One amazing thing about Venice are its alley ways. You travel through the heart of the city by walking down twists and turns of alley ways, some lead nowhere while others bring you to your destination. Venice is a labyrinth of alley ways filled with amazing little artisan shops. Every turn you take leads you down a new one, and to new things.

Some are filled with color, others are dark and dank. Some are peaceful and romantic while others are crowded and chaotic. But you can always look up and see beautiful blue sky.

Alley ways are not reserved just for ground, the waterways for intricate alley ways as well with lines of houses and shops surrounding you.

I love the alley ways in Venice because you never know what the next will look like. There is such beauty and variety that you can never get bored.

Venice is extraordinary and one of its most stunning assets is Piazza San Marco. A massive square which contains the Campanile, St. Mark’s Basilica, and lots of pigeons.

Filled with tourists, this place can seem overwhelming but there is so much beauty and awe-inspiring architecture in this small area that it truly can blow your mind.

First and foremost is the Campanile, which at my new home at UC Berkeley lies a close cousin of this monumental tower. The dazzling brick monolith stands high above all else in Venice and stands as a musical guardian over the city.

We waited in quite a line  to get into the tower and then crammed in a stylish elevator for a ride up to the highest point in the city. The view was in no way disappointing.

It seems like the whole city is within your grasp. Huge expanses of red roofs, rising cathedral of church towers and twisting streets gripping the sides of dark waterways. There really is nothing like it. Looking over the giant square that is the piazza and turning every which way and seeing red roofs for what feels like miles.

In the Piazza itself was an amusing spectacle. Hundreds of pigeons filling the square where people where feeding them and letting them crawl all over them. It was extremely entertaining to watch but I would never let those gross rats with wings touch me. More photos of this will be seen later.

The Basilica was beyond words. This overly ornate structure is a house of gods built by thieves. A strange concept to build a holy structure entirely constructed of goods that were stolen from other places like Constantinople or any of the other numerous Venetian neighbors. It amounted to quite a spectacle.

The inside of the church was covered in gold and the most amazing feats of architecture. It is a strange concept though, if not an hypocritical one to build a church out of stolen goods. Whether the grounds of which this place was constructed is correct or not, it still amounted to an intricate and stunning structure that is nearly indescribable.

The Piazza San Marco was an amazing and awe inspiring place, it is still hard to believe that the Venetians were able to squeeze that much beauty into a small square.

Even flowers cry sometimes
What do they have to cry about?
They are so pretty
But they won’t stay pretty for long
And it isn’t about being pretty
It is about loosing life
Where did they loose it?
I laughed softly
Resting my hand on her shoulder
I don’t know
Maybe they left it under their bed
And forgot it was there
I did that once
She said with a sad sigh
I know I said smiling
Maybe they lost it
In the playground
Hidden under a sandy Everest
I think I get it
The flowers have lost their petals
And that is why they are sad
Exactly and they cry for each others loss
Then why doesn’t it make me sad?
Different things make different people sad
I say with a frown
Watching the poppy’s tears
Roll down its face
You will understand when you are older
But I want to understand now!
I know, I say with a smile
I know as I guide her away
To happier things
To flowers with open faces
Smiling at the sun
But she will never forget
The crying flower
Knowing that every flower she sees
Will cry someday
For what it lost in the sandbox
Or under the bed
We all loose something in the end

I found this adorable little creature out at Moss Landing on my way down to Cal Poly. I keep seeing them there and always forget my camera. But I came prepared this time and ran over to capture his cuteness with my camera.

It started to rain on him, he didn’t seem very happy about so he decided to roll over. First he did this cute little fist pumping action with his arms by holding them out from his body and moving them up and down. It was probably one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

Then he proceeded to roll over on to his stomach with his hands held against his nose. It really looked like he was praying or something.

It just made my whole day seeing this otter. I love wildlife and capturing pictures of it to show other people why I love it so much is worthy standing out in the rain for however long it takes to get my shot. Lesson of the day anyways, otters are unearthly cute and I want one as a pet. It makes me sad to know I can’t have one, maybe some day I will befriend an otter and visit him. Dreams, oh well. I love otters and if you don’t… there is something seriously wrong with you.

There are several phases of bobbing for apples that the bobbers go through in the process.

