A Text Message to the So-Called Reality

The Meaning of Temporary

2004-12-20T01:20:00.000-08:00

I guess it's pretty obvious that I haven't updated in a while (if there's even anyone who's actually bothered to notice, but at least it's obvious to me=)), mainly because I have started posting elsewhere as of a couple of weeks ago. I started a page on Xanga at http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=modernvapor if anyone who hasn't seen it already is interested in checking it out. I do plan on possibly mirror posting some of my more important announcements on here, but I've been bad about that so far.

A quick update on me to get up to speed on what's happened since I started posting at Xanga. I've gotten a co-op position with Mercedes-Benz for next semester, so I will be able to stay in Tuscaloosa and keep from missing out on all the exciting happenings, but I'll also have 40 hours of work per week instead of taking classes and studying. Other than that, I just got done with finals this last week, and now I'm at home for break, so all is good.

I did have a short story to relate from my trip home from Tuscaloosa. I'd already posted this, but I figure it can't hurt to post it on here as well cuz it was kinda neat when I think about it. When I stopped for gas on the way home, I was approached by a man who asked me if I "could help a fella out", I think because I was wearing an Alabama shirt cuz he was wearing one too and I didn't see him go up to anyone else. He said he and his friend (who I could see in the truck behind him) needed money for gas because they had to get all the way to Huntsville, which didn't seem very far to me so I wasn't sure if he was lying or not. Having run into gas station "beggars" before, I tried to give him the excuse that I barely had enough money for my gas, but he persisted, saying if I could even spare a quarter that it would be appreciated and he didn't neglect to mention that it was Christmas time. In my mind, a couple of dollars was a worthwhile price to pay to get him to leave me alone, and if he really did need the money for gas, then it would be enough to get him most of the way to Huntsville. So I told him that I would see what kind of change I got back after paying for my gas, and I handed him the two dollars I received in change on my way out, which he and his buddy seemed exceptionally grateful for. I almost put the whole instance out of my mind entirely until I started thinking about what he had said about Christmas, and I was immediately reminded of Sunday's sermon. Assistant Pastor Tim Lien had been talking about how one of the outlooks on Christmas is that we get something that we have not earned; the way he put it was "it's someone else's birthday and yet we get something". He related that back to the Gospel, which isn't difficult to do because the fact that we're undeserving of God's grace is so obvious even though we are often blind to it. The whole message of the cross is that we receive something that we don't deserve. Did the guy at the gas station deserve that two dollars? Probably not, but it's not like the money was really mine to begin with. The thing was that he understood the position he was in; he was desperate enough to beg. We should be so desperate that we can come begging to the cross. We can't do anything along the lines of earning salvation, the best that we can do is beg because nothing we can do will make us deserving of the blood of Christ. It was really humbling to me to think of myself in that man's position, and yet, the position I'm in is so much more humbling and desperate than having to beg for enough gas to get to Huntsville. The cool thing was that while I was thinking about that, I was listening to a song off the old Kutless record and one of the lines of the chorus was "Take my pride away". I never would have thought that I'd be so broken by a man at the gas station asking for cash=)

Anyways, that's all I have for now; but I'll be sure to keep this page updated on the more important goings-on in my life, for all the internet stalkers and online predators out there...

Social Communism

2004-11-29T23:34:00.000-08:00

Since I'm on this All Star United kick, I actually started trying to figure out what they were singing about, and while their stuff is at least mildly entertaining, sometimes they have valid points too:

Worldwide Socialites Unite

At the top of the social ladder I speak
Let me welcome you here officially
To the back drop of martini clatter
Break the ice with superficial chatter
I'm glad to be this year's MC
To greet the chic and the elite
Yeah, you finally get to mix and mingle
Pressing flesh until your fingers tingle

Worldwide socialites unite
OK, alright

The band is grander than I recall
The talk is cultured, if a little small
Keep parading your charading manners
Keep pretending that it really matters
Don't ask, don't tell
And please don't stare at the emperor
In his underwear
Special thanks to the snack committee
Heavens, don't those tarts look pretty

Worldwide socialites unite
Enjoy the conversation
But try to keep it light
Just avoid the friction
And if you feel conviction
Well then, baby, step outside
Let's keep the "lite" in social
Let's keep the social light
Let's keep the "lite" in socialite

Worldwide socialites unite
Avoid the dreaded question
The meaning of our lives
And as to God's existence
Well, that's your private business
And, quite frankly, impolite
Let's keep the "lite" in social
Let's keep this social light
Let's keep the "lite" in socialite

I've always thought this song was hilarious, and anyone who hasn't been privileged enough to hear it has missed out on life itself (well, only 3 odd minutes or so, but still that's 3 odd minutes of your life that you'll wish you had had if you don't listen to this song at some point..). But anyways, this song actually brings up a good point: anything you want to talk about is socially acceptable unless you bring the Gospel into it and then it becomes a forbidden topic. The media is no stranger to broadcasting drugs, sex, and violence loud and clear for the world to see and hear, but heaven forbid that they allow anyone to talk about religion unless it's about the injustices done to Muslims in the U.S. We have freedom of speech as Americans, why is it so hard to proclaim the Gospel? I think it's partly a mindset that Christianity is uncool and so people feel that they'll be social outcasts if they let it be known that they believe in God, and so the profess with their mouths that Jesus is Lord, and then walk out the door and get on with their lifestyle (like it says on that DC Talk track that's such an incredibly poignant picture of Christian hypocrisy).

In other news, I'm back at school now and it's gonna be a fun week (said with all the mock excitement that I could muster..). I'm having one of those wonderful nights where I can't find the desire to do anything productive (such as study for those Statics and Thermo tests I have this week) and so I'm sitting here on my computer typing this post. I had a good week for Thanksgiving break because I did a lot of sleeping (I slept for 12 hours the night after Thanksgiving) and I got to see some of my family. I went out and bought Elf (paid a bundle for it too I might add) so that my siblings could watch it on a screen that was a little bigger than the two inch by two inch video file that I have on my computer. I talked to one of the men at my parent's church on Sunday who works at Adtran in Huntsville, and he's going to ask around about whether or not they have an open position for a co-op student, so I'm sortav excited about that being a possibility for my next semester.

