Go West (But Not Too Far)

So, for the most part, my life is really boring and not progressing in any kind of way and I don't really want to talk about it, but a few interesting things have happened to me in the last few weeks and I will talk about those things!

First, two weekends ago I went to visit Ali in Chicago. She had time off because they were in between quarters, so it was an ideal time to visit. Our cousin Jesse also came, and I like him, so that was nice.

One of the things that we did actually in the city was go to the Shedd Aquarium. We took the Metra into the city and then walked to the Shedd, which was like 2 miles--but luckily it wasn't one of the days that was miserably cold, so it wasn't bad. We also waited in a really long line to get in, and while we were waiting some man kept walking up and down the line asking people to donate money to the soup kitchen--which, great, donating to charity is a good thing, but he pretty much just stared awkwardly at you until you gave him money, so that was weird.

Us in front of Chicago! This is just before we got in line. Sad news--I accidentally left my scarf at Ali's house.

 It was a good time and there were lots of weird ass fish there. I don't have pictures from when we went, but fish look basically the same no matter what location you're looking at them from, so I found some pictures online of ones I remember seeing.

Japanese spider crab. Hard to convey how creepy it was without seeing it in person.

We spent a lot of time looking at the otters. They weren't stacking cups but for some reason I always think this is funny. The otter is so indignant. 

This picture is actually from the Shedd! They have a tank where they let you touch all kinds of starfish, like this baby is doing. The water is very cold and I couldn't reach all of them with my short arms, but I still touched some. We also got to touch a sturgeon, but I didn't really like it because touching fish makes me nervous.

This is an Australian lungfish. His name is Granddad and apparently he has been at the Shedd since 1933, but they didn't advertise that well there because I'm just learning that now as I looked for this picture. I do remember that lungfish have both gills and lungs, for during seasons when the water levels are low and there's not as much dissolved oxygen for them to get with their gills. Two interesting things for the price of one with this picture!

Anyway, that's enough fish pictures. Once we left the aquarium, we met up with my friend Marie from high school and she drove us to Chipotle and then back to Ali's house. At Ali's house, we had a tattoo party! It was a fun idea--everyone had to have a temporary tattoo in order to stay. I had a Mole Day (because that's also my birthday!) tattoo, and also Ali's friend Bobby drew a Red Wings tattoo on me. Jesse had a mermaid tattoo that I had in my wallet, Ali had a glittery shooting star tattoo that I also had in my wallet, and Marie had an Iron Man tattoo that someone bought.

Left to right: Ali, Jack (Death Eater), Taylor. Sadly, I do not have a picture of the Mole Day tattoo.

A bunch of Ali's other friends came over and we drank a lot and I learned some new drinking games, like Irish Poker. Jesse had lots of White Russians (which I had for the first time as well and I like them even though they sound gross!) and got very drunk. Ali and I both felt like we had to take care of him but didn't know the other person was doing anything, so she fed him like half a bag of pita chips and a bottle of Gateraid and I fed him a chicken breast with BBQ sauce, which was kind of funny to hear from him in the morning--he was like, "You guys just kept making me eat so much!" but he didn't stop us at the time, so how were we supposed to know?

Jesse and I rode the train back the next day, which was very uneventful.


The other exciting thing that happened to me was that last weekend, I went to Kalamazoo to visit my friend Hannah. I've never been to Kalamazoo and I guess she doesn't go out much, so it was an adventure for both of us. We went to a place called the Beer Exchange, which is based on a stock market type idea, I guess. There is this big board that has all of the beers and their prices on it, and as beers get more popular, they get more expensive, and as they get ordered less often, they get cheaper. The prices change every 15 minutes. And then, every once in a while, the stock market crashes and everything is super cheap! It felt like a place people in Ann Arbor would be into.

A picture of the board--the time in the corner is how much time is left til it changes again. 

We met some guys there who were trying to decide if this girl across the bar was pregnant (she definitely was, but they couldn't make up their minds) and they asked us to play pool with them. I'm very bad at pool. Their names were Charlie, Kurt, and Brian... but none of them looked like their names belonged to them? It's hard to explain, but Hannah agreed with me the next morning. Maybe that's why they're friends--their parents all sucked at naming their kids. Anyway, they hung out with us for the rest of the night but to be honest they were all pretty boring and not super nice. Later, we left and went to another place called The Gatsby, and Kurt was SUPER pumped to dance, which was amusing. Like, I have never in my life met a man who was so excited to just dance. Caryn would hate him.

That's all! I don't have an adventure planned for this weekend--probably I'll just see Evan, but I like him so that's okay!