From LA to Colorado

This post is not much. It is more of a grocery list of days and stuff from the trip. My wireless here is slow so sorry no pictures. However, we have 300 photos and a 2 hr movie of everything so if you want to see any of this let me know. Heres what has happened.

So we left Carson City and strolled down the winding road to San Francisco. On the way down, we tried to stop at the Redwood forest just north of San Francisco. However seeing that it was 9 PM when we arrived the park was closed and we went to the beach to get our first taste of the Pacific Ocean. Even at night the waves and the crash of the surf was breath taking. Next we drove across the Golden gate bridge to Oakland where we stayed with Brad. He was pretty much one of the coolest friend of IJ that we met.

The next day we woke up bright and early to catch the BART that is San Francisco’s rapid transit thing. That was definitely a fun ride. The day was bombastic. Brad knew all the best spots in the Bay area. We saw the ugly smelly sea lions that just sat on one of the piers. That was definitely my least favorite part of the journey. Then we strolled down the pier and ordered some amazing sourdough bread with clam chowder inside. It was absolutely scrumcerlecent. We walked further and bought chocolate at the Ghirardelli Chocolate factory. That too was a taste bud fiesta. The strolling continued as we saw so much that it is hard to list. We went to Chinatown. There we found the some sweet gift for so cheap, but we didn’t want to carry them so we figured we would come back on our way out that evening. The stuff in Chinatown is dirt cheap. They were selling 4 packs of AA batteries for $1. Not to mention you could also buy dried eel for two dollars. I wanted to get one just because they were the weirdest thing I ever did see. We walked in San Francisco’s big park all the way down to the ocean. Then on our way back we stopted again in Chinatown for dinner. That was great it was so filling. However, when we were done it became clear that the shop where we wanted to buy those cheap souvenirs had closed. We wandered the city looking for and open shop and came to one that was full of cheap samurai swords. One thing lead to another and Ian and I walked back to the BART with swords at our hips, just waiting for someone to try to mug us. Brad, to say the least, was a little concerned.

The next morning we woke up and finally got to see the Red Wood forest. Those trees were freaking amazing. We took some photos I stole some Red Wood bark and we left. The next thing in store was the long drive down to LA. We hit traffic in the middle of farm country right next to three fresh cherry stands. Coincidence? I think not. When we finally drove up to origin of the bad traffic we realized that nothing was causing the bad traffic. I think the cherry sellers were just trying to turn an enormous profit. Those diabolical farmers, what are you going to do? We finally arrived at our next house of slumber. It was the home of Sarah. She was a very fun girl who, like all of IJ’s friends, loves to give IJ a hard time about anything they can think of.

The next day we went to the beach and rode some waves on surf boards and boogie boards. It was such an enjoyable time until we got back and realized that we got some major sun. IJ looked like he had a tomato stomach. And the back of my legs had a distinguished line between red and white. The rest of the night consisted of laying low. We saw X-men 3 and just hung out talking about this that and everything under the sun. The next day in La pretty much consisted of Sarah driving me and IJ around while we sampled her favorite restaurants. They really like their food down there. Most of our conversations were about food. We ate at three different places and in between we got ice cream and other snacks. Then after all being tired out from so much food we went back and watched the food network as we talked about what good meals we had lately. That night we left to stay at CMC. As we arrived on campus we saw our friend Brad again from San Francisco. I was thinking in my head that Brad was like one of those characters in the movies who you think is gone for the rest of the movie but then randomly shows where you least expect him. We basically went to bed in one of the CMC apartments and woke up the next morning to drive to Las Vegas.
I drove to Las Vegas it was ok. However, when we got there we just drove down the strip and then stopped for lunch. As we walked out a homeless woman began to ask us for money and stuff so we left. We got lost on the way to Hoover Dam but eventually got there. That is one damn big dam damn it. (I could not resist the pun opportunity) From the good ole HD we drove to the Grand Canyon which is where we are staying tonight. It was too dark coming in to see the canyon so we are going to head out tomorrow and check it out then. These next two days will be our longest of driving thus far, 700 miles and 1000 miles each day accordingly. I am definitely very excited. Whoot!
Last night we camped at the grand canyon. Then in the morning we woke up and drove to an outlook point. We found an amazing spot. The grand canyon is magnificent. It is definitely the biggest hole I have ever seen. The view was breathtaking especially with all of the wonderful color we could see early in the morning. I decided that it would be a sweet picture if I climbed off the trail and took a picture from a far ledge. Some Japanese middle aged women saw what I was doing and began taking pictures of me. Next IJ went down to the little ledge on the rock and the Japanese people followed him down and asked if they could take his picture. It was strange. The rest of the day consisted of driving until we arrived in Colorado Springs. Tomorrow we will drive 18 hrs back to Minnesota.

