From the misty shores of Terre Haute

It's Monday, and we're back. Dan, Beckie and I trekked down to Terre Haute to visit Jessica and celebrate her birthday.

I have these observations. Terre Haute is far. Indiana is weird. Trivial Pursuit takes forever.

We watched Ants, a late 70s horror movie, which was not scary nor terrifying nor any of the other adjectives used to describe it on the box. As suspected, I looked it up and it was a TV movie, Suzanne Somers (at the time not even the top billed star) was probably just starting/started Three's Company, and most everybody else were has-beens or nobodies. It was pretty terrible, saved only by the prodigious drinking we did whenever somebody said "ants" or we saw ants.

Still, we had a good time. It was good to see Jessica.

Riding the cougar!

Well, sorry I haven't posted in a while. There have been interesting things going on, but mostly I've kind of forget to blog about them.

This weekend, Austin and I went to Napa Valley for the wedding of one of my fraternity brothers, Dan Fanton, or as he is also known, Don Santon.

Austin and I's flight left at 7:20am on Friday, necessitating a drive to his parent's house at 5:00am. I went to bed Thursday night, Austin decided to just stay up and sleep on the plane. We flew Frontier, which I hadn't flown before. Our flight had a layover in Denver, and the first leg was fine, I slept a little, and also watched a couple of episodes of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" on my iPod which I had ripped from the DVDs I borrowed from Austin.

Once we got to Denver, things went a bit awry. Our departure gate was changed, plus we had to truck down most of the concourse to get there in time. Then the seat assignments were all screwy. Thankfully they decided for the hassle they were going to give us free TV. I should also mention that all of Frontier's planes have a picture of an animal on the tail and the that these animals have names. I think we were on Spike the Porcupine for that particular leg. The rest of the flight proved fine, though as is usually the case these days, there wasn't a meal, just a snack (a granola bar).

We arrived in Sacramento about 11:00am, where coincidentally one of the other fraternity brothers, Drew and his fiancee, had just arrived on a different flight. We bussed over to the rental car terminal and headed out towards Napa. We had decided we would look for somewhere for lunch on the way. Little did we realize that there is very little between Sacramento and Napa. Drew led the way and twice we had to turn around while off the freeway because we couldn't find a place to eat. We finally found an Applebee's in Davis (home of UC Davis) and stopped there. After lunch we headed off towards our respective hotels. I managed to get off on the wrong exit, but we turned back around and made it eventually to our hotel.

That evening (this being Friday still) we went to the rehearsal dinner. The food was very good, I had the rainbow trout. After the dinner we went to the sportsbar in the hotel and had some drinks before retiring for the night.

Saturday, Austin and I met up with Drew and Erin, and also Adam (another fraternity brothere) and Andi and we headed down to Fairfield (town of my birth) to tour the Anheuser-Busch brewery and the Jelly Belly factory. Both tours we showed up just in time to join the next group. At the brewery they gave us some samples and as none of us had had lunch yet, we got a bit tipsy. After that we went down the block (literally) to the Jelly Belly factory. At the factory store I bought several bags of the "Belly Flops" which are jelly beans that fail the strict quality standards of factory.

After the tours we headed back and looked for a spot for lunch. Once again we were following Drew and he got us all turned around, but eventually we ended up at a Baker's Square, where there were some interesting people. There was a Cajun festival in town, so the couple seated at the table near us were regaled in bib overalls and straw hats.

The wedding was at 6, so Austin and I headed over a bit early to the winery's store to pick up a few things. Oh yeah, the wedding was at the Domaine Chandon winery. The ceremony was out on the lawn and then we went up to the patio for champagne (or rather sparking wine) and appetizers. After that was dinner. There were neverending rolls, where as soon as you ate your roll (or even most of it) they appeared with basket to give you another. There was a salad course, soup course and then the entree. I had the beef tenderloin with carmelized shallot sauce, creamed potatoes, and market vegetables. That was seriously the best beef I have ever had. We also had wine with dinner, red, white or both. Both were very good, though I'm no wine connoisseur. Then there was cake, and dancing and candy and coffee. I was so stuffed from dinner I couldn't have any cake.

When Austin and I got back from the reception, we turned on the TV and "Harold and Kumar" was on, near the end, where they were riding the cheetah. I fell asleep very soon after that.

The next morning there was a good-bye brunch hosted by the maternal grandparents. We packed away the food as we knew there would be nothing on the plane. We managed to make it back to Sacramento in pretty decent time, and I was only one hour over 2 days on the rental car, so it ended up being pretty cheap. I mentioned before that all of Frontiers planes are animal named, and our plane for the trip back to Detroit was Charlie the Cougar. We were Riding the Cougar all the way back to Detroit! What was also funny was our pilot on the second leg was Tom Cruise (or maybe Cruz) but I was tempted to ask the flight attendant if the co-pilot was Anthony Edwards. We got back to Detroit a bit after midnight. Austin's dad picked us up and then we headed home.

I should have some pictures to put up along with the post soonish, but they aren't here with me. All in all, an awesome weekend, it was a lot of fun to catch up with my fraternity brothers. Drew is getting married the weekend of Thanksgiving, so we should all be together then also.

I'm like a photographer and stuff.

So, apparently some of my photos are good enough for online travel guides. It's almost like I'm a professional photographer except I'm not getting paid.

Home and Abroad, a travel website which is using my photo of the Ala Wai golf course.


Schmap, a online travel guide, which is using my photo of Kama'ole Beach.

Damn you, Alberta!

Went to Canada to John's cottage last weekend.

