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March 31, 2007
Backgammon
Sorry for the not-so-brief blogging hiatus, but I'm still trying to figure everything out on my new computer. Macs are awesome, but I've been using PCs with Windows for so long that I have to re-learn a lot. It's funny how something simple can be so confusing for PC users. It's almost impossible for me to understand the concept of "drag and drop" and "one click" access to things because in Windows I was so used to using the most complicated, long, drawn out methods of doing anything and everything. Anyway, I'm trying to switch from Photobucket to Flickr and that's why I'm taking so long with my pictures. Hopefully this will work.
Today, Brent and I played backgammon on video chat! How cool is this:
I promise I have a lot of pictures coming up with more fun blog entries, but for now this is all I've got online. Sorry!
Lauren
Posted by lauren at 11:42 PM | Comments (0)
March 29, 2007
Lite Brite
Remember Lite Brite? If you don't, you weren't born in the right decade. I recently downloaded the Lite Brite "widget" for my MacBook and made this picture of Brent:
If you want to play Lite Brite online, click here.
Enjoy!
Posted by lauren at 11:52 PM | Comments (0)
Bloggysitting
To use Jocelyn's term, I've been "bloggysitting" for Rock Star Diary while Jocelyn is in Chile. I know that I haven't posted here recently, but there's sort of an explanation for that on my entry for Rock Star Diary, An Apple A Day....
Basically I explain on Jocelyn's blog how I ended up getting a MacBook. Yup, that's right! I'm done with Windows forever. Apple computers are amazing and I highly recommend them. Anyway, check out Rock Star Diary and I'll be posting soon with pictures from my mom's birthday.
Lauren
Posted by lauren at 10:39 PM | Comments (0)
March 26, 2007
Spring Break
Spring Break is over, but that means I'm back to posting so I guess it's not all that bad. Sorry for the brief hiatus, I hope the ridiculous video of Winston and George (who, it turns out, may be a girl!) kept you entertained.
Anyway, I spent the past few days in Naples, FL at the Ritz Carlton Golf Resort with Brent and his parents on vacation. The weather was beautiful and it was a very nice, relaxing vacation.
I arrived on Wednesday and spent the afternoon sitting by the pool with Brent. I have a billion (exactly) pictures of us that look almost identical to one another, but that's too bad for you because this is my blog and I'm putting them ALL up.
Brent and Me by the pool:
Brent reading:
Me trying to read, but getting terrified by the bird that was on top of the umbrella I was sitting under:
I had a traumatic pigeon experience in Florida a number of years ago and haven't been a huge fan of birds ever since.
Out by the pool:
Showing off my pedicure:
View from my chaise lounge chair 1:
And 2:
Barrels:
Welcome tray in each of our rooms:
While on the subject of rooms, we had a really perfect setup. Brent's family got a suite that had a bedroom and a bathroom attached to a living room with a bed (for Brent) that had its own balcony, TV, and bathroom, and the living room had a connecting door to my room which was a hotel room in and of itself.
My room:
The room came with everything you could possibly imagine needing while on vacation... or ever:
All the free hotel products were Bulgari:
Everything was Bulgari even down to the candle and the giant tea bag for the bathtub so that those who wish can steep in a tub of Bulgari tea:
View from the balcony:
Brent and Me:
Brent's dad wasn't feeling well the first night I was there, so Brent, his mom, and I went out to dinner at Real Seafood Co. which was absolutely adorable. I didn't get any pictures there (or at the other restaurants, for that matter) so I hope you'll check out their websites to see how cute they all were. At Real Seafood Co. I had salmon, Brent had mahi mahi for the first time, and Brent's mom had snapper. We all tried some of each other's meals and it was some of the best fish I've ever had. My salmon tasted like it had been cooked on an outdoor grill which, I think, is my favorite seafood preparation.
After dinner, Brent and I went down to the jacuzzi by the pool. I don't know how hot jacuzzis are supposed to be, but add 30 degrees and that's what this one was. It actually stung to get in, and after a few minutes we would get so hot that we'd have to jump into the pool just to feel normal again. Somehow, it was actually quite enjoyable, though.
Brent getting into the jacuzzi:
Brent and Me:
I put this picture on a long exposure because I wanted the air jets in the jacuzzi to come out looking misty, which they did. I think this is actually a pretty cool picture, despite being so simple:
The pool deck at night:
The next day, we went to the pool again where I got sunburned, despite the sun not being out. I didn't get burned once on the sunny days, that would just be crazy, but the one cloudy day that I decide to leave my beach cover-up dress on... I get sunburned. Of course I had to get burned in the shape of my dress. I don't think you could call the outline of a J-Crew beach dress a "farmer's tan," as the phrase goes, but something along those lines. Despite the not so great weather, we had a nice morning and spent the afternoon playing pool which I won! Brent swears he didn't let me win so I must be a natural (or just very lucky).
