These Days

Hellooo! I haven't found a good, consistent time to write and update this blog.  I am back to daytime work which means evenings are the only time I can post.  It has not been happening because of... TV.=) I've been watching Love It Or List It, Flip or Flop and Property Brothers on HGTV, Treehouse Masters on Animal Planet, Criminal Minds. They show one episode after another and before I know it, it's late.:S  But I'm starting to get my act together. Some updates. We're still in the corporate apartment.  Even though we have found a rental unit (second one because there were "creature" issues with the first unit we chose), the furniture will be delivered only on Friday so we have to wait a few more days before we can finally move.  I anticipate a very busy weekend ahead. We are ready for you, Ikea! We're also still renting a car and might need to extend it until mid-July.  There's a lot of dependency to buying a car here.  We need GA driver

One of the things I appreciate about Atlanta is the greenery.  There are a lot of trees all around and parks for recreation.  Last weekend we went to Piedmont Park on a whim. It was tough to find a parking spot but the park itself was really nice. There's a green market every Saturday. Not as festive as the Salcedo Market in Makati. There a large playground which Neil enjoyed, despite the sun. It would be great to come back and bring Neil's bike.

Sunday of Memorial Weekend, we went to the Stone Mountain to see the laser show and fireworks.  We actually watched the movie X-Men in the afternoon and had naps so it was around 7:30PM when we drove 20 miles to Stone Mountain. I've been here on 2 other occasions and the holiday really made a difference in the number of people and parking.  When we found a place to park, it rained.  So we stayed in the car until the rain stopped. There was probably an hour of wait before the laser show but many people who got wet decided to leave.  Even so, many people stayed and if was a challenge to find a comfortable spot with a good view.

We drove to Rock City after spending the morning at Ruby Falls .  It's a short and pleasant drive as both sites are located on Lookout Mountain.  Rock City is basically a very large garden with walking trails. It was a hot day but we were cool among the large rocks and trees. Lookout point where you can see 7 states. Our last stop in Chattanooga was the  Incline Railway .  We were told that the wait would be long - at least 45 minutes to go down and over an hour to go up.  We decided to stick it out and it actually did not take as long.  After all the walking we did at Ruby Falls and Rock City, standing in line was ok.=) This was a day well spent.=)

Our second weekend in Atlanta coincided with Memorial Day weekend so we planned to venture farther from our neighborhood.  During one conversation, an officemate mentioned the places in other states we could easily drive to.  Chattanooga, TN came up, specifically Lookout Mountain with 3 popular attractions - Ruby Falls, Rock City and Incline Railway.  We researched it and it's 2+ hours drive.  Richard agreed to it and we invited Sally and Anne as well. So we were off to Chattanooga on May 24.  We left the apartment at 8:15AM and arrived at our first destination, Ruby Falls, 10:30AM. I knew Ruby Falls was underground but we were not aware of the 1/2 mile walk in oftentimes tight spaces to see it.  We had to be with a group and they time the entry to control the number or people inside.  Then the space opened up to this.  Beautiful!  Even if we wanted to stay longer, it was not allowed because other groups were coming.  Overlooking downtown Chattanoo