Ski Trip

Last weekend, we took a ski trip to the upper peninsula of Michigan. We rented a minivan, which was okay, but cramped with 7 people in it!!
And then we had a problem. . . about 20 miles south of Madison, WI, and 4:41am Friday morning, we got a flat tire!!! Uhhh ohhhh! Thats was really annoying, but Romy fixed it with the spare tire. Thats him on the picture to the right. There were trucks passing us going 70mph, and so close!! But we finally got back on the road in less than an hour.

The first day we went downhill skiing at BlackJack Mountain. Thats was fun, but we were really tired. We skied a half-day. The next day was cool. We downhill skied at Indianhead Mountain, and it snowed all day, putting fresh powder on the slopes. We were doing black-diamonds that day!

Later, we went out for a big plate of spagetti and meatballs at the Ore House restaurant. Mmmmmm. . .

Finally, Sunday, on our last day, we woke up really early to go cross-country skiing at ABR Trails. They have a huge web of trails, and they were freshly covered with snow from yesterday's snow fall (about 3-4 inches at least). We had a good time. Nicole and Marcel rented skating skis and me and Romy had our classic striding skis. Then at the end, me and Nicole switched.

$340 !!!

$340

Thats how much I paid for a roundtrip ticket (all taxes included) from Chicago to London for this summer! WOah! I still can't believe it!!!

Well, its was all because of STATravel's Bluesday Sale, the launch of their new flexible student and youth tickets. They had really insanely low prices on many destinations to Europe, but you had to book on Feb 7th.
We were so lucky that we got them! There was some real drama. We had to change the day of our wedding, but whatever. . .

Also, The Great Baikal Trail Association has released its dates. We want to do camp 17 (Holy Nose), so we already applied. Now lets hope we get accepted. Yes!

Future Planning

Some things we are planning are going okay, and others are not going so good. Right now, we are getting a list ready for camping in Finland and Russia this summer. We are also getting some gear ready for it too (should we bring climbing stuff????).
Hopefully that will be us!! --->
But soon the fun will begin! We gotta buy our air plane tickets (on Feb. 7th, theres a BIG sale at STA), and get visas, get train tix, book hostels, etc.
At that same time, we gotta get things going for our wedding, which now has shifted to July 8th. On Feb 15th, we must secure our permit for the park, and reserve a tent. Then there is the rest of the stuff to do.

And on top of all that, we're trying to make the student exchange to Denmark work. We are having trouble with the ABET accrediation stuff. More on that later!
Well anyways, the exciting stuff:
-We're getting a set of the Faraday Flashlights, the ones you shake and make power by induction.
-We're getting a First Need portable water purification system, so that we never run out of water. You can even purify a puddle of rainwater, and it'll taste great!
-Nicole is getting ready a homemade book/guide of the National Parks in Finland. I'm gonna put one together about Lake Baikal and the area. We have a book about the railroad, and we also have on on Moscow.

So thats about it for the update. Hopefully I can provide more details as time goes on!

Woah!

I have had no time to write. I am sooooooooooo busy trying to plan out our wedding, our Finland/Russia trip, and our idea of doing a student exchange in Denmark for an academic year. PLUS, school!

Its all coming down to the time where things have to be acted on. I gotta make reservations, buy tickets, etc. Oh well, HOW EXCITING!!!!

PS: My left foot is finally better. . .

"My Left Foot. . . . " -Stewie Griffin

Yesterday, we helped out @ the YMCA because they had two birthday party climbing wall rentals, so we were belaying bratty little kids for a few hours. When we were done, I wanted to do the super swing, where you climb up the wall, and swing tarzan-style. Well, Romy was belaying me, and he let me swing, and then dropped me on purpose when I was near the ground. Even so, as I was dropping, I landed on my left foot wrong and twisted it! At first, it didn't hurt. I thought it was going to be like one of those ankle things, where it hurts but only lasts about 5 minutes, and then you can walk again. Well, this just kept getting worse, and worse. After about 5 minutes, I couldn't even put any weight on it because it would start hurting like crazy! So I hopped back, and sometimes Romy carried me, still not believeing me, and claiming I was just being "cute" and trying to get attention. Whatever. . .
Now I woke up the next morning AND IT STILL HURTS, JUST LIKE IT DID YESTERDAY!!! Grrrr. . . . I can't go exercise today or climb at the gym like I wanted to. I can't even clean the apartment!
I am confined to sitting and doing fluid mechanics homework! ::sigh::

My Second Latte Art . . . . kinda

Well, this one happened by accident too, and the pic was taken about 3 minutes after I made the latte, so it started fading, but. . . I think its a tree. Or maybe a mushroom. I think its a tree, yeah.

I really have no idea how I did it, I wanted to make a leaf design, and that popped out! Its tough to make latte art if the froth is not perfect, or there isn't enough crema on the surface of the espresso, but I keep trying!

In other news, Nicole already left Chicago to go back to school in Daytona Beach. She was originally supposed to leave Tuesday morning, but a weird thing happened. They canceled her flight with out notifying her, and told her the next flight was at night, but at night she would miss her DOTS shuttle from Orlando to Daytona. So then she asked to move it to Wednesday morning instead, and they did! For free! So, she stayed an extra day. We went out to a sushi buffet that night, which was excellent! These were their house rules:

1. No food left on the plate, or they charge $5.
2. No ordering more until everything on your plate is gone.
3. No sharing.
4. A limit of 2 maki per person per time ordering.

But it was dirt cheap, $12.95/person which included miso soup and grean bean tempura. And the sushi was HIGH quality, but no sashami, only maki. But they had eel! Mmmmmm. I think my fave was the Miami roll, or the Crazy Chicago roll. We ended up ordering 4 rolls each. We were stuffed. We even let our "5th guest" have a taste of the Caribbean roll (Marcel's big idea, he was pressured).
The place was on 1610 W. Belmont in Chicago. I strongly reccomend it!