The hotel still looking beautiful, even on a rainy day:
Eating lunch before the rain started (Brent was upset because my picture-taking was interfering with his cheeseburger time):
Lunch brought to our chaise lounge chairs, yumm:
More pictures of Brent and Me:
Another view of the Ritz Carlton:
Brent and I decided to go for a walk after the brief rainstorm stopped. Florida is so beautiful, and I love anyplace that has 10min rainstorms followed by sunny afternoons.
Beautiful pink flowers:
Me by a palm tree:
Why are there weird roots growing out of the trunk of this palm tree?
Ducks:
Fountain:
Dry "ground" (or something):
We saw a black snake that wasn't moving. I wanted to know if it was alive so we poked at its head and I believe it was dead:
That night we went into downtown Naples to a place called 5th Ave. which has great shopping.
5th Ave:
The Wind in the Willows store:
Dog Bar (so cute):
Samurai chess set in one of the stores Brent and I went in:
Brent loves samurai so I promised him I'd get it for him if I ever have a billion dollars to spend on something stupid.
We ate dinner there at a restaurant called Chops:
Again, I don't have any more pictures, so check out the website, or just go yourself! Chops had fantastic steaks and I would absolutely recommend having reservations or else you'll NEVER get in. We got in and sat down very quickly, but there was a huge crowd at the door of people who hadn't called ahead and were waiting to get in. After dinner, we went back to the Ritz and Brent and I went in the jacuzzi again.
Back at the hotel, my evening tray awaited me:
They know me so well. I could come right in, sit down, have the remote in my hand, two bottles of cold water next to my bed, two milk chocolates, and a printed out index card with the next day's weather on it. Why don't we get this kind of service at college? We're only paying close to $200,000 just to go here, I guess that's not quite enough to cover the charge of turn-down service.
Down at the jacuzzi again:
Snail at the jacuzzi, just like last year:
Brent taking a nap after the jacuzzi:
Lizard on the ceiling:
Chairs where we sat and discussed Buddhism (random, I know):
Staircase:
The next day, Brent and I got up early to go to the beach. There's another Ritz Carlton right on the beach with a shuttle service to and from the golf resort where we were staying, so it was very convenient. The Gulf is so beautiful and there were so many good shells!
At the beach:
Searching for seashells:
Coral:
The water:
Parasailing:
Brent and Me:
There were a lot of gorgeous houses on the beach that I couldn't resist taking pictures of. Some of them are a little out of focus because it was very bright out and I could hardly see the LCD screen on my camera:
For lunch, we went to the Ritz Carlton's little beach restaurant called Gumbo Limbo:
It's right on the water and very cute:
While we waited for our table, we took a few random pictures (as usual).
Brent:
Me:
In the trees:
A non-threatening bird:
More trees:
Brent had a grouper sandwich and I had a lobster quesadilla which was delicious:
Afterwards, we split a slice of key lime pie (Brent's first!):
Brent's picture of how green it was in the untouched part of the beach (if you can really call this area "beach"):
Trees again:
Giant hourglass at the Ritz Carlton on the beach:
Fountain:
Brent and I came back from the beach and got cleaned up and ready for dinner that night:
We went to a place called Brio which was in another really cute shopping center. I'm starting to think Florida has some of the best shopping ever.
This picture is really blurry, but it's all I've got of the outside of the shopping center where Brio is. You can see Brent and both his parents, even though they're very much out of focus:
Brio is a Tuscan grill and has fantastic Italian food and is absolutely worth trying. The little shopping center was a lot of fun too. In addition to having a lot of cute high-end stores, there was an entire area that seemed to be outdoor kareoke where everyone was singing and dancing. If we're ever in Naples again, Brent and I will have to go back and do our two part harmony of Dexy's Midnight Runners - "Come On Eileen." If you haven't heard it, you've missed something sensational.
Back at the hotel, Brent and I went to the jacuzzi once again for our system of boiling and then freezing ourselves. I took some long exposure pictures that came out really well while we were down there.
