...And she flew out of her chair... Day 115 cont'd

Well... today was absolutely insane. I arrived in Detroit around 9:30 and Coop & Cat told me that they would be circling the airport to pick me up. Funny. I'm going down the escalator and all the sudden, I see my two best friends. I was overjoyed, I pretty much bowled them over giving them the biggest hug ever. It felt really good to see them again. Anyways, we attempted to handle my lost luggage fiasco, but it really didn't do any good at the airport, so we left. I called Jill to see what was up, since she was in on the scheme to surprise my parents. My mom was actually at Jill & Jen's house, so we made a beeline for it. Coop & Cat walked up because Coop had to do an interview... which was a lie. But yeah, they went out back to start this interview with my mom and now Jill & Jen. I was hidden in the back seat of Coop's truck. A few minutes into it, Coop texted me that it was time for business, so I scrambled out of her car, setting off the alarm, by the way. I made my way to the back porch and at first my mom didn't even see or realize that it was me. Then she lost it. She jumped up with such force that her chair flew about a yard behind her. It was good. All in all, it was a great day, it turned into a little barbecue, Jason & Becky came over, soon followed by my father, who also didn't know I was flying in today. He was just as shocked as my mom, if not quite as loud about it. But yeah... I'm home!

Chicago to Detroit... Day 115

Arizona came and went quickly enough, since there was free Internet. We left the airport at exactly midnight, as there were some difficulties including a flight attendant. As soon as I got on the plane, I put my mp3 player on and fell asleep. I woke up when we were taxi-ing down the runway at O’Hare International in Chicago. I am in my 37^th hour of travel right now. I’m starting to feel it, especially since my body is somewhere near NZ time still, which would make it about 11pm. (Current Local Time: 6:00am June 10) So far I have been to 6 major cities and 7 different time zones, including the International Date Line, in 36 hours. That’s pretty impressive. Just one left and I board that flight in an hour. Then I’m home free. I wonder what mom will think…

This day has 37 hours... Day 114

Today I woke up and took all of my trash out, did any extra cleaning that I needed to do and then I called a cab and went to the airport. I was sad for a minute there and my eyes started to tear up, but I got over it. I got through the ChCh airport just fine. In the next 45 hours or so, I will have been (or seen in some cases) in 3 countries (New Zealand --> Fiji --> USA), 6 airports (ChCh --> Auckland --> Nadi, Fiji --> LAX --> Phoenix, AZ --> Chicago --> Detroit), 8 time zones (NZ/Fiji --> Nuku'alofa --> International Date Line West --> Samoa --> Hawaii --> Alaska --> Pacific --> Mountain), 3 sun rises (NZ, Date Line - ish, Chicago), 2 sunsets (Fiji, Phoenix) and the most confusing part... three days... but two of them I had twice. I went over the international date line just after at about 2am on June 10, so then it was June 9 again... then I flew for a million more hours and it was June 10 again. Yeah. Sweet as.

So I started June 9 at midnight at +12 Greenwich Standard Time (GST). I ended June 9 at 11:59 -7 GST. That means that my day was approximately 37 hours long. Let me tell you, it was a wicked dodgy day. I'm going to post a series of entries that I typed onto my computer at a few of the four airports I was at on June 9:

~I’m sitting in the airport to fly to Auckland. I have a crazy journey ahead of me, lasting 40 or so hours. I fly from Chch to Auckland, Auckland to Fiji, Fiji to LAX, LAX to Phoenix, Phoenix to Chicago and finally Chicago to Detroit. I’m kind of excited to get home, but at the same time, it’s quite sad. Oh, and I just saw a guy with a Central Michigan University shirt on… so I asked him about it. Turns out he’s a Kiwi with a friend at CMU. Sweet as. (Current Local Time: 11:06am June 9)

~Here I am, reporting live-ish from Nadi International Airport. I have approximately 3 hours until I board my flight to LAX, where I intend to sleep for as long as possible, since this flight is ludicrous. I had a horrible experience at Auckland International, as our flight landed late and I had a connecting flight with only 40 minutes to make it through the departure customs. I forgot those existed. Anyways, I made it to my flight, which was also running late, with a few minutes to spare, but there were a few minutes where I thought I was going to completely miss everything. Which would have been bad. Anyways, I’m just going to sit here for a few hours, try and hold off on eating dinner, since I’m sure I’ll get something on the plane. (Current Local Time: 7:23pm June 9)

