Mary Poppins Ain't Got Nothin' On Me!!

I don't really remember watching the movie Mary Poppins all the way through. I just remember snippets and parts here and there. But these small snippets have taught me many important life lessons. Things like:

• You can fly with an umbrella.
• If you sing about doing something (let's say, for example.... flying a kite), it will be the coolest thing since sliced bread and you will get old men to follow suit (is that the phrase?).
• It's okay to pull your pants down on a date as long as there are cute penguins in the vicinity.
• If you are laughing, you are most likely high.
• Your reflection moving separately from you in the mirror doesn't have to be creepy.
• And the most obvious, of course, is that if you make cleaning fun, cleaning will get done.... or something like that.

Great life lessons. But I have found the last one to be not quite true. Cleaning can be fun, but it's still cleaning. And even though I can make it MORE fun, it's still not fun. And thus, I am not motivated to do it. That is, unless I am in school.

I've never been officially diagnosed with A.D.D., but I think I may have a slight case of it. I am constantly procrastinating, have troubles prioritizing, and am constantly distracted (I could make some joke here and get side tracked on another story... But that is too obvious. This thought did, however, get me sucked into the blackhole of youtube for quite awhile because I thought of a Simpsons clip where Homer is supposed to be paying attention in church or something like that and gets distracted by a butterfly outside. Anyone know which one I'm talking about?)

Anyway.... I realize that I am a fairly lazy person. I text and call people on the phone even though they are just upstairs. I drove down to my friends' (Skybo and Adam) houses, and they each only lived two houses away. I've seen plenty of them girly designer television shows and other shows I would probably never watch just because the remote was not in my immediate reaching range. I usually end up driving for about an hour in a parking lot to find that perfect parking place. My family tried to train the dog to close the door (we had already taught him to just walk in) so that we didn't have to get up to close the door after he came in (this didn't work so we built a pulley system so the door would shut on its own). And that's just the starting of my laziness.

I can't think of anything really significant that I got done during the summer. Except beating Batman and Portal 2. I had a few projects that I could have worked on, but I didn't. I mean, come on, I was busy with..... going on that.... one date I went on .... maybe...... and I probably occasionally mowed the lawn...... and other busy stuff.

This month I just started going back to school for my Masters. Homework, as we know, always comes along with school. The Masters program seems a lot worse. There is a ton of homework. It's non-stop. One of my professors said that for an undergraduate class, they expect you to spend an hour out of class for every hour in class or something like that. For the graduate level, they expect you to spend 3 or 4 hours out of class for every hour in class..... are they serious? That's an entire long boring movie! Or two good movies! An entire weeks worth of exercise that I don't do! An entire nap! An entire weeks worth of church! An entire football game!..... And that's just for one hour of one class! I have three classes.... That's like ..... a lot of hours (I didn't feel like doing the math). And the reading..... oh the reading. That's all they give us for homework, is reading. And they actually expect you to read and learn. What's with that?

So, as I was saying earlier (before I got sidetracked), I get sidetracked really easy. And this seems to happen most often when I have homework to do. I make all sorts of plan the day before (*cough*procrastination*cough*) to get my homework done the next day. The game plan is generally something like this:

1. Wake up early.
2. Get some breakfast.
3. Get some exercise in.
4. Do some homework.
5. Go to work.
6. Work super hard and don't slack off at work (just in case any one from work is reading).
7. Get some homework done on my lunch and then continue to work hard until that clock hits 5 pm.
8. Come home speedily and start on my homework and don't stop until caught up on all the homework.... In fact, get ahead and do all the homework for the rest of the semester.
9. And then go to bed super early, because being healthy is important.

But then, that day comes and goes and it usually ends up going something like this.

