Dear Weather Part III

Dear Weather,

It's quite possible that I have overused this format to complain about you cleverly. I never intended to write three letters about you. However, I think this gives me an opportunity to complain about how much you suck and update everyone about my trip at the same time.

At first, I thought that I might have won. I didn't go up Thursday in fear that you would be there. You had forced me to postpone my trip. Friday, I thought I had gotten through to you. When I arrived to the camp site, it wasn't half bad. A little windy, slightly chilly but bearable. I had time to set up my tent and help my family set up camp. You rained and hailed briefly but stopped. You had me believing that victory was at hand.

Saturday was another glorious day that lacked your presence. Cloudy, a little windy with the occasional rain shower wasn't bad. I can handle all that. I got to hit the four-wheeler a couple of times, got to shoot my guns and enjoy the outdoors. I figured my previous letters threatening hot litigation had worked. Your team of lawyers crumbled and allowed you brief storms in my area, while the rest of the state got hammered with your nonsense.

Sunday was a disappointment. The secret must have gotten out that I'm too lazy (or too broke) to take you to court. It was then that you unleashed the full fury of your potential. The bone chilling hollowness of your existence was made clear when you snowed a couple of inches on my camp ALL DAMN DAY LONG! As a result, paintball was missed, four-wheeling could not happen, no additional firearms were shot, no hikes that I had planned were taken, and it was too cold to enjoy the outdoors.

This is just a small sample of your treachery.


You're a dick, Weather.


I did not let you spoil it all for me. I still had fun. I saw my family. I was on vacation. I was outdoors. The cold wasn't my favorite, but I still loved being out. You did not rain on my parade, so to speak.

I win. You lose. You're a dick.


Warmest Regards,

Johnny W.

Dear Weather Part II

Dear Weather,

I see that my letter had changed your tune a little bit. I noticed that your plans to go ahead with snow showers on Friday are no longer present. I'm guessing you're facing so much litigation from local towns over tornadoes and hurricanes that you may not have the resources to fight another legal front.

However, you must also have a crack team of lawyers to help you avoid court. You have clearly acknowledged my warning for no snow on Friday. I see now that you are going to go ahead and start snowing on Saturday instead.

Pretty tricky, Weather.

I can only guess how you make the money that entices you to do these things. I'm pretty sure you make a sweet billion dollars every time you decide to devastate a large city. That's about the estimate in cost for damages generally. Every time you destroy a small town, I'm sure there is a few million in it for you. I'm now beginning to think that an evil corporation (perhaps the Trump Corporation) has interest in paying you for every time you crush somebodies vacation, let an old lady slip on ice, or sunburn someone halfway to Hell.

You are a soul-sponge, Weather.

I think you can be reasonable. I am generally a reasonable man but I also know when I'm close to defeat. Therefore, I propose this desperate compromise. I see that you are receptive to large lawsuits but still want to find a way to destroy my fun. I will meet you halfway on destroying my fun. You can rain all you want; the whole weekend if you want to. BUT you cannot snow Friday through Monday. If you fail to comply with this compromise you will force my hand.

Enclosed, is a second threat full of steamy legal action.

I was recently informed that British Pounds are a hot piece of currency. The dollar is probably just chump change to you. The Euro is probably just your wallet money that you don't care gets stolen or not. Therefore, my next threat of financial legal action will be in British Pounds. Trillions of them. I'm not familiar with the current exchange rates but I'm sure it's enough to make you shit your pants. I will sue you till it rains chocolate! I'm serious.

Trillions of pounds serious.

When will it end, Weather? This has gotten to be ridiculous. Haven't you caused enough trouble already? Can't you just turn into summer where our biggest problem is it being mildly uncomfortable outside? I love hot weather. Pile that on instead.

I hope we can just move past this ugly incident and go on with our lives. If not, I'm more than prepared to make more legal threats and act on them if necessary. I have some pretty sinister threats left in my bag of tricks. Please don't make me use them.



Sincerely yours,

Johnny W.

Dear Weather

Dear Weather,

I have done my very best to not complain about you, despite you meddling with my every day plans. However, I now see that you will be interfering with my camping vacation plans this weekend.

Not cool, Weather. Not cool.

You see, Weather, I need this vacation. I'm so burned out I might scream and/or explode. Would it kill you to just be nice for a day or two this weekend? I realize that you are busy killing people with tornadoes, floods, and hurricanes lately and that I should consider myself lucky. But you are now messing with the one time of the year that I can reliably look forward to a vacation. That's the last fucking straw.

I see that you are scheduling snow on my first day of vacation. I will cordially ask you to cease and desist with any plans to initiate any snow related activity this Friday. If you fail to recognize my courtesy warning, I will be forced to take legal action. It will not be long until I will have a petition a large enough for a class action law suit.