This is one of my favorites, it's of the palm trees above us with the starry sky in the background:
This was an experimental picture that turned out to be really cool. I pointed my camera out towards the golf course where there was no light and very very little visibility. I left the shutter open for 15 seconds and here's the result:
Brent wanted to try to and left the shutter open for 30 seconds. His came out cooler, especially because if you look right behind the trunk of the tree, you can see a shooting star!
This is a 15 second exposure of the clubhouse portion of the hotel, over by where our rooms were:
On the way back to the rooms, we found a friend for Winston and George:
The next morning everyone was up early so that Brent and his dad could play tennis before it got too hot. Brent won best three out of five and definitely needs to give me some tennis lessons here at school when the weather gets better.
Brent:
Brent's dad:
We all went down to the pool for a little while before showering off, packing, and getting ready to go to the airport. After getting organized, we all went to the clubhouse (pictured earlier in this entry) where we ate lunch. Everything was delicious, but unfortunately the fire alarm went off right as we were finishing up. After waiting for the firetrucks to come, we headed off toward the airport in Fort Meyers. On the way, we stopped at the Miromar Outlets which were amazing. There was even a Michael Kors outlet which is one of my favorite designers.
Brent and Me at the outlets:
There were lots of fountains so we made lots of wishes. I gave Brent two pennies to wish with and he gave me three quarters! Those are some very expensive wishes, so they better all come true.
Wishing on fountains:
After the outlets, we went to the airport where we had to go our separate ways to fly home. I got really lucky because I was in a row of three seats and the other two people didn't show up! I took the window seat for myself and used the seat next to me for my purse. I also used all three TVs at my disposal which earned me quite a few looks from nearby passengers. I didn't care, though. How could I be expected to make it on a two and a half hour flight without a show about raising baby tigers, MTV, and the flight progress screen?
At the window seat, I got a lot of really cool pictures. None of them came out as well as I would have hoped because the window was sort of dirty, but they're still pretty.
Making our way home:
Out the window:
The trail left by a nearby jet:
As the sun began to set, the colors of the sky were so beautiful and vibrant. I haven't altered any of these photos in any way, so this is exactly how it looked:
For a while, the sun was completely behind the clouds, but trying to peek through. It looked like a glowing red ball coming through the blue clouds:
Flying over Washington DC:
Thunderstorm off in the distance with a visible anvil cloud:
This is one of my all-time favorite pictures I've taken. The quality isn't perfect, but I love the one visible star, the changing colors of the sky, and the city below:
That's all for now, I have to get some sleep! Goodnight everyone!
Posted by lauren at 01:10 AM | Comments (3)
March 21, 2007
While I'm Away...
While I'm away, I have a couple videos for your entertainment. First, I have the video of Winston and George hopping around my room. My room recently got painted, so it's sorta empty and mostly has some plastic containers from college. Anyway...
Winston and George:
And if you're not too bored yet, here's a video I found online. It's a guy spray-painting these really cool sci-fi pictures. He makes it look like I could do it in my garage, although I'm sure I can't. Make sure you watch all the way to the end, it's really cool:
I'm off in the morning for Naples, FL and won't be back until Saturday night, so I guess these videos will have to entertain you all for a few days.
Goodnight (again)!
Posted by lauren at 01:32 AM | Comments (0)
PoP! Goes My Heart
I went to see the Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore movie Music & Lyrics with Ali and Sarah today. It's fantastic if you love corny things like this (which I do):
That song will be playing in my head until the end of time.
In other news, my mom and I went to Borders Books a few days ago to look at some travel guides for my trip this summer. My mom is awesome and got me all these!
The Bill Bryson book is actually a travel book on Europe that I got for Brent as a present (Shh! I'm giving it to him tomorrow!) Brent is in Naples, FL right now and I'm going to be meeting him and his family there tomorrow at the Ritz Carlton Golf Resort. I went there for spring break with Brent and his family last year too. It's beautiful and I'm sure we're going to have an amazing time.
Lastly, I made a really cute video of Winston and George hopping around my room, but Google Video is taking forever with it, so if it's ready by morning (which I can't imagine it not being) then I'll post it before I leave.
Goodnight!
Posted by lauren at 12:29 AM | Comments (0)
March 20, 2007
Haunted Mansion
So you all know my friend Cathy from many a previous blog entry, and now she has written a post for me! Cathy goes to school in New London, CT and recently visited a local haunted mansion (now known as The Lighthouse Inn) where some of her classmates live (in the carriage house). She took a bunch of pictures and caught ghosts in six of them! Anyway, here's her story:
The Inn was built sometime around the year 1902, and it held a lot of weddings because it's really beautiful and just a really really nice place. There was this one bride who was walking down this spiral staircase (which is STILL the original staircase, nothing has changed about it) and she tripped and died- I think she broke her neck or something. When we went in to take pics, we talked to the lady at the front desk who works nights, and she said that people have come to her saying that they can hear a woman singing and that people have seen a ghost in a white vintage dress walk down the halls and stuff.