I went and played basketball at the Rec today for about an hour. Marshall didn't show up, so I guess I'll havta give him a hard time about that at RUF tomorrow night. I played in one game and that was it because I got tired out way too quickly, I guess because I still haven't fully recovered from whatever that evil strain of bacteria was that infected my system for what seemed like an eternity. So anyways, I'm considering switching my blogging habits over to Xanga where I also happen to have a profile (one that was made for the specific purpose of leaving obnoxious comments on others' blogs=)) because I'm greedy for more comments (*evil smiley*). Peer pressure is the devil I tell ya, I mean dadgummit, I was determined that I wouldn't update over there since this blogger has such a cooler format, and I specifically said that I wouldn't and now look at me, I'm a ruined man (ok, well, maybe nothing that drastic, but still, I'm ashamed of myself... what next? Will I start listening to Brad Paisley? oh wait... nevermind, I didn't say anything about listening to Brad Paisley...). So we shall see if I actually turn over to the dark side, but you can be assured that I will not abandon this sinking ship completely; HAVE NO FEAR! I will not become a social communist (whatever that means... and don't start blasting me for the incorrectness of that phrase because it's just a title=b). Anyways, I will update later, or maybe I won't.... you'll just havta see if I can resist the peer pressure...

"Well, as silly as it sounds, a lot of people down south don't believe in Santa Claus."
"WHAT?!? Who do they think puts all of their toys under the tree?"
"Well, there's a rumor floating around that uh.. that the parents do it"
"That's..that's ridiculous. I mean, parents couldn't do that all in one night! What about Santa's cookies, I suppose parents eat them too?!?"
--From Elf with Will Ferrell, who must be the greatest man who ever lived, besides Jesus of course

Little drops of my heart

2004-11-24T01:10:00.000-08:00

It's been almost a week since I posted; for those few of you (if any) that have been disappointed, I apologize profusely. The last week has been fairly hectic and I haven't been all that excited about spending the time it would take to write another post, and I continued to put it off because I knew the longer I went without posting that the longer the post would have to be seeing as how many enlightening events have occured. Now that I find myself at home for Thanksgiving weekend, I have found a wealth of time on my hands and not enough activities with which to consume that time and have inevitably found myself confronting the daunting task of recapping my life (or at least that part of it that has taken place in the last 6 days). It is true that I have a number of movies that I purchased the last time I was home that I still have not watched yet, but none of them particularly appealed to my search for productive homeostasis, so here I am, about to disclose the most personal inner thoughts and feelings about the last week. So here goes..

To start with, the event that defines any Alabama or Auburn student's fall semester, the Iron Bowl. It would seem likely that everyone who deigns to read my blog had enough interest in it themselves that they already know the outcome, so I will spare them any long play-by-play and suffice it to say that Auburn survived with a win 21-13 over my beloved Crimson Tide. It was a very emotionally up-and-down as Bama's defense dominated the first half and shut out the Tiggers in the first 30 minutes for the first time all season, and then the Tigger offense roared back in the third quarter to take charge of the game. Bama definitely still had a chance to win the game, and all it would have taken was another play or two to go the Tide's way, and we could have pulled it out. Nonetheless, I was proud of our guys yet again for coming to play and giving Auburn fits the whole first half; we played with the #3 team in the country ( a team that should probably be ranked 1 or 2, and should most definitely have a shot at the national championship instead of USC, but I won't get into the injustices done to the SEC yet again this year right now) and did it with a second string offense to boot. It's ok, we'll get them next year, although I'm not gonna make any bets about it because I'm not coming back from Thanksgiving next year with blue and/or orange streaks in my hair like certain people who will go unnamed.. *cough*Evan*cough*...

On top of a tightly contested game, the GameDay experience held several more goodies. One of those being the end of my amazing run as the last representative of The Dudes (my War Games team). I was gunned down as I made a pacifist stand at the game; I decided that the Auburn-Alabama game was more important than worrying about whether or not I got hit with a rubber-tipped foam dart, and so I didn't even consider trying to sneak a gun into the stadium because I was determined to enjoy the game and put everything else far from my mind for a few short hours. Lo and behold, while I was staunchly defending the seats that we were saving for other RUF acquaintances in the student section, Dalton tapped me on the shoulder to tell me that I was dead as he shot me with a dart from short range (with a former teammate's gun no less!). I was hardly disappointed as I knew that now I was free to walk in and out of the dorm a free man, and I didn't begrudge Dalton his kill, saying he deserved it since he was dedicated enough to sneak a Nerf gun through security (in hindsight, maybe I should have reported to the TPD that we had a terrorist in our midst who was carrying a lethal weapon disguised as a toy gun... that would have been fun, it's too bad I only have great ideas after it's too late=(..).

Another benefit to Iron Bowl weekend was that I got to see and hang out with Amy, my Junior High partner at Marannook and one of my good friends from Auburn (if such a thing is possible as having good friends from Auburn;-)), for several hours before the game. She was welcome even if she was wearing orange, and she didn't give me too hard of a time after the game, and I know for a fact that we had her scared during the first half=). It helped put the loss into perspective, making me realize that at least a few good people would find enjoyment out of the outcome, and also reminding me that God can't be on everyone's side every year=D .. I really miss all of my fellow counselors as we became like brothers and sisters this summer, and I look forward to seeing all of them again. Hopefully, I will be able to see most of them over the short period of time that is my Christmas break and I should be able to as I plan on making a trip up to Murray, KY to see Janna, Libby, and hopefully Russ in addition to Marannook reunion in January.

I suppose I will have to leave some other happenings to retell at another time as I have a dentist appointment at 10 this morning, and so I had better go to bed. I know I know, very anticlimactic after that emotional title, but perhaps I will get around to some deep thoughts next time. I guess I could extrapolate on my Thanksgiving plans; my family is going to Atlanta on Thursday to celebrate with my aunts, my grandmother, and some cousins, and it shall be good...Until next time then... everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving and God Bless

It's excruciating
I know you need to know where we stand
Is there harm in waiting?
Is this my only chance to take your hand?

I'm torn in two
By what I should
Or should not do
Torn, torn in two
Will you wait for me
If I run from you?

Over this I'm loosing rest
I can't bear to turn away
If I try to second guess
Oh, I gamble it away
I'm torn
--All Star United

I don't want it to be illegal, therefore, it isn't; that's the way it works...

2004-11-17T17:15:00.000-08:00

I probably shouldn't be on here considering how much stuff I need to get done before Friday when the craziness that is Iron Bowl weekend begins (and they haven't even canceled any Friday classes; maybe we should just boycott school starting now until after Thanksgiving break or maybe even Christmas break, although I guess boycotting finals wouldn't be such a wise decision for my GPA..) but as long as I can put off all that stuff for a few more minutes (or hours..), I will jump at the opportunity. I am struck with a suprising lack of things to talk about...

