Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Sarah Paintin: Going Rouge

Actually, I would say we went with more of a deep red. After months of doing little to make our house a home, Becky and I have decided to get our decoratin' on. We hired a guy to come and paint our house last weekend. What started out as one dude slowly morphed into four guys and a girl (and a pizza place). While it was not the best paint job I've ever seen, it was well worth the 60 bucks we paid! We thought our dedicated viewing audience, both of you, would like to see our "new" house.
BEFORE

AFTER

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Saturday, November 21, 2009

Wine and Cheese

Taking a note from the Korea book, Becky and I along with our friends Kirk and Julie decided to import a wine tasting/judging and cheese party. The idea is that everyone brings two bottles of the same wine. Everybody samples each disguised bottle and rates them. The person who brings the wine with the best rating wins all the second bottles of wine.

Of course, part of the fun of an event like this is the dress up. I decided to break out the ascot. I liked it so much, I think I may just try to bring it back. My friend Ryan said that I would bring the ascot back to prominence the same year the Aggies win a football national conference. I was going to tell him to shut up, but he went to Cal and I am pretty sure I can't talk smack for a few more years due to the beating we took from them in the Holiday Bowl in 2005. Dang it. Becky looked stunning in her bridesmaids dress from Katie and Scott's wedding. Getting our moneys worth!

Becky and I selected a nice Argentinian wine that we had with dinner one night because we thought it was nice. We also bought some Carefour (think WalMart) brand cheap sparkling white wine as kind of a joke, hoping to pull the upset. I am happy to report that the cheap walmart wine came in two spots from the bottom...right ahead of the other wine we bought. Thats right friends, we didn't get last place, and we are proud of that. Next to last is still not last. That is the message we try to instill in our kids at school. Strive for not last.

Sigh, there's always next year.

Isaac
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Thursday, November 19, 2009

"DON'T YOU DARE!"

In what has become a weekly occurrence, I present you with a fun little video that is absolutely not an exaggeration. Here is the scenario, and remember, although this is one isolated night, it could easily be any day of the week. I was laying in bed about to pass out when I hear a shriek from the class room.
"What's wrong?"
"The biggest cockroach I have ever seen is in the bathroom!"
At this point, I am thinking, 'It's only big because you never lived in Texas'.
"Isaac, come and kill it."
I ask if it is within distance of my reach. It's not, so being the good husband that I am , I tell Becky I am not going to be able to help her.

After some rumbling around, I hear a "Bam" followed almost simultaneously by "AHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

At this point I am awake and laughing and going for my camera. Like I said, there have been numerous occasions like this one and I have kicked myself in the past for not getting it on camera. I was not going to miss it this time.

Now I will leave the rest up to you. Watch and enjoy.




After I finished off the roach and got into bed, Becky said to me, "I didn't like it when you flung the roach at me." Through chuckling I said, "I have no regrets."
"What if it would have hit me?" she asked.
"Well, I guess it would be tough at first, but I guess I would have to move on and maybe even remarry in time."

She didn't like that and let me know that she knew it wouldn't kill her. Needless to say, I found this entire event VERY humorous. I hope you enjoy.

Also, did you notice the newest addition to the Currey family? It's Danni! We adopted her from a animal shelter here in Bangkok. She is awesome. Dog personality in the independent form of a cat. To Matt: think Boomer!


OK, Gig 'em Aggies.

Isaac

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Let's get Currey'ed away! To Laos!

Well, it’s that time again! Time to hear about another exciting Currey adventure! You probably thought that our trips couldn’t get any more amazing but you would be wrong!

Last week we ended our first quarter and had our first week-long break of the year. Isaac and I decided to go to a country that no one REALLY knows how to pronounce: Laos. Whether you pronounce the “s” or not, Laos is fantasmic!

Laos truly was a really cool place to visit, but first let me tell you that getting there was half the fun! And by fun, I mean on of the worst experiences of our lives.

Isaac and I like to think of ourselves as very smart, and practical travelers (aka cheap). Now there ARE flights to Laos from Thailand. It only takes about 2 hours to fly there, in fact. BUT, as frugal as we are, we decided to save a couple hundred dollars to experience TRUE Thai travel. We took the night train and a bus. After all, how bad could it be?

