Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/15/11 Yellowstone National Park

Today started off with clear skies, so FINALLY we were able to get up and go see sunrise. We headed over to Inspiration Point on the north rim of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone (we learned our "east vs. west" lesson finally). It was a really awe inspiring sight. The colors and the canyon getting blasted with light make for a really breathtaking combo. Sunrises are great because all the n00bs don't have the energy to get up on time to go see them (a disease that I definitively do NOT suffer from), so we were the only people there. (I hate when people ruin my sunrise with their presence. THAT IS A MOMENT BETWIXT ME AND THE SUN, STEP OFF). Oh also, sunrises are just fucking beautiful.

Your argument is invalid

We then saw some more of the dawn rays hitting the canyon from Artist's Point on the south rim - still fucking amazing, as per usual. (This happened after we followed a lone bison cross the bridge from the north to the south rim. MY GOD THEY HAVE BIG FUCKING HEADS). I managed to stand out on some precarious ledges (standard), so that was fun. Not having a fear of heights is pretty great.

Even the slightest breeze would have knocked me off this cliff

Then we went back to our tundra-esque snowy campsite, broke down the wet tent, and bid that god-forsaken place fucking adieu.
On our way to our next location, we probably saw a bunch more animals, including about a billion buffalo. It's getting hard remembering how many we see at this point because there are so many. We did see a vast number of buffalo today: crossing the road, walking around some hot springs, taking dumps near our car - the usual. We definitely saw a crapload of baby bison, including one running to it's parents. So adorbs. I walked up to a few today. Dangerously close: probably. Dangerously awesome: definitely.
We did a small hike early on in the day near the Roosevelt Tower area. It was a bit more intense than the other hikes we've done. I feel bad that Nadkarni keeps sitting out at the lodges while we hike, but she's more than willing, so I guess it's ok. We passed by a really cool lake, a petrified tree, and a group of elk. I then took a piss with a grand mountainous view, and finished our hike as the weather persisted to stay perfect.
We then drove to Bridge Bay campground: our new home for the next two nights. The check-in was INFINITELY easier this time around: competent employees, no snow on the ground, an actual fire pit and place to set up our tent. AND a great view of Yellowstone Lake. It is, however, intensely windy. When we arrived back at our site later in the day, the tent was completely blown upside-down. Tents all over the campground were blown from hell and back - it was really funny.

The wind got a little crazy

After setting up the tent at our better, but windier campsite (seriously, we had to put boulders ontop of all the stakes so they wouldn't get ripped out of the ground), we headed up to see Mud Volcano: yet another location that makes you think you should be hanging out with dinosaurs. The entire place smelled like horrible, acrid sulfur. My clothes are going to smell like pure awful: sulfur, campfire smoke, B.O., and pine trees, by the end of this trip. But there were some really cool things: a place called "Dragon's Cave" - a cave with "smoke" pouring out and the sound of dragon breathing. I know it was steam and bubbling water inside a cave, but shit, I was like 40% sure there was an actual dragon in there. There was also a really cool bubbling mud area, the Mud Volcano, and some super sulfur-y stuff (smelled like absolute ass), and a lone buffalo walking through all of it.
At some point (we did so much that I've already mixed up the order of things we did) we had a leisurely lunch at the Lake Lodge. It was good to calm things down a bit and enjoy a decent meal. Bagels and hummus, PB+J on shitty bread, and granola bars were starting to get on my friggn nerves.
We then took a short, easy hike that Nads could join in on by the lake at Storm Point. There wasn't any elevation change, but it was a really great hike regardless because we passed through several different environments. We were by the lake, so a portion of it was a windy, sandy beach area. Then a bit of prairie, into a dry forest, then finished with a super-dense wet forest. It was beautiful will trillions of tall, thin evergreens everywhere except on the trail. However, we had to balance on fallen logs to avoid the muddy, sometimes water-filled trail (Alex's nightmare - he has NO balance).
The rest of the day, until now, we kind of took it easy. We re-supplied some of our food (let's be real - just the snacks). OH SHIT! Then we saw an enormous Grizzly bear at the side of the road. It kept crouching and digging things out of the ground (potentially Pikachus?). It was epic: it was a huge fucking bear. We stayed by the side of the road, where tons of other people gathered to watch. Throughout the rest of the evening, whenever we drove by the area, there were a lot of people stopped at the side of the road - the bear hung out in the area for a while, but stayed in the trees at that point. Total bear count for the trip so far: 3 Grizzlies and 7 black bears.

Grizzly bears are terrifyingly huge. When I fight one, I'm going to need ALL the adrenaline.

After the Grizzly bear escapade we spent some quality time at our campsite until now: fixing our overblown tent, cooking some burgers and grilled vegetables over a campfire, and laying out our clothes to dry/de-smell-ify them, etc. Our plan now is to head to the east side of the lake to see the Sun set over the western side. Then we might go for a moonlit stroll around the Steamboat Point area. It is going to be a full moon tonight, so we'll have plenty of light for a short hike. Hopefully the sky won't be overcast for ONCE and we can see some stars.
Aaaand I just sllipped in a big pile of mud. Awesome. Now all my warm clothing is sopping wet and dirty. Hopefully the Sun will be up long enough to start drying everything out (in retrospect: IT WASN'T). And I got a huge gash on my hand. So that's cool. This sunset better be FUCKING AMAZING. (Alex started laughing when he saw me fall, which was right of him to do, because I'm sure it looked hilarious. He later felt bad after he saw blood dripping from my hand. HA HA! I win due to the fact that Alex has a conscience!)
Ok, it was fucking amazing, crisis averted. We first drove by the lakeside where waves of SNOW were crashing against the beach, shooting ice pellets up onto the road. It was amazing. Then we got to Steamboat Point, which had a few thermal vents and an incredible view of the western mountains.

The superman pose is unstoppable

It was a bit cloudy, but we ended up seeing some spectacular colors as the Sun set. I was pretty blown away, and that is hard to pull off.

I don't know physics well enough to explain what's happening here. Actually I do, but I'm not going to.

On the way back, we passed the Grizzly Bear's roadside "territory" again; it turns out it is a mother with TWO CUBS. We could only see them from far away, but it is clear that they are insanely cute. I plan on being cautious when in that area from now on... pissing off a mother Grizzly might not be a great idea. jk I'm going to go in there with guns blazing.

Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/14/11 Yellowstone National Park

The day started fairly cloudy, so I opted to continue sleeping rather than try for sunrise. We woke up and had a quick breakfast (everything we owned was still sopping wet, so we just dealt with it), and started our day of adventures at about 8am. (We pack so much into each day that at this point in the trip it is just starting to be a grind writing in the journal. I was just jotting down what happened just to have it written down so I could go to sleep sooner. WHAT A BABY.)
We drove around towards Prismatic Spring (for the life of me I can never remember that fucking name), stopping at a bunch of places along the way. A lot of geothermal sites, including a few with hot, bubbling mud. I felt like I was in some prehistoric time, and there probably should be dinosaurs walking around all over the place. It was odd that there weren't, so I learned to be happy with just the bubbling mud. Oh, it was the Artist Paintpot area. I'm good at remembering things. We then went to the Fountain Paintpot, where Nadkarni decided to throw litter into the scalding, growing bacteria that form the beautiful red colorful terraces (she accidentally dropped her trail map, but that didn't stop me from giving her shit for it). The geysers, bubbling mud pits, and fumaroles were awesome. One was called Spastic or Spazzing Geyser, I don't know the actual name, but I know that it was apt as SHIT because the geyser was spritzing out water in crazy directions.
We then made it to the Prismatic Spring area. It is a huge, intensely colored pool that Yellowstone is well known for. Seeing it on it's horizontal axis is interesting, because there is a lot of steam coming off (into us, so pictures were basically impossible), and the steam is colored the blue and orange of the actual spring.
After a quick PB+J AND buffalo jerky lunch, Alex, Scott and I started our nearby hike to Fairy Falls. We saw a lone buffalo close by right at the trail head, which I promptly threatened and warned that I was eating it's brethren in jerky form. The hike was really nice: perfect weather through a forest of young, super-green trees (that's a color, right?). The falls were great: about a 200 foot fall where I proceeded to climb up to the base and dance around in the mist. Refreshing AND dangerous - perfect combination.

I'm not sure who invented waterfalls, but you, sir, are a genius

We hiked back and up a hill to get a higher elevation view of the Prismatic Spring. Without exaggeration, it was in the top 5 most beautiful views I've ever experienced. The colors were so vivid and amazing. I had a hard time believing it wasn't a photoshopped poster someone had put in front of me. The bright blue and orange were beyond words... so I'll stop now.

The photos look like absolute shit compared to the real thing. It was mind-blowingly amazing.

We then drove around the southern side of the park toward Yellowstone Lake. There, we stopped at some lookouts we hadn't seen before and basically rocked out to some music and a picturesque drive (but seriously, those two CDs were starting to get pretty old).
Alex, Scott and I took a short hike near the "Lake Thumb" - it was an insane view of the lake and surrounding mountains. We also trudged through snow to see a couple elks REALLY close up. About 15 feet away. They are enormous. I don't understand how these animals are not afraid of us. I mean, I could literally walk up to it, pull a gun out, and shoot it's face off. These things have some serious balls.

"Holy crap he just looked at me!"

But we left the immense valley to continue our drive back to camp, along the gorgeous lake. We saw a HUGE Grizzly bear on the other side of the Yellowstone River. It was immense. I saw it swim partway across the river to an island, hoping against hope that it would come at me and we'd be able to battle, but alas, not this time.
We just finished a foil dinner - ground beef, carrots, and potatoes in foil pouches on a fire. Pretty damn good. I'm amazed I was able to get the fire going with wet wood right next to the snow bank though.
We just got back from our excursion from the Grand Canyon, just near our campground. We saw a bit of sunset at Artist's Point on the south rim (after a fiasco of trying to see it from the north rim, but facing the wrong way). Without fog, the canyon is JUST LOVELY. We saw the sky and clouds change to purple, orange, and red colors as the full moon came up. It was a pretty great evening.
Some notes about Yellowstone in general: unlike other hikes or parks, like hiking near Boston, Yellowstone isn't a monotonous hike with interspersed "holy crap this is an amazing view" locations. Yellowstone, every single moment of it, is "fuuuuuuuuuck this is beautiful and green and amazing and gorgeous and pretty and gorgeous again! I need to look up more synonyms for gorgeous!" Everything, every moment driving, every step while hiking, is just amazing. The smell of the trees, the views, the animals, they all make me think I need to reevaluate my life because the best I have to compare is a grey, overcast drive to shitty Lynn, MA for work every morning. I WANT GRIZZLY BEARS IN MY OFFICE.
Also, we've been doing thorns and roses for each day, and Alex and I had an epiphany together when we decided our overarching "thorn" for the canyon campsite would be "fucking freezing water in the sink." Seriously. The thing I dread the most each day is washing my hands in frigid ice-water.
Due to the fact that I am terrible at remembering things, I just thought of this. Earlier, while driving, we saw a coyote just hanging out in a field. He was waiting above a Pikachu hole (small rodent called a Pika, so I just took the next step in naming it Pikachu). Maybe he got one?

This guy is SO INTENSE

Also, whenever Alex yawns, we all lose "the game." It is terrible. He just learned about The Game, and now we all have associated yawning with The Game. Shit.

Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/13/11 Yellowstone National Park

We slept amidst enormous snowbanks, on pavement, in 32 degree weather. HEROIC.
Scott and I got up around 5am to see the sunrise, but to no avail. The clouds thwarted our plans yet again. But we drove around all the views of the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. Fog blocked most of the good views, and when I say fog, I of course mean clouds, because we are over 8000 feet up. Still great views, and we'll be back when it's nicer out.
We hung out at Inspiration Point, Artist's Point, and then saw an amazing angle of the Lower Falls - it was insane. I ran out onto some dangerous ledges to see some amazing higher-up views, as I am wont to do. It was a great way to start the day.

What is wrong with me?

Now, almost as if my life were a comedy, I'm sitting at our picnic table, COMPLETELY surrounded by snow, eating a bagel dipped in cream cheese (fuck knives) and fruit snacks, writing in this journal. We stuck some beer in the snow wall for later tonight.
And now I just climbed on top of the 4 foot wall of snow to go pee. And knock over a dead tree. It was difficult to push it over in the snow, but I managed. I'm basically a lumberjack, but my only tools are my BARE HANDS.
Some thoughts I have of Yellowstone so far: everything smells like rotten eggs. There are so many sulfur-spewing geothermal areas that the sulfur just gets everywhere. I don't think I'll be eating eggs for a while (and I HAVEN'T yet). Another thing is that there are awesome wild animals all over the place. Bison, bears, elk, marmots. They are just ALL OVER. It is really cool. Also, there is only ONE radio station. And it's fairly shitty. The radio just seeks all the way back around to the one station. They had a "rasta-hour" or something. It sucked. So we've been sticking with the 2 CDs that I brought: it's getting... tiring. Lastly, the water at our campsite's bathroom is so cold that you need to dry your hands in the middle of washing them just to prevent them from going numb.
Anyway, after breakfast we went to the Tower Falls area. We saw our first black bear, up a hill, somewhat far away. It was really cool to watch though. We checked out the falls, which were impressive, but I liked Lower Falls better. We then took off most of our warm clothes, because the weather became really nice. This included stripping down to my boxers in a crowded parking lot and not giving a SHIT.
On our way to our next destination, Mammoth Hot Springs, we drove by two black bears, one of which was super close to the road. I managed to get up really close for pictures; at one point it walked up to me, eating grass, about 15 feet away. I opted not to fight it, because it wasn't very big, so I'll wait for a Grizzly. Also, it was adorbs.

Holy crap he's LOOKING RIGHT AT ME. Please don't eat me.

At Mammoth, we saw quite a few thermal hot springs which created really colorful pools with insane bacteria that can apparently survive in temperatures that would scald my face off. They were really cool looking - we basically walked along the boardwalk directly above one-billion degree water (slight exaggeration). I was particularly fond of Canary Spring ("particularly fold of?" What am I, 70?), because it looked like what I imagine bears fighting each other would look like: pure awesome.

Hot Springs are one to two trillion degrees. Give or take.

