Life Goes On

There are few things I enjoy more than reading a good book or sitting down and writing in my blog. Unfortunately I only get a chance to do both of these things when the dust settles down from my business of my daily life. That is the exact reason why I get most of my reading and writing done while on vacations or trips.

Before I write a new post I always read the previous one to see where I left off. Seeing how the last time I wrote was in March, I have a lot of catching up to do.

Anyway, I ended up not finding a house in that first weekend of looking. Some of them were nice, but they weren't right for me. I kept on looking and about 3 weeks ago I happen to run into a house that is perfect. Made an offer. They made a counter offer. I accepted. On June 15th I close...only 4 days before I leave for Europe. I'm very excited. I am going to re-do the kitchen while I move in because it's pretty old school, but everything else can wait until after I move. Here are some pictures:













I've still been going to the boxing gym, but I don't get as much attention as I'd like so I've skipped a few times. I'm getting into decent shape, but I'm not learning a whole lot. They did however put me in the ring about two weeks ago. It was my fist sparring match and I got rocked. I'm guessing the guy is a few years younger than me, but has way more experience. He is about 6'3" 250, so he doesn't have a ton of weight on me, but his reach was waaaaaay longer. The match started and I was trying to be really technical. He would throw a punch and I would try to dodge it just like Marshall showed me...and then I would get punched in the face. I can honestly say that I've never really been punched in the face (minus the time George hit me for no reason). Well I can't make that statement anymore. I got punched in the face over and over and over...at least 50 times. It's a funny feeling to get rocked in the face. Having spent the last few years of my life training for throwing, I have learned to really analyze and break down my athletic movements. I don't just got off of pure emotion without even knowing what I'm doing. I usually am very aware of what I'm doing and I think about it while it is happening. Well, I did the same thing while getting punched in the face. I would just stand there and be like "that guy just punched me in the face and I did nothing about it"...then he would hit me again.

When I realized that I was getting tired from attempting to avoid his punches without even throwing any of my own...I decided to start getting aggressive. It worked ok. Basically I was accepting that I was going to get hit, but in turn I had a decent chance of landing one or two of my own. I did land one haymaker on his face (the only highlight of the fight), but I was too tired to make it count...it probably still hurt though. At one point I remember getting hit in the nose so hard that I was sure I was bleeding. By the time I consciously had the thought that I was bleeding, I got hit again right in the same spot. It hurt. Bad. But I was too tired to do anything about it.

Enough of the boxing for now. Jepsen put together a softball team called the Soggy Bottom Boys. We are sponsored by none other than the Downtown Reading Hofbrau. We suck. 0-3 right now, but were starting to get better. We lost our first game 32-5, then our second 15-2, then our third 9-7. We're definitely onto something...I think we will be over .500 at the end of the season.

Alright, I'm starting to get really annoyed. Steve and I are going up to PSU this weekend to throw. He was supposed to be leaving DC and meeting me in Harrisburg at 3 or 4. Now it is 3:20 and he hasn't even left DC yet...two hours away. I took a half day...and now I'm just sitting on my couch at home getting bitter. I'm gunna try calling him again. Peace.

The Search

Once again I've managed not to write anything in a while. I should start keeping track of how many hits my blog gets these days...because I don't think anyone visits anymore. Oh well, back to treating it like a diary.

I watched an episode of Survivor with my dad tonight and I'm really happy I did. I have seen many episodes before, but I definitely don't watch it routinely. I think my dad watches most of the seasons. Anyway, if you haven't seen it, watch it. There is a guy named "Coach" that is awesome. I just searched google to see if I could find any of his quotes, but I couldn't. He said something to the effect of "I am like an iron sword, forged into an unbreakable force"...and that only the tip of the ice burg. This guy is an instant classic, Survivor should pay him $1,000,000 just for being on the show. One of the girls on the show said "Where did they find this jackass?". I don't actually know where he is from, but it's gotta be a town called Awesomeville. He's priceless, I hope he doesn't get kicked out anytime soon. I wish it was American Idol and we could vote...he would be my pick for sure. Who wants to see a bunch of normal people anyway?

Moving on, pun intended, I'll be looking at about 10 houses on Saturday. I'm pretty excited about it...I really hope I see something that I like. Of the 10, I really want to like two of them, but my Realtor said the one is really goofy. I guess I'll see on Sat.

I joined a boxing gym the other day. My first session is next Thursday so I decided to go to Dane's "Garage Strength" gym to get a workout so my body wouldn't go into shock. Dane had me doing a few things and within 5 minutes I was wondering why I signed up for all of this. When I don't do anything hard for a really long time, I forget about my asthma. Well I didn't forget about it last night. By the way, I hate to make it seem as if my asthma was the only thing holding me back. I'm not in anything close to good boxing shape. I would get beat down so hard if I walked in the ring right now. Well actually, if I landed a haymaker within the first 30 seconds I might be alright. Anyway, I was at Dane's for well over an hour...I probably was working out for a total of 10 minutes. It was pathetic. I knew it. He knew it. And unfortunately my trainer at King's gym will know it next week.

Alright, I'm done for now. I hope to have some time to update soon, but I'm done making promises.

The Boys are Back in Town

So I said I was going to write something once a week, haha, what a joke. Although that remained my intention and ambition...I dropped the ball. Anyway, some exciting things have happened over the last few weeks. Here they are:

Marijke is going to be back in the Netherlands when Tony and I will be there. I've already been there, but hanging out with a local always proves to provide a completely different experience than just doing things on your own. I can't wait to see her, it's going to be so much fun.

I'm meeting with a banker tomorrow to discuss what I can afford as far as buying a house. I've decided to buy a place since it is a buyers market, interest rates are low, and I qualify for the first time home buyer stimulus tax credit. As much as I like getting the royal treatment living at home, I've been on my own for almost 5 years now...and I'm ready to get back to it. The idea of owning a house and creating equity is pretty exciting.

On Friday Scott is flying into DC from Rhode Island and Steve is picking him up from the airport, driving to Reading. We are going to hang out all day before going to Dane's football game. Dane went out for, and made, the Reading Express arena football team. It'd been a really long time since we have all hung out together...so it should be pretty fun catching up. We'll have to break out our PSU gear since we obviously don't own any Express stuff.

