All posts by hannahviolin

I am a violinist. I also enjoy running, working out, reading, and hanging with my friends and cat.
Southern Road Trip 2018, Travel

Southern Road Trip: Macon “We have mounds too”

This year Louie and I decided to do a road trip around Georgia and South Carolina. Our main reason was to give him the opportunity to get rid of a sailboat he’d had sitting around for various personal reasons. Then I thought, well, we can visit my parents, and I thought Charleston would be fun, then added Savannah, and then the beach, and visiting my friend April in Atlanta, and there you have it: another great road trip! This one was hot and buggy and had a lot of great food, compared to our typical summer trips, but it was nice. (Next year we want to go west, and preferably north.)

So the first step was towing the boat to Macon, Georgia. As always, we work too much, and were too busy leading up to the trip. The day before we were to leave, Louie realized that the tires on the boat trailer just weren’t going to cut it, so instead of setting off first thing in the morning to Macon, he had to go to Wentzville to get new boat trailer tires first! Not a great start (oh, and did I mention it was pouring rain), but necessary.

But we did finally get on the road, around 10 am, I believe. It was still raining, but I’ll tell you, it’s easier to load up a truck for a road trip than a Corolla. It’s harder to drive, and I’m not ashamed to admit I didn’t drive…I probably should have driven the truck after we dumped the trailer, but I was afraid of wrecking it, and I really didn’t want to drive it with the towing. Louie did a fantastic job driving the whole way, and I just sat there looking pretty.

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Louie, inspecting the boat after a few hours of driving. Various parts kept flapping around.

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So we ended up having a very long day—google told us it was 9 hours to Macon, but it took 12 plus a few stops, and we lost an hour, so we didn’t get in until after midnight. I will say I did a lovely job packing avocado egg salad sandwiches for us to eat, so we were able to eat good food along the way without having to stop at McDonald’s or Taco Bell.

The next day we did some sightseeing around Macon with Louie’s relatives (basically). We went to the Ocmulgee National Monument, which is Macon’s version of the Cahokia Mounds. (Side note: everybody we met in Georgia and parts of South Carolina,  after visiting Macon, seemed to have spent some portion of their lives living in Macon…the Macon folks are proud of their hometown! It was a nice place, and probably better to live in than visit, I suppose, though evidently they no longer have a symphony orchestra so that’s less interesting to me Winking smile).

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It was a VERY hot day, which set the tone for the trip. The South in August…I wouldn’t have expected anything different.  Anyway, that’s the visitor’s center which has a very informative museum.

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I have naturally already forgotten it all. This is Louie posing in front of a hut of sorts. I presume this was a reconstruction.

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Unlike Cahokia, at Ocmulgee you get to go inside a mound. This one even had air conditioning! This was behind glass—a recent development, I was told.

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That’s the outside of the mound you can go in! Who would believe there is a whole room under there? Also much cooler and out of the sun (even before the Native Americans put air conditioning in).

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We found this lawn mower really interesting—it’s like a roomba but for lawn mowers. Much safer than going up steep hills on a riding mower, I guess!

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You can see downtown Macon from the top of another mound, the Great Temple Mound. You can also see the Visitor’s Center from there. (One of my favorite things to do at the Cahokia Mounds is to loudly exclaim that the reason the mounds were built was to see the Arch. I actually did this once and people looked at me with horror, and it was a proud moment.)

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This is Louie, out standing in a field. It’s a field on top of a large mound though, so that’s even more impressive.

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Okay, sorry, enough not funny jokes!

After the mounds we had a unofficial driving tour of downtown Macon and then went back to the house to clean up before dinner. We had dinner at a restaurant called Brasserie Circa, which was very tasty—the bread especially was good. During dinner there was a HUGE storm that came through, and there were lots of tree branches down in the neighborhood. The next morning Louie had some paperwork to deal with with the boat and trailer, but after that, we were on our way, heading to Savannah next…and that’s a blog post for another day.

So that was Macon! Short but sweet. It was nice to see Louie’s people there, to see the town, and to drop off the boat. It is hard to transition into vacation mode for us but Macon was a good start.

Random thoughts

Rainy Day

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Hi readers! I’m back home, I survived my two week vacation, and I’m back teaching and trying to get ready for an insane September.

