Under da sea

Had my scuba open water test yesterday and today. Yesterday we went to Hawthorne Pond in Barnstable, MA. The weather was gorgeous and the upper few feet of water were really warm, but then it got quite cold deep down, as is expected early in the season. Unfortunately the water was really really murky and so we could barely see anything at all. We did get to swim around in a sunken boat, though, which was pretty awesome. Since visibility was so low (more because of darkness down there) any holes in the boat looked like infinite black chasms. As sebs lowered himself down in the water he didn't realize we were standing around one such opening on the top of the boat, and he was coming right down in the middle of it. When he looked down he freaked out and flailed around, it was pretty hilarious. There's also supposedly a car and a tractor somewhere in the pond, as well as an eel or two, but we didn't get to see any of those.

Today we went to Sandwich Beach (also on the Cape) and went in the Atlantic Ocean! It was pretty awesome, very cold but the wet suit really does wonders in keeping you warm. We got to see a bunch of lobsters, a crab, some flounder--which lie flat on the bottom and have both eyes facing up, weird--and tons of tiny hermit crabs, among other random things. The visibility wasn't great there either, though, but relative to the pond it felt like we could see for miles. The second of our two dives today was the first time I felt totally comfortable, really like we were just floating around in the water and enjoying myself. I want to grab a lobster but it's a little freaky I have to admit, they have big claws and really do run around with their claws up in self-defense; you have to grab them from behind over the tail where their claws can't reach.

Off to Malte's tonight for one final hoorah with Sebs :( burrito time...

Yeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaah

Finished the written portion of generals! What a relief. Today was an amazing day, as I played tennis twice (winning my league match), had a Corona with lunch under the amazing warm sun, did some laundry (admittedly not that exciting) and then headed over to Mike's place in Ashdown for a dinner and to meet his girlfriend Gemma, who never seemed to exist until now. Good times, including sundae making with alli and I with ice cream and hot fudge and caramel pecan and whipped cream and "hundreds and thousands" which apparently is slang for rainbow sprinkles in both the UK and australia. ha.

tomorrow morning bright and early: SCUBA time!!!!

Tired. So tired.

Doing my generals exam. It's going fine. But I started yesterday morning at 10a. Right now, I am so so exhausted. And it's 90F and sunny outside.

It's finally here...

Finally, generals have arrived. Written exam starts tomorrow, 10am. I am nervous, but also excited both to get it over with and to get a chance to try to answer some interesting questions. Should be good, as long as the questions aren't too wacky. Getting the first one out of the way will feel fantastic.

Roofs and brunch

More glorious weather. Last night we headed over to Malte's to make some pasta and hang out on his roof after a couple hour rest following our bike adventure. Unfortunately by the time were there and had made food it was already totally dark and a bit windy and chilly up on the roof, although we did still get to have a nice meal up there. We introduced Marty to the bean game, which was a blast. It's a game that one of us will have to purchase now that Sebs is heading out to Cal Tech next weekend :(

This morning we got up and headed over to Luna Cafe for some amazing brunch outdoors. The sun came out and it warmed up in a hurry. I ate my delicious delicious lobster eggs benedict, as well as some fruit and mascarpone stuffed french toast. Yum. Tonight we're headed back over to Malte and Roxie's place for some burritos, this time at 5p so we can enjoy the bright warm sunshine (hopefully it wont get cloudy) with our food...

Fantastic bike ride

Today I ventured out with Malte, Marty, Anita, and Peter to Concord via a string of side roads and back country roads. A quick Google Maps estimate puts it at about 17.2 miles between my place and downtown Concord, so approximately 35 miles in all. The weather was beautiful, and, technical issues aside (Anita's flat before we even left, my busted pedal), we had a great time. It's really nice to hit stretches where the road is nice and smooth and there aren't too many cars. A great idea would be to map out the smoothest ~30 mile ride possible from Boston. When the roads are smooth you're finally set free from staring at the immediate road ahead to steer clear of big potholes and can finally just look all around and soak in the view.

Tennis at long last

Finally got out for a league match with Tennis Northeast today. It was an absolutely beautiful day out. I hit with Abel up at Tufts on the blue courts, which are really nice. The bright sun was a little bit of a distraction for a while, but it didn't matter since we both played pretty terribly anyways. It's always strange when I hit with Abel, he never seems to play very well against me and gets angry with himself quite a bit. In the end I won, but not after enduring some boring tennis where I wasn't able to put away short balls and so his lame strategy was just to slice balls softly back to mid-court, where I'd have to hit a low short ball. And if I was able to get a solid shot back, I couldn't hit a volley to save my life, so I was typically just losing on that subsequent shot. But we played a 3rd set tiebreaker and I finally stepped up, broke loose of the tension that always seems to be with me when I play an actual match (ah, tennis...), and started hitting solidly until I won with relative ease.

This has always been what I've found annoying about this league: everyone I play with (except for Phil) seems incapable of playing a great match regardless of how their opponent plays, so the general course of a match against me goes: 1) I start playing tight, but keep it close as the other guy matches my (bad) level of play; 2) I manage to take the first set, then start playing REALLY badly and lose the 2nd set; 3) I pick up my level of play in the 3rd, but the other guy can't do the same. All I want is for me to come out and play poorly and get my butt kicked. That's what forces me to play well (or else I lose badly), and then we can get a great match going. Unfortunately the story is either I play poorly and the other guy does too, or I play well and just beat the other guy. Oh well..

