Things that Christopher Thatcher is incredibly bad at:
1) Dota
2) Metabolizing glucose
3) Sledding
4) Arm Wrestling
5) Leg Wrestling
Notice the addition of "sledding" to the list. That's a big one.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Friday, December 19, 2008
A Previously Published List
Things that Christopher Thatcher is incredibly bad at:
1) Dota
2) Metabolizing glucose
to be continued...
1) Dota
2) Metabolizing glucose
to be continued...
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
A Song about Sand Paper
*note- this post is to be read like a country fellow with his guitar and peculiar cowboy drawl. endnote*
This isn't a song. And it's not really about sand paper. It's not singly about sand or singly about paper either. It's about folks all over the world like me and kyle who are simply not smooth.
Guys like me and kyle who are pretty good guys on the inside, we like to think. But guys that wouldn't know how to woo a girl if she jumped into our arms and said "I'm already in love with you, just don't screw it up!"
Guys like me and kyle who don't pick up on hints. Guys like us who are too busy not trying to offend girls that there's no way in all of Georgia that we'll break that touch barrier unless it's for CPR. And you better believe we'll apologize to you for it afterwards.
Yeah, guys like me and him, who are so afraid of looking stupid or doing something that she doesn't want that we'll just avoid her for all of time instead of walking over there.
This song's for all the gentlemen that spent three hours at a party with a girl and didn't even look at her. Yep, this songs for those guys that went home from that adventure and texted her five minutes later because that's just the way that they roll.
I strum my philosophical guitar for people who are not and who will never be Tyrel. Guys who won't even be Glen or P Burn. Nope, we'll just keep on being not smooth.
But, after all, it's our own peculiar brand of not smooth. We're not smooth by the nature that we're too terrified to even try to be smooth. So not smooth that instead of even risking our wildest dreams come true we'd rather sit from the sidelines as those bold enough to act sweep them all, one by one, off their feet.
Yes indeed, this country song should probably rhyme but doesn't. It should probably have meter, but doesn't. And really, it should probably be sung by a giant jackalope that Pixar animated, but isn't.
But regardless of the song's shortcomings, this one goes out to all the fellows like me and Kyle. The ones without the girlfriends. The ones that, while girls probably like them, won't succeed for a very very long time because they're too nice to try. Too cautious to risk. Heard too many stories of hugs from guys that were unwanted, awkward moments forced by someone wanting to know an answer.
Yep, we're not as smooth as the Tyrel's out there. And we're not nearly as bold as the P Burn's. We like our girls cute, modest, intelligent, and ninety meters away where we can't do anything stupid. We'd step in front of a bullet for them, yes we would, but when it comes to saying "hi" in the mornings we'll kindly pass, thank you very much. That bullet starts to sound mighty appetizing when it's time to graduate from texting to real phone calls, I'll tell you what.
We are a noble class of gentlemen. We get good grades. We do our duty. We tie our ties well. We've never ever offended you, your sisters, your friends, or your mom. We have no criminal record. We have clean language, and you better believe that we drive safely. If there were superheroes in the world, most of them would be us. Most of us voted in the last election. We love and respect the women in our lives. But no, we will not go out of our way to talk to you at the party. And no, we will not ever try to bust a move. We're brave enough to fight a wild bear for you, but we're not brave enough to look you in the eyes when we talk.
This is our anthem. Too good to settle for the easy ones, too stupid to go for the right ones, and too cowardly to go for our dreams. We are sandpaper, and proud of it.
Nobody gets by without sandpaper. You need it for stuff. But you wouldn't want to be stuck on a doorstep with it, now would you?
Here's to you, fellow men of the sandpaper. One day our time will come. One day...
This isn't a song. And it's not really about sand paper. It's not singly about sand or singly about paper either. It's about folks all over the world like me and kyle who are simply not smooth.
