7 Things

Most readers will probably not get the title, but it's an allusion to the Miley Cyrus song which was featured in my post last time. Anyways, not much has happened in my life these past few weeks, and since I am becoming a crotchety old man, I have found some trifling things to rant about in society. But before I step on my soapbox, two immediately memorable things that have happened lately, some "everytimes," a popular music observation, and the seven things. This is also long and it is recommended to read in multiple sittings. (Ahem, granny and gramps).

• On Monday morning at 1:30, while I was nearly resting, I came across a happenstance, whose irony left me weeping. Caution: this is going to be an anecdote whose comic value vastly depends on whether you witnessed it (translation: it won't be funny). Any-who, I was at my friend Addison's room with another friend named Kelly. We were going to write our papers together to keep each other focused. Never happen again. I failed to take my strattera that morning, which means my focus is greatly curtailed as the day progresses, and my true attention deficits emerge. Having said that, I had the most trouble focusing ever. I finished a 4-page rough draft in like 2.5 hours. Terrible efficiency. Nevertheless, I was a whopping 16 times more efficient than my two friends. You can figure out how much they got done. Yes, their efforts (or lack thereof) were that futile. My nazi, fun-draining, drill sergeant tactics I've learned from my stern, demanding mother over the years worked to no avail. Anyways, this was not the point. The point is, after this episode, I was walking through the halls of Duren to go down one floor to my dorm to doze. I take the stairs. Always. I open up the door to go enter the stairwell to find my dear friend and BYX brother, Jeremy.
  No it is not that unusual to happen upon people sitting in the stairwell. Students often do it to have phone privacy if their roommate is in their room. The peculiar thing, was that Jeremy lives down the hall from me on the third floor. He often hangs out with lots of his friends on the fifth floor. I however came across him in the fourth floor stairwell.
  This also alone is not entirely peculiar. There could be acceptable explanations. What was amiss was that he was zonked asleep. Passed out (figuratively) against the wall. I don't know if you have ever seen a homeless person resting or either passed out against the side of a public edifice, but this is what Jeremy most closely resembled, containing all of the telltale signs: 1)head slightly tilted back, mouth agape, as if he lost consciousness right before taking another swig of whatever liquid of choice filled the bottle concealed in the brown paper bag. 2) curved lower back with one leg straight and one leg bent at about a 60˚ angle to prevent the rest of his listless body from sliding down the wall. 3) one hand resting on said bent leg with the other on the floor by his side.
  I quickly took this in, caught completely off guard and hesitantly said, "Jeremy?"
  You of course don't know this, (unless if you're Joe Shields), but Jeremy is a very high energy kid, and thus inherently easily excitable. These qualities combine to make Jeremy very easily startled. And he lets you know when he is startled. Once I was waiting outside his room while he was getting changed. As he came out the bathroom, his roommate scared him by donning a crazy, disfigured, morbid halloween mask and jumping at him. Jeremy's reaction would have been audible to at least a person with a mild-moderate hearing impairment. I'm sure people on the above and below floors all briefly paused to contemplate the outburst they just heard, and its possible causes. Anyways, Jeremy was also caught off guard by my presence and did one of these numbers, only slightly more mild.
  Apparently he was taking a break from working on a paper. I told him he should go finish that paper. He did. After going upstairs to talk to people, and staying up the whole night. Oh, Jeremy.
• In my Educational Psychology class we were discussing how to combat classically conditioned responses, and we had to brainstorm ways to use counterconditioning to combat math anxiety. (If you are bamboozled by my psychological jargon, wikipedia does wonders. Just read the first paragraph, that's usually all laypeople need to know). The solution my group came up with (jokingly, mind you) was as follows. Math anxiety is a higher order conditioning in which failure in the past was repeatedly paired with math, which eventually starts to unconditionally provide an anxiety or fear response in the learner. To countercondition, you pair the conditioned stimulus (math) with something that will counterbalance the conditioned response (in this case anxiety/nervousness). Now, most groups incorporated math games, candy, or stickers into their solutions. We went the extra mile. We decided to procure copious amounts of medicinal marijuana for our elementary aged students, have them get blazed, and then work their math problems worry free. Sounds great, right? It's funny because it's outrageous, and we all want to be teachers.
• For my bilingual reading tutoring today, my first grader at the end of our time had to make turkey feather saying things for which he is grateful. After explaining to him what "grateful" means, he sat there and thought for a few seconds. He looked at me excited and said, "You!" My heart melted.
• This past week, on two separate occasions, two random, unrelated songs randomly got stuck in my head. "As Long as Your Mine" from Wicked was the first. This is understandable: Wicked is awesome. What isn't understandable is how Shania Twain's "Rock This Country" got stuck in my head. I honestly haven't heard that song since my dad blared Shania in elementary school. Nonetheless, it made me laugh audibly.
• Two Tuesdays ago, I was introduced to glee. I have now watched all 10 episodes to date. Me gusta mucho. Even though it is at many times corny/cheesy. Even though at times the vocals are edited (not Lea Michelle/Rachel though, she is a beast). I love most of the musical numbers, the characters of Sue (Jane Lynch) and Principal Figgins (some random Pakistani actor who's had recurring roles on TV shows) are awesome. Plus, Artie, played by Kevin McHale, is a Planoite who graduate from West a few years back.
• What is a citizen from Plano called?
  

