Picture updates!

I have done a lot of work getting pictures added to the site. I've gotten a few updates to existing sections, and added pictures from our sunset-watching day last weekend. I'm going to go out for a walk, then come back and do some homework, and then hopefully get pictures from our sub tour up. Enjoy!

Another fun day!

Yesterday we had another really fun day involving sea life and a good dinner. Although yesterday was 150x more expensive than last weekend, it's kind of ironic that last weekend just seemed to mean more, maybe because it was so unexpected.

Anyway, yesterday we started out the day by going on submarine tour of the waters just off of Waikiki Beach. The sub took us about 100 feet deep, and had windows so everyone could see outside. We were seated next to a family from, of all places, Stevens Point, WI. Upon initial descent, we saw a barracuda staring us in the face. I got tons of pictures which I WILL be posting TODAY. (A little self-motivation with the caps there :P)

Throughout the rest of the tour we saw sea turtles, sting rays, colorful fish, plane wrecks, shipwrecks, sea urchins, coral, a shark (well, it was on the other side of the sub, we didn't actually see it) and a lot more cool sea life. I was hoping we'd luck out and see a whale up close but no dice. We were given the opportunity to get annual passes for $25 each (far less than what we paid for the tour initially) which I am going to call to get right now. That way when you all come to visit me (HINT HINT) I can take you on the tour, too!

After this we had an hour or so to spare before our next venture so we found a neat little spot to sit and overlook the Honolulu harbor. We sat on a rock wall and watched the water hit the rocks below and also watched some bright yellow fish play below our feet. We were only a hundred yards from a major Honolulu street, but for the 30 minutes or so that we sat there, we were 100 miles from civilization. We have noticed this before, how the rest of the world just disappears when we sit and watch the water. I wish there was a way to bottle the ocean and pull it out when you need it.

The rain chased us to our next stop - a medium-sized cruise boat called the Navtek for a dinner cruise. We boarded the boat and took our seats by a window. Included in the price of the cruise was three drinks each. I have been off of my medication for a couple of weeks now and was actually able to drink two without having a crippling headache or puking!!

Neither Matt or I is a big fan of fish, but we tried our first appetizer anyway - chilled baked salmon with some sort of sour cream dressing. Matt liked it and gobbled it up - I tried it and ate about half of mine. I can still say that I am not a big fan of fish. Then we had a salad, which was delicious. Then our first entree was delivered. I'll let the pictures do the talking on this one. I'll just say that it was lobster and I was at least brave enough to try it and I can emphatically say that I do not like it. Matt is a big chicken and would not try it. I named mine George and he named his Fred.

Between entrees, we took a walk up to the observation deck and watched Waikiki fly by us. Then we went back down for entree #2 - fileted tenderloin with mashed potatos and gravy and veggies. This was much more normal for us and didn't last too long on either of our plates. While we were eating this, some Hawaiian entertainment was on stage (a singer and hula dancers). They called a birthday guy up on stage and he was from, of all places, Milwaukee. We then ate our chocolate mousse cake dessert and went out on the deck to watch the night lights as the boat pulled back into the harbor.

Matt wants to do something cool every weekend now that his boat is out to sea and he's not. Next week's agenda - the Honolulu zoo!

I mean it this year

I know I say this every year, but I've got a really good feeling about the Brewers this year, especially if they bring up their young trio of talented infielders early. Getting Ben Sheets to sign for another year helps, too. I was disappointed to see that they traded Kolb and Podsednik, but that seems to be traditional Brewers style.

ESPN.com seems to agree with me for once, too. It will be interesting to see how spring training develops. Go Brewers!!

I agree with Simon most of the time

He might be brutally honest, but I really don't find myself disagreeing with him too often. Tonight he said something during the girls competition that made me yell at the TV about how much I agreed. The crowd did not agree. He said to the annoying young kid Mikayla (the one that keeps mentioning the prom date) that half the audience will like her personality and the other will find her annoying. BINGO! She reminds me of the nanny and annoys me to no end. Out of the chicks that I saw, I would only vote for one, and that's Nadia (the one with the big hair who sang a rock-ish song.)

Darnit!

I was just checking my DVR (Tivo) listings and saw American Idol there. I'm really ticked. I'm watching it right now, and I'm mad because I didn't realize it was on Monday night instead of Tuesday night. That means that I missed the voting for my two guys, Bo and Constantine. I thought Bo really kicked butt tonight, but Constantine picked a Seal song?!?!?! What the heck is up with that?

