I can’t even begin to explain the things I have learned at this conference the last two days. It has truly been insane. The amount of oppression and just horrible things in the world is overwhelming. It’s been so great and I have collected many book titles and documentary movies to watch and I can’t wait to get started this summer. It’s gonna be great.

Our presentation went well. I think the ending had the strong impact that it was intended to make. However I just wish we had more time. Time. It’s always time. 30 minutes was not enough to explain over two years worth of information. But it was a great first step and a wonderful experience! I am so proud of everyone and can’t wait to come back to this conference next year!

After the whole conference was said and done, we decided to celebrate. We started off at this bar called Rebar. There we drank a few beers and played darts. It was pretty funny because it is a college town and on a Friday night, it was packed. Everyone there was drinking, they were playing loud dubstep music, and people were wearing cowboy boots like it ain’t no thang. It was way fun.

I suck at darts. It probably took me the first 3/4 of the first game to even understand how scoring worked. We played Teachers vs. Students. Jackie and I lost, ha! But we played 301 after that and Flavia and I ended up winning, me with the winning throw! Go figure.

After that we left because no body liked the music and headed to a bar called Losers. Yes, Losers. Conveniently right next door was a bar called Winners. I’m sitting in this bar,
(I turned my chair to face everyone standing) at a table, live band playing, drinking and laughing with everyone. Next thing I know an elbow hits me in the back. I turn to see and there’s an old man sitting next to me who replies with “sorry baby” and I’m officially creeped out. We keep talking, randomly cheersing and drinking with him. I then realize people keep talking to him randomly. I ask everyone that I’m with if they know who he is cause I think he’s famous. Come to find out after a bit of talking I have just found myself sitting next Earl Bud Lee. He’s a song writer most known for writing Friends in Low Places. For those of you who know me well, Garth Brooks has been my favorite since I was a little girl. This has been a pretty bomb moment in realizing who I’ve been sitting next to all night.

He was totally sloshed. But hey, who can blame the guy. What is great about Tennessee is that almost every place has live music playing. ALL. THE. TIME. I’m not joking, breakfast, lunch, dinner, there’s always a live band of music. It was really great, even in this bar. We had loads of fun the rest of the night, talking, cracking jokes. Eventually we decided to call it a night and headed back to the hotel. Here we ordered pizza and played Rummy until about 3 in the morning when I called it quits for bed. But it was a great night to remember!

This week I will be in Nashville. Jackie, Will, Flavia and I are presenting in a Crticial Race Theory in Education conference, buuut you will hear more about that later.

First of all we took a red eye from CA to get here. When I say we,
I mean Jackie (Jax), Laura and I. Will and Flavia come in tomorrow afternoon. Anyways, the flight. Wasn’t too bad except the second plane had the WORST AC ever. It was insanely cold and blowing on my legs. I absolutely hated it. But I slept the whole time so that was good.

We landed in Nashville, and had to wait for the shuttle to come from the hotel. So I decide to sit on the sidewalk because I’m lazy. I look on the ground, all is clear and I sit. I begin to do work on my phone. After a good while my legs were starting to itch, tickle and bug me. I at first was just brushing it off until I realized something was legit happening. I look down to find myself surrounded by ants. I literally had ants. In my pants. It was ridiculous. So I moved real quick!

From there we dropped our luggage at the hotel and we asked the shuttle driver to drop us anywhere downtown. So he dumps us on the corner of 5th and Broadway. Now it’s 11 am here but 9 am for us, which meant breakfast, but I opted for lunch.

We went to this place where they said they are the only place on the entire broadway strip with all natural unprocessed food. Now, I’m not sure I believe that, but food wasn’t that bad. I had half a turkey burger but it was cooked a little too long.

Everyone we have met so far in Tennessee have been really nice. Mac, our shuttle driver told us if we need anything just to ask for him. Jeorge, told us if we see him around and have questions, just to ask and he will point us in the right direction. It’s been great.

So we wandered around on foot for a while in the blazing hot sun. We scope out all of Broadway and the bars. Check out the Country Music Hall of Fame, which was not worth a tour for the cost. From there we decided to rent a car. After walking the wrong direction, laughing, trying to use our phones for walking directions we land ourselves at a Enterprise dealership.

Renting a car is no problem, everyone working there were really nice and young, that’s important. Laura is waiting for paperwork when she looks at me and quietly says “should we ask about the meadow?” Clearly kidding. Back story a bit, all day Laura was talking about how she wanted to find a nice meadow here in Tennessee and that’s all she really wanted to do. So even though I know she is kidding, I turn and look at the man helping us and and I say “Do you know where we could find a meadow?” The guy says “what?!” Laura is busting up laughing at this point. I laugh and repeat myself, “a meadow, we are looking for a meadow” he is still confused. We are now the only people in this place now and the young lady standing next to him looks over and says “do you know what a meadow is?” And everyone is cracking up now. The guy says “what? No. What’s this foreigner talk” and another man, clearly the youngest there, looks up and over and says “Like a field, man” and another man says “you know what a field is right?” So now everyone is dogging on the man helping us and we are all cracking up. He
Obviously knew what a meadow was, he was just thrown off by the absurdity of my question. Eventually we get directions to the closest thing they have that is meadow. Really, it was more of a giant beautiful park, but it totally worked. We parked, found a tree, laid down and took the longest best nap on the grass.

It was seriously a much needed nap. It felt
So nice. It was beautiful. I fell asleep in the shade, woke up because I was so cold, moved to the sun, where I was too warm, the opted for a half half spot.

After that we came, checked into our hotel, which is really nice, relaxed, I did some work, then we ventured out back to downtown Nashville for dinner.

Can I just say, Nashville is way smaller than I had originally imagined it in my head. But after much contemplation (because between the three of us, no one can make a decision) we land ourselves at Honky Tonk Central for dinner. This place was pretty dang good. Big three story building with a live band. These guys:

They are Harold Allen. They were pretty dang good. They could sing almost any song, covered a lot and then sang their own. They did a cover of Hit Me Baby One More Time by the infamous Britney Spears, which was actually pretty funny.

The food was soooo good. I had a Southern BBQ Sandwhich. It was BBQ pulled pork with some chili sauce. I loved it, spicy, BBQ, and delicious. With that I ordered a rootbeer float. Well, Tennessee’s version of a rootbeer float which is:

– Chicken Cock Rootbeer Whiskey (yes, that’s really what it’s called)
– Smirnoff Vanilla
– Coke

Holy. Shit. Way. Too. Strong. I mean, I don’t like whiskey in the first place, but in a rootbeer float was worse. I thought since it’s suppose to taste like rootbeer, it would be okay. Nope. It’s not. I was very wrong. I don’t recommend this drink if you don’t like Whiskey. Go figure. Tennessee. Strong whiskey. I should have thought that through first…but I didn’t.

We listened to music for a bit then headed to get ice cream! I got coffee gelato. It was delicious! Totally worth it. After that we walked back to the car. Broadway is really pretty at night. Lots of lights.

After this we headed home. I finished more work, watched my LA Kings win the playoffs (booyaa!!), watched the Karate kid and just relaxed.

It was a really simple day, but really great at the same time. Can’t wait for the rest of the week!

Yeehaw!