1. Hit my snooze alarm.
2. Hit my snooze alarm.
3. Realize I hit my reset alarm instead and have to be to work in 5 minutes.
4. Rush to get ready and get to work late (a little stressed because nobody likes to be late to work).
5. Work extremely hard (again.... people from work may be reading this).
6. Lunch time! I was going to do homework, but I worked hard so I deserve a nap... Take said nap in car.
7. Wake up late from work nap and get back to work late after lunch.
8. Having a semi-nap in car just makes me sleepy but some how make it to 5:00 without passing out.
9. Get home determined to do homework.
10. Realize that I can't do homework on an empty stomach, so I make myself some food.
11. Realize that I can't make food without something on TV.
12. Realize that I can't really watch TV when the family room and kitchen are dirty.
13. Proceed to clean family room and kitchen.
14. Now that family room and kitchen are clean, try and find a show to watch while cooking and eating.
15. Start cooking, then eat, all while watching a show.
16. First episode of whatever I'm watching ends while I'm still eating. I might as well start another episode to watch while I finish eating.
17. Finished eating but episode isn't over yet. Might as well finish episode.
18. Walk upstairs to do homework.
19. Realize that I can't do homework without a drink, make a quick Maverick run.
20. Come back and realize that room is dirty and one cannot do homework in a dirty room.
21. Clean room.
22. Sit down on luv sac or bed because all the cleaning and eating has worn you out.
23. Wake up an hour later.
24. Start on homework but realize it's dinner time.
25. Repeat steps 10 - 19 (yes, the house gets dirty somehow. And even if it didn't, I could still find something to clean).
26. Finally sit down to start on homework and maybe get an hour in before I convince myself I should go to bed and just wake up early to do my homework.
27. Better play one more level on that Playstation before going to bed....
28. And finally, go to sleep close to 1 am.

And that is a normal day. 

Anytime I think about homework, I think about that little project I've been putting off. I mounted a TV on my wall awhile ago. And then I got a sound bar earlier this past summer. The sound bar needed a digital audio cable plugged into it. I put it off during the summer because it was going to be quite the project. But the second I have to do homework, I think to myself that I really can't let that sit anymore. So I spend the next few hours trying to get that wire plugged into my TV. Then I've been perfectly fine not having blinds in my room for years. But, as soon as school starts, I decided that my room must have blinds and I proceeded to go and buy them, mount the brackets, and  put those suckers up. I may have vacuumed my room once during the summer, I think I've already vacuumed it four times in the four weeks since school has started. I've washed my sheets more often. And I have dusted a ton (I don't think I dusted once during the summer).

Little did my parent's know all those years growing up that all they had to do was ask me to do my homework. All my chores would have been done at that very second. Mary Poppins' spoon full of sugar? Pfft.

(P.S. Did you notice the dates of my last blog posts? Last one was pretty much when school just ended. And now I'm doing this post right after school has started. Just sayin....)

....eh?

Warning: If you are older than 26, you make think I'm being overly dramatic and need to wait a few more years until I start complaining. You have been warned.

I've never really considered myself old. I may have considered myself older than other people, but even though I joke about it, I never really felt old. That is, until this past weekend. There were a few things that just made me realize that I am getting older.

My church young single adult group went down to a little pageant this past weekend for an overnight get away. It was a fairly long drive (about 3 hours) and it was decided that it would probably be best to get some carpools together. On all the church or scouting activities I've ever been on, the older folk usually end up being the drivers. Well, I ended up driving on this trip (driving a carpool car on road trip for youth/ysa group = old).

On the way down, we had to stop and get gas. So we pulled off the freeway, found ourselves a Chevron, and put some gas in the truck. After I had filled up the truck, I was about to get in the car when it dawned on me that we still had about another 2 hours left to drive. I didn't have to pee, but we were at a gas station, and said gas station had a bathroom. So I decided that I was going to go even though I had no natural urge telling me to relieve myself. I just figured that I might as well because I might not get another chance (for a brief 2 hours... I seriously can't hold it that long?). So I went, and I told the others in my car that they should follow suit. (Doing a plan-ahead-bathroom trip = old. Telling others to do the same = old. Being worried about having an bladder related issue even though you don't have to go and the trip will only be another two hours = old).... This happened multiple times during the trip.