The trip was really neat. It was different than some of our vacations the past few summers but was really fun. I thought about blogging the other day but instead I organized all my photos and ended up ordering a photo book online instead. So I’ll get to that soon. I’ll just tell you the highlights involve staying in a teepee and cheese grits!

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Being back home has its advantages, of course. The cats, easy access to a variety of bathrooms…

I’ve been working hard finalized my teaching schedule for my private students and at Lindenwood. Wash U is still a crap shoot—classes start Monday and I know nothing about my students yet, so who knows how that will work. I have a 5 week run of Evita starting on Tuesday night (1 week rehearsing, 4 weeks of performances) and I’m kind of in denial about how busy I’ll be. I think it’ll be okay: things are always worse looking at them in advance than just doing them. And I’m looking forward to playing the show—I think it’ll be loads of fun and I am working with some excellent colleagues (and I’m not just saying that in case they are reading this, haha!).

It was also nice visiting my parents and my hometown of Clinton, South Carolina. People are always shocked that I grew up in the South, probably because I have no discernable accent and I don’t dye my hair blonde. But I grew up in a town of about 8000 people, in rural South Carolina.

Anyway. I’m off to do a few computer tasks, work out, run a couple of errands, practice, and then teach for 3 1/2 hours. Not a bad day!

Random thoughts, Travel

Treat Yourself

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4 more students and then WOO HOO I’m on vacation for two weeks. Often I say that my vacation is well deserved, but I had so many actual days off over the summer I’m not sure that’s true. Then again, many people have two days off every 7 and still think they deserve vacations…(or maybe they don’t, but you know what, they do!) so…a well-deserved vacation!

I’ve got today off. Louie is out of town over the weekend, so I finished the opera performance last night, then stayed up late finishing a book. (The Visitors by Sally Beauman, which makes me want to visit Egypt and also makes one feel odd about colonialism). I thought I’d sleep in today, and didn’t set an alarm, and woke up at 7:45 am. Which is earlier than I sometimes even get up normally.

Some people tell you that when you have kids you won’t be able to sleep in anymore. I’m here to tell you that it seems to just happen as you age. I used to sleep past 10 am no problem, and sometimes even until noon. I would never wake up before 10 am without an alarm! And now, it’s a struggle to stay asleep past 8, even when I can or even when I need more sleep. The older I get, I realize so many of the things that people tell you about having kids are simply about aging.

But I digress. You know me, I’m preparing for a trip, so I’m reviewing my lists and checking stuff off. This is how I cope. Other things on the docket for today: work out, read as much as possible. I’m taking the day off from violin practice to recover from the opera, and besides, I’m about to go out of town…(arguably one should practice more because of that, but I am not going to make that argument.)

I had a busy week until a few days ago. I had quite a lot of students this week and a couple of interesting gigs, which went really well. On Friday though, I only had a performance at night and a couple of lessons to teach, so I ended up meeting one of my Wash U students for lunch and getting a pedicure. My student is actually no longer my student because she graduated and is headed off to grad school in another city. I had wanted to take her out for lunch in May, but I canceled our appointment back then due to being completely overwhelmed and finally got around to rescheduling. It was great to see her and I know she’s going to do well in grad school. I was going to put a picture of us here but it just keeps being upside down and won’t be correct, so go to instagram if you want to see the picture.

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I also got a pedicure. This is my treat yourself thing to do about once a month (or less, really) in the summer.

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A pit selfie! I played four performances of Nabucco with Union Avenue Opera. It was a very energetic opera, and I really liked the conductor.

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I got the cats a water fountain. Muriel at least seems to like it. I’m not sure if Miles has tried it out yet.

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I’d say Miles is adjusting well to being an indoor kitty.

I feel pretty good about things right now. I’m relaxed, I’m as caught up as I need to be for work. I have mostly accomplished as much as I’m going to accomplish this summer, and I’m okay with that. I’m fairly ready for the fall semester to begin. I’ve got an incredibly busy September because I’m playing a musical show at the Rep and there are 28 performances, plus a week of rehearsals and a few student shows and preview shows too. It should be fun and I’m working with some of my favorite colleagues, but it is going to be a tough month to get through, since we also have a quartet concert and I’ll have my college students starting up. I know I can handle it, but I’m not sure quite how it will work out. So being relaxed now is probably a good thing, because in one month I’ll be really busy.

