Weekend with Kristin

So this has been a very intense weekend, and yes I know I'm skipping over what's happened since the cliff incident. I'm skipping it because basically nothing other than me working every single day between Friday and Thursday happened.

On Thursday (20th) night after work I went to see District 9 with some people from work. Well at least it was supposed to be some people from work but some of them backed out at the last minute so it ended up being just Josh and I. Josh is practically the only non-manager at Culver's who has worked there longer than I have. He also just graduated college and, like me, is looking for a job. So we went to the movie and it was amazing. Such a brilliant idea and so unique from every other alien movie out there. I really recommend seeing it.

On Friday I started preparing for Kristin to arrive. Kristin was one of my best friends while I was in Australia and lives in Greenbay, Wisconsin. Why I haven't seen her before this weekend is a mystery of poor planning on our part. Anyway, she came on Friday afternoon and we ended up bringing Belle to the dog park and then going to the mall. Saw Hannah working at the pretzel place and then went to Maurice's for Kristin to get a new shirt. Wandered around for a bit and then ate dinner at Applebee's while watching the Vikings play for the first time with Brett Favre as quarterback. He sucked. On the way home we stopped at a redbox to get a movie - Push. Didn't end up watching it but played cribbage instead. Then went to bed in the basement.

Was woken up very very early by Belle whining, and of course since it was Saturday no one else in my family got up with her (to be fair, mom was away on her girl's weekend and Sara was camping). Took care of her, went back to bed for a little while, and then woke up early and got ready to go to the Renaissance Festival. Unfortunately there wasn't an actual address listed, which made it hard to find using the GPS. Kristin drove and we got there just before they opened the gate. We got in, picked up a schedule of shows and events, and planned out the day. It was brilliant - we got to see so many amazing shows and got great seats to the joust! We also ate good food there and Kristin got a few neat souvenirs. We left about 30 minutes before it closed - it was just so much fun! We got home, ate food, and then watched Push. It was pretty good, but felt like it wasn't really over when the movie ended. Rearranged our sleeping arrangements and went to sleep a bit early.

Woken up again by Belle but this time dad got up with her the second time so it was alright. Kristin was feeling a bit sick so she showered and then napped for awhile as I showered and ate breakfast. Also got coupons for the MN Zoo, which was where we were headed that day. This time I drove, and luckily since it's well known, year round, and has an actual address we got there with no delay. We toured the outdoor exhibits first - smart move considering how hot it got later in the day. Started with the tigers and worked our way around the loop. We then went inside to see the sharks and dolphins, and spent a lot of time watching the dolphins play. One of them swam up and splashed the crowd, all on its own! They were so graceful in the water, not to mention playful and fun to watch. We then went through the tropics trail and then over to the bird show. That was really exciting, and amazing what they can teach birds to do! Finally we got something to eat and headed back to Rochester. Kristin packed up and left for Greenbay and I crashed.

Today (Monday) I worked from 11 - 3:30 (was supposed to work until 4) and then came home, showered, took a little nap, and then went over to Hannah's house at 5 pm. There we watched The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers before finally calling it quits. One can only handle so much Frodo! We also talked a lot about how depressing it is to be unemployed and not going back to school. She works at the pretzel place again tomorrow and, since I don't work, I'm considering popping over to say hi. Well after the 6 hour marathon at her house I came home and watched the end of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days with Megan and Sara and then came up here to post this entry.

Over the weekend I took 342 pictures and about 11 videos. Insane. Well that's all there is, and I'm still tired from the weekend, so I'm off to bed soon.

Hanging over the cliff's edge

So today was so exciting I had to post about it. Last night Megan was sad because she had no plans for the weekend, so she and I tentatively planned to go tubing in Lanesboro today. So I set my alarm to go off at 10:30 am and went to bed.

This morning I woke up, found out that Megan was still sleeping, and so went back to bed. Woke up later and we started getting ready to go. We got dressed, started packing up towels and sunscreen and Megan looked up the directions and tried to find some tubes that weren't popped (unsuccessful in that). Eventually we managed to get into the car and get going around 12:30.

