Hot Sauce and Highways

May 31, 2016KatCeg Leave a comment

After our time in New Orleans 3 weeks ago, we couldn’t leave Louisiana without stopping by to tour the Tabasco factory which is on Avery Island ourside of New Orleans. It is the only Tabasco Sauce factory in the world. It was first produced in 1868 by Edmund McIlhenny and the company is still family run to this day using the same three ingredients, red tabasco peppers, vinegar and salt. You can read more about Tabasco sauce here: History of Tabasco Sauce.

Leaving Louisiana took us through the highways and byways of the lower bayou. Water everywhere and not much civilization. It was a beautiful drive.

On we drove down to Galveston, TX to spend a few days on the beach relaxing. Our spot was at Galveston Island State Park and we had the most amazing sunsets every night.

Every night from our campsite.

Every day

From Galveston we drove northwest towards Killeen, TX where my daughter lives. We got to spend 10 days with them helping my daughter move from one house to another. Since our son-in-law is deployed, we were glad we were there to help with the packing, moving and kids. We managed to have fun in between and I got to spend Mother’s Day with her for the first time in about 8 years. We spent a fun day in Waco having brunch then taking the kids to a hands on museum at Baylor University, which was great after many hours of packing and moving. Allison Boatman, you are amazing and I love you to the moon and back!

So on we travel and we can’t believe we have been on the road now for several months. We miss the kids but thanks to technology, we are able to “see” them along the way. This is it for now and the adventure continues for us “wandering gypsies”.

See you soon and thanks for stopping by!

NOLA

May 17, 2016KatCeg Leave a comment

_DSC0336

New Orleans, what a strange and unusual place. Okay, if you’re a lover of the city, don’t be hatin’ on me, you know that it is both those things. I was amazed that everything is below sea level, that you actually have to walk up steps or a berm in order to see the Mississippi River. The Mississippi River, it’s above you everywhere you go! That amazed me. We did spend some time walking around down in the French Quarter, eating some food, hearing a little music and people watching. Some of the best people watching around!

Our trip to New Orleans was different from other visitors since the sole purpose for us being there was to work at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. The festival is held at the 3rd largest horse race track in the country, right in the heart of New Orleans. JazzFest celebrates the music, food, culture and heritage of New Orleans and Louisiana and has every kind of music you can think of, including Jazz. From Trombone Shorty to Elivs Costello, Flo Rider and Snoop Dogg, Neil Young, Paul Simon, Gary Clark Jr, Bonnie Raitt, Buddy Guy, Stevie Wonder, Cash Box Kings to Mavis Staples, Aaron Neville, Rhianna Giddens and CiCi Whinens just to name a few. Wow, it was a lot of music! The festival was held the last weekend of April and the first Thursday – Sunday of May so we were there for almost 2 weeks. We heard a lot of great music, ate lots of cajun food and made some new friends. Rain on the last Saturday closed the festival early, canceling Stevie Wonder’s performance, but since we were sweeping bleachers at the main stage in the morning, we got to hear him rehearse a lot of his set! A private show by Stevie! No pics, though, as security was tight, but boy was it good!

We stayed in St. Bernard Parrish at the St. Bernard State Park, about 18 miles from the festival site. It was a nice quiet retreat after hot, crowded days at the Fest. Every day our drive took us through the Lower Ninth Ward and Ninth Ward of New Orleans, the 2 hardest hit sections of New Orleans that were destroyed by hurricane Katrina. It is a place that seems forgotten. Katrina may have well as hit that area 6 months ago not 11 years ago. Not much has changed. It sad and depressing yet the people who have stayed carry on amidst rubble and decay. It was a difference experience driving through there every day. One day we drove as far south as we could down into the bayou. It’s a whole other world, sparsely populated, houses abandoned since Katrina, the small fishing village out in the middle of nowhere. A unique beauty of it’s own.

