Back Home After a Awesome Trip

I couldn’t be happier with how the visit with Travis went and the weekend vacation. Leaving on a Friday and getting home late Monday night was perfect. Now I am resting and reminicing about the Museum of National History, the Museum of Science and Industry, and the Art Institute of Chicago. That is three epic places in during that 4 day period.

And these weren’t the smallest of buildings. The buildings where huge, not just huge, but acres of HUGE. I was wearing my boots and my feet are like rawhide leather that could withstand anything now. On average, Travis and I spent 3.5 hours at each place going from room to room and exhibit to exhibit. Each time we turned around there was something else or a room that drew us in and we couldn’t stop, we just had to continue.

Over and over we gazed upon one-of-a-kind and irreplaceable items from history. It was just truely amazing.

Another amazing feet was Sunday night’s escapes. After walking around the Museum of Science and Industry we took a drive up north to Mustard’s Last Stand for a real Chicago dog with all the fixings, then it was drive around a upscale neighborhood just to look at some homes and a temple. Feeling like we needed a drink we drove south to a pub for some drinks. I had a few Bell Ambers which were surprisingly smooth. Then we had a craving to try some bacon.

It didn’t take long before we arrived at Paddy Long’s  because we heard there was a thing called a bacon board. The rumors were true but we started out with the Bacon Grenades; deep fried bacon wrapped sausage with bbq dipping sauce. YUM is an understatement. We thought about ordering more but we went to the Bacon Board to try 4 different types of bacon. By this time, Travis and I had the bar smelling of bacon. Winning. Still not satisfied, we ordered a Bacon Bomb Sandwich.

Oh holy hell, that took us over the top and after finishing a beer we both decided it was time to head home. Walking Monday morning with my first official bacon hangover, it felt great, and I need substance to fill the void that was now vacant. More food and the morning’s flavor was Chicago’s Bagel Authority. Damn, the menu was so packed with tasty concoctions that would have any breakfast expert in a state of wonder. We ordered some Sara’s Secrets and enjoyed every single bite of cream cheese, sprouts, and mounds of avocado.

That mean gave us enough energy to walk around the Art Institute and look at Monet, Picasso, mid evil armour and weaponry, and loads of religious paintings. It was great and I needed more time but unfortanetly it was time to catch a flight and have one more Chicago dog before boarding. I did it, another dog, made the flight in time and even got a home signed around. Now I am blogging and its 12:55 pst and I’m wupped.

Time for bed; night night.

My First 2 Days in Chicago

When Travis invited me to stay with him at the Jesuit house on campus I was bit nervous – like with anything a bit new. I’ve been to church, Christmas Eve mass, and had many discussions, religious and on a variety of other topics. With this pending trip though I soon got over the nervousness as I realized I know virtually nothing of what my cousin does, outside working with troubled youth and studying philosophy.

Up arrival Friday, after battling through what looked like Seattle traffic, we were at the Jesuit house. Checking into the room I hurried to put on a wrinkly white shirt and blue sport coat to look halfway presentable for mass. Not being anywhere familiar with procedure and song, I followed Travis’ lead and stood awkwardly in silence during song. I felt okay as guest but there is always a part of who wishes to participate.

Mass was really good and the building and architecture  more amazing than I thought. Afterwards, everyone made there way downstairs for a toast to new recruits and a professors tenure. Drinks where served and I was being introduced to many folks. So far, I’ve remember one name of a short pudgy Irishman named Ryan, also a Jesuit, who sang some and made me laugh like no other. Maybe that is why I remember him. Or it could be that he had a tie on with the coolest knot I’ve ever seen. Either way, he is rememberable.

Today I awoke to breakfast and a bit of a hangover, from the dark beers at the Norse Bar, folks I didn’t, and food I desperately wanted to eat. After chow and getting to know more and more folks, hard to keep everything straight when meeting a large group, Travis and I set out for the city. Riding the Red Line on the “el” (elevated subway) into downtown Chicago was interesting. Not for the people but for the architecture. It is odd to see so many homes/buildings all made out of brick.

