My perceptions on the whole "girls mature faster than guys" argument has been forever shattered by my experiences this summer working at the conference desk. To explain how it's been shattered, you'll need to understand some facts of life that I have observed.
Firstly, when observing adolescents to determine their true nature, you must examine the specimens in question in an environment outside parental supervision. When teenagers are around their parents, they behave differently for the same reason a dog doesn't jump on the couch when it's owner's home: namely, they don't want to be swatted with a rolled up copy of Taste of Home magazine. Secondarily, the environment must be one in which there are many other specimens all without parental supervision, and thus acting in their true colors as well. This creates the perfect environment for observing the adolescent condition. Thus, I have determined that summer camps are actually the perfect place to observe and draw conclusions about the developing man or woman.
Secondly, you must understand the basis for my previous acceptance of the assumption that women develop maturity earlier than men. I have found in my studies that the best indicator of a given adolescent's maturity is what I like to call the "Camp Creeper Factor." (CCF) This is defined as such: The amount of time measured in minutes that a given camper spends awkwardly hitting on the opposite gender multiplied by the either the number of hairs in their failstache or the number of hours you estimate it took them to apply the copious amounts of facial makeup around their eyes will always = the number of years until that individual is actually ready to function outside of summer camp.
Previously, my experience at camp had always led me to believe that CCFs for male individuals was exponentially higher than the CCFs for female campers in the same age group. It's common practice for male campers to spend their entire summer camp trying desperately and lamely to attract the attention of the female campers. This phenomenon is painful to watch and is often accompanied by copious failstache hair, thus leading to a very high CCF. Meanwhile the female campers seem to have zero interest in flirting with the notable exception of any female camper with blonde highlights. Thus, any non-highlighted female will generally have a 0 CCF since 0 x whatever their makeup earns them is still 0. However, what I've learned this summer has led me to take another look at the CCF of females.
What I have discovered will I am sure rock the substantial scientific community studying adolescent creepiness. Girls don't flirt with guy campers, they stalk guy STAFFERS. This is a revolutionary discovery! Since the CCF on the males they have available in their age group is so high, they naturally gravitate to the nearest available non-camper males, who have long since outgrown the attraction that 62 gallons of green sparkly makeup has for the camper males. This has resulted on my being stalked by no less than 5 different groups of middle and high school girls who for some reason mistake "being trapped behind a desk and obligated to be friendly" for "approving of the awkward crush you seem to have on me."
Think of the repercussions! Now, instead of having 0 CCF, they have an even higher CCF than male campers, who at least stick to girls their age. Thus I have determined that each minute spent awkwardly hitting on someone older than you must be accompanied by another integer for every year older than you the subject is. For example, a 15 year old hitting on a 19 year old for 10 minutes would actually result in a CCF of 50 times the makeup factor.
All that to say: Guys mature faster because at least they stick to what is theoretically acheivable.
Other than revolutionizing scientific discoveries, working at the Conference Desk this summer has afforded me quite the opportunity to get acquainted with the men and women who work every day to make Covenant function. Names I see in e-mails all the time, like Rodney Miller, Leda Goodman, and Angie Nail actually have faces to attach to them and overall, getting to know Covenant's staff has been a great experience. They're awesome and if you don't know the people filling up your inbox each year you should make the effort to stop people with coffee mugs around campus and find out who they are.
We're now most of the way through all of the camps coming to covenant this summer. After another two weeks of Student Life camps, we're done, and I'll be working for facilities in between RA training and getting ready for the semester to start. Next week I'm actually heading to upstate NY to meet my family at my uncle's lake house there for a weekend before returning to Covenant WITH A CAR!!!!
I've also noticed I have a bad habit of burning myself recently. Whether I'm sunburning myself, lighting my thumb on fire trying to grill something, accidentally touching hot oil, or just straight up dropping flaming branches on my foot, my subconscious seems set on self-immolation. Have to watch that.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Ghandi with a 'Zooka!
I thought this blog was dead. It hadn't shown any life signs in six months, it hadn't even entered my mind. I was well past the third stage of mourning for it when it suddenly gasped, punched it's fist through the coffin and clawed it's way back to the surface of the Earth. It returned to me, and demanded I update it.
So, now at the behest of a (possibly undead) internet journal, I return to chronicle my life once again. The past semester went by surprisingly quickly due to the fact that it was shortened by a week at either end. The first week of classes was canceled due to massive snowstorms and finals week was canceled due to massive twisty-winds-of-doom storms that knocked out power and water to campus for a week and caused insane amounts of damage to the surrounding community.
Other developments include learning to run a sound board while helping with the college's production of Doubt, wearing a fake mustache for And Then There Were None, dying my hair black during a speech tournament and shocking my poor mother, and learning that a whole week of nothing but rice to eat is not something to repeat.I also applied for and got a position as an RA next year. I'll be working and living down in the student apartments next year with my co-apartments RA (since both men and women live down there) Stephanie Ammons. I'm really excited and look forward to the opportunity to live in the more independent apartments. I'll miss dorm life, sure, but I'm going to have to learn to shop and cook for myself eventually, and better sooner than later.
Toward the end of the semester I signed up to take a may term class in Jordan, which was good fun, very eye-opening, exhausting, and ultimately awesome. I made a separate blog with my journals from the trip, so I'm not going to re-tell the tale here. If you do want to read about it, you can find the whole thing here: http://hummusandmintlemonade.blogspot.com/
After getting off my flight from Atlanta and catching a shuttle to Chattanooga, I was given a ride back to campus by Ila Davidson, who was picking up Sara Schaaf and Hannah Sluis and had an extra seat in her car. Grateful to return to American normality, I grabbed my bags and walked into my apartment for the summer, where I was greeted by Jimmy Gildard, and Tim VanVliet, who along with Brandon Flynn were to be my roommates. I unpacked and showered, and then my mom and Emily arrived with the rest of my things, having graciously driven down to drop them off for me. They then treated me, Tim ,and Jimmy to Mellow Mushroom pizza (since Brandon was gone for the weekend.)
