Rafting the Devil's Soda: She don't come in Diet

Went whitewater rafting with Tom and Dave (and two of Tom's friends) this weekend. I had heard about the trip a few months ago, but Eric was psyched about it much more than myself and there were limited openings so I wasn't going to go. Then (long after I had forgotten about the whole thing) last thursday Dave asked if I wanted to go because Eric and John Sawyko had bailed at the last minute. I am a true merchant, I haggled Dave down to $100 from like $150.

I had never really thought about rafting before. Apparently there are different levels of whitewater rafting, and some of it can be dangerous. Dave gave me no warning (he forwarded me an email from Tom about the trip, but had "accidentally" removed all the html tags), so I showed up thinking it was going to be whitewater rafting like the rafting rides they have at amusement parks (which were fun because I don't like heights but I don't mind getting thrown around or getting wet). Instead, we went down one of the top 10 most violent commercially rafted rapids in the world (number 7 to be precise).

Tom and Cameron showed up and joked all night about how this river is going to chew you up and spit you out. They spent all night doing impressions of the old shark hunter guy from Jaws, where he's lecturing the cops on how dangerous sharks are. Except they were talking about how dangerous this river is. "You ain't getting nothing out of the Gauley! At the end of the day it's just a matter of how much she takes from ya!" "This white water is the Devil's soda! (then after the guide sees the girl in our group) What are you here for, girly? The Devil's Soda don't come in diet!" I guess drinking diet soda is feminine. Also, our guide was going to take one look at us and say "You boys on the upper Gauley? Is this a joke? 'Cause I ain't laughing!" That'd be right before one of us would try to introduce ourselves to the guide and he'd interrupt with "I don't want to know no names!" As he had lost so many foolish amateurs already and didn't want to get attached. The guys had watched youtube videos of this river (and people crashing badly) and had psyched themselves up to the point where Cameron had nightmares the night that night about the river. I wasn't scared by it, just a little concerned. The only comment our guide actually made was "Oh this is your first time? And you decided to start with the Upper Gauley..." Our dead-weight (see below) was also all first-time rafters, so I didn't think he was talking to me specifically and I didn't respond.

The morning of rafting we got up at 5:30. We were planning on renting wetsuits but we didn't make it to the meeting in time for that. I went out on the river with a t-shirt and shorts, and froze pretty much the whole day. Had I not worn the shirt I probably would only have been cold half that time because the weather was pretty warm out once the sun was up. There were 5 of us, and because it's an 8 person raft we picked up 3 more people. I was hoping for hot chicks, Tom was hoping for experienced rafters, and I think Cameron was hoping it'd just be the five of us. Well we ended up getting 3 older guys added to our raft, all of whom were useless and one of whom was fairly over-weight. Basically we picked up about 650 pounds of dead-weight. Our guide was pretty talented though, and seemed to anticipate that whenever he yelled "forward!" the left side would go forward a little faster than the right.

We only had one disasterous wreck. On the rapid called "Pillow rock" or something like that, we were going down full-tilt and hit a rock (actually i think it might have been the pillow rock). We hit it sideways after spinning. It was my side that hit, so one second we're flying down the rapids and the next second I'm tipping over backwards out of the raft and I looked up and the raft was almost vertical in the air above me and still rising and people are scrambling to hold on. Tom and I fell out first (tom was sitting behind me in the raft). I was sure the raft was going to flip (after seeing the otherside practically over my head) so I wanted to get out of the way before people started falling on top of me. But it turns out that the raft didn't flip. The tour guide (who had managed to duck flat very shortly before the rock hit) and dave (who we all thought was just very lucky but it turns out he might have been desperately clutching to the chicken rope when the raft went vertical, something you're not supposed to do because you might flip the boat) managed to stay in the raft. Everyone else got dumped.

I hit my foot on a rock, got dunked a bunch of times and resurfaced to find myself about 5 feet from Tom, both of us right behind a rock that had water flowing over the top. Not a good place to be because there were rafts behind ours coming down the rapids. We see the almost-empty raft downstream (where dave and the guide were standing up yelling but I wasn't sure what was being said) and start swimming towards it. After a good 30 seconds of very hard swimming we had somehow made no progress. Absolutely none and I was dead tired. I remember thinking "It's a good thing i've got this life jacket on!" as I dropped my exhausted arms and promptly sank in the water. I was surprised and kicked to the surface, immediately sank again, and then resurfaced again and had time to look around to see the boat about 15 feet away. I also spotted Tom way off to the side clinging to a rock while people were telling him to swim toward a nearby boat. I swam to our boat, and managed to grab Dave's hand just before the current could drag me past (aparently a bunch of people were narrowly missed by Dave because the current was pulling them by too quickly). I got my arms pulled into the boat and grabbed on but was too tired to make any progress on my own, and then Dave and another guy pulled me the rest of the way in.

