Victory in the last days

I hope that title doesn't sound too Dooms-Day, because really its Happy-Days, no not the show the reality of days that full of happy, or happiness if you prefer. If I was keeping track, which of course I'm not, then I could tell you that I have 23 days left in the Army before my leave starts and that of those 23 days only 8 of those days are working days. However, as I said before I am not keeping track of that kind of stuff so I don't really know how many days I have left. I must say that leaving the Army is an exciting proposition. I no longer have to deal with insane bosses that have control of every aspect of my life. I will agree that there are most likely there are insane bosses outside of the military as well, however I think that there is a qualitative, if not quantitative, difference in the insane bosses here. It must be that the Army attracts people who like to be able to have a great deal of control with a fairly limited amount of oversight and a population that has little say, few rights, and less knowledge about their rights. I don't want to say that I have hated all the time I have spent in the Army. I would say that there have been some good times and some experiences that I would not trade. The Army has allowed me to be financially independent, has paid off my student loans, has gained me a Masters degree for free, has allowed me to purchase a house, two vehicles, have a baby (again for free), and do things that few people get to do. I feel blessed to have had this opportunity. That being said I am not re-enlisting. To be fair I am getting a commission. Let me explain a little the difference between an enlisted soldier and a Commissioned Officer. An enlisted person performs the menial labor to middle management of the Army. At its most basic level the enlisted soldier is the guy marching, shooting, fighting, dieing, and training every day to do what the Army does. The NCO (what I am currently) supervises and makes sure that the day to day tasks are completed and that the soldiers are able physically an mentally to do what they need to do. The NCO should be a self sacrificing individual who puts the needs of his soldiers above his own, who ensures that his soldiers are held to strict rules, but is fair in applying corrective actions. The Officer is the management and planning. They develop the goals the NCO's implement, they decide what the goals for the unit are and develop the standards of the unit. Officer's are the white collar workers, Enlisted are the blue collar workers.
As I said I am taking a commission, but its in the reserves. I like to think of the reserves as doing the Army as a hobby. Right now I do the Army as a job, but in the reserves I get to act like a soldier one weekend a month, couple weeks a year, you know like a hobby. But like with all hobbies, there is the possibility that I will have to it professionally for a time, 15 months or so. I talk a lot about the Army on this page a lot I guess. Mostly I think its because there is so much interesting culture that is specific to the Army, and the Military in general. As it so happens I now am leaving, and am very happy to being doing so. My last few weeks I get more time off to take care of the things I need to do and to set myself up for the next step in my life. I have been fortunate in the Army, more fortunate than most, and get to leave intact in body, mind, and soul. Thanks Uncle Sam, and thanks for stopping by.

C'est le vie

That's life. I was thinking earlier about life, and what people do in life. When I started to define what it is in life that matters, and when I look back on my life the things that make me happy are the memories I have of events, of conversations, of places I have been and amazing things I have seen. I guess what that means to me is that I don't often look back on my life and smile with fond recollection that specific sitcom I saw three years ago and think how great it was to sit on my couch and watch it while slowly sipping my flavored soft drink.
The more I think about what counts in life the more I realize the value of activity. There is a certain immediate gratification in watching TV and being lazy. It allows you the comfort of inactivity. You say to yourself "I'm relaxing, and I need to relax because what I do is hard work and I need to not work hard all the time." That's okay I guess, I've seen some stirring movies and would consider some to be art and was glad for the time I spent watching them, but I have also seen Rush Hour 1 and 2.
I think about the time that I have wasted and feel a little bad, there have been so many opportunities in my life for a quality experience that I chose not to partake in or did not go out of my way to find. Then I think of people who do less than I do and it makes me feel bad for them, even worse I guess. I'm not trying to say I do everything great and that other people are huge retards wandering around being stupid (though there may be a certain element of truth to this). However people seem to consistently choose not to be involved in things of meaning and not to find experiences that will fulfill them in some deeper way. I don't expect that everyone ought to go rush off and see the Eiffel Tower, tour Europe, or see the Bridges of Madison County (the real things not the movie, though I understand the movie is good too (good job Clint)), but I am sure that there is some wilderness out nearby every ones house, or at least within a relatively short commute. Go to it and look around. Yes there will be bugs there, yes sometime you will sweat But if you live the entirety of your life with the sole purpose of avoiding sweat and bugs then you have had a sad existence. There is too much life to live and sweat, blood, tears, laughter, joy, sorrow, and pain all make up life. I don't think you need to go around being a masochist or anything but at least once I think we all ought to go on an adventure. Whether the adventure is alone, with friends, or with family I don't care but a life without some excitement, without some challenge or danger is not a life. In art, and in life, contrast is important. If there is not enough contrast you can't make out what it is your looking at. If you don't have the contrast of sorrow with joy you will never know how good joy feels. that's just my two cents, thanks for stopping by.

