Good morning! It is 8 a.m. and everyone has terrible, terrible morning breath. It is Audrey here, site leader for New Orleans.
We all met up at Stankowski at 5 a.m. on Saturday. Eliot and I had budgeted about a half hour for the people who would miss the alarm clock, pack too much or bless us with their crankiness by not being a morning person. To our surprise, however, we drove on to I-70 at 5:12. I was immediately asleep in the back seat by 5:13, and woke up at our first rest stop South of St. Louis. Eliot took the first shift driving and did a great job. Mariah sat in the front because she gets car sick, but after her first Dramamine, Tori took over as co-pilot.
The day went by fast. The girls got along great, lots of laughs and no farting! I'd like to thank Eliot for his energizing playlist…I'll be getting that on a flash drive as soon as we get back. Lunch was in Jackson, Miss. where half the group enjoyed Taco Bell and the other half crossed the street to Subway. It was 80 degrees and enough breeze floated by to take away the dew of humidity. Sorry Eagle Butte and Detroit.
At five we stopped in a sketchy little Shell gas station somewhere in Mississippi. We had told our bunk house in NOLA that we would be there around 9 p.m., but the gas station attendant told us we had about a two hour drive if we head straight on 55. Sometime after that we stopped to get a picture in Kentwood, La. BRITNEY SPEARS WAS DEFINITELY THERE!!
Once we were at our bunk house I was pleasantly surprised. Hard wood floors, two bathrooms and a spacious kitchen for all of us. I was honestly expecting army barracks so I think I can handle this. I'm sitting on the deck right now and enjoying this beautiful weather. I haven't seen enough of New Orleans yet to love the city, but I for sure love the weather.
We did get a bit lost on our way to get groceries. Everyone was tired, hungry and sick of being cooped up in that van. We made it to Walmart eventually, grabbed some more fast food for supper, and made it back to the bunk house by 10:30. We showered and were all in bed by 11:30.
We don't all know each other or our quirks quite yet. But as a site leader, yesterday was encouraging. I was worried about being in such tight quarters, but so far so good. I'm excited to start volunteering, too. We all obviously have something in common if we chose animals as our issue preference. We already have something to bond over, and I think once we become attached to our rescue shelter then we will have a kind of passion we can share and have memories with for the rest of our lives.
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