Incremental updates from Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Left: Me Right: Peter, in our little work area
March 24 2006
The “hatch” door
We went to a LOST party with a few friends, I’ll have photos and information about the great time we had when I have a little more time.
We were greeted by a great door decoration, made to look like “the hatch” from LOST. It looked like Ivan and Andrea put some serious time into it.
March 25 2006
11:15am: We’ve made it to North Carolina and met up with my brother and his family for breakfast. We drove to North Carolina through the night, after the LOST party. I’m going on hour 36 of being awake consecutively.
Jessica Corinne Devroe
Peter and Jessica
11:30am: Heading off to the Hanes Mall.
4:50pm: I failed. I tried to stay up while my brother and his wife looked at a few potential homes today. After about three or four houses I ended up falling asleep in the back of the van.
Now, we’re off to find some good pizza and some beer and get some sleep.
7:25pm: Just finished some great pizza and lager. Pete and I had to drive around for what seemed like forever to find a pizza place around here. Now we’ll just be drinking and then getting some shut-eye.
7:40pm: We gave Peter an older digital camera that we had so that he can take whatever photos he wants. Here are some highlights.
Eliza & Jessica
Jessica
Too many pictures!
Peter’s Dad Peter
Sawyer
GOTCHA!
Eye ball
It’s Peter
Peter Zachary’s photos
Peter shooting
He had a great time taking pictures, and took over 100 photos so far. I’m keeping his photos separate from mine, so I’ll be able to post a majority of them later.
March 26
Click to view video
11:30am: We ate some breakfast in the hotel, the normal continental type breakfast. Then, found out that our door key didn’t work to our hotel room. After a few trips back to the Lobby, a maintenance man came up to fix the door. Turns out we locked ourselves out by locking the dead bolt inside, and going through the middle door.
Long story short, the maintenance man Enrique was almost finished unlocking the door with his tools when Peter used a credit card to get in through the middle door – much to Enrique’s surprise.
Peter recorded a few videos while we waited in the hallway for Enrique to come up.
5:30pm: We visited the local congregation here this morning, then we went to see one potential home for Peter and his family. Very nice place, it is definitely on their list of potentials.
We’re going to eat some Japanese tonight. Not sure where yet, but we’re calling around.
7:45pm: We just got back from our reservation at Kabuto. My god Japanese food is good! We all ate way more than we should have. But the hibachi is definitely fun.
A big flame at Kabuto
After dinner we hit up Carvel for a little ice cream before making our way back to the hotel. We’ll relax and take it easy tonight, because tomorrow Peter and Melanie have a ton of houses to see, and I get to meet Mike Rundle.
10:30pm: Just played poker with my brother and took him for everything ever had, his firstborn, oh yeah and his soul! In all fairness, he was drinking and I was not.
Now Peter, Melanie, and Eliza are playing Yahtzee and we’ll all be playing ‘Hand and Foot’ shortly.
March 27
10:15am: After Eliza and I destroyed Peter and Melanie in the first two rounds of hand and foot, we decided to call it a night. We’ll end up playing the second two rounds tonight. I think we got ‘em though.
Had some breakfast this morning with the family before Peter, Melanie, Peter Z., and Jessica headed out to do some house hunting. Eliza and I stayed behind for a little rendezvous with Mike Rundle, who just happened to turn 23 yesterday.
I was looking through Peter Zachary’s photos this morning, and it’s really cool to see things from his perspective. Here are a few more highlights of the photos he took yesterday.
Colin’s sock
From below
Uncle Colin
Funny face!
Photos from Peter Z’s perspective
4:45pm: I met Mike Rundle. I feel dirty now. Like rubbing up against a wall of “wet paint”, you’ll never get it all off. 
Mike Rundle and I plot our course
Eliza, Mike, and I headed to the local TGIFriday’s and scarfed up some grub. Afterwards we tried to find a local coffee shop to chit-chat, but after doing like 10 illegal U-turns we decided to give up. We ended up chatting for a few hours in the hotel lobby.
It was great to finally meet one of my team members.
8:20pm: Talk about gourmet. We hit up the local Wendy’s for some good eats tonight (since everyone was tired and we just wanted to chill tonight). Hopefully we’ll finish our game of hand and foot, so Eliza and I can came true victory!
We also managed to get a quick family portrait done in the hotel room.
The entire group
Jessica smiling
9:00pm: This weekend was the first time I ever met Jessica, my niece, and I don’t mind saying how much of a bundle of joy she is. She’s an extremely good baby, and very well tempered. She gets along with Aunt Eliza much better than she does me, but then again who doesn’t?
I can’t wait to be able to spend more time with her, and Peter Z. in the future. I’d have to say that is the biggest drawback when living far away from family – missing out on the children’s lives since they go by so incredibly fast.
March 28
8:00am: Good morning! Peter, Melanie, Peter Z., and Jessica just headed out the door to travel south back to their home. We had a short, yet great, visit with them here in North Carolina.
Now, we’re off to Sterling, Virginia to Eliza’s cousin’s house to visit with them for today and tomorrow. Can’t wait to see Anthony and Matthew and how they’ve changed since we saw them last. It is going to take us about 5 1/2 hours to get there. Lets hit the road!
3:15pm: We made it to Wendy’s in Sterling, Virginia. We’re going to hang out here, play with the kids, eat something, watch American Idol.
9:15pm: We got some pizza and some beer and watch American Idol. American Idol was absolutely atrocious tonight. If the performances tonight were the first performances that the contestants gave, they’d have never made it this far. But what do I know? I had too much beer.
March 29
5:20pm: Home sweet home. We left Eliza’s cousins around 10am and hit the road. Traffic wasn’t too bad, the weather was perfect, and we couldn’t have had a better time.
Now, back to the daily grind.
8 Comments
We are having a great time!!!!!
HAND & FOOT!!!!! I love it. I thought it was something my cousins made up. But other people play it! yay!
Obviously, I think Hand and Foot rules. =)
Nice “live blogging”
hope you guys enjoy the rest of the days as much as you have so far
“worthless. worthless. worthless.”
ahahaha
I’m the guy on the left
It was good meeting you too homie, now let’s get back to work haha.
What did you think of North Carolina? Hope you enjoyed your trip. I live over in Durham, which is next to Raleigh.
Nick: That is right next to Rundle. North Carolina is ok. I much prefer the Outer Banks area than Winston-Salem, Greensboro area. Though, Rundle says he loves it near Raleigh.
That first picture looks like you guys are playing chess, from your laptops.
4 Trackbacks
[...] For anyone that is wondering where I’ve been for a few days, I’m live blogging from North Carolina. See ya in a few days. [...]
[...] I am currently in North Carolina visiting my brother while he house-hunts, and Rundle lives only one hour from here. So, he hopped in his hot-rod and made it over here for lunch today. [...]
[...] The below is written incrementally during a trip the Seneca Lake, one of the Finger Lakes in the state of New York. Eliza, Chris, Andrew and I are going to be enjoying some wine, and food while we’re up there, so you might as well enjoy it right along with us. I had so much fun doing it the last time, that I figured I’d do it again. [...]
[...] It isn’t often enough that the friends we create in this online world are met in real life. Earlier this year I was able to meet with Mike Rundle, and now I’ve finally gotten to meet another Mike. [...]