Happy Easter!

PS
The guy in green looks really funny at regular size, trust me

My st patty’s day away message and my favorite response so far....

Auto response from Me: Some people struggle all their life to be perfect- Some are just born Irish. Happy St. Patrick’s Day!!

CaptainNamo: what?!
CaptainNamo: forget that!
CaptainNamo: it’s st. patrick’s day!
CaptainNamo: EVERYONE’S IRISH!
CaptainNamo: SOMEONE GIVE ME A GUINESS!!!

Ok, I never did a birthday entry, but it was awesome. But hey! Here’s one of my presents. Greg gave me tickets to go see him in the Rocky Horror Show.

Here’s me dressed up as Columbia.

And here’s Elio and I all ready to go. His make-up supplied by yours truely.

Very good show, I had alot of fun. We even got picked to dance with the cast! Woo hoo! Anywoo I’m gonna see it again on sunday, with my parents. It is now my goal to get them dressed up. Muahahahahaha!

i’m doing this for tony lee. plus i still have an hour till work. last night duke beat unc by like one point. amaazing. college basketball isn’t like this anywhere else. i forgot what it can be like.

i got a parttime job at acmoore, selling yarn to old ladies. john booker’s sister works there. weirddd. it’s only 5 minutes away. i get a really good discount and stuff there is cheap as it is. my sister came and got a good deal on lots of paint so she can make pictures for her boyfriend year-round. if you live here, as in north carolina, come visit me. please. i get bored.

i had my birthday and it was good, mom bought me an ice cream cake yumm and now it’s all gone. i got 4 free songs on itunes from pepsi tops someone gave me.

sxsw--i’m tooootally going. it’s going to be the reunion. i will love it. hopefully. i think all the good bands are scheduled for saturday night so it’ll be really hard to get out and see them all..i hope these venues are really near eachother. i’m hoping to make connections..is that bad? whatever. today i got rid of the california plates on my car. i’m hoping to save them forever....siigh. i think i’ll have bojangles for dinner. or..hmm...shells & cheese. or a ham sandwich. or PIZZA MM..durham should open a cabo san luis. i would die.

ps-only like a week till scott pilgrim 2. and only like 2 years till its a major motion picture..!

i’m back home in NC. we drove over 3,100 miles..i don’t know why it took that long. but whatever. i miss people already but i love the weather here.

no one gave me their addresses for postcards, so basically, you all suck. all of you. but that’s ok because i didn’t even buy postcards except a couple.

tonight i’m going to a house show in raleigh to hopefully make new friends, but i doubt i will. right? right. happy birthday lawrence..im seeing hot cross for you

i’ll do a big tour of the country update as soon as i get my computer situation figured out. my dad’s sucks, and i need internet like woah if im going to survive living here.

I spent most of the day unpacking and rearranging stuff in my room, returning the bed to its proper position, and unpacking the metric ton of crap in my suitcase and backpack. During this time Cory bombarded Sean and I with questions concerning our journeys. We saw a movie (?Arry Potta? was quite entertaining) and went to a few bars that night to further facilitate the telling of our tales.

My birthday is on the 5th (coolness), and it should be fun after I finish getting my teeth filled. I made a dentist appointment a million years ago and didn?t realize it was on my b-day until later. I didn?t reschedule because I had already pissed off my dentist once by missing my last appointment, I didn?t want to press my luck.

I?m going to try and contact all of my ex-shipmates very soon so that we can have a reunion party/ies, but I have been running into difficulties using the internet (grrrrr). I am greatly anticipating maintaining the friendships I developed on the ship here in SLO.

I?ll also be calling New Frontiers, my old work, soon. I have to see if they have an opening for me. I am beyond sure that they?d take me back, but they may not have a spot for me. I?m not worried though. I can always find another job, and I have some money I can coast on for awhile.

I am still in the process of cleaning up my room. It?s going to take several more hours of solid work.

Nothing was broken while in transit which I am very grateful for. I can?t wait to enjoy some of the best green tea in the world with my new tea set (something I picked up in Korea). I also got plenty of new T-shirts to wear. Cory seems very pleased with the gift I gave him, a Russian military pocket watch of authentic design.