The city was great and the people a bit on the crazy side. Seen a young kid, 19/21, looking like he was going to die on the sidewalk as well as many wasted folks but we kept walking. We walked to the river and see it dyed green, I was more impressed by the police boats, took photos of the cool buildings, parade, skylines, and then arrived at the Field Museum of Natural History. Walking in my boots, people that know me know my boots were not made for walking, for about 4.5 miles, will give a person time to rethink their style. We did the tour, 3-D Waking Sue movie, took a bazillion (yes, that is officially a number) pictures, discussed history, science, the evolution of our species and the hope that society will not destroy itself.

Time for food and a street vendor had a tasty, maybe because I was starving, Chicago style dog. It was good but nothing beats Seattle’s Downtown Dog. Now it was time for a cab because I couldn’t walk to the Navy Pier for more touristy stuff. Cab driver couldn’t drive yet we made it safely to our destination. We walked through the pier but being that it is still winter outside it wasn’t all the impressive – summer would be better.

But on the highlight side, a Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. restaurant was open, haven’t been to one since Maui in 2011. Travis had never been and I recommend a 1 1/2 lb cajun shrimp bucket. Yes Yes Yes! It was so good and I could have kept eating them but we finally ran out and it was time to get back and rest. Hoofing it back to the “el” we prepped ourselves for the crazies.

The train had its fair share of super drunks and one guy that had been being an asshole to his girlfriend he was so crunked. Needless to say I was happy to be off that ride.. Travis and I can back and did some work; with me entering a listing and him a bit of studying. It felt good to get the feet up. So so good. Then we went out an shared a large pizza while chugging the water. 2 beers on St. Patrick’s Day is a personal best for me – in a good way.

The two items I noticed about Chicago I have share are 1. The city and river are dirty with garbage and litter (disgusting) and 2. People here drive and park like crap (seen cars put their hazards on and leave their vehicle in the street while others banged into other cars just to squeeze into a “parking” spot). Interesting difference in Chicago culture when compared to the Pacific Northwest.

End note: I am no skinnier with that long walk as I’ve not been starving LOL

Here I come Chicago

Today I am on my way to Chicago to visit my cousin Travis and to spend a highly anticipated St. Patrick’s Day in a new place. From 30,000 ft I can finally see the Washington sky, been a while it seems and the mountains have had nothing but rain, and I am reminded how interesting and exciting the unknown is. East I fly and into the future.

Last night, Joy and I started chatting about vacations and this will be my first, besides Pubcon conferences, that I will vacationing without her. It seems odd for both of us. Most of the time, I spend my weekends with her, unless I have to work, and always travel with her. So this trip is a bit odd in that respect.

Anyhow, it will be awesome to spend time with Travis as it has been years since we’ve been able to hangout, have intellectual discussions (with the first Jesuit Pope and President Obama in town there should be no shortage of conversation), see architectural and historical sites, enjoy some haunted or Capone tours, eat and drink to fulfillment.

I’m surprised there is no internet on this flight so it leads me just to blog. No inputting a new property listing or keeping tabs on the Facebook social media world. It is good to unplug for a bit and get back to my roots, blogging here. So I guess is on to more fun stuff than work.

One question I am going to have answered is “why do they call Chicago Chicagoland?”. No clue why. Is it a local cultural deal or is Chicagoland an actual place. Either way, I have never seen the History, Discovery, or Travel Channel use the Chicagoland reference.

I believe I am staying at the Jesuit university with Travis, should be cool. From pictures he sent upon his arrival in Chicago the campus looks great, has excellent location (always a real estate agent), and has beautiful architecture worthy of a thousand pictures – unloaded my phone last night and brought the GoPro. I will be getting crazy with pictures and maybe some video. I would like to actually put an edit together but never seem to get it done. Maybe this Chicago trip will persuade me to do it.

Side Note: 3g just popped up but alas it was a fleeting connection.

