The train was a few minutes late but we ended up leaving around 9:45pm. 
I took along my little black book and wrote notes throughout the day. Here they are, straight from the book:9:45am--Amtrak train to NYC, sitting next to orange lady. Left G'boro at 9:45am.
9:46am--Orange lady's name is Nyga.
10:30am--In Durham. I'm listening to the Counting Crows new album. I will be sitting next to Nyga for the next 10 hours! Nothing interesting has happened yet.
10:30am--In Durham. I'm listening to the Counting Crows new album. I will be sitting next to Nyga for the next 10 hours! Nothing interesting has happened yet.
12:00--I found the dining car! I bought a $4 cheese pizza and a pepsi. There is a lot of room here in the dining car so I think I'll spend some time here. There are two amtrak security guards who are straight off of Reno 911. They are sitting two tables away from me and are talking non-stop about a guy they kicked off the train for smoking--on the train! Seriously one of the guys looks like Donnie from New Kids on the Block. I guess there's not much action on these trains so when something does happen, its exciting to them.
1:24pm--We are in Virginia. 8 hours to go. A guy just sat down at my table. He's going to DC to visit his dad. He said, "Yeah my dad lives down there." I don't why it bothers me but if you're going north, don't say DOWN there.
1:06pm--Ok I was wrong, now we're in Virginia
1:24pm--!!! Reno 911 boy just asked the other guy if allow has two "L"s or one.
1:35pm--Just passed Emporia Country Club--goat ranch!
1:58pm--this old lady in a green coat just sat down at the table next to me and is playing solitaire to pass the time. She has the tiny, tiny Charlie Brown playing cards!
4:52pm--Just learned by looking at her computer screen, that Nyga goes by "Brownsuga". I've been on this train for 7 1/2 hours.
5:06pm--15 min delay, something the Reno boys were working on.
5:22pm--just left the Quantico station and whatever body of water is near here, I'll have to look that up, there are duck blinds everywhere!! I must have counted at least 20 from the train.
Time (confidential)--we are now at Central Station in Washington DC. I saw Marine One (the presidential helicopter) flying over head.
7:57pm--We are now in Delaware. It is freezing on the train and my throat hurts. They don't have any ibuprofren, but I did buy some orange juice.
7:59pm--just took a picture of myself on the train. "Brownsuga" is in the background.
8:03pm--i finally have my own seat in coach class. So there is this girl in bleached blonde hair sitting two rows behind me who has been talking for the past 2 hours on her cell phone. I now know all about this guy named Doug who is dating her roommate. Bleach girl works with Doug and her co-workers want to know if its weird when Doug stays over night. Don't worry, it's not weird, their bedrooms are on opposite sides of the house so she doesn't see him much. I wonder if Doug and Bleach girl carpool?
8:15pm--did I mention my throat hurts? it hurts mostly when I swallow so I started using my empty OJ bottle as a spittoon
9:40pm--I made it to New York!! Time to go see my folks, Jimmy and Barbara.
I found my parents and the first thing I did was get some ibuprofren from my mom! Thanks mom! Then we went to get something to eat. It was about 10:00pm when we got to this restaurant across the street from Madison Square Garden called Lindy's. We waited for a table, sat down looked at the menu, and ran. No, literally we ran! All five of us out the door as quick as possible. They had a revolving door and Jimmy almost knocked Barbara over trying to get out the door. We looked at the menu and the cheapest thing on there was a $19 hamburger!! We then went to this other place that was much more reasonable and good too. While we were eating, my mom realized she left her rain coat in the other restaurant. She said, "oh well, I needed a new one anyway!"
We figured we would go to the bridge on Saturday. We checked into our hotel around 5:00 and decided that since it was so nice (70 degrees and sunny) we would go to the bridge that night instead of Saturday because it was going to be cold on Saturday. We went to the bridge and it is actually pretty dang neat. When we got there, the lady at the desk said, "make sure you stay for our show tonight at 9pm." We had Maddie with us, but decided we would see how she did and decided to stay there until the 9 o'clock show. We sat on these green benches and someone read the Book of Genesis while a light show against the rock bridge was going on. They didn't read the whole book of Genesis, just the story of how God created the earth. While I was sitting there with Kelly and Maddie listening, I was reminded that the God that created the universe loves each one of us. That's a crazy thought, but one that I've been trying to pass along to high school kids for the past 9 years. Next weekend, I'm taking a group of freshmen camping along the Appalachain Trail.
It's kind of a transition weekend for these guys as they have been led all year by seniors at Grimsley High School and this will be my first trip with these guys as their leader. This will be my third group of freshmen at Grimsley since moving to Greensboro in 2002. Last week I met with some of my favorite guys in the world--Todd, Chris, and Eric who were in town for Easter. I was their YL leader when they were in school and now they are each getting ready to be seniors in college(wow time flies!). Each of them is involved in Young Life, either as leaders or working at the camps during the summer. Each of them is spreading this same message of how the God that created the universe is crazy about them. 
Ok back to our trip, we left the natural bridge at 10:00pm. Maddie did great. Kelly and I stopped and grabbed dinner on the way back to our hotel. On Saturday morning we headed to downtown Roanoke. They have a small outdoor market that we checked out and then ate lunch.
We then headed to the Roanoke Star! Its the biggest star in the world built by man. Here are a few pictures. 
One thing I noticed about Virginia. There is a Zoo on just about every corner. The Natural Bridge Zoo, the Roanoke Star Zoo, the I-81 Zoo, the Dodge Store on US220 Zoo(they do have great corn-dogs), the Zoo that is Martinsville-especially on race weekend. Here's a picture of Maddie with a real bear just outside the Natural Bridge Zoo.
No, its not Ansel Adams, its a Charlie Heritage original out my back door!
I was cleaning up the living room last Sunday afternoon, picking up all of Maddie's toys. As I was picking up her toys, I accidentally picked her up and placed her in the toy basket. I kept looking for her and finally I found her in the basket. She loves sitting in her basket now.
Kelly and Madison went to Chick-fil-A and saw Mr. Moo Cow in his pajamas-what if real cows wore real pajamas..
Maddie and I played dodge ball for the first time a few weeks ago.
Speaking of football here's a picture of myself and a few of my friends playing Madden 08 on the nintendo wii...i had no clue what I was doing, but it was awesome. The key to getting a nintendo wii in your own house is telling your wife, "honey, its excercise and we do it together as a team." or so I'm told.
We had a great first Christmas with Maddie Grace! I gave Maddie a dvd of Elmo and friends singing great country songs. I'll put up some pictures of us watching it when we watch it...I told Maddie that it is ok for her to be a country girl but not a redneck (yes, there is a big difference). Country girls like stuff like cows and horses and trucks. Redneck girls like Jack Daniels. Here is a picture of Maddie, riding her rocking dinosaur. People would ask us what Santa is giving Madison and we would tell them, "a rocking dinosaur." Most of the time people would move on to another topic of conversation because they probably thought we were crazy or they would say, "you mean a horse right?" What lil' girl would want a rocking dinosaur. Well here is a picture of Maddie's rocking dinosaur and I say, "what lil' girl wouldn't want a big lime green rocking dinosaur!" 
Is this not the cutest Maddie Grace in the world!! And no, that is not Kelly's garter from our wedding.
My beautiful wife and baby on Christmas Eve. It is a Heritage tradition to eat hamburgers, hot dogs, baked beans, and other stuff on Christmas Eve at my parents' house. I guess we've doing it for a long time because I can't remember not doing it. 