The other story is that back in the day, there was a really bad hurricane, and two little boys got stuck outside and got pretty banged up I guess. All the houses nearby had gotten ruined and there was really no place to stay except The Lighthouse Inn, so the people at the inn took the boys in but they died there too. I don't know what from, though, probably injuries? I'm not really sure, but yeah, people say that they can hear the boys running down the halls and laughing, and even sometimes in the middle of the night they can feel the boys climb into bed with them because they're afraid of the dark (that's what the lady at the desk said). So yeah, that's the story and here are the pictures.
Make sure you look for the ghost orbs:
It's Lauren again. I just wanted to add that I saw a documentary a while ago on haunted places, and some expert on the show was talking about ghost orbs and how they work. He said that usually ghost orbs are just camera flare, but that camera flare is ALWAYS perfectly symmetrical. Cathy's ghost orbs are definitely not all symmetrical, so I think they're the real thing. My favorite picture is the staircase where you can see one big orb and two little ones.
Maybe ghosts just really like Cathy because when I saw my ghost, Cathy was visiting me at school. Hmm...
If any of you have fun ghost stories, please share! I love that kind of thing and I'd love to post your story and/or pictures too!
Lauren
Posted by lauren at 04:22 PM | Comments (11)
March 19, 2007
Out Like A Lion
Friday was the last day of classes for Brent and me before spring break, and we had a blizzard! It wasn't a real blizzard, but there was a lot of heavy snow and strong winds. A lot of people actually got snowed in Friday night, including Brent and me. We kept ourselves occupied, though, with a large pizza from Sgt. Pepper's and a Nick at Night marathon of "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air." Speaking of pizza, I guess that's the one positive thing I can think of about Hartford, that it is the home of the first ever pizza. Wouldn't you think that would have been Italy? I guess not. Anyway, since I couldn't live in Hartford in its good years, I'm glad to live there in the Sgt. Pepper years. I could go on and on about the texture and density of their pizza perfection, but I'll spare you the details and just tell you to call and order your own the next time you're in Hartford.
Snowing on the quad:
An interesting tidbit about Trinity is that we have the largest unbroken quad in the country. Anyway, here are a couple pictures looking through one of our many archways:
Goodnight!
Posted by lauren at 08:38 PM | Comments (3)
Field Trip
So last Thursday I took Brent on a field trip to the car wash. I thought he was getting bored from all the finals and studying and could use a little break. My mom had sent me a list of 50 of America's greatest road stops, and one of them was a car wash in Cromwell, CT. Cromwell isn't too far from Hartford, so I told Brent I had a surprise for him and took him to Cromwell to see the car wash. It wasn't all that exciting, but it was sorta cute and definitely better than studying. Here are the pictures:
It probably would have been more fun on a nicer day.
Lastly, here's a picture that was supposed to go in my Likes and Dislikes entry, but I couldn't tell if it was a Like or a Dislike:
It would probably be cute if it weren't on the side of an abandoned building in the middle of an empty lot. Considering that we do live in Hartford, that was probably prime real estate, so I guess it can be a Like.
I'm going out to get a manicure and a pedicure with my Grandma now, so I'll post more later.
Lauren
Wow, is this the first time I've signed off with my name? That's sorta weird. Maybe I'll start doing that now.
Posted by lauren at 12:43 PM | Comments (1)
March 15, 2007
Stiamo Andando A Roma!
That's supposed to say "We are going to Rome!" but I don't speak Italian, so who knows. Anyway, Brent and I have been accepted to Trinity College's Rome Campus this summer! We're going to be taking an art class that fulfills our science requirement (aka we're going to do nothing and get credit). I'm so excited to go and can't wait until June 2nd when it starts. It's only three weeks, so after Rome Brent and I are going to wander around Europe for a little while to take advantage of the super cheap travel for students. I have a bunch of pictures of Trinity College in Rome that I stole off of Trinity's website, so check them out!
Trinity Rome Campus:
Stanley, Trinity Rome's mascot:
I hear that Stanley wanders in and out of classes all day because he actually lives on campus. I can't wait!
I'll keep everyone updated on anything new and should hopefully have a lot of amazing photos this summer!
