we're not dead

friends and followers,

i (it's still ashley) know that this blog has been severely neglected lately, but I wanted to assure you that we are alive and well and missing all of you so so much.

I am sitting in Nashville, TN across from Matt who is SO CLOSE to submitting his first, second, and third application to grad schools. He will soon, officially, be on his way to figuring out what happens in our brains. We've been working on his applications quite a bit for the last few days.

last night we did make it out to the Grand Ole Opry! We we're the youngest people in the audience by AT LEAST 120 years - actually, you can include the performers in that as well. It was a fun show though, lots of old country music. The Christmas parade in Nashville was at the same time which was a little sad. We've been in the Homestead Studio Suites - long term hotel rooms with kitchens and work spaces - it's been great for productivity!

Before we got to Nashville we went on quite a Civil Rights tour - from Memphis where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel before a Sanitation workers strike, to Little Rock and central High school, to Jackson, MS, to Selma, Al where we drove the 50 mile Voting Rights March to Montgomery, where we saw where Rosa Parks was arrested, the home of Martin Luther King Jr, and the Civil Rights monument to Birmingham and 16th st. baptist church where the Birmingham marches took place and thousands of young black marchers were attacked with water hoses and police dogs.

I couldn't blog during those visits and days. I hope that the next few days I will write more - we met wonderful people and have great stories and learned SO much - it was just an awful lot to take in at once. Yea. So - more about that to come.

We're headed now to KY to visit Matt's cousin and his wife and two little boys. After that we're headed to Asheville to visit my cousin and then to Hillsboro, WV to visit a college friend. We'll in Philly/NY on the 10th!

some logistics

#1. We need to name a dog Cornelius. It's a Regier family name, as we found out at the cemetery in Henderson, NE (and not suitable for humans in this century).

#2. We're nearing the end of the road trip potion of our adventure year and are thinking about the following itinerary: Memphis, Little Rock, Jackson, Montgomery, Birmingham, and Nashville before we visit family and friends in Kentucky, North Carolina, and West Virginia. Any thoughts or advice on those places?

NEWS!!!

Before we tell you about New Mexico and Oklahoma and Thanksgiving (we're safely and happily in St. Louis now) we must update you all on some VERY EXCITING news!

We have just bought plane tickets for January 1st to St. Johns island in the caribbean where we will be moving to work and play from then until the end of April. We've not gotten luxurious or high powered jobs, but they are ones that will allow us to live for cheap in a ridiculously beautiful and warm place for a few months. Our travels plan will continue when we return.

We'll be in the NY area from the middle of December until Christmas and would love to see you to say "see ya later, we're going to the beach!"