Merry Christmas from Palm Springs! Yet another fun Imus vacation to a random place for the holidays, this time a desert for retired people. Lots of fun mall shopping, eating at a seafood restaurant with a really pretty waitress, a trip up a mountain to see a national park (basically the only landmark in Palm Springs), and a Christmas eve dinner of spaghetti while toasting with gatorade (we follwed it up with a buffet with free champagne). And all that while keeping a 100 pound dog hidden in our hotel room where no pets are allowed!

Standing in front of an abandoned gondola thingie.
Taken from the actual lift thing carrying us up the mountain. It was a lot higher than it looks from this picture. I was tempted to reach out one of the open windows and take an even better picture, but decided risking our $300 camera wasnt worth it.

After the 40 minute wait and 10 minute ride, we found the park to be filled with trees and rocks.

I guess I should put a picture of my parents, since they paid for everything.

And of course the dog, here with his very own Christmas present. It only took him about 30 minutes to break this one.

All I've done all winter break is watch movies, so I figured I should share my wonderful progress and accomplishments with the world. So, here are Mike's 5 second reviews of all the movies I've seen in the last month or so.

Aeon Flux: Mildly interesting plot, decently good action. Charlize Theron is hot. B

Serenity: Good action towards the end. B

Brothers Grimm: Could have been much better. Err, not as good as Van Helsing. C+

Fantastic Four: Good comic fun, but could have used 20 more minutes of action. Why did Jessica Alba have to keep disappearing? A-

Stealth: I went in with an accepting mind and it still was lame. C

War of the Worlds: Independence Day was better. B+

Polar Express: The parts where the train was like a rollercoaster were cool. B-

The Perfect Man: I hate movie critics. Hilary Duff is hot. B

The Ring 2: A lot like the first one. Naomi Watts is hot. B

Miracle: Pretty good, but somehow The Mighty Ducks was better. B

Friday Night Lights: Good if you like football, but I found it more depressing than inspirational. B-

Million Dollar Baby: Started good, but has the most depressing ending since Harry Potter 6. B

Cinderella Man: Good plus inspirational, but not as fun as Gladiator. B+

Master and Commander: Good but not all that interesting. B

The Island: Meh. B

Mr. and Mrs. Smith: Gun fights were good cheesy fun. B+

A Series of Unfortunate Events: Interesting in a goofy way. Jim Carrey is funny. B+

Constantine: Better than I thought. B

Elektra: Worse than I thought. C+

The Princess Diaries: Fun, but not as good as the Lizzie McGuire Movie. B+

Ong Bak: Fight scenes decent. Girl was annoying. B-

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: Original was much better. B

Robots: No computer animated movie is as good as Pixar. C+

Assualt on Precinct 13: Lots of shooting is good. B

The Phantom of the Opera: Lots of singing but not very interesting. B-

The Pacifier: Relatively funny. “They’re not boobs!” B

So the movies I've seen get an overall GPA of about 2.92. Still gotta see Harry Potter, Chronicles, and King Kong. In other words, all the A movies.

Yay for 4 weeks of winter vacation!! Hopefully we've all been as productive as me, having watched all of Alias season 1 and currently working on 24 season 1. Great stuff yo. Other highlights include good ole Randy treating the metabolic TA's to dinner at TGIFs, and taking a trip to Julian with mario, MJ, rob, and our old friend christine. On the way we spotted Dudley's bread, the place where all those people got that great fruit bread stuff they use to sell for fundraisers back in high school. I remember eating that during chem labs with acid all around. Haha. Also had lunch at the suspiciously named Rongranch, and then we spent the day trying a slice of apple pie from each of the Julian pie providers, pretending to be expert pie critics and trying to figure out who had the best. All in all a good and productive day.

Enjoying the pork ribs, beef ribs, chicken, beans, and some other piece of meat i couldnt identify. Cheers to hot apple cider!
Standing outside Julian's Pie Co., unanimously decided to be the best apple pie in Julian after much discussion over the pie to crust ratio.

Us with all our pies after our final decision. "One for all, and all for pie!!"

Gloating of the Victorious 2005, Part II

We all know the Chargers are the best around and that our most detested and terrible enemies barely even know how to play football anymore, and due to finals I lack the energy to make even more fun of those fools who show up in their halloween costumes and have to go home losers in their make up and cardboard armor.

Chargers = Winners
Losers = Losers