Living Spontaneously

A mini Stadium reunion occurred this past weekend on the beautiful islands of St. Thomas and St. John in the Caribbean. This was an impromptu reunion, an exercise in living spontaneously, what with Saturday morning flights purchased two days prior. Let me just say: live spontaneously, we did. Elliot and his friend Nick ("Nasty Nick"), who turns out to be a pretty cool dude, came down for a visit. These are [our] stories (I hope someone gets that reference):

Day 1:

Elliot and Nick woke up at 4:00am to begin their journey to the Caribbean. Arriving at 11:40am, I met them outside Cyril E. King International Airport and we had hugs all around. Elliot and Nick were the first people to visit me on The Rock and so I was, admittedly, rather excited to show outsiders around the crazy place (unofficial motto of the island: Welcome to St. Thomas, You Can't Make This Shit Up.)

From the airport, we drove immediately to my one room bungalow to drop some shit off. Here are pictures of Elliot on my patio:



After we were done, we hopped into the trusty Ford Fiesta and drove the windy roads across the island to Red Hook on the east end of the island where we planned to catch the ferry to St. John. We hopped on the 1 o'clock ferry and took the twenty minute ride to St. John. Here's a picture from the ferry:




Once we got to St. John, we rented some snorkel equipment and made the twenty minute walk to Honeymoon Beach. Honeymoon Beach is in the middle of Virgin Islands National Park, and is located such that it's remote enough that it's never crowded, but close enough that it's not a problem to get to. At Honeymoon Beach, we snorkeled, chilled, walked the sand, and generally did "the beach thing". This is what I'm talking about:





Honeymoon Beach is gorgeous. Unfortunately, I don't have any pics of the cool sea-life we saw, but I will tell you we saw sea turtles, two types of rays, lots of fish and coral, and there were rumors on the beach of a nurse shark (but we didn't get to peep it).

So, we left Honeymoon beach and we went to an aweosme bar called Iguana Grill. Iguana grill opened right across from Wet Woody's, which is a St. John institution famous for it's excellent happy hour deals, awesome atmosphere, sweet name, and strong pours. Iguana Grill opened a few months back, made their happy hour an hour longer, had the same deals, and offered more seating. Excellent business plan. Excellent way to piss off the other bar. Here's a picture of Woody's (you can't beat the ambience):



And here are some pics of us at Iguana Grill:





I'm not going to mince words: we're equal opportunity drinkers, and we're going where we can drink the longest, for the cheapest, and actually be able to sit down. So we went to Iguana. We still grabbed a brew from Woody's Express Window to drink on the street, just so we could tell our grandchildren about it.

After Iguana (18 beers, 18 bucks, bitches!), we loitered for a bit:



And then we went to Rhumb Lines. Rhumb Lines is a fantastic place. They serve Asian/Caribbean fusion and awesome drinks. They have fabulous servers that act like they like me, and they have begun to give me free drinks as a result. The bar at Rhumb Lines has swings for seats (if you want them), serves Fernet-Branca (delicious), and has a live guitarist who puts up with my drunken requests. I can't ask for more. Here's a picture of us at Rhumb Lines:



And one with our bartender:



After Rhumb Lines, we hung out on the beach for a while, had a pretty strange experience with some strung out locals (ask Elliot), met a man named Whisky (!), and then took the ferry back to St. Thomas.

I have no more pictures from Saturday, but just because I know you're all so curious to hear what we did, we went back to Red Hook, met up with some friends of mine at an Irish bar (St. Patrick's Day, after all), and then went home to sleep.

Day 2:

We woke up (early!), and ventured back to Molly Malone's for brunch. Highlights of our hungover morning were the pancake wraps (sausage, egg, cheese, wrapped in pancake) and grilled cheese with egg (Nasty Nick's a vegetarian - what a bitch).

After breakfast, we had made plans with a friend of mine to go back to St. John and rent a dinghy for the day! This meant that we got to take a little Zodiac with a 15hp motor and cruise around the north shore of the island, stopping as we pleased to go to beaches, snorkel, etc. And this, my friends, is where the pictures get EPIC!

Nasty Nick drivin' the yacht:



And Elliot straddling the boat:



But wait, what's that I spot? A jolly roger on the high seas? Where real pirates like Captain Kidd and Blackbeard actually roamed?







