Drawing Jam 03.12.04    [ Sketchbook ]

Hiatus    [ Sketchbook ]

bleh ... been busy ... i guess. :/

kewl thing is that I got a new tablet ... 9x12 wacom. here's a couple studies i did messing around with it.

appropriate use of funds    [ Just Talk ]

From an interesting discussion with a co-worker.

Its estimated so far that the Iraq war has cost the US over 100 Billion dollars and of course that number is growing by the second. Now I am all for liberating people, but you do have to wonder if 100+ Billion dollars is worth it. I almost don't want to discuss what else that money could have been used for, but I counter one point I have heard from a number of places.

Many people have commented that the Iraq war was a ploy to obtain and better control access to the oil in the middle east. This is possible, but with 100 Billion dollars the US could have freed itself from the use of fossil fuels forever by simply investing all that money into new research and architecture for the use of hydrogen fuel, or even something else.

So, should the US have gone into Iraq and forced itself to invest so much of its own money for their sake? and if not, what else should the money have been used for?

-- AG

ecclectic trio    [ Beats ]

possibly the best trio of albums i have ever bought in a single purchase.

Zero 7 - When it Falls
Nuspirit Helsinki - Nuspirit Helsinki
Kings of Convenience - Versus

Australia Teaser a.k.a. Spring Break 2004    [ Travel ]

Ah yes ... first trip of the year. Always feels good to ditch work and get out somewhere new.

The whole trip was *out of this world!* crazy fun ... it really can't be described, but i will try. There is far too many memories to put in this humble blog entry, so i'll be using the extended entry feature to go above and beyond ;)

Special love goes out to ... chels, jacks, liz, selena, sorraya(spelling?), josh, jess, jess, alicia, jen, katie, carla, bethany, cary, and justin ... it was truly a pleasure to party with such a great crowd. And of course, much love to my great australian roomies ... chels, selena, amanda, mo, ash, jonathan, anthony, and nordberg ... you guys rock!

Can't wait for 7 weeks to come and go so i'll be on my way back to the fun.

from a cold & wet cali
-- Al G

!! --

Chapter 1 - Forgotten Time

10.02.2004 - left sj for sydney @ 20:00
11.02.2004 - totally non-existant time in my universe
12.02.2004 - arrived in sydney @ 9:15

Chapter 2 - Go Wild

14.02.2004 (V-Day) - on saturday we left on our "Go Wild" overnight tour through some parts of the rainforest and up to cape tribulation where we spent the night at PK's Jungle Village. The day was rather plain and certainly overshadowed by what would be a hell of a night. Because it was V-Day the managers/owners of the hostel organized to have some activities and games to provide a bit of fun for everyone. The main attractions were two games of perfect match (i.e. the dating game) and of course i was selected as a contestant. So there i am sandwiched between 2 cheecky australian guys about to play the dating game in the australian rainforest ... trouble.

Now this next bit threw me for a loop ... not only did they select Alicia (part of the B.U. gang) as the female contestant, which i was happy about, but for some uber-random/coincidental reason she had stated on her entry form that her perfect man was someone who's last name began with "G" ... that goes way beyond bizarre. I'm still not sure if it was my witty answers or if the game was rigged, but I managed to come out as the winner and won of a bottle of champagne and a hot air balloon ride at sunset to be shared with my perfect match, Alicia. Then to my disappointment she refused to drink any champagne and promptly gave the balloon trip to my sister ... ouch :( Anyways, that was a long-winded description ... the other perfect match game featured 3 girls all from the B.U. troop, so that was fun to watch as well.

At this point the whole gang was engaged in dancing and drinking the 3 bottles of champagne we had won as well as celebrating all the great prizes we had won, in total i think it came out to 5 snorkeling trips and 2 balloon rides. So while we were all dancing and enjoying our drinks a final contest came over the air ... **the first guy that comes up to the bar with a bra over his head gets a free jug of beer**. Now I was too busy dancing to pay attention, but Chelsea's ears were keen, and in what seemed like the blink of an eye she grabbed me, ripped her bra off (very skillfully i might add), threw it over my head, and pushed me to the bar. I clocked in at a PK's record time of just over 10 seconds and was met with a look of total shock and what i might call envious amazement on the looks of the announcer. He said "Damn, you're good!" looking slightly puzzled at the same time. So I collected my free jug of beer with a smile, turned around, walked back to the dance floor, where I learned that Chels had gotten so excited that she rolled her ankle while jumping for joy ... poor thing. So the beer was only bitter sweet, but at least the memory will last a lifetime. Of course Chels would not go down so easily, and despite a bit of pain she returned to the dance floor to finish out the night.

Ahhh ... so that was the first day of the trip :)

Sunday - luckily we didn't have to get up too early for anything, and with chels' ankle in pain we decided to just rest that morning. the "go wild" trip continued that afternoon with a pretty lame little boat ride ... *time passes* ... an we're back in cairns and still a bit tired from the previous night, so nothing much happens.

Chapter 3 - Cairns

Day 3 (Monday) - we did a day trip to the resort at Fitzroy island where we basically just layed around and tried to get some sun/rest/who knows. i remember that i wasn't too fond of the lunch menu so i ordered what they called a kabob, but was really iceberg lettuce, tomato, cheese, and chicken breast wrapped in a tortilla. yup ... definitely the very worst thing i ate the whole trip. overall the fitzroy trip was pretty lackluster except for the fact that late that afternoon i connected with Alicia & Jen who would become my new drinking partners ... shots only of course ;) That afternoon we would take the first in a long line of shots taken over the course of the trip.

Now ... we started early, but would finish quite late in what be *supa-nite #2* of our 9 day joy ride. Everyone returned from Fitzroy and split up ... shower, get ready, yadda ya, etc, ate dinner ... and rejoined at something something O'briens (i think). So we finally got to the bar where we started off nice and slow with cocktails and conversation. Eventually the party really began once the crowd began to thicken and the dance floor got a little action. Drinking and dancing at P.J. O'briens (or whatever) was a decent start, but really the music was pretty wack and the dance floor was only marginally full. The bartender was nice enough to recommend a better spot for dancing and so not long after we decided to split and check it out.

balloon ride, bus trip.

Chapter 4 - Whitsundays

the motorized sailing cruise.

Chapter 5 - Sydney

Chapter 6 - Flying Back in Time

29.02.2004 - Depart Sydney @ 11:35
flight time ... 13 hrs
29.02.2004 - Arrive L.a. @ 6:00
and they thought time travel was impossible.

to the best of times ... cheers.