Saturday, March 29, 2008
spring break! woo!
I've been promising this for awhile, so three weeks later, here it is.We left at 6pm on a Friday night because we didn't want to wait until Saturday morning. Jake drove for something like 9 hours, taking us to southern Illinois, if I recall correctly. We slept in the car at a rest stop for a couple hours then I drove us the rest of the way to Missouri. Our first stop was the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. Unfortunately, the arch is really much too big to take all in one shot, so I made this instead.
There wasn't much else to do in St. Louis, at least not the area we were in, so after a delicious lunch at some local Italian restaurant, we got back in the car and headed for Oklahoma City. We didn't do anything there but sleep and took off fairly early Sunday morning - the Weather Channel was warning everybody about a massive storm that was coming in from the West, so we figured we'd better head out quick. Fortunately for us, we drove right under it with literally about 17 sprinkles hitting our windshield at a couple different points. Driving through Texas it was pretty windy, and we both saw our first live-action tumbleweed. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of that.
We didn't bother to stop in Texas except to switch drivers and maybe get a tank of gas. We ended up in Albuquerque (NM) that evening around 5pm. The city is literally surrounded by mountains; it was quite pretty (especially for someone coming from the delightfully flat plains of the Midwest).
I was under the impression that we were going to stop there for the night, but Jake decided that we should get inside the AZ border before we rested, so after hitting a couple malls for my benefit, we were off again. We stopped in a little town called Holbrook in AZ and slept at the Sahara Inn.
On our way to Flagstaff, we saw signs for the Meteor Crater, so we decided to go see it. It's just out in the middle of the desert, but we were at about 6,000ft elevation so it was still pretty cold, and we got winded rather quickly from climbing all the stairs. But the view was pretty sweet.
Apparently this thing is nearly a mile across and something like 500 feet deep. We spent some time there, taking pictures and wandering through the museum, then continued on.
We met up with my brother Jeremy that afternoon when he got out of work and followed him back to his place, where I finally got to meet his wife, Sonya. She was about 8.5 months pregnant (due any day now!), and she's one of those women who's beautiful pregnant (I'd post pictures, but I dunno if she'd want me to. She's on my myspace for those of you with the privilege of being my friend there). That night she and her mom made us shrimp fettucini for dinner (they're living with Sonya's parents until June), and her mom offered to let us stay in their guest room while we were in town, which was very fortunate for us (I still need to send them a thank-you for that).
For the next couple days, we meandered around Phoenix and the surrounding area while Jer was at work, then spent the evenings with him and Sonya. The first day (Tuesday) we drove to South Mountain and did some hiking on the trails and picture-taking.
That night we had dinner at Ruby Tuesday's; I was disappointed to find that the strawberry lemonade was not as delicious as I had remembered it being (they added too much strawberry to the ratio). But Jer's friend Bryce came out too (he just recently moved to AZ from MI; he's helped me out with my car a time or two).
Wednesday we went shopping (again for my benefit) then went back to Jer and Sonya's and watched them open the Christmas presents I never got around to sending, along with some late baby shower gifts. Then we had ice cream for dinner that evening (from Cold Stone Creamery), Jer's treat, before Jake and I left Phoenix and made our way north to the Grand Canyon. We actually stayed in a hotel somewhere near Flagstaff, and made it to the Canyon on Thursday.
The Canyon was cold, but it was a bright sunny morning, so I got some great pictures. Unfortunately for you, loyal readers, I haven't put together a panorama yet, so you'll just have to settle with a couple pieces.
(the windy line running down the middle is a trail. If you look closely, you can see a darker line running along the left of that - that would be the Colorado River).
After extensive picture-taking and a little hiking on one of the trails, we got bored and headed for Vegas. To our surprise (us being the naive easterners that we are) the road we took acros the AZ/NV border just so happened to pass right by the Hoover Dam. Of course we stopped.
We made it to Las Vegas as it was starting to get dark, so we got to see all the pretty lights upon our grand entrance. It's really quite an impressive sight.
This was our hotel, the Excalibur. We booked it on Orbitz.com for a whole $68 total, taxes and everything. It's quite an impressive place - free valet parking! We spent Thursday night wandering up and down the strip; we walked through some of the hotel/casino/lounge/shopping centers, but we were pretty tired from all of our wandering so we went back to our hotel sometime around 11pm or so (keep in mind, that was like 3am our time - I don't think I ever fully adjusted to the zone changes).