Everytimes. These are things I have found that elicit a strong emotional response from me every time they happen. Every time. Without fail.

• Listening to the "Finale" from Les Miserables. (Finale starts at 4:20) I get chills. Every time. Usually when the ensemble starts the "Do You Hear the People Sing," or when Eponine and Fantine do the minor sounding harmony (I am not very musical so this is egregiously wrong terminology).
• Talking about/watching the Mens swimming 4x100 freestyle comeback win anchored by Jason Lezak in the 2008 Bejing Olympics. (race starts at 0:43, is 3.5 minutes long). I didn't know this gave me chills until we started talking about it in one of my classes. (I am a huge Olympic nut. I love them. I watch everything: I even love curling and team handball, so you know I get passionate about the important sports.) Swimming is so epic because comebacks are gradual. Halfway through the last length, when you see Lezak is gaining, you start going nuts.
• At any sporting event, when they sing the Star Spangled Banner, and you can hear the entire crowd singing along. Emotional ending. Everyone is momentarily united, even if it is a colts/pats, yankees/red sox, lakers/celtics game. Chills.
  
• You've probably seen or heard about the story of Dick Hoyt. If you think you haven't, you have; you just know him by what he did, not by his name. I can't describe it in words. watch this one for the first 2:40 for background. Then this one for race shots/sentimentality. This makes me cry every time. Or at least tear up.

This is just on observation. That led to another observation, whose revelation is not so revelatory, but just common sense. It took me an astounding 18.5 years to realize that lyrically, the song "Cotton-Eye Joe" is painfully repetitive. The song consists of 15 verses. The opening is verse is repeated 12 times, while another verse appears twice. A song that is 3:10 long has two original stanzas. So how was this a hit? Why because it had an easy to do dance to go along with it. You can churn out trash, but as long as it has a dance, it's going to be a hit. Cotton Eyed Joe. Wait, writing one stanza and repeating it an umpteenth number of times is too hard? Simple! Just sing instructions. Wait, you can't sing? It's okay, just say them. Boom. Cha Cha Slide. But it goes on: electric slide. Cupid Shuffle. Wait, you want to popularize a song that is beyond demeaning to women, and have little girls and kids of all ages sing it? It's okay, just make a dance to go with it. In summary: want a pop music hit but are completely devoid of musical and lyrical talent? make a line type dance. 7 Things. This is where I rant. Invective/diatribe for the win (even though these are not harsh enough to be considered that). Some are serious. Some are sarcastic. Some are both. 1. It has come to my attention that Taylor Lautner is the new hottie of choice for teeny boppers across America. I see how he can fit some traits of the ideal man, but come on! It takes more than just what Scott Gorthey calls being "incredibly cut" to be all around aesthetically appealing to the opposite sex. If you don't know that, you haven't learned anything from Disney at all. I will now use my very limited knowledge of Taylor Lautner (which comes from the girl who sits besides me in Educational Psychology and does nothing during class but shop online, play Farmville, and look at pictures of Taylor Lautner) to compare how he scales up to what Disney tells us is the ideal man.

