Good Ole Rocky Top

This weekend, Brian and I made a trip to visit Brent and Kasey in Knoxville, Tennessee. It was great to see both of them, as well as their two dogs, Braddock and Shelby. In addition to checking out their awesome downtown loft and playing with the dogs, we also explored World's Fair park (the last World's Fair to make money, raking in a revenue of one whole dollar), went to see UT kick South Carolina's behind, and went out downtown. The best part was that this was all within walking distance from their place!

The weekend started out eating pizza and helping Kasey construct Brent's "tornado" Halloween costume. She showed off her homemaking skills by sewing toy cars and small plastic farm animals to a black t-shirt. We also met coworkers of Brent who were busy dying their hair blue and red to be Trolls. After going out with everyone for a friend's birthday, I had begun to pick up a southern accent, which Brian quickly pointed out. The birthday party had an awesome cover band, the likes of which I hadn't seen since I was in Nashville last November!

On Saturday we explored World's Fair park and even got to go up in the Sunsphere. Apparently the Sunsphere was supposed to be the central visual point of the city, but they unthinkingly built it in one of the lowest areas. I got to eat one of my favorite sandwiches on the planet (the Oh Boy from The Tomato Head - which we will learn to recreate: fresh spinach, free farmed chicken, benton's bacon, sundried tomato, monterey jack, poppyseed dressing, mayo, heated), and then we marched onward to the stadium.

As we approached the campus, the sea of orange grew and you could hear Rocky Top every time you turned around. Unfortunately, it rained through most of the game, but after purchasing a poncho for our laps and wrapping up tightly in our rain coats, we managed to stay drier than most. We saw a great game as USC (remember when it was all the rage for boys to have hats for the South Carolina Gamecocks?) fumbled time and time again, and UT raced to an early lead that they held through then entire game.

By the time Sunday rolled around, we were all exhausted. Although we didn't have time to stop at Krystal on the way out of town, it was an amazing trip. ...almost amazing enough to have me consider moving to Knoxville...

Neyland Stadium