Wednesday, March 02, 2005

Collide With Nashville

I live on the road. The road has become a good friend of mine over the past two years. Every single weekend, I am somewhere doing something. My boy Grier spoke of this Nashville trip and I was DOWN! Left work a little early on Friday and hit the road. Met Jason and Bradley at the NC Welcome Center and that's where it all began.

Picked up the Howie Day'snew album, "Stop all the World Now." What a great buy. "Collide" became our theme song for the weekend. Lyrics. "Even the best fall down sometimes, even the wrong words seem to rhyme, out of the doubt that fills my mind, i somehow find, you and I COLLIDE." Just a taste! We spent many hours on the road, at one point telling 10 year olds Happy Birthday during a traffic jam. What else were we to do. So we get to Nashville and see Other Cody. We just hung out Friday night so we could be charged up for Saturday. We gained one hour going there because of time change, so that's good! Woke up Saturday, went to eat breakfast. I had the greatest french toast ever. Man! We then went to Centennial Park. If you ever go to Nashville, you must make a visit to this park. It's huge. We just played Frisby and then heard about this "special tree." Well this tree was the coolest thing. It was a magnolia tree in the entrance to the park. We all climbed up this tree and in the top were hammocks! Imagine that. There were at least 5-6 up there. They weren't your typical hammocks. Some great people had made these out of special climbing rope and had woven them together. We all stayed up there for at least an hour. It was a beautiful day. Stevie G joined up with us and I got to meet Stevie G's friend Jesse Lee. We then left the park and went back for some charge up time aka, naps.

Charged up, it was time to hit the town. I have never been so excited to go out on the town. We started out by eating at the "coupe." Fun time and a great atmosphere. Cody's friend Lindley joined us. Wow. Sitting at a table with doctors. Boy did I feel dumb. I'm glad I have smart friends! We left and decided to stop by the BlueBird. Man. We couldn't stay long but next time I'm in Nashvegas, I'm setting up a rendevous there! What a pimped out place. So small and such a good atmosphere. Just sit around people playing guitar and singing their songs. When we left, the girl said, "here is a song about Jesus." Man, we had to leave! So we hit the town.

I know this is a boring blog but Jason covered a majority of the funny stuff and I just wanted to write about things we did. So bore on. Well it was time to hit the town for some HONKEY TONKIN! HONKEY TONKIN is when you just hit the town and go from bar to bar listening to country music and dancing. There are bands playing in every place. We found one we really liked and hung out there. Got smokey and walked outside with Stevie, hung out behind the Opry. Saw Craig Morgan and Miranda Lambert. Holla! Then went back in Tootsie's and experienced something I never have before, among many things. Well, I met "Cool Cody." Cool Cody was the band's cheerleader. He just stood on the stage and danced. He really does give the best high fives, EVER! We listened to so many songs and just sang along and danced with Cool Cody and other "random" people. We stayed up so late and then well, it wasn't over. We listened to country the whole night so it was time for some good ole booty music. We found the Red Iguana. It was fun fun, for a little while, then we saw some things that we could have done without. It was time to leave, haha. Still a great time. They played Michael Jackson, "beat it". WOOOO HOOOO. Great song. We ended our Honkey Tonkin night.

Woke up on Sunday and went to Midtown fellowship. Community church started by a few presby guys. Great church and good atmosphere. Atmosphere of a community church, but a good mix of contemporary hymns and good teaching. I saw 3 Clemson people! How random is that. One walked right up to me and then glanced..."wait, what are you doing here?" Haha. Then I found Michael Gilbert, another friend from Clemson, years ago. Random! Left church, went to eat with some new friends. I realized something at lunch. I'm not saying this in a boastful way either. All my Dillon boyz have such a way of bonding around each other. When we meet people, it's like instant fun. I think because we are so lame and pathetic that people feel sorry for us and the way we talk. We laughed our head off at lunch and of course, we always bring up the point that Jason is going to be a geriatric gynecologist. This usually brings about 10 minutes of good conversation, then laughter. Who says these things!

All this boring blog just to say that it was one of the greatest weekends. I really just appreciate my friends and how much they mean to me. Even as I was typing this, one called to tell me GREAT things the Lord is doing. Community is so important to keep us in check and to encourage. If I ever do anything sketchy, I know I have friends that will call me on it. That's good news. So all this boring blog to say that I love my friends and the Lord.

4 comments:

Ed said...

That's not a boring blog lil' buddy. I like reading about what you did. Now I want to go!

Jason said...
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Jason said...

I enjoyed your blog too Justin. Only way that trip would've been better is if Ed had come too, but I know he had to unpack a lot of boxes. I think you're right on about meeting folks. That was one of the highlights of the trip for me. I sometimes wish I was on the outside meeting us all at once. I wonder what people think. Are they overwhelmed with nerdiness? Do they question our sexuality? Are they just putting up with us out of southern hospitality? Lot of questions I'd like answered. At least we enjoyed it.

Laura said...

Well Jason maybe I can answer that question for you... granted I didn't meet ya'll all in one day but probably in a year. Ya'll are a trip!!! Ya'll are so much fun. Even when things aren't going your way you Dillon boys still know how to have fun. It's awesome how ya'll have stayed so close and now have this tight knit support group or family in ya'lls case. All of ya'lls personalities blend together so well and ya'll bring in tons of friends to your group. That's one thing that's cool about ya'll... you don't discriminate. You Dillon boys really have a special bond that is amazing!! From an outsider looking in.