• Admired by his hometown
• Possessing a Thick Neck
• A swell cleft in the chin
• Characterized as an "intimidating specimen," worthy of 5 "hurrahs" and 12 "hip-hips"
• Good at fighting and arranging lights
• Good at Biting in wrestling matches
• Burly and brawny, having biceps to spare
• A body whose every last inch is covered with hair
  
• Proficiency at expectorating
• A large diet of eggs
• Being roughly the size of a barge
• Particular skill at shooting firearms
• Boots as a common occurrence in daily wardrobe
• Profuse amounts of antlers in personal decorating

I don't know much about this wereman, but I am confident he lacks more or less 11 of these critical points. That's a Paltry 3/14. So what is so great about this yuppie besides maybe being "burly, brawny" and "hav[ing] biceps to spare," what does he have going for him? He seems far too much of a pretty boy to expectorate. I can say quite confidently there are probably some newborns with more hair than him. I have never seen him tromp around in boots or shoot a gun. On a musically unrelated note, he wears gratuitous amounts of hair gel/wax whatever it's called these days. Demetri Martin anyone?

• 2. It has also come to my attention that Facebook fan pages are becoming quite popular. I do not bite my thumb at this concept. This is a very viable means of
  

• 2. It has also come to my attention that Facebook fanes are becoming quite popular. I do not bite my thumb at this concept. This is a very viable means to build publicity for companies, celebrities/artists, politicians, nonprofit/charitable causes, and products. However, I have seen many pages whose titles logically should not have a fan following, such as declarative statements, "I hate..." or assertions. These should be group names, not fan pages, which brings me to my next point. I have also noticed that these mindless facebook users with the propensity to incessantly declare their fanship to pages tend to be kids in middle school. These kids should not be on facebook. All of their friends they most likely keep in touch with live within a 20 minute drive. They see each other everyday at school, and likely on the weekends. Stop spending excessive amounts of time on facebook, joining excessive numbers of pages, and clogging up my newsfeed with things I don't care about. Log off facebook until you're 17 and have friends in college before I hide you, or better, unfriend you. Furthermore, it is evident you don't understand the concept of inflation. When you are the fan of over 400 pages, it really devalues how much your support really means. Alex, for instance, is currently the fan of 390 things, since she is an 8th grade girl, this number has probably increased since I typed it. She is a fan of cookie dough in about 15 different ways. Gummy and sour snacks about 10. She is also a fan of Barack Obama once. Wow, I'm glad to see that you care about our president 1/15 as much as cookie dough, and that you are equally passionate about "Oh sorry G2G bye *Appear Offline* ...thank god that's over" (which doesn't even make sense). If I were that celebrity/politician/musical figure, and I could see what else you've put out for, I'd be disgusted. I somehow want to incorporate a witty sentence about easy girls/guys who devalue being intimate with someone by doing it with everything that walks, but that would probably be inappropriate.
  

• My third rant is also facebook related. Through my many years of education in secondary and post-secondary institutions, I have found that many people blame their unproductivity (new word) on things like facebook or skype. This annoys me to no end, and I must confess, I often judge these people as being unintelligent (at least with their time) or at the very least unmotivated. Good learners (Self regualted learners) regulate their metacognition, motivation and emotion, and finally their environment to maximize their learning. I am far from being the best at managing my time and doing tasks, but when I sit down to do things, (excuse my french) I get shit done. People who complain about this are basically saying this, "Hey, I 'wanted' to get this homework done, but facebook distracted me! I only needed to have microsoft word open to write this essay, but I can't not automatically log on to facebook the second I touch a computer. I didn't get to finish my work. Darn you facebook. This couldn't have anything to do with my lack of maturity in time management. This isn't my fault."
  
• Lil Wayne's voice. Basically it sounds vile. Gross. Disgusting. Perverted. I hear his voice and think he belongs at a classless strip club. People that listen to him probably get photographed while smoking weed in bongs, get DUI's at 19, are jerks of people, but are extremely successful at swimming.
  
• FML. 99% of those stories are just people complaining about inconsequential inconveniences and seeking attention. Their life doesn't suck. They probably have people who care about them. They probably are well enough off since they have access to the internet. And they probably don't have cancer or any terrible disease/disability. Learn how to adequately express your frustration without using primitive profanity. MLIA is indescribably better.
  
• Facebook games (farmville, etc). Get off facebook. If you have plethoric or unconscionable amounts of time to kill, spend it with a real video game. Or even better, do something productive.
  