Super day

Matt is home with the best news that I could possibly hear at this point. I was really really not looking forward to being alone for the next 6 weeks, so when he told me that by some act of God that he gets to stay home while his boat is out, I was thrilled.

Yesterday (Saturday), I asked Matt if there was anything he'd like to do, and he said that he wanted to go for a drive. Neither of us had any idea of exactly how awesome this day was going to be. Both of our sleep schedules are seriously messed up right now. Mine because that's just how my sleep schedule always is, and his because he was on the third shift watch while he was at sea. We woke up around 2:00pm. We started driving westward and stopped when the road ended. We found ourselves at a state park and at the northwestern tip of the island.

We sat on the beach for a while just looking at the waves. They were very large waves and some kids were boogie boarding in them. It was an impressive sound, too. While we just staring at the water, and while of course I was looking in a different direction, Matt exclaimed "Did you just see that?!?" I looked to where he was looking but was too late. Then, a couple of minutes later, I saw it, too. Some whales were surfacing and we could see them blowing water out of their blowholes and their massive tails breaking the surface of the water. Then we saw one jump straight out of the water and splash back in. I really can't describe how awesome this sight was for me. Matt estimates that the whales were .5-.75 miles off the shore, but even without my glasses I could see them clearly. It was too random for me to get pictures, but we have something planned next weekend which might allow me to get some much closer pictures of a whale.

After watching the whales for an hour or so, we headed back toward home. I am learning that the best food on the island is not from big fancy restaraunts, but instead tiny places that nobody seems to know about. We found one of these not too far from the beach and had the best Mexican food either of us have ever had. Not only was the food great, but the service was even better. This is a rare, rare, RARE thing in Hawaii. The tiny place was only big enough for the kitchen (which was wide open) and a few tables. It was decorated with homemade decorations. When we walked in, the owner (and waiter) of the place greeted us and seated us. He asked us if it was our first time there, and then proceeded to give us a brief history of his establishment. He actually pulled out my chair for me. I have never seen this happen. Needless to say, I was impressed. As we were waiting for our food, I watched numerous customers walk in to order take out and tell this guy about their families and stuff. Anyway, if you're ever on the west shore of Oahu, look for a tiny hole in the wall called Tacos and More. You won't be disappointed.

We finished eating just in time to catch the sunset over the ocean. I did get a few pictures of this. The sun setting in Hawaii is very funny to me. In a matter of three minutes, the sun went from very visible to gone. You can literally see the sun set. It's almost like something out of a cartoon. After we saw the sun set, we played around for a bit on a cool patch of land that we found overlooking the ocean. It had palm trees and lots of neat rock formations. We found a coconut and broke it open on a rock. The coconut milk tasted really good and it was very interesting to see what the inside of a coconut actually looks like. Then we walked around on the rocks for a while chasing crabs and finally headed home. I got pictures of a lot of the day and hope to have them up soon. :)

Idol reactions

I'm watching American Idol right now, and it's the one where the final 24 are selected. I'm really finding it interesting the way that some people react to the bad news. I know that not everybody is like me, but if I were rejected, I really don't think that I'd be crying and having a fit. However, if I made it, I don't think I'd be crying and having a fit, either. But then again, I'm not the type of person who would be in that situation at all.

I do have my favorites, I like the long-haired rocker types. I haven't yet seen if Constantine makes it through, but Beau just did. Tony and I were just talking about this today, and he prefers the Clay Aiken-type (Anthony Federov). Oops, Constantine just made it. He will most likely be receiving my votes. :)

Updates!

I finally made a few updates to the site. I've reformatted the pictures site and added a few new pictures. I've also added some of my favorite links on the links page. I've got more pictures to add yet, and I will let you know as they are posted. As for the Pro Bowl, I've decided not to go. Wait, yes I am. No, no I'm not. :P

To Pro Bowl or not to Pro Bowl...

...that is the question. Tomorrow is the Pro Bowl, which I have tickets for. One minute I tell myself that I'm going, the next I'm not. I really want to go, I just don't want to go alone. The stadium is only about a mile from here. I could easily walk there and back, so I wouldn't have to mess with parking. But Matt and I will be here this time next year, and he won't be at sea, so it's not like I'll never have the opportunity to go again. Ok I'll go. Wait, no I won't. I guess I won't really know until tomorrow.

