Random Musings...
Monday, June 30, 2003
- I am just coming off of the best weekend I've had in a really, really long time!! Cari was in town!! YAY! It was perfect! I went bowling with a bunch of Andrew's friends and bowled the lowest score out of the 14 or so people there. Heh heh. Then, off to see DAVE MATTHEWS COVER BAND!! Oh man! Next best thing to the real guys. They were AMAZING! Guess who was there, front row center, jamming her ass off. Oh yeah, me! Ok, I'm not kidding, though, my ass still hurts!! I was dancing like a woman possessed by the music. The band members were watching me throughout the show and giggling at me. Afterward, the bass player said he just had to come up and shake my hand and that I belonged up on the stage with them. Hell yeah! Of course, I also had about six whiskeys in me, which only enhanced my performance! Cari joined me at the concert about four or five songs in, and we hugged and jumped up and down screaming, of course! After we got home, we sat around and chatted until about 4:30am! Lots of catching up for the past two years!
Saturday, I was a wee bit hung over. Didn't roll out of bed until noon, and all I wanted was a smoothie and a salad. Cari and I went out to get these (and made a pitstop to check out the adorable puppies up for adoption at Petsmart!). Then, we watched "The Apartment Tape!" Wow, talk about memory lane!! We were cracking up!! We were such goofy college kids! Heh heh. Then, of course, we watched the wedding video. *Tears* So nice.
I saw her pics of her med school friends as well as her new beau Jeremy. Nice!
Saturday, had a get-together with some friends at my place. Nice and low key. Just hung out asking each other stupid trivia questions off of Trivial Pursuit. Never quite got organized into a game, though. It was a nice time, even if Cari slept in the chair throughout 75% of it!!
Sent her off Sunday after having a tasty lunch at the new Latin Cafe that opened here in town. Such a short time, but we packed it with fun, I thought! Then, I was off to a meeting for a movie I've been cast in. Apparently, people are actually going to see this movie, as opposed to the five others that I've made! It will play in artsy theatres all over Florida and in select cities around the country. Actually, it will even go international because it will be at the Toronto Film Festival! I don't know if this is actually true or not, but it will at the very least play here in town at the Hippodrome, so I will get to see my face on the silver screen for the first time! That will be an interesting experience. I'm only in three scenes, but I have a decent number of lines and drive the plot a bit. All of my scenes are one-to-one with the lead actor, so I will definitely get some screen time. Pretty exciting!
So yeah, definitely this was a good weekend for me!!
Posted at 9:01 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Thursday, June 26, 2003
- The best thing about Thursdays is that it's the day before Friday.
I have a confession. I was so hooked on American Idol that last night I actually sat through an entire episode American Juniors. Wow. Nothing like obnoxious kids who are all full of themselves. I found myself rooting for one of the girls, though. Fortunately she got through. I promise never to watch this show again, ok? One odd thing, though, as soon as the final credits are done for the show, you are met with a warning, "The following program contains sexual material that may be unsuitable for children. Parental discretion advised." Paradise Hotel! I don't know who the genius was who planned that Fox line-up.
Posted at 3:55 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Wednesday, June 25, 2003
- What kind of Puerto Rican girl are you?
Classic Puerto Rican
What kind of Puerto Rican girl are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted at 4:34 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- With all this Dave Matthews in my life lately, it should come as no surprise that I actually had a dream about the man last night. I dreamt that I was in front row of a solo show he was doing in the tiniest venue with only maybe 50 other people there. As soon as he walks out, before he takes his guitar, he catches a glimpse of me and can't help but be drawn to me. He asks me what my name is and proceeds to flirt with me. After a nice hug, he writes down his cell number for me and asks me to call him after the show because he wanted to hang out. Oh my gosh!! I was so excited and completely freaked out!! This was the moment of a lifetime, but what about Andrew?? I didn't want him to tell me I couldn't hang out with Dave Matthews, but I didn't want to hurt him and jeopardize our relationship over one night. Finally, I broke down and called him and asked him to join us so that Dave wouldn't get the wrong idea about me. (I can't even cheat on my hubby with Dave Matthews in my dreams!! This is the second time I've had to turn Dave down for Andrew, by the way)
He played the show, but I hardly remember any of it (except for Tripping Billies). I was too excited! So, he disappears backstage, and I let about half an hour pass before I dial his cell number. (I wish I remembered it! Heh heh!) So, he asks us to join him at Waffle House. Awesome! We have some waffles, chat with him and a couple of other people there. The Dave gets a craving for some Steak n Shake shakes. A man after my own heart! It was a fantastic night and I was so disappointed when I woke up!
