Stock Xchange Karaoke

I went to Hell Pizza and it was FABULOUS. Amy invited me to karaoke, which of course I said I'd go to. I told her not to let Liam buy me a drink! He always buys everyone drinks, and it makes me a little uncomfortable because he's spending a lot of money on it... also I didn't feel like drinking anything. But, he did anyway, which I guess is okay since they unexpectedly had daiquiris again. But still... I mean I know he does it because he's nice and I assume he has the money but you know... every time... anyway when we got to Stock Exchange there was like no one singing and no one there so we ended up being able to sing whatever we wanted as much as we wanted for the first hour or so. People eventually came but we were still able to sing A LOT. I sang 8 songs, only one of which was with someone else. Amy also sang 8... Hannah probably sang about as much and Liam as usual would not sing. I sang: Hero (Enrique Iglesias... hot), You Oughta Know with Amy (Alanis Morissette), Torn (Natalie Imbruglia), Concrete Angel (a sad but pretty country song by Martina McBride), Everything (Fefe Dobson), Drops of Jupiter (Train but I'm sure you know that one), Strawberry Wine (Deana Carter... it's about losing your virginity!), and I Swear (John Michael Montgomery... another country song...). I was going back to old songs I used to love, especially country, for some reason. That's okay. I know Concrete Angel was the best one I did, I actually felt I sang it really well. Everything is another great one. And Hero is just super fun to sing, with gestures as you can imagine. I have to do it when I get home.

Salsa Lessons

Oct. 24: What I did today was I went to the grocery store. Between going there and back I managed to run across all of the Grange flat. Then I cooked dinner in Amy's flat (we shared a dinner of beans-only chilli and potatoes). We did some planning of our Northland trip. We have decided to take the Magic Bus because it will be probably less expensive due to the price of gas and just easier since neither of us have done much driving here and don't really want to start in the biggest city in the country.

After that I went to a salsa lesson with Amy, Michelle, Hannah, Austin, Laura (a Canadian who's friends with Michelle), and Liam (a Kiwi I met the night before my big trip and who apparently has a thing for Amy). It was really cool. The lesson was just the basic steps in a line and then you add a partner. I was dancing with a guy named Nathan who knew what he was doing, so that made it easier. Then they just have dancing, and first I was dancing with Liam. Then for a while no one asked me to dance but then I danced with Michelle, and then this really awesomely good guy who is also really nice whose name I forgot, then Austin, then a guy named Shaun who was also good. So I know some salsa moves now. The instructor was dancing with his girlfriend and they are both really good and they were pretty much having sex on the dance floor. At first Amy was like 'I can imagine them having really great sex tonight' then as we were watching it was like 'well, no need to imagine'!

Then we went to Laura's flat which is on Leith Street North and played Catchphrase until some people decided to go to Jenn's to play beer pong. Then Michelle and I went home.

Oct. 26: I studied pretty much all day until 10 pm when I watched Cabin Fever which is about flesh eating bacteria and is terrible. Then to get our minds off that we tried to watch Love Actually but it turned out Jenn didn't have it on her comp. We went to McDonald's and talked for a while.

Oct. 27: I studied, and then at 11 met Amy to do karaoke. Went to Stock Exchange but no one was there so we went to the Bowler instead. Two guys stripped naked during their song, it was hilarious and wow, everyone there was so drunk. Amy and I sang 'I Believe in a Thing Called Love', and Amy sang 'Put Your Records On.' I tried again to sing 'Throw it all away' but they never let me. Maybe they don't actually have it? The announcer guy remembers us as 'those American girls' and he was staring at us a lot... yeah cause we're so hot. Then I got mini muffins at the 24! Yum.

More Bowler karaoke

After tacos, I did a tiny bit of work then went over to Amy's. We went down to Martina's birthday party (it was in the downstairs of Amy's flat) and there was some good dessert type food, yum. Then we headed out to The Bowler through the pouring rain. At first it looked like only Michelle and Hannah were coming. Amy and I sang "Complicated" and then all 4 of us sang "Wannabe" and "I Want it That Way". Karin, Gavin, Austin, Becky, and Ali showed up, then Gavin sang "Temperature" and it was one of the most hilarious moments ever. Later I sang "Candy Shop", which was also hilarious and fantastic (I actually know the words so I am pretty good at it). I got a video of Gavin doing Temperature but no one got a video of me doing Candy Shop.

First Bowler Karaoke outing

I went to karaoke just now!! It was so much fun. It was at a nearby pub called The Bowler. You get a free beer if you sing in the first hour. Karin and I sang Wannabe by the Spice Girls. It was SO much fun. We got a free beer... Karin gave it to me because she had already gotten drinks, and so I sipped at it a little (when you get beer here it comes in HUGE servings, at least a pint, and these came in handles, which i think may be more than a pint) until the other people at my table were like "are you actually going to drink that?" and i was like, no, im only sipping it, have as much as you want. for beer, it was decent tasting which was why i continued having a couple of sips. It was a beer called Tui which has lots of ads that end in 'yeah right' all over the city. I have to take a picture of this one, I don't remember what the actual Tui ad was, but someone spray painted on it: "Jesus Saves. Yeah right." and we're terrible but we find it hilarious, just the way it's done. Actual ads include: "We shouldn't, we're flatmates. Yeah right" so you get the picture. Anyway so yeah, I won a free beer! WOOO! haha, I was kind of excited because of the whole 'free' thing, but not as much because of the 'beer' thing. If it was free food, I'd have been happy. I've been really hungry all day for some reason. Anyway, we think we're going to do karaoke every Monday if we can, it's so much fun. And it was SO crowded, it was ridiculous. It was fun watching other people and singing along. Other people in my group put in requests for songs but did it too late so their songs hadn't come up by the time we were ready to leave. Tomorrow there's an open mic night, which you may recall I went to last week, and I want to hit it up again cuz it was cool. It's so different: Dunedin has a NIGHTLIFE!!! Including the massage parlor above the Peaches and Cream adult store lol I wanted to tell you about that too. Oh yeah and I heard my neighbor/fellow-orientation-goer Sean may or may not have gotten arrested today for smoking pot. And yesterday he got punched in the face at a party. Not a good couple of days for him, I guess. So that's my night! It is fun to hang out with cool people.