Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Fun With 9-1-1

There haven't been many interesting things that I've seen lately, but I wanted to write something. More accurately, my girlfriend wanted me to write something, so, I'm writing something. I also wanted to write something, though.

I was a pretty mischievous child when I was younger, though that's not saying much because I feel like every child is mischievous. My mischief took place mainly in calling 9-1-1 unnecessarily. There were three instances that I can recall, two of them with details. The one that I remember the most happened at my mom's house. I have no idea how old I was, but I was pretty young. My mom and I were outside. I think she was gardening, and I was probably goonin' all over the place. My mom went inside for something, and I stayed outside. A little while later, I ran inside. I had to tell my mom something. "Mom!" I yelled as I entered my house. She didn't answer. "Mom!" I yelled again. Still no answer. "MOOOOOOOOM! MOM! ...Mom? ...Mom?! MOM?! MOM!" I was in a panic. Where was my mom? Someone came and stole my mom! This was an emergency, and I learned to call 9-1-1 in an emergency. I frantically picked up the phone and dialed.

"9-1-1, what is your emergency?"

"Hello? Um, I can't find my mom."

"What?"

"I don't know where my mom is!"

"Okay, what is your name?"

"Um, Joe?"

"Okay, Joe, where did you last see your mom?"

"Well, we were outside, and then she came inside, and then I came inside, and I don't know where she is!" Just then my mom came in through the back door. "Oh! Never mind, I found her. Bye!" and I hung up on 9-1-1. "Mom! Where were you?!"

"I went next door to give something to Jan." Jan was our neighbor. After she said that, the phone rang. I answered. It was 9-1-1.

"Um, mom? It's for you."

The next incident that I remember was before my dad and my step-mom got married. My step-mom worked at the school in Becker, and one day my dad, sister, and I went to visit her. It was in the evening, so there was no one else at the school. I quickly got bored as my dad and step-mom talked, so I wandered off to explore the school. Whilst exploring, I came across a pay phone. "Hmm, I wonder if I don't pay for the call and dial 9-1-1, it'll go through." I tried it, and it rang. I hung up after the first ring. "Huh. I guess it does work," I thought, and that was that. About ten minutes later, a police officer arrived at the school. Since we were the only people there, he talked to us.

"Did any of you dial 9-1-1?" Everyone said no. I was terrified. I thought I'd be in so much trouble if it were to be discovered that I had dialed 9-1-1. "Huh. That's weird. We received a call from one of the phones here." Everyone thought it was weird except for me, but I played along. The four of us and the police officer investigated. We found footprints, actually, which was weird because the floors had been cleaned by the janitor before he left. The mystery was never solved, but I like to think I helped almost catch a bad guy.

The third incident I don't really remember, but it's a lot like the second one, but without the excitement. My dad, sister and I were at Central Park in Litchfield. I came across a pay phone. "Hmm, I wonder if I don't pay for the call and dial 9-1-1, it'll go through." I don't remember if this was before or after the Becker school incident, but regardless of which one came first, apparently I didn't learn anything from it. The same thing happened - it rang once, I hung up, police came. This time there were multiple officers though, but I think they showed up as we were leaving. I'm not sure. This is one is more of a blur in my head.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Food On Sticks

A few weeks ago (that seems to be a theme in my recent posts) a bunch of camp friends and I were going to go to the Minnesota State Fair. I was really excited because I haven't been there in six years, and I really love food on sticks, especially if it's deep fried. However, my involvement in the plan hit a snag.

Since this was near the end of August and school was right around the corner, I decided I should probably check my school email. I hadn't done that since shortly after Summer had started. Sure enough, I had a decent amount of emails, though most of them weren't important. There was one, however, with a bunch of medical stuff that I needed to get done before classes started. Fortunately, I had gotten a physical before Summer started and I was up to date on all my immunizations. However, it said I needed to get a TB test. I had not had one of those ever. For a TB test, you get a little shot right under the surface of your skin. Between 48 and 72 hours later, you go back and get it checked. If there are no bumps around the area you got the shot, you're good to go. The 48-72 hour thing was the major setback, because I read this email on Wednesday, and the State Fair outing was to be on Friday. I set up an appointment for 2:00 on Wednesday, meaning I'd have to wait until 2:00 on Friday to get it checked. We were meeting at 11:00 at the Fair on Friday. Clearly, I would be late, especially considering my appointment was in Litchfield, which is an hour and a half away from the Fairgrounds in the cities. "Oh well," I thought. "At least I'll get to be there for a few hours."