Headed south and got stuck in road construction traffic and so it took us about 40 minutes just to get out of Rochester. We kept going and started to see some rain clouds on the horizon. This is when we realized we never actually checked the weather for today. So since my aunt and uncle and cousin were down camping at a campsite near Lanesboro we called to see if it was raining and it was. We decided since it was just scattered showers and still hot we'd just keep going anyway. On the way we saw a sign for the campsite our relatives were staying at and decided to head there and just go tubing on that section of the river.

We were going up the long narrow drive up to the place when all of a sudden a huge semi truck came barrelling down the middle of the road. Megan was driving and she started moving towards the side of the road since it was narrow and we'd only both fit if we hugged the sides. The truck moved over a little but not nearly far enough and so to avoid an accident, Megan pulled over just enough so that the left wheels of the car went off the road. Unfortunately, since we were back in the hills and the road was going up the side of it, where the road ended so did the ground. Which meant the wheels were basically hanging over empty space. Okay that's a slight exaggeration, it did have a steep drop but the wheels were on ground, it just happened to be very muddy and slick and the car sank into it and basically the stuff underneath the car was resting on the asphalt.

A man and his kid who drove up behind the semi actually stopped and helped keep us from totally freaking out as I climbed into the back and out of the car and Megan set the emergency brake and climbed out as well. He corroborated our story and even remembered the kind of truck so we could send angry phone calls to the company. Called our aunt and uncle and they came and really took care of us. They called the tow place while we called our parents and our parents found out we have towing insurance and so a guy came out and hooked up the left side of the car to a crane and the right side to a tree on the other side of the road and he pulled the car up and over and there (luckily) wasn't any damage to the car.

Drove it up and parked in the campsite parking lot and there Megan and I just ate our packed lunch and tried to calm down from all the stress. Then went and played volleyball with our relatives and their friends and then borrowed some of their tubes and went tubing. Eventually got too tired and cold and headed home.

Got home and Belle was super hyper, which of course means no one did anything with her all day. So I took her to the dog park for about 30 minutes until it started raining. Then we headed home.

Well that's about it for today, other than watching George Lopez and reading Flowers in the Attic, which is a really depressing book.

I also managed to get some sun on the river, hooray for vitamin D!

Drama at the Dog Park

Sigh. So I'll start off with a story from tonight and then backtrack and try to fill in as much from the last 11 days as possible.

So around 7:30 tonight I decided to take Belle to the dog park and mom decided to join me because she'd never taken Belle there before. So we got there and she played with a cute little bloodhound for awhile and then found a cute little 3 1/2 month old black lab puppy to play with. They were playing nice together and mom was busy chatting up the owner of the other puppy when Megan, Sara, and Emily L. came and watched her play. Of course this was a bit overwhelming for me because I usually go with her alone or maybe with Megan. I don't tend to chat a lot with other owners and am very non-confrontational. A few weeks back for example there was this basset hound puppy that plays a little too rough. Megan was there with me and it just pulled or bit down a little too hard and Belle would yelp and run away (or try to) with her tail between her legs. So last time I just would pick up Belle and walk her over to a different group of dogs to play with. This time however, the basset hound was back and its owners weren't watching it hardly at all (they were sitting at a picnic table 100 yards away). Well it came and interrupted the little lab puppy playtime and started barking at them and again playing too rough. Mom got worried and tried to pull the basset off of Belle and kept saying "no" and just kept trying to separate them. The basset owners noticed and the guy started yelling "she's just a puppy, she's just barking." Which of course inspired mom to yell back something about how she wasn't just barking and how she knows because she goes to puppy class and so there was a mini yelling match between mom and this guy and then the girl got a bit involved and then I did too but meanwhile he came over and put his dog on a leash and walked it away. Of course that inspired a lot of gossip between us 5 and the black lab puppy's owner. Because of how defensive he was and how quick he was to try and defend his dog it makes me think that it had happened before. You'd think he'd learn to watch his puppy and try to teach it to be less aggressive instead of just defending it and letting the behavior solidify itself in this poor puppy. Once that dog grows up it won't have any excuse for its aggressive behavior and its owners will regret not training it properly. Anyway, the basset hound owners just walked their puppy over to another picnic table full of people to probably talk about us. Sigh. There's never any drama when I take her by myself.

