On the Road Again

Pretty excited about my vacation that's about to start.  Flying over 18000 miles and spending at least 42 hours in a plane over two weeks.  Two family weddings, old roommates birthday, a few drinks with friends and a lot of quality time with family and friends. I'll try to post pics and updates throughout the trip, but it might be two weeks before i post again.

Why you should sit on a towel in a sauna

One of the little things i've come to really enjoy while I'm in Kuwait is the sauna in the gym.  I love the feeling of a good sweat, to be honest, at least a 1/4 of the times i workout and 3/4 of the times i go running is to break a good sweat.  There is just something peaceful and relaxing about it, like all the stress and worry leaving.

Anyways, today's post is about a not so clean experience i had last night.  There is a sign on the sauna door about bringing a towel to sit on and while i have almost always done this, i never really thought much about it.  So last night after a little jog and workout, i head to the sauna and whats the first thing i notice, its a rather large nude man sitting on the bench with a towel thankfully draped across his lap.  He was easily 280, maybe 300 lbs.  He had a bunch of water bottles next to him and every once in a while, he would pour a little on him, gross.  He left a little before me and there was a large wet butt print where he was sitting.  Thats a lot of hairy fat man butt sweat.

Folks, please bring a towel into the sauna to sit on, and wearing a bathing suit wouldn't be a bad idea.

Admitting Failure

So when i first got to kuwait, i was pleasantly surprised at how good the food was.  Considering where im at, and how much food these guys make 4 times a day, its pretty good.  Needless to say, my complete lack of self control with how much food i got and ate, plus the sitting at work for 12 hours a day, and going to my apt and sitting there, all added up and expanded the waistline.  All my pants still fit, well, two are a little too tight for comfort, but I have tried loosing the weight.  I have been working out, and tried a 600 calories a day diet for a couple of weeks, but i dont think i lost more than 5 lbs, if that.  

I was pretty optimistic about the weight loss, but in the end, I've stopped caring. I'll eventually lose it when i move back to the states, and dont have a lethargic 12 hr/day job.  Maybe i could go back to Camp Ozark for a summer, that would burn it all off pretty quickly.  In the end I've accepted my gut, i hope yall do as well.

A Thousand Splendid Suns

I just finished A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (same guy who wrote The Kite Runner) and while it wasn't bad, it wasn't really on the same level as the Kite Runner. 

This one was also set in Afghanistan, amid all the turmoil of the soviets invading, then the warring factions then the "liberation" by the taliban, then the U.S.  This one also involved drama and love and redemption.  It also contained a character who was spit on and looked at with disgust their entire lives, beaten and betrayed and ultimately dieing for others.

The biggest difference was how the story jumped back and forth between the two main characters.  I never felt like i knew either of them nearly as well as the main character from The Kite Runner.

Books and breakfast

I highly recommend reading Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen and Her Mother's Hope by Francine Rivers.

Water for Elephants is a book about Jacob, who lost his parents in a car crash just before he was to take his final exams and graduate from Vet school.  Since Jacobs dad took out a mortgage to pay for his schooling and accepted chicken eggs as payment for his veterinarian services (his dad was a vet as well), after the crash the bank got everything.  So he just took off and ended up joining the circus

The story jumps between Jacob as a 93 year old man at a nursing home, and his memories of working for the circus.  This book was funny, entertaining, sometimes sad, always honest, and overall a very good read.

Her Mother's Hope is the newest book by Francine Rivers and if you know me at all, you know I love Francine Rivers books.  Having read all of her books (except the Lineage of Grace and Sons of Encouragement series, i read one of each, but wasn't a fan) I was looking forward to this one.  Her books are engaging, thought provoking and challenging.  Overall one of my favorite authors.

Her Mother's Hope is about Marta, a girl who struggles with a crappy dad throughout childhood and then through many different service jobs as a teenager learning all she can so that one day she can open her own hotel.  She later raises a family while fighting the ghosts of her past.  The story later focuses on her second child and oldest daughter who is close to the exact opposite of Marta.  This is the first of a two book series, lets hope the second is written quickly so we can see how it all ends.

