Saturday, October 23, 2010

A Dive Party Contest, Results (in Running)

Don't Let a Diver Drive Your Boat

The Dry Dive Party has turned into a tradition for us, this was our third year in a row attending. It's good to see our diver friends, hang out, enjoy some food, but lets be honest, it's more about winning a prize! This year was slightly different than previous years, where prizes were luck of the draw, instead it was a photo contest to celebrate our Dive Shop's 30th Anniversary. Talk about right up our alley.

Every party, there is always some social type game going on. We were each given a wrist ban and the object was to collect as many of them as you could. When somebody said dive, diver, or diving and you noticed, that entitled you to take all the wrist bans they had collect. Though I wasn't planning on trying to trick anybody into giving me their band, I wasn't going to let anybody take mine. The easiest way to not slip was not to talk about diving, that was my strategy. Turns out a couple of other people must of had the same idea, because I spent most of my time talking about running. I successfully kept my wrist band, but in the process I may have lost my mind, because I got talked into running the Kalamazoo Marathon. My goal for next year was to do a 10K, but valid points were made that I should at least do a half marathon. I'm now officially signed up for the half, though I going to attempt to approach training like I'm doing the full, because it would be awesome to get that crossed off my bucket list.

Back to the contest, I had big plans and many ideas for cool shots that would win me the big prize. As it turns out, the only pictures we took were from a single dive. Yeah, I still have lots of slacker left in me. I honestly didn't think we took any that were prize worthy, but Becca forced me to submit what we had anyway, couldn't hurt, right? Turns out the one that I had the highest hopes won us 3rd runner up! So, the evening ended a runner up and runner to be.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

One of those moments, in Tea Time

Tea Time

Traveling four thousand miles round trip, driving another two thousand miles by car, one state park, one national park, and four national forests...oh yeah and a brief stop in Vegas all while visiting an old friend should create many memories. The memory that is going to stick with me forever is Tea. Seriously?

I actually did have the inclination to pick a couple other events from the trip as my favorite. Having a wild coyote casually stroll within a few feet in a National Forrest was damn cool. Getting stopped less than thirty minutes in the Casino for being underage and having the security guard guess I was 23, now that was a highlight! But when I really sat back and thought about it, this Tea Event has every element of my relationship with John wrapped into one unique experience, the main being torture to force the other person to try something new, but also that special moment when thinking back to it, it brings an immediate smile to my face.

Barely off the plane I found myself in downtown San Fransisco. John was courteous enough to put the car in park as I put my bags in the car, I think. Did I mention I flew into San Jose? Anyway, it seemed like we were on a mission. Even though part of me thought this was John being spontaneous, he did seem to be checking his phone often for directions, which seemed odd to me. With one turn the signs went from being completely legible to being completely foreign. You guessed it, we were now in China Town. Next thing I know I'm standing in a 20x40 closet of a Tea Store. About to tease John about taking a wrong turn, when I realize this was the mission as John sits down to one of the two baby tables. Now, I'm game for almost anything, but in our relationship making the person try something new....that is the game within the game.

At this point, I should say the extent of my tea experience is Lipton. My world of tea drinking not only was going to get expanded, but I'll say shattered. It's impossible that this blog entry is going to include every detail, or do a very good job of explaining the depth of what went on for the next hour, so as the reader you are really cheated of this experience based on I'm not a writer.

John immediately began chatting with the Tea Girl about his preferences. I admit it, I completely zoned out and worked on taking in the ambiance of this shop. In the back, what I can only assume were mom and dad running the cash register. One wall was filled with row after row of what looked to be urns. The opposite was was filled with tea sets that looked like they were designed for children. It wasn't because they looked like toys, they were beautifully designed out various materials, but looked like tea sets mice would use.

By this time John and the the Tea Lady decided on the first tea we were going to sample. At this point I'm going to throw it out there I'm fairly skeptical, yet I still wasn't exactly sure what we were doing in a tea store in China Town. The Tea Lady went to the wall of urns, selected an urn, then brought it to us. After removing the top, we were presented the tea for aroma testing. I don't have a clue what bad tea smells like, nor could I tell you what great tea should smell like. What I can tell you, is this tea smelled EXACTLY like my cat's catnip! I admit it, I did start looking out the corner of my eyes now paranoid I was about to find myself on Candid Camera or Punked. But, nothing. The tasting continued. A small pinch of this catnip, whoops I mean tea, was placed in this small saucer, water was added, it was covered, and in a what looked like a precise motion the saucer was flipped over by her hand in some kind of tea ritual. That was a lot to digest there, believe me, there was even more going on. In that process, I know my eyes had the look of "are you serious" as the water came from not the traditional tea pot that I know, but from what looked like a Starbuck's Coffee cup with it's own built in heater slash temperature gauge appliance. I know we are taste testing and typically sample sizes are small, but are we really drinking warm flavored water and it's so important that water needs it be warmed by it's own personal jacuzzi in a cup not much bigger than a can of pop? (Like I said, I'm a little skeptical)

Tea Lady now pours from that saucer into three thimbles. I'm sure they have official names, I'm sure John knows them, but I'm basing my description on reality...these were thimbles! A sip later, bottoms up. I did find it cute that Tea Lady also drank with us, I wasn't prepared for the quiz afterward, I quickly learned that after every sip we needed to discuss what we liked about this particular tea. I was caught off guard by this, luckily towards the end, I thought I did a very good job of acting the part of a very interested customer with specific tastes. Oh, I had some much to learn though, I wasn't done yet. Tea's taste different based on the different "pours". That was only the first pour, the second pour (ie serving) would result in a different tastes. It probably was my novice status (or maybe skepticism), but the second and third pours tasted essentially the same, but by this time I was completely in awe of this whole process and couldn't resist acting the part of being very impressed with how the flavor changed over the various pours. At one point Tea Girl even suggested we slurp to get the full taste of the tea. With tea in mouth, suck air over the tea as drinking it down to get the full effect of the taste. This wasn't skepticism, but all I could think of was my mom would be so proud of me slurping tea.

The tasting continued to find John's tastes, but had to laugh Tea Girl also began to predict which teas I'd like, if she only knew. The Tea Girl was a complete wealth of knowledge. We must have tasted six to eight different teas, each had a story, sometimes Tea Girl even broke out the map and showed exactly which region of China this tea came from and what made it special. The whole time, the entire process of smelling the tea prior, making the tea, discussing after each sip, oh and I forgot we also smelled the used tea leaves after all the pours had been completed. Who knew? I certainly didn't and my tea drinking I learned leaves much to be desired. I suppose I could learn to open my Lipton tea packet with more pizazz.

The whole experience was classic John. After almost fifteen years apart, he found not only something on a level I had no idea existed, but the entire chain of events on the surface seems so silly to me based on how my mind works, yet I'm sure seems perfectly natural to him. I'll be utterly disappointed if his goal was simply tasting tea, because everything about this experience defines our relationship, hence was the best moment of my entire trip.

Oh, and for the record, John walked out with $120 worth of tea. The skeptical side of me says John got taken advantage of by an attractive Tea Girl! The logical side of me says $120 was a bargain for the entertainment value alone! We could have tipped $120, walked out without any tea, and then spent another $5 on a box of Lipton and still call it a successful trip.