Close the door!!

I'm on vacation and on the way to Disney.. We are taking the slow route to Florida.. We left Saturday and got all the way to Brooklyn! Left car at my friend Michelle's house and went into Manhattan for a pre-NY Anime Fest show. My friend's old dance troop was preforming so we went over to check it out. They are a super cute trio who dance to J-Pop and Anime songs.. After them a guy came up and sung a few songs, he was good too so it was a fun time. While we were at the show Jessie's friend Charles showed up and the 4 of us hung out for a while, we went over to the Mets Clubhouse shop because it was close by but didn't buy anything. After that Jessie wondered off with Charles and Me and Michelle went to Perfect Pint in NYC for dinner. I had The Perfect Cheese Steak which is "ny strip steak, applewood bacon guinness barbecued onions with irish cheddar and porter cheese", it was so good but oh so not healthy.. After dinner we went back to Michelle's house and played Mario Party with her room mates.

Went to bed far too late and woke up too early.. Long drive again... This time to NJ.. I know, we are getting real far in our journey towards Florida... Stopped at Matt's house and went over to a Chowderfest. Chowderfest is outdoors, sounds good right? Smeggin' weather didn't want to cooperate, it was cold and windy and if that was not enough it started to rain as soon as we bought our tickets. Was standing in line doubting the intelligence of going but oh well... It actually ended up being a really good time. They have two tents setup, one for "white chowder" and one for "red chowder", because of the rain everyone was staying under the tents and you really had to push your way to the front to get to the chowders. First place we went was a red chowder and it tasted like tomato soup. Left the red tent and me and Jessie waded into the white tent while Matt, Daniel and Sile went to get other food.. Once we got our system of pushing down we actually made it through the tent pretty quickly, most of them were good but the best was Panzone's Pizzza & Pasta which took 3rd place in the White category. This place Stefano's ended up winning both the red and the white but they were both crappy.. They must pay people off because they apparently win almost every year. Honestly I didn't have many of the reds but the one I liked the best won 2nd place in Reds.

After the fest we came back to Matt's house, Sile made home made Fish and Chips for dinner! So good... I took pics of the making process and the end process but my Droid cable is in the car so I won't be uploading any pics today.. Well, at least not yet... Went to bed super early (9:30) and slept for about 12 hours! My body really was in need of that after coming back from CA..

---

Speaking of coming back from California.. Wednesday night I went to AT&T Park to see the Giants play the DBacks. I was going to take the train but ended up missing it, I was standing in line to buy my train ticket when the train left... Oh well, at least I didn't buy the ticket yet. Driving to AT&T Park shouldn't be too bad anyway, it's about 40 miles from Santa Clara and it was before rush hour so no problem.. /sigh... It took me almost 2 hours to get there and I got to park in the main A lot for $30!! What a bargain.. The stadium is in a beautiful area, it's right up against the SF Bay, the right field wall is right up against the water. I got in about 15 mins before the game and walked around the stadium, by the time I got to my seat the first batter had already hit a home run and the DBacks were up 1-0. The view from the seats were awesome and the people next to me were really cool. The guy right next to me was a season plan holder and he originally lived in NY and was a fan of the Giants before they moved to CA so we talked a lot about Ebbets Field, the Polo Grounds and even Shea when it first opened. In the 4th inning I decided to go eat, the food on the upper level was not very exciting but the food on the field level was.. I got a crab sammich which was on butter toasted bread and served with cheese, it was very tasty! Unfortunately for me, while I was in line for food the Giants rallied and scored 3 runs to take a 3-1 lead. That was the final score which means all the runs were scored while I was not at seat.

Thursday was flight back day, but the flight was not till 10:45pm so I went up to Muir Woods after class and before my flight. The Muir Woods are right above SF and very beautiful! I posted pics on Flickr, go check them out. I don't think pictures can truly capture the amazing awe inspiring brilliance but they are still nice.. I felt very recharged from wondering the woods.. In the back of the parking lot they have a "first amendment area", it was a taped off area of the parking lot with sign saying this area was set aside for freedom of speech...

The flight from SF to Detroit was quick and I slept for most of it. The flight from Detroit to Boston was really annoying... We got on the plane in time for an "on-time departure" but the luggage people took way too long to load the plane to we ended up leaving about 20 mins late. Now the fun starts! Started to rise (got to about 10,000 feet) and they realized the door was not closed correctly. Had to turn around and land back in Detroit to reclose the door! Landed, opened door, closed door, refueled the plane and were ready to go again... Unfortunately now it was an "in-air incident" which means lots of paperwork... Left about 3 hours later than we were supposed to... Once in the air I slept again for a bit of the flight and then watched some Glee.