~I’m currently at LAX, talking to Catherine Trombly on my cell phone. There was a fiasco involving my baggage, one of my bags came through on the wrong plane and one is still unaccounted for, so if you don’t get a souvenir, don’t fret, it will arrive in the next year or so. (Current Local Time: 5:45pm June 9)

Totally Skipped Valentines Day

Yesterday was quite possibly the longest day of my life. Actually, I don’t even think it counts as yesterday. My day started at 6:00 am, Eastern Time. I got up, had a shower and mom and I left around 7:30 am, since there was a major snowstorm rolling in. We stopped and had breakfast, then continued on to the airport. We went through customs and all that stuff and the airline lady gave mom a boarding pass so she could wait with me for my flight. We just kinda hung out and looked at pictures on my computer. When my gate finally got called at 11:35, we both kinda lost it. But then I regained composure to get on the plane.

The flight to Dallas/Fortworth was long and boring. I was sitting next to a man from Wichita, Kansas. Exciting. I arrived @ DFT at about 1:30 Central Time, so that’s one hour gained. Total hours awake so far: 8.5. Then I had an hour and a half layover. I love that airport, it was so big, they said it was the size of Manhattan. It’s so pretty. My flight to Los Angeles left at 3:15pm Central Time. I got to LAX at 4:00pm Pacific Time. Total hours awake thus far: 13. Then I had a five-hour layover. Running total? 18 hours. During the layover, I met a whole bunch of people going the same place that I was. I met one girl, who looked like upper class white trash… figure that out. Anyways, she looks uncannily like Matt Lucas. Which is quite unfortunate for her… and funny for me.

Anyways, I boarded the plane with the rest of the group and I couldn’t believe how amazing it was. The plane was an Air New Zealand 747-400. Effing huge. And each of the seats had it’s own television. And a whole bunch of movies, tv shows, documentaries and music, on demand. We had dinner, which was kinda shady, but only because of the chicken. I still ate it like a ravenous animal. I tried to watch three different films, The Queen, Babel and Mary Antoinette, but I kept passing out for small parts of the movies. We arrived in Auckland, NZ @ about 6:30am New Zealand Time, which is –12 Greenwich Standard and 18 hours behind home. Running time awake? 30.5 hours. We had to go through customs and all that; we finally got through and to the AustraLearn people at about 7:30am. I immediately bought a huge bottle of water and downed it, the plane made me super dehydrated. We left about an hour later, but we were all zonked. We rode on a bus for the next three hours, with a few stops for food and the toilet. Here’s one place we went to, to use the toilets: Yes, I peed in a giant dog. I know, it’s kind of exciting.

We arrived in Rotorua around 1:30 pm and got settled into the KiwiPaca hostel. Sweet as. ß We learned some new words. That’s pretty much saying ‘awesome’ or ‘it’s all good’, they say it all the time. Ready for a lesson in Kiwi English? Dairy = small grocery store, chuddy = gum, dodgy = shady, fanny = vagina… That one is kinda weird, since we were playing a version of bingo to match the Kiwi word to the American word. All the sudden, Tommo, the guy on our bus, is saying ‘The Kiwi version of chewing gum is…? The Kiwi word for female genitalia?’ It was slightly awkward. But whatev.

Total time awake thus far? 37.5 hours. A little while later, they provided a buffet style sandwich bar, which was amazing, as we were seriously famished. A while later, we went to the school across the street to get some super important (read: boring) information about NZ. I tried really hard to stay awake, but it was rough. At about 4:30, we went on a little tour of Rotorua, I wish I had brought my camera, as we went to Lake Roturua, and it was absolutely gorgeous. We drove through town a little bit more, then came back to the hostel. Dinner was pretty delicious and it was all homemade food. After dinner, I went for a walk with a few people to the park behind the hostel, which is a geothermal area. It was really cool, as we saw a whole bunch of little springs. I don’t really remember a whole lot else, as I was awake a grand total of 45.5 hours. I slept very well. Probably because we crossed the international date line and I had absolutely no Valentines Day what so ever.