Alright, I'm going to bed, but I'm going to start updating much more often. I promise. I have a few stories that need to be told.

Worst Blogger ever

As you can tell, it's been about a month and a half since I've last written. I'd love you tell you how busy I've been and how I haven't had any time to update, but that would be a lie. I think the problem is that I talk to many of you pretty often now that I'm back in the USA...so I just tell my stories in person. That being said, I am going to try to start writing once a week. I would really like to keep this thing up and running.

A few big things have happened since I last wrote. I started working and it's going alright. I'm getting a lot done, but I'm far from where I'd like to be. I know it takes time, but it is a little frustrating not knowing what I'm talking about. Whatever, I won't bore you about my 9-5.

On to more important things...like traveling. As you all know, traveling is probably my favorite thing to do. I've seen more and learned more from traveling than I all my years in school combined. If I am in one place for too long I honestly feel as if I'm missing out on something. I've never regretted traveling somewhere...and there are just so many things to see. Basically what I'm trying to tell you is that on July 8-12 George, Tony, Devin, and I will be running with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain. It's going to be doper than an egg salad sandwich in my lap (inside joke).

The plan is to go to the Czech Republic for 9 days with a work group from church, then I'll have a week and a half before the running of the bulls. I think Tony is going to come over during that week so we can hang out in Europe. I want to go see a bunch of my European friends from Sydney, but I'm not sure who all will be around. During that week we are thinking about going to Either England, Holland, Denmark, Greece, or Portugal. We are definitely going to do at least two of those...maybe three. I'm obviously pretty pumped about the whole situation. Then we will finish everything off with Spain.

Tony and I have decided to get into good running shape since we don't want to pull a hammy while being chased by a bull...probably a good idea. It's funny that Tony is coming, since bad things always seem to happen to him. He is definitely the most eligible to get gored. We consider him our weak link. Haha, I think they say "you don't have to be the fastest guy out there...you just don't want to be the slowest"

I've been watching some videos on youtube and there are definitely a few different strategies on running. There are soo many people in the road that you could easily stay to the side, jog lightly, and let the bulls run by OR you can be THE MAN and run right along side of them and put your hand on their back and yell things. We are also thinking about running with a football in our hands and maybe even doing a Heisman pose or two. The possibilities are endless. In the videos I watched, there are some legends. They run at least 50 meters right next to the bulls while the crowd parts in front of them. I want to be a legend. I want someone to see me on youtube one day and say "wow, that big white guy with the football in his hand just ran really far right next to those bulls..." Then he will call me a legend...or an idiot. I can't wait.

Alright, like I said before, I'll try to do an update once a week. So check back every once in a while. Catch you later.

2009

Happy New Year! I hope you all enjoyed your holiday season. I went to DC for NYE and then up to Georges cabin for the rest of the weekend. I had a great time in both places, but it's good to be home. So it's 2009 and next year will be 2010. Crazy. For some reason 2010 seems like it should always be the future. Basically I'm disappointed that we don't have flying cars and laser guns.

I'm pretty excited about my upcoming year. Although there is pretty much no way it can be more exciting than 2008, I'm looking forward to it none the less. Actually I've already started chalking up my calender with some travel plans. I'm going to Florida for the first weekend in Feb. Then hopefully to Boston sometime in March. There are also some plans starting to take shape that include running with the bulls in early July. I really want to run with the bulls...like really bad. I keep on looking at pictures and watching videos...it's so sweet I have to do it. Plus I've never been to Spain or Portugal, so I want to go. I also want to buy a house...actually a condo. So I guess I have to start saving, or start playing the lottery. I'm really good at spending money...but I take pride in not wasting money. I'm not sure $40 a night working the Hofbrau is going to cover all my future plans. Haha, which is why I am soon going to be the newest employee at Hartsoftware. Thats right, as of the 19th I will have a real job...the kind of job that doesn't include me checking id's and kicking out drunk people...I think. However, if things do ever get rowdy at Hartsoftware, I won't hesitate to introduce anyone to the pain train. WOO WOO!!!

My position title will be sales and development. I'm actually pretty excited to get my hands dirty. I have a decent idea of whats going on, but there is a lot to be learned. I hope my learning curve is fast...which it prolly will be since I'm wicked smart. I have a pretty good relationship with everyone at the office so I think things will go smoothly. I just hope I'm not treated like Tommy Boy. Haha which brings me to the most important part of this blog entry...my favorite Tommy Boy quotes, enjoy:

Tommy: I l-left a message.
Richard: A message? What number did you call?
Tommy: Two, four, niner, five, six, seven...
Richard: I can't hear you, you're trailing off and did I catch a niner in there? Were you calling from a walkie-talkie?
Tommy: No, it was cordless.

Richard: [watching Tommy squirt catchup into his mouth] Ugh, I can actually hear you getting fatter.

Tommy: Did you hear I finally graduated?
Richard: Yeah, and just a shade under a decade too, all right.
Tommy: You know a lot of people go to college for seven years.
Richard: I know, they're called doctors.

Richard: No way that just happened. My car is completely destroyed.
Tommy: I swear I've seen a lot of stuff in my life, but that... was...AWESOME.
Tommy: ... but, sorry about your car, man. That... That sucks.

[Tommy carelessly set an open bag of M&M's on the dashboard and they immediately poor into an open slot]
Richard: Oh that sounds good: melted chocolate inside the dash, that really ups the resale value.
Tommy: I think you'll be okay here, they have a thin candy shell. 'Surprised you didn't know that.
Richard: I think your brain has a thick candy shell.
Tommy: Your... Your brain has the shell on it.
Richard: Are you talking?
Tommy: Shut up, Richard.

Tommy: Does this suit make me look fat?
Richard: No, your face does.

Merry Christmas!

Hey, I hope you all are enjoying your holiday season as much as I am enjoying mine. I've been spending most of my time getting fatter. As much as I try to keep my diet going during the holidays, I can't. I'm just too much of a fat kid at heart to say no to all my favorites.