America vs Shitty Weather will likely be a costly and lengthy court process. To avoid financial waste on both sides, I suggest you carefully consider my warning and take immediate action to avoid this. Otherwise, you can look forward to my team of soul-less lawyers raping every dollar [or Euro] from you in a fairly brutal fashion. You can rest assured that I mean every word of this.



Thank you for your attention and consideration.

See you in [Hell] court.


Sincerely,

Johnny W.

My Musings For The Day

I wondered down to Cabela's to buy a tent today. Cabela's is fun to visit but I rarely buy anything. The prices tend to be too damned expensive. Anyway, as I was driving there, I noticed two elementary school buses were passing me at near blinding speeds. It was like watching twinkies jump into warp speed. Just yellow blurs passing me as I was going almost 85 mph. I wondered, "Where could they be going in such a hurry?" The cynical part of me suggested that it was the states smartest kids getting rushed into hiding while a murderous Noah's Ark-esque rain storm lurked in the near future. Save the smart kids, drown the assholes!

When I finally got to Cabela's I noticed that the buses that passed me were parked up front. You have got to be kidding me. Our school system cannot be so broke [or ignorant] as to think that Cabela's is a remotely educational field trip. Maybe the bus drivers were just pulling over for a break; and the kids are actually at Thanksgiving Point learning something relevant.

Nope.

The kids were all lined up at Cabela's. When I walked into the store, (walking through the crowd of obnoxious 10 year olds) I must have had the obvious readable look on my face that said to the world "this is ridiculous." Sure enough, the greeter at Cabela's saw this look on my face and commented "You think this is ridiculous, don't you?" (He read my mind!) I just kept walking and replied. "Yep, I sure do." As I was walking, my back turned to him, he hollered back "But the kids are learning about nature!"

I chose not to engage that man in conversation. I would have made an ass of myself arguing with a redneck Cabela's store clerk in front of a horde of kids and adults. If I had no common sense however, my obvious retort would have gone along the lines of:

"The kids don't need Cabela's to teach them about nature when the whole state of Utah has a million state parks in their fucking backyard!"

As I walked around, the kids were just being shown sale products to tell their parents about. There was nothing educational about it! Why go to Cabela's of all places? If you're trying to teach kids about nature for cheap, national parks are free! Hikes are free! Skinned knees are not a liability!  Kids without their parents and knives, guns, steep stairs, elevators, and a million pointy objects are a liability. Kids act different without their parents or strong supervision. We all know this to be true. A lot more shit can happen in a smaller time frame. It's a sad education system we got going now.



While I was at Wal-Mart picking up a cell phone car charger, a fat girl who was probably around my age was talking to her friend. I overheard her say:

"I'm comfortable with how big I am. My thick body is beautiful. After all, men like meat. Dogs like bones. I'm just saying, that's the truth."

I thought this was pathetic. Even though that's what she said, what I really heard was:

"I'm too lazy/too dumb/too unmotivated to go to the gym and eat healthy. I would much rather not change my disgusting eating habits because that's a lot of work. And work is hard. This is my way of lowering my standards and not changing anything. Plus, this helps me justify anything I eat from now on without worrying about how I look. Statistics be damned, I don't mind living 20 years shorter than everybody else."






I'm just saying, that's the truth.


Fer' real.

Post-Rapture Blues

So the world didn't come to an end after all. Suprise? There was no Christ or Anti-Christ to smite my atheist ass to the firery pits of Hell. (I assume that's where I'd go. Maybe Limbo.) There was not massive amounts of death and chaos. There was not a lot of people praying in the streets for their soul. There were no random articles of clothing laying about. It was just a regular day.

I woke up this morning just feeling blah. I think it's because I'm sad the world didn't actually end.


Or I'm just sad that I haven't had breakfast yet. I don't know. My emotions are always tough to decipher......


Actually, now that I really think about it, I'm definitely sad because of my lack of breakfast.

Yep, it's definitely the breakfast thing.

While I contemplate my future breakfast menu, here are other failed rapture dates to entertain you.



Between March 21st 1843 and March 21st 1844 (When the rapture didn't come, claiming it was a miscalculation, it was then revised to October 22nd 1844) Fail!

1914, 1918, 1925, 1942 were all years predicted by Jehova's Witness. All these dates would have been ideal. It would have saved us all World War I and II, the Great Depression, and prohibition. Fail!

No later than 1981. There was no specific date. Just no later than 1981. Vague Fail!

1988 was predicted by Edgar Whisenant. The following year he predicted 1989. (He also later predicted 1992 and 1995.) Super Fail for repeated attempts.