ARMY ARMY ARMY ARMY ARMY!

I have talked about cadence in the past. The mysterious semi-singing form of communication that keeps soldiers a-truckin. I was once told a story that at a Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) school a guy was told to do cadence to march the platoon someplace. He responded "I don't know any cadence." They told him "make one up." So he said "A is for Army, R is for Army, M is for Army, Y is for Army." Followed by "ARMYARMYARMYARMYARMY!" At the top of his lungs as fast as possible. This story has nothing to do with why I am writing today.
It was 0300 and I was sleeping on my couch. You see on Thursday I had discovered my toe had become infected, it was black and horrible. I went in to the ER and the Dr. sliced it open and gave me some drugs and told me not to go to work the next day. I was also supposed to keep my foot up. That was why I was on my couch. So there I am sleeping peacefully on my couch when my phone begins to humm its gentle melody. So I answer the phone, as has become my habit. "SGT Crozier, you need to go to the AOD desk and report to the SDNCO ASAP, one of your buildings is unsecured. I tried to call your counterparts but they were unavailable so you will need to go in until they relieve you."
"What?"
"You need to get in ACU's and go to the AOD, now!"
"I'm on Percaset."
"Are you trying to pull a fast one on me? Because you're slip said you were off of duty for 24 hours and its been over 27 hours, so you should have no excuse not to be able to go into work."
So here I am. An AOD is like the Hospital's night watch. They mostly sit and answer phones. The SDNCO is the Staff Duty NCO. They wander around post and make sure all the buildings are locked. As it turns out, one building was not locked. So, because this building was unlocked I was asked to go and sit in it until someone came to lock. I didn't have a key, but I am a soldier with a damaged foot. Right now it is 0530, on a Saturday and it is raining outside in drought ridden North Carolina. It is times like these that I am glad that I only have 2 more weeks of work as an active duty United States soldier. Don't get me wrong, the Army has been good to me and I have been pretty good to the Army. However these are the times when I think how stupid some of the things we do are, and how petty people can be about things we have no control over.
The moral of the story: If you are in the Army and they have not issued you a phone, don't answer it when it rings.

Investing like a fool

I don't want people to think that I'm some retard here who's just prattling around about money and whatnot. I have an MBA and I had a focus on finance. This means I'm a retard with a degree. That aside I think the idea of people investing in stocks unassisted is silly. Here is my problem; investing is a competitive venture, it is also (to a certain extent) a gamble. Of course the more diversified your portfolio the less risk you have by nature of the beast, but it is still a gamble. When I say it is a gamble I don't mean like roulette or blackjack, or even a slot machine, those are games that the house has a percentage on every time. No I'm talking poker, and professional poker at that.
The reason I say this is because there are people who invest for a living. That is there one and only job, they wake up and keep close tabs on the market and they make money. As a private investor you think "I can invest just as well as some wall-street jerk!" and you choose to enter the game. The problem, much like with a poker hustler, is that you can win. I say this is a problem because by getting a few good picks you think your smart stuff, in much the same way that any one can be dealt a winning hand and beat the pro you have beaten those wall-street jerks.
The problem becomes that in the long run you don't have the time to invest in keeping up with day traders because you have a job, or don't have the resources to get the information they have. So here you are trying to compete with the best and the brightest in their field because you have Internet access and a program that "tells you when to buy and sell". It's ridiculous.
What I say is get a professional, sure do your research make sure that your investment adviser isn't an idiot (much like you would want to make sure you have a competent doctor, attorney, or drug dealer). If you have a competent person working for you they will be able to do professionally what you do as a hobby, and in the end I think you will be happier with the end result. The reality is if you purchase stock on your own or with an adviser you will have to pay commission fee's, there is no way around it. So why not pay commission fee's to someone who is invested in helping yo to invest?