I went snowboarding with Devin, Jepsen, and Pat the other day. It was the first time I had gone in at least 4 or 5 years. I used to be really good...now I'm ok. For some reason I have a lot of trouble dismounting the ski lifts. My biggest fall of the day was about 20 feet after I got of the lift. It was very ungraceful and embarrassing. I think I fell a total of 4 times...including 2 in the ski lift area. I should be back to normal after going a few more times.

I've still been working shifts at the Downtown Reading Hofbrau. It's ok. Not exactly something I'd like to make a career at, but it's cool for now. Most of my time is spent sitting at the doors checking id's. However, lets not forget the first two words in the name of the pub "Downtown Reading"...so inevitably we get ton's of rif raf that love to fight. When fights break out we just try to get them outside. Our theory is that anything that happens inside the bar is our problem, but anything that happens outside isn't. One nice thing is that the Hofbrau is on 6th and Cherry, so there are usually cops in the area at all times. The police are usually there within two minutes of an outside brawl.

After much disorganization amongst my Wyo friends, I've decided to go to DC for New Years. Steve and Jen invited me down for the night and I'm sure we will all have a good time, plus I haven't seen them in a while so it will be good to catch up. Then on New Years day I am driving up to Georges cabin and staying there for a few days. I've actually never been to his cabin so I'm pretty excited about it. The cabin is right next to Elk Mountain so we are going to hit the slopes pretty hard.

Alright, I have to get going. My cousin, Tim, is getting married in less than an hour and a half...and I'm sitting in bed writing this instead of getting ready. I don't know if I'll get a chance to post again before the New Year...so I'll catch you on the flip side.

Happy Holidays

Home Sweet Home

Hey everybody! As you already know, I got home Monday morning at 2am. It feels great to be back, but it's really really cold. I immediately got into the Christmas spirit because of the snow we got on Tuesday. I have been pretty busy getting around saying hi to everyone...and eating cheese steaks. I have a lot of catching up to do with my favorite foods that I couldn't get in Sydney.

Anyway, sorry I haven't posted anything in a while, but I'll get back into it over the next few weeks. I've talked to a handful of you guys in the phone over the past few days, but if I haven't heard from you, give me a ring.

I talked to Steve the other day and we had a good laugh about his email (that I posted in my last blog post). Steve got some kind of government contracted job a while ago, but he still hasn't gotten his security clearance. So basically he sits on his computer and screws around all day...maybe not all day, but you get the point. So why am I telling you these things? Well because he admitted that the formula he came up with in his email is not only completely original and fully functional...it also took him 3 hours to develop. So here we are, the tax payers of America, paying Steve hundreds of dollars to sit around and contribute to my blog. I guess thats better than not contributing to anything... But anyway, if you enjoyed Steve's email, don't thank him, thank yourself...for financially contributing to it. It has officially become my most expensive blog post ever...because lets be honest, my time isn't very valuable.

So now is you chance to tell everyone how you feel about this situation. Should we congratulate Steve on "screwing the man" (well more like the man is screwing himself since they haven't given him clearance)or do we tell Steve that he's a disgraceful drain on society. It's you, the people, that have to decide.

Haha, alright, I have to get going. I got a part time job bouncing at a local pub so I'll be making more updates in the near future...since I already have a few stories. Bye.

Leagues part 2

Alright, so I finally put up some quality material and what do I get?? Even more quality material. Most of you know my good friend Steve Meyers. But for those that don't, we threw together while I was at Penn State. We have remained good friends and he is avid reader/supporter of my blog. He sent me an email regarding my last post on leagues...and it was so good that it needs it's own blog entry. Keep in mind that Steve is a nerd...which accounts for his amazing formula, and it's accuracy. Here is what he had to say:

Jon, I like the numbers, but your logic is flawed for talking to 8 girls, and getting one. You might have a 12.5% chance of getting a girl 2 levels above, but this does not mean that speaking to another girl increases your changes. Since these events are mutually exclusive, you have a 12.5% chance with each girl, no matter what. So, odds are quite good that you can talk to 8 girls, and no luck would be had. But let’s be a bit simpler here and look at a real life example:
 
Let’s start out the night where you are tossing a few back, and talking to one girl every 15 min throughout the night. This means that you will be able to talk to 8 girls in 2 hours. Assuming the first encounter does not go well, you continue standing around consuming another beer. This proceeds is likely to repeat itself 8 times in a row, and by this time, you have had more than your fair share of beers.  Odds are at this time, your girl ranking system could be slightly skewed. Fed up with the rejection, you then try your luck at level 6 girls, thinking that these girls will get a good chance (80%), since they are within your rank or level.  But you do not include the Beer goggle factor formula which is:

BD = Number of Beers Drank
T = Time Spent Drinking
BS = Beer Strength – in %
LF = Lighting Factor – Ranked 1-5 – 1 being very dark, 5 being bright
FC = Food Content – Ranked 1-5 – 1 being no food eaten, 5 being stuffed
HF = Success Factor – Ranked 1-5 – 1 being little success with girls recently, 5 being lots of success recently
 
So, judging from these calculations, Jon has drank 8 Beers over a span of 2 hours, assuming slightly stronger beers (5.0).  Lets guess this is a normal house party, where the lighting is average (2.5), and Jon will have certainly eaten something (4), and he has not had the best luck as of recent with the ladies (1.5).   As noted above, Jon wants to talk to girls of his own perceived level (granted he has had beers), so using a level 6 girl we resolve an answer of : 2.42. Jon is actually is talking to a girl of rank 2.5, which makes his odds nearly certain to have some success, but, the next day, he will quickly realize that he has made a horrible mistake, and must carry around this formula in his back pocket to quickly reference how attractive this girl will look the next time her sees her. Working backwards from this formula, if Jon wants to talk to an Actual level 6 girl, he must try to talk with somebody who will be ranked a level 15, which is impossible, fully bringing to light that its near impossible to understand what level of girl you are talking to after drinking for a night. 

Well Steve, thanks for your input, I laughed out loud the entire time I read it. But now for everyone else that actually reads my blog. If you have any ideas or something you would like to post, be my guest. I love hearing from everyone. You can always write a comment on my blog, but as you've seen me do a few times now, I love to post other peoples emails on here. So shoot me an email with your suggestions...and if they are funny, I'll post them. Alright, I'm going to bed. Ciao.

