no, seriously--we made tunnels! TUNNELS!!!

if you read the last post and thought "those tunnels are the coolest things i've ever heard about anyone doing in the history of people doing things!", you're in luck, because this post is also about those same tunnels. if you had any reaction even a tiny bit smaller than that, you might find this a little boring. unless you enjoy watching people awkwardly falling over, or the sound of people laughing at people awkwardly falling over, in which case i might have a little something for you. because this is going to be all about that:



here's kim going in and then coming out of two of the tunnels. the third entrance is in the foreground. you can tell by how big it is and how long it takes kim to come out that the tunnels are really cool.


but don't just take my word for it! here's some footage of kim going through the tunnels with the camera. you're looking at some fine craftsmanship there, believe me.


and finally, here's kim destroying the tunnels at the end of our trip. i'm not sure what, exactly, about this is so funny, but as you can hear from michael's uproarious laughter in the background and my snickering behind the camera, it definitely is. maybe it's kim's extra layers of clothing and the way they make her sort of flop out onto the snow, or the sound she makes when she hits the ground, or the way the ground seems to suck her in after a second...whatever it is, it's the good times.

today kim and i go our separate ways: i'm leaving california to go back to chicago so i can start school again on monday, and kim heads up to seattle to visit the piestch's (they of the creative ways to play baseball with food) for a few days. travel!

christmas and beyond

hello readership! i am writing you from our most excellent holiday adventure. right now we're in the snowy mountains of southern california with kim's family, frolicking in the snow and relaxing in a cabin next to big bear lake. just before this, we were in nebraska for a few days to celebrate christmas over there, too. somehow we managed to leave snowy, blustery chicago to arrive in lincoln, where it was even colder, leaving only to come to rainy southern california and then to the ice-cold mountains, while lincoln and chicago warmed up to somewhere around 60 degrees. it's bad luck, but we've made the most of it. yesterday we recognized the virgin 2-3 feet of snow in the back yard as the perfect playground opportunity and made a series of tunnels which are, in my opinion, super awesome. SUPER! the photo above is of a portion of our tunnel system and was taken by occasional blog photograph contributor michael chan.

this break has been very much needed after a pretty brutal finals stretch to finish out the semester, and i'm finally feeling reenergized enough to start looking ahead to my last semester of classes in medical school, and just beyond that to what most people call the most important exam a doctor takes in his or her career--STEP-1. so there's that to look forward to. but for now, i'm going to enjoy the next week or so of not thinking too much about it.

my summer vacation

this summer, back when the blog backlog (clog) was building up, kim and i went to seattle. we had lots of fun, and planned on writing a really long post with lots of pictures. we almost got around to it, and then we didn't, and then we didn't post anything for several months. for some reason i thought of some of those pictures today, and i'm posting them now without much in the way of explanation, other than to say that the pietsch's, who live in seattle and who we were visiting out there, like to play a little something called "apple baseball" (which is exactly what it sounds like and is exactly as awesome as it sounds), and we also got to play. we also played old bread baseball and watermelon baseball and can of V8 baseball. it was fun and delicious.

the exploding bread is cool, sure, but look at my face. i am very much in the moment right there.







nate not only made a decent cup of apple juice here, he's also showing he's got a swing that means business. that's commitment to apple baseball right there, folks.




caity makes some applesauce.









again with the face. this should be on an atkins diet billboard. "DEATH TO CARBS," it'd say.







ah, summer: friends, sports, and watermelon.








the aftermath. sweet, sweet aftermath.








trevor opens a can of V8 by opening a can of whoopass on a can of V8.







jeremy pietsch is so proud of his work here. "look what i made!!!"









here's some video footage of the carnage.

oh my red:






i'ma make it rain!!!:

pictorial update essay, pt. 4--nebraska

After Sigur Rós, we went on to Lincoln and enjoyed several days of awesomeness and fun. During the rest of our stay, we spent lots of time with the Howes, enjoyed expanses of green grass such as Chicago has not seen for some time, ate excellent food (Jeremy's nephew Landon especially enjoyed his ice cream, as you can see), enjoyed Lincoln, played with kittens (and more kittens!) and other examples of Nebraskan wildlife, saw more friends, went bike riding, and – best of all – got to borrow the kayaks for a couple afternoons to cruise the rivers and creeks and enjoy ourselves thoroughly. Here's some photographic evidence of our exploits:





On the water, kayaking like explorers on the Amazon (that's what we were pretending, anyway).