• I now have to go off on things i haven't prepared to fulfill my titular allusion. Fortunately I thought of one. College Football Rankings, Heisman this year, and the BCS. It's evident that besides the top like 5 teams, no one has any clue who the hell is better than who. I think it's kind of a joke. I think it should be a more breakdown of like elite title contenders, seriously great teams, great teams, good teams, etc, like a tier based ranking. Heisman race: Mark Ingram is great, but if you look at Ingram, you must also seriously consider Toby Gerheart of Stanford. He is a beast. He has 32% of his team's yards, and 23/45 of their touchdowns. Ingram ha 28% of his teams yards and 15/37 of his team's touchdowns. I think Toby Gerheart is better, and am glad he is now getting consideration. Finally, I don't think anyone likes the BCS but Tim Cowlishaw. Literally everyone wants a playoff. People say there isn't enough time and that it wouldn't generate enough money. Well, I say phooey. Take the top 16 ranked teams. Yes there will always be controversy as to the last like 2 or 3 who get in, but they'll probably just get crushed anyways. College football regular season ends in like the first week of December. It would take four weeks to do a 16 team playoff. You could do two before Christmas and two after. College students wouldn't be on campus during this time, so it could be played around the country in regions like March Madness. Companies could sponsor each round, or quarters of the bracket. Schools could get money for getting in, and each successive round win by the company who sponsors that round. We would have a decisive champion. Wait, you say this way only 16 teams get money from corporations? Why not have a second tier tournament, like an NIT of football? Everyone loves march madness. Everyone loves having a winner. Football is more popular than basketball. Wouldn't a two tournament system be huge marketing? Pox on you FBS. We never actually have a "champion" in the truest sense of the word. Only a team that is thought to be the best because they've only played one other elite tier team when it mattered most.
  

Austin is a Prototypical Halloweentown (serving size 1 section, 3 servings per post)

First Thoughts:

1. Writing this blog is ten percent luck, twenty percent skill, fifteen percent concentrated power of will, five percent pleasure, fifty percent pain, and one hundred percent reason to remember the name. This is true in many ways, except that last one. scary though. (People over like 25 probably won't get this)
   
2. Due to the 15% concentrated power of will (I'm lacking in it) and fifty percent pain (not really that much, but it takes work/time to churn out AD musings with pathetic attempts at humor/allusions), I haven't written in like 2.5 weeks. This might get long (halfhearted allusion).
3. The time/sheer volume of writing may push this posting into the sugary/fatty "read sparingly" portion of the reading pyramid for proper reading health and prevention of tedium. Thus, this has been broken up into serving sizes conveniently for you. And it won't be in something obscure like ounces, because honestly, who weighs their sweets before they eat them.
4. Altered Wii health warning:

• Avoid excessive reading. Parents should monitor their children for appropriate play.
• Take a break every 10 minutes, even if you don't think you need it. This crap sneaks up on you and wastes gratuitous amounts of time.
  
• If your hands, wrists, arms or eyes become tired or sore while playing, or if you feel symptoms such as tingling, numbness, burning or stiffness, stop and rest for several hours before playing again. You think these can't happen from reading, but yes, they can. These off-brand second rate blogs can mess you up. Give you cancer in the state of California.
  
• If you continue to have any of the above symptoms or other discomfort during or after play, stop playing and see a doctor. Yeah. it's that bad.

Please excuse the lame attempt at humor you just read. It seemed like a wittier/better idea in my head.


Preview:
-Things that happened to me, including: BYX full retreat, Halloween, this past week
-Observations: pet peeves, night showers, useful but bad inventions
-New segment: random acts of kindness
-Videos
-Songs
-Prayer Requests

Things that happened to me:

