Getting Out Here - Part 2

The furthest I had driven eastward in a car was close to Rawlins, Wyoming where Martin's Cove is. I had been there a couple of times between going with my family and going with our stake for Pioneer Trek, yet these trips were always made in the dead of Summer. Wyoming in the dead of winter, however, can be a brutal place...which suddenly made me appreciate those Pioneers even more.

Day 1

The first leg of our trip consisted of a lot of fog...it's very dull weather to drive in. We'd stop now and again to get food and gas, but we mostly just munched on all the treats Judy had packed for us. We listened to a lot of podcasts, including Dear Hank and John, Ear Biscuits, and Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me, and that definitely made the time pass much more quickly. 

We passed the portion of the road where Bill had been in an accident years earlier when hauling a trailer out to Pennsylvania for a trade show. A FedEx truck was off the road close to the same area when we passed by, but at this point we weren't nervous. 

Really, our trip was rather uneventful until about the last 90 miles of Wyoming...which Aunt Nadine had warned us about. It came out of nowhere! There was a light flurry of snow and then suddenly all the Wyoming road signs were flashing and warning people to slow down and drive cautiously in these winter road conditions. The semis started to back up and red brake lights dotted the highway. Although the snow wasn't terrible just then, the wind picked up and it got cold. Black Ice. 

It was slow driving for the next little while. We pulled off at a gas station because we weren't sure we'd have enough fuel to make it to Laramie at that point. It was a station in the middle of nowhere and they had a bright pink and purple hallway leading to the bathrooms. Although I was initially disturbed by their choice of paint color...I later realized that the station was owned by an Indian family - and suddenly all the decor design choices of that station were made clear to me. I kicked myself for being so quick to judge and to comment. A lesson I am constantly learning! 

My car on the U-Haul dolly was all iced up. The sun had officially set. And it was up to us to make it to Laramie in the dark. I'm so glad I can trust in Bill's driving abilities! Just a few miles left to go before we could call it a night.

We pulled into a rest-stop that had a delicious place to eat called "The Iron Skillet" and we made ourselves quite comfy there. As we were sitting, Bill realized this was the same restaurant that they had stopped to eat at after his traumatic driving-off-the-road-experience all those years before. He pointed out the table where they had sat and how he basically broke down and cried the last time he was there. It's amazing how much detail and information your body takes in when your adrenaline pulses through your system. Bill's memories were vivid, and although it was a frightening experience for him then, it was nice to share a glimpse into his memories. 

We stayed at the same hotel as a snowmobile club. We passed many people in the halls dressed in snow gear and branded clothing. They had matching trailers and trucks out in the parking lot as well. When we ate breakfast and planned our travels for that day, we overheard all their conversations discussing the same thing - where to ride that day.

As a side note: I mentioned in my last post that there were some items that the moving company wouldn't take and left it up to us if we wanted those things in Iowa. Among these items included house plants. I have these three plants that are all sentimental in some way - an orchid from Bill, a plant from Greg when I graduated USU, and a plant from my Higley family when Ben passed away. I really wanted to take them with us, so we thought we'd give it a try. As is obvious, house plants don't do well in the cold. We needed to cart them inside each of our hotels with us like little pets each night...and I prayed that they would survive. They seemed okay at the end of day one.

Day 2

It was like a switch flipped when we got to the Nebraska border. The weird wind and snowy and icy roads immediately vanished. We were suddenly able to cruise along without a care in the world! 

We stopped in Sidney, Nebraska to stop and say we've been to the headquarters of Cabela's. We really did it just to take a picture to be able to send to Kyle later. We literally walked in and walked out...and went and got lunch at a swanky Subway across the street. Everything has a woodsy theme going on in that town, and I very much adored it. Antler chandelier and all!

We drove and we drove and we drove that day. We learned that Ethanol is viewed as an "enrichment" to your gas in the Midwest, where it seems heavily frowned upon back home. (Bill was outraged! Haha.) Our goal for the day was to get to Omaha that night so we could stop by and see the Noker family! In all their years of living in Nebraska, I had never been able to visit them at their home, and now was our chance. :)

We hadn't used a GPS at all up to this point. You can really get to Iowa City just by following road signs the entire way. But when it came time to making sure we got off on the right exit to get to Nadine and Marshall's home our GPS was spazzed out. It said we had overshot past their house by an hour and I panicked! No! No! No! How could we have overshot? I thought they lived right by Omaha? How did we miss them? 