A Christian Korean group predicted October 28th 1992. If anyone was going to be right about calculating the rapture mathmatically, you would think it would be the Koreans. (Or some other stereotypical Asian country.) But no. Fail!

1993 was predicted based on superstition since it was 7 years before the year 2000. That makes a lot of sense. Fail!

June 9th 1994 was predicted by some obscure pastor. Fail!

September 6th 1994 was predicted by the same douche who predicted May 21 2011.

January 1st 2000 was predicted by everyone. From the paranoid to the religious, the end of the world was near for everyone. Bomb shelters were constructed, supplies were pillaged, last minute sex was had. Nothing happened. Happy New Year Fail!

December 21st 2012 is predicted by the Mayan's as "the end of the world" but not necessarily the rapture. However, many Christian groups have taken that prediction as their own. I already know people who are planning on having Christmas on the 20th and maxing out their credit cards. Which begs the question: If you are so sure the world is coming to an end, why bother buying Christmas gifts or any gifts for yourself? If you think you'll just be a crispy biproduct of the end of the world, what's the point? Waste of money Fail!

No earlier than 2060 is mathmatically calculated by Sir Isaac Newton. The man was a genius. Could he be wrong?........Yes. Modern physicists have come to find out that a lot of Newton's shit is wrong. It remains to be seen if he could be remotely correct. If I'm still alive by that year, I'll be 73. I could probably give a shit less by that time. So bring on the 2060 rapture, Newton!


The 80's and 90's were full of failed predictions. That's probably because the 80's and 90's sucked. Looking over the superficial crap that made those two decades suck, (the mullet, the start of boy bands, poofy hair, Michael Jackson-related rapings, slow internet, the laser disc, HIV and AIDS breakout, Prince, and the birth of many of today's awful teen icons) I also realized that there were several other events that might have possibly but wrongfully hinted the end of the world. 2Pac's death. Kurt Cobains death. Biggie Smalls death. The fall of communism. The phasing out of the mullet. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles getting cancelled. If I was more aware of my surroundings in those days, I too might have thought the world was coming to an end. My child mullet would have cringed in fear as I watched the last episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Luckily, I was in a blissful state of childhood ignorance. Nothing else mattered except for my mullet, my toys, and what I had to bring for show and tell the next day at school.


Anywho, I've entertained the rapture idea long enough. Time to go back to my cynical reality.

More important than that, it's time for breakfast.

Paid Writer

When I was a kid in elemetary school, I dreamed of writing for a living. By the time I was in 6th grade, I had already authored six books. Now don't get the wrong idea. These weren't professionally published with hardback covers. If I had an idea for a story, I would spend half my school day writing it down on paper. Then I would put them together and staple it so it would open like a book. I even attempted to sell copies for 25 cent. (Which was surprisingly successful.) I made 8 dollars one day selling these things. When you think about it, selling homemade books for 25 cents per copy and making eight bucks means quite a few kids felt inclined to purchase my attempt at creativity. I thought for sure I was headed for a career as a writer. My parents and teachers encouraged this. My mom would make copies of my books at the library. My teachers were supportive but didn't appreciate me attempting to profit from it. They put a stop to that pretty fast.

By middle school, I had lost some interest in writing. I was much more concerned with learning to skateboard and playing basketball. Both of which I was hoping to one day enter at the professional level. I was more concerned with my image. I wanted to be cool and liked. Not nerdy and lame. I didn't try as hard in English as a result.

When 9th grade rolled around, I decided I was going to try to do music and bought a drum set. I also wanted to contribute to the lyrics for my upcoming band. (Part of the reason for this was my deep disappointment of learning that I was a terrible singer.) I was terrible at songwriting. The content of the lyrics wern't important in my mind. I just wanted it to rhyme. I was self-conscious about making it sound like poetry. I felt that poetry was for pansies and girls. I didn't not want to be identified as either one of them. As a result of this mentality, most of my "song" lyrics turned out like crap. They lacked content and real thought. They had no meaning or purpose.

When my band was established I was still writing lyrics for it. I didn't do so bad of a job at it. About a quarter of the songs we played were written by me. I was obsessed with writing lyrics. It became my outlet. In reality, they were just poems. But to avoid a personal stigma they were "songs." I wrote in little books that I carried with me at all times just in case inspiration struck. 98% of the writings were dramatic rants about how terrible things were. They were strongly emotionally driven. By the second little book of writings, I had owned up to what they were and called them poems. I didn't care anymore. It just felt good to write.