We enjoyed the time to catch up and eat good food, then returned to the apartment and I collapsed in an exhausted heap on my bed and slept for a very long time. The next day I started work at my summer job, which is manning the Conference Desk in Carter Lobby for all the camps and conferences that come through Covenant in the summertime. My coworker for that shift was Ila Davidson, who along with being totally nutty is a very fun person to work a shift with. Since it was a night shift and there wasn't anybody around, we ended up spending most of the time in between things to do on Facebook and Stumbleupon, occasionally pausing to drive the golf cart around campus to make sure no alarms were going off, no fires were being started, and that no one was watching South Park in Andreas Lobby illicitly.
I have to say that this summer's job is really nice. I like my coworkers, the job's not stressful, and since it's full time I'm able to work far more hours than any of my other job options would have allowed. We have a good deal of fun behind the desk too. We have a serious log of events that happen during the day (ex: Fuse blown in Carter, student leaders lost keys, etc.) and also the "Daily Snews" which contains all the humorous events which happen during the day. For example, yesterday's Snews contains this entry: "9:30PM: Campers approach the desk with a look of terror. 'I locked both bathroom doors. Now we can't get into the bathroom.' They then marched down with me to Andreas as if going to their own execution. Both doors were, in fact, locked. No one died."
Apart from working, life at Covenant over the summer is pretty relaxed. Student workers get together to cook, eat, watch movies, play games, and generally enjoy the season and the nice weather. The pool at Covenant is open, and the weather is surprisingly hotter than it was in Jordan, which makes the pool a very attractive option.
By way of more specific events, two days ago Drew Moriarty, Brianna Pearch, Waverly McMahon, and Kaddy Hall got together with me and ate breakfast for dinner that Drew and Brianna had made and watched the A-Team movie, which is one of the best underrated movies of ever. While watching a part of the movie where a character quotes Ghandi on violence, we started theorizing about Ghandi in a fight, which led to the conclusion that due to lack of body mass he'd have to resort to a bazooka. This led to me drawing a picture of Ghandi, on a zipline, with a bazooka. I'm actually quite proud of the drawing, since you can actually tell who the picture is supposed to be and what he's doing, which is very rare among my drawings.
So for now I'm sitting at the desk during a lull, watching a technician install internet cable in the ceiling and working my way through captioning the 960 photos I took in Jordan to submit as a Global Trends project.
Hoping that I'll keep this up this time and not have to come up with another lame excuse for not updating,
Ciao.
So, now at the behest of a (possibly undead) internet journal, I return to chronicle my life once again. The past semester went by surprisingly quickly due to the fact that it was shortened by a week at either end. The first week of classes was canceled due to massive snowstorms and finals week was canceled due to massive twisty-winds-of-doom storms that knocked out power and water to campus for a week and caused insane amounts of damage to the surrounding community.
Other developments include learning to run a sound board while helping with the college's production of Doubt, wearing a fake mustache for And Then There Were None, dying my hair black during a speech tournament and shocking my poor mother, and learning that a whole week of nothing but rice to eat is not something to repeat.I also applied for and got a position as an RA next year. I'll be working and living down in the student apartments next year with my co-apartments RA (since both men and women live down there) Stephanie Ammons. I'm really excited and look forward to the opportunity to live in the more independent apartments. I'll miss dorm life, sure, but I'm going to have to learn to shop and cook for myself eventually, and better sooner than later.
Toward the end of the semester I signed up to take a may term class in Jordan, which was good fun, very eye-opening, exhausting, and ultimately awesome. I made a separate blog with my journals from the trip, so I'm not going to re-tell the tale here. If you do want to read about it, you can find the whole thing here: http://hummusandmintlemonade.blogspot.com/
After getting off my flight from Atlanta and catching a shuttle to Chattanooga, I was given a ride back to campus by Ila Davidson, who was picking up Sara Schaaf and Hannah Sluis and had an extra seat in her car. Grateful to return to American normality, I grabbed my bags and walked into my apartment for the summer, where I was greeted by Jimmy Gildard, and Tim VanVliet, who along with Brandon Flynn were to be my roommates. I unpacked and showered, and then my mom and Emily arrived with the rest of my things, having graciously driven down to drop them off for me. They then treated me, Tim ,and Jimmy to Mellow Mushroom pizza (since Brandon was gone for the weekend.)
We enjoyed the time to catch up and eat good food, then returned to the apartment and I collapsed in an exhausted heap on my bed and slept for a very long time. The next day I started work at my summer job, which is manning the Conference Desk in Carter Lobby for all the camps and conferences that come through Covenant in the summertime. My coworker for that shift was Ila Davidson, who along with being totally nutty is a very fun person to work a shift with. Since it was a night shift and there wasn't anybody around, we ended up spending most of the time in between things to do on Facebook and Stumbleupon, occasionally pausing to drive the golf cart around campus to make sure no alarms were going off, no fires were being started, and that no one was watching South Park in Andreas Lobby illicitly.
I have to say that this summer's job is really nice. I like my coworkers, the job's not stressful, and since it's full time I'm able to work far more hours than any of my other job options would have allowed. We have a good deal of fun behind the desk too. We have a serious log of events that happen during the day (ex: Fuse blown in Carter, student leaders lost keys, etc.) and also the "Daily Snews" which contains all the humorous events which happen during the day. For example, yesterday's Snews contains this entry: "9:30PM: Campers approach the desk with a look of terror. 'I locked both bathroom doors. Now we can't get into the bathroom.' They then marched down with me to Andreas as if going to their own execution. Both doors were, in fact, locked. No one died."
Apart from working, life at Covenant over the summer is pretty relaxed. Student workers get together to cook, eat, watch movies, play games, and generally enjoy the season and the nice weather. The pool at Covenant is open, and the weather is surprisingly hotter than it was in Jordan, which makes the pool a very attractive option.
By way of more specific events, two days ago Drew Moriarty, Brianna Pearch, Waverly McMahon, and Kaddy Hall got together with me and ate breakfast for dinner that Drew and Brianna had made and watched the A-Team movie, which is one of the best underrated movies of ever. While watching a part of the movie where a character quotes Ghandi on violence, we started theorizing about Ghandi in a fight, which led to the conclusion that due to lack of body mass he'd have to resort to a bazooka. This led to me drawing a picture of Ghandi, on a zipline, with a bazooka. I'm actually quite proud of the drawing, since you can actually tell who the picture is supposed to be and what he's doing, which is very rare among my drawings.
