30: ready or not here I come

I really enjoyed myself last night at my birthday party. Lots of my friends came to share it with me and wish me well. Even Dad was able to come down for it, which was pretty special because I rarely get my friends and family together at the same time and I hate having to choose. The food was great and I got some very thoughtful gifts. I like having an excuse to throw a party, I just hope everyone enjoyed the party as much as I did.

I put up some links to more pictures, hosted over at flickr and a link to my second blog and profile over at MySpace. I just started exploring the community over there and its been rewarding so far. I'm keeping this blog for family and travel related stuff, MySpace is for random thoughts and and networking. Feel free to go through my stuff :)

Ciao.

More books and bike rides

Hey all,

So I got the rest of the books Chris ordered for me from Amazon the other day. Looks like he's got me covered for this trip between Krakow, Poland, and the rest of Eastern Europe. Thanks again bro! If I can't find something to do, see, eat, or somewhere to stay its my own fault now.

I've recently reconnected with Lindsey Miller and we've had a good time hanging out. As some of you may recall she's a friend from way back, grade school through high school and now she's back down here in Eugene working and finishing up grad school. Lindsey mentioned that she might do the Seattle to Portland bike ride coming up this Summer, and thought I might be interested seeing as how I ride my bike to work everyday. I've never done something like that before, but I'm considering it. Its a 200 mile ride spread over 2 days. We've decided to start training with little bike rides around town once a week and gradually scale up to longer rides. Too bad I'm going to be gone for most of May.

I'm looking forward to my party Saturday night. It will be nice to have most of my friends and family together for dinner and drinks. I just hope I get everything done in time.

Ciao.

Time to RTFM

Hey all,

On my ride home last night I was thinking to myself that I needed to get started really planning my free time on my next trip to Poland. I've never been good at planning stuff, usually just going with the flow and letting more organized people set the pace, and I'm cool with that. So I didn't know where to start when making a plan for myself. Thankfully my highly motivated and organized brother was a step ahead of me! When I got home there was a box from Amazon.com waiting for me. I was feeling a bit down and this immediately perked me up. Imagine my surprise to find Rick Steve's Best of Eastern Europe 2006 inside! Thanks, Chris :)

Looks like the perfect thing for me. I'll be reading it and taking it with me for sure. Its got maps and rail schedules and short trip itineraries and everything. Great stuff.

Ready or not, Europe, here I come.

I have tickets in my hand that say I'm going back to Krakow this May. I did want to go back, but I didn't expect it to be this soon. I am scheduled to stay 3 weeks. Hopefully I can take some of that time and see a little bit more than just Krakow.

This time my traveling partner will be Andrea, who is one of the three liaisons and the only one who hasn't gone over to meet the folks in Poland yet. Andrea is very cool and we've had a great time hanging out together. It's going to be a ton of fun to share what I've experienced of Krakow with her. She's only scheduled to stay one week though.

Anyways, when I come back from Poland I should be bringing one of their Java devs, Marcin, back with me to stay in Eugene as a guest of Lunar Logic for a bit. It should be fun to entertain him, but unfortunately Eugene isn't quite as fun as Krakow. We'll find something to keep him busy for sure.

Thanks again to Mom and Dad for my early birthday gift. This weekend they took me shopping for my very own matched set of luggage. I love it. Should cover me very well for just about any length trip. So naturally I gave them back their luggage I borrowed for my last couple trips, smells and all.

Speaking of my birthday I'm planning to have a party at my house on Saturday the 22nd. I'm thinking of a potluck dinner in the early afternoon and dinner time and then transition to a full blown party that night. You're all invited. This coming weekend I'm probably going to the coast with Elliot to help him celebrate his 30th. Happy birthday Elliot!

So on to the flight itinerary. Until next time.

