What a trip! I don't even know where to start... After 28 hours of traveling, I arrived in Sydney where I spent 8 full days being touristy. I got to see the Sydney Opera House and the bay bridge... went to the aquarium and animal park down town. Got to browse through the botanical garden... took a tour bus to 27 different destinations throughout Sydney. I even got to go to the top of the Center Point Tower, which is the really tall building in the center of the city. The architecture was magnificent, the weather was in the 70's when it was suppose to be in the 50's during this time of year... One of the last days we drove outside Sydney to a zoo-like place where Cook's Turtle (when it was alive) lived. They still had tons of native animals there, including a kangaroo petting zoo, platypuses, Tasmanian devils, and koalas. I got to pet both the roos and the koalas.

After a great 8 days with Mike and Allie, we packed up and headed to Fiji. Talk about beautiful! We stayed on the main island, at a resort right outside the town where the current president was raised. The resort was on a bay so we could see across it to the Nadi, one of the main cities in Fiji. The mountains were beyond words, and it was off season so most the time we had the resort to ourselves. On the second day we took a boat out to another island where there was snorkeling, better beaches, and more great views. We hit it off with the locals, which ended us up in town during part of a Fijian funeral (Christian, but they had some derivations) The whole town was involved, we stopped so our bus driver could pay his final respects. Two elder brothers died within days of each other.

The last day was the wedding, and the weather couldn't have been more perfect. A Fijian choir as well as traditionally dressed ring bearers/flower girls. There was no rehearsal so I was freaking out that I'd mess up. Oh, and I got to sign their marriage certificate!

Anyways, I'm exhausted, and my brain isn't fully functional due to jet lag, so sorry the brief details. I'm off to bed.

Labels: allie evans, marriage, mike smith, vacation, wedding

This is a long overdue update... A ton has happened in just the few months since I last wrote. I'll try to make this as chronological as possible:

Patti came up to visit in mid-October. She spent 9 days here, and for the first time she got to meet my other best friend who lives here. They got along great (of course they are practically the same person, so why wouldn't they)...

So right on to November... the first weekend of November Patrice, Brian and Megan all came up for the Boston College/Florida State game. We had a blast and we got to see FSU upset the #2 team in the country! Woohoo! I felt a little bad for the BC fans, but it still felt great over all... Patrice was absolutely miserable because it was in the low 40's and pouring rain and her feet got wet on the walk over the the stadium. Megan had a blast though!

For Thanksgiving I flew out for a week's vacation at my grandparent's lake house in Homer, Louisiana. Lots of my family also went which was awesome. I was feeling really homesick at this point. Even more exciting though, was Mike, one of my best friends while growing up, decided to fly out and spend the week there as well. His sister Tatiana also drove in from Tallahassee. It felt great to catch up with him. It's always fun to hang out with Honey and Papa as well.

On to a very sad and depressing thing: my friends lost their baby Wesley so I only had the title of god father for less than a day. The whole situation has really brought me down during the last few months, so to avoid thinking about it, that is all I'm going to say... at least for now. On the brighter side, I'm flying to Australia in May for their wedding! 9 days in Sydney and 4 days in Fiji. I'm extremely uberly excited about it!

Now, in December I flew home for the holidays. My PTO expires at the end of the year, so with the combination of holidays, I was there for almost 2 weeks. While I was there I got to see my god daughter Ashlyn! She makes me happier than anyone on the face of the planet! It is so hard not being there while she grows up. I spent 2 days with her though... Man, those were two very tiring days.

During the holidays my dad, my grandma and I decided to do a three way car swap. My grandma got my car, my dad got her car, and I got his car. It's been a major ordeal, but it is finally working out. I was tired of paying $400 a month in car payments when I was only driving 30 miles a month.

Dmitri was kind enough to drive my dad's car up to me, and my car down to my dad. Of course, he got a free trip to Boston out of it. He spent a little over a week here, and during that time we went skiing in New Hampshire with my neighbor's brother Doug and my co-worker/friend Josh.

Of course, not everything is wonderful... I have horrible elbow pains from too much computing (of course, I'm using the computer to write this, which probably isn't the best idea). I've been to a Dr. who says I need to see a specialist... I also talked to her about my knee pain that I've had for nearly 3 years now... It hurts a ton to run/ski/hike/walk/ride my bike, etc. It most likely is going to require some sort of cartilage manipulation surgery, but hopefully not.

For new years I quit soda again... I drank no Dr. Pepper all of 2005 and absolutely no soda for 2006, but then I rewarded my self with a Dr. Pepper to ring in the new years 2007... well, that was a bad way to start a new year... so after getting in the habit of drink way to much soda again, I am forcing myself to quit it... for good this time... I'm 32 days sober... go me!

Well, I think that covers everything, although extremely briefly... but I'm suppose to stay off the computer, so that's all I'm going to write.

Labels: allie evans, ashlyn pinner, best friend, boston, boston college, brian and patrice mankowski, dmitri sokgobenzon, florida state university, homer, josh kolash, megan folts, mike smith, mike treffehn, papa and honey, patti botero, tatiana treffehn, wedding

WOOHOO! I was found out today that I am going to be the God Father of two of my closest friend's first born! What an honor! Super exciting, I can't wait until he/she is born! They told me right before work, and then I had to try and not be too excited and actually be productive! For those of you who don't know, I am the godfather of my cousin's daughter (love of my life... hardest part of moving to Boston was leaving her) as well.

Well, I haven't updated in forever, but that is because it has been some of the busiest weeks of my life... I finished moving to Boston, I am almost completely settled now... need a few more random things, but other than that, I am pretty much set up. In a gist: I absolutely love my apartment, my neighbors kick ass, and work is very enjoyable and is only about a mile from me. Jäger is loving life here too, so many new smells.

