Yesterday I went Snowshoeing

We went up to Mt. Hood. Our local favorite... actually its a world favorite. It is either the most climbed mountain in the world or the second most climbed mountain. Its competitor is Mt. Fuji of Japan. For those of you who don't know what snowshoeing, it looks something like this:

From Mt. Hood

It is basically hiking while wearing really big, flat shoes. Their supposed to be extra big so you don't sink into the snow. That being said, I still sank into the snow. Pat had rented the shoes for me, but, she thought I was 6 foot, 165 lbs, while I'm actually 6'2", 175 lbs(I've gained some weight... but, I've always been 6'2"). Luckily it hadn't snowed in a while so I wasn't walking on powder. Instead, it was all frozen ice. That is, at least on the way up. On the way down the ice started melt and the ground was giving way. But by then two things had happened. 1) I was a lot better at balancing/walking with the snow shoes. So I could go over the harder terrain without falling through as often. 2) We had arrived really early in the morning and beat the rush. When we first parked our car there were some 5 cars in the parking lot. When we returned the whole place was filled. Needless to say, there was that there was a lot of foot traffic during the second half of the hike. So, the snow was packed down to the point where the melt didn't matter much anymore.

Also, for those of you who don't know Mt. Hood, it looks like this:

From Mt. Hood

Isn't that a great photo? Well, it looked better while we were there. That's why I love hiking so much. Baby, we have to go hiking/camping/backpacking together. You'll love it. I promise. Its great to be out there, its so peaceful and quiet. You weren't a walker before and love it now. Well hiking is just the logical next step. Its just going on a walk... but outside of a city. Mwah!

And people, check out the gallery to see the rest of the pics. I'll just leave you with this final one of Jake after his long adventure. That dog was tired. As my dad says, he just doesn't move for three days after going up to Hood.

From Mt. Hood

This Weekend

Hey,

So the weekend has come and we've had some highs and lows. The high has been learning how to video conference through meebo. Its great. I love it. The first day(Friday) it took quite some time to figure it out, but on Saturday it was a breeze. We video conferenced a ton. Its so great to be able to see my baby's face. But, she also sent me images of her crying and those made me so sad, then on Saturday when i had to leave she started crying again. I feel so bad for leaving you Vicky. I'm sorry. I love you. Please hold up until I'm back. Kisses and Hugs.

Other things that I did this weekend:

On Friday my mom, Senja and I went to go see Atonement. Its a movie about a girl who breaks up a relationship with an accusation when she's 11 and doesn't realize how wrong she was until later, when she attempts to make up for it. It was really good. I didn't think I'd like it so much, but I did. It stars Kiera Knightly. And its one of those British nobility, country manor, dramatic period types. That are normally so dull. But this one had a great twist and halfway through they left the manor and it became a whole other kind of movie. Bravo. It was great. Oh, and bit of irony... Senja started farting during the movie, so I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom(which she did). My mom took her away and the story fast forwards to the future where a big reveal happens. My mom totally missed the end of the movie and there was a really great monologue about the meaning of the movie... too bad. I tried to explain it to her when she returned, I hope I did it justice.

Then on Saturday, I woke up early so I could do my RA reapplication. It took me the entire day and I was so annoyed. First off I finished completing the forms after just 2 hours. Then when I try to email it out the program crashes. Luckily I saved it right. WRONG. The form doesn't allow you to save it. That's so smart you retarded monkey, what were you thinking when you made this form. Your such an idiot. It doesn't let anyone save it and it has a built in emailer, which of course doesn't work. those things never work because they assume your using a desktop email app that's built into your OS. No one does that because they suck. Webmail is so much better. For one thing you can check your email at (GASP) any computer. Crazy, right? The only people who would logically use a desktop app for email are those who have an email account tethered to a specific computer(this reads professionals with desk jobs... i.e... not RAs) or people who live in the 1980's and only have one computer in their life(i.e. not college students). Either way the guy who made this app angers me. I played with it all day and in the end just had to email her a PDF version.

Luckily I was able to talk/see/be with my baby the whole time so I wasn't overly angry.

After that, my dad and I went to meet an old family friend named Don Moore. He has season tickets to the Portland Lumberjax with his daughter who turned out to be bipolar(whic is really sad, because now she's all medicated, unstable and I think suicidal at times if she does take her meds). So we went to the game to meet them. We bought the cheapo $5 tickets(what a steal) and half way through went down to find Don. It was a great game Portland rallied back the whole game, brought it to a tie at the end, but in the last 2 minutes lost by 2. Heart breaking. But, the cool thing was the music. They had heavy rock pounding the whole time. The atmosphere was crazy intense. You could feel the action pumping through your heart. And the Rose Quarters(our stadium) has a brand new killer sound system that doesn't even echo. I've never heard anything that good in a stadium. And they have like a 300 inch, wrap-around screen in HD to show the action up close. Its awesome. Oh yeah and the lumberjax are a lacrosse team. I've never seen lacrosse before and I really like it. Its so fast passed and that pounding music mixes in for an adrenalin rush. It was a good night.

