So I am home in Wichita for the weekend, and I was ransacking my closet upstairs late last night, like I do EVERY time I come home, because I am an inherently nostalgic person, I think. Anyway, I found a ton of old CD's and DVD's, including one that that I had burned from a VHS tape that the Cohlmia's had found sometime last year.... it contained a number of "action" movies that we had made years and years ago... 1994-5 or so?
Anyway, here they are:
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Dr. Sinister - Episode 1:
The first of the trilogy. Dr. Sinister is hellbent on using the Smith family's nuclear technology for world domination, and only one man stands in his way: McBoone.
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Dr. Sinister - Episode 2 / The Revenge of Dr. Sinister:
Dr. Sinister is back with three things: a vengeance, a biomechanical arm made from an impenetrable alloy, and a mindless android slave with a gun for an arm. This time, his plans are not so lofty as taking over the world. He is after one thing, and one thing only: McBoone.
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Dr. Sinister - Episode 3 / The Return of the Revenge of Dr. Sinister:
Dr. Sinister's twisted technology helped him cheat death, and travel back in time. Have you ever seen Terminator 2, where the bad guy is trying to kill the good guy's father in the past? It's pretty much like that. And instead of the antagonists using a liquid metal robot as a past-sassin (past assassin), Dr. Sinister employs Charlie the Pom-Pom Manufacturer, a simple man, with simple morals, and a helluva temper. Guest starring Matt Meikleham as McBoone Sr.
---
Bill:
Don't watch this movie if you are scared of the dark. In fact, don't watch this movie if it ever gets dark anywhere near where you live. It's that scary. Bill is undead. And he's out to get me. And he is ubiquitous, kinda like Mexican food from Ubiquitaco, that taco place that will deliver tacos anywhere in the world. Well, that's still hypothetical, but that restaurant is MY brainchild, so don't go getting any bright ideas. Anyway the movie is "scary" and by "scary" I mean hilarious. The car scene is quite possibly the funniest silent scream I've ever seen, if I do say so myself.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
Lucid Dreams
"A lucid dream, also known as a conscious dream, is a dream in which the person is aware that he or she is dreaming while the dream is in progress. During lucid dreams, it is possible to exert conscious control over the dream characters and environment, as well as to perform otherwise physically impossible feats. Lucid dreams can be extremely real and vivid depending on a person's level of self-awareness during the lucid dream." (wikipedia)
Back at BU, I used to come back from physics class, and take a nap every day in the sun coming in the window. Most often, during these naps, I would have extremely vivid and bizarre dreams, and occasionally they would be lucid. I made a conscious effort to recognize when I was dreaming, so I could start doing crazy and impossible things. With time I got better at having, recognizing, and enjoying lucid dreams, but it was never very predictable.
I'm going to start trying to do that again. I had read a long time ago that morning naps are the best time for lucid dreams, and at BU that always held true for me. Today, I took a morning nap for the first time this year, and I had some strange half-dreams, and time seemed to pass very slowly, as it used to when I was having lucid dreams. So, I hope that I haven't completely lost my ability to have them. I'm not sure how often I'll get the chance to take morning naps (however, I have discovered that I can quite efficiently take notes from podcasts at 200% speed, so I wouldn't feel bad about skipping the occasional class) but I will try to have lucid dreams whenever I sleep.
There are several methods (but many are not very reliable) for inducing lucid dreams. Here are some wikipedia excerpts explaining some of them:
"Mnemonic induction of lucid dreams (MILD): The MILD technique is a common technique developed by Dr. Stephen LaBerge used to induce a lucid dream at will by setting an intention, while falling asleep, to remember to recognize that one is dreaming, or to remember to look for dream signs when one is in a dream."
"Reality testing: Reality testing (or reality checking) is a common method used by people to determine whether or not they are dreaming. It involves performing an action with results that will be different if the tester is dreaming. By practicing these tests during waking life, one may eventually decide to perform such a test while dreaming, which may fail and let the dreamer realize that they are dreaming.
Common reality tests include:
* Looking at one's digital watch (remembering the time), looking away, and looking back. As with text, the time will probably have changed randomly and radically at the second glance or contain strange letters and characters. (Analog watches do not usually change in dreams, while digital watches have great tendency to do so.)
* Flipping a light switch. Light levels rarely change as a result of the switch flipping in dreams.
* Looking into a mirror; in dreams, reflections from a mirror often appear to be blurred, distorted or incorrect." (or trying to read a book and realizing the text is jumbled (Batman - The Animated Series, anyone??))
"Wake-back-to-bed (WBTB): The wake-back-to-bed technique is often the easiest way to encourage a lucid dream. The method involves going to sleep tired and waking up five hours later. Then, focusing all thoughts on lucid dreaming, staying awake for an hour and going back to sleep while practicing the MILD method. A 60% success rate has been shown in research using this technique. This is because the REM cycles get longer as the night goes on, and this technique takes advantage of the best REM cycle of the night. Because this REM cycle is longer and deeper, gaining lucidity during this time may result in a lengthier lucid dream." (Kind of like the morning nap routine.)
"Wake-initiation of lucid dreams (WILD): The wake-initiated lucid dream "occurs when the sleeper enters REM sleep with unbroken self-awareness directly from the waking state". There are many techniques aimed at entering a WILD. The key to these techniques is recognizing the hypnagogic stage, which is within the border of being awake and being asleep. If a person is successful in staying aware while this stage occurs, he or she will eventually enter the dream state while being fully aware that it is a dream.... There are key times at which this state is best entered; while success at normal bedtime after having been awake all day is very difficult, it is relatively easy after sleeping for 3–7 hours or in the afternoon during a nap. Techniques for inducing WILDs abound. Dreamers may count, envision themselves climbing or descending stairs, chant to themselves, control their breathing, counting their breaths to keep their thoughts from drifting, concentrate on relaxing their body from their toes to their head, allow images to flow through their "mind's eye" and envision themselves jumping into the image, to maintain concentration and keep their mind awake, while still being calm enough to let their body sleep.
During the actual transition into the dream state, one is likely to experience sleep paralysis, including rapid vibrations, a sequence of loud sounds and a feeling of twirling into another state of body awareness, "to drift off into another dimension". Also there is frequently a sensation of falling rapidly or dropping through the bed as one enters the dream state. After the transition there may be the sensation of entering a dark black room from which one can induce any dream scenario of one's choosing, simply by concentrating on it. The key to success is not to panic, especially during the transition, which can be quite sudden." (I used to be pretty good at this; closing my eyes, concentrating on watching the little swirling lights you see with your eyes closed sometimes... I could feel my body "disappearing," as I kind of forgot the position of my hands, legs etc.... the weirdest part is when you can feel your eyes start to twitch. Shortly after that, if I could keep it going, I would have a lucid or semi-lucid dream. If I couldn't keep it going, I would often have some sort of bizarre idea or dream picture pop into my head, and then I'd lose concentration and wake up again.)