Do you know how hard it is to get a shot like this from separate kayaks? It's really hard.






KITTENS!!!











By the end of our visit, the recent tornadoes and rainfall had only exacerbated the rising floodwaters in Iowa, and on the way home, we were forced to take a 4 hour detour around the river. Even that was a close call, as we found ourselves in water up to the hubcaps at one crossing. We stopped for lunch in Iowa City, only to find our Burger King underwater. It is a very surreal thing to look down a street and see familiar distinctions like curbs and white dashes and stop signs all erased while the wide expanse of water slides smoothly and seamlessly from building to building. Note also our friends Chase and Kara, who were very open to exploring and enjoying the adventure (such as it was), except for the part where the detours meant we didn't get home until 1 or 2am...none of us were particularly excited about that. But we made it home in one piece, and thankfully, dry.

Coming up next: the 4th of July and anniversary celebrations! Stay tuned!

pictorial update essay, pt. 3--sigur ros

editor’s note: this post was, in an inspiring display of marital harmony and compromise, co-written by jeremy and kim. democracy!

after the bike crash and the beginning of the euro, we come chronologically to our great trip west, to nebraska. the timing of this trip coincided (not coincidentally) with a sigur ros show in omaha. but we cracked open the ol’ wallet and found that 6 hours of gas each way was going to cost us a pretty penny. so we put an ad on craigslist for company, and got two students from the art institute to join us--chase (who looks vaguely like a musketeer) and kara (who appears to be leasing out her clothes and skin to be a safety pin breeding ground). but as the return trip was more interesting than the first leg, we'll hear more about them later and skip right ahead to the show.

in omaha, we met our nebraska friends for dinner in the old market and ate our corn-fed beef while listening to tornado warning sirens wail outside the windows. just as we were leaving we heard the service staff telling everyone in the restaurant to move away from the windows. a sane person would probably conclude it'd be better to stay put for a minute, but a sane person would run the risk of missing the show--not an option! about 5 steps out the door of the restaurant, a torrential downpour began and we became almost instantly soaked. we ran the 4 blocks to the theatre and arrived soggy and dripping, to discover a scene something like this:

i'm borrowing the photo from pitchfork here, but the point is that those several hundred people were all huddled together under the marquee, shrinking back from the rain. we squished ourselves into the edge of (only slightly drier) people, and there were told that there was a tornado warning, and they weren't letting people in until it passed. let's take a paragraph break while that fema-style disaster management sets in, shall we?

the ushers watched us sternly from the warm, dry other side of the glass for 45 minutes, until it was deemed safe enough to enter. even then, we were only allowed to wander around the lobby. by the time the concert had been delayed 2 hours, the humid, steamy mass of people was beginning to foment into the beginnings of a rebellion, when from the underbelly of the theatre we heard the sound of horns and drums. we followed the music and pushed our way through a crowd of onlookers, past a couple ushers, and down a flight of stairs to find ourselves face to face with the members of sigur ros and amiina. we were so close we could smell the sweat and feel the vibrations of the drums as they created this joyous impromptu drum circle in the basement. after a while, they marched off to other parts of the basement, and a little while later, the real concert started.

the concert itself was great. this was (i’m trying my best not to brag here) my fourth time seeing them, and other than the time i met jonsi before the show and he put me on the guest list (really trying!) or the time i was in the second row and brushed wayne coyne’s butt as i walked by him (trying really really hard!), this was definitely the best show i’ve ever seem them do. they are touring their new album with a 13-piece ensemble—the band, amiina (the string quartet), and a five piece horn troupe. the sound was enormous, and even though the show at times felt like a dress rehearsal (this was a 4-show tour that included a completely unadvertised show in omaha, nebraska, after all), it was a really great experience and i assume was incredibly inspiring and moving for all in attendance (other than kim, of course, who fell asleep at various times throughout). as the internet is already littered with pictures of jonsi grimacing as he sings and plays, here's a shot of the aftermath.

