now, tell me that aint insecurrr. the concept of skool seem so securrr

i'd hoped to keep this blog relatively introspective-free. too often i think online blogs can be obnoxiously self-indulgent. well, today it's my turn. i promise, my few but faithful readers, subsequent posts'll be more upbeat.

i've spent the last few hours tackling the emmense project of educating myself about nursing education. it seems the more i find out the more i have to learn. it also seems the more i learn the harder this new major seems like it's gonna be. i'm stubborn and proud enough to want to go to the best school there is (U of W-Madison) but the more i look into it the more i think that might not be an option. it's a really good school and, consequently, a really hard school to get into.

there's another school in madison called edgewood that might be suited for me. though i can't find anything that says so, i suspect there's a waiting list for it. and even if there isn't there's residency issues to think about. in order to even think about applying to either i should probably wait a year and establish residency (the money savings are huge). then i have at least 9 - 12 credits of anatomy, physiology, and/or microbiology to deal with before i can even apply. even assuming i get awesome grades in those, my GPA and ACT scores may only barely put me at the bottom of the entering class.

all that aside, even if everything goes perfectly, by the time i finish establishing residency, finishing pre-reqs, graduating with the BS in nursing, doing residency-type work, then going back for my master's in science as a nurse practitioner something like six or seven years have passed. so here i am, in the beautiful highlands of panama stressed out about school. trips like this are supposed to give you perspective, and perspective is good, no doubt. but i've had more than my share of late.

phew. that feels better.

tomorrow alyssa and i are going to check out some hot springs a few kilometers away. then on monday we're going on a tour of a coffee farm led by this really cool dutchman named hans. (interesting side note: panamanians use the u.s.'s so-called standard system for weights and measures, but not for distances).

humble as a mumble in the jungle

alyssa and i just spent the last couple days visiting andrea martinsen out in her peace corps site. the journey was almost as cool as the destination. we took a bus to this seedy little port town called chriqui grande. imagine white clay on stilts and instead of south dakota you´ve got the carribbean sea. from there we took this rickety boat taxi across the bay and up a river delta about 2 hours up. we couldn´t take the boat all the way up to andrea´s village for the river hadn´t seen enough rain. so we had to jump ship a village early. this left us walking. it wouldn´t have been a problem if it hadn´t started raining. for an hour alyssa and i trudged through knee-deep mud in a torrential, tropical down pour.

we are hard core.

the pay off was a few days in a sleepy indigenous village along a quiet river in the middle of the jungles of panama.

things are still going fine. i´ve been thinking about home a lot lately. figure that´s why you go on a trip like this. also been thinking about moving to wisconsin. and utah, among other places. settling down is sounding tempting after this last year of vagabonding.

of course, as soon as i settle down i know i´ll miss it. life can be obnoxious, but at least it isn´t boring.

the bird keeps her distance, and I keep my spleen

obligatory tropical bird picture. saw these two very tame birds outside the gate of the copan ruins in northern honduras.

went to the beach but I couldn't find the path

dateline - quepos, costa rica.

alyssa and i are alive and well. i know the lack of interweb presence may have left some of you in doubt, but rest assured we be a'ight.

after some whirlwind days in antigua, guatemala punctuated by a hike up an active volcano and a late night of libations with some cute irish girls and a brit named andy we headed to honduras. we did the mayan ruin thing, which is as cool as ruins can be, then hauled butt across honduras and nicaragua coming to a well deserved stop at playa hermosa. it was beautiful - a surfer's haven with a black sand beach and plenty of hammocks to be lounged in.

alyssa and i are currently in quepos, costa rica to do some sight seeing, then it's off to panama for carnivale, more beachin' and swimmin', then we're heading off to ecuador in mid-march.

we'll try to keep the updates coming, but with the spotty interweb access we can make no guarantees.