Carmageddon

This past weekend was an interesting one. The interstate by our apartment is one of the largest in Southern California and handles about 500,000 travelers a weekend. That's half-a-million, just in case you can't count all those zeroes. From Friday night to Monday the morning, 10 miles of this incredibly important interstate that connects northern LA to San Diego was scheduled to be closed while they tore down an overpass. "They" (I have no idea who "they" are) projected that there was going to be traffic jams backed up for 30 miles. If the construction lasted into early morning Monday rush hour, all hell might have broken loose.

So, expecting the worse, I biked to work Friday. It was a great ride, actually. I was able to take mostly back roads the whole way and I didn't feel like I was going to get run over by angry commuters. Mike got home early in the afternoon, and he and I parked our cars for the weekend, planning to only walk or bike where we needed to be.

Saturday I did errands on my bike and biked to the gym. We walked to the neighborhood bar Saturday night and to the market and yogurt shop on Sunday. And guess what? There was no one on the roads. Since they had been advertising the closing up to 50 miles away, everyone had the same idea to stay at home. It was quite amazing for a city that depends on motors.

They are planning on closing it again in a year (or maybe 6 months, I can't remember to be honest) to tear down the rest of the bridge. I hope the several millions in the city are smart enough to stay at home a second time.

12 Down, 5 To Go

For those of you loyal readers (and let's be honest, we only have loyal readers since only about 5 of you actually still read this blog), there's a chance you might understand the title of this post. Go ahead and think about it for minute before you continue.... any thoughts?.... anything??

Well, today (July 10) marks exactly one year since I proposed to Megan, and it also marks exactly five months until we get married. In those twelve months, we've moved across country, Megan's found a new job, I've finished a year of business school and found an internship, and we're knee deep in planning a wedding. And we've posted about 157 entries to this blog. Not quite as often as we had hoped, but still halfway decent.

Thank you for staying with us all of this time. We hoped you've enjoyed this little window into our lives and hope that you will continue to read and comment. As promised, this will not turn into a wedding blog over the next five months, but we will be posting updates as we get closer to the date. And hopefully we can get our act together and start posting a little more regularly.

Lack of Self-Control

I went to the library today on my bike with the intent of getting a couple of research items. And came home with 13 travel books in my book bag for my uphill ride. My buns are burnin' and I'm regretting my "I'll just take this one, too" attitude. I'm intent on figuring out where to go on our honeymoon, which is harder than you might think. We want some beach/so absolutely nothing time, some action/adventure time, some great food, some warm weather, and something we've not done before. By the books you can see we are heading South. However, December is the wet season in the South Pacific and the busy season everywhere, so we have our work cut out to find the perfect destination.

Any suggestions?

Random Thoughts About Israel

Even though I tried to update with some frequency about my experience in Israel, I still missed quite a few events. So over the next week or two, I'll try to post some recounts of the cooler moments of my trip. Here we go with the first one.

• Shabbat Dinner and Yeshiva Moonshine: On the Friday night we spent in Israel, we had the chance to experience a real Shabbat dinner with an Israeli family. Because our trip was organized by an orthodox rabbi, we were placed in orthodox home. My family was a young couple who made aliyah (moved to Israel) about five years ago from Montreal. Our three course meal was wonderful and included homemade sushi, hummus, baba ganoush and challah for the first course; chicken wings, beef meatballs, rice and grilled veggies (all homemade) for the second course; and a homemade chocolate cake for dessert. Between the first and second course, Patrick (the husband) broke out the Maker's Mark and we all did whiskey shots. Once the Maker's was gone, he went back into the kitchen and pulled out what can be best described as Yeshiva Moonshine - Vanilla liqueur made by a friend who is studying in a Yeshiva. The whole experience was great - it was nice to see how Shabbat can be celebrated and how it can really just be a time for family and friends even without any religious overtones.
  
• Stand Up Rabbi: The rabbi who organized and led our trip used to be a stand up comedian. Even though that career never led anywhere, he's still a remarkably funny guy. Throughout the trip he would make wisecracks and jokes at both appropriate and inappropriate times (he is a New Yorker after all). As thoses of you who have been to Israel know, you tend to spend a fair amount of time on a bus traveling around. Well, whenever we did, he would always get on the microphone and start riffing about god only knows what. I think the funniest story involved him drinking beer, going home and eating an entire pizza, jumping in a bounce house and then taking a bath in chocolate milk (something gets lost in the retelling).
• Guns and security: As Americans we are used to having liberal laws regarding guns and their ownership. We aren't, however, used to seeing them in public very often (with the exception of seeing them more and more often in airports). Well, guns are everywhere in Israel. In addition to seeing soldiers walking all around town carrying their M-16s, there are many private security guards who are wielding weapons. At one point during the trip we went into a shopping mall in Tel Aviv and after getting our bags checked before entering, the first thing we saw once we entered the mall was a security guard with a big handgun sitting on his hip. Life is just different in Israel and sometimes it takes something so striking as the omnipresence of guns to remind us.