Posted by lauren at 09:43 PM | Comments (7)
Likes and Dislikes
Good thing midterms end after tomorrow, I've had enough with school, learning, the library, and especially politics (what I'm majoring in). All of those things would definitely be on my "dislikes" list if that's what this entry was about. Here's a list of my likes and dislikes of the city of Hartford. I took all these pictures as a passenger in Brent's car on the way home from the mall so I could absolutely do a much more interesting, extensive entry on this, but I won't... for now. Also, the weather was pretty nasty so they're all pretty gray and dull. That's ok though, Hartford is pretty gray and dull so I guess it gets my message across.
LIKES
The Connecticut Capitol Building:
A very confused Columbus... "What am I doing here?":
Drive-Thru Dunkin' Donuts:
Strange statues of insects outside the Hartford Hospital:
DISLIKES
Traffic:
McDonalds that make me fear for my life at the drive-thru:
Wandering children:
Boarded up buildings:
Buildings that could be cool... if they were somewhere else:
Ugliness:
Rundown pizza places:
People who drive on the wrong part of the road:
That goes for this guy too (no? too far?):
Boarded up neighborhoods:
Fresh graffiti:
Trinity College turning Friendly's into the ever so useless "Trinfo Cafe" which no one even knows exists:
The entrance to Trinity that someone from Hartford tried to tear down:
The "nice" part of our neighborhood (paid for by Trinity student coke money):
Locals with guns:
Toilets on the sidewalk:
Too many bumper stickers:
I hear that Hartford used to actually be really nice, so... what happened?
Anyway, here's something to make us all smile again, the bunnies! I know you all must be really sick of seeing them, but Brent took a bunch of pictures of them and here are my favorites.
George:
George and Winston:
Lastly, I inverted the colors on a lot of my pictures because I was bored and here are the ones I thought looked the coolest:
I have to get back to studying now. Someone go out and have fun for me =(
Posted by lauren at 06:58 PM | Comments (1)
March 07, 2007
Twister
I don't know how I haven't blogged about this yet because it was absolutely the most interesting thing I have ever done, but I thought it was time to do a post of my storm chasing trip I went on in June of 2003. For those of you who are huge weather nerds (probably no one) you know that June 24, 2003 was an enormous day in meteorology, it was the tornado outbreak in the Northern Plains (Nebraska and South Dakota). It actually set the record for the most tornadoes EVER in a 24 hour period! I've always wanted to be a tornado chaser and no, not because of the movie Twister, it started long before Bill Paxton took to the roads of Kansas. However, having been storm chasing, it certainly wasn't entirely dissimilar to Twister. Anyway, it was AMAZING and I am absolutely going again and again and again. I went with my dad with Storm Chasing Adventure Tours, and I highly recommend them if you want to go yourself.
So, my dad and I flew into Denver, Colorado where we all stayed for the first night where we (about 14 of us) had an orientation meeting before leaving at the crack of dawn the next morning. I could go into so much detail in this entry because even four years later I still remember everything that happened, but this would end up being about 30 pages long not including pictures... and probably most of you don't care anyway. With that in mind, the trip was five days long and we didn't see any tornadoes until the last day when we saw twenty-three, so everything up until then will be kept brief, not to say that it wasn't just as fun touring a completely new part of the country with amazing thunderstorms despite not seeing tornadoes.
So one thing to be said about the states we were in (Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota, and briefly Iowa)is that they must not have a whole lot to do, because every gas station has an attached attraction of some sort, whether a giant car, a museum of garage junk, or an entire palace made of corn! I guess that's where I'll start, with the corn palace. It's not actually attached to a gas station, but that doesn't make it any less ridiculous.
And yes, they have an official corn palace webcam.
My dad and me in front of the storm chasing vans:
Dad:
Early on in the trip, we saw this beautiful anvil cloud (aka Cumulonimbus Incus):
Storm:
Inside the van (that's Todd, our amazing tour leader):
One of the things that I found to be the most amazing about our trip was how much land there is that's completely untouched. You can drive for miles and miles without passing another car, without seeing a house or anything. Also, the highways are red! I don't know why, I'm sure it has something to do with the kinds of materials available, but it was really cool. Anyway, I'm sure my pictures won't do the Northern Plains any justice, but I hope you get some idea of how beautiful it is out there.
So much open land:
Beautiful clouds:
There were actually two giant supercells getting sucked into each other in this picture, and yes, it was really that pink!
My dad at a gas station attraction, this one had a giant green car!
