Am I rightside up or upside down?

Alas, my week is about halfway over.

It's been nice so far, unfortunately not quite awesome. Monday brought clouds, chilly temperatures, and off-and-on rain showers. It seemed nearly as cold as a warm March day in New Hampshire.

We checked out the local Casino and played a long round of Bingo. The Casino was cute, but not impressive, the Bingo was expensive and the payout was bad. It was a bit of familiarity for me, which is something I needed with all of the foreign sights and feelings.

Everything here feels sort of half alive, dormant somehow. Most of the vegetation is dry, thorny and sick looking. Yet there are instances of life and color in between, some prehistoric looking trees and the occasional patch of wildflowers. There is always a visible backdrop of the jagged mountains, mostly because there is very little that could hide it. Sans Monday's dreariness, the sun has been intense and the warm breeze endless. It's incredibly foreign in comparison to the northeast - exactly what I've hoped for in a vacation.

We went to the Phoenix Zoo yesterday, an outdoor oasis of sorts. Of course, all of the animals that we wanted to see were given their daily sleeping pill or hiding in a far corner. I can't exactly blame them, I would keep my distance or attempt to nap through the thousands of eyes on me. Yet it was a lovely place with lots of tree cover and a very pretty pond [from afar, I definitely wouldn't want to rent one of their boats for severe fear of falling in it].

It had all of the negatives that go along with such attractions; four dollar bottles of water and six dollar hot dogs, neglectful parents who thought taking along extra children was a good idea when they can barely keep track of their own, the constant smell of wildlife poop.

We were able to check out some small shops on the ride there and back, so I was able to knock off some gift requests from my friends. We're running low on money now so we have to start becoming uber conservative with it.. at least the rental car is amazing with gas - so much so that my aunt wants to buy it immediately. The hope now is that we can go to Mexico with the people who are housing us, apparently we're a couple hours from a small fishing and touristy village with beautiful beaches and more beautiful liquor.