Hello from California!!!

My airplane flight went incredibly smooth - check in was fast, got through security without questions, flight wasn't delayed... and aside from the fact I have now seen Twilight without hearing any of the dialog, I arrived unharmed. The first thing I must say about San Diego is there are lots of trees! It's unbelievable. There are palm trees everywhere! It's almost like a game, where whoever fits the most plants in their community wins, and everyone is playing. It completely contrasts the "concrete jungle" city stereotype which Cincinnati fits so well. From reading in my San Diego travel guidebook, I know why: In the late 1800's, a college-educated woman named Kate Sessions made a deal with the city of San Diego, where she got 36 acres of City Park (now Balboa Park) to herself to mess with gardening, in exchange for planting 400 trees a year, 100 in the park and 300 elsewhere in the city. She is credited with pioneering and popularizing many of the tree species popular in the area and turning Balboa Park into a "horticultural paradise". Anyway, basically San Diego has lots of trees, and they're different from Ohio trees. I'll try and get some good pictures.

I've met all my fellow co-ops, and they all seem cool. Three guys live in an apartment a few doors down, and one girl lives in the same apartment as me. (Lol, I know what you're thinking guys... but it's a big apartment and she's on the way opposite end, and she has her own bathroom and shower and everything, so it's not close quarters. The only thing we're sharing at the moment is a refrigerator.) As soon as I dropped my stuff off in my room, Sally (the person from ATA that met me at the airport) took me and the other co-ops to Brew and Board, where I consumed a giant, double-decker sandwich... the first thing I'd eaten in 8 hours. After lunch, the guys and I drove down to Balboa Park and played frisbee for a while, after which we got snackers from KFC, and then we played tennis in the evening. As you can imagine, I was pretty worn out by then, but it's great to be finally getting some exercise again after spending last quarter completely sedentary.

And now, some pictures of my room, because pictures are better than long paragraphs anyway.

I've got a palm tree right outside my window!

I've got a bigger desk than I had at college!