Winding road:
I thought these flowers were really cool, the stems and leaves were almost blue:
I love this picture:
I don't know if you can see it, but there's an oil rig in the background of this next picture. I love oil rigs, I don't know why:
Murdo, South Dakota:
An experimental Dominos delivery car in a gas station junk museum:
Me taking a picture:
I couldn't help but wonder... whose mailboxes are these? There weren't any houses for miles:
Irrigation system at one of the many "corn or something else" fields:
They must really need it with land like this:
Well, this next one was a "something else" field if I ever saw one. We stumbled across a marijuana field on a little dirt farm road in Nebraska when we were pulling the vans over to use the satellites.
Yes, that's all marijuana:
Dave (one of the guys on our trip who just so happened to be wearing a Marijuana shirt that day) holding the cash crop of Nebraska:
Stoner Dad:
Now back to some more pretty pictures from the area:
If only back then I had the camera that I have now.... Oh well, I guess I'll just have to go back and do it all over again!
Watching a Red Cross vehicle heading towards a storm:
More clouds:
One ray of sunshine:
One night, we were chasing a huge storm somewhere in Nebraska, I believe, and using the in-van computers we followed it even at night when we could hardly see anything. We ended up turning onto a dirt road that led right into the center of a giant corn field. A giant corn field in Connecticut terms would be... well, probably non-existent, but in Nebraska those things are HUGE so we drove deeper and deeper into the field when we passed a little old graveyard, how weird is that? It was actually terrifying because it was literally a dark and stormy night with an ancient little graveyard. When we reached what must have been the direct center of this corn field, we discovered that while there were stars above us, we were surrounded 360 degrees by lightning storms. There was constant lightning, never a second without any, and the winds were whipping around us like nothing you'll ever see in New England. This is a picture of some tall grass in the headlights of one of our vans that sort of shows how bad the wind was:
I tried to get a picture of lightning, but it was so bright that it had some weird effect on the film (I was using film rather than digital for most of these pictures) and the light got refracted or something into a bunch of different colors onto the picture which is still pretty cool:
That night, we all woke up to a tornado siren going off which was definitely exciting. The next day, we finally saw our tornadoes, twenty-three of them (part of a 67 tornado storm). I spent most of my time video-taping rather than taking still pictures, so I don't have that many, but I'll put up what I have.
I wish we had a need for these in Connecticut, I really do:
Storm:
That's our other van, up by that soon-to-be tornado. This is when we decided we should probably back away a little:
This is actually one of my favorite pictures, although the small version on the computer doesn't do it any justice. If you look carefully, you can see the "corkscrew" tornado spiraling down to the ground right in the middle:
This tree got completely split apart:
We chased this storm from Nebraska all the way to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, stopping at a number of places along the way to take pictures and videos.
Amazing supercell with a great wall cloud:
There's actually a tornado in this picture but it's really hard to see. It looks like a vertical white line in the direct center of the picture:
Video taping a tornado:
This is the edge of the supercell which was ENORMOUS by the way, I just didn't have enough room in my lens to get the whole thing in a picture. You can actually see bands going around the outside of it which were rotating the whole time:
Tornado:
We chased the storm to Sioux Falls, like I said:
The Brick Wall
(my favorite part of the story)
When we got there, it was nighttime and we couldn't see much of the storm anymore except for the lightning, so we stopped the van in another field to watch. The wind kept picking up until it was so strong that we couldn't even stand and everyone had to lean up against the van to protect themselves from the wind. I tried to walk out into the wind and nearly got knocked right over. No one was paying attention to any of the weather instruments because we were all too busy enjoying the strong winds when one of the members of our tour heard a tornado warning on the radio. Apparently, we were right in between two giant storms and needed to get to safety ASAP. We sped down the road looking for the nearest gas station, listening to the radio which was, at that point, reporting that there were multiple tornadoes right exactly where we were. You really don't want to be anywhere near tornadoes in the dark. Well, I do, but in general you shouldn't. We pulled into the only gas station, parked the vans under the little roof over the gas pumps, and ran inside to take cover. We looked around only to realize that three of the four walls of the gas station were entirely glass! I don't know how we didn't notice this, but the only thing we could do was run back outside and get up against the one brick wall and hope it would protect us. We got outside the building and Todd looked up at the sky and told us to run, so of course we did. We got up against the wall and watched a tree crash down in the parking lot right in front of us (I even caught it on video!) The metal street signs were bending backwards in the wind and looked like they would blow away any second. Lights were flickering, the wind was howling, and there was absolutely nothing we could do but wait. Another car came screeching down the road and pulled in right in front of us and asked if we knew what was going on. He said that there was another storm chasing group that had been a few minutes behind us and they hadn't made it in time and all the windows of their vans had blown in. We had no idea how close we were to disaster that night. We stood up against that wall for a completely unknown amount of time because I think we were all entranced by a combination of amazement and terror. It wasn't until the next morning over breakfast that Todd told us how much trouble we were really in. He said that he hadn't wanted to freak us all out, but that he was really thinking in his head Well, maybe the bricks will fall on all of us and someone will see a giant heap of rubble and dig us out in a few hours. We also analyzed the satellite data from the time period that we were at that gas station and saw a giant vortex pass over the gas station. We weren't actually in a tornado, but a rotating vortex did pass right over our heads which certainly made it feel like we were.