stay tuned for tomorrow’s installment with even more nebraskan adventures.

a sandy christmas

at some point last week i decided to hold off on my music list extravaganza until my friends and i have completed our work making the annual meta list, so if you were holding your breath waiting for my top albums list, well, i hope you gave up or have exceptional lung capacity.

in the meantime, here's a post from sunny san diego. (actually, it's not exactly steaming hot down here, but when i talk to my med school friends who didn't leave the chicago area for christmas i make it sound like it's a non-stop sweatfest down here, just for the jealousy effect.) and since i'm mentioning med school, all the grades came in, and thus far i am still on my way to being a doctor. i can definitely say i've never been happier to get passing grades, so i guess this semester has whatever dubious distinction that honor bestows upon it. (and since i'm writing convoluted sentences i'll note that now when i write any sentence too far outside the standard style i try to guess how strong a candidate it is for another of kim's polls, and how many people i think would be able to ascertain my meaning if a poll were made. and speaking of--i'm sure some of you are wondering who "won" the bet or what have you...unfortunately, the parameters of what, exactly, is being bet on or what would comprise a victory are never as clear once the results are in as at the beginning, so it's hard to say. for example, kim had originally predicted that 9 out of 10 people wouldn't understand the sentence, which i am now to understand meant "wouldn't understand upon first reading," so in her eyes the fact that most people had to read it two or three times clearly means she foretold correctly. whatever the case, though, it seems pretty likely that i'll continue to write these sort of labyrinthine sentences every now and again, and when i do the end readability will not be a high priority for me. take it as a challenge, or safely (correctly?) assume it's not particularly important and move on.)

this was going to be about my break, though, and that's where the above photo (shot by mr. michael chan) comes in--here is our day after christmas beach football game documented in all its sandy, oceany glory. the blurry figures in the background are the "old people" team (which i was surprised to grouped with--when did that happen?), who overcame their alleged aged, creaky bodies (and my inability to catch the ball for most of the game) and won the day. i proudly pledge my allegiance to the old people. hail, old people!

most of break has been similarly enjoyably spent (but with much less physical activity since then, as my efforts at the game made me so sore i've needed assistance to get into or out of cars or beds (old people, i embrace your traditions! i am one of you now!)), and today my family joins us out west for what will certainly be even more adventures.

the end of our endless numbered days

this weekend we took our last trip of this summer, this time to maine, to see my friends chris and tarah get married on the ocean shore. it was pretty much as cool as that sounds--maybe i'll show you some pictures in a minute. and it was a great weekend.

since tomorrow is the start of orientation for med school, kim and i had been planning on getting home and falling gratefully into bed, resting up for the first of many long days. but instead, we opened the door of our apartment and were greeted by the rich aroma of natural gas, so i figured i'd write a blog while we wait for the gas people to come and fix the leak. hey, it's a science experiment--let's see if i write more or less coherently under the influence.

the night of the rehearsal dinner, chris and tarah had me sing a song, which i did at the beach. check out this cool blue atmosphere!






here's the wedding itself. here we see tarah ('s veil), chris, brian the pastor, and tarah's sister ashley and friend megan, who we thought was a pretty great person to know and hang out with. i'm representing for the groom on the other side of the beach, but you just saw a picture of me playing guitar, so i figured you'd be ok not seeing that.

the day after the wedding, chris and tarah and megan and kim and i went whale watching. the boat went fast, which blew our hair back and apparently made me squint my face awkwardly. they say the camera adds ten pounds. and the wind, it adds a good fifteen just to your neck. in pure neck fat.

speaking of fat and all, here's a whale. this is the blue fin whale, which is the second largest of the whales. "whale watching" means riding in a boat for a couple hours and never seeing any more than this much of any whale at any one time. so i'm telling you that this whale is really big, but as i never saw more than this 10 feet of it, i've got to tell you i'm relying a little on extrapolation and a lot on the tour guide, who sounded pretty knowledgeable.