As far as these past 11 days have been, I seriously haven't done anything of note. One night I went over to Jackie's (when Sara had her Holy Spirit class reunion party at our house) and we watched Legend of Zorro. Yesterday Jackie and Natalie (her sister) and I took some old paperback books to this new used bookstore where you can trade in your old books for store credit and then use it to buy other used books from them. It was great, I got rid of about 7 books (big deal for me) and got 3 new ones. Afterwards Natalie went to her friend's house and Jackie and I went downtown to return some library books and run some errands. Then I went home and went to let out Becky's dogs (fat old black lab and hyper little shih tzu) and then to meet mom and Belle at her puppy class. Belle lost one of her teeth at the class (she's supposed to lose them all by around 5 months).

Later last night I was catching up with some people online and then got into a texting argument with an ex which was incredibly unpleasant. It's just that he doesn't get me at all lol. Keeps thinking that when I say I don't want to talk to him it's because I still have feelings for him. Sigh.

I really don't know what else to talk about here which is incredibly lame. Considering how long it's been since I last posted, I really haven't done a whole lot.

Went to the funeral and saw my cousin who got bit by a (brown recluse?) spider and had to go to the ER three times to get the bite cleaned out and get some good pain drugs.

Right now my sister (Sara) is practicing for her danceline tryouts tomorrow by dancing to this horriblely annoying music.

Dad and I are watching Extra. Not really sure why. Also watching CSI: NY which is about a stalker who got killed by one of the people he was stalking and I totally don't blame her.

I'm bored and I think I've been bored all summer. One thing I have been doing lately is playing Spore. I got the game when my hard drive crashed only to find out my computer can't handle it. But apparently my mom's laptop has a good enough video card to play it so that has been my latest addiction. I haven't been as obsessive with it as I would be just because I have to use my mom's computer to play it.

Last night there was supposed to be a big meteor shower but I went out during the supposed peak time and didn't see a thing. It didn't help that the moon was so full and bright and it was freezing outside. I wish I could curl up in a sleeping bag next to someone and just stare at the stars all night.

I had to reapply for the VA through like usajobs.com or something and I just got an email from them saying that I qualify for the job, but it's not a job offer. Wtf does that mean? I don't even know what to expect from them anymore. I don't really want this job but I do want a job and I'm sort of assuming after all this bs they've put me through they darn well better give me one.

R.I.P. Aunt Betty

My grandma's sister-in-law (my dad's Aunt Betty) had been sick for awhile. Last weekend my parents went down for a day to Iowa to visit her, and she wasn't doing so well. Yesterday her kids made the tough decision to take her off life support. So now we're going down to Iowa on Sunday for the wake and the funeral on Monday. The only good part of this story is that now she's with her husband, my great-Uncle Dick, assuming there's an afterlife of some sort.

Tuesday I went bowling with Hannah and Liz from Century tech. It was pretty fun, caught up on a lot of gossip and actually bowled really well. I broke 100 both times - although the first time the computer was cheating for me and kept adding 1 pin to whatever I actually bowled (not every time, but often enough, and once gave me a spare). First game I got 111, second I got 121. We only played two games but ended up spending 2 1/2 hours there just talking and catching up. Hannah is sort of in the same boat as I am. She was an English major and is trying to get a job in the cities. She's going to move there (if all goes well) in September. Liz is going to vet school at Columbia in Missouri, while living in an apartment with her boyfriend. At first (since she has no undergrad debt) I was thinking she had it made. Then she informed me that she took out a $50,000 loan just for the first year. After that I started to feel bad for her, although she at least has a plan.

Wednesday I didn't do much, but later that night I hung out with Jackie again. We went to DQ again and then off to Cinemagic to see The Ugly Truth. It was pretty funny, but I think I was expecting more. It also had a very confusing conclusion. I couldn't figure out what the moral of the story was. Be yourself? Be a slut? All so confusing.

On Thursday I worked from 11-5:30 (was supposed to work until 8:30) and walked home afterwards. Then took Belle to Foster Arends park where mom was having a work picnic and had a swimming lesson. Belle first jumped into the little lake and immediately sunk. And then clawed her way to the surface and figured out how much she loves to swim.