Today is Day Three of Fall '04 War Games, and I am still "alive" as of the moment. I haven't even really had any desperate encounters that required me to flee. There were two people waiting for me when I got out of Statics class today (one of them is in my Statics class, so he knew I would be there and he skipped out on class today, hopefully not just because he was planning to shoot me, but whatever), but I played my apathetic card when one of them emerged from the nearby bushes with a semi-automatic NERF minigun instead of reaching for my concealed weapon because for one thing I knew I was overmatched and also because I had already come to the conclusion that it would be within my best interest to extend an alliance to said party and his team since my main goal was to take out everyone on second floor anyways. So I was spared in lieu of the greater good (the greater good being the utter liquidation of the communists and nazis and base-guarders who live on the second floor...). 60% of my own team has already been eliminated, leaving me with a solitary ally before the spontaneous alliance of this afternoon. I have already begun wearying of sneaking in and out of the dorm in order to avoid "death", so I will not be sorely disappointed when I am eventually shot. However, my mad skills of trickeration from last semester have not been exposed to be a fluke yet...

Marshall, RUF's campus minister turned 31 this last week, so last night at RUF, we had something of a birthday surprise for him. 5 of the girls had written a rap and had taped a "music video" of themselves breaking it down ghetto-style in their "M: the campus minister" shirts; it was quite entertaining and I wish I could get my hands on a copy of that tape because it would make great future blackmail. Several RUFers had also gotten their hands on some old pictures of Marshall (without his knowledge) back in his fraternity days at Vanderbilt and they made a Powerpoint Presentation out of it which promptly elicited a number of embarassed exclamations from him. After RUF, I attempted to help one of the girls fix her computer because one of her friends had assumed that I was good at that sort of thing. I wasn't able to help much, but I think we were able to figure out that it was a problem with her lack of a driver that wasn't fixable because the driver CD didn't work. All in all, it was a very eventful night and one that resulted in me not getting a lot of studying done. Speaking of that, I should probably get on that now that I've procrastinated for a good 45 minutes... Gotta get that stuff done before some of my friends from this summer at Marannook come in this weekend which I am exceedingly pumped about. I am also cognizant of the fact that I will not be getting much studying done this weekend because of that in addition to the football game and two basketball games that we have this weekend. Anyways, that's it for now, sorry I didn't have anything amusing to share this time=(

"A good teacher knows that the best way to help students learn is to allow them to find the truth by themselves."
--Noam Chomsky

Vote for Pedro

2004-11-13T01:30:00.000-08:00

I am totally in the mood to write a post right now, mainly because there's not a whole lot else going on at the moment besides a big poker game down in the drawing room, and since I'm not much of a poker player or real big on blowing money for fun, I'm kinda out of options. I guess I could play some Halo 2, but everyone worth playing with is doing something else so we wouldn't be able to get a quality 10+ player game going; there will probably be a game later on anyways so I'll just wait on it. Anyways, I just got back from spending a good four hours watching movies at the Ferg, and it was an awesome four hours at that; The Big Lebowski played at 7 and then Napoleon Dynamite was on at 9, and I highly enjoyed both of them. While the first one wasn't exactly what you would call the most quality movie, it was amusing for its completely random plot, and it's probably a good thing I didn't have to think a whole lot to enjoy Napoleon Dynamite because my logical thought process was basically scrambled after The Big Lebowski=). I had been given the highest recommendations on Napoleon Dynamite, and I was not disappointed; it was hilarious and it perfectly captured the picture of a high school geek, reminding me much of some of my own high school experiences... I won't go into any further detail on that. I also found it amusing how much the main character reminded me of a couple of my younger brothers, more because of their tendencies to become easily agitated than the nerdy aspect=D. I'll have to remember to recommend to my mom that they rent that movie sometime=)

I'm quite relieved to arrive at the weekend; the last two weeks have been quite hectic and last weekend wasn't much of a break because of my soccer reffing experiences which can be read about in a previous post. I also was finally able to register for classes today which was a great relief in and of itself; I have yet to hear back from two of the companies I interviewed with about co-op and while the possibility of a job still exists, I needed a backup plan. I did have my semesterly encounter with the Tide Navigator (the online registration service) today once I was finally cleared by my advisor, but at least it didn't take me another two weeks to clear it up like it did last semester. So I'm excited about having a little fun this weekend even if I'm not going to Baton Rouge for the LSU game; I'm still looking forward to watching Bama beat them on ESPN and the basketball team also has an exhibition game tomorrow, so it's going to be a good day for sports=) I may also participate in some major multiplayer Halo 2 competitions if the opportunity presents itself, but don't worry, I won't let it (completely) rule my life=).

There is an overabundance of tension in the dorm this weekend that is slowly being unleashed... The freshmen (and many of the upperclassmen...) are almost salivating with anticipation of the opening of War Games on Monday, and I believe that the release of Halo 2 this week has only helped enhance the visions of glory and gore that they have conjured up (not that I'm sure how they're expecting to achieve those with only a plastic air-powered gun that shoots relatively harmless foam darts, but whatever, it makes it more fun...), and today seemed to be the unofficial day of obtaining weaponry. Several people on my hall went on a mass shopping adventure at the local Toys-R-Us and returned with a plethora of havoc-causing instruments and have naturally been happily testing them out on unsuspecting innocents (I myself was shot in the ear from close range, which did sting a little). I have a dart gun in my possession, but its capabilities are very much overmatched and its weaknesses are many, so I plan on making a shopping venture myself sometime this weekend to find something a little more intimidating and worthy of my superior war tactics... With that I will leave you with some pictures of some "friends" "attempts" to strike fear in the heart of the weak. Only the strongest will survive...

Here's some random freshman who thinks it's cool to hang out in our room... o well, nobody's told him the truth yet

Evan is about to get owned and he has no idea...

I promise that's not me... no fo' real... aww shucks
And these guys are on our team too... well, actually, these are the guys we wish we were...

