Friday, September 30, 2005

I'm Such a Rebel

You know how everybody has that one cool story about the time they went to Walmart and got kicked out for rowdy behavior? Well, this is mine:

So, Steph said she needed some binders, so we went to the amazing walmart. She says she just wants 1/2 inch ones for super cheap. They don't need anything but the 3 ring things. No cover sheet place, nothing, just good cheap 1/2 inch binders.

and thus we set off on our quest. We checked at the seasonal corner, then the school supply corner. The cheapest crap they had was a $1.50. We began to be discouraged.

Then, steph caught sight of an amazing sight. Up stacked on the top shelf were 2 cardboard boxes with binders in them. They were unmarked, and looked cheap. We had no idea the price, but we knew we wanted them. The hunt was on.

Well, if you're familar with Super walmart, every single top shelf has a little runner underneath it that says "Ask for assistance with items on the top shelf." Now, who's honestly going to do that?

Definitely not me, that's for sure.

So, me and steph stake out the area, and make sure that there aren't any employees coming. Then, I hop in the cart, and steph holds the cart. I grab one, toss it down, and then hop out. It was an insane ninja explosion kind of operation, all done in like, 4 seconds. We check the price at one of those cool auto check things. $0.25. 25 cents! GOLDMINE!

so we go back, and do the same thing. Nobody saw us. No polite old men asked us to leave. But its still the most daring thing I've ever done at walmart, and probably will ever do at walmart. That's right. This old man is gonna go sit on his driveway in a lawnchair.

Well, today being friday, we didn't have school. So, I went to my sister's school to help her out with her classes because they were doing an art project today. I learned some valuable things today.

Valuable thing 1: Little kids think I'm amazing.

So, at the beginning of the afternoon class, Steph introduced me to the kids. They all said hi, were really polite. Well, shortly after that Steph was having them do stretches, you know, touch your toes, roll your shoulders, blah blah blah. I was playing along to, and when she told us to reach our hands up as high as we could, I just pretty easily was touching the ceiling.

"HOLY CRAP! HE'S REALLY TALL!"

Yeah, I'm awesome.

The little kids really thought I was cool though, it was super fun. Kindergartners aren't good at too much though. We were making paper mache, and it took them ages to do it, and they honestly got it ALL over them. They were pasted. They all looked ridiculous, but it was fun. I got to read them a story and they all applauded for me at the end. Honestly, it made me feel pretty good inside.

Its funny how small they all are though. Like miniature people with really big heads. Some kid told me he was really heavy because he weighed 50 pounds. We were all out on the playground, and they wanted me to lift them up on to the zipline. Its not a real zipline, just one of those cool things that glides along the track. Since they're too small, I lifted them up and pushed them. They thought I was pretty cool for that, but then I got some cool ideas. I just started launching kids as hard and as fast as I could. They'd go flying, then hit the wall and then come flying back. Oh it was fun.

So, the moral of the story is, go hang out with kindergartners, it's alot nicer than reality.

How I feel? Right now I'm super happy. Last night I wasn't happy at all. I couldn't smile if I tried, it blew chunks. I could have won thousands of dollars and not smiled about it. But now things are fine, and that's good. I should really write a book, but I don't think I'm going to. Since nobody really wants to hear me complain, I'm not going to. Just remember, Zorro never dies.

Saturday, September 24, 2005

"...But he commands fifty!"

Whoa, it's definitely been a while since I've blogged, and I've got alot of business to talk about. Lots of pretty awesome stuff happened this week, and more awesome stuff is about to be happening pretty soon.

So, three awesome stories, starting now.

.....Go!

So, we're at cross country on tuesday, and our crazy assistant coach that lives in the woods showed up again. Now, I have no idea who this crazy guy is. He just shows up sometimes. He says he graduated from taylorsville in '91, but I'm not sure I believe him. Other than that he doesnt have any relation to the school or team at all, but they call him the assistant coach. Anywhom, he's chilling out with us before we go out to practice, and coach molen is there too.

Asst. Coach: "Hey, you mind if I talk a little race strategy with them before they go out?"

Molen: "Sure, go for it"

Asst. Coach: "Ok, what is the #1 mistake high school cross country people make?"

