Yesterday, we went to church and then did a bunch of nothing to recooperate from the Busch Gardens and beach trips the prior two days. Had nice mid-day naps. Yaaaay! Then we watched The New World, which was a horrible waste of time and Flightplan, which was less so.

I don’t even really know if I have any pictures or videos from yesterday worth mentioning… I might scrounge up the flash cards and see later though. Speaking of which, I uploaded pictures from Busch Gardens yesterday.

Anyways, back in Austin now and I am ready to take a long nap. Thanks to Andrew, Jen, and all the other Floridians that hung out with us while we were there, had a great time!

“And Leonard Nemoy
can’t stand up to this.
And Captain James T. Kirk
bows beneath my fists!
And I am awesome!
Awesome!
I am the awesomest!” - Five Iron Frenzy

Today we went to some beach four hours away and woke up really early to do so. Was quite a bit of fun, but I think all of us (except for Andrew) got burnt. I did, however, put a small amount of sunscreen on myself (or rather, other people put it on me) to make a heart on my chest, a smiley on my right arm and “MOM” on my left arm. The heart didn’t turn out so well, I think, but Van might have a decent picture.

I’m going to be uploading pics to my flickr as I sleep, I’ll title them later… heh… Edit: Ok, never mind, I titled them already. =) And here’s a pic just for our favorite Brit:

We finished the night off watching True Lies at Jen’s again… wheeeee!

And, this song is a throat killer:

“If I should stay,
I would only be in your way.
So I’ll go
But I know
I’ll think of you every step of the way.

And I will always love you
Will always love you.” - Whitney Houston

That song always reminds me of Kevin Costner…

So Day 1 in Florida (not counting the day we arrived) was spent at Busch Gardens. In the following video, you can see Andrew, Van and I slightly confused as far as amusement parks go… (Floridians will probably not understand this):

We also rode ultra-exciting rides like the following log ride (feel free to stop watching after a minute or so… it gets boring after that, haha):

Haha… actually, it was pretty fun (and the coasters were more lively than the above =)… Kathy even went on some! …and got really nasty wrinkled feet from getting socks/shoes soaked… ewww… but she wouldn’t let me take a picture of them.

Afterwards, we went back to Jen’s place and watched Four Brothers… better than I expected it to be, actually, haha.

…well, soon anyways. See ya, Texas!

“So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you’ll wait for me
Hold me like you’ll never let me go
cause I’m leavin on a jet plane
Don’t know when I’ll be back again
Oh babe, I hate to go” - John Denver

Took this shot with my new 50mm f/1.4. I think I’m gonna try it out for a bit and maybe sell off my 85L. I don’t think I’ll even bring my 85L to Florida… well, maybe I will… hmm, we’ll see… I must pack…

I’ve been making a decent amount of OliverWEB drafts, but haven’t come up with a design I want to stick with yet. Well, I’ve got a month and so to come up with something, so we’ll see. =)

I kind of want to use pink in the new layout, but not too much cause it’ll just contrast too much with pictures I post, I think. Haha… maybe a splash… =)

“Poor unfortunate souls!
In pain.
In need.
This one longing to be thinner.
That one wants to get the girl.
And do I help them?
Yes, indeed.” - Ursula (The Little Mermaid)

I like leaving messages for my roomies. Sometimes they’re nice, sometime’s they’re not. =)

On an entirely unrelated note, I tried the “shortcut swim” again, but this time giving Kathy my shoes before doing so and it went oh so much better, haha…

“Beautiful day,
wonderful feeling,
I feel like singing,
psalms meaning songs singing praises all day long.
Joy fills the weak,
joy makes us strong.
Filled ‘till we burst,
songs of praise to the God of the Universe.” - Five Iron Frenzy

You guys need to blog more, I can’t keep the blog count up for everyone here. What am I supposed to do when I’m waiting for a kernel to finish compiling, huh?

I was thinking of cool things to do in Florida and somehow thought it would be funny to bring a bag full of LEGOs to the beach, but decided that was probably a bad idea (I’m sure you can come up with quite a few reasons why). Then, I thought it’d be cool to bring that bag on the airplane to build something cool on the flight, but realized I would probably drive everyone around me insane with all the LEGO shuffling, haha.

So I think I like the 50mm on the 5D a lot better than the 85mm. I think the 85mm still seems a bit too “tight” for me for everything except solo portrait shots (which it does insanely well with… oh the bokeh…). I bought a 50mm f/1.4 which should hopefully arrive before the Florida trip. Highly considering selling the 85L, if my run with the 50mm f/1.4 goes well. I know it won’t be nearly as sharp… but since I already have the 85 f/1.8 (which is nearly just as sharp as the 85 f/1.2, just can’t stop down as low and doesn’t have as nice bokeh), I’m not sure if I use the 85L enough to justify keeping it…

“halogen, the lights will flicker
incadescent burning lies
and the silence stands for nothing
desperate, I search the skies aching for a spark
trembling in pitchest dark” - Brave Saint Saturn

Freescale has a concierge service (which I think they contract from another company or something) which I’ve found useful on a few occasions. Today, I had the guy take my car to get an oil change. Wheeee!

Although, I just realized that since I’m taking tomorrow off, I could have done it then. Oh well, more time to relaaaaax. =)

Uh oh, meeting time…

“When the toast is burning
And all the milk has turned
And Captain Crunch is waving farewell
When the big one finds you
May this song remind you
That they don’t serve breakfast in hell” - Newsboys

I have the Snakes on a Plane song stuck in my head now and I’ve had it on repeat in iTunes in an attempt to cleanse it from my head by making me sick of it, haha. That reminds me of this time I ate this bag of beef jerky when I was young and I ate so much of it so fast, I felt sick and to this day whenever I go back to San Francisco and see that type of beef jerky in the asian markets, I get a sick feeling in my stomach. Why is too much of something “good” bad? Is it because in our selfishness for temporary pleasure, we gorge ourselves with things that ultimately make us sick?

How in the world did I end up going from Snakes on a Plane to a question like that? Hmmm… Pause. Bed time. =)

Edit: Aw poo, I like all the lyrics of this song too much to just take a snippet… so here’s all of it.

“He’s washing his face to start his day
He’s lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely
Nothing in the mirror ever shows him
what’s within

He’ll push the pedal to the floor
Like the day before
He’s trying to be always trying
Try to find an end to justify his means” - Switchfoot

I took Kathy to Town Lake to run with me (well, kinda… I left her behind a few times =) and showed her where I hopped into the water to take the “shortcut.” She points and says “you went through poison ivy?” And yes, apparently, I did. Despite the little warning tags on vines along the trail which clearly state “POISON IVY,” I just went right on through and swam across. Haha… man, I am hardcore! uhhh… just kidding. =)

After running, I came back to my apartment to my sister and her friends having a BBQ and got some steak and chicken from them. Mmmm… thanks. =)

I looked at my PTO today and I will apparently accrue nearly two weeks of vacation between now and January (not including what I’ve already accrued). I’ve got about a week right now, which I’ll be using most of for the trip to Florida… but now I might take an extra day (maybe this Wednesday) if I get my work done tomorrow. Maybe I can use that time to work on the Vox Veniae website which is going to be quite rushed……

“You gotta slow down SLOW DOWN sweet talkin’ woman SLOW DOWN
You got me runnin’ RUN RUN you got me searchin’.
Hold on HOLD ON sweet talkin’ lover HOLD ON
It’s so sad if that’s the way it’s over.” - Electric Light Orchestra