It is currently december 26 and i only have 2 and a half weeks until i leave. Things seemed to be going along quite smoothly untill i got this cold. I wouldn't be surprised if it turned into pneumonia.

My last 2 trips over seas have been all awesome experiences. Some one told me that everday spent abroad adds 4 months of life experience depending on how you travel, and I believe that. However, I also believe that the hardest part of traveling is leaving. It seems that no matter how much I plan, there is always something that is thrown into my path like some evil divine intervention.
I remember my first trip to Europe was back in 2003. I was very excited and I was getting ready to pack, when all of a sudden, my country went to war. This seemed to throw a major wrench in the plans when the company my school was traveling through started to debate about calling off the trip (to Italy). I was on edge for about 3 days as the "great bueroctatic process" deliberated in some office complex somewhere far off. All that worrying for nothing, because nothing ended up changing.
Then, when I thought I was out of danger, Colorado's biggest blizzard in years came barreling through the rockies. This ended up closing DIA for about 3 days, and forced us to travel through Wyoming to go around the mountians. Miraculously, the airport opened up on our day, and we were one of the first normally scheduled flights to go out in 3 days. I think I'm just a lucky guy, I succsessfully dodged the antics of my war-faring government, and mother nature, not to bad for a 15 year old.
We all thought that was just a bad streak of luck and decided to pay no more attention to it. So the school started planning for the next years trip to Spain. OK, so more of the planning stuff, blah blah, but about a week before our trip to madrid and lisbon, we all heard the news of the Atocha Bombings. All of a sudden we were thrown into the same situation as the previous year, and simillarly, nothing changed and we left as planned.
So what I'm getting at is that I would not be surprised if this cold I have suddenly turned into pnuemonia or tuberculosis or meningytis or cancer or bubonic plague or SARS, you get my point. It just seems like there is this big obstacle thrown in my way every time I leave for a trip, and I'm expecting the worse. The closer I get to my departure date, the bigger of an obstacle is going to be thrown in my way, you just watch. You probably think I'm being paranoid or something, but i have justifiable reasons. Does this happend to anybody else on a habitual basis, or is it just me?

-Eric

---Matt, remind me when school starts to kick your pansy arse. Thanks a lot for nothing. oh yeah, your mom was really good last night. Take care bud.