Ran home, showered and went to meet Becca for lunch.. I didn't even unload the car first because of all the delays in Detroit.. After she went to work I came home and started laundry and the process of getting ready for vacation.. Lynz came over for dinner and finished helping me pack..

And now the story wraps back around... About to leave NJ and head to my Uncle's house in West Virginia..

--Diversion of the Day

Time travel has a lot of turbulence...

Flight from Tokyo to Houston was very turbulent, I really didn't get much sleep on that flight. I did however watch Get Smart of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Get Smart was sorta disappointing, it was good, just not as good I was expecting. I guess the more I think about it, it was good a good movie, it's not the kind of movie I would own. Indiana Jones was just as good as the previous Indiana Jones movies, I went into that movie with no expectations because everyone told me how bad it was. Let me say that I was never an enormous Indiana Jones fan, I put them in the same league as the Romancing the Stone movies, I liked them but they didn't define my childhood.

On the flight from Houston to Boston I had a entire row all to myself so I laid out and slept the whole flight. I didn't even get up for the food service.. :)

I am now a Silver Elite member on Continental Airlines, which means I get to board early, I get to go through the "elite" security lines and if there are open business class seats available when I check in for my flight I automatically get upgraded.. :D I didn't get upgraded on either of these flights, but I am looking forward to my next flight and having that happen.. The security line is a big advantage and I did get to use that in Tokyo and in Houston, it was amazing how quick I got through security in Houston..

Today I am going to Maine with Jessie, Lynz and Anja to see Great Big Sea.

----
The Lions beat the Giants today in Game 1 of the Japan Series by a score of 2-1.

---Diversion of the Day
Legend of the Seeker promo 1

Finally in Japan..

Just arrived at my hotel and unpacked.. Woke up later than I wanted to and ran to Boston Logan Airport. I was reminded how much I hate Logan. First of all the parking lot is way far away from the terminal and the bus takes forever to get there, which is really only a problem because of the cold weather and having to stand outside waiting for the bus.. I checked in and went to the security section which was re-done, now they have three lines. First line is for families, second for occasional travellers and third for expert travellers, I jump in the expert traveller line which was a mistake because they have no way of controlling who goes into which line so the expert line was the slowest because they only had one security officer. Not to mention the fact that someone removed the rope between family and expert so the families were coming over too.. It took me over 30 minutes to go through the security line.

A kid sat in the row in front of me and would not stop screaming the whole flight so I didn't get much sleep. I arrive in Houston and found that might flight to Tokyo was delayed from 10:50am to 2:35pm so I got to hang out in the Houston airport. Flight to Tokyo was really nice and I slept for most of it, unfortunately it's now 9:00pm and I'm not really tired. I am going to go out and wander around the hotel for a bit before bed.

As I came off the plane I saw a sign that just said "Finally in Japan" I thought it was rather fitting...

Hate-lanta Braves!!!

Friday I left Chicago, I was supposed to fly out on Continental but they were overbooked so they paid me to fly out on American.. While waiting for the American flight I chatted with a girl who was her way to a college visit.. I sat down in the American terminal and I apparently sat in a broken seat, after almost falling on my ass I saw a girl sitting across the terminal laughing at me. We ended chatting till her flight left, she was a senior in high school heading up to a college for the weekend so they could woo her into coming there. She swims and is looking at a swim scholarship..

Got home and ran around like crazy to get everything together for Lynz's birthday. Made a spinach salad with scallops, bacon, tomato, mushroom and a homemade balsamic ricotta dressing. I also made a maki roll with tuna and an attempt at the wasabi ricotta, I say attempt because it came out pretty "eh". Not sure what it needed, but it certainly needed something.. Ended up trying to write in the card while Lynz was driving up to the house, finished the card while she was here...

Used my new alarm clock on Saturday morning for the first time, it was great. The new alarm I got is http://www.hammacher.com/publish/70460.asp it has a light that gradual comes on while it plays nature sounds and sends off aroma. At the end of the sequence (30 minutes) it sounds an actual buzzer, if you set the alarm for 6:45 the light, sound and smell starts at 6:15 and the buzzer goes off at 6:45.. This clock not only works as a "sunrise" clock, but it also functions as a "sunset" clock reversing the process (light full to off, nature sounds and scents for 30 mins).