" I will carry out great vengeance on them and punish them in my wrath. Then they will know that I am the Lord, when I lay my vengeance upon them."
--Ezekiel 25:17

Carbonation is good for the Soul

2004-11-11T13:27:00.000-08:00

I've found myself saying that a lot this week; I've been sick with a horrendous cough and a sore throat the last few days, and there's nothing like a well-timed Mountain Dew or root beer to provide some relief. It's amazing how much better I feel with some sort of coke (no, not that sort of coke... you know what I mean=b) by my side, but as soon as it's gone, that darn cough comes back with a vengeance. At first I joked about the significance of those much-needed doses of carbonation, but then I began to ponder that analogy and pulled my own symbolic interpretation out of it. By no means am I going to pretend that this is the most theologically correct analogy, but it made me think of the effects of repentance. The state of sickness I have found myself in most recently is partially comparable to the state of sin and depravity that has existed since the fall of Adam and Eve (only partially because my present physical condition is hardly as alarming as the judgement that awaits sin). Our sin and guilt steadily consumes and plagues us, much like the dreaded cough. We are given relief from our sin and guilt through repentance because Christ's sacrifice covers our sin and washes our guilt away, and the Holy Spirit begins the healing process of sanctification when we are reconciled to the Father through the blood of Christ. But we are not free from sin because we are still unrighteous on our own so we will continue to struggle with sin and it will creep back into our lives again as we forget the cross; the only remedy is to continually come before the cross in repentance in order to find the relief of God's forgiveness. And while we will never be free from sin in this life, Christ imputes His righteousness to us if we believe and we will become more like Him through sanctification until we are gathered together with Him at the second coming of Christ at which time we will be free from the sickness of sin, which I must remind myself as I slowly recover from whatever this bug is that I've happened to get.

I'm beginning to realize that Evan has much more time on his hands than I do, seeing as how he’s been able to post so much more than me and pad his word count (it's funny, I think we agreed we weren't competing for highest word count, but we’ve still been keeping close track of it) on top of all the time he's been able to play Halo 2 that I haven't the last couple of days=b Yes, Halo 2 came out Tuesday morning and so there have been a multiple number of people playing on the LAN at just about any time the last couple of days. I, whom many of you may be surprised and/or proud to know, have only been able to play around a total of 45 minutes up to this point because I have been so incredibly busy the last couple days. Last night was about pure torture for me because I had to study for this morning's Psychology test from about 8-12 while people were playing Halo 2 in my room. Needless to say, I had to leave and go study somewhere else just to keep from being distracted to the point where I wouldn't have gotten anything done=) It actually worked out well that they were playing on the LAN because I couldn't get on the internet either, so it was a lot easier to justify leaving=)

The last couple of days have been busy, but not totally devoid of entertainment. Part of the reason I had to cram for my test was because I made the decision to go see the Alabama basketball team play their first game of the season (it was an exhibition game against Stillman College) at Coleman Coliseum, and I knew the consequences I was lining up for myself, but it had been too long since I had seen Tide basketball and I wasn't going to let a full night of studying keep me from going and sitting on the third row of Mark's Madness. I did tell myself that I would leave at halftime if we were up by more than 25, and seeing as how it was 59-19, I felt pretty safe leaving the rest of the game in the hands of the players, and they apparently did not disappoint because I heard this morning that the final was 104-50. I'm really excited now cuz the team looks a whole lot better than they did last preseason, and our newest additions to the team seem more than capable of making up for losing Pettway, even though he was the heart and leader of the team. Blah blah blah, I know that's not interesting to anyone besides myself and maybe a couple of other diehard Bama fans, so I’ll move on...

Ok, so I have one more thing to discuss before I cease from boring all to tears with another ridiculously long post, and that is the event that begins next Monday, which I daresay most anyone would find amusing and entertaining; if this doesn’t make you wish you went to school at the University of Alabama (if you already do then I'm sure it'll make you wish you lived in Mallet, and if you already live in Mallet [Evan for example] then you will probably just wish you were as awesome as me=)) then I don't know what would (other than maybe the greatest college football program ever;-)). Lol, enough foreshadowing... well, maybe not quite enough... I bet you hate me now, don't you?=) Alright, I can feel the suspense rising and the exasperation level you're at with me rising even higher=) I have two words for you.... WAR GAMES!... It's that time of year (actually I guess one of the two times a year now since we don't usually have Fall War Games) where everyone on campus will be treated to the sight of 40+ random nerds, geeks, and weirdos running around campus and hiding behind bushes and the safety of academic building doors bristling with yellow, orange, purple, green, and other brightly colored Nerf weapons, waiting for the next Malleteer to make a strategic mistake (which in my past would have been to try and kick down a locked door... ask me about it sometime if you'd like to hear about one of my many most embarrassing moments..). This will go on until all but one player has been eliminated, and if it takes too long then the War Lord will declare anarchy and safe zones will cease to exist which allows you to be "killed" even on your own hall or your own room! Prepare yourself for War Games Fall 2004, coming soon to your nearest Mallet Assembly (Note: dart guns not included, get your own!).

"Is that not the perfect visual image of life and death: A fish flapping on the carpet and a fish not flapping on the carpet?"
--David Carradine as "Bill" in Kill Bill Vol. 2

One Last Disguise

2004-11-07T21:04:00.000-08:00

I envision a long post somewhere in the none-too-distant future... it's been an interesting weekend since I last posted; I'm almost glad that it's nearly over, not so much because I want the weekend to be over as I am that the hard part of it is over. I had seven YMCA soccer games to ref at Snow Hinton Park this weekend, five of them yesterday, and they went less than smoothly, but I will get to that. The good news is the Bama won last night, beating the Bulldogs of Mississippi State 30-14 and becoming elibible to play in a post-season bowl. The stadium was rocking last night and it was louder than I believe it has been since Oklahoma came to Bryant-Denny last year. It made the three extra hours of standing up on my nearly dead feet worthwhile. I honestly don't know how I made it through as much of last night as I did without falling asleep from sheer physical exhaustion, I guess I was just excited. I went and post-game tailgated with Austin Dalgo's family and some friends from RUF, it's always fun to have free food, o and I drank Anheuser-Busch water in a can, which was quite interesting, I think it was leftover from the hurricane provisions in Mobile. Very soon thereafter, I conked out on the couch at Austin and Alex's place while watching the USC game before I woke up and realized that I really needed to go to bed=) I did get a good 9 hours of sleep once I got back to the dorm at 12, which was really refreshing and needed before church this morning. I got to go out to Marshall's for a few minutes for First Feast before I had to go back to the fields for my last two games of the weekend (fortunately the third one I was supposed to have was rescheduled, so I was able to flee from the wrath of the people that probably really wanted to wring my neck after the second game...). On that note, I will begin to explain why I will never recommend refereeing as a potential part-time job to anyone..

