So I figured I’d give ya’all a quick update on life as I currently know it. So here goes –

When I took the job I am now currently in, I moved to the LA area, or more specifically the Orange County area to live with the old buddy Geoff. Initially it was a tough move for me, as California was a difficult adjustment for me when I was really looking for something different after being in Hawaii for three years and California is different only in that it lacked the local charm and backwoods close proximity of the north shore. So I wasn’t expecting to enjoy myself a whole lot, but honestly I figured life could definitely be worse so I wasn’t complaining.

So it came as a bit of a surprise to me this last week, as I was told by my work I needed to relocate in an eastern direction and I packed up to move, how genuinely attached I’d grown to the area and my friends there. It’s rare to find people that accept you as whole heartedly as my friends did down there, and honestly I feel like I was just getting to know many of them. And despite my tendency to chase adventure on every front which elicits frequent moves, leaving friends has never become easy for me. It was a relatively empty drive Wednesday as I left, and I’m more motivated than ever to settle down and put some roots in somewhere. Even as a single guy, stability is a bit appealing eh’? :)

What then am I doing you might ask? So the plan is to move out east, maybe Boston, maybe DC, maybe anywhere, I’m still deciding, but that’s where I’m headed, sometime in the fall. But Geoff was already off to school again, so the housing situation needed attention, and my solution was to go on a road trip of buddies and friends until I decide to move out east. So I have about 2 months, and right now I’m back up with some Utah buddies, hanging out in Provo now, gonna go drive support car at the Latoja Classic for a Etherington (a 206 mile bike race across 3 states, pretty sweet) visit some old EFY chums, then roll on with a few musts as I make it back across the US (and I’m open to suggestions if you have anything you feel should be on the list)

Yellowstone

Mt Rushmore

Gettysburg (currently reading Killer Angels and I must see)

That’s all I have on the must see list right now, but I’ll have plenty of time I reckon, so give me some suggestions.

Anyway, that’s where I am. Miss my Orange County family out there, and am especially grateful for the friendships they extended to this lil ole missoura farm boy. I continue my nomadic journey, and will keep you posted on how it goes. Much love and aloha. :)

so the other day a buddy calls me up and we decide to go grab some dinner. We go cruising …. TO DISNEYLAND. That’s right, people here all have passes and stuff, so we just cruise into Disneyland, the magical kingdom of america, and eat some gumbo in a breadbowl, ride a few rides, watch the big show, then roll home, just a few hours you know. Who does that? Seriously, who goes to disneyland for dinner. That’s like going to the moon for a sale on sneaks. Very entertaining, but still. :)

A comic I read frequently, xkcd, posted this today and I laughed out loud…. seriously I lol’d. I do sometimes go on a crusade to argue, it’s the lawyer blood in me that wants debate, wants to be challenged, and I will troll till I get it. I’m getting better, it’s called growing up I think, but still, nothing is quite as satisfying as internet arguments….. riiiiiight. :>)

I also watched a documentary called King of Kong about two guys competing for a world record on Donkey Kong. It’s like a little window into my world, that was disturbingly accurate. :)

So I’m rolling through the summer, barely keeping up with life and the what not, but I am really loving it.  This summer has been very kind to me, especially seeing how I’ve had some great times at home, in the short time I’ve been there, followed up by a few great weeks of EFY (Especially For Youth) and the opportunity to work with some great kids.  I’ve been through Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and now today I’m heading to Geneva New York for my last EFY session, probably ever. 

We packed up this morning after searching out a meager breakfast that was surprisingly unavailable for a college campus, and then packed a van full of 8 of us counselors, our luggage, and the office luggage for the 4 hour (max) drive to Geneva, NY, ie Rochester area.  Well we’d been driving for a while, just following our google map directions to a T, and not paying to much attention to the time.  So we take a step in the directions and go north on highway 89, waiting for exit 42, after a few hours, there comes a sign that says 5 miles to Canada.  Christy, our driver begins to question our positioning, and pulls over to confirm our route.  We hit a Mobil gas station in Champlain New York, and Christy and Steve go in to check on the route, then Christy comes out doubled over in laughter yelling for all of us to come in and see the map for ourselves.  We walk in and the lady at the register is patiently explaining our plight.  Where is Geneva we ask, she points to a spot a little bit in on the left hand side of the atlas, to which we nod and reply so where are we now, and her finger dramatically traces a line across the page and up to the very top right corner of the state and stops in Champlain.  Still not quite grasping the gravity of the situation, we ask innocently, how far away is that?  6 and a half hours she replies, at which point all 8 of us begin laughing hysterically taking pictures of the map with fingers pointing, some running out to the parking lot and renting our clothes in dramatic fashion calling for ashes, as we hysterically begin to realize our 4 hour drive and day to catch up on rest has turned into a 12 hour drive and a scenic route unsurpassed.  We laughed and laughed, then get in the car and begin driving, Steve takes over to ensure no more mistakes.  About 30 minutes later we get pulled over, and despite our best attempts, we begin laughing hysterically again.  The cop asks innocently “So, where you coming from?” Massachusetts we reply, where you headed he asks, Rochester New York we reply, and were rewarded with a quizzical expression which elicits another round of hysterics from the car.  He had to have been wondering about substance abuse or alcohol consumption, but Steve, bless his heart, explains dutifully, “We’re counselors for a youth camp for our church, see my name tag (points to his tag that says Steve as if to prove his innocence)” then the cop asks him if he know why he pulled us over, and again, bless his heart, Steve ventures in with “cause I was going 20 mph over?” the cop replies “well my radar didn’t get you that fast but yeah” the cop then “when do you have to get there?” steve instantly responds “tomorrow by 7pm at the latest” unknowingly condemning his case of need or even reason to be speeding, but all the same, grins respectfully at the cop as the 7 of us act like hyenas laughing and rolling around at every comment.  In the end, Steve got his first ticket, and we’re currently on hour 12 of the drive, still hoping we’re heading in the right direction while waiting for our destination to arrive.  In short, we’ve been rewarded with the ever elusive adventure found only in upstate New York while traveling from Massachusetts. 

