Got a lot to catch you up on. This is a very lengthy update of the last month. Some of the stuff probably deserves better narration, editing, or even a separate post, but I wanted to get this up ASAP (translation: I’m too lazy to make this better). Anyway, let’s not waste too much time with an intro and just get things going. Shortly (as in the next day) after my last post…

…I went on a family vacation to the Canadian Rockies. Admittedly, its kind of an unusual destination (picked by my mother), but despite a ridiculously lengthy travel route (NYC - Houston - Calgary - Houston - NYC), it ended up being a fantastic trip. We spent four full days in Banff and Jasper national parks, seeing mountains and lakes and rivers and more mountains and more lakes and more rivers. And though a couple of days in things started feeling repetitive, I still found myself really appreciating the beauty of it all (perhaps its my ever-increasing jadedness at this concrete and steel filled city I live in). I got to do a little bit of hiking, canoeing, mountain biking, and horseback riding ( see my (somewhat popular) facebook album of my favorite pics - no login necessary), and take a much needed break from work. Even after six days off, I certainly wasn’t ready to go back. And I didn’t, because instead…

…I took another week off and went home to Florida. I won’t get into the specifics of why I went, other than to say that the trip was unexpected but everything is OK. I did a lot of sitting around, bumped into a few old friends, and got constantly harassed by my family’s attention-whoring cat. (Seriously, have you ever heard of a cat biting you when you don’t pet it?) Anyway, the good thing about being home was that…

…I didn’t shave for a week. By the end of the week, I was rocking a substantial amount of scruff on my face. Actually, the same thing happened during the 6 days I was in Canada, but I got nervous about the reactions at work and shaved the day I got back, only to leave basically 20 minutes later for Florida. This time, however, I felt that fate had given me a second opportunity to show up bearded at work without dealing with the awkward uneven growth phase. So I kept it on, and I’m still rocking it today. And the real fun hasn’t been living life as an uglier version of my former self (my boss says I look “distinguished”, which I think just means “I don’t know what else to say that won’t offend you”), but in how appropriate the beard is with the fact that…

…I’m currently homeless. A few months ago, I mentioned that my roommates moved out in advance of our expiring lease. Back then, I had a couple months left, but that expiration date (August 31) has since passed. Right after coming back from Florida, I had to pack up all my things and vacate my apartment. And since I hadn’t yet found a new residence to move into, I rented a storage unit for all but a couple suitcases of clothes. Last week I stayed with Rishi and Evan on their couch, and this week I’ve moved over the the Turner / Briggs / Ian residence. Next week - who knows? Got a place? But back to moving out…. Moving out was….painful. Not because I was sad to leave the place I had been living for three years, but because there was so much random crap generated by three people over three years that I was left alone to deal with. I even had to ask my building for an extra day to finish. Having an arsenal of shot glasses was great for pre-parties or days when I only wanted one small sip of water, but having to individually wrap and protect them made me want to kill myself. Yes, I could have thrown them out, but they all have so much sentimental value to me. Like the “Alaska” one Sachin got me when he went on his Alaskan cruise because he had no idea what else to buy me as a gift. Or the one that’s just clear glass. How could you expect me to throw that away? Also, do you know how frustrating it is to think you’re done clearing out a bathroom only to realize “Ah crap, I forgot about the shower curtains!” And how on earth did we end up with not one, but two different versions of Cranium? Where did this random bucket of paint come from? How do you throw away a trash can? Will they realize that I’m actually trying to get rid of it? Do I need to leave a sign that says “This is trash”? Will that then be misinterpreted and responded to with “No shit, Sherlock?” Do I need to clarify my sign with “In addition to the contents inside of here, this actual container is to be thrown out as well.” Are these things really what crossed my mind when moving? Yes. The good thing about dealing with all of this on September 1st was that it distracted me from…

…That bad thing that happened to that school I am affiliated with. Sigh. So much to say here, and so little. Anyone keeping track of my Google Reader Shared Items saw all the various blog posts and articles I linked, which have said more than enough. What a crazy day that season opener was…. Shock, disbelief, anger. Turner shattering his expensive phone. Walking home past a bunch of bars on 9th ave, passing random Michigan fans, having nothing to say or do but hang our heads in quiet shame as we passed each other. Texting all my non-Michigan friends with “we suck” because it was easier to beat them to the punch. A friend Niraj asked me in a comment on my previous post what my thoughts were on all of this, and honestly I don’t even know what else to say. We’ve downright collapsed, and its both frustrating and humiliating. After all that smack I talked at the tail end of last season, I have nothing but four straight losses to back it up. Zero credibility for who knows how long. (Niraj also asked what joining Facebook groups like “Fire Lloyd Carr” accomplishes, and my answer is that it makes me feel better. It shows my friends how frustrated I am about my program and coach. Will it specifically translate into any actions by the athletic department? Probably not. But I’ll still do it. I compare it to yelling and cheering for our team when they’re doing well, even if we’re watching the game at home on TV. Does the noise we make actually accomplish anything? Not really, but it helps us express and share the emotions we’re feeling. Same with Facebook groups.) More on Michigan in a bit. For now, I have no clue how to transition from this paragraph into the next one about…

