20040613

Drinking Games; or maybe just drinking

Ok, so the last list of drinks i did didn't turn out looking like it was supposed to. so here is the new, updated version.

Good Drinks
--Strongbow: a hard apple cider. apple-y enough that it tastes good, but alcoholic enough that you know what you're drinking
--Smirnoff Ice: vodka with a hint of lemon; and, at only 5% alcohol by volume, something you can drink quite a bit of. apparantly it's better here than in england, so i'm looking forward to it.
--Smirnoff Black Ice: similar to "regular" Ice, but with more citrus flavor.
--Raspberry vodka: somebody had a really good idea with this. if you like berry flavored stuff, try this.
--vodka (double shot) with lemonade: i've been told i was a girl for liking this, but she was kinda drunk at the time, so we'll ignore that comment. i'll have to compare it to a hard lemonade sometime.

Decent drinks
--Mead: honey wine. one of those things i kept reading about, so i figured i had to try it. i could still taste the wine a little to much (don't really like wine), but it had a nice honey aftertaste.
--Guiness: one of two things that i absolutely had to try while in england (the other was a cuban cigar). i have to say i was a little disappointed; but i've heard it's only good in ireland, so i'll have to give it another go someday.
--Kaluah: i'm normally not a big fan of coffee flavored stuff, but this was pretty decent.
--Rum & Coke: i had never had rum before, and i don't like coke, but i have to say that they mix pretty well.
--vodka (Absolut): definitely better as a mixer, but not too shabby on its own. i can see how alyssa was corrupted by those russian ballerinas.

Bad drinks
--Jack Daniels: in its defense, it was served to me on the rocks. but if i'm just taking whiskey as a shot, i'm not going to waste money on something like Jack.

i'm sure i've forgotten something, but those were the basics. now i can get back to updating about other stuff, whatever that may be.

20040609

Also, rather belatedly I realize, I'd like to make a small tribute to the late great Ronald Reagan. If anyone reading this could observe a moment of silence in his memory, that would be great.

damn. i started a post with "well" again. one of these days i'll get away from that.

Well, believe it or not i'm still alive. unfortunately, jet lag does seem to work both ways. i've been waking up really early in the morning, because my stupid body clock still thinks it's 8 hours later than it really is. oh well.

needless to say (but i will anyways), the trip was awesome. if you ever have a chance to travel to britain, i would recommend it. just make sure to avoid glasgow. it's got one really nice park, and that's about it's only redeeming factor. hopefully at some point i'll have a full rundown of the trip, but that may be a while in coming... i still need to finish my journal up, and i'll probably be working out of that. also, hopefully i'll be able to get back into a regular pattern of updating this; we'll see. for now, farewell.

20040529

Being sick also sucks, possibly as much as jet lag. and the scottish weather doesn't really help... in glasgow, it feels a lot like seattle. big, and rainy.

one more to add to the good drinks category... smirnoff ice. i really like that stuff. it feels really weird being able to buy alcohol over here, and it'll probably feel weird when i get back home and can't buy it again/any more. oh well. that just means i'll have more money to spend on mountain dew.

that's really about it for now. hopefully sometime soon (read "probably in the fall") i'll get a webpage of my own to put this on, so i can include pictures and stuff.

20040526

well, i broke down and paid at an internet cafe. in my defense, i just wanted to email my family and let them know i was still alive. i'd like to write more about what's going on, but i'm running out of time, so i'm just gonna make a few quick updates.

1) it would really suck to attack edinburgh castle
2) if it's not already there, vodka with lemonade goes into the "good" category, and mead should be added to the "decent" category. tastes a bit too much like wine, but with a very nice honey aftertaste.
3) walking is not as much fun as it sounds. i have walked a ridiculous amount of miles on this trip, and my feet/legs are starting to get rather pissed at me.
4) alcohol travels through your system way too fast, so my bladder is also pissed at me. which means it's time for me to leave and pee. farewell all.

20040522

Good Drinks/Bad Drinks, pt. 1

It feels really weird being able to have alcohol over here. So far, though, i've stuck to having it with meals. Here's a list of the good and the bad so far. This list will be updated occasionally.

