i usually don’t address specific people in this journal, but i have been asked to give a shout out to a guy named eric stewart. hello eric. i’m flattered that you think i sound like a cool person. 
i dropped becca off at the airport early this morning, so my memorial day weekend adventure is officially over. how disappointing! i am still riding the adrenaline rush from sunday’s hike/climb. yosemite was awesome. half dome was awesome. if you didn’t catch the link yesterday, you can go to my homepage and click on the last link to go to a page i made about the 8.2 miles and 4,800 feet elevation gain up to the top of half dome, the time i spent at the top, and the 8.2 miles and 4,800 feet elevation loss back. there are plenty of pictures, and i will add more when i get the chance.
ideally, i’d like to make an informative page about the half dome hike, since i gathered a lot of useful information from reading a few other webpages put together by people who’d done the hike before. it’s a great hike accessible to anyone in decent physical shape, but there are also a few things people should know before they head out. i’m definitely glad that becca and i did our research ahead of time.
but today it’s back to the real world, meaning…school. ick. i have a lot to catch up on, and quickly. these last two weeks are going to be stressful, i fear. late tomorrow night i’ll be getting on a plane for charlotte, where i’ll then drive to boone for jes’s wedding on saturday. i’ll fly back here on sunday for three more days of class, one day off, and then–BAM!–finals. before i know it, i’ll be graduating again. i can hardly believe a year has gone by so quickly…it seems like only yesterday that i was moving into this cramped bedroom and wondering what stanford had in store for me. suddenly, it’s summertime again. this summer is different though; this time around, instead of begging time to slow down, i can laugh and just say…
bring it on.
(10:51 p.m.)
this is my friend tibor:
on tuesday nights, i cook at breakers with tibor, nick, and dave. tibor is from slovakia and would have joined the communist party if it had lasted long enough; thus, i have dubbed him my favorite almost-communist. 
tonight, he came in saying that he realized he doesn’t understand an american social custom–hugging! it turns out that when i gave him a hug a few weeks ago, he was traumatized. (ok, well maybe not traumatized…let’s just say he was caught off guard and shocked.) i didn’t realize a simple hug had caused such a reaction, but as he said: “i hug my mother, my father, and my girlfriend. no one else. when you hugged me i didn’t know what to do!” so i hugged him again, and he stiffened. i laughed, and so as we were cooking, we discussed the fact that he can hug someone and it doesn’t have to be sexual. it’s not that he doesn’t like being hugged, it’s just that he has always perceived it to be a sign of something deeper, never as a simple greeting or friendly gesture.
hee. today i taught a slovakian how to hug.