"Prolonging lucid dreams: One problem faced by people wishing to lucid dream is awakening prematurely. This premature awakening can be frustrating after investing considerable time into achieving lucidity in the first place. Stephen LaBerge proposed two ways to prolong a lucid dream. The first technique involves spinning one's dream body. He proposed that when spinning, the dreamer is engaging parts of the brain that may also be involved in REM activity, helping to prolong REM sleep. The second technique is rubbing one's hands. This technique is intended to engage the dreamer's brain in producing the sensation of rubbing hands, preventing the sensation of lying in bed from creeping into awareness. LaBerge tested his hypothesis by asking 34 volunteers to either spin, rub their hands, or do nothing. Results showed 90% of dreams were prolonged by hand rubbing and 96% prolonged by spinning. Only 33% of lucid dreams were prolonged with taking no action." (I tried the spinning one time, and it successfully kept me in the most amazing lucid dream I ever had. I could bound for miles in single jumps, and abracadabra the world into a completely different planet. It was spectacular.)
Alright, so that's my whole long rambling intro to lucid dreaming. I'll post my lucid dreaming results on the blog and tag them with an appropriate tag, so if you want to, you can follow along : )
Alright I'm going to sleep... or am I??
Back at BU, I used to come back from physics class, and take a nap every day in the sun coming in the window. Most often, during these naps, I would have extremely vivid and bizarre dreams, and occasionally they would be lucid. I made a conscious effort to recognize when I was dreaming, so I could start doing crazy and impossible things. With time I got better at having, recognizing, and enjoying lucid dreams, but it was never very predictable.
I'm going to start trying to do that again. I had read a long time ago that morning naps are the best time for lucid dreams, and at BU that always held true for me. Today, I took a morning nap for the first time this year, and I had some strange half-dreams, and time seemed to pass very slowly, as it used to when I was having lucid dreams. So, I hope that I haven't completely lost my ability to have them. I'm not sure how often I'll get the chance to take morning naps (however, I have discovered that I can quite efficiently take notes from podcasts at 200% speed, so I wouldn't feel bad about skipping the occasional class) but I will try to have lucid dreams whenever I sleep.
There are several methods (but many are not very reliable) for inducing lucid dreams. Here are some wikipedia excerpts explaining some of them:
"Mnemonic induction of lucid dreams (MILD): The MILD technique is a common technique developed by Dr. Stephen LaBerge used to induce a lucid dream at will by setting an intention, while falling asleep, to remember to recognize that one is dreaming, or to remember to look for dream signs when one is in a dream."
"Reality testing: Reality testing (or reality checking) is a common method used by people to determine whether or not they are dreaming. It involves performing an action with results that will be different if the tester is dreaming. By practicing these tests during waking life, one may eventually decide to perform such a test while dreaming, which may fail and let the dreamer realize that they are dreaming.
Common reality tests include:
* Looking at one's digital watch (remembering the time), looking away, and looking back. As with text, the time will probably have changed randomly and radically at the second glance or contain strange letters and characters. (Analog watches do not usually change in dreams, while digital watches have great tendency to do so.)
* Flipping a light switch. Light levels rarely change as a result of the switch flipping in dreams.
* Looking into a mirror; in dreams, reflections from a mirror often appear to be blurred, distorted or incorrect." (or trying to read a book and realizing the text is jumbled (Batman - The Animated Series, anyone??))
"Wake-back-to-bed (WBTB): The wake-back-to-bed technique is often the easiest way to encourage a lucid dream. The method involves going to sleep tired and waking up five hours later. Then, focusing all thoughts on lucid dreaming, staying awake for an hour and going back to sleep while practicing the MILD method. A 60% success rate has been shown in research using this technique. This is because the REM cycles get longer as the night goes on, and this technique takes advantage of the best REM cycle of the night. Because this REM cycle is longer and deeper, gaining lucidity during this time may result in a lengthier lucid dream." (Kind of like the morning nap routine.)
"Wake-initiation of lucid dreams (WILD): The wake-initiated lucid dream "occurs when the sleeper enters REM sleep with unbroken self-awareness directly from the waking state". There are many techniques aimed at entering a WILD. The key to these techniques is recognizing the hypnagogic stage, which is within the border of being awake and being asleep. If a person is successful in staying aware while this stage occurs, he or she will eventually enter the dream state while being fully aware that it is a dream.... There are key times at which this state is best entered; while success at normal bedtime after having been awake all day is very difficult, it is relatively easy after sleeping for 3–7 hours or in the afternoon during a nap. Techniques for inducing WILDs abound. Dreamers may count, envision themselves climbing or descending stairs, chant to themselves, control their breathing, counting their breaths to keep their thoughts from drifting, concentrate on relaxing their body from their toes to their head, allow images to flow through their "mind's eye" and envision themselves jumping into the image, to maintain concentration and keep their mind awake, while still being calm enough to let their body sleep.
During the actual transition into the dream state, one is likely to experience sleep paralysis, including rapid vibrations, a sequence of loud sounds and a feeling of twirling into another state of body awareness, "to drift off into another dimension". Also there is frequently a sensation of falling rapidly or dropping through the bed as one enters the dream state. After the transition there may be the sensation of entering a dark black room from which one can induce any dream scenario of one's choosing, simply by concentrating on it. The key to success is not to panic, especially during the transition, which can be quite sudden." (I used to be pretty good at this; closing my eyes, concentrating on watching the little swirling lights you see with your eyes closed sometimes... I could feel my body "disappearing," as I kind of forgot the position of my hands, legs etc.... the weirdest part is when you can feel your eyes start to twitch. Shortly after that, if I could keep it going, I would have a lucid or semi-lucid dream. If I couldn't keep it going, I would often have some sort of bizarre idea or dream picture pop into my head, and then I'd lose concentration and wake up again.)
"Prolonging lucid dreams: One problem faced by people wishing to lucid dream is awakening prematurely. This premature awakening can be frustrating after investing considerable time into achieving lucidity in the first place. Stephen LaBerge proposed two ways to prolong a lucid dream. The first technique involves spinning one's dream body. He proposed that when spinning, the dreamer is engaging parts of the brain that may also be involved in REM activity, helping to prolong REM sleep. The second technique is rubbing one's hands. This technique is intended to engage the dreamer's brain in producing the sensation of rubbing hands, preventing the sensation of lying in bed from creeping into awareness. LaBerge tested his hypothesis by asking 34 volunteers to either spin, rub their hands, or do nothing. Results showed 90% of dreams were prolonged by hand rubbing and 96% prolonged by spinning. Only 33% of lucid dreams were prolonged with taking no action." (I tried the spinning one time, and it successfully kept me in the most amazing lucid dream I ever had. I could bound for miles in single jumps, and abracadabra the world into a completely different planet. It was spectacular.)