T minus 12 days

I leave for New Zealand in 12 days for my orientation in Roturua, New Zealand :) I'm super excited. Look forward to a video journal and other exciting stuff to come.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 6

Well, this morning, I apparently opened my eyes & stretched when someone "woke" me up, but in reality, I was still sleeping. You see, I do this thing where I sleep with my eyes open. Freaky. Someone took a picture & I'll upload it once I get a copy, apparently it's pretty funny. Today was a pretty quick day, we found 11 turtles and then went to Juno Marinelife Center. We got a tour of the new facility, which is very impressive indeed. After Juno, we went to this lighthouse, which was scary, if I do say so myself.

But that may be because I like neither heights, nor rickety stairs. The view from the top was pretty sweet though. In this pic, the little outdoor patio thing at that restaurant is where the video for Jimmy Buffet's "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere" was taped:


Oh, and one more awesome thing from the Lighthouse place was this tree outside, called the Banyon Tree:


Oh oh oh! Another sweet thing I got to do today was interpret French. There was a lady walking the beach and she was curious about what we were doing & she was from France. She came up to the group & started speaking French & I responded... the entire group balked for a second. It was sweet. Had to be the first time I spoke French in almost a year, so of course I sucked, but it was cool.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 5

This morning, just like every other morning, we woke up @ 5:15 and were at the beach by 6:30. We found 4 disoriented baby turtles before we even got up to the shoreline, then we had the most amazing discovery, a Leatherback nest. Leatherbacks are by far the most endangered of the species that we were dealing with. They had laid less than ten nests on that stretch of beach, as opposed to the hundreds of Loggerhead & Green nests. As soon as we found that nest, we knew something was wrong though, none of the turtles were moving. We did find three alive, but the nest hatched when it was hot out & they were exposed to the sun for too long. :(. Sidenote on Leatherbacks, they are soooo big when they mature, one was found on the coast of Maine & it was the size of a Volkswagon Beetle.
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Here's the Leatherback turtle nest that died, but 3 of those turtes made it & we took them over to the Juno Marinelife Center.

After lunch @ MacArthur, the guys from the Florida Parks Service took us on a boat ride on the Intercoastal Water Way to get to Munyon Island to pick up trash. Unfortunately, the tide was too low, so we had to go on a pontoon ride for almost an hour. Ughhh I hate when that happens ;). We saw some amazing stuff, primarily a family of wild bottlenose dolphins. It was flippin' sweet. We also saw some famous stuff, like Kate Winslett's house and Tiger Wood's yacht. Here's a sign that was to be taken completely seriously:


I think that's pretty much amazing. Here's another photo, I stole this one from Katie:

That one was more amazing though. Riding around on that pontoon was so much fun & being with the group like that, just hanging out, was a lot of fun. I'll post another picture of the whole group on the pontoon, as I think I can only put 3 on each post. After the awesome boat ride, we went to Munyon Island and picked up trash for about 20 minutes and I saw real hermet crabs... they were huge. I think they were in conch shells, it was so cool... and kinda scary.

After MacArthur, we went back to the church and showered & hung out, then we got to go to Debbie's for dinner. She's an amazing cook, it was delicious. We also got our shirts, which wre beautiful, with little Leatherbacks on them. I got one for my mom too. We got back to the church after eleven, had reflection, then went to bed. AWESOME day.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 4

Today we got up around five... this seems like a trend, does it not? Anyhoo, we went to the beach but had to wait until about 7 to go out, as there was a small storm over the water. We found one nest when we got there & there was only one hatchling in it, so that's a good sign. Quite soon after we found that nest, we found a nest that was on the verge of emerging, so we waited & helped them along, there were 91 in that nest alone, it was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. After the emergence, we took a swim break. After that, we found another nest with a few turtles left in it and a family came up to talk to us, curious as to what we were doing. One of the cooler things on this trip was that Katie & I were able to answer all of the family's questions.

Click To Play
After we got done @ the beach, we went to Juno Marine Life Center and had lunch. We got a mediocre tour of the place, but they thought we were coming on another day, which I don't believe, so there wasn't much work for us to do. I did get to clean out a Kemp's Ridley tank. That was flippin' sweet. Then we went inside with the rest of our group and incured the wrath of Jessica, the girl that worked there. She was a bitch. Then we went outside to collect some trash off the beach. Ironically, I found a piece of wood with a rusty nail in it... and I wanted to hit her in the face with it. But I didn't. But I wanted to. We had a very short day, we were back @ the church by 2:45, so we showered and ate dinner. Ashley got the genuis idea to play mafia, which no one else knew how to play except me, so we pretty much got everyone hooked on it. The hardest part is narrating and not being able to think of interesting ways to die.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 3

This is the first morning on the beach, we had to get up at an awesome 5:15 in the morning. That's shitty if I do say so myself. But somehow we all managed and it was a pretty sweet day. We were on the beach by six am and we met Debbie Sobel, the turtle lady. She seems super passionate about her turtles. Anyways, we found a nest with about 8 live turtles in it that were left behind from the night before and made sure that they got into the water alright.

