I'm getting a hero's welcome in Atlanta!

So Thursday I am heading south to Atlanta for the 4th of July to visit my best girlfriends from college (and frequent Aut, Colleen commentators) Kate and Chrystal. We plan to do all sorts of fun stuff like go to the aquarium, Margaret Mitchell house, the new Coca-Cola museum and probably some drinking and general merriment. Well, it turns out they are not the only ones who can't wait to see me! Check it out what K & C had to say about it this morning:

Kate: I think I can safely say without being overly hyperbolic that all of Atlanta is excited for your visit.

Chrystal: That’s true. Why just yesterday I saw someone on the street and they said to me, “Did you hear, Colleen is coming?” And I said, “Yes, in fact she is one of my best friends”. And I could see the jealousy in their eyes as I said that. They wanted to be your friend too. The whole city is abuzz with the news of your invasion. It will be just like when the Beatles invaded America.

Kate: Seriously, yesterday evening when I was sitting in traffic heading home I heard a traffic report on the radio. They were warning to allow a little extra time and patience during the commute over the next couple of days because extra people are on the roads, stocking up on party supplies in anticipation of Colleen. There is definitely an air of excitement in the ATL.

Who knew?

Just for fun check out the video Kate sent me this morning...

http://mx.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY

"i shuddered when i read that thomas kincaid anecdote>who would write a paper in art school re:that?"

"Just read your blog- very clever, informative, & entertaining. I had never read it before so I read the ENTIRE thing while Giselle was napping. We are in a hotel room in Cleveland-yes Cleveland. Tres boring. Every nite we go out for some sort of world experience dinner>tonite=ethiopian, but alas, the city is still mundane."

This is an excerpt of an email from Nicole who was my good friend, fellow SCAD grad, and co-worker at The Olde Pink House in Savannah (pictured above). You know the saying “two heads are better than one”? The opposite is true when Nicole and I are together. Case in point: late one evening while it took us an absurdly long time to realize the man with the long blond hair who reserved his table under the name “Allman” might just be Greg Allman who lives about 30 minutes outside Savannah. Aha! It was.

She now lives in Michigan now with her man and beautiful baby girl Giselle. The Savannah years were defining for both of us and she and I spent many evenings sitting on the porch of her house right off Forsythe Park drinking and exploring all the "how did I get here? What am I trying to do - what did I expect to find here? Will it ever make sense for us?" and of course we talked about art and being broke. She had a palm tree in her front yard which was something neither of us could get over. We would drink the $2.50 bottles of wine you could get at the Kroger and one time her weird pot head neighbor tried to give us this HUGE bag full of kine bud but for some reason Nicole wouldn’t let me/us except. It was like $400 worth of serious weed. We were both poor and could have sold it! Or smoked it. I wanted to give some to my Savannah obsession, Craig, who worked with us at the OPH. Hadass, gets it. She worked with him at Seasons and she had a crush on him but I was full blown in love. I could (and did) literally talk about him for hours at a time. I was 20 so my infatuation was kind of adorable and just a little bit pathetic.

Nicole and I were held up at gunpoint one night after we hit up Goth Night (also bottomless cup night!) at Club One. We were so scared we ran into what we though was a small corner pub but turned out to be gay leather bar. Another time we were on Tybee Island for her birthday where we got drunk on Margaritas at Skipper’s, then played in the ocean fully dressed. What happened next is still kind of fuzzy but I think we lost the person who drove us there and we had to walk from one end of the island to the lighthouse where my friend Maime lived so she could drive us back to the mainland. I remember we got lost wandering around an arboretum… Our bizarre misadventures are countless and we are in talks to taking on Thailand next year.

Nicole rocks. She is an amazing photographer and a kind, sensitive, complex woman. Best of all, she is raising a second generation Aut, Colleen reader. Welcome Nicole!