Bye 2006

Merry Christmas everyone!

I hope to catch up with everyone I can while I'm here in SD. (A looong time, btw, I don't get back until Jan. 4) I also hope to write more next year, on the blog, or otherwise.

Here's a little something to keep you entertained - http://www.viceland.com/int/dd.php?id=532&country=us
I forgot how much I miss Viceland's do's and don'ts. Do yourself a favor and check out a bunch of them. Thanks for the reminder Case.

Have a happy and healthly and above all fun 2007! I intend to.

** casey sent me this, btw.

Hey, on another note, I'm going to Boston tomorrow!! To see the Patriots/Colts game (thanks Galina!)

Then, I'm going to San Francisco on Monday for about a week. SO excited! Man, I gotta pack and clean right now though. ugh.

NY Times vs. NY Post

I know what you're thinking. How can I compare a world-renowned newspaper like the New York Times with a smutty, sensationalist rag like the New York Post? I would tend to agree with you, but please direct your attention to the except from an article I cam across in the Post today. (I like to read the Post when I know I'll be on the train for a bit and have no other reading on me.)

This excerpt is from an article about a guy that was holding a woman hostage at knifepoint in Brooklyn who the police ended up shooting, saving the woman's life. Still, in short amount of space, thank heavens they included the bit about that before getting attacked she was "on her way to buy yogurt". I'm sorry....what? How is this salient information?

However, clearly this kind of overly-thorough reporting, rather that answering my questions, has only generated more questions, such as, what kind of yogurt was it? Was she going to eat it with a spoon, or was she looking for the on-the-go drinkable kind?? We may never know. But I do know that these obscure, useless facts will keep me coming back for more.

US Open: Another example of all the cool things that happen in Queens

Here a are few pics from Wed, which I spent at the US Open. I was operating on roughly 4 hrs sleep that day (due to some travel snafus the day before), so much of the day is blurred. I do, however, recall that the players are very fond of Playstations and they were all very polite.

After I'd logged in my 8 hours staffing the players' internet cafe area, I was free to roam around the rest of the night. The blank statium picture (above), I took after I rushed upstairs to the Arthur Ashe Statium once I was free, only to find out that the night matches wouldn't start for another hour. So, then I proceeded to just wander around restricted areas to see where my credidentials would get me.

I ended up watching most of the night matches, which weren't very close that early in the tournament (Sharapova and Roddick both killed). It was fun, but I was fading toward the end - and woulda been more fun if I had a friend or two with me. Maybe next year.

P.S. How cool is that globe statue?

A Word About Automatic Hand Dryers

I went to Japan last year, and although many things impressed me (e.g. the toilets are more advanced than NASA scientists could ever hope for), none so much as their automatic hand dryers. I was used to the US version, where you could hold your hands under them for a full 20 minutes and still not feel dry. But in Japan, they don't mess around. It's like mini hurricane at the press of a button. For this, I would consider swearing off paper towels forever.

So you can imagine my surprise and delight upon encountering not one, but two such hand dryers worthy of Japanese praise. Pictured above is the Xcelerator dryer I found in the bathroom of the White Plains Target store. (Incidentally, the White Plains Target store is by far my biggest vice of late.)

You can also find the Xcelerator in the bathroom of my favorite Mexican Restaurant in NYC, Tortilla Flats. Suffice to say, although I go there for the Margaritas (they sell by the pitcher!), the mole sauce and the pretty twinkling lights in the bar, I stay for the hand dryers.

One of the proudest moments in my life....and i MISSED it!

okay, for those of you that aren't familiar with the sharing site, reddit.com, it's awesome. in a nutshell, people submit links to cool articles, websites, pictures, whatever...and then other people vote on if the like it by giving a positive or negative point. anyway, so many people vote on this site that the end result is that there are consistently good recommendations (updated constantly) to some of the most interesting stuff on the internet.

so, i've been checking reddit regularly since my brother told me about it a few months ago, and i've tried in vain to submit things to get enough votes to merit being placed on the reddit home page. sadly, all of these previous attempts failed miserably. last week i posted this dolphin-training article from the nytimes up, but never followed up on it. low and behold, i saw today that it frickin killed! 447 points!! that's unheard of. i almost cried.

Back in action

Um yeah. I don't even want to start by apologizing all again about sucking at blogging because you've heard it before. I was really just taking a break for awhile. And then you know how it is when you keep putting something off like this, and then you feel like if you start up again, you should really have something fabulous to write about. Well....not really the case, but I'm writing anyway.

However, I will add this...reason #117 why I love Astoria: If you need a gastroenterologist, you can find one within 3 blocks.

