Surprise Flight to Georgia

Shhhhh....the secret flight to Georgia wasn't even announced to brothers until yesterday so that it would truly be a surprise. Gracie loved this flight since she actually knew she was on an airplane, it was daytime, and she got to look out the window. Still she wasn't very impressed.

After we disembarked, we took the train to the shuttle which took us to our hotel, rested a while, and headed to the track meet. Careful planning kept us using cheap public transportation to get around Atlanta. We hadn't really thought about the safety of riding on the MARTA late at night, until someone at the meet mention it, and it was probably better that we didn't ponder the thought too long. The most disturbing part was actually the mice that were running under the concrete benches in the terminal, right under the unsuspecting folks dozing on the bench, especially after we realized that we were sitting on a similar bench. Oooo, the thought made me stand up and walk around.

Blaise was really excited to see Grace walk over to where he was sitting on the bleachers. I wish I could have captured the look on his face with my camera. Later he even told us with watery eyes that it was the nicest surprise he had ever had. Everything was going great until it started to sprinkle right before his race and then it poured during the last mile. With our umbrella safely packed in our suitcase in the hotel, we threw our coats over our heads, Mark videotaped the steeplechase with Gracie's jean jacket thrown over the top to try to keep it somewhat dry, and generally we were soaked by the time the race was over.

As Murphy's Law would suggest, it stopped raining as soon as Blaise's race was finished, but he got lost in Atlanta on his cool down and all of us were waiting not-so-patiently for him to show up. We thought he was really disappointed in his Personal Record that didn't quite qualify him for regionals, but apparently, that wasn't it at all. He just took a wrong turn.