Day 29 - a/c + water + climbing shoes = :(

For the first time so far this summer, I overslept my alarm, waking up at 9:50. Oops. I showered very fast and made it to work by 10:15, which turned out not to be the worst thing ever because once I got there I realized I had absolutely nothing to do. I sat around, sort of graphing my data but mostly talking with XiaoMeng, who was also very bored. I won't lie; facebook happened.

A bit later, I ate lunch with Zvonimir, Ari, and Jonathan, without planning on it, at San Martin, which was interesting due to a funny comment of Jonathan's, addressed to Zvonimir: "Do you have facebook in Croatia?" What he meant to ask was whether it was popular and used, but the ensuing discussion of Croatia's recent acquisition of electricity and clean water was amusing.

The afternoon was spent shooting the breeze and being bored again, so I left early and went shopping! Oh retail therapy. I bought a few cute things and returned to the dorms, where I found Zvonimir watching some YouTube videos. After a few minutes, though, I headed to my room to discover the sad fact that I had left my climbing shoes under my a/c, with the hopes they'd air out faster, and had left my a/c on by accident, which of course meant that the puddle/flood had surrounded and permeated my shoes. I grabbed some clothespins from a laundry line on the 4th floor and hung them out to dry on the roof...hopefully they aren't permanently damaged.

I then took an unintentional nap, with my door open and lights on, until around 8:30, when we were supposed to leave for the Euro championship game. We were heading to Hertzl Bar, but planned on getting there early and ordering dinner to get good spots. Of course when we arrived we discovered that all the outdoor street-level tables had been reserved, so we crammed onto a small balcony to get an almost equivalent view. When we arrived, we had six people, but eventually 10 were sitting or standing around our small table. It was a great game (and Spain beat Germany, in case you are in the US where these things aren't really followed), and a really fun atmosphere.

Afterwards, we returned to Clore to join in on Dave's goodbye party (Dave, this is the first in a string of tags for you, really!). We just hung out in the lobby and right outside the front door of the building, drinking a bit and saying our goodbyes on film for his farewell video. I think that will be a hilarious documentary! I also gave Nitzan the CD I had made for him, which I had so cleverly forgotten to bring to work. When I shared with him my climbing shoes lament, he made the excellent point that they can't possibly smell any worse, which was some comfort. Eventually the party had wound down a bit, but was still going relatively strong when I decided to retire for the night. I chatted with Ari in the kitchen for a few minutes before turning in. All in all, a good day.

Day 27 - Wasting time in virtual spaces

I woke up this morning to the lovely sound of Ari knocking on my door at 12:15.  He wanted to get lunch, and kindly granted me 15 minutes in which to get ready.  I showered, got dressed, and grabbed my stuff in only 12.  It was apparently very impressive.

We ran into Clay in the lobby, so waited 2 minutes for him to put away his stuff so he could come with us.  Ari wanted to try the dining places on campus, but all the subsidized ones (Jubilee, San Martin, and Charlie's Place) were closed.  The restaurant at the Visitor's Center was open, however, so we decided to eat there.  We ran into Zvonimir having some coffee, so he ordered another one and hung out with us.  After a bit Ari left a bit early to catch his train to Haifa for the weekend.

When we got back to Clore, I chatted with Carina (!) for the third time in four days, or something ridiculous like that.  It was great!  Carina, if you are reading this, I am waiting for that report...it's due on my desk by MONDAY.

Anyways, Anya came down to the kitchen to find me.  It was time for our shopping date!  We walked along Hertzl Street, stopping in any shop that held the possibility for cute summer dresses, the objects of our quest.  The first place we entered turned out to be the most promising, but since it was fist, we tried on oodles of stuff and then moved on.  We found ourselves empty-handed, until we found some cute and cheap socks at one of the places along Hertzl.  As neither of us had brought enough, we both got three pairs.  We worked our way down all the way to the mall, but by the time we reached it, most things were closing.  The pharmacy was still open, though, so I bought an ace bandage.

We were both glad, after the walk back, to reach air conditioning.  As we parted, the protocol to exchange some sort of contact information was fulfilled in that Anya told me she was now on facebook, and went up to her room and friended me.  Oh the joys of facebook.  

I went down to grab my computer, and ended up joining Zvonimir in the lobby.  Asaf had called me when we were out, asking about my ankle and wanting to exchange some music.  So I called him back and told him we were chilling in the lobby.  I put a bunch of stuff on his thumb drive, and we sampled some Dane Cook, because he had mentioned a love for Mitch Hedberg.  Of course this launched a YouTube visit, because Dane Cook is better when you can see him.  And this one video precipitated an entire afternoon spend watching YouTube videos.  It was amazing.  We were joined on and off by Dan and Jordan, and later permanently by Joel, but our core group of three spent some embarrassing number of hours showing each other clips from comedians, imitators, Christopher Walken reading The Three Little Pigs, and other amazing stuff.

Asaf had a hankering for a hamburger, and since we had seen Nina, Dave, and a bunch of others heading to Hertzl Bar, we decided to go change and join them.  We sat, Asaf and Zvonimir ordering hamburgers, and were joined by Asaf's friend Amir.  I got edamame (steamed soybeans in the pod) for the table, which were a hit!  Somewhere in the middle of the meal Asaf decided we needed to call Nitzan and Yaron, but only had Yaron's number.  I, therefore, called Nitzan, breaking our no-call streak and ruining both our hopes for Beijing.  He said he could come in about an hour, so we finished up our meal and went back to Clore.  Joel broke out some tasty beverages and we chilled for a bit.  Eventually Nitzan showed up, as well as Yaron and Rotem, his fiance.  Iris also hung out with us, which was great because she will be a sophomore at Penn this year, so we have lots we can talk about.

We left Clore, at which point Yaron and Rotem headed home.  Our intention was to head to the Irish pub near Hertzl Bar, but our hopes were dashed when they didn't have a table large enough for the group.  Another place had a 35 shekel minimum per person, not appealing to those of us (*raises hand*) who would not be consuming two beers.  So we returned to the old standby, Hertzl Bar, where we got a large enough table and weren't forced to order a preset amount.  We got more edamame, too.  It was a banner day for soybeans.  

After sitting and chatting for a couple of hours, we all went back to Clore and from there some went their separate ways.  All in all, a good day.

For those of you with picture cravings, 

enjoy one of Anya and I shopping...