European Recap: Germany

I'll talk about the two weeks in Europe with one post for each country. Just easier that way.

Day One (Sun, 5/16): I got to the airport around 6:30pm or so and there was time to kill. Then the stupid Icelandic volcano delayed the flight another hour. We made good use of the airport bar to get some sleep aid for the long flight ahead. Too bad it didn't work. I got many an hour of sleep over the course of the 7 hour flight to London

Day Two: We arrived in London and then flew to Munich, got there around 3:30 in the afternoon Monday, Munich time. We eventually got to the hotel and had a walking tour of the nearby parts of the city. We all got dinner at one of the beer gardens, and got the night off to a good start. Next we went to the train station for more drinks, because they had them. THEY HAD JACK DANIELS AND COLA IN A CAN. It was my dream come true. So good. Later we all hit up this bar called 23 or something like that, don't remember. Those who stayed got nice and drunk before our return to the hotel. Those who went out to celebrate Rich's birthday had an interesting time, but I stayed put rather than getting lost.

Day Three: We had our first site visit in the morning: the BMW Dingolfing plant. The bus ride over was miserable. Never been so dry mouthed in my life, and I wasn't alone. The plant was huge, bigger than my home town and had more employees than people in my town. It was a nice start to the school part of the trip. Later we went to Dachau Concentration Camp site. I really wanted to see it and it was certainly a moving experience. Most of it was cleared out, but what they had was very informative and interesting. That night we went to the Hofbrau Haus, a famous beer garden in Munich (pictured above). It was a lot of fun. We had a group sitting outside, got some dinner and beers and had a fun time. Afterwards we went to a hookah bar by the hotel called Millennium and were rowdy Americans. This is where we started chanting names and gave birth to the Stenson chant.

Day Four: In the morning we walked to Serviceplan Media, a European marketing firm. They gave us some of the best quotes of the trip including "Wizards" instead of "Visits". That one stuck the whole trip. That was done early, so we had time to kill at the hotel used for napping. At night we went to Hofbrau again, but there were no tables. We went to the place next door called Augustiner, which was just as good. I stole one of the mugs. After starting there we went back to Millennium and had our own room upstairs. As a group we had a great time for our last night in Munich.

Euro Trip!

Get it? It's a crappy movie and what I'll be doing the next two weeks! LOL!

Crate & Peril

As you can see, Crate & Peril is the easiest game in the history of Mario Party. Romo pointed out that I missed one of the craziest moments of the year: When Adam Michael Vida lost in Crate & Peril as the one person. I cannot make this up. He lost. I once won in 2 seconds...and he lost. Please, remind him of that.

In fact, this was probably the highlight of the year. How I forgot it I don't know. I'm ashamed of myself. Almost as ashmed as if I had lost in Crate & Peril....but not quite because that is just sad. Still, Vida did it.

A Fond Adieu

Junior year has come to a close, and it was a damn good year. I probably had more fun this year than in the past 2, although living in Butler will always make a strong case. Here are some of the highlights of this year. I think I have my months right, but I'm probably wrong in several places

September

• First Southwell Banger: Mike ends up with cupcake nipples
• Going 4-0 in softball and losing to the last seeded team in the first round of the playoffs
• Probably because we were all still hung over from the black light party the night before

October

• Romo's birthday playing "who sings this" with Andrew
• The start of the MLB playoffs
• Al's coming out party
• Gaslight Anthem in DC
• Smashing Pumpkins
• Halloween...a night of randomness

November

• Yankees win the World Series
• ....Whatever else happened that month didn't matter

December

• This month was also pretty busy with work, all I really remember was Healy visiting and that night being really fun.
• Oh yeah....SLAP BET VICTORY

January

• Born to run FUCK!!!!!!
• Rob's birthday...started out great but the next day wasn't so great
• Pietasters at the Senator Theater

February (The highlight of the year)

• SNOWMAGEDDEON!!!!!!!!!!
• Snowmageddeon write up
• My birthday, great time
• Blacked out Mario Party
• Naked Lapping Rich on my birthday...took him long enough to actually do it
• Rich's birthday.....not so great of a time
• English Beat and Fishbone show

March

• Spring break in Jamaica: Pool Bar! Volley Ball! Beer Drinking Contest! Clothes Pins! Hedonism....yeah....! Solimini and his shrimp!
• Deeg and Healy's birthdays, pretty fun times

April

• Big Kev's birthday beer Olympics
• Laser tag
• Orioles opening day

May

• What better way to end the year than Mike Reynolds' blackout birthday bash?

Back from the dead

More or less. I still don't really have anything to say until I go to Europe in May since I live a very uneventful life. So since it is nearing the end of spring more or less, I figure I'll chime in on all the different TV shows I watch and their seasons so far

Sunday:

• Mad Men (9pm, AMC in the Fall): By far the best season of the 3. The finale was one of the best episodes of TV I've ever seen and I cannot wait for its return this summer
• Breaking Bad (9pm, AMC in the Spring): Unfortunately, I'm still in the middle of season 2, so I can't yet comment on season 3.

Monday:

• Chuck (8pm, NBC): So far, season 3 has been great. I really hope there is a 4th season with how much fun this one has been. 5 episodes left and I really hope that the ratings get it back for next year
• How I Met Your Mother (8pm, CBS): Season 5 has been....ok. It hasn't been bad at all, but there haven't been too many truly memorable episodes. There have been a lot of good ones, and a good amount of not so exciting ones, so when put together the season hasn't struck me as too legen.......
• Big Bang Theory (9:30pm, CBS): Season 3 has been probably the best so far. The characters are much more tolerable and less creepy and annoying. It is still a corny show, but I don't mind watching it when it's on

Tuesday:

• Scrubs and Better Off Ted: They had good runs, I'm going to miss them. (I'm assuming Scrubs is finally done, I haven't heard anything to indicate otherwise)

Wednesday:

• The Middle (8:30, ABC): I like this show a lot. It is probably the one I'm least dedicated to, but still worth watching once a week.
• Modern Family (9pm, ABC): One of the 2 best new comedies on TV this year, and I am a big fan. The first season has been great, especially because it is one of those shows with little plot to really follow along with.
• Psych (10pm, USA): Another great season. Probably the one I've liked the least with the cases being just too out there, but the finale was so intense that I cannot wait for season 5 to start up this summer.
• South Park (10pm, Comedy Central): Amazing as always. The 200th and 201st episodes were just classic and no less witty than ever before.

Thursday:

• Community (8pm, NBC): The other great new comedy, which I am also hooked to. This one is much cornier than Modern Family, but still very witty with all of the references in it. The cast is wonderful, almost in an Arrested Development or Office way where you can't believe that this is how they are acting.
• Parks and Recreation (8:30, NBC): I only just now started to watch this show. The 4 or 5 episodes I have watched have been GREAT. I regret not giving it more of a shot last year and I'll be sure to catch up this summer.
• The Office (9pm, NBC): Season 6 has been the worst one since the 6 episode first season. Michael is just annoying and too much this year. Jim and Pam have been a nice story all year, and really the whole other cast has been as well. However, the Michael heavy episodes have made me just want to yell at him to "Shut the fuck up" because of how much he is messing everything up

More to come soon once all their finales happen.

...dary