me + my autumn sweater

We rolled into town Sunday at 4. Running on 5 hours of sleep (3.5 caught in half of the back of James' CRV [the other half was filled with our stuff. Neither of us remember anything between lying down and the bling of the alarm at 6 am] in the parking lot of a Motel 6, 1.5-ish on the road when we weren't keeping the other awake). Ward prayer, some unpacking (I ate a meal made by humans. I heard James ate a leftover blueberry cobbler MRE). I was up at 6 to finish some stuff up before teaching at 9.

Welcome back to Fall.

Fall is my favorite season. Today I'm wearing an aqua sweater and my blacks. Monday night I got to break out my kitten cardigan. After sleeping Tuesday night Business Kjerstin reemerged and started to work on the to-do list. Work on syllabi. Call the Financial Aid Office. Throw away a year's accumulation of student papers and handouts. Color-code my classes. Etc. etc. etc.


The week before Hawaii was pretty hectic. Graduation+family reunion+prospecti+moving+grading. Little sleep, lots of diet coke (remember when I was off for a minute?). We ended up speeding down to Vegas to make our flight in the middle of the night in the rain. I was chomping sunflower seeds and blasting Marina and the Diamonds and Vampire Weekend, chanting something about being young and reckless and alive. Lucky for us that corridor is made for speeding (if I go 95 from Cedar City to St. George I can make up for the 85 I have to go through the Arizona bit to survive the turns). Lucky for us the Nevada state line brings with it an extra hour and we were both distracted enough to be pleasantly surprised.

We slept on the plane (someone got sick? We had to reroute to LA? If sounds nightmarish and I only sort of remember it happening.) And woke up in Hawaii.

Palm trees! Balmy weather! Abandoned North Shore! We got a house a block away from the beach and spent the first couple of days napping in the sun and in the shade and in the sun.

We ate at Ted's and spent a lot of time at Sunset Beach (with like 7 other people) and swam with sea turtles (I had to step out of their way so they wouldn't wash into me. And they were huge and sad-eyed and adorable). We rode horses on the beach (I got a stubborn blonde who refused to do what I asked) and ate fresh garlicky shrimp and watched a lot of sunsets and picked guava from the tree outside our door for breakfast and did some PCC stuff and spent time in Honolulu and ate sushi and spam.

Hawaii was magical. Gorgeous. Perfect.

It was part one. Part 2 was even better though it was shorter and, um, more physically intense. We got off the plane in Vegas (having left one of our drivers on the island...it's a long story but ended well I think?) in the early morning. Ran to Walmart for food for backpacking and fuel. Ran some other errands (we stopped into Dick's Sporting Goods and almost napped in one of their tents. I bought a sunhat and a couple of water bottles for a dollar and fell in love with the new insulated aluminum straw-ed Camelback water bottle (It's soo pretty.) and decided I need more clothes that wick moisture. Then did we head for the trail? We meandered a bit and got there and packed and on the trail by 6 or so. Hike hike hike. We stayed the night just outside the village (Supai), headed in the morning, found our group, set up our hammock and went to sleep. There were falls and hiking and some brushing of teeth, but mostly mostly we napped.

We camped (illegally it turns out) next to Havasu falls--gorgeous red rock and aqua water and lush viney green out of this desert canyon. We all had hammocks and the people were great. I dunno. So quiet and beautiful.

Hiked out Saturday afternoon. Started driving at midnight or so (if we drive all night we can make 9:00 church bahaha).

And that's the story.

And now fall's here. Hurrah!