Birthday and Leaving Day

So January 10th -- I turned 24. I know some people aren't into their birthday, which I can understand... but I appreciate this day of feeling special because the attention is turned on me. Judge me, fine.

I was kind of hungover in the morning from previous night's festivities, so I took it kind of easy. Believe it or not, at this point I still hadn't thrown everything in my suitcase yet. That was priority number one, stuffing it all in.

It actually went a lot easier than I thought. I ended up buying some space saver bags from Wal-Mart which worked out well, if even for just keeping my clothes protected.

Of course I had several lists of what I needed to make sure I packed.

I checked it 10 times before I finally convinced myself I had everything I needed. Check out the money pouch I bought from Wal-Mart too, so I didn't have to carry a purse. I had been warned many times about pick-pockets around Amsterdam, so I knew I'd feel more comfortable keeping my money and passport under my clothes where no one could grab it. Heck, half the time I had trouble getting to it.

I was ready!

Jamie was going to take me to the airport that day, so we made time to grab some birthday lunch right before that. Since I have a new obsession with Reggae Shack, we decided to go there.

Their Brown Stew Chicken is the BEST! I could eat that meal all day, e'ry day!

Jamie still had to work that day, so he dropped me off at the airport a little earlier than I needed to be there. I had never been inside the Gainesville Airport before. It's pretty small, but still has a gift shop inside. I guess some people collect crap from every airport they visit, so I shouldn't be surprised.... but I was. There was a gator tooth necklace and everything.

While waiting for my other coworkers who were traveling with me to show up, I thought these signs were kind of funny. I'm pretty sure I saw this same picture on someone's Facebook before, but seeing it in person makes it a little more funny.

Finally, Wesley (pictured center), Shaine (pictured right), and Rion (not pictured yet) showed up, and we were off to Atlanta.

We grabbed a bite to eat in the Atlanta airport (Rion and Wesley pictured below).....

 and then we were off to Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam.

This 9.5 hour flight ended up being a nightmare as far as screaming babies were concerned. Since we were taking a late afternoon flight, we would end up in the Netherlands around 10:30 am the next day, so I was counting on sleeping through the night. That didn't happen...