I got home last night!
I was excessively happy to see Billy and Lars, and the hermity crab, and...my new Apple laptop. Yes!
The laptop is awesome, though the initial tinkering around phase has been foiled by the fact that I have no internet to connect to. I guess I could connect it to the DSL we have at home, but...why built in wireless unless I use it? I'm thinking about going somewhere with wireless today just to play with it. Oh and also, it's sorta scary playing with it bc it's white and I always have to make sure my fingers are as clean as possible. Urg. New things.

Anyways, the rest of the trip was awesome.
On Wednesday, I walked around Hollywood by myself, resold some DVDs at Amoeba music and traded for a poster and a random CD, and bought some sunglasses, and chilled at the hostel. It was so hot that day they had the inflatable pool outside, where everybody put their feet into while they read or did whatever. I did not, because I felt too self conscious about it, I don't know why.
We left LA at 2:00 pm on Thursday, July 27, which was two days after my last post, and drove to Flagstaff. We had planned to get to Flagstaff around 7pm but didn't make it till 10:30. I ended up driving those last 3 hours or so in the dark, and it was quite scary, with the road being super windy and going into mountains and such, and all the "Caution: Deer" signs, but I have a feeling the scenery would've been awesome if only I could've seen it. Before it got dark, we saw all these plateaus, and I'd really never seen such things in person.
Ok, this is going to have to go to list form, so it won't be ridiculously long.
Flagstaff:
Thursday night: unloaded necessary stuff to hostel room, signed up for Grand Canyon tour thing, showered, walked around Flagstaff, which seemed super safe, until we crossed the train tracks (literally) and were immediately accosted by random people. walked to convenience store which was really a liquor store and bought gatorades for the grand canyon, hurried back across the tracks.
Friday: breakfasted with a German couple who'd just finished high school, Grand Canyon tour'ed with them, two girls from Russia, a girl from Korea, an American woman from India...and some others. Tour guide in flip flops and funny sunglasses, which were made fun of by a passing tourist while he was taking a pic of the group. The tourist said, "hey, I can take the picture, so you can get in it too." and the tour guide replied, "No, that's alright, thanks." and the tourist said, "With those sunglasses, you really should get in the picture! Haha, right guys?" to us. Burn.
Anyways, we hiked around the GC for the day and then stopped at the Navajo reservation on our way back. I know I sound blase about the Grand Canyon, but it's hard to describe it. and hopefully it shows up well on the video we took.
Fiday night: got back to the hostel around 7 pm, and we walked downtown and had pizza at a little pizza place, which was delicious. Then we did laundry at the hostel and played pool, while I stole surreptitious looks at the (drunk?) couple dancing to the jukebox in the corner, which was not pretty. The lady would put a song on, and dance (very badly) in front of the guy, who would caress her butt. It was more disturbing bc the lady was asian and middle aged, and the guy was in his 50s. Then sometimes they would dance together, and the guy said at one point, in a sickly sweet voice, "When you smile, your face just lights up..." It was pretty gross.
We left the next morning to go to Roswell, and we ended up getting into Roswell pretty late as well. We had Chili's for dinner that night and walked around the 24 hr Walmart, which was decorated with aliens and UFOs on the outside.
The next morning, we stopped at the UFO museum on our way out of town. Which was awesome, but more kitschy than I had hoped.
We stopped at Lubbock to see Jennifer Stewart! who drove us around in her Blazer.
And then on to Dallas.
Ok, no more about Dallas, since I'll be there for the next 4 years. Suffice it to say that we found Aaron a place to stay out in the boonies, and stayed at a Backpacker's Hostel that was run by a family, and an old Bulgarian man, and there was a kitten that I played with.
Then we stopped in Austin for a night, and me, Aaron, and Elissa went to the Drafthouse, then drinking with Rachel and her horde of friends at Hole in the Wall. Then the next morning, ate lunch at Dog Almighty and then dyed Elissa's hair again. Also, there was a kitten at Elissa's too, who I loved even a little more than the one at the hostel.

Ok, ok, no graceful goodbyes, because this post is way too long, but it just had to be done.