Once we finally got down to the city with the Pageant, my little car group got some food. While we were eating we had a very lovely conversation. One of my carpool members finished a bit before the rest of the group and got up and started moving around a bit. At one point, she came up behind me and was probably lost in her thoughts about how awesome my hair is, when she exclaimed that she had made a discovery. She had found a gray hair and everyone in earshot also knew at this point that I have gray hairs. (Having more than one (yes, I have multiple) gray hairs = old).

The pageant ran pretty late (it didn't get over until about 11 or so) we all headed back to our campground. Once we got there we made sure that everyone had a place to sleep and then we chatted it up for a bit. Eventually everyone got into their own little groups and went their own way. The group I ended up with was playing card games outside in a little circle. Sometime around midnight I announced to the group that I was heading to bed and got up to leave. They eventually talked me out of it and convinced me into staying for a bit longer (considering going to bed before dawn on a camping trip = old).

So while we were out playing cards until the late hour of 1 am, the little card playing group discovered that I had a giant bag of Starbursts hidden away. I told them that I wouldn't mind sharing my Starbursts as long as they took care of their wrappers (telling people to clean up after themselves = old). I had just brushed my teeth and so I didn't even end up eating any of them (brushing my teeth while camping out = old. not eating candy just because I had brushed my teeth earlier = old).

The next morning we headed back home. After my bathroom-before-we-go-break (..... old), we got all loaded up and took off back home. On the way home multiple people passed me on the little two lane highway (getting passed multiple times = old). Once we got back on the freeway (and maybe a few times before and the day before) I changed lanes a few times. And multiple times, a mile or two after I had made said lane change, I would discover that my blinker was still on (forgetting to turn blinker off = old).

There have been a lot of things that make me realize that I am getting older (no eating late at night, wanting to go to bed earlier and earlier, bad back, etc), but these were all condensed into one weekend and it just seemed to be a bit more in my face. And I would probably be convinced that I am old, if it weren't for the fact that I laugh every time I hear some one use the word "do" twice in a row in a sentence.

Married People Are Weird

I've always known that married people are different from single people:

• Married people like to do things together. All the married folk I know are constantly wanting to be together : Single people like their free time. I'm constantly looking for some "Mike" time.
• Married people talk like they are Gollum using " us" and "we", when a normal person would say "I" or "me". Sometimes the other part of the "us" or "we" might not even be part of the conversation : Single people talk like a normal person should.
• Married people like shopping at stores like Lowe's, Michael's, Bed Bath and Beyond, etc together : This may be normal for a single dude (Lowe's) or a single girl (Michael's, Bed Bath and Beyond), but there never should be any kind of cross-over. A single man would never step into a Bed Bath and Beyond if he didn't have to.
• Married people have bedtimes again. And they're early : Single people are semi-wise adults and sleep when they feel the need

...... and many more.

But recently it seems that this fact, that singles and marrieds, are different has been more apparent in my life. One example just happened a few days ago.

I had been studying for a test for quite awhile one day (this studying may or may not have occurred whilst at work). I finally decided that I was ready (aka was sick of studying) to take the test. And so I headed up towards WSU's main campus to take the test.

At this point, I had recently discovered Wal-mart's little food corner that sells chicken of different varieties, potato wedges, and who knows what else. I had always known this existed, but I had no idea that it had such delicious General Tso chicken. And it's less than $2 for a little personal serving. Delicious and cheap. You can't beat that. So while I was driving to the main campus, I saw the Neighborhood Wal-mart coming up in the distance and instantly decided that I needed some brain food (this is actually a plot by Wal-mart to take over the world. Along with Microsoft and Google).