On our last day, we were all so happy to have been a part of something so amazing. I'm sure not everyone would see being trapped up against a brick wall in the biggest tornado outbreak in history as "amazing," but it was and I would do it again any day (and hopefully will!) The next few pictures are from the drive back to Denver before going home. We didn't see any storms, but we did get a beautiful sunset:
I can't wait to go back and definitely will. Sorry this was so long, I couldn't help it. If you're at all interested in this stuff, I hope you'll go to the Storm Chasing Adventure Tours website and check it out for yourself.
Also, I found a couple awesome links. This guy's website has a bunch of pictures from that same storm, and the picture of the group of people walking around the street looking at debris is actually our group:
Erig Nguyen's June 2003 Storm Site
This is a video I found of some of the tornadoes that day. The one at the end was an F4 that destroyed the entire town of Manchester, SD (click on the first picture on the left for the video):
Lastly, I found this site which is another guy's experience chasing the same storm. He has some cool pictures and satellite graphics:
Well, that completes my very long (but actually very short compared to what I would have liked to have written!) storm chasing entry. Goodnight everyone!
Posted by lauren at 10:07 PM | Comments (9)
March 06, 2007
Luna
OK, so I'm not going to talk about it this entry (because I haven't uploaded my pictures yet) but Brent and I just adopted two baby bunnies!!! They are so adorable and there will be much much more on that later, but for now, I have a few random pictures to put up (as always).
I've been getting bored with a lot of my pictures lately, so I've been messing around with them on Photoshop, so if they look really crazy that's why.
Brent in his room (it looks like he's wearing a crown, but it's actually a Mardi Gras mask on his wall):
This is a picture of Brent and Me in our awesome sunglasses. I got Brent his sunglasses for his birthday last August and was wildly jealous of them until Jocelyn got me mine for Christmas!
After I played around with it for a while:
The weather here has been crazy and we've been getting a lot of rain and snow (which, of course, melts in the 60 degree weather we had two days ago!) Anyway, our campus is pretty much flooded:
Although I actually took this next picture, Brent was the one who had the idea for it so I'm giving him credit. We thought this was strangely representative of our weather, the beautiful blue sky leaving behind us as dark storm clouds roll in:
Brent and I have a presentation tomorrow (well, technically today) on The Tin Drum which we started reading in Barnes & Noble on Saturday:
I also thought this was funny:
After reading, we went to Luna Pizza in West Hartford where we had a delicious meatball pizza:
Finally, here's a picture of the lunar eclipse!
I have a video too that came out pretty cool, but I'm going to mess around with it for a while and add music or something, so that won't be up until later.
Wow, I actually just realized this, but isn't it cool that we went to Luna Pizza on the night of the lunar eclipse? It's also pretty cool that we met a psychic in Barnes & Noble that night. He happened to be deaf which somehow made him more credible. He was a really nice guy who told Brent that he had a strong, white aura. I hadn't met him yet (Brent was off in one of his nerd aisles while I was looking at normal people books) and he told Brent that he and I are going to get married, isn't that weird? Brent said it was right after I walked past on my way to the bathroom that the guy told him that he was going to marry me, and he didn't even know that we were together! I wish I were psychic. The guy was trying to teach Brent how to be psychic too and then I came over and he told me some cool stories about his experience with psychic stuff. I know I sound like an idiot, but it was actually really really cool. He showed us a book about Nostradamus and when he saw that I was wearing a turquoise necklace (the one Jocelyn brought me from Mexico) he told me all about what turquoise means and how it protects people from the "evil eye." OK, I know I sound like such a loon right now, but wait, it gets better. So the psychic guy told me that I had to rinse my turquoise necklace under cold water to get the something off of it... it sounded like he was saying e-chi but I'm sure that makes no sense. Anyway, he said I had to put my necklace under cold water before I wore it again. I got home and was washing my hands in the bathroom when I saw my necklace in the mirror and remembered what the guy had said. I almost rinsed it off in the water and then thought I was really going off the deep end and started to leave the bathroom. I threw my paper towel into the trash can and, what was there? A can with the words "Evil Eye" right on it, facing up out of the trash. Wow, isn't that creepy? Obviously I turned around, went back to the sink, and rinsed my necklace under cold water IMMEDIATELY. Maybe I'm just crazy, but I thought that was more than coincidence.