Let me begin by saying that I have never been a big fan of referees because it always seems like they're biased against my team (which in many cases, they have been, but we'll not go into that to save me from boisterous ranting..) and I have always been quick to criticize the refs on their perceived ineptitude. After this weekend, I have a much greater appreciation for how they have to handle themselves with everything they have to put up with and all the negative perceptions which are normally formed about them. There are too many times where refs are forced into the position of being "the bad guy", and the darn thing about it, is that it has got to be one of the most helpless feelings in the world, because somebody's gonna get mad either way [the secret is to figure out who's going to get the least mad at you and call against them 100% of the time... and yes, I am kidding (well, at least mostly..)] because you're going to have to either make a call or not make a call and then you're gonna have unhappy (and sometimes irate) people on your hands which are a lot less fun to deal with than the game itself. So anyways, I digress, let me start at the beginning of my "fun-filled" weekend... I had to get up about 7:30 (on a Saturday, so feel at least a little bit sorry for me..) in order to make it out to the fields prior to first game at 8:30 (whoever schedules stuff this early on a weekend anyways? I mean, c'mon). Non-coincidentally, Tuscaloosa had the coldest weather of the year come in the day before and it hadn't warmed up a whole lot and the fields were still soaking wet with dew, so the first game wasn't too pleasant since my feet were squelching in my cleats until they started drying up in the 4th quarter, but at least there were no major altercations other than over-protective parents yelling at me every time their child hit the ground and I didn't call a foul, but considering it was between the 1st and 3rd seeded teams in the Under 10 tournament, it really wasn't all that unusual. The second game went even smoother because my cleats and the field were drying up, but the first signs of fatigue starting showing themselves by the end of that second game. Then came the drama game, the matchup between the 1st seeded team who had played earlier that day and the 2nd seeded teams in the U10 league, and I was prepared for the worst through prior encounters with the 2nd team's head coach, who had an established reputation of competitiveness and ref-bashing. Ironically, I didn't have any trouble from her the entire game, and she even said I did a good job. Everything went fine until the 3rd quarter when there was a particularly vicious trip of a yellow team(the #1 seed) player that I refrained from calling because it would have nullified the yellow team's advantage which resulted in a shot on goal and a score for the yellow team(a perfect execution of the rules if I may say so myself=)), so the yelling of "WHAT?!? ARE YOU CRAZY REF? abruptly changed into jubilant shouts of celebration. All is fine and good until another questionable trip of the same player occurred and again I didn't call anything because the opposing player was going for the ball, but the boy's father didn't appear to come to the same conclusion, and I immediately hear screams of rage and the words: "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, REF? IF HE INJURES MY CHILD, I WILL SUE YOU!!! I partially find this rant amusing because I figure he's just caught up in the moment until the break inbetween the next period where I see the guy who apparently yelled at me furiously conversing with the YMCA Soccer Administrator while angrily pointing in the direction of "THAT REF WHO WON'T CALL THE FOUL!", which results in my sudden wish not to run into aforementioned furious guy after the game... It would be just my luck that this game would finish regulation tied 2-2, which meant we had to play an extra 6 minute overtime period, and after six minutes of goal-less soccer, the game proceeds to a shootout. As am I little more than confused about the rules concerning this predicament, I am made to look really bad by the coach of the yellow team who prefers to confirm my ideological rules with the Administrator. It seemed really straightforward to me that the ball is placed at a predetermined spot in front of the goal and then the alternating team's kickers attempts to score when I give him the OK that he can kick the ball when he's ready, using the whistle only when the kicker doesn't understand "Go when you're ready". But I am faced with a problem when one of the yellow team's kickers kicks the ball past the goalie and into the goal before I had moved to my position, turned around, or given the OK. The yellow team, naturally, assumes they have scored a point and begins celebrating while the blue team's assistant coach had not missed the fact that I had not blown my whistle or given an OK, and is quick to remind me of this fact. After momentarily pondering the unenviable position I have found myself in, I decided that the kick must be taken again. This results in enough angry protests from the yellow side originally, but when the second attempt does not go in, I have a seething crowd of yellow-clad individuals on my hands that would undoubtedly murder me if they found me alone in a dark alley. The first set of best-of-5 kicks also ends in a tie so there is another best-of-5 set(it was beyond me why it didn't become a sudden death kick, but I do what I'm told) which results in a victory for the blue team. On top of this, I had begun having major leg cramps during the overtime period which caused me to call my boss to see if there was anyone available that could take my last two games. After getting off the cell with my boss, who basically told me I would have to through the last two games since no one else was available, I am faced by a bold woman who sees it as her duty to tell me how cheap it was for me to take that goal away and who doesn't necessarily want to listen to me explain why it was within the rules for me to make that decision. I see someone else waiting in line after her who looks a little too much like the furious father who had threatened me with legal action, which wasn't a tremendously exhilariting feeling. He naturally wanted to know how exactly that wasn't tripping, but I will give him credit, he listened to my explanation, shook my hand, and said he understood that I had a difficult job even if he did agree to disagree with me. The last two games of the afternoon were fairly uneventful save for the fact that my fourth game also went to overtime and then shootout which resulted in it taking up an extra thirty minutes. The coaches in the last two games were very understanding when I explained to them that I would probably be walking through the game and possibly miss some calls, and they were of the opinion that the kids were out there to have fun anyways (why can't more people be like that?). When I finally finished my last game on Saturday after 3:30 p.m., I remember thinking that I would make sure to tell Bill that I never wanted to ref five games in a row ever again and that I would kill for something to eat=). Fast forward to this afternoon when I had to return to the place of my most recent discomfort and ref two more games. I was relieved to find that the first game consisted of two teams that I had not had a conflict with, and it went rather smoothly as expected with no overtime and no cursed shootouts because the blue team (the No. 2 seed from the previous day's drama game) won 3-0 and advanced to the championship game next week [let me just say, for the record, I do not intend to ref that championship game next week(unless the bribe is good enough..), I've had about enough U10 tournament games after this weekend]. I was not so fortunate in the second game as I saw that the yellow team had returned to fight another day in the losers bracket (notice I said another day and not days, yeah, this sounds like fun, don't it?;-)). I found myself hoping that the yellow team would win so that I would not be the object of their enmity a second day in a row, but of course, I wouldn't let that get in the way of calling a fair game. The game was really uneventful as a whole; the green team scored a goal in the first half and the yellow team had more than enough opportunities to score, but they didn't. There was a bigger girl on the green team that was pushing ppl around, and I probably should have found at least one occasion to call a foul on her, and I did warn her to watch her physical ways, but I apparently didn't do enough to justify to the yellow coach that I was calling the game fairly because he approached me at halftime to protest, in a fairly mature way, that I had let her get away with so much. He said he had never protested to a ref before, but that he felt that he needed to talk to me especially after the previous day's game (yes, he didn't fail to remind me about how I had taken that boy's goal away and how they had really won that game save for my calls). I really didn't know what to say, so I basically shut my mouth, which is why I figure most refs do that exact same thing, and I told him that I would keep an eye on the girl in the second half. If anything, my calls were more favorable to the yellow team because they got away with a lot more pushing and shoving and also a hand ball that probably should have been a penalty kick for the green team, but whatever, I realize that the losing team never sees it that way. The green team put everyone around their goal for the second half and prevented the yellow team from scoring, which really surprised me because I thought the yellow team would win hands down, but it didn't keep me from leaving as soon as the game was over in order to avoid running into anymore irate fans who weren't used to losing. lol, so that is the long and boring account of my weekend experiences as a soccer ref. I hope that someone will be saved from making the same mistake of an income choice as I did. In closing, they don't pay me nearly enough to do this=)