So for now I'm sitting at the desk during a lull, watching a technician install internet cable in the ceiling and working my way through captioning the 960 photos I took in Jordan to submit as a Global Trends project.
Hoping that I'll keep this up this time and not have to come up with another lame excuse for not updating,
Ciao.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Semester in a Sentance
It's finally happened.
I never thought it would come to this, but, as you can see, I've arrived at that point.
I'm an apoloblogger.
This is at least the third time I've had to start a post by apologizing to the internet at large for not updating sooner. (don't count them, please.) I'm not going to make another promise to keep updating (as I always seem to do and then fail to do) but I am going to promise to finish writing this one, post it, and then perhaps speak about it to someone who brings up the subject at a later date. Rather than belabor that fact, however, I'm going to dive right in to trying to catch up to things I actually remember and can blog about.
Three things you need to know which have occured since the last time I blogged:
1. I dyed my hair teal.
2. I opened an internet poker business.
3. I learned how to play Tetris.
And with that I'm sure you don't need any more information on the months of...let's see...September-November, so let's start in on December! ;)
Yeah...that's not quite going to fly, is it? Hmm.. let's see.
September:
Was so long ago the only thing I remember doing was being attacked with fans. I also remember eating rice.
October:
Tried out for, got cast in, played a publisher in Confessions at Knifepoint (pretty sure that went into November but it started here so there you go.) Went to Disney World with mom over Fall Break, which was pretty epic even though she decided to create an album of photos of me with as many Disney Princesses as she could find. Because I'm a good sport and because the last time I refused to get a picture taken with Disney characters I was attacked by Bambi animals, I agreed. The first one she paired me with was Pocahontas, who was, for a Native American musical star, rather a smart aleck. I said "My mom would like me to get a picture with you for her scrapbook (all true)." She replied, eyebrow raised, "Your mom wants a photo, eh? Sure." Then she turned and smiled at my mom's camera. This would have been a minor incident if my mom hadn't spotted Mulan the next day in Epcot and sent me over, where I realized that it was the same person in a kimono, and worse, she recognized me, as evidenced by her greeting "Ah, the brave warrior from the Indian village! How are you?" I think I'm justified in wishing an ancestral curse of sarcasm on both mom and Miss Disney.
After getting back from Disney, my mom gave me a rice cooker, which is the coolest thing ever to come out of Japan since sushi. Basically, it's a pot with a button. You put rice and water in, press the button, and food comes out. Woot.
November:
Freshman Wynn Bennett scarred my turtle concerning a knife in her possession and Alan and Jordan became Third Lobby Pokemaniacs. I held a prop gun in Alia Hollback's face for Confessions at Knifepoint every day for a week and then I went home for Thanksgiving, where I ate a ridiculous amount of food and helped my mom bake 73 dozen cookies, which I finally got rid of the last of the day before I came back here for Christmas break.
December:
I finished classes, studied for finals, took finals, and in between my hall became addicted to Dexter, a tv show about a serial killer who kills serial killers. Odd thing to watch around the holidays but such is dorm life (and I think quite a few people were projecting their finals into all of the victims.)
Then I flew back home on an airplane, went to a retirement party for our neighbor, Mr. Freeman (who, since he is no longer an employee of the Federal Government, wears a t-shirt with the FedEx logo rearranged so that it says "ExFed".) and then I watched a movie with my sister.
I started back to work at Pottery Barn last night and when I arrived home at midnight realized that I was locked out of the house and had to tempt the dog to start making noise and alert someone that I was freezing at the front door.
That's the story till now, I guess. The next time I update I promise that I will write some words here and maybe push the publish button. :) Now I'm going to post this and go back to the Skype conversation with Alysha I've been neglecting while writing this.
I never thought it would come to this, but, as you can see, I've arrived at that point.
I'm an apoloblogger.
This is at least the third time I've had to start a post by apologizing to the internet at large for not updating sooner. (don't count them, please.) I'm not going to make another promise to keep updating (as I always seem to do and then fail to do) but I am going to promise to finish writing this one, post it, and then perhaps speak about it to someone who brings up the subject at a later date. Rather than belabor that fact, however, I'm going to dive right in to trying to catch up to things I actually remember and can blog about.
Three things you need to know which have occured since the last time I blogged:
1. I dyed my hair teal.
2. I opened an internet poker business.
3. I learned how to play Tetris.
And with that I'm sure you don't need any more information on the months of...let's see...September-November, so let's start in on December! ;)
Yeah...that's not quite going to fly, is it? Hmm.. let's see.
September:
Was so long ago the only thing I remember doing was being attacked with fans. I also remember eating rice.
October:
Tried out for, got cast in, played a publisher in Confessions at Knifepoint (pretty sure that went into November but it started here so there you go.) Went to Disney World with mom over Fall Break, which was pretty epic even though she decided to create an album of photos of me with as many Disney Princesses as she could find. Because I'm a good sport and because the last time I refused to get a picture taken with Disney characters I was attacked by Bambi animals, I agreed. The first one she paired me with was Pocahontas, who was, for a Native American musical star, rather a smart aleck. I said "My mom would like me to get a picture with you for her scrapbook (all true)." She replied, eyebrow raised, "Your mom wants a photo, eh? Sure." Then she turned and smiled at my mom's camera. This would have been a minor incident if my mom hadn't spotted Mulan the next day in Epcot and sent me over, where I realized that it was the same person in a kimono, and worse, she recognized me, as evidenced by her greeting "Ah, the brave warrior from the Indian village! How are you?" I think I'm justified in wishing an ancestral curse of sarcasm on both mom and Miss Disney.
After getting back from Disney, my mom gave me a rice cooker, which is the coolest thing ever to come out of Japan since sushi. Basically, it's a pot with a button. You put rice and water in, press the button, and food comes out. Woot.
November:
Freshman Wynn Bennett scarred my turtle concerning a knife in her possession and Alan and Jordan became Third Lobby Pokemaniacs. I held a prop gun in Alia Hollback's face for Confessions at Knifepoint every day for a week and then I went home for Thanksgiving, where I ate a ridiculous amount of food and helped my mom bake 73 dozen cookies, which I finally got rid of the last of the day before I came back here for Christmas break.