Holy shit, I completely forgot driving to Cascade Falls! We did so freaking much today! It was another waterfall, it was cool,we saw a bald eagle: pretty standard.
Anyway, after Mammoth Hot Springs, where we saw a giant rock that looked like a dick, and a huge growing rock formation that looked like Jumbo, Scott and I went for a short hike near Mammoth. We heard there was a fresh carcass there, so we were hoping to see some more bears (because 3 isn't enough?). I literally was hiking with my drawn pocket knife. Unfortunately, no bears, but we managed to see some spectacular views, a dead elk carcass, a cool river/walking bridge, and another bald eagle. We got really close to this one; it flew directly over our heads. I tried to chase it up to the branch it was perched on, but oh wait, they can fly, so it left.
Skipping ahead, it started to rain pretty hard when we were at Norris Geyser Basin, so we had to cut that part short a bit. I swear, I had to change my hot weather/cold weather/rainy clothes more times today than I usually have to in a month. We were too discouraged to try to build a fire in the rain, so we bought some quick food at the general store near our campsite and ate in the car. We also had the beer we had stored in the snow at our site.

Scott and I are STOKED! jk we're not that stoked because it is pouring out.

I continued to drink delicious beer in the HOT SHOWER that I took. Scott and I managed to cheers our shower beers above the barrier to our showers. The shower itself was stupendous. I should start bathing less so that I get that amazing feeling more often. For only $3.25, my soul was rejuvenated and my bones were warmed. AND my growing B.O./sulfur smell was eliminated (keepin it classy). We then finished the night with a long game of hearts (I don't want to talk about the outcome) in the tent, hiding from the rain. And now I'm pooped, so I shall sleep.

Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/12/11 Grand Tetons/Yellowstone National Parks

Writing from Grand Tetons:
It rained all night, and it is still drizzling now, and my fingers are numb writing this, but who gives a fuck; I'm in one of the most beautiful places in the world (sweet attitude brah!). No stargazing, sunset, or sunrise due to cloud cover, but it honestly doesn't matter. I passed out right when I got in the tent last night. I barely made it into my sleeping bag.
This morning, I got up before everyone else and walked down to the lake (Jenny Lake, where we camped at). It was preposterously amazing, even with clouds covering the mountains. Shit's getting tranquil up in here. Then I saw another moose. Holy shit. I was, I kid you not, about 10 feet away from it. No exaggeration. I took some amazing pictures (including one of myself on a timer), stalked it a bit, and then went to have a bagel-y breakfast.

Am I doing it right?

Writing from Yellowstone:
After breakfast, Scott, Alex, and I went for a short hike around String Lake toward Paintbrush Canyon. It was a really pleasant hike made better by the fact that we didn't see another person the entire time. The mountains were covered by clouds, but the awesome pine trees and snow covered mountain slopes were still gorgeous. Stomping through virgin snow in the middle of June is probably one of the top things you can do in life. We got to a mini hill, where Scott suggested we trail blaze up the hillside. Alex then had the incredible idea to sled down on our asses. It was I who recommended we do it again. It was a blast, even if our asses got soaking wet. Then we ran/slid down the snowy slopes and made it back to camp pretty quickly.

Soaking wet pants are TOTALLY worth it

After breaking down the tent, we drove to the Colter Bay area for a quick, easy little hike by Jackson Lake. It was a nice way to say our goodbyes to the Grand Tetons. We then drove along the Rockefeller Parkway into Yellowstone. There was a crapload of snow and everything was beautiful. Yep, that's how I'd sum up the entire park so far. We crossed the Continental Divide (where water flow changes direction from one side of the continent to the other) like 3 times and drove the zig-zag mountainous road through a lot of the southern portion of the park. I probably had about 10 mini freakout sessions due to everything being so epic.
Our first main stop was Old Faithful, which is a geyser (no shit) that goes off every 90-130 minutes or something. Whatever, I'm not a stopwatch. Our timing was incredibly fortuitous, because it blew it's load RIGHT AS WE ARRIVED. Perfect timing. It was a really fantastic sight to behold: boiling water launched up about 130 feet. We then took a long walk around a lot of the other geysers, hot springs, and other geothermal sites. Oh wait, that's the ENTIRE PARK. Everywhere you drive there is sulfur-y, acrid, smelly steam coming off the ground, or some thermal vent or hot spring. It is unbelievable. Anyway, we saw about 20 geysers, including Beehive Geyser, which is WAY better than Old Faithful. The blast is actually taller and you can stand way closer. The nozzle is also smaller, so the water rockets out of the opening like it's on crack or something (I'm pretty sure that's not possible). It only goes off once or twice in a day, so we were super lucky to be there. Granted, my warm weather clothes got soaking wet with boiling sulfur-water (I took them off when it got warmer out, and when the geyser went off, it shifted directions and sprayed Nads, Scott, and Alex, who forgot that my shirts were right next to them in their insane panic to get away from the steam), but hopefully they will dry by tomorrow morning... (spoiler alert: they didn't.)

We also saw 6 or 7 buffalo RIGHT NEXT TO the walkway, so close that I could literally touch them if I wanted, and they didn't give a shit about ANYTHING. There were 3 tiny baby bison with them, and they were adorbs.
Scott and I ran to a lookout (literally ran) that overlooked the entire geothermal area, which was a really interesting perspective. We came down, saw a few more geysers (oh, at this point I'm apparently underwhelmed by the FANTASTIC MAJESTY THAT IS A GEOTHERMAL EVENT), saw Old Faithful go off again,and then saw the CUTEST black and brown puppy that I have ever seen in my entire life. Without superlative, that puppy was the best. So yeah - saw Old Faithful go off 3 times from different angles, saw a buffalo family, saw a shitload of geysers, saw the cutest puppy in the history of the Universe: great stop at Old Faithful Village.
We then drove to Canyon Village, where we are currently camping. We stopped at a few notable views, were amazed by the green awesome trees (LOOK AT ALL THE GWEEEEEN), and rocked out to Queen whilst driving some fun roads. But the best was having a HERD of buffalo cross the street all around our car. There were probably 60-70 bison. They stopped traffic for about 45 minutes, but it was absolutely worth it. I got great pictures and it was a quintessential Yellowstone adventure. Some of them were fucking enormous. I think my adrenaline was going nonstop (however, my adrenaline going nonstop is not an abnormal event).

We kept yelling at the buffalo from the car: "CROSS IN FRONT OF US, WE WANT TO LOOK AT YOU."

We then had to deal with some incompetent, over 60-year-old campground people at our campsite, but after an hour-long fiasco of changing our snow-covered site to a site where we could AT LEAST set up our tent on the pavement next to the road (there was also an unnecessary amount of highlighting on our site map by the campground guy who didn't know how to use a computer). (WOW. I really toned down the intense frustration here. Dealing with those people was seriously the worst. In fact, I literally just filled out a survey for customer satisfaction. I gave them the worst possible score in every category. WE COULDN'T EVEN FIND OUR FIREPIT in the 3 feet of snow that covered our campsite). It is a shitty location, but at least our tent isn't DIRECTLY on snow. There is seriously about 2-3 feet of snow everywhere; I think it might be a cold stay...

