311 Mary Party If I've said it once, I've said it a million times, Kathy and Scott definitely throw my favorite parties. As I had been to many many of them before, this was just another 311 Mary (the street address) that I happened to make it to. I initially stopped by the Draughthouse so that I could meet up with the Crocketts, Mussells, and other such faces, but only stayed for a short while so that I could make it to the party. Evidently I got a hold of the classical guitar at one point and made it a highlight of my evening. I recall playing my acoustic version of Little Wing (Hendrix) for Dreux and some people and Dreux has periodically commented on it since.

Exploring NZ Northern Tip With just a few days left on our rental car (before we needed to head back to Auckland), Tisa and I drove as far north as we could make it in New Zealand. Although we didn't make it to the northern-most tip due to time constraints, we definitely got to explore much more than we had otherwise planned to. I was particularly frustrated one evening when we couldn't find a place to stay and I was overly exhausted late into the morning. We eventually pulled into a trailer park and just slept in the car.

Night out in Wellington Since Tisa had literally worked seven or eight different jobs in just the short month or two that we were in Wellington, she naturally met tons of friendly people. On this one particular night we went out with a large group of people that she met at her restaurant, her bagel shop, and probably some other combination of workplaces too. It was particularly enjoyable as some of them were Kiwis, some of them were Americans, some of them were Canadians, and on and on.

Paraparaumu with Jas Toor One of our flatmates from our Vogel Street flat was headed into Paraparaumu (a bit north of Wellington) so that he could pickup a car that someone had been holding for him. I'm not entirely sure of the details as to why the car was there in the first place, but I took the train from the Wellington station up to Paraparaumu with Jas. On the way back to our flat, we stopped off at some scenic overlooks and even grabbed some fish and chips at a local restaurant outside of Paraparaumu.

The Sydney Australia Zoo I think the Sydney Australia Zoo is definitely one of the better zoos I have visited in my time. Perhaps most interesting was the fact that the zoo had a number of other creatures that most zoos in the United States don't have (or at least have very few of).

Te Papa Museum With the family in Wellington, one of the likely places to visit (which Tisa and I had visited months before) was the Te Papa museum (that means "Our Land" in Maori). The museum was as interesting as it was the first time we'd been there. A bunch of worldly sort of artifacts mixed in with a large amount of Maori heritage.

The Hughe's House Tisa and I were invited over to the Hughes house one afternoon after dinner. To say the very least, their house is beautiful. It's just a few miles from the rugby stadium and the beach.

Kaikoura Whale Watching The previous time or two that Tisa and I had been in Kaikoura, we unsuccessfully tried to do some whale watching from the whale boat. Unfortunately and once again, we were unable to do it as a result of bad weather and strong seas. Sean and I decided that it would be worth it to take one of the 30 minute whale watching helicopter tours. In hindsight, we should have asked him not to worry about finding any whales as the real joy was cruising around in a helicopter, a first for both Sean and I.

Out with Roni and Maria This was the first time that I had met two of Tracy's very good friends, both of them from highschool, Maria and Roni. We all headed downtown for a show, had a number of drinks, and then went to the Beauty Bar before closing time. We wound up going to Magnolia's on west 6th after closing time with one of Roni's friends too. It was a pretty late night, but plenty of fun was had.

Fenway Park One afternoon while I was hard at work (or likely not working at all), Tracy called me up and asked me if I'd like to go and see the Red Sox play the Yankees in Fenway Park. She added the obvious that we'd have to go to Boston to see the game. Without hesitation, I jumped on the opportunity and we had the tickets booked the very same day. To anyone who has never made it to Fenway Park, I would definitely recommend checking it out. Baseball games can get a little boring, but the crazy Bostonians cheering on the Sox definite have a way of making the game much more interesting. The best part is that no matter what tickets you buy, the seats are pretty much all the same (perhaps with exception of the famous Green Monster seats).