Israel

We've been in Israel for about 20 hours and I'm really enjoying myself. It's pretty amazing how well everyone speaks English and I heard two great jokes at dinner yesterday that I want to share.

First, we were eating some appetizers which included 2 different kinds of hummus. Dani was teaching me that "huh?-miss" is incorrect and his cousin interjected with "Hamas is a terrorist organization, don't go around asking Israelis for Hamas. It's 'hoo-moose' that you want to eat." It was funny and delicious at the same time.

Second, the owner of the restaurant was talking to us about the Super Bowl and how we felt about it. I told him I was rooting for the Saints and he said, "yes, it's good to help the people of New Orleans forget Katrina...now we need Haiti to win the World Cup." This brought down the house because Dani and I had talked earlier about how it was kind of ridiculous how often commentators were bringing up the hurricane even though so much time had passed. Brilliance out of the kind restauranteur.

Tonight we're going to hit the town and hopefully I'll have some good pics of Israeli girls for everyone. =)

Man

I was planning on limiting my drinking in February and then I went out and got DRUNK for 4 straight days, Feb 2-5. The worst was last night. I threw a going-away party for my buddy Marcus who is joining the Peace Corps and ended up getting extremely sauced. I had a flight this morning at 8 to NYC and it was one of the most miserable of my life. Oh well, the party was a blast and Marcus enjoyed himself so that's what's important. I bought a bottle of Louis XIII at the Canadian border about a year ago and I had been waiting for a good reason to open it and this ended up being that reason. It's weird having a bottle of liquor that retails for $1500-2000 and it's been hard to deem an event worthy of the opening. However, Marcus joked early in the night that we should open it and I suddenly felt really good about doing so. Marcus is a guy who definitely enjoys and appreciated unique experiences and I'm happy he was the first one to share a shot with me. I'm thinking I should ration it out for close friends at big events, like births of children, weddings, and other cool things that happen in lives. It should be easier to ration out now that the seal has been cracked.

I feel like some sort of sick is coming on and that would be brutal since I'm flying to Tel Aviv on Monday. I rarely get sick so hopefully all I need is rest but being sick on vacation is the worst.

Here are some pics from the party and my buddy's balcony in NYC. This is such an amazing city, I would love to live here for 6 months to a year. We'll see if I can make that happen.