That's all for now, I'll try to update with some more thoughts later.

Atop Masada

That 2am wake up call was worth it.

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Northern Israel

We spent Wednesday in Northern Israel visiting Migdal Ha'Emek, Tzfat, the Golan Heights and finally Tiberias. After leaving Jerusalem in the morning we went to Migdal Ohr which can be best described as a boarding school for underprivileged children or kids from broken homes. We arrived during recess so we had the chance to play a little soccer with them. It was fun except for the fact that the 10 year olds were a lot better than us. I played goalie which was for the best since I am really out of shape. We lost 1 to 0 but I had already subbed out by the time the kids scored. After recess ended we went inside to learn more about the school and the Rabbi who founded it. Unfortunately we had to go shortly thereafter and didn't really get a chance to do a whole lot with the kids.

We then moved onto Tzfat (or Sefat) which is one of the four holy cities in Judaism. Tzfat is suppose to be a very spiritual city and as such is filled with lots of artists. We met with one Avraham Lowenthal an American who moved to Israel to study the Kabbalah a few years back and now does Kabbalah themed paintings. Avraham reminded me of the hippies who show up at Whole Earth Festival in Davis every year. We had some free time for lunch so I finally got to taste some real falafel. Tucked inside some pita bread with hummus, cucumbers, cabbage and fries, the sandwich was great.

We left Tzfat and headed out to the hills in the Golan Heights. There we ditched the bus and picked up jeeps and drove around the hills with three locals. My driver was very entertaining, pointing out different plants and wildlife, proclaiming Israeli mangos to be the best in the world and giving us the history of the Golan. He also made tea from some natural leaves; it wasn't bad considering his limited resources.

Next we moved on to Tiberias where we stayed for the night. The only interesting thing there was Decks, a family style restaurant know for serving lots of meat. I'm guessing the place caters to tourists as we saw a big group from Birthright and another American group celebrating "William's" bar mitzvah.

Its now 4am and we're on the bus driving to Masada to see the sun rise. I've done it before but it should be fun.

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Day 2 in Israel

As we ride the bus North to visit Tzfat, I thought I'd recount yesterday. We started the day at the Western Wall, but instead of doing much at the Wall, we did a tour of the tunnels underneath the Old City. Apparently Jerusalem was rebuilt on top of itself many times and at one point the Muslim rulers decided to raise the city so that it was closer to the Temple Mount. After Israel captured East Jerusalem they increased the amount of digging and uncovered a big chunk of the western retaining wall of the second temple underground. We spent about an hour wondering around the tunnels with a great guide from Washington DC who moved to Israel in the 80's.

After the tunnels we had two lectures: the first with a former MIT physicist who has written extensively about reconciling biblical and scientific differences; and the second was another American now living in Israel who talked about what Judaism has to say about judging others. Both were engaging speakers which made up for the fact that the topics were a little too preechy for me.

We spent the first part of the afternoon ATV-ing in the Judean Desert. The ATVs were really just golf carts that were supped up with stronger engines, big tires and a good suspension system. Even though we didn't go as fast as I would have liked, it was still a fun experience. The desert is beautiful and there were enough big rocks and hills and valleys to get the off road experience.

After another short lecture we headed back to Jerusalem for dinner and a night out. We all went to Ben Yehuda Street (which is kinda like the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica) and had schwarma at from a street vendor. The food was good but not great but it was a fun place to sit and eat together.

After dinner we all went to a bar to celebrate my birthday and the birthday of another girl on the trip. A few shots and a couple of beers later we moved locations to a dance club and danced the night away.

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The Western Wall

Me at the Western Wall with Dome of the Rock in the background.

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Greetings from Israel

After three days in Prague and a hectic travel schedule we finally made it to Israel, flying into Tel Aviv around 3PM. First thing we did once we made it through passport control and customs was to drive out to Gush to go to an antiterrorist training camp. There we learned a little about urban combat tactics from some former Israeli special forces. More importantly, we for to shoot some guns. We shot about 5 rounds from three different guns: a micro-tovor on semiautomatic; an M16 on automatic; and a Glock 19 hand pistol. I have to day that in 10 years since I last shot a gun my aim has not improved.