Just a Tuesday in Carson City

Tuesday was a good day in Carson City. Jeremy who is a friend of IJ’s gave us a magnificent walking tour of Carson City. It is a nice little town. We had some Indian food which was all you could eat. My favorite thing that we ate was definitely the florescent pink chicken. I have no idea what cooking process or array of spices made the chicken that color. However, the bottom line was it was delicious, no matter the wave length. I also met up with Johnny C’s Dad MicK. We had some coffee and he told me about some excellent sites that we are going to try to check out on the rest of our journey. A very odd thing happened while we were in the coffee shop, which was called Comma Coffee. That is a good name for a coffee place, because it makes me chuckle. But as we were sitting sipping on some Carmel Coffee-slushy things, which were delicious by the way, something happened. A man who was sitting at one of the stools up by the counter started throwing-up. Now this wasn’t your average carrot bitts puke. This was mostly orange-like watery throw-up. It sounded like someone was hosing down the floor with their mouth. It was kind of discussing. But mostly, it was just really funny. The guy he was with was also just as drunk as the bleach-blond wavy-hair vomiting man. The person behind the counter was freaking out telling the vomiting albino that he had to go outside. The other guy just looked around with a chuckle and addressed all of us in the coffee shop. “Don’t worry about it folks. I was in Vietnam. I’ve seen much worse than this.” Really I have no idea why he told us that or how that would make us all think to ourselves “Oh yeah Vietnam, now that you mention that I am not disgusted that your friend is vomiting on the floor.” So we basically left the coffee shop and finished our coffee outside. After that, IJ and I went back to Jeremy’s house for some dinner. During the course of the dinner discussion IJ and I began to tell some stories about senior year track. I was beginning to tell a story about how our relay team was disqualified for throwing the baton after the race. As you all know, I can get pretty dramatic when I get into a story. So I was motioning with my left hand a sort of throwing type gesture. Oblivious to me, the spot where I was waving my hand was occupied by a glass of milk. My Left hand struck the glass of milk. Then there was that slow motion horror when you see something falling over and no matter how you try you know you will not be able to stop it. So you are left usually yelling some variation of “Oh No!” as you watch the glass tumble to the floor. This was one of those circumstances. The milk spilled everywhere. But don’t worry I didn’t cry over the spilled milk. (Did I just really say that? Man that was the corniest thing ever, but whatever) The entire family got a big kick out of my clumsiness. We all laughed hard it was a good time. Jeremy’s house is also at the bottom of this hill which IJ and I saw as a great climbing location. We traversed the dessert terrain to arrive at some magnificent rock formations. We climbed these and took some pictures. It was good fun. That night we went to see Da Vinci Code at a local movie theater. It was ok. Then I went to sleep. Our next destination is San Francisco. We will stop by Lake Tahoe on the way.

Monday May 22, Day Five of the Road Trip

Today was Monday. We woke up from our rest and hit the road across Nevada. We basically spent the entire day driving to Carson City. We drove through Reno and Battle Mountain which is also known as the arm pit of America. This afternoon we finally came to Jeremy’s house it is really cool. I will say more things later I’m just really sleepy tonight.