Writing in those little books really was the best thing for me. My sanity was kept in tact and my emotions in check. If I didn't write them, my teenage anger was seemingly uncontrollable. I had to write what I was feeling. I had to take it out on the pen and paper. On some days, I could crank out 15 writings. Life was terrible, but it was largely my fault. It had to do with bad grades, my poor choices in women and fights among friends. The confusion of growing up and taking responsibility for the person I was going to grow to be was just as hard. I wasn't sure who I was and what I was doing. I just knew I was young and wanted to be in a band for a living.

I wrote so much that I wanted to do it professionally on some level. I wanted to be a writer again. I figured if I wrote enough, I would produce enough material worth reading that I could make it into a book. I had hopes that I could have legions of fans who were just eager to read my angry poetry. It wasn't terrible logic, but I also didn't realize that out of the thousands of writings I had made that maybe 20 were any good. But my writing meant the world to me. It was an emotional passion. It made sense to me to consider making it my job. I had even prepared for the possible idea of being published. After every book I finished writing in, I would go back and transcribe it on computer. My handwriting in some cases was very difficult to read. I could get so angry that I could barely write straight. Plus, I have awful handwriting. I figured if I transcribed it after I finished the book, I would still be able to read it since it would still be semi-fresh in my mind. I also left commentary after each poem to help remind me of why I wrote it. I tried to make the commentary as detailed as possible. Why did I write it? Where was when I wrote it? Who was involved? How I felt exactly. I translated some of the metaphors that weren't directly obvious to anyone but me. Some of them were so obscure that I knew I would forget if I didn't input a back story.

All in all, I finished 7 of those little books completely. But as time went on, it was harder for me to write poetically. After high school, I wasn't as angry. I wasn't as confused. I was more in control of who I was and the emotions that came with that. Strong (and generally negative) emotions are what fueled my writing. I wasn't so negative anymore. Life was better. Life was different. High school and the things I cared about then didn't matter in the real world. I quit seeing real life in a poetic context. I don't remember when I quit writing that way but I was probably around 20.

Another writing outlet I enjoyed was blogging when it first came out. Myspace was how I documented funny stories, my life updates, and my general musings and thoughts on life. I made it a habit to write in twice a month. I tried to make it into a system as if I was some sort of established writer. Once every two weeks I would come out with something. One was a life update or something serious. The other was on something funny. On myspace you could subscribe to blogs. You would get notified every time someone you subscribed to published something. I had 22 subscribers, which I thought was a substantial accomplishment. Most people, if they blogged consistently, only had 5 or 6. I thought I could possibly write in a magazine as a regular author some day.

This idea has also vanquished. I realized just about every hack capable of writing a semi-interesting paragraph had ambitions to write professionally. Plus I had no particular style that applied to anything. The idea of becoming a paid writer was abandoned.

Now that I'm blogging on this thing more consistently, I realize that I'm almost accomplishing my dream of being a paid writer. I'm at work writing as we speak. In essence, I'm being paid to write. I'll take it. My childhood me wouldn't be too disappointed on that.

Being Homeless Wouldn't Be So Bad Part II

I posted a blog 11 months ago about how I would probably be the best homeless guy ever. It was a silly blog that was poorly written. However, looking at my blog statistics, it was one of my most read blogs through the winter months. I'm thinking that was mostly likely people googling stuff about helping the homeless for the winter time. Then they would stumble upon that blog in particular just because it merely had the word "homeless" in it. Well-intentioned people had the unfortunate chance to read my asshole ramblings that really didn't have a whole lot to do with helping the homeless. Instead, they read an eye-full of self indulgent crap. They read a blog about absolute stupidity and ignorance.....



This blog will be no exception.





So with that unnecessarily long prelude, I will jump right into more thoughts of how I would find resourceful ways of being homeless. If the being homeless scenario doesn't fit your fancy, try to think of it as being resourceful during an post-apocolyptic timeframe. If you're not into post-apocolyptic scenarios you can try to put yourself in a "Great Depression" scenario.



Anywho, one of the greatest challenges of being homeless is having a steady source of food. Sure, you can use shelters and soup kitchens. But what if those were gone? Or what if you were too lazy? Personally, I would much rather cook my own food. Of course, you have the option of stealing food from the grocery store, or maybe even a small gas station. What do you got to lose? You're homeless! If you get thrown in jail, you get a roof over your head for a few hours. In my last blog I spoke of roasting geese in the downtown park. What if you aren't near a park full of semi-domesticated geese? As I was driving home the other day, I came to an overpass. I noticed there was a ton of pigeons. Most of them didn't fear cars. It would be easy to take one out for a small snack. In fact, there are already 5 or 6 dead ones just ripe for the taking. Is this why hobos hang out by overpasses? Aside from the vast market to panhandle from, you also have a decent last minute food supply too.