I was also shown an awesome little breakfast restaurant this last weekend.  Tucked between two 10 story buildings, this 15 ft wide by 40 ft long building was easy to miss and had room for maybe 16 people at a time, but it was good.  I had the Monte Cristo sandwich, and it was great.  I'm likely to start eating there once a week given the great quality of the food, and pretty cheap prices.

New York girls and the Kite Runner

   I would like to start off by telling a story about a girl and some cheese.  I thought it was a funny situation, I hope you do as well.


   Last week I went to dinner with Sarah and Scott, a married couple I met at church.  Sarah is my age, Scott is a couple of years older and they've become my good friends since I came to Kuwait.  Oh yea, Sarah is from NY, not that its a bad thing to be from NY, but someone from TX would never make this mistake.

   So we went to dinner at Tumbleweeds, a "southwest" styled restaurant in Kuwait city.  Sarah orders some chili con queso and i ordered, i dont remember what they were called, something as an appetizer.  What I ordered was like the ingredients of an enchilada, but stuffed in little cup shaped chips.  Well, it was more like rice paper than chips, or that really thin stuff that's sometimes used to wrap egg rolls.  Its wasn't bad, weird, but ok.   So the waiter brings out the queso, my appetizer and shortly later our food which we enjoy.  Sarah hasn't touched the queso since it was brought out, which i thought was weird, but it didn't look like very good queso so i didn't say anything.  It had the look and giggle of cheese from a can, with a couple of pieces of pepper. 


   The waiter brings the checks right after Scott starts eating the queso.  Sarah looks at hers and tells the waiter she never got her chili and would like it taken off the bill.  The waiter then looks down at Scott with a confused look, which Scott and myself are also both giving Sarah.  But the chili con queso is right there was his reply and Sarah just looked confused.  It turns out that Sarah had thought she was ordering chili, with a little cheese sprinkled on top and not the great mexican dip chili con queso. I laughed for a while and promised Sarah that if they ever came to Texas, I would take them to a real mexican or tex-mex resturant and order some real chili con queso, or we could get some chili.



   I also finished reading The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini last night, and while a pretty sad book, i would say it was a worth while read.  Basically its about a guy who goes back to Afghanistan to try and makeup for his cowardice as a child.  His dad and himself fled Afghanistan and left behind those he had betrayed.  15 or so years later, he is reminded of his past and given the chance to make up for what he did.  Next up is Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, but i did just get in a couple of programming books about PHP, MySQL and Ruby on Rails, so who knows if i'll be reading or playing around with those.

After Kuwait...

I just finished reading A.W.O.L. on the Appalachian Trail and i've had to stop myself from doing any more research on the trip.  The book is a journal of a 41 year old engineer who went awol from work to hike the AT (thats what the hikers call it, saying appalachian trail over and over would get a bit annoying)

It took him 146 days to walk 2172 miles through the east coast of this great nation.  that's an estimated 5 million steps.  he had a small surgery to cut out an infection on his foot, and sprained his ankle requiring him to use an aircast for part of the trip. other than that, and some not too friendly bugs and storms, it sounded like an amazing trip.  so much so that im really considering doing it when i get back.  It starts in Georgia and goes all the way up to Maine.  He met some interesting characters, stayed in a lot of hostels and camp shelters, and went through a lot of shoes. 

i've already decided that if i hike it, im taking a hammock and avoiding shelters, hostels, and tents and a couple of pounds of weight.  im hoping i can find some friends from A&M or Camp Ozark that would be willing to hike with me. I will also be hiking the Lone Star Hiking Trail (130 mile hike about 2 hours north of Houston, TX) and likely heading out to Big Bend State Park to get a little training in, and test out all my equipment.

If I'm able to hike the AT, i will be very likely starting the hike about 2 years from now. I guess time will tell if its gonna happen.