Good Bad Decent
Strongbow (hard apple cider) Jack Daniel's Guiness (though i've heard
Smirnoff Ice it's only good in ireland)
Kaluah (or however you spell that)

haven't tried the mead yet, so that'll be added later. i probably won't be able to try as many things as i'd like, cause i'm pretty much just having them with meals. farewell for now. remember, drink responsibly.

20040520

ok, i lied. they've got decently priced internet access here in the bed and breakfast, so i figured what the heck. first off, i'd just like to state that jet lag sucks horribly. i didn't think it would be that bad... keep myself up till about 10 the first night, sleep thorugh till the next morning, and be fine. it started out fine... then i woke up about 1:15 in the morning, and couldn't get back to sleep till sometime around 5:30. i think... i was asleep when my alarm went off at 6:45.

the day itself was really fun, though. got to visit westminster abbey and the tower of london, and lunch and dinner in pubs (guiness isn't all it's cracked up to be, but strongbow--a brand of hard cider--is pretty good). though i don't plan on making a habit of it, it is kinda nice to be able to try different types of alcohol. i also split the cost of a bottle of mead with one of the girls in the group... we'll see how that is.

but my intorweb time is running out, and i really don't want to put more money in. london is awesome. the only way i could be having more fun is if i was actually fully awake for it.

later all. don't expect any more updates for awhile.

20040517

well, this'll be the last post for awhile. tomorrow i fly out for england, and i'll be there till june 6th. i'm too cheap to use an internet cafe, so if there are any updates between 11 am tomorrow morning and sometime on the 6th or 7th, it's an imposter. the one thing that i am definitely going to try is a guiness, though i've also been told to try a cuban cigar... i'll have to look for one of those also. that's one of england's many benefits, i guess... they're not within swimming distance of cuba. if there's anything else that i absolutely need to try, feel free to email me, menoichius@hotmail.com. i'm running out of stuff to say, so i'm going to play some farcry--amazing game, even on my horribly inadequate computer--and get killed a few times. farewell all. to any college students who haven't taken finals yet... hahahaha!

20040514

well, i'm finally finished. it was pretty crazy, but my fairly large research paper--the biggest i've done, at least--is done. 16 pages on the sons of liberty... it was actually kinda fun learning about them. writing, on the other hand.... so originally, i thought the paper was due today; last day of finals, it made sense. i found out on wednesday, however, that it was actually due on tuesday. luckily the prof was really cool about it, and i was able to turn it in this morning. there was another kinda freaky moment in the typing though. i also originally thought that it had to be 18 pages, and was a little worried when i ran out of notes about half way through page 15. but then i turned to the syllabus again (a friend was trying to talk me into using the font "courier new" to take up more space, and i wanted to see if that would work). the syllabus didn't say, but while i was looking, i noticed that the paper only had to be 15 pages. i turned off the bull-sh*t-o-meter, wrote a conclusion, and spent the rest of the night playing lord of the rings RISK and watching independence day. now, all that remains is to clean my room.

20040512

mad props to president bush: "It really gets me when the critics say I haven't done enough for the economy. I mean, look what I've done for the book publishing industry. You've heard some of the titles. 'Big Lies,' 'The Lies of George W. Bush,' 'The Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them.' I'd like to tell you I've read each of these books, but that'd be a lie." --President Bush

that just rules in so many ways.

in the not-so-mad-props category, i just found out that the 18 pape paper that i thought was due on friday was actually due yesterday. bad stuff man.

20040507

yeah. so i was pretty excited about only one final. and believe it or not, it gets better... that final is now optional. although i think i may take it anyways, cause my grade is about 0.5% away from an A. Or, i may rewrite one of my papers for the class (only got an 85 on it)... if i can pull off a 90, i'll have an A. and that would just be great, cause it would give me more time to type my 20 page paper thats due next friday. and now, i'm off to either read or procrastinate. or maybe a little of both.