As I was walking out of Wal-mart, very happy with my neighborhood market delicacy, I bumped into an old friend. He was there with what appeared to be his wife and his child (I was assuming at this point because he was holding the kid in one arm and he had the girl's hand with the other). So I stopped, because that's what you do when you see someone you know (Although I think it should be socially acceptable to continue on walking. The person need not be offended. It's actually the polite thing to do. You don't want to waste the person's time with fake interest in what they are doing with their life. Think about it. The last time you bumped into an acquaintance, you probably talked about what they were doing with their life. Do you honestly remember anything they said?). Anyway....

I said hello. And he introduced me to his wife and kid (I wasn't assuming anymore. He said "This is my wife, _______ and this is my daughter, ______. ) And he asked what I was up to. I told him about the test I was about to take and how I was pretty close to finally graduating.

Then it was my turn to ask a question, I really didn't know what to ask. I had just met his wife and kid. That's enough. But there wasn't any way of just leaving without appearing rude, so I thought of the best single-guy Wal-mart question I could think of while outside of a Wal-mart. I asked, "What are you doing here?"....... He just stared at me for a bit and then slowly answered, "....Shopping....?" Or in other words, I was asking a pretty stupid question.

But, to all you marrieds, this question makes perfect sense to us single people. If you are married, try to remember back to your days of singleness. Why did you go to Wal-mart? For the most part, you'd only go with a purpose. You were going to buy a movie, or just browse through the movies. Or maybe there was a new video game that you wanted to buy. You needed toothpaste. You wanted that can of chili for queso. You wanted to pick up on the girl at the hair-salon. Again, you were going with a purpose.

My asking, "What are you doing here?" in singleness, was a perfectly legit question to ask. Any other single person would have understood what I was asking. But, alas, married and singles are different.

My question kind of killed the conversation. After looking back and forth at one another, I said, "Cool..... Well, see you later." And left. Hopefully it gave them a good Gary Poll story for later. It gave me one.

And by the way, I'm not dissing marrieds. I'm just saying we are different. Being a married is actually a goal of mine. I'm planning on finding a girl, having her ask me out, and eventually ask me to marry her. Is that too much to ask? And when I am married, I'll send a proxy into Bed Bath and Beyond.

Gary Poll

Most of you are probably confused by the title. Let me explain.

A while ago, my father and I found ourselves having to socialize with some odd people and the whole thing was quite awkward. We were all sitting in a booth having a little dinner. I was sitting next to my old man when he leaned over and said, "Gary Poll."... and that was it. My dad was obviously having a little logical conversation in his head and decided to have me join in at that particular point with no other explanation. A few minutes passed (maybe it was seconds) before he realized what he had done. He then went on to catch me up on his conversation he had been having with himself.

Apparently a long time ago, mi papa was out to dinner with an old neighbor (I am not referring to the age of the neighbor, rather to the fact that he no longer lives in our neighborhood. Hence he was once a neighbor or, in other words, an old neighbor) named Gary Poll. During dinner, they got to talkin about an awkward experience that Gary had and he mentioned that while this awkward situation was playing out, all he could think about was how good of a story it would be after it was all over. Or something like that. I can't remember the exact story. Anyways, what he was trying to say was that any awkward experience is survivable because you can know that its almost always going to be a good story after.

Rob introduced this theory to me as the Gary Poll theory. I believe that this theory has been being taught for quite some time now from comedians, television, and movies.

One of the best examples is the TV show The Office, American or British (My brother wrote a little something on his blog about The Office awhile back). You also have the movie Meet The Parents. Most of Brian Regan's stories. They are all funny because of all the awkwardness.

And I think that's why my life is so awesome. Its full of awkward moments. And that just gives me plenty of good stories. So, occasionally I will share these awkward stories. And they will hence be known as Gary Poll stories. I was going to share one at the end of this post, but I starting writing all this and I changed my mind. I decided that this was enough for one post. So, moral of the story. Awkwardness will always end up making for a good story.

Why Bother?