One benefit to having a wall of snow around our picnic table is that we have a place to keep the beer cold

We had noms at the Canyon Village Lodge, where I had some Wyoming beer and Bison ravioli. Pretty damn good. Now I'm lying on pavement in our tent, freezing cold, starting to smell, and super tired and dirty - it was a great day.
Some notable moments were when Nadkarns coined the term "Hagstag," a clever play on the twatter phrase hashtag. I rofl'd. Another is when we had just left our snow covered campsite for dinner. We had just finished eating and Alex goes "should we buy some more ice?" (Nadkarns needs ice for cooling her newly healing knee). I simply responded "shut up," assuming he was being a jackass talking about how COMPLETELY COVERED our campsite is with snow. He apparently had forgotten. I hadn't.

Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/11/11 Grand Tetons National Park

Continuing to day 2 of the roadtrip. Holy shit, I have no idea if it should be roadtrip or road trip, and I keep flip-flopping. THIS IS SLIGHTLY ANNOYING TO ME.

We started our morning by waking up at 4:30am in Salt Lake and I started driving through the incredible mountains toward Grand Teton. Our drive, about 6 hours total, was our first grand adventure. We drove in and out of Wyoming, driving along the western border of the state. We cut back into Utah and into Idaho sporadically - it was super hilarious because I was really excited and awake and screaming with intensity while everyone else was napping. It was a fun drive to say the least. We actually ended up in the MIDDLE of a cattle herding. WE WERE ACTUALLY COWBOYS! Cowboys were riding around on horses by our car as cattle swarmed around us on the highway. It was truly epic. Hysterical moments include a bunch of cows shitting/pissing right in front of our car, on calf FACE PLANTING in front of us, and me saying "I think we're helping!" to one of the cowboys (cowgirl actually). Apparently we should have driven right through with no regard for the cow/horse/herding dogs' well-being. It was a fun little adventure.

Hahaha look at how excited I am

We later had a superb breakfast at "Bubba's BBQ" (how could we not?!) - great biscuits, gravy, bacon, etc. Our last stop before the park was to go to an Avis at the Jackson airport to replace our faulty GPS. It was giving us shit all morning.

So when we finally drove into the park and passed by the entrance sign, the hill next to us abruptly ended and the Tetons suddenly came into view and they were INSANE. Seriously, every time I looked at them I was in awe, because they are among the most beautiful things I've ever seen. I was literally screaming at the top of my lungs. I must have looked like a crazy person. I mention it later in the journal, but this moment is among my favorite on the trip. It was just so "THIS ROAD TRIP IS GOING TO BE AWESOME STARTINGGGGGG... NOW." It was a perfect way to start the trip: me screaming from excitement from the awesome and intense view that was shoved in my face.

I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the extreme awesomeness of these freaking mountains.

After calming down and setting up our tent, we decided to go for a hike to the Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point (how can you pass up a place called "Inspiration Point?" It basically says "this view is going to be awesome. come look or you are an idiot."), on the other side of Lake Jenny (we were camped at Lake Jenny: right at the foot of most of the Teton mountains). Alex, Scott and I hiked around the lake while Nadkarni, still not 100% from ACL surgery, opted to take the boat shuttle over. We came across some chipmonks and marmots and eventually, after hiking through a ton of snow (IN JUNE), we came to the Hidden Falls. They were really amazing, but at this point, the immensity (hahaha I just tried using the word "immenseness" and learned that it actually isn't a word at all. Fail.) of the Grand Teton mountains might already have me overwhelmed.

Alex and Nads went back down to take the boat over, so Scott and I decided to hang back and bushwack our way to Inspiration Point (the bridges to get to it were closed. Pffftt, like that would stop us). It was fairly easy actually, so we took our standard "jumping" pictures amidst an awesome view. Yes, I managed to pull a hip flexor jumping. We then made our way back down, where we saw a MOOSE right next to the trail. I found it and warned everyone behind us on the trail to stfu as I excitedly took as many pictures as physically possible. It LOOKED at me! It was amazing. That was the highlight of my day - the first moose I've ever seen in the wild. Possibly the first moose I've ever seen. I'm not sure how I managed to extract myself from that situation without shitting my pants.

OMG MOOSE!

Making it back to the campground, I figured it was immediately time for another adventure (obviously). So I hustled everyone into the car for a lovely scenic drive. We saw some caribou (I actually think it turned out to be elk. We saw about a billion elk in Yellowstone, so it's not all that crazy) as we stopped at a few overlooks, including a stop over Lake Jenny. I walked into the water for a bit, but it was 42 degrees F, so my feet were numb for a while.

That water is so fucking cold

Regardless, we continued on to drive to the summit of Signal Mountain. It was a gorgeous, spectacular view of the Teton mountains and the nearly unending valley on our other side. We even saw some buffalo! (It was really far away, so it doesn't count in my book). Then we took a few graphic photos consisting of a lake that definitely, definitely looked like a penis, and drove back down the mountain. However! We saw a GRIZZLY BEAR on the ride back down. Just for a moment, and the pictures we took aren't great, but it was an enormous bear. It fled down the mountainside before I was able to leap out of the car to give murderous chase. My adrenaline was going like crazy. We saw more huge caribou (most likely elk), but whatever. Grizzly Bear! Holy freaking crap. It was the real deal. Fuck.

Penis Lake. If that's not it's actual name, it should be.

Anyway, we made it back to camp to put some warm clothes on (it is freezing as I write this now! I've got a winter hat, sweatshirt, and gloves on!), start a fire, and begin making dinner. We had baked beans (duh), canned vegetables, and bratwurst (yep. Two bratwurst nights in a row. Deal with it). We also enjoyed some fantastic Utah beers. That basically brings me to right now. I grabbed the food up on my frisbee/plate, looked at the mountains during a cloudy sunset (still awesome), and am about to partake in some much needed sleep.

Epic Roadtrip Journal: 6/10/11 Salt Lake City

Ok, similar for other posts, I'm going to transcribe my written journal of the epic road trip to the INTERWEBS. I'm going to break it up into pieces, because apparently we did a shitload of stuff, and if I put it all in one post everybody's head would explode and I would break the internet. Anything in italics is an added thought; everything else is the original journal. Enjoy! Or don't. I really don't care how you choose to react to these words, just as long as more than just my followers in China read this.

6/10/11 Friday - Boston

I'm sitting in the Boston airport right now, thoroughly pumped about the epic adventure I'm about to take. I'm waiting for Scott to arrive at the moment; we have window/aisle seats in the same row (turns out Scott decided to show up exactly 30 seconds before we were boarding). I REALLY hope there isn't anyone in the middle: otherwise this flight could get awkward. Oh man, I hope I sleep on this flight. Something tells me I'm not going to get that much rest on this trip. Because fuck sleeping. It's adventure time.

I'm not 100% amped though. I just got a great text from Michelle, and I'm realizing that I'm really going to miss people in Boston. I'll see them in a couple weeks though, so I'm not TOO disappointed. it's good to know that I have people that I'm this close with in my life.

Salt Lake City

After a short layover in Dallas (read: a Tex-Mex FEAST), Scott and I made it to Salt Lake. The flight was incredible, because the snow covered mountains are enormous and surround the lake and the city. I feel kind of bad that Nads and Alex won't be able to see how gorgeous it is. We plan on leaving at fuck o'clock in the morning for the Grand Tetons tomorrow, but maybe the Sun will be rising in time to see it? (in retrospect, not really a concern. While the Utah mountains were awesome, they were basically a joke compared to the mountains we saw in the Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, and Olympic National Parks).

