Date: 2010-06-11
From: HARPERS FERRY!!!

To: Harpers Ferry
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: clear sky

Continental breakfast here I come! Fruit loops, bagels, bacon, 2 biscuits w/ gravy! Plenty of coffee and oranges. Trog, Redhat, and Limestone here. I mistook Trog for Limestone the other day because he wasn¢t wearing his booty shorts and knee high gaiters. Updated my journal between the kids playing computer games. Listened to the clerks music. He seems like an angry kid in need of a hobby.Waiting for Funk to wake up to pack my bags. Funk is trying to sleep as late as possible in preparation for his 4 state challenge attempt. 4 states. 43.3 miles in 24hrs. He wakes up around 11am and gives us a ride back to the ATC.Cricket and BooBoo are being picked up and taken to Washington DC.Conan and Backwards were there at the ATC center! So happy to see them again. They instantly seem to me as though they¢d lost weight since I last saw them in Waynesboro. Caught up on our adventures since the last encounter. They didn¢t see a single bear in Shenandoah. Told them that they should have left earlier and hiked later. Extra quiet. Not their style though. They¢re leaving town tonight for the trail. Someone from back home is going out on a 5 mile overnight with them. Their guest is a former Boy Scout. Which isn¢t necessarily bad, but he¢s going to be carrying a ridiculous amount of weight in his pack.I slack around town waiting for Angela to arrive. I instantly feel a nap coming on so I stagger down the busy town streets to sleep under the biggest tree I can find. There¢s a freaking helicopter flying back and forward and hovering over the train tunnel. Practicing rescue maneuvers I guess. Good thing I¢ve got these ear plugzzzzzzz¢¦.Angela texts my phone and it wakes me up. I meet them at the outfitters in town. We catch up as Angela hands me a wonderful letter signed by everyone back home. So many fantastic words of encouragement from former coworkers! They even sent money! Paul Gibbs sent me snacks and goodies! Tom Tlusty sent Crasins! I¢m being taken to Dulles to stay at Residents Inn! When we get there I was speechless! What a fancy hotel! Pool, hot tub, pool table, library, internet, laundry and continental breakfast! They even gave me the keys to my own room! I would have made my bum ass sleep on the floor in my hotel room. Wow! I was prepared to sleep on the floor and would have been happy. Now, I have a king sized bed! Sheets! White sheets! Shower! Frig! Sink! Dishwasher!Best of all was the fact that someone cared enough about me to come all this way just to see me. I feel so appreciative that anyone would do such a thing! We settled in and dropped off my bags and headed for what I¢d been looking forward to since lunch! DINNER!At first I chose Applebee¢s but we couldn¢t find one. We saw ¢Hooked¢ as we were getting directions to Applebee¢s. As I thought about it, I reconsidered and had a lust for seafood. Better enjoy it while it lasts with the oil spill in the gulf coast. We ate at ¢Hooked¢ instead. Live band! Some kind of Blue Moon beer that was pretty sweet. Sesame Tuna with rice and tempura battered shittake mushrooms! Fun conversation about Lish, work and Harriet¢s new granddaughter! They ordered dessert ice cream and cookies. The tuna was rare, like red meat rare! Tasted so good! I wished there were more grilled seafood choices back home. It¢s mostly fried seafood around NC. Talked about the Gulf Coast spill. I¢m so heart broken over this that I can hardly even bring the words out. We limped our way back to the car and arrived at the hotel around 10pm. I absolutely cannot be a sissy and not get in the pool. That king sized bed must wait. All these amenities must be utilized! I did my laundry while using the hot tub timer to keep track of the time. Felt so insanely good! My feet still tingle when I think about it. Totally felt like hiker trash with messy greasy hair and beard, bug bitten legs, dripping wet in the elevator with an older highfalutin couple. I didn¢t have a shirt on or even a towel. ¢I¢m dripping dry, Granny! It¢s all the rage in the woods¢, I thought to myself as they tried not to stare at me.Fell asleep after a shower and some more of the candies Michelle made for me! My two favorites from back at work. Chow mien noodles with peanut butter. The other was peanut butte with Chex mix. Laid in the bed thinking about how privileged I was, I felt overwhelmed with joy! The light from the world was all beaming down on me, I felt like I was in the spot light for one night. Then I realized it was the street light and I had to get out of bed to draw the curtains. I passed out soon afterward while watching a western on HBO.