Today I woke up very very early to Belle barking her head off around 5:15 am. Took her around 20 minutes to quiet down and that much again longer for me to get back to sleep. Then she started up again around 7:15 am after mom and Sara left for a tour of the U of M and finally I got so fed up with it I just yelled "BELLE! THAT'S ENOUGH!" And she stopped! It was amazing. I still slept badly this morning because one of the neighbors was getting their house re-roofed and it was soo loud and noisy. Eventually got up, took a shower, started some laundry, and then headed down to the Apache mall to see if I could catch Hannah at work at the pretzel place. No luck there, but I did get a book (one recommended by Joel, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin). Then came home, took Belle to the dog park (where she made friends with a malamute named Balto) and then came home and got ready for work. Worked until 10:30, came home, and started the long stupid application for the job at the VA. Took awhile to finish (all the normal stupid ridiculous application stuff that is all on my resume anyway). Now just working tomorrow 11 - 8:30 and then Sunday 11 - 2 and then down to Iowa.

PS - I can't believe it's already August.

Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down!

"Though we adore men individually, we agree that as a group they're rather stupid." ~Mrs. Banks from Mary Poppins.

Just watched that tonight after work at Jackie's house. Been spending a lot of time with her now that she's back from Washington and wishing I wouldn't have to ever stop. Come on Chicago Zoo! Hire me!

I also finally reconnected with Hannah, we watched Coraline and played with Belle and are trying to make plans to go bowling with the old CHS techie crew sometime, but it's hard because some of them don't live here anymore and we're all old.

This is going to be a short post. I really have been hanging out with Jackie a lot (we played Myst, went to DQ, and just hang out) but other than that just working and watching Belle grow.

Still don't know what I'm doing, still not sure about the job thing at the VA but I keep finding more things to apply to.

Went to the library to try to find American Psycho but it was already checked out and going to be on hold for someone else once it's back. So instead I went to my normal route in the SciFi/Fantasy section and picked up the rest of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series as well as a series by Anne McCaffrey that I've not read yet. So far the McCaffrey set is pretty good - and different from her other stuff.

I did end up getting a 0.75$ raise at Culver's - woohoo! Makes working there a lot more worthwhile. I mean if I think about it, if I worked there full time and stayed at home with free room and board I could save up quite a bit. But I'd also go insane so maybe not quite a good idea just yet.

It's amazing to me how quickly time passes. Especially since I'm not really doing anything during that time. I work, eat, sleep, watch tv, stare at my computer screen, and read and not necessarily in that order.

A few days ago I actually went to the RAC and did a circuit and thought yea I'll do this more often and get better and track my progress. That was on the 22nd and today is the 26th. Haven't been back since. Damn me and my laziness.

Apart from the weight gain my hair is also continuing to grow. It's getting pretty long, but I've decided I won't cut it until I either go back to Australia or figure out what I'm going to do next year. I have a feeling it's going to get very very long.

Belle has a vet appointment tomorrow and I have to bring in a fecal sample. Looking forward to that.

Still having issues with my dreams - things I could swear I don't want in my conscious state keep cropping up while I'm unconscious. Not to mention the glorious impossible realities that persist in dreams. Sometimes I wish I would never wake up.

Well I don't know what I'm rambling on about or why I even bothered to post today, but it has been awhile and maybe if I wasn't so lazy I'd do it more often and you'd get more fine details of my mundane life. As it is... this is all you get!

It's July Minnesota! WTF

It is freezing today. And of course, today is the day I woke up at 6am to go up to Lake Pepin to go fishing with my dad on our boat. It was cold and windy and we only caught 6 fish in the 5 hours we were there. It was fun in the sense that I haven't been out MN fishing in a long long time, but miserable in the sense that it was freezing cold, windy, and wavy, plus hardly any fish.

After we finally decided to call it quits, we headed back to the launch where I dropped dad off at the dock to go get the car and trailer and I drove the boat around in circles until he backed it into the water. Drove the boat up onto the trailer (crooked) and then when dad tried to straighten it out I had to get into the car. Unfortunately it was still in the water so I tried to jump to clear it and dad tried to help me time it between waves but I totally failed and had one leg soaked. Had to take off my sock and shoe in the car before my foot froze *although it got pretty cold anyway!*. Slept in the car, and when we got home, after emptying the car/boat and saying hi to Belle, I went to my bed for a 2 hour nap before work. I was freezing and feeling very cold-fever-sick-ish. Kept feeling that way even after I woke up, ate leftover mac and cheese, and went to work. 45 minutes later, after being very morose (as opposed to my usual cheerful self) at work, I got sent home and spent the rest of the evening (so far) watching House with Megan (until she left) and looking for jobs online.