Girls Chorus: "Starting out too fast..."

Asst. Coach: "That's right, last meet everybody sprinted out too fast, and I was asking some other coaches about it, and they were telling me that you were supposed to sprint out, and thats just stup-"

Molen: "No, they're right, you have to sprint out or you get boxed in. You have to sprint."

Asst. Coach: "No, you really can't sprint, you've got to-"

Molen: "What are you talking about? If you don't sprint you're screwed out there."

Asst. Coach: "If you sprint out there you're gonna get ti-"

Molen: "Guys, go... just run... go, now."

And with that, we all booked it away from there as fast as we could. In the middle of this crazy man that lives in the woods' speech, molen took away his audience. The whole team was laughing about it during the whole workout, it was so cool. Ive never loved molen quite so much as I did then. Man he's cool.

Now, there was another really cool story I wanted to tell right here, but I definitely forgot it. Dang, that bites big time. Oh well, onward and upward to awesome story 3!

Yesterday in fitness for life, after we did our stretches and situps, we went out to the track to run. Now, of course Josh fallows is trash talking, because that's what he does. "Yeah, lets go run 6 straight laps backwards!" What a nutjob. Anyways, so coach, being the stallion he is, says:

"Alright, listen up. Today Josh is gonna run the mile, and we're going to watch him. If he can do it under.. oh... say 7 and a half minutes, nobody has to run. If he gets over 7 and a half, we ALL have to run."

So, Josh agrees, the time is started, and josh sprints out like a madman. At about 150 meters he plops and just goes slower than kyle in a wheelchair. After a lap of this, Coach says I can pace him, so I take coach's watch, and run with josh. Josh is running pretty slow, and he won't really speed up for me. When we finish this lap, Josh just stops. "I can't finish, I'm done".

So, Coach is pretty dissappointed, and josh is like "let thatcher finish for me" and coach says "Nah" and im like "Coach! Let me finish for him!" and he's like "No" and im like "Hey, I'll run another 3 laps under the time!" Coach says ".....Run"

So it's on. The time right now reads something like 3:30. That means I've got 4 minutes to run 3 laps. Thats a 1:20 lap. That's nothing I can't do, its just something I don't do often, especially when I'm not trained for the mile. Sure, I can run 3 miles, but not 1 really really really fast. Anywhom, I book it out of there, determined to make this happen.

So, lap one goes fine, lap two hurts, but it's alright. When I'm headed for lap 3 I check my watch and I've got about 60 seconds to do it, definitely not enough time. Well, I book it anyways, trying to make it happen. I end up crossing the finish line at 7:42, 12 seconds over the time limit.

Coach says "Well... I held you up for about 10 seconds anyways, so nobody has to run." Then he gave me a high five and pat on the back, and brought all the class together and made them cheer for me, it was pretty cool, I felt like a stallion. So, I saved the day, and had a good time doing it. I know I'm a glory hog, but boy was that fun.

It's funny, I didn't have to tell that story, because Marissa is the only one that is going to read this, and she was there, but I really wanted to tell it anyways. I really did feel cool. It made my day!

So, numerous people have asked me who I like these days. Well, I've been meaning to tell people for a long time, I just never have. So, finally, after several weeks of not doing this, I'm going to do it.

*deep breath*

I like Marissa. Again. That's right. Light your torches, pitchforks, send me letter bombs. Thats the way I feel, and if you don't like it, well, I'm sorry. But, I'm done listening to the anti-Marissa lobby.

See, I went into high school actually liking her, but I was pretty sure that that was a bad idea. Not only had she just gotten over me, and probably thought I was mostly a scumbag, but the whole anti-marissa lobby had me convinced it was a bad plan. So, I'm thinking "Ok, I go to high school, plenty of new, cute, cool girls there, things will be dandy." So, I'm totally on the prowl, searching for awesome ladies, and it just doesn't work. I honestly couldn't find a girl that met the criteria as well as marissa does. But, I was not to be discouraged, I kept searching.