I can’t end this post without introducing you to a man we met at St. Bernard State Park, Dean Nelson. Dean is traveling across the country for about 8 weeks, going where God leads him, interviewing the homeless with a mission to get to know them, and to change the public opinion of homeless people. He hands out hundreds of Walmart gift cards, McDonald gift cards, etc. Most of the time, he says, the homeless he meets just want to talk, share their story and have someone treat them like human being. It was a humbling experience listening to his stories and it forever changed the way we look at homelessness. Check him out on Facebook, it’s worth the look.

Well that’s about it for now. We keep on trucking’ so I’ll have more soon. Thanks for stopping by!

The Big I Do!

April 27, 2016KatCeg Leave a comment

Mr & Mrs Jimmy Robbins

April 16th marked the big event we had been waiting for! Our sweet Jimmy married his beautiful Sarah Boddie and what an event it was! Words are hard for me to find as this boy means the world to me. As my son’s best friend since they were kids, I’ve watched him grow into an outstanding young man who has overcome some hard adversities to rise up to be a successful songwriter and now a married man.

I loved Sarah the minute I met her, I knew she was the right one for Jimmy and it was with great joy that we got to be a big part of their big day. Both families are getting a gift in the these two!

My mother adored Jimmy and the two of them could banter like no body’s business! He made her laugh till she cried. Ms Evelyn, our RV, was the honored guest at Jimmy and Sarah’s wedding, asked to come so she could block the noise from a generator next door. Our hearts were full knowing that in some way my mom was there!

See Ms E in the back?!?

From Friday night’s crawfish boil, to Jaybird’s Mancave, tears of joy, toasting the bride and groom, laughing and eating awesome food to fireworks, birdseed sendoffs and Jaybird’s Mancave it was more fun then words can describe! Many thanks to George and Sandra Boddie (Sarah’s parenets) and Michael and Adrea (Jimmy’s) for such a huge and off the charts celebration of love and family!

In the words my son, Stephen, coined “We weddinged hard”!

Learning the mother|son dance with pops looking on

And look who caught the bouquet and garter!

5 Weeks Rolling

April 10, 2016KatCeg 5 Comments

Fritz and Rose getting ready to hit the road.

Hello Family and Friends! We have now been on the road for closing in on 6 weeks! Time flies when you’re on the move! We’ve been having a blast and learning the ways of the RV lifestyle. It’s been good and cozy and Ken and I are still in love, the animals are adjusting and all is well with our world.

We left Jacksonville Beach about 3 weeks ago?!? I can’t believe it’s been 3 weeks, like I said, time flies. Unfortunately we had to leave without our sweet cat Gracie. She escaped on day 1 and we never saw her again for the next 9 days. It was time to leave and we hadn’t seen her once. Hopefully she is happy and doing well as the ferrel cat she was born to be. We miss her.

Our sweet Gracie

Next stop, Live Oak Florida and the Suwannee Springfest! We had so much fun, heard some great bluegrass, met some awesome people and just had a good ole time. As most of you know, Ken and I volunteer at music festivals to not only get free admission but also to be a part of the bigger picture. I highly recommend it. If you love music (or any event for that matter), volunteer and you’ll get the best of both worlds. Our job and this festival was working in catering for the breakfast shift, 7:30am to 12:30pm, serving a full breakfast buffet to the crew, staff and artists. So much fun!

Home SweetHome

Suwannee Campground

Way down upon the Suwannee River…

Kitchen is cooking!

My job, manning the egg station and buffet

My cooking Sensei, Jeff Paulin

View from the kitchen…

…

Just a jam session break out

Jeff Austin Band

Our friends and neighbors

This was a fun little festival with some really great music.

On our way to Suwannee we had a little mishap. Oh oh…. we tried to back up with our car hitched to the RV, something you should NEVER do, but no one told us this so we had to learn the hard and expensive way. While backing up in a very crowded and busy truck stop, the car nearly jack knifed and if it hadn’t been for some trucker looking out for us and yelling STOP STOP STOP, well…it would have been a whole lot worse. We could not get the car unhitched since we had bent everything but luckily for us a young auto mechanic came to our rescue and he was able to help Ken disconnect the two and checked out the car and told us it was okay to drive. So now I had to follow Ken in the RV and follow the back end of Evelyn for our 6 hour drive to Naples.