Being homeless doesn't mean you have to be "homeless" per se. There is a large market of broken down abandoned houses to hang out it. Trespassing is a fairly minor crime that means nothing to most homeless people. An abandoned house is a perfect place to hang out in. (Providing the abandoned house isn't already taken by meth dealers or other smarter homeless people.) If you stake out the property right, there still might be useful appliances and utensils left in there. If you're lucky, you might still have electricity. That would rock. Abandoned houses also attract rodents, small birds and the occasional owl. Bonus! You can probably get a day or two worth of food before you scare the rest away. There is nothing like eating an endangered owl over a roaring fire!



Mugging is a pretty lucrative business for the homeless. However, they tend to mug other homeless people for useless things like backpacks full of citations. Mugging would be the way to go if you don't do it violently and pick your targets right. Go for the obvious rich people. Hang out at place where rich people notoriously shop at. You have the option to pandhandle the rich consistently or mug some poor bastard then run like hell. If you get caught, you get jail time. But jail time usually equals a little healthcare, some food and exercise. What do you got to lose?







Pretty ridiculous, right?

We All Win and Lose the Hard Way

It was a long day at work. It wasn't hard. It was just long. I felt as though I was in a haze the entire shift. I couldn't hit a single IV to save my soul. I couldn't interact with patients like usual. I was just......blah. I just wanted to get home so I could ride my bike. I knew it would do me some good to get outside and ride a little bit. It was the perfect cure to my haze. The sun was shining. The temperature was perfect. Kids were giggling and screaming in the background static of a suburban neighborhood. Birds were chirping. People were out running and biking. It was perfect.



As I rode, my mind cleared. (Despite being out of breath) I didn't concentrate so much on beating a slight incline with my out of shape body. I started to concoct a funny blog about the homeless again (another blog, perhaps). As I rode through my old neighborhood, I ran into an old friend whom I had literally grown up with almost my entire life. I stopped to talk to him. It had been years since I had talked with him face to face. It was a somewhat eery experience. Not in a bad way. It was like looking into the face of a past long buried but not forgotten. Our conversation only lasted 20 minutes, but it was overwhelming to hear of the life he had led since I had last talked to him. I heard about old friends and old classmates, the routes they took, and some whose lives had tragically ended. My old friend had a bit of a hard time himself but made it out and was getting it together. I was speechless hearing his stories. In my mind, I see him and these people he spoke of as the people I remember in high school. Their younger faces and mannerisms still in my mind as they were 6 years ago. It was hard for me to believe how much had changed. How much time had gone by. I felt as though the world kept moving while I stayed in place in the comfort of my own home.



He was very much as I remembered him. General same sense of humor. General same pattern of speech. Just almost the same person. Something was different. I couldn't place my finger on it. Maybe it was the awkwardness of catching up. Who knows. I was just happy to see him. In his face, I was brought back to years of childhood memories all the way up till I was 16 when we gradually drifted apart. But  it was the decade of memories that clouded my senses. All I could feel was a mix happiness, a sense of regret for not having been a better friend back then, and a sense of closure. I often wondered about my old friends and others I used to know. But you can never really guess where life could lead them.



I guess we all learn life lessons differently. It's all a matter of perspective, really. We all come to our personal philosophies and triumphs the hard way. Through hard times, bad decisions, and even pure bad luck. We can call that a victory in the end, if we so chose. We can win the hard way. We can lose just as hard and still come to the same amount of strength and philosophy.



I learned we can never really set out to be something. We just have to let life lead us and take it's course. Our hopes and dreams fabricate delusions of what we think we should be but not what's realistically possible. Our hopes and dreams don't take into account for what real life is and how harsh and ugly it can be. Our hopes and dreams don't take into account the people we will meet and change us to one direction or the other. All we see is this gloriously ideal end picture where things turn out the way we want. The way they are supposed to.









The truth of the matter is, not everyone gets to be an astronaut when they grow up.

Apparently the World is Ending Soon

Have you seen those signs all over the country claiming that the world is ending on May 21st? It's pretty ridiculous. I hate to write about this because it just validates their publicity campaign but I can't help it.

I was driving home from teaching a PALS class when I noticed a convoy of trucks with same artwork passing me up. They all had a picture of the world with a caption saying

"Have you heard the AWESOME news? The world is coming to an end!"

This was also followed by a a circle and slash through the year 2012. As if to imply the 2012 nutjob theory of the world ending was widely accepted.

How does the world coming to end become "awesome news?" I don't believe this ridiculous crap but how does anyone refer to this as being awesome? Maybe depressed and suicidal people may see this as good news but in general? If this were true, there would be cataclysmic anxiety and lapses in faith. Everyone would worry if they were going to heaven and hell (providing those places actually exist). People would question if their religion was correct. If they would see their loved ones in heaven. People would loot and screw like crazy. Yet none of that is happening. I wonder if the people who thoroughly believe in this are just as excited about the world ending as their trucks seem to imply.