Leagues

Found it! Here is my opinion on dating "leagues". This is part of an email I wrote Dunne about a month and a half ago.

Ok now onto the real topic, leagues. Although there might be a little validity to your argument, I tend to disagree with your overall theology. Leagues are like laws...made to be broken. Do I seriously need to point out to you how many people are dating people that are out of their league? Here is a common problem, people fail with one person out of their league...and they let that person be the representative of the entire league.

Leagues are on a person by person basis. The best way of describing it is by using percentages. Lets use the 10 point scale to define different leagues. Pretty much everyone is willing to date someone within their own league. Example: Lets say I'm a 6. I am aware of my status as a 6, therefore I am willing to date anyone that is a 6,7,8,9, or 10. However, your percentage of probability drops severely every number you move up. After many seconds of contemplation and research, I have determined these percentages.

80% - The percentage of people in your own class that you can get with.

35% - Success of getting with someone that is ONE point ahead of you.

12.5% - Two points

3% - Three points

0.33% - Four points

I decided to stop at four points because seriously...who can move up 5??? That would just be ridiculous. So here is the thing, these odds might not look good, but they aren't as bad as one might think. You just have to play the percentages. Back to my example. If I'm a 6 and I want to get with an 8, I shouldn't be discouraged that I only have a 12.5% chance, I should be excited. That means that I have a 1/8 chance. So what am I going to do??? Talk to 8 different girls in the 8th category...that way I am almost guaranteed to get one. Just because I get rejected by the first one doesn't mean that I should stop trying...it only means that my chances are even better for the next girl I talk to. See???

So how can we relate this to our lives? Well, Tara, it means shoot for the stars...because we might just land a 10 (Bonnie). You better get used to rejection, but you just have to keep in mind that the big score could be right around the corner. I hope this has cleared some things up, but let me know if you have any more questions. By the way, I don't know what number I currently am...but it's definitely higher than it was a few months ago. BAM!

haha ok, I just re-read that for the first time since I wrote it. Waaayyy better material then I have been putting on here recently. Talk to you guys later.

More New Zealand

Hey, so I've had plenty of down time to do a blog post...but I haven't felt like it. I'm done with my 15 page paper so now all I have to do is send in a few more documents...and bam!, I'm a college graduate.

We are having a good time here in NZ. We went bungy jumping the other day and it was pretty sweet. I had never done it before, but my dad had...so I had to do it since he's a wiener. Anyway, the bridge is home of the first commercial bungy jumping place in the world. Here is a picture

Here is what it looked like while standing at the edge...a lot more scary in person

It's a hard thing to make yourself do something that seems like suicide. When you look over the edge...we'll your perspective changes. I'm glad there were other people there to cheer me on, I think the peer pressure made me jump quicker. I was the first jumper of the day so there were a ton of tourists watching in anticipation. And by tourists, I mean Asians. I must be on 20 different home videos now, it was pretty funny. I don't have time to put any videos of my jump right now, but I'll get to it sometime.

After bungy jumping in Qeenstown, we flew to Auckland in the north island. We did some cool stuff like going to a cave with glow worms and stopping at a sheep show. Again, I'll put more pictures up later when I'm more motivated. Since we've arrived in the Bay of Islands we have been really busy...golfing, para sailing, scuba diving...etc. Here is a picture of my golf ball that landed in a tree after I hit it over 200 yards off the tee...I feel like I should have won a million dollars or something.

The golf course was amazing. I've only played pebble beach on Tiger Woods for PS2, but this course reminded me of that. Half of the course was along cliffs and water, it was pretty awesome.


Para sailing was really cool too. The guys that were running the operation were from Ocean City, New Jersey. Apparently in NZ it cost half as much and you go twice as high...and it was bout 500 times more beautiful than Jersey. Good times were had.

Scuba diving was pretty sweet too. Nobody got sick, so I don't have any funny puking videos...sorry to disappoint.

Ok, my posts have been really infrequent and lame. When I am traveling around all I do is tell you what I'm doing...and I don't put in anything funny. Thats pronanny why I don't get very many hits anymore. So I am going to look through some past emails to find something to post. I know I gave Dunne an explanation of how to work the system of getting people that are out of your league...let me see if I can find it. Also, as requested, sometime in the near future I will be making a short post honoring the great Joel Beck...

Alright, so we are in New Zealand. I've had quite a bit of down time, but I've been working on this 15 page 1 and ½ spaced paper for my internship. It's coming along pretty well, I have 11 pages done, but I don't really feel like doing anymore. I have plenty of material, but 15 pages just takes to long to type out.

Anyway, we spent the first two nights in Christchurch, which is in the south island. Our hotel was right in the main square of the small city, so our location was great. We are really far south in the world so even though it's summer, it get quite cold. Fortunately we lucked out and caught some amazing weather, it was in the mid 70's both days. The first night we didn't really do anything other then going to a nice dinner. The next day we slept in then walked around town. In the afternoon I decided to catch a few rays of sun in the park. That evening we went on a trolley for dinner. The trolley did about 5 laps of the city at a very slow pace, while we enjoyed a fine dinner. It was a pretty good time...except for my dad when I spilled an entire glass of water on his lap...oops, my bad. Wednesday morning we went “punting”, which is basically boating down a stream. It was a lot like a gondola, some girl slowly navigated us through Christchurch's botanical gardens. It was really relaxing and the weather was amazing so we had a nice time. That afternoon we hit the road on our way to Lake Takepo.

The lake is stunning. The water is really heavily concentrated with minerals, so it kind of looks like light blue cool aid. It looks very unnatural, but extremely beautiful. The town only has 300 residents, so there aren't very many people around. Our hotel rooms looked right out onto the lake so I got a few nice pics. That night is was ridiculously windy...like really really windy. We were supposed to go horseback riding around the lake this morning, but it got rained out. Instead we got back into the mini van and drove 4 hours to Dunedin, where I am now sitting writing this post.