(Ashley, Liz, Kristen, Mandy, Melissa... ? unknown person's arm)
I'm pretty sure that that's not my hand holding the turtle. Anyways, we got to have a few swim breaks along the 2.5 miles that we walked, which was pretty cool, as I haven't been in the ocean for years. We also found a few nests that were laid the night before by both Green & Leatherback turtles. That was pretty sweet, as the turtles tracks are plainly visible from the shore.

Around lunchtime, we went to MacArthur State Park and ate our lunches, followed by the cleaning up of exotic plants. We were supposed to be going to Munyon Island to clean up these plants, but the weather was not boat permitting. These plants looked like carrots, but they were stringy like coconuts. So not really anything like carrots. We also watched a film on MacArthur State Park, but everyone was pretty much dead and fell asleep during it. After that, we went to the church & showered, then a few of us went to the store to get random stuff. I had to get a new satchel to carry on the beach, as my old one kinda ripped right in half.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 2

This morning I drove from 2 am til' six. Atlanta is sweet when there's no one awake, otherwise is slightly shady. I'm pretty sure I slept for a good few hours after my driving shift. We got to the First Presbyterian Church around 4 in the afternoon, so 11 of us somehow managed to shower after being awake for about 25 minutes. Needless to say there were a few naps. We hung around the church campus for a few hours, then went to a Pizzeria for dinner... not good times. Well, the pizza was okay, but they gave us dirty silverware. And they had the Spanish channel on... muted. But it was fun to try and read lips in Spanish, our table made up some flippin' sweet story lines.

Sea Turtle Rescue, Day 1

I got to Mt. Pleasant around 1:00 pm and went to have lunch with the Philf. The Alt. Summer Break group assembled & we left around 2:30. I wound up in a van with Melissa, Katie, Shelley, Liz & Nick. I'm pretty sure our van was SILENT for a good few hours, I read some of my book then fell asleep to my mp3 player. I drive at 2:00am, right through Atlanta, Georgia. I get to stop somewhere around 6 in the mornin'.

The Last Few Days

Well, the last few days in Chicago were a blast.

Thursday: We went to the Adler Planetarium, which kicked behind. It was so fricken cool. I'm in love with it. Although, the planetarium eerily reminds me of the movie Contact. Then we stopped by the Art Institute, mainly to see American Gothic, a peculiarly intruiging painting. We hung around there for about an hour. When we got home, we went to the beach and laid out for a bit, then swam, then laid out for a bit more. The we went home, showered and started cooking. We had shells, which by the way, went over very well, thank you very much, because Uncle Bill's awesome friend, Walter, came over for dinner. He reminds me of Thomas Haden Church. He's a cool dude. The we played the ever infamous, Trouble, in which Uncle Bill lets his inner bitch out to play. Its so much fun. And each one of us won one game.

Friday: We went to the Field Museum...which was very educational. Nuff said. Then we just hung out for the remainder of our time. But of course we ordered Barry's Pizza again.

Saturday: We woke up somewhat early to go to the beach and not get yelled at by the bitch lifeguards. Then we went home and showered and finished packing up. Then we just sat around like hippies and listened to music. "I'm throwin' up my baby bumble bee/Won't my bulemic past life be so proud of me" Then we boarded the train, only to find that there were no seats next to eachother in business class. Lifes a fucking bitch sometimes. After about an hour and a half, we went back to the cafe car and watched 4 or 5 episodes of Will & Grace on my laptop, then found seats next to eachother minutes after my battery died...with a plug next to them. Score! So we watched Real Women Have Curves. Good movie.

Anyhoo, Chicago Rocks. Thanks Uncle Bill.

