oh what fun ;-)

welcome to my week -- it's been a crazy good one so far. every night for the last better part of a week i've been in a totally different world so to speak :-P... in the past few days i've seen someone i knew from HS, three valpo friends, and a friend from my semester in budapest -- it's been fantastic!

sunday, i dropped alliswan off at the train station on my way to church... it was a fun week, but as my spring break began, hers ended, so she needed to get back to school... i'm glad we had the time for all the fun we did have :-)

after church, i headed south to wilmington, delaware. jessica warnier (of valpo fame) is there doing the lutheran volunteer corp thing. she shares a 5 bedroom 1 bath house with 4 other girls in the same program. mostly we just chatted a lot until dinner time (as we hadn't seen each other since last may!)... i lucked out sine for dinner they had a potluck for all their support staff, etc., so i got to meet new people and get quality eats... after most people left, all the roommates, and the 3 extras of us who were staying the night watched "saved!", which i had never seen before. i didn't know what to expect, but for what it is, it's a decent film.

monday, jessica, had to be at work at 8am, so i planned to head out at the same time. by 10:30 i was in downtown washington, DC, and running ahead of schedule, so i decided to park and walk around for an hour... i made it past the white house and the washington monument and over to the WWII memorial in the middle of the national mall before i needed to turn around and head back to my car,... it was a nice stroll though :-) and i got a few nice pictures :-)

things were going well until partway through virginia, when a rock fell out of a dumptruck and hit my windshield, putting a fist size star-shaped crack in the darn thing. i called insurance to see what i was covered for, and i still have a $200 deductible on glass claims, and so i get to pay full out for a new windshield this afternoon.... that didn't make me very happy :-P

however, north carolina cheered me up... in addition to finding a nice surprise from alliswan in my car, i also got sweet tea when i just ordered iced tea, and the pleasant surprise of that cheered me up considerably too!

finally, around 7:30 (right on schedule) i pulled into my friend sheima's apartment. sheima and i were the best of friends freshman year of high school, and just before the end of that school year, her family moved to virginia. besides seeing her and her family spring break of my senior year of HS, we've not been super in touch since... in the meantime she's finished college and gotten married, and both works and is in grad school now, here in columbia. it was a blast from the past and so fantastic to catch up with her! her husband (fahrettin) is from turkey and only just came to the states for grad school (he has a masters in poli sci from rutgers and a ph.d. from USC in the same, he now teaches economics at a local college)... we had a fantastic dinner, and then played scrabble. fahrettin made up for his lack of being able to spell non-turkish words by placing 2 and 3 letter words on double and triple word scores... it was a fun time... we also (over dessert) had a good chat about christianity. sheima and fahrettin are both very devout muslims... sheima and i had many a chat in high school but fahrettin had his own questions, and from being in an LVC house one night to trying to explain my beliefs to a turkish muslim over pistachio pudding the next night, you have to agree that my network of friends is a fantastically diverse and cool set of people, eh ;-)

yesterday (tuesday) morning, i left when sheima and fahrettin left for work, getting to roommate (aka kristin)'s school just as she got out of her first class. after setting me up an appointment to get my car window fixed, we headed south on another mini-roadtrip -- to charleston, south carolina.

we made it through the old slave market, fort sumter, several oooooooooooooold and very cool churches and down the waterfront to the battery before nina miller (also of valpo fame) got out of work to meet us. from there the 3 of us went to another beach (and saw lots of dolphins playing in the water! i think that's the first time i had ever seen them in the wild!)... then dinner, and then i asked for a tour of nina's workplace (she helps write math textbooks for a publishing company in charleston)... after seeing the book office/warehouse, we went to her place for cookies and to chat a little more before driving back to columbia.

today, for heading south for my vacation, it's rainy and with a high of 46... go figure... this morning i met up with mason (of budapest semesters in math fame) at his place and then we went out to breakfast... i'll meet up with him again tomorrow morning before he goes into work and while roommate's taking her last midterm of the week. we chatted lots about grad school and common budapest friends and had a quality time :-)

now, i am glued to roommate's room from 12-3, waiting on the autoglass people to come (i need to be able to answer the phone and give them directions if necessary), while she has class and/or a funeral to attend this afternoon (someone from the church she works at locally)

so far, it's been a quality trip... hopefully i'll get some homework done this afternoon through too :-P

so yeah, a new world of sorts every night... makes it fun to catch up with people when there's such a variety of people to catch up with :-) it also is just fun to SEE for myself the places where my friends are at :-)

turns out after hanging out with roommate yet tomorrow (and some with mason too), friday i'm going up to greensboro, NC to see my cousin heather, then back down to lancaster, SC to spend the night at my uncle dave and aunt michele's place... saturday, all the way back to jersey, but going to dinner and a bible study with carli rossow in maryland on the way first :-P i'll be back laaaaaaaaaaaate.

anyhow, all this is to say: here's what i've been up to, yay for friends, and hope you all have a fantastic week!

signing off from a very rainy and cold columbia, south carolina :-P

later dudes :-P