On finance

Now that I've gotten that other terrible post out of the way I would like to wax economic for a moment. People are very concerned about the economy and about the value of the dollar and about all kinds of money things right now. Well I can tell you that its not all bad. In reality things are okay, no they are not as good as they were a little while ago, and yes some people are having trouble. However most people feel that they are doing okay financially, but think everyone else is having trouble. What that means is that most people are not being hurt by the current market conditions. That aside, this is an excellent opportunity for people who felt that the market was getting too expensive to invest. There is really a lot about the economics that I would like to talk about, but it would probably be too tedious to read. So I will talk for a moment about good ideas.
1: It is a good idea to save money. I know this seems silly to say, but when Americans spent more than they made last year it makes me wonder about whether people realize this. I like those feed the pig ads, because the pig smacks the guys hand when he tries to buy a TV (haha). but its true save some money. If you save $200 a month then that would save $2400 a year. At that rate you would (accounting for a certain level of investment) be a millionaire in about 40 or so years.
2: DON'T PUT IT ALL IN SAVING! I know it can be tempting to have a gigantic savings account with all this money straining the seams of your bank account, but don't. This is a mistake more people make than I had realized. Now I am not saying that people need to go nuts and buy every new stock that comes out, but if a person were to own 20 stocks (or one mutual fund account) they would have enough diversification to save them selves from the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and be a reasonably wealthy person who could one day retire.
3: ride a bike. I'm starting to run out of advice here, but this seemed like a good idea. If you ride a bike more often you will be a strong person, and have more money not being spent on your 2003 four-door F-150 that drains $300 from your bank account every month...grrr.

Well there you go, I hope you have enjoyed this little tid-bit. This post isn't much better than the last one really...ugh.

April Fool's!

This man is a Fool

In this post I will not fool you, or at the very least try not to fool you. Let me say that I will not knowingly fool anyone within the confines of this length of text. I think that it is nice to know that there will be one place you can look to today and realize that what you see is what you get, and that no trickery will be about. I would like to talk for a minute about what April Fool's day is. Or rather that I don't know what it is. Where did this festivity arise from? Why is is here? Why does that man look so stupid. For the sake of integrity, and so that I do not make it seem as though I am trying to fool anyone, I do not know who that man is, and I don't recall where I found the picture. What I can tell you is that it struck me so profoundly in its vivid colors and idiocy that I would have felt remiss if I did not capture it immediately. I am very bad at April Fools day pranks, I will say something like "your shoe is untied april fools." all one sentence without any pauses, and it is not funny. This is perhaps the least interesting post I feel I have written on this page. I think I will stop now before it gets any worse.

