Everyone around here is really in the Christmas spirit; excited about celebrating the birth of Jesus. I have heard a lot about Jesus at the house and decided to throw a party so my friends could also learn about Jesus and how he came to help us understand how to live.

I invited several friends over and we ate and ate. Then, we sat on the couch and talked about Jesus and how much He loves us.

After that big meal, we decided we needed to go for a walk. I had heard that there had been a really big event in Tallahassee. One of the big hotels downtown, the Prince Murat, had just replaced its old sign and put up a new one. So, we set off on our walk to go see the new sign.

We set off and walked and walked; it was further than we thought it would be. But, it was really worth it; wow, what a sign! After we had spent a while looking at the sign, we realized how tired we were. Lucky for us, we found out that the Prince Murat offers a special room rate for one hour. So, we pooled our money and rented a room for one hour to rest. Then, we walked back home and had dessert; it was a great day.

In early November, I got a chance to go to North Carolina with Andrea & Alison's Mom & Dad to see the leaves change colors. I have seen that red maple outside the living room window change to a beautiful red before but I heard that in North Carolina, whole mountains look like that but with shades of orange and yellow and red.

When I got there, the trees were indeed beautiful. One day, I went hiking and found some huge rocks. Alison had told me about a sport called bouldering where you climb around on a rock so I gave it a try; didn't do too badly for my first try. A little later in the day, I was hiking a little higher in the mountains and came across a sheer ice wall. I decided to try to climb that too but it was a little slippery and I did not get very far on that before I came sliding down again. Still, it was fun.

After going to North Carolina, we stopped in Knoxville to spend Thanksgiving with Andrea & Alison's grandmother; we call her Grammie. Grammie was glad to see us and fed us a great Thanksgiving lunch.

On the following Saturday, Andrea & Alison's Dad & Mom got an invitation to tailgate for breakfast before the Tennessee - Kentucky football game with Andrea & Alison's cousins - Reggie, Melinda & Nathan. I tagged along and we had a fantastic breakfast. They also had one extra ticket and so Alison & Andrea's Dad and I (Trolls don't have to have tickets) sat with cousin Nathan at the game. As we walked to the game, there was a huge crowd; there sure are a lot of those Tennessee fans. On a beautiful autumn Saturday, those fantastic Tennessee Volunteers were victorious and we had a great time.

The rest of the weekend we spent raking leaves at Grammie's house. Then, we went to Nathan's new house and helped him paint. It was a great trip!

One of the places that I had heard about in the Outside was a place called Sunland Hospital. Sunland is an abandoned hospital building. The hospital has been empty for several years and apparently some of the high school kids go there and sneak around in the dark, some even say it is haunted! The decision has been made to tear the old building down.

Since it is getting close to Halloween, I decided this would be a good time to go see this part of the Outside. When I got there, I saw that they had already started tearing down the building. There was a fence there but I used my climbing skills and went over the top.

I did not see any ghosts or ghouls but, several times, I think I heard some mysterious noises. I also noticed that a lot of people had written their names on the walls but I won't repeat those since it could get someone in trouble. I came home in the wee hours of the morning satisfied that I was beginning to know my way around the Outside. Little did I know that there was a lot more to the Outside than I thought.....

Today there was a big celebration at the Happy House! Andrea & Alison's Mom & Dad are celebrating 34 years of marriage -- 34 years! What a great adventure they have enjoyed together - and, it's only just begun. They say that having Jesus as the center of their marriage is what has made it so good.

Well, let me tell you about about what I did this summer after I returned from Hawaii with Jay & Jarred (see earlier blog).

Alison's Mom & Dad were so missing Alison that they put together a trip to California and invited me along. I was excited because I had really been missing Alison too.

We got up early on a Friday morning in August and headed to the airport. We flew the day after a security issue dealing with liquid explosives came up at the London airport and so we knew that we needed to be early to the airport for security screening. We were a little delayed leaving Tallahassee and so we ended up taking a different flight arriving in San Francisco instead of Sacramento. But, that was OK because that is where we were meeting Alison anyway.