Alright, so that's my whole long rambling intro to lucid dreaming. I'll post my lucid dreaming results on the blog and tag them with an appropriate tag, so if you want to, you can follow along : )
Alright I'm going to sleep... or am I??
Thursday, March 20, 2008
PKD
Polycystic Kidney Disease is a genetic disease that leads to the formation of multiple cysts in the kidney. Here are two pictures of kidneys from people with PKD.
For comparison, here is what a normal kidney looks like:
Also, here's an unrelated picture of a number of kidney donors in the Phillipines, who sold their kidneys to foreigners in need of transplants.
For comparison, here is what a normal kidney looks like:
Also, here's an unrelated picture of a number of kidney donors in the Phillipines, who sold their kidneys to foreigners in need of transplants.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Happy Birthday, Mom!
Happy birthday mom, I love you : )
I know it's a few days belated, but I couldn't get it edited any earlier:
I know it's a few days belated, but I couldn't get it edited any earlier:
Day 8 Update
Not much to post about today; took care of packing and other necessary things, and Naomi and I tried to enjoy each other's company as much as possible... she calculated it to be 100 days between today and the next time we see each other.
Picked up some Boba tea on the way to the airport. Almost got lost, but Naomi stopped at a convenience store and got directions, so I made it to the airport in plenty of time. Said a sad farewell, and got in line to check in as Naomi left.
THEN, found out that Qantas has a carry-on weight limit. Unlike in the US, where if you can hoist it and stuff it into the overhead compartment, they actually have a cutoff point. So, I couldn't carry on my big duffel, and had to check it. So I knew I wouldn't have enough time to clear customs in LAX and still catch the LAX-DFW flight, which then meant I wouldn't make the connection for DFW-MCI. So, I had that weighing on my head the entire international flight. But, I still managed to sleep most of the time after watching "We Own The Night," (mediocre).
In LAX, they had "prioritized" my bag at my request, so it was supposed to come off the plane early. However, they didn't TELL any of us who had prioritized bags that they were pulled off the plane and didn't go to the carousel at all. So I, and some other people in my same position, sat there for 45 minutes waiting for bags before another passenger pointed out that some bags had been pre-pulled and were sitting on the other side of the carousel. Damn it.
So, then I had to go wait in line, and they ended up booking me on a United itinerary through Denver, getting into KC 2 hrs later than planned. Could've been worse.
After some more minor delays, I made it back into town, almost exactly 24 hours after leaving New Zealand. Two friends of mine picked me up. They brought a bunch of hand-written signs from my friends who were drinking at a friend's house for St. Patty's Day, welcoming me back to the states, along with a single oatmeal cookie in a Ziploc bag. Pretty awesome welcome home, especially when I was so tired, grumpy, and depressed after having to leave Naomi and endure all that traveling mess. So, I figured I should take them up on their invitation to come over. Kathryn drove me over to Stephanie and Caleb's house, where I had a beer and talked with everyone for a bit, and then she dropped me off at home as she was driving everyone else to the bar. Like I said, pretty good welcome-home.
House is fine, but cold. I took a shower, and am now hoping Naomi gets on Skype to say goodnight to her before I pass out. She just got an internship at a school in NZ for kids with cerebral palsy. I'm anxious to hear how her first day went. I'm proud of her : )
It's good to be back home somewhere clean and comfortable. 100 days though...
Anyway, I'll post the rest of the NZ pics tomorrow. It was a great trip.
Night everybody.
Picked up some Boba tea on the way to the airport. Almost got lost, but Naomi stopped at a convenience store and got directions, so I made it to the airport in plenty of time. Said a sad farewell, and got in line to check in as Naomi left.
THEN, found out that Qantas has a carry-on weight limit. Unlike in the US, where if you can hoist it and stuff it into the overhead compartment, they actually have a cutoff point. So, I couldn't carry on my big duffel, and had to check it. So I knew I wouldn't have enough time to clear customs in LAX and still catch the LAX-DFW flight, which then meant I wouldn't make the connection for DFW-MCI. So, I had that weighing on my head the entire international flight. But, I still managed to sleep most of the time after watching "We Own The Night," (mediocre).
In LAX, they had "prioritized" my bag at my request, so it was supposed to come off the plane early. However, they didn't TELL any of us who had prioritized bags that they were pulled off the plane and didn't go to the carousel at all. So I, and some other people in my same position, sat there for 45 minutes waiting for bags before another passenger pointed out that some bags had been pre-pulled and were sitting on the other side of the carousel. Damn it.
So, then I had to go wait in line, and they ended up booking me on a United itinerary through Denver, getting into KC 2 hrs later than planned. Could've been worse.
After some more minor delays, I made it back into town, almost exactly 24 hours after leaving New Zealand. Two friends of mine picked me up. They brought a bunch of hand-written signs from my friends who were drinking at a friend's house for St. Patty's Day, welcoming me back to the states, along with a single oatmeal cookie in a Ziploc bag. Pretty awesome welcome home, especially when I was so tired, grumpy, and depressed after having to leave Naomi and endure all that traveling mess. So, I figured I should take them up on their invitation to come over. Kathryn drove me over to Stephanie and Caleb's house, where I had a beer and talked with everyone for a bit, and then she dropped me off at home as she was driving everyone else to the bar. Like I said, pretty good welcome-home.
House is fine, but cold. I took a shower, and am now hoping Naomi gets on Skype to say goodnight to her before I pass out. She just got an internship at a school in NZ for kids with cerebral palsy. I'm anxious to hear how her first day went. I'm proud of her : )
It's good to be back home somewhere clean and comfortable. 100 days though...
Anyway, I'll post the rest of the NZ pics tomorrow. It was a great trip.
Night everybody.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Day 7 Update
[Pictures Posted]
Today, we woke up, checked out of the Top 10 Park, and drove up the street to the Long Black Cafe, where we had a quick breakfast.
Then, we walked next door to "The Legendary Blackwater Rafting Co." for out 5 hour session of black (as opposed to white) water rafting. It is black because you're on an underground river in a gigantic, pitch black cave. We started off by repelling (or, as they call it down there, "abseiling") 35m down through the "throat" of the cave, a very narrow section that was a pretty tight squeeze. Once down there, we started off hiking through the cave system, and did a zipline through the pitch-black without any lights on. We leaped off a ledge into some black water, checked out some glow-worms later on, free-climbed UP some waterfalls. At one point, I found a tiny side cave, and followed it off without telling anyone : ) After climbing back there and turning my head to to peer up a narrow channel, I could see it was formed by a small tributary of a waterfall/river. I also found a little baby eel working its slimy way up the water rock by rock. It was awesome. Then, about 5 hours after we left the sunlight, we came out into the sun a long ways away from where we went in, and hiked back towards the van that had brought us there. A guy who has been traveling for the past 2 years or something, and has been to 30 some countries, was on the trip with us, and bought the picture CD from the guide company... he offered to email everyone else the pictures when he got access to some fast internet, so we should have some good pics eventually.
