Sunday in Georgetown

This Sunday we attended the First United Methodist Church just diagonal from the university. Oddly enough it was directly across the street from St. John's United Methodist Church. It seemed very strange to have two ornate United Methodist churches built roughly the same time within spitting distance of each other.
We were a cautious 20 minutes early just in case parking was difficult and the pews filled fast. Parking was a bit of an issue as there was another church (Evangelical, I believe) right next to the FUMC. We found a spot in the residential area behind the great buildings and casually strolled around admiring the fine architecture.

Please click the photo to enlarge and read this brief history on the First United Methodist Church of Georgetown.The stained glass windows that surrounded all four walls of the sanctuary were brilliant! The late morning sun made the images glow which, coupled with the fine, dark wood lining the high, arched ceilings created a reverent yet celebratory atmosphere. I found it interesting that most of the windows were dedicated in memoriam to past administrators, teachers and members of the congregation.

The 11 o'clock service was noted as being traditional and it lived up to it's word. All hymns; not one worship song or chorus. Frankly it was refreshing. The congregation was mainly elderly, made up of many folks from Georgetown's retirement community, Sun City, and the Wesleyan Retirement Home across the street. Georgetown has at least 4 retirement homes that we've seen (excluding Sun City) and I must say it's a fine place to settle down for one's last years.

We met Ruth and Mary, roommates at the Wesleyan home, Pearl, Betty from Sun City and Bonnie (the young one of the bunch) who lives in our new neighborhood. Having sat in their regular section of the pews they gave us the warmest of welcomes and we immediately felt as if we had several new adopted grandmothers.

The service was wonderful and the church felt like it could easily be a new home for us until the sermon. A lively and funny fellow, the pastor told a rambling story that only partly connected with the scripture he had chosen. Though he had a charming personality, his age and apparent lack of preparation took a major toll on the sermon, leaving us disenchanted with the formerly ideal church package.

Well, on to an new one next week! We may try the Presbyterian Church in historic downtown or hop across the street to St. John's.
Next stop was the only coffee shop in the vicinity, Cianfrani's. You'd think for a college town they'd have a plethora of caffeine refueling posts for students to study or go for that first, casual "date," but no. Just one.

The long, open rectangular space had walls lined with colorful original paintings. The prices (none under $1200) seemed a bit outrageous for the casual coffee shop patron, but they certainly brightened the place up.

Similar to the other day's experience with Laurie's Too Cafe, we found a large space being used as best as the owners could figure out, though having the industrial sized roasters and grinders as well as other coffee supplies totally visible in the back was very poor taste. The drone of the machines blocked out all normal leveled conversation so we could hear the folks behind us shouting as they attempted to continue their chat.
Why not try brunch at The County Seat? It is ideally located on the corner just down from Cianfrani's, decorated tastefully (the best interior of a food service joint we'd seen yet) and folks were streaming in.

Seated in the upper level -a gallery, you might say- we had a perfect view of the food coming out of the kitchen to see what dishes they served. We became increasingly unimpressed and ended sorely disappointed.
First our waitress brought us the wrong order. Then she brought us the right order but with our over medium eggs completely undercooked -back to the kitchen again. Finally our order came back. They had re fried our eggs to a plastic consistency that vaguely resembled a form of egg product but was nothing close to eggs over medium or hard. Our waitress refilled our water once and never asked how our meal was or how we were doing. Now, this may not seem too much of an offence to you and you may feel I'm over reacting, but hear me out. We shared one order -one plate of food. We didn't ask for anything special or different -just the standard breakfast meal with our choice of eggs and meat. There were more servers on hand than we'd seen in any restaurants we recently dined at, which would make you think we'd at least get taken care of in a proper manner. When we ordered our eggs I asked our waitress if overhard meant completely cook through -totally solid yolks- to which she said yes. I expressed a wish that there was a happy medium between over medium and over hard. Our eggs came back over easy and returned obliterated after asking for them to be more solidly cooked. The pancakes were worse than IHOP's or Denny's and we were given a small plastic cup of syrup, hardly enough for a decent portion. Knowing that my cooking -and food service- far out ranks The County Seat we have absolutely no desire to ever dine there again.

The day was beautiful and though we had a string of disappointments we were determined to keep enjoying ourselves. Time to find Lake Georgetown. Not having looked at a map we drove for quite awhile on an open country road, turned around and tried another route. Finally we found it.
Due to the major rainfall this summer Lake Georgetown's level was well above normal. Trees and brush that had skirted it's shores lay submerged beneath it's gently lapping waves. Honestly, it was pretty unattractive, especially compared to what we'd been used to with Alaska's pristine beauty and countless bodies of water. But it would do. Next time we'll find the park on the other side of the lake with more facilities and where the bike trail begins. Though it wasn't ideal, I won't complain that we live so near a lake and close to such a beautiful river.

So Sunday didn't show us the best of our new town, but we still absolutely adore it. It was wonderful trying out our first church, tasting more of the cuisine and seeing the sites on a lovely, sunny day. After meeting some of the sweet gals from the retirement home I've decided Wilder and I will try to make regular visits when he's old enough. Obviously now is too early, but give us a few months and we'll have oodles of great aunts and great uncles!