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September 29, 2004

"You fool us, shame on you, shame on you"

Hey so I haven't really been in a blogging mood recently at work and add that to the fact that all of my pictures are on my laptop, and I'm never in the mood to post at home and basically you get nothing. So quick wrap up, went to Assateague Island with Matt, Catherine, Tom, Jon, Jessica, Robin and several of their friends. We had a great time and it was beautiful! one day i'll upload my pictures and you will all be able to see them. I got a semi base tan for my trip to Bali and Hong Kong next week, I was so pale I could wear all black and still reflect car headlights!

I'm so psyched for Bali and Hong Kong!! Hey Brian can I come borrow your flash card sometime this weekend maybe? I also found out that I can use my battery charger in both places so I don't need a power converter, I do however need a plug adapter, but those are like 2 bucks and I'm hoping I can find one at an airport. Other than that the only thing I'm sort of worried about is that Independence Air might have some upper weight limit for checked luggage. I ran into this problem when I was flying from London to Edinburgh on British Midlands, I think I had to pay an extra 35 pounds to get my over weight bag on the plane and considering the ticket itself was only like 40 pounds I was a little pissed. Anyway, considering i'm only going for a week and a half instead of 6 months and I don't think I'll need to pack too many sweaters, I think I'll be OK.

In other news, the first Presidential Debate is tomorrow evening and in it's honor here is an old clip from the Daily Show which I hope you will all appreciate. Go see it, it's really funny. (you might have to hit reload on your browser to get it to start, atleast, I have to on Mozilla for some reason.)

I must admit that I'm not sure I really like either candidate but as Democracy is the exercise in choosing the least of a two evils, I am happy to help in any way I can, and then leave the country if Bush wins.

Here's another lost Australia picture, sorry I'll get new ones up soon I hope. And yes that's me on top :-)


September 22, 2004

Knee, Drink and Sunset

Becca has knee surgery today. It's scary but she should be her old crazy running self soon. I can't say that I know how it feels, but I bet it's awefull to not be able to do what you love so much for so long. Get better soon, Becca!!

Also, today is Catherine's Happy Hour to raise money for the Lombardi Cancer Center. If there is anyone who reads this blog and not unrequited narcissism (I doubt there are many) if you're in the area and feel like hanging out with some cool people and doing your bit for charity, please come. I'll be there as soon as I can make it.

Here is an old picture from Darwin, Australia. It never made it into my photo albums cause it's from one of the last rolls I took there. I was at this time travelling on a month long camping/site seeing trip through Australia with a group of about 30 other University of Mebourne international students. Anyway, we had heard that the sunsets in Darwin were amazing. But the best place to see them were on the beach which was about 2 miles from our hostel. Anyway, we were running late and the directions we got to get to the beach were awfull so we ended up having to break into this fenced off concert venue and hop the second fence to finally get to the beach. We made it just as the sunset was at it's prettiest. This is a picture of the rest of my food group posing in front of the sunset.


September 21, 2004

Rolling Baba

Ok here is some fun for every one:

There is this Indian Holy man rolling, that's right on his side, to Pakistan to spread his message of peace. I heard about it on NPR this morning, they only report the important news. I googled it and found this hilarious article about the 'Rolling Baba'. I was going to just paste in some good quotes but the whole article is just so funny I decided to paste it in entirety:

Hindu holy man rolling to Lahore

Daily Times Monitor

A Hindu holy man known as Ludkan Baba, or Rolling Baba, is rolling his way to Lahore on a mission of peace, Nick Meo reports in The Times.

It was in 1983 that the wandering holy man Mohan Das first decided to make his pilgrimages more of a challenge by rolling along the ground instead of walking. Since then he says he has rolled more than 20,000 miles across India to spread his message of love and peace. Before he started rolling, he had spent seven years standing up, leaning against a swing to sleep. Rolling is much more fun and has put him in the Guinness Book of Records, he says.

He set off on his latest adventure in January, inspired by the peacemaking efforts of Atal Behari Vajpayee, the former Indian prime minister.

He is currently rolling down National Highway No 2 Between Agra and New Delhi, still some 500 miles from Lahore. Every few miles traffic comes to a complete halt when villagers swarm on to the road to seek the holy man's blessing, forming a chaotic scrum with the entourage of hymn-chanting pilgrims trailing in his wake.