in three-part summary, congratulations chris and tarah; maine is cool; and if i think much about it, i'm a little nervous about tomorrow and the beginning of all that. i'll update you with all that fun soon. in the meantime, i'm gonna go get started on the rest of my life!

overdue update, part 1: adventures with aaron

boy howdy, things have been pretty crazy lately. since getting hitched, kim and i have been racking up the frequent flier miles: trips to colorado springs, california, and nebraska, and this week we're heading to maine to see my friends chris and tarah get married. the day after i get back, med school orientation starts. unfortunately being so busy has meant not having time to update this blog with all the excellent things we've been doing. i think my new year's resolution next year will be seeking that balance: having enough time to write on my blog, but not having so much free time that i never have interesting things to tell about when i write. ah, the zen of the taoist blogger's life. here is a story from recent life...

last weekend my friend aaron came and visited our humble abode so we could all go see sevilla, our hometown team (in spain), play soccer here in chicago. we did, and that was fun, but the next night as we walked around downtown, we came across quite a scene. policemen were running around everywhere, putting up caution tape and herding people along, trying to stop them from taking pictures. we walked a little further on, and saw the burned out body of a crashed helicopter laying on the intersection amongst all the skyscrapers.

we walked a bit further and saw an armored police van, and as we looked closer we saw where someone had shot it several times. we also saw along the side where it said "gotham police department", and then we noticed that all the cars along the street had gotham license plates on them. we had walked right onto the set of the new batman movie while they were still setting up the perimeter tape to keep us out. as we took pictures, some movie people with headsets and walkie talkies ushered us away, but not before kim talked to one of them about being an extra in the movie.

that guy told kim the name of the casting director, so with our taste for movie crashing adventure thus piqued, we walked further along and talked to another official looking person, claiming to be extras and asking where we might find that guy. our use of the name was impressive enough that that official looked us up an address, which made us even more convincing when we got to the next person, asking for an address, a name, and with a plausible movie role. unfortunately, at this point we were back to the people who had first kicked us out, so aaron and i, fearing we'd be recognized (they call it "made" in the business), walked on while kim gained access to the building where the extras go. a security guard there asked for her name, which she supplied, and when he told her she wasn't on the list, she replied "really? i was told to meet (director's name) here at 7:00 with all the extras." so security guard told her where to go, and she made it in where all the extras were waiting to film the movie's big chase scene that night. apparently, there were snacks and assorted free foods, but kim only hung out for a little bit before she left to find us again.

anyway, here's a few other pictures from the weekend:

here's the three of us post-game, after walking from soldier field to the museum campus to enjoy the skyline at night. it's really a very nice skyline--come stay with us and we'll show you!





here's aaron and i enjoying chicago dogs. because i am stuffing my face, you can't tell how happy i am to have found a hot dog eating buddy (kim is apparently biologically or philosophically opposed to "encased meats" as she calls them. see, i told you she's crazy.). plus, these were pretty good dogs.






on saturday we went on an architectural cruise, which was pretty cool. after that (and before batman), we checked out this flamenco show in millennium park. it's a nice view from here, but we mostly watched the show a little closer. like, where you could see what was happening on the stage.


after our batman adventure we grilled out (on my third story fire escape stairway), and had a sing-along time. aaron and i used to play together all the time, so he brought his guitar out with him so we could enjoy that together. hopefully our neighbors enjoyed it as well, even when it got sort of loud singing oh, darling at about 2am. well, we had fun anyway.

china

i've finally found myself enough time to pick some pictures and post them for your pleasure. lucky you, and lucky your pleasure. before we go to the pictures, let me just say that going to see china with my mom was a really great experience and it's a really cool country and there's lots of neat-o things to see and do there. i recommend traveling with your mom and i recommend traveling to china. on to the pictures!

when we landed we went to our friends in shanghai, the meyers. in a display of recombinated hospitality and tough love they refused to let us go to sleep upon arrival in the afternoon, despite our bleary eyes and slurred pleas. that night, to keep our adrenaline pumping, they took us downtown and then to this hotel's 40 or so story atrium, where they apparently figured the onset of vertigo would keep us on our toes and fully awake. they were right--i nearly threw up. or down. down 40 stories.

