Homesick

It has been 154 days since I left Utah for Atlanta (or 5 months and 2 days) and I'm officially homesick. Previously, the longest I'd been away from home was...like, 2 months. Maybe. Probably more like a month and a half when I lived in Virginia. Don't get me wrong, Atlanta is great, and I'm enjoying life here, but it's just Not Home. Here are some things that I'm missing:

Family - I love my family tons, and I feel like I haven't seen them in forever! With the exception of Mindy and Jeran, because I actually see them tons more now, which is great. Dad did manage to stop by once on a twelve hour layover, which was good. I did get to visit Andrew and Lindsay and Riley in Pittsburgh, too. They're not Utah family though. So, special shout out to Mom and Alyna, both of whom I really really miss a lot! Extended family, too. (Lisa and Cameron, I miss you guys too, but you don't live in Utah. I'll come visit sometime though!)  

Friends - I'm getting lots of friends here, but that doesn't stop me from missing my friends in Logan and in Provo. Especially Erilyn Heintz, Sarah Hafen, April Atkin, and Mindy Pinson. Well, April is actually on her mission, so I wouldn't be able to see her anyway, but I still miss her. (Kalie, you're in Rexburg and I never saw you. We talk more now, but I can't wait to see you again!) 

Desert - I miss the open spaces and sparse beauty of Utah's deserts, especially the red rock areas. I enjoy having trees here, but they give a very uniform look to the landscape.  

Mountains - They're just so majestic and comforting to have near. Also, real hiking involves going up a mountain, not winding around some little trail next to a flat boring river or tiny little park.

Dry heat - It's hot here. Like, ridiculous - 95 degrees and it's only May. I think I might die this summer. The worst part is the humidity which makes the heat suffocating and makes you sweat about 7x more easily. I honestly don't know how people live in places even more hot and humid than this. 

Some aspects of my life at BYU - including my Landscape Management friends and professors, lots of people to go running with (that live nearby), BYU tree crew and all of the fun and chill-ness that implies, Spicy Thai restaurant, J-Dawgs, Jamba Juice, Zupa's, being able to just not go to classes if that's what I really wanted. 

And probably a bunch of other small things. Yep, I'm homesick. Even one of my coworkers noticed and commented on it. His advice was to go home as often as possible, even just for the weekend (yeah, because that works with a $500 plane ticket). I am planning on coming out for a good week and some odd days in August, so I just have to survive another 68 days. 

Fun Weekend at Mindy and Jeran's

So, this is rather lazy of me, but I liked Mindy's blog post so much, you can all just go read hers again. http://supona.blogspot.com/2012/05/fun-weekend-with-jessica.html
 It was a really fun weekend, and so worth the drive to get there and back. I love living so (relatively) close to them.

Life as Late

For the most part I feel like life is pretty boring, until I remember all the exciting little things that I've done. These little adventures happen almost exclusively on the weekends. Here's a few of the highlights:

Visiting Andrew, Lindsay, and Riley in Pittsburgh. April 6-8. This was the first time I've ever actually met nephew Riley, since skype doesn't really count. He's such a cute baby. Nice and chunky. I just love him. It was also really fun to hang out with Andrew and Lindsay, since I haven't seem them in roughly forever. We watched some tv shows, played a game or two, and explored some of Pittsburgh. Super fun times.

Looking out of the Cathedral, on the 30th floor or something really high like that.

I really like all the bridges in Pittsburgh. Bridges are cool.

University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning. Seriously cool building.

Playing in the fountain. Almost.

Georgia Tech Swing dance and Last Call Blues - I finally had the time, the information, and the guts to go dancing here in Atlanta. I'm usually really nervous the first time I go somewhere like this, especially by myself, but both times it turned out really fun. The Georgia Tech dance was pretty much all Lindy Hop swing, which I enjoy but haven't done much of in recent years. But it was there that I met Benjy, who told me about Last Call Blues. It was fun to come in as a new person and be taken completely at face value, without anyone knowing me already. That's a monthly event I'll probably be going to almost every month.

Les Miserables - This has got to be one of the highlights of my Atlanta experience so far. I LOVE this musical, the theater (the Fabulous Fox theater is beautiful and very unique), and I specifically loved this production of Les Mis. I've been to a lot of Les Mis productions, and this one blows them all out of the water. The vocals were all absolutely stunning, the orchestra was powerful, the staging awesome. Kara and I went with Lei and Dan on Wednesday and had seats quite near the front. I loved it so much I went back by myself on Saturday for the matinee, bought a ticket from someone on the street, and watched it again. It was great, but a different experience being in the nosebleed section.

It has a very Middle Eastern/Persian feel to the interior of the theater, which is very cool.

Avengers IMAX 3D - A small group from my ward went on opening day - not midnight opening night, but Friday night - to see the show in Atlantic Station. It was great. If you like action, superheroes, handsome men, or Scarlett Johansson, I highly recommend this movie. I can't wait to go see it again.

Krav maga self-defense class - on Saturday afternoon, Kara and I went to a self-defense class with Rachel (Kara's friend with lots of karate experience) to one of her gyms. It was awesome! If that gym weren't so far away, I'd be tempted to sign up for an entire class series. I still might. Krav maga was developed for the Israeli military and quickly gained popularity for civilian self-defense. It's a rather aggressive form of defense, where you avoid conflicts if you can, but if you have to fight, you're attacking to cause maximum damage. I feel much more dangerous now.