A smiling devotee with a red banner is the only warning to the lorries thundering down on Rolling Baba at 70mph. "Once a truck was about to hit us," he said. "Thanks to the Mother Goddess, it overturned at the last minute." He also trusts Kali will find a way round his lack of a visa or a passport. "The goddess will provide," he said. "Or the government will help us." He hopes to convey personally a message of peace to President Pervez Musharraf.

His progress is fuelled by endless cups of tea and five packets of cigarettes a day. Rolling Baba has even developed an impressive technique for smoking as he rolls.

Truck drivers brake furiously at the last minute in clouds of blue smoke. But when they realise that he is a holy man, they are rarely angry and often pull over for a quick blessing. In front of Rolling Baba a devotee kicks bits of glass and metal out of the way and holds an umbrella over his frenetically moving body.

"I joined Baba because his cause is a noble one," says the umbrella-holder Ajab Singh, a 32-year-old farmer who left his fields to join the pilgrimage two months ago when Rolling Baba passed through.

"My followers are from all religions and castes," Rolling Baba said with a gesture at the 30 men and women of all ages camped out with him in the grounds of a roadside temple south of Delhi. Most have been with him since he left his home in Ratlam, about 650 miles away in Madya Pradesh in central India.

"We don't believe Pakistan is our enemy," he said. "Those who are terrorists and warmongers mislead people. All kinds of cultures are necessary in this world - Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jains and Sikhs."

Soon after dawn, Rolling Baba set off in a shower of flower petals cast by his devotees, before the heat builds up to the 45 degrees Celsius afternoon maximum. His biggest problem then is melting tarmac. He is only 5ft but is fit and wiry and looks much younger than his 55 years. The exertion must be doing him good.

Heavy bandages on his legs and tennis-players' sweat bands on his elbows give some protection from the rigours of flailing along at a fast walking pace that leaves some of his older devotees puffing to keep up on foot. He is proud of his cracking pace. "When he gets into top gear he can go 18 miles a day," said Bhuvan Eshwari, a former newspaper reporter who renounced the world to follow Rolling Baba and now acts as his public relations man, complete with a mobile phone which he uses to take pictures to record the journey and send to friends.

"Baba has so much love he even loves the road and it loves him," Mr Eshwari said. Baba never gets dizzy and he says that he feels closest to God when he is on a roll. He is happiest rolling up mountains on pilgrimages to Himalayan temples.

A spokesman for the Pakistan High Commission in Delhi said: "We welcome all efforts to further the cause of peace. He really ought to apply for a visa, though. So far as we know, we haven't had any communication from this Rolling Baba yet."


The update that NPR gave me was that he is currently waylaid at the border since he has no visa or passport. We can only hope that the Mother Goddess will provide him with a passport soon or his pilgrimage may have to be cut short.

"I shot the ground"

Ok sorry I haven't posted in a little while, I've been a bit busy at work. This weekend I finished my housesitting duties and had a relaxing friday and saturday night. Watched Sky Captain, which was alright, I guess I'm not a fan of the all blue screen look or the obnoxious dialogue, but I can see how some people would really like it. Being all for special effects in most forms I can't whole heartedly dissuade people from seeing the movie. I also saw Havana Nights with Matt on Sat. night, I actually really liked this movie. Although it marketed itself as a remake of Dirty Dancing (a movie I love) it didn't push it and actually added to the root plot of uptown girl and downtown boy get together and fight the authorities through dancing. The addition of the Cuban Revolution added a sort of background seriousness to the movie which was appealing and thankfully non-overpowering. The best parts of the movie however, are the soundtrack (full of Cuban folk and dance music) and the extended cameo of Patrick Swazye. I had no idea going into this movie that he was in it, and the revelation for some reason made me exceedingly happy.

On Sunday, Naomi and I went to a Knitting Expo (Knit-out and Crouchet) where we learned to crochet and refreshed on Knitting. It was silly and fun and I'm extremely glad that I went, especially since it was a magnificent day and afterwards we walked around the mall and headed towards the WWII Memorial, there wasn't a cloud in the sky.




September 16, 2004

Another Work Trip

I just found out that I'm going to be going to L.A. in December, now don't get too excited for me. In this case L.A. stands for Lower Alabama. Yahoo! I don't know exacly where in Lower Alabama I'll be, but luckily I'm fairly sure that December is no longer Hurricane Season.

A belated thanks to Naomi for the mouse rollover idea with the sketchy Matt picture! Also, thanks to Naomi for taking this picture in Georgetown after I nagged her a little, since she had the better angle.




September 15, 2004

Happy Birthday Dad!



