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Update

Tuesday, February 11th, 2003

There’s a kid in one of my classes who talks like Elmer Fudd. I know I’m not supposed to laugh (he can’t help it, obviously), but it’s just kind of funny. Aren’t the things we find humorous bizarre?

Ugggh. I got an hour of sleep last night, so I napped from 2-5:30 this afternoon and from 9:00-1:00 tonight. I really need to fix my sleep schedule.

But I do have a great idea for a collection of short stories. They will be thematically linked by Highway 93; i.e. they will procede from north to south along the highway. Stories about all sorts of things, maybe about fifteen of them. Of course, I should concentrate on my academic writing first, but that isn’t nearly as fun!

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Update

Sunday, February 9th, 2003

Yes, I’m alive. I’ve just been delving into the exciting world of poetry. I wish I knew a publication to which I could submit some of my poems. It’d be a delight to be ‘published.’

Dad and I went to Wade’s for a chili thing. There was supposed to be jamming, but no jammers jammed, jammit!

We watched Stand By Me tonight. “When the night, has come…”

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Update

Friday, February 7th, 2003

I think Houston, We Have a Drinking Problem is one of the greatest albums of the millenium. I can say that because the millenium is only two years old as of this writing. It’s definately a keeper. I wrote a great review of it for Amazon.com, but only found out after I submitted it that reviews become the property of Amazon.com. Oh, well. I didn’t put much effort into it anyway.

God, Geography was a boooooring class. Yuckers.

I wrote a nifty poem in Psych class. I managed to do it despite the activities we did. Of course, I didn’t finish it until I got back to my room. It’s about two pages long. It’s written in blank verse, and I think it came out rather well. I like it so much, in fact, that I’m going to work on it for about a week before I post it on my website. Maybe I’ll even get someone else’s opinion on it. It’s called “The Highway” and it’s about this game I used to play: you watch passing cars on a road and try to dream up a story for each car that comes by. I wrote it out by hand, instead of composing it on the computer, which is how I usually write poetry. There’s just something about a pen on paper, being able to tap your pen with the words to count the syllables, that MS Word can’t match.

We had a floor meeting tonight. There was free pizza, so that made me happy. There are a lot more guys on my floor than I would have thought.

Tomorrow I go home for the weekend. I hope that the band practices. It would be nice, for a change. I can actually stay up later than usual tonight because my Rock ‘n Roll class is canceled because they need the Music Building all day tomorrow. It’ll an an extra hour or two to my sleep schedule. I’m kind of feeling tired tonight, which is really weird, because I usually don’t feel tired until about four o’clock in the morning.

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Update

Thursday, February 6th, 2003

Well, I overslept a little today. My alarm clock went off, but it took me about twenty minutes to get up. I really need some sort of backup alarm clock, put in some out-of-the-way place where I’d have to actually get up to switch it off. It would work, because it takes a lot of effort to climb back into bed.

I talked to Brenner and told him that Mr. Kane sends his regards. He’s a really cool guy, and I’m really looking forward to having the class this semester. For one thing, the reading isn’t as voluminous as in my other English class. We read about one short story a day. More time is spent actually thinking about the text. It also turns out one of my roommate’s friends is in the class, too.

Then came the other English class. I find myself writing a lot of poetry there. Today I wrote four poems: “Moth”, “Having Observed Upon a Sunset”, “The Anti-Sonnet”, and “Holden.” Why do I feel so creative when I’m supposed to be learning?

I finally got my financial aid dealt with. Turns out my bill comes to $360.84.

Other than that, I’ve been working on the novel I started in October. I finished it last night (at around two-thirty in the morning) and am now going over it and editing, re-writing, and generally fixing it. It’s amazing how much I’ve improved as a writer in just five months. I’ll probably never publish it, but it’s nice to know I’ve actually written a novel. Working on the novel is a nice distraction from my other concerns.

Anyway, I don’t want to waste any more of my writing energy on some silly blog. 😉

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Update

Tuesday, February 4th, 2003

God, we had to work in groups in Geography today. I hate working in groups, especially ones in classes where I don’t know anybody. It happened last semester in Native American Studies, and it’s happened long before that. I’m just a shy person, I guess. The assignment went okay, but I hate being forced to work with people whom I don’t know. I got to see Alan Alda on Scientific Frontiers (or maybe it was Nova) during a video in Psych class, so that was okay.

I wrote a song today, but it’s waaaay too poppy to even show to anybody else. I feel torn between writing songs that have significance and writing songs that I like to play. Occasionally, I’ll find a happy medium, but more often than not it’s one way or the other.

Well, it’s quarter till eleven and I’ve resigned myself to my fate. The ball’s in my court, there are twenty-one hours left on the clock, but even that much time isn’t enough to score a goal. Still, you gotta keep on playing, even though you know that the game is heavily stacked against you. There’s a chance, yes; there always is; but the odds are so astronomical that only a Corellian would feel confident, and that would only be before C-3P0 blabbed them.

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Update

Monday, February 3rd, 2003

I sure was tired this morning, so I skipped History of Rock ‘n Roll. I handed in my AIS (fingers are crossed), and slogged through the next English class.

