...where were we?

Baseball digression aside, it is now time to highlight the first trip I took without my parents. Coincidentally this trip was one of my first traveling experiences outside of California.

Who: mature, poised, and ever-so cultured...8th grade students
What: learning?
When: Spring break, 2004
Where: Nation's capital (Washington D.C.) and surrounding area (Williamsburg...oh and Jamestown)

As part of the cultured group of students that attending this pseudo study abroad program--or maybe it truly was a study abroad, details are fuzzy--I had the opportunity to well...how about I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. To be honest most memories from this trip have culminated in a sort of haze that is filed in the back of my mind, only to be opened upon reunion of the members of this trip. The two memories, however, that I most vividly recall are the following:

1. Writing Mia's 7-digits on a piece of notebook paper and plastering it against the mega-bus window as we drove away from some sort of student convention (Why 13-/14-year-old girls/boys found it necessary to distribute any form of digit-ness is beyond me, but I did it regardless).
2. Desperately locating, in Williamsburg, some form of warm beverage to relax my shivering, near frost-bitten fingers and upon purchasing said promising cup of hot cocoa, placing it on my lips only to discover that literacy is indeed necessary for survival. "Caution: Hot" gained a whole new meaning.

All other memories, like previously mentioned, are basically non-existent. But never fear, I documented the travel fairly well thanks to my trigger-happy index finger. Observe.

An homage to shoes at a very young age. Who do these slick leather boots belong to? Five bucks goes to whoever knows the answer.

at the John Wilkes Booth exhibit...or was it Abraham Lincoln's? Regardless, here's a boot.

Posted against my better judgement, this is the only picture where my super awesome Chucks can be distinguished in any way. I loved these Converse SO MUCH that I owned about five pairs of the same shoe in different colors. Yeah, I still wear them, and yes, I still love them. Oh, and...so I was a chubby kid, sue me!

A much better representation of my 8th grade shoe of choice =)