When I got to the doctor's office on Friday, I was told to sit in the waiting room, as is the standard protocol for doctor's office visits. It turned out that they forgot about me, apparently, because I waited for over an hour, which is really fun at the doctor's office because they have...um, magazines! So I read the "ESPN The Magazine" magazine all the way through, then read the longest article over again. I also sat and listened to the old people talk. It is a fact that over 80% of people in a doctor's office at any given time are old. I mean like "over 70" old. One old lady also had to wait for a while, apparently, because she was upset. A nurse finally came for her, and I could hear the lady as she walked back to the room: "I am very upset. I have been waiting and waiting. I am very upset."

"I know, I understand. We're sorry for the inconvenience. Now if you could just step on the scale and we'll measure your height and weight..."

"I came in two days ago and I had to do that. I won't do it. I will. Not. Do it."

"Okay, well, we'll just get your weight then."

After starting that really long magazine article (which was about Matt Kemp of the Dodgers, so I wasn't even that interested in it) for a third time, I decided I should probably see what was going on with my wait. I went up to the receptionist and said, "Excuse me, I've been waiting for over an hour, and all I need is to get my TB test checked."

"You're still here?! I told the nurses three different times that you were ready! I'll take care of this." She left, and I went back to sit. I felt like I handled that really well considering I was furious because I just wanted to eat food on sticks. About a minute later, a nurse hurried in and called my name. The appointment literally took one minute. I held out my arm, she ran her hand over it and said, "Okay, you're good," and I left. It was about 3:30 when I finally left. I pulled out my directions to the Fairgrounds and began my journey. Unfortunately, my directions were from google. You'd think I'd have learned by now. I followed them perfectly until it was literally impossible to do that. They told me to turn left on some street South, but follow the signs for some street North. I couldn't even...I didn't...I had no idea what google was trying to pull, so I just turned left. I drove past the Fairgrounds and ended up parked in some cul-de-sac. I called some camp folk and asked how much longer they would be there. They were just getting ready to leave, which was fine because then I didn't have to pay for parking. They said they were looking for some place to meet up and just hang out, though, which was perfect because I really wanted to see them. We met at a Perkins and ate. Me more so than everyone else because I had anticipated eating a ton of food on sticks and, thanks to the ACMC in Litchfield, MN, I was unable to do that.

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Belated Posts #4: Deidra's Coffee

I feel like I just can't catch up. Belated Post #4 is about a simple coffee date turning into quite the journey. Actually, it was only simple in the planning stages. As soon as the plans were put into motion, it became an unnecessarily difficult task.

During the quilt auction (an auction where quilts are sold. We have one every year at camp), I had won a game called "Heads or Tails." It's a simple game, really. The auctioneers had a quarter and they would flip it. Before each flip, every person at the auction (including camp folk such as myself), would have to commit to either heads or tails. I guessed correctly every time, making me the victor. As my prize, I was given a $20 gift card to Deidra's Coffee, which, as I hope you've guessed, is a coffee shop. I don't like coffee, but I do like someone who likes coffee: my now-girlfriend, Erika Meierding. I asked her if she'd like to go to Deidra's with me, and she obliged (I know, I know, what kind of guy uses a gift card on a date? I have no excuse for that one. But you know what? It worked out. So there).

Erika and I decided that the last day of camp would work best for our coffee date at Deidra's. On the last day of camp, though, we at Shores have to clean the camp. Erika did not work at Shores. Nor did she have a working phone, which made arranging the whole thing pretty difficult. On top of that, I wanted to say goodbye to everyone at Shores, since, sadly, I probably won't see some of them ever again. I ended up going over to Green Lake (which is where Erika worked) around 1:00. I think. I'm not entirely sure because I've taken too long to write this. Anyway, when I got to Green Lake, I saw that I had a voicemail. I listened to it, and it was Erika using Drew's (the guy from "Belated Posts #3: The Final Cabin" saga) phone. Some people had gone out to eat, including those two. Unfortunately, I don't have service at Shores, which is why that was a voicemail instead of having been a phone call that I answered. The fact that I didn't have service at the time of the call also meant that my phone wouldn't show me the number from which the call was. So, when I heard Erika leaving the voicemail, I assumed that she had gotten her phone fixed. I tried calling her, but it went right to voicemail. This is because her phone was not fixed. I listened to the voicemail again (and again and again and again) and realized that at the end of the message, Erika said she was using Drew's phone and that I should call him. However, I didn't have Drew's number. So, I texted Emily Stets and Mic-Mac from Shores to see if they had Drew's number. They both did, gave it to me, and I called it. It went to voicemail. Defeated, I sat on a bench, watching a wedding party take pictures. After about a minute, my phone started ringing, and it was Drew! Except it wasn't Drew - it was Erika! And they were going to Dairy Queen! And I could come, too! So I did! I got to Dairy Queen, Drew, Jeremy, and Bethany left, and Erika and I went to find Deidra's.

