vacation 2009 part 4: horses

I'm almost done with these vacation stories, so if you're bored of them, it's almost over. The action really starts to pick up here, though!

On the last day, we got to the airport and found out our flight was delayed a few hours. That caused us to miss our connecting flight in Charlotte. I'll get to that later, though. First, I had to go through customs. Where they were adamant that I rode a horse.

TSA: "Did you ride a horse at all?

Me: "No."

TSA: "Do you have anything to declare?"

Me: "I declare that I am awesome."

TSA: "Okay. And did your awesomeness ride a horse?"

Me: "Uh...no."

TSA: "No food or anything?"

Me: "Nope."

TSA: "Finally, are you going to the USA and did you ride a horse?"

Me: "I am going to the USA and I did not ride a horse."

TSA: "You're free to go. Perhaps you will ride a horse to the gate?"

Me: "I will walk to the gate."

TSA: "Have a great horse-riding day!"

Me: "I don't ride horses!"

After riding a horse to my gate, I decided to do a little shopping at the Duty Free stores. They must have known I was coming because they had a HUGE cheese wheel for my plane trip. What can I say? I get hungry when I'm flying!

I can't imagine somebody buying a giant chunk of cheese for a flight home. It was the size of my head. They also had smoked meat. Can you imagine being on a 4-hour flight and somebody whips out a cheese wheel and meat?

At least they give you enough to share with everybody on the plane.

Be here tomorrow for the hair episode. It's a good one.

I'm off to ride my horse into the sunset and hanker for a hunk of cheese.

Enjoy!

-DJ

vacation 2009 part 3: numismatic

Where do coin collectors go when they want to get away? Aruba! That's right! They go to the Numismatic Museum in Aruba. Numismatists love the sun of Aruba and shiny coins.

The museum is cool, ESPECIALLY THE UNICORN COIN! I call it the "Unicoin". China made some coins with unicorns on them. Presidents are lame. Unicorns are cool. We should put a unicorn on the quarter. Maybe we should vote for a unicorn for president! I would get behind that campaign.

Besides the love of numismatists, Aruba has liquid fireworks. Liquid fireworks! Are they as cool as they sound? Yes they are!

Oddly enough, that segues into my next topic. Aloe. Aloe is huge in Aruba. They have it in everything. Soap, shampoo, clothing, inhalers, ostriches. You can even eat it! You must always remember to eat the right part, though. One part you can put in chocolate and it tastes great. The other part will clean you out.

And if you are getting cleaned out, remember to put the TP in the trash. You don't flush it down the toilet there. Every stall has a little waste basket for you. Just in case you wanted to know that. You probably didn't. I should probably delete that.

I'm off to numismatate!

Enjoy!

-DJ

vacation 2009 part 2: red flavor

The people in Aruba are very trusting. I know this because they let me drive there. They have these jeep tours over the desert and rocky areas and they let YOU drive the jeep. One guy leads in his jeep and the other jeeps follow him, with the tourists as the drivers.

Does this seem like a bad idea to anybody else? They didn't even check if I had a license. And who's to say my USA license is valid in Aruba? Aruba is NOT a territory of the USA and I'm barely allowed to drive here. I can't legally drive in twenty states...and half of Iowa for an incident involving pancake mix and a tree.

Other than blind trust, the driving was really fun! It was bumpy and dusty and windy and really cool. You should do it. Part of my jeep fell off, but we fixed it, so I'm sure you can handle it.

I also found out that there is a lot of soda sold in Aruba that you can't get here. Like Big Red Fanta. I asked the lady at the counter what flavor Big Red is and she could not answer me. Liking the color red, I decided to try it. It is, in fact, red flavored. You may not think red is a flavor, but it turns out that it is. And adding big flavor to red flavor?! Amazing! I hope you can find it sometime.

I also enjoyed cherry, banana and pineapple soda. Also good. It's like carbonated fruit. That actually sounds really yummy. Can science do that yet? If not, I'm going to work on it.

I'm off to plant a carbonated apple tree.