Guys like me and kyle who are pretty good guys on the inside, we like to think. But guys that wouldn't know how to woo a girl if she jumped into our arms and said "I'm already in love with you, just don't screw it up!"
Guys like me and kyle who don't pick up on hints. Guys like us who are too busy not trying to offend girls that there's no way in all of Georgia that we'll break that touch barrier unless it's for CPR. And you better believe we'll apologize to you for it afterwards.
Yeah, guys like me and him, who are so afraid of looking stupid or doing something that she doesn't want that we'll just avoid her for all of time instead of walking over there.
This song's for all the gentlemen that spent three hours at a party with a girl and didn't even look at her. Yep, this songs for those guys that went home from that adventure and texted her five minutes later because that's just the way that they roll.
I strum my philosophical guitar for people who are not and who will never be Tyrel. Guys who won't even be Glen or P Burn. Nope, we'll just keep on being not smooth.
But, after all, it's our own peculiar brand of not smooth. We're not smooth by the nature that we're too terrified to even try to be smooth. So not smooth that instead of even risking our wildest dreams come true we'd rather sit from the sidelines as those bold enough to act sweep them all, one by one, off their feet.
Yes indeed, this country song should probably rhyme but doesn't. It should probably have meter, but doesn't. And really, it should probably be sung by a giant jackalope that Pixar animated, but isn't.
But regardless of the song's shortcomings, this one goes out to all the fellows like me and Kyle. The ones without the girlfriends. The ones that, while girls probably like them, won't succeed for a very very long time because they're too nice to try. Too cautious to risk. Heard too many stories of hugs from guys that were unwanted, awkward moments forced by someone wanting to know an answer.
Yep, we're not as smooth as the Tyrel's out there. And we're not nearly as bold as the P Burn's. We like our girls cute, modest, intelligent, and ninety meters away where we can't do anything stupid. We'd step in front of a bullet for them, yes we would, but when it comes to saying "hi" in the mornings we'll kindly pass, thank you very much. That bullet starts to sound mighty appetizing when it's time to graduate from texting to real phone calls, I'll tell you what.
We are a noble class of gentlemen. We get good grades. We do our duty. We tie our ties well. We've never ever offended you, your sisters, your friends, or your mom. We have no criminal record. We have clean language, and you better believe that we drive safely. If there were superheroes in the world, most of them would be us. Most of us voted in the last election. We love and respect the women in our lives. But no, we will not go out of our way to talk to you at the party. And no, we will not ever try to bust a move. We're brave enough to fight a wild bear for you, but we're not brave enough to look you in the eyes when we talk.
This is our anthem. Too good to settle for the easy ones, too stupid to go for the right ones, and too cowardly to go for our dreams. We are sandpaper, and proud of it.
Nobody gets by without sandpaper. You need it for stuff. But you wouldn't want to be stuck on a doorstep with it, now would you?
Here's to you, fellow men of the sandpaper. One day our time will come. One day...
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Two and a half months
I'm back. And I'm home. I'm home in so many different ways and it feels incredible. I'm happy to be alive and sitting where I'm sitting today. I've got a lot to talk about a lot of people to hug for that one. And it can't all be contained in this one happy and smile-filled post, but I'll do my best to put a small portion in.
I'm sitting in my childhood home, upstairs in my room. My computer is sitting on my spacious desk while I type at it dressed in my pajamas, old man slippers, and the incredible scarf that Molly made me. The furnace is on and I'm toasty and happy. There's snow outside like there used to be.
I just read a lot from my journal and from some of my older posts. Just things from the past couple of months. It feels *so* good to read that journal. My posting here fell off about two months ago, but my journal has never stopped. I loved reading back and remembering so vividly all those things that I experienced. Things that I had completely forgotten but that were important to me at the time. That phrase, "important to me at the time" is something that I want to talk about tonight.
