Where We Live

We were out and about yesterday so I took pictures.

The people at Thai Island know Dave by name. I guess that there aren't too many white boys that can speak Thai in San Diego.
This park is downtown and it's really nice and quiet. It was surprising to find it.
The U.S. Grant
Karl Strauss Brewery. We ate there and I had the Ahi Poke. SO GOOD!
Yet ANOTHER car accident near our apartment. This is the view from our balcony. There are a ton of accidents in this intersection. (By the way, gas at that gas station is up to $4.25.)

Thoughts on this 2008 Memorial Day

It is not the result of service of thousands of American soldiers that determines their honor and success but rather the act of service itself. I refuse to allow political figures, vying for your vote, to program me into thinking that anything but success in Iraq would be a disgrace to the sacrifice of the fallen soldiers. There is no true winners in war; too many lives are lost and families shattered for there to be true winners. We hope, however, that because of their sacrifice the world is a better and safer place. These men and women are honorable to a significant level. Their decision to serve is all that is needed to acquire my respect and to carry on with honor. These men and women chose on their own free will to serve, a luxury known to young Americans for only the past 3 decades. I may not have served myself, but I hope that my hard work and determination to advance myself in this wonderful country identifies my gratitude to these fallen soldiers. May we all be encouraged by their sacrifice to strive for acceptance, kindness, hard work, diversity, and peace, for those are the things they fight and die for.

Here's a picture of the damage:

Natural Gas Explosion & Las Vegas Pictures

After a fun 3 days off for my birthday weekend I went back to work (unwillingly) this morning. It was getting close to the end of my shift when all of the sudden there was a HUGE explosion. Everyone in the restaurant stopped talking and started looking out of the windows. I walked out with a few people I work with to see what was going on. Everyone in the surrounding restaurants were also starting to walk outside to look around. We walked to an intersection and saw a building about a half mile away with some white smoke rising above it. It turns out that there was a natural gas explosion at a Hilton hotel that was under construction. You can read about it and see pictures at www.nbcsandiego.com. It was so loud! I thought that a bomb had gone off.

Our Las Vegas trip was a lot of fun. It wasn't long enough and it made me sad to have to say goodbye to my dad and Pat. I miss the convenience of having family close by. Here are some of the pictures that we took:

Dave, Me, Dad, Pat, Josh
The view from our hotel room at the Stratosphere
The fountains at the Belagio
Inside of the BelagioJosh
Pat & Dad
Me & DaveInside the Stratosphere at the Top of the World Restaurant
The Vegas strip from the observation deck of the Stratosphere
X-SCREAM! Dave & Josh are on the 2nd row from the front. (If you haven't seen this ride check it out here.
This is my poor dad standing as close to the door as he could while Dave and Josh went on the X-Scream. My dad is just a little afraid of heights.

Thanks again to everyone who sent me wonderful birthday wishes! I had a great birthday!

My new favorite class, Law & Religion

Love my new Law & Religion class. I feel like I'm relearning the history of the U.S. Here is a "nugget" of perspective. Hope you enjoy!

a.     George Washington, Farewell Address (1796)

   i.     “Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”

 ii.     Washington loved the Quakers and called them “exemplary and useful citizens.”

b.     Thomas Jefferson, Letter (1802)

    i.     Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach action sonly, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.

This is why you should leave things to the professionals.

In order to try and save some money I decided that I would dye my own hair. I bought a highlighting kit for $7 and followed the directions as best I could. When I washed the dye out it my hair ended up being a horrible orange-ish color. I spent the next hour trying to find a salon that could fix it immediately. We ended up walking to a salon that Dave walks by on his way to and from school called C13 Salon. There is a stylist there named Emily. She couldn't get me in last night but she came in early this morning to get me fixed up. It took 3 hours but I have normal looking hair now. Some things are best left to the professionals!

This is the before picture. The orange color isn't as obvious in this but either way this doesn't look good. I look like a blonde zebra or something.
After 3 long hours in the salon fixing it.
Don't mind the ornery face. I was really tired and I didn't want Dave to take a picture but this is the best one I have right now of the new hair.

These are just some random pictures from the last couple of weeks.

This is a picture that Dave took
A picture I took while we were out

Dave

Some Random Business

Today was an incredibly gray day. It wasn't too cold but it wasn't the weather that I like to call home and brag about. Life is good. Dave is back at school in full force. He has some pretty interesting classes that I'm sure I'll be hearing a lot about when he comes home. One in particular is Law and Religion. Very interesting.
Anyway, last week we were out shopping for a wedding gift for Dave's cousin Liz (who was married TODAY by the way... CONGRATS LIZ AND RYAN). We stopped for a bite to eat at Dick's Last Resort. They had one of those coin operated claw machines there that you usually see full of stuffed animals, but this one was full of live lobsters. I thought it was kind of mean but kind of funny at the same time. (Deryk, you're dad would love this... it's on a whole new level of claw machines!)
I had my camera with me to take pictures of anything that might be interesting but the only other thing we saw during our walk was a protest at the Wells Fargo building. Here's that picture:
I have the next couple of days off so if I see anything interesting I'll be sure to take a picture of it and post it. Other than that we're just doing the same old thing. School, work and Netflix. Good times! I love everyone and will talk to you soon. - SHANDIE