We picked up our rental car - a Ford Expedition. I'm not sure if you've ever seen/driven a Ford Expedition, but I'm not sure my license legally covers a vehicle that size. I think I need "tank" checked off or something. It is a beast. In fact, we named it "Beast." We look BALLER. We checked into our hotel, jumped on the beds (obviously), and then immediately drove over to Temple Square to see the Mormon Tabernacle.

It was fairly spectacular, but a bit awkward as we were easily the worst dressed people there (hiking boots vs. white button-ups? what?) and we weren't getting married (seriously, does every Mormon teenager in Utah get married there?). AND I guarantee everyone thought Scott and I were gay together. But everyone was super-polite and friendly and didn't care that we are heathens who don't believe their interesting religion.

Wait, am I pretending to be Amish or Mormon? I can't tell.

We definitely stood out. The first thing anyone said to us was "where are you guys coming from?" Oh you can tell I'm not from Utah? One hilarious conversation was when we told a girl that we were coming from Boston. She responded "oh, have you seen the Mormon church there? I've heard it is beautiful!" My response was just "nooooooooo..." and then we kind of shuffled away.

Then we bought 800 lbs worth of noms for the next few days at Walmart. At least we're kinda prepared now?

Lastly, we went to Squatter's Brew Pub, recommended by none other than Pete Rock. Great beers and Bratwurst. And Scott finally found his keychain! So now I'm readying for bed. Scott is going to pick Nads and X up from the airport since I am driving at some God forsaken hour tomorrow morning. Ugh.

Going out west tomorrow. BRB.

In less than 24 hours I will literally be on a flying machine hurtling in the air at 500 mph towards Salt Lake City. I am so amped right now.  In less than one week I will be fighting a Grizzly Bear.

It is fairly difficult to focus at work today because I'm super pumped and my stomach is all rumbly like it's made out of tectonic plates and dild-... vibra-... shake weights. Instead of focusing on things like turbine temperatures, like I'm supposed to, all I can concentrate on is calculating the amount of pepto bismal I should take right now so that I don't unleash semi-digested liquid fortune cookies (read: my breakfast) all over my keyboard and monitor. I'm thinking it's somewhere around a quarter of a bottle.

Getting UNCOMFORTABLY PUMPED for this Northwest Road Trip...

An elite crew of adventurers are joining me for what will be known as "the greatest road trip ever achieved in the history of the Universe." Senator Nadkarns, X Mandeville, Scottholomew Hagerty, Colleen of the Kling Faction, and potentially Madam Surbhington the Third (more prodding is in order to nag her to accept) are joining me on my brainchild road trip that has been in the works for about a year and a half. And I'm getting way, way too pumped.

We're flying out to Salt Lake City on June 10, where we'll rent a car (kickass Ford Escape. FUCK YOU gas economy, we need leg room!). Over the course of 12 days we'll travel to the Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, Craters of the Moon, Portland, Mt. Saint Helens, Mt. Rainier, Olympic National Park, and flying back from Seattle. I know what you're thinking: "But Chris, that is WAY too much awesomeness for any mortal." Well, you are correct. But we are not mortals. We are fucking adventuretimes champions. The kind of champions that save you from all the zombie-raptors when you dream at night. The kind of champions that walk up to Cancer, kick him in the balls, and then send in a faulty version of his taxes so that the IRS audits the shit out of him. This is our plan:

Click on this map. If you dare.

In between boring things like sleeping, pretending to do work, and eating ALL the food, I spend most of my time getting physically pumped up for this trip. Like, I'll stomp around the apartment doing roundhouse kicks in the air and spitting ALL over the place. This one time I was making dinner, and I swear to god I punched my stir fry in the face. Or, where I'd imagine the face would be if stir fry had one.

In fact, just today, Scott and I spent the better part of ten minutes trying to come up with a name for the road trip such that the acronym would spell out something badass. We're tabling it for now, but what we have so far is TEARTITKU - The Epicest Adventuretimes Road Trip In The Known Universe. It has TEAR (that's what bears do!) and TIT (nice), so you know it has to be good.

So anyway, since this interblag was originally intended to capture the beautiful essence of America's greatest pastime - the road trip - I figured I might as well stay somewhat true to my roots and write some road trip bloggy kind of stuff. If you don't like it, then don't let the door hit you on the ass on your way out.

Polar Bear Swim? No Thanks.

Back in scout camp (for a week every summer my troop went to scout camp getting merit badges and camping and shit. Yep, I'm pretty cool.), we had to do the "polar bear swim" every morning, and it is complete bullshit. Here's a little rundown of what that magical activity actually entails:

- Our troop leaders would come by our tents every morning at the ass-crack of dawn and wake us up with their mind-numbingly annoying "time to make the donuts" shout.

- 10 minutes later, after we've already fallen back asleep, they would come back and actually start to prod and shake us to get us up.

- When we would object to getting up at a time in which THE SUN DOESN'T EVEN START HEATING UP OUR ATMOSPHERE, they would pour some water on us and force us to get up.

- We would brood and sulk and pout as we walked down to the pool area, where we would then jump into the freezing cold swimming pool (I was actually surprised every morning to find the water was in a liquid state, because it was easily below -100 degrees Fahrenheit. They must have done something weird with the pressure...) for NO REASON AT ALL and then go back to camp so we can change for breakfast. SO MUCH FUN.

Once my friends and I got older and wiser, we came up with a new strategy. A strategy in which we could live our lives polar-bear free. When the leaders came by to wake us up, we woke up immediately (this should have tipped them off that something was amiss, but I guess their initial faulty assumption was that we actually wanted to subject ourselves to a watery torture every day at fuck o'clock in the morning). We put on our swimsuits and ran down the path to the swimming pool while they were still waking up the other kids in our troop. "We'll see you down there!" No you fucking won't.

Once we were out of sight, we ducked onto another path which was a roundabout trail to the shower area. While our troop was busy hurling themselves into semi-solidified ice-water, we spent our mornings taking nice hot showers. It was the perfect crime. Our leaders never saw us because we "got to the pool early" and there were so many other troops there that it was easy to miss us, we got to take piping hot showers every morning without worry that the warm water would be out due to over-use, and we'd show up back in camp dripping wet from our "polar bear" excursion. Bwahahahahaha

With that said, I find it hilarious that in my twenties I am now opting to do the polar bear jump. On three separate occasions I've jumped into the freezing Boston ocean in the winter for... the fun of it? I don't know why. You can tell by my expressions in the following pictures that I was less than pleased by my decision...

First polar bear at Revere - Dodgeball House residents randomly going in the middle of January for no reason

Second polar bear at Revere with Michelle, Scott, and Zak. Michelle's Cupid Splash was moved, so we decided to spend our February afternoon leaping into the ocean JUST BECAUSE WE DON'T SUCK

First one in, first one out

LOOK AT CRONIN'S FACE. PRICELESS.

