Oh Atlanta...whatever!

July 18th, I headed down to good ole Atlanta to visit "Cousin Chris"(I put Chris's phone number in my phone under "Cousin Chris", so now I just call her that instead if Chris), who has been living there for about 3 or 4 months now, I think! She actually lives in a suburb of Atlanta so I didn't have to deal with the Atlanta traffic that I had heard about, at least on Friday.
I will give you a little history on Cousin Chris, she and I are about 7 months apart, she's older! :-) Cousin Chris's family lived right beside my grandparents, so when my family came to visit my grandparents, we got to see some cousins.
We were inseparable, more of me just following her around everywhere. If "Chrissy" (she's now grown out of that now), went inside, little Stacy went inside. We did alot together, I don't remember us grandkids getting into alot of trouble, but there is a "sandpit" story that I will tell you sometime, that you will need to hear my version first, right Cousin Chris!
Now, I was supposed to go and visit her about 1 or 2 months prior but I had gotten sick and wasn't able to make it. She had gotten Atlanta Brave tickets and since I bailed on her, I told her I would buy tickets this time.
I had a nice drive down to Atlanta, it took me about 3 1/2 hours to get there and was greeted with a friendly hello from "Charlie" her dog. Charlie, is a black mix dog, I'm not sure what all she has in her, but she was really cute and she sat, rather layed by me on the couch several times during the weekend!
Saturday, the game started at 7pm and Cousin Chris suggestd that we head out about 4pm, that would give us some time to look around in gift shops at the stadium and just hang out before the game. For those of you who don't know Cousin Chris, she is a huge Braves fan, she has been ever since I can remember, so if cousin Chris wants to go to the stadium early, I am in no way going to object!!! :-)
Cousin Chris had seen on the news that there was construction going on that would possibly slow us down getting there, but we figured we are going 3 hours ahead of time, we will be fine! Ahhhh, famous last words!
The information that was given about the constuction, should have been more along the lines of. "Do not get on I-75 South, unless you were planning on parking your car there." That information would have helped us with our decision of getting on I-75. When we got going on it, it didn't seem that bad, but then all of a sudden, we came to the parking lot and sat there for 15 hours...okay, not 15 hours, but let me just tell you that we finally got to the game at the begining of the 2nd inning, yea do the math, we left 3 hours early and got there after the game already started. Does anyone else see that I was in the car the day before for the same amount of time, but I actually was moving and even went into another state. Oh and let me tell you, I was in "another state" as well sitting in the parking lot as well. I was going crazy, but I think I handled it outwardly fine, maybe you need to talk to Cousin Chris about that!
Apparently the brilliant state department thought it would be a great idea to shut down 4 of the 5 lanes and do some paving all weekend long! Now, I am not the brightest bulb in the pack, but I can tell you this, NEVER, would I have thought that this was a great idea. Why, would you want to shut down a major highway, on the weekend and when there is a sporting event at home! I believe my suggestion would have been, "why don't you do this at night, from maybe 9pm to 6am every night for a week or two."
Now, I understand that there were other options that we could have taken and since I was knew to the area and Cousin Chris really hasn't gotten the chance to know the Atlanta area yet, this is really just all of our own fault. But I would still like to blame the state department or who ever makes those decisions, to maybe rethink that idea.
Okay, I am done venting about that now. Even though, it doesn't sound like I had a good time, I really had a great time visiting Cousin Chris and watching the game. I took a couple of pictures, so I thought I would post them.

Star Gazing!!

Back on June 22, (yes I know that it is now August and I am just blogging about June!)anywhoo....like I was saying. Back on June 22, I had the great privilage of volunteering at the Country Music Hall of Fame "Medallion Ceremony" - inducting Tom T. Hall and the Statler Brothers into the Hall of Fame.
I was assigned with another lady to hand out programs to the guest and yes to the stars!
I was asked to be there at 6pm - the ceremony would start around 7pm. When I got there they were having a reception for the inductees and friends.So I was able to do a little "star gazing" while they were eating.
While some of us volunteers were hanging out, a girl, Nicole, that I have become friends with since volunteering at the hall. Comes walking up fast to me and says, I just passed Reba and she is coming this way. Sure enough, just as Nicole had got the words out, there comes Ms Reba McEntire around the corner with her husband Narvel Blackstone, heading straight towards me. I immediately started repeating in my head "Don't say anything stupid, just say hello!" So as she walked by, I said "Hello, welcome!" (Ah, what a relief, I don't have to worry about being escorted out of the hall!!!) She smiled and said "Thank Yu!" That was so neat, I wasn't expecting her at all to show up. I found out later that she was going to be singing "Flowers on the Wall" at the ceremony.
When it was time to start handing out the programs, I was on one side of the entrance of the Ford Theatre. I really didn't think I would have that many "stars" that would come through my line, but I was happily surprised! I got to hand the programs and say "hello" to Brenda "Dynamite" Lee, Ralph Emery, all of the inductees, which I congratulated each of them and they either said "Thank you, hun" or "Thank you, Stacy!" (I had my name tag on obviously), Little Jimmy Dickens, Eddie Stubbs and Kelly Clarkson was even there, I know there were others, but of course now I can't think of them. Vince Gill and Amy Grant as well as Reba McEntire and Emmy Lou Harris, who was also an inductee, but had been inducted earlier in the year with Pop Stoneman (never heard of), went in the other line.
I was so thankful that I got the opportunity to do that, everyone was so nice and it was a "genuine" niceness, you can tell when people are being fake to you and I didn't see that at all.
I could have stayed and watched the ceremony that was being simulcast upstairs in another area, but they were going to honor Tom T. Hall first an I didn't care to see that. I was able to see Vince Gill and Amy Grant sing an old hymn with the Jordonaires. If you don't know who the Jordonaires are, they sang with Elvis Presley.
I headed home shortly after that and was home by 8pm. I heard on the radio the next day that the ceremony went till about 10 or 10:30, I'm glad I didn't stay.