I need help, but I'm proud that I didn't forget about the real love of my life...
You're the love of my life and the breath in my prayer
Posted at 10:13 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Tuesday, June 24, 2003
- Just got back from a lovely lunch with Andrew. I went home and Andrew had prepared some pizza bagels for us to have. Not frozen or anything. He actually sliced up some bagels, put on sauce, cheese and pepperoni himself. Very nice! On my way home, I heard something incredible on the radio. It was only 81 degrees!! It's a beautiful sunny day, hardly any humidity, and it's only 81 degrees. So, we decided to inaugurate our recently (though not yet completely) redone patio. It was so nice. There were tons of kids playing out in the pool which is just a few yards from our patio. We brought Lucky out with us. Just the three of us there enjoying the day.
On my drive home, NPR was doing a spotlight on Puerto Rican music. Nice surprise! I hardly ever listen to it when I'm not actually in Puerto Rico or at a party. But listening to it now just brought back so much. I don't know how anyone can listen to that music and not want to just get up and dance dance dance. I was wiggling my culito just sitting there in the car by myself. I need to get myself a small collection of really good Puerto Rican music. If you want to hear one of my favorite Latin songs, La Bilirrubina click here to download this mp3.
Posted at 2:12 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Yay!! Yay Yay Yay!! I'm going to Atlanta to see Dave!! I'm going to Atlanta to see Dave!!
Dave is excited too!!!
This will make an interesting milestone. After this show, I will have seen them play in every state from Virginia on south.
Yay!! I'm so glad the tickets came through. They were nearly impossible to get, but I had my own nationwide network trying to get me to the show, and it happened! Now comes the perhaps even more difficult part. I must wait until September 20 to actually go to the show. 89 days from now. 89. Gotta make it!
Posted at 8:37 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Monday, June 23, 2003
- Which Salvador Dali Painting Are You? (inspired by Luciana's blog)
You're Metamorphosis of Narcissus!
You're bright, philosophical and creative, but you
don't always get the attention you deserve.
Which Salvador Dali Painting Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted at 2:30 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- I think I may have landed TICKETS FOR THE DMB SHOW IN ATLANTA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Cross your fingers for me!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted at 1:00 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Friday, June 20, 2003
- I keep playing with my short hair now! It feels funny!
Posted at 2:16 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Yesterday I taught Lucky to "speak." I was wondering how I would go about teaching a dog to bark on command who hardly ever barks. Basically, I had to torture him. I was showing him his most favorite treat and kept repeating, "Speak! Speak!" and he was just so confused. He tried everything. Sitting really straight, laying down, giving me his paw, rolling over, every trick in the book. I had to wait until he was so frustrated with staring at that treat and having me repeat a command he didn't know that he finally started whimpering a bit. So, I gave him a little piece for that. Then, I gave him more and more little bits as he increasingly became more vocal until he was getting the hint and finally did a full out bark and I gave him a whole big piece and petted him and played with him. The whole process took about 20 minutes or so. He's such a smart doggie. Now, I can have him bark on command, which can be very useful. His bark is extremely intimidating, and I'd love it if he barked whenever someone came to the door when I was home by myself. That's right potential rapist, I got a badass dog that will do my bidding, so you best be on your merry little way!
I love Lucky, even though he hated me for a little while yesterday!
Posted at 2:00 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Thursday, June 19, 2003
- Anika, my faithful shout out-er, just sent the most entertaining email questionnaire!! Answer it in the shout out if you have the time! I had so much fun filing one out for her. Ahh...memory lane...
Your name:
Where did we meet?:
Take a stab at my middle name:
How long have you known me?:
Do I smoke?:
Do I believe in God?:
What was your first impression of me upon meeting?:
What's my age?:
My birthday?:
And color eyes?
Do I have any siblings?:
What's one of my favorite things to do?:
Do you remember one of the first things I said to you?:
What's my favorite type of music?:
What is the best feature about me?:
Am I shy or outgoing?:
Would you say I am funny?:
Am I a rebel or do I follow all the rules?:
Any special talents?:
Would you consider me a friend?:
Have you ever seen me cry?:
If there was one good nickname for me, what would it be?:
What's your favorite memory of me?