• Three weekends ago was BYX Full Retreat, in which all member of BYX go on a retreat. This involved many traditions and fun things, some of which I can't tell you, most of which I can. First of all, the speaker (a BYX alumni (I never learned the proper uses of alum/alumni/alumnus, so this is probably used wrong) named like Tupair) was good. He talked about ways we hide the Gospel which I remember being very true, but alas, I had no pen and paper and am miserable at remembering things with one go around that were only spoken.
• We had krusteaz just add water pancakes (which are the best just add water pancakes around). There was a big line for chocolate chip pancakes and no line for normal pancakes. I was an innovator and got normal pancakes and grabbed a handful of chocolate chips and made a chocolate chip taco. We also had oatmeal that breakfast; there were several things wrong with this oatmeal: it was made in a giant, uncleaned pot that had been used for something about three months ago, it smelled awful, it tasted awful, i foolishly had some anyways (that's something wrong with me), no amount of brown sugar or chocolate chips could right any of the aforementioned wrongs.
• The first night there is an edification circle, in which graduating members sit in the middle of the circle and briefly talk about members that greatly impacted them, while the actives can talk about the guys in the middle who greatly influenced them, "edifying" one another. This lasted 3 hours for 5 graduating guys. I enjoyed it. I may not enjoy it next semester. Last spring semester, albeit poorly ran, it lasted 11 hours.
• There was much frisbee play and the semiannual pledge/active football game. Despite a neck and neck first half, we lost.
• Lastly for this weekend...¡¡¡SMASHBALL!!! I don't know why it took 18 years of my life to discover this awesome game. There is an equilateral octagon about, about 12 feet from opposite sides whose walls are wooden and in between three and four feet high. The ball used is a slightly deflated volleyball. Rules: 1) you are trying to hit (but it's really a slap) the ball with your hands with the objective of it hitting another player below his/her knees. if he/she is hit there with the ball, he/she is out. 2) after a player has hit the ball, the said player may not touch the ball again unless if the ball bounces off one of the walls or another player hits it. if a player hits it twice consecutively without it hitting the wall or another player, he/she is out. 3) You may defend yourself with your hands to keep from getting out. 4) Player is out if he/she: is hit below knees by ball (suicides count), hits ball up into air and another player catches it, is the last player to touch ball before it goes out of octagon. Two people can get out on one play. 5) last (wo)man standing wins.
• In short, this game is addictive and has great qualities: it is fun for everyone, low base level of skill/athleticism/coordination needed, mild competitiion. Honestly, need I say more? Basically, I think this game could be for a youth group what horse pool was to ours, but better, because it has more of a draw to more sporty kids. Basically: TELL PAM (or your youth minister) ABOUT THIS AND HAVE AN ASPIRING EAGLE BUILD IT. HECK, I'LL DO IT (maybe, probably not without a team of friends). YOU WON'T REGRET IT. (¿¿¿can't you see this is good enough to warrant upside down exclamation marks???
  

Here ends serving size one. Rest your eyes and your wits. Enjoy something.

• For cell group two weeks ago, we met at the 360 Overlook. It is a beautiful place where you can see Austin's skyline. That place was not extraordinary (it is, but i'd already been there). What was extraordinary was Tanner's driving. Tanner is my big bro. He is many things: awesome, funny, eccentric, awkward, endearing, cute, frequent user of the phrase "hey little guy," all around good guy, etc. Skilled in driving and with directions/location, He is by no means. Not at all. We almost died 5 times going there (this is hyperbole (not by much)) To the point where we were all dying laughing by the end, but not on the inside because knew we could've died. Sam Rhea (another all around cool guy, pledge brother, and Austin local) was giving directions, which Tanner seemed to disregard (along with occasional traffic signs) until the last minute. This caused mass yelling at Tanner, hilarity, and a thrill to be a passenger. Four most thrilling drivers I've rode with (not in any order): Brian Bedford, Brian Mountjoy, Tanner Hodgeson, That lady who drove my dad and I in the jeep from the parking lot to the golf course for the golf tournament in Reno (my brother can better elaborate on this should you have questions).