Seeing as how I've been typing a really long time on my account of "Two Days in the Life of a Soccer Ref" and the fact that I am pretty hungry at this very moment, I must leave abruptly with the promise of returning someday soon. However, I can't leave without saying ROLL TIDE!

You hold the answer deep within your own mind. Consciously, you've forgotten it; That's the way the human mind works: whenever something is too unpleasant, too shameful, for us to entertain, we reject it, we erase it from our memory. But the imprint is always there...

It's Election Day

2004-11-03T23:46:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I know you're all thinking "this bozo is a day late and two pennies short of making cents because the election was yesterday". So we know now that George Bush has won another 4-year term as the President of the United States and we are all relieved that it didn't take three weeks of chaos to figure it out this time (saving our country from looking like a disorganized jumble of confused bickerers at least). But we're far from having unified support behind the president, which isn't all that surprising considering how close the race has been for the last few months because so many people just wanted to see someone besides Bush in the White House. Honestly, I can't say that I blame anyone for their dissatisfaction; I mean, if I had it my way, we would have had a candidate to vote for who communicates exactly what he's going to do and follows through with it, somebody who always makes the right decisions and leads the nation the right way, someone who builds up the economy and lowers taxes. I mean, wouldn't that be awesome? O wait... reality check, all men are fallible and are going to make mistakes. I wasn't thrilled about either candidate because I knew neither one of them was perfect and there are probably a lot of other people that could lead the country just as well but I voted for Bush because he's not afraid to give due credit to the God who is in true control over this nation. Honestly, I knew that life would go on no matter who won the election because I knew God had already ordained who was supposed to lead America for the next four years whether or not that meant he was the best person or the best leader. Bush may not be the best communicator and he may not always make the right decisions, but he is the man that God in His sovereignty has chosen to lead(whatever that may entail) this country for the next four years. That brings me to another point: however long four years may seem to us right now, it really is a very short breath of time in comparison to eternity. In another four years, we will elect another President and then four years after that, we'll repeat the whole process again and this election will be in the distant past. A presidential term is temporal at best, far from a life and death matter for anyone, so why do we treat it as such? I was actually fairly amused when I started thinking about the connotations of "winning" the election; it's almost like it's a sport on a much higher scale than the Super Bowl in that it actually makes a small difference in our future. But however big an impact this next four years will have on us is nothing in comparison to eternity. "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Corinthians 4:18). The leader that we can see (the President) is so insignificant when compared to the leader we can't see. In fact, any power that our current President has at his command is derived from the President of Presidents (a.k.a. The King of Kings), even the power to draw breath in order to live. Isn't it comforting to at least think (if not know, but I'm not gonna put words in your mouth) that an imperfect Bush is answerable to a perfect higher Authority for the actions that he chooses to take as President of the U.S., and that while Bush may be in limited control, there is One who is in ultimate control over all including Bush?

Alright, my brain is about 99.8% spent at this point so I will begin to wrap up my rambling ways. Whether we have a good authorities or a bad authorities, we can still pray for them either way. We are, in fact, encouraged to pray for all who are in authority, and our desire should be that our authorities will seek guidance in making the correct decisions. Why wouldn't we want our leaders to make the right decisions? I don't see a problem with having a selfish agenda here, we should want and pray for our authorities to make the right decisions. I'll leave you (my future self in other words) with a verse to contemplate. Any of my fellow counselors out there shouldn't have too much trouble recognizing it=)

First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.
--1 Timothy 2:1-2

Hurrah! We're Still Alive!

2004-10-31T02:01:00.000-08:00

I really shouldn't be on here considering that the later I go to bed, the less I get to sleep and the more likelihood that I'll fall asleep in church tomorrow... O well, I had a moment of clarity tonight and although I really don't think I can discuss it right now, perhaps someday I will really figure out what I figured out tonight and will one day be able to share it with the world. However, I most definitely did not have enough time to watch a movie once I got back home and since nobody was online (I mean it's only 1:30 on a Sunday morning, what gives?) and I didn't feel like going to bed just yet, so I decided I would type a small portion of a post (as opposed to a long portion of a post which might be equal to the length of a short sci-fi novel).

I'm home for the weekend in Decatur, AL, which is pretty nice cuz it's been a while since I've really seen my family, so it was nice to spend some quality time with them. Since I don't really feel like boring you with all the details of my weekend up to this point, I may look back and recap later, but for now I'll just skip to the most recent event. I just got back from Florence; I drove a little over an hour to go out there earlier tonight to see Alan at UNA and we went to a Halloween party for a few hours and then I came all the way back home. A couple of live local bands played at the party which was kinda cool unless you had a strong distaste for heavy metal... o well, it was tolerable, and the second band was actually fairly good. It was a costume party, which Alan didn't tell me until two hours before I was planning on heading out there so I had to hurriedly scrounge around to find something a little out of the ordinary. I ended up going for what I guess was the Panama Jack look (without the mustache cuz I didn't have enough time to grow facial hair); I borrowed one of my Dad's hawaiian shirts and a straw hat. I guess you could also say I was masquerading as my Dad since it's not unusual for him to wear outfits like that on a regular basis=) There were a couple times where younger siblings came up behind me and asked "Dad, why are you wearing that hat?", and so they were a little startled when I turned around=) Anyways, that's the short end of the story; it was good to see Alan again, it's too bad our respective schools are three hours apart, which took a little getting used to since we graduated together as the only two in our high school graduating class (not an unusual number for a home school graduation, Alan's sister Sabrina only had one in her graduating class...) So that's what's been up most recently anyways.