The next morning (Friday) we continued wandering, which included a trip into the Flamingo Hotel's neat exotic bird garden (it was free!) and into Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum at the Venetian Hotel (which was not free - actually, it was a little pricey).
Flamingos at the Flamingo.
Around 1pm or so, we went back to our hotel to explore it a little more. I bought a ridiculously-overpriced strawberry daiquiri because it came in a cool glass souvenir cup, and we each put a dollar in the 2ยข slots, but unfortunately neither of us hit it big (though Jake always has better luck on slots than I do). Around 3pm we gathered our bags and headed for home. We drove straight through Colorado, Utah, Nebraska, and Illinois without stopping for anything except gas and food; Jake drove until about 3am then I took over until sometime early Saturday afternoon. Driving that early in the morning is an experience in itself, out in the middle of nowhere. A deer ran across the road right in front of me and made me paranoid for the next hour or so, but the horizon started to lighten around 5am and I felt better.
We made it back to Jake's at about 2am our time Sunday morning; just in time to set the clock ahead for daylight savings time.
If you've never taken a road trip across the country, I strongly recommend it.
Posted by Rachel at 10:32 AM |
Saturday, March 22, 2008
I did some research on Thursday concerning the rest of my college career, and I do in fact have to wait until December to graduate. They're not offering one of the classes I need for my major until fall - an English class concerning editing, which, given my tentative career path, would probably be useful. I'm also taking an infant development class and a class on motivation to finish out my minor. Fortunately for me, the 3 classes I need will fit neatly into a Monday-Wednesday 2:30-7pm schedule, and as of December I'll be FREEEEEEE...Free to do what, I don't know.
Posted by Rachel at 9:49 AM |
Friday, March 21, 2008
I am currently doing something to my hair that I never thought I'd do - lightening it. I've decided to step away from the black and maybe get back to my natural brown, but in the mean time I'm adding some purple, which requires some pre-lightening. I hope I don't regret this...But, while I wait for the chemicals to do their thing, I figured I'd add more to my story. I was a little pissed off when I made my last post; I think that's evident.
So Liz has packed up a few things, but to my dismay has not actually moved any of them out and says she doesn't know when she's going to. Ten days, I keep telling myself. Ten days is the longest she can possibly stay. Unfortunately, with no job and no money, she's actually going to be occupying the apartment for most of it, which seems to be the trend thus far. I think she gets up from the living room couch and pulls herself away from the T.V. about once an hour... Now I'm just being facetious.
And for the record, she is actually pregnant; also for the record, she has not actually stopped smoking. This bothers me, but it's none of my business... the baby was doomed from the start anyway. :(
The thing that made me mad was this: Tuesday I was gone all day at work and in class. The next day, the landlord called me once I got home and told me that Liz had taken her dad up there to talk to them (she still maintains that the landlord harassed her and called her a whore while I was on vacation; I'm skeptical) and that he got really aggressive with them, yelling and pointing his finger in their faces. He was still under the impression that Liz had a job, at which point she accused the landlord of calling the store she worked at to check up on her. As if they don't have better things to do with their time. She told her dad that I lied about stuff, and that the landlords were lying, and apparently he believed her, because he told them not to talk to Liz, not to say hi to her, not to even look at her while she's still here. She can't even handle her own problems or accept responsibility when she does something wrong, apparently. Apparently she has to run to daddy and tell him a bunch of lies to get him going. I bet she gloated over that one. It's irritating me just thinking about it, so I'm going to move on.
She never said a word to me about any of this; I heard it all from the landlords. I don't see why they would lie to me about any of it (though I did take the possibility into consideration - they really don't have anything to gain by it though; I know they don't like her and they know I don't like her) so I assume they were being truthful. Plus she's lied to her dad before; she faked registering for classes at Delta so that she could go to some football game. I assume that's also why he bought her a laptop - for "homework."