My hippie nature exposed

<-----Delicious

I watched a movie not too long ago called "Into the Wild" its about a guy who said he was going to Harvard for medical school or something but instead bought a book on wild edibles, gave his life savings to charity, burnt the rest of his money, wandered around for a couple years and eventually died of potato in Alaska. That being said I bought a book on wild edibles last week because the idea that I can eat my lawn is too great to pass up on. For whatever reason the idea of going out someplace and simply attempting to live off of what is available immediately in the area is incredibly fascinating to me, perhaps when I get to have my midlife crisis I'll be like surviorman and go and "survive" someplace for a week or so. I like to think of it as extreme camping. But regardless of all that I like still the idea that I can go out and find things that could be edible and potentially delicious while camping, hiking, or just around the house (literally(I share my sisters affinity for parenthetical annotation)). Wildlife and nature I think are wonderful things, these are the things that make me feel like hunting is fun, and eating wild lettuce from my ward is neat. While hunting may seem somehow contradictory to enjoying nature I would argue that there is a certain amount of ethical responsibility that goes into the act of hunting, after all we are the ones who killed off the predators and if we expect there to be balance in nature it must be provided somewhere and that is our job to provide it, but that may be a discussion for another posting. I think this ties in to a lot of the personal beliefs I have politically as well. While I'm not convinced that global warming is a man-made event I don't have any problem with conservation of our wilderness and nature. an argument that says "Global warming doesn't exist, it doesn't exist so much that I will pollute MORE!" seems a little bizarre to me. I think that wisdom lies somewhere in between. While I do not believe that humans should attempt to subsist soly on wild edibles, it seems like a good idea to take a little from the earth around you. And the crazy part of me thinks its a good idea to be able to identify edible plants for when doomsday comes and I will be forced to grow my own crops. I think we all have a little crazy in us, what matters is learning to live with it and accepting that our craziness shapes our viewpoints and understanding how it does so.

How the west was won

I have recently decided that there are few genres of movies that can be as impressive as the western when done well. I watched the movie 3:10 to Yuma tonight while doing my military duty at the front desk of a hospital telling people where a nearby gym is and realized there are many subtle layers to the movie. I think this is a fantastic story. Perhaps there is too much going on in there for me to go into, but ultimately the story is not really about the two main characters, it is about Dan's (Christian Bale's) son. In the end of the movie we see that good ultimately triumphs over evil, regardless of any other events simply by the actions of young Will. In the end good defeating evil, in one sense or another, is one of the defining elements of a western. Perhaps the other key element is redemption, and in some senses these two concepts are indistinguishably intertwined. The west, as portrayed in movies, was a place where the law had little sway and men where forced into extremes. Evil would be an easy choice and yet to see men make the right choice for the sake of it being the right thing to do and ultimately be vindicated for these choices. Unforgiven would be another great example. Clint Eastwood does a great job in this movie of showing how a man who had been wicked is struggling for redemption. It takes a while but he evolves into perhaps what he always should have been (had whiskey and wickedness not gotten the best of him earlier in life). Roger Ebert says that in the end good silences evil. I think that is a fantastic way of looking at this. While his character had done terrible things in the end he brought justice into a place where justice did not exist and evil was ultimately silenced by the deeds of a man who could not forgive himself, that- I believe- is why he is Unforgiven. There are a number of other great movies out there to use as an example, but I think these two do justice to my thoughts. Westerns, when not cast into the pot of stupid pointless action, are forced into an introspective light. The characters must have depth, because special effects have little room to hold sway. Dialogue becomes key and we see human nature at its most basic, simple people struggling to survive in an untamed land. Conversely, when a western is done poorly it hurts your brain to have to watch it (Badgirls would be an example, as well as the quick and the dead remake... ugh). But you must steel your resolve against these and be willing to witness scenes that are slow, yet relentless in their purpose. Well, that's enough philosophical waxing on movies for now!

Jacob laughs at strange things

Jacob began making word happen this past week. He chose to say "Dadadadada" we took that to mean Daddy. Though he now has expanded to saying ada and dada and aaaaahdadadadaaaaah. He made a "Ga" sound the other day too. I have to say that Jacob is a cool kid. He laughs at lots of silly things. we wiggle a blanket and he laughs and laughs. As a side note to all of this Jacob is pretty gross. As is demonstrated by this picture to my right, your left (I'm in the computer) he is licking my foot. GROSS. I didn't raise this kid to go around licking people's feet, I hope this is not a trend towards later in life. The good news is he is a sweet little guy, which means we like him. I like my baby probably more than I like my dogs. Yes, that is a fact I think that Jacob is far superior to either of my dogs, especially Smokey. Rebecca and I have decided that we are keeping Smokey around just in case we run across a hard winter sometime in the future. We

anticipate that she will be delicious. I really dont have much else to say, Jacob is silly, Smokey is tasty ( I think) and I need to go to Wal-Mart (stupid Wal-Mart). Carrie probably wants me to go to some strange organic land of crunchy delight, whatever I live in Raeford NC, the geometric center of waste. Baah.