Alright, well, I should probably wrap this up and head to bed. First, I need to give a shout out to Tiffany, Libby, Janna, and Alana; hope y'all aren't getting into too much trouble up in Murray this weekend with the big reunion and all. I would tell y'all not to have too much fun, but I'm sure it's already too late for that=) Remember that there needs to be a school there for Janna and Libby to go back to on Monday;-) Congrats to Alana's Dawgs on beating the Florida Gators... ok, I'm done making a fool out of myself with shout-outs which always seems inevitable. I'm out, God Bless

Have You Seen My Comb?

2004-10-29T12:32:00.000-07:00

Hey, I'm back after a not-so long respite... I have distinctively less to write this time (Disclaimer: I think it is less anyways..) so no one will have to peruse a novel and randomly pick and choose which parts you want to read so that you can pretend you read the entire post... O well, according to Evan, no one reads these things anyways and that makes enough sense to me that I won't be disappointed either way, and I know that if I were anyone besides me and even including me, that I wouldn't want to read my posts either so it's ok! Anyways, on to the incompatible pieces that make up my day...

So today was Thursday, which is one of my two "break days" during the week since I only have one class which is my 8 o'clock Psychology class. So I went to class this morning and listened to my professor babble about something that's in my notes but that I won't try to understand until two days prior to our next test and then I came back to my dorm with the intention that I would go back to bed for an hour since it was still only like 9:30. In order for me to take post-class siesta, I have to keep myself from turning my computer on because if I do then I will undoubtedly forget about taking a nap, and I was able to avoid the power button once I got back to Mallet so I did actually get that intended nap (YAY for me!... feel free to rejoice with me if you like..). So I set my alarm for 10:30 and promptly fell asleep. And if any of you know what it feels like to wake up to an alarm knowing that you don't have anything pressing to be up for within the next couple hours then you probably understand precisely how I managed to stay in bed until 12:15... But all that aside, I did get up with the mindset of getting work accomplished, and I believe I did just that today (I even made my bed today; impressive, huh?=)). I worked on Thermodynamics homework for about 4 hours (all that for six measly homework problems.. but I did get them done, which is an accomplishment in and of itself; congratulations to all those non-engineering majors out there, you never have to take Thermo), and I also got my required Statics homework for tomorrow done... I was curtailed from my post-studying internet goof-off session when Dalton came up to the room to remind us about what would-be the last Mallet soccer game of the season unless we won, thus qualifying for the playoffs. The first words out of my mouth after Dalton left were "I hope we lose"=)... it took me forever to get to the Rec fields because there was some stupid accident on College drive that forced me to turn around and drive all the way back to University and come in the back way which made me 5 minutes late, which meant there were five less minutes of soccer to play, so I guess it kinda worked out towards a positive end=D ... I did get my wish because we lost, but we did play our best game so far even considering that we only had 5 people. We actually scored 2 goals!! The first one of the night was a first for us as a team, lol=) I had an assist on both of them, Evan and Dalton both scored, which puffed Evan's head up like a balloon... I do believe that single goal gave him new meaning, and I think he's gonna base the rest of his life on that goal he scored in some random Mallet soccer game, o well, I guess he deserves it (haha Evan)...

After cleaning up and eating after the soccer game, I went to the Ferg to see The Bourne Supremacy. I was really excited about it (even though I couldn't get anyone to go see it with me because Alex was already in Memphis for the weekend when I called him and everybody else was going to the dumb Mallet dorm meeting=(..boo on dorm meetings=b) because I've been wanting to see it since it came out but I never could find anyone else that wanted to go when I was in Decatur and I didn't really wanna pay 8 bucks to see it by myself, so now that I could see it for free, I was all for it. It turned out being pretty good (a lot better than the first Bourne movie IMO). I might analyze it sometime when I have more time... I also have a rant about modern entertainment that I need to put into words sometime, but that can wait as well cuz I don't wanna write another novel tonight...

Alright, well, I'm out... good afternoon, good evening and goodnight..

Lesser of Two Evils?

2004-10-27T20:02:00.000-07:00

With all this talk of who was the lesser of two evils, I thought this was amusing

A shadow on me

2004-10-27T17:20:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I started this monotonous thing last night, but it turned out being so long that I couldn't finish it, so bear with me if it's a little confusing on the date and time and all that, but I'll try to make it clear when I wrote what...

(Written Tuesday)
I dunno if I'll have time to finish this entire post tonight, especially since it's already past 12 and I'm also talking on AIM, so I'll get even less written, but that's definitely ok. I had a semi-eventful day beginning with the creation of this online journal/blog thing (whatever you want to call it as long as you don't use the word diary...), and I did actually get 5 of my 1st-4th camper letters done (which is far less than I should have been able to do with my free time, but I ended up wasting close to two hours trying to get that dumb picture of my ugly mug up on the blog profile; I guess I'm not as cyberspace savvy as I thought I was...), and I went to Full Court and RUF after missing both last Tuesday. I guess since I didn't post a week ago, all are entitled to an explanation as to why I would miss two such worthy activities: As it turns out, those of you who have been keeping up with me know that I had C0-op Interview day last Wednesday, so I had three interviews with prospective engineering employers for next semester. The best case scenario is that I'll be somewhere besides Tuscaloosa next semester working in a co-op position, gaining some much needed experience and hopefully not screwing anything up too horribly, although if I am back at school taking classes next semester instead, I will be content=). On top of those three interviews, I had two tests in my Thermodynamics and Discrete Math classes respectively, so studying for those basically wiped out my Tuesday. So that, my friends, is why I missed Full Court and RUF last week, so I hope you will all forgive me. But anyways, back to my afternoon... Full Court is the local ministry that I have gotten involved with this semester, and the gist of it is this: Calvary Baptist takes a group of college Christians out to one of the local gyms, which is located in the "ghetto" part of Tuscaloosa, to share the Gospel and play basketball and other games with some of the local Junior High-High School kids that have not been given many opportunities to hear teaching from the Bible. Needless to say, it's been a pretty cool experience for me because I have been able to continue sharing God's Word in a setting much like the one I worked in this summer, and I have been blessed yet again for God to use me to spread His good news through Full Court. Today we talked with the kids about how we are lost in our sin and yet God continues to be the loving Father who forgives us and receives us with open arms much like the father in the story of the prodigal son. Sometimes I am really excited by the responses I get from the guys during my small group time, but today, even though my guys listened really well, I was reminded of their need to hear from the Gospel because they were having a hard time answering what I considered to be Sunday School questions, and it wasn't for lack of trying on their part; they just didn't know and it made my heart go out to them because at least a couple of them really seemed to have a desire to understand; I can only hope that they will continue to show up with an intrigued desire to learn more about the awesome grace and love of the Father. After our small group time, I played dodgeball for what seemed like 45 minutes with one of the boys, Tyrone, and he totally wore me out; he had a lot easier time hitting me with the ball than I did him=) I was extremely relieved when 5 rolled around so that I wouldn't get heat exhaustion or something... I'm really not sure what I did once I got back to the dorm, although I know I did get some letters done before RUF...