Meanwhile, I talked to Jeff about all of this and he's interested in moving in here. I decided that'd be pretty cool, despite his previous rent-related foibles, because A) he's got a new job, is straightening his life out, and was looking for a place anyway, and B) we don't have to sign a lease which means neither one of us is stuck here should the other leave. I took him up to meet the landlord, and they were a little hesitant at first about me living with a guy (they're pretty old-fashioned - self-proclaimed "fuddy-duddies") but I assured them that he was like a brother (they seemed more comfortable with the idea when they found out that Jake was okay with it too). Once they talked to him, they were fine with the idea, especially if it meant that Liz would be gone. He's not moving until probably May, which means I get the place to myself for a month. Plus, the landlord's giving me a break on the rent since it'll just be me here and since I'm going to school, which is pretty fantastic. Now I've just got to wait for the month to be over. 10 more days...
Posted by Rachel at 1:27 PM |
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
SO, I know I promised a spring break post, and I'll get to that. But first, allow me to inform you about all the drama currently in my life (yet another testimony as to why [most] girls piss me off).It's kind of a long story. Our landlords (this elderly-ish couple who lives upstairs in our building) have this rule where they don't let people stay the night here, especially guys. Lame, but that's not the point. Liz (my delightfully bitchy roommate, as if you didn't know) has a tendency to break said rule. She has people over during all hours of the night, and they get pretty loud. I usually stay at Jake's, especially when I have to get up early, to avoid them. Well, last week I was gone and she was here by herself, and apparently she had one of her many "friends" over 'til something like 5am. I only heard the story secondhand, but according to her, the landlord came down the next morning and called her a whore; according to them, he never said that, but told her she can't be having people over like that (which she already knows) and that maybe she should start looking for somewhere else to live.
Meanwhile, she calls me crying while I'm on vacation to tell me her side, and says that she'll take care of my cat for me because she didn't want them coming in our apartment while she wasn't there (they were supposed to take care of Clarice for me, since Liz hates any and all animals). So she bolted the door so they couldn't get in the whole week and as far as I can tell generally ignored the cat's existence for the most part.
So I come home, and hear the landlord's side of everything, and how terrible they felt about not being able to take care of Clarice for me, and how Liz is still having people over at all hours of the night and how they're "shady characters" - they're pretty rude, didn't acknowledge the landlord except to give him dirty looks (she does often have people over that I'd rather not have in my house). Last Saturday morning the landlords called me again, and told me that she'd had people over again (I was at Jake's once again) and that they wanted me to start looking for another roommate because they didn't really want her here anymore. So I told her how they weren't happy with her (minus the "find a new roommate" part), and she said, "It's okay, I'm moving back home anyway."
I said, "Oh yeah? When?"
She said, "As soon as possible. I got fired yesterday."
Well, those of you that talk to me on a semi-regular basis know that I've wanted her out for months, so this was in no way bad news.
So the next day (this last Sunday) I made the landlord a copy of the deadbolt key and told them what she'd told me. They were quite enthusiastic about having her out, and told me to go ahead and tell her to leave, otherwise they would. Well, through a series of text messages she confirmed that she is in fact moving out by April first (yay!).
She hasn't said more than two words to me since then - wait, that's not true. In the meantime (oh, about Monday) she let it slip that she's pregnant (by "let it slip" I mean, left a pregnancy test box on the bathroom counter and asked if "pregnant people could eat popcorn" - she and her sister were going to watch a movie). She said, "I'm going to smoke my last two cigarettes, and I don't want either of you to say a word."
So I said, "You know, the first couple months are the most important to the baby's development; after that it's mostly just growing."
She didn't seem to care for me adding my input. And she smoked them anyway.
Not really relevant, but moving on, she hasn't talked to me since. And she's slowly been packing up her stuff, much to my delight.
Geez, is this long enough? There's more, but I'll continue later.
Posted by Rachel at 10:25 PM |
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Just got back from vacation this morning; it was spectacular and details (and pictures) will come soon.First though, I need a favor as part of my homework for one of my English classes. It's just a survey; you don't have to be right or wrong or even look anything up. Just put in your answers for what you think the plural form of each word is:
one syllabus, many _____
one ox, many _____
one fish, many _____
one antenna, many _____
one hippopotamus, many _____
one octopus, many _____
one nucleus, many _____
one focus, many _____
Do it quick if you want to help; I need answers before Wednesday. Thanks!