No One Cares

The Academy awards are an institution that no one cares about anymore. At one point it was something that was fun to watch, see which movie you loved so much during the past year had become the one that would win. People were excited to find out how well they fared in the Academy process. However, as the years have gone by people have become more and more aware that the Academy is stupid. No one cares what movies are being selected because no one has seen them. They come out in the last ten minutes of the year when people already have better things on their mind than watching a movie. The Oscars have become a festival of self-gratification. It's like turning on the TV to see a really great meeting at the Elk Lodge, why would I do that. Actually that may be more fun than the Oscars. To watch the Oscars is essentially to watch a bunch over horribly overpaid Hollywood "elites" getting to play dress-up and applaud each other for how great they look and for how well they are doing. The Oscars are a Richard Simmons work-out video where everyone is rich and beautiful, save for Peter Jackson and Michael Moore.
The thing is that the entire event is based on the fact that people in Hollywood really enjoy the fact that they make movies. Whats more is they really like watching their friends in movies too, then they get to party party party all night and slap each other on the back for being so good at being in a movie. "Did you see the movie I was in?", "Oh yes, it was good here you go have a statue!"In light of this realization no one watches the Oscars anymore. We wait until the next day to find out who won. Can you imagine people forgoing the Superbowl for the same reason. It's because the Superbowl is fun to watch and people are invested in it. No one even talks about the Oscars anymore. People used to love the movies. We talked about these great movies that were coming out and how they said or did something interesting. Hollywood thinks they have people figured out, so they make a movie, we don't care about it, and then they say "Hollywood is dying, maybe this new movie like the last one will save us!"
Hollywood is stupid. However, if I was offered the same money they are to do what they are doing I would take it and laugh at anyone who mocked me because I would be rich, and they (like me) would be poor. That's all I have to say about that.

From the ashes emerges a butterfly

I'm pretty sure I messed up on the title, either its a cacoon and a phoenix or something. Any way here I am again typing on a thing that I haven't used in a while. There have been a number of changes to the Crozier family in that time. 1. Rebecca is not in the Army any more and 15. we now have a baby, his name is Jacques, or something. I will not list the other 13 changes, even though they are significant I dont feel like it. In other news I stopped writing that story I was doing. Mostly due to a lack of time. I still have a little note book of thoughts in which I pen concepts that may wander into the written page, but as yet this has not occurred. My sister made me look at her Blog again this past night after not having looked at such a thing in months and I decided I should send out my own blog in response. Not in response exactly, since I am not addressing anything that happens in her blog, but more just because. So its not a response at all. Hmm. I find the philosophy of we(blog)s to be fascinating. For whatever reason I find it fascinating that people think that what we have to say is so important that other people would want to read it. I have nothing important to say, and I take a long time to say it. So I will never be a very popular blogger, because people dont want to take fifteen minutes to read about my shoesize or whatever else it is that I happen to write about. On the brightside this gives me the opportunity to write something someplace, something I should probably do more often. It also provides me the opportunity to look at what I wrote in the past and roll my eyes at the nonsense that I thought passed for original thought. Well, at any rate here I am writing myself into the annuls of internet obscurity for the world to look at. When I run for public office this is going to be a real thorn in my side. However by that point if you dont have a we(blog) people wont even know what you stand for, not that people care now. Forward march.