After shooting some terrorists we headed to Jerusalem to out hotel for dinner. After dinner we spoke with an Israeli Arab journalist about the Israel-Palestine conflict. He was very critical of current Arab/Palestinian leadership and pessimistic about the immediate future. We only had an hour with him but I'm sure we could have spent half a day picking his brain about what's going on.

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That was Quick

Thanks to a very proactive member of our group, our travel situation has been resolved. We are now flying through Vienna, Austria tomorrow and getting to Tel Aviv only 12 hours later. We are spending an extra night in Prague, but Lufthansa is picking up the tab and rumor has it that American Express is picking up dinner (thanks to their travel protection thing). We only have to cancel one or two minor things in Israel, so this has worked out pretty well.

I'll try to find some time tonight to post about the last three days in Prague. But to sum it all up, they have been fun and really cold.

Stuck in Prague

Sorry this is my first update, my phone isn't working, so I have had limited access to the internet. Have people been watching the news lately? That horrible weather in Europe has wrecked havoc on travel and now my group is stuck in Prague. Our flight from Prague to Frankfurt was canceled. Our flight from Frankfurt to Tel Aviv, however, is still on schedule, so if we can somehow make it to Frankfurt, we can make it to Israel. I'll try to post again later.

Three down, one to go...

Sorry I've been kinda absent over the last few weeks, class and recruiting has been dominating my life. Well, the class part ends in about 12 hours when I finish my fourth final in four days. It started on Monday with Finance (which went well); Stats reared its ugly head yesterday and Accounting took its toll this morning. I've only got Econ left and its an open book, open note, open everything (except the internet) exam, so I'm not too worried about it. My Econ professor is very engaging, and I've enjoyed the class, so I'm hoping that I retained a good deal over the last 10 weeks.

A little update on the rest of my life: I'm going to Israel and the Czech Republic in a week. There's a small group in LA that organizes educational and networking events for Jewish business school students, one of which is a two-week trip to Israel over Christmas. Fortunately, the trip is heavily subsidized, so I get to frolic around Prague for three days and Israel for ten for less than the price of an airplane ticket from LA to Tel Aviv.

The flip side, however, is that I'll be leaving Megan for two weeks, and that will be hard especially after barely seeing her over the last month or so. But, with finals ending tomorrow and neither of us leaving until the 15th, we'll have a few days without any distractions. We've actually got a nice little date for Friday: we're using two Groupons we bought, one for a vineyard in Malibu and the other for a comedy club in Hollywood, and having a nice dinner out.

Like I said, one of the reasons I haven't seen Megan much lately is because of recruiting. On that front, I actually went up to Santa Clara last Friday for a "Day In The Life" at Abbott Labs. Abbott brought about 25 first-year MBA students from all over the country in for the day to learn more about the company and their Management Development Program, which is basically a three year rotational program for freshly minted MBAs. The day went well; I learned a lot about Abbott and potential jobs there and had the chance to meet a lot of current employees and pick their brains about life at Abbott. I'll apply in January for a summer internship, but who knows what will come of it. Other than Abbott, recruiting has calmed down over the last 10 or so days, which is nice as it allows us to prep for finals. There are a few resume deadlines for summer internships over winter break, but official recruiting is pretty much on hold until January.

Some Random Thoughts from 30,000 Feet

1. I saw Glee last night. It was the wedding episode. Fair warning for the bridal party, you may be asked to sing and dance down the aisle.

2. I like veggies. Mike and I have been trying to eat healthier, and we've decided to go veggie one night a week. So far it's been pretty great - we eat a lot of salad or stuffed pasta those nights. The best part about it is that I get to experiment with new veggies. Like leeks (blanched with a dijon citrus dressing) and kale (sauteed with olive oil, garlic, and red pepper. Oh! And next time I will add pine nuts because that sounds delicious) and fennel (julienned with green apple matchsticks and a bright citrus dressing). And I feel like with this and using our reusable canvas bags at the grocery store we are saving the world.
3. Mike and I are on our way to Atlanta for Thanksgiving. (Hooray for free WiFi on the cross-continent flight!) His parents are already there. I brought my stretchy pants for dinner tomorrow since Mom has created a menu fit to serve half our neighborhood. Nevermind that there are only going to be 8 of us at the table.
4. Our good friend Garen is in Mexico for the holiday competing in an Iron Man triathalon and has been raising money to find a cure for ALS. You can read his story here. Good luck, Garen!
5. For those that have made it to #5, I wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving. One of the traditions we have is that before we say grace, we go around the table and everyone has to say something for which they are thankful. I have so much to say! Don't forget to take a moment this weekend to share what you are thankful for!