Saturday I went for a walk in the woods while waiting for Jessie to get home, when she did we went to visit my dad. Saturday night we went to see Atwater & Donnelly ( http://www.atwater-donnelly.com/ ) at the Vanilla Bean Cafe in Pomfret with Lynz, John, Anja, Sara and Ryan. After the concert Sara and Ryan came back to the house and I showed the Chicago pictures on the TV.. I am hoping to get around to posting pics on Myspace, I will post a quick headsup if/when I do that for all those interested.

Today I went with Elizabeth and my dad to the Mets game, for those of you who don't know I have Sunday season tickets to Shea. It was a great game till the 9th!! Today was Shea Stadium Tin day, Subway sponsered the give away today. Went down to Subway on the field level to get a sammich before the game started and they didn't have anymore wheat bread, if that was not enough they also didn't have anymore of the cold cuts needed to make a BMT or Spicy Italian!!! How do they possibly sponser a give away at the stadium and not even have the cold cuts to make their most standard sandwich... So, everday the Mets have a kid playing home run derby on the Wii up on the Diamond Vision. If the kid hit a home run in 3 pitches he get a copy of MLB '08 for the Wii, what happens if the kid does *not* hit a homerun? Well, he gets a copy of MLB '08 for the Wii of course?! They had a kid up today who missed 4 pitches and they gave him the game anyway.. I can understand giving him some kind of second place prize, but the same thing for winning or losing?

I'm heading to bed - have to work in the morning and I have an appointment tomorrow to start the ball rolling on my achilles tendon surgeries.

---- Comic of the day
http://www.xkcd.com/392/

---- Thought of the day
You are who you are because of the decisions you made in the past - if you reget those decisions you reget the person you are today.

Welcome to Cold and Rainy Chicago...

Update from last week... Went with Elizabeth on Thursday and she got a new phone (Chocolate 3). John and I didn't hang out on Thursday because he needed to catch up on sleep.. Mon-Wed he had classes so he was up late.. Instead Jessie made raw pasta sauce on Thursday night which was awesome... Friday I went to Lynz's house for lunch and had leftover pasta sauce before going for a nice long ride with Matt. Dinner with Matt was good, but good god that sword fish was spicy..

Saturday Lynz, Anja and Mike came over and we went for lunch before playing Catan.. Hold on to your seat, but I lost Catan, Mike won!! Riverfire was cancelled due to the rain but we ended up seeing a really good show at VSC, me and Lynz ended up standing in the doorway for most of the show while Anja ran around in the rain... Gotta love kids sometimes...

So... Now on to new things... Yesterday I flew into Chicago, actually got an earlier flight and got in just around when the Mets game was starting. The flights were good, the Hartford to Newark flight was quick and I was in a row by myself. The flight to Chicago was PACKED, they were offering $400 and a room in Newark to anyone who would take a flight the next day.. I met a guy who was flying from the UK on the plane, he was a cool guy.. Unfortunately there was a newborn baby in the row directly behind me who decided he would yell/cry for almost the entire trip, luckily I had my iPod and headphones to drown out most of it.. Sunday night I ate at Red Robin...

Today.. I went to work and found that I only have two students this week, they didn't ask any questions during lecture and they were done with their labs around 1:30.. I tried to go to Borrowed Earth (the raw vegan lunch place) but they are closed on Mondays.. After work I went into the city and wondered around in the area of the Chicago Diner..

Saw lots of "cool" shirts in a few stores, here is a sampling of them:
Some of these are not direct quotes because my memory is not perfect...
Stick figure man with penis - under says Weapon of Ass Destruction
Picture of a fork and knife and a cat
Alright I'm sorry, unfuck you!
shh, hey you.. Less talky more sucky
what starts in the mouth stays in the mouth
I fucking <3 Fucking I really wonder who wears those, I can't imagine anyone wearing those is getting laid anytime soon.. Had good raw food at the Chicago Diner to make up for not eating it for lunch.. Dessert was a raw cocoa orange cheesecake! So good... After dinner I went to Goose Island and had a Blueberry Cubbie Ale before heading back to the hotel.. Anyway, I'm back at the hotel at the hotel now and heading to bed... I'll see you all tomorrow...
--- Comic of the day
http://www.redmeat.com/redmeat/1997-04-14/index.html

--- Thought of the day
A friend of mine started a new activity where each night they look at the best thing from the day and the worst thing from the day.. I decided to give it a shot and I recommend everyone do it.. You would be surprised at how trivial the worst thing usually is and how good the best thing usually is.. Plus it gives you time to reflect on each day.. As Ferris Bueller once said "Live moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

A Quick Stop at Home (mine and ones for sale)

I am home for a few days... I leave for Chicago on Sunday morning.. So, what's been up?