Halloween

• I was excited for Halloween for the first time in years for the following reasons: I thought I had a good costume, BYX mixer with Phi Lamb, and BYX Halloween party in the gracious Jordan Ramirez's apartment. Mixer was good. Party was fun. Costume, ehh. Here's why.
• I thought I had a genius idea to be Waldo, from Where's Waldo fame, for halloween because i strongly resemble him and thought it was awesome. Unfortunately, many other UT students had the same idea. Despite failing to be inconspicuous, I assert I was the best Waldo I saw for look-a-like reasons. Sidenote 1: nothing sucks more than seeing someone unintentionally dressed up exactly like you for a costume event. Sidenote 2: there are worse things;it can happen more than once, say at least 6 times walking around Austin/UT. Sidenote 3: there are many things far worse than these benign predicaments. Sidenote 4: did you see how I planned all these sidenotes (I started numbering at 1, not 2). Sidenote 5: if you ever seek attention from strangers, dress up as waldo on Halloween night in a big city and walk around for a few hours. You could get well over $100 in a few hours if the "If I had a dollar for every time..." aphorism rang true.
• The party was great for many reasons, one of which was my discovery of the functional purpose of hip hop/rap besides illustrating the beauty in hooking up with some easy chick (normally your bitch/shawty) you met at the club: forming a circle with friends and flailing limbs your limbs vaguely to the beat in ways that accentuate, to be racist, my inner caucasian (this is not true, because there are many caucasians who are brilliant dancers like this, namely Scott Eshbaugh). I am not very good at this, but enjoy it much (witnesses may attest to this). My "friend circle hip-hop/rap dancing" is more like what i described, while that of my more experienced peers was that, but with a more coherent, smooth motion, with motions that often loosely correspond to words in the song.
• Other lessons learned from the party. I already knew that strobe lights = awesome. I found out that Strobe lights + glow sticks > awesome. Keep it up with balloon = boring. Keep it up with a balloon and strobe light > awesome. Keep it up with balloon, strobe light, and glow sticks = indescribable. Basically strobe lights make everything but my abrupt dance moves cool. Also, even at non-alcoholic parties, drunk people will find them: One shady guy came in with a backpack full of keystone, and tried to hand them out to kids; One scantily clad, inebriated girl came in (keep in mind this is a Christian, dry party (but rockin' nonetheless)) came in and may or may not have been the culprit of a red punch stain now ingrained in Jordan's carpet.
• Austin is also, like many big cities, a great place for halloween, mainly due to 50K+ college kids, the majority of whom are looking to go crazy, a majority party of these kids walking the street inebriated. Combine this with the ability to observe these drunkards from a distance and you get people watching gold. If you are a pervy old guy who enjoys seeing scantily clad college girls, there's another plus (cringe).
• Austin is also famously home to 6th street, the street with all the popular clubs/bars. Basically, if you like personal bubble is greater than 6 inches, don't go here. Do if you enjoy seeing crazy costumes and things in general. I didn't go this year, but learned that there is always someone dressed as a giant penis. Other more creative, elaborate costumes abound.

End Halloween. Last week, I was waiting for the bus after tutoring for Metz. I already knew that riding the bus is always fun: crazy people collide, a great chance for a bus with pee in it (two instances), a heated verbal argument (two instances), and opportunities to be grateful and see life from other people's shoes (infinite). I did not discover that waiting for the bus can be interesting too. While waiting for the bus after tutoring in an east Austin neighborhood (east Austin is considered the run down, lower socioeconomic part of Austin), a sketch old car drove up with two young, disheveled people as driver and passenger. They pulled to a stop in front of myself and my friend Hannah Moody on the wrong side of the road and rolled down their window (red flag).
"Do either of you participate in any illegal activities?"
-After glancing at each other with a hidden smile, a calm "No" in unison.
"All right. Well pretend you didn't see us then." (obviously a yes would've yielded a conversation about drugs)
They do a three point turn and drive off. Hannah and I burst out laughing once they are out of sight. This was not as funny in retelling it, but reasons why it was funny/disheartening:

• Funny: situational humor, that's never happened to me before
• Funny: Hannah and I are two incredibly innocent, goody-two shoes looking white college kids, we are the last people you would want to help you get the goods
• Disheartening: This was right outside of a school

End serving two, things that happened to me section, and any chance at getting more than seven hours of sleep tonight.

Observations

• One of my pet peeves is people who stand in the middle of the escalator, or go two wide in an escalator. Etiquette says the right is for standing and the left is for walking/climbing. Go to any big city subway station and you'll see this. Kids at UT are painfully unaware of this factoid. It irritates me without fail, especially when I am running late for class. In reality, the difference in time between climbing the escalator instead of taking the ride probably won't make or break me being late, but it irks me regardless
• In speaking with folks back up in Plano, this is happening there too. If you aren't from these parts, basically, it has been raining at least once every ten days (no joke, that's being generous) since mid September. At first it was great: Austin was in a huge drought, and I always liked the rain. However, this rain was different: it's always been simply rain showers, not thunderstorms. If you're from texas, you know this isn't kosher here. Texas is about extremes, and when it rains here, Gaia (captain planet anyone?) normally goes all out: huge drops, epic thunder and lightning, leaving you in awestruck wonder as long as you are inside. This was petty california rain. In short: 1) it sucked, 2) the Mayans might be right about the world ending soon; since when does Texas have simple rainshowers? 3) that statement was a joke, i don't think any civilization thinks the world or themselves is going to last 3000+ years. I think they were like, "well we're pretty much done." 4) My assessment of the rains suckage may have been influenced by my lack of an umbrella.
• I thought this was funny; it might be considered racist, but, think about this one: The Native Americans were the only ancient civilization that never invented the wheel. Curious...
  
