Sufer Girl

This past weekend was my first surf all on my own. The first day, Saturday, it was a bit hard to get up on the board because I had rented a 9'6 longboard. All my lessons have been on 10' longboards and it is amazing how much difference 4 inches can make. I kept nose-diving into the bottom of the ocean, flipping and flying all over. As the day progressed I was getting the hang of the board, but I like my 10'. Sunday I was able to rent a 10' longboard and had a blast. Caught lots of waves, and still wiped out a few times. I need to work on popping up in one motion, i still use my knee as a crutch which is BAD. I just have to keep going out and practice, practice, practice! :)

Here are some pics of me from Saturday, courtesy of Greg. :) To view more, go to: http://www.fujicolor.com.au/Triana

From graduate to graduate school

Life has been oober crazy. So much has been going on that I have barely had time to comprehend it all. Here's the skinny- I have decided to start graduate school this fall, 2005. I was going to start taking pre-requisit classes at CSM, and then start the grad. school Fall 2006, but the program director for the MBA program at Notre Dame de Namur said I might as well start the actual program if I am going to start the pre-requisit stuff. They allow you some leway in finishing your pre-reqs while you start the program. So I went home, talked to mom and BOOM- I am applying for Fall 2005. I had to drop the German course at CSM becuase there is no way I can manage graduate school and learning a language at the same time. My new plan for that is to finish my MBA in about 2 years, then I will still have 2-ish years before the supposed "move to germany" happens and I can learn german then. So there is that.

I have also taken up surfing- yay for me. Last weekend I went down to Santa Cruz to buy my wetsuit, and today I went out to Pacifica for my first surf on my own. It went okay, the board I rented though was only 9'6 and usually i have been learning on a 10' - and believe it or not but those 4 inches make a difference becuase everytime I tried to catch a wave, my board took a nose dive to the sandy bottom and i went flying. towards the end I was starting to figure out how to manage the board so it wouldnt do that,...but I like the 10'. I am going back out tomorrow morning and hopefully i'll find a 10ft board to rent. Hopefully I'll get some pics of me out on the board soon, Greg was with me today but his battery was low and so was his energy ;) I'll give mom my camera tomorrow and we'll see what happens.

Deutschland!!!

Earlier this 2005 a wonderful idea popped into my head- move to germany. Greg and I were just driving in the car and I realized that I can't stop thinking about Germany and that I really miss it and want to go back on a slightly more permanent basis. Greg thought the idea was cool, but I didn't get a lot of support on the home front. And after lots of talks, I decided to put the plan on hold. I realized that I wanted to go to graduate school still and if we were to move in like 1 year (which was my plan at the time) and live there for who knows....2-4 years...then graduate school would have to wait. There were also a lot of other things Greg and I wanted to do first before making such a big move.

But ho- in the back of my mind the thought has continued to linger, and this past week my moving spirit was rekindled and I announced plans to move to Germany. This time though, I have a better plan of how it will all pan out. We won't be going for about another 4 years, which leaves me plently of time to finish graduate school, for Greg to finish his school and start working more in photography, time for us both to save money, get more work experience out here, and-of course- to learn German. That was another set-back when I thought of this before, Neither Greg or I speak German and i doubt we would have been able to learn enough in a year. So this new plan of mine makes more sense, factoring in all those lovely details.

I'm already getting started on the language part- I have signed up for German I starting thus August at CSM, and by next Fall I should be starting Grad. school.....that could take about 2-3 years to finish depending on if I am part-time or full-time....while continuing my German, and getting Greg going on his German, working, saving, and violla (?) 4 years have past, and we are off to Germany. Now, don't get me wrong- I understand that this kind of move isn't going to be easy. A lot of planning will be involved in the next 4 years to help the transition. I have family in Munchen whom I shall solicit help with job-finding, apartment-finding, and once we get there- setting everything up. I'm hoping that between now and then greg and I can afford to visit germany for a few weeks, kind of a reconnaisance trip, but we'll see.

The whole purpose of this trip, for me anway, is just to see more of Europe, live there and just be there. I don't have any delusions that life will be a total vacation and that greg and i will always be traveling, and doing stuff- well maybe i would wish for that, but I'm a practical girl, and know that we will only do what we can afford. So yeah, that's the plan.

Job-hunting...season closed?

This job hunting business is looking bleak. I had a whole bunch of places I applied to, and a few calls/invited for interviews,...but a little birdy told me to be careful of these places that are "sales/marketing" because what you end up doing is like door-to-door work. ew....not my thing. and sadly some of these places I have applied/interviewed for are those type of places. Rats. Back to Square1.

Why isn't Pixar calling me? Maybe they misplaced my number and are at this moment sacrificing small rodents to the telephone gods, hoping that they (the telephone gods) will be pleased enough by their offering to give them my phone number again. I just have to remember that everything happens for a reason. maybe I am not meant to find a job right now....just gotta go with the flow. Well, back to searching the wanted-ads. Wish me luck. :)

Opera

On Sunday I took mom to the SF Opera to see Bizets "The Pearl Fishers." We went early in the morning (10am) to the box office, and at 11am any tickets that were not sold already for the show, go on sale for students at $15/ticket. So, we got orchestra seats (normally like $100+) for $15/each. Cool huh? After we got the tickets we walked to the shopping center on market and had lunch at the Nordstroms cafe. Good food, and plus my friend Marie works at the bar, so we said "hi." The opera itself was pretty cool- the story was based in Sri Lanka, so the sets were really colorful, as well as the costumes. The story is about two friends who fall in love with the same girl, but swear that neither will go for her, and remain friends. but then she comes to their village, and one recognizes her, they are in love....and then the other friend finds out, and gets jealous and their punishment is death. but then at the end, the friend creates a diversion, sets them free, and dies for them. The ending though was kinda quick. They didn't really spend much time saying good bye to each other, or explaining why he changed his mind to set them free- actually, maybe they did. see, the guy realized later that this girl, had once saved his life many years ago, and so he was returning the favor i guess. the one bummer of the whole show was that this old man sitting behind us sneezed, and failed to cover his mouth so his snotty- goobers sprayed ALL OVER our necks and shoulders- and we were wearing tanktops. it was soooooo gross- about as bad a Greg getting yacked on in Hawaii. I felt like I needed a shower immediately. at intermission mom asked him to cover his mouth next time, apparently he didnt realize he goobbered us- eww, you should always cover your mouth when you sneeze!!! many because he was old he forgot that life-lesson. Ew.