5 days remaining

some quick hits.

brett just left for cairo today

im so bored i have started packing 5 days early. really not a lot left to do. by far a new record

surprised by the amount (or lack there of) of clothes and stuff im gonna take. which is good because i think i will take a lot of books. its a tall stack and im not done. recommendations welcome

scott gets into town for a few days tomorrow. im excited, another unexpected visit from him

hadnt posted a picture yet so i thought id just make sure how it worked

Waco

for anybody who has ever had even a short conversation with me it does not take long for my love and appreciation of waco to become obvious. i dont think i have ever spent more than two months away since i first arrived. as i prepare to leave for a few months in nairobi, kenya it will certainly be more than four months till i come back home. that makes my last week here especially important. its been good, nothing too mindblowing, but definitely just good solid waco time.

im not sure what it speaks to that i have managed to improve my halo skills more than i ever have noticed before, but ill take what i can get i guess.

im now down to a week and a half before leaving for kenya. iv had some good conversations over the past week and feel like i have a fairly good mindset going into the trip. one thing that has got me a bit excited is thinking about things that we can do in the many hours per night in the house. aside from hopefully large amounts of reading, theres p90x to some extent, and any other activity that can be carried out in a house that i am willing to consider. this is a trip that i have been looking forward to for long enough that while i dont expect everything to be perfect, i have no hesitancy in going.

its getting close.

oh, and a major assist to jack and aaron for removable hard drive and p90x. they're lifesavers, or at least major simplifyers

sushi

yesterday i did the last of the dunking booth promotions which i have been doing periodically this summer with Crazy Water. i thought i had completed the entire summer without having to get dunked. i was wrong.

but the really amazing thing about yesterday was my epiphany moment concerning sushi. i had had sushi before, but never really good sushi, and normally california rolls, but not much with tunu and salmon. at market street in collyville they have a sushi chef making it right in front of you, and he knows what he is doing. so i ate a bunch of sushi yesterday and can no longer understand why i had felt no desire to try really good sushi before. and raw meat is so good im not sure why ill ever need it cooked again. well not quite.

also, imagine my surprise as i walked out of the store while setting up and saw leasha heffington. i thought it was her at first glance but could think of no possible reason why she would be there, much less be in conversation with carol, my boss. yet it was her and we were both in for a pleasant surprise. leasha was there with a wish for wings, the charity we were partnering with for the dunking booth this weekend.

and you know something is consuming your thoughts when it becomes the subject of nightlong dreams. that would be the case with my upcoming trip. even when i am not conciously dweling on it, i seem to be pondering it.

and anthony bourdain has the worlds best job, id like to be his intern...travel the world eating the best local food and drinking beer

home

i just returned today from another weekend in waco. for any who know me, you know that there are few, and none other that i know of, places where my soul feels as happy and content at just being there. i have yet to make it more than two weeks this summer without a visit to waco.

i stayed an extra day this time in order to be present for the return of griffin kelp. griffin is one of my favorite people and one of my roommates this past year. since i hadnt seen him since graduation there was no way i was going to miss him by a couple hours and have to wait a few weeks to see him again. his return coincided with mug club and it was a blissful night.

i was also able to get a good deal of reading done at common grounds. before the summer i had grand plans of long reading list of classics and gk chesterton. however i was soon hit with the realization that having a job where i work all day for the first time in my life puts a huge damper on reading plans. the book im currently reading is The Everlasting Man by GK Chesteron. this is possibly the most dense book i have ever read. it is basically chesterton looking at the history of man and then Christ from a non christian perspective. but that really does not do the book justice. i have probably only read about 50 pages during my two weeks in mineral wells while reading this book, however a few days in waco has allowed another 120 or so pages which i am very thankful for so that i now have a hope to finish it.

i spent my drive back today pondering africa. trying to find the specific feelings and thoughts that cause me to want to go so badly, and what i am even hoping to get out of the trip. i also had a great conversation saturday night with tanna, and my new friend lotto about their trip there earlier this summer. i just cant wait, however i am trying to enjoy my time before i leave as much as possible.