Eugene to Krakow

United Flight 6404
depart eugene 10:45 2006-5-4
arrive san francisco 12:12 2006-5-4

United Flight 870
depart san francisco 14:00 2006-5-4
arrive chicago/ohare 19:56 2006-5-4

United Flight 4778
depart chicago/ohare 21:35 2006-5-4
arrive krakow 13:55 2006-5-5


Krakow to Eugene

United Flight 8765
depart krakow 6:55 2006-5-26
arrive munich 8:20 2006-5-26

United Flight 903
depart munich 11:35 2006-5-26
arrive denver 19:13 2006-5-26

United Flight 6665
depart denver 20:40 2006-5-26
arrive eugene 22:19 2006-5-26

Spring is in the air and my eyes are itching

Hey all,

So its that time of year again, time to find my allergy symptom meds I put away in the Fall and start popping them once again to combat the constant runny nose, itchy eyes, sinus headaches, and sudden sneezing fits. That may be one of the reasons I love the Fall so much, it means a respite from my allergies for six months.

April also means that my birthday is coming up, as well as the birthday's of some of my most favorite people. This year many of my highschool chums are turning 30 and some are celebrating in style. I have no idea what I want to do for mine. I will probably just invite people over to my house for a little party. Is it narcissistic to throw a birthday party for yourself? I just don't want 30 to go by without some sort of significance. Then again it is just another day, why ascribe any particular relevance to it at all?

When I bring up my birthday I feel bad for mentioning it, especially when someone asks what I want for my birthday. I never know how to respond to that. I don't keep a wishlist of things I hope people will buy for me, that would be very selfish. If I want something and I can't live without it I go buy it. If I think of something I want and I don't buy it right away I just end up forgetting about it anyways.

My thoughtlessness about gifts extends to others too. I never remember other people's birthdays in time to get them a decent gift. Plus I've always been a terrible gift giver. One of the reasons I dread the Christmas season.

So anyways, getting back to travel stuff... I might be going back to Poland in the first part of May. I'm not sure how long I would be staying this time around, but it could be for two weeks or longer. We are working out the details now. I will post more when I can.

Cheers.

The scent takes me back to India

So when I got all unpacked from my trip, and I do notice a bit of a smell hanging on all my clothes that faintly reminds me of the smell in my hotel room in Chennai. I never did figure out what it was, but I strongly suspected mold or mildew.

I packed the shawls I bought in my suitcase for the journey home. They sat in there with my dirty clothes for the 20+ hour ride home, which had been soaking up all that good stuff in the hotel room all week. So the combination of mildew and old Jeff sweat made for an interesting musk.

I gave one of the shawls I brought back in my suitcase to Vanessa, because I knew she would like one and I wanted to thank her for being so great about watching Jester all this time that I couldn't. She said later she noticed the "odd" smell and is now trying to overpower it with yummy smelling stuff. I wonder which smell will win out in the end.

I should probably air out the rest, but I think it adds a unique character to them that you just couldn't have gotten any other way. Hope you all are having happy olfactory adventures. Ciao.

No more jet lag

I think I'm finally back on schedule. I caught up on my sleep Sunday and Monday and actually woke up at a decent hour today. Vanessa came down yesterday and brought Jester. He seemed really excited to be at the house again and was happy to see me. I love having him back for awhile. I took him on a nice long walk this morning in the park and he seemed to enjoy sniffing around his old territory again. He woke me up a couple of times last night running outside to chase whatevers, but I didn't mind I was just happy knowing he was here. I really missed that little guy.

Its back to work for me now. I wonder if I still have a desk.

April Fool

I swear I must have been born on April 1st instead of the 25th. Its like a cloud of confusion constantly surrounds me and can sometimes effects others in my vicinity. I do some really dumb things in spite of being paid to be a "smart guy". So I was wrong about the whole daylight savings time change over and have done some historical editing, but there was good reason for me to think it was. At SF airport when I finally got my laptop set up again I switched the timezone because it still thought it was in Europe. Well the EU observes spring daylights savings time on March 26th, so my computer had already adjusted. When I changed to Pacific time it stayed an hour ahead, which I think is a bug in the WinXP clock. I kind of freaked out when I noticed what time it said because my watch which I had adjusted on the flight in said I still had plenty of time until boarding, but my laptop thought I should be boarding already. Due to my cloud of confusion the first person I happened to ask about daylight savings time was from Sweden and therefore confirmed that I needed to adjust my watch forward. Despite all that I was still able to get on my plane and get back to Eugene safely. If it had been in the Fall I might have missed my plane by an hour.