here we are having another amazing meal in shanghai. bee tin (mrs. meyer, who is singaporean) ordered food for us so we didn't end up eating dog. she did a good job of that as far as i know. either that, or dog tastes really good--all the food we had was delicious. plus this restaurant does a remarkable job of keeping its ceiling mirrors clean.

here's a picture inside a temple in xian, which is the second city we went to. this is where they light the candles and then bow several times in the smoke. that probably would have been a better picture than this one, but this one's not so bad. plus, this way you SEE this one and get to hear about and imagine that one. so this one picture, in a way, is worth TWO thousand words. that's word economy right there.

this, then, is word and picture extravagance and superfluity. this is also in xian, overlooking one of the excavated portions of the tomb of the first emperor of the qin dynasty. this tomb was under construction for most of the guy's life, which means mr. qin was either really morbid or blessed with a strong sense of foresight. or both, i guess. first of all, let me give my standard photo disclaimer (long-time readers, sing along if you know the words): it looks way better in person. but seriously. each and every one of those clay statues is life-size and individually designed and hand made. this room, in other words, is approximately enormous. and it's sort of surreal to be there. plus, they've only excavated three of the many many pits full of untold treasures and tourist traps, so the whole thing is completely unique and bigger than whatever comes close to it and so on.

this is the great wall. some folks say you can see it from outer space, which is not true. so if you tried to see it from there you'd be pretty disappointed, and not only because at some point you'd probably realize you could have seen it without leaving planet earth anyway. we went from where we're standing here to where you can't see the wall any more in this picture. this hike was probably my favorite part of the china trip. there was incredible scenery, that palpable feeling of history, fun times with the mom, and the fun feeling of breaking the law when we snuck past the "danger in path ahead" sign. breaking the law in repressive communist countries just gives you an extra little thrill.

here's a picture depicting the scenery. and the history. and the mom time. and the overall awesomeness. but not the law-breaking, because this part wasn't forbidden. but probably there's extra helpings of awesome here to make up for it. we visited the great wall while we were staying in beijing, which is where we went after we went to xian. those are the three cities we went to: shanghai, xian, and beijing. next picture!

finally, this is tiananmen square. an enormous swatch of cement filled with monuments to various pieces of chinese splendor, it's also the site of an incredible massacre for which there is no monument. the eeriness of being between the time when that happened and when it will ultimately be acknowledged is...like, really eerie. the square is enourmous (in typical empirical fashion) and full of people and just walking through it was a very exciting experience.

so that's some pictures of china. there's probably more around somewhere, and there's therefore a decent chance i'll post more pictures after these pictures. but here are some of them, for now.

ping

yes, i am back from china, and not dead or now communist. but i also brought back like 500 pictures and haven't had time to sort them into fair, good, and blog-worthy categories. but i will, dear readership, i will. and when i do, you can be sure i will share those and other pieces of news and updates shortly thereafter. stick around! we'll be back to normal production soon!

mexico, like it used to be!

i have successfully returned from mexico, without apparently bringing back a single unfriendly microorganism in my bowels. either that or my bowels have become more diplomatic and don't just expel every foreigner it meets. ...wait, that's not what i was going to talk about. here, as promised, are some photos from the last week:

this or something like it was what the clinics we did looked like. in the foreground we have pete, the physician's assistant i worked with all week. in the background we have mexicans. sick mexicans, probably. this was the third of four clinics we did, during which time we saw about 350 patients (including 100 on this and the day previous). i enjoyed working with pete, and i think we made a pretty good team. this picture also hints at the importance of dust in the tiny poverty-stricken towns we visited. it's not just a reason to buy pledge and a medium on which to write "wash me" on windshields--it's also roads, sidewalks, floors, and the thing the hot dry wind blew in your eyes!

here's a shot of another clinic, before we started. this was most of the people who had already lined up before we'd arrived. no kidding, probably 75% of the kids in the picture have a cold, sinus or ear infection, or flu. and of those, about 3% cover their mouths when they cough. i, then, am a testament of the miraculous disease-preventing power of God, because i probably had an index of infectious saliva on my arm at any given moment during a clinic. the whiteys in this photo are, from left to right, johanna, kelly, and david.