Another thing I do want to try to do (after September, I think) is try to get more viola playing work. I don’t plan to stop being a violinist ever, but I want to do more with the viola, so I need to work on moving that part of my career forward.

Lots to do! But not right now. Later. After vacation. I just downloaded a bunch of new books onto my kindle (the library is AMAZING) and so I’m going to read and drink coffee now.

Deep Thoughts, Travel

One more week

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One week left of summer work, then it’s off on a vacation…and then it’s fall. I know it’s not TECHNICALLY fall, but school will have started for the kids, and that means it’s fall. This fall is going to be busy as usual, and I think September is going to be the hardest, so wish me luck.

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Until then! I’m trying to get as many things in place as possible. The good news is we’ve settled on a concrete company for the front stairs. And I’ve finished with all my bank switches. There are a few more things that need to be done around the house, but I think I reached all my first tier goals for the summer. The stretch goals would involve getting a giant tree bush trimmed, but quick internet research tells me that this isn’t a good time of year to trim stuff and that that winter is better. I should also research to see what the difference between a tree and a bush is, because if I’m going to find somebody to come out to work on this monstrosity I should be able to describe it. It is a living creature that has taken over the entire space between my house and the driveway, and is probably 20 feet tall and as wide. I don’t even know. Louie used to be able to trim it but he got behind and now it’s becoming a monster. Home ownership is NO JOKE.

I got off track there, however.

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It’s been an odd week. I have millions of thoughts involving an article from the Washington Post regarding my teacher from graduate school. The #metoo movement is powerful, strong, and shows no signs of stopping. I have nothing to report in regards to him, and when I think of things involving my own #metoo stories, he doesn’t really factor in…I also learned so much from him, and I loved studying with him, and I found him very charming and…oh it’s just all so complicated, sad, and awful all around.

One of the things that we are doing on this trip is towing a sailboat down to Georgia. Louie has a sailboat in his possession from a series of complicated events, and we are finally giving it to somebody who will use it more. (Zero is the amount I’ve used it, and he has used it I believe once since I’ve known him). This is exciting, because they say the two happiest days in a boat owner’s life is the day they get the boat and the day they get rid of the boat. Towing a sailboat is no small feat though—I don’t think I’ll be very comfortable driving the truck, but after we get rid of the sailboat then I may need to drive a pickup truck for some period of time. I’ve driven a Uhaul and a 15 passenger van at points in my life, but lately all I’ve been driving are compact cars! The other nice thing about getting rid of the boat is that we’ll have more yard room. We would technically like to start a garden but feel overwhelmed by how to do that (and while, we’d love to HAVE a garden and eat the vegetables and stuff from it, we aren’t sure if we really have the time to dedicate to it.) Do any of you garden? Mom, want to come help organize a garden for us?

My timehop app reminded me that today was the two year anniversary of the time the bear attacked the car in Colorado. If you are a new or occasional reader, you might say WHAT? Read here.

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We’ve had some good summer adventures! We are already looking ahead to next summer, though more in a brainstorming way. I do love planning trips, and I like to think I’m getting better at it. I also like to think I’m getting better at organizing my life and being relaxed and calm, and I’m not sure those things are true, but…life is a work in progress.

I’ve got some fun and interesting stuff happening this week! Over the weekend I was playing Nabucco with Union Avenue Opera and we have two more performances next weekend. In between I’m playing for a mass at St Francis de Sales—it’s something I’ve done before once but is pretty unusual: it’s a mass where new priests are ordained. I’m not Catholic but it’s still a very interesting and unique thing to witness. Then I’m playing a little concert with some colleagues at a retirement home, which is always nice though I’m not always so popular at these places. In between all that I still have 22 students scheduled, so I won’t be lacking things to do.

Last note: who is enjoying this cooler weather in St Louis? I know I am! I wish it would hang around.

Random thoughts

Rainy Thursday

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I have one more week of teaching until vacation…two weeks off then, until the fall semester starts.

I realized this time last year (thanks timehop app) I was updating syllabi and whatnot for one of my adjunct positions. I suppose I should do that before vacation, or I’ll be stuck doing it after vacation. I’ll add that to my to do list for next week, I suppose.