If you and I were stranded on a desert island, what one thing would I bring?
Posted at 4:56 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Something random I was thinking about walking to the Union to grab lunch...
For some reason, I thought back to my Acting I class that I took back at Davidson. There was a girl in the class, a senior, that one day said that one of the ideas that freaks her out the most is that there is all this atmosphere above us that is subject to gravity like everything else and that this atmosphere is exerting a tremendous amount of downward force on everything. She said whenever she thought about it, she'd feel claustrophobic and have a hard time breathing. When I heard her say this, I thought she was really weird for being freaked out about something like that.
But then, every since that day, I catch myself thinking about that, and when I do, I start feeling as though my chest is getting heavy and it's hard to breathe. Strange. I wouldn't say that it freaks me out, but it isn't exactly the most comforting thought. Each of us have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pounds of force pushing down on is from the moment we are conceived. It's strange, in a way, to think of how we never really feel this. I guess since it has been exerting pressure on us since before we even developed consciousness, we just don't register it. Our brains, I guess, just ignore it all. So do our scales. We just pretend that our feet only push down the weight of our bodies, and not the billions of particles pushing on us and everything at the same time.
I thought about how strong we all are to be able to walk around with all these tons pushing on the tops of our heads, but I guess we're not really that strong since any other object that exists can pretty much do the same.
The clearest example of this concept, I suppose, happens on the ocean floor. Humans can only dive so deep before the pressure of all the water above you just becomes too much. Subs that dive deeper have to be built incredibly strong to be able to withstand all that tonnage pressing down against it. But then, on the ocean floor, there are strange almost alien-like fish who have never seen light (or anything for that matter) who float around like it's no big deal. I guess those are the strongest creatures on Earth.
So, I'm thinking all this, until I had an interesting thought...this whole concept made a lot of sense to me until I began wondering what happens to all that downward force when we walk into a building under the roof??? I don't get it. How does the roof transfer all that pressure down again to our heads so that we don't feel the difference in weight when we walk in and out of buildings?? There must be a totally obvious answer to this, but I'm just missing it right. *shrug*
Posted at 3:02 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Last night was the most amazing DMB setlist I've ever seen in my life. Check it out at nancies.org's homepage. Oh dear Lord. I better make it to a show this tour. That was incredible!!
And do you ever think that you're doing just fine and then *WHAM!!* You realize that you are so far behind on work and you're going to have to work your butt off to get it done in time?? Well, that's what's happening to me. Spring 2004 Course Scheduling is kicking my butt right now. I guess I forgot it usually takes me months to get it right when I was blowing off the deadline thinking "It's not until mid-July which is sooo far away!" Uh oh.
Posted at 10:53 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Tuesday, June 17, 2003
- I'm getting a haircut on Friday and I have no idea what I want done. I'm very tempted to just say, "Do something. Anything as long as it's not what I have right now." My only rules: I should be able to pull all of it back and out my face if I want to and I don't want any alterating of my actual hair with colors or chemicals. I just have no idea what I want. Just something different. What are the chances I might regret this?
Posted at 3:16 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- This picture makes me laugh! I can barely make out which end is what!!
What Breed of Dog Are You?
You're a Pekingese! You always want to make sure
things are in order, and care very much about
the safety of your family. You like to make
things presentable and have fine, fine taste.
You prefer the refined and sophisicated stuff
of life.
What Breed of Dog Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted at 1:52 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Last night, I went out with some friends to a restaurant. They had gone there the week before and discovered Monday Night Trivia. They recruited me for their team this week. Lo and behold, we won First Place! Woohoo! Our dinner ended up being more than free after collecting our prize money, which is an awfully nice feeling. I have a feeling I will make this a weekly outing. Heck, it's cheaper than staying home, isn't it?
Posted at 9:05 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Monday, June 16, 2003
- DOWN*
Damn the man
I do all that I can
I just wanna be free
But he just keep me.....
...DOWN!
*guest vocals by David J. Matthews
That's my original work that's gonna be my ticket outta here, I tell ya!
Posted at 3:37 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- I was Andrew's DD on Friday night. As I was driving down University Ave., I drove by The Swamp, and there was a guy outside with a guitar playing. I hear a faint, sustained, high vocal note, and it occurs to me that the note sounds a lot like a Dave note. I quickly lower the window just in time to catch a few seconds of the guy playng Grey Street as I drove by.