Day 4: The Great American Road Trip

Today I slept a lot. I slept through seeing the great salt lake, which disappointed me. We drove all the way through Idaho. I soon became very hungry for some mashed potatoes or some tatter tots. We finally arrived at Salt Lake City. This place is really kind of weird you can see the influence of the Mormon everywhere. There is a Zion bank, Zion dry cleaners, and about 40 later day saints churches in a 3 block radius. There is also this really weird Mecca for the Mormons with all their holy sites and people and stuff. And they interrogate you if you approach and are not Mormon. We stayed clear of that place. The other really weird things about this city are that it is surrounded by the mountains which give it a cool look. Since we were there on Sunday we walked downtown and everything was closed. You didn’t see anyone on the sidewalks and there were almost no cars driving down the streets. It was like a ghost town. I haven’t seen any metropolis like it in my life. I guess none of the Mormons do anything on Sundays. We passed the big downtown mall and the entire thing was closed. But the really freaky thing was that we almost could not find a Starbucks. We searched for almost 5 blocks! And finally found one. It was open too. But what kind of American city does not have a Starbuck or two on every street? Now we are headed off into the desert to camp for the night. We are in the Perkins parking lot right now and are hacking into the comfort Inn wireless. I was not able to post the last few days because we were stranded in Yellowstone. But tomorrow we are on to Carson City and will stay there with Ian’s friend from school. I did not have any time to upload pictures but I will try to get some up tomorrow. We made a lot of progress on license plates in the last few days I will post them on the post that lists all the states. Oh and we saw a snake, a fox and a buffalo for the road kill count.

Day 3: Road Trip

Day three. I awoke to find the sun shinning bright outside and Ian ready to go out on a hike through the benevolent Yellowstone wilderness. I felt a little disshelved and rushed getting my stuff together for our hike. We stopped at a tree with our fishing poles however we had no bait and there were no fish in the stream so our attempts were rather futile. We decided to hike to a lake called Ice Lake. This was an adventure to say the least. We got up this very large hill and after a mile or so of hiking we came to an enormous marsh. Now as many people know. I am not a fan of marshes. You can never tell what land is safe to walk on and what ground will get you in much to you waist. Ian had more an adventurous spirit that day. So he deiced that we should keep going across this marsh to the rest of the trail which was not even visible from the grove of trees where we stood. We had to keep going across this march after I suggested that we turn back. Ian insisted that we press on. So I let him see where this marsh would lead us. Well we got to the other side and could not find the trail. We recrossed the horrible marsh I got my hiking books soaked and my pants wet up to my knees. Thus this little misadventure engrained in my heart a still unquenchable hatred for swamps and marshes. We got back to the campsite had some lunch and decided to head out for Old Faithful. This was the more fun part of the afternoon. We stopped at a cool waterfall along the way. Old faithful was pretty sweet. We also got a lot of new licenses plates for the license plate game. I snagged Hawaii. We came back to the camp site and I made a real fire this time. It was great. I played some guitar and we went to sleep.

Day 2: Road Trip

The winding road becomes my only view point as the hours unfold under our tires. Day two of the great American road trip was spent driving through lovely Wyoming and Montana. We stopped at little big horn the battle field where the American army was slaughter by the Native Americans. There were a lot of rattle snakes in the grass and we both were wearing sandals. We got back into the car after some wonderful KFC. Well my biscuit was pretty much the hardest biscuit I have ever had. We kept driving all the way to Yellowstone national park. I was a breath taking view going in. We got to the camp site at mammoth but decided to keep going on to Norris campsites. We decided they were much cooler because they were more secluded and were also probably named after Chuck Norris. We set up the tent without much difficulty. However getting a fire started proved to be much more work than we intended. All the wood we found was wet. We also soon realized that we forgot our frying pan at Ian’s house. So I tried to cook some soup by putting the can directing in the fire. The soup became very hot. However, it soon boiled over and put out or pathetic excuse for a fire. I just ate the soup and we went to bed. I rained throughout the night and we slept in rather late.

