What! You're going to Africa?

So the time has come for me to write my first post.  I have said all my goodbyes for the last two weeks and they were wonderful and awful, happy and sad all at the same time.  I drove from Oregon down to Tucson with my Dad, my best friend and a very packed mid-size rental car full of my stuff about a week and half ago.  I felt so good about the amount of stuff I managed to get rid of until I had to shove it all in a car with three people.  I stopped at both sets of g-rents houses along the way to say goodbye.  I played an extremely good game of Quiddler with the Schlarbs (probably a couple of words in that sentence most people have never heard before).  I won't say who won.

I have had so many mixed emotions in the months leading up to my departure, I'm not even sure which one  I'm feeling at any given moment.  I feel like a baby or like I'm on drugs, you know since they're basically the same.  I'll be giddy with excitement one moment and the next I'm near tears imagining my life (or at least trying to imagine it) for the next two years.  I managed to bring just about everything I wanted, including some chocolate peanut butter and a spoon.  That's right, bringing fat-girling to the motherland!

Speaking of fat-girling, I managed to eat myself silly in Tucson with all my besties who just happened to be home right as I was preparing to leave.  I don't know how I managed to have such good friends and such good luck.  If a person really was what they ate, I would be a big-fat burrito right now.  No joke.  I'm at a plush hotel in Philly right now trying to mentally burn off the past week's (well let's be honest, month's) calories by watching the Project Runway finale and furiously typing this first of hopefully many blog entries to come.  Thanks for reading.  I'll miss everyone and I can't wait to share my new life with anyone who wants to read about it.  FAREWELL AMERICA OF THE NORTH!  See you in 27 months.