

I have to continue reliving our concert moment for a long time since this was the first and last concert we will be able to attend for a while. We were so hopeful that music options would be so available in Nashville that there would be a lot of free options. There definitely aren't as many as we wish. However, the Derailers are doing a free show this Saturday night that we will definitely attend.

This place is a trip. You gotta come visit!

Tuesday, August 1, 2006:

I was so excited for Dan to have a day to enjoy his house a relax a little bit after all of our work. My family had left, most of the house tasks were completed, and I was going to work for my first day.

But, alas, Dan had a horrible day. He stepped outside for a moment only to step on a nail that went through his shoe and into his heel. He went inside, cleaned up, and tried to persevere. He had a tetanus shot right after our honeymoon two years ago when he cut open his hand. He hoped to mow the yard with the mower that we had just fixed. It was donated to us by some friends. We fixed it, and had not even used it yet. It was stolen, along with the gas can.

We may borrow a neighbor's until we can get another one. We filed a police report, but our side of town is known for its illegal activity, so we don't hold high hopes of getting it back.

But, I started my job, and everyone with whom I work is great. They're all very nice, and I think I will really enjoy working with them.

Thanks for all of your well-wishes. Keep them coming!

Thursday, July 27:

We are in full "do-it-your-selfer" mode here in Nashville.

Our furniture arrived Monday morning, and we started unloading it all. The weather was perfect. It had just rained and cooled off the air, so unloading didn't take long at all. Well, that's mostly true.

In case you were wondering, be prepared for some surprises when you buy a house where no one has actually lived. Our house was completely renovated just before the sale, so no one has lived in it to figure out the quirks and correct the errors in construction. Take for instance the fact that our bed won't fit upstairs in our bedroom. The door that opens to the stairs was once the door to a small closet. It's still the size of a small closet door...with stairs behind it. Even after much review of my brother's trigonometry and cutting out the door facing, we were still unable to squeeze the box spring through the doorway. So, we are currently sleeping on a mattress until we can find a split box spring for a queen-sized bed. They exist, according to our research.

So, my dad is hammering away right now, trying to piece back together the door frame.

After that, we will finish installing the chain link fence, and hopefully install the hood over the range. We have already installed mini blinds and ceiling fans all around the house. The best addition is the overhead light and ceiling fan in the living room. Who builds a house with no overhead light in the living room? Good question.

The dog is completely weirded out by all of the construction and unpacking. We don't know if it was all of the confusion, or if she simply does not tolerate other dogs well, but the interactions between her and my brother's dog could have been much better.

She loves people, so please come visit, but make sure to kennel your own pooch before making the trek. She hasn't been socialized properly from what we can tell.

Oh, the job: I was offered and accepted a position as Web Producer at NewsChannel 5, the local CBS affiliate. I hope to start next week. They were kind enough to understand my unpredictable circumstances right now, and were willing to delay my start date until after the family left. I have been freelancing with them, so know a lot already about the corporate culture and with whom I would be working. They are all very nice folks, following nicely in suit with the rest of their Nashvillian counterparts.

Dan and I have decided that the only way we will move from here is if the move is sponsored by someone else, i.e. the university that hires Dan for a tenure track position. It will happen eventually....

Please come visit! We would love to see our friends from anywhere and everywhere. I learned from my friend Alex Esmon that he drove from Columbia, Mo to Nashville in under eight hours. We made it from Charlottesville in less that nine. My parents made it from Houston in about 13. We're right in the middle of everyone we want to see!