On the way up to Boston I made lots of stops. First, I stopped in Tampa for Patrice & Brian's wedding. This was absolutely awesome beyond words... Everything was perfect... short ceremony, long reception, good food, and most importantly great people. It was great to see all my family and friends. Some of the people there I hadn't seen in nearly 11 years! All the parents of my elementary school friends were there... It was great seeing them... and for the first time I was an adult as well... much different conversations take place between two adults, than between a child and an adult. It was very enjoyable. For the third wedding in a row, I caught the garter... still single ladies!

The next day I continued my drive to Boston. I stopped in Tallahassee to pick up a few things (at this point my car was packed to the brim with at least 2 tons of my belongings). I had dinner with Kyle, Shannon, Dmitri and Nithin. And then early the next morning I was off... I drove all the way to Philly, arriving after 1:00 AM... I stayed at my friend Mike Treffehn's apartment. He and I had fallen far out of touch in recent years, and I was really happy to catch up with him! (despite it being after 1:00 AM we chatted for nearly 2 hours).

I was off the next morning for the final leg of my drive. The drive through New York sucked, but Connecticut was beautiful! I need to do that drive in the Fall, it has to be gorgeous.

Once I finally arrived, I had to unload the 2 tons of stuff from my car... then I went Target shopping, filling my car again, having to unload it again. Then I went to Ikea, and had to unload another 3 tons form my car... then I went grocery shopping and had to unload even more... Once I was finally done, every muscle in my body ached.

Well, that is all I have time for, but in general, everything is going great! Can't wait for Boston tourist to seek refuge in my apartment!

Labels: allie evans, ashlyn pinner, boston, brian and patrice mankowski, dmitri sokgobenzon, dogs, kyle gower-winter, mike smith, mike treffehn, new york, nithin sathyamoorthy, philly, tampa, work

Another week done, meaning 5 weeks from now I will be done with my Undergraduate... I am pretty scared... I don't know what I am going to end up doing with my life... The offer from Freescale, the company I interviewed with in Texas, sent me an offer and it should be here early next week... I am excited about it in some ways, but not in others... I hate Florida, so it would get me out of here, but unfortunately Texas is Florida with more Republicans and higher humidity... bummer... I am also scared because then I would have nobody... well, I have family there, but I would have no friends... Not the posse, or my friends from my other home (the Computer Science Majors lab)... I am going to ask Barry (Ken's IT guy) if he will match the offer for me to work there the whole summer so that I can spend my last real summer with friends. Moving away is just to much of an abrupt ending... I guess I shouldn't hang onto impossible hopes that one day I will be as happy as I once was... Luckily I have been too busy to be bothered by my feelings... too stressed about getting into gaming school and trying to figure out what exactly I am going to do with my life... Getting accepted to UCF helped my self esteem a little... not that FSU is bad or anything, but rumors have it that the IT department is going to take over it because not enough people want to get into it... The teacher are afraid of changing from what they are use to and won't teach us what we want to know, practical stuff... They tempt me to stay here with the whole 85-90% paid, plus $14,000/year, but I am not going to be bribed to stay somewhere when I really want to do something else (This is how I feel about that job in Texas too, if I have another opportunity, then I will probably pass it up, no matter how excited my family there is)

Anyways, on a different (nerdier) note, I am learning a lot about C and Java that I didn't know which is really exciting, I wish I could have learned it in school, but the teachers don't want to teach it, so I have to learn it myself... but considering I learned 90% of both those languages on my own, what is more going to hurt. Next weekend is the programming contest and my competition (Micah) some guy from the majors lab (Jacob) and I are all on a team... Micah can code in C damn well, and now that I am using it and getting use to it I might actually be more of a help then I thought I would be... Jacob said he is good at figuring things out, he just isn't the best programmer, so he can give us pseudo code and we can make it code... I hope we win so I can get Microsoft Software and also put it on my resume... as long as we get in the top 3 I would... hell, I might go to regionals this year (invited the last two years but turned them down because I wanted to be with Francisca) even though I know we wouldn't win, but at least I can program, which is the only thing I truly live for...

Tonight Micah had a birthday party that I went to, everyone there was a foreign exchange student from every freaking country in the world... it was pretty cool, it brought me back to Munich International School days... Anton was the only other CS person that showed up... Micah was lucky because I was paid 30 bucks by Mike (the other lab monitor) for covering for him for 3 hours... so I gave him $22.50 or something... I had spent some of it already... I hate carrying cash so I thought why the hell not... anyways, I want to throw a graduation party but I am not sure how many people from the department would actually show up to it, most people there I would consider "in school" friends, very few I would tell anything personal to... Only people I would think would hang out with me would be Kelley, Kerstin, Micah, Meat, Anton, and um maybe one or two other people that are always in the lab... If Erica, Christy (but she would never hang out because she is to much in love with her husband), or Tom, were still there they would be on the list too... and of course, I could be wrong about the above too, so yeah... who knows...

I am enjoying the Intelligent Systems face reorganization program that Micah, Kerstin and I are making... that is a lot of fun, it isn't due for another month and we already have all this cool shit that we don't need... yeah... We are going to kick team Bling's butt... mu ha ha ha ha... them and their "awesomeness factor" are going to be blown away... yeah, ok...

OH well, it is almost 2 so I should go to sleep, I left Micah's after 3 hours because I was so tired... but then I got carried away here... oh well, probably won't have anything to update for another month or two in my boring life... well, I guess next week I will get that letter thingy... but yeah... oh well...

Labels: acm, austin texas, diet, francisca amunategui, grad school, kelley jones, mike smith, programming, the posse