Ok, I wrote that first part the other day. Now we are in Queenstown, another beautiful city. We've been making our way around New Zealand pretty well. The landscape is amazing. Tomorrow we are going bungy jumping so that should be pretty cool. I've never done it before so I'm sure it will be scary. I'll post some pictures of it some other time. Peace

Christchurch






Lake Takepo

From the hotel


More New Zealand


A duck

Goodbye Australia

Well it's over. It's a funny thing when you spend so much time preparing and planning for something...then it's over so fast. Things at work really calmed down toward the end of the week since I was leaving. They threw a farewell lunch for me and bought me a bunch of things to remind me of my time spent here. It was really nice. Everyone at Sydney Uni Sport and Fitness really went out of their way to make sure that I had a good experience...and it worked. I will never ever forget the past few months of my life.

I got to say bye to all my friends before I left, except Marijke and Benedikt. I'm really sad that I didn't get a chance to say bye to them, but I'm sure we will keep in contact via facebook. I've made so many good friends while I've been here...most of which are from Europe. I've now got contacts all over the place, so I'm sure my path with cross with most of them in the future. I hate saying bye to people, especially when I know I might not see them for a really long time. Also, I haven't seen my college friends in 6 months and high school friends in 5 months. Now I've left my Sydney friends...so I have two weeks of no friends, just family...which is good too.

On Saturday my parents and brother got here in the evening. Their flight came in at the same time that the first flight returning from Mumbai after the terrorist attacks, so it was a little bit of a media frenzy. It was great to seem them. That night we went to Darling Harbor for a nice dinner and we had a good time catching up.

On Sunday we got some breakfast, I showed them where I worked, and then we headed to Manly. The fairy to Manly has pretty much the best view of the opera house and the bridge. Manly is a really popular surfing beach and I wanted to go because I was meeting Marie, Joanna, and one of their friends. My parents got to meet Marie...actually she was the only one of my friends that they met, then they walked around while I got in some beach time. Marie had her surf board with her so I walked over and rented one from the shop across the street. It was an appropriate afternoon since we met at surf camp. Neither one of us is very good, but we had a great time. I ended up staying at the beach for the rest of the day. The whole time I was just thinking about how it was all over and the next day I would be gone. I was really sad to say bye to Marie, shes such a sweetheart. I'll definitely look her up next time I'm near Denmark.

Well anyway, I packed up my stuff, and this morning we got on out flight. So this is the first post coming to you via New Zealand. Right now we are in Christchurch. We are going to take it easy tomorrow, but then we are hitting the road and traveling all throughout the country for two weeks. I realize that there were no good stories in this post, but I'm working on it. It's just been too long since I've posted...other than the last Tasmania post that I put up 5 minutes ago, so I wanted to let you know what I've been up to. So there should be some cool New Zealand pics and stories to follow in the coming days. I hope you are all well, see most of you in a few weeks.

Tasmania Part 3

This has taken me way too long to post, but I finally had some down time. These are pretty much my coolest pictures from my entire trip. Enough excuses, here is what I had to say a few weeks ago:

Sunday:

I got up bright and early, eager for my Wine Glass Bay cruise tour. I drove down to the meeting place which was only about 1 mile from where I was staying. It was much calmer than the night before, but it was still pretty windy and the cruise got canceled. I was disappointed that it was canceled, but I was quickly reminded of how sick I felt while on the boat in Cairns...and then I was glad that I wouldn't be experiencing that again.

The tour was going to take up the majority of my day so it was the only thing that I booked...but now I had nothing. So I jumped in the car, stopped at a cafe for some breakfast, and then headed to the national park. I talked to the lady at the information center and she told me that if I had the entire day open, that I should do the entire 11km hike. Feeling very optimistic and over confident as usual, I agreed. I quickly stopped at a few beaches and observation decks for a picture or two, but then I headed to Wine Glass bay. The way the Freycinet nation park is set up is that you have to park pretty far away from the actual beaches. Basically they just have a bunch of hiking paths which all end up at some beaches...but not just any beaches, the most beautiful beaches ever.












I was a little out of place when I showed up at the park entrance. Everyone was wearing very outdoors gear...like boots, windbreakers, huge backpacks, canteens, walking sticks...etc. I was wearing the same baggy blue jeans I wear all the time, my New Balance classics, a rugby jersey, and I had my Brooks track and field backpack. Whatever. I also had a sandwich and two bottles of water.
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So I started my hike. The first sign said 40mins to the Wine Glass bay look out...and it also gave recommendations about the other trails. I had nothing else to do all day, so I wanted to do the long one. The sign showed the trial I wanted to follow...and it said something about it being “difficult” and for “experienced” hikers. Haha, what I joke, don't they know who I am? I was a division 1 athlete, this is going to be easy. *Severe over confidence alert

I got on my way. The first couple hundred meters were pretty tiring, but had some great views of Coles Bay. I was moving at a really good pace and I made it to the look out in 25 mins...15 mins faster than the sign said. This particular look out was definitely the highlight of the day. Stunning. I took a ton of pictures because I was paranoid that maybe they weren't coming out. I decided to take a few minutes and soak in the view, so I stuck around and ate half my sandwich while talking to a couple from Canada and another from New Zealand.









I then started my trek down to the beach. It was really steep and way more effort than I expected. I was pretty tired, but I made sure not to show “poopy face”...especially while other people were around. When I finally made it to sea level I started to run into a few wallabies. They had no fear of humans so you could walk right up to them. The beach was beautiful so I decided to take yet another break and have the other half of my sandwich. Again, I took a ton of pictures.













After a half hour or so I decided to get moving on my long journey. I walked through the woods for about 30 or 40 mins and then I hit another beach. At this point I thought I was about half done with the hike...way way wrong. It took me another 25 mins to walk down the beach before picking up on the trail. About 15 minutes later I saw a sign that said the end of this particualr trail was 2 hours away. I didn't have anything else to do all day, but at this point I was pretty tired and only had half a bottle of water left.












I kept on going, stopping less and less to take pictures because I just wanted to get back to my car. I finished all my water when I figured I had an hour to go. I hadn't seen anyone else on the trail for over an hour. I wasn't worried, but I was starting to regret choosing the longest hike. I guess I figured that if McDougal can run a 10k in under 30 minutes easy, I should be able to hike a slow 11k without any problems. Turns out that there were a few errors in logic when thinking like that. 1) Josh is an NCAA cross country champion, I am an NCAA fat kid thrower. 2) Hiking doesn't imply flat easy trails. 3) I never actually walked or ran anywhere close to 11km...so I have no concept of how far it really is.







