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This is a quasi-meme. If you have Netflix, go to your queue and look in the “Genre” column for documentaries. Pick 5 and post them. It’s okay if you post less than 5, but not more, so we can keep things tidy! Personally I have a lot more than 5, I love documentaries. That’s why I’m forcing this meme upon you - so I can see what documentaries I might have missed and would want to add to my queue. If you don’t have Netflix, find 5 and post them. You can post as a comment to this entry, or as an entry in your own journal.
Here’s my 5:
This morning I had to do that test for linguistics, but I couldn’t get the wireless working at all. I eventually gave up and used one of the computers in the lobby - thank goodness there was one available. I discovered that once you logged in, you couldn’t stop the test, or you would be locked out. Fortunately it didn’t take me very long, although it was long enough for one or two people to mill around hoping for a computer. I wasn’t about to give mine up, though! Luckily the other users moved out and the people waiting got to move in. I finished the test relatively quickly at least. While I was working on it, A negotiated a 25$ reduction in our total hotel bill. The hot water in the shower has quit working again, and the bathroom light and outlet still don’t work either.
We went to get breakfast but that turned into a fiasco. A wasn’t really listening to me at the Burger King drive-through, so I missed the opportunity to say “I can’t read anything but Pancakes and Hash Browns, can you tell me what else they have, since it’s all in Spanish?” I ended up with a packet of hash browns. We pulled over to eat, and I went in to see if I could figure out my order. No good - the desayuno menu wasn’t even inside, and all the lunch/dinner food was meaty. I was pretty discouraged, but I had seen a 7-11 down the street, so I said I’d walk down there. No dice: it was boarded up and closed. By this point I was really annoyed but I was also ready to give up. A was going to drive down the street looking for a shop she wanted to go to, but I saw a Subway so I asked her to pull over there. It turned out there was a bagel shop next door, so I went there, and waited about a million years for a bagel with cream cheese. Next we had to return the car, which meant I had to drive; when I was done with my bagel we pulled over and switched drivers. And I promptly got lost. We could have had the GPS do it but we didn’t have the actual address of the place, so we had to call them up and they talked us in.
After all the rental stuff was taken care of, their guy drove us to Calle Fortaleza in Old San Juan, which is a big shopping area. We wandered around shopping for hours. I was wearing my very old Lesbian Avengers shirt, and I got a couple of comments on that today. We stopped for lunch and I had a mojito and some weird Greek-inspired tofu dish that was kind of odd. We walked and shopped some more, and I kept having to sit down on the floor and then get up again as A moved from shop to shop. Eventually I asked if we could take a break, and we stopped at Barrachina to get drinks at the bar. We each had a Bacardi cocktail and a piña colada, though A had me help her with her piña colada. We shopped some more after that, and I happened to turn on my GPSr just 500 feet from a geocache, so I went and found it - a very nice one! After we finally finished shopping, we waited for the trolley to take us to the bus station. We waited, and waited…to no avail. We ended up walking to the bus station, which wasn’t as far away as I had feared. And then we waited, and waited…to no avail! There must have been 20 people waiting with us for the A-5 bus, and finally another driver took pity on us and told his boss that he was going to switch to the A-5 route. We all piled on his bus and got on the road. It was a little difficult to see out around all the people, and we worried we would miss our stop, but we managed to spot it in time and we got out. I got another comment on my shirt on the way off the bus, from a couple I’d pegged as lesbians right away, but who obviously didn’t notice that we were, since we’re both femmes. *snorts*
Anyway, we walked up the stairs of the pedestrian bridge, crossed the highway, and went down the other side. We came to the room, I got ice, and A started laundry in the machines that are available for guests. Right now I am drinking an old 20-oz soda bottle full of vodka, Diet Welch’s Grape Soda, and Tropicana Light Fruit Punch. Yes, it sounds vile, but it tastes okay. The reason I am drinking it is because we’re not allowed to bring alcohol on the ship (at least, not supposed to) so I have to drink it tonight! That’s why this entry might sound a little funny…as I’ve been writing it, I’ve been getting tipsier. Tomorrow we get on the boat. Checkout here is 12 noon and check-in on the boat begins around 1pm I think. We won’t be able to go anywhere after we’re on board, because Celebrity docks at the far pier rather than the one that’s at the base of Old San Juan. So once we’re on, I will relax, and try to figure out my powerpoint presentation thing for Sex and Gender class. Good night!
I am backdating this slightly because I have had connectivity issues and browser issues, and if they hadn’t happened I would have posted before midnight. Also, I am a little fuzzy because I am finishing off the last of the Drunken Egg Cream. It’s a drink of my wife’s creation - chocolate vodka, chocolate milk, and club soda. It’s good. Also, pictures will have to wait, because I am too woozy to operate the camera and upload them.
A let me sleep late this morning because I didn’t get to yesterday - I had to take her to training on my actual birthday, so I got to sleep late today! (I can’t believe I’m 27.) Once I was finally ready, we went to the Farmer’s Market and got crêpes. There were plenty of interesting places to look around, but we vowed to come back for dinner and tore ourselves away. We had been planning to take a bus tour of the city, but instead we decided to drive it ourselves; next we went over to the La Brea Tar Pits. They don’t look like much; I was kind of surprised how small they are. In fact, while growing up, I’d always thought they were huge pits on the outskirts of town, instead they are little blobs in the heart of the city! Most of them are contained behind fences, but we saw at least two that were bubbling up in the middle of everything; people seemed to enjoy poking at them with sticks. We didn’t bother with the Page Museum because it cost money, and we mostly just wanted to see the pits themselves.