Before I'm 30

I've mentioned this or have shown this to a few people, but apparently having a list of things to do before you're 30 isn't all that normal? I don't see why. I have life goals, and the most opportune time to do most of them (due to being physically capable, having the time and energy, or just because of the terrifying idea that I might not be as insane as I am now) is before my 30th birthday. Plus, that is going to be a super depressing day, and I want to be able to look back at my life and be like "oh right, I forgot how awesome I am. Carry on." I encourage you to make your own, because it feels great crossing off these huge life achievements when you complete them. Like, better than that feeling you get when you push the "other" button down on a McDonald's soda lid. I came up with most of them the day after I graduated undergrad (literally the next day), but some I added when I heard of something so awesome that made me go "holy shit. I must conquer that. IT'S GOING ON THE LIST." So here is my list:

1. Oktoberfest in Munich - this needs to happen.
2. Get a dog - I'm going to name him Khan, so that whenever I call his name I scream "KHAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNN" SEE WHAT I DID THERE? roflroflroflrofl lolersk8s roflcopter
3. Skydive - COMPLETE (This is the epic coming-of-age narrative in which I punched the face of god and then jumped out of a moving aircraft)
4. Triathlon - potentially signing up for baby's first triathlon this summer? CALM DOWN it's just a sprint, not a full "all my bodily functions are failing me and I'm definitely going to have 17 heart attacks" all-out crazy triathlon. But still. w00t?
5. Climb Kilimanjaro - should probably start researching what that is going to require...
6. Go to California - COMPLETE (I kinda lived there for 4 months? And I kinda created this blogosphere to chitchat about it? The blag is literally named "Goin' to California." To my faithful readers in China: I know you probably didn't realize this, but yes, I completed that life objective.
7. Go to Yellowstone - I'm doing this in 3 weeks! (You'll probably see some journal entries in the future, or if you are a time traveler from the future, you already know this, but I'm going on a road trip from Salt Lake City to Seattle with some grade A chums).
8. Learn another language - FFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU- I need to get on that...
9. Learn how to solo on the guitar - COME ON. When am I going to have time to "become proficient at skills I don't yet have?" Ugh.
10. Go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras - that seems pretty fantastic.
11. Go to Japan - seems simple enough. I think I need to start designing some pyramid schemes to build up enough capital to achieve some of these goals.
12. Eat the Vermonster - some of the D. Haus crew and I came up with that around sophomore year, but it never came to fruition. I need to build up a team to take down this mountain of ice cream THIS SUMMER.
13. Paint the Tufts cannon - I've actually never done this, how is THAT possible? But whatevs, it's happening this summer.
14. Drink around the world at Epcot - I heard about this through Jimmy (who actually did it on his honeymoon), and it sounds phenomenal. The idea is that at every "country" in Epcot, you get that country's signature drink. Apparently, it culminates to a tram ride back to the hotel in which you scream "I love you, dude!" in front of 20 children. SIGN ME UP.
15. Wear Greenman suit to a sports game - SO PUMPED TO DO THIS. The Phillies just need to get up to Boston and I need to get tickets so I can pull this off. Because I am NOT rooting for a non-Philadelphia team in the Greenman suit. That's sacrilege.
16. Eat the world's spiciest burger - COMPLETE (UGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH enjoy this link to the WORST EXPERIENCE OF MY SWEET YOUNG LIFE).
17. Get Master's Degree - FUN. I'm working on it I'm working on it.
18. Backpack in the Alps - I'm actually worried it will be too gorgeous.
19. Brew beer - I'm hoping to make a batch for the fall. And I want it to taste like FRIGGN PUMPKINS.

Not really a "before I'm 30" goal, but DEFINITELY a life goal: I recently ate so many cupcakes that I literally vomited. It was awesome. There was one with bacon brittle on it and pieces of actual bacon in the cupcake! WELCOME TO AWESOMETOWN, POPULATION: ME.

Wet Leaves

With the first camping trip of the year approaching (a bunch of us are heading up to VT to enjoy the outdoors, eat baked beans, drink beer, and play Spades ALL FUCKING DAY), I got to reminiscing about another one of our hilarious boyscout escapades. This one isn't as bone-crunchingly painful as the other story, but it does paint a very accurate picture of what our time in scouts was really like. This, boys and girls, is a story about urination.

It is a fact of life: peeing on something is simply the act of marking your territory. In fact, it is a legally binding act whereby you claim ownership of said "target." I once set the goal to urinate on every notable landmark in one week at summer camp one year (achievement unlocked). I set a similar goal to excrete liquid waste on every building at Tufts (yep, I pretty much own most of Tufts by now). TONS of well known places and landmarks are now my property (Mason-Dixon line, Tooth of Time in Philmont NM, Half-Dome at Yosemite, Angel's Landing at Zion, Harvard Statue - hahaha there is a picture of Shaq touching the exact location that I peed on, Mississippi River, Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, etc.) And when you camp a lot in scouts, you come to learn that peeing outside is better..... or at least more hilarious.

On this particular camping trip, we were training for our big backpacking trip to Philmont, NM. This campground had PERFECTLY GOOD LEAN-TO's, but our leaders did not allow us to shelter ourselves from the rain because we had to "practice setting up and taking down tents." Bullshit. Out of furious spite, we all decided that the floor of the unoccupied lean-to would be our urinal for the weekend. Whenever any of us had to go, we had to declare that we needed to "use the lean-to," and then we'd go to town. By the end of the camping trip, there literally was a puddle on the floor of this edifice in which other people would use as shelter whilst camping. Yes, world, we had our revenge.

But as we were leaving we realized that a puddle in the middle of the lean-to looked entirely too conspicuous, especially because it hadn't actually rained. In our brilliance, we opted to cover the puddle with a bunch of leaves laying on the ground. I don't know why we thought a pile of soaking wet pee-leaves in the middle of a dry floor looked any better, but we were satisfied. It looked hilarious. Just a empty, bare lean-to with a pile of soaking wet leaves right in the middle of it.

The best part is that as we were driving out of the campground, the rangers stopped us so they could "check the site" to make sure it was clear of trash. Jesus tapdancing Christ. They would immediately find our moist, leafy "gift," and in our minds we assumed that the only possible conclusion a normal human being could come to was that it was a pile of leaves used to hide a steaming puddle of piss that six teenage boys had created in the span of three days in order to get back at their scout leaders for making them set up tents. We thought we were doomed. Waiting in the backseat of the car, the tension was palpable. We were too terrified to utter a single sound; instead we sent each other knowing glances that said "the moment they come back and tell the adults what they've found, we're bolting from this vehicle and running into the woods, starting a new life as forest people, living off the land for the rest of our days." I think one of us may have vomited from the anxiety, I'm not sure. But anyway, the rangers finished their inspection and came back. The adults got out of the cars to make sure everything looked good so we could head home. As they walked back to the cars, we readied myself for the rapid vehicular exodus we were about to make. "Ok, everything looks good." How can this be? DIDN'T THEY SMELL THE PILE OF SOPPING WET LEAVES IN THE LEAN-TO??? I was flabbergasted. "Yeah, all they found was a plastic wrapper." Oh thank the heavens, we were off the hook. I am sure that we only got out of that by the skin of our teeth and by the fact that these rangers clearly don't have it all going on upstairs to have missed it.

"They said they found some wet leaves in one of the lean-to's, but it must have been the wind that blew them up off the ground."

"Heh.... heh... yeah. Probably. Just drive."

I almost died again...

