HLGTS

Highlights of the last while:

Spending hundreds of dollars on CD's
Laser Tag
Water Balloons
Beach
General "craic"

Also, i'd like to point out that last week Jimbo tried to explain to Americans what "craic" meant. This is how it went:

"Craic in Ireland means something different to craic in America...."
"Basically craic is fun"

Nice

Anyways, it's now some random time in the early morning/late night, and we are leaving today. Not that i wouldn't mind staying for longer. This trip ain't over yet, but it's been awesome. There's still the odd 24 hours to go, let's hope it's a fun one, and let's hope my eardrum won't blow up on the plane......

..........

Hmmm, so since the last post this trip has got crazier and better by the minute. On a Stevie-style list, here's what's been going on....

Habitat all week
Pool Parties
Disputed Terrortories
Bargain CD's
9/11 Talk
Pool @ The Everett's
Awesome chains
Cinema
New house, new people, but all immense


Well that's kinda in a nutshell. I've blown my eardrum again, so it's all icky and crap, but it should be better for flying. Our house is crazy, and we've had some pretty awesome stuff going on over the past few days.

I have to highlight Friday and Saturday, as they kicked ass. Friday we finished habitat, chilled at the pool (again), hung about at the house, and then went to see the Durham Bulls baseball game. This was awesome, and i now love baseball and appreciate why crazy people go to watch it. It's basically just a sing-a-long, jump around, have a laugh pie-out, with some guys hittin a ball in the background. The amount of food was immense, as were our section of the crowd, and Bob is such a funny guy. The Bulls kicked ass, and after there was a neat firework display.

I also must mention this ice cream shop we went too. I can't remember it's name, but it is the best ice cream chain in the world. The staff are crazy, and sing when you tip them. And you can mix all sorts of crap into all sorts of ice cream. Gotta have it (:

So, after we got home from baseball, we all went to the Harry Potter launch party. I swear, it's one of the most ridiclous things in the world, worshipping a damn book, but Friday night was such a blast. We had our faces painted, the chants going, and general awesomenss with all the crazy Americans. Will John, me, JME were among the last to leave at about 00.45. After we went home, grabbed a screwdriver, and went on a late night "special ops" mission around Raleigh. It just involved changing the numberplates on certain cars, which is such a great thing to do.....

Anyways, today we went to the flea market, and all i spent was $4 on a smoothie and a glowstick. Niall had already nicked all the good CD's, so we just chillaxed. Then me & JME headed out to Duke Uni and UNC (university of NC) with some French guys, just to see around. It was cool, and a good thing to see the rivals.
Later we had tea, and organised to go play some Laser Tag (which is just laser quest). So at like 8.30, about 18 people arrived at our house, including Bob in a pickup truck completely packed with people. Also, the long awaited return of Hunter took place, and he was just as great as ever. Pity he's off again tomorrow.
Anyways, laser tag rocked, it really did. We had 5 games in total, 3 of which were Ireland vs America (we got owned). The 4th one we just all teamed up on some other random team, and the last one was a free for all, with around 20 people. And i owned everybody, and won. I deserve a medal!
So we all piled back here, and the 4 of us have just spent the last while watching a parody Cops show, followed by Extreme Dodgeball, while making fun of the ads inbetween. Will's off to camp tomorrow which is a pity, but we still got John, who has already got some great mess about ideas...

Anyways, i'm now staying up later and later. It's now 2.30am, which means i'm getting up in 6 hours. Better hit the hay

Nice

The USA blog deserved an old update, since i'm staying in chilling tonight before i go pump iron lifting bricks or something tomorrow....

....which i'm actually looking forward to. I'd normally hate doing building crap like this, but even as we fry in the heat and suffocate in the humidity, i'm looking forward to it. Should be good due to the fact that it's with 19 other Irish.

So, where'd i get to?? Hiking on Friday was great, Hunter the Explorer got me some weird leaves to eat, as well as sighting a bear and going on the hunt for snakes. It was like a 3 hour bus journey, but who cares?? We had good craic & an iPod on the cards. The views at the top of the mountain were awesome, could see into other states such as Virginia & Tenessee. It also gave the leg muscles a bit of well needed pumping. On the way home we also tried Bojangles....enough said on that!

Saturday consisted of doing whatever we wanted. For us that was a lie in until like 12, pool, then mall. The pool was cool. A group of 4 Americans totally owned me, JME, Reuben & Stevie at pool basketball (even with our 10 point handicap at the beginning). The mall was like a full on city...but had no damn CD shop. You see, i have hundreds of dollars on me, and i plan to blast it all out on good old cheap CD's. Niall managed to get 11 for under $40 at the flee market...awesome. And before you ask, yea, they are actually CD's with good music on them.

So, with nothing to do on Sat. night, we just went home and chilled til we found something to do. That something was pretty much meeting up with half the group to go see Million Dollar Baby at the outdoor cinema. Score. So we grabbed some pizza, all hopped into Hunter's wagon and set off for wherever it was being shown.
After days of finding radio stations that played nothing but crap, we found a fully awesome one. If you are ever within a 253 mile radius of Raleigh NC, tune into 106.2 FM, it plays good music all the way.

So anyways, we all watched that movie in the night heat. And it is a class movie. Sad yea, but really well done. Who ever thought a boxing film could be good??
After there were big traffic jams as everyone left, so we waited up. Stevie & i had a "race" in the forest, which i truly won. Hunter, on the other hand, decided to "race" in style, and ended half way up a tree in the car park. Enough said. It was possibly one of the funniest things ever, and the guys will agree.

Hunter cleared off to ASP today (another habitat thing til Sat.) but he better be back. Coz i know where he keeps his shotgun. Today we impressed Americans at the Church with our Irishness, then like half the group whizzed round the art museum for no reason, then headed to another pool, which was fun. Though some people need no practise on their "Sitting Priests". As do i on the old backflips lol.....

After that we went to the supermarket with Susan (our host mom), and got what we wanted to eat. Jame & i found some Chips Ahoy. We only got one box for now, but we'll be back to raid the place before we leave. Well at least i will.
I did watch quite a bit of TV earlier, and it totally kicked ass. Loads of choice. The Simpsons, coverage of Hurrican Dennis, James Bond, and COPS, all at the same time?!?! Scoreage....

Day 1& 2 (A pretty crappy name)

Well, we arrived like 5 hours late, but who cares. I had the task of sitting beside Stevie for 7 hours to New York, which i could've called my worst potential nightmare. It wasn't really though. Stevie just slept like a tank. Me on the otherhand just watched movies & walked about the jet for the whole time, though i have to say long haul ain't as boring as i expected.

Our house is pretty cool, and all the Americans i have met so far are nice & decent. Apart from the psycho guy at customs, who almost exploded coz we weren't in proper lines. Anyways, one guy in our family is called Hunter. He's 17 and has his own big cool car, so we can go where we want. Tonight we went bowling, where i got the crappy score of 65.

Tomorrow is hiking in the nearest mountains, though at the minute we are getting remants of tropical storm Cindy, which means it is lashing down. Just to make it sound cool, the Raleigh area also currently has a Tornado watch, and NC a hurricane watch. Cool.

Anyways, i better knock it off to bed. Talk soon guys.