After that, we wanted to go to the Chinese Theater. I took us on a rather roundabout route to get there, though - down Wilshire all the way to Western and then back along Hollywood Boulevard. It probably could have been done more directly, but I enjoyed our trip through Koreatown, Little Armenia, and all the other interesting places we saw. The trip along Hollywood Blvd was rather boring though - it was a long sequence of tattoo parlor, smoke shop, souvenir shop…tattoo parlor, smoke shop, souvenir shop…sometimes one was combined with the other, as with the tattoo parlor combined with the smoke shop. I can just picture the tattoo artist saying “whoa dude…lemme smoke another joint…okay gimme your arm” and it doesn’t sound pretty! At any rate, parking was a total pain in the ass. We finally managed to get parking outside a Famima!! store, which I found terribly amusing. Famima!! is based on Japan’s FamilyMart convenience stores, which - I’ve heard - are based on American convenience stores like 7-11. So it’s all a big circle. Soon there will be Japanese stores based on Famima!! stores, which are based on…you get the picture!
From Famima!! we walked to the Chinese Theater; I took pictures of a few stars along the way. I was astonished by how many street shows and buskers there were along Hollywood Blvd. We had been rather surprised to see Jack Sparrow eating sushi as we drove along the street…later we spotted him posing for pictures with tourists, which I assume he got paid tips for! It was hard to get any pictures at the theater itself, because the courtyard was so crowded - I had to say “excuse me” several times in order to get a decent photo. After that we went up the stairs to the Hollywood & Highland Center to take pictures of the Hollywood sign; next we went to the Disney Soda Fountain across the street where I bought way too many pins! I’m still not sure what the purpose is of the Disney Soda Fountain, but they have their own special pins, so there you go. Next we got back in the car and went to the Farmer’s Market. After struggling to find parking, we went to Lotería for dinner. We did a little shopping, and then we finally saw Sweeney Todd at the on-site movie theater. After that we came back to the hotel!
Our flight is at 11:00am tomorrow so we are waking up at 8:00am. So I am going to go to bed so I can try to get a little bit of sleep. I definitely had fun in Hollywood today, and I’m glad we drove ourselves rather than taking some dumb bus tour. It was much better that way!
I don’t think I’ve made a drunk post in several months, have I? Anyway, here you go. I have had almost an entire bottle of TGI Friday’s Long Island Iced Tea mix, because I got it to share with my friends last night but nobody liked it. So tonight I finished off at least two-thirds of the bottle.
Anyway, I still have some History reading to do before Tuesday. And I have to print some study guides for my History exam on Thursday. Oh, and I have to set up a date to meet the lady I’m supposed to be interviewing for my First Year Seminar presentation.
I better go now. I got up from the socialization table to go to the bathroom, and on the way I got out my Sidekick and started writing this entry, but I have no idea how long I’ve been in here and they might be curious if I fell in or something.
Champagne with pomegranate juice is good. Ditto for champagne with Grand Marnier. And the two margaritas were good too. My in-laws are always happy to share their alcohol. I am working on a scarf for my wife, it will be done by the time we leave…the one I already made for her was deemed “too long” so I am making another one, much shorter. Anyway, the chocolate torte my mother-in-law made was good too. And we are watching Dracula on public television. I will have to re-tag this post when I get to a real computer; right now (9:23pm) I am just sending via e-mail. It’s all good though…I feel fine. I love my wife and I love Valentine’s Day. It is supposed to be a “wintry mix” on Tuesday night so we are going to stay at my in-laws’ that night, because there are no major hills on the way to their house so it will be easier for the cab to pick us up so we can fly to Las Vegas on Wednesday morning…I hope our flight leaves on time. You know, I haven’t really eaten much, I should eat a little something.
Today was a bit of a bummer due to the first snow of the season. We were supposed to run errands, then go bowling, then go have cake at my in-laws’ house. The errands were going to include picking up a PS2 memory card, because when I tried to play one of my birthday presents yesterday, I realized that my only PS2 card has died…somehow. I have some games on PS1 cards, but whatever was on my PS2 card - including my 860m katamari - is gone.
I was really looking forward to the bowling and cake, because it was going to be kind of like a birthday party. Last night my sister-in-law went out to dinner and had friends over, and I could hear them downstairs having fun, and we weren’t invited. (Remember, her birthday is the same day as mine.) So next year I’m hopefully going to have my own party, but for this year it was going to be bowling and cake today…and I didn’t get it. We’re going to go over for cake anyway sometime this week, but the party atmosphere won’t be the same. I’ll hopefully be getting together with my mom this coming weekend (?) so we’ll see how that goes.
By the way, I’ve had a few margaritas tonight. So forgive me if I’m not making much sense.
Hey look, I am so drunk that I can’t even load up the post screen. I started this post by e-mail. I like my mango lassi. This is more drunk than I usually get and all I had was two gin and tonics. Then again I made them myself so they are probably heavy on the gin. I don’t get drunk often, but I probably will on New Year’s, which will be twice close together. I’m going to go now.
Today I am writing to you while a bit drunk. Okay, maybe a lot drunk. But fortunately I’m writing from my Sidekick so it takes so long to type that I have a chance to think about what I’m saying. Sort of. Anyway, the reason I am drunk is because I was given two margaritas at dinner. Not very diet-y, I know. I was good at lunch though, didn’t eat more than I should have. Although we went to one of my favorite restaurants for dinner, I am saving half for later. Today with my mom we saw a play called Mameleh after we had lunch at Ruby Tuesday’s. It was a nice day and I have been having a pretty good weekend. Yay!