(And it's Wednesday...)
Ok, it's rant time (YAY, my favorite time! just ahead of sleep time..), and first of all, I want to apologize for being a hypocrite. You see, last night at RUF, we had a guest speaker, John Stone, the campus minister from UT-Knoxville (it's ok, he said he didn't really care about Tennessee or Alabama football..) and (our campus minister) Marshall's boss, and he spoke on a topic that has intrigued me for a long time: Repentance and Christian Hypocrisy. The main thing he said right away that really struck home was that "we were immediately going to think of someone else who needed to hear this sermon about Repentance, but no, this sermon was for us". Our initial response to a rebuke, whether we're Christian or not, is to blame someone else or think of someone else who needs to hear it more than we do. See, that's where I'm wrong and that's where a lot of people are wrong because we should be so much more worried about our own sin before we begin to judge others. It is so easy for me to see when other Christians are being hypocritical and to condemn them for it, and as true as it may be that they are, my own sin is still worse and should be foremost on my mind. I get so caught up in judging other Christians making atheists out of others because of the way that they live that I overlook my own hypocrisy all together. I can't do anything to make other people more Christ-like so I should be focusing on my own sin and constantly laying my faults before Christ in humble repentance. I should be so humbled by my own depravity that the words "I'm sorry" should be on my tongue at all times and not just when it pertains to God but to my relationships with others as well. Stone was saying that he could easily go in-depth into examining and analyzing his wife's faults, but that the attitude that he (or anyone else with a significant other or any type of relationship with anyone) needed to have was being able to say "I'm sorry I exist. And I am wrong". Repentance isn't something you do once and then you're righteous forever-after, it is a continual process because we're perpetually sinning (and Christians are most definitely not exempt) and although we are becoming (look it up, it doesn't mean a reached state) like Christ, we will never be perfect while on this earth or during this modern vapor that we know as life. If we have all the characteristics of the Christian life, yet we don't have a repentant heart, we don't know what it means to be a Christian. This is difficult for me to grasp even now; I know I am not nearly humbled and saddened often enough by my sin. Stone was right, I do see repentance as abnormal because I tend to think that there is something wrong with my Christian life if I have to continually repent, but to God, a repentant heart is normal because He knows we aren't capable of righteousness on our own. So why do we try to mask our sin? Why do I always try to blame the negative things on someone or something else? If repentance is a normal thing, why are we so afraid of it? Are we afraid God is going to love us any less because of what we have done wrong? On the contrary, God already knows when we have done wrong, and trying to hide our sin is only going to make things worse because denial brings guilt, but repentance brings relief in knowing that we are forgiven. Here is only one example of where God sees the wisdom of the world to be foolishness, for what comfort is found in guilt? Would I rather have the wisdom of the world or the wisdom of God? Alright, I'm done with the rant, I'll leave myself with that question and try to answer it on a day to day basis...

Alright, so here comes the part of my post where I try to remember something funny that happened yesterday to wrap it all up. Luckily, I don't havta think very hard because I got a good deal of amusement out of a certain event that occured last night after playing a few "minutes" of Halo with Evan, Hayley, and Brandon... Evan (my roommate for those of you who don't know, there you go Evan, there's your shameless plug..) came out on the losing side of a balancing contest he was having with his chair while he was talking to Hayley and (unfortunately I had my back turned or I would have better play-by-play) and he fell backwards onto the floor and the supports of the chair snapped. It was highly entertaining to say the least=D Anyways, well, I'm done with this post, I apologize for the length... Later

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."
Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
--1 Corinthians 1:18-20

Beautiful Oblivion

2004-10-26T11:46:00.000-07:00

Hey look, it's my first post... I'm not sure who's more excited, me or.... o yeah, no one else knows about it yet... Maybe I should just not tell anyone about it and this can be my own personal online diary where I can post all the embarassing things that I do each day, and that way I would only be boring myself and sparing everyone else. I'll entertain that idea for a little while and see what happens. Anyways, I started this blog because I didn't already have ENOUGH online stuff to waste my time on... I should probably be writing camper letters right now seeing as how I have 28 of them to write by next week, but I suppose I haven't quite learned how to defeat my powerful nemesis of procrastination yet. Have you ever noticed how it seems like you have so much extra time until test week rolls around and you realize that you're knee deep in homework that includes everything that your professor went over in class because you haven't done anything besides procrastinate the last three weeks? No, probably not because I'm sure that you are much more disciplined with time management and that you do everything the day that you're supposed to and you go to bed at 10:30 and get up 6:00 and get right back to work. Funny coincidence there because I did that all summer at Marannook and got a lot of stuff done and then I came back to the University... Trust me, we have no idea how easy we have it in high school and college; it only gets harder from here, so enjoy your precious moments of free time while you still have them=) Which is precisely what I'm doing right now although I'm sure I will regret it later.... Anyways, I apologize for not really having anything witty or amusing to say today, as I get used to this whole blog thing, I'll try to post some of my more entertaining thoughts and experiences (well at least I will think they're entertaining)... I do have one exciting piece of news that probably won't matter to anyone but me unless you're in my psychology class on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but o well, that's your loss, and I'm sure if you go anywhere besides the University of Alabama you will get the whole week of Thanksgiving off instead of just Wednesday and Friday. The point being that my professor said this morning that the Tuesday class before Thanksgiving is optional (and we all know what that means, especially when he doesn't even take roll to begin with..), and since that's my only class on Tuesday, I get to go home a whole day earlier for Thanksgiving Holidays which helps me to be more content with the whole deal. Alright, well, that's it for now... sorry for the big post without anything majorly interesting at the end, I'll try to stick to that format from now on when I actually have something interesting to say... I do need to get some letters written... fo' real doh, I holla at ya later...