After that, we went with the Australians we had met the night before (who also had been on our blackwater raft trip) to "The Shearing Shed," to watch some Angora rabbits being sheared. They strapped the rabbits into this medieval torture-looking thing, and shaved them with these gigantic clippers.... it was insane. Just check out the pictures.
Then we headed of to go find some horses, to take some horsey laugh pictures for my mom.
After that, we headed back towards Auckland, intending to stop at "Candyland - NZ's Largest Candy Retailer!" (we had seen a sign for it on the way to Rotorua a few days before). We arrived at 5:12 pm; it closed at 5:00 pm. Naomi was DEVASTATED. She wanted to extend our trip a whole extra night just to stay in a nearby town so we could come to Candyland the next morning. After debating this for about 30 minutes we decided to got back to Auckland, since I had to leave NZ the next morning. I don't think Naomi will ever fully forgive us for making that decision... (j/k).
Once back in Auckland, we took much-needed showers, and went out to "Blush," this fancy Asian restaurant near Naomi's apartment. We had a great dinner and some delicious milk tea.
Great last day in NZ : )
Today, we woke up, checked out of the Top 10 Park, and drove up the street to the Long Black Cafe, where we had a quick breakfast.
Then, we walked next door to "The Legendary Blackwater Rafting Co." for out 5 hour session of black (as opposed to white) water rafting. It is black because you're on an underground river in a gigantic, pitch black cave. We started off by repelling (or, as they call it down there, "abseiling") 35m down through the "throat" of the cave, a very narrow section that was a pretty tight squeeze. Once down there, we started off hiking through the cave system, and did a zipline through the pitch-black without any lights on. We leaped off a ledge into some black water, checked out some glow-worms later on, free-climbed UP some waterfalls. At one point, I found a tiny side cave, and followed it off without telling anyone : ) After climbing back there and turning my head to to peer up a narrow channel, I could see it was formed by a small tributary of a waterfall/river. I also found a little baby eel working its slimy way up the water rock by rock. It was awesome. Then, about 5 hours after we left the sunlight, we came out into the sun a long ways away from where we went in, and hiked back towards the van that had brought us there. A guy who has been traveling for the past 2 years or something, and has been to 30 some countries, was on the trip with us, and bought the picture CD from the guide company... he offered to email everyone else the pictures when he got access to some fast internet, so we should have some good pics eventually.
After that, we went with the Australians we had met the night before (who also had been on our blackwater raft trip) to "The Shearing Shed," to watch some Angora rabbits being sheared. They strapped the rabbits into this medieval torture-looking thing, and shaved them with these gigantic clippers.... it was insane. Just check out the pictures.
Then we headed of to go find some horses, to take some horsey laugh pictures for my mom.
After that, we headed back towards Auckland, intending to stop at "Candyland - NZ's Largest Candy Retailer!" (we had seen a sign for it on the way to Rotorua a few days before). We arrived at 5:12 pm; it closed at 5:00 pm. Naomi was DEVASTATED. She wanted to extend our trip a whole extra night just to stay in a nearby town so we could come to Candyland the next morning. After debating this for about 30 minutes we decided to got back to Auckland, since I had to leave NZ the next morning. I don't think Naomi will ever fully forgive us for making that decision... (j/k).
Once back in Auckland, we took much-needed showers, and went out to "Blush," this fancy Asian restaurant near Naomi's apartment. We had a great dinner and some delicious milk tea.
Great last day in NZ : )
Friday, March 14, 2008
Day 6 Update
[Pictures Posted]
So today, we woke up and hurriedly checked out of Burke's Backpackers. We headed out to the Taupo Airport to leap out of a plane. We had made a reservation and Skydive Taupo. We showed up, signed in, and both immediately hit up the bathroom, which was very nice and clean... I anticipate everyone else who skydives wants to make sure they aren't carrying any extra ballast for the jump, just like we did. We opted for the 12,000 ft jump. We took off in a tiny pink plane (see that website for some pics of it probably), and climbed pretty quickly. Me and my tandem instructor were scheduled as the first to go, along with a guy that was practicing to be a photographer for them.
We hit 12,000 feet, the tiny plexiglass door that makes up the side of the plane slides open, and the photographer climbs out the door to hang on the rear part of the door frame, outside the plane. I scoot up to the door, hang my feet out the plane, and a second later, we're gone. The instructor does all the work, including making the initial leap decision, so I didn't have to worry about last minute paralytic panic. We backflipped/Gainer'ed out of the plane, and the initial sensation was like a big rollercoaster drop, where it feels like your heart is gonna leap out of your mouth, but it was alot more intense. Pretty soon we had completed the flip and I was face down, hurtling towards the ground. It was amazing how fast everything seems to be moving, but it's hard to actually see the movement... and I never felt like I was actually "falling" per se, because the ground is SO far away that it just looks unreal. It so, so much fun. The instructor through us into a spin (like a CD spinning, horizontally), which was really cool. We fell for about 45 seconds, during which time we fell 7,000 feet, and reached terminal velocity for a tandem pair. Then, he pulled the chute, and we drastically, but relatively smoothly, decelerated.
I was afraid that I was going to find this part much scarier, as I have had dreams before about being way up in the sky and realizing that I was about to fall.... and I had thought that the feeling of dangling at a height where I could actually see some ground detail would be much scarier than just hurtling through space. This wasn't true at all. It was so peaceful at that point, and I never felt like I was going to fall at all... there is alot of drag upwards that you perceive through your harness, so you feel pretty secure. We did some fun turns, etc., and were on the ground much before I wanted to be. Overall, awesome, and I would definitely do it again ... especially solo where you could play around more : )
After that, we drove a ways to a horse-trekking place, and rode some horses around for an hour in some awesome, hilly New Zealand terrain, lookin at all kindsa sheep, cattle, etc. It was really cool, and we took lotsa pictures.
Then, we hopped in the car and headed to Waitomo. Along the way, I saw a sign for a Poukani Tree Nature Walk, so we pulled over to the side of the road, and just headed into the forest. After a 20-minute-or-so hike, we came reached the 1850 yr. old tree. It was pretty huge, but the hike itself was alot more fun than the tree at the end. During the hike, we had heard some crazy bird calls, and couldn't seem to catch sight of the birds singing them.