Bill and I were frustrated and I pulled out my phone in hopes that its GPS would tell us something different. We hurried to pull off at an exit and lo' and behold, the sign at the exit said "LaVista turn Right." ??? The GPS finally caught up to us and we didn't need to backtrack! We had miraculously turned off on the right exit. Blessings.

We followed the GPS's directions to the Noker's home and finally pulled up around 8:30 that night. It was so nice to sit and visit with them after a long day of driving! I sat next to Liz who was knitting some leg warmers for Hannah. And Ben, Marshall, and Nadine sat on the couch as we all talked together. Bill got his doggie-love from Freckles and the stress we had experienced minutes before was immediately dissolved. We talked about family and what to expect living out in the Midwest. Marshall showed me that some of our pioneer ancestors lived in some of the very places Bill and I will now be calling home - Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. It was really cool to have family ties to this "faraway place." We talked until 11:00pm and headed on our way to a hotel when we found out Marshall had to drive the basketball team to their game early in the morning! 

Walking from their front step to our our car was like ice-skating. A thin layer of ice developed on the driveway and on the street. I finally grasped why it was so dangerous to drive on snow days if this is what was on the road beneath!

We drove to the hotel a couple of miles away, and carted my planties inside out of the cold. We then proceeded to stay up waaaaayyyy too late working on trivial things. I had been making little videos through Snap-Chat in an attempt to document our trip and to share it with family as we went (posted at the end of this blog). But the app was struggling! The deal is, after 24-hours, Snap-Chat starts to delete your "stories" or videos that you have uploaded...and I wanted so badly to download my full-day's video before parts of it were deleted, but nothing was working. Eventually I found a solution that got the job done...but it was really late/early. And I was grumpy and tired. When I woke up the next morning, I discovered that there must have been a glitch last night - Snap-Chat worked fine. Even though some of my stories appeared to be deleted by this point, they still managed to download on to my phone and all my struggles and worries throughout the night were in vain. I was bummed again.

Day 3

Leaving the hotel at this point is now where we experience our first blast of cold. Like...COLD. Like...I-want-to-die-right-now-COLD. Utah definitely gets cold - having lived in Logan for a few years, I thought I was prepared for what everyone had warned us about. But NOTHING could have prepared us for that. IT HURT to walk outside. The windchill is brutal in the Midwest...and my concern for my planties went up exponentially. 

We crossed into Iowa a few minutes later with a total of five more hours to drive until we reached our destination. All things considered, this trip was passing by quickly!

We ate a Denny's that had stained glass windows with cows on them. That was cool...and unique...and seemingly Iowan.

It was lovely to drive through Iowa with its endless rolling hills. The road follows the curvature of the land and rises and falls with the hills, rather than cutting through it. It was nice...and maybe a little headache inducing at the same time. But definitely beautiful. 

And before we knew it, we had reached our destination of Coralville, Iowa!!!

We stayed at a Hampton Inn in Omaha, and it was very posh and not overly priced. So naturally, we decided to stay in a Hampton Inn again here in Coralville...and we were less than enthused about our hotel stay this time around...

We got my car off the U-Haul dolly (and found my front Aggie's license plate had gone missing...?) and returned the dolly to the nearest location. We were both pretty tired at this point and Bill was feeling less than stellar. We picked up a Domino's pizza and stopped at a Wal-Green's for some medicine so that we could go back and crash for the night in our hotel. 

The thermostat in our hotel room was stuck at 80 degrees. Despite how frigid and awful cold it was outside, one cannot sleep comfortably in such a warm room. So maintenance came in and we got moved to the next room over. The windows whistled from the wind. Every time the heater turned on, a sneeze-fest ensued. The tiles in the bathroom were all cracked. Oh! And our pizza was cold by now and the rooms had no microwaves. This hotel room cost more than our room in Omaha, and things were less than awesome here. But really, we were too tired to care anymore. We had made it here and that was all that mattered.

Day 4

I woke up the next morning to get ready for Sunday and a couple of the leaves on my planties were shriveling up and dying...oh no! My planties just needed to make it through our three-hour block of church and then we would be at our extended-stay hotel!