So I'm home again and it feels really good. I was tired, but still stayed up to watch one of my "new" DVDs. The quality is noticeably poor on my big TV, but what do I expect for less than $3.00 a pop? Oh well.

I didn't do much of anything today. Actually I slept for a good 12 hours. Felt great, really needed it. Now its time to unpack and do some grocery shopping and all that domestic stuff. I'm planning on taking tomorrow off work as well and ease into work on Tuesday.

I'll keep updates coming when there's something new to share, but the India portion of the blog has come to a close. Thanks for reading. Ciao.

Safe in San Francisco

Almost home. I arrived in San Francisco at 5:10, and thankfully my suitcase managed to get here too. I had to pick it up and go through customs and then recheck it. Thankfully it wasn't too busy here on a Saturday afternoon. I was able to get some sleep on the plan since the Economy Plus seats on UA have enough room so I could stretch out under the seat in front of me. For some reason I had a whammy put on me today and everyone was spilling things on me. The stewardess threw some ice on me while she was making someone else's drink, the guy next to me spilled his leftover rice and chicken on me when they were picking up the trash, and again someone dropped a jacket on my head while they were getting something else out of the overhead compartment. I wonder what Hindu god I angered on my way out of India receive such punishment.

On the way to my connecting flight I remembered it was my last chance to exchange my rupees so I looked for a map that would point me in the right direction before I got too far. I didn't find anything informative so I figured the international terminal would have one and I was headed in the other direction towards domestic flights. I figured I should ask someone before walking all the way to the wrong terminal. The guy I asked told me there was an exchange counter at the domestic gate hub so I thanked him and continued on my way. I got through the last security check-point and reached the hub only to find that the exchange counter was closed and a sign said to go to the other one at the international terminal. I should learn to follow my instincts more. I only had 650 rupees left, about $16.00, so I decided it wasn't worth going through 2 additional security checks and a long walk.

While waiting for my flight I had a vodka-cran and a burrito and then went in search of a power outlet. I finally found one attached a pay phone so I'm camped out by it now. This laptop's greed for power seriously compromises its portability.

Well, its time to go, my flight boards in 10 minutes. Cheers.

Fortifying at O'Neills

Mmmm, I'm sitting here in O'Neill's at Heathrow airport in London pounding down a Full English House breakfast complete with sausage, bacon, toast, mushrooms, baked beans, eggs, and a tomato and washing it all down with a delicious Guinness. I still have about an hour before they even announce which gate my flight to San Francisco will be leaving from, but my battery only has 40 minutes left in it. Fully charged it lasts a whopping one and a half hours max. Not too impressive.

So as you may have guessed I didn't have any troubles getting packed, checked out of the hotel and onto my flight out of Chennai. The lines were long at the airport, but I got there plenty early. We took off around 4:15 in the morning and I was already falling asleep. Unfortunately I woke up for the first meal, I shouldn't have bothered. The fruit tasted rotten, the sausage was like jerky and the "omlette" could have been used as a sponge to mop up the juice I managed to spill when the guy next to me dropped his bag on my head while he was getting into the overhead compartments. I only managed to stomach one bite of each before pushing it all aside. The only consolation was the two free glasses of wine I had with lunch. At least British Airways softens the blow of being packed into steerage by supplying free booze. United Airlines could learn a thing or two from them.

I passed the rest of the time trying to watch the in flight entertainment without sound since the headphone jack on my chair was broken. Luckily the Bollywood film showing had subtitles, but watching them all dance and sing without a soundtrack just managed to inhance an already bizarre experience. The only accompany sound was the incessant crying of babies. I distracted myself with some Kakuro puzzles and writing down the names of European cities I might like to visit on my next trip as I saw them pop up on the map as we passed overhead.

Batteries about to die again, so I better sign off. Cheers and I will see you all soon.