All this plays second fiddle to the waiting I’ve been going through. It’s been a week since I called Erin and poured my heart out, and I’m pretty sure she said she’d let me know by tonight. She didn’t call. To her credit, my roommate was on the phone during the half-hour that she tends to call, so I don’t know. I think I already know what she’s gonna say, and I’ve been pretty much accepting that fact for the last year, but I have to know. Y’know, I just want to be able to know if, when she finally gets ahold of me, if I’ll despodently accept what she says or — and in my mind this is a remote possibility — I can go “Woohoo!” and do some strangely arrhythmical dance. I guess I’ll call her tomorrow, if I have to, but I’d feel kind of weird. I almost literally dropped a bombshell on her last Monday, and she probably needs time to mull it over, still. Is it wrong to phone and say “Well?” That seems so… so… much like delivering an ultimatum. I just wish I knew the answer to that. I know I’ve been pretty much reactive in every aspect of staying in contact with her, but I just feel that I should give her time here, to make a decision in her own way.

The thing is that she really is an empathetic person, so it could be hard to tell me what I’m fearing. But this limbo, this Purgatory on Earth, is much worse than flat-out rejection.

All I know is that I screwed up, big time, majorly, Iran-Contra, and if I have a chance I will let her know what she should already know: that she’s the prettiest, brightest, gosh-darn swellest gal I’ve ever met and that every second I’m around her is (literally) a dream come true. These words look so hollow on the screen, but that’s only because I can’t find the right ones.

Anyway, I’ve got this, for whatever good it does:



I couldn’t tell which had become more wet:

The rain, drizzly, falling on field and farm

Or the perspiration — I mean my sweat —

Which created small lakes under each arm.

When I saw her, dazzling as always

I jumped, because I still wasn’t prepared.

I did not know smooth words the smooth man says;

I fumbled, squawked, and nervously I stared.

I was suff’ring, yes, and deathly afraid,

But was happier than I’d ever been.

‘Twas later I this observation made

Which dispelled almost all of my chagrin:

I realized, as we were saying goodbye,

Perhaps she was merely as nervous as I.

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Update

Sunday, February 2nd, 2003

I really need to start writing these things earlier in the night, if only to make the dates match the day about which I’m writing.

I went for a stroll down my road today. It’s pretty serene, even with the highway a quarter-mile away. Usually I walk and listen to a Walkman, but this time I just walked and thought. I thought and thought, about a lot — and not. Sorry, switched into Seuss-mode there for a while. I did have a lot to think about, yes, and it was nice not having my dog to babysit. It was cold, but the cold was that crisp, refreshing cold you can only feel in your lungs. Strolls through Missoula’s streets just can’t match it.

I just finished my first AIS for an English class. The instructor is interesting, and for the first time (possibly in recorded history), I am really, really interested in my assignment. I gotta go to bed now.

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Update

Sunday, February 2nd, 2003

Al Gore on Saturday Night Live. Somehow, it didn’t improve his image much. Now, instead of seeing him as a stiff, emotionless politician (a “Gorebot”, as Tom Tomorrow took to calling him), I see him as a stiff, emotionless politician who once appeared on a sketch show that has seen better days.

I am, of course, at my parents’ house, a fact one can infer from my having seen television. The TV I brought to my dorm room quit soon after the State of the Union address, which doesn’t bother me much. That’s also why I wrote nothing here yesterday. Last night I stayed over at Shawn’s house. We rented This is Spinal Tap, a movie which neither Shawn nor Aaron found as funny as I did.

Friday’s classes came and went, with only two noticeable incidents. The first was in History of Rock ‘n Roll, when professor Leadbetter played some different early blues songs. I got this urge to go back to my room and hammer some of my own out on the guitar. And I did. Later, in my British Lit class, I wrote a couple of poems which may or may not make it onto my main website. I had to walk to downtown Missoula because my bike is still here at my parents’ house, but the stroll was pleasant. The weather was a bit drizzly and the fog clinging to the air almost made the usually dingy Missoula streets almost pretty. Even the turbid Clark Fork was something to look at as countless drops of rain speckled its smooth surface.

I finished reading “Apt Pupil”, a story which I found quite disgusting. Now I’ve started in on “The Body”, which in the popular mass-media world goes by the movie title Stand By Me. Is there anything Stephen King has written which hasn’t been made into a movie?

Tomorrow, I have to write an AIS for Brenner’s class, an assignment which tickles me pink. For the first time, I am looking forward to something in my college classes. I looked forward to some stuff in my acting class, but I’ve considered that more of a diversion than a bona fide course. I need to e-mail my Senior English teacher, Mr. Kane, about Brenner. Shawn tells me that Kane had Brenner and I’m not at all surprised.

It’s a bitch about the Challenger. But you know what really pisses me off? The fact that nobody cared a donkey’s ass about the space program until a shuttle blew up.

Anyway, something important might happen tomorrow. I’ve done my best to steel myself, but there really is no speech for me to write, I guess. I have a feeling I know of what’s going to happen. I can hope against it, but I have to face overwhelming facts.

