29 January 2010

Moderation

Under comment moderation, there's an option to receive an email when one who comments meets a certain criterion. Yes, criterion.


Maybe it should say, "...when a member of another blog community leaves a comment..."

Mormon humor.
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27 January 2010

Choose Your Own Title, Blogger!

I've never been very clever at writing good titles. I call it title block. What's the matter? Don't believe me? I don't blame you.

That was a lovely transition into my cool words for today. I am not intending on writing a blog post tonight. Alas, do not fret, as something lovely shall soon venture its digital way to your most likely made-up IP address and display itself in full HD: a gift from me to you. Not too much longer now. It takes time to be this creative, you know. What, with work and scouts and important meetings and video gaming and Twitter and fb and netflixing, creativity has taken the back seat in my grandma's old minivan, anxiously awaiting the moment that they pull up to A&W and the nice man brings out a delightful root beer freeze that is sure to fully satisfy the grizzliest of grizzly bears. That being said, I bid you adieux, which is more than one adieu, as I know there are at least 2 people reading this post. Be gone!
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19 January 2010

Black Holes

I went into it with my expectations set at a minimum. On the expectation scale everyone has come to love that goes from 1 to, say, 10, I went in at a -367. Shane said he didn't like it. Lots of people said they did like it, people for whom I have an ever-growing distrust on movie selection. So there I was, wearing the number -367 on the back of my shirt, akin to the marathon runners who wear a number on the back of their shirt denoting their expectations of a movie on the expectation scale, in line for a movie I didn't really even want to see. Ticket purchased. Bucket of MD purchased. Worms in hidden coat pocket.

I was frightened upon entering the already lightless movie-watching room until I realized that the aliens now staring me down with their ridiculously oversized bug eyes were not hostile aliens at all, but humans which here wearing ridiculously overpriced 3-dimensional glasses. Also they were looking at the screen, but for my vanity I sensed them all staring in my direction, like a swarm of bloodthirsty, big-eyed beings from outer space whose only purpose is to stare down the kid that entered the theater after the movie had begun. Upon closer inspection of these fictitious creatures whose gaze I imagined upon me, I became aware of their outstanding beauty and the strong, emotional bond they share with all things living, that kind of bond you see and long longingly to be a part of; those emotions that are so deep that you become completely engaged and enthralled and desire more than anything to belong somewhere and in some way among them, yet leave you feeling an emptiness, a void, a black hole of despair once they fade away from view in your imagined place from whence nothing can relieve you; no video game, no book, no amount of Mountain Dew will ever make you feel whole; you wander for hours which seem like weeks at a game store looking at every game for every system known to man; you search every single book in every single nook in a bookstore; you realize that nothing will ever fill the void, no fix will be strong enough or last long enough, except maybe the one emotional attachment to another human being of high significance that you lack; you are reminded of this loneliness; this feeling leaves you eagerly empty; the years turn over; you become old; you die.

Fortunately, I was there to watch a movie, a -367 still attached to the back of my shirt with a safety pin. The whole scene was imagined. The movie barely reached my expectations, leaving no emotional footprint in my being.

Or did it? Duhn duhn duhnnnnnn...
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14 January 2010

The Shrivner

There's this song I know. It's called The Girl by City and Colour. It reminds me of this girl named the Shrivner.

The Shrivner has a beautiful soul and an equally beautiful smile. Partially because of her, I like to buy fresh, organic milk. She taught me the awkward touch. She sent me a text at 2 a.m. saying, "It's hellin' 2 a.m.!" to which I replied, "You're hot!" Keep in mind, it was 2 a.m. and the text woke me up. She encouraged me to buy my first (2) pair(s) of skinny jeans. She would stop by the apartment just to say hi. She has great taste in music. She dances, plays guitar, sings, photographs and she does it all well. If I had to describe the Shrivner in only one word it would have to be totally-bodaciously-legit.

Lots of good memories. One of my favorites is this one time we hung out and went to Taco Time and watched Slumdog Millionaire and she recorded this [radical] song (the aforementioned) on a video she facebooked to her friend. I'd put it on here, but she'd probably kill me. Refraining, due to not wanting to die, I relearned the song real quick and recorded a video of me singing it. Quick warning: I'm a little off key (it's really high!) and I forget where I am in the song sometimes which causes me to pause and my guitar skills aren't exactly akin to Jimmy Hendrix's. Maybe Jimmy Hendrix's at 5 years old. Three sir! Right. Three. To the Shrivner: I hellin' miss you! Hope you like the song. Peace out.