The flight from London to NJ was good, I met a cool guy and chatted with him for a bit and then we watched Iron Man.. That movie was amazing, I really want to get it and watch it on my TV so I can really enjoy it. After that movie I watched Be Kind Rewind, it had some good points but overall was not the greatest movie...

Landed at about 11 and drove to Laire.. Got to Laire around midnight, signed in and went to get food. Laire was amazing this month, it could have been the best written event I've played in a long time. I walked into game on Saturday morning with Rayhin, neither of us had any weapons so we just strolled in un-armed.. It was pretty funny... It didn't take too long for me to get a weapon, I ended up getting two swords and fighting that way for a bit. The thing about LARPing is, just because your card says you can fight with two swords does mean that you can magically fight with two swords.. :) After getting beat up by a minatour I gave up the second sword and got a shield! Saturday night we had a heirarch (dark god) ascend and cause massive death and destruction before a dragon ascended and started to fight with us. Hierarchs and Dragons are not supposed to be on the mortal plain and a Forestal was sent by the Mother (earth) to send them home. It was truly an epic battle and was one of the first times I was actually afraid that we were all going to die.

Sunday we had to go into a mystical castle to get a unicorn horn to repair the land that was destroyed Saturday night. It was a fun puzzle filled mod, we had to run away from a Succubus, fight our Dopplegangers, and solve a somewhat easy puzzle that we (I) way over thought and made it much harder than it needed to be. On Sunday we found out that one of the players was helping out demons, the Order caught him and brought him in for sentencing. He was sentenced on Monday morning.

*

Friday I have a motorcycle date with Matt and then dinner at his house.. Saturday Mike Modee is coming over to hang out and we are going to the River Fire in Putnam...

Phew, what a week...

---- Comic of the day
http://www.xkcd.com/372/

---- Thought of the day
Sometimes the simplest things in life really are the best things in life... Take for example sitting in the dark overlooking a lake and listening to nothing but crickets and your heart...

Everyone in Europe loves Obama!

Last day in Frankfurt.. I don't think I will be staying at that Courtyard again.. First - they charge for internet which is pretty common, especially in Europe.. Second - they don't a gold/platinum member lounge.. Third - Breakfast is not included and is VERY expensive.. Fourth - They make you pay for parking.. Fifth - The Bed is crazy hard.. Sixth - The checkout process sucks, they don't do the normal Marriott quick checkout.. seventh - Although they are only 10km away from work you have to take 4 major highways.. Not to mention the fact that the main Marriott is in Frankfurt center and has an underground station attached to it and EMC has an underground station about 2 blocks away.. Next time (and yes, there is a next time) that's the way to go.. Maybe I'll remember this by the time I book that trip.. :)

Crazy weekend ahead... Fly Frankfurt to London on British Air, fly from London to NJ on Virgin, go to Laire and try to stay awake.. I hope I can either borrow somebody's shaver or that I can plug mine in when I get to Laire, I have way too much of a beard to play Mr Jax..

Speaking of Laire.. Amber's car died, she is going to get a ride to NYC and John Molina is driving her to the event. Good news - I have someone to ride home with on Monday.. Bad news - I have to drive her to her school in NH, anybody want to go with me for that ride so you can keep me awake on the ride back?

I am sitting at the Frankfurt airport. This airport has two terminals.. Terminal 1 is the main terminal and has all kinds of awesome stores, bars and restaurants. Terminal 2 is the terminal I am in, we have McDonalds and a duty free store.. I just went into the gate area and there is a restaurant called Laxx. I'm sitting here trying to get wireless connection and the signal does not appear to be strong enough so.. I will try to post this once I get to London-town... I got to the airport real early, I drove a guy from class over with me and we went our seperate ways to check in and try to get earlier flights. Neither of us ended up getting earlier flights so we hung out together over in Terminal 1 for a few hours.. Good conversation and good beer.. Now a burger then a flight... Talk to you in London..