Do I remember that time we had to push the van up the hill? Do I remember the lessons I learned from it? Do I remember the list that I made the night after I talked with Heather? Do I remember how it felt to take that long walk? Do I remember how fun battling brad at battlefront was this semester? Do I remember running all the way home, down-hill, to get back in time to play warcraft? Do I remember singing that duet with Jake in mission prep? Do I remember the fireside?
With the exception of the van, those are things that I wrote about throughout the past two and a half months. I write pretty important things in my journal. I never really thought that I did, but reading this evening helped me see that a little bit. If it was good enough to get into the journal it certainly meant something to me. It changed my life and made me think. It was something that I wanted to remember. Those things that happened, whether they were things that I did or that someone else did, changed those days forever and made me feel differently.
I've written and thought a lot before about honoring the past version of myself. The first time I can remember doing this was late one night as I was wrapping up one of my very first emo-posts. As I came to finishing it, I realized that it was pretty personal, very long, and might bring some people down instead of lifting them up. Those were things that I didn't like to post, especially that last one. But as I argued with myself over whether to delete it or not, I wrote something like this: "I really want to take this down. But as a monument to the way that I felt tonight, to the person who I was tonight, I'll leave it up. Because I know tomorrow-me is going to want to take it down. But for what I feel and who I am tonight, I'll leave it." Ever since then I've kind of had that mindset. When I feel passionately about something I know that there's a good chance I won't feel like that in the near future. And when I stop feeling like that, then what happens?
Looking back on these past few months, on all these events and occasions, I realize that I did quite a bit of feeling. Those things I mentioned, and many others as well, made me into "someone" those nights and days. I left monuments to them through my journal and sometimes my blog. But I hadn't ever really revisited them. They existed, but what good is a monument that is never visited?
The moral of my story? I read tonight. I read to prepare for a post I was planning that was entirely different from the one that I just wrote. But something cool happened as I read. I remembered those things that have happened. And as I remembered them, I felt like all those different Christopher Thatchers that existed on those discrete nights came back together to be me again. I feel very whole right now. Whole like everything I did this past semester hasn't been forgotten. Whole like I'm living my life on purpose and moving forward. I feel whole like I haven't forgotten the things that are important. It's a difficult feeling to describe, but it is important to me.
Those things were important to me at the time that they happened. And they're important to me now as well. When I forget about things, what changes? Is it the event itself? "It was important to me at the time, but it has fundamentally changed since then, so it is no longer important"? Or is it myself that changes? "It was important to me at the time, but since then I have fundamentally changed, and it is therefore no longer important"? I don't necessarily know the answer to that question.
But I'll tell you something good. Reading and thinking and praying tonight makes me very happy to be the same me that experienced all those things. Those things haven't changed. I haven't changed, in the respect that I'm still the same me that experienced them. And I'm happy about that.
I'm proud to report that I made it through all of those experiences. I survived pushing that van up the hill. I survived those rounds of battlefront and dota. I survived the physics final. I really did find out that girl's name. I did that laundry, and you better believe it got clean and dry. I shopped at Lee's. I stayed up late, and a couple times I even went to bed early. I was part of apartment 36. I cared about those guys and they cared about me. I was part of a quorum and a ward. I made friends. I got better at Ultimate, and I did play in that tournament. Yes, those things did happen. And yes, I do remember them.
The past few months have changed me forever. I could say that about any sequence of months in my life. There have been ups and downs, but all in all I'm proud of what has been accomplished.
I'm happy to announce that I'll be back here more often. Like I said at the beginning, I'm back. Don't expect daily updates about my life, but do expect a couple of posts a week about what I'm thinking.
Thanks for reading friends. Thanks for being around. It's been a good adventure thus far. I hope that you're all doing well. I do care. Good luck on everything. And if I can do something for you, let me know, cause that stuff makes me happy. Keep on trucking, friends. I know I will.
Here I go, happy to be getting better.
I'm sitting in my childhood home, upstairs in my room. My computer is sitting on my spacious desk while I type at it dressed in my pajamas, old man slippers, and the incredible scarf that Molly made me. The furnace is on and I'm toasty and happy. There's snow outside like there used to be.