Although I've had so much fun traveling to a plethora of weddings lately (Congrats Kelsi&Vince, Hillary&Jason, Jess&Troy and Can&Paul!!), I am severely looking forward to hanging out at home for the forseeable future. Especially now that I have a couch (pictured here). And it folds out for you friends that want to visit NYC. :)

Okay, and I know that Amy sent this story out to some of you via e-mail, but I swear I was already planning on posting this gem of an story about Mickey Rouke's pinky. I hope now that he realizes how important it is to have 2 full length pinkys. I should know. Crazy bastard!

Settled? Yeah, sorta.

Well, I've been in NY over a week now. Honestly, it feels like ages ago that I was in Btown. Everything's going well, although I miss everyone from school lots. It's a damn shame I didn't get to go to Mexico.

Work's going just fine. Not much to do yet, but I'm sure that will change soon. My apt is great although it only contains an air mattress and a spattering of clothes. The movers are coming tomorrow with the rest of my stuff and I am def looking forward to sleeping in a real bed, having chairs to sit on and a tv to watch.

I've decided to drive to work instead of taking the train (hence the pictures of the Triborough Bridge). For those of you not from here, the boroughs it connects are Manhattan, Queens (my hood!) and the Bronx. It's a really long drive (min of 1 hour each way), but I'll usually only go up there 3X per week. Still, I would certainly die w/o my trusty ipod to keep me company on the drive. I've managed to find parking on my street every night, and I've only gotten one ticket so far (forgot to check the signs on the street when I was gone this weekend).

That's all I have for now. I'm exhausted...I plan to start getting some more sleep soon. Luckily, I'm headed to Hawaii on Thurs for Hillary's wedding. Let's hope I remember to take some pictures to post. I'm always forgetting things like that!

Don't give up on me yet.......

......it's just that i have to finish this week o' school, graduate, move, and all that crap, and then i will start having things to write about again. i promise. i know i'm lame right now.

I laugh in the face of boredom! ha!

I recently found out that I will be starting work quite a bit later than I thought (May 15th!) This is good news, I guess, except that I've been scrambling for the past few weeks to finish all of my GA hours and classwork early. The net result is that I have a bunch of time on my hands until I graduate.

This would be fine for most people I think, but I can honestly say that one of my biggest fears in life is boredom, so this could have been cause for panic. I dread boredom, which probably explains some of the poor decisions i have made in my life in order to avoid it (a lot of bad dates come to mind). But here I am, nearing the end of Day #2 w/o much to do, and things are going swimmingly. Here is what I have done so far:

- read a lot
- started writing a book
- worked out twice (not even counting softball)
- watched more than my share of crap tv
- done some stuff for school
- scored many high scores on that fun game on my cell phone
- emptied the dishwasher (which is my least fav chore)
- looked online at apts in NYC
- prob lots more i can't think of right now

Phew! Let's hope I can keep up this pace.

Here's some links from the week that I think are interesting:

- I think I've seen these before, but they are still funny
- Some girls aren't very smart
- Batman Onomatopoeia

Newsworthy?

I have an idea. Instead of always writing about things that happen to me (for example i will spare you the details about the comings and goings here at the front desk of the MBA office from today), I am going to post links from time to time of interesting stuff. Kind of along the lines of my fav news source, Pinkisthenewblog.

Nothing wrong with following in the footsteps of the I.R.A. in this case. (nytimes)

Grammar = first casualty of war (reddit.com)

I'm not sure why people are obsessed with this version of crusty mac'n'cheese. I would have probably fallen for it too, if not for this warning. (slate.com)


oh, the pic is of Hillary's new dog, Duke. He's so frickin adorable. I still don't want a dog, but I'd sure like to babysit.

Just Like Barbie's Dream House. Except with a job.

Alright, the blog hiatus is over. I know, that was really quick. To be honest, I didn't want to write much b/c I was really freaking out about the job situation (or lack thereof), but I have fully recovered since receiving an offer last night. It's really the perfect job for me too.

I'll be starting sooner than I expected (like in a matter of weeks), which is a little insane, but I'm really excited anyway. I'm sad to leave B-town, but at least I'll be back for graduation.

You prob won't hear a lot about the job in the future (as I have a no blogging rule about two subjects - work and boys), but i will certainly blog about everything else that happens to me in NYC.

Last posting before Hiatus

hey all. i think this blog will be taking a hiatus in the near future. i just need to take a break, and trust me, nuthin' exciting is happening to me lately.

however, in honor of tonight's flip cup tourney, i thought i would post this video of a flip cup match from last year. for those of you that are not familar, this is a game of intense competive skill, and of course, drinking. (who says you don't learn anything in B school?) unfortunately, in this match my team (blue cohort) lost to the green cohort. this had better not happen tonight!