Now sitting in the London airport waiting for my flight to NJ... Amber called, her grandmother will not allow her to get a train to NY! So, Amber is not going to Laire, she is actually on her way to NH now to unpack for school... I guess Daimone will have to steal someone's weapons.. Maybe I can use the sword of the house of the sun...

I met a cool girl on the plane, she was born in Germany and lived in London for four years before moving back to Germany. She was on her way to London to her friends wedding.. We talked for awhile about how it was to live in London and how Obama was going to change the economy of the world.. It was a fun flight.. :)

---- Comic of the day
http://www.redmeat.com/redmeat/2008-07-08/index.html

---- Thought of the day
The most hopeless situations can sometimes workout if you never give up.. Like any good Mets fan will tell you.. "Ya Gotta Believe!"

Germans don’t do humor.. They do beer!

I really like this training facility. I had a banana and coffee for breakfast, salmon with rice and salad for lunch and an ice cream bar for mid day snack. All of it very good and all of it FREE!!

Booked my trip to Chicago today, AE Travel's website would not let me book Continental flights because United had flights as well and they are now really pushing United flights so I had to call on the phone to book everything. I fly out on Sunday afternoon and arrive home on Friday afternoon, the Thursday evening flight was closed to EMC from Continental, there are still seats available but not at whatever price EMC pays for them.. Other plus side of calling vs. online is that calling I was able to book a compact/economy car whereas if I had booked it online I would only been able to book a mid to full size car. So, think about this for a second.. When you book a car online EMC won't let me book a smaller/cheaper car... When you come up with a reason for that please let me know.

I found out today that my Quantas miles never got credited to my Continental one pass. I called Continental and they said I need my original boarding pass?! I am going to call Quantas and ask them if they can send me proof of me boarding the plane so that Continental can give me the credit. I also found out that I can mail Continental my Marriott reciepts and get miles based on 1 mile per $1 spent! I guess I'm going to get a bunch of miles all at once, apparently I can mail in receipts up to one year old!

I really hate time zones... I'm sitting here watching the students do labs and everyone (except Jessie) is asleep and she is out wandering Frankfurt so it's not like I can sit and chat with her...

Got a con-call at noon eastern time (6pm here)..

Con-call was exciting as always... After that I drove to a S-Bahn station and heading into the city to meet Jessie for dinner. We went to a medieval german restaurant and had steak and sausages, it was ok. They did have really good mead and on the way out we saw that the waitress was playing Catan with a guy!

After dinner we went to a heavy metal club called Speak Easy, there was only 3 people there (the bartender, a guy playing pinball and another guy who was really cool). We ended up spending a long ass-time there chatting with the bartender and the other guy. We heard lots of good music and had a few beers.

Just got back to the hotel, posting this blog and heading to bed...

On to tomorrow and new and exciting things.. :)

Just a quick hi to everyone back home.. I miss you all and will see you when I get back...

London ate my bag again?!

Finally got a bunch of sleep last night, well I guess thats a relative term.. :)

Today was travel day.. On the flight from Cork to London I met a 19 year girl who is going to study in New Zealand to be a Horse Dentist. She was very cool, we had a very good conversation. As Tyler Durdin would say she was a great single serving friend.

The flight left Cork late and therefore arrived in London an hour late. I got off the plane with 45 minutes to get on the next flight which was in a different terminal, if you've ever been to Heathrow you know it's a big ass-airport. I had to run (literally) all the way from Terminal 1 to Terminal 2. Made it to the plane just in time. The flight from London to Frankfurt was good, I listened to Storm Large (see yesterday's post) and read a book.

I got to Frankfurt for the real fun... My luggage is in London, apparently the people at Aer Lingus made a typo when booking my bag so it was not put on the plane. They have the bag and are sending it to me, I should have it tomorrow. Went to Avis and they only standard cars which is not the biggest deal since I can drive it but it takes some getting used to. The problem is that Jessie can't drive it..

Had McDonalds tonight (I guess I have to eat fast food on the first night in a new country) because I got here too late for anything to be open.

Tomorrow is German Heavy Metal!!! Oh, and maybe clothes shopping so I have something to wear?!

Cork Ireland - The center of the world??

For those of you who don't know, I drove to Newark NJ late Thursday night/early Friday morning and flew to Cork Ireland via London. I am here for a week teaching and then I go to Frankfurt Germany to teach for a week before heading back to NJ for the Laire 4-day. What have I done to prepare for this trip?? Nothing... I almost tried to learn some German but never found the time, I was going to look up cool things to do here in Cork and also never had the time. So, here I am flying by the seat of my pants..