I just read a lot from my journal and from some of my older posts. Just things from the past couple of months. It feels *so* good to read that journal. My posting here fell off about two months ago, but my journal has never stopped. I loved reading back and remembering so vividly all those things that I experienced. Things that I had completely forgotten but that were important to me at the time. That phrase, "important to me at the time" is something that I want to talk about tonight.
Do I remember that time we had to push the van up the hill? Do I remember the lessons I learned from it? Do I remember the list that I made the night after I talked with Heather? Do I remember how it felt to take that long walk? Do I remember how fun battling brad at battlefront was this semester? Do I remember running all the way home, down-hill, to get back in time to play warcraft? Do I remember singing that duet with Jake in mission prep? Do I remember the fireside?
With the exception of the van, those are things that I wrote about throughout the past two and a half months. I write pretty important things in my journal. I never really thought that I did, but reading this evening helped me see that a little bit. If it was good enough to get into the journal it certainly meant something to me. It changed my life and made me think. It was something that I wanted to remember. Those things that happened, whether they were things that I did or that someone else did, changed those days forever and made me feel differently.
I've written and thought a lot before about honoring the past version of myself. The first time I can remember doing this was late one night as I was wrapping up one of my very first emo-posts. As I came to finishing it, I realized that it was pretty personal, very long, and might bring some people down instead of lifting them up. Those were things that I didn't like to post, especially that last one. But as I argued with myself over whether to delete it or not, I wrote something like this: "I really want to take this down. But as a monument to the way that I felt tonight, to the person who I was tonight, I'll leave it up. Because I know tomorrow-me is going to want to take it down. But for what I feel and who I am tonight, I'll leave it." Ever since then I've kind of had that mindset. When I feel passionately about something I know that there's a good chance I won't feel like that in the near future. And when I stop feeling like that, then what happens?
Looking back on these past few months, on all these events and occasions, I realize that I did quite a bit of feeling. Those things I mentioned, and many others as well, made me into "someone" those nights and days. I left monuments to them through my journal and sometimes my blog. But I hadn't ever really revisited them. They existed, but what good is a monument that is never visited?
The moral of my story? I read tonight. I read to prepare for a post I was planning that was entirely different from the one that I just wrote. But something cool happened as I read. I remembered those things that have happened. And as I remembered them, I felt like all those different Christopher Thatchers that existed on those discrete nights came back together to be me again. I feel very whole right now. Whole like everything I did this past semester hasn't been forgotten. Whole like I'm living my life on purpose and moving forward. I feel whole like I haven't forgotten the things that are important. It's a difficult feeling to describe, but it is important to me.
Those things were important to me at the time that they happened. And they're important to me now as well. When I forget about things, what changes? Is it the event itself? "It was important to me at the time, but it has fundamentally changed since then, so it is no longer important"? Or is it myself that changes? "It was important to me at the time, but since then I have fundamentally changed, and it is therefore no longer important"? I don't necessarily know the answer to that question.
But I'll tell you something good. Reading and thinking and praying tonight makes me very happy to be the same me that experienced all those things. Those things haven't changed. I haven't changed, in the respect that I'm still the same me that experienced them. And I'm happy about that.
I'm proud to report that I made it through all of those experiences. I survived pushing that van up the hill. I survived those rounds of battlefront and dota. I survived the physics final. I really did find out that girl's name. I did that laundry, and you better believe it got clean and dry. I shopped at Lee's. I stayed up late, and a couple times I even went to bed early. I was part of apartment 36. I cared about those guys and they cared about me. I was part of a quorum and a ward. I made friends. I got better at Ultimate, and I did play in that tournament. Yes, those things did happen. And yes, I do remember them.
The past few months have changed me forever. I could say that about any sequence of months in my life. There have been ups and downs, but all in all I'm proud of what has been accomplished.
