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Actually, that’s kind of a weird phrase.

Anyway, here I am writing to you, dear world, at the ripe old age of 22. I’m not entirely sure I feel any different nor am I sure that I don’t feel different. I do feel a bit nostalgic and regretful as this year many of my friends from school have graduated college or, at least, the first portion of their post-secondary education. I admit that I am jealous but hope to catch up with when I am able to and things are looking good that I may be able to do that this fall once we are back in the states.

I feel as though I am counting unhatched chicks by saying this as many things are unsure yet but I can say with good authority we will be relocated to a base in San Antonio. It wasn’t my first pick, or his, but it will be something new and better than where we are for sure.

Back to the birthday subject, I had a pretty good time. I went bowling Friday night with friends. It was a very casual celebration with no expectations and I think perhaps that is what made it go off so well. Often, high expectations about birthdays often resulted in a very disappointed Cole. We followed up bowling by heading back to a friend’s house and playing board games.

Saturday, my birthday, Ryan and I went out to eat at a restaurant he did not remember liking. I remember loving the corn soup. Surprisingly, he enjoyed it even more than I did, I think. He believes they have a larger selection now which may be the case. I don’t know. Ryan even bugged me to go again today but my craving for Chinese had been satisfied.

After dinner we picked up pre-sale vouchers to be able to see Iron Man. On Monday we’d gone down to see it but hadn’t realized they were preselling and we weren’t able to. Because it was a holiday, nothing else was open. Gah!

Luckily, we got out vouchers, headed home for a minute and returned just in time to get in line. Most of the theatre was already packed by the time we got in there and I was seriously worried that we wouldn’t be able to find seats together but we did.

We both liked the movie quite a bit. It was fast moving, exciting and funny in many places. The background music reminded me a lot of the music that was used in Transformers.

We weren’t the only ones who liked it as, I’m sure most of you know. People were there who had already seen it once or twice and as we were leaving, people were discussing going back to see it tonight! But I didn’t like it enough to try to deal with our ghetto as movie theatre. Right now there’s doing construction so only 1/2 of the seating is available. As we were leaving last night, I saw 2 folding chairs that must have been set up for customers who could not find any place to sit in the theatre! How awful!

By the time we left the movie, by birthday was finished. I was rather pleased. I’ll need to do this again in another 365 days. Thanks to everyone who sent wishes!

Picture this: It is quiet, foggy Friday morning and 2 nocturnal creatures who just happen to be married are whiling away the time in front of their screens. Creature A realizes Creature B has done some creative conjuring to produce a mouse pad where no mousepad is to be found.

Creature A: you’re using our next president’s face as a mousepad?
Creature B: Laughs. I wouldn’t care if it was our current president.

But Creature A is perplexed. It is not the current president. It is the candidate for whom both creatures root. There must be some subliminal message in this.

Or, perhaps, it’s just a silly coincidence that Obama’s face is on the magazine Ryan is using as a make-shift mousepad.

I have a love-hate relationship with my kitchen.

On the one hand, it’s mine or, at least, as close to mine as anything gets these days. Ryan tends to leave it alone so I govern it in any way I choose.

On the other hand, I don’t particularly love anything that the kitchen was made for using it for – dishes and cooking mainly and the messes left by said activity.

Dishes are messy and I always wind up wet with dishwater or get a fair amount on the floor. I also don’t love having to scrub until my fingers fall off. Ryan, as much as I love him, is hopeless when it comes to the fine art of rinsing dishes before putting them into the sink rather than letting them sit and become encrusting with what might have once been a sandwich or chicken strips or the-end-all-be-all of disgusting food remains RANCH DRESSING.

Now let’s talk about cooking. Some people are wonderful cooks and chefs. They do not need recipes and, if for some reasons they choose to use them, they deviate in a way that turns a simple meal into a piece of fucking art. I once knew a man with white carpet in his kitchen; he is one of those people. Let’s get this straight: I am not one of those people!

I don’t know how anyone can make food look like a masterpiece. My goal? Make it edible. I don’t know how anyone can finish baking or cooking with a spotless kitchen. My goal? Make it without any major catastrophes. And I certainly can’t keep myself looking like one of those 50s housewives by the time I’m done. My goal? Don’t sweat into the chicken too much.

Cooking demands far more time and energy than I want to give to something that I don’t naturally love. I am not a great chef because I lack 2 important qualities: desire for precision and patience. Coincidentally, this is also why I would make a bad sniper.

Precision, you ask? Yes, precision. Precisely. It’s not something I strive for. I like the feeling of a job well done if it’s a job I like to do not one I must do out of necessity or because someone else tells me to do it. Cooking is just one of those things. Even if I really desire the outcome – edible, even delicious food – the process is something I despise.

What’s the deal with patience? Unless it’s something I can put in the oven and forget about, I become agitated about the time and attention cooking demands. I don’t want to stand around “stirring occasionally” or watching for bubbles or thickening of paste or what-have-you. Even if I know that something needs constant attention I tend to get distracted by – oh – the internet and – wouldn’t you know it! – the food has become slightly charred.

So this attitude toward cooking generally means I do a sloppy job. I don’t tend to fully read through recipes which means I usually don’t get them quite right and don’t notice until it’s too late.

