BLOGGED ALONG THE WAY

Talledega, Alabama
September 7, 2012

After getting on the road this morning, I finally stopped feeling so anxious.  I guess I had just freaked out about the whole thing so hard that I'd broken through to the other side. Well, that and I took an anti-anxiety pill. Those things are very helpful!

I had only been driving for about 5 minutes though, when suddenly everything was engulfed in a thick, white fog.  Greeeeeeeeeat.  It was probably the worst fog I'd seen in years and when I ran into it, I was trying to drive along a curvy, mountain road. That was not fun at all.  I kept expecting the fog to lift, because the sun was already up fairly high, but it couldn't get through. It was like Silent Hill. You couldn't see the cars ahead of you until you were practically right on top of them, and you couldn't see anything along the sides of the road, so it was very creepy.  The fog lasted almost the entire drive to Talledega.  I also got behind the slowest people in the universe, so I didn't make it to the campus until later than I had hoped, but I was still there in plenty of time. Yay!

Getting checked in was super easy, and I was given a giant folder full of stuff immediately, so all of the worrying I did about wondering around aimlessly was for nothing. Eh.  My fist class was for new. Treasurers and financial secretaries, and it was fairly interesting. Well, at least my mind didn't wander off while he was talking.  We headed to lunch after that, and while I was standing in line, I got a bunch of text messages all at once. It was weird, because I don't usually get many texts at all. I couldn't ignore them because they were actually about something really important, so I hope the other attendees didn't think I was being standoffish. I'm not usually one to use my phone while I eat, but this couldn't be helped.

The food was sort of bland and industrial tasting, so I couldn't make myself eat very much. I ended up throwing most of it away and going to the chapel, where our next session would be held.

We had a fairly brief session out there, and I had a very bad moment when I thought one of my ex boyfriends was there and about to get up on stage to talk. I thought he was the guy I dated the summer before my senior year who was so much older than me, and there is no way that meeting wouldn't have been awkward, but thank goodness it was just a guy who looked like my ex. Yeesh. I feel bad, though, because I know the man on stage saw me staring at him very intently while trying to decide if he was the guy I thought I knew. I'm sure he thought I looked unhinged.  Sorry, guy!

We had a couple of other sessions, and most of the information just flew right past me. I've been trying to pick workshops that pertain to what I will actually be doing at church, but the thing about tax forms pretty much blew my brain apart. She talked so fast, and she said a bunch of stuff like, "you have to fill out form w-4 and then make sure it has a w-3 cover letter, and then the next thing you have to do is make sure the T-2000 is stapled to the BMX and then filed under purple, because the IRS always checks for purple." She might as well have been speaking in Klingon. I'm just glad I get to keep the book, because I'm going to have to go back and read everything again to see if it makes any more sense.

At dinner, I did something that makes me feel so rude, and it was completely unintentional. I was sitting alone, trying to choke down another meal when a lady asked it she could sit next to me. I think she was just looking for someone to talk to, because almost everyone there had a coworker along, so she was lonely.  I'd eaten about as much as I could make myself, and I sat and did. Little chit-chat with her, but I was starting to feel kind of yucky and I didn't want to sit at the table anymore. I told her, kind of abruptly, that it had been nice to talk to her, but I needs to go back to my room to see if my air conditioning had been fixed. (It hadn't been working at first.) I didn't mean to be rude, I promise, but she looked kind of taken aback. I feel really bad if I was rude, because I wouldn't have done that on purpose.  I was feeling quite awful by the time I got back to my (thankfully) much cooler room.  I had begun to think I was comings own with the flu. My muscles hurt all over and my stomach hurt, and I was cold and  dizzy. Maybe it was the food, who knows, but I proceeded to be unwell in that room.

I was still cold and sore and so very tired when I finally managed to pull myself together again, and since I still had one more class to attend, I went back to the classroom.  I sat there trying not to fall asleep, or get sick again, while she talked. The class seemed to take forever. We were supposed to have some kind of "fellowship time" after the class was over, but I just couldn't do it. I came back to my room, changed into my pajamas, and wrapped myself up in a blanket. These people probably think I'm a huge snob, or at least quite unpleasant, because I haven't been too friendly with anyone. Well, I'm not being mean, I guess, just being kind of to myselfish. I hope no one thinks I'm being rude, I just don't feel well.  Tomorrow I'll be attending the Quickbooks classes, and maybe I'll feel better then and can be more chatty.  Who knows?