Simon is unprepared, and faces the consequences

     I spent the past weekend with the dudes.  That means there were just 3 of us: Joncas, my roommate Steve, and me, with a peach pink Corolla station wagon.  Now, to get to Palmerston from Wellington involves a long 2 hour train ride, where sleeping was heavily involved.  Steve sleeping is really quite a sight.  Normal people bob their head up and down in a vertical motion when they are nodding off.  Steve, on the other hand, involves all 360 degrees of action.  Therefore when he nods off, he makes quite a fool of himself.  3 kiwi girls across the aisle were there to witness this event, and eventually I joined their laughter to wake Steve up. 
     We come into Palmerston by 7pm, extremely hungry, and somehow decided to get Chinese takeout.  All three of us got the large $11.50 plate, and piled the food on.  I was pretty surprised that they didn’t charge me extra for the mound that I put on.  Craig is trying to be healthier these days, and having us come over was not conducive to this.  He passes the blame unto us.  
     Palmy is just another college town (Massey University), with not much to do besides go to pubs and eat cheap food.  While we were walking back, a car full of drunk girls passed, whistling and shouting incoherently at us, and I was very surprised, because in Berkeley, GUYS do that to girls, not the other way around.  This was the first time I have ever been shouted at by a car of girls.
     After deciding which hikes to do the next day, we went over to a pub to play pool.  Craig Joncas is an excellent pool player.  Steve and I lost horribly, but we all blamed our performance on the amount of beer we had.  I blamed the amount of alcohol I had too, even though I only had 3 beers.  If alcohol is good for anything, it’s for steak and excuses.
     The next morning, we hiked up to Sunrise hut in an hour and a half.  The sign said it would take 3 hours.  Near the top, it suddenly became extremely chilly and started raining… VERY hard.  I was so wet that by the time I got back to the hostel, I was still drenched.  Fortunately, I did not pack an extra set of clothes, and sat shivering next to heater in the living room.  As we sat eating tacos and watching Jackie Chan’s “The Medallion”, I recounted my stupidity.

     I realized how much time I waste while I’m here in New Zealand.  Back at Rosemere Backpackers yesterday, I put my wet clothes in the washing machine out on the porch, and asked the other American Simon (graduated from Arizona University, now he’s in New Zealand for no apparent reason) how long the washing machine takes.  He said 30 minutes.  If I were in Berkeley, I would spend the 30 minutes waiting for laundry to do something productive, but but I’m not at Berkeley, so I sat myself down on the porch and played snake on my cellphone for 30 minutes.  Life is good.