We went to church with a lovely ward that was reminiscent of our married student ward. As Iowa City is a college town, families are always coming and going and everyone seems very academic and knowledgeable. They were very nice! Luckily it happened to be their ward conference, so Bill and I got to stay with one another through all three blocks of church. Nice!

Coming out of church we were hit with that painful cold all over again. Excruciating pain hit the tops of my feet which were exposed to the cold winter air. *Note to self: wear boots.

We went back to the Hampton Inn to grab my car, and we were off to drive a few blocks to the Residence Inn. My car's windows were caked with grime from the roads. I wasn't worried about not having tinted windows anymore. Nobody could see into my car and know that half my closet was in there! 

Off we went down the street, me following closely behind Bill, when suddenly we were pulling off to the side of the road. I was confused. Bill turned on his hazards and hopped out of the Trailblazer. I turned on my hazards and quickly learned that everything in my car very frozen. My hazard lights wouldn't stay on without me pushing on the button at all times. I had no idea what was going on! 

It then became clear that a couple was stranded on the side of the road and needed help getting down the road to their hotel. Bill was eager to get out his tow straps and give them some help. Meanwhile, the gal from the car came over to me and I noticed that their license plates are from Minnesota. That became even more obvious when she called her boss to tell them that "some guy was here and helping them oot." It made me smile...but I also felt bad realizing she was standing out in that frigid cold air and I had absolutely no room to let her come sit in my car! Bill and the other guy in the car got everything hooked up just right and we pulled them down the street to the Super 8. By then the gal's boss had found us and joined our long train of cars with hazards on as we all took turns turning into the parking lot.

When the event was done and over with, we were finally able to check into our home sweet home for the next month or so. And due to poor planning on our part, we headed over to the Olive Garden for our Sunday meal. I'm sad to say that those three hours in church did my planties in. They look so sad. I have no idea if they'll be able to make a comeback, but I'm hopeful!

The hotel room is cute and convenient for many things. Inconvenient for others - but I was just glad we were one step closer to finding the ground beneath our feet once more!

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Here are the short videos from each day of our travel:

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Getting Out Here - Part 1

It was only two weeks ago...but I find that our experience of getting out here is already slipping in my memory. I suppose that means it wasn't very eventful or traumatizing...but parts of it kind of were!

WLF covered our expenses to move out to Iowa. So my least favorite part of moving - PACKING - wasn't my burden to bare! Two burly men came to our apartment on a Monday and got busy packing all of our stuff. It was impressive how relatively quickly they got the job done by having all the tools and supplies on hand. They had gobs of paper and boxes in uniform sizes. They were fairly systematic about boxing and labeling everything in my house. I didn't understand to what extent they would be packing though...I was told we'd likely be able to sleep in our house that night as the next day would be the actual moving day. So I assumed we'd have some bedding and supplies to use the following morning.

I don't know what my brain was thinking.

Of course these guys aren't going to come back or wait for me when they've got a job to do. So EVERYTHING got packed if I hadn't previously set it aside. I feel like I should have thought ahead just a little bit more than I did...and the longer we stay in this hotel, the more things I wish I had on hand.

When lunch rolled around and the two dudes bounced to the nearest gas station, I was left at home with leftovers in the fridge and absolutely no utensils to eat with. I microwaved my little bowl of fried rice and promptly shoveled it into my mouth with my hand. I sat on my kitchen chair in the middle of my living room just staring out my curtainless windows. This was my sad hour of solitary confinement. My phone was nearly dead and everything was ever so quiet, minus my refrigerator. My fridge has always been loud.

We went to Olive Garden in Layton that night and then drove out to Kaysville to say goodbye to Grandma and Grandpa Schroader. We ended up staying the night at Greg and Judy's because all our bedding got packed and we had no way of getting ready at our own place. Bill still had work in the morning, so we just got up early and Bill planned to drop me off at the house to be there for when the movers came.

When I walked upstairs and into the dining room, I was stunned to find a brand new piano bench - handcrafted (no joke!) by Greg! A few months ago my parents bought me an amazing piano from a school district auction. It's a little beat up, but plays beautifully! (I hope to have some time to refinish it once it warms up!) Fewer things have made me happier than to be the owner of my own piano! It only lacked a bench. And now I had one! I don't know when Greg had time to make me a piano bench amidst all the hours he was helping us out at our duplex. You should see this bench! It's better than anything I could have every found or bought myself! I cried inside! You could still smell the fresh coat of lacquer. Aw! 'Tis a masterpiece.

