Summer Summary/(Summery?)

Well I'm pretty ashamed at the lack of posts I made this summer. Let's be honest - the majority of it was laziness. However, that said, I postulate that my blood pressure is lower at home. In order to make up for it, just slightly, I will summarize my summer.

I began summer with a cleaning frenzy. My mom decided that spring cleaning was just more fun with me around, so she rented a Rug Doctor and we shampooed the carpets. This in turn delayed my unpacking because I had to empty my room before I moved in. To keep this short and sweet, I consequently never fully unpacked.

The next week I began work at the pool store for my third year. Generally speaking I enjoy working at the store. My coworkers keep me amused and the customers usually keep us busy. I managed to work outside as a service guy several days, which was a nice change of pace. At the end of summer my salary went up in the form of a bonus, which I appreciated greatly.

Early in August, I went on vacation with some guys from Taylor. It proved to be a good week, but you can check that out in my last post. When I got back from vacation, I sent my car off to be bandaged from all of Taylor's hail and she's like new again!

At the tail end of August, I packed up to head back to Taylor. More than packing, because I never really unpacked, I spent time frantically checking off a to do list. I formatted a laptop, updated anti-virus, reconfigured our network, and made winter preparations for the pool. Sounds thrilling, huh?

Otherwise, I spent a lot of time chilling with friends. Most of the movies on my list, I watched with Brad - we made it tradition to sit down once a week and watch a DVD. (We wanted to break-in his surround sound.) I also went boating with Brad twice. In fact, I learned how to kneeboard. I was satisfied with my summer, but now it's back to work!

Vacation bliss...

Four guys in a car for about 12 hours. How could that not be fun?

Jay (Blacksheep), Aaron (Deich), and I started our vacation out at the Family Pools & Spas Picnic. I thought it would be nice to start the trip out with a full stomach (steak, cheesy potatoes, rolls, and dessert) and it would give the guys a chance to meet my work family (so to speak). Unfortunately, we didn't mingle as much as I had hoped, but I think the guys felt a little out of place and were excited for the trip. After that was all said and done, we began the four hour trek to Alex's (10-Speed's) house.

The next morning, after a waffle breakfast, the four of us loaded my dad's Accord (which we drove for the extra space and because the V6 was fun) and started the eight hour leg of the trip. The only thing that made the ride rather eventful was an evil energy drink debacle. For whatever reason, the guys decided that Deich should be fed Energy Fizz and Amp. The first clue to the ensuing fiasco should be FIZZ. When mixed together, Energy Fizz and Amp have a middle school volcano style eruption; not exactly the type of thing that you want in a moving vehicle. Gory details aside, orange, sticky, energy goo was splashed all over the car. You can imagine my OCD at that point, and Deich's ensuing stomach ache. A quick cleanup at a CVS got us back on the road, but I insisted on a full detailing job later in the week. The rest of the trip went on without a hitch.

When we finally made it to the beach, we were shocked at how little beach was left. It was almost discomforting to see that the only thing separating the ocean from the house was a ton of sandbags. After we unpacked we settled in and hit the waves. We ended our first night after a run to Harris Teeter (the grocery store with silky smooth shopping carts) and a feast of Mac & Cheese.

Throughout the week we kept busy staying lazy. The first few days the ocean waves were intense, so we made use of our boogie boards and swam a lot. We also watched several movies, and saw Wedding Crashers at the local theater. We ventured out to the public beach just south of us to check out the beach shops and cuisine.

I kept busy all week with wardriving. After finding out that the neighbors had wireless, I was determined to get on the net at the beach. I actually talked to the neighbors who said if we could break their encryption, we could use it. (Basically they had forgotten the key and didn't want to take the time to find it.) As a result I spent the week driving around the island in hopes of finding Internet access.

Several nights, the guys decided to go hunting for crabs. Rather than using some sort of trap, they went out like a bunch of fire toting cavemen with lighters and aerosol white grease as their weapons of choice. They then proceeded to chase the crabs all over the beach and burn them to death. To be honest, I never found it quite as amusing as they did, but it was pretty funny to watch them chase crabs all over the beach.

All in all, it was a good week. Not including about 5 meals, we managed to budget only $75 per person with gas and food, which was excellent for a bunch of poor college kids.