• I think that the snooze button is a great invention in theory, but has caused more harm than help. How many times have people kept snoozing right on through an important meeting/appointment/class. Too many times. I see the necessity for it, but it seems like it would be better if alarms just went off across the room and didn't stop until you solved a sudoku or something (they make those). What other inventions (besides controversial things like abortions, weapons, time consuming/impersonal technology) would the world be better without? You snooze you lose.
  
• I don't take night showers for a reason: my hair. It does not dry by the time I go to bed. It dries while I am asleep. Bad things happens. My hair becomes mischievous and starts flying high, defying gravity, and you'll never bring it down. Here's an example
• 

Random act of kindness of the period of time in which i posted this: on the bus, a lady left at her stop and left her sweater. A man got off and went and gave it to her. these things make me happy.

Youtube Videos you May or may not have seen (depends largely on your age)

• You thought the snuggie was ridiculous. They outdid themselves with the dog snuggie. this is real. I'll leave the punchline to you.
• A ridiculous move in pulled off by a nine year old kid during halftime of a bruins game. notice the dumbfounded nine year old goalie. Surely thousands of hockey players, amateur and pro started trying to do this the days after this happened. this one isn't the best version, but it works
• More Sports: Female soccer + crazy female hormones = this
  
• Kittens Inspired by Kittens: my friends will hopefully already have seen this. If you haven't, combine a cute, peppy little girl with pictures of cute kittens. If you love cute kids, see david after dentist, star wars according to a 3 year old, and when a three year old is asked about monsters. Basically, if my kid gets to be 10 and doesn't have a youtube hit, I will be mildly disappointed.
  
• A man's musical inclination combined with creative vegetable vision

Songs I like right now

• "Daylight" and "yea yeah" by Matt & Kim
• Empire State of Mind by Jay-z (featuring Alicia Keys)
• "All I ever wanted" and "DotA" by Basshunter
• Everything by Michael Bublé
• "7 things" by Miley cyrus (will be added to my playlist called "ditzy heyyyyyyyy," which consists of surface deep, ditzy songs sung by usually young female artists) LOLLLOL (Plus, catch the last video of miley before Disney starts to blatantly try to capitalize on Miley's increasingly mature sexuality! (you must see the party in the usa video to understand))
  
• Basically anything by taylor swift. I have a music crush on her right now. it's cool that she writes her own songs, it is hardly done by mainstream people. Although her songs are all consequently surface deep and about love. they're....so....catchy
• Fireflies by Owl City. This a lie. I actually hate it. The song makes no sense until you find out their songs are written because the lead singer has insomnia and stays up mashing whatever words together that rhyme. But...it's catchy...save...me....
• most colbie Calliat, right now "Fallin' for you" love it love it love it.
• A song that i don't know the words and only pieces of the melody, but don't know what it's called (IT'S DRIVING ME CRAZY). It is an acoustic-y happy, mellow love song with predominately a guitar and a high male voice that makes me think vaguely of the song "Tu Amor" by RBD

to listen to these songs, see the playlist i made to listen to while i work. check out the playlist i made

Spiritual Stuff

• This past week I was reminded that I too am a child of God, which means God made me, and God looked at all he had made and deemed it good, which means I am good in God's eyes. this humbled me/happied me.
• I lesser than three the Stone and BYX
  
• Pray for Ft. Hood victims, the 100 missionaries the stone is sending out (especially the one who was robbed at knife point in India, did nothing to retaliate, and received a .25" deep gash from his mouth to ear), Zachery Vanderford missions, two friends I have back home who are going through tough times

Thanks for taking the time to read this. If your eyes strike these words, I am honored.

Toodles