September 14, 2004

Istanbul was Constantinople?

Since I've been fairly busy (not ultra just fairly) at work recently and I've been spending my days after work lounging around and reading, I don't have anything new or novel or otherwise exciting to report. For example, my most exciting news is that I recently found out that Arwen and Aragorn of The Lord of the Rings are actually distant relatives, who knew? I mean one's an Elf and the other a Man, but it's true. They're first cousins (about a thousand times removed on Aragorn's part). Anyway, enough of the geekery.

I apologize for the lack of point to the following long story:

I shall tell you a story of the last night I spent in Tasmania. We had spent the last week driving around the red-headed step child of the main continent of Australia. It was spring in Van Deiman's Land and most of our outdoor adventures had been continually dimmed and damped by the cold rains leftover from winter. By our original itinerary we were slated to camp out once more on a beautiful eastern beach but the skies and the weather channel were threatening yet another storm, so we altered our plans and found ourselves in a small town in the inland hills southeast of our final departure point from Tasmania. This night you see, was our last night on the island. We had spent the day touring a system of caverns not unlike those found here in Virginia. The major difference and most exciting part of these caverns, however, were the glow worms. That's right they're not just plush cute little playthings from our childhood anymore, they are living slimy glowing carnivorous cave dwelling grubs who grow into mosquito like insects.


(place your mouse over the picture to see a real glow worm)


The amazing thing about them though is that they live in colonies, so there are millions of them in one gallery in the cave. The guide shuts off the light and it's like you are looking at the stars in the sky, only slightly green tinted.

Anyway, so after the glow worms we continued on our way stopping only to take pictures with the 3 story tall statue of a Tasmanian Devil by the side of the road.



Thus, we came near dinner-time to a small town in the middle of nowhere Tasmania, which contained a grand total of exactly 1 Inn. It was the only place in the entire town which (somewhat) catered to tourists, there were no hotels, no hostels, no bed and breakfasts. I actually think that the only restaurant in the entire town was also at our Inn. Our hodge-podge group of mostly Canadians and Americans, with a German thrown in for good measure and good jokes, were not to be dissuaded, however. Most of our time in Tasmania had been spent in so-so hostels or in mostly dry tents, with the exemption of Port Arthur where we slept in a nice little vacation apartment, but this was due to a 5 year anniversary of a massacre in the area and can hardly be viewed as an asset.

We had the whole Inn to ourselves, which meant we got our own beds and real beds not just bunk beds. That is until we went down for dinner and found, this being the only place to go in order to get away from home in the entire town, all the 'colorful' folk of the town congregated in the bar/restaurant. We stayed in the bar/restaurant for the rest of the night, again this being the only place to buy booze or food that we could find. There were several games of darts going on and the TVs on the wall blasted what I can only remember as Nascar. We had a wonderful dinner of Hamburgers and fries with all the Cascade Beer we could hold, needless to say I remember little of the rest of the night besides much loud joking and laughing, on our part mostly at the expense of our German friend and the locals surrounding us. This might be a good time to bring up the similarities of Tasmania and West Virginia:

1. Tasmania is more rugged and beautiful ... WVa is more rugged and beautiful
2. Tasmania is much less populated ... WVa is much less populated
3. Tasmanians carry the stigma of the convict era more than the Mainland ... WVa, uh I think many may be descended from outlaws from Scotland and Ireland
4. It is said that Tasmanians are inbred and born with 2 heads ... just like to say that West Virginians are inbred and have buck teeth

(I'm sorry if I have offended any West Virginians or Tazzies)
The next morning I awoke and packed up slightly before my other student travelers and made my way down to the bar/restaurant/breakfast room/reception area where I found my two mainland Australian Guides in a drastically onesided discussion with two locals, apparently still there from last night. I had already made it through the door, however, and was therefore doomed to pull up a stool and stair dumbly at these two (possibly still drunk) Tasmanians. Due to, what I can only claim as, sheer luck I had stumbled into the middle of a body scars competition between the locals. The winner of the competition had a Giant Scar running down most of his thigh (yes I saw this man's thigh) which he claimed to be a shark bite. I must have said something at this point as the two of them looked up and suddenly became aware of both my presence and that I was not Australian, they then began asking several questions about who we were, what we were doing, where we were going, and when we were leaving. When they found that we had both come to and were planning on leaving Tasmania by the over night ferry "The Spirit of Tasmania", the man with the shark scar just about went ballistic. For nearly ten minutes he expounded on how terrible the old boat, "Tasman Ferry" or "Van Deiman Cruise" or whatever, was and how nice and wonderful the new boat was. To hear this man tell it the old boat was like convict life come back to haunt all of the poor Tasmanians who had to go back and forth by her. I was extremely grateful when my fellow travelers finally made it down the stairs and we were able to leave and begin packing up the car. Only to find as soon as we left the room our Australian guides doubled over in laughter. They then explained to me that the old boat and the new boat the man was talking about was were exactly the same boat! It had apparently gone through a name change a couple years before but absolutely nothing else had changed. Thus I considered my self introduce to the true "spirit of Tasmania" once known as Van Deiman's Land.

