that's how you know

a couple of weird things happened in america in the last 2 days. specifically in upstate NY where my mom and dad's families live.
1. my grandpa mannix was in a picture on the front page of their local paper, listed as 'unidentified man' in a story about the NAACP founders in their town. they wrote a note in the caption asking people who knew who he was to call the paper, and apparently when my aunt called, the editor told her she was the 21st person to call that day.
2. my 10 year old cousin, martha, wrote a letter to her state rep and she got a ticket to the inauguration! she gets to go with my aunt and the state rep's office is paying for their airfare and hotel. awesome.
sean, emma, julia and martha at my graduation in 2007
that's a makeshift gate on the corner right by our school.
during the holidays they had a giant blown up santa in front of 'welcome party', this restaurant on the corner next to the coffee shop. when i got back, santa had been replaced with this guy.
panini! at latini's. i think i've eaten at least 50 of these. it's homemade bread with tomato, basil, mozerella and salami.
dan was nowhere to be found when i was at the restaurant, and justin told me he was upstairs working on his model trains, so i went to check it out. i had to climb under a table to get these pictures.
tiny men!
a double wedding in a tiny church.

i forgot to tell you yesterday we watched this insane show on the discovery channel about animals living in extreme environments and we learned that frogs can freeze over the winter and then thaw out and electrocute themselves back to life when it warms up with their own electrical currents in their neurons.

It is able to prevent cell and tissue damage by circulating large amounts of cryoprotectants (such as glucose) throughout its body before it freezes. The cryoprotectants act as a natural form of antifreeze that prevents the insides of the cells from freezing. High levels of cryoprotectants inside cells also minimize the amount of water that diffuses out of the cells, which reduces both the amount of ice that forms around the cells and cell shrinkage. In addition, the wood frog's body also prepares for freezing by moving some water to areas where it would do the least harm, such as between layers of skin and muscle. Through these mechanisms, the wood frog can survive at temperatures several degrees below freezing, with 65-70 percent of its body water in the form of ice. While frozen, the wood frog has no heartbeat and does not breathe or move. However, because it is possible for its body functions to resume, the frog is not dead, but rather preserved in this frozen state. When the temperature warms up, its body thaws and resumes normal activity.

crazy, huh? i guess you need to see the video to be sufficiently impressed.

a bunch of girls in one of my classes ambushed me before class while we were waiting and they quizzed me on my chinese knowledge. we went through all of the colors, parts of your face, random articles of clothing, some fruit. they think it's way too funny to hear me pronounce words.

long day. time for bed!

p.s. look where my blog is!