Dan, Jessica and I headed up on Thursday. We stopped at the Duty-Free and I got some beer, Jessica got wine and we declined exchanging any money there, because, as the US dollar sucks right now, the exchange rate they were giving was $1 US = $1 Canadian. Ridiculous. It was later that John told us that apparently more oil had been found in Alberta and that was boosting the Canadian dollar.

We got to the cottage kind of late and in the middle of a pretty good rain storm. Jessica had driven and the rain and fog did little to help her poor night vision. The weather for the rest of the weekend was very nice though. We sat around and drank and had campfires, kayaked out to the beaver dam, went to town, slept, ate, drank some more, ate, read, did crosswords and word searches, and even found the Walmart in Owen Sound. We went to Walmart to get the Canadian version of Harry Potter for John's brother, and also to replace the shampoo that lives at the cottage, which had long passed its expiration date. We unfortunately did not go to The Mall.


As all things must end, we came back on Monday and I picked up Skippy at my parent's although I did make a Sam's Club run to get groceries and Harry Potter while I was on that side of town.

I started reading Harry Potter on Monday night and got through about 280 pages, and then finished it on Tuesday night at about 3:30 in the morning. I am still tired. I really liked it, even for as dark and bloody as it got, it was still kind of uplifting in the end.

Had my WW weigh-in yesterday. I was up almost 2 pounds from the previous week, which I can mostly attribute to the Cottage. I had met my goal the previous week, but slipped back up on the wrong side of it with this last weekend of drinking and snacks. I have to try to be really good this next week so I can make my goal again. I know it's doable, even with Anna's party on Saturday.

So sleepy.

Ridin' in the dirty 'Hoe

Just a note about the title of this post, this last weekend Ryan dubbed Anna's Tahoe, "the 'Hoe", and it stuck. There were many references to the 'Hoe being dirty or stinky or packed full of junk, and even the 'Hoe's rear access being open.

Camping was alot of fun, I'd like to thank Anna, Beckii, Jacque, Sandra for putting up with me for the rest of the weekend after Darcy, then Jackie, Sarah and Ryan left.

I got freakin' burnt up on my back though. We went to the beach Tuesday for a pretty good amount of time. About 4 beers worth. I neglected to put on sunscreen until a while in, and I'm still feeling it.

We did go to the beach on Sunday, but it was pretty cold, so we didn't stay long. Unfortunately for everyone that only stayed until Monday, the weather was much warmer the next couple days. Of course it did rain on the 4th.

I think I ate so much while camping. What was worse for my diet though was probably the amount of drinking I did. One thing I learned though, is that grenadine makes mixed drinks awesome. We also discovered the innovation of the "Sunrise Mimosa".

I think I had a five-day-hangover. I can't wait to go next year!

Oot and aboot

Going to Canada for a couple days. So, no updates until after the Holiday, eh? Should be fun times, drinking and swimming, camping, fires, more drinking and general rowdiness.

Hold on, this is gonna take a while...

Well. I'm back to work after a seemingly too short vacation. I'm still a bit sick.

I started to feel a bit sick on Saturday, but on New Year's Eve, I was deep in the midst of a cold. I figured I could drink it off. Alcohol kills germs, right? You can kill them on the inside, correct? I asked Sam, 'cause he's a doctor, to confirm that quinine (an ingredient in tonic water) would fight a cold. He couldn't confirm that as he had passed out. I still proceeded to drink like a fish.

I realize it's been a bit since I last updated. I just didn't have any compunction to sit in front of my computer and procrastinate.

So, in the days following Christmas, I was up to a bunch of stuff. Tuesday, Austin and I drove out to East Lansing to pick up my Fraternity brother, Jared, who was in town to visit with us and also his roommate out in L.A.'s family. We had dinner there in enemy territory with Jared and Aaron Travis, another frat buddy. We drove back home and Jared crashed at Austin's.

Wednesday we went to lunch at the Redcoat, and that night, played poker. I came in 3rd, winning back my money.

Thursday, Austin and I drove Jared to Ann Arbor, where we had lunch, wandered about campus and left Jared with his roommate. That evening, Dan, Tess and I went to Casino Royale, which was really good.

Friday night, I met Tess and Dan for karaoke at Grissom's on the east side. I ran into Jim (Beckie's cousin's boyfriend) there. I sang a couple songs. It was good times.

Saturday John and Julie called and invited me and Dan to see a movie at the Emagine. We saw The Holiday, very cute and charming, surprisingly good. Then Dan and I headed down to Tess's for bad movie night. I started to feel a little sick by this point. Bad movies included the end of Deep Blue Sea, Ghost Ship, and I only stayed for the beginning of The Fog (2006). I said several times while we were watching the movies, that I could write a better movie. Maybe some day I should try. Anyways, I was getting tired, and the Benadryl was making me sleepier, so I went home early-ish.

Sunday I felt much more sick. I was still determined to party. Dan, Austin and Sam came to my house and then we headed off to Jordan's house where we hung out for a while and then went to Beckii's for the remainder of the evening. We played Scattergories, and High/Low, Sam did not do so well at this game, I was a bit better. Many Jello shots were consumed, and Austin, Dan and I played the fastest game of darts I think we ever have, because we were trying to finish before midnight. We almost did, but when we resumed post-countdown, I managed to win. There was also the afore-mentioned Sam passing-out, and various others puking. We left there somewhere around 3:30 and when we got back to my place, Sam crashed on my couch to sleep it off.

New Year's day, Monday, I eventually made it over to John and Julie's for the Rose Bowl, which sucked. I was also feeling a bit hungover and still sick, which didn't help any. I did also watch on my computer, the Christmas Special episode of Doctor Who. It was excellent.

I think that about wraps up my last week or so... I still need more sleep and TV watching time.