View this clip on Vimeo

I don't wanna go

but alas, I must. I am leaving tomorrow.

here's info the pics:
1. 7 AM at this great club on the river in B.A.
2. Last dinner in B.A.
3. home section at the River Plate fútbol game

Buenos Aires was great. Way too much fun actually, and we mostly compensated from our long nights by sleeping away a good part of the days. Still, we managed to see the sights, and ate lots and lots of food. Any good I'd done for my body with all that hiking in Patagonia went way downhill after my stay in Buenos Aires.

Now I'm back in Santiago, and have been mainly relaxing. Tis nice.

Still alive

Sorry I haven´t posted in awhile, but it´s just not that easy when you don´t have internet at your apt. these internet cafes may be all over the place, but they have a lot to be desired in terms of speed.

anyway. we´ve been here in buenos aires since sunday. it feels like we live here already for some reason - maybe b/c we have this great little apt. it´s only US$25 a day too which is a frickin´ steal.

i´m not feeling too well today. i really hope i don´t have the flu or something. i took a four hour nap today, so i´m crossing my fingers that that makes me all better. we´re gonna try to go to tango lessons tonight.

i´ll write more later! i arrive back home on thurs, btw. too soon!! but...it will be nice to see everyone.

(Pic is of a street in BA called el 9 de Julio- not taken by me, btw. nope, that is not the Washington monument, although it looks just like it. we´ve walked across this street many times, which a feat when you realize that most cars speed up and try to hit ya when you´re crossing!)

I know...I didn´t think I could do it either!!!!

i made out of Torres del Paines in one piece. (well, kind of. my feet are hanging on by a thread. next time = spend more money on shoes).) the trip was INCREDIBLE, but i will write a more detailed account later, when i am on a better keyboard and have time to post pics. Important to note about this elevation-distance map that we did this ´W´ trekking circuit in 4 1-2 days. holy cow. (by the way, i couldn´t ask for a better group of traveling companions: Linds, Tim, Blake, Kelly and Phi)

until then, i will recount the comical (well not-at-the-time) events of yest:

10 AM to noon: hike down from Campo Chileno to the shuttle stop that takes us to bus out of the park.

2 PM: shuttle to bus staging area.

3 to 5 PM: bus from park to Puerto Notales

5 to 8 PM: change clothes at our old hostel, pack, eat hamburgesa completas at a local restaurant (pics will follow of these hamburgesas. incredible.)

8 PM: packed and waiting for bus to pick us up and take three of us (me, Phi and Kelly) to Punta Arenas. (Punta Arenas is where the airport is, and about 2-5 hours from Puerto Notales).

8:11 PM - We realize that the lady that owns the hostel didn´t call the bus company that afternoon to reserve us seats after all. Realize that bus is not coming. Since this is the last bus leaving P. Notales and Phi and Kelly have a flight from P. Arenas at 8 AM the next day, mild panic commences.

8:15 PM - Taxi arrives with the intention of catching up to the bus and making it pull over and let us on. (Apparently these things happen.) Unfortunately, once we are in the cab and two blocks away, the taxi driver says that this is impossible and pulls over. We take our stuff out of the cab and stand by the curb, but he doesn´t leave us stranded there, tg.

8:16 to about 8:50 PM - Driver decides to call someone else who might be able to drive us to P.Arenas that night. He says would be much more expensive to rent a car and leave it in P.Arenas. Wait a long while for this new driver to show up, while the first driver gives us lots of advice on how to negotiate a good price. (All these converstions are in spanish, btw.)

8:51 PM - Roberto, our new driver shows up in a little minivan. He says it will cost 80,000 pesos total (about US$160) for the trip. (Note, the bus would have been 10,000 each) We try to negotiate, but he says we have to talk to his boss, the lady that owns the cars.

9:05 PM - Arrive at the casa of the lady that owns the cars. I ask her if we can pay 60,000 instead, but she says this is impossible b-c the minivan is reliable but guzzles lots o´gas. Instead she offers to have Roberto take us in this old Peugeot, which gets better gas mileage - for 60,000. We have a deal.

9:15 PM - Set off in the Peugeut. Stop for gas and see the original taxi driver at the station, so we thank him for his help earlier. (Incidentally, did I mention that on the way to P. Arenas, our bus ran out of gas b-c the driver forgot to check it? Anyway, other story.)

sometime around 10: Discover that our driver Roberto likes many types of music, but there is only one tape in the car, the Backstreet Boys. Listen to this tape for the first of many times.

