Sticking to What Matters, Family Dinner, Friends, JMT hike, Soccer, and my Dad's Band

Wow, it's been an interesting week. Most of this week, despite my new found health, I felt like I was trudging through the mud. It feels great to be strong enough to walk during a whole 8 hour shift, not have a massive headache, eat things other than Jamba Juice, not have a fever, and not have terribly sharp pain in my sour throat. I'm so grateful to have my health back!

However, lately I've been feeling like I'm getting sidetracked. I've been spending a lot of time on things that are not as important to me, really. It's been fun hanging out in SF, at Kipp's, Bear's Lair and getting to know new people at Ral's functions.

I feel like I need to be focusing more on the things that are important to me in this life. I need to concentrate on getting all the supplies we need for the JMT, figure out what I'm going to be doing with my time in Colorado, running every morning, eating healthier, doing a better job of keeping up to date with friends and fam, researching things on my to do list!, reading books that inspire me rather than talking to people that only make me want to drink more!

I know honest honest run down of the week... to much?? Neway, of course every muddy spot has it's good times if your traveling with some interesting folks. Here's some of this last weeks happenings...

One of my favorite folks at ral's is an Australian guy named Sam (Left of guy in pink hat). He's leaving Wednesday to travel around Thailand and Malaysia. Then he's off to do the JET program in Japan for a year or two!! You can see him in this pic to the left of the guy in the pink hat. It was amazing. We started drinking at 5:30 when my shift ended and stayed out until 3 am! Yet this is the only pic I got of the whole evening. the highlight of my night was meeting a Turkish guy who showed me all this awesome Turkish music on youtube!


My younger brother Lowell (2nd to the left) just came home from West Point. We have enjoyed many fam dinners together since his return. we went to this Italian restaurant last Wednesday. We shared a big laugh over Obama's Reverend. Apparently he's quite a character!!! Here is a video if you wanna check him out... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAYe7MT5BxM

And I met up with one of my best girlfriends randomly this week! I had no idea she had just gotten back. I decided to lay on the grass one day and we just sort of ran into each other while sitting out there. I met Nimisha my freshman year at Cal while living at the Clark Kerr dorms. She's now getting her PhD in history at Princeton and came back to Cal for some much needed rest. Although she's still reading 3 books a day! I'm looking forward to meeting up with her again tomorrow at the bears lair.

I'm not going to lie putting breakfast, lunch and dinner into 23 bags was time consuming! The pic on the left is what the bag for July 15th is full of. That day we will be eating oatmeal, snickers, a pop tart, apple cider, trail mix, and REI's version of cheese enchiladas.

One of the best parts of my week has been playing soccer out on the new field! The pic on the left is my new man-crush. His name is Ronaldo and is the best soccer player in the world. He plays for Portugal!

My dad plays in a band with some of his friends. The weekly rock out session happen once a week at his house in Pleasant Hill. About 5 minute away from where I live in Concord. I was lucky enough to go over there in the middle of a gravity kills jam session!

Just finished a great book. Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace One School at a Time was an extremeley inspiring true story. the book begins with an American who gets lost climbing K2. he stumbles on a village full of children who are determined to learn, but who have no text books or materials. He promises that he will build this small village a school. By the end of this book he ends up building hundreds of schools all over Pakistan and in Afghanistan. This is my favorite quote from the end of the book:

"Jahan took a breath and composed herself. 'When I was a little sort of girl I would see a gentlemen or a lady with good, clean clothes I would run away and hide my face. But after I graduated from the Korphe school, I felt a big change in my life. I felt I was clear and clean and could go before anybody and discuss anything. And now that I am already a Skardu, I feel that anything is possible. I dont want to be just a health worker. I want to be such a women that I can start a hospital and be an executive, and look over all the health problems of all the women in the Braldu. I want to be a superlady'. Mortenson didn't laugh after all. Instead he beamed at the bold granddaughter of Haji Ali....Five hundred and eighty letters, twelve rams, and ten years of work was a small price to pay, Mortenson thought, for such a moment".

Newho, I miss you guys. Laura I hope you got our message from the concert this week. I know your kicking ass over there and I was soooo happy to get the update from Ariane. Post pics when you can!! Ariane, lets look into wicked!