I can't get over how it calls this event "awesome news." That's not awesome news. I don't want to die. I'm sure millions don't want to either. If this were real this would be just as uncomfortable and worrisome as trucks driving around with big words saying

"Have you heard the awesome news? May 21st is National Anal Rape Day! Sodomize non-consensually for a legal 24 hours!"

That is not awesome news! This is, in fact, just the opposite of good news. Quit wasting peoples time and emotions on the concept. It sends idiots into a frenzy, skeptics into frustration and normal people into even considering the possibility. This campaign is sick. I often wonder if there is some financial gain for the people who started this. Maybe they are selling disaster kits full of arsenic and white robes for people. Or maybe if people pay enough money they get to go to heaven. I just wonder what the reward is for this. Obviously a great amount of money is being invested on the advertising. It must be coming from somewhere.

I haven't really heard anyone really buy into this bullshit thankfully. I think this would be made much worse if people actually believe this "prophecy." I've heard nothing but jokes when it comes to this subject.

I'm sure this will just disappear as if it never happened when I wake up on May 22nd. The people who believed this will look like fools and be silenced for a while. For once, the general population was wise enough to not swallow this pile of crap.

Doing Things Alone

I do a lot of things alone. I always have. It's never bothered me much. One of the things I love doing alone is eating at restaurants. I don't do it for some sort of attention-seeking shock factor. It's something I've just always done since I was about 16. I just enjoy having a good meal by myself. I like being able to sit, order, and enjoy. No needless talk or conversation. Just food and my thoughts. Don't get me wrong, it's not my preferred method of eating. I love eating at restaurants with other people. I do enjoy conversation at the table. But sometimes, I just like to be alone when eating. I don't know why. I can walk into any sit down restaurant and do it. I don't mind the occasional snickers from servers and other people in the place. That actually makes it easier to ignore them and enjoy my food. But I can always tell when I'm being stared at by people. I sometimes wonder what they are thinking. But that thought is fleeting and quickly disappears. It is rare that I get self-conscious about it.

There is one time where I got slightly self-conscious about it. There was this Denny's I went to frequently while I lived in Ogden. It was nice and quiet and rarely busy. I would show up, get a cup of coffee, have some eggs and enjoy the general peace of the place. The background noise of a restaurant was almost soothing. Anyway, I remember one morning I got sat on a side of the restaurant that I didn't normally sit. I thought it was odd for a moment but ordered my coffee and eggs without really taking notice. I sipped on my coffee for a second and just glanced at my surroundings. I counted 6 other guys sitting alone at different tables on the same side of the restaurant as me. They were just doing the same thing I was. Enjoying a breakfast.....I think. I looked at the other side of the restaurant and realized the other side of the restaurant was full of tables with multiple people on them. It was like being segregated. Socially acceptable on one side, weird loner guys on the other. When I looked at these other men I noticed they were all in their late 40's to early 60's. They all had a somewhat sad look about them. They looked unkempt and sleepless. They all chatted up the server as much as they could before the server would find an excuse to get back to work. They all had aviators in the pocket of their flannel shirts. (Yes all of them had flannel shirts and aviators. No joke.) They looked............Lonely. Sad. Desperate for a human connection. I was in my scrubs and had at least looked ready for the day. But then I noticed I had aviators in my shirt pocket. I remember thinking at that moment "Looks like I'm the newest member of an elite club." I looked on myself and realized I too was lonely. I was in a strange city separated from my friends and family. I missed them dearly. But then I realized, it was all just a coincidence. I have always worn aviators. I still do see my friends and family, just not as often. And I probably would have been eating at that Denny's whether I was separated from my friends and family. I didn't chat up the servers every chance I had. I'm not doing this out of loneliness. I've just always done this because I like it. My circumstances happened to make me lonely. Ogden sucked.

I like going places to browse at items I can never purchase alone. It's more socially acceptable and most people don't think twice about it. In a way, I feel that it makes me more self-sufficient to things like this alone. I enjoy the company of others. I love my friends and family deeply. But I feel better knowing that if I can't hang out with them, that I can manage on my own if I have to. I never realized how much I did on my own until I talked with my friends last night. I was talking about the restaurants I had tried and the stores I had been to. They asked always asked "Who did you go with there?" I just nonchalantly replied "just me." My friends were somewhat shocked. Even my closest friends had no idea I was such a loner. My friends and I go to a lot of places. I guess I just never realized how many other places I go without them.