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11 January 2010

BC

Those of you that have known me for at least a half of blog post know that I can get a bit longwinded. Yes, I admit that sometimes even getting out the simplest sayings in less than 3 sentences with at least 14 words in each can be quite the daunting task. I realize that this can be quite unbearable to some, and that most people simple skim when I create words by sounding my voice box which then projects fluctuating, analog tones towards a small opening that is my mouth, getting formed into an understandable mixture of words by my skilled tongue and gapped teeth, sounding slightly muffled only when I am stuffing my mouth full of Count Chocula, and that even now you're skimming and probably have no idea what I just said. Setting all of this aside, there is one thing that you must admit. You also like the sound of your own molded sound waves.

Of course, there are times when being longwinded or letting even one word escape your mouth is [some extremely cool adjective that I'm failing to construct] and [another one] wrong. Take this for instance: the Bathroom Chatter (BC). For Pete's sake, don't do it! If you are ever involved in BC, it must needs be that you stop such behavior immediately. I find it filthy. It gives me the heebie-jeebies. It's awkward (and the bad kind). It's worse than listening to Secondhand Serenade on a PC. I take that one back. A quick story: today, while minding my own, two gentlemen were in adjacent stalls discussing their weekend. Not the time, pals. Another two guys were standing side-by-side (forgive the imagery) when one looks at the other and says, "We seem to have the same schedule!" The other laughs. I shuddered. The only time BC is remotely acceptable is while washing, nay, SCRUBBING your hands at the sink (and yes, please, DO wash your hands at the sink) or in passing at the doorway. Period.

I realize that this is not my best blog post; I just had to get that off my chest. Of course, I guess I could have just written:

"Don't participate in the Bathroom Chatter."
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04 January 2010

Adventures in Awkward (AA)

A show of hands if you consider yourself a little (or more) awkward. Nobody can see you, thus it's a completely anonymous poll; no need to worry. You may need to worry if you're sitting in a public library or a computer lab somewhere. Maybe that guy sitting across from the strange person raising their hand in a public library needs to worry. I've gotten off track again.

If you're anything at all like me, and I assume you are since we share over 40,000 genes (one is bound to be at a similar expression value, meaning we're at least one gene alike), then I bet you, like me, embrace the little bit of awkward you have. To be frank, there is a substantial portion of awkward in my molecular makeup. A recent Wikipedia page on Leon (made up) claims he is 70% water, 30% awkward. Today, I may just prove that true. (Note: a more appropriate word that may be used in place of awkward throughout this post is weird.)

So sit back, relax, put your hand down (I think that guy sitting across from you just uppity-upped and left), and enjoy, if you wish, a few of the more awkward moments (and quirks) of my life. Some of these I must attribute to those who have shared their somewhat magical awkwardness-talent with me, for I wouldn't be who I am today without them.

In general, upon meeting someone for the first time, I reach out and grab their elbow. One of my favorite individuals did this to me when we met and it stuck as one of my own defining attributes. Another he showed me was the awkward handshake I give by grabbing only the fingers of he/she attempting to shake my hand. I have also highly favored the frape over the past few years, which is where you take the palm of your hand, place it on the forehead of the person in front of you, and smear in a downwards motion. All of these gestures have been known to throw people for a loop, and, although it's done out of pure affection, I simply love the reactions.

About a year and a half ago, I was sitting by the fireplace in a ritzy, highly expensive living room at some young single adult activity. I'm enjoying a nice conversation with Kendall, and this unintelligent biped (bai-pehd) decides to stand exactly in front of me in order to talk to this other clique of likewise stupid people. Getting slightly annoyed, I reach out and awkwardly touch the guy's leg. This is not a tap; this is a stroke, a two-inch rub down back of his thigh or shin or whatever it was. Then, like the genius that I am, pretend I didn't see anything when the fool turns around and inquires, "Did someone just touch my leg?" We're still not friends to this day.

