Christmas time...

is cool. Here's a picture from our house photo shoot. Some should expect a christmas card from Dick's Bar in the near future. Check out my book-of-face page for the rest of them. They're pretty hilarious. We laughed our asses off anyway.

Drew needed to do some photo shoot for a class in a studio on campus and we wanted to make christmas cards and send them out, so we figured this would be perfect. we killed two birds with one stone ya know?!

I think we ended up taking 91 pictures or something. It was pretty fun tho.

Anyway, Merry Christmas from Dick's Bar.

My...

belly is full. 

Turkey...

is delecious. Good God turkey is delicious. Thank you pilgrims. Thank you generous indians. Thank you turkey for being fat and so damn good to eat. Thank you family for letting me eat turkey with you. Thank you friends for being my friends. Thank you Mandy for being so beautiful. Thank you, just, thanks. There aren't enough thank you's in my lungs to express how greatful I am. It always feels good coming home. it's good to see how things have changed. It's good to see those who i haven't seen in years. It's good to remember. it's good to see how i've changed. it's good to see how i haven't changed. Life is just good. Even though it can suck pretty hard sometimes. It's just way to awesome.

I tried to pay...

a parking ticket i got in july today, (i procrastinate more than most people) again. i went to pay it about a month ago and was steered to building after building. i finally found someone who would take it, but then a few days later i got it back in the mail saying i turned it into the wrong place. so today i finally got around to trying to pay it again. when the ticket was sent back to me in the mail ther was a sheet of paper that gave me a building to go to, to pay. i went there. i gave the ticket to a lady and she said i needed to bring it somewhere else. i instantly got pissed because that's exactly what happened to me last time i tried to pay it. i showed her the slip that said it was in fact to her, where i was supposed to bring it. apparently she didn't believe it so she sent me to another building i had already been to. i just took the ticket and went there again. when i got there it was the county judicial building. a security guard and a metal detector met me at the entrance.
"i can't let you in the building with that cell phone." the guard said.
"alright"
so i put my phone and ipod on a ledge outside the door. then i preceded to go back and forth through the fricken' metal detector four or five times.
"all this to pay a parking ticket" i said.
"don't get a ticket next time" the guard said.
I was this close --- to headbutting the bastard. what a prick.
anyway, i went up to the front counter and gave a lady my ticket.
"oh, you need to go to city hall to pay this" she said.
"no," i told her "i've been there already. twice. and i've been to three other places. i was told to pay it here. take my check."
"let's see" she said "how much is it for?"
"thirty bucks," i said.
"thirty bucks. we dont' even need thirty bucks" she said under her breath.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!! THEN GIVE ME THE DAMN TICKET. I NEED THE THIRTY BUCKS!!
now, honestly, who would say that?
"well let me check again," she said.
"ok"
she typed on the keyboard for a minute then said.
"well, it looks like you actually owe thirty TWO dollars. do you have another two dollars on you?"
now, here's where i lost it. she just told said they don't even want to take the thirty bucks and now she's bitching about TWO FUCKING DOLLARS!!! i can't even think it anymore. it just makes me mad. so anyway, i took back the ticket and left. it might be another few months before i try to pay that damn thing again. to hell with paying parking tickets in this damn city.

on a lighter note, i bought some boxed wine two nights ago and it's delicious. i really like boxed wine. god bless boxed wine.

Last Night...

I witnessed violence that is probably the ugliest of all types of violence. Let me set the scene. Mario, Steve, Teen Machine, and myself are watching 'Ocean's 13' in Teen Machine's living room around 11 p.m. last night. Out her front windown of the living room is the main drag of Bemidji Town. About half way through the movie we notice a man walked a ways down the side walk in front of the house & then sprinted back towards where he came from. I stood and looked out another window to see the man smash the windshield of a black four door Pontiac. He then hit the car a few times while he ran around the car. We thought he was either vandilizing the car or was trying to steal it. Then the car pulled forward, stopped, and drove in reverse to the other side of the road it was parked on. A woman got out. Teen Machine was on the phone with the police, i next to her watching from the window, while steve and mario went outside to a side deck area to watch. when the woman came out of the car the man ran across the street and started beating this woman. Teen Machine and I both said "holy shit!" at the same time, then she told the dispatcher it wasn't a car jacking but in fact a man beating a woman. it was dark but i'm pretty sure the man didn't get her with his bat, just open and closed fists. i ran outside to join mario and steve on the side porch to watch. why didn't the three of us go over and stand up for this woman?! the only reason i can come up with is it all happened so fast. we really didn't know what to do. we were just kinda froze there watching. thinking about it i feel pretty worthless that we did just sit there and watch. after the man hit her a few times he jumped back in the Pontiac and drove forward and backward and forward and backward. then he backed it over the curb and into the lawn where the woman was lying in tears. the police responed very quick to Teen Machines call and the man was taken down and cuffed. more police showed up and put a blanket over the woman and soon an ambulance showed up and she was taken probably to the hospital. both the man and woman seemed drunk or high but who knows. i still feel stupid that all we did was watch.