I tried the restaurant Chipotle today. I was craving a burrito and that was the only place open. I decided to give it a shot. Of course, I was on my own but I didn't think anything of it. I ordered my burrito, found a table and started eating. I kept noticing glances from people within the restaurant looking at me and quickly looking away when I noticed them. I sat in the back near the exit. The girl who served my burrito was washing tables with a co-worker. I heard her say to her friend "Why is he alone? I hope he is waiting for a friend. It's kind of sad." I just rolled my eyes. Why did it have to be sad? I was enjoying my food.

There was a divider in the middle of the restaurant that unnecessarily split the place in half. On the other side of the wall was a family eating. A pair of small eyes and fingers peered over at me from the other side of the wall. Then behind me from the other side of the wall. This little girl kept looking over at me. I thought it was cute. She had to have been 6 or 7 years old. As I finished my food, she finally stood next to me and said "Why are you eating alone?" I smiled and said "Because I like to." She asked "Where is your family?" I kept smiling "At home. Enjoying the day off. Where is your family?" She pointed to the other side of the wall. Her mom quickly came over and apologized and asked if she was bothering me. I smiled and said no.

Then the girl said "I think you're funny. You don't care about nothing. You're nice. Why do you like eating alone?" (She said this all with her hands behind her back, twisting back and forth with the biggest smile.)

I replied, "Because if I wasn't eating alone you wouldn't have talked to me and made my day better."

She giggled and ran back to her family. She said goodbye to me as she walked out of the restaurant.

It was a great weekend. Today has been good to me, but now it's going to be better.  

My Plain Life

Last Saturday was quite productve despite my head cold making me miserable. I started my day off with some awful food like most champions do (or so I'm told). I went to a local restaurant that had been recommended to me years ago that I've been meaning to go to. I kept hearing things about how they had the best philly steak sandwich in the state. I found that hard to believe. I was confident my favorite shit-hole restaurant had already claimed that title. However, I do love going to local restaurants. It's one of my favorite things to do. The service was great, the food was good, but it couldn't overthrow the current title of best philly steak sandwich. Shithole restaurant still holds that title safely and securely. After that fattening lunch, I then decided to go to my newfound favorite donut shop. They have a cinnamon roll covered in coffee cake crumbs. Against that pastry, I'm completely powerless. I could recieve the worst news ever and forget all about it by eating that ingenius pastry. It combines my two favorite things about a pastry: cinnamon sugar and coffee cake.

Feeling confident that I had just given myself diabetes, I decided that it was high time to get my car registered after I let the registration lapse for a couple of months. Plus, I got a ticket in Park City for my expired registration. Which, I have no problem with in principle. I was breaking the law and got caught. But still.....That's $100 down the drain. I should have known better than to drive my expired car through a town whose crime rate is relatively low and their cops boredom factor relatively high. I was just asking to get a ticket.

After I got my car registered, I was feeling rather saucy. I had money to spare. It was time for me to get the mountain bike I had wanted for a while. I got back into my street-legal car and drove to the bike shop post haste. The bike purchase went smoothly. Nothing to complain about except for the service that I seemed to have recieved begrudingly from a lazy and/or disgruntled staff member. I was spending good money on a bike. But it felt as though I was inconveniencing them with my purchase. I'm surprised I also didn't get a kick in the ass on my way out the door. I won't be going there again for my bicycle-related needs in the future.

Even though I was sick, I decided I had to ride the bike. How could I not? I spent a little over a grand on the damn thing. I should ride it the first day I get it! This proved to be a bad idea. I found myself woefully unprepared for how out of shape I was to ride it. Combine that with my cold, I was huffing and puffing like a dying Geo Metro. It was kind of embarrassing since I didn't go very far. I was so out of breath. My first instinct on this issue would be to save my pride and blame it all on the cold. This respiratory cold was the cause of my inability to peddle a bike up small inclines. (Yes, small inclines. Not hills. It was sad.) The next coming days, I got slowly better and started to ride my bike more often. I was definitely out of shape. But I enjoyed just being outdoors and absorbing the fresh air. Even if my fat ass was having an obvious hard time moving up the simplest of obstacles. I couldn't help but think of how I used to ride around this whole neighborhood as a kid, no problem. Now I'm in the prime of my youth and can barely make it. But don't you worry, troubled reader. I will get the hang of this and will no longer be embarrassed on the roads. I'm scared to do my first mountain trail. I'm sure it will be an ass-kicking discovery of my lack of physical prowess.

