No Shoes, No Shirt, No Service

So I went to the beach again, yay! After isha on the 17th I drove once again down to Shallotte, a NC beach town where my brother lives. I stayed there until Tuesday and came back.

I went swimming... spent days doing nothing at all. Except checking for comments on my blog, and I got quite a few over the weekend (thanks everyone, I'm still trying to reply to some of them!)

Now I'm back in Raleigh, back at school, which started Wednesday morning. Unfortunately. Full engineering load, still in shock over how much time it's going to mean I'll be doing homework for the next few months. I can't just fake it either. But since I won't be working in the middle of the night I should actually be able to pull it off... inshaaAllah.

Sincere apologies if I can't keep my blog up like I did over the summer. Naeem, I saw your tag, I'll get to it soon I hope inshaaAllah, and get on with stuff.

Like the picture? At the Wal-mart they had this sign; my brother's store had one too. I guess people at the beach think they can walk around barefooted and scantily clad. What was nice though, was how much cooler it was there. For example, on Monday it was 102F in Raleigh, but only 84F in Shallotte. Breezy, not nearly as humid. The water was nice. Not quite so calm as sometimes I remembered it being. The first day I went swimming was Saturday, which was calmer than the second day I went, Monday. I don't know if it was actually "swimming." More like, going out into shoulder-deep water and jumping waves. So Monday was just rough enough to be annoying since the waves were breaking sooner, and water getting into my eyes more.

I could explain how I pulled it off anyway... the beaches are public, but really the beaches are on islands covered with condos, and they are too far for most people to go, except those who live nearby. On the other hand, the Wilmington beaches are much shorter a drive for people coming from out of town to go to the beach. Driving all the way into Brunswick County, a whole extra 45 minutes or so, it's a little different. No big port city life down in Shallotte, just a little beach town.

Relaxing! And with limited access to the net I didn't do too much. All that was very nice. Not so happy to be home honestly, but it's my first real vacation in a very long time. Will I be going to ISNA next month? That's the next big question!

Anyway... stuff upcoming. Unless someone asks, I probably won't say how I pulled off the swimming.