Well, one half of a term later, Marissa is still winning. She's cute, modest, smart, fun to be around, She's got talent up the wazoo, and she's nice to me. She totally made my day yesterday, because she told me she was impressed. Sure, the whole class cheering for me was pretty cool and all, but her telling me good job meant alot more to me than anything else that happened that day.

I've been thinking about her alot lately, and thats the way things are. I know she doesn't like me, and that's alright. I mean, she'd be pretty stupid to like me. But that doesn't change the way that I feel. I like you Marissa, and I'm finally saying it. Hooray for me.

Well, that's all I've got for the day. There's alot more that I meant to write, but I think that will do for now. Keep on truckin' out there. Toodles~

Monday, September 19, 2005

High Fives

Today was a rather dandy day. I just got back from jogging for an hour. I ran super super slow, but I was out there for a full hour, and it felt great. I know it didn't do me much good because it was so soft, but I'm still proud of myself. I mean, that's at least 6 miles right there, if not 7. I'm going to figure it out tomorrow with my mad orienteering skills I picked up at scout camp.

School is going pretty good. I'm not gonna get a 4.0 at midterm, but I should scratch one by end of term. My CPA is gonna blow chunks, simply because of chemistry, but oh well. Nobody likes coming to class on time anyways. Everything else is an A though, and chem is an A-. I got 104 on the math test, that was kind of fun. I wonder what I'm going to get on world history, I sure hope it's good.

Cross country is coming along. Only 3 or 4 meets left. The team is really cool, and meets are actually kind of fun. I know I'm not pushing myself as hard as I could be, but I'm staying in shape, and having fun, and I think that's important right now. I know I'm not going to win any races, and my points don't count against the team because im always 6th place, so its just a happy time. I'm liking it. Endorphins are where it's at.

So, the high school lady situation... Definitely needs some work. But that's alright. It's not keeping me down or anything. I think I'm going to start programming again. Now that I know that im not gonna program for a living, I can just play around in visual basic and not feel guilty about not learning C++. Hooray, maybe I'll finally finish snake;).

So, my life right now is going pretty good. The girl I like doesn't notice me, but that's fine. I'm quite content to play frisbee and grow up to be a lonely old man. So, yeah, marathon here I come. High fives.

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

(r^2 / 2) - (r * 0.5) + 1

That's the answer! That thing took me 1.5 hours to figure out, but I sure figured it out, and its definitely right. That little line of numbers made me more happy than I have been in a very long time. Let me tell the story:

Today in physics we got 2 worksheets. One was a very repetitive and boring one about converting pounds to grams, grams to ounces, miles to kilometers, etc. etc.

However, the other worksheet we got was another pattern exercise. There were 2 pyramids of numbers, and we had to find out the formulas for the first number on the line, the middle number, and the last number, then do some work with that. The first one was really easy, and I figured it out in class pretty quick. The bell rang as I finished it, so I didn't even look at the second one.

Well, I found myself at home today with alot of spare time, so I decided to bust out the worksheet and get it done. I've felt pretty motivated to get all my work done this year, so I got it out and looked at it.

Now, there are a few things in life that I take as direct challenges. One of them is a math problem that I know has an answer, but that I can't figure it out.

I sat there for about 10 minutes, just trying the basics, trying to figure out the formula. Nothing made any sense, and I just tried and I tried. After 20 minutes of this, my mom thought I was a dork for sitting here this long looking at a piece of paper, and I felt a little stupid. However, I knew that there must be an answer, so onward I plodded, trying and trying.

And then, our power went out. The house was bathed in darkness, and I found doing math a little difficult. Not to be discouraged I went out on the front porch, so I could catch the last rays of the sunset. It was here my epiphany struck. "You should divide r^2 by 2 and see what you get."

Aha! After 1 whole hour of racking my brain trying to get this, I honestly got it. I tested my formula out with all the numbers, and it came out perfectly. I DID IT. I conquered the challenge. I was honestly dancing around the house and singing because I was so happy. That made my night. There is a very good feeling involved in getting something you really really really work for. I worked super hard for that formula, and I finally got it. Nothing stands in my way now. I figured it out. I beat it. I conquered the number pyramid. Fear me.

Sunday, September 04, 2005

Thoughts on Frisbee

PC Cillin, you've made a powerful enemy today.