Can’t wait to arrive and the flight is going great. I fly Southwest as much as I can because I like their service and ease of travel. Of all recent past flights, this flight in particular is so smooth. Not one bounce of turbulance yet I probably just jinxed myself. Yep, I did but it is was small. Irony. I  would really like an internet connection as to be able to move on and not worry about publishing upon landing. Ah well. Just get it done.

Well that is it for now and probably will post here as well as the real estate site. Laters!

In flight to Vegas

I am finally leaving to Las Vegas for the my 3rd annual Pubcon conference. Even though I am excited to learn new SEO as well as corrective SEO, I have the desire to be with my girlfriend. It’s not that I’m already home sick; it’s just that she arrived back Saturday from a weeks trip to Alanta. Needless to say we didn’t spend much time together between our two trips and I met up with Jake for the Seahawks Game.

Saturday, Upon picking up Joy and her girls, I ran into my dad at the airport. Not strange, however, when it was unplanned and sheir coincedence. Dad drove down his wife’s son so he could pick up his fiance and new baby who just flew in from Rio. It is still odd to have a step brother even though I consider him my dad’s wife’s son. Guess I’m still not willing to accept I have more than one brother – LOL.

The rest of Saturday was just as good as the morning and Joy, the girls, and I drove home slowly taking in the sites and stopping and stores for Halloween decorations. After a few stops we finally made it home and we all set up our spooking decor – my job being outside in the cold. LOL its cool as I started to sweat and I enjoy outside. We still have to get pumpkins and I hoping Joy and the girls can wait till I return since I really enjoy doing stuff with them. A very different thought process I once had.

Random Thought [inflight cheezits are good]

In 2012, I took a few vacations and have done tons of stuff: Arizona, Soap Lake and Sun Lakes, Moses Lake (for a waterpark), Kelso, a handful fo trips to the mountain, Lake Cavanaugh, crabbing on the Sound, and … hmmm … probably look at Facebook and get more to the list. Oh yea, Zombie shooting in Snohomish. So I’m definitely not hurting in the travel and fun department.

Random Thought: [the guy seated infront of me has odd skin]

Now that I am airborn, and have sometime to kill, I am running through my new Motorola XYBoard. Pretty sexy machine I might add with a bluetooth keyboard. The mouse stick embedded in the keyboard is tough to use and its faster just to stick a finger to the screen and mouse around instead of moving that little stick with my sausage fingers. So far I’m pretty impressed by the load speed of applications, the fluidiness in applications, and how thin the tablet is. I opted to tether the 4g to my Verizon account versus buying a mobile hotspot – less shit to worry about especially if I am showing homes.

As a real estate broker, I damn near have a Batman utility belt. One surprise I did have and not sure why, is I thought I would have to ahve a 4g phone to add a 4g device on my account. Nope, but it will take a moment to get used to not doing emails on my phone. However, setting up and exchange server between all these gadgets would nice as to not confuse what message have been followed up with and when instead of looking at each device or always cc’ing myself.

Random Thought: [flight attendents are nice - Southwest]

As we approach the halfway mark of a 2:15 minute flight from Seattle to Las Vegas I think I will save other thoughts for future blogs. Cheers!

Played at the Lake with Family

Today’s Snapshot of Snoqualmie Falls

Last Day of Vacation is a Bummer!

Today marks the last day of my April vacation with Joy and her family. It has a been a great vacation and it feels like we’ve done everything under the Arizona Sun. Upon landing and driving to Joy’s father’s and wife’s home, Joy,her girls, and I where in the pool swimming. Residents of Las Palmas, a 55 an older community, looked at us funny since it was only 75 degrees out which is hot for us Washingtonians.

Besides swimming, shopping and hanging with friends at Greasewood Flats and playing at round of golf at Dobson Ranch, Joy, her family, and I went to the Wildlife World Zoo & Aquarium and the Arizona Science Center in which I blogged about – Joy gave me a sideways look for that. The two posts have pictures and here is a video from the Science Center’s Forces of Nature exhibit.