September 13, 2004

Valar and Beleriand

Not too much happening this last weekend. I'm currently reading The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien. Mostly because I was bored and picked up the book, but also because I guess you can't really consider yourself a Tolkien aficionado unless you've read it. It's not the most exciting read ever but if you have an interest in anthropology it can be really interesting. Mostly for the linguistics and the mythology. Otherwise I wouldn't really recommend it for anyone other than die hard Tolkien Fans.

Here's another random picture from the vaults. I took it this summer on one of my many travels. That's right, at the National Zoo.


September 12, 2004

The joys of photoshop

A lovely picture of Becca, Catherine and I, courtesy of Jamie. Place your mouse over the picture to see sketchy and scary Matt in the background.



September 10, 2004

Puppies are fighting back

Dog shoots man
Sept. 10, 2004
Jerry Bradford of Pensacola, Fla., was shooting 10 puppies he couldn't find a home for when the animals shot back. A pup he was holding got a paw on the trigger of the gun, shooting Bradford in the wrist. Seven dogs survived. Bradford has been charged with animal cruelty.

If you ask me this guy deserved what he got, who could shoot poor little innocent puppies.

Bugs hate me

What did I do to deserve this? Did I kill too many of you in my day? I didn't think that I was any more of a bug murderer than most. So what gives? Why do you, Bees, feel the need to swarm me while I was innocently walking the dog yesterday afternoon? Why must you sting me twice, under my shirt I might add, forcing me to drop the leash and run away, cursing under my breath? Then you followed me back to the house, stinging me one more time, again under my shirt, at least a half mile from the original swarming incident and forcing me to run the rest of the way back to the house so that I can tear my shirt off in privacy. Then one of you proceeded to taunt me in the house flying around the ceiling for at least another 10 minutes before finding the open door and leaving me alone. Perhaps it was the spiders, maybe they told you that I was easy pickings. Well let me warn you, I don't care any more if you pollinate the pretty flowers, and make the honey that I put in my tea, I wouldn't care if you made the world turn round. You, Bees, are on my hit list!


September 09, 2004

Sad news



Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

--Robert Frost

This entry is dedicated to the memory of Peyton. He was a wonderful person and everyone who knew him will miss him.

September 08, 2004

Annie are you OK?

Last night I spent house-sitting for Lauren's parents who just happen to live within a 5 minute walk to my work, very nice. The dog, Folly, is great although completely deaf. I've never had a dog that has gone deaf so I sort of don't know how to act. I still say reassuring things to her, which Matt has pointed out as futile. There is a dog in one of the neighbors houses which goes into histerics every time I walk by with Folly and I sort of find it a little eerie the way the Folly completely does not react. The weirdest thing, however, was the fact that I had to wake Folly up this morning. I've never had to wake a dog up in the morning, our dogs were always up and hour before we were ready. I must say though Folly is the easiest being I've ever had to wake up, she popped right up and was ready for her walk.
------
On another subject entirely. We had Red Cross Adult CPR and First Aid training at my work today. Seven of us spent most of the day watching videos and abusing legless dolls named Little Anne. Needless to say I had that Michael Jackson song in my head all day, "Annie are you ok? are you ok? are you ok, Annie?". There were all sorts of other disturbing things that went on during this course:

the dummies we used had removable faces, one of which we were each assigned. I perfectly understand the germ phobia that inspired this, but it's still a little disconcerting to peel a latex face off of a dummy.

the acting in the videos, DISTURBING!!

the pictures of an avulsion and 3rd degree burn segment, also grotesque.

the advice the booklet gives for caring for a pregnant woman:
Do not let the woman get up or leave to find a bathroom
Do not hold her knees together; this will not slow the birth process...
Do not pull on the baby

there were many other disturbing things that may not come across in type such as certain coworkers attempting to give other certain coworkers the Hiemlich maneuver, and one coworker performing compressions right over the notch at the bottom of the sternum.