Once we got back to the car, we saw some huge magpies, and lo and behold, they were the culprits. While Naomi was looking up magpies in her bird book, I was wandering around being ADD, and found a bunch of wild blackberries. We picked a ton of them, hopped in the car, and finished up the drive to the Waitomo Top 10 Holiday Park Hostel, which was pretty great.
Halfway there, we stopped in Bennydale for Fish & Chips, which were delicious, and learned from the waitress / bartender / restaurant owner that in New Zealand, there is nothing wrong with drinking and driving. You could be driving along drinking a beer as you're going, and as long as your under the legal limit, there's nothing wrong with it. Furthermore, the passenger can site up front drinking as much as they want with no limit. So, upon hearing this, we naturally picked up a couple beers, and I sat shotgun drinking while Naomi finished up the drive.
When we got to the campsite, it was really late, but they had left a couple of signs up pointing us in the right direction. We went into our cabin, and found out the door didn't lock. Oh well.
We drove down some crazy backwoods roads, and saw a few hedgehogs along the way, to find the glow-worm caves that we had seen advertised. Outside the entrance to the trail leading to the caves, we ran into some Australians (Athron and Thelesa - yes those are their names), and some Danes (Geiss and ....something?). The Aussies were traveling in a rented Toyota Previa van with all the rear seats pulled out, and some aftermarket cupboards and mattress stuff in the back.... a company called "Wicked Vans" rents them out like that. The Danes were these two 18 and 19 year old kids, traveling for 2 months in NZ, in living out of the back of a $1,100 station wagon without back seats that they had bought upon arriving here a week ago. The inside was a complete disaster, complete with hanging bags of dirty boxers, cases of beer, loaves of wet bread, etc. They had covered all the rear windows with black plastic bags, after one time when they had unknowingly parked right across the street from a girls highschool and passed out in the back of their hobowagon in just underwear, only to wake up to the creeped-out stares of adolescent girls.
So we went on the cake trek with the Danes, drinking some of their hobobeer along the way, and saw a bunch of neat glow-worms, some cool caves, and some HORRENDOUSLY big cave crickets.
Gross.
So after that, we returned to the cabin, propped up a chair to keep out would-be-burgulars, and slept like a rock in preparation for some of the craziest activities yet.
(Incidentally, the glow-worm link above takes you to a segment from the Planet Earth series, which was filmed in the caves we were in : ) : ) : ) : ) )
So today, we woke up and hurriedly checked out of Burke's Backpackers. We headed out to the Taupo Airport to leap out of a plane. We had made a reservation and Skydive Taupo. We showed up, signed in, and both immediately hit up the bathroom, which was very nice and clean... I anticipate everyone else who skydives wants to make sure they aren't carrying any extra ballast for the jump, just like we did. We opted for the 12,000 ft jump. We took off in a tiny pink plane (see that website for some pics of it probably), and climbed pretty quickly. Me and my tandem instructor were scheduled as the first to go, along with a guy that was practicing to be a photographer for them.
We hit 12,000 feet, the tiny plexiglass door that makes up the side of the plane slides open, and the photographer climbs out the door to hang on the rear part of the door frame, outside the plane. I scoot up to the door, hang my feet out the plane, and a second later, we're gone. The instructor does all the work, including making the initial leap decision, so I didn't have to worry about last minute paralytic panic. We backflipped/Gainer'ed out of the plane, and the initial sensation was like a big rollercoaster drop, where it feels like your heart is gonna leap out of your mouth, but it was alot more intense. Pretty soon we had completed the flip and I was face down, hurtling towards the ground. It was amazing how fast everything seems to be moving, but it's hard to actually see the movement... and I never felt like I was actually "falling" per se, because the ground is SO far away that it just looks unreal. It so, so much fun. The instructor through us into a spin (like a CD spinning, horizontally), which was really cool. We fell for about 45 seconds, during which time we fell 7,000 feet, and reached terminal velocity for a tandem pair. Then, he pulled the chute, and we drastically, but relatively smoothly, decelerated.
I was afraid that I was going to find this part much scarier, as I have had dreams before about being way up in the sky and realizing that I was about to fall.... and I had thought that the feeling of dangling at a height where I could actually see some ground detail would be much scarier than just hurtling through space. This wasn't true at all. It was so peaceful at that point, and I never felt like I was going to fall at all... there is alot of drag upwards that you perceive through your harness, so you feel pretty secure. We did some fun turns, etc., and were on the ground much before I wanted to be. Overall, awesome, and I would definitely do it again ... especially solo where you could play around more : )
After that, we drove a ways to a horse-trekking place, and rode some horses around for an hour in some awesome, hilly New Zealand terrain, lookin at all kindsa sheep, cattle, etc. It was really cool, and we took lotsa pictures.
Then, we hopped in the car and headed to Waitomo. Along the way, I saw a sign for a Poukani Tree Nature Walk, so we pulled over to the side of the road, and just headed into the forest. After a 20-minute-or-so hike, we came reached the 1850 yr. old tree. It was pretty huge, but the hike itself was alot more fun than the tree at the end. During the hike, we had heard some crazy bird calls, and couldn't seem to catch sight of the birds singing them.
Once we got back to the car, we saw some huge magpies, and lo and behold, they were the culprits. While Naomi was looking up magpies in her bird book, I was wandering around being ADD, and found a bunch of wild blackberries. We picked a ton of them, hopped in the car, and finished up the drive to the Waitomo Top 10 Holiday Park Hostel, which was pretty great.
Halfway there, we stopped in Bennydale for Fish & Chips, which were delicious, and learned from the waitress / bartender / restaurant owner that in New Zealand, there is nothing wrong with drinking and driving. You could be driving along drinking a beer as you're going, and as long as your under the legal limit, there's nothing wrong with it. Furthermore, the passenger can site up front drinking as much as they want with no limit. So, upon hearing this, we naturally picked up a couple beers, and I sat shotgun drinking while Naomi finished up the drive.
When we got to the campsite, it was really late, but they had left a couple of signs up pointing us in the right direction. We went into our cabin, and found out the door didn't lock. Oh well.
We drove down some crazy backwoods roads, and saw a few hedgehogs along the way, to find the glow-worm caves that we had seen advertised. Outside the entrance to the trail leading to the caves, we ran into some Australians (Athron and Thelesa - yes those are their names), and some Danes (Geiss and ....something?). The Aussies were traveling in a rented Toyota Previa van with all the rear seats pulled out, and some aftermarket cupboards and mattress stuff in the back.... a company called "Wicked Vans" rents them out like that. The Danes were these two 18 and 19 year old kids, traveling for 2 months in NZ, in living out of the back of a $1,100 station wagon without back seats that they had bought upon arriving here a week ago. The inside was a complete disaster, complete with hanging bags of dirty boxers, cases of beer, loaves of wet bread, etc. They had covered all the rear windows with black plastic bags, after one time when they had unknowingly parked right across the street from a girls highschool and passed out in the back of their hobowagon in just underwear, only to wake up to the creeped-out stares of adolescent girls.