11:30ish - first sign of car trouble.

12:00 AM - Car dies. Just outside of P. Arenas. Roberto calls his boss, who says that her brother-in-law will arrive to help us in 15 minutes.

12:45 AM - No sign of help. Still by the side of the road, with very cold strong winds raging outside. Call Roberto´s boss again and she says we should be patient.

1:05 AM - We call our hostal and ask them to call us a taxi.

1:35 AM - Taxi and brother-in-law arrive at almost the same time. We pay Roberto, say chao and hop in the taxi.

At long last - After about a 15 min drive, we arrive at the warm, cozy hostal. We take real showers (!) and fall asleep around 3 AM.

Phi and Kelly had to go back to the airport a 6:30 AM, but I slept in until 9:30. I´m catching a plane back to Santiago (warm, sunny!!!) in a few hours. Phew. I will miss the beauty of Patagonia, but not this frickin cold wind. Stay tuned for pictures.

Funniest Thing I've read in years

I know that I can be pretty random sometimes, but the guy who wrote this is my officially my new idol. here's the link: indoor swimming pool

Here's an excerpt:
Manager: Sir, can you tell me why you’d like to return this pool?
Tynan : I was going to buy a penguin, but I was worried the pool was going to leak on my carpet. It doesn’t say anywhere not to use it inside, but I don’t think it’s sturdy enough.
Manager: Are you being serious?
Tynan: Yes.
Manager: Ok… I guess we’ll take it.

By the way, i discovered this story on reddit.com - a wealth of info and hours of fun.

Busy, busy, busy

What have I been up to? Well besides peeling copious amounts of skin from my body (damn that hole in the ozone layer - see previous posting), I've been buying the necessities to prepare for my trip to Patagonia. Most of the stuff I can rent down there, but I needed a jacket, hiking shoes, pants, headlamp, cutlery, scarf, hat, gloves... TG for Lindsay, or I would never know what to get. (Incidentally, Lindsay and I are not allowed to go shopping together ever again. We are bad influences and cannot resist deals on shoes or tank tops at Zara.)

I tried to take some pics of the really cool buildings here in Santiago, but the pics just don't do them justice. They other pics are from this cool, organic restaurant called Fresh/Good. The one pic that looks kind of blurry is the tag on some back to school uniforms - the brand is called "Hate the School". Freakin' hilarious, if you ask me. I saw it at this store called Jumbo - Chile's more upscale version of Walmart. We had a bit of an incident there trying to return some $12 bottle of sunscreen that my friend Phi bought and decided to return right away. 20 minutes later, after giving them my passport number, address, phone number and promised my first born child, we were out of there.

Inside the Mountain

(note: until I get a new camera, I will be posting pics from earlier in the trip, so they won't really match the current posting. These 2 were taken from my bedroom window here at diff times of day.)

Things are great here. I have pretty much recovered from the unfortunate events of last weekend...new eyeglasses, new chilean cell number (using my US phone too-it only cost $10 to get a chip that works here) and not so sunburned. Speaking of nasty sunburns...for those of you planning on visiting Chile sometime, there is a big ol' hole in the ozone layer down here, so much more sunblock is needed than normal. Yes...this certainly would have been useful information had I heard about it before last week. Ouch! Don't worry, now I lathering myself in sunscreen at all times.

Despite having a lot of homework (this week being our last and all!!), I've had so much fun. I have to say, you really can't beat the people here. They are wonderful. The other students have been showing us around quite a bit. Tonight I do planning on catching up on some sleep though.

A n y w a y. Today we went on a visit inside of the worlds largest mine. It's a copper mine that is on the inside of the Andes Mountains. Seriously, it was unreal. A lot of the mining is done with robots that are controlled with joy sticks. They let my friend Kelly operate it for awhile even. It looks just like a video game, except you are busting up giant rocks instead of playing Madden. I can't imagine a US company allowing some random person to control million dollar equipment, which is another thing I love about here. Not v. many rules.

Love the food too. I've become a big fan of the Chilean style of eating bread with butter and salsa. (They don't call it salsa, but it's pretty much exactly like pico de gallo.) Yum. Plus, there is really good meat everywhere, and I've never eaten so much fruit in my life.

Stolen

Yesterday was a very bad day. It started out great, a bunch of us had rented cars and drove to Viña del Mar and Reñaca for the weekend. I would post the pictures that I took (this one I just found on the internet), but but my camera was stolen...along with my wallet (cash and credit cards), cell phone, new eyeglasses and everything else that was in my little bag.