And lastly, Pajo and Nasty Nick posing with the flag:



While this only brings us through Sunday afternoon, I have no more pictures to share. I can assure you all, however, that the rest of Elliot and Nasty Nick's visit involved pools, beaches, beer, urchin spines in the foot, and Elliot passing a fart so smelly it made me vomit.

Yes, that actually happened.

Jolly (Roger) Times in NY

About time I got around to this...about damn time...

You guys probably already knew this, but over spring break Toto and I went road trippin' to NYC and Washington D.C.

I'm not going to write a whole lot about it because I've forgotten most of the relevant details, but we've got some pictures and a new tradition (probably, we'll see). Think Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants but less utterly lame and with A LOT more piracy.



Yup, that's me rocking the Stadium-110 Jolly Roger on the Brooklyn bridge in front of all of Manhattan and apparently feeling incredibly fucking sublime about the whole damn thing!

Nonberg, don't worry, you'll get your flag back...eventually...probably.



Toro!





As you've already inferred, NY was a lot of fun.

It was interesting driving in from New Jersey, which--near New York--was a massive industrial park/shit-hole. Then we payed something exorbitant like $8 to go through a tunnel and wound up right in the middle of Manhattan.

I found it pretty impressive how many people there are constantly streaming all over Manhattan no matter what the time of day or night.

We made it to all five boroughs (Queens for all of a 5 minute walk from Brooklyn to Manhattan), and saw lots of different neighborhoods (Dominican, Puerto Rican, Hasidic Jew, et alibi). We had a lot of good food. Good times all around.

This wins the prize for the best-intentioned-yet-most-poorly-executed street naming ever:



This little church has no business being in Manhattan between these giant skyscrapers:



No more than this turkey has no business hanging around outside the coast guard office there:



Finally, Grand Central Station is pretty sweet for several reasons. 1) This small dome-ceilinged part of the passageway around the main atrium (Toto will have to help me out with exactly where it is):



You can stand at one corner, and have someone else stand across the diagonal, then put your face a few inches from the wall as if you are being punished, and speak into the wall at normal volume. The person across from you will be able to hear you as if you are talking right next to them. Very cool.

And 2) sweet pictures like these:



There was lots more cool stuff, but after a few days we headed down to D.C. where we saw Elliot, Liz, Freho, Jen, and Barb which was equally awesome. Also, Ben's Chili Bowl; delicious. Maybe the best drunk food anywhere.

If you end up with a pirate flag sometime in the future, you know what to do.

A Cosmic Week...

Last week, the cosmos spoke to me.

It started actually longer than a week ago, with finding out about a certain member of the ocho's secret hidden relationship with a certain current senior at Carleton. News spread through the digital network due to my drunk ass and my phone, but we still desire to know more, my friend.

So that was cool. But besides the fact that I thought much of on its own, I didn't think much of it from a connected perspective... that is until the universe started to talk to me.

Last Tuesday, I was looking up the list of staff working at Good Ol Pendalouan this year (Fyi - I'm going back as the Asst. Program Director / Teen Director, so not as a counselor, but as a more supervisory/leadership role). I noticed a freshman from Macalester had been hired. I thought, "Whoa! Minnesota! Crazy." Its not that unheard of though, because Brenner had worked there and a few years ago there was a Gusty (but he wasn't a douche... i know weird). But then I looked at the name. It looked VERY familiar... I thought maybe she had a sibling at Carleton. I typed in the name in stalkernet and viola! IT'S DARA'S SISTER! I didn't know how to react. I texted Toto right away.

(708): DUDE SMALL WORLD: DARA'S SISTER IS GOING TO WORK AT MY CAMP THIS SUMMER!?

I realized that working under me was going to be the sister of a girl who wasn't exactly on my good side when I last saw her. Would I harbor feelings of resent? Would it affect my work? I know i'd have to tell this girl that I knew her sister, but how?

Toto texted me back, amuzed.

(612): hahahaha

BUT THEN he texted me again saying

(612): also, one of my friends, unprompted, started singing "you've lost that loving feeling" today

BAM! Right then and there, I knew something was up. Cosimic shit was abrewing. What was the universe trying to tell me? Was it building up to this weekend? Why was it sending me Ocho references up the wazoo? Little did I know, more was to come.