I think I forgot

To keep posting on this Dag-gone "Blog" business. In recent months rebecca and I have been a little busy. A number of transitions have occurred in our lives and at work. 1: Rebecca is no longer working inpatient Psych. (all hours of the night and day). Now she is doing outpatient psych (a set schedule and weekends off HOORAY). 2: I am now the acting secretary at the dept. of socialwork at Womack (the hospital), boo. I end up doing all kinds of boring repetative tasks that seem to have little to no impact on anything. However, for some mystery reason they must be done. Ugh, this was supposed to last a couple of weeks and we are about to start month number three. 3: we painted a little in our house, not a big change but WHATEVER I NEVER ASKED YOUR STUPID OPINION MAYBE YOU NEED TO CHILL OUT!

so there you have it. I don't have much else to say right now, but maybe I will update this tiny piece of internet faux-estate that I have. PEACE OUT DOODS AND DOODETTES.

I was...but it happ...I...okay

Being raised in a religious family is rather difficult. Not because there are problems with the family itself. Quite the opposite really. If I was to put my families relative okay-ness on a scale of one to ten I would have to say we are pretty okay. The problem is that as a part of this family being religious and having a personal/public/private relationship with God is common. The real issue becomes when it gets difficult. My sister in her own (WE)blog today (or someday) said that as young adults we get comfortable with the church doing things for us and we get lazy. The same is true with family. In the family having that connection is easy and comfortable, everybody seems to do it. However outside of the family in our daily lives it is harder because other people are not helping us and making it easy and comfortable. Well that is how it seems to me at least. My wife and I don't see each other on weekends much. Before when we did have a Sunday off we made sure to go to church together but as time has gone by it has become much easier to just not. We don't know very many religious people out here and I, at least, have become comfortable doing my own thing. I still pray and talk with God but there is definitely

something that is astray. I say it is because I am far from a church and that my spouse and I don't have the time to blah blah blah... but that is a me making excuses to feel better. In reality if it was a real priority then I would make time for it. I make more time for things I like doing, but less for God... pretty silly really. Oh well there you have it.

In other news: I got a new computer the other day. The PX (post exchange(army walmart)) had a sony Vaio for sale there. Which is what I had. They had a computer I was looking at i 2 models. VGN270 and VGN170. Both were the same price both, on the display had the same specs. I randomly picked one and they were out. So I said I'll take the other (they look the same too). As it turns out it was the better of the two. It had twice the RAM and hard-drive in addition to a better processor...and magically this better computer was (as it turned out) $100 LESS than the worse computer they were out of. No one knows why. There you go. Laptop 1 gig memory 100GB hard drive, 1.83 GHZ processor 14.4" screen for about $1000. The military has its advantages.

In addition

as an adendum to the previous post my wife and I have taken the time to fortify our house. This includes a number of intricate and deadly traps that will be set off upon entering the home and are activated upon leaving. We have also let our dogs loose while we are gone, hoping that they will kill the second wave that survives the initial onslaught we have set up. There are a number of advantages and disadvantages to this system. Most importantly our house is impenatrable, the key problem is that we have not been inside our house in days. By now our dogs may be starving and we are to scared by the death trap that is our home to go inside. All of our worldy belongings are safe, and we are permenantly camped out in our driveway, praying for someone to break in so we can follow behind. If we're lucky our dogs will recognize us and let us feed them before we are torn limb from limb, or that they will be so weak from hunger that they will not be able to put up a fight. All our hope lies in the foolish mistakes that dangerous criminals may make...

Something, something, and something

I was on leave not long ago. As I have a habit of explaining military terms in mind-numbing minutae I will explain leave... even though everyone already knows what it is. We in the "Army" get thirty days of paid vacation. this is leave. <--- that was not technically a sentence. (Ir)regardless- I hate it when people say irregardless. Do they realize it means nothing? I hope so if you say regardless it means you are not giving regard to something if you irregard then you have chosen to ignore a fact, but if you chose to ignore something that you are not giving regard to then what does that mean... are you paying attention to it? are you ignoring the fact that it means nothing and therefor paying lots of attention to it? I don't get it.
Regardless... When we got back from leave some one broke into my house and stole my laptop computer. As a result of this I am updating this blog via smoke signals and morse code. It's a little complicated but I figured it was worth it for the two people that look at this thing on a monthly basis. If things go well I should be able to buy a new computer here in a little bit. I don't know what to get though!!!11!1!! I was too excited to continously hold down on the shift key. Well there you have it, peace out donny.