I enjoy blogging about activities and think I am going to do more on my real estate website. Today’s shopping was fun and picked up two ping pong ball guns for my nephews. My brother and sister-in-law always give me the stink eye for buying items that fly yet I can’t help it. In addition to the guns, I bought myself a AZ golf ball and a three wheeled motorcycle with two golf bags in the back and the wording on the side of the bike that read “fairway to heaven”. Then it was ice cream time at the Sugar Bowl in Scottsdale.

Now its quiet time and blogging (go figure) and a bit of tinkering on this site. Take cares!

Scuba Diving off the Coast of Maui

Here are two videos filmed with a GoPro from a dive done at St.Anthony in Maui.

Hawaiian Vacation 2007

I am sorry for not being around that much lately and the only updates are the Hawaiian Vacation 2007 (pictures are in order through the vacation) photo album. the trip kicked so much ass it was almost unimaginable and hanging with My Aunt Kris, Jim, Travis and Kendra was the best vacation I’ve had in many years. Being the only one to Oahu before I got to be the tour guide for 7 days.

 

The week started off excellent with us getting settled into our condo at the Hawaiian Princess in Makaha on the westside of Oahu. The accomodations where cozy being a one bed room and one bath but being on vacation who needs a place to sleep. The beach was private and at most there were roughly 25 people in the water and on the beach, prime relaxation. After getting settled in I found internet access, who me?, and started planning our first day.

 

The family decided that staying out of the tourist traps is a must so we went for more scenic adventures and hit the Monao Falls Trails. Being .8 of a mile, it was easily traversed but good hiking/walking shoes are definitely required. The trail was something right out of Jurassic Park with the towering vegetation and lush underbrush. Once we got there we seen a sign that said you shouldn’t go under the falls due to slides. I didn’t head the warning and ventured in then got my picture taken and bounced.

 

Being slightly hungry we wondered to Waikiki and grubbed down at Cheese Burgers in Paradise right on the main strip. The food was as awesome as I remembered and the fam gave me 2 points on the day for the hike and the food. After eating we walked around and we seen some sights and made our way back to the condo to map the next part of the adventure.

 

Early morning plan, hit Pearl Harbor (wait till the afternoon and catch the later shows/tours and avoid the early morning crowds) and got the head sets for the audio tour. My first trip to Oahu, my buddies and I didn’t get the audio and it so much amazing after having it on the second trip. It made me feel for everyone that served, I’m a Army son born in Nurnburg, and brought emotion (Yes, I cried during the tour) and for some reason made it "more real".

 

With all that taken in our course was set for the North Shore for some big wave sight seeing. Evidently it wasn’t the right time of year but with no avail we found some excellent sites just driving easterly on Highway 83. After driving for a bit we got hungry and got some snacks at a local vendor’s stand. Iced coconut was the best well the fresh Dole pineapple was pretty good too but the coconut was awesome!! During our journey around the island we stopped for a cool off spot at the Waimea Bay Beach Park for some rock diving fun. Being a local spot you won’t find any, I mean any, tourism around the area but that is perfect if you are looking for an escape from shopping and crap.

 

The next day was filled with Travis signing us up for a scuba diving trip with Island Divers Hawaii for a two dive trip that was guided by Jo (a Swedish native). Travis was conducting his first open water dive and working through some skills and being so long out of the water I took the time to brush up on my under water skills, read IDH’s review. The dive went smoothly and I got familiar fast but it wasn’t until we seen the sea turtles that things got interesting. The group swam out to the end and a sea turtle there chilled. But on the way back the sea turtle decided to give chase (in a sense).

 

I followed the pack and let everyone swim ahead but looking back, must be a fear of mine, I saw the same sea turtle swimming in my wake. He followed us all the way till the tag line. That is when I broke off and started hover and the sea turtle made his way towards Travis. Nothing crazy yet but when the turtle made a lunge and snapping move inches from Travis’ face we knew somehow it was funny, no blood no fowl

 

But that wasn’t all, Travis and I hit another dive the next day. Travis dove very well and as a result received his Open Water Certification after conducting all his underwater skills, read IDH’s review. This day was very exciting, not only for Travis getting his Open Water cert, but for the numerous sea turtles we seen. We got to see many turtles lying on the ocean floor but one in particular stands out. The turtle has these large humps on the his neck and fins which turned out to be tumors that left him blind and lethargic. It is definitely sad to see especially such a graceful and peaceful creature.