Probably time to mention the fact that I haven't updated in a long time - and really for no reason other than laziness.

Not to mention the fact that not much has happened. At all. Basically I've just been working at Culver's, trying to get ahold of the VA (they finally replied this past Monday - with not a lot of information, saying they'd get back to me by the end of the week but haven't heard since), playing with Belle (puppy class, dog park, training), and seeing the midnight showing of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

I went to it with Megan, Sara, and Sara's friend Amy. Megan and I went at 10:30 and were almost out the door in the line. I dressed up in a witch hat and my Gustavus grad gown and some other people were Hogwarts ho's and some full on awesome costumes. We had a nice Hagrid/Dumbledore duel in front of the theater before the show started (Dumbledore won). Overall the movie was very fun and pretty good up until (SPOILER?) the Burrow exploded. Wtf? Kind of destroyed the plot after that. And totally skipped the final battle scene, but whatever it was still enjoyable as a movie.

For the 3-4 days prior to the movie coming out my dad had managed to read the entire book. That was impressive, and made me want to reread it as well. I was already reading Angela's Ashes and The Dragon Companion but decided to start rereading it anyway. So now I'm reading 3 books and not very into any of them.

Belle just farted. And it stinks. Gah. Dog farts are the worst.

Seriously I can't think of anything else to share. Which is incredibly sad considering I haven't updated in 10 days.

Oh well, I guess life can't be all that exciting always.

Groundfish Survey Part II

So I'll finally pick up where I left off from my journal and then (hopefully) share a bit of what I've been up to since coming home.

6/26 at 2:00 pm

Another long day with hardly any breaks. I slept like a log and completely missed my first alarm - good thing I have a backup! No new species really - other than a pretty spotted crab. There was also a teeny crab that I put in a vial to keep. I think I'm finally getting used to the rocking ship - either that or it's getting calmer out. I did see a couple of waterspouts today (tornadoes over water), which was both exciting and scary. No one else was worried about it though. One of our trawls today was 70 kilos and 50 of that was shrimp! Ugh. We started getting really behind after that (like 2 trawls behind) and yet again no breaks. Lunch was pretty good - fried catfish and salad and fries. The dinner tonight is spaghetti but I probably won't request any. Hung around outside a bit after eating/showering but not a lot going on. I may go to bed early, but now I'm going on one more wander.

6/27 at 2:53 pm

Getting late again. Was an awesome day though! We had tons of long breaks and one haul was super tiny (like 3 kilos). We did have another mud haul but still. It was good timing too because I slept terribly - for some reason I just kept waking up. Sometimes I had weird dreams too. Anyway, nothing too exciting during work - except a lot of talking with Joel. He was a big Ursula LeGuin fan and so we talked sci fi for awhile. Had a nice French dip sandwich for lunch and started my laundry after that. Then I watched Scrubs with Alonzo for a bit but then he fell asleep and I nearly did too. Switched my laundry and then wandered around outside for a bit. Good timing too! I walked out to the deck outside my room, started staring at the water, and a dolphin came! It just swam right up to the front of the boat - they I mean. There were at least 3 and 2 were a mother and calf. So awesome! Tried and mostly failed to get pictures and they swam to the other side of the ship. I ran down and across and finally saw them swimming behind the boat like they were following it. They soon lost interest though and swam away. After that I sat on the deck reading for awhile. Came in, tried to get my laundry and it wasn't done yet. So I took a shower, now writing in here, and then I'll go get it and climb into bed. Off I go.

6/28 at 1:24 pm

Had another rough night. Woke up every 2 hours-ish from bad dreams - and most had something to do with Jazzy. I miss her. So I'd wake up sad, remember she was really gone and then get sadder. Work was busy but not hectic - mostly just steady. A couple of horrible mud tows, but luckily not too much shrimp. Finally saw sharks today - we were stopped to haul in the next trawl and had just dumped the latest one and 3-4 sharks came and swirled around eating the dead fish (~4-5 ft long). They also stopped shortly after the sharks to go diving.