All right, well I've procrastinated enough and I have to get to working on my presentation. If anyone out there is a psychic or otherwise magically inclined, could you explain to me what the evil eye is? Thanks.
Goodnight!
Posted by lauren at 12:14 AM | Comments (6)
March 03, 2007
It's All Getting A Little Foggy
I wish I had something more to say about this past week, or perhaps some fun pictures to post, but I've had an incredible workload this semester and have pulled far too many all-nighters to even remember what I've done in the past few days because... "it's getting a little foggy." I know I'm really lame with my titles, but whatever. However, it actually is getting not just a little, but a LOT foggy outside. I have a few pictures coming up after I ramble. The weather has been really crazy lately. Last night, Brent and I were up until 5am studying for our Constitutional Law exam and when the night began, it was snowing, which quickly turned to freezing rain that formed an immediate sheet of ice on any surface on contact. Last night (or I guess, technically, this morning) Brent and I were about to walk back to the dorms when we encountered a raccoon walking down the sidewalk towards us. Brent thought it probably had rabies, but I thought it just wanted someone to cuddle it and take it in as their own. I lost, we didn't adopt it, although maybe we should have. Anyway, this morning we both walked to the library in more freezing rain (for more studying before class) and then all of a sudden the clouds cleared and we were left with one of the thickest fogs I've seen here in Hartford. The fog was so thick that we could actually see "billows" of it blowing in the wind. I tried to take a couple pictures and it didn't come out as well as I had hoped, but you'll get the idea.
Storm clouds clearing:
Rain on the windshield:
Fog:
Tonight, as a celebratory dinner for finishing our Constitutional Law midterm exams, Brent and I went to the Texas Roadhouse. We went there once before, as featured in Brent Freaking Out. We think the Texas Roadhouse is absolutely hilarious because nothing in it has anything to do with Texas... at all. They have Nascar stuff, Mexican blankets, a mural of Mississippi with Mark Twain and a steamboat... you get the idea. They do have delicious steaks though, so that's why we go. My pictures came out a little boring, so I messed around with them on Photoshop to make them more fun, so if some of them look weird, that's why.
Every table gets a bucket of peanuts to snack on (this is a really classy joint, seriously):
I was entertained by how much Brent's head resembled the cactus behind him:
Something probably not from Texas (picture taken by Brent):
The Outhouse:
After dinner, Brent and I went to see Babel at Cinestudio, our school's on-campus movie theater. Having a movie theater on campus almost makes up for the 13 gunshots we heard tonight. Almost.
It does not, however, make up for the flooded sidewalk leading to the parking lot. With the rising and falling temperatures we've had lately in conjunction with the heavy rain and snow, one of our VERY uneven sidewalks has turned into our very own Arctic River, ice floes and all! Brent and I were navigating the Arctic River on our way out tonight (in flip flops because we're stupid stupid people) when Brent, unknowingly, stepped on a faulty ice floe and fell through into a two foot deep puddle of ice water.
Well, I guess that's all for now. I hope you all have a great weekend! I'll be reading The Tin Drum with Brent for our English class. It's a nearly 600 page book that we both have a presentation on on Tuesday and it's ENTIRELY Brent's fault. We get to choose which book to do our presentations on, and Brent had to choose the longest, hardest one of them all (there are options with 100-something pages!) Our professor was asking for more volunteers and in the thirty seconds between Brent volunteering and me volunteering as well, I just had this vision in my head of Brent freaking out about getting the book done and me having to deal with him for like, 48 hours of stressing out about the book and I thought... wow, I should get credit for that too, hence the presentation I have due on Tuesday.
Ok, I'm actually done now. Goodnight!
Posted by lauren at 01:28 AM | Comments (7)
March 01, 2007
I Feel Safe
After seeing helicopters on the news circling a Hartford elementary school (now on lockdown) after a shooting right outside... I walked outside here at Trinity and saw these same helicopters with my own eyes. It's things like that that make me feel safe here in Hartford, New England's rising star.
Posted by lauren at 04:27 PM | Comments (3)