I?ve started to get in contact with my social group here in SLO again. I am amazed at how many people have been regularly reading this journal. It?s a very big compliment and I am glad that so many people found it useful. Just as a reminder, now that I am home I can read any comments posted on the journal. Feel free to post now that I?ll actually be able to read your comments. I might even respond to some of them.

I?ve been feeling pretty good . . . very good since I?ve returned for a variety of reasons. I?ll explain what they are and my feelings about the trip as a whole in my next and possibly final entry (bum bum BUMMMM!).

I woke up at one in the afternoon today, the latest I’ve arisen all trip. This is because last night, or earlier this morning, some friends of mine convinced me to play some Illuminati (a game I brought with and have shown a few people how to play) with them. The game is simple in it’s overall theme (as one of several secret societies try to take over enough organizations to rule the world), but complex in its details. We ended up playing two games since the first was so short (somebody snuck by everyone else to victory, I won the second one). Bedtime was a little after four (the latest I have gone to bed while not being in port).

I missed breakfast and lunch (snacked on instant noodles from Korea), but dinner was fun. Mom (the cook everyone calls Mom I mean, an adorable Indian woman) made Chelsea a huge chocolate cake and everyone jumped one it (my naseau is totally gone yay!).

After dinner I spent most of the night working (whale presentation, physics homework, and a small paper). I think I am going to be able to meet all of my deadlines this week, but it’s going to be busy until the end.

I am in an excellent mood; despite my business today a spent ten minutes here and fifteen there just hanging out with different people, talking, and getting a little slice of what everyone was doing throughtout the day.

The ship is kinda a like an improved reincarnataion of the dorms: it’s on the ocean, not so crowded, a higher ratio of cooler/more together peers, and lots of little exciting vacations in foreign countries between classes.

I realized today (and last night) as I was looking at pictures of myself on the 1st day of cruise, that I have definitely gone through some change. The major motivation for this change hasn’t been all of the new ’things’ I’ve been exposed to necessarily; it’s been due to the reappearance of little pieces of past personal baggage that I’d thoguht I’d dealt with. I’ve gotten a chance to get another, subdued taste of them. Now that all of the those little aftershocks (ideas about myself, what I want, who I should be) have resurfaced, been acknowledged, and floated away; I feel like a larger part of myself has clicked into place, I am sturdier more secure.

Well, that’s all for now.

6/19 . . . one more time!

We re-crossed the international dateline today. Today was kind of a repeat of yesterday.

Since it was the nineteenth again I made sure that Chelsea, my Div Com, was soaked with water again. She was watching like a hawk me the whole day as well as during formation. I recruited two friends from Division A (all of the Cal Poly kids are split into divisions A & B) to dump two buckets of water on her I had set up earlier in the day. It went off almost perfectly. She definitely wasn’t expecting two buckets. Hahahahaha. I can still remember her scream when the second bucket hit her.

I finally got a lot of work done today. Which is very good considering the amount of crap that I need to finish by the end of this week. I probably will be spending most of my time on Sunday doing lots of school work; first on the list is preparing two presentations that I need to do.

I am a little bummed out how busy I’ll be this coming week since it is really going to be the last full week of cruise. I am flying back to the states from Hawaii on Wednesday and finals are Saturday so I’ll have a little free time before the cruise is finished, but it’s still winding down. At least I’ll have a bunch of new friends to hang out with when I get back.


Man, talk about cries for attention. Although I was involved in several other students birthday soaking, Chelsea?s was the only soaking that I set up. I was asked to do all of the others. I guess that it was tough luck for me that so many kids on the ship happened to be chasing after her, and on top of that she kind had something going on with the head cadet on the ship (found that out later).

6/19... the first time around

Well, there is a little less than two weeks of time left on this cruise, and during that time (much less than that time actually) I have to prepare two 1/2 hour presentations, write two ten page reports, and study for three finals. Busy busy busy, but I am still feeling crappy. Hopefully I ’ll feel better tomorrow so I can get some serious work done.

The highlight of the day was during formation. My division commander (div com) Chelsea, has her birthday on the twentieth. When it’s your birthday on the ship you usually get a bucket of H20 dumped on your head during formation, but since Chelsea’s birthday is on a Sunday (when there is no formation) I decided to give her an early birthday present myself. She couldn’t have been more surprised, and everyone had the initiative to start singing happy birthday to her right after she was soaked. I forgot about my nausea for at least an hour after that.


