Day 32

January 31, 2010

 

Day 32:

 

            Today was another one of those days where I can’t figure out where the time went but at the same time I can’t figure out what productive I did today. Eric and I decided to walk to the resort and run errands early. So we left the trailer at 11 headed towards the resort with our and also Ben’s laundry. We stopped at Good Earth to drop off the laundry at about quarter til 12. The lady said come back around 5 or 6. It never takes that long but we said okay and went on about our business. After that I went to Copy Masters to see if they had the school supplies that I needed for my class. Just like most businesses in Majuro on Sunday, it was closed so I went to the resort and got in a workout. It was a pretty good workout; I’m pleased with my physical progress while on this trip. I can only imagine how bad my physique would be if I were in freezing cold Hanover this winter. I’m not in nearly as good of shape now as I was this time last year – I was in great shape getting ready for spring ball last winter. But I’m definitely in better shape now than I was this summer.

            After the workout I got chicken wings and fries for lunch at the resort and proceeded with logging onto the web. Kicking and Screaming was on the TV in the bar. I had never seen it and despite what people say about Will Ferrell and that movie, if you half watch it and half surf the web, it’s actually a really funny movie. I researched a bunch of statistics for some ProCamps articles and chatted with a few friends. I ended up staying at the resort until about 3:40. When we made it out of the resort we headed to Payless to pick up some filler items. Eric said his mom wanted to see the city so we each did photo documentaries of the city.

            I mentioned that Professor Garrod had gone to a movie premier last week and Eric, Peter and a few had gone to see it. Well the theatre is right next to Payless and it was PACKED outside the theatre of people trying to go in and see “Yokwe Bartowe”.  Most of them were kids and Eric noticed a few of them. Some of them threw up the deuces and screamed “Hi Kyle”. After mingling with the kids for a bit we finally went into Payless. Two of Erics kids, Bobson and Damieo, walked through the store with us.  I had to buy some tea, sugar and a thermos style glass. I’ve gone over a month now without sweet tea and I can actually feel myself going into withdraw. We then walked up to Good Earth where our clothes were done at around 4:15. Eric had been searching for a good reading pillow and so we walked up a little further, upon the advice of Bobson and Dameio, to the “One Dollar Store” where Eric found the pillow he was looking for. We took pictures of all the sights along the way. I saw another group of boys, none of which I recognized, who threw up the peace sign and spoke to me. When we came out of the One Dollar Store we decided that we’d taxi back to the trailer since we had a few bags with us now. As SOON as we hailed a taxi, the skies opened up and it started raining. We scrambled to throw our bags into the trunk of the taxi and get in. When we got to the school we realized that the gate that blocks off the school campus from the city was locked. And our trailer is right on the other side of the gate. So we decided to wait under an awning of a whole-in-the-wall Chinese corner store. After about 8 minutes of waiting and no drop in water pressure, we decided to just go for it. So Eric went first. We had jumped this fence several times by this point because the whole compound is locked on the weekends and the alternative is to walk another half mile or so to a secret opening, which isn’t so secret, and then damn near another half mile back to the trailer. So Eric put his bags through a small opening so they didn’t have to travel so far to reach the ground. He then jumped up and half-squeezed through and half propped himself over the opening between the two silver gate doors. He was facing away from the gate when he cleared it. The wind was blowing into his face and I was behind him. Right before he jumped down the wind blew and got under his shirt. Just then the tail of his shirt got wrapped around the post of the gate. “Your shirt! Your Shirt! Your shirt!” I yelled, but it was too late. He had already jumped. So there he was, with his Argentinean soccer jersey on hanging from the gate like a 1960s school boy being given a wedgie from the jungle jims. His drawers were not caught in the gate by the way, but nonetheless, the image in my head screams wedgie. I didn’t quite know what to do initially. Do I hurry up and get over to lift him up and free his shirt? Do I reach through the fence so he can stand on my arms long enough to free himself? I choose to just risk tearing his shirt and hope that the rain on the gate would allow me to slide it forward enough for his body weight to pull him from the gate. It worked. When he finally got done, he looked at me laughing HYSTERICALLY! I was still somewhat worried about his health. He could have chocked on his collar or anything. But once I saw him laughing I let loose too!! Not for long though, it was still raining and I had to still jump the fence. I passed him my bags and I jumped the fence making sure not to allow my shirt to grab any wind on my way down.

            When we got back to the trailer we were soaked and our laundry, which had just been washed and dried, was pretty wet. So I changed and put my clothes away before composing some letters to sponsors for Spring Fling. Edie and Ally were making dinner and they had a Mexican style dinner. We had kidney beans; rice; ground beef and onions; onions, peppers and sprouts; sour cream; cheese and of course Ally and I utilized the hot sauce. It wasn’t bad. The tortillas weren’t thawed out before they started cooking so they tried to thaw them in the oven which made them kind of brittle but we made it work nonetheless.

            After dinner I composed all of the letters that I will be sending to NFL, MLB and NBA teams soliciting donations for Spring Fling. I asked Ben for help with the order of my paragraphs and before the night was over, Edie and Derek helped me out with it as well. I got 37 letters written so that’s a good sign. After that, Edie brought out the “Friends” DVD. She joined Eric and I in our room and we watched three episodes before I passed out and she went back to her trailer. Before Edie left, we had our first roach encounter in our trailer. It was crawling along the floor at the base of my dresser. I saw it and stabbed at it with my shoe. I jabbed it pretty good so I doubted it would survive the attack but I didn’t see it. And the way the dresser is situated I would have had to lay on the ground to see if it was dead or not, and in the case that I wasn’t dead I wasn’t really down for looking a Pacific cockroach eye to eye. So i was pretty paranoid for the rest of the night. But after Edie left I Raided everything down and then realized that my closed bag of Starbursts, all of which were in their individual wrappers, was the cause of the critter because ants had found a hole in it and were all throughout the bag. I had to throw a brand new bag of starbursts away. L After spraying every thing down around my bed. I rapidly made my bed and got in it. I scratched for the first 15 minutes of laying down but eventually fell asleep. I woke up two or three times scratching again but it wasn’t a problem.