I'm happy to announce that I'll be back here more often. Like I said at the beginning, I'm back. Don't expect daily updates about my life, but do expect a couple of posts a week about what I'm thinking.
Thanks for reading friends. Thanks for being around. It's been a good adventure thus far. I hope that you're all doing well. I do care. Good luck on everything. And if I can do something for you, let me know, cause that stuff makes me happy. Keep on trucking, friends. I know I will.
Here I go, happy to be getting better.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Christopher Thatcher - Good Day
I'm very happy to report that today was a good day. Today was a day that I felt like smiling. I did a lot of that today. I did some running that was free and purposeful. I did work and I learned things. I was social. I looked good for a large portion of today. Things were good today.
I've been around long enough to realize that today was not good entirely because of the things that I did. I know that part of it was my fault, and I feel good about the things I did to make it a good day. But I know that I'm a sine graph. I know that things go up and down without me necessarily knowing why or how. I know that no matter how good today was, bad days are on the way. Not because anything terrible is going to happen, but just because I'll be unhappy sometime in the future. It's the way things go.
And so I recognize that today may be part of a much larger cycle. It wasn't all me making this day good. Why is it important?
Because I feel like I was blessed with a good day for a reason. I don't know what the reason was or is. But I don't necessarily think that it's that important that I know. What's important is that I take this good day and that I use it.
I feel like I have more capacity to do good on a good day. I smile more. My smile makes other people smile. I want to work on a good day. I want to share happiness with others and I want to move forward into the future. If I've been dealt that good of a hand on that day, I feel like it's my job to use all of that to make good things happen. My job is to take the good day and run with it.
And that's what I wanted to say tonight. I don't know why I've been blessed with this good day. And I know that tomorrow might very well be a sad and depressed day in which I don't want to do anything.
But for now, while the sun is shining and I'm feeling great, I'm going to run with it. I'm going to do the absolute best I can with all of this, because today's a blessing. They don't come around all the time like this, you know. I've got to take it.
That's my happy message of the day, it makes me smile. I hope that I can write a big post soon about everything in my life. But tonight's not that night.
I hope that you're all doing well. Things are going to get better. They have a tendency to do that, you know. Sometimes it's stuff we do, and sometimes it's not. But things will get better. Maybe not forever. But hey, good days will come. I'm going to run with it.
I've been around long enough to realize that today was not good entirely because of the things that I did. I know that part of it was my fault, and I feel good about the things I did to make it a good day. But I know that I'm a sine graph. I know that things go up and down without me necessarily knowing why or how. I know that no matter how good today was, bad days are on the way. Not because anything terrible is going to happen, but just because I'll be unhappy sometime in the future. It's the way things go.
And so I recognize that today may be part of a much larger cycle. It wasn't all me making this day good. Why is it important?
Because I feel like I was blessed with a good day for a reason. I don't know what the reason was or is. But I don't necessarily think that it's that important that I know. What's important is that I take this good day and that I use it.
I feel like I have more capacity to do good on a good day. I smile more. My smile makes other people smile. I want to work on a good day. I want to share happiness with others and I want to move forward into the future. If I've been dealt that good of a hand on that day, I feel like it's my job to use all of that to make good things happen. My job is to take the good day and run with it.
And that's what I wanted to say tonight. I don't know why I've been blessed with this good day. And I know that tomorrow might very well be a sad and depressed day in which I don't want to do anything.
But for now, while the sun is shining and I'm feeling great, I'm going to run with it. I'm going to do the absolute best I can with all of this, because today's a blessing. They don't come around all the time like this, you know. I've got to take it.
That's my happy message of the day, it makes me smile. I hope that I can write a big post soon about everything in my life. But tonight's not that night.
I hope that you're all doing well. Things are going to get better. They have a tendency to do that, you know. Sometimes it's stuff we do, and sometimes it's not. But things will get better. Maybe not forever. But hey, good days will come. I'm going to run with it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
