Christmas Vacation

My Christmas vacation was not relaxing enough. I'll try to be brief.

Got driven to O'Hare (nice), got a bon voyage kiss (even nicer), and then sat around waiting for the plane to come (not nice.) Our plane was coming from Minneapolis and was late due to bad weather. About 50 minutes late. So late that I missed my connection. It was also the last flight to my destination and the flight they rebooked me on was for 4:14pm the next day! My mom and dad had to drive down to Minneapolis to pick me up. I was not able to get the one bag I checked in because it was in locked storage and they didn't have the man power to retreive it since they were busy dealing with an already tardy luggage delivery system. It was mayhem at the airport. I got to my mom and dad's place at 2am. (ugh)

The next day we drove to St. Cloud to do last minute Christmas shopping. Or for me, all of my Christmas shopping. It's okay because I've only got to get gifts for 6 people. Then we went to the airport to pick up my luggage. I was afraid they wouldn't have it but they did. (thank God)

The day before Christmas, we drove down to Minneapolis for my mom's side of the family's Christmas get-together. It was at my Grandma and Grandpa's place, which they've had since the '60s I believe. It's super small and we had about 30 people crammed in there, many of them kids. I rarely see my relatives so it was nice to see them. Then we had to drive back to Brainerd and got home around 11pm.

Christmas was the only day I didn't travel around and I was so glad to not have to be in a car. We watched a lot of DVDs. My parents love watching movies. I got a $200 Best Buy gift card (towards a digital camera), $20 gift card for Macy's, white socks, a red sweater, and a billfold that I don't need.

I also learned what are all of the surnames of my great grandparents. Mine are:
Forsythe
Kirberger
Morgan
Showalter
Komro
Kothbower
Lowry
Cook

I traveled back to Chicago the day after Christmas and it was a long day. I had to get up at 6am to go into work with my dad, who was driving me to the airport. My first plane was 40 minutes late and this made me miss my connection. They rebooked me on a plane that left Minneapolis at 3pm, so I had 2 hours to kill at the airport. It turned out to be a longer of a layover since the 3pm flight ended up being late by 30 minutes. I was very worn out when I got back home.

I took the next day's morning off of work so I decided I could play poker late Tuesday night, which I did. I played it way too late and got little sleep. Not surprisingly, I woke up Wednesday feeling sick. By the time 5pm came around, I was full blown sick and feeling awful. Thanks God for Advil. And chicken soup. And green tea.

Skeleton Attack had a killer show in the Caberet space to open for Millies and Carl and the Passions. I was super proud of them. Then I went upstairs to perform in FELT. I was feeling much better by this point (yay green tea and medicine!) and our show was awesome. And it was in front of a full audience, which is always nice.

I'm still feeling ill, but not as bad as yesterday.

Wasserbomben!

The CBC documentary on the u-boat shoot was fun although it was long and tiring. I thought I would have had more downtime so I could listen to music and read the book I brought with me. I got to say a couple of lines, most notibly "wasserbomben!" That means "water bombs!" Meaning depth chargres. The director said he'll probably dub over my voice since I didn't have the German accent down. Se la vie.

Speaking of French, the whole crew spoke it predominately since they were all from Montreal. I got to ask francophile questions, which was nice though. Shaving my beard was almost not necessary but I was in the last shot of the night - moving a crate of limes and lemons down the aisle - so I guess I did need to shave my beard.

The iO holiday party was last night and it was fun but the gift exchange didn't even last an hour, which was surprisingly dissappointing. I got to silly dance later on in the night, which I always enjoy.

Being in the mood to work while at work gets harder and harder each week. Other aspects of my life are going okay. I have been feeling a bit of envy lately when hearing about some people's new projects.

Last Night for Beard

I have to shave my beard tomorrow. This is a picture of my beard. Once I shave it off, I will start the ever so slow process of growing it back. So I guess I am now making a conscious decision to have a beard. Also, a beard really DOES protect my face from the cold. I wouldn't have thought that my crappy and spotty beard would have done that but it does. How about that?

Production Interrupted

We had a big snowstorm in Chicago last Friday. I somehow got a bit of snow stuck underneath the tread of my shoe that hardened into what felt like a small ice ball. It felt like I had a rock in my shoe as I stepped on my left foot. Not painfull at all but highly annoying. It wasn't until I was at work and in a heated place that the ice ball melted and left my shoe back to normal. I mention this because I need to get appropriate winter footwear: boots. Last winter it wasn't a problem at all to walk around in my Sketchers and I'm not really sure what makes this winter different.

I went to a Toys For Tots party at the Piano Man Bar on Saturday night. The mound of toys seemed bigger this year than last year, which is definitely good. I got there a little after midnight I think - after the raffle - and the bar was much less populated than last year. Cesar - who helps run the thing - told me that the place was packed like sardines before the raffle and once the raffle was done, almost everyone left right away.

Saturday was quite productive and Sunday not so much. Saturday I put in my new inner shower curtain since the old was was moldy, did 3 loads of laundry, put a new lamp that I bought together and placed it on my desk, finished some mix CDs I was working on, and played 3 hours of Guitar Hero I. I was doing Quick Play on Hard for most of the song (man it really is hard) and managed to get 3 stars for the most part. Then I went back to the Medium level since I figured it would now be easier for me to get 5 stars on about 6 songs that I've only managed to get 4 stars on. But instead of being easier it was harder because now the medium level feels like it's going too slow and I keep hitting the notes a half second before I'm supposed to. Very aggrivating.

Sunday was spent recovering from a dehydration headache. Those headaches suck. In other news, the Bears clinched their division and UF is headed to the BSC championship bowl game against Ohio St.