Interesting timing, which sparked a lot of discussion about sharks and shark attacks. Emailed home, ate lunch (fried fish with skin on it - good but ew) and showered. Went outside where Walter (cook) told me I'd get a better view from the top. So I finally got adventurous and climbed to the top - literally above my room which is on the top inside section/floor. And there I took pictures of the line of rain intruding on sunny skies.

And then I started to get wet. So much for sunbathing! Came back in and decided to write some postcards and head to bed early. (PS - planning on starting a list of species in the back of this)

6/29 at 1:30 pm

Long shift today. Slept bad last night - nightmares about sorting fish in my bed! Closed the porthole but that didn't help. Small break at the beginning - good because Joel and Casey overslept, Joel got in at 11:58 pm and Casey at 12:19 am. Then steady/busy until ~9:30 am. Then we were practically done, other than bongos/neuston. Saw an octopus in an old Budweiser beer can and caught a HUGE snapper - 26 inches long and 5 lbs of fillets. Also sliced my left middle finger open while putting shrimp in the freezer. All the fish and saltwater kept stinging it until I found the band aids. Went through two before I got the brilliant idea to cover it with duct tape. Didn't come off then until I took it off for my shower. Nice. Ate grilled cheese for lunch (+ a salad) then showered, got dressed, and went outside. Gorgeous day. Sat on the deck and started the species' names list in the back. I'll keep adding as I remember. But I'm doing them all 100% by memory - no cheating! All of these things I currently have memorized (not for long I'm betting). Haven't decided yet if I'll go back out and read, go out and up and read, or just read here and sleep. After starting the list I went to the dry lab and emailed people. I'm so desperate for outside communication! Ah well, I'll end it here.

6/30 at 12:59 pm

See emails. Tacos and sleeping pills from Aspen for lunch - no apple at breakfast. Overslept this am. Autobahn on History Channel at lunch. Nonstop work until 10 am - drills. Sleep. I hope.

*** Inserting the email sent home for this day here***

Today has been a really hard day for me. Last
night I hardly slept at all - and for no reason it seems. I just didn't
sleep - my brain wouldn't stop thinking of random stuff! I finally got
to sleep for about an hour between 5-6 pm and then woke up again and
didn't sleep until 10 pm. And then I slept until 12:40 am - which meant
I was late for my shift. Aspen (roommate who's on the day shift) came
in and woke me up and then I scampered. Luckily they hadn't had
anything to do yet but the trawl started coming up as I finished a few
bites of cereal.

Since then, we've been working nonstop until around 10 am. Quick break
for breakfast but we had a huge trawl come in (11 baskets - we usually
 have between 1 and 4). And there were about 3000 shrimp in it - which
have to be individually counted and measured. After that we started
falling behind - first just one trawl behind and then 2. And then the
computer froze on us! Luckily we eventually caught up right around 10
am which was good timing (or evilly planned) because then we had a fire
drill. I felt so bad because all of the day shift had to wake up and go
to the assigned spot.    

Directly after that we had an "abandon ship"
drill. Luckily we didn't have to try on the survivor suits this time,
but it still took awhile. After that, Aspen headed back to bed and I
went back to work. Which meant cleaning out the wet lab with PineSol to
try to get rid of some of the smell. And then back in the dry lab to
sit. Yay sitting.

I could fall asleep right now, but the trawl just went in so we have a
30 minute break. Hopefully by the time we finish that we'll be about done.

Earlier I had some lemonade, and it was mostly gone when I noticed there
was a fish scale in it. Which prompted a short debate over whether or
 not to drink the remaining lemonade. In the end I decided to drink the
 rest of it while avoiding drinking the scale. I call it compromise.

Only new and interesting creature has been a shark sucker - black white
and gray fish that is usually stuck on bigger sharks. Other than that
just shrimp, shrimp, and more shrimp. Well we had all the other stuff
too but nothing else new.

Currently we are about 30 miles due south of Sabine Lake - I think
Louisiana but it could be in Texas. It's a bit rainy out but off and on.