This happened about 15 minutes before we were leaving. I went to have something to drink at these little tables in the shade on the edge of the beach, and I ran into two of my friends and sat down to talk to them. I put my bag on the floor next to my feet and chair (yes...like an idiot). A few minutes later I realized the bag was gone, but none of us had noticed anything or anyone suspicious. By that time, the person who took it was long gone. Ironically, the reason I had so much important stuff in it is because it's not so safe to leave things in the car.

Anyway...the good news is that I still have my passport and one visa check card (which were at home in my apartment). I am v. thankful for that. I cancelled the other cards.

After it happened, I felt physically sick for awhile, but I think that was also partially due to my extreme sunburn (see...bad day all around). Today, I still am bummed but definitely feel much better than yesterday. (And I've pretty much stopped replaying the whole thing over and over in my head..."If I'd only done this..or this..., etc.") After all, it could have been worse, and it was a sobering wake-up call which will remind me to be vigilant at all times during the rest of this trip. Also...thanks to everyone that was with me for being so great and helpful and to Ames for helping me get money transferred from my wamu account to my bank1 one. I would have been a wreck w/o you guys.

One final thought: What is wrong with these people that steal things? Don't they know how mean it is? Get a real job.

En Vino Veritas

Our Doing Business in Latin America class took a field trip today to a vineyard about 2 hours out of Santiago. The landscape looked exactly like Southern California, which was little weird. Clearly the best part was the lunch (pictured here). I also got to brush up on my wine tasting skills, although none of us spit out the wine as apparently you are supposed to do.

Bachelet - Por Chile. Por la gente. (that's the slogan)

View this clip on Vimeo

Here's a video from a political rally we attended yesterday. (Countdown...2 days left till Presidential Election.) It was a very excitable bunch, and very loud with lots of musical acts. There were vendors selling everything from flags to beer to confetti to ice cream. V. festive feel.

We didn't stay for the whole thing (I went to see a play - which is a whole 'nother story prob not fit to explain here on the web...ask me about it when i get back though b/c it was really interesting), but still managed to get stuck in human gridlock as we tried to leave. Dio mio! I'm a little bit clauterphobic in crowds, so it was a less than pleasurable experience. It was fun though before we tried to leave.

Do I look like I speak Spanish?

Apparently, in Santiago, I sure do. I do understand some of what is being said, but the accent here is really confusing. I had a very comical encounter with the plumber who just kept getting madder and madder the more I said "no entiendo". and "despacio, por favor". People here just keep talking on and on whereever I go, and I barely get a gist of what they're saying. I've perfected the "nod and smile" strategy, which works like a charm until they ask me a question.

Anyway, today we walked all around cerro san cristobal, which is a hill overlooking the city with a park on it and a big statue of the Virgin Mary. To get up there, you take this funicular (which is like a small bus on a train track that goes straight up the mountain) which was has not changed much since it was built in 1925. Then there's these little cable car things which takes you to the other part. There's also a trememdous public pool, but I didn't know to bring my bathing suit.

We had lunch at this restaurant at the top. A word of advice about dining in Chile: be sure to give yourself a good two to three hours because you won't be getting out of there before then. The waiters don't like to visit your table (or even enter the dining area) but once every 45 minutes or so. Oh well, at least the food is good and it's not like I'm on a very tight schedule.

"...clever ways of fastening bits and pieces together."

Here's a pic of one of the courtyards at my school. It's really quite a beautiful little campus. My fav thing (not surprisingly) is that we get a 15 min break in every class and they give us coffee, little sandwiches and fruit. How about it, Indiana?

I'm taking two classes here: one of them is great (Doing Business in Latin America) and the other one sucks big time (International Marketing). I could honestly go on and on about the bad prof in Int'l mktg, but I will try to hold back a little. To amuse myself, I write down stupid quotes that he says and keep track of how many times he mentions Canada, his current home and fav subject. Today, I almost lost it after he kept mispronouncing Chilean ("Chilly-en") and Nicaragua ("Nikki-a-ga"). I really wouldn't make fun of someone pronouncing things incorrectly (lord know my pronuncian is far from perf), but he really is a complete pompous jerkface windbag, so I feel justified.

made

We're here. Didn't do much exploring today, but we did walk down to our nearest metro stop (Av. Cristobal Cólon) so that we'll know where to go when we head to escuela tomorrow. These pics are of the metro station. V. new and reminiscent of O'Hare airport.

I also included a pic of a political poster - there are hundreds of these around the city. The Chilean presidential elections are this month, and there's a woman candidate, which is cool, I think.