December:
I finished classes, studied for finals, took finals, and in between my hall became addicted to Dexter, a tv show about a serial killer who kills serial killers. Odd thing to watch around the holidays but such is dorm life (and I think quite a few people were projecting their finals into all of the victims.)
Then I flew back home on an airplane, went to a retirement party for our neighbor, Mr. Freeman (who, since he is no longer an employee of the Federal Government, wears a t-shirt with the FedEx logo rearranged so that it says "ExFed".) and then I watched a movie with my sister.
I started back to work at Pottery Barn last night and when I arrived home at midnight realized that I was locked out of the house and had to tempt the dog to start making noise and alert someone that I was freezing at the front door.
That's the story till now, I guess. The next time I update I promise that I will write some words here and maybe push the publish button. :) Now I'm going to post this and go back to the Skype conversation with Alysha I've been neglecting while writing this.
Friday, September 10, 2010
The Results of An Experiment
As with all experiments, the results of my venture into video blogging yielded unexpected results. Not bad, but intriguing. The consensus was mainly that people liked the video blog, but they wanted the text updates to continue. Thus, they continue. I also learned that video blogging isn't very good for communicating the facts of an event, but it is an excellent format for going into more detail on important or interesting events that I've already communicated. So for now, what I think I'm gonna do is chronicle the week's events here in text updates and then elaborate on a couple of them in a video blog. I also had a couple requests for a Q+A segment, so if ya'll send me questions then I'll answer them. If not, then I'll just fill the time answering fake e-mails from India.
Okay, well some of this is going to be a re-hash of stuff I said in the video, but some of it will be new stuff.
Last week I started joining Brethren's weekend pastime: Brethren Lawn Club (we want to get t-shirts made). Basically BLC is a bunch of Brethren guys heading out to the chapel lawn to play lawn games like croquet, frizcup, bocce, or frisbee. This past week we mostly played croquet, and after making it all the way to the second wicket before Steve won the first time around, I actually won the next game through a series of blind luck moments and being as cutthroat as I ever get when playing a game.
Learned Ladies has been quite fun to start working on. We're blitzing through the rehearsals since we only have about 2 weeks before we need to be totally ready for tech week. Rehearsals themselves have been a TON of fun. In addition to Jordan apparently thwacking Seth Marsh a good one with her fan (by accident, I'm sure) we've had a couch that actively tries to trip people, a hilariously flirty Katie Jenkins (in character), and I've had to practice getting really angry. Last night we practiced a scene where my character gets quite mad at Jordan's character. I had been playing it as perturbed, but Prof. Slav told me to "take it from 2 to 9.5" at which point I realized that I am not good at being that angry. I eventually got it, but now I actually have to practice working myself up (mostly by re-playing the finale to LOST in my head). The first time I actually achieved "angry" Jordan was surprised and kind of jumped backwards, which ruined the whole thing and made me start laughing.
Speaking of laughing and Jordan; Alan, Ann, and I last night decided to play a prank on Jordan to get her back for various bits of mischief she'd perpetrated this week. It started when Alan filched her backpack after rehearsal (where Jordan inexplicably decided to hang around an empty Sanderson building). We then decided to hang said backpack from the Founder's lamppost. Not satisfied, we enlisted Ann to bring us some more of Jordan's stuff from her room, which we taped to the other lamppost/put in a tree with a huge masking tape arrow pointing to it. It took Jordan a really long time to find all of it (and a surprisingly long time to realize that Ann had been involved even though it was closed dorms and thus neither Alan or I could possibly have gotten her stuff.) She was a fairly good sport, even when we made her root through a bunch of bushes since she didn't believe she'd found everything (which she had, so she was rooting for nothing).
Hmm..that kinda brings us up to today. Sorry for the short post! I promise it will be longer next week!
Until then, have a good week. And Skype me!
Okay, well some of this is going to be a re-hash of stuff I said in the video, but some of it will be new stuff.
Last week I started joining Brethren's weekend pastime: Brethren Lawn Club (we want to get t-shirts made). Basically BLC is a bunch of Brethren guys heading out to the chapel lawn to play lawn games like croquet, frizcup, bocce, or frisbee. This past week we mostly played croquet, and after making it all the way to the second wicket before Steve won the first time around, I actually won the next game through a series of blind luck moments and being as cutthroat as I ever get when playing a game.
Learned Ladies has been quite fun to start working on. We're blitzing through the rehearsals since we only have about 2 weeks before we need to be totally ready for tech week. Rehearsals themselves have been a TON of fun. In addition to Jordan apparently thwacking Seth Marsh a good one with her fan (by accident, I'm sure) we've had a couch that actively tries to trip people, a hilariously flirty Katie Jenkins (in character), and I've had to practice getting really angry. Last night we practiced a scene where my character gets quite mad at Jordan's character. I had been playing it as perturbed, but Prof. Slav told me to "take it from 2 to 9.5" at which point I realized that I am not good at being that angry. I eventually got it, but now I actually have to practice working myself up (mostly by re-playing the finale to LOST in my head). The first time I actually achieved "angry" Jordan was surprised and kind of jumped backwards, which ruined the whole thing and made me start laughing.
Speaking of laughing and Jordan; Alan, Ann, and I last night decided to play a prank on Jordan to get her back for various bits of mischief she'd perpetrated this week. It started when Alan filched her backpack after rehearsal (where Jordan inexplicably decided to hang around an empty Sanderson building). We then decided to hang said backpack from the Founder's lamppost. Not satisfied, we enlisted Ann to bring us some more of Jordan's stuff from her room, which we taped to the other lamppost/put in a tree with a huge masking tape arrow pointing to it. It took Jordan a really long time to find all of it (and a surprisingly long time to realize that Ann had been involved even though it was closed dorms and thus neither Alan or I could possibly have gotten her stuff.) She was a fairly good sport, even when we made her root through a bunch of bushes since she didn't believe she'd found everything (which she had, so she was rooting for nothing).
Hmm..that kinda brings us up to today. Sorry for the short post! I promise it will be longer next week!
Until then, have a good week. And Skype me!
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Back on Da Hill
Yeah, I know. I'm late again. I can't even claim ignorance since the last time I updated I named the thing "T-minus three weeks". Well, I'm back at Covenant now. Oops. Well, let's dive right in then, shall we?