There are some pretty exciting photos of the whole boat going up in the air and me and Tom in the act of falling backwards. I'll post them when I get them. Nobody was seriously injured. It's a good thing we fell at that spot also, because there were other rapids where if you fall you're supposed to swim away from a particular side because the water runs under a lot of the rocks and if you get swept down with the water you'll drown. And after falling in the river I had no idea what the guide had said about where to swim, had any rocks been nearby I probably would have instincually swam toward them.

This isn't our raft, but we did go down that same rapid.

Today my arms are a little sore, one of my legs is super sore, and my butt is really, really sore. I have a little trouble sitting even now (36 hours after the rafting). It's worse than after your first day snowboarding.



We stopped by and saw the New River Gorge Bridge. It's pretty awesome, it's the highest bridge in the nation. But I think I was the only person who thought it was very cool. Now I'm back in dc, and have to work 12 hour days this week. I wasn't planning on it, but now I have less time to make up for last week's slacking. The surprise rafting trip was 3 days I was planning on working and a my sister's almost-surprise weekend trip to NYC is one more (she's presenting a documentary she made).

Kate: I hope the rafting trip was fun, I bet you're closer to being a real woman now.

a new low of laziness

Today I bought a new pack of socks just to put off doing laundry. Yes, a new low of laziness has been reached.

Actually it's not as bad as it sounds. I had to stop by the post office this morning to pick up a package (Rome season 2) and as I was leaving I was upset that I was going to have to leave work early to do laundry tonight. "I just did laundry less-than a week ago too, how can I only have one pair of clean socks left!!!" At that very moment I noticed that the discount-store I was walking past had socks in its display. 6 pairs for $5 because they're "slightly imperfect". So I went in and bought a package. I don't care about them being slightly imperfect. Hopefully they're wearable, but I don't really care, so long as they're clean. Hardly anyone ever sees my socks anyway.

(a bunch of people are crowded around a computer)
me: What's going on in here? Looking at porn?
Gabe: Noooo. We're thinking of getting a gift for New-Guy Joe.
(they call the other Joe "new-guy joe" because he's been in office for a fairly long time)
me: Is it his birthday?
Gabe: In December.
me: What are you thinking of getting him?
(long pause)
Gabe: ...A mail-order bride.
Mike: It's the gift that keeps on giving!

on videogames

Got an email from Dan saying he's saving up money for a ps3 to play tekken online. I just looked it up, and somehow at the beginning of this month they came out with tekken 5 playable online without telling me! I knew the japanese had it (those bastards), but didn't know it was available in the states.

So I was looking into getting a ps3 (I have a little more spending money than Dan), but I was just checking and there are no really good games for the ps3! I went to gamerankings and did a search for the top 40 RPGs on the ps3 (RPGs are really the only games worth playing). And it came back with a list of 4! The only one that got decent reviews was that Elder Scrolls: Oblivion game too, a game which is almost definitely better on either the xbox or pc, and I'm not really interested in playing it anyway. The PS3 has like 4 games that have gotten decent reviews, and they're all either sports or stupid action games.

So, what to do, what to do. I'm not sure. Is it worth $500 to endlessly humiliate Tekken pseudo-players nationwide (besides Dan occasionally) and not play another game until Tekken 6? It might be. Or I was also thinking of just getting a Wii instead (getting both sounds overindulgent) because I want to play Residet Evil (yes, I have zero interest in Zelda). Though the Wii is kinda hard to find, and I refuse to pay more than MSRP. I refuse to get price gouged like a sap, or propogate the culture of price gouging. I still have my dignity!* They should make a multiplayer counter-strike-esque shooter for the Wii. Normally I don't like shooters, but that'd be kinda cool.

I'm busy at work this weekend, and I haven't had any time for videogames in at least the last month. But I'm looking forward to it soon. I was also thinking of buying the Office DVDs and Rome season 2, but I may have too many dvds as it is. I hate to accumulate stuff. Though Rome is a great show and the second is the last season.. I'm such a consumer.

(from a review of Def Jam: Icon, a fighting game for the ps3)

"[The control scheme] takes a while to learn, because the game moves at a much slower pace than most fighters. Maybe that's because the MCs, or their digital counterparts, are bigger and thicker than most fighting characters. It might simply be difficult to react quickly wearing a massive parka."