Superlatives

Yes, it's high school all over again. But here are the superlatives for our trip.

• Worst Road Maintenance: Oklahoma Obama, please give them some stimulus money, it felt like we were riding on cobblestones for the whole state.
• Best Stretch of Road on Which to Drive: Wendell H. Ford Western Kentucky Parkway Beautiful scenery, beautiful weather, no traffic, high speeds.
• Worst Stretch of Road on which to Drive: I-40 Memphis to Little Rock There were more trucks on the road than cars, they were all going slow, and with only 2 lanes, it put a serious damper on our average daily speed.
• Best Highway Scenery: I-40 in New Mexico See previous posts as to why, but it was gorgeous.
• Best Food Stop: Owl Cafe (Albuquerque, NM) which puts green chili on everything, and Mary's Cafe (Flagstaff, AZ) which served the best egg and chorizo tacos on earth.
• Top Speed: 86 MPH, reached by both of us at one time or another, mostly on accident.
• Best Road Name: Zzyzx Road (CA). We don't even know how to pronounce it but it is awesome. It is the first exit in CA on I-15 coming from Vegas and I think the one person who lives off this road, some 10 miles from the interstate, thought to himself "screw you, I'm not putting vowels in my road name."
• Best Rest Stop: New Mexico with its friendly staff, who insisted on having a conversation with everyone that walked in the door.
• Cheapest Gas: $2.49 in Oklahoma
• Most Expensive Gas: $3.55 in CA right before the Grapevine on the last stretch going into LA
  
• Coolest Cargo: Blade for a wind turbine (NM). There were three, each on their own truck, and they were so long that I'm not sure how they are able to make any turns on regular roads.
• Most Entertaining 5 Miles: Chasing a clown who was riding a motorcycle in full costume and makeup (we have picture evidence) on Hwy 99 outside Stockton, CA
• Least Entertaining 5 Miles: the first 5 miles on Hwy 50 in West Virginia, which included the accident
• Most Insects Killed in One Day: 376,028 on the 900 mile day. I think we could potentially be arrested for insecticide

Day 9-10: Rocklin, CA

We got to Rocklin last night (a suburb of Sacramento), our first official stop in CA. The plan was to stay three nights, but that's been cut down to two (Megan will post more about it later). We are staying with my Aunt Sue and Uncle Stu and have had a chance to see my brother and his girlfriend, my grandfather and his wife and my cousins Andrea and Dustin and their kids. In about 21 hours, we will no longer be homeless.

Mileage:
Time:
Gas:
States visited: NV, CA

4000 Miles and Counting

At 1:33am Pacific Time we officially hit the 4000 mile mark on this trip. We are already 500 miles over our expected distance with another 500-600 left to go before we arrive at our new home in LA.
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Day 7: Flagstaff, AZ

After pushing it yesterday and driving almost 900 miles we were able to take it a little easier today with only about 400 on the schedule. So we slept in, ate a real breakfast (instead of granola bars in the car) and took our time. We stopped multiple times to see various things including the Continental Divide and some of the views that New Mexico and Arizona had to offer.

Around mid-day, we arrived in Flagstaff and began our visit to the Grand Canyon. Before we even got to the Grand Canyon National Park, we had to drive through the Navajo Indian Reservation, which offered some amazing and humbling views. We'll post pics later (probably on Facebook), but the Little Colorado River Gorge provided some amazing views of a site that would be a major draw just about anywhere else in the world. Meanwhile, as you drive through the Navajo Reservation, you see Navajo Indians in little roadside stands selling trinkets. It's a sad reminder of our history and how little some people have.

When we eventually pulled into the Grand Canyon National Park, I was a little surprised that admission cost $25 per car. It only took, however, about 20 minutes to feel that it was money well spent. The Grand Canyon is truly amazing and awe-inspiring. I think Megan said it best when she commented that the views made her feel small.

Mileage: 525.7 (cumulative - 2940.3)
Time*: 5 hours, 8 minutes (cumulative - 43 hours, 43 minutes)
Gas: $37.77 (cumulative - $226.14)
States visited: NM, AZ

*We had to estimate time today because of all of our stops, which were tourist stops, not travel related stops.

Day 3/4: Mason, OH

Last night and tonight have been spent in Mason, OH, a suburb of Cincinnati visiting my cousins Heather and Ravi and their two daughters Hannah and Rebekah. As luck would have it, Heather's parents, my Aunt Susan and Uncle Stuart, also happen to be visiting, coming in from Sacramento (which should be Day 9 through 11 on our trip). It's been great to see everyone again; the girls haven't started school yet and Heather took some time off, so we were able to enjoy each other's company all day today while catching up. It's been over a year since we've seen Heather, Ravi and the girls, and about nine months since I've seen my aunt and uncle (and much longer since Megan's seen them). Even though not a lot changes in 12 months time, it still seems like a long time to go in between visits.