Oh hay guise,

So remember how every so often I do something so reckless and awesome that I get the feeling "shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit, I'm definitely going to get naturally selected" but then miraculously survive? (reference jumping off a 78 foot cliff and eating the spiciest burger in the world). Yeah so I had that feeling again this weekend. It was amazing/terrifying. That's a normal combination of emotions, right?

My buddy Rich, from work, and I went up to Mt. Washington to ski Tuckerman's Ravine this past Caturday. We went up to the Tufts Loj with a few friends because, hey, I'll be damned if I ever hike a mountain in New Hampshire without being depressingly hungover. So yeah, it was a rough start to the morning, but I powered through, as I am wont to do when hiking Mt. Washington (note: the last time/only other time I've hiked Mt. Washington was with Rich and I was so hungover that I puked up a colorful-gummybear-mess about an hour before scaling the tallest mountain in New England). And hangover aside, this hike was exhausting. The trail was snowy/icy, so for every step forward, we slid half a step back. Also, we were trucking it up that mountain (made it to the top in less than three hours while carrying skis? what?), so I was so friggn tired.

We made it to the base of Tuckerman's Ravine, which is a huge snowy bowl with nearly vertical walls that you have to climb up in ski boots. You know, ski boots? Those things that make you look like you have a mental disorder when you walk? Those things that are in no way fit for scaling a vertical wall of ice? Fun times. So yeah, with our skis on our backs, we start climbing up this ravine wall, using our ski poles as ice picks so that we have more than just the toes of our FUCKING SKI BOOTS as points of contact. And it was terrifying. If your center of mass was just a tiny bit backwards (and remember, we're climbing a wall that is nearly vertical. I exaggerate quite a bit, but this wall was literally about 80 degrees vertical), you would absolutely fall down the entire mountain wall. In fact, we saw a few people that did end up falling. And when you fall, you can't just stop yourself. You fall all the way down. I think one guy broke his arm. I was not amused by my predicament.

Pictures do it no justice. This thing was nuts.

Getting up this wall was both physically and mentally excruciating. It was honestly the third most difficult hike I've ever done. At one point I was 20 feet from the top, clinging to whatever surface I could for dear life, too tired to keep going. Ugh. And when we got to the top, I collapsed. But oh wait, it is Mt. Washington, so it was freezing and all my sweat was now super cold and pissing me off. But my legs still felt like they were made out of jelly, so I wasn't ready to start skiing. Soooo about halfway before I would have been actually ready, I was forced to put on my skis lest I die from hypothermia. And the fun part is that it was so vertical at the top, that you literally had to jump to start skiing. It was like ten feet before my skis actually hit snow.

And the moment they did hit snow? They instantaneously crossed and I fell. And tumbled. And spiraled head-over-heels out of control. For the third time in my life, I, Chris Severino, thought that I was going to perish. LUCKILY, I was able to swing my feet out in front to control my slide, and used my ski poles to stop myself before I hit a HUGE FUCKING PATCH OF ROCKS. Great start. I had tumbled halfway down the friggn ravine. Rich was kind enough to bring my skis down so I didn't have to climb up the entire way again, and then I managed to survive skiing down the rest of the way. It was fun, but I think I was still all jacked up on adrenaline from the whole "almost-dying-via-smashing-into-jagged-rocks-at-Mach-2" thing.

Needless to say, my survival rate is still at 100%. But just barely.

I am the smartest

Ok, most people don't realize this, but boy scouts are fucking crazy.

We were on a camping trip when I was younger and had just joined the troop, so I was like 12 at the time. On this particular camping trip, my friends and I did the dumbest thing I've EVER DONE... before we learned how great fire was. The fire stories are great stories too, because all scouts are necessarily pyromaniacs, but we'll save the one where I melted off the soul of my hiking boots for another day. This is a tale of creativity, ingenuity, triumph, and traumatic levels of pain.

When we joined the troop (back in... 1998? Holy shit), we didn't have many responsibilities. We were carefree, young go-getters who would stop at nothing to attempt the most dangerous stunts that our semi-developed brains were capable of concocting.

We are also fucking adorbs. Oh the guy in the hat? That's my best friend Jimmy. HE IS A MARRIED PERSON NOW. WHAT.

So anyway, on this camping trip we had the entire afternoon free, so what do we decide to do? CONSTRUCT A GO-KART BY TYING TWO DOLLIES TOGETHER WITH TWINE. This is normal. But to our credit, we used really good knots. Our plan was to ride it down a nearby hill MOUNTAIN like an unsteerable go-kart. It must have been the steepest hill in Pennsylvania. It was a friggn cliff. We were SO pumped. So me, Jimmy, Geoff, and probably Olsen (I don't really remember) got on this XTREME death vehicle that we had constructed, making sure to sneak by the troop leaders (because they would not be too keen on the idea of four 12-year-olds careening themselves off the side of a mountain while riding two package-transporting devices tied together with string). The funniest part about this scenario is the fact that it took less than ONE SECOND for all four of us to simultaneously regret our rash decision.

After about 3 seconds were were hurtling down the hill at Mach 2. I'm not sure if we were screaming, because the sound would have been drowned out by the sonic boom surrounding our shoddily crafted and rapidly accelerating makeshift speed-rocket. And then we saw it. We were on an unchangeable vector heading toward huge tree. In that instant we all knew that we would perish. I'm not entirely sure what transpired in the next few moments because I kind of blacked out from sheer terror, but I think it went something like this:

Jimmy and Olsen somehow bailed off the rampaging death-mobile by throwing themselves off the sides and rolling over boulders and snakes and bushes or whatever to eventually slow down fast enough to avoid breaking ALL THE BONES. Geoff and I, meanwhile, were somehow locked to the craft, speeding faster than Escape Velocity towards a tree that clearly doesn't give a shit about us. Because even though we were nearing the speed of light, our 12-year-old mass was basically negligible when compared to that of a tree. We were sure to lose the battle of momentum. And we absolutely lost. Upon crashing into the monstrous vegetation, we hit at such an angle that I was hurled forward off the dollies, flying through the air for about 10 seconds, and smashing into the ground 50 feet from the tree (the actual hangtime may have been significantly less impressive. shhhh.). I'm not sure what happened to Geoff; it is possible that the force of the crash was enough to make him collapse into a Black Hole.

Miraculously, all four of us survived the ordeal. We all stood up, and by the grace of God our inevitably shattered bones must have instantaneously healed themselves. However, I had more blood pouring out of my legs than I was previously aware existed in my entire body. And the pain. Holy shit. My comrades were in just as bad shape; I think one of them accidentally swallowed a family of possums while rolling over their nest at 350 mph. But that's not to say that would wouldn't do it again... though it was enough to make us at LEAST reconsider participating in this activity. The worst part is that as we clambered back up the hill, dragging our broken invention and dignity behind us, the troop leaders were at the top waiting for us. They had heard our blood-curdling screams of terror and arrived just in time to punish us for our reckless and mildly retarded behavior. So not only did I lose 3 pints of knee-blood, but I also had to wash all the pots and pans after dinner. Screw that.

I forgot about roller blades

I was walking home earlier today and saw a girl in her early 20's roller blading. This caught me by surprise, because I hadn't passed by any time portals to the 90's that she must have used to enter our realm.