Shoes, Running, and Being Fat

I said yesterday that I was going to be doing a APFT today (refer to yesterdays posting if you have memory problems). For the most part it went pretty well. As it turns out I maxed the Pushups (I did 78) I got a 70-ish on the situps (57) and I got a 65-ish on the run (15:50). The interesting thing is the weigh-in. The Army wants people to not be fat, understandably. It turns out that since last month I have lost three pounds, shrunk more than an inch and gained 3.7% body fat, also my neck is 1/2 an inch smaller. To say that the system of measuring health and fitness is flawed is similar to saying that my NCOIC has the occasional alcoholic beverage or that Jesus accidentally got stuck in some wood. You see somethings aren't just a little bit (for those of you who are currious Jesus really did get on the cross on purpose, so don't panic you can reference the Lord in analogies and still be a nice person... and my NCOIC is a drunk).

No one cares about what I have to say about the military though, sorry for boring you (no one is reading this and I know it) with needless details and rambling similies. On the other side of things my wifes parents dropped by the other day. I thought we were a little out of the way, but they got caught up in traffic on the way home from Kansas to Kansas and decided to go 20 hours out of there way to avoid the frustration of deer migrating at night. Everything has been going pretty well. We have found a new shoe store too. The Shoe Carnival. I feel weird going to a store that has the word Carnival in the title. for whatever reason Carny's have never been people that have inspired a lot of trust in me. So to go to a store that models itself as a Carnival is somewhat out of my comfort zone. On the bright side those Malasian kids do a heck of a job with their stitching. Well I think thats probably enough for today, prett soon I'm going to start offending people.

Fortune, Fitness, and Chinese Buffet's

The other day my wife and I went to a Chinese buffet. The food was okay… it was after all a buffet (I don’t like buffets very much). What really got me was the fortune cookie. Everyone has their own particular brand of funny when it comes to fortune cookies “After...hehe…after you read it you should say ‘in bed’ heh. Get it? Then it’s funny because it’s a fortune, hehehe, in bed!” right well that stopped being funny years ago, but keep on doing it if you find it so terribly amusing. My fortune cookie was quite possibly the most eerie thing I have ever seen. It said “Pick another fortune cookie”. How often do you see a cookie refer to itself in the first person? Or at all?! Most of the time they seem to be pretty content being a carrier for a message, as opposed to being part of the message itself. I refused to get another, I will not have dough control my life.

On an unrelated note I have an APFT tomorrow. The APFT is the Army Physical Fitness Test. It makes sure I’m not too slow, too weak, and not too fat. So far I have not failed. I have to run 2 miles in under 16 minutes, do more than 45 push-ups in 2 minutes and more than 50 sit-ups in two minutes. I can do the allotted push-ups and sit-ups in under a minute. The run however is where I tend to suck. Oh and the better you do the more “points” it is worth. Just passing is 180 points (each event is worth up to 100, but a minimum of 60 is required). I usually score somewhere in the mid 200 range. I come close to maxing the push-ups do okay on the sit-ups and pass my run panting and wheezing and just barely eking by. I can’t seem to bring myself to care all that much, so there you go! Well have a nice day on the internet.

On down to San Antone...