One story that hasn't made it on to the blog yet is the story of Megan's cell phone. As we were leaving DC on Thursday, about 20 minutes after we turned in our keys and hit the road, Megan managed to drop in BlackBerry into a cup of water. She immediately pulled the sucker out, removed the battery and prayed for the best. After four days of drying (which included the use of a hair dryer and lots of sunlight), we decided that today would be the best day to see if her prayers had been answered and the phone still worked, or if we would be out a couple hundred bucks on a new phone. Luckily, about two seconds after Megan popped the battery back in, a red light came on and the phone started working. As far as we can tell, everything works just fine, so we are back to being a two cell phone enterprise.

We received another piece of good news today: my car is in good shape and she should be able to make it all the way to LA without the bumper falling off. Megan and I ran over to the local Honda dealership this morning and talked to Nick, some dude in the body shop. He came out and looked at the bumper and undercarriage and said that the bumped is still bolted to the body in a few places and that the undercarriage won't be going anywhere. Both will probably need to be replaced, along with the tip of my muffler, but that can wait until LA.

Lastly, we talked to our movers and the driver expects to be in LA on August 25, meaning that we can now officially plan the rest of our trip out. We'll be in Little Rock tomorrow night (the 17th), followed by Amarillo, Flagstaff, Vegas, Sacramento (for three nights) and show up in LA on the 24th, a day ahead of our stuff.

Mileage: 138.3 (cumulative - 864.3)
Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes (cumulative - 15 hours, 20 minutes)
Gas: $0 (cumulative - $67.14)
States visited: IN, OH

Day 0: Harrisburg, PA

We officially began out journey to CA yesterday evening, arriving in Harrisburg, PA late last night. (It was a little too late for a post, so we're updating it before we hit the road again this morning.) We considered yesterday Day 0 - because most of the day was spent finishing up our lives in DC. The movers were great, but the three of them took longer than we thought and our errands took even longer. Harrisburg provided a great location for two reasons: first, my parents are here, so we were able to see my mom one last time (my dad is actually visiting his father in Sacramento); second, it provided a place to sleep for the night. All of our possessions, included our bed, are now in the hands of the Allied Van Lines, so unless we wanted to start our 9 hour trek to Indiana at 6pm at night, we needed a warm bed in which to sleep.

We'll be using the same format for each of our upcoming travel updates, letting everyone know how far we've come, how long it took and how much we spent on gas. Here are our stats so far:

Mileage: 137.5 miles
Time: 3 hours, 25 minutes
Gas: $20.37
States visited: VA, MD, PA

So Nice They Named It Twice

We spent last weekend in New York on the last leg of our so-called "victory tour" of the East Coast seeing some friends and being tourists again. Technically, we stayed in West Chester with our friend Jason (pictured below) and not NYC, but who's counting.



We got to New York on Friday afternoon and visited Jason at his summer job working at the Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture. Stone Barns used to be the Rockefeller's dairy farm, but a few years back they donated the 80 acres and it now operates as a sustainable teaching farm and restaurant.

On Saturday, we got into the city in the early afternoon and walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to eat real, New York style pizza at Grimaldi's. Even though the wait was an hour long, it was definitely worth it. We had a thin crust sausage and black olive pizza that was fantastic. Had we not seen ice cream in the neighborhood, we probably would have had another pizza. After eating, we walked around Brooklyn Bridge Park, and then back over the bridge to go see Ground Zero. Unfortunately, we're not VIPs and couldn't really see anything at Ground Zero except a whole lot of construction.

We spent Saturday night hanging out with two more friends from Davidson, Garen and Will. (FYI, Garen recently finished in third place in the Block Island Triathalon - he's pretty awesome.) Besides the company, I think Meg's favorite part of the night was the drinks we had at this little dive bar. The first was a dark n' stormy which came in little tiki glass. The second was called a Rusty Knot (named after the bar) which was some frozen concoction that included basil.



Sunday was our travel day, so we took things easy and met up with Garen and another friend, JP, for brunch at a cool little spot called the Spotted Pig. After enjoying a burger with bleu cheese (for me) and strawberry french toast (for Meg), we hit the road.

All in all, we now have traveled about 2400 miles on our three-week victory lap. We've survived with each other thus far, so hopefully another two weeks and 3500 more miles won't be a problem.