At one point I decided that if the trail didn't end in the next 15 minutes, I was going to need water really bad. Like stop the next person I saw and ask them for their water...or knock them out and just take it. Survival of the fittest right? Well luckily for the rest of the hikers, the trial ended, I got my water and found my car. I forget exactly what time it was, but I decided to start heading back to Hobart since I was already tired and I had a 2 and ½ hour drive.

I got back to the Old Woolstore and decided to keep the car instead of returning it. I packed it in early since I had a few more tours the next day before returning to Sydney.

Monday

There is a huge mountain in Hobart called Mt. Wellington. I got picked up by a downhill mountain biking company who drove about 20 of us to the top of the mountain. At sea level I was wearing a t-shirt and shirts. At the top of the mountain, where we started, there was snow on the ground and it was freaking windy. I had a sweater with me and they also had some gloves and stiff to had out. Turns out we covered over 22km, but it was all down hill so we didn't have to pedal once. It was for sure one of the best tours of the weekend. They actually took us through some pretty fast and rocky paths, I was surprised...I almost crashed a few times....mostly because they told us to go slow, which I thought meant go fast.

After the sweet bike ride, I went on a short kayaking tour which was weak...pronanny at best:) The rest of the day was spent walking around the city trying to see as many things as I could before leaving. All in all the trip was a blast and I'll never forget it. I would definitely go back and recommend it to others. I really would like to hit a few more of their mountain biking trails and then spend a few more nights in Freycinet. Anyway, I ended up making back to Sydney in one piece, with lots of cool experiences and a ton of pictures.

Tasmania Part 2

Saturday:

Every Saturday from 8:00am to 3:00pm are the Salamanca markets. It's basically a huge street that is shut down so vender's can try to sell tourists stuff that's made in Tasmania. I got some great gifts at really reasonable prices. I got my dad a really cool Christmas gift which was good because he's hard to shop for...since he already has everything.

After spending quite a while at the market, I had to get to the Cascade Beer brewery for my 1pm tour. The factory was pretty much what you would expect, but the visitors center was much more. It was amazing. They had a nice cafe and restaurant all of which was surrounded by a huge garden. I got some cool pics of both the garden and the brewery.

The Garden

Beer

The tour was pretty long, but definitely worth the $20. As much fun as I was having, I was anxious to leave because I had to go pick up my rental car and drive two and half hours to Coles Bay and Freycinet. The rental car was only $55 a day and it cost me $40 for a cab ride to my hotel. Instead of catching a cab back to the airport...where my car was, I decided to wait around for a $15 shuttle. I got to the rental agency and they showed me my Nissan. I forget what model it was, but it was similar to a Sentra. I was surprised that the car was an automatic, but I was happy since I was going to have to use all my brain power to concentrate on driving on the wrong side of the road...and on the wrong side of the car. Surprisingly it wasn't difficult at all. I've been here long enough and taken sooo many buses and taxi's that it's kind of second nature. Actually, I think it's going to be weird when I get back to the US.

Ok, so at this point it's about 4:30 pm and I'm on the road. I had no idea what I was in for...the most beautiful car ride of my life. The whole trip was up the coast and I couldn't believe the views. I had to keep on pulling over to take pictures because it was so magnificent. And as if the scenery wasn't nice enough, there were these two rainbows that were so bright that I almost kept on driving off the road. It was so nice that I wanted to high five someone...maybe even a high ten. By the time I got to Coles Bay, I realized that coming to Tasmania was such a good idea. I had already seen enough to make the entire trip worth it. Actually it reminded me a lot of how I felt when I was in Norway last year.
One of my stops on the side of the road

It wasn't even sunny out, but you could still see right through the water.

Sheep and a rainbow

More rainbows

Another view I had to stop for


Anyway, the entire Coles Bay/Freycinet area is national park so there are no hotels or anything. Only campsites and cabins. I wasn't sure what exactly my travel agent had booked for me, but while I was pulling into the camp site I was pretty skeptical. I'm not really the camping type so I hoping to avoid those type of accommodations. I checked in and the guy told me what cabin I was in. At this point I was happy that I indeed had a cabin and not a trailer or something, but I wasn't too excited about having to share an accommodation with others. I pulled up the the cabin and went inside. About 15 seconds later I realized that I was wrong. I wouldn't be sharing the cabin with anyone. I had the whole thing to myself. Thats right, I had an entire free standing cabin with 5 beds to myself. I was so happy. Two minutes later I got even happier when I realized that we were less than 100 yards from the beach. I decided to walk down to the beach and take a few pictures. It was really windy so I didn't stay out very long. Instead I waked to the restaurant and had another dinner by myself. The area was pretty quite so I decided to go to bed early since I had a tour in the morning. I was excited to go on the tour since I had underestimated the beauty of Freycinet. I was pretty sure it was going to be sweet.
The beach next to my cabin

Tasmania

I started typing out everything I did while in Tasmania and I realized a few things. One, if I published everything I wrote at once...I would break to world record for the longest blog. Two, it would take me forever to add all the pictures. So what I've decided to do is put a few days on now and the rest on some other time. I just looked, I already have 3 single spaced pages typed out not including pictures...and I'm not done yet. Here is day 1 and 2.

Tasmania

Wow, what a trip. Tasmania is beautiful. I'm not exactly sure what I expected from this trip in the first place, but whatever those expectations were, they were exceeded by far. Here is what I did.

Thursday:

I left work early...around 2pm so that I could go home and pack. I packed and caught a cab to the airport, arriving plenty early for my 6pm flight. I checked in and waited at the gate. At this point I was pretty excited. Although you can make a case that my entire life is a vacation, this was my first real vacation by myself.

I fell asleep on the 2 hour flight, but was awake for the last 15 minutes before landing. I had a window seat and at this point it was almost 8pm. I've been on a lot of flights and I can easily say that landing is Hobart, Tasmania was the most beautiful view I have ever had from a plane. White beaches with water so clear that you can see the ocean floor and a beautiful sunset. This was the first of many moments I had this weekend in which I was sad that I had nobody to experience it with. I felt like it was too awesome to experience alone.