I just know these things.
Posted at 2:47 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Last night, I dreamt that I was arrested. It all went down like this:
Andrew was doing his own hilarious stand-up comedy routine for a packed house. He was doing so great, cracking everyone up, but one girl was extremely offended by one of his jokes. She was so upset that she started threatening him, yelling at him, and ended up chasing him. I ran after her, lunged, and tackled her. Then I punched her square in the face.
Next I knew, I was being arrested for assault. Who knew? Lucky for me, though, I got sent to the good girl jail that was really more like a modern summer camp. It was very comfortable, very clean, and all the girls were really friendly. I was very impressed. Plus, I knew I was going to be released the next day, so I just took it in and enjoyed the experience, participating in all of the fun in-house activities! I did not feel the least bit sorry for beating up that bitch.
Posted at 8:30 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Friday, June 13, 2003
- Ok, to kill time at work and get my mind off things, I wandered back into the stupid, yet amusing quiz site. Wow, I had to cover my mouth to hold back the laughter. I loved this one.
Which Obscure 19th Century President are you?
You are Martin Van Buren. You were accused of
taking more baths than a gentleman ought, and
of having expensive taste in cutlery. You
didn't do much else.
Which Obscure 19th Century President are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted at 3:50 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Erggg. I'm frustrated today. I'm frustrated with everything. I'm pretty sure it has a lot to do with my post yesterday too. *ehem*
I'm just frustrated is all. I want to go home. I want a new job. I want to go to a DMB concert. I want to buy some new clothes because nothing fits me anymore. (Yeah, I've actually gained weight, believe it or not) I want to sleep. I want to eat a large quantity of good food because my lunch today just did not cut it. I want a Midol.
I want all these things right now, and I can't have any of it. Next I'm going to throw myself to the floor and start kicking. Spoiled, I suppose. Ugh. I guess I'm just sick of sitting here pretending to do work for hours and hours on end.
Posted at 3:17 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- Hehe...I love that my friends stop by here often! :)
Ok...brainstorming. I'm dying to go to a Dave concert this summer, especially since Boyd has said they're going to be pulling out old songs they haven't played in a long time with a new twist and will be debuting several new songs. Atlanta is the only show within a resonable distance of me and Dave-friend-Jennifer is going, but I haven't been able to find tickets. I'll keep searching, of course...
But I've been itching for more. Then I realized, there are some New England dates on Labor Day weekend. Dave-friend-Christina, who lives in CT, (where the shows take place), told me she'd pick me up from the airport and can possibly even offer a place for me to stay. Then it occurs to me some more...by Labor Day, Lane and Sheila will be living in Boston and Anika will be living in NYC. Any chances of a Labor Day reunion in Connecticut and take in some good quality entertainment?
Flight for me is $212...tickets are still available for the show...
Gosh, is it worth me tormenting Andrew over this?
Posted at 9:12 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Thursday, June 12, 2003
- I have cramps, and I feel it's my right to say it.
Posted at 12:49 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- What's YOUR deepest secret?
YOU EAT PEOPLE!!!
what's YOUR deepest secret?
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted at 9:42 AM
Comments...
Permalink
......
Wednesday, June 11, 2003
- Oh, and these aren't Hawaii pics, but they are pics of Andrew and I at the beach along with some friends on Memorial Day. Most of them are pretty good except for some dorky ones of me jumping through the waves!
- Memorial Day 2003
Posted at 2:54 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
- I'm back! It's great to see a few more of you made it out to my li'l ol' blog here.
As for Hawaii...wow. Awesome! Amazing! What a great trip. I'm not quite as clever as Lane, but I will recount my trip in the form of a travel log:
Friday, May 30
Left work early and zoomed to Orlando to make the late afternoon flight to LA. When they started boarding the plane, my dad surprised us all with First Class tickets! Wow! Nice and comfy. The in-flight movie was About Schmidt, which I LOVED. I was sobbing through half the movie, which was embarrassing to do on a plane with the flight attendants asking me if I needed anything to drink. Great movie, though, and now that I've seen this and the Pianist, I think that maybe Jack Nicholson should have won Best Actor instead. I know he's already won it and it's boring to see him win it again, but I just loved him in this movie, and I'm normally not a fan.
We get into LA and drive out to Anaheim where we stay at a Travelodge owned by one of my dad's friends. We walk down the street and have dinner at Baker's Square (bring back any memories Lane and Anika?).