We spent a wonderful week in Naples with my sister. We had such a great time visiting, going to the beach, shopping and eating and even caught a movie. We went to a great Easter service in a park on the beach attended by 5000 people. Beach Community Church served cake, coffee, ice cream sandwiches and juice to everyone. It was a beautiful day to celebrate Jesus. Naples is where Ken had to spend a great amount of time trying to figure out how to fix our hitch and what part would be covered by insurance. He got everything all squared away, ordered the part that we picked up at our “home” in Green Cable Springs and then we were off! So great to spend time with my sis! Miss you sister!

Next we headed to Titusville, to the Manatee Hammock County Park. It was right on the Indian River with an incredible view of the Kennedy Space Center. That place is huge! We spent the next day touring the KSC and ended the day by renting the movie Martian, which seemed appropriate since we learned that Mars is the next frontier! We had dinner with Ken’s sister Julie in Orlando the next night and went to see his Aunt Esther the next day. Great time visiting with Ken’s family which we hadn’t seen in some time. We realized that we actually have a lot of family in Florida, but were only able to see a few. Love you all!

We left Titusville and headed towards Grayton Beach State Park located between Panama City and Destin, FL. This is a beautiful State Park full of bike trails, hiking trails and a beautiful private beach. We were so fortunate to have a guest come stay with us! My very dear friend, Gerry Neuman. Gerry lost his beautiful wife and my good friend, Marcie a little over a month ago. He’s on his own road trip, visiting with friends and families along the way as we all tell our Marcie stories and laugh our heads off. She was a great lady! Gerry was there to help Ken with the hitch and thank God, because I would have been useless. It was a hard job but they got it fixed so I could now sit next to my Kenneth while we travel the roads of America! Thanks Ger! We love and miss you SO much!

We are now in Gulf Shores Alabama hanging out until the big Boddie/Robbins wedding next week. We’ve been taking care of business stuff, doing laundry and hanging out at the beach. The weather has been beautiful and Rosie has finally been allowed to go out at night, she comes in on her own! Yea!

This is all for now folks. Our wifi has been sketchy to say the least but I’ll try not to wait so long for the next post! Until then, thanks for stopping by!

The adventure begins!

March 10, 2016KatCeg 4 Comments

Apologies ahead of time, this first entry might be a little long. A real shocker for those who know me! HA! Well, hang in there, this blog can only improve!!

Two years ago Ken and I started talking about doing something crazy, fun and adventurous with our lives. We decided to buy an RV and travel the country for a year. Last March we purchased our 33′ Class A Motorhome that we fondly named Ms Evelyn in honor and in memory of my mother. We gave our notice at our house, gave/sold/donated/stored all our stuff we couldn’t take, hugged and kissed our kids and grandkids and set off with one dog, Mr. Fritz, and 2 cats, Rosie and Gracie on the adventure of a lifetime, Driving Ms Evelyn.

It’s been 1 week and 2 days since Ken and I set off on this great RV adventure! One week, 3 trips for repairs, 1 escapee cat, 415 miles, 1 night at South of the Border, 2 State Parks, 1 City Park, 1 clogged toilet, and one missing cat. It’s been quite the ride already and we’ve barely started.

Our repairs were minor (new valve extenders on tires and break lights on car fixed) 2 were taken care of before we left Raleigh. Escapee #1 was Rose and it happened at a repair shop in Raleigh on Capital Boulevard! Ken was able to corner her at a fence line and get her back inside. Neither cat was very happy with the whole thing. Fritz, he’s another story.

In order to get out of NC (so we felt like we’d actually gotten somewhere) we camped overnight at South of the Border. Yes, that cheesy spot on I-95 that everyone passes if they are traveling North or South by the North Carolina/South Carolina border. This is where we flooded out our kitchen due to a faulty installation of a new hose. We got hosed and that ended up being repair #3.