Back at our duplex, I busied myself with little things, but was surprised when an early knock came to my door. Mike the driver had arrived in his giant Mayflower semi truck. I quickly had to go knock on our neighbor's door to have him move his car so that the driver could pull forward and not be blocking the other neighbor's driveway...which really was a problem as she tried to pull out that morning. Ready or not, things were about to get real.

We did a walk-through of the house as I showed the driver what would stay and what would go. We started some paperwork and he got busy labeling everything that didn't fit in a box. He informed me of his route and that he would be arriving in Iowa on Friday, possibly Saturday if the weather was bad.

"This Friday?" I asked. "Not NEXT Friday?"

"This Friday!" was definitely his response. I kind of panicked.

Most people told us to expect the delivery of our stuff to be late. It happens all the time. Usually the driver gets behind schedule and a lot of people are ready to move into their house, but have no furniture until a week later. Bill and I were okay with that scenario because our stuff was going straight into a storage unit while we were stuck living in a hotel. We were not prepared for a situation in which our stuff might arrive early...Bill and I weren't going to be arriving in Iowa until Saturday.

I told the driver our situation and that we had been told to expect our delivery to be made on the following Tuesday. We weren't going to be in Iowa to accept his delivery if he came on Friday. The driver kind of panicked too. He calls up our moving-coordinator and they get snippety with each other. Our coordinator agrees to work things out. The driver hangs up and tells me to get to Iowa when I'm ready. This isn't either one of our problems. And that was that!

Shortly thereafter, Greg showed up for moral support and so that I could leave and get some things done around town. But an hour into the movers hauling stuff out to the semi, I realized that I too was blocked into our driveway and had no hope of getting out until the semi was gone. I felt horrible that Greg was now there for truly no reason! I sure enjoyed and appreciated his company though. We stood around in the freezing cold of my apartment as the door was wide open. I put hand warmers in my shoes in hopes of warming my feet (that only kind of works, for future reference) and wore my coat around the house. Greg was absolutely in awe of the system the movers had of getting the furniture packed with their packing blankets and GIANT rubberbands. Our driver was particularly efficient and definitely knew what he was doing! It was cool to watch.

Wrapping my couch for a safe journey.

Our stuff piling up in the semi.

And by the early afternoon our house was empty! Minus my closet...which the packers forgot to box up and which I forgot to even check. The contents of my closet are still in the back of my car at this very moment along with the other odds and ends that the moving company was not allowed to pack - like some cleaning supplies and aerosol cans and other various liquids like laundry soap...

As soon as the semi was gone, I was off to Logan to do all my last minute errands. I dropped some things off at Cache Valley Print and bought paint and other supplies at Home Depot. I bought and exchanged some new garments and dropped things off at the DI. Finally I was ready to hustle home so that we could go out to eat with my family at Maddox as our final good-bye.

We had dinner with Madre and Pops, Val and Marie, Jord and Missy, Grandma and Grandpa Sorenson, Grandma Higley and Erin and Phoenix. It was a nice little crew that I'm so glad I got to sit down with. I did really good without tearing up when hugging everyone good-bye (I had done this over and over again)...until Mom. Bah! Mom! You always make me cry...

After this late dinner, Kristi and Kyle wanted us to come by so that we could say our goodbyes to them and Cora and Penny. And so we did...and time passed all too quickly while we were there. We love the Allred's! Cora had already gone to sleep and was actually pretty sick, but Kristi and Kyle woke her up so she could say good-bye to 'Sica and Bill - which made our hearts so very, very happy!

Even though we felt like the evening should be close to over, we still needed to get back to our duplex to do a couple of little maintenance things and one last walk-through now that everything was gone. By the time we were able to leave and lock our door one last time it was close to 1:00am. Bleh...

On the Saturday before anything previously mentioned took place, Bill and his dad worked on his Trailblazer in preparation for our 1200 mile drive. The last thing we needed to do before we could leave for Iowa was to have an alignment done on the Trailblazer. So bright and early, Bill was up and at the top of the hill at the Jiffy Lube getting his alignment taken care of. He came back to Greg and Judy's and while we were eating breakfast, Bill got a call from Jiffy Lube...the news was NOT good. I don't remember or understand all of the details (and perhaps Bill can fill you in), but crap had hit the fan. And suddenly Jiffy Lube was quoting us on $1200 worth of work needing to be done before they would even think about doing the alignment. Ain't NOBODY got time for that...