Road Trip: Day One Rapid City SD

Today has been the first day of the great American road trip that Ian and I are currently traversing. We left at ten this morning and drove to Mankato. In Mankato we stopped at the BK I got a double cheese burger with bacon and they messed up my order so I got a free large milk shake. Hurray for me. Then we took a long drive through the fast spaces of South Dakota. We stopped twice to get gas once at some shady gas station with a really old guy behind the counter and the second time in Wall South Dakota. We stopped at Wall drug. It was quite the experience. Then we drove to Mount Rushmore and checked that out. I am currently at a motel 8 in Rapid City. There were no regular non smoking rooms so we got the handicapped room, which just has a bunch of weird handicapped stuff. Ian and I made up a game to play as we are driving. It is the license plate game however we need to take a picture of each license plate to win. So far we have 17 states. I think we will be able to get all of them by the end of the trip. We are also keeping a count of the variety of road kill we see. Tomorrow we head to Yellowstone for two days. So the progress will not be posted for a while. If you are interested here are the states we have so far. There were two other ones we saw but missed as we drove through keystone.
California
Maryland
New York
Nebraska
Michigan
Kansas
South Dakota
North Dakota
Wisconsin
Georgia
Nevada
Oregon
Illinois
Washington
Minnesota
Massachusetts
Maine
Montana
Wyoming
Flordia
Virgina
Tennessee
New Mexico
Hawaii
Connecticut
North Carolina
Indiana
Texas
Kentucky
Idaho
Utah
Mississippi
Arkansas
Ohio
Pennsylvania
New Hampshire
Yellowstone will be sweet. Many more pictures and updates to come.

Drama On Second Floor

So today is a day like any other I am strolling through campus causing mishap and rampage like I normally do. However, today something happened a bit out of the ordinary. Usually my shenanigans go sadly unnoticed by the general UST community, with the exception of select individuals with highly developed taste for eccentric social experiments. There I was walking from the underground ramp. That is where I spend most of my time hustling, making amok, and living the vagabond lifestyle. However, there is just so much underground rebellious work a guy can handle in a limited amount of time. Thus I decided to protruded from my below the surface hideout and do some "normal good college student stuff", things such as pudding slip and slides. As I walked into the elevator I noticed something different. Someone had draped blue fabric on the wall. Now elevators have always intrigued me. First of all they are pretty much the most awkward places to be with a stranger. Thankfully there were no strangers for me to awkwardly ask what floor they are going to then stare at the door praying it will open soon. However, there was also a video camera in the corner. This video camera has been an object of wonder and amazement ever since I began using the elevator. Why is it there? Who is watching me? Is that to prevent people from having dance parties and playing twister in the elevator or something? (Something by the way I'm still planning on doing) So curiosity decided to possess my body for a short period of time. I looked straight into the camera made a face and moved the blue blanket over the lens. "That will teach them to spy on me!" I said as I indignantly walked out of the elevator. Only a few hours later I receive this email which I will copy in its entirety. It turns out some sadistic freak does watch me while I shake it in the elevator. Even worse they know who I am and can identify me! Here is the email I got...

Mr.,

Today our camera in the S. Residence north elevator showed you covering the camera with the protective blanket that had been put up for move out. (The blanket was put up to protect the sides of the elevator from damage.) In doing this, you created a safety risk for those who use the elevator, mainly the occupants S. Residence. Please be more respectful and thoughtful in your actions in the future.

Thank you,

Laura Sorkowski
Lead Dispatcher
Public Safety and Parking Services
University of ST
Mail #4081
Ext. 2-5100

So of course I responded.

Dear Laura,
How about you get a life and stop spying on me! Doing so you would be more respectful and thoughtful in your actions in the future.

Thank you,

Me
Indignant Resident of S Hall
You know my Room number
and Phone Number
Because you spy on me.

Check Out Me In the Newspaper!

This Sunday for my honors seminar we completely our work with Heart of the Beast theater and their annual mayday parade. It was quite an experience for me. We studied the parade from its humble beginnings in the 1970's to its enormous event that takes place every may. I was one of the people who held the first banner of the parade. This sign which read the name of the theater was constructed from bamboo and old bike tires. I was amazed how many people came out of this seemingly vacant neighbor hood to watch the giant papier-mâché puppets dragons and other floats roll across lake street. The parade is an artistic becoming for people to take action against the environment they find themselves in. The theme of this years parade was the time is now. The man holding the sign next to me in the picture is my class teacher Mike. And the women who are asleep in the middle of the street are the individuals who make this parade possible year after year. They would periodically pretend to fall asleep in the middle of the road and my job was to rile up the crowd to wake them up until a lady dressed like a clock would make them get up off the street with the clanging of her cymbals. These pictures are from the front page of the local section in the Monday, May 8th Star Tribune.