So we went on the cake trek with the Danes, drinking some of their hobobeer along the way, and saw a bunch of neat glow-worms, some cool caves, and some HORRENDOUSLY big cave crickets.
So after that, we returned to the cabin, propped up a chair to keep out would-be-burgulars, and slept like a rock in preparation for some of the craziest activities yet.
(Incidentally, the glow-worm link above takes you to a segment from the Planet Earth series, which was filmed in the caves we were in : ) : ) : ) : ) )
Day 5 Update
[Pictures Posted]
After pilfering linens from the hostel, we went whitewater rafting, which was a blast. It was slightly less "constant rapids" than I had anticipated, but was still alot of fun. Naomi and I sat up front, so we got wet every big rapid pretty much. We were also first to go over the falls (a 3 meter one, and a 1 meter one). We got some good pictures taken with Naomi's Canon SD750 + waterproof case, which is AWESOME.
Then, we headed to Zippy's Cafe, where we got some fantastic sandwiches that I intend to bring back to the US and promote (with a few changes of my own): The BLEAT - BLT + Egg and Avocado. Phenomenal.
Next, we went to the AGRODOME a fully functioning huge farm complex place. (I drove from the Rotorua out to there, and it went much better than the previous day.) We watched a sheep show complete with live examples and backstories of many different sheep breeds, a shearing demonstration, and some exhibitions of the sheep dogs, which were amazing. They did this thing where they would run all over the backs of the sheep to get kinda a stampede going, which they could then guide. All of the dogs' actions were of course guided by whistling and nonsensical kiwi-accented bellowing. There were also two demonstrations involving animal milk, with Naomi volunteering for one of them on stage, and me volunteering for the other. Suffice to say, you'll have to watch the video. See the link at the top of the post.
Then, we headed to a Blueberry Winery, which made awful wine, and other, only slightly-less awful, blueberry things (liqueurs, jams, etc). Good experience, but poor wine.
Then, we set off (me driving again) for Taupo, where we checked into Burke's Packers, a renovated hotel which was a much, much nicer experience than Cactus Jack's. We wandered around for a while, and ultimately settled on a small Japanese cafe for dinner, where we had delicious Udon noodles and a Bento box. We stopped by a local bar for a couple of beers afterwards, and watched Rugby on the projection screen. We had a local guy explain a bunch of the crazier parts to us, which was interesting.
Made reservations for all our activities of the next day, which you can read about in the next post.
After pilfering linens from the hostel, we went whitewater rafting, which was a blast. It was slightly less "constant rapids" than I had anticipated, but was still alot of fun. Naomi and I sat up front, so we got wet every big rapid pretty much. We were also first to go over the falls (a 3 meter one, and a 1 meter one). We got some good pictures taken with Naomi's Canon SD750 + waterproof case, which is AWESOME.
Then, we headed to Zippy's Cafe, where we got some fantastic sandwiches that I intend to bring back to the US and promote (with a few changes of my own): The BLEAT - BLT + Egg and Avocado. Phenomenal.
Next, we went to the AGRODOME a fully functioning huge farm complex place. (I drove from the Rotorua out to there, and it went much better than the previous day.) We watched a sheep show complete with live examples and backstories of many different sheep breeds, a shearing demonstration, and some exhibitions of the sheep dogs, which were amazing. They did this thing where they would run all over the backs of the sheep to get kinda a stampede going, which they could then guide. All of the dogs' actions were of course guided by whistling and nonsensical kiwi-accented bellowing. There were also two demonstrations involving animal milk, with Naomi volunteering for one of them on stage, and me volunteering for the other. Suffice to say, you'll have to watch the video. See the link at the top of the post.
Then, we headed to a Blueberry Winery, which made awful wine, and other, only slightly-less awful, blueberry things (liqueurs, jams, etc). Good experience, but poor wine.
Then, we set off (me driving again) for Taupo, where we checked into Burke's Packers, a renovated hotel which was a much, much nicer experience than Cactus Jack's. We wandered around for a while, and ultimately settled on a small Japanese cafe for dinner, where we had delicious Udon noodles and a Bento box. We stopped by a local bar for a couple of beers afterwards, and watched Rugby on the projection screen. We had a local guy explain a bunch of the crazier parts to us, which was interesting.
Made reservations for all our activities of the next day, which you can read about in the next post.
Day 4 Update
[Pictures Posted]
Naomi and I are in an internet cafe in Taupo, NZ. Don't have a ton of time to update, so I'll just give some basics. May go back and flesh them in later, or may not, but will definitely upload pictures when I'm back in Auckland or the States.
So today, we left at about 2pm for Rotorua. Naomi drove most of the way, except for a short stretch through Hamilton, NZ, where I decided to try.... which was AWFUL, because of the number of roundabouts that I had to drive through. Normally, I would have no problem with those, especially after having biked through numerous roundabouts in the US, but the wrong-sidedness made it pretty harrowing. Ah well. Right after Hamilton, we stopped at a "Warehouse - Where everyone gets a bargain!!!" which is a huge TJ Maxx + Walmart kinda... Naomi loves them and we HAD to go in. Pretty good idea, actually, as I picked up some knockoff hipster slip on Vans for like $17 US. Anyway so then we went on to Rotorua. Had dinner at "Pig and Whistle" bar, which was alright. That night we stayed at "Cactus Jack's Hostel." It was by far the cheapest option, and we got what we paid for. Several of the shared showers only had cold water, and the one that had warm water was filthy... there were lots of bugs in our room, etc. All in all, pretty gross. Now don't get me wrong, I've slept in dirtier conditions, but caught me by surprise. Oh well, the next morning, we stole some towels, called it even, and set off for activities.
Naomi and I are in an internet cafe in Taupo, NZ. Don't have a ton of time to update, so I'll just give some basics. May go back and flesh them in later, or may not, but will definitely upload pictures when I'm back in Auckland or the States.