No, the food isn’t art and, yes the kitchen is a mess by the time I’m done which usually means more dishes that I’m not happy to do. It also results in careless accidents like, say, leaving the sugar bag over the burner where the vent pipe it for the oven and having it turn into a molten glob of sugar-lava on top of and inside my oven!

Remember how I don’t like scrubbing? I’m still working on that one. Coincidentally, those cookies were the best I ever made despite the fact that I thought they’d turn out horribly.

You’d think this fuck all attitude would make me the perfect candidate for playing Grand Theft Auto IV buuut, I’ll leave that pleasure to my beloved. -smirks-

I didn’t go out with a bang so much. no, work went out with a bang or, rather, it sent me out with what seemed like a bullet to the stomach. My last day was horrible.

Underlying it all was the unbearable heat in the cage. I’d say it wagers from 20 – a million degrees hotter in there than the rest of the club and out doors. Unfortunately, it’s a glassed in room with no circulation. I literally would be dripping sweat unless I was sitting directly in front of the fan, not moving at all. It’s probably issue enough to arise health concerns but no one seems to give a damn at all. This made me miserable.

It also gave me a headache. For some reason, heat like that makes my mouth dry and causes my jaw to hurt which turns into a headache. I know it probably sounds like whining when I say “OMG it’s hot in there” and use it as part of my reason to quit but if you worked there, you’d understand.

I awoke with my back hurting and although this eventually subsides, I found myself having new pains during the day: cramps. Now, I haven’t had cramps or even a period for some time because of my IUD so I wasn’t expecting it at all. In fact I assumed it couldn’t even be my period and didn’t check until I accidentally noticed while flushing the toilet. Nice one, ovaries.

Now on top of those two things I experienced the usual feast-or-famine deal with customers which means I either have a bunch at once or none – for hours. I’m not a person who takes being bored very well, especially when a proxy blocks all the good sites at work. After checking in on a few forums, I was bored out of my skull for the entire day while being physically uncomfortable. Nothing like having time on your hands to think about being miserable.

Besides that, nothing went horribly wrong except for the fact that my eyes were bigger than my stomach when it came to ordering lunch – I had a fajita and a sandwich. I ate the former and had no room for the latter. I wound up tossing most of it because it quickly became disgusitng sitting in the heat of the cage. This made me a bit sad.

I’m really glad to be done with that place, though!

So DisneySea was a lot of fun. It makes up a little less than half of the Tokyo Disney Resort with the other features being Disneyland, Ikspiari, a shopping center, Bon Voyage, the largest collection if Disney merchandise anywhere in Japan and a handful of hotels.

Tokyo Disney Resort has been around for 25 years. Disneyland there is actually the oldest Disneyland outside of the United States. Interestingly enough, neither park is owned by Disney park, something no other Disney park can say. Anyway, the park was full of signs and attractions celebrating the 25th anniversary in bright, bold colours.

I was simply amazed by the park, as I was with Disneyland but even moreso. These parks are both amazingly detailed bringing you into another place, not just showing it to you. It starts as soon as you enter the gate and see the giant rotating globe above a fountain of water with characters in gold decorating.

However, Disneysea is more geared toward the adults so princesses and Stitch have no place there. There are 7 themed areas known as ports (to follow the overall water theme): Mediterranean Harbour, American Waterfront, Mermaid Lagoon, Mystery Island, Arabian Coast, Lost River Delta and Port Discovery.

The entrance leads you into Mediterranean Harbour, a gorgeous port with Venetian influence. Ryan and I rode the gondola through the harbour where I snapped many pictures including one of a pirate ship! Toward the end, our gondolier even sang a bit of a song though I couldn’t tell you what he said. I definitely would love to visit Venice/Italy someday!

We checked out the American Waterfront, a rustic imitation of early America – where I even convinced Ryan to join me on the Tower of Terror. Let me tell you, I was a bit terrified once I was actually strapped in but it wasn’t that bad. It’s not one continuous drop of 13 stories; you don’t even go all the way to the top! Still, feeling myself being lifted off the seat was a bit terrifying.

Other highlights include the Indiana Jones Temple of the Crystal Skull ride which was inside a giant, amazing temple (of course). We were in a jeep-like ride on a track that bumped and jerked its way through the course. It featured an odd Japanese-speaking robotic Indiana who looked just like Harrison Ford, “poison darts” being blown at us and, of course, the large rock ball thingy.

We also rode the StormRider in Port Discovery, the Electric Railway between Port Discovery and the American Railway, 20,000 Leagues Under the sea in Mystery Island and we saw Sinbad’s Storybook Voyage – a show you progress ‘though’ on a little river while in a boat. I especially liked seeing Sinbad’s tiger Chandu who was adorable!

I’m happy to say I was finally able to see the characters and take picture of them, at least, if not with them. I tried to get one with Mickey but the crowd was crazy and girls were grabbing him before anyone else had a chance. I just don’t have it in me to compete with that!

We didn’t see any night time events, however; we chose to go home early as we’d been rained on all day and were quite wet by the time 5 o’clock rolled around and the early bus departed. I had hoped for nicer weather and the light mist in the morning wasn’t too bad but it eventually just became to much to continue walking around the park in the rain.

Of course, we did buy a few things before we left including some sweets for ourselves and a t-shirt for Samantha. Ryan even played a few games and, though he didn’t win, got some cute consolation prizes. I also have a few souvenir coins from the “coin pressing machines” to remember DisneySea by, though I doubt I’ll be forgetting it any time soon!