I just finished...

reading the book "into the wild." It's about this kid, alexander supertramp, who after college graduation packs his shit and takes off west without a nickle in his pocket. he had a $25,000 bank account that he gives up to charity. he didn't say a word to his kin about where he was going or why. he just got sick of society and wanted to drift. he thumbed north to alaska and walked into the bush where he was later found dead of starvation by a group of moose hunters.

i admire supertramp (chris was actually his real name. he just called himself alexander supertramp.) how many of us have the balls to actually go out and do what we dream? most of us will graduate from college and get a 9 to 5er to pay for the gas for the car that drives us to work to pay for the gas for the car that drives us to work. it's a vicious cycle. but obviouslly most of us aren't going to abandon family, friends because working sucks. after reading this i can't stop thinking about how powerful money really is. i'd like to think that i'm a non-materialistic person, but damnit the thought of being rich and not having to worry about money is nice.

i like this quote. "happiness only real when shared." i can only think of one person when i read that because she's the only person i ever think about. every time i laugh, it doesn't seem real without her laughing with me. (or at me) nothing seems real without her with me. but soon i'll wake up and she'll be there and it will be real and happiness will be an understatement.

i'm going insane without you mandy.

Action Movie...

bad guys always have their minions. You know, the ones that get wasted by McGivers' homemade flamethrower made from chewing tobacco, paper clips and rubber bands. How do you get to be one of those guys? Where do you find an application for a job like that? Do they put their resumes on Monster.com?

Where are there always so many of them too? I think Swartzenegger kills about 500 in Comando. Do they get paid well? They must. What do they tell their families at dinner when they come home? "Hey honey, how was work today?"

"oh, fine. Rambo broke in today and shot Ted, Frank, Allen, and Eddie. Ted owed me $20 from poker last Friday too."

"oh my."

"I was a lucky one, he only busted my arm in half over his shoulder. It coulda been worse. Mike got his knee caps kicked in, so he got lucky too."

And why do they always SUCK at aiming? Never once in any movie have i seen Van Daam or Segal get hit by one of the million bullets shot at them. And quit fighting one at a time!! Bum rush the bastard!! He might get one or two of you but if all 50 of you tackle him he's dead and your boss gets the ransom money or nukes the world for once.

What about the honest guard at the front desk at Vinnatech that gets his neck snapped by some terrorist breaking in to steal a vial of infectious virus for ransom. That guy never even has a chance. Poor bastard. He's just working the night shift as a second job so he can pay for his bratty daughter's pony or something.

Once Again...

I have started blogging. I believe this is my third attempt at keeping up a blog. I kind of hope I stick with it this time.

My senior thesis is killing me. My college career is coming to a close after five boisterous years, but certianly not without stress. Of all the semesters I have under my belt this has turned out to be the worst. In about one month here is what I must have done: Senior Thesis and Senior Thesis presentation, graduation plans, & five grad school applications. None of it is extraordinarly difficult, just time consuming. The kind of time consuming where you want to scream because it just sucks.

Being poor also sucks. I can't find a freeking job. I did have a pretty sweet gig announcing women's hockey games but thanks to BSU & their sweet budget cuts we now only do 4 games. which gives me approx. $100 for working all 4 games. urg. $100 doesn't sound bad but here's what $100 can buy these days: about 2 weeks groceries (if you ration well), Halo 3, two nights at a bar, half a tank of gas, a used text book (probably with a few pages missing), 1/3 of rent, part of utilities, or a few cases of Old Milwaukee. Doing without any dough for a long time forces you to make choices. Do I want to eat tonight or do I want beer? Rent or the 3 month overdue gas bill? Walk or Drive or hitchhike?