We got to San Francisco and met up with Alison and then took a walk down to Fisherman's Wharf. We got a view of Alcatraz from there and saw some other sites like the Hard Rock Cafe, curvy Lombard Street, and this bakery that had some of the best bread.

Later that night, we took in the night life in San Francisco. My favorite was stopping to get some chocolate at Ghiradelli's - they gave away free samples!

Saturday morning we got up and prepared to head out after a stop to see the Golden Gate bridge. The first place we stopped to see the bridge was from the west side of the bridge. There is a beach there and we saw dolphins playing in the water as we walked closer to the bridge. Oh - one other thing we noticed was that the beach we were on appeared to be a clothing-optional beach. Even though it was August, it was pretty chilly, even with your clothes on! Those guys were getting more windburn than sunburn that day.

Next we drove to the east side of the bridge and got the official tourist view of the bridge. We had a clear day so we got a good look at the bridge. Then, we were off to the mountains.

We drove to Lake Tahoe where we spent a few days enjoying the beautiful lake and the mountains around there. One day we went on a nice hike along the Tahoe Rim Trail.

Around the middle of the week, Alison showed us some of the beauty of the Yosemite area. We went to Mammoth Lakes and then into the east side of the park through Tuolomne Meadows. The ride to the park was gorgeous as we climbed higher and higher in the car. The views were fantastic. One place we stopped, we could see El Capitan. We spent some time in Tuolomne Meadows which is beautiful. We hiked to a high mountain lake named Budd Lake. In August, it still had snow and ice along the shore. Being from Florida, I had only heard about snow so there I was making snow angels and running in the snow. Alison even helped me make a snowman. The glacier was so blue in some places that it almost matched my hair.

That night, Alison took us to the famous Mobil station across from Mono Lake for dinner. What kind of food did they have at the Mobil station? Well, it was great. I had a chicken sandwich that had one of the biggest chicken breasts I had ever seen - tasty, too - not bad for a gas station. After dinner, we camped behind the Mobil station and next morning, we went to the Mobil station restroom to brush our teeth, etc. and get ready for the day.

Next we hiked to beautiful McLeod Lake where we ate our breakfast. Then, we met up with a friend of Alison's and hiked to Ruby Lake. Along the way there was a chain of several lakes. Wow, is that a beautiful part of the country!

As we headed back to Lake Tahoe, Alison took us by a natural hot spring and we soaked in it for a while. From Tahoe, the next day, we took a little tour of Carson City, Virginia City and Reno.

As we ended our week, Alison introduced us to a friend who joined us for the rest of the week. He was a really nice guy. He went with us on a hike near Lake Tahoe and we took in an outdoor Shakespeare play on the shore of Lake Tahoe. On our last day there, we all took a boat ride on Lake Tahoe. Then, we had lunch together and said our good-byes.

That Alison is a really good travel guide. She showed us some fantastic sites and I think it may have been one of our best vacations ever. Of course, the best part of all was getting to spend that much time with Alison; she is fun to be with.

It has been such a busy summer that I have not had time to update my blog but now that autumn has arrived, I am trying to do some catching up.

One of the big events of my summer came when a couple of good looking adventurous brothers named Jay and Jarred invited me to go with them to visit Hawaii. Jay & Jarred are a couple of most eligible bachelors in Tallahassee though they are both off to college out of town right now. They had heard about my desire to learn how to surf and knowing what a fun person I am, invited me along. To save money (you know how broke college students can be), I traveled in a suitcase instead of paying for a seat. We were a little concerned about those TSA baggage checks but I made it through screening.

Being natural athletes, it took us no time to master surfing on the North Shore of Hawaii. The waves were huge! The photo below is a little hard to see but that is Jay on the board and I am riding on the very front of the board.

Our trip was not all surfing. Sometimes, we just lazed around on the beach. One day we went to the zoo and for some reason, they had a statue of the famous Indian Ghandi there - what is that about?.

We had such a great time in Hawaii surfing, learning to hula (Jarred was really good at it), playing the ukulele, climbing volcanoes and just enjoying the weather that it was hard to leave. But, when we stepped off the plane, Tallahassee and home looked really good.