We had a few friends over tonight for dinner and tree-trimming… It’s nice being back in Colorado among a lot of people who I haven’t gotten to see much.
Category: Daily Life
de-blarificants, please.
Today at work was teh stress. To give it a very brief overview, it was a lesson in what specific types of IT careers that I don’t want to pursue. (That doesn’t mean I hate my job. Just the parts that stunk today.)
My younger cousin Kate just set up her own blog. Check it out at http://katesworld.wordpress.com . It’ll be interesting to see what you have to say, Kate! 🙂
I think I’m gonna do absolutely nothing that requires mental effort tonight. My brain needs to take a short vacation.
Week off
Geez, am I ready for this.
phlegm
Last Friday I went to Littleton and saw the Rhythm Devils. They are:
- Bill Kreutzmann (Drums – Grateful Dead)
- Mickey Hart (Drums – Grateful Dead)
- Steve Kimock (Guitar – Steve Kimock Band)
- Mike Gordon (Bass – Phish)
- Sikiru Adepoju (Talking drum master)
- Jen Durkin (Vocals – Deep Banana Blackout)
A pretty heavy-hitting list. It was a good show. Horrible venue, drunk crowd, but a good show. It makes me wish I had been born a few decades earlier to really appreciate Mickey and Billy’s drumming. Those guys have some crazy solos, and they have an amazingly synchronized style (anyone who has tried to keep 2 drumsets going at once will understand how hard that is. I think I started to develop a little bit of this with Pat after 3 years of drumline, but only in a small degree.
Not much happened this weekend. That’s OK.
But now I’m sick again. I hate dorms because they’re a complete bacteria breeding house.
Snow (already?)
Today was the first snow of the year. In the middle of October. Fall doesn’t end for 2 more months! I don’t know how that happens.
Made a gallery… haz clic for more:
Snow!
I have to figure out what to do about my bike. The snow’s gonna destroy it… I’ll probably have to part with Tiberius for a few months 🙁
WHATTHE$#!%???
…I am officially a victim of the freshman fifteen.
No wonder I can’t bike up a mountain.
My bike kicked my butt.
Today I tried out another church… I think it was called Timberline Old Town? It’s in a huge coffeeshop. I want to go another couple of times, because we were late and I didn’t get the best feel of it. I had said before that I am very happy with Mountain View, but I want to look around a bit more. I decided that I really, REALLY like what is preached at MVCC, but I’ve been going for like 2 months and I still feel like I don’t know anyone there.
That said, what makes a church the “right one” to attend? There are plenty. I’m never going to find one that’s completely in tune with my own beliefs, and I’m never going to find one that’s just so cool that I can’t help but want to go there- God has done a good job of working through the humble and imperfect over the past few millenia, so I don’t think he’s going to change that policy any time soon.
This afternoon I went up to Horsetooth Rock with Riley, one of the guys on my floor, on my mountain bike. I’ll tell ya what, four years of biking on flat Arizona roads does nothing for me… I was biking up this really long, steep grade, and gasping for air all the way. I was dehydrated, my lungs were about to collapse, and my poor thighs haven’t done any work since I left Colorado before high school. We turned around really early.
I’m still really glad that I went- the weather will be taking a turn for the worse very soon, but it was really nice today. I was stupid to try and conquer a mountain without doing any preconditioning… and it showed. I am embarrased of myself, so I want to spend the winter doing at least a little bit of cardio, because I have asthma that only kicks in when I’m exercising and I need to train myself to actually do physical things again.
That, and once I get some savings going, I want to spend a couple hundred bucks upgrading Tiberius, my trusty Trek 4500. He’s a great bike, but I’ve really destroyed his gears.
Crap.
Update: Yep, the weather totally sucks today. When I posted that image, I didn’t even bother to look at what today’s forecast would be. A high of 38 is no good for someone who spent the last 4 years in Arizona. This was the first crappy, rainy day that I’ve had to endure in that long, too. Biking with 19 degree wind chills is no fun. Everything is wet, the leaves are all still on the ground (I have noticed that Arizona has plenty of leafblowers but no leaves) and it’s generally gross- but just above the temperature needed for it to turn to snow.
I prefer the heat to the cold. But this year I will have endured the hell of 118-degree Arizona summer, and also a long Colorado winter. Blar. It will probably start to get nice and pretty again around a month before school gets out for the year… 😛
Homecoming
I didn’t think I’d get to go to the game today against UNLV, because all 10,000 seats sold out. I managed to score a ticket, though, and went with a bunch of cool people from my floor.
We kicked their butts, 28-7. It was definitely a good game, and our season is off to a great 4-1 start. Our biggest rivals, the CU Buffs, are 0-6.
