Date: 2009-03-26
From: Hiawassee Inn

To: Hiawasssee Inn
Miles today: 0.0

My first zero day!   Ron told me I could come get breakfast anytime I wanted, so I slept in until 8:30 and then showered. Unfortunately, because I got up after everyone else, all of the hot water had been used, and all that was left for me was an icy cold stream! Oh, well. I could take another one later in the day. I stepped outside to see Sam smoking a cigarette. "Good morning, sunshine!", he said. All day long, these guys would call me "doll" or "baby". This was a place where I would be happy to stay. The 9:30 shuttle was about to leave, so I waved good-bye to the boys (Richard, Skip, and Patrick) and they wished me a good rest day. (Skip told me to make a hot bath and soak my feet, but I had a lot of work ahead of me! No time for rest!)   I made a pot of coffee (since Ron had showed me how yesterday), and toasted an English muffin. When Ron saw the peanut butter I put on it, he said "You love your peanut butter...!" (I had done the same with my bagel yesterday). I had a sliver of canteloupe and then a bowl of cereal to top it all off. Ron was thawing meat and finding ingredients for the pot of chili he would make for us ("because it was raining").    Then, I was off to the library! I was allowed to use a computer for 2 hours in one setting, and four for the day, and I typed as fast as my two fingers could. When my first two hours was up, I headed back to the Inn, just in time for a bowl of chili and a hot dog! (In my normal life, I would not eat hot dogs, but I had already lost several pounds in my first few days of hiking and knew I should eat everything I could. If I am this thin now, what am I going to look like in Maine?!). Then, I walked to the post office, where I mailed some extra food and supplies back to Erik. (I mailed myself way too much stuff!). Then, it was round two of writing (documenting this trip is almost as labor intensive and time consuming as hiking it!). Kelly (Snuggles) sat beside me and typed up her trail journal entries in a fury. Boy, can she type fast! I got to a certain point in my journal entries, and then decided I better start labeling my photos, as I had already accumulated many, and the job would only grow... For an hour and a half, I whizzed through my pictures, typing labels and dates for Certain as fast as I could. It was almost like a game of password... If I couldn't think of a label fast enough, I would just type "skip" and move on! At 5:45 pm, the computers shut off, and I headed over to Subway (after buying two more Cadbury eggs at the drugstore) for a 6 inch chicken sub on honey oat grain with green peppers, lettuce, tomato, and a little honey mustard. (When I saw her pick up a cold, processed piece of chicken from the metal container, I wished I had asked for turkey...) I also bought a chocolate chip cookie (they were trying hard to sell me three...(is it any wonder why this country has such weight problems, when one sub and cookie is not enough?!) and picked up an orange juice at the gas station.   And then back to writing in my journal! (I haven't been writing in it each night like everyone else...)      My first week on the trail was a good one, even though it came with its share of trials. My body is bruised, cut, and irritated from the rubbing of my pack straps, and my achilles tendon has given off twinges of pain, (oh, and blisters started forming under my big toes by Neel's Gap- I popped a painful one the morning that I solo camped), but overall, I am happy and healthy, and ready to begin anew tomorrow!