(I remember thinking, while playing Def Jam: Fight for NYC years ago, that the rappers fighting in their huge jackets and chains and whatnot seemed even more rediculous when than when they were interacting, boasting about how badass and hardcore each one was)


*109th Rule of Aquisition: "Dignity and an empty sack is worth the sack."

Always Sunny in Philadelphia

In Arcata (the wedding last weekend was in the total hippy town) I happened to catch 2 episodes of the show It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and they were pretty hilarious. I'm netflixing the dvds now. Here's a youtube promo. It's not actually a clip from the show, but it has a similar tone and writing. Warning: Contains Adult Language and Situations.

Still doing work, maybe I'll write something here tomorrow.

Slashdot commenter: How come Shaolin kung-fu masters aren't winning UFC championships and such? The reason is simple. Shaolin kung-fu is easily beaten by powerful grappling just as easily as scissors beats paper. When a huge Zangeif type person grabs all their limbs and holds them to the ground, their fancy kung-fu runs out pretty quickly.

Hawaii and a little sister's wedding

Right now I'm waiting at the airport with a lot of time to kill, so I'll write this now. I'm heading back to dc tonight. I spent about 6 days in hawaii. It was fun, but traveling with the family is a little annoying. With 6 people, everything is a compromise, and after a while I get tired of compromising. I don't really like japanese food (besides the very, very occasional california rolls), and all my sisters love japanese food, so we only at it like 3 times in hawaii. Still, they didn't push me around too much, and there were a few days that I just wandered around by myself and did what I wanted. We were right on the waikiki beach, which is nice, but mostly alcohol free. You can't drink outdoors, nobody else in my family drinks, and I didn't feel like sitting in the bar by myself. I was clean and sober the whole time. On saturday night I was walking down the street and a girl asked me if I wanted "to party". I don't think she was a prostitute, but I wasn't sure what exactly "partying" meant so I declined. I don't want to get involved in anything sketchy. I did a little snorkling and got fairly sunburned. I wore thong-sandals for a single day and cut my feet up pretty badly just from them rubbing on the rubber sandals. Yep, sandals are the devil. And so, so feminine, I don't know what I was thinking wearing them. Oh and I saw NIN in their last concert for their "Day One" tour. It wasn't a album I particularly liked, but they played a lot of old stuff too. Hawaiian people are short (especially the girls), and twice I almost tripped over girls in the mosh pit because they were less than 5 feet tall and I wasn't looking down. What were they doing in there anyway? It's not like they can see anything.

I have zero photos from my little sister kathryn's wedding. I was planning on taking some with my phone's camera but the phone's battery had died in hawaii and I apparently forgot the charger in dc. So my phone was useless almost the whole trip, and the internet was spotty, but I don't think too many people were looking for me so it's alright. (editors note: actually, I'm back in dc now and still have no charger, so phone is still down.) I have no photos, but it was a really fun wedding. I was worried that my uniform of a grey shirt, brown pants, and gold tie would look silly (as it sounds), but apparently it wasn't too bad. My table was right by the bar, where my sister had put an ice chest full of pre-paid beer, and I did quite a lot of drinking. The whole night, beer after beer, it was great. The beer wasn't very good, it was too ale-y for me, but after 2 or 3 I wasn't noticing. I even did a tiny bit of awkward dancing toward the end of the night. Family gatherings are so much easier with alcohol.

This week is the last week of our fiscal year at work. I am going to be busy.

(At Kathryn's wedding reception I was talking to a girl and an older lady from my childhood church. I excused myself to hit the restroom, come back and find that the older lady has moved on to another group)
me: So did she say anything bad behind my back?
girl: No, she only said nice things. She was really talking you up.
(Kathryn, moderately drunk, walks up and smoothly enters the conversation)
kathryn: Are we supposed to be talking up Joseph? Joseph is a great catch! Um, Joseph is smart! And funny! And strong! Though you can't tell it from that shirt.
(this string of rediculousness continued for like 20 seconds while I frantically and unsuccessfully tried to jump in and steer the conversation away. Drunken disaster. I suspect this happens a lot at weddings when you're an unmarried older sibling of the bride/groom.)

a weekend of daves

Very briefly, last weekend was the weekend of Daves. Dave Shapanka is moving away (probably to Chicago) and Dave Reynolds is back from NYC. Friday night Dave, Dave, Eric and I went drove down to Baltimore and went out to bars with Noelle and Rob. It was a nice night and the bar we went to had shuffleboard (Shapanka got super lucky on a clutch toss and beat me), foosball (eric narrowly beat me, mostly because of bad lighting and my unfamiliarity with the 3 goalies configuration), some beanbag throwing game (Reynolds and I were doing well until Noelle scored 3 times in a row), and that deer hunter arcade game (I didn't play). It was fun, which is surprising for Baltimore.