The upside is that this day has gone by really fast for me and I haven't had to do any work. Oh I just found this picture of Baby Anne, I'm glad we didn't get certified in infant CPR! Can you imagine peeling the face off???

September 07, 2004

Hurricane? What Hurricane?

So I tried to post an audioblog from the 1/2 marathon, while running along with Catherine but that was unsuccessful, I think that I forgot to hit the # key at the end of the message, I will do better next time.

Our weekend was awesome! Thanks SO SO much to Tanya and James for allowing us to partially take over their house for the weekend! I accidentally brought their key back with me, oops.

I had a lovely time cheering Na, Catherine and Jamie on a the race and am glad that I was not talked into actually running it myself :) It's just not my bag, baby, yeah. Also, it meant that my legs weren't sore for dancing sunday night. I'm sure all the scandalous details will be covered here, here and here, so I won't repeat them. Instead, I will go on to my big news!

I bought a computer! It's a Powerbook G4 and it is so cute. This is also the reason why this post will be so short, I'm still getting the feel of the new laptop and need much more play time.

Well done Girls!

September 03, 2004

Livin' La Vida Loca

Thank you to all those who helped Becca and I celebrate our Birthday, but it's not over yet! Tonight I go to the parents house to see Kim, in town for the weekend, and hopefully to have cake as well, yummy. Then tomorrow morning I head down to VaBeach to cheer Jamie, Na, and Catherine on in the Rock and Roll Half Marathon, you go Gals! Also, there will be much beach lounging as long as the hurricane stays away and then Matt comes down sunday and we all party the night away, Yipeee!!! I can't wait, Labor Day weekend is much more fun now that it doesn't mean school and new classes to try and get ready for, and nightmares about going to the wrong class or something about accidental public nudity. Although I still get that one dream where you have to take a final for a class that you somehow forgot to go to the lectures all semester.

Anyway, last night was awesome, I only had two drinks, both had taste a little lacking but man did they pack a punch, I was loopy the entire night. It was the good sort of loopy that makes you want to dance when there isn't any music and put your pony tail sideways in a salute to the '80's, which I did. I also cinched my jeans in another misguided '80's salute but this was pre-drunkeness and only served to keep people at a healthy distance. The best thing was, though, that since Naomi brought me water and Matt made me drink it, I amazingly had zero hangover this morning! I think that my boss is amazed I made it to work on time! So as long as I can make it through another head-bashing-against-my-computer-boring day at work I'll be primed and ready for the weekend.


September 02, 2004

Happy Birthday to US!


September 01, 2004

The evolution of Mice

Check out this laser hand held trackball! Now you don't need a wire or a flat surface. This thing has a trigger click button, it's like you're using one of those wireless duck hunt guns for you mouse! Green Green Globe has wired ones too in all different colors. I'm just sad that these things don't work with Macs.


Time is on my side

As September 1st comes around I am reminded of two things. Exactly one month and five days until I head to Bali and Hong Kong, WOOHOO! and tomorrow is my birthday. As I turn 24 tomorrow I can rest easy knowing that 1) I still have another year till I have to take the dreaded test to renew my license and 2) Becca is still exactly 1 year older than me. Sorry Becca I had to do it :-).

I was thinking that I would write up a wish list not a birthday wishlist really just things i'm missing. So here it is in no particular order:

New Laptop: i've been scanning craiglist every day in hopes of finding the perfect one.
Wave Bird Gamecube controller: those cords really get in the way, and I don't really like the 2nd controller that I have since it does funky things in Super Monkey Ball 2: Bowling.
New Comforter/Bedspread: my old one is shedding and clumping
Someone to write me a recommendation for Grad School: where do you find these?
More time to read novels and scifi books
Someone to fill out Grad School applications come winter
New watch band or watch: this thing really is getting ratty
A haircut (big star), uh, just kidding
A magical current changer to charge my camera over seas that is small enough to take with you without needing an extra peice of luggage, or just a second battery
A second memory card for said camera
An amazing score on the GRE's that will get me into any school without sending in a letter of recommendation
Bike rack that will fit on my car
My memory: where are you?
A new niece or nephew: I can't wait

I think that that's it. Here's a picture of some sort of bird of prey, that lives on that pyling there in the entrance to Harrington Harbor, where my parents keep their boat.


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