The last thing I will bore you with is how happy I am to have found a plain black hat. I've always been one to wear really simple clothing. I hate today's clothes with all the flashy designs. All the shirts and jackets are covered in crappy semi-artsy designs. If it's not designs it's covered in, it's covered in logos. It's almost inadvertantly becoming a NASCAR-esque way of clothing. This rant on today's styles really confirms that I am OLD! But that's ok because I have always known that. Anywho, most of my clothes tend to be super plain. If there is a logo, it's simple, centered and a two-color maximum on the entire piece. Most of my clothes tend to be just black, grey and an occasional off color like brown or green. It's simple, doesn't draw attention and makes me look like less of a toolbag. Hats are very much becoming problematic in this same fashion. Too flashy. My favorite hats have very minimal logo's stamped on them. I've always been on the lookout for just a plain black hat. But it's hard to find one that's not extraordinarily crappy. Generic hats tend to unravel easy or look shoddy. (Don't worry, I'm coming to the climactic point of this story.) As I was walking through a Wal-Mart I found a hat rack that had what I had been looking for my whole life. The holy grail of plain! A plain black hat that fit and was made of quality material. My heart melted a little. The price: $3. My knees started to get weak and I think a little drool escaped my mouth. (I will neither confirm or deny that conclusively.) It was the last one. I snatched it up before some toolbag starting a clothing company can ruin it with a badly made logo. It was mine for the taking in all it's plain glory!



I can't believe I wrote such a long blog about this. It really underlines the generally uninteresting characteristics of my life. But that's ok. It's my life and I'm happy with it.

Thanks Mom

Thanks Mom! You're the best!

Happy Mothers Day!

'Nuff said.

Colds in the Spring

Currently, I'm battling a cold and losing. That's the worst part of any cold; you lose for easily 3/4ths of the battle. Then you rally at the last second and win. I'm glad I got this cold rather than the other crap that has been floating around. I've seen nasty stomach flus hit people lately. So happy I don't have that. I've been exposed to strep throat easily 6 times the past 2 weeks. Definitely happy I don't have that either.

The only good thing I can even take from a cold is that it makes my voice sound deeper. I'm always secretly self-conscious about my voice. I sometimes worry that it's too high and nasal. A good cold usually drops my voice a couple of bass notches. Weird right?

With my luck the way it is, I catch a cold during the week I've had the most days off in almost 2 months. And of course it's also the same week that it's the sunniest and warmest all year.

Well that is all I will whine about today.........

Or is it?

Bored Myself Awake

As I was snuggled in my nice warm bed enjoying a good nights rest, a dream came upon me. It was nothing special. In fact, it was downright boring. My dream consisted of me shopping tirelessly for breakfast bars. The focus of the dream centered on my dilemma of choosing the right cereal bar. Which as it turns out was much more complicated than I thought humanly possible. This dream was so boring that my body forced itself to wake up. This caused me to wake up a full hour early. I went back to sleep hoping I would be swept into another dream. One that was more interesting. But I would have no such luck. I just came right back to the same dream and my perpetual dilemma of getting the ultimate breakfast bar.

Aside from that, I've noticed I've been slacking in my blogging. This mostly has to do with the fact that I've been keeping extremely busy. I'll try to be better.

This last weekend was amazing however. On Saturday I went to the difficult airway course with a friend I work with. He enjoyed it as much as I did. I took the course a couple of years ago and loved it. I loved it this time too, but it felt different. I realized how small I was sitting in a room full of doctors. I realized it 2 years ago when I took it. But this time it was hollowing. I was like a middle school baseball player hanging out as the towel boy in the major leagues. I was nothing. Even though everything I did was fun and I learned a lot, I couldn't but feel useless. There was only one way I would be able to use this skill set. I would have to finish school and be a doctor. I didn't want to feel small anymore. I didn't want to be playing on the same field as the major leagues but only be at a middle school player level. It was time to move on and start getting my shit together. This was yet another inspiration to continue with pre-med even if it hurts feeling so low. I just have to plow through it.

It's nice to see the weather starting to shine and warm up again. For a little bit I was getting angry and depressed about the amount of snow we were recieving. But I realized that people in the state of Utah, myself included, tend to get weather amnesia. We always seem to forget how wet and cloudy April is. It was rainy all of April last year. And the year before that, and the year before that, and so on. Here's a crazy guess, it will probably be really rainy next April too. I've tried not to complain about the weather. We don't have it so bad really. There isn't tornadoes destroying my home, or floods making me wet and cold. There isn't fires or earthquakes ravaging the life that I knew. In fact, we are pretty damn lucky that snow at the end of April and beginning of May is our biggest problem. We have it pretty good. Putting it into perspective like that makes all of the Utah complains appear simple and selfish.

But still, on my few days off, I just want to enjoy a nice sunny day. Instead I get bombarded with snow and cold.

Fuck snow.

Bring on the sunshine and warm weather. I'm ready.