Satuday the other kids went tubing but I skipped on that. That night was the sausagefest at eric's. Reynolds and I went to georgetown briefly to congradulate Ravi, our freshman year roommate, because he just got engaged. There was a slightly embarassing moment when I didn't recognize Ravi's new fiance (I'd met her once). I walked up and gave Ravi a warm congradulations, and the girl standing next to him said hi to me. But I didn't know who she was, and there was another guy standing with them too, so I just told her hello. Dave, that jerk, just thought it was funny. He knew full well that she was the fiance but didn't warn me.

There was a Shakira-looking girl at the party with really, really big hair. Dave thought she was cute. "The more Shakira-like the better." At one point I was talking about Star Trek with Kate, Val (John Sawyko's girlfriend) and Eric Noriega. Like 5 minutes into the conversation, Val, who had been contributing knowledgeably until then, asked if Star Trek was the one with light sabers.

Wednesday morning I'm leaving for about two weeks in California and Hawaii. Then when I get back I have to do some cramming for the end of the year at work. I'll be back here next month.

(talking about Arnold Swarzenegger running for president)
Loan: He hasn't been a good governor.
me: I think he's been a great!
Loan: No, If you actually look at what he's done, he hasn't been a good governor.
Spittle: Listen I don't need to see how good he is. I've seen the movies. If he ran, I'd vote for him.

on Harry Potter

Somehow I got spyware on my laptop. I wonder if I ever ordered a cd copy of Windows from Dell. I think I did... So rediculous, they should just give you the Windows CD when you buy the computer.

Just finished the last Harry Potter book. Decent book, but not my favorite. I think my favorite was the Goblet of Fire. It's all been downhill since then. This one had too much running around worried about some stupid mystery, and no classmate interaction. The glory days of the series were back when it was Harry's clique verses Malfoy's clique, all within the confines of the school. Maybe I should get that videogame Bully. Hmm.

(possible Deathly Hallows spoilers!)
My biggest problems with Harry Potter:

-Malfoy had zero character development. How cool would it have been if Malfoy did something redemptive? He's been a bully and a coward through the whole series, a change would have been nice. Not just the cliche standing up to his father for the first time (which he didn't even do), but a sacrifice. Malfoy should have done something great.

-Voldermort had no depth. His Tom Riddle incarnation was much better. Maybe he should have tried to convince Harry to join him. It would have been interesting: a passionate speech about how Voldermort being dictator would be in the best interests of everyone. Give him a chance to explain himself. Voldermort is supposedly intelligent too, he should have been able to make a convincing case. Instead he just ran around angry and baffled about how Harry manages to beat him each time.

-Hermoine is supposedly the greatest witch of her age, but she never really does anything special. She just has random knowledge whenever the story requires it. And she nags a lot.

-Magic is so inconsistant. Some spells require speaking, some don't. Some spells require a wand, some don't. Goblins and Elves have magic, but who knows what they can do with it, besides make magic swords. The way the room of requirement works and what it can do changes with each book.

-Snape had so much potential as a character and it was mostly wasted in the end with a stupid death scene and extracted memories. It doesn't really make sense that he spends so much time belittling and dispising Harry, and then as he's dying he wants Harry to see his memories to know he wasn't really a traitor. Why does he suddenly care what Harry thinks? It's such a coward's move, from someone who clearly was not a coward.

-The wizard society looks down on muggles, but we can do so much more than they can. It's interesting, none of the wizards go to universities, understand computers, drive cars. I honestly think, if the wizard community had just gone to the British FBI and explained who Voldermort was and exactly how his magic works and what it can do, the muggle police would have tracked him down using DNA, telephones, and computers. Then we would have shot him full of bullets, and that would have been that.

-The Weasleys are an entire family of redheads. This is only a small annoyance, but red hair is such a recessive gene than the odds of all 5 children having bright red hair, even when both parents have red hair, is pretty much zero. I think the only possible explaination is a long history of redhead inbreeding.

I have two copies of the book now (sort of accidentally), and I'm not planning on keeping either. So if you want one let me know.

I also saw Super bad. Pretty hilarious movie, if you can get into immature humor.

me: i might switch to linux. all i do on the computer is instant message, surf the web, and play music
Dan: linux more like gaysexnix