The last few weeks at home were pretty largely uneventful (with a few notable exceptions). Mostly it was just get up, go to work, veg, sleep, repeat. I did go to see the Expendables with Josh and Adam Bernitt, which proved that while Stallone can do action, he cannot write a very good script. It was basically a lot of explosions, car chases, and gunfights punctuated by the occasional failed attempt to be deep. Good explosions, bad dialogue.
The last week before I left Angela Beall came down from PA and we got the chance to hang out before I left back for Chattanooga. We kayaked on the West River, which was a ton of fun, and then afterward ventured to downtown Annapolis to tour the main drag. From art shops featuring fantastically complicated sculptures to "oriental markets" with lots of Asian kitsch to joke shops selling Bacon tuxedos and mugs with pictures of Henry VIII and wives who disappear as hot liquid is poured into the mug, we discovered that Annapolis is a very eclectic place to be. They even had a shop devoted entirely to hats.
Along the way we met a street painter who told us that Annapolis was the best place for an artist to be compared to other cities, and that "the Mexicans even asked me to leave after I did this." and then proceeded to turn a spray can into a flamethrower to dry his paint. Very talented, mildly crazy? Sounds like most artists I know.
After Annapolis we checked out Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, which although I will refrain from publishing another nerd-rant about, probably beat out Inception as my favorite movie this summer, check it out by all means.
After Angela left Sunday afternoon, I got down to getting the finishing touches done on packing before my flight on Monday. This was pretty easy since my Mom and Emily had already left for Tennessee for totally unrelated reasons and had taken most of my stuff with them. I just had to pack my suitcase and my new computer.
Oh yeah, I didn't mention that in my last post, but about two and a half weeks ago I got a brand new Macbook Pro 15-inch laptop. I'm really really pleased with it and will probably not go back to PC. Sorry Bill.
So Monday morning this amazing machine wouldn't boot up (through no fault of its own, mind you, I messed it up due to ignorance of Mac software) so on the way to the airport I stopped at the Apple store and got it fixed. Funnily enough, the guy who fixed it happened to be someone I was in fourth grade with and haven't seen since. Odd how that works.
Anyway I caught my flight, and since my sister had classes the next day, she got on the exact same plane and turned around back to DC. Mom and I went to Tony's for dinner (great pasta, if you happen to be in Chattanooga). We did some last minute shopping and then Tuesday I moved back to Brethren.
It's been really awesome seeing everybody again, and Dan Rienstra, my roommate, is a really great guy. He had the brilliant idea to buy a very comfortable green folding chair that has made studying so much easier. After Mom left I went to the O-Team (orientation team) skit night and laughed my head off, then re-connected with Liz and Mary Simpson, Ann Jones, Liz Brink, and Alan Cheney.
Classes started on Thursday, continued into Friday, and nothing very eventful or blog-worthy occurred. I'm taking Principles of Management with Dr. Quatro, Intermediate Accounting with Dodson, Doctrine with Kapic, Statistics with Eames, and Microeconomics with Wescher. Fun stuff. Friday night Alan, Liz, Liz B, and I went to go see Scott Pilgrim again, just as good the second time, and then I read a lot of stuff for classes. I continued reading when I woke up and finished just in time not to have anything left to read during the ridiculously cheesy OSHA video we had to watch this morning. Fail.
Anyway, didn't really do much of note today. Hopefully this semester won't be too busy and I'll remember to update more regularly.
As if...
Anyway, arrievederci!
The last few weeks at home were pretty largely uneventful (with a few notable exceptions). Mostly it was just get up, go to work, veg, sleep, repeat. I did go to see the Expendables with Josh and Adam Bernitt, which proved that while Stallone can do action, he cannot write a very good script. It was basically a lot of explosions, car chases, and gunfights punctuated by the occasional failed attempt to be deep. Good explosions, bad dialogue.
The last week before I left Angela Beall came down from PA and we got the chance to hang out before I left back for Chattanooga. We kayaked on the West River, which was a ton of fun, and then afterward ventured to downtown Annapolis to tour the main drag. From art shops featuring fantastically complicated sculptures to "oriental markets" with lots of Asian kitsch to joke shops selling Bacon tuxedos and mugs with pictures of Henry VIII and wives who disappear as hot liquid is poured into the mug, we discovered that Annapolis is a very eclectic place to be. They even had a shop devoted entirely to hats.
Along the way we met a street painter who told us that Annapolis was the best place for an artist to be compared to other cities, and that "the Mexicans even asked me to leave after I did this." and then proceeded to turn a spray can into a flamethrower to dry his paint. Very talented, mildly crazy? Sounds like most artists I know.
After Annapolis we checked out Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, which although I will refrain from publishing another nerd-rant about, probably beat out Inception as my favorite movie this summer, check it out by all means.
After Angela left Sunday afternoon, I got down to getting the finishing touches done on packing before my flight on Monday. This was pretty easy since my Mom and Emily had already left for Tennessee for totally unrelated reasons and had taken most of my stuff with them. I just had to pack my suitcase and my new computer.
Oh yeah, I didn't mention that in my last post, but about two and a half weeks ago I got a brand new Macbook Pro 15-inch laptop. I'm really really pleased with it and will probably not go back to PC. Sorry Bill.
So Monday morning this amazing machine wouldn't boot up (through no fault of its own, mind you, I messed it up due to ignorance of Mac software) so on the way to the airport I stopped at the Apple store and got it fixed. Funnily enough, the guy who fixed it happened to be someone I was in fourth grade with and haven't seen since. Odd how that works.
Anyway I caught my flight, and since my sister had classes the next day, she got on the exact same plane and turned around back to DC. Mom and I went to Tony's for dinner (great pasta, if you happen to be in Chattanooga). We did some last minute shopping and then Tuesday I moved back to Brethren.
It's been really awesome seeing everybody again, and Dan Rienstra, my roommate, is a really great guy. He had the brilliant idea to buy a very comfortable green folding chair that has made studying so much easier. After Mom left I went to the O-Team (orientation team) skit night and laughed my head off, then re-connected with Liz and Mary Simpson, Ann Jones, Liz Brink, and Alan Cheney.