Planning on finishing work, eating some lunch, finding some sleeping
drugs and going to bed. 

7/1 at 3:05 pm

Today has been a great day! Not that I slept any better (even with the sleeping pills) but I think I at least slept for longer. Had a nice-paced day. Started and ended with breaks but busy in between. Not behind or rushed, just consistent. We caught a big spade fish - funny in comparison to the size we usually catch. Joel and I took pictures of ourselves with it next to a strategically placed fishing pole.

We also caught some little black tip sharks and I saved some croakers. All big hauls today - closer to shore. All the seagulls are back too. Dumped one haul when next was coming up and saw sharks go after the old and dolphins following the new in. They came right up next to the boat (dolphins) and some people got some good pics. Since I failed at picture-taking I opted to get some video. Haven't watched them yet (battery died and is charging now) but I'm hopeful! At around 10:30 we finished and were told the next station was 90 minutes away. Score! So Joel and I went to the lounge and watched National Treasure: Book of Secrets with Vinny (engineer). After that we ate lunch (noodles and fish and double chocolate cookies) and then back to the lounge to watch Hot Fuzz. Which was hilarious! Casey came and watched the end. Then I showered and went out and up to read on the top of my room for awhile. Cloudy sort of but still got enough sun to feel sleepy (hope I sleep!). Overall it's been a great day and since tomorrow may be my last shift I hope it goes just as well (if not better!).

7/2 at 9:51 pm

Yes, it's about an hour and 1/2 from when I normally wake up and I've been awake for 22 1/2 hours. Normal shift - one triple dip but not too much shrimp so no big deal really. Nothing too new or exciting during the shift - other than sharing pictures! I miss home but I'm going to miss here too. Lunch was burgers and salad, then watched Apocalypto - weird but good. Then Casey and Keith watched Wanted and Joel was in his room so I started laundry. Watched a bit of the movie then wandered around/read outside for awhile.

Talked to the attractive ensign Aaron for awhile, watched the CTD and trawl go in and out from the deck outside my room.

Saw one dolphin when talking to Aaron and a shark earlier when I threw a couple of dead croakers over - but nothing too fantastic. I'm so tired! Found Joel again at dinner - I just had a potato and chocolate fudge cake (omg). After, I went down to the dry lab and heard the rest of Joel's scandalous advisor drama. Back in the lounge watched part of Bangkok Dangerous (Nicolas Cage) with Vinny, Aspen, and Joel. Now bedtime for me - screw the postcards!

7/3 at 11:58 pm

Got up - bought a t-shirt and said goodbye to Casey and Aspen and most everyone else. Hung around the ship for a bit - got online and no one had emailed me :(. Joel came back and then we walked to the beach (long and HOT walk). Got there and set up under nice umbrellas with chairs.

Joel went in the water and I sat and a dude with a clipboard came and asked if I wanted to rent the umbrella and chairs. I was like hell no and moved my stuff and went out to the water.

Didn't stay there as long as I'd have liked to - Joel got too hot (and little did I know it but I was getting toasted as well). Headed up and found a piratey beach bar and had some frozen margaritas (not as bad as I thought).

I spilled water all over the table and Joel got wings which took forever to arrive. Then started the long, scenic, and semi-depressing walk back. Stopped at a Foodmart once just to cool down. Was walking around in my flip flops and got blisters in between my big toe and second toe on both feet (one just popped and oozed - nice). Walked back to the boat and then showered. Then went with Alonzo and Joel on the long traffic-ridden trip to Walmart so Joel could get a cooler for his fish samples. Got back and took pictures of the "Capt. Joel" boat and then I watched The Bourne Identity with Jared and Alonzo while Joel wandered around Galveston. He called and invited me to dinner and so I went out and met him. Couldn't find a place and the Quiznos was closed (next to pink Elvis lofts - wtf?) so ended up taking a long circle to a Japanese place so Joel could have sushi. Sushi?! After the trip we've just had that surprised me, but whatever! I had the most boring salad. Our waitress must have been new because she kind of sucked. Didn't get the chicken on my salad and Joel was shorted a lime but whatever. Headed back to the ship, talked for a bit, and then Joel headed to bed while I started packing/cleaning/throwing towels in the laundry. Timers are set to go off at 7 am tomorrow so hopefully I'll get up and won't forget my starfish. Can't wait to get home!