I don?t remember feeling that nauseous. I think half of it was caused by angst over the cruise almost being over, and the fact that I had to spend a nice chunk of it getting everything done since I procrastinated my final projects. Oops. I really didn?t want to go home yet.

Joy! Today is my birthday! I have a particular affinity for birthdays, I like them all, even those that belong to other people.

So, now that I have used a full 22 years, what should I do with this next one?

Happy Valentine’s Day my lovelies! 

I predict (with all my psychic powers) an excellent year of love for all of you! May I receive deep tissue bruises if I am wrong.

 

Acacia beauty in retirement	Daffodil respect and "the sun always shines when I am with you"	Marigold grief
Agapanthis secret love	Daisy loyal love and innocence	Narcissus "stay as sweet as you are"
Ambrosia "your love is returned"	Freesia trust	Orchid thoughtful, maturity, charm
Anemone sincerity; forsaken	Forget-me-not true love and good memories	Petunia "your presence soothes me"
Aster symbol of love	Hyacinth "please forgive me"	Primrose "I cannot be without you"
Azalea "take care of yourself"	honeysuckle happiness	Stephanotis happiness in marriage
Bluebell humility	Hydrangea "thank you for understanding"	Sweet Pea "thanks for a lovely time"
Cactus endurance	Iris wisdom, faith and hope	Sunflower pride, sunshine
Caladium great joy and delight	Jonquil desire for affection returned	Tulip perfect lover and luck
Camellia good luck gift for a man	Larkspur fickleness	Violet faithfulness, virtue
Chrysanthemum "you are a wonderful friend"	Lily of the Valley beauty, gaiety, coquetry	Viscaria "dance with me"
Crocus gladness	Magnolia nobility	Wisteria welcome

Carnations The flower of fascination Pink - "always on my mind" Red - passion White - sweet, lovely, good luck Striped - refusal

Roses The flower of love Red - love, passion Pink - happiness White - purity, innocence Yellow - friendship

(Stolen from http://www.didyouknow.cd)

I was in a bar tonight for a friend’s 21st birthday, when an older guy offered me $50 to use my cel phone. Naturally, I was intrigued, but not for the money. I gave him my phone in exchange for a gin & tonic, and we chatted. He asked me if I was following my dreams (yes, very cliché, but quite relevant) and I had to think for a minute and wonder which ones I am indeed following. I chatted with him for the better part of a half hour to find out where he was coming from, who he was, and where he’d been... His father, a racecar driver, had died this week, and his grandmother had in the past few months. He was drunk, friendless, and suddenly a millionaire. After the bartender cut him off and threw him out, I rejoined my girlfriend and our birthday boy, but definitely appreciated the experience of the evening. I’ve had good karma with drunken rednecks in bars thus far, and I rather enjoy the conversations that come out of the experience.

Laura,
Can’t you give me some time?
I got to give myself one more chance.
To be the man that I know I am.
("Laura", Scissor Sisters)

I’ve had that damned song running through my head this whole afternoon. I’ve only heard the scissor sisters through a DJ Riko remix of that track... is the rest of their body of work worth a listen?

hrm.. sexy geeky redhead waiting in a warm bed behind me. why am I blogging at a time like this?

Olympia: The rumors of my demise were premature. I’m back.

The rest of the world: I think I took a wrong turn. After 5 weeks and two continents, I ended up back in Olympia. I’m guessing my GPS needs new batteries.

A belated happy Groundhog Day to my dearest Renée. Your gift shall be in the post this next week, I hope.

I’m once again pondering my future fate. My ass (and much of the connected bone and tissue) belongs to my chem prof, lab project, and a slightly awkward existence in this research project (for which I’ve lost most of my enthusiasm), for the next 10 weeks.

Thankfully, however, I’m already skipping town this weekend, in search of a sea breeze (not the beverage) and a bit of peace and quiet.

Photos and a more verbose breakdown of the last month or few shall be had sometime soon, probably. I also haven’t been reading journals, et cetera reliably for the last month, so if something significant happened in your world which I probably missed but you think I should know about, comment within.

I’ve been told that the customary thing to say at this point is "It’s good to be back." Maybe it is...