So, for the past two weeks I was in San Antonio. The reason I was there was for Army training. To be specific I was learning some extra drug and alcohol training tips and tricks (on a side note I had the highest scores on both the written and oral tests). It was mostly something the enlisted folks go to, but some civilians are there too. During the day we would learn about the dangers of alcohol and in the evening almost everyone would get drunk. There were two exceptions myself (Justin) and a man named Stewart. Stewart is a Mormon Bishop and president of his ward in Hawaii, he was a pretty cool guy. Stewart and I were the designated drivers. What I would like to tell you about are the dangers of being a designated driver. I was sitting there minding my own business at this piano bar (here I will explain this concept- the idea is that there are two grand pianos on a stage and two guys playing on them taking requests from the audience and generally being silly, they were pretty good and knew lots of songs). All of a sudden all the drunk people decided to order Jaggier-bombs (a mix of Jaggiermeister and redbull) and one drunk man spilt his all over me (1). Later I was being shouted at by a drunk man to order a Shirley temple and a margarita was spilt on me (2) which caused someone’s vodka and something else to spill on me (3). Afterwards a full corona and a Shirley temple were spilt on me at the same time (4 and 5). At this point I decided (using my designated driver powers) that it was time to leave. I finally managed to round up everyone who came with me and eject them from the bar. It was about 1230 in the morning and then I got them back to the hotel, took a shower and went to sleep. The strangest thing was the next morning I woke up to find the strangest rash on my body were all the alcohol and been. Needless to say I was unhappy. There were two things that made it worthwhile 1) no one died in a car accident 2) everyone that was not me or Stewart had a terrible hangover which made my last day that much cheerier when I shouted good-bye to all the sleepy people after our last half-day of class. The lesson: don’t drink and drive and don’t be a designated driver just stay home and don’t drink (if you do go Shirley Temples are too sweet).

Bow-dit-dit-bu-dow-dow!

That’s the sound ‘The Shield’ (a television show on FX) makes when it starts. On a different note (both figuratively and literally) I was walking towards the Hospital I work at today and I noticed (this was around 1400-ish(2:00 PM-ish)) that there were some bagpipes playing Amazing Grace somewhere off in the distance. I found it a little surreal for some reason. After all, how often do you hear someone playing bagpipes (outside of the Renaissance Faire) and playing Amazing Grace at that, maybe at a funeral, if you happen to know a Scotch/Irish policeman or fireman? Outside of those rather limited times it seems to be something of a rarity. I’ve been over to people’s homes and have heard them strum a little on the guitar, or casually play the piano but it is uncommon in the extreme for someone to nonchalantly play the bagpipes in your normal everyday life. I think it has something to do with the fact that you CANNOT play a bagpipe nonchalantly. I believe that it requires a person to be fully chalant (ßthis is not a word) in order to pull out a set of bagpipes and start playing. I don’t think that bagpipes are really good background music for conversations either. It’s like trying to have throbbing club music as a background piece. “Did you hear that so and so was doing…” “WHAT?!” they would reply. So it is with bagpipes. On the other hand they do have a certain ethereal quality that makes you enjoy them. I don’t know what to tell you, bagpipes are loud, cannot be played casually, but people love them.

Beer in North Carolina

Rebecca and I have some friends who are really big beer fans. As a result of this they pay a lot of attention to what is going on in the world of Beer, believe me there is a whole world of it too. This next weekend there is a Beer Festival in Ralliegh NC that they are going too. Now, for Rebecca and I beer is not that big of a deal. Let me clear something up real quickk (for those who are currious) I have no problem with people drinking. In fact I occassionally have a drink. I do not believe there is some morae out there that tells people that to allow alcohol to enter your body is the essence of drinking in the devil. If that was the case then I could never have cough medecine. What I do believe is that excess is bad news. In anything, eating drinking, playing video games, or sleeping. all of these things when done in excess can take the place of God and that becomes an issue. The reason alcohol can be so dangerous is that it is easy for people to get pulled into its shadowy depths. So to recap real quick: 1) beer in NC, 2) drinking isn't that bad. Okay, so Rebecca and I are thinking that we might go, this is because we like these folks and we have been told it is a really friendly place (few alcoholics go becuase the beer glasses are too small) and they have good live music. For any more insights into the human psych, or about what drinks I like send me an e-mail at Dontemailme@shutup.com Thanks