Pictures from May Day Parade

New Quote Idea

I hope you all like the new "quote of the day idea". I have decided that I will make it a little more interesting and make the majority of the quotes be things that other people say during the Day. It is pretty much an all day contest that you are a part of!! So you better try to IM, call or hangout with me and say something really good. That way your words will forever been engrained on the "Past Quotes" post.

From Rain to Bacon

Like usual, I'm up late sitting in my old study room. I haven't been here for a while but I have a lot to get done. It is late and night and it has been raining for three days straight. I am just wondering what genius invented automatic sprinklers that go off when it is raining and spray you as you go through the middle of the quad. Good job man how about you go eat some badly flavored jellybeans or something. I can't do anything productive when it is raining. I tend to find myself sleeping a lot or just singing songs about how it is raining. Banana pancakes by Jack Johnson is one of those. Speaking of pancakes, I was at breakfast the other morning and I got some pop. No big deal right? Wrong. I got chewed out for having pop for breakfast. So I responded with the usual, "Thanks for the advice mom." response that I give most people who try to tell me what I can and can't eat. Come on , I'm still young I have the rest of my life to watch what I eat. Eating healthy only makes you body dependent on healthy food. It is like being addicted to a drug. No thanks. Then when you want to have something bad for you, lets say two pounds of bacon, then you get sick or bad cholesterol or whatever. I will have to eat bad tasting food when I'm old so I might as well make some memories of tasty fatty foods now when my metabolism is high. But you know it is not like you only eat healthy food at breakfast anyways. Let me compile a list. Pancakes they are basically fried paste that sounds really healthy seeing that you do not even let children eat paste. Everything in your breakfast you pour syrup on which is liquid sugar really. Next you have sausages I have no idea how many varieties of animals were killed to create this tasty greasy meat, but sausages rock. Then there is the chocolaty sugary cereal, and the chocolate waffles, which is like half candy half paste. I swear most breakfast foods were invented by children. Dougnuts are basically round old cupcakes without the center. Then there is toast. I’m just going to break it down for you. Toast is burnt crusty bread. You have to put a pound of butter on it to make it taste like food again. They you have bagels. I don't understand why people like these stale things. I know folks who love to get fresh bagels. How can you tell if they are fresh? You could keep them outside for 3 years and still sell them as fresh and no one would know the difference. To make a long story short. I do not like breakfast because there are too many rules for the things you have to eat for breakfast. The truth is none of those foods are really any good. You have to be in a daze from waking up just to want to eat them, not to mention all the sugar and syrup you have to add to make them taste good. Tell me this if breakfast foods were really that good why haven’t most of them spread to other meals such as lunch or dinner. No breakfast foods have managed to break out. With the exception of bacon, which is one of the greatest meats of all time, whose potential for widespread use has been significantly hindered by his association with the motley gang of dull breakfast foods. When is the last time you were making a dish and decided to chop up some pancakes and throw them in? How about I grill up some deep-fired sausage for dinner? Has anyone here ever made a casserole with bagels? No, of course not! Why? Because when we are in our right mind, we want nothing to do with most of the so called breakfast foods. It is like a conspiracy or something. The world of breakfast foods is very hard to break out of and very hard to break into. It this way because from our youth we have been taught the rules of breakfast and still mindlessly abide. This here is one human being who is right not rebelling against the establishment of breakfast and all that it stands for. Most important meal of the day, yeah right! You'll believe anything when you are tired and groggy from just waking up. Well this meant to be a post about a rainy day but it turned into an explanation of why I usually don’t eat breakfast. The only reason I go on occasion is for my friend bacon, and sometime sausage but then you can only have so much sausage. In conclusion, rain is not good usually.