Vacation Review

Time for me to document that super awesome vacay I had during the week of July 4th.

06.29: I take off from work at a typical hour and head to Dearborn to get my bags and what not. Liz and co. pick me up and take me to DTW where I chill in the airport for a minute. I'm flying NWA out of the D, and I'm a little worried because of recent articles showing that they've been cancelling a shit ton of flights. I make it on the plane though, which is good. Connect at MPLS, then off to SEA. I land in Seattle at about 11:30, pick up my bags, and meet Vincent in the pickup area. Conveniently, he works at the airport. Where'd we go afterwards? Earl's of course. I got a quite nice welcome from the homies and proceeded to consume quite a bit of liq. Great way to start the vacation. Vincent takes my intoxicated ass home, but not without stopping by McDonald's for the ultimate dollar menu combo. Thanks buddy.

06.30: I wake up pretty late (daylight savings adjustment + ending a work week + sleeping late) and hang out with the fam for a bit. My mom is pretty happy to see me, as I am to see her. 'Twas awesome. Phang picks my now hungover self up in the 240sx con SR20DET and we head to Nick's. I get to drive Alan's R-swapped '98 EJ8 with a smaller steering wheel, no power steering, and a 6 puck clutch. It smashed, but damn it was difficult to drive. Phang and I help Nick lower the AP1 (which is lookin' fly since coming out of JMI). Linh joins and we all mob to Sushi Zen for some bombass (yet pricey) sushi. After gettin' full, we head to Anthony's where he's hosting a drinkathon to celebrate his graduation. Drinking continues, but not with a Domino's 5 for 5 deals. Mushroom pizza FTW. Drink, then drink some more, then pass out back at home.

07.01: Wake up. Time to see the Church fam. It was nice to be in attendance, not just to see some of the people that I haven't seen in a while, but also because I've been having trouble getting to Church out here in MI; mainly my own fault on that one. Either way, good time. After the service, I meet up w/Linh and Bird, and we head to the Tulalip outlet. Kevin and Arlyn are around for a bit, but then split. Nic yanks some Ray-Bans, I buy some shoes, and Linh gets some glasses from Zumies. We then head to the local Applebee's to get some food. I order some gigantic burger that I'm asked to take a survey on for a dollar. It was an aiite burger, too much beef and lettuce though. Afterwards we go hang out at Linh's condo, checkin' out her bachelor'ette party shit she's getting together for her sister. Waaay too much penis. Nightfalls, and Linh, Nic, Danni, Helen, Heidi, and myself get our cheap drink on at Goldie's. Sunday night specials. Awesome tator tots btw. Afterwards we check out some joint on 45th but the girl's aren't feeling it so we go to Havana in Cap Hill. Havana is a dope spot on Sundays as they've always got good music playin'; some type of theme (Dilla, Wu, Nas, etc.), this Sunday was Michael Jackson and Quincy. Hot shit.

07.02: Time to find the 'Bu. My nephew has been learning how to drive on it, so it's at my sister's place. My Mom, brother, and I head to SeaTac for my sister's house where we kick it for a bit. Then we all head to RMC (for some reason they sell pretty good food at Renton Motorcylces) to have lunch and so my sister can buy some things for my toddler nephew (who was unfortunately at the sitter all day). Albeit only a few hours of good hangin' out time, it was really good seeing my sister, nephew, and bro-in-law. We had a lot of catching up to do. When it's all done, I meet up with Phang, who I lend a ride home from Drift Office, where he's getting some work done on his car. I take the Malibu home and chill for a bit, then get a call from Kiel about something going down at his place. I head out that way to his parents' BALLER ass house in Kirkland. We play a bit of pool and watch I'm Gonna Get You Sucka (Kiel's choice), eventually being joined by Dave, Alex, Steve, and Gilbert. We all develop some hunger and venture out into Bellevue. Gilbert lets me whip around his '06 Si which is a SOLID fuckin' car. I wouldn't mind having one. Good handling, good shifter, good NA power. After being kicked out of Joey's because of Gilbert's young-ness, we decide to settle for Denny's. Man, Denny's is sooo much better when you're stupid drunk. Great way to end the night either way. We had a lot to talk about between catching up on each other's lives and things going on with the FSAE team.