Classes started on Thursday, continued into Friday, and nothing very eventful or blog-worthy occurred. I'm taking Principles of Management with Dr. Quatro, Intermediate Accounting with Dodson, Doctrine with Kapic, Statistics with Eames, and Microeconomics with Wescher. Fun stuff. Friday night Alan, Liz, Liz B, and I went to go see Scott Pilgrim again, just as good the second time, and then I read a lot of stuff for classes. I continued reading when I woke up and finished just in time not to have anything left to read during the ridiculously cheesy OSHA video we had to watch this morning. Fail.
Anyway, didn't really do much of note today. Hopefully this semester won't be too busy and I'll remember to update more regularly.
As if...
Anyway, arrievederci!
Friday, August 6, 2010
T-Minus 3 Weeks
With only a few more weeks left before I return to that brownish-adobe-sorta-looking-castle-thingy on a mountain I take classes in, I'm beginning to feel odd about my whole summer. When I came home from Covenant it sort of felt like I was pressing pause on forward progression in my life. Now, after being home for three months, I'm beginning to think I learned a lot more this summer than I thought I would and have grown a lot. Soon, I'll be back at Covenant and it'll be another lurching jump back to a different reality. Almost like waking up from a dream...or a dream within a dream....
...and with that incredibly forced segway, I want to delve into something I only vaguely hinted at in my last post which was Christopher Nolan's new movie: Inception. I didn't really dwell on the movie at all last week when I saw it, mostly because I knew that the post was going to be long already and that I had a good bit to say about it, being a huge Nolan fan. Now, before I begin I know that several people (one in particular) who read this did not like Inception at all. I'm not going to argue with you about it's merits, I can see how people might not like it. They'd be wrong, but still. (I'm also going to do my best to avoid spoilers for those of you who have been amiss and not seen it yet).
Basically, Inception is about a man named Dom Cobb, an "extractor" who can use an IV like machine to enter your dreams with his team of other extractors and basically pull corporate espionage on people by taking ideas or information out of their heads. In order to clear himself of charges which prevent him from going home to his children in the States, Cobb is given the task of pulling off what most extractors believe to be impossible. Instead of stealing an idea, Cobb's team must plant an idea in someone's head (in this case the heir of a corporate empire) and get that person to accept the idea as his own without knowing Cobb put it there. In other words: Inception.
The plot is confusing if you aren't invested in following it (and you didn't come here to read a movie review, so I'll try to be more concise) so I'm not going to go much further than that. I will say that I really enjoyed the movie and found it to be great food-for-thought. Even better was when I realized the whole movie was sort of like a parable about filmmaking itself. This concept might not make sense if you don't know the movie, but think of Cobb as a director, Ariadne as a screenwriter, Arthur as the film crew, and Seito as the producer. Each fills a distinct role within the creation of the dream (or film) for their audience: Fischer and his subconcious. Think about it. What are the filmmakers/Inceptioniers trying to do? Get a message across to the audience, and get them to accept it. They're bound by the fact that if the audience realizes that it's being manipulated, it'll focus on that and the filmmaker has failed, much like when the subconcious realizes the dreamers are there, it rejects them and drives them out. Anyway, nerdy filmbabble over now.
As for what actually happened in my real life this week, I hung out with some friends over the weekend since I didn't have to work for a good couple of days in a row. I did a little bit of back-to-school preparation Wednesday and Thursday. Thursday afternoon my sister was accidentally given a full-caffeine coffee, which is bad since she's rather allergic to caffeine, and got really ill very fast. This resulted in her getting off of work an hour early, but not being able to get home since I couldn't leave my job until my shift was over and nobody else could come and pick her up. Eventually I got her home and now she's feeling better, but at the time I thought she was going to faint in the middle of the napkin section.
Today I relaxed a good bit since I didn't have to go to work until 5pm. Once I got to work I found out that I was going to be in the Bedding section for the first time. "No big deal," I thought. It wasn't. Bedding was perhaps the easiest and most boring assignment I could have gotten. Almost nobody needs help doing anything, since they just walk in, grab what they want, and leave to buy more complicated things. Bedding is the only thing we have fully stocked on the shelves, meaning that they don't have to interact with me at all to buy it, and since there isn't a cash register in Bedding, unless I'm specifically helping someone, they usually just go somewhere else to pay and I just continue to hope somebody needs me to help them. There are also a ton of mirrors over in Bedding, which is creepy. Everywhere I look, four of me are staring back. I swear that one of them kept winking at me.
So yeah. That was this week. I played video games with friends, bought some new clothes and books, worked, and read a book called "The Book of General Ignorance." From this amazing tome, I have learned of the existance of and become gripped by an intense desire to visit the city of Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Yuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Phiman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit. This translates to The city of angels, the great city, the eternal jewel city, the impregnable city of God Indra the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukarma. Look it up, it's real.
Alrighty then. The Countdown to Covenant has officially begun. Until next week, Adios! And go see Inception!
(I should get an advertising stipend from Warner Bros.)
...and with that incredibly forced segway, I want to delve into something I only vaguely hinted at in my last post which was Christopher Nolan's new movie: Inception. I didn't really dwell on the movie at all last week when I saw it, mostly because I knew that the post was going to be long already and that I had a good bit to say about it, being a huge Nolan fan. Now, before I begin I know that several people (one in particular) who read this did not like Inception at all. I'm not going to argue with you about it's merits, I can see how people might not like it. They'd be wrong, but still. (I'm also going to do my best to avoid spoilers for those of you who have been amiss and not seen it yet).
Basically, Inception is about a man named Dom Cobb, an "extractor" who can use an IV like machine to enter your dreams with his team of other extractors and basically pull corporate espionage on people by taking ideas or information out of their heads. In order to clear himself of charges which prevent him from going home to his children in the States, Cobb is given the task of pulling off what most extractors believe to be impossible. Instead of stealing an idea, Cobb's team must plant an idea in someone's head (in this case the heir of a corporate empire) and get that person to accept the idea as his own without knowing Cobb put it there. In other words: Inception.