Then, oh then, we ended up at Hunting Island State Park in Beaufort, SC. This place was amazing. We could sit on our couch in the RV and look out at the ocean. We loved it here.

This is where Fritz came alive! Fritz is a 16 year old Miniature Schnauzer that belonged to my mom, Evelyn. We’ve had him for 2 1/2 years now and have never seen him act so “young” as when he saw the ocean for the first time! He was like a little kids prancing and jumping and going “WOW, LOOK AT THIS!”. We’ve always known him as this snarky old dude with an attitude (okay, most of that still exists) but when he saw the beach and all that water he went crazy!

The other old man is mine, and he’s pretty cool, too. Seldom snarky! {wink wink}

Before we left Beaufort, we stopped at Kazoobie Kazoos in honor of my friend Ed Hallberg who is a lover of the weird and unusually things you can visit and see in America. Kazoobie Kazoos is the only plastic Kazoo manufacturer in the US. It’s a small place that produces 1000’s of kazoos a year. Check it out at the link below! Here ya go Ed, just for you…

After having to reluctantly leave Hunting Island, we stayed at Fort McAllister State Park outside of Savannah, GA. Our site faced a huge marsh where the sun set every night. The gnats are usually horrible here in warmer weather, but we lucked out and had chilly weather so that kept them away for the most part. It was a very nice park with friendly people (had to get my talking fix in!) ! We love Savannah and spent a morning there having breakfast at our favorite place and walking around while the hose was being repaired on Ms E (remember? Repair #3)

Since Monday we have been at the Kathryn Abby Hanna City Park in Jacksonville, FL. A nice, quiet little spot about 1/4 mile from the beach and a stones throw from a nice little lake where we can sit and watch the sunset. This is where our ferrel cat, Gracie, decided to make her escape. I’m not sure how I managed to do this but I didn’t lock the door properly Monday night and I woke to the door wide open. Rose was sitting on the bottom step, Gracie was gone. Rose came right back in and we haven’t seen Gracie since. I’m worried for her and sad, but if she had to live out her days here, it wouldn’t be the worse thing to happen.

We have just been chillin’ since we’ve been here. Getting organized, making things homey, fixing small things and resting. I have taken very few pictures since we arrived, I will, however, leave you with this one. Thanks for reading! Stay tuned and Happy Trails everyone!

Ready, Set, Get on with it already!

October 23, 2014KatCeg Leave a comment

`<a href="http://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/ready-set-done-5/">Ready, Set, Done</a>`

The Daily Post – 10 minutes of free writing. Hmmm….Since I’ve been in a boot for going on 6 weeks now, due to a broken foot, my attitude has been less than stellar! My apologies beforehand to anyone who has a permanent disability, you have my utmost respect and admiration. I have been swimming in the pity party pool most of the time. This is not something I am very proud of, in fact I like to hide that fact. But, here I am, ready to set things straight.

I am a coward. Straight up baby. I can handle a cold, a hangnail, bad zits, a kink in my back, a bad nights sleep but take away my independence and I turn into a class a “you know what” and I complain and whine like nobody’s business. I’m tired of it all.

I don’t even have a good story for my broken foot.
I would like a story that says I was skydiving in Peru, or flamingo dancing in Spain, anything that sounds more exciting than “I was standing in the driveway and turned to talk to my husband and my foot rolled, breaking my foot in two places”. Honestly, if we have to break something there should be more glory in it!

The boredom kills me, but truthfully, I just got back from a 10 day road trip that included Kentucky, Nashville, Grand Rapids and Ohio. I ate some outrageously good meals, saw awesome family and even had the honor of going to the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville to hear my “pseudo son” play in a songwriters round. Not bad. Not bad at all.

So am I ready? You bet! Set? YES! Then GONE, off on another adventure.

HOLY RETIREMENT, BATMAN!