Good times. :)

It got pretty intense down there, the rules were to dance in a Cook Island style, it was crazy, but in the end, we pulled it out.  Watch ya self!

Part One - Heidi and Taylor set the standard
Part Two - Me and Kristi counter
Part Three - We pull away with our Cook Island flare.

so I was emailing a buddy, and this came out, I laughed and thought it worthy of posting -

So I’ve been doing some christmas shopping lately, but the college kind of christmas shopping, the kind where you’re at wal-mart and you see kit-kat’s 3 for a dollar and think “that my sister Sarah’s favorite candybar, and probably my sister Hillary’s, and….. perfect, it’s gotta be Natalies as well! Sisters are done…” You know what I’m talking about, so funds are low, I’m on the end of semester diet, which is painful, but necessary, so anyway, after a bit of christmas shopping, about everyones taken care of, and I’m feeling good about stuff, I’ve got just enough money in the bank for rent, and we’re all set. So I’m sitting in class, reading email and news / paying attention and I come accross a forum where somebody had posted up a link to a feather down comforter for 17.99 shipped, I scoff to myself and think right, for a twin. I click the link, and there it is, a big white fluffy feather down comforter, I check the sizes, and there’s a King! for the same price, so I think to myself, that’s a great deal, a king size fluffy white feathery comforter, I nod my head in agreement and click twice and the comforter is in the mail. After the second click my hand doesn’t move, nor do my eyes, and I spend the next 5 minutes or so, frozen, the responsible voice in my head screaming at me “What the heck did you just do!? You don’t even know someone with a King size bed, let alone someone with a King size bed who needs a comforter!” The splurging voice counters “but it’s a good deal” to which the ever louder responsible voice yells “A good deal! We’re eating ramen just to live, and a feather comforter, to a hawaii resident is about as worthless as it can get, A GOOD DEAL! YOU JUST BOUGHT A FEATHER COMFORTER! YOU GONNA GO BUY A HOPE CHEST NOW!?” so in the middle of class I’m sitting there staring at this and just start laughing, like lean back in the chair, head back laughing, and have now gained a little more understanding of what it must feel like to be a woman sometimes. Oh the compulsive shopping. What joy it can bring.

we gave it a shot, and here’s how it turned out…. Read the rest of this entry »

I feel this merits it’s own post, and position at the top of the page for a while -
Read the rest of this entry »

Hey everyone, finally got around to pushing out the norris fact generator. Hope everyone enjoys it, and special thanks to the guys at www.chucknorrisfacts.com for the insanely funny collection of facts. btw for those downloading, this is just a php script and a database, so if you are just lookin for quotes, read em on teh top right of the page. For those who want to integrate this in your site, then download away.

Enjoy

Get it here

UPDATE: To integrate the plugin, you activate it then call the function in your sidebar.php with a statement like

“< ?php quoteAl(); ?>“

Aloha, Talofa, Ahnyanhisayo, Ni how, Sha Nyi, bonjour, privyet, and how’s it?

Well, I thought I’d take a quick moment here and let you guys know how things are going. I’ve had a few good events come through. First and foremost I think people have most enjoyed the thought of me trying to dance. Well in fact it is quite enjoyable, and I’m one of the better dancers of the group. It seriously is a blast. Yesterday we had out first exam/evaluation and that didn’t go so well. We were split into groups and had to write a routine using the steps we knew, well my group followed me to destruction virtually, don’t get me wrong, it worked great, but apparently it wasn’t exactly ball room. I employed a Virginia reel method for changing partners, we had a 6 count of the guys putting one arm in to the middle of the circle and pin wheeling, and then we had a synchronized step back with the girl hesitation for dramatic effect, oh and of course the dip at the end. None of which she had taught, all moves I had in my personal arsenal. And I think we may have pulled it off, but in practice, I taught Aaragon to do a Mexican “hoiiiiiiyaaaahh ahaha ahaha ah” yell, I didn’t anticipate that coming out during the performance, which it did several times, and disgusted our very proper teacher, :D ooops, J Also, this weekend I went surfing of the 200 ft foam board they rent to us big new guys, the thing was mammoth, but man, what a blast. I went down there with two girls who were trying to find a group to go down and everyone kept bailing out on them. We had so much fun, we just hit the bus and rolled for an hour down, then surfed, swam, ate at cheese burger in paradise, cause it was the same price as mcdonalds on Waikiki, and then took a two hour bus ride home, which was kind of an accident, but we got home right, :D But anyway, things are going good, I’d love to hear from you guys a bit more, drop me a line sometime.

Enjoy,

Al