 

Upon exiting the water, Travis and I made our way back to Waikiki to meet up with Kendra, Aunt Kris and Jim for a luau at the Royal Hawaiian. It was so much fun watching all the different dancers which performed many styles of dancing from all around Polynesia. The last dance was with fire and boy-o-boy it was cool. The dancer had two battons, with both ends lit, twirling, throwing and resting the fire on his skin. Crazy cool in my opinion and definitely worth watching.

 

But the night wasn’t ever yet. We met up with my college friend Cindy, her boyfriend and some of their friends for an evening of dancing. Cindy and I used to go dancing a lot together while we were in college as well as all the college party functions. We went to the Moose McGillycuddys and started right away and instantly our grove was on. It has been ages since I last danced and let me tell you it was bad to look at. Though it felt great at the time it had to painful to watch. After sweating and dancing all night we finally jammed to the condo and laid down in bed around 3:30am.

 

Back up at 9, not much sleep for us, we were all tired but decided to go on another hike, this time to Maunawili Falls Trail. It was only 1.25 miles but mostly uphill but thankfully there were stairs cut into the embankment. The hike ended at a waterfall and a pool (it went farther up in the mountains but we didn’t check it out) with a 50 foot cliff jump. Naturally, Travis and I had to get down on it and strut out man hood. Getting up to the top of the cliff wasn’t to bad except for the wet clay but there were bamboo trees to hang on otherwise it would have been really difficult to traverse.

 

Travis and I hit the top to find a girl who wanted but didn’t want to jump, oh great, now we have to wait. Anyone who likes to jump off stuff knows that waiting will make you unsure about your irrational decision to jump off a tall object. So we waited, and waited and waited some more until Travis took charge and she moved out the way. Travis was getting worried so I encouraged him by saying "just do it". He did and launched into the deep, it was sweet. Now my turn. I got out there and noticed the take off was all clay, and wet, so footing sucked but after razzing Travis I couldn’t just bail. So I jumped and it was one of the most awkward jumps I’ve ever taken. I jumped but got cattywampus in the air and landed slightly in my seat and shooting pain went up my spine, OUCH. I didn’t say it though, got to retain that man hood, but the walk to the car was painful.

 

The rest of the day concluded us driving back to the condo, the long way, and while doing some sight seeing from the car I drove it into a big ass curb popping the front passenger tire. DAMN IT. It was a total bone head maneuver but after changing to the spare we were off again and this time to Costco for a new tire. While we waited Travis and I had our scuba diving pictures developed, see photo album, and got some grub at The Shack just around the corner, also near the Island Divers Hawaii shop. By the time dinner was done it was time to get the car and go to bed. It was another late night so the next day, Saturday (our last full day on the island) we opted for something low key.

 

So it was off to the swap meet held at the Aloha Stadium in the early afternoon for all our nick knacks. There prices were good for cloths, board shorts $8 a piece and shirts 8 for $20 but I opted for some more non traditional items like a Spanish Galleon wooden ship and a tiki mask for my wall.

 

Then it was back to the condo for sun tanning, snorkeling and just hanging out in the summer Oahu sun. Ah it was a great trip and I was sad to see the week fly by so quickly. I guess when you are busy and all get out then time will just fly by, maybe I’ll go back soon.

 

Mahalo

Las Vegas Nevada

This weekend I got to spend some time in Las Vegas visiting real estate webmaster for Las Vegas homes for sale. It was a fun and exciting time since I’ve never met Charles before and he is very good at internet marketing it gave me the opportunity to ask a lot of questions and discuss many issues. When we were walking around Las Vegas I took a few pictures from a few vantage points but being caught up in conversation my picture focus slowly slipped away. This coming December I am planning to go back to Las Vegas for Pubcon, a internet marketing conference.