So today, we left at about 2pm for Rotorua. Naomi drove most of the way, except for a short stretch through Hamilton, NZ, where I decided to try.... which was AWFUL, because of the number of roundabouts that I had to drive through. Normally, I would have no problem with those, especially after having biked through numerous roundabouts in the US, but the wrong-sidedness made it pretty harrowing. Ah well. Right after Hamilton, we stopped at a "Warehouse - Where everyone gets a bargain!!!" which is a huge TJ Maxx + Walmart kinda... Naomi loves them and we HAD to go in. Pretty good idea, actually, as I picked up some knockoff hipster slip on Vans for like $17 US. Anyway so then we went on to Rotorua. Had dinner at "Pig and Whistle" bar, which was alright. That night we stayed at "Cactus Jack's Hostel." It was by far the cheapest option, and we got what we paid for. Several of the shared showers only had cold water, and the one that had warm water was filthy... there were lots of bugs in our room, etc. All in all, pretty gross. Now don't get me wrong, I've slept in dirtier conditions, but caught me by surprise. Oh well, the next morning, we stole some towels, called it even, and set off for activities.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Day 4 Preview
So today we're heading out on a roadtrip. Naomi's in class now and I'm packing for departure in an estimated 2.5 hrs. We're heading to Taupo and Rotorua, places that apparently have tons of fun things to do, but I am not sure exactly what. We rented a car from this guy the other day, but the AC didn't work particularly well and the transmission was definitely on its way out, and since Naomi has rented from him several times already, he swapped us out for a significantly nicer car... so that is really cool. We will take tons of pictures and upload them when we get a chance.
Day 3
[Pictures Posted]
Yesterday night, after all the dune-jumping and traipsing around in that beautiful creek area, we came back to Naomi's apartment where her friend had cooked us all Indian food. Now, anyone that knows me knows that I have never been a huge fan of Indian food, largely due to the presence of coconut in many dishes, but I have got to say I'm slowly being drawn over to the dark side. It was all really good. Chicken Vindaloo and Lamb Rogan Josh were the two dishes that I liked, according to people that allegedly knew what they were called. So we ate a bunch of Indian food and then passed out at like 10:30, since we were so tired from the day's adventures.
Today Naomi had class, so I again walked around Auckland for a couple hours. I went to Karangahape Road, or K'road, as it is abbreviated, and just kinda looked around for a while. Went into a Kiwi Army (oxymoron?) Surplus store, but they didn't have too much of interest, surprisingly. They did however have a fixed gear "Swedish Bike Messenger Bike" that looked to be from WWII for $550 NZ, but I couldn't get a good picture of it. Then I found a Boba Tea place and got some Chocolate Milk Tea with Boba, one of my favorite things ever. Didn't even get charged for the Boba, since it was "yesterday's".... a bit sketchy, since Boba is basically just like agar gel to grow bacteria in. I hope I didn't ingest something awful. My stomach/duodenum has been grumbling non stop since I had that tea, come to think of it, and I can press below my sternum to produce a horrendous gurgle... maybe I clogged the pipes with a bunch of old moldy jelly. Hmm.
Also I came across Auckland's oldest cemetery, used from 1846-1898, or something like that. I love old/abandoned things, so I really enjoyed it. I walked through alot of it and took a bunch of pictures of neat tombstones. I particularly like the one that shows the cause of death... tragically funny, kind of.
Anyway, we're gonna drive out to Devonport Beach now for a nice sea-side dinner. Will take more pictures this evening and update them all at once.
*edit* Pictures posted now *edit*
Also, tonight's Wine Wednesday amongst Naomi and her roomates, so we'll drink alot of wine and eat alot of cheese. So, between the cheese, the sketchy boba, and the Indian food, I'll be thrilled if my intestines don't just fall out of my body by tomorrow.
*edit* They decided NOT to do Wine Wednesdays, but instead to play beer pong for hours. I thought I left that crap at college. So since we didn't feel like playing beer pong, we are semi-confined to her room enduring a bunch of loud bullshitting outside her paper-thin door. Excellent. We're hoping they leave soon so we can sleep early; tomorrow we head off on a road trip to see some cool stuff, so we were hoping to be semi-well-rested.*edit*
Yesterday night, after all the dune-jumping and traipsing around in that beautiful creek area, we came back to Naomi's apartment where her friend had cooked us all Indian food. Now, anyone that knows me knows that I have never been a huge fan of Indian food, largely due to the presence of coconut in many dishes, but I have got to say I'm slowly being drawn over to the dark side. It was all really good. Chicken Vindaloo and Lamb Rogan Josh were the two dishes that I liked, according to people that allegedly knew what they were called. So we ate a bunch of Indian food and then passed out at like 10:30, since we were so tired from the day's adventures.
Today Naomi had class, so I again walked around Auckland for a couple hours. I went to Karangahape Road, or K'road, as it is abbreviated, and just kinda looked around for a while. Went into a Kiwi Army (oxymoron?) Surplus store, but they didn't have too much of interest, surprisingly. They did however have a fixed gear "Swedish Bike Messenger Bike" that looked to be from WWII for $550 NZ, but I couldn't get a good picture of it. Then I found a Boba Tea place and got some Chocolate Milk Tea with Boba, one of my favorite things ever. Didn't even get charged for the Boba, since it was "yesterday's".... a bit sketchy, since Boba is basically just like agar gel to grow bacteria in. I hope I didn't ingest something awful. My stomach/duodenum has been grumbling non stop since I had that tea, come to think of it, and I can press below my sternum to produce a horrendous gurgle... maybe I clogged the pipes with a bunch of old moldy jelly. Hmm.
Also I came across Auckland's oldest cemetery, used from 1846-1898, or something like that. I love old/abandoned things, so I really enjoyed it. I walked through alot of it and took a bunch of pictures of neat tombstones. I particularly like the one that shows the cause of death... tragically funny, kind of.
Anyway, we're gonna drive out to Devonport Beach now for a nice sea-side dinner. Will take more pictures this evening and update them all at once.
*edit* Pictures posted now *edit*
Also, tonight's Wine Wednesday amongst Naomi and her roomates, so we'll drink alot of wine and eat alot of cheese. So, between the cheese, the sketchy boba, and the Indian food, I'll be thrilled if my intestines don't just fall out of my body by tomorrow.
*edit* They decided NOT to do Wine Wednesdays, but instead to play beer pong for hours. I thought I left that crap at college. So since we didn't feel like playing beer pong, we are semi-confined to her room enduring a bunch of loud bullshitting outside her paper-thin door. Excellent. We're hoping they leave soon so we can sleep early; tomorrow we head off on a road trip to see some cool stuff, so we were hoping to be semi-well-rested.*edit*
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Pictures from Days 1 and 2
Here are some pictures from Day 1 and 2. Picasa seems to hate me and/or Macs, so I will probably just keep making galleries on Pseudotalent until I can figure out a better solution. Whenever I post new pictures I will post a link to them here on the Broog.
Also, note that I will be wearing the El Pelon shirt in many, many pictures. This is because I need to get some good international-lookin' pictures in it, so I can get my picture on the wall there.
Pictures!
Alright. So Naomi is off at class right now, and I'm finishing this post, and then gonna go wander around Auckland for a while. She told me some good places to go, so I'll go wander til I find a coffee shop, then go see some things.
Also, note that I will be wearing the El Pelon shirt in many, many pictures. This is because I need to get some good international-lookin' pictures in it, so I can get my picture on the wall there.
Pictures!