Oh, don’t worry, I had just written up a pretty long blog about all my hopes and dreams and wishes, when it decided to jack me, and get rid of it. Now, this is mostly my fault. It’s about 12:06, and I know it always happens around now. And I am using firefox, so I was asking for it. But c'mon, that’s just not even cool.

Dang. That’s irritating.

Anyways, things are going a lot better. I'm not going to rewrite everything I had written before about New Orleans. I had my really cool plan for rebuilding it all drawn up. But now that’s gone, and I don’t want to rewrite it, so I'll commence where I left off, at Frisbee.

Mainly, I want to build a Frisbee empire. Frisbee is not a high school sport like Frisbee, but I think one day it will have the potential to become one. I want to make that happen. My dad was trying to trick me into doing an eagle project a couple weeks ago. Whenever I was looking for ideas, he'd say "Well, what are you passionate about?" The only thing that I could think of that I was passionate about was Frisbee. Perhaps I shall make Frisbee a recognized sport for granite district. If not, maybe I'll die trying. Chances are neither of those two scenarios will come to fruition, but I can sure try.

So, here's the plan.

Step 1 is to get a ton of people playing Frisbee on a regular basis like we had last summer. Last summer every Friday all of Andrew’s buddies would get together and play Frisbee at night. I always went along because sometimes they needed extra guys, and I loved it. See, problem is they were all seniors, and now most of that generation is off and away at college. So that leaves me to create it again. There's a Frisbee vacuum here, and somebody has to fill it.

Step 2 is to get us to be an official club. Everyone and their dog can make a club if they can get a teacher to sponsor them for club rush week or whatever the crud it is. My plan is to trick somebody into letting me make an ultimate Frisbee club. That's crucial.

Step 3 is to find other people like us from other schools. I'm sure there are a bunch of people from cottonwood that get together to play. My mission is to find them, and then challenge them. Imagine if you and a bunch of friends always get together to play and then some ruffians from Murray send you a DVD that challenges you to a game. Not only are you infuriated at their boldness, but you determine to beat them, so you practice harder, and get ready for a crazy good game.

Step 4 is very similar to step 3. We find more people, and set them up to play other people. I set myself up a nice little website with a schedule, forums, stats, and all that other cool business. Pretty soon, clubs from schools are meeting up, playing, and getting better.

Step 5 ends in a tournament. Organize an official tournament, run by myself, and offer an actual prize. Now, prizes are hard to come by. But it'd have to be something actually worth it. Money perhaps? Or maybe I could get some local business to donate something. Anyways, it'd be publicized.

Step 6 is the culmination of my eagle project. After establishing clubs in all the schools around, I send a killer letter/DVD to granite district, telling them that if they don’t support it as a real sport I'm going to blow up a building. They're forced to accept, and ultimate Frisbee is now a high school sport. I go on to receive a Nobel Prize for my work, and live happily ever after in my gym shorts.

Doesn't that sound like an awesome plan? I would so love to play ultimate Frisbee against another team. We always just played pickup games with Andrew, but to get an organized team against somebody else you've never seen before. That'd be amazing. It'd be even cooler if it was against someone you had a grudge against, like Murray. Ultimate Frisbee has potential to take off super super fast. All it needs is a little encouragement. Tada!

So, basically I really wanna play Frisbee. I'm Frisbee hungry. I'm tempted to buy me one of those cool FlashFlights. I will champion the cause of Ultimate Frisbee. There will be no stopping me. It'd be a dream come true to play college Frisbee. That'd be so amazingly fun. Frisbee for life.

Friday, September 02, 2005

Mediocre

0-49. Good game warriors. Last football game I ever go to on my own free will.

As I sat there in the bleachers by myself I realized something: I'm pretty dumb.

Yeah, I don't talk to people anymore. For whatever reasons, I just don't do it. Right now I'd be more content to sit and stare at a random piece of sidewalk than carry on a conversation with a girl. Not that I don't want to talk,but it seems I can't talk these days. Why? I don't know, I'm just socially retarded.