Chicago By Boat... Who knew? Day 5

This morning we got up bright and early for an architectural boat tour of Chicago. It was sexy, but the lady talking was both nasal and boring, so I stopped listening half way through and we all went downstairs because it had a much better view of it all. Oh, and they had free Starbucks coffee and lemonade and muffins. FREE BREAKFAST! Haha. Then we went to the biggest, kid friendliest place on the planet. The Museum Of Science and Industry. Woah, its huge. And we had to see the Human Body IMAX because the others were sold out...sorry Cat... The museum would have been great if I was about 11 years old, but it was still pretty interesting. The IMAX on the other hand, was quite disturbing, I only recall seeing a gigantic pimple being popped on a dome screen that was about 5 stories high and surrounding us. It was a pimple the size of a small pool. It was disgusting. I wish we could have seen the Nile movie, that looked cool.
Oh, and Cat and I are really getting the hang of this L system, you could put us anywhere in
Chicago and we could get back to Bill's house without any effort what so ever.

Woot! When we got home today, we decided to go swimming and there was actually waves. It was like a mini ocean. Yay. We were most definitely on the gay beach though, there was 15o gay men, a pair of lesbians, me and Cat (no, we weren't the pair of lesbians), and a family of four, who must have gotten lost. There was an old man in a lime green speedo thong...quite a sight, let me tell you. And the lifeguards are stupid, they put the bouys in 25 feet of water, but you're only allowed to go about boob high. Wft? We got yelled at about 50 times.

I Will Never Go To The Sears Tower Again... Day 4

The Sears Tower has to be the most boring place on the planet. I hate it. A lot. The Hancock Observatory, on the other hand, is pretty interesting. And the views are spectacular. We could see the shadows cast by the clouds on the city and it look like Earth was gonna be invaded, ie Independence Day. It was freaky. We also went down Michigan Avenue...The Mag Mile for short and we found a 4 story Borders! And we thought 3 stories was huge. I bought a single book, but its an awesome one If I Should Die Before I Wake. We took a gander at Shedd's Aquarium today as well. I'm in love with that place, if for no other reason than the dolphin show. I love dolphin shows. The aquarium itself is pretty good, saw some weird little sea animals and they had this gigantic tank, called the Wild Reef, that had some awesome animals in it, it was like a mini ocean. Then, on the way home, we got off the L at Belmont and went to the Army Navy Surplus store. It's pretty awesome but uber expensive. We both bought British Flag buttons and Cat was adamant about buying one that said "Fuck Off"...but they were all sold out. Darn. I fell asleep on the L today. I hear that I rubber necked the whole way.

Sometimes You Should Identify Street Names... Day 3

Today we woke up and ambled over to Navy Pier to buy IMAX tickets, we saw some movie about sharks...I fell asleep, not because I was bored, just out of sleep deprivation. Anyhoo, it was in 3D. Anyway, that's not the point, we went to Navy Pier and walked all the way down and it was pretty neat, however, I paid $5 for a lemonade that was mostly ice...it did come with a souvenir cup though. After walking around the pier, we caught a free trolley to State Street, where a Marshall Fields is. Across the street, we found a Borders books that was 3 stories high!! Yay! Whilst shopping and finding 3 awesome guides for Anatomy, Med Terms and Med Abbreviations, my uncle called and asked where we were. I told him at the Borders across from Marshall Fields. To bad theres another Borders in town across from another Marshall Fields. He gave us directions to a place for lunch...but it was quite a catastrophe. We ended up making it to lunch eventually and ran to a bus. By the way, we got pelted with sand while running towards the bus, it was windy. We took the bus to the IMAX. The movie was pretty good and the whole 3D thing made my head spin.

After the IMAX experience, we went to the Lincoln Park Conservatory and Zoo. I'm absolutely in love with the Lincoln Park Conservatory. It's so pretty. The Zoo was crap, half of the animals were dead, so it wasn't that exciting. We took the bus home and went down to the beach and swam. Whoopie! Anyways, later.

Fireworks make life amazing... Day 2

We woke up early today and went swimming at the beach and we were the only ones there. And the bouys went on forever...at our park, the water gets to be 5 feet deep...at this beach the water gets to be 25 feet! Anyhoo, we went for a walk down the coastline and it was so cool. I can't wait until after college so that I can live in Chicago...because I'm in love with it. Then we went with my uncle to the nursery to get some flowers...they were pretty, but there were no white lilies.

