where to start the catching up?

googly. well on friday, we went to a new restaurant called himalaya. there is an australian guy (douglas) here working on a site nearby who found it and had a beer there, so he suggested it. it was going to be me, emma, paul and douglas, but emma, being the popular "i'll to talk anyone buying me a drink" type (just messin' chica) asked her new friends if they wanted to go. her new friends are some schlumberger (pronounced shlum ber ZHAY) oil rig fellas who had a problem on the rig so they are here waiting for things to get fixed, so within about 10 minutes our party doubled in size. the s-berger guys are a man of the hollandaise variety, that is dutch, i believe), coen (pronounced COON), another aussie, richard, an indian named richard and another indian named stephen. those are some WEIRD names, i tell ya. so we all hop in auto-rockshaws and arrive at himalaya. my rickshaw was the last to get thtere since the driver had to ask directions several times. so by the time we get there, we see it is friday night packed, and are ushered up to the roof. hrm. might not have been too bad had it not been raining, so we go back downstairs to get into the rickshaws, i think we had 2 of the 3 rickshaws full when the himalaya staff, say they have a COVERED section on the roof, A/C and all. how did we miss this the first time? dunno, so we go up, and they are cleaning out what seems to be an old office of sorts, there were peanuts and snacks on the shelves, an old printer, and lots of beer stacked against the wall. they were DESPERATE for the pale-skins money. the food wasn't too bad it was just funny that they cleared the place just to keep us. we weren't agry with them or anything, we were going to come back another time, just too busy. so we had our meal, here is a pic of the crew hanging out at "the top of the himalaya". we ended up going back to the hotel for a drink or two more, i felt like sitting on ramesh when i got there, what the hell?

worked late on saturday doing stuff onsite i knew would be fruitless, were here till about 9pm, got home and showered in record time to get some drinks at the bar. as usual, if i get home late, i gotta double fist a whiskey and a beer, i got a good number down my throat by closing time, and it was decided that we'd after-hours in emma's room. got therem drank some whiskey's, coen, paul, and stephen came up and we had some more to drink. at an undisclosed time, i decided i needed some alone time on the balcony. i went out on the balcony, it was nice out, a fine rain/mist was falling (ASIDE: at this very moment, it's been raining almost constantly for 5 days, EXCELLENT), so i decided to lay down on the rain-soaked marble floor of the balcony where i proceeded to pass out quite comfortably. i recall at one point, i believe the party was ebbing away and paul came out to try to motivate me to leave. MWAH HAH HAH!!! i appreciate his attempt, but i wasn't moving, i was actually comfortable. it was good. i roused around 4-5AM freezing my nards off, saw no one was there, emma was sleeping so i stumbled my way back to my bed upstairs. woke up around 4-5pm the next day. technically we are working 6 days a week, 8 hours a day = 48 hours a week, last week we had 65. the customer won't change the hours, they just pick and choose. that's not how it works. we left work late saturday night, on the way to the truck, the phone was switched to silent (still had a TheGeneral guy coming in the next day, so i couldn't turn it off in case he had troubles, damn responsibilty crap). i got 3 calls from the customer before 10AM, i'm guessing he wanted us to come in... um contract... sorry. change it, and we'll be here. so around 5pm i motivated my self to shower (oops i woke up and caught the NASCAR race at fontana replay (an entire NASCAR race in 1.5 hours, excellent). i remembered emma said she was invited to an indian festival (telugu ruchulu or "taste of telugu") at the veg restaurant in the hotel, they wanted her to wear her saree and since i got a loongi the other day, she asked if i wanted to go and wear mine. there were going to be pictures. eh, what the hell? we went, it was an indian buffet, but they had i sit and served us, i guess we would'nt have eaten in the correct order. i wore my loongi with under-roos underneath just in case. not sure that you are suppoed to. we ran into ramesh and his wife, srivani, and ate with them. instead of pictures, there was a TV crew there for the local satellite station. woo-hoo. MASSIVE STAGE FRIGHT boy is not happy about this. this guy from the channel, naveen, SAID (not asked) he will sit with us. he sat, asked boring questions, then they put the camera on us. emma went first, then me, ramesh, and since srivani was having so much fun laughing at our interviews, we insisted she get interviewed as well. it is going to be on TV tonight at 9:30PM. we are the stars of rajahmundry. no autographs please. i also got some henna done. actually, i think the art itself is called mahendi, and the paste is henna. guys don't typically do it, but i like it so i did. it's on the inside of my forearm across my palm to my fingertips. you have to let it set to dry, about an hour. we were leaving the restaurant and i was walking upstairs and my god-damn loongi fell off (good thing for the 'roos). i grabbed at it quickly to cover my near-nudity and closed my palm, squishing the henna. it was a nice design, still pretty ok, but you can tell some oaf decided to use his opposable thumb at an inappropriate time. i'll have to take a picture. gotta pack up, it is time to go.

and thanks for the link swedishchefdave.