As mentioned in the previous post, I enjoy Weezer. A lot. It's true. I think one of the reasons that I like them so much is that their songs relate a lot to how I feel and think. I could name multiple songs that I think fit me perfectly, but one of them is "Why Bother?" from their Pinkerton album (Listen to it, its good). The gist of the song is that Rivers (the lead singer of Weezer) knows he's going to get hurt so he asks "Why Bother?" or what's the point of even trying when you know its not going to end well. This song is kind of my view point on dating. Some of you might say that is not a great outlook on dating or that maybe it is even a bitter outlook.... Yup.

I've told people about my Why Bother Weezer theory and they have been confused by it or taken it the wrong way. So I thought the best way to describe it would be graphically. But as soon as I tried to put my thoughts into graph form, I realized that the whole graph idea was easier said then done. I get what my brain is saying, but its another thing to try and get my thoughts out on paper (or whatever the blog equivalent of paper is). But after talking with a few people and playing around with a few different graphs, I think I finally figured out how to graph it.

The Why Bother Line (in red above) just shows the sum of all the crappy parts of dating:

• the awkwardness of asking for a girl's number and asking her out
  
• the chance of getting shut down and the suckiness of that
  
• planning the first date
  
• picking the girl up awkwardness
• the whole we're on a date awkwardness
  
• spending money
  
• if it ends up being more than one date then you have the define the relationship awkwardness ahead
  
• if it doesn't work out, the crapiness of the break up.
  
• etc.

All that summed up together equals the Why Bother Line.

For me to date a girl, all her attributes (or how smitten I am) must exceed or be above the Why Bother Line. Her attributes can include, but are not limited to: looks, personality, where she lives, her interests, smarts, (my buddy, Bubba, said to put boobs on here, but I decided against it. Because that's not appropriate. Plus I'm a stomach and legs guy), etc etc. All these attributes can contribute to the over all smitten-ness level.

#1 shows the smitten level completely empty. I don't know why I put this on there, it just seemed like a good idea at the time
#2 shows a girl who surpasses the why bother line. This girl would be datable.

#3 shows a girl who's attributes do not exceed the Why Bother Line, and so she is not datable. Why should I bother?

Make sense? I hope so. I may end up re-writing this post a few times.

I also talked about this with my good friend, Ann, and my brother, Joe. They both came up with similar ideas. My brother, Joe, sent me this graph. This is also a pretty good representation on my dating theory.

So there you go. That is my dating theory. You may think that I am picky and shallow, but is it so wrong that I want to be head over heels for the people I date? That may seem gay (not that there is anything wrong with that) but that's how it is.

By the way, I was inspired by the television show "How I Met Your Mother." Here is the clip that inspired me.

(The Pops Proviso: Although this is my general rule, I do realize that I need to date. It's something you have to do when you are a 25 and single. And so, I will occasionally date for the sake of dating. Dating's a skill and you got to keep your game up.)

Top 5

My brother's and I often talk about "our favorites." For those of you who know me, know that I enjoy music and I am listening to it most of the time. I'm constantly "learning" more about bands/singers/groups by doing a little research on their official website, Facebook page, Myspace, songfacts.com, YouTube (live concerts and music videos count as a learning experience, right?), and of course, the source of all true information, Wikipedia (checkout weezerpedia.com). So after many hours of research and learning, I think I've whittled it down to my Top 5 Music Makers:

(note: this list is not a list of the greatest bands/musicians of all time, but a list of my favorite bands. The ones that I enjoy listening to the most)

5. Jason Mraz.
4. Dashboard Confessional (Sorry Joe)
3. Reel Big Fish
2. Blink 182 (I'm including Boxcar Racer, Angels & Airwaves, and +44 with Blink. It's my list, I can do what I want)
1. Weezer
   

I would like to give honorable mention to BNL, The Beastie Boys, The Beatles, Fall Out Boy, Jack Johnson, No Doubt, Queen, Rage Against the Machine, and They Might Be Giants

There you go.

Classic Blog Post. The Kids.

Maria.

It Begins.

Now I just need to think of something to write.