Anyway, we landed, got my bag, and caught a cab to the hotel. My travel agent told me that it would be a cheap cab ride to my hotel...$40 later I arrived, not too excited about the price. The hotel was great, “The Old Woolstore” was it's name. It was after 9pm, but I decided to head out into the city to see if I could find anything cool. I didn't. Haha, actually I realized that I was in a great location, but Hobart isn't exactly a huge city...I think I heard it has 200,000 people. I was close to the dock and tons of shopping, but everything was closed for the night. I decided to call it a night and retired back to my room.

Friday:

I got up at 8:30 since I had booked the “Hobart Deluxe” tour for 9:15. I walked down to the pier and found my tour bus with out any problems. We started our tour by going to the Cadbury chocolate factory. It was cool, but not as cool as I expected. Instead of them showing us the factory, they showed us a video. I didn't come to Tasmania to watch a video that I could probably have found online. Basically what I'm saying is that Hershey Park's Chocolate World is quite a bit better. However the one redeeming quality about the Cadbury factory was that they actually sold the chocolate at a very discounted price. They even sold the screwed up chocolate at really good prices. That is when my fat kid instincts took over. $40 later I left the factory with a very nice assortment of Tasmania's finest candy.



When I left the factory I decided to make a few phone calls, but unfortunately one one of them worked. I called Dunne, but got the added bonus of talking to Matt and Heidi. While I was on the phone with them there were two parrots sitting in the grass about 40 feet from me.

After Cadbury's we went on a lunch cruise through Hobart. It was weaksauce. Turned out to be the lamest thing I did all weekend. After that they took us to the wildlife center. This turned out to be one of the highlights of the entire trip. Our guide was great. He introduced us to Trixie the wombat. She might be the cutest thing I have ever seen. Look at my last post if you want to see her picture. After Trixie he introduced us to a few different Tasmanian devils.


They are surprisingly nicer than I thought they would be, but still scavengers. After the devils it was on to a few koalas, kangaroos, and wallabies. They gave us food to give to the kanga's and wallies as they call them. I was so happy when one wallaby saw that I had food and he came hopping over. He was my favorite...so I decided to give him all my food...and none to the others. It was so weird to just hand feed him, but really cool. Pretty much exactly the type if thing I was hoping to do on this trip.
After I took this pic they told I probably shouldn't do that again...unless I want the Koala to slash my face off...
Best friends

Albino

After the wildlife center they took us to a small art town called Richmond. There were many stores and boutiques, I got a few Christmas gifts out of the way. Once we were done shopping in Richmond they took us back to our hotels in the city.
Richmond

I was pretty tired from the long day and was thinking about just eating at the hotel, but “Hogs Breath Steakhouse” was right across the street. I felt like a loser going to dinner by myself, but whatev. Once I had finished my delicious prime rib I went back to the hotel.

And now onto a video. It's been a while since I've had the time to put one of these videos together, but this one was too good to sit on the shelf. Kangaroos are great.

Alright, I'll put up the rest of my weekend some other time. I have a zillion pictures of beaches that I am going to force you to look at.

So Busy

Alright, just like I said in my last post, I went to another surf camp last weekend. Honestly it was waaaaaay worse than the fist one I went to. Two different worlds. This camp was much more about partying than it was about surfing...and since I was recovering from being sick for a few days, I had absolutely no tolerance for people actin like idiots. Also, the accommodations were terrible and there were mosquito's everywhere. Like everywhere. The first night I was getting eaten alive. I got out of bed, put a long sleeve shirt on, pulled my hands inside, and I slept with a towel over my head....and I still got bitten over 30 times. I slept for maybe a total of 1 hour...it was horrible, I was in such a bad mood. The only thing that was better about this camp was the location. It was absolutely beautiful. It was kind of like a tropical rain forest with tons of private beaches. There were kangaroo's everywhere and we saw dolphins and whales every single day.

Here is one of the beaches we spent time at

And another...I wish it was sunny in these pictures so you could see how clear the water was.





A small one


Some big ones


I also got some cool videos, but I haven't had time to edit them yet. I'll try to do that sometime in the next few days.

But enough about surf camp...thats old news. Where am I now? You know, obviously I'm in Tasmania. Yea thats right, home of the devils. I took a few days off of work and caught a flight to Hobart. I'm by myself, but I'm having a great time. It is beautiful here and so far it has been everything I had hoped for. I don't have time to put up tons of pictures or video, but here are two teasers. After this weekend I will have soooo much material. I can't wait to show you guys more of what I've been up to. Alright, I'm going to the Salamanca markets in 20 minutes. Talk to you guys later.

We got to pet and play with Trixie the wombat. So cute you just want to squeeze her.


Kangaroo's have to eat too.

Olli

Ciao! Se hai volglia di scrivere un email questo e la mia indirizzo: jahart@liberty.edu or hecubus185@gmail.com ho anche laciato un messagio nell stesso posto dove tu hai laciato il tuo.

Ok, for the non Italian speaking readers of my blog, that first line is an attempt to tell Italains how to email me. Turns out that somehow my best friend, Olli, from when I lived in Italy found my blog and left a comment on the post called "Ross Tucker" that I wrote on May 23rd. I haven't heard from him in forever and I couldn't have been happier to hear from him. I hope he logs back on and gets my message.

Anyway, I wanted to quickly come on a write a few things since I will be gone for the entire weekend. This week was the Melbourne Cup. It's the big annual horse race...kind of like the Kentucky derby in the US, except way more popular. Like waaaay more popular. The entire state of Victoria, where Melbourne is, gets off of school and work as a public holiday for the big race. Although we didn't get off of work up here in New South Wales, our office did close at 2:30pm so that we could all go watch it. Our office reserved a few tables at a pub so we had great seats. There are 20,000,000 people in Australia and there was $150,000,000 bet on this race alone. For those of you that are mathematically impaired, thats $7.50 for every single person in the entire country.