Some other oddities: I've licked somebody's face, shared toothbrushes with numerous people, had a mustache for over a month, gone on a date wearing all mismatched clothing, ridden mandem (where two guys ride a scooter meant for one) on at least 3 occasions, worn skinny jeans and a t-shirt stating "The Working Man is a Sucker" to my government job (where I met a producer in whose corn field we were working), openly admitted my obsession for Pokémon, confessed my love for someone over facebook chat, asked a girl out over text, told a girl in a note in 7th grade "You so fine, you so fine, girl I wish that you were mine!", attempted to correct a professor in the middle of class and was wrong, attempted to correct a professor in the middle of class and was right (! - had to throw that in), flirted with the bishop's daughter at an activity at his house (in front of him and his wife), called my sister's girlfriend (when I was in middle school) the blueberry girl, done Smeagol impressions to impress dates, discussed symptoms and realities of IBS on (many) first dates, donned grey hair and a grey beard for a whole night (not Halloween), ran away (literally) from a girl out of fear who wanted to kiss me, asked a different bishop who a certain pretty young lady (I actually said it like that) was only to find out it was his daughter, used made-up words (thanks to Seth) like H-ing to non-Utahns (they generally shrug me and everything I say off anyway), flexed my buttocks on the subway as a missionary, told a girl in Spain (in English) that she was a sinner for wearing a nose ring (she smiled and casually said "good bye" in perfect English as she left the train), carried a tin whistle around with me at college for a month, worn a pen around my neck and carried a notebook claiming I could communicate with a ghost whose only form of communication was the written word and who helped me solve cases (it was the exact plot of the cult TV show Ghostwriter - I was 28), spoken with a phony English accent for the better part of a night while touring a small city outside of St. Louis with a lovely Columbian (Missouri) family during Christmas (only to crack when someone would ask where I was from), spoken with a phony Alabaman accent while touring the famous arch at Lake Powell (only to find out the tour guide was moving to Alabama and wanted to meet up when she got there - I'm not making this up!),..., n, n + 1, ....... (the list goes on towards infinity here).

But the coupe de grace, the winner, the blue ribbon, the gold medal, the one what cuts the big fish, the cake-taker, the top dawg, after which only the fat lady will sing, happened to me (or should I say I happened to them) as I was sitting in the airport in Kansas City waiting for my plane ride home. Now first, you have to imagine what I looked like. I have on a green plaid driver (newsie) hat, glasses that scream metro!, a purple hoodie under which I'm wearing a blue and black checkered flannel. I'm wearing grey, no blue, super tight skinny jeans, and old, once-white Vans with red and black checkered laces. On top of all that, recall above when I said I had a mustache for over a month. I still have it. It's thick. Get the visual? Ready for what happens next? Please, don't judge me too harshly. As I hope you can understand from above, I have a bad habit of sticking my foot in my mouth all too often. I'm sitting there next to these two girls, looking like I did, and I just get this feeling. They're Mormon. So I decide to test my theory. Bust out the trusty MacBook, open up to LDS.org, begin to browse around. I see girl 1 send a text; girl 2 gets a text as soon as girl 1 puts her phone away. Sneaky. Upon reading the text, girl 2 looks at girl 1 and says, "Yeah, I do." Then they start ever-so-quietly speaking of religion. They start speaking a little louder. At this point, I know they're Mormon. I just know it. So I look over and say (and brace yourself):

I wear magic underwear.

As the words were rolling off my tongue, I could only imagine how awkward, creepy, and just plain weird this whole scene must look to an outsider, let alone to the two nice girls who didn't deserve that. This is what I imagined the people telling their families later that day, "So this guy, mid- to upper-30s, is sitting next to a couple of girls who are at best 20. The girls are having a very private, almost mumbled conversation. Suddenly, the guy looks over and proclaims, "I wear magic underwear!" (gasps! from the peanut gallery) And what's even more shocking is that these girls didn't get up and move or tell security or anything! No, they just sat there; they began to have a conversation with the creep-o! They stopped talking after two or three minutes; he went back to his Dante's Inferno or whatever it was and they went back to their conversation. Silence. I tell you what (!), I have never felt a more awkward tension than I did today. It was weird."

Mind your own business, filthy eavesdropper. Comments welcome.
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03 January 2010

Stupid. Don't Waste Your Time.

I've slipped into my old ways of being a crappy blogger friend. Goal: be better at this.

Some other goals include getting used to writing 2010, catching all 400+ pokemon in Platinum, watching all of season 1 of Pokemon, doing all this before Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver are released (March 14), somehow managing my time between catching Pokemon in Platinum and Emerald and LeafGreen and Diamond and the aforementioned HeartGold and SoulSilver all while reading new books like Dante's Inferno and the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and movie-watching and daydreaming about moving back to Utah and nightdreaming about moving back to Utah and this is an entirely ridiculous sentence. I know what you're thinking. Yes, I am obsessed with Pokemon. No, I don't want you to set me up with your friend, and 5. No, 3.

I also plan on getting back on my healthy-lifestyle kick, for the holidays were somewhat rough to keep that going. Tonight I had a bowl of broccoli. It's a start.

Since I know I'm boring you to tears, or maybe death, and since I have no ganas whatsoever to write anymore tonight, I'll be done. But a question before you leave: what are some of the goals you guys, all n + 1 of you, have set/are setting?
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