Bill and Greg worked on the Trailblazer ALL day after that news was broken to us...and I know they have some miracle stories to share. With all the work they put into tightening up the front end of the Trailblazer, I'm ever so relieved that we found all this out when we did and not while being stranded on the side of the road with very limited resources. The whole situation was the biggest bummer in the world! But truly was a tender mercy from the Lord. He's always looking out for us. Always!

While everyone was away at work, I went to my parent's house. I had really wanted to get a father's blessing before I left, but had totally spaced asking my dad for one when we actually had the time...but because of our bummer car situation, I suddenly had no excuse NOT to ask Pops for a blessing. Pops was working from home that day and it just so happened to be my mom's day off. So I felt particularly blessed that they both were home for me to talk to one more time before leaving. Maddox was not our last good-bye after all! (Seriously...so many false good-byes!)

And finally I made it back to the Kiefer home where I had some delicious lasagna soup...home cooked meals sound so amazing to me right now!!! I'm already missing that big time!

The next morning, Bill got up early to go and get the alignment checked one final time (after receiving a father's blessing from his dad and officially saying "good-bye" to Judy as she left for work)...and everything worked out JUST FINE. He was able to pick up our U-Haul dolly for my car and everything was loaded up nicely.

At last...we could be on our way!

And so we were.

We hugged Greg good-bye and hopped in the Trailblazer...trying to keep it together.

We needed to drive up to the top of the hill to return something to O'Reilly Autoparts. But as we drove away from Bill's parents one last time to run our errand, we both became emotional wrecks. Sobs. Violent sobs. Saying good-bye is THE WORST. Plus, I have this huge tendency to cry whenever I see anyone else crying...but seeing your husband cry is one of the hardest sites to see. I just wanted to curl up in a ball and pretend like this wasn't really happening.

We reached O'Reilly's and parked the car. We cried together for a bit out in the parking lot, but had to regain some semblance of composure before going into the store.

When Bill came back to the car, suddenly...that was it! Our need to cry in that moment lifted. I think we both realized that this was actually happening and our new adventure was here and it was now. I don't know about Bill, but every time I thought about Iowa, I felt peace. I've never felt anxious about any of this. I felt that subtle sense of peace once more and it felt easy to drive away knowing that good things lie ahead of us. And we have so many marvelous tools with which we can stay connected to our friends and family! We've already heavily utilized the power of Skype, Snap-Chat, texts, e-mails, Facebook, and this blog. It's not like we won't ever see our families again! It probably won't be as special as we think it will be whenever we go home to visit - everyone will already be so sick of us. You may even know more about our lives than when we lived close!

Ultimately, it was peace that gave us the confidence to drive on. And so we did! :)

Change Begets Change! (Except where it doesn't...)

At the risk of sounding like a 2008 Obama campaign listing, we have had a lot of change in our lives...

We moved halfway (literally) across the country.

I am working with a whole new group of people.

Everything is an hour off.

Presidential candidates now care more about my vote.

Ethanol is now branded as an enhancement instead of just another additive.

We skype (yes, skype is a verb) our parents instead of getting a free dinner on Sundays.

I'm thinking about contributing to the blog some more from time to time, as much as I HATE to write.

When I applied for and accepted the system administrator job with West Liberty Foods, I knew that we would move away, that we would find a whole bunch of new things and people, and that we would probably change a little as well.

A lot of things did change.  But, at the same time, things didn't.

I still have a 30 minute drive to work, it's still cold, I still have to put gas in my car.

Youtube is still a thing out here too.

We eat a lot of the same things and shop at a lot of the same places.

Jessica still has to have large amounts of patience with me.

I still have a hard time sleeping.

I'm still a huge nerd who struggles with social anxiety and extreme depression.

The LDS church is still the LDS church and you will find good people anywhere.

So.. as much as thing change... they stay the same.

Anyways, a first post to break the ice and maybe more to come.

Thanks
-Kiefer

We Found Our Way to I-O-Way

Minus the 3 years inbetween blog posts...(if I didn't blog about it, did my LIFE happen?)