October 3, 2014KatCeg 1 Comment

Woozers! Today my husband retires after 34 1/2 years of service to his job! 34 1/2 years! I’m not sure how many of us Baby Boomers have been committed to anything that long! Marriage, if you’ve been lucky. Parenting. Maybe even living in the same house. 34 1/2 years. Not that there’s anything wrong with longevity, may we have many good, healthy years left in us, but for this dreamer, parenting my 5 incredible kids has been my longest run.

So tomorrow begins the new and exciting chapter in the lives of two wanderlust filled nearly 60 year olds! It’s exhilarating!! It’s a little scary, but mostly exciting. We’ve had years of discussions leading up to this day regarding what, where and how. We want an adventure and now the time has come!

The “where” part has been the most challenging. We’ve gone from buying an RV and traveling the country to moving to St. Croix and experience island living for a year to Colorado, Ken’s favorite. We’ve been reading books, talking to friends that have gone before us, looking at maps, real estate, blogs, just about any source of information we can get our hands on. We have about 6 more months to finalize things and help my nearly 21 year old to launch and then we’re off.

It’s a bit surreal for Ken, leaving a job he’s been at for most of his adult life. He’s shaking a little but confident. Life is for living, there is so much out there to explore and experience on this tiny planet we’re spinning around on. K & K’s Great Adventures! Stay tuned!

WHY BE MARGINAL?

September 30, 2014KatCeg 2 Comments

May was the last time I pulled up my blog page. Several things kept me from writing. One, I was depressed. Two, I really didn’t think I had much to say (wrong). Third, I don’t want to be marginal anymore.

There is a lot in a name, it says something about us. I first picked “marginally professional” because it was something I’d say when I’d screw up the family picture or couldn’t get my speed light to work well, “Yikes, sorry! You know I’m only marginally professional!”. When I was trying to think up some clever name for my blog that’s all that stuck in my head. Well I am much more than marginal. At least I want to be, and I think I am on certain days.

The last 8 months I’ve been in a slump. Can anyone relate? I have great ideas, great thoughts and horrible follow through. That’s not marginal is it?I broke my foot almost 5 weeks ago and I’ve been stewing about that for 5 weeks instead of trying to tap into whatever creative juices I still have. I think that’s called having a pity party, not being marginal. Right?

So today I started writing again. Right here, right now, with my french press coffee and pumpkin donut. No pictures this time, just words. Is that professional? {sigh} #pathetic

A Tribute to my Mom on Mother’s Day.

May 9, 2014KatCeg 3 Comments

Meet Evelyn Grove Higginbotham, my incredible mom. This picture was taken at her 90th birthday party, 3 years ago, where we gathered all her family and friends together for a 2 day celebration of her life. It was quite the fun time and the picture above shows a little of my mother’s spunk and willingness to be silly and fun. I love this picture, it’s my screen saver on my phone. It makes me smile every time I open my phone. Actually, sometimes it makes me cry. I love this woman. I am her baby girl, her favorite I’m sure. I have an older sister, Dianne, and an older brother, Duane, they are MUCH older. Something I like to remind them of on a regular basis. Why I didn’t get a “D” name? That remains a mystery. Probably because I was an “oops” and by the time I came along they had all but forgotten to keep with the D theme. Up until last year my mom always told me I was planned, their love child. Yea, right. She confessed after many glasses of wine that I was not planned, I was an “oops” but still their love child non the less….in the hippie kind of way I’m thinking. Whatever the case, I felt loved by my parents every day and as time passed my mom became my best friend. It’s Mother’s Day this Sunday. The first I must have without her. My mom left us in October of last year and there hasn’t been a day that’s gone by that I haven’t thought of her, haven’t gone to pick up my phone to call her and then realize she isn’t here anymore. This is my year of “firsts” without mom. I didn’t realize how hard it would be to live without her. I didn’t realize how much I would cry and miss her and want her back. I didn’t realize how much it would break my heart. Thankfully, I have no regrets. Well, there are some. I was a rotten teenager. A nightmarish rebel of a daughter that causes parents to stay awake at night forever ruining their sleep pattern! Mom and Dad were in their 30’s when they had me (oops) and I’m just guessing they didn’t really know what to do with this kid that defied all forms of conformity. Many years later I asked my mom to forgive me for giving her and dad such a hard time. She told me she had wiped it from her memory! Or was that dementia? Oh well, I was off the hook…until I had my own kids, but that’s another story. When offered a glass of wine, mom was famous for saying ” I sure wish I liked wine”. This statement coming from a woman who 2 nights previously had drunk more than 2 glasses! I guess she was just being polite. This statement came out of her mouth a few days after these pictures taken last Easter