this is the scene previous to a third clinic. the pastor's wife had made us a delicious crab salad, which you can see us eating here. while we all appreciated and were probably to some degree humbled by this generous gesture, david's facial expression, and johanna's watching him eat it, more or less sum up the group's feelings about the actual eating of this dish--it's hard to make out in the photo, but what we have here is crab meat pulled right out of the ocean, lettuce, and some kind of mayo base to the whole thing, which had apparently been sitting out long enough for the lettuce to wilt before we tore into it. i don't know how savvy you are on what not to eat in little tiny villages out in the middle of nowhere in mexico, but...i think i just listed all of the major things to avoid. but we soldiered on, and we all didn't get sick. when someone said we'd just have to smile and eat it and trust God with the rest, i said "so...you think we'll get sick." but somehow God sent neither lightning bolts nor amoebas to my belly in response, and we all lived happily ever after, even at great distances from toilets.

here's a shot of me in action. notice my form--i'm leaned way in, like i'm about to interpret the sound of her heartbeat, should it become necessary. for the record, the heartbeat sound in spanish comes out as "tun tun. tun tun." this was at the end of the day, which is sort of unfortunate because you can't really appreciate the crowds and general activity going on for most of the day while we worked. so you'll just have to take my word for it--we were pretty much rock stars. ROCK STARS!

in addition to working, there was a lot of playing. we stayed in a missionary house about a 10 minute walk from the beach, so in the mornings we'd go over there. one morning i went exploring a little and decided to check out an apparently deserted and under construction house. while i was there the watchdog ("pulgoso," i later learned he was called) alerted the security guard (gabriel) to my presence. gabriel is, i'm sure, an excellent security guard, but i found that he also makes a top-notch tour guide after minimal conversation. he showed me the house and told me a bit about the place and his life while we walked. the house was very cool, and i'm currently working on a good plan to usurp the wealthy americans to whom the place belongs in the near future. if it works out you can come down to party with me.

here, then, is one such view from the house. you're probably wondering what hair styling products i use, but try to focus. (but i'll let you in on a secret--i just use a hair compressing device known as a "baseball hat" and it does the rest. the deeper mystery is, why'd i take the hat off for this self-portrait if my hair looked so dumb underneath? and that's one i won't answer for you just now.) don't tell anyone, but the beach where we were supposed to be doing all this thankless work was pretty awesome. you can kind of see it in this picture.

so there's some pictures from mexico. there's a lot more, and maybe i'll show you later. or maybe you should come over and i'll show you. it's up to you later. don't forget, though--tuesday night is menomena's show here in chicago, and it's also wednesday morning over in china.

trains, planes, and automobiles

today begins a stretch of adventure and excitement. in a few moments i'll head out the door and get on the train which will carry me (via airports and such) to mexico for the next week before it brings me back long enough to clean my clothes (and show you all pictures, of course!) and then head out once again, this time to china (via the other airport). this is, i guess, what wandering folks like myself do when they feel the icy grip of a 4-year (plus) commitment creeping up on them.

i am going to mexico with a group from my lincoln church led by dr. martin (that's him modeling the proper way to say "ah" from the last time i went). for the past several years he has gone to a series of small pueblos in northwestern mexico to do free clinics there. 2 years ago i went as an interpreter, and this year i'll be reprising that role as well as once again meddling with the setup and attempting to find the very best, most efficient way to clear the language barrier and see as many patients as possible. i'm very excited about the trip and the challenges and fun that i'm sure are awaiting all of us there.

my trip to china, on the other hand, will probably not be of any benefit to anyone other than the people around here who are glad when i'm not here. my mom and i are going just purely for the fun and edification of it, and also of course to finally find the magical, mythical part of china where the world's toys are made. this is a trip i've dreamt of ever since i played with my first transformers and while converting a car to an ominous looking robot (with lasers!) i wondered to myself "where on earth did such a fantastic piece of plastic come to be?" and there, on the robot's food (formerly a rear fender) was the answer: made in china. so china, here i come! (in a week.)

come back soon for pictures of mexico and for progress reports on the red's efforts to indoctrinate me. but mostly for the pictures.