…My 25th birthday. Yup, yours truly hit the quarter-century last week, in near-perfect sync with his quarter-life crisis (see beard/homelessness sections above). With all the traveling and moving and not having a place to live that I had been dealing with, I barely had time to remember my birthday was coming up, let alone plan anything for it. So in contrast to the multi-day birthday celebration marathon I had last year, this year I scrambled on the day of to pick a bar and try to convince friends to come out on a weeknight for a couple drinks. Later that evening, while at a small celebratory dinner before heading out for drinks (not knowing who was even going to make it out), Sachin suggested we check out another bar first, saying that some of his old coworkers were there for a work event and we would get free drinks. Though I had no interest in hanging out with some random people instead of my own friends, everyone else at dinner seemed very convinced in swinging by the other bar first (I’m an idiot for not picking up on this). I hesitantly agreed to come along for a few minutes, all the time worrying that some friends, if any, would be at the other bar waiting for me. Even as we headed to the other bar, I got a text from Chris asking where I was and after telling him about my detour, received the response “I’m not going all the way downtown. Fuck you, dude. Oh and happy birthday.” I wasn’t happy about the diversion, and as we walked toward the back of the bar, it took me a second to realize that the group of people standing in a circle yelling SURPRISE! were a bunch my friends… the same friends who had earlier told me they would not be able to make it out that night for drinks. Needless to say, I was completely surprised. And a few minutes later, completely drunk. Annnnnnd I don’t remember much after that… But the next day, myself and four others left for…

…Another RV trip. After all the fun we had on last year’s trip, a bunch of us wanted to go on another RV trip this year. However, without any Michigan games in the area this year, we had to find another destination and activity, and decided to head down to Maryland/West Virginia to go whitewater rafting. We left Friday after work and drove all evening and night to get down to Friendsville, MD (no kidding, that’s the town’s name) where we parked the RV for the night. The ride down entailed some drinking and some cards, specifically the “Prime Number game”, a modified version of War in which a pair of cards were dealt out to each player, and anyone with a sum equaling a prime number had to drink. I’m not making this up. The next morning, after a motorhome-made breakfast, we went on our rafting trip down the Upper Youghiogheny River. Rafting was awesome - we spent about 4 hours working our way down 10 miles of river through Class 4-5 rapids. Most of us stayed in, but Briggs has an incident where he sort-of half fell out and dangled for a couple minutes, his foot still stuck in the raft, his knee twisting awkwardly. And when Turner tried pulling him back up, he almost pulled himself down into the water. Anyway, after rafting, we hopped back in the RV and drove 30 miles to West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV, checking (and becoming increasingly frustrated with) the Michigan score on our Blackberries on the way. We parked in a Buick dealership lot and then headed to a bar to watch the second half of the terrible Michigan game. Later, Turner, Levine and I decided to explore the college campus upon hearing rumors of a block filled with house parties. After finding none (and realizing it was only 8pm and possibly too early), we hit up a convenience store for a couple of Sparks (warning: bad idea) and Boone’s Farm (don’t ask me why) and sat on a random porch drinking and waiting for things to happen. A short while later, Levine and I wrestled (Sparks = too much energy = not good things happening = wrestling and injuring my thumb). A little while after that we went to a random house party with a band playing trippy music (they only had a drummer, a bassist, and a keyboard/Moog player). We bounced around a couple more house parties with varying degrees of suckiness, and eventually made our way back to the campus bars. Memory starts to fade here, but apparently the following things also happened throughout the night: Levine wrestled a random guy as bouncers from a bar cheered them on, Turner asked a girl why she doesn’t read Wikipedia, I told said girl as she turned around and headed toward an ice cream shop that she probably could do without it, Turner rode a pretend horse-on-a-stick as he crossed the street, I bought 6 shots of tequila toward the end of the night and had to drink 3 of them myself when no one wanted to do it, I did some form of dancing resembling those inflatable, wavy person things that stand outside car dealerships and sporting events, I left the bar alone and got lost, West Virginia students didn’t know where their nearest Buick dealership was, Williams had to come out and find me, and I still don’t remember the first half of the drive home Sunday, even though I was awake for some of it. The drive home, especially the brief period when we were stuck in construction traffic, ended up being pretty eventful too. Turner convinced two girls in a car ahead of us to kiss each other by holding up a sign to our windshield that said “MAKE OUT”. Later, we inched past another similarly branded rental RV and realized it was full of girls. We slowed down to let them catch up (remember, we were in traffic) and joked about hanging out in each other’s RVs. A few minutes later, Turner, Levine and I were in their RV, drinking beers and hanging out (for about 20 miles). The whole trip reminded me of how much I love road trips, which is good, because…

…Tomorrow, I drive to Michigan. Yep. Doing it again. Again, after all the fun we had on last year’s trips, the decision to drive out to Michigan again this year was easy to make. Obviously, with 10+ hours of driving each way, this seems like a lot of effort to go through for a team whose self-implosion rivals that of Britney, Bitch, and to be honest, we thought about canceling the whole thing after the Appalachian State debacle. But because a bunch of friends are also coming in from around the country, because Rick’s is still alive and kicking, because State St tailgating will still be going strong, because I haven’t had Panchero’s in a while (side note: while cleaning out my apartment, I found a Panchero’s punch card with only two more stamps needed for a free burrito), and because I have nothing better to do (aside from, you know, finding a place to live), we’re still making the trip. We’ve rented a minivan, we leave tomorrow evening, and…

…You bet your ass I’m getting me that free burrito.