So, I'm not very excited about that piece of news. Pretty sad about it actually. I don't have friends at high school, and that blows chunks. Kyle's gone, twins are gone. No classes with any of them really. I've got like, 40 minutes with kyle on gold days, but that's band and we don't talk. No lunch with the boys either. I sat alone at lunch today for about half the time till courtney and wilma and hali came and sat by me. This is weird business.

I didn't go running today. Boo. I like running, even though it hurts afterwards its good for me. I guess im going to do that tomorrow, probably about 4. Sounds like fun.

So yeah, I'm pretty down tonight, but I'll be dandy when I wake up tomorrow morning. isn't that cool? this whole sadness thing never makes it through a good nights rest or a good nap. Convenient.

Anyways, enough emotional business for a whole day and a half.

Today in seminary Brother Pearce gave us this cool assignment. He split us all into groups of 4, and then said we're going to play a game. Now, there's only one rule to the game. "Build the tallest tower" Then he handed out some straws, some tape, and a couple index cards. He gave different ammounts to each group. Well, my group ended up with 2 straws, an index card, and a bunch of tape. It was me, robert, courtney, and malyssa.

We were very much lacking materials, but we had some killer brains behind the project. We decided that if I stood on a desk, and robert was on my shoulders, and robert had some straws taped to his forehead, we could probably win. Now, we didn't win. A conglomerate of 4 groups actually ended up beating us, but we were dang close to winning the imaginary prize. I nearly killed robert, that was pretty cool. The moral of the story is, when you're trying to make a tower, dont make a conglomerate of 4 groups, it makes me feel bad when I lose.

Umm, I don't have anything to do tomorrow, and i'm happy about that. No work, no school, no family reunions. Days off are pretty nice.

So.... yeah. happy business.

Thursday, September 01, 2005

Ice Bath

Sorry this isn't in my other blog Marissa, I'm not feeling too philosophical tonight. But, I do feel like blogging like a madman, so here I am.

Yesterday night I was pretty down when I wrote. Here I am though, and things are looking up a lot more, so you get the rebound blog tonight, hooray.

School today was pretty fun business. Physics is going to be a really good class once it warms up I think, right now it’s merely ok. Most of the class was still finishing the worksheet from yesterday because they didn't get it, so we didn't get much work. We got one new worksheet, and I got that done so I had about 40 minutes to do nothing. So, I did nothing, it was fun. I'm pretty afraid to take naps in high school yet, so I kept myself awake. I'm sure I'll break that habit soon. Olsen (The teacher) is one of the funniest guys around. He doesn't try to be funny, and he's pretty lame, and that’s the cool and awesome part. He's got a mullet, it’s amazing. But its not like a white trash mullet, it’s just a mullet. He's always got a sort of dazed look on his face, and doesn't talk very much or very fast. It’s just the little simple stuff he says that's so awesome, it’s great. He's a really likeable guy, even though he's slow at everything. He's a stud muffin.

World history turned out pretty good today, I really like MJ. Me and Jason decided that we were going to call him MG because he's a gangster, but that probably won't happen. Andrew told me he was a loser, so I wasn’t looking forward to the class, but he's ended up way cool. We split the group into "tribes" today, and had 15 minutes to set up a government and a culture, and all agree upon it. Then we had to go up in front of the class and he'd ask us questions. It was pretty fun business, and a real clever way to get to know other people. It was definitely as good as Alsop's whole "line up in order of birth without talking." thing we did in 7th grade. I really wish teachers would do more of this 'get to know each other' stuff. I think its pretty fun, and that’s most of the fun of high school anyways, the other people. We totally got our butts kicked today though in world history. We all walked in, and the class managed to get it 97% segregated. All the guys on one side, all the girls on the other. And now that’s the permanent seating arrangement for the term at least. Crazy talk eh? No flirting in that class... unless it’s with Jason.

Band was crazy talk today. The really awesome thing about high school is that we've got 6 trombones, and they're all pretty good. I'm easily the worst one, but I think I like it that way. Junior high we never had enough trombones, and I was usually the best one, I had to lead. That meant that I had to know what I was doing, which I didn’t do most of the time. With all these other guys it’s really easy to pick stuff up from them, and follow for now. I'm not good at sight-reading, and it’s nice to kinda learn the tunes off of them. I'm doing a ton better than I expected to though, and I'm happy about that. Doc made me improvise 4 measures of solo today, and I'm pretty sure I bombed it, but the fact that I did it makes me happy. Playing that stuff is really really fun. I'm liking it a lot.