Our trip kicked off to a good start. The cab driver decided to take a “short cut” to the train station and added an hour to the trip. Then, we got onto our night train and waited in our seats until we left about an hour and a half late. We had a delicious dinner of Pringles and peanuts. We had a 2nd class sleeper car which meant we had bunk bed deals in one big car.

We were supposed to get into Nong Khai (the border crossing between Laos and Thailand) at about 8:30 but woke up to a conductor saying “machine broken, 6 hours late! You can sleep!” As good as sleeping sounded, we were pretty upset that we weren’t going to arrive until 2 pm (actually it was 3p.m.) because our bus was supposed to leave in the morning.

After we got off the train, we had to buy vises and get carted around until we ended up in Vientienne at 5 pm. We missed the last bus to Luang Prbang (our final destination ) so we had to stay the night in Vientienne.

The next morning, we woke up at 6 and went to the bus station to catch the “VIP” bus. The next 9 hours were anything BUT VIP! Picture riding thought winding mountain roads with your knees pinned against the seat in front of you and the constant smell of urine wafting from the bathroom below.

The journey was pretty rough but when we finally got to Luang Prabang it was worth the trip! We stayed in this great place with a bungalow facing the river. Each morning we had breakfast delivered to our balcony outside facing the river. We spent most days relaxing, playing skip-bo (with some friends who joined us later) and riding bicycles around town.
Laos was once colonized by the French so it looks like buildings are European and there are a lot of road-side stands selling baguetters. Overall, the trip was really relaxing. We went to a really cool waterfall, saw some monks getting food, and took a boat trip down the river. Good times.
I just like this picture.
I think that kid in the circle is my long lost brother.
Check out the lady all up in the faces of the monks.

Too bad all of the relaxation was cancelled out by our return trip back to Thailand.

We thought getting back to Thailand couldn't POSSIBLY be as bad as getting there. We were wrong!

This time we made it to the bus station on time. There was even a bit more leg room! It was a good sign. Then we realized that we were in the back of the bus where you can feel EVERY bump and curve to the extreme! It was like those terrible carnival rides where there’s no rush or fun, just the feeling that you want to throw up. At least with carnival rides, they only last a few minutes. This was 9 hours! There wa no air-con bt after a while we were covered in sweat so that was a little refreshing.

The bus arrived in Vientiene about an hour and a half late, and after another crazy trip through customs, we got to the train station 30 min after our train was schedule to leave. I told Isaac not to worry because Trains in Thailand NEVER leave on time. Seriously, we’ve always been told not even to arrive at the station until the scheduled departure time because the train will leave at least an hour late. As luck would have it, our sleep train WAS THE FIRST THAI TRAIN IN THE HISTORY OF TIME TO LEAVE ON TIME! So we missed it.

Isaac convinced this dude at the station to give us free tickets to the only other train leaving that night for Bangkok. It was a 3RD class train leaving in 15 minutes and we gladly took it. The train had bench seats about 2 feet across. We had to get up and move to different seats 3 times throughout the trip. The train was so full that Isaac and I had to share one of those little seats all night This time, our dinner was peanuts, Pringles, and about 500 bugs that flew into our mouths from the open window we were next to. Miraculously, we did manage to fall asleep. At one point, I woke up in the middle of the night to see a cockroach scurry across the window next to my face.

We got home and tried to forget the whole thing happened. It didn’t work. I suppose that we should be thankful that we have enough money and time to travel at all and we should think about how many Thai people travel like that all the time. We learned a few valuable lessons on our trip. Here are the top five:

5. Baguettes CAN be eaten for every meal
4. Condensed milk doesn’t make EVERYTHING taste good
3. No matter how mature you think you are, it is not possible to be a gracious loser at Skip-bo
2. Putting dead animals in whiskey bottles does NOT make you want to drink more.
1. When given the choice ALWAYS FLY!

Culture Week:
Before we left for break Isaac and I got “roped” into being a part of a teacher talent show during our school’s culture week. We showcased American culture by doing a line dance routine. Isaac and I were supposed to do something creative for part of the dance so I hog-tied him and left him in the middle of the stage while the rest of the teachers danced around him(we didn't let them in on what we were going to do). It was really entertaining. The best part of the show is when our PRINCIPAL said: “Now I know why Isaac married you.” I said: “Because I look good in jeans?” And he said: “No, S & M”. Classy.