Goodbye 2005

The last couple days of 2005 were good. On Friday evening, I braved the snowy roads to drive down to Osseo to hang out with a bunch of my physics major buddies from Gustavus. Cory’s dad owns a bar so we all met there for a good time. It was awesome to see everyone again, and there was quite a good turnout, I’d say, about 15 or so showed up, including Cory (of course), Dave, John, Mueller, Seth, Jolene, Carl, Al, Mike, plus a few other non-physics people like Jess, Sara and Liz. I’ve missed hanging out with all those guys, we had so many good times in Olin, despite the fact that it was usually while we were working on physics homework. Who knows when we’ll be able to get so many of us together again. I spent the night at Cory’s place, and despite the best efforts of Regis, Cory’s dog, I actually did get a few hours of shuteye. 😉 There’s a story there, ask me sometime if you wanna hear it.
Saturday morning I drove from Cory’s place down to Eden Prairie to visit John. Ben was there too, and we played a game of “Acquire” before Matt showed up, since we all like that board game and Matt hates it. At that point we played some “Pac Man Vs.,” on the GameCube, a few games of “500,” some “Wario Ware” on the GameCube (a game that’d be great for someone with ADHD, it was kinda annoying), and finally a couple games of “Apples to Apples” before we all headed out. It’d been awhile before I’d spent basically an entire day playing games, it was fun. Matt also mentioned at one point that he thought it might be fun to write some sort of political book with me, where we each talk about our perceptions of the other’s political ideologies. I’d say that’s definitely an intriguing possibility, that might be kinda fun. 🙂 But I got back to Cumberland around 10 or so, I didn’t want to be out driving around much later than that because of how many drunks were likely to be out on the roads as well. So I just had a relaxing last couple of hours of 2005 before watching the ball drop to ring in 2006. And as always, probably the most spectacular New Year’s celebration was in Sydney, they always put on an amazing fireworks display over Sydney Harbour, by the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. Man I hope I can be there for New Year’s someday… But like for some down in Texas and Oklahoma, New Year’s has been a bit nervewracking for many Aussies in Victoria and New South Wales, with wildfires being fueled by temps of 45 C (112 F), low humidity and high winds. Bad combo.
Yesterday my parents and I went down to church at Searching Together in Taylors Falls, I enjoyed getting a chance to see all those people again. I spent the afternoon watching the final Vikings game of head coach Mike Tice’s career, and then in the evening Nathan & Jake, although Nathan spent almost all evening over at a neighbor’s place fixing their virus- and spyware-infested computer.
Today I woke up at the crack of 10:30, and have basically been lazy all day, watching a bit of the Tournament of Roses Parade in rainy Pasadena, and since noon I’ve been watching the Citrus Bowl (I refuse to call it by its current name, the Capital One Bowl) between Auburn and Wisconsin. Prior to this year I might’ve cheered for dem stinkin Badgers, but Daniel’s converted me into a bit of an Auburn fan this year. And besides, he’s down in Orlando at the game, so whenever the TV does crowd shots in the Auburn sections I’m scanning the screen to see if I can spot him, hehe. The game just finished though, and Wisconsin came out on top 24-10, bummer.
In a half hour or so I’ll be heading down to the Twin Cities to have supper with all my old roommates from 202, including Josh, who’s back from Japan for Christmas. Then the plan is to head down to Gustavus tonight and visit a few people, and then I’ll be heading back tomorrow afternoon, making sure that I get back up here in time to catch the entire Orange Bowl, which is between Florida State and Penn State. I won’t wanna miss a second of the Nittany Lions’ BCS debut! LET’S! GO! P.S.U.!