English was great, I read all day. 20,000 leagues under the sea. I'm not sure if that’s the book I want to do my book project on or not, but it’s pretty interesting to read for now. It's always interesting to read old books, like ones from back in the day. They are a lot different, and aren't really written the same. The language is still the same, but just the styles are a lot different. But I'm learning from it, and its fun and interesting, so I'm liking it. I really like to just sit and read, it’s relaxing and lets you just be in your own bubble. I don't read enough, but I like it.

So, now to the actual fun stuff. After school I went and ran cross country again, and I'm getting really excited about it. There are a ton of cool people on the team, and it's going to be great to get back into shape. I'm considering trying to break a 5 minute mile this year. I think I can probably do it. We ran 4 miles today, pretty slow, but 4 miles nonetheless. It was pretty laid back, and we all moved as a team.

After we got back, the whole team was super excited because today we got to do ice baths. They talked about it like it was some sacred ritual that would make you run faster, jump higher, and look better. So, I was excited about it. Now, thinking about the words "Ice bath" you can pretty much guess what it is, but it just didn't really click for me.

What happens is we go into this little dingy room off of the weight room. There's an ice machine in there, a sink, one of those beds they have in doctor’s offices, and a metal tub on wheels. It probably holds about 75 gallons, I don't really know. Any whom, you put a hose on the sink, and fill up the tub. All the while you are shoveling a ton of ice into the water.

Now, for some reason this all seemed really elaborate to me. Like it was a super super complex and super cool process, and that this tub was special. Nope. It’s just a tub with a bunch of ice water in it. However, the whole team regarded it with reverence, so I did too.

...and then we got in it.

Good crap. The tub fit 2 people at a time, and you had to kneel in there for 10 or 15 minutes, depending on what you wanted to do. It came up to my waist about, just a little below it. It was honestly the coldest thing I've ever done. 15 minutes, kneeling there motion-less in water that couldn't be more than 40 degrees.

As soon as you get in everything underwater hurts. It felt like my toes were getting attacked by some sort of mongoose. After about minute two I really wanted to get out, but I was determined to ride it out, and stay in there. So, 15 minutes later, me and nokesy got out. Standing on numb legs is really crazy. You can feel em, but not really. Walking is a very dangerous and difficult thing to do. My legs were 100% red, it was pretty ugly. I’ve never seen human flesh look that red. It felt like it was a bunch of frozen meat you were getting out of the freezer. Pretty dang gross.

Sometime later I regained feeling in my legs. Word on the street is an ice bath is supposed to make it so you're not sore anymore, and makes your muscles cooler or something. Yeah, it didn't work, I'm sore. Not amazingly sore, but still sore. So, I spent an extra 2 hours at the school, and froze my butt off for no real reason, but it was still pretty fun, and I enjoyed it. Plus, it makes a really cool story to tell on your blog that a whole 2 people read.

That being said, its time to move on. Drama is getting a lot better. I actually talked to Jenny last night after I blogged, and we kinda worked things out. The last words she said to me were:
"ur dumb, and now I'm going to bed" But it’s still an improvement. I'm happy about that. It ends up she has to move back up here pretty soon, and she's really upset about that. She's convinced that once she moves up here I'll never talk to her again. What is with all these girls pointing out the fact that I'm socially retarded all the sudden? Can't we just give me a break?

And, I talked to hope today on the phone (That’s right, phone conversation with a girl). That was good, and made me worry about her less. So, she's not crazy, that is good news.

So, life is mostly on the up and up, I’m excited about this. Tomorrow night I'm either going to a football game, some sort of shindig, or setting up a new Jolene. I'd definitely like money from Jolene, high school is expensive. But things are going to be good any whom. Life is going to move on rather nicely I hope. My foot sure hurts, but that'll go away like it always does, and in the meantime, I’m going to enjoy having a good nights sleep. G'night everybody.