Ahhh too much studying

Generals are coming up. Finally. I say that with fear, but also with great relief that it'll all finally be out of the way in a couple of weeks. Ive spent many hours the past two days catching up on some of the studying I had got a bit lazy with over the past couple of weeks, but needless to say I've spent tons and tons of time studying over the past few months. My brain actually hurts right now, and unfortunately our wine bottle opener has gone missing :(

Contrasting parties

Yesterday afternoon/evening Cim hosted a bbq party at his place, which was full of delicious grill food, home brews, the most amazing cupcakes ever, and some cool late-20s folks, including a girl who was literally 6'7" and athletic. We ventured over to the park to play frisbee as well. Afterwards we headed over to Morgan and Christine's for a childhood-themed party, where we played beer pong, ate some mediocre store-bought cake, someone took a beer bong, and a pinata full of bad candy and small liquor bottles was beaten down with a broomstick, all while mingling amongst folks who all seemed to be under 5'8" and a few of whom actually looked like 12 year olds. It was strange. In the end both parties were fun, though I'm definitely partial towards the former.

Pasta party

Last night we hosted a going away pasta-making party for Caty, who is heading back home to Saudi tonight and then moving out to Pasadena with Sebs a month later. Sebs, caty, rosemary, kurt, kat, adam, max, malte, alex, grant, and my roommate were there throughout, and roxie and laura joined late. Pasta making was fun, I need to pick up a little mechanical pasta-maker, it's really quite easy to do, and home-made pasta is awesome.

Burning milk

The smoke alarm just went off for a little while after I completely forgot about the milk I was heating up on the stove for some hot chocolate. The smoke detector is all the way down the hall from the kitchen. So that gives you an idea of how long this thing was smoking--the milk had boiled over, covering the entire pot, and then in all places it had burnt onto the pan, including leaving this ridiculous thin black sheet at the top of the pan stretching across it, covering perhaps 50% of the area of the pot opening. Impressive. But now I need to buy Caroline a new pot.

Also, it's getting cold in here. The open windows and fans don't seem to be ventilating the apartment as quickly as one might think.

Carcassonne

Played some carcassonne with Laura last night, and finally checked out our beloved mayor Mumbles Menino on you tube after hearing off and on since I moved here two years ago that he is hard to understand and then the sketch making fun of his mumbling last week at the Second City show. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LabuH1PnUoo

Good stuff.

A capella n zombies

Last night I finally got to check out Ben's Harvard a capella group, Voice Lab. They sang at the TMEC amphitheater at Harvard med school. Overall they were pretty good, but definitely a lot of intra-group variation. Ben was fantastic, and had a hilarious spanish rap bit in a song that i assume was titled "Cuba" (represent represent). Otherwise there was one girl in a white dress who just had a magnificent voice, one of those people for whom a simple exhalation resonates at a perfect note so that her songs sounded totally effortless. It amazes me to hear amazing singers sing, my body totally relaxes and I just suddenly stop thinking and enjoy a moment that doesn't come around so often.

Today I slept in, got some brunch at Tosci's with Malte, Roxie, and Sam, and worked at my office and home after battling the awful windy cold outside. Tonight I watched Zombieland, which was ridiculously funny. Plus it had Bill Murray, whose role was basically to exist for the sake of noting that the characters get to meet Bill Murray, and that Bill Murray is awesome. Brilliant.

Tornado dream

On thursday night I had a tornado dream, just another in the long-running series that is my inner self being scared as hell of tornadoes.

This time, I was in a small river that ran underneath a large cement highway overpass. Suddenly there was a large black tornado nearby, and I watched from just above myself as the water swelled upwards toward the tornado with myself in the middle, as the twister tried to suck me up outer of the water. I grabbed one of the big cement pillars holding up the highway aloft, and I succeeded in saving myself. Then as I swam towards the shore (which seemed not to be very far away) some cement blocks from the highway fell down and smacked the water just behind me. I don't recall what happened after that, but suddenly I was in a room with some friends--there was a connection, but it quickly vanished the second I opened my eyes.

It seems that tornado dreams are one of the few ones that I actually remember. I am a very deep sleeper.

My life written down, sort of

I always get bummed that I forget so many cool stories, whether truly incredible or quaintly inane. It still amazes me to go back and read my pseudo-diary entries the few times in my life where I actually chose to do so, which were inevitably always on traveling adventures--studying abroad in Montpellier, traveling through Europe, working in Geneva, traveling in Ghana. What's amazing is your brain's ability to retrieve those memories, even as subtle as a brief encounter on a train ride, when given the smallest of reminders of the event. In the absence of such a stimulus, the event, though almost never deleted, is locked away deep within your brain, likely never to be heard from again.

So finally, FINALLY, I am stepping up and writing things down. Writing anything, it doesn't matter. A lot of this will be just "stuff". But interesting things happen much more often than you realize, and so until I have a camera taking pictures everywhere I go this will serve as the surrogate for a memory that is plenty good enough to remember all the details but cruel enough to lock them up and throw the key away forever.