life in surround sound and process color.

LISTENING TO: Jethro Tull - Aqualung This is a quick wrap up post for the rest of my trip out west. Like I said earlier, I feel like these posts really aren't doing this trip justice, but for as much as I want to remember, everything is blending together. In the end, maybe that's how it should be - with only the best pieces really making a point in my memory. For instance, after my dad's procedure, we experienced the kindness of the nursing staff. As my dad had to stay flat on his back for a few hours after his treatment, we basically sat in his recovery room watching the Nicolas Cage movie Drive Angry. This movie will always have a special place in my heart, I think, because 1.) it's so bad it's good and 2.) we had about a half hour of it left when the nurse came to tell us to leave, and she let us stay to finish it. From there it was a slow connecting walk back to the Kahler, where we ordered Jimmy Johns and watched more of the SyFy channel. We had near...

LISTENING TO: Hooters - And We Danced I feel like there is so much going on with this trip that I'm leaving out all the little moments that keep happening. Did you know that the Illinois highway system has Oasis-es (that's totally the wrong way of writing that out, but bear with me), rather than rest stops? I mean, they're pretty much the same thing, EXCEPT AN OASIS FLOATS OVER THE HIGHWAY ITSELF. It sucks that it was sleeting outside when we stopped at one on the way through - they have an outside skyway you can walk on that I'm guessing, when the weather is nice, makes cars driving underneath a little more perceptive that the rest stop is literally floating over the highway, and oh look! there are people standing right overhead. My dad may or may not have taken my photo while we stopped to get coffee. Every state's rest stops should be like this. After passing through Chicago, we were on our way to Wisconsin (where we kept running into more waterparks a...

LISTENING TO: Don McLean - American Pie Whenever I thought I would be driving through midwest America, it was definitely never going to be because my father was going to the Mayo Clinic to be treating a cancerous tumor. If his diagnosis has taught me anything, it's that you have to take the good with the bad, and I've always been down for a multi-state road trip. Since we are driving through states known for their hellacious winter weather in the middle of January, we rented a four-wheel drive SUV. Unfortunately, that SUV is a Yukon. What we've very quickly determined is that no one of a height less than 5'6" should really be driving a Yukon, because the blind spots are literally not made for someone of less than average height.  Needless to say, it's one of the most comfortable vehicles I've ever been a passenger in, and although driving isn't the easiest (and I look like a child driving a car made for a giant), it's actually a pretty cool c...

LISTENING TO: a year in review... 1. Chasing Kings - Maybe It's the Distance 2. Lily Allen - Who'd Have Known 3. Tinie Tempah - Pass Out   4. Jessie J - Domino   5. Matt Hires - Honey Let Me Sing You A Song   6. Kanye West - Power   7. Emeli Sane - Heaven   8. The Rembrandts - I'll Be There For You   9. Chris Brown, Lil Wayne & Busta Rhymes - Look At Me Now   10. Camelia Jordana - Non Non Non 10a. Ben L'Oncle Soul - Seven Nation Army

LISTENING TO: Camelia Jordana - Non Non Non , but in actuality Ben L'Oncle Soul - Seven Nation Army , since we're in a travel throw-back mood. This is a bit delayed, but seeing as my flight home was also delayed, it fits with the narrative (Side note on the song choice - this was an earworm that got stuck in my brain during my trip to Paris, and it seemed absolutely appropriate for the story of my journey home from Prague). ...So, where were we? After getting a notification about the impending strike in Brussels, Rachel's grandmother very kindly proceeded to be my Czech interpreter while attempting to get instructions from my airline. After being told to not make any major changes with the exception of hopping on a different layover flight to Amsterdam and then Newark once I got to Brussels, I skype'd my family, let them know what was happening, and got ready to consume massive amounts of quality coffee prior to getting to the airport around 4am Czech time. F...

LISTENING TO: Chris Brown (feat. Lil Wayne and Busta Rhymes) - Look At Me Now When we last met, things were different. Rachel and I had just gotten up, ready to take on the Prague Castle, which, by the way, was one of the high points of this trip. It was gorgeous and ginormous, and although very, very cold (you could see your breath while we inside) was definitely worth the trip up the mountain. I'm so excited to see the film I took there - I can't even describe how great it was. Not to mention the view was something amazing - you could basically see all of Prague, which was beautiful. After walking down these really cool stairs and eating trdelnik (which is basically a funnel cake doughnut with cinnamon sugar and chocolate filling), we walked through Old Town and made our way to Palladium, which was the mall, which was insane but really cool. And huge. Like 200+ stores, four floors, really cool escalators huge. After speeding through there, we bought some hot wine on the ...

LISTENING TO: The Rembrandts - I'll Be There For You So where were we? Oh yes, going out to the bar before staying up all night and getting on a bus, then a train, then a plane all at 2am, 3am and then finally around 4-6am. Seems like a good plan, until you put it into practice. Then it turns into a lesson of how many (drunk) people take the night bus in Islington, paired with how very, very awful McDonald's smells within a closed space (say, a train, where you're already feeling sick). However, after that horrifying experience, the rest of the very early morning was actually pretty much smooth going. Gatwick Airport is HUGE (also, for some reason although my Doctor Who bracelet didn't set off security alarms in either Newark or Brussels, it totally set things off in London... which I guess is kind of ironic), and although we had to make our way to the second to last terminal in the entire airport (a fifteen minute walk, mind you) the flight itself was pretty chill...