It got me to thinking about back when I was a kid when roller blading was the shit. My cousin and I would roller blade during our summers in Florida, and it was hilarious because our mothers REQUIRED that we wear those awesome-looking OFFENSIVELY NEON green knee pads and elbow pads. We must have looked like the goofiest creatures in the world. Especially because all our neighbors were at least 80 years old and the only thing they could possibly relate to roller blades are those old-timey bicycles with one enormous wheel in the front that you can only ride whilst wearing a top hat.

Oh hahahah and that just reminded me of this one super-old neighbor we had who was a complete turd. He was come outside yelling FURIOUSLY if we ever set foot on his lawn to chase a frisbee or something. We would always get him back though. We always made my dog take a dump on his lawn when we took him out for a walk.

Roller blades: greatest invention the world has ever seen. Anything that can compliment the banana hammock so perfectly can't be ALL bad, right?

My recent dreams have been really weird...

This might be fun, because some people who actually read this blog appear quite a bit in some of these. These are some of the dreams I've had thus far in 2011. So yeah, here's some evidence that my brain is still a very strange place to live...

1/3/2011

I had a dream where I was fighting evil demons in various forms. Sometimes it was with a set of pokemon in Manhattan streets. Other times it was by earning trophies and diplomas at GE and then bringing the demons to a whiskey tasting/dance club place in Harvard (what the fuck is that supposed to mean? Does such a place exist? CAN I GO THERE WITH POKEMON???). One really detailed segment of the dream was kind of like playing Risk: I had a map of my area and I had to bring reinforcements to certain segments to defend a central area.

1/4/2011

I was training Michelle in archery and how to shoot a machine gun out of a helicopter for an upcoming battle against zombies, who were swarming the compound we were staying at (ok good, a standard zombie dream. Back to basics). The dream was like the game Dragon Age in that I had new "quests" to achieve, like to quell a rebellion or to help Rob Cole fall in love (wait WHAT? How is this a quest? How would this help solve the zombie issue? WHY IS THIS THE FIRST TIME I'VE HEARD ABOUT THIS?? I hope for Rob's sake we completed that quest, and then....survived all the zombies?)

1/5/2011

My main dream was about me trying to get a flight from LA back home. At first I was with a mob boss, who told me that I either had to swallow a bunch of pincher bugs or burn myself with a cigar to get home. I ran off and came across Kyle's family, who helped me make an intricate balloon/kite thing and then I went to the park with Olsen (ok I guess the whole thing about flying home is no longer an issue?). We accidentally destroyed some kid's toy boat, but he said it was $2 and we gave him $6, so he was super happy. I then told him to be my spy, because he was the child of my enemy or something.

1/10/2011

I dreamed that I was about to go pick up Michelle somewhere in a national park, and then the two of us were going to head down to Florida. Along the way we had to stop and I had to finish some engineering challenge to continue (oh god damn it Sevs you friggn nerd). It was a lot like building a Lego robot, except all the parts were metal and I had to make them by using lathes and mills. I couldn't figure out how long to cut some of the pieces though.

1/12/2011

Some friends and I went to a carnival, but even though it was supposed to be the best in the world, it looked completely shitty. My friend said that they purposely did that to look "worn out." What bullshit (hahaha I like how I'm super sassy in this dream). We went through a hole in a roller coaster truss to find a robotic hobo with evidence that the carnies were killing people. He kept the data in a computer in his face. Bart Simpson, one of our group, took the data from him, but the guards found all of us (guards? At a carnival? This is an elite fucking carnival). They killed the robot hobo and ripped out Bart's face computer. They then forced the rest of us to stay at the carnival forever by trapping us in a ride for each of our personalities. Mine was that I was in a house that was a huge maze and the only way I escaped was to pretend to be one of the guys running the ride, and then getting out a secret entrance in which gravity reversed. So I crawled out on the ceiling. (Wait, seriously? I escaped this maze by pretending to be one of the operators? I take back that "elite carnival" thing, these guys are retarded.) I helped my friends out of their respective rides and we escaped to some tunnels.

1/17/2011

I had this dream while in Portland, ME, and literally laughed myself awake at the end...along with everyone in the hotel room.

In the dream, I had recognized the setting and realized that it was a terrible dream I've had before. But this time, I knew where to avoid the traps and enemies. I was a SWAT team member, along with Rob Cole and Zak. We were fighting terrorists and martial arts master ninjas. But since I had this dream before, I knew where everyone was hiding to prevent an ambush, so we did ok. Jill explained how the soul-trapping demon was actually an evolved dragon-type pokemon (what the fuck is with all these pokemon dreams? I say that because I'm angry I don't have them EVERY NIGHT). Before heading out into a swamp, we saw Andrew Miner playing videogames at Tai's house, and Tai was yelling at him because it was too loud (hahaha classic). In the swamp, all the terrorists were southern hicks and were REALLY stupid. They kept saying hilarious things and tried to stop our guns from firing by covering them with condoms. I can't explain all of it, but it was literally the funniest dream I've ever had. I laughed so hard in the dream that I actually woke myself up, along with everyone else in the room. I can't really explain it, but whatever was happening in the dream was hysterical.

1/22/2011

I was driving on really icy roads to try to drop off Michelle and Zak from broomball. The car would consistently respond the wrong way when I tried to make a turn. Also, midway through the drive it became a manual car, which I'm not very good at. It was really stressful. The car suddenly started going nuts and almost careened us over a cliff despite the fact that I had it in Park. Also, our only camera that had all our pictures for the past year fell over the side of the cliff. I woke up feeling really frustrated and angry because of the dream. I actually remember this one and how not being able to control the car in my dream literally RUINED my morning after I woke up.

2/4/2011

I was trying to order a buffalo chicken pizza, but I had to download it via EZdata in Excel. I had to keep changing the dataset keys to try to download it. I clearly was thinking about work too much for this one.

2/14/2011

My dream was like a multiplayer round in Call of Duty, but we had to kill the entire team at the same time. Nerd.

2/23/2011

My co-workers met on the roof of a chocolate shop after work one day for a group outing. There was a special seat called the "Mexican Party Seat," and whoever sat there got a V.D. (BAHAHAHAHAH WHAT??? Where did I come up with THAT?)

2/27/2011

Jill and I were in an indoor lake with waves, just swimming around. Then we found a kitten with two paws stuck in ice skates, walking around in them (awwwwwwwwwwww). We tried to help it escape, but there was a really intricate transmission system inside that was too complicated to figure out.

In another dream I was one of several targets that bounty hunters were after, set in a Borderlands-desert type landscape. One of the bounty hunters was a really badass guy with a pistol that you spin the top around to reload. He killed his target every time, including purposely missing to shoot down a hanging sign to kill one of them. One of the guys drove off, but was shot into a cannon, which then careened him off a cliff. That doesn't make sense, but that is what happened. He then started coming after me, and I woke up after he had me pinned down behind some barrels.

2/28/2011

I was on a flight with Andrew Miner and my parents on a small aircraft meeting up with some friends in VT. The pilot took the plane out onto a highway, and then some smaller roads. Eventually we got to a covered bridge, which the pilot decided to use to ramp the plane into the air to takeoff. It actually worked. We went high enough that when we stalled at the apex, the wings caught lift again and started flying. We were suddenly in France, and from above I saw Danny DeVito give the finger to a cop.