07.03: So, the previous week, my homie Nick volunteers his S as a car I can rock while he's at work. Rules are a) no humping in the car b) you wreck you buy and c) there are no other rules. I wake up and head to his place. We take the hard top off (I mean, come on) and I bring it back to my place so I can shower / get ready. I head back out to pick up Phang, who needs to get his car from Drift Office. Man, top down on 405 is a little violent, but it's a good violent. At first the fit in the S was a little awkward, but it didn't take long to adjust. I don't know what it feels like to be a fighter pilot, but this is what I imagined, between the 9000 RPM redline, sharp steering response, and the "cozy" cabin space. I was pretty much sold on the idea I'd been playing around with about getting one in spring/summer of '08. Anyhow, Phang and I get to Drift Office to pick up his now nicely running SR20DET. It previously had some cooling issues. We kick it at Drift Office for a bit. There's something cool about hanging out at a speed shop, idunno why. After that whole ordeal, Phang and out hang out at South Center for a bit until traffic dies. I buy cheap sunglasses and a belt from Pac Sun because I refuse to buy the expensive shit only to sit on it by accident. After that whole ordeal, I drive back up north. It's about 7 and the sun is setting. The view is fucking sick driving through downtown. Top down in an S in a city I love... why the fuck did I move again? I get to Lynnwood and find my friend John's hidden house. We grab some L&L aka quality Hawaiian BBQ and chat. The food is bomb and its dope being able to find out what John's been up to with the UW ME Grad program and such. Once that's done with, I meet up with Hobea (Hobey + Lea), Glenn, and Jeffrey and we cruise around for a bit. We end up at Boston's in Mill Creek, killing a team pitcher (128 oz's). 11 rolls around and it's time to return the car so we head to Nick's. Once we're all assembled, we go to some ghetto ass place in Lynnwood and meet up w/Rome, Nate, and some hood-ass white girls. We knew it was the end of the night when one of the girls was like "let's go back to your place and snort some yay." Just jokin' my ass you cokehead.

07.04: Independence Day. Lazy start off, hangin' out at home and chatting w/my Mom. I also ate some bombass steak and rice: a meal for champions. It's also my bro's bday so I don't forget the berfday wish. I head for Eddie's where a heated game of kickball is going on. I hang out there for a bit, eat many giant oysters, then head to my Uncle Bob's (not really my uncle, but that's how Filipinos do) house on Martha Lake. Apparently it was recently bought, and it's a sweet ass house on the water. Good food. Good people. Awesome stuff. When things wind down, I go back to Eddie's where being a blowin' shit up in the street. Side note: the Malibu is still a pretty solid car for all the shit it's been through. Much nicer than the Cal. It's also nice to be bumpin' KEXP again. Anyway, it's bright, and kinda nice how everyone regardless of political view comes together in the street on July 4th, even if it is just to blow shit up. Everyone heads in afterwards and eats some crawdads. I take off for home feeling really full from a combination of food, alcohol, and a lot more food.

07.05: I wake up and my stomach is not happy with me. I don't blame it though: oysters, lasagna, salmon, rice, steak, juicy jun's bbq, cheeseburgers, garlic bread, random beers, random shots, crawdads... my apologies to you stomach. It was good at the time though, LoL. I spend a good chunk of the day trying to feel normal again, and set up my mom's new laptop to work with our printer. Stupid ass Vista, way to go Microsoft; making different OS's not able to work together. Eventually I meet up with Eddie and Danni, and we grab some food at McCormick's on 5th downtown. They have some dope salmon cakes. We then head to Capitol Hill so I can try to find some local gear. No luck, but I did buy a shop deck from Goods. Gotta represent Seattle while in the D. So far the skateboard deck has been serving me good btw. After dropping Danny and Eddie back in Northgate, I head to UW for a UWFSAE meeting. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I MISS BEING A STUDENT AT UW. There's just something about the atmosphere on the campus, especially throughout the spring/summer, that makes it an ill ass place to be. Anyhow, I park in the 'ol C15 and sneak into the meeting. A bunch of my old teammates are like "WTF?! Alfy's here." You're damn right foo! There was a breakdown of the SAE West results so it was good to see that and see what's been up with the team. It was also good seein' all the old faces. This project takes a lot of your time, so you become quite familiar w/your teammates. After chattin w/a lot of the folks, we head down to the pit so I can check out the car. Liz by the way has made an appearance at this point. The car looks really similar to the T17 car, but the carbon work is far more awesome thanks to Kiel's creativity and some help from a professional Boeing cat. Chris Dolan's cooling system is much smaller and lighter than mine was, which was good and bad to see. Good because of the improvement made, bad because it was superior to mine (okay, so on some things I am a little competitive); well except for it blowing a fan fuse at comp, but he can't control that. After hangin' out there, I take off for Lake City / Northgate and have dinner with Hannah and Josiah. Hannah has graced us with some bombass tempura. Definitely quality catch up time with the Perez siblings. Around say, 10:30, I take off for Goldie's for more homies and drink specials. We proceed to quickly get our drink on. Long Islands and such. Afterwards, it's Viceroy time, another place that has dope ass music going depending on what night you show up. Viceroy also serves goldfish, which is sweet. Kiel and Liz join, which is sweet as well. After Viceroy, we check out the 7-11 converted to Kwik-E-Mart in anticipation of the Simpson's movie. DO NOT DRINK BUZZ COLA. 42g of sugar in that nasty ass drink. Kiel drank it all somehow. I took two sips and said heeeell no.