My flight from NJ to London was nice, the plane was mostly empty so I got to lay out in a row of 4 seats (I actually fit laying flat without my feet even hanging off the end of the seats). I slept a little bit on that flight but didn't want to overdo the sleeping because I need to be in this timezone.. Anyway, I hung out in Heathrow airport for a few hours and decided I didn't want to eat there because it's always a hassle to expense stuff in London because of the GBP and VAT. If you've never flown from London to Ireland it should be noted that Aer Lingus has their own little section of Heathrow, there is a bar about half way between the main terminal and the Aer Lingus section and another bar at the gates.. I went through 5 security check points in Heathrow (1 - passport control of plane, 2 - they took a picture of me and gave me a bar code at the 2nd one [didn't know why], 3 - checked bag and had to go through metal detector, 4 - customs with bags, 5 - took my barcode and loaded picture (from 2) on the database to see if it was me)

The flight to Cork was full, the girl next to me made a comment about Ireland being the Center of the World because you can fly from Ireland to almost anywhere in the world in under 10 hours.

When we landed it Cork my first surprise was that the plane lets you on the runway and you have walk to the terminal (it was about 40 degrees and raining HARD), funny side note to that was that my coat was in my checked luggage.. Got to the hotel around midnight, checked in and went to get food.. Well, my decision to not eat in Heathrow ended up being the wrong one, apparently you can't get food in Cork after 10pm unless you consider McDonalds and Burger King food.. Well, after my Buger King bacon double cheeseburger I ended up at a "lap dancing club" for a Guiness before heading back to the hotel for my pushups. (4 hours sleep + long flights + burger king + guiness = really tough pushups)

So, on to today...
I woke up around the crack of noon and went out to check out Cork in the daytime. I decided to walk to the Beamish brewery to do a tour, on the way I stopped at a bagel place and had a multi-seed bagel with bacon, cream cheese, guacamole and tomato and a latte. Got to the brewery to find out they only run tours on Tuesday and Thursdays from 10:30am - noon?! So, where to now? The clouds decided to part so I decided today would be a good day for a double decker tour of Cork, I found a tour that did a run of Cork City and then went to Blarney Castle for a few hours. The tour of Cork was pretty lame really, the only cool things were they have a cathedral with 4 clocks (one on each side of the tower), they it the four faced liar, apparently all 4 clocks have different times and not one of them ever has the correct time!? The other cool thing is that apparently Cork is a shortened Gaelic word that means Marsh. Then the bus went onto a highway and went over to Blarney village, I was on the top of an open air bus, great idea till you hit highway speeds!

Blarney village was a pretty nice little town and the castle was really nice but was really great was the land around the castle. First of all, I did NOT kiss the Blarney stone, I did walk up to it and take a picture, but I did NOT kiss it. I walked around in the castle looking at all the rooms, it was pretty neat to see. When I left the castle I walked around the grounds and came to an ancient tree, the tree felt like one of the warmest places in the world, I went up and sat under the tree and could feel my energies hit overcharge levels. When I walked away I felt all tingley, as I continued my walk around the grounds I found a cave system that went under the castle, they had some small lights in the cave. I went in there and my energy levels and connection to the earth continued to grow, I ended up walking all the way into the cave till I hit a cave in. Went back out and started to leave the castle grounds. I got almost out when I decided to go back to the tree one last time. sat under the tree again for a few minutes and took some rocks from the base of the tree.

I felt like I was floating as I walked back to the mill shops and the bus. Walked around the shops for a bit before the bus left and got some really cool stuff. What I didn't get was a really nice wool cape sorta like this one (http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3LmJsYXJuZXkuY29tL2NhdGFsb2cvZGlzcGxheS9wcm9kdWN0X2RldGFpbHMucGhwP2lkPTYxMDY=), it was a light purple color and would look amazing on my lady folk but the price and size uncertainity scared me away. I did end up spending too much money on other stuff including a really nice greenman necklace (bought that before going to castle) for me.

Back to hotel...
A friend of mine who I used to work with in Hopkinton came and met me for dinner. We went to an Indian place and I got Tandori Quail and some Nan, afterwards we went to a pub for a pint and now I'm back in the hotel typing this up. I think I am going to head back out and see if I can find any live music at one of the local pubs.

I will try to blog more often, I know I said this before but I feel like there are so many people I want to update on my daily occurances and if I did that the phone bills would be out of control..