This week has been dedicated to annoying bank errands. Two visits later, I’m almost done with what I was trying to do! It’s going to be awkward when I return to the bank tomorrow for an appointment with a notary for another annoying bank errand…not really, but that WILL be my third visit this week. How do normal people take care of things? I feel like I’m racing against the clock to get my summer to-do’s taken care of before summer is over and the college lessons start up (and the GIGS, my goodness, the GIGS).

It’s a funny day weather wise. It has been cooler all week (yes!) and today it is raining. I guess that’s not terribly funny, except in July I just expect oppressive, crushing heat and humidity.

I was feeling better enough today to finally get back on the workout train. I’d been feeling better probably for a few days but the last two days were just too busy for me to get up earlier to work out (opera dress rehearsals until 11 pm really take a lot out of one). But today felt good and I’m glad to be back at it. I’ve been slowly updating my working out wardrobe as well, so that makes things more fun!

It’s possible that this year will be easier than last year. I am sort of dreading it, but I’m also just sort of gearing up for things to be busier. I know that won’t even really kick in until last August or early September, and I know that I don’t have quite as much on my plate as last fall (well, in some ways I do, in that I’m playing a few more weeks of shows, but not as many solo and chamber music performances). It’s just that this summer has been deceptively easy.

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I appreciate all the comments on my blog! I sometimes feel like I blog just for me, but obviously that’s not the case. I do blog for me, because I like having a record, but I like to put my thoughts out there in the hopes that other people can either relate, or that it makes them feel better about themselves, or perhaps it gives someone inspiration (positively or negatively—as in, be like me, or DON’T be like me) or who knows. There’s certainly a bit of “look at me” in blogging, and everybody says blogging is passe and dead (and so is classical music, so why am I even here)…but I still read a few blogs, I still enjoy writing, and I think it helps! So keep commenting, keep reading, and keep judging and being entertainedWinking smile

Did I mention we are headed to Savannah and Charleston soon? (Among a few other places. ) If you have any must do suggestions, please let me know! We are also visiting family, friends, and the beach. I’m very excited.

Random thoughts

Monday Thoughts

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I had a busy weekend and I was dealing with a head cold the whole time, so I took this morning off to just relax. I had some errands to run in the afternoon so I did that and now I’m back, killing time until I have a rehearsal tonight.

It’s a busy week ahead, but I’m looking forward to it. I’m still a little worried about being overwhelmed in the fall, but I’m trying to stay positive and organized. I’m coming to terms with some things in my head, and I think after another year I might make some tweaks, but I can do it!

I sometimes think about what the future will bring. I have done a lot of different things in my career so far, and anytime I think I know the future things tend to change. I’ve been in St Louis for about 10 years now, can you believe it? I’m still considered “new” because I didn’t grow up here, but that’s almost as long as I lived in my “hometown” before college started! Louie and I occasionally ponder if we should stay here or consider moving elsewhere, and while I won’t be repeating my earlier mistakes of moving for a guy without a financial guarantee from him, I don’t want to live my life in fear of making mistakes! I haven’t in the past, and while I find myself wanting to be more cautious as I get older (isn’t that normal?) I still don’t want to be afraid to make any changes.

I know this is vague sounding, but it’s vague just because…I don’t have any concrete plans. Right now I’m just trying to figure out how to keep my stress levels down and how to have some semblance of a life while I’m working. I used to worry about work-life balance, now I feel like I’m so far tipped towards work that life went out the window. I don’t feel that I have close friends like I used to—I know that everybody says this is normal as we all get older and we are paired off—but I also see that many people I know seem to have close friends still, so I know it’s possible. Maybe it’s not possible for me, or maybe I’ll have to settle with a few decent friends rather than really close ones I can discuss hard topics with, but I can dream!

I went by the library today to renew my expired library card, but I couldn’t find it so I assumed I had left it in another wallet. A little later I did find it, but “renew library card” is still on my to-do list. I did get to the bank, though I have to go back later this week for another task, and it’s possible what I did at the bank won’t work so fingers crossed. (Transferring from one IRA to another…there were difficulties, which made me glad I enlisted help rather than doing it myself!)

Now the choice: what to do with the rest of the afternoon? Practice, read, clean? I think I know the answer to that one. Remember, I’m still getting over a cold and I already cleaned the upstairs thinking I was going to teach (student got sick).