We drove all around Spicer, which isn't really that big, so it took a little more than five minutes. However, we didn't find it, so we went back to Green Lake to utilize their internet and google the location of Deidra's. My hatred for google maps is well documented, but we used it anyway. Guess what - it was wrong. It told us to take a left at a certain intersection when, in reality, we were supposed to do the exact opposite of that (which is to take a right). We went back to winging it, and eventually, we found it. We arrived at about 2:45, and it closes at 3:00 on Saturdays, which is what day it was. I think those times are right. Maybe not. Regardless, we got there fifteen minutes before it closed. Consequently, the espresso machine was turned off, which was actually fine because neither of us wanted anything that required an espresso machine. However, when I presented my gift card, the lady (Deidra?) said, "You know what? This is on the house. You guys are so great. Thank you for understanding about the espresso machine. I'm sorry again about that, so this is free."

Whelp. Alright, then. I feel like that was the universe's way of showing that it felt bad for me for not being able to find Deidra's, and for using a gift card on a date.

Monday, August 27, 2012

Belated Posts #3: The Final Cabin, Part 3 - My Least Favorite, Favorite

So, the last week of camp I had really dumb kids and a sick kid. Now I'm going to tell about the most dramatic change in favoritism I've ever experienced.

The youngest and smallest kid in my cabin started out as my favorite kid in my cabin. He was so sweet and cute, I couldn't help but make him my favorite. He'd give me hugs for no reason, hold my hand whenever we walked anywhere, and he even had a cute little voice. But then things went south real fast, and it all started when I decided to bring my cabin on a pontoon ride.

It was a windy day and, consequently, there were some waves. Once in a while, some globules of water would splatter on us in the pontoon. When the first one hit my lil' favie, he dropped the f-bomb, as in, "What the (f-bomb)?" Kris, the waterfront director, called him out on it.

"Did you just drop the f-bomb?"

"...No."

"I'm pretty sure I heard you drop the f-bomb."

"No, I said, "What the...frick."

"No, I heard the f-bomb."

"I said-"

"You know what - I don't care. Just don't say any more things that start with "What the," okay?"

"But I didn't-"

"I don't care! Just don't do it!"

After that, he quickly descended my rankings of favorite camper. By the end of the week, the only time he would talk to me was when he was tattling on someone, and he talked to me a lot. He'd tattle on anyone for anything. One night for devotions, Drew and I integrated our cabins and did bro-tips. Being very bro-ish in nature, both of us had a good amount of combined bro-knowledge. I feel like we passed on a lot of useful tips such as, but not limited to, always lift the seat when you pee, respect the ladies, call girls 'pretty.' 'beautiful,' or 'cute' instead of 'hot,' be nice to your friends' parents, etc. After we ran out of tips, Drew took his kids back to their cabin. As they were leaving, I gave them all high-fives. Once the last of Drew's kids were in their cabin, my lil' no-longer-favie came up to me.

"Um, Joe?"

"Yes?"

"Um, you know that kid you just high-fived?"

"Yeah?"

"Um, the one with the red hair?"

"Yeah. What about him?"

"Um, well, he steals things from other kids."

"(To myself, in my head) 'Ohhhh my goodness. No he doesn't. You need to stop tattling.' Sigh...Okay. Thanks for telling me that. Now go to bed."

And yes, he did start every sentence with "Um."

Friday, August 24, 2012

Belated Posts #3: The Final Cabin, Part 2 - Smells Like Teen Spirit. No Wait, That's Vomit

This post could very well be #3 in the short "Worst Night of Camp" series, but it's already part of another series. Posts can only be a part of one series. That's common knowledge. Therefore, it is not part of the "Worst Night of Camp" series. Just know that it could've been, though.