Early in the afternoon, we made our way downtown to get prepared for the fireworks. Along the way we stopped at Millenium Park. It's really cool, they have this gigantic pavillion by Frank Gehry (He did a lot of cool buildings, like the EMP in Seattle and the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain) and they do a lot of concerts and stuff there. They also had this really cool set of fountains that you could walk in and stuff. Then we went down to the Adler Planetarium area to watch the fireworks. Which were flippin' sweet, they sure upstaged Fishfly Festival Fireworks. Ha, try saying that one five times fast. I'll eventually post pictures and stuff...but I'm too busy now. Then we braved the subway on the way home. It was so packed, I think all of Chicago was on the L.
A la prochain fois~

The Worst Way To Start A Vacation.. Day 1

...Is definitely missing your train. Yep, we missed the train this morning. It felt bad. We were the most pathetic sight ever. But more on that later, first, lemme explain why we missed the train. Well, first off, my dad insisted that we go to Kroger to get us some snacks for the train. Then we missed our exit. Then we ran into about a million detours. Then we got onto the platform. Then, as we made our way to get on, it slowly but surely started moving away. Mind you, my mom was in the station telling them that we needed to get on, but the guy WOULD NOT tell the train to stop. Asshole. We were there at 5:15 am, which is on time.

Anyhoo, we had the most priceless/crushed expressions on our faces. If someone would have been videotaping, it would have won money. But we weren't the only ones to miss the train. We met Yvette and Kenneth. They were nice. So, on to the adventure. First, we're told that we have to go to Flint to catch a bus that will take us to Battle Creek so we can get on a train to Chicago. Ugh. There were easier options, but he failed to inform us of them. So, for the time being, we went home. Cat and I were a gigantic pathetic mess. I know both of us wanted to cry. But we held a stiff upper lip and collapsed onto the futon when we got home, all the while, discussing just how retarded we felt.

We left home around 7:00 am and made our way to Flint. On the way, we stopped at a Big Boy's for brekkie. Funny story. So we're sitting down for breakfast and I make the declaration that I have to pee, which is hardly uncommon, so Cat and I go to the bathroom (I know, we travel in packs, what can I say?) And I go for the handicap stall because theres something yucky in the other toilet. But Cat, being the brave one, goes to flush the toilet and use that one. As soon as I sit down, I hear a deafening sound and I hear Cat's voice calling me...she sounded like she was in pain. So I told her to hang on so that I could finish peeing. So I did. Then I open the door to discover the strangest sight. Cat on the floor with the bathroom door. She completely took out the door. Completely. Apparently the door was somewhat off its hinges and she went to close/open it and it came off and she and it crashed into the wall together. And she really hurt her shoulder...I had to pull on her arm to pop it somewhat back into place. I think that was worth missing the train. Then we had to recount the story to my parents and the waitress. We didn't file an accident report though...wimp.

Now that that exciting portion is over, we fell asleep on the way to Flint and drove around in Flint for a while until we woke up. When we woke up, my dad had pulled into this parking lot full of modular homes because he wanted to put one on the property up north. They're all a hell of a lot bigger and prettier, outside and in ;), than my house. The people there thought we were sisters. Thats probably because Cat has the habit of calling my parents mom and dad. Unusual and yet expected. But holy crap, these houses are HUGE, they have upstairs and everything. We finally got to the station and waited for our bus with our new friends, Yvette and Kenneth. We traveled with them the whole way to Chicago. It was nice. The remainder of our journey wasn't that exciting, it was pretty much: sleep, listen to music, talk, sleep, eat a cracker, listen to music, talk...

Then we got to Chicago. Finally. A few hours late. My uncle picked us up at Union Station and we took Lakeshore Drive, the coolest road in the world, almost all the way to his house. It runs along the coastline of Lake Michigan, which is all part of Chicago. I think Cat was in awe. We got home to his awesome condo, a few blocks from the lake, and oddly enouch, took a walk to the lake, it must be a swimmer thing...must identify water source, MUST IDENTIFY WATER SOURCE!!! Its such a pretty lake. I'm in love with it. Then we came back home and ordered Chicago Style deep dish pizza with yummy stuff in it, I believe it was Barry's Pizza. It was so good, though Cat and I, as mere amateurs, could only eat one piece each, while Uncle Bill could devour 2 or 3. Then we both kind of drifted off while watching What Lies Beneath. Then we went to bed and fell fast asleep.