Saturday, May 31
My 24th birthday! We head over to Disney's California Adventure for the morning before our late afternoon flight. It was tons of fun, though I can understand all the complainers. We pretty much did everything we wanted to do in the park and were done by 1:00. Fortunately, my dad got free tickets, but I understand people who paid nearly $50 a person being upset for only getting a few hours of enjoyment. It was a perfect time for us, though.
We head to the airport and fly out to Honolulu (not First Class this time!). Since we were flying west for six hours, I realized that I was having the longest birthday ever! The sun was setting for most of the flight, which was pretty cool. We made it just as it was setting in Honolulu. We drove out to our hotel, the Royal Hawaiian, which was gorgeous! We were met with fresh flower leis. Completely exhausted, though, we headed straight for bed.
Sunday, June 1
We woke up early since we were still somewhere between Florida and LA time and headed down to the hotel breakfast buffet which proved to be the most spectacular breakfast of my life. Oh man. Very few meals could ever stack up to this marvelous culinary feast! They had every kind of breakfast item available you could ever think of. Best of all was the omelet bar where a chef makes an omelet with ANYTHING you want in it, a waffle bar that included my favorite strawberries and whipped cream, and, best of all, a SMOOTHIE BAR! Oh man. And it couldn't have been in a better setting either. There we were eating incredible food on the terrace right on Waikiki Beach. The surfers were out, the waves were rolling in, gentle ocean breeze, Diamondhead volcano in the background. It was so beautiful! This is probably the closest I'll ever get to perfection in my life.
We went out for a walk through the shops on Waikiki. Everything was to be found from super upscale untouchable stores like Tiffany's and Gucci to little vendors selling handmade carvings. One of these carvings was especially cool, and it what Andrew ended up buying. The guy was finishing up the woodwork right then and there and Andrew bought it when he was done. Very cool Tiki guy. I bought a little beach outfit and some earrings, my mom bought some necklaces, and my brother bought yet another WWII shirt, but this time with the boats instead of the planes.
Honolulu is a nice tropical city which reminded me a lot of San Juan, except a little more clean! But the buildings with the mountains and the coast, it all reminded my so much of Puerto Rico!
We headed to the ship a little before lunch. The Norwegian Star. Beautiful ship! My dad surprised my mom with a suite, which was great! We spent the rest of the day relaxing and finding our way around.
Monday, June 2
Hilo, Hawaii (The Big Island)
We arrived into Hilo on an unfortunately cloudy day. The especially unfortunate part was that my dad was planning on surprising me with a helicopter tour that would take us over flowing lava, something I had been saying I wanted to see all along! The helicopter tours were cancelled for the morning, so no such luck. Such a pity. We still found ourselves an very colorful local tourguide who took us around in his van. He was a true Hawaiian. So much so that I think Hawaiian was his first language and English was his second. He took us up to see Kilauaea, which is still an active volcano, though it's not erupting. It was fantastic to see. You could tell when we were getting closer because the landscape suddenly turned from a very lush tropical rainforest to a barren sea of black, cooled lava. It was incredible! It seemed like we were on another planet. The crater itself was HUGE!! I can't even describe how huge it was. It was almost my entire view. It had various steam vents around spewing puffs in the air, reminding me that this is still active. We even went into a "lava tube," which is one of the paths fast flowing lava took out of the volcano. It was actually really big, probably 12 feet tall and cylindrical. The walls were crusted with cooled lava while the hottest stuff flowed right through the middle. It was neat to be inside that thing.
Other little stops that day included a stop at a candy factory, a macadamia nut farm, an orchid farm, and a beautiful waterfall. Very nice day!
Tuesday, June 3
Day at Sea
The trip to Fanning Island in the remote republic of Kiribati was a long one, so the days at sea were necessary. These days proved why my parents getting themselves a suite was a great idea because it was a great gathering place for the five of us. We played cards in the dining room, watched movies in the living room, and relaxed on the balcony. We watched the hundreds of flying fish zipping along the side of the boat. Nice treat!
My family entered a Movie Theme Song trivia contest and won! Woohoo, we won some keychains!