That night, there was a stupid free food thingy in the great hall sponsored by the Res Life and some of us went to get some free food. Turns out it was waffles and turns out Irene, our wonderful and amazing stadium RA from fall term, was making them. As she made them, she brought up that time where she had leftover breakfast stuff from a Cross Country Breakfast, and the ocho invaded her room, hungover as shit and in our pjs, and ate breakfast with her.

THEN, the next day, I was walking up the back stairs of Willis to 4th Willis to see Prof. Kim Smith because I bombed her midterm for Constitutional Law. On the way up I passed the door to the clocktower. Needless to say, I tried to open it, as I do with most doors that I walk by that I've never been in. but right there at 9am on Wednesday morning... it was open. I quickly went to talk to Kim, thinking about the clocktower the ENTIRE time. Afterwards, I snuck inside the door trying not to have the door make a loud noise. Let me say guys, its intense. There is a small stairway, a ton of electronics for KRLX and the bells, and then a lot of space... I had to get to class, but I definitely wish I had the ol Ocho Jolly Roger from the crow's nest.

Then there was the Conference Meet, which was powerful and amazing as always. We got to reunite with some of you and for those precious moments. Ted, Brooke and I appreciated texting with you during diving. We knew you'd have the answer to our specific questions.

Then there was 40ozs. Oh man. Too. Much. Fun. To the alums who made it down, everyone was talking the next day about how great it was to party with you that night. The men's team circle jerk, the Cobra, Seamus's dream, the cake, yada yada yada (that was epic), the creepy hispanic kid with no shoes or friends, Nonberg's freshman fun, and the late night hilarity, as well as the stadium-110ish morning recollection session/debrief the next morning was great too. GOOD FUCKIN TIMES.

And to put the cherry on top of the cosmic time, I loaded up on bacon the next morning because Toto told me to. And then I slept all day, and was fucked on Monday. Worth it? Yes.

Crazy. Cosmic. Week.

I'm Down With Tim's 12 Step Program

So I think yesterday was one of the greatest days of my life.

Just putting that out there.


What made it so great? Well we all woke up, planning to watch Lord of The Rings because its fuckin awesome, but then realized it was way too nice out to be inside staring at a screen for even more than an hour. After Alfredo found various types of currency in my L. Ron Hubbard book (more about this at some other time), we decided that the best thing to do was use our new found fortune to buy some burritos. So Toto, Dave, Ted, Annie and I headed over to the mexican market for some yum yum. We decided that since it was so nice outside, we should eat them on the bleachers.

Did I say bleachers? I meant pirate ship. We hoisted the jolly roger as any good pirate would.

We then pretty much spent the entire day out there.

For further analysis, let's take a step back and review a post made by our dear friend Tim at the beginning of the term. Tim provided 12 Steps to The Best Spring Term ever... Let's go through them and see how many applied yesterday.

1. Good music - We had The Decemberists playing on a iPod player until batteries ran out and after that, we got serenaded by Johnny V (aka Buster/Viggy Stardust/JV)'s soothing banjo playing.

2. Outdoor cooking. We BBQed on Friday so it counts, because this weekend is one big ball of fun.

3. Outdoor sports. The Vortex, 16in Softball, and an IM Softball game. Nuff said.

4. Minimal studying. Let me just say this: Tim and I told ourselves the day before we were going to work on our final paper for our 5 week Diplomacy class... and at the moment I am at the library trying to figure out a thesis.

5. Good weather. BAM!

6. Rotblatt. Doesn't apply, but will be awesome.

7. Spring Concert. Same as above.

8. Baseball Challenge. Same as above.

9. Plenty of Ocho parties. We haven't been having as many people over lately, but we have had what I consider the only two things I ever need for an enjoyable evening: good company and good music.

10. Live blogging. Toto watched me as I drunkenly blogged about those damn murderous egyptians. Does that count?

11. No inhibitions. We ate free Cheese/hoisted a pirate flag/watched Top Gun AND Tropic Thunder and have been giving 100% at everything we've been up to lately.

12. Beer (or other booze). This is a given. Although the decathlon (10 different drinks throughout the course of an evening) failed, we did a powerhour and also drank a lot and drank well.

So by my count, we succeeded at 9 out of 12... Sounds good to me.

Best Mid-Term Break ever? I mean its all relative, but to me, I had the fuckin time of my life...