1. Disgust: It is all fun and games until it is your turn. When you get up to the bucket and you are staring down into that gross pail of water filled with a few measly apples you can’t help but think, God please give me an excuse right now to bail out of this game. Of course you don’t get one, and as you kneel down right next to the water you realize something disgusting. That water you are about to shove your face in, mouth wide open, has been the home to several other people’s mouths searching for apples as well. Yes, you are about to dunk your face into a cess-pool of germs to pick out an apple.
2. Embarrassment: The embarrassment comes in right as you first dunk your head. Then you lift your head out of the water soaking wet and totally embarrassed that first, you don’t have an apple, and second you just ruined your hair, outfit, makeup or any other thing you put on your face that morning. Yes, you are embarrassed to lift your head out of the water, appleless to face your friends who are now dying of laughter because you look like a drowned rat.                                                                     
3. Frustration: At this point you have gotten past the initial embarrassment and disgust. Because you have already gotten totally soaked, you are now committed and become an unstoppable force of trying desperately to get that apple. You have to get the apple, and fast so you can get out of here. So very quickly your embarrassment at not getting an apple turns into frustration. After time and time again of not getting and apple you are at the point of gnashing violently at the water in a desperate attempt to grab an apple. All sort of tactics to get an apple fly away from your mind, you are a single-minded apple grabbing machine. 
4. Victory: The final and best phase of bobbing for apples is victory. And the surge of over exuberant energy where you just start smack talking the apple and its mother. At this point your friends look at you like you are crazy and are thinking, geez you were just bobbing for apples. To this I respond. I was bobbing for my life, you wouldn’t understand but that apple had back talked me for the last time!

A little over the top? Maybe, but it is all justified due to that stage of frustration, when you are frustrated any overreaction is justified, even if it ends with yelling at inanimate objects…. which I definitely don’t do. Bobbing for apples is not a simple game, it is actually quite difficult and takes some amount of strategy, which I am not going to share so next time I see you at a party I can watch you fail at bobbing for apples and then when you finally get one and overreact, you will know the truth. The truth that bobbing for apples is a cruel game meant only for the pleasure of those watching, kind of like gladiators.Yeah it is just like that -.-

P.S. Bobbing for apples makes for awesome photos

I really, really hate it when at a restaurant they put lemon slices into your glasses of water. It ruins the water entirely.

I have four theories as to why someone might commit this heinous crime.

1. They are punishing us for not spending ridiculously large amounts on sodas or other beverages we don’t necessarily need but want. If they ruin the water, the customers need to drink something, as in my case while eating at a spicy thai restaurant, so the customers will be forced to either endure the gross lemon water or spend large sums of money on something else.
2. They are hiding something. Don’t know what. Don’t know why. They use the horrible lemon taste to mask some sort of other taste for god knows what reason. Then I am forced to wonder, whatever could be so wrong with their water, unless they take it from a restroom or some other unbeknownst place. (My mom mentioned this second reason and I agreed whole heartedly)
3. They just plain don’t like us. They for some unknown reason just want our taste buds to burn and suffer.
4. I don’t even believe this option is possible but here it is. They believe it actually tastes good. I shudder at the thought of someone believing this and hope that I am wrong.

So please, no more lemons in my water. There is only one thing that bugs me more than lemons in water, is limes in coke. WHY? So now they not only ruin the free water but the coke you paid three bucks for? Don’t get me started, it just makes me sick.

I know some of you are thinking this is pointless and wonder, why doesn’t she just take it out and stop whining. My reply, it doesn’t fix the problem. I don’t know how they genetically engineer these lemons to spread there juices the second it hits the water, but once the lemon goes in, the taste never leaves. Not to mention the uncouth methods for retrieving the drowning lemon. You can either stick your whole hand in and fish around or dig around with a utensil for a while cussing until you can spear it and drag it out. Take your pick, either way the lemon taste still contaminates it entirely.

This isn’t just because I dislike leomons, which isn’t true, I enjoy things with lemon flavors, or things with lemon in it. JUST NOT MY WATER. So again, please no more lemons in my water.

My mom and I took a hike up to Hungarian falls in Hubbell Michigan this morning. It was really nice. There are two sets of falls and we visited both. The first was a this big pool covered in greenery and ferns.

Then we headed around the top of the falls seeing many others on our way. It was a really nice hike and the water was beautiful. I really enjoyed the greenery and the beautiful Michigan woods.

Right near our homes in Bootjack is White City, a park on the Lake Superior with an amazing pier stretching out between the Portage Channel and the vast depths of Lake Superior. There is an interesting lighthouse at the end of the pier that some of my cousins like to jump off of; It is really high up, and the water is really cold.

My cousin brought up KT and I got some good pictures of her leaping off the lighthouse. She definitely had the best form and was the most graceful.

Others took a less graceful leap, like Doug with his flying squirrel style.

In the end the jumping style didn’t matter but the fact that they jumped. Soon I am going to get over my fear and jump it too. Till then I will have to vicariously live through my cousins.

You were adorable. It is amazing to see how such a simple thing as a spraying water fountain can amuse and bring happiness to someone. You were having so much fun trying to grab the water as it shot up. You seemed to have so much fun even when you saw that the water simply slipped away because you knew in a few seconds more chances to catch it would arise time and time again. It was refreshing to see you having fun even though you never really could succeed.