Since the office wasn't opening back up for the rest of the day, most people stuck around until about 4:30. I hadn't eaten lunch, so when they brought out the finger food I went to town on it. They had seasoned fries, chicken wraps, cheese bruschetta...and some kind of terrible fish/seafood patties. So at this point I'm having a great time. That was about to end. At 5:30 I went to the bus stop to catch the bus home. My stomach was starting to turn. Before I knew it I was running into the building across the street looking for a bathroom. I don't know if I got food poisoning or if I was allergic to something I ate, but I've been bed ridden for the past 48 hours because of it. I literally wanted to kill myself during the first 24 hours. I obviously called off of work both yesterday and today, but I was so sick that I couldn't even use my computer or watch tv. I'm definitely feeling better now and I plan on going to work tomorrow, but it was horrible.

Anyway, I go to another surf camp tomorrow, it should be pretty sweet...assuming I keep on feeling better. It will be good to get out of the house and to get a workout. Also, I booked a trip to Tasmania for next weekend and it looks like my friend Benedikt is going to come along. I write more about those things later. I hope you are all well. Ciao.

World Series Champions and Halloween

WE WON! WE WON! THE PHILLIES WON THE WORLD SERIES! As you can tell, I'm pretty excited about the Phils. I didn't miss a pitch during the entire series. My co-workers were really cool about letting me watch the games online during office hours.

It's kind of a weird thing. I'm so used to complaining about how a Philadelphia team has never won a championship in my life time...and now I don't know what to do. I briefly talked to George after the game and we had that exact conversation. Now what?

A few of us took lunch break and went to a pub for the last few innings of game 5. I was the only one in the entire pub that cared about the game...and I was also proudly wearing my Phillies hoodie. When they got the last out I forced everyone into high fiving me and even a few hugs. Then I explained to them that that was a defining moment. What might have seemed like a very normal lunch break for them, will forever be where I was when the Phillies won the 2008 World Series. I will never forget it.

Now onto Halloween. I didn't put much thought into Halloween over the past week, but then the other American intern invited me to go out with her and her friends. I decided that if I did go out, I wanted to look good. I thought of a few different ideas, but nothing great. I was gunna go as something really generic like an army man or some type of sport figure...but then I jumped online to see if I could get any ideas. I was trying to think of different cartoon characters, super hero's, or famous people. I did a character search and within 2 minutes I knew exactly who I wanted to be. The Colonel. Yea, thats right, Colonel Sanders, the American hero and creator of our favorite chicken.

So at this point I realized that if I wanted to go as the Colonel, I would have to do it right. I knew it would only be funny if I looked good. I did it right...and I looked good. I went to a costume store since I didn't have any white pants and I rented a pair for $15. I got a Santa Clause beard and trimmed it down. I got the Groucho Marx glasses and ripped off the nose. I tried to find white hair spray, but I don't think they sell it. Solution: White Out. Then I found a red apron at a Chinese dollar store. My roomates helped me get ready and when I looked in the mirror I was no longer Jon Hart. I was Harland Sanders, the founder of KFC.

I went to KFC to pick up a bucket of chicken and they loved my costume. I had to walk to Michelle's house from KFC. It was during that walk that I realized the night was going to be pretty fun. People were shouting from across the street "Hey! It's the Colonel!!" I would turn and wave. Cars were slowing down to look at me. I finally got to Michelle's and she was dressed as an indian or Pocahontas or something like that. Here is a picture of us.


We ended up going to Scruffy Murphy's and had a blast. There is a time for humility...now is not that time. I had the best costume in the entire place. I was a novelty. I am not exaggerating when I say that I was asked to take pictures with over 100 people. Even the band gave me a shout out. I've never gotten so much attention.

We had a great time...and that won't be the last time I dress up as the Colonel. I'm definitely going to recycle this costume. Alright, it's getting late here, I'm going to bed. Here is another picture of me...but with out my KFC bucket, which really made the costume.

Surf Camp

Well I went to surf camp this past weekend and it was awesome. It was pretty much exactly what you would expect. Rooms filled with bunk beds, picnic tables, grills, palm trees, and the beach. We had two lessons on Saturday and two on Sunday. Each lesson was 2 hours long. The first lesson I didn't get up at all. The second lesson I got up a few times. By the fourth lesson I was getting up almost every time. There were 42 of us campers. Most were Americans, Germans, French, or other European countries.

I don't have time to get into details right now, but I'll try to tell some stories later. They had a full time photographer on staff and he got some awesome shots. I decided to purchase my photo cd for $50 once I realized that he had taken over 35 pics of me. Here are some of them.







Australia shaped cloud


This isn't me...just wanted to show that we had some big waves


Again, not me


All the surf instructors did was screw around...they love their job




I didn't actually see the dolphins...but here is what I almost saw




7 mile beach...where we surfed




The camp

World Series

I haven't had much time to write about the Phillies, but I have been following them closely. Right when I got to Sydney I bought the MLBTV package which allows me to watch the Phillies over the internet. Since we are 15 hours ahead of the east coast, I watch as much of the games as possible while at work. Now that the are in the World Series, I don't miss a pitch. Everyone in the office has been pretty cool about letting me watch the games since they know I'm a big fan. I've been wearing my Phillies hoodie almost everyday and I break out my Cole Hamels jersey as often as possible. The Phils really haven't looked good in the first two games. Hamels was the man in game one, but our hitting has been terrible in both games. It's so frustrating to watch. They have tomorrow off which is good because I am leaving for surf camp tonight.

The weather is supposed to be perfect all weekend. I will definitely take pictures while at camp. I'm pretty excited.

The response to my story about Rina and I was pretty good. Everyone seems to enjoy me being in uncomfortable situations. I don't know if you guys ever read the comments, but I felt that Joel had a great suggestion for what I should do to end the relationship. Here are his thoughts :

"Hart I am a little disappointed you didn't ask for my advice. So I am going to give it to you anyways. Play the friends with benefits card, all the while leading her on about how your going to have a long lasting relationship that may end in marriage and the production of five mixed asian babies. When you get tired of the friendship tell her that you never want to see her again because you can not bear the smell of her. This will haunt her for a long time and leave her in devastating tears. Then exit her apartment making sure to break something like a lamp by touchdown smashing it on the ground. Your friend and relationship counselor and one time lover Joel Beck"

Hahaha, thanks for the advice buddy. BTW, I fixed some of your spelling problems. Go Phils!