Alright. So Naomi is off at class right now, and I'm finishing this post, and then gonna go wander around Auckland for a while. She told me some good places to go, so I'll go wander til I find a coffee shop, then go see some things.
Some Jumping
Today, we rented a car and drove for about an hour to Bethell to jump down some crazy sand dunes. The scenery was awesome, and we took lots of pictures. *edit* See Post "Days 1-2" for pictures. *edit*
Monday, March 10, 2008
First Day
[Pictures Posted]
So the first day/night in Auckland was pretty great. Naomi and I walked around and saw the city for a bit, then cooked a dinner of lamb, Tzatziki sauce, and salad. Mighty fine. Then we had a bottle of wine and a bunch of terrible mixed drinks with some of her friends on the study abroad program. We ended up going to Mermaids, a nearby..... club.... for a while. That was an experience. I will say no more about it.
Off to jump down sand-dunes today and go to the beach. Will post pictures later.
So the first day/night in Auckland was pretty great. Naomi and I walked around and saw the city for a bit, then cooked a dinner of lamb, Tzatziki sauce, and salad. Mighty fine. Then we had a bottle of wine and a bunch of terrible mixed drinks with some of her friends on the study abroad program. We ended up going to Mermaids, a nearby..... club.... for a while. That was an experience. I will say no more about it.
Off to jump down sand-dunes today and go to the beach. Will post pictures later.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
AuckLanded!
http://picasaweb.google.com/BLTJNR/NewZealand
So I got into Auckland at 11:30 AM on Sunday, March 9th (Kansas time), after have left my house at 8:45 AM on Saturday, March 8th. However, I've crossed the international date line of course, so it was 6:30 AM on March 10th according to New Zealand time. The flight really wasn't bad; I ate some Chicken Coq au Vin, drank the tiny bottle of wine that came with it, and passed out for three hours. Then I woke up, watched half a movie, and passed out for another three hours, waking up just in time to watch all of Austin Powers 2 before we landed. All in all, pretty decent really.
Up until I actually boarded the flight for NZ, I was so paranoid that something was going to go wrong and I wasn't gonna make it here... I'm really not very good with planning/itineraries/logistics, and especially with the ticket-test conflict that started off this vacation, I was a bit concerned. However, it all went off without a hitch.
At the airport I hopped on a bus, rode it for about 40 minutes, and took it right to Naomi's apartment. It was great to see her again, but I was really confused as to why she was still wearing pajamas at 2 in the afternoon, which is about what time it felt like to me. I finally got to shower and then walked her over to her class. I stopped at a coffee shop afterwards to get something to eat, and ordered a coffee, which, to my surprise and disappointment, was euro-style extra dark shot style, not a normal cup of Americano like I expected. Oh well. not too bad with extra sugar. Had toast and "preserves" for breakfast, that took like 10 minutes to make, apparently... I was expecting Busy-Bee style warm bread with brushed on butter, but this was apparently a much more high-falutin' coffeeshop, so I should've known better.
Anyway, then I walked back towards Naomi's apartment stopped to lay down on the grass in a pretty park (it's gorgeous outside here) and was narrowly missed by a large falling nut. However, this inspired me to start cracking open nuts with my teeth and trying to carve things into them with a dull key.... which was minimally effective. So, I walked the rest of the way back to Naomi's place to use her pocket knife to carve some nuts. Figured I would post the whopping 3 pictures I've taken so far and write this post for anyone curious back home too. In about 10 minutes I'm gonna head back out to meet her when she's outta class, and maybe we'll grab food or something.
Anyway, long rambling post, but I'm trying to keep a semi-detailed blog-journal for posterity.
Will post more pictures when we take them.
Also, I got a 93.3% on my anatomy lab final! Pretty surprisingly good, I think. The thing now is, I needed 91% on the written test, and 91% on the lab final to get a Superior in the course... I got a 88% on the final, and so needed a 94% on the lab component. So, if I get even 1 point back on the test, I SHOULD get a Sup in the class. I am also missing .18 of a percent due to what I think is a clerical error, so if they fix that, that might bump me up too... I'm right on the border here, so hopefully I'll pull through with a Sup.
So I got into Auckland at 11:30 AM on Sunday, March 9th (Kansas time), after have left my house at 8:45 AM on Saturday, March 8th. However, I've crossed the international date line of course, so it was 6:30 AM on March 10th according to New Zealand time. The flight really wasn't bad; I ate some Chicken Coq au Vin, drank the tiny bottle of wine that came with it, and passed out for three hours. Then I woke up, watched half a movie, and passed out for another three hours, waking up just in time to watch all of Austin Powers 2 before we landed. All in all, pretty decent really.
Up until I actually boarded the flight for NZ, I was so paranoid that something was going to go wrong and I wasn't gonna make it here... I'm really not very good with planning/itineraries/logistics, and especially with the ticket-test conflict that started off this vacation, I was a bit concerned. However, it all went off without a hitch.
At the airport I hopped on a bus, rode it for about 40 minutes, and took it right to Naomi's apartment. It was great to see her again, but I was really confused as to why she was still wearing pajamas at 2 in the afternoon, which is about what time it felt like to me. I finally got to shower and then walked her over to her class. I stopped at a coffee shop afterwards to get something to eat, and ordered a coffee, which, to my surprise and disappointment, was euro-style extra dark shot style, not a normal cup of Americano like I expected. Oh well. not too bad with extra sugar. Had toast and "preserves" for breakfast, that took like 10 minutes to make, apparently... I was expecting Busy-Bee style warm bread with brushed on butter, but this was apparently a much more high-falutin' coffeeshop, so I should've known better.
Anyway, then I walked back towards Naomi's apartment stopped to lay down on the grass in a pretty park (it's gorgeous outside here) and was narrowly missed by a large falling nut. However, this inspired me to start cracking open nuts with my teeth and trying to carve things into them with a dull key.... which was minimally effective. So, I walked the rest of the way back to Naomi's place to use her pocket knife to carve some nuts. Figured I would post the whopping 3 pictures I've taken so far and write this post for anyone curious back home too. In about 10 minutes I'm gonna head back out to meet her when she's outta class, and maybe we'll grab food or something.
Anyway, long rambling post, but I'm trying to keep a semi-detailed blog-journal for posterity.
Will post more pictures when we take them.
Also, I got a 93.3% on my anatomy lab final! Pretty surprisingly good, I think. The thing now is, I needed 91% on the written test, and 91% on the lab final to get a Superior in the course... I got a 88% on the final, and so needed a 94% on the lab component. So, if I get even 1 point back on the test, I SHOULD get a Sup in the class. I am also missing .18 of a percent due to what I think is a clerical error, so if they fix that, that might bump me up too... I'm right on the border here, so hopefully I'll pull through with a Sup.
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