The plot is confusing if you aren't invested in following it (and you didn't come here to read a movie review, so I'll try to be more concise) so I'm not going to go much further than that. I will say that I really enjoyed the movie and found it to be great food-for-thought. Even better was when I realized the whole movie was sort of like a parable about filmmaking itself. This concept might not make sense if you don't know the movie, but think of Cobb as a director, Ariadne as a screenwriter, Arthur as the film crew, and Seito as the producer. Each fills a distinct role within the creation of the dream (or film) for their audience: Fischer and his subconcious. Think about it. What are the filmmakers/Inceptioniers trying to do? Get a message across to the audience, and get them to accept it. They're bound by the fact that if the audience realizes that it's being manipulated, it'll focus on that and the filmmaker has failed, much like when the subconcious realizes the dreamers are there, it rejects them and drives them out. Anyway, nerdy filmbabble over now.
As for what actually happened in my real life this week, I hung out with some friends over the weekend since I didn't have to work for a good couple of days in a row. I did a little bit of back-to-school preparation Wednesday and Thursday. Thursday afternoon my sister was accidentally given a full-caffeine coffee, which is bad since she's rather allergic to caffeine, and got really ill very fast. This resulted in her getting off of work an hour early, but not being able to get home since I couldn't leave my job until my shift was over and nobody else could come and pick her up. Eventually I got her home and now she's feeling better, but at the time I thought she was going to faint in the middle of the napkin section.
Today I relaxed a good bit since I didn't have to go to work until 5pm. Once I got to work I found out that I was going to be in the Bedding section for the first time. "No big deal," I thought. It wasn't. Bedding was perhaps the easiest and most boring assignment I could have gotten. Almost nobody needs help doing anything, since they just walk in, grab what they want, and leave to buy more complicated things. Bedding is the only thing we have fully stocked on the shelves, meaning that they don't have to interact with me at all to buy it, and since there isn't a cash register in Bedding, unless I'm specifically helping someone, they usually just go somewhere else to pay and I just continue to hope somebody needs me to help them. There are also a ton of mirrors over in Bedding, which is creepy. Everywhere I look, four of me are staring back. I swear that one of them kept winking at me.
So yeah. That was this week. I played video games with friends, bought some new clothes and books, worked, and read a book called "The Book of General Ignorance." From this amazing tome, I have learned of the existance of and become gripped by an intense desire to visit the city of Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Yuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Phiman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit. This translates to The city of angels, the great city, the eternal jewel city, the impregnable city of God Indra the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukarma. Look it up, it's real.
Alrighty then. The Countdown to Covenant has officially begun. Until next week, Adios! And go see Inception!
(I should get an advertising stipend from Warner Bros.)
Friday, July 30, 2010
Be Careful What you Whine About...
...because God has a sense of humor. So last week I spent half the post complaining and making excuses for the lack of things happening in my life...so naturally this week has been packed with craziness.
After last Saturday's tie confusion, Sunday was pretty quiet (aside from nearly being run off the road by a crazy motorcyclist). I mostly just relaxed at home and hung out with my family. And worked. That too. Oh...and a thunderstorm hit which my mother thought was the storm of the century because she was driving the same speed and direction as it for the greater part of her trip home from the grocery store. While watching the storm from the garage, I noticed some kids across the street partaking in a sport that I loved as a child: abject futility. Specifically they were golfing into the wind (which was bending trees over) in blinding rain (with metal golf clubs) and kickballs that had even less ability to go forward in the wind than a regular golf club.
Monday was when the real excitement began. After work I hung around the mall since my accounting class is an hour after my job shift ends most of the time. I got dinner at the Potbelly Sandwich shop my sister works at and then drove to class. On the way there I got caught in a backup caused by workman repairing damage caused by a storm caused by the foolishness of humankind in attempting mad science in Baltimore city. (or maybe just weather patterns, I dunno) Whilst in said backup, I accidentally bumped into the trailer hitch of the person in front of me, resulting in my first time swapping insurance info. Nothing came of it though, and no damage was done, so I think I lucked out.
Tuesday I blitzed a bunch of accounting assignments that I needed to get done and then attempted to stay cool as the heat which has been oppressing our area returned and made even air conditioning feel less comfortable.
Wednesday...was interesting. I started the comedy of errors off by leaving an hour early for work by accident...which would turn out to be a very good thing. As I pulled into the post office to mail a package for my mom, I noticed that the front right wheel was really dragging. I parked and took a peek, which confirmed my fears that the tire had been slashed, and judging by the marks I think my car was attacked by Wolverine. I do not know how the tire managed to slice so big a gash in itself without my noticing. Anyway, I got out to change the tire. I jacked the car up, put it in park, put the parking brake on, and set to work. I got the blown tire off and started to put the new one on...when the jack slipped. The car apparently rolled backwards a bit (despite the parking brake) and the whole minivan came down on top of my right thumb. I think it hit a nerve or something because the whole digit went numb for about 20 minutes except for right at the base. I didn't think it was broken so I went inside and just got an ice pack from the post office staff (who were very nice). By this time a handyman happened to drive by and, noticing my plight, came and changed the tire for me. (Thank you very much, mystery mechanic!)
Now that I was mobile again, my thumb was really starting to hurt. My mom told me that I needed to get it x-rayed, so I drove to the Sears car repair station at the mall and dropped the car off, while my mom came and picked me up. (she had been there when the car fell and afterward). We then drove across the chesapeake bay to my doctor, who told me he wanted my thumb x-rayed. TO THE DIAGNOSTICS CENTER! Once there I told another doctor my story (this one was very surprised that I had ever considered not coming for an x-ray.) She then scanned my hand with a very star-trek looking ceiling mounted x-ray cannon and said that the thumb was fortunately not broken. Back to the doctor we went, and he put me on a course of advil to keep the swelling down and a thumb splint for at least a week to keep it from being further injured.
After all of this I finally got to work.
When I arrived my boss (whom I'd called) checked up on me and then let me get to work. Several coworkers and customers asked about the terminator-hand I had and I told my story about a dozen times that day. Reactions ranged from "Oh my lord!" to "That's why you drink, milk, Geoffry." (directed at the reactor's five year old.)