List of species:

Stenotamus caprinus - scaly, silver fish

Portunus spinicarpus - spiky brown crab with long arms

Callinectes similus - green crab with blue and white, bigger claws

Trichurus lepturus - cutlass fish

Lagodon rhomboides - blue and yellow striped fish (my favorite!)

Porichthys plectrodon - brown/gold with electropores

Peprilis burti - butterfish, silver, smooth

Solenocera vioscai - long horned shrimp

Calappa sulcata - crab that fits together like a stone, orange

Bregomacerus atlanticus - little, silvery minnow

Synodus foetens - lizard fish, long skinny and brown

Amusium paprycium - "funny papers!" scallops

Lutjanus campechanus - red snapper

Micropogonias undulatus - croaker, green/gold, non-forked tail

Upeneus parvus - goatfish, pink with black and white striped tail

Pristimopoides aquiloneres - pink fish

Serranus atrobanchus - small, pinkish, tiny

Loligo peali - squid, pointed mantle

Lepophidium brevibarbe - eel, gold with black edge

Raja texana - skate

Muscalis canis - dogfish shark

Penaeus aztecus - brown shrimp!

Trachypenaeus similus - smaller shrimp, rough carapace

Urophycis floridanus - hake, gray and black

Centropristus philadelphicus - like a bass

Hildebrandia flava - long, thin eel, gold

Polystira tellea - spiral shell

Anasimus latus - spider crab

Cynoscian nothus - white trout, narrow anal fin

Cynoscian aeronarus - white trout, broad anal fin

Lolliguncula brevis - squid, broad mantle

Bollmania communis - minnow with hake-like tail

Selene setapinnus - moon fish, big forehead

Chloro. chrysurus - yellow top and tail

Callinectes sapidus - big version of similus

Leiostomatus xanthuras - like croaker but forked tail

Opisthonema ophelium - sparkly blue and green top, silver bottom

And ladies and gentlemen that's all I wrote!

Not much has happened since coming home. I worked my shift at Culver's - luckily the manager I had the argument with wasn't working on Sunday. I ended up getting off a couple of hours early which was nice. I'm scheduled to work everyday this week except Monday and Wednesday. Went in on Tuesday (rode my bike) and worked for about an hour before they sent me home. They keep overstaffing the place and weekdays are not very busy. Later that day I went with mom to Belle's first puppy class. It was kind of fun and kind of a joke. The first 30 minutes of the class was spent watching the puppies just play with each other, which was really cute. Belle is very social! Then we took them outside to potty, then back in to learn "sit." Belle pretty much knows it though so that was kind of a waste. The class went well over the time limit and the teacher told us it probably would every night. Then why don't they just say that class is from 6 - 7:30 instead of saying it's 6 - 7 and then going over every night? Seems to be poor planning or advertising.

Tuesday night I went to see Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen with both my sisters and their boyfriends. It was a little awkward, and I think I'd have enjoyed the movie more seeing it with different people, but it was still fun. The movie was lacking a lot of the class of the first one. I mean, the random corny bits were just a little too much. And why were the Decepticons all of a sudden speaking English half the time? I did like that Optimus kicked a lot more ass in this one than he did in the first one. He was definitely much cooler.

Today I didn't do a whole lot. I baked cookies - that lasted a few hours. Hopefully the cookies themselves will last longer than my last batch did. Cookies seem to disappear quickly in this house - but I hid three bags in freezers this time. After that I took Belle over to the dog park and she had a blast. Of course the ground is all muddy so she got pretty dirty but I think it was worth it to see my little 12 week old lab trying to take on a fully grown mastiff. She is such a brave little dog! She also made good friends with an 11 week old huskie. She's definitely not shy! Watched some of the Twins game and then went to the RAC where I watched all the way until the top of the ninth inning. Then I had to shower and head home - and I'm still not sure how they did. I should go check that. Apparently they lost. Oh well, at least it was close!

Now I'm heading to bed (probably). Still no word from the VA or any of my other jobs (other than another almost instant rejection from Mayo).