I'm just going to jump in with where I am right now. And as the camera zooms in on the globe and then in closer on the North American continent and just off of center of the contiguous United States, you'll find the high speeds of the camera passing through clouds to be quite unsettling as it suddenly zeros in on me - who is avoiding the arctic winds, but sitting in a slightly chilled hotel room in Coralville, Iowa. Bam. Here I am! Doesn't my red sweater look so nice?

Bill worked for a meat-processing company called West Liberty Foods in Tremonton, Utah and applied for a job within the company that would take him to the corporate offices in Iowa. WLF took him on in what seems like a drawn out heart beat. As soon as he was offered the System Administrator position, there was talk of trying to move back east within three weeks. Our world was flipped upside down and we tried to brace ourselves as the snow started to settle back down in our figurative snowglobe. Fortunately/Unfortunately it was quite a process finding Bill's replacement as the IT Specialist for the Tremonton plant, so we were scheduled to stay put in Utah until after Thanksgiving...and then until after Christmas and the New Year.

We rode the waves of momentum in trying to prepare our side of our duplex for future renters, but quickly lost steam with every push back of our moving date. If it weren't for the help of Bill's dad Greg, we would have been sunk (I'm still not sure how to convey how much we appreciate his help!). -- I'd also like to give a holla' to my best of friends Mallory, Taylor, and Jeremy for swooping in and helping me push things out on our last Saturday in Utah! --

There were also terrible waves of emotion with each family gathering, thinking it was our last time together for the next who-knows-how-long...only to find we were able to have dinner together the following weekend. Our Brigham City ward was so supportive of our move! But quickly became confused when we kept showing up to church each Sunday. Will the Kiefer's just move already? I assure you all - we felt the same way!

But rare is the opportunity to literally start the New Year completely new...New place. New home. New ward. New friends. New opportunities...there is no one around to remind you of who you were, if that's something you'd rather forget. This feels special. I have this thought in my head and feeling in my heart that I shouldn't mess this up - whatever "this" may be. Before I left, I asked my dad to give me a father's blessing and through it, I was told that I will be blessed to do all the things I need to do. As a very non-specific phrase, it felt very specific to me.

The company had professional movers pick up our LIFE and then plopped it into this extended-stay hotel and a 10x20 storage unit. I'm living with some bare essentials and have extreme amounts of free time to myself at the moment. Today, I only emerged from my hotel room to find some free continental breakfast (and found that I had already missed it for the day) and promptly went back to our room. I worked on figuring out Bill's insurance, looked at places we could potentially live, ate some lunch, organized my email, and started this long-anticipated blog post. I'm feeling really good about LIFE! Albeit lazy, but good. ;)

The sun feels like it sets earlier here...I don't know if that's true, but sunsets here are unlike anything I ever experienced in Utah. On Sunday night after church, we drove out to the town of West Liberty itself to find where Bill would start work on Monday. *I have to say, when everyone heard we were moving to Iowa, they all told us to be prepared for "flat." I don't know what part of Iowa they went through, but Iowa seems to be nothing but beautiful rolling hills (please note my very limited exploration). I was honestly afraid of experiencing wide open plains, I worried I would feel exposed - like I do when I look out across the ocean! But I do not feel that way at all here. I feel like I'm tucked away in rumpled sheets, which is a really cozy feeling to me..........anyway* West Liberty is rather out in the middle of nowhere and sits on top of those rolling hills. We found the WLF plant and decided to go a different way to get back onto the interstate. As we drove and drove, I literally saw the sun set along the horizon of chilled empty fields. Everything took on a strong burnt orange tone. It was surreal! And suddenly I understood why most people in Iowa would say they are grateful for sunsets. In that fleeting moment, I was grateful too...and I'm grateful that I get to keep experiencing it for the next little while.

What People Are Thankful For in Each State - mentalfloss.com and facebook

Our arrival here has not exactly been smooth sailing. I'm quite confident Bill would tell you the first few days have just sucked. That's the honest truth from his perspective. And I feel bad that that's the case. But if there is anything that I have learned in this LIFE, when everything goes wrong that could go wrong, you must be doing something exactly right - Satan is just trying to discourage you any way that he can. We just can't succumb to all the worry and junk he throws our way. I just hope we can survive the rest of this week.

Iowa - we're here to stay for a while. Do you mind if we make ourselves feel cozy amidst your rolling hills?