Thursday my sister and a couple of friends we hadn't seen in a while went to watch a movie, which might have been a dream, or else a movie in disguise as a dream. If you don't know what I'm talking about...then shame on you. If you do, then you'll also know that I thought it was epic, amazing, and totally mind blowing, although the ending didn't bother me as much as most people. I was oddly at peace with not knowing the outcome of the circulating object. If you wonder why I am being so cryptic, I just don't want to spoil anything for you...because you must go and see Inception, or I will be very unhappy with you. :)
So that brings us to today. I began the day by saying goodbye to my family for the weekend. (literally, I woke up and said goodbye. That's what I get for sleeping too much.) They're off to New York to visit my Uncle, and if it wasn't for work I'd be going too. I'm getting paid for that, though, so I'm not complaining. Most of the day I did various house chores, put some work in on a take home accounting test, watched an episode of White Collar on tv, banged my thumb into everything since I'm a klutz, and mailed more packages for my entrepreneurial mother who sold books on amazon after leaving home (and thus the ability to deliver them.)
At Pottery Barn tonight I received, for the first time ever, a "guy question" from a seven year old boy. I had no idea what he meant when he said he needed to ask me a "guy question" but he wouldn't ask his mom and she figured it'd be better to just answer whatever it was. He leaned in really close and whispered, with mild urgency "How on earth do you get out of this place!?"
I nearly fell over laughing.
Other than that it was a pretty normal evening. I did get stuck behind a rear-end collision on the way home, but that was only mildly exciting. Now I'm going to go to bed. And never again will I complain about a lack of excitement in one week. Adios, goodbye, and enjoy August. It's my birth month and therefore blessed above all others.
After last Saturday's tie confusion, Sunday was pretty quiet (aside from nearly being run off the road by a crazy motorcyclist). I mostly just relaxed at home and hung out with my family. And worked. That too. Oh...and a thunderstorm hit which my mother thought was the storm of the century because she was driving the same speed and direction as it for the greater part of her trip home from the grocery store. While watching the storm from the garage, I noticed some kids across the street partaking in a sport that I loved as a child: abject futility. Specifically they were golfing into the wind (which was bending trees over) in blinding rain (with metal golf clubs) and kickballs that had even less ability to go forward in the wind than a regular golf club.
Monday was when the real excitement began. After work I hung around the mall since my accounting class is an hour after my job shift ends most of the time. I got dinner at the Potbelly Sandwich shop my sister works at and then drove to class. On the way there I got caught in a backup caused by workman repairing damage caused by a storm caused by the foolishness of humankind in attempting mad science in Baltimore city. (or maybe just weather patterns, I dunno) Whilst in said backup, I accidentally bumped into the trailer hitch of the person in front of me, resulting in my first time swapping insurance info. Nothing came of it though, and no damage was done, so I think I lucked out.
Tuesday I blitzed a bunch of accounting assignments that I needed to get done and then attempted to stay cool as the heat which has been oppressing our area returned and made even air conditioning feel less comfortable.
Wednesday...was interesting. I started the comedy of errors off by leaving an hour early for work by accident...which would turn out to be a very good thing. As I pulled into the post office to mail a package for my mom, I noticed that the front right wheel was really dragging. I parked and took a peek, which confirmed my fears that the tire had been slashed, and judging by the marks I think my car was attacked by Wolverine. I do not know how the tire managed to slice so big a gash in itself without my noticing. Anyway, I got out to change the tire. I jacked the car up, put it in park, put the parking brake on, and set to work. I got the blown tire off and started to put the new one on...when the jack slipped. The car apparently rolled backwards a bit (despite the parking brake) and the whole minivan came down on top of my right thumb. I think it hit a nerve or something because the whole digit went numb for about 20 minutes except for right at the base. I didn't think it was broken so I went inside and just got an ice pack from the post office staff (who were very nice). By this time a handyman happened to drive by and, noticing my plight, came and changed the tire for me. (Thank you very much, mystery mechanic!)
Now that I was mobile again, my thumb was really starting to hurt. My mom told me that I needed to get it x-rayed, so I drove to the Sears car repair station at the mall and dropped the car off, while my mom came and picked me up. (she had been there when the car fell and afterward). We then drove across the chesapeake bay to my doctor, who told me he wanted my thumb x-rayed. TO THE DIAGNOSTICS CENTER! Once there I told another doctor my story (this one was very surprised that I had ever considered not coming for an x-ray.) She then scanned my hand with a very star-trek looking ceiling mounted x-ray cannon and said that the thumb was fortunately not broken. Back to the doctor we went, and he put me on a course of advil to keep the swelling down and a thumb splint for at least a week to keep it from being further injured.
After all of this I finally got to work.
When I arrived my boss (whom I'd called) checked up on me and then let me get to work. Several coworkers and customers asked about the terminator-hand I had and I told my story about a dozen times that day. Reactions ranged from "Oh my lord!" to "That's why you drink, milk, Geoffry." (directed at the reactor's five year old.)
Thursday my sister and a couple of friends we hadn't seen in a while went to watch a movie, which might have been a dream, or else a movie in disguise as a dream. If you don't know what I'm talking about...then shame on you. If you do, then you'll also know that I thought it was epic, amazing, and totally mind blowing, although the ending didn't bother me as much as most people. I was oddly at peace with not knowing the outcome of the circulating object. If you wonder why I am being so cryptic, I just don't want to spoil anything for you...because you must go and see Inception, or I will be very unhappy with you. :)
So that brings us to today. I began the day by saying goodbye to my family for the weekend. (literally, I woke up and said goodbye. That's what I get for sleeping too much.) They're off to New York to visit my Uncle, and if it wasn't for work I'd be going too. I'm getting paid for that, though, so I'm not complaining. Most of the day I did various house chores, put some work in on a take home accounting test, watched an episode of White Collar on tv, banged my thumb into everything since I'm a klutz, and mailed more packages for my entrepreneurial mother who sold books on amazon after leaving home (and thus the ability to deliver them.)
At Pottery Barn tonight I received, for the first time ever, a "guy question" from a seven year old boy. I had no idea what he meant when he said he needed to ask me a "guy question" but he wouldn't ask his mom and she figured it'd be better to just answer whatever it was. He leaned in really close and whispered, with mild urgency "How on earth do you get out of this place!?"
I nearly fell over laughing.
Other than that it was a pretty normal evening. I did get stuck behind a rear-end collision on the way home, but that was only mildly exciting. Now I'm going to go to bed. And never again will I complain about a lack of excitement in one week. Adios, goodbye, and enjoy August. It's my birth month and therefore blessed above all others.
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