Wednesday, June 4
Fanning Island, Republic of Kiribati
What an interesting experience this was! First of all, the island was beautiful. It was really nothing more than a large palm lined sandbar in the middle of no where. I mean, really in the middle of no where...just about 200 miles from the equator and about as much from the International Dateline. And the 1700 people who live there are about 300 years behind. Not a single car on the entire island, no electricity, and no running water. They live in huts, walk barefoot, and some even still wear the grass skirts, etc. It was such an interesting experience. My dad, brother, and I rented some bicycles and rode along the dirt path which was the only "road" in the whole place and went from village to village. We saw them making fishnets and all the children would run up to us yelling out the only English word they knew "Hello!" It was a very interesting cultural experience. I think they looked at us with as much amazement as we looked at them. After a little muddy mishap I had on the bike, it was nice to take a dip in the crystal clear water. Nice, relaxing day.
Thursday, June 5
Day at Sea
This day was spent much like the previous day at sea. Just relaxing. There was a Star Trek Convention on board. We found out that it was not only Trekkies, but also a few Star Trek actors, the most famous of which was George Takei who played Zulu in the original series and in the movies. The funny thing, he asked my Mom were something was and she made a mistake and directed him the wrong way. She felt bad when she realized, but my dad joked that he's supposed to know where to go since he's the navigator.
Friday, June 6
Kuhuilui, Maui
Maui was yet another beautiful island. We went on a hike over a very, very rugged lava field which was completely different than the lava fields we saw on the Big Island. This lava field was created by very slow moving lava, which created a very craggly, rock effect, rather than the smooth black of the faster moving lava. It was a very strange formation which I can't even describe other than to say it was very, very rugged and craggly. At the end, where the lava flow met the sea, some wonderful underwater formations made for some spectacular snorkling. We snorkled all around this little cove that was home to all sorts of interesting sea life. We were surrounded by countless fish of all types, an octopus, and even a sea turtle! It was beautiful!
The drive to and from the lava field was beautiful. The landscape was beautiful, and the houses and resorts along the coast were stunning. A very nice island!
Saturday, June 7
Nawiliwili, Kauai
The word I would use for this island would be "breathtaking!" Wow! For reference, this is where a lot of Jurassic Park was filmed. All those beautiful mountains and valleys that you see were filmed there. Actually, lots of movies were filmed there. We saw it all in the best possible way: by helicopter. We flew over these amazing landscapes. There was Waimea Canyon, called the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific," which looks exactly like it. We flew by the Na Pali coastline, which was stunning. We floated over these mountains shaped in a way I had never seen before. I can't even describe these mountains. Some of them looked so thin and steep that it seemed I could stradle the top of it and have a leg hanging down on each side. Just incredible. You will have to see the pictures to believe it!!
Sunday, June 8
Back in Honolulu
We departed out beautiful ship and headed straight for Pearl Harbor. I had trouble really understanding this place. It was very hard for me to picture the Japenese Zeros flying in and bombing this area into a sea of fire. The videos they showed of the attack were so dramatic that it seemed impossible that such a thing happened exactly where I was standing. It was much the same way I felt when I went to the site of the WTC in November. Perhaps being too familiar with the magnitude of an event that took place makes it impossible to believe it existed in a place you could visit. The U.S.S. Arizona, the ship were 1,177 men lost their lives, still lies there sunken on the shallow water so that some of it still sticks out and is visible. Standing over it in the memorial, you could see the shape of the ship pretty clearly in the water. The most amazing thing, the oil from the ship still bubbles out from below in tiny spurts over 60 years later. The air is heavy with the smell of the oil. That sense was the closest I felt to the tragedy, even as I looked at the imposing list of names of fallen soliders who lay just below my feet.
From there, we checked in to our hotel, the W Honolulu Diamondhead which was on the opposite end of Waikiki beach as our previous hotel, right at the foot of the volcano we had had a view of before. Very chic hotel. From there, we headed toward a luau, which was quite fun. I question the authenticity of some of the hokey things they had us do, but it was a fun evening and the food was great! The sunset was beautiful.
Monday, June 9
Sad day, the day we left Hawaii. We didn't have time to do anything else in Honolulu except head for the airport. We got to LA a little after 8pm, had a late dinner, and went straight to bed. The next day, we flew to Orlando again in the morning, and didn't arrive until the evening and drove straight to Gainesville, picked up Lucky from our friends' house, and went straight to bed. So sad.
That was my trip. Amazing, amazing trip. As soon as I get the pictures, I will be posting them. I had so much fun!
Posted at 2:39 PM
Comments...
Permalink
......
