I was going to blog some of these individually, but then I got lazy, so I thought I would just group all of Jammin' January's fun times together and blog them all at once!
* Surf's up dude I'm not sure how I have lived in Florida pretty much my whole life and have always been obsessed with the beach, but have never learned how to surf! My friend Neely, who's a great surfer, called me up and invited me to go with her and some friends to Cocoa and catch some waves. I was super excited, although I knew I would stink at it (I have no balance or coordination what-so-ever!). We ended up going two days in a row (New Smyrna on the second day) and although I pretty much beat the tar out of myself over and over again I did manage to stand up on the board *very* briefly on the second day! Here are some pics of the weekend's adventures. There are apparently a few pics of me standing on the board, but they were taken by a friend of a friend of a friend, so hopefully one day they'll find their way to my inbox!
* Chomp Chomp Chomp I already blogged about this, but since it did technically happen during Jammin' January and it definitely warrants being mentioned again, the Florida Gators proved they are the best in the nation! Of course, we all already knew this, but it was nice of them to confirm :)
* Manatees! I haven't gone anywhere to see the manatees taking their annual winter refuge in Florida's beautiful warm spring waters in years! My friends, DeAnna and her fiance Aaron, and I headed over to Blue Springs hoping to at least see a few. When we drove in, there was a manatee count sign of sixty something, so we were excited! When we started walking down the trail, we realized there were way more than 60! We soon found out that they increased the count, just after we drove through, to 147. The most exciting part was seeing so many babies swimming around. As I'm sure most people know, the Florida Manatee is endangered, so seeing so many babies is such an awesome thing! Check them out, they're so cute!
* Attack of the CrAzY lAdY On my way from checking out the manatees and heading to a pig roast with some other friends, I got in a car accident. Don't worry, it wasn't my fault. I'm still in shock and disbelief thinking back about this. Here's the story: I was at a red light, behind another vehicle, in the left turn lane. The light turned green, however the driver in front of me did not go, so I gave her a little courtesy honk. Instead of driving forward, she put her truck in reverse - I laid on the horn, trying to get her attention that she was going to hit me (there was a vehicle behind me so I couldn't reverse to get away) but she didn't stop. At first, I didn't think it was that big of a deal. I know accidents happen, so I figured we'd just pull off into a neighborhood, see if there was any damage and then go on our merry way. This is not what happened unfortunately. After reversing into me, she got out of her truck and started screaming at me and cursing at me, calling me every name in the book. I was in such shock! Eventually the light turned back to red. She got back in her truck, and then proceeded to reverse back into my car over and over again, probably around 10 or so times! I know the first time was an accident (or at least I assume it was) but this was definitely not an accident. This woman was CrAzy!!! Once she started repeatedly ramming into the front of my car I called 911 and told the operator I needed police immediately! Then the light turned green again and the driver finally drove in a forward motion and pulled off into a neighborhood. I followed her and when we stopped, I double checked to make sure my doors were locked. This was a good idea because she immediately got out of her truck and started screaming at me again and came over and tried opening my car doors! After a few minutes on the phone with 911, she also called. The first thing I heard her tell her operator was that she had to go soon because she was on her way to pick up her son (scary!) and then she told them we were on Markham Woods Road - we were actually on Longwood Hills Road, which is about 3 miles away from there. This just confirmed to me how crazy she was (or at least, how intoxicated she was). The police finally got there and she started rushing the cop, trying to explain her side of the story. The cop told her to get back to her car over and over again, and finally had to hold his gun and scream at her to get back to her car. It was seriously like a scene from the show "Cops." More cops showed up and the lady finally calmed down a little bit. Long story short, she admitted to being on prescription drugs, got a ticket and they called her parents to come get her (since she was clearly in no state to drive). Although she did ruin my front Gator plate (which I joked with the cop that that should be a felony in itself, ha ha!) the damage to my actual car was very minimal and no one got hurt, thank goodness. Well, except for my nerves, which were damaged for quite a few hours afterwards! A very sad Gator
* Pig Roast I love finding cool, new, unique things to do, so when Amanda's boyfriend, Dustin, sent out an email about a pig roast, I was all in. Not that eating pork is all that exciting, but it sounded like fun! Although I was about an hour late, thanks to the crazy lady that I got into the accident with, we had a good time, and being able to share my crazy lady story with friends helped me shake off my nerves! Yummy piggies picture
* Sea World My last 2 Sea World tickets were going to expire at the end of January, so Danyel, Matt and I put them to good use. I never get tired of Sea World! Some pics from the day
* Zing Zang Zoom My friend DeAnna works at Animal Kingdom as an elephant keeper and she scored some free tickets to circus. We got there a little early so we could see the animals behind the scenes - my favorites (and DeAnna's too, duh!) were the elephants. The circus itself was of course a bit cheesy, but the animals were awesome! I can't believe the things they train those elephants to do and I really can't believe there is a man crazy enough to get in the ring with 12 tigers! DeAnna met him once at work and she confirmed that he is one zany character, and has scars all over! He did get those tigers to do some fascinating things, however there were a few, with one in particular, that looked like they wanted his blood! At one point, he had to turn off his microphone so he could scream at her - he had no fear! Circus Pics
* Visit from KB My friend Katie, who I worked with at Discovery Cove, was in town from Vancouver. After she left DC, she moved to Atlanta to work at the Georgia Aquarium and now works at the Vancouver Aquarium with belugas and otters. I miss working with her, but I know she loves her job and I'm so happy for her! I didn't get to hang out with her too much while she was here, but we did get a group together at Chili's for dinner. It's nice to have things like facebook (and blogs, ha ha!) to keep in touch with friends, but it's so much better to see them in person! Check out Katie's awesome job, with baby beluga Tiqa!
* DeAnna's Day This month was also DeAnna's wedding shower, lingerie shower and bachelorette party! One of the bridesmaids, Meghan, and Aaron's (the fiance's) mom Judie, did a wonderful job organizing and hosting the wedding shower. Another bridesmaid, Jennifer, organized the lingerie shower and bachelorette party and we had a great time! I don't go out downtown or drink very often, but I've decided that when I do, one of us girls always needs to pretend to be a bachelorette because everywhere we went everything was free! Pics from the day's events
Great update!
ReplyDeleteYour January seems to busy as busy as my February!!!
xoxo