20040503

if it hasn't already been done, i want to invent a new word: heterophobe. it's in response to the word "homophobe", which is thrown around way too often. first, a phobia implies an irrational fear. arguing against homosexuality is not irrational; and i am most definitely not afraid of gays. unless they're incredibly muscular... but any incredibly muscular person is kinda scary. but back to the whole fear thing. this report--"They Look Silly Anyway"--seems to me to be an argument against the whole fear thing. personally, if i were afraid of gay police officers, i would want them to keep their earrings in: that way i could tell who they were and stay away from them. this is not, however, to imply that earrings make a guy gay--i know plenty of perfectly straight guys with earrings. also in the chief's defense, he asked female officers to avoid "all but the most innocuous studs." he's targeting both sexes... how is that homophobic? but then again, this just seems to fit with the liberal mode of thinking: be tolerant of other people's views, as long as they agree with you. there are sevearl other stories on the site that are pretty ridiculous... i would recommend checking them out.

also, if you are a politically conservative--or at least not raging liberal--college student, you should go here. i'm currently trying to get a branch of the Collegiate Patriot Project started here at whitworth... we'll see how that goes.

and now i'm off. i need to procrastinate some more so i can start doing homework.

20040429

yeah... so it looks like its been awhile since i've updated. for those of you who actually care about what goes on in my life, sorry for the wait; for the rest of you, hopefully you found something better to do than read my random complaints. really, i've just been busy, writing papers and playing computer games--not enough of the former and too much of the latter. on the bright side though, i haven't been playing video games as intensely as these guys do. there's a chance, however, that that link will make absolutely no sense in a day or so... we'll have to wait and see what happens. if the comic that comes up has no references to star wars galaxies, then my web skills just suck. i've probably linked to them before, but if you're interested in gaming at all, you should check out Penny Arcade. once i started reading it, it quickly became one of my favorite websites ever.

in other news, only one big paper left this semester... w00t. too bad i haven't even started it yet. oh well. it'll get done sooner or later, most likely later. have a good night/morning all. later.

20040422

cool, no class today. which hopefully means i'll get lots of homework done. but probably not. and all because of--you guessed it--another new game. any of you who were fans of the diablo series should check this out. its incredibly similar, but at the same time its much, much better. much better graphics, of course, and from what i've been able to see in the demo, a cooler storyline.

and now it's time for lunch. there's a good chance that whatever they're serving will have either more mushrooms than actual food or chunks of pepper the size of ayer's rock, but i gotta sustain myself somehow. later all.

20040419

yay! one research paper down, and i've got a whole week till the next one is due! right on! as long as i don't get handed any other random paper assignments, things should be going pretty good.

in other news, getting hit in the groin with a tennis ball hurts. don't do it.

20040412

wow. i just read the beginning of some of my previous posts, and realized that i seem to say "wow" a lot to start things off. i'm going to try and remedy that.

well, this is a bipolar week, to be sure. first off, people who actually pay attention to the syllabus the prof hands out rule. we were supposed to have a 12-15 page paper due in early american history this wednesday... but apparently, the syllabus said the prof would hand out more detailed instructions so we'd know what we were supposed to do, and he didn't. he apologized, said he'd hand it out wednesday, and moved the due date back to next monday. great stuff.

unfortunately though, i still haven't got fitted for a tux; as many of you know, i will be acting as one of the groomsmen in my friend jon's wedding this june. i've been planning on getting fitted for quite awhile now, but just keep forgetting about it until i'm too busy to do anything about it. i seem to be really good at that. the worst part though, is that he im'd me yesterday and said i was the last one to get fitted. i realize it had to be somebody, but why me? i'll have to make some time to do that this week. oh, for a motorized vehicle...

on a totally random note, tennis ball golf rules. not as much as frisbee golf, but it's still really fun. especially since my style--pretend you're playing baseball--works really well. i actually managed to win on my first time through the course, against people who had played several times before and/or actually play golf.

ok, that's about it. time to try and pick out some classes, and then get back to writing another paper.

20040409

wow. it's been awhile since i've updated. and it'll probably be awhile till the next time... this weekend will hopefully be spent doing lots of homework. i've got 4 papers due next week, for a total minimum of 20 pages. one monday, one tuesday, one wednesday, and one friday. i also have to prepare a reading guide for a section of "eminant victorians" (sounds exciting, doesn't it?) and analyze the painting "Horse Attacked by a Lion" by george stubbs.

and now it's time for food, so i'm off.

20040404

wow, just what i didn't need... another distraction. but lords of the realm came out 6 months early (or late, depending on which release date you're looking at) and $30 cheaper than expected, so i had to buy it. sorry i haven't updated recently... we've been disconnected from the internet since friday afternoon, for some inexplicable reason. and apparently it was only our dorm. weird.

and for some reason, my compy is running hella slow, so i'm gonna finish this off. later all.