Enjoy!

-DJ

vacation part 1: back

So, I'm back from vacation. And, as is tradition, I will blog about it so I don't have to actually look for news stories to talk about. Because I'm lazy.

It was Aruba this year. The bad thing about Aruba is that it's always sunny. I tried to stay away from the sun as much as possible, but it kept following me. It was like a hot stalker. And not hot in a good way.

I tried to go underwater so the sun couldn't find me, but there is only so much air in a submarine. I did find out that the color red doesn't make it too far underwater and your lips turn grey. It's pretty cool. And you look dead, so for all you Twilight fans, get in a submarine and you'll look like a vampire too!

I also got a dive certificate that tells me that I am an OFFICIAL "Atlantis Submariner"! It is signed by the Manager of Submarine Operations. That means it's official. I'm going to ask the Navy to borrow one of their subs this weekend. I'm clearly qualified to operate an underwater vehicle. I have a certificate. With my name on it. I had to write my name in, but it still counts.

I'll keep it short today because I still have about 3 days worth of work to catch up on, but I will leave you with one more tidbit of information.

Popular songs like Bailamos sound great on steel drums. I was hoping for a little steel drum Journey, but sadly, steel drums don't have Steve Perry's vocal range.

I'm off to the Navy for my sub.

Enjoy!

-DJ

vacation 2009

It's vacation time again. Which means I won't get to blog with you for about a week. And that is sad. Well, for me. You might be excited about it. All three of you wonderful readers.

So, what do I do when I don't have a blog to write down all these random ideas that I have? I usually make towers out of silverware at restaurants. Yep. For some reason that is relaxing to me. Unless I have a pen and a napkin, then I might draw pictures of unicorns jumping over the sun.

I like going on planes. I don't like the popping ears thing, but flying is fun. And no, it's not because unicorns fly. I like to fly because Superman can fly. So, for a few hours I'm kinda like Superman. Even though the flight attendants hate it when I get on my stomach in the aisle and put my hands above my head and pretend I am flying.

I just crush one of their plastic cups and yell, "LOOK AT THE STRENGTH I HAVE!"

That usually means I don't get a free soda, but it's totally worth it to show off my muscles.

I'll see you in week!

I'm off to pack my comic books.

Enjoy!

-DJ

cloudy

There is a Cloud Appreciation Society. It is real. I know it sounds like something I might make up for a joke, but it's totally true. They love clouds. They love looking at clouds. Writing about clouds. Singing songs about clouds. All sorts of cloud stuff.

They also want the world to recognize a brand new cloud. It's some cloud that isn't classified yet and they want cloudologists to give it the respect it deserves. They want to call it an Asperatus. I know it sounds like a vegetable, but it is cloud. It might have fiber and Vitamin A, but I'm not sure. I haven't eaten a cloud. Or a vegetable.

As you may have heard (or read a few seconds ago) that the Cloud Appreciation Society writes songs about clouds. They have inspired me to write a song about clouds as well. I call it "Ain't Too Cloud To Beg".

I would write the lyrics, but they are in cloud language, so you wouldn't understand. But I can tell you that the song is beautiful. I've seen clouds cry when I perform it. Yeah. I'm good like that.

I'm off to check the stratus of my cumulus.

Enjoy!

-DJ

you hard a drive bargain

I almost didn't write anything today. I'm still a little lost. My hard drive went away. I'm not sure what happened to it. Maybe it had some trouble with the mob. Perhaps it is on safari. I don't know.

I do know that I have been scrambling around trying to rebuild all my files.

So. That is all. I wish I could tell you more, but I honestly don't know anything without my computer. It's like my brain. I would say it's like my second brain, but it's really my first brain. Whatever is in my head is like a third or fourth brain.

Computer comes first. Then my calendar. Then that thing in my head.

I wish I had one of those smart phones. Then one of my brains would be smart.

I'm very distracted today.

I can't focus without my computer.

I totally forgot to eat lunch.

I'm off to try to find...something...

Enjoy!

-DJ