Wine glasses in every picture. Red, White. Make no mistake, my mother liked wine! She was hysterical and we loved her with all our hearts. It’s nonsense for me to think that everyone loves their mom as much as I did, but if you still have your mother here on earth and things aren’t the best, work on that. She’s the only mother you’ve got. If it’s too late, just be a better person to your family so they will miss you as much as I miss my mom.

Happy Mother’s Day Mom. It will never be the same without you, but thanks for my really kind of wonderful life and for the memories. I love you.

King for a Day

April 10, 2014KatCeg 1 Comment

Oistins, Barbados

On our travels to Barbados we ventured into Oistins Bay Gardens one Thursday afternoon. Oistins is an active fishing town on the south coast of Barbados and also home to Oistin’s Fish Fry which happens every Friday night. The thing about being there on a Thursday afternoon is that you will likely see few if any tourists, especially people like me with blue eyes and fair skin! My husband Ken and I like to travel out of the box so to say. With caution, I always tell my kids…we want them to think ole mom and stepdad are just keeping to the resort. If you want to taste the local culture and meet new and interesting people, ya gotta leave the box.
This day’s journey led us to Chris. Chris eyeballed us immediately and attached himself to us for several hours which included a tour of the fish market, his favorite fish monger, a shared meal and more than a few “no thanks”. He wanted to sell us anything and everything. After all, he was well-known at Oistins, owned a blue boat named “Blue Boy” and could for a very reasonable price provide us with….whatever. Since he was glued to my side, we just hung out with him and let him pitch his deals. I also got to meet his friend “Dangerous” (Yea kids, mom’s safe…) and carry around his week-long body order on my right shoulder for the rest of the day.
Probably the most interesting part of the day involved a trip to “my” bar. Kathy’s Bar. As soon as Chris found out my name he wanted to take us to “my” bar for a beer (aka, we buy him a beer). Picture this: Two white tourists enter into a dive bar in a small fishing village in Oistins, Barbados at approximately 11:00 am with “King” Rasta Chris at our sides. Sitting at the bar are 3 Rasta men, one Rasta “bartender” (all they served was beer), all wearing sunglasses listening to reggae on a radio. The bartender turns the radio off, they all stop and look at us saying nothing. FINALLY Chris jumps through the door and says, “Hey mon, get my friends here a beer”! Beers are handed out and paid for, no one takes their eyes off us or says a word, Chris says something to them we don’t understand and we exit. It wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when thinking of getting to know the locals, but I got the shot of my bar and we laughed about the awkwardness of it all for some time and wondered if we might be just a little crazy!

There’s a Tom Petty song (those who know me, knew Tom would show up somewhere) called “It’s Good to be King”.

It’s good to be king, if just for a while
To be there in velvet, yeah, to give ’em a smile
It’s good to get high and never come down
It’s good to be king of your own little town

Yeah, the world would swing if I were king

Well that was Chris. Just being King for a Day. Owning his own little town, showing these two numskull tourists around, given us a smile. We went back to Oistin’s the next night, with the rest of hundreds of tourists and locals alike to sample the local flavor of food, music, art and dance. We didn’t see Chris, but I’m sure he was there running his kingdom.
It’s good to be King, if just for awhile.

Driving Ms Evelyn

Going There Doing That

Widgets

Search