Oh and baby.. this ones for you. If your reading this... guess what... there's a new Big Shots episode.


Plus I love you, so that's good too. Have fun, my love

The Annals of My Trip

On the 7th I nearly stayed up all night. Vicky and I watched Avatar, a show that her sister recommended, we squeezed each other tightly and had a very sweet final night. We didn't do the things that we were planning to, but no regrets on my side. I was just glad to be with her and happy. Around 2 a.m. we decided to fall asleep. But not for long, I was awake by 4:45. I hadn't packed yet so I got to work while Vicky continued to sleep. Eventually, I was packed and Vicky was up and ready to go.

It was 5:34, a little after we had wanted to leave we took a taxi, got there a little late. In the rush, they put the wrong tag on my bag and my stuff got sent to Pheonix. And on the connecting flight, someone experienced some medical problems.. paramedics came and all was fine, we just got delayed for an hour or so.

Upon arrival, my mom picked me up and we had had spaghetti. Its been really mellow. I haven't done much of anything and I really need to get myself away from the internet. I'm here at my dad's now and I guess I'll go to Powell's Books Store.

I'm still in Portland and the Story's not caught up

Where did I leave off, during my restart of firefox?

ahh yes, RA work. One last thing about RA work: while I work for them, I'm supposed to get a compensation package that includes room and board. But, because i'm not going to be an RA during the Spring, they had to drop me out of housing and move in the new guy. Then, I don't even know what the issue was, but, I wasn't given an intersession meal plan. Vicky, my sweet, was kind enough to sneak food out of the cafeteria for me each day. But the bad news, though, because it was intersession they rarely had anything to eat. One day they didn't even have enough supplies for her to make me a sandwich. She had to make it with lettuce and onions and ranch dressing and that's it. That was crazy. so everyday our breakfast came from the caf and we had to go out to eat fast food for dinner. That generally ended up being burger king or boston shawarma. We also moved all of my stuff out of my old room and into hers. That was quite the ordeal. A) getting all my stuff out was pretty easy and B) getting all my stuff into her room was not so easy. In my old room was the only existing loftable bed, that Speare Hall had. I stress had because it ain't there no more. We lugged it out and switched beds(vicks with mine). That was pretty tough, since RSO's not supposed to let anyone steal furniture. Well, with some smooth talking and reassuring them that all was good... we got through. And I am so glad that we did. If we hadn't changed to a raisable bed, my stuff would have never fit comfortably in her room. But, with the addition it fits into her room as if it weren't even there. Everything nestles under her bed, other than the fridge(in her closet) and my computer(on her desk). It looks beautiful. Then we also did some rearranging of her room. I'd say it looks better than it ever has. Yay!

After we were done being intersession RAs, and started RA training. This didn't mean to much. As a returner, she typically had to go to 1 hour of training each day. However, Friday and Saturday she had a few extra hours. In the end, the two weeks after I stopped co-op were great. I spent nearly every hour with my baby. We didn't go out as much as we hoped. But, I guess that just proves that we don't need to go do fancy things to enjoy each others' company. The simple things in life are great, while I'm with her. Whether its the simple triumphs of rearranging a room together into a more successful place or holding each other while we watch a good show. Those two weeks really just reassured me that I want to spend the rest of my life with her.

Anywho, I love you! So there... take it! Tehehe...

I'm in Portland Now

I arrived in Portland on the 8th... now its the 10th. Time to start the chronicling.

This trip starting weeks ago(December 21st) when I stepped away from the desk at my last co-op position. Fittingly enough, I worked at Northeastern University's Office of International Study Programs. It is the office at NU that organizes most of the non-domestic, international learning experiences for NU students. Those include semester programs in some 30 countries and summer programs lead by NU faculty. Those summer short terms are the equivalent of taking a regular class of students and facilitating it on board a roaring 747, as it takes the professor and their students to the far reaching corners of the globe. An interesting example of this is a summer trip this July that will bring them to Beijing during the Olympics to study Chinese culture and history. I did all the typical desk work of an intern, but I thought it was a great opportunity, learned a lot about higher education and enjoyed the experience. But enough about co-op. My current adventures started on the 21st, because that was the day that I left the workplace.


For the following two weeks I spent all hours of the day with my lovely girlfriend Vicky. We wouldn't be able to spend much time together for the next few months, so we decided to build up a store of as much love as we could squeeze into those scarce hours each day presented us with. We are both resident assistants with the department of ResLife here at NU and we spent our winter break working a few shifts holding the duty pager( an annoying little device that tends to buzz, beep and scream only at night or during other inopportune times when you'd rather be doing anything other than leaving the comfort of your room). Anywho, I was on duty for nearly a week straight and Vicky took a few shifts here and there. Ironically she was the one who's pager screamed at her more often. I was only paged twice and only one of those pagers required any action from me. She, on the other hand was paged constantly. We spent the week squeezing and loving, going on walks, hanging out in the LP(which is great... I so want to be an LP RA, just so I can continue to hang out there).

I have to restart my browser, so i'll be right back. peace - love - happiness