07.06: The drinking has finally caught up to me. I let out a hearty bit of yakk Friday morning and get back to the air mattress that's now in my room. By the way, it appears my mom has turned my room into a storage area. I lazy around for a good bit of the day and try to pack my bags up. I meet up w/Bird for a bit and we check out the local mall. By the way, the shops here are far doper than they are in MI. I pick up a Casual Industrees snowboard tee from BC (they sell local gear, which is ill); gotta represent, again. Dinner comes around, and I decide it's time to take my Mom out. Myself, my brother, and my Mom all head to Ivar's in Mukilteo (sp?) for some awesome seafood by the water. Damn, I miss having good seafood. I hit my Mom off with some money, which was an awesome feeling. I wish I could give her a shit ton of cash just to show my appreciation, but I gave what I could and she was still quite surprised. After dinner is wrapped up, I coordinate some type of post-dinner activity with the homies. The fam and I say a traveling mercies prayer, and I say goodbye to my mom and brother, who I might not see until December =( . It was rough driving away (the car was going back to my sister) and having my mom stand in the doorway. I get to Earl's (it was the easiest choice) and meet up with the homies, from all around; high school, and college friends, and we all get to drinkin' profusely. Wow. I wasn't supposed to get too faded, but it's hard when it's your last night w/your homies and you are on vacation. Anyway, we drink and have a great time just soaking up those moments that seem too damn rare now that I'm in the D. Afterwards, we head to Alki so I catch a good glimpse of downtown Seattle before I take off again. I take in a couple deep breaths, bullshit w/the homies for a little longer (Alex's crazy ass tries to pick up the fireball) and then it's time to get the car to my sister's and get to the airport. Nic takes me to SeaTac w/Vincent following, then my sister takes me to SeaTac airport. The airport is quiet since it's 4 AM. It's peaceful... good time to relax and take in the last week. I hop on the plane, and that's that.

Wow. Just typing this out has got me all homesick again. Moving is fuckin' tough. Especially if it's far from anything familiar, you get hit with a string of unfortunate events, and you don't click with folks as easily. This midwest thing man, how long will it last?

Sorry for the typos.

patRIOTism...

Happy Independence Day everyone! Despite all the nutty shit going on, we still don't live in that shabby of a place. Yes, civil rights are being trampled, we've got awesome leadership, and don't know if the government has got our back (read: Katrina), but living here still beats some of the other offerings around the world. SOME laws are actually around to protect us, SOME police actually care, SOME school districts are top-rated. Now that I've said that, I feel the need to say this: damn this place has got problems =(

Today I was in the kitchen trying to get my mom's laptop sync'd with our printer (thanks Microsoft for making Vista and XP difficult to network together), and on the radio there was some news about some soldiers re-enlisting. My mom thought that was glorious news, and shared that later at a Church-folk get together, where some other people agreed at what a sign of greatness that was, and others stayed silent. My mom, and apparently some others, are still in the minority that think this war is being fought to protect our lifestyle. I always get uneasy when my mom or anyone else gets patriotic. Protect our lifestyle? Oh, is that what the big brother Patriot Act does? The mentality is old school, support the leadership/president through it all, and now that Bush has plucked the Christianity heart strings, he's got people mislead. I don't really know enough to get into a heated debate about this stuff, but I do know that I don't support much of the decisions/actions our government has taken and it's always an awkward situation when people I'm so closed to have such an opposite way of thinking. I feel a bit foolish for not paying more attention to politics/world news, but I, and I'm sure many of my apathetic peers, have become jaded by all the run-around bullshit we've been fed by the government as we've gone through life. /end pointless vent.

One thing someone said at the get-together in a devotion was that today is one of the few days we can put politics and world views aside and celebrate the fact that we are American. As I hung out there, and at another friend's BBQ, I couldn't help but think about how true those words were. I'm sure everyone's views varied greatly, but we've got this day to remind us that we can still celebrate together as Americans about the lives that we do have, regardless of political stance. Furthermore, republicans, democrats, and everything else in between... there are plenty of benevolent people out there that really do mean well and want to see our people bettered. Note to self, don't be such a hater based solely on one's political views.

^^ what my average-Joe-self thinks about the 4th of the July, I don't care if I sound ignorant by saying it.

By the way, the vacation is going awesome. I might just have to tell my group that I'm not coming in on Monday, or ever. Haha. Maybe soon, a little vacation play-by-play and some pictures to go along with it.

Cheers homies.