The quest for the high score

Once upon a time, there was a person that logged into Yahoo Messenger. This day was very different than past days, however, because on this day she saw a high score staring her in the face. It was an outrageous high score from a word game online, and she knew that to beat this score would take hours of work. But she persisted and played for hours.

She came within 200,000 points of beating this high score when her stupid f*ing computer kicked her out of the window and she had to start over. She has not quit, however, and she still persists to this minute. The quest for the high score will endure until it has been achieved.

Your score is in grave danger, Mother.

Modern-day superheros

If Blade and Neo from the Matrix got in a fight, who do you think would win? I'm not sure if he would win or not, but I'd be rooting for Blade. He's a bad ass, Neo is kind of a wimpy dork who just happens to end up in his super-role. Although, that seems to be the story with most super heroes, they are wimpy nerds by day and super cool by night. That's probably because the guys that originally wrote the comics were wimpy nerds who could only dream of being cool.

Anyway, Blade still gets my vote.

Bye bye litterbox

I have been blessed with very smart cats. I do not like the litterbox. This is why I have decided to toilet train my cats. I estimate that it is going to take about two weeks to do. From what I've read, it simply needs to be done in stages - moving the litterbox to the bathroom (we're on this step, which I think will only take a day to get used to) then raising the litterbox about two inches per day. Then we place a bowl of litter in the toilet, start to remove the litter a little at a time, then replace the litter with water, and after a few days of that, help them learn what position they should be using, remove the bowl and viola! I'll keep you posted on how this experiment is going. :)

Matt-less life

I am in day 10 of my Matt-less life. Only 11 more to go. I'm kind of surpised at how different I live my life when I know he's coming home at night. For example, instead of cooking a well-rounded meal each night, I've been living on things like carrots and pizza rolls. Last night I splurged and ordered the new Pizza Hut dippin' strips pizza. There just doesn't seem like much of a point to cooking a large meal when it's just for me. When he's home I vacuum every other day. I don't remember the last time I vacuumed now. I only shower when I feel like it now, because there's really nobody here to impress.

I've been doing pretty well regardless. The lonliness really hasn't set in too much yet, and I know that this week is the toughest of the three. Next week will simply be a countdown to the day he comes home. Now next month, though, when he's gone for over a month, might be a little tougher. I'm really considering coming home then. If it weren't for these darn cats I'd probably be home right now already. Actually, I'd be in Puerto Rico, but that's a story for another day.

Song lyrics

I've been listening to the local oldies station here lately while playing EverQuest 2, and I find myself singing along with the majority of the songs. A couple of times, though, I've started to notice exactly what I'm singing, and I'm realizing more and more that a lot of oldies make absolutely no sense. For example - Mrs Robinson by Simon and Garfunkel. What the heck is this song about? From what I gather it's about a family of people named Robinson who have some sort of a secret that they want to hide from the kids in the cupboard or something. Another one is Incense and Peppermints. I really don't think I need to say much more about this one since the group's name is Strawberry Alarm Clock. And don't even get me started on the Beatles. Their early stuff is easy enough to understand, but they seemed to get really really weird later on. Same with the Beach Boys.

Then there's songs that I've been singing along to since I was little when my parents used to listen to oldies. For example, the song Judy in Disguise by some group that I don't know. Up until tonight when I looked up the lyrics, I've thought it was Judy in the Sky.

I think a little Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was responsible for a lot of these far-out lyrics.

Buffy the moth slayer

You've heard of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I want to introduce the world to Buffy the Moth Slayer. No moth in my apartment is safe. Buffy will track them down, catch them, injure them just enough so they can't fly, then take it to Nite and the two of them will play with it until it dies. It's really funny to watch. One night there was a huge moth that flew into the apartment. Matt and I just sat and watched the entertainment. I'm not sure how she manages to catch them, but she does every time and carries them around in her mouth. This one got away a few times and I was afraid Buffy was going to jump off the balcony chasing it. They are playing with another one right under my feet as I type this.

Idolized

In the past years, I haven't been able to watch American Idol because of my work schedule. I always felt kind of left out because everybody at work was always talking about it. This year, I have watched every episode so far and I'm really enjoying it. I love seeing all of the sucky people that they are cutting. It's very amusing for me. I actually think I'll get kind of bored with the show once they start narrowing things down and we see the same contestants week after week. But for now, I'm loving it.