This was the first game that I went to for my own team that I wasn’t drumming for. I miss doing drumline. I’ve always held that it is a waste of time, and once you get to a certain point, you aren’t really feeding your skills musically by doing it. I still hold to that opinion, but it’s just so much fun! It’s a huge commitment, but the fun is worth it- and I’ve forgotten that. Unless I’m in a very different position in a year or so, I will definitely be trying out for the line. They even have the same “snare curse” that MHS had: just 3 snares. With a band so huge in size, you can’t hear them at all. (You can hear the five tenor players, the low basses, and that’s it.)
In other news, Chad and I rearranged our room. Pics will come soon. I basically had a desk that was secluded in the corner, so nobody would know that I was home, and nobody would say “hi”. Now I’m within view of the door, so that’s not a problem.
Another college bachelor’s discovery: Target brand “Mountain” trail mix is way better than Wal-Mart brand mountain trail mix. Just for the record.
A Day in Song
Wake Up: I’m Ready – Jack’s Mannequin
I wake up to find it’s another
Four aspirin morning, and I dive in
I put on the same clothes I wore yesterday.
When did society decide that we had to change
And wash a tee shirt after every individual use:
If it’s not dirty, I’m gonna wear it.
I take the stairs to the car
And there’s fog on the windows.
I need caffeine in my blood stream,
I take caffeine in the blood stream.
I grip the wheel and all at once I realize:
My life has become a boring pop song
And everyone’s singing along.
Yep, I’m emo in the morning. Eh. Once I “take caffeine in the bloodstream,” I enter SuperHappyOptimist mode. And I don’t fall asleep in my third class of the morning.
Bike to The Bean Cycle in Old Town: Penny Lane – The Beatles
In Penny Lane there is a barber showing photographs
Of every head he’s had the pleasure to know
And all the people that come and go
Stop and say hello
Fort Collins is the ultimate representation of the “blue, suburban skies” of Penny Lane. Old Town is such a quaint city center, with almost completely locally-owned shops. Sure, it’s only a couple of blocks long, so it’s no Mill Avenue, but Fort Collins has been blessed by being out of the way. The neighborhoods here are a little older, and really beautiful. I’d love to raise a family here. Obviously I’m not the only person to think this, since Fort Collins is Money Magazine’s #1 Place to Live in 2006.
Class: College Kids – Relient K
I’m poor, I’m starving, I’m flat broke, I’ve got no cash to spend
Sell all my books for front row tickets to Dave Matthews Band
My girlfriends at another school i know this year will test her
I called, found out she had 3 other boyfriends last semester
And that’s why I say
Oh no, not for me, not for me
Call it torture, call it university
No, arts and crafts is all I need
I’ll take caligraphy and then I’ll make a fake degree
Like I said before, College for the sake of college is worthless. Yet very fun.
Work: U Can’t Touch This – MC Hammer
U can’t touch this
U can’t touch this
Break it down
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh oh-oh
Stop. Hammer time!
Getting used to work on the Security Team can be summarized with four words: U Can’t Touch This. Everything we do is on live, critical systems that have hundreds of users logged on at any given time. You have to be really, really sure that you’re doing the right thing before you do it. We’ve had two major system failures in the last two weeks, and we have to scramble to fix it- keep in mind that there are only four people on this team. They all have more stress than I do, too, because I don’t know how to do everything yet. It’s also interesting working in an office-type team environment- that is, I almost never work with the other people on my team. I know my responsibilities, and take care of them, but I’m insecure not having a handle on everything, since I’m a control freak. I hate working in groups at school, and adjusting to working in this environment has been a challenge (the good kind- it’s not uncomfortable at all, I’m just learning how to do it).
Getting Home: Procrastination – Wendy Woo
I have been procrastinating
Well, I have been waiting my whole life through for you
I always say I’ll wait another day to do those things I meant to do
And I have been been procrastinating
And I have been waiting my whole life through
Just to do all those things that I wish I had done the day before
I really know how to waste a few hours. I deserve it, I have five classes a day.
Actually getting work done: Elmer’s Revenge – Steve Kimock Band
RidecrazinessSIXTEENTHSEPTUPLETS
paradiddlebetweenbassandsnareostinatos
PolyrhythmicRoundhouses
OPENROLLBETWEENHANDANDFOOT
RareButPerfectlyPlacedDoubleBassAttack…
I don’t know how the heck that’s supposed to help me study, but it does.
Chillin’ at night: Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangsta – Geto Boys
Damn it feels good to be a gangsta
Feedin’ the poor and hepin out wit they bills
Although I was born in Jamaica
Now I’m in the US makin’ deals
Damn it feels good to be a gangsta
I mean one that you don’t really know
Ridin’ around town in a drop-top Benz
Hittin’ switches in my black six-fo’
Now gangsta-ass n****s come in all shapes and colors
Some got killed in the past
But this gangtsa here is a smart one
Started living for the lord and I’ll last
That song is way too laid-back. If you haven’t heard it, you wouldn’t know- it just looks like another crappy hip-hop song.