That’s all for now. Mr. King’s prose calls.

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About Me

Wednesday, January 29th, 2003

I have stepped into the miraculous world of online blogging. Hooray! I have chosen to do this because while I still have a ‘real’ diary/journal/log, I find that typing is much easier on my hands. So everything that isn’t too private will go here, for all eyes (or, to be realistic, no eyes) to see.

A little about myself? I’m 19 and a freshman at the University of Montana in Missoula. I graduated from Corvallis High School, which actually furnished a decent education for being in the middle of nowhere. My biggest accomplishment there was probably winning fourth place in the state at the ABC speech meet for Serious Duo. I don’t fancy myself talent as an actor at all, so it was quite surprising. Just a few days ago I learned that my partner from last year and the singer from my band got first place in the state for Humorous Duo, so I’m psyched for them. I’m majoring in English Teaching, with a minor in Paying Off Debts For Life. I mean drama. A minor in drama. I’m going into teaching because I love being around kids. They seem so free, so full of life, and so innocent that it seems nuts not to do something to try and light a fire within their minds. I’ve always liked kids (not in a Pete Townsend type way), and seeing a group of them at play (on a playground somewhere) always brings a smile to my face. Being a teacher will mean that I will never be able to buy the finer things in life, but that doesn’t bother me.

I was born and raised in Walla Walla, Washington, a city infamous as the ‘Warner Brothers Funny-Name City.’ What I remember most about Walla Walla was the heat: clinging to your very skin, cloying, overwhelming. My childhood was very much one of the late eighties/early nineties: moonwalks, and M.C. Hammer, and Nintendo. In 1993, shortly after the birth of my sister, we moved to Billings. Billings was large, stinky, and somewhat unfriendly. Two years later we moved to Corvallis, where I finished middle school and high school. Corvallis is small, friendly, a tad boring at times, and beautiful. I met many interesting people there, including all of my bandmates, my closest adult friend (who also happened to be my Speech teacher), and other people who I will carry with me for life. Missoula (my current hometown) shares some of that beauty, glimpsed above the buildings in the mountains, so I really don’t feel out of place here. The only thing to miss about my hometown (which is only an hour away) is the people.

They say I’m pretty smart, and I will admit that I tend to agree with them. I was singled out in elementary school as ‘gifted and talented’, for whatever that’s worth. I’m not going to engage in anything as masturbatory as posting my IQ or SAT scores, and I promise that this will be the extent of my ‘bragging.’

I play guitar in a band, Nerds With Instruments, which is unknown even in the rather thightly-knit Montana punk rock scene. I fancy myself a decent writer. I dabble in a lot of other hobbies, including programming, photography (usually when I can get my hands on my Dad’s digital camera, which is a lot cheaper than film), and recording music. My favorite hobby, I must confess, is to frequently split infintives.

Now that exposition is out of the way, I will get into my day. I woke up at 9:00, an hour before my History of Rock ‘n Roll class. This class is interesting. Unfortunately, its format (three exams make up the total grade) is the easiest one for me to skip, but I won’t want to skip it. Bottom line? I will not be skipping ten class periods like I did in Native American studies last semester. Today, we went over the defining characteristics of Rock ‘n Roll. I still need to get a copy of the book; tomorrow I’ll check the UC Bookstore.

An hour after that class ended I have American Lit. This class reminds me of my high school Senior English class, mostly because of the similarities between the instructors. I was startled today when everyone started packing up to leave, because I hadn’t looked at my watch once while sitting through that class. The same thing happened in my Senior English class. I’ll have to either ask Professor Brenner if he remembers a student from Butte or ask Mr. Kane if he was a student of Brenner’s.

Then I had a rather boring British Lit class. Almost the polar opposite of American Lit. It’s startling to see the dichotomy between these two courses. One is dynamic, and chatty, and interesting; the other, static, silent, and boring.

After classes I fiddled around with my guitar. I finished reading Insomnia by Stephen King, and started in on my Psych asssignment. I still need to finish that before the end of the night. Then I went to dinner. Thank God Missoula is such a liberal city. The Food Zoo (the place in which I’m forced to eat) has a nice selection of vegetarian foods, so I don’t have to fill up on French Fries and salad. A nice piece of cake rounded out my one meal of the day. Although my parents are concerned because I only have one repast a day, I am not. I eat a big meal, and I’m kind of big anyway.

After dinner I settled down to watch Jeopardy on the TV I brought up from home, but the TV (an old Sony which has seen bitter days) blitzed out on me. This means that I have to hook my rather crude antenna up to my VCR (which will not release its vicelike grip on my Star Wars: A New Hope tape) to get any TV. Not that I watch much television. Jeopardy, Seinfeld, and the News: these are the only shows I watch up here. Back home, I can see M.A.S.H. and Spin City on my parents’ fancy satellite dish, but here I only get broadcast shows. With no TV, I took a four-hour nap, and woke up to start this blog.

I have a personal homepage, where you can sample my writing and other things about me. I hope to get some of my photography up there someday. It is, I confess, an exercise in vanity, but it’s probably the only vain thing I do. Click Here.

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