This particular night did not necessarily start out nice. It started out pretty bad. It escalated to something much worse, however. Let's start at where I want the beginning to be. I had just finished the nightly devotional, which was probably "highs and lows," where each camper shares what their favorite and least favorite part of the day was. That's a go-to devo for me, because it takes no planning, and planning is an area in which I do not excel. We finished earlier than I had anticipated, so I did the one thing I swore I would never do: I gave the kids flashlight time. I feel as though I am the strictest counselor when it comes to flashlight privileges in that my kids don't have any. I always explain to them that there is no need for a flashlight at camp and, really, there isn't. There are lights on the outside of cabins if they have to go to the bathroom at night, and that's the only scenario in which they would be outside when it's dark. However, flashlights are on the list of things to bring to camp that is sent to the parents, so every kid brings one. For flashlight time, I turned off the lights in the cabin and they all shined their lights spastically on the walls and ceiling. For some reason, that's fun. Then I thought of something else we could do, so I abruptly ended flashlight time and explained the new thing. Unfortunately, I can't remember what the new thing was, but I do remember that they were not participating. Consequently, I ended the new thing abruptly, too, and declared a premature lights out. The kids were surprisingly quiet for the first five minutes or so, but then a couple of flashlights were turned on. I confiscated them. Quiet for a few more minutes, then whispers. Whispers gave way to laughter and soft talking, which birthed normal talking. I told them to be quiet a number of times. Each time, the level of anger in my voice was more notable than the previous time. I was on the verge of using my angry-dad voice (which is quite terrifying) when the talking was reduced to only a few whispers. I drifted in and out of sleep for about an hour before finally activating full-sleep mode. That's when the trouble started.

I was awoken by the sound of someone pouring water out of a bottle onto the floor. "Why? Just...why?" I thought. "Eh, it's only water; I'll worry about it in the morning." Three seconds later, the worst smell ever to enter my nasal cavity entered my nasal cavity. "Oh. Oh no. That's not water." And it wasn't water. It was vomit. The kid was on the top bunk, just leaning his head over the side and letting it rip. I turned on one of the flashlights I confiscated earlier and caught the eyes of the kid. I simply pointed at him and did the finger motion for "come here."

"Can't I just get a drink of water or something?"

"Nope, we're going to see the health aid."

"Why can't I just get a drink of water?"

"Because you just threw up! Let's go!" For a second, I thought about just going next door and waking up Drew since, like I said in the first installment of "The Final Cabin," Drew was the health aid for the whole summer. I decided against it, though, since he had his own cabin to worry about, firstly, and secondly, we'd still have to go to the health aid office. I walked with the kid to the health aid office, making a short pit stop at the dining hall so he could rinse his mouth out. I explained to Haley, the interim health aid, what had happened and she took over from there. At this time, I realized that I still had eight kids in a hot room with the stinkiest puke puddled on the floor. I decided I should relocate my kids and then clean the puke. Luckily (and I do mean luckily), I ran into Katie, AKA Katie Dubs, AKA K-Dub Money, a service staff and tie-dye extraordinaire, on my way back to the cabin.

"Joe? What are you doing out?"

"Oh, one of my kids threw up and I had to bring him to Haley. And now I have to move my kids and clean the puke."

"Do you want me to clean the puke?"

"...Yes? If you could, that would be awesome."

"Okay! I'll clean the puke!"

I got back to the cabin and woke up all my kids and told them we were moving to a different cabin, because this cabin stinks. This took about twenty minutes because when I woke up one kid and went to the next, the first kid would fall back asleep. Paul, a counselor who was working Family Camp (which means he was not responsible for any kids), came to lead the kids to our new cabin, since he was staying in the other side of it. As I was grabbing my stuff, Katie Dubs came in with puke cleaner and went to work.

Then everybody slept and we all lived happily ever after. The end.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Belated Posts #3: The Final Cabin, Part 1 - Power Hour

During the last week of camp, I was lucky enough to be counseling. It's always a blessing to be on site during the last week because, well, it's the last week and it'd be nice to actually be there for it. I was also lucky enough to have Drew Boraas as my co-counselor for the week. Drew was the health aid for the summer so, obviously, this was his first week counseling. You may be thinking, "Why was it lucky you had a first time counselor as your co-counselor?" Valid question, and the answer is simply that Drew is a pretty cool guy; it has nothing to do with his counseling experience.

Anyway, none of that is relevant, really. For the last week of camp, I had third graders in my cabin, which is pretty ideal, considering I'm going to have a career working with second graders. However, these third graders didn't have very good memory. I don't know if there was like, a virus in the cabin that spread from kid to kid to cause a coding/storage/recall deficiency or something, but they just could not remember anything. For instance, every day we have something called "Power Hour," which is when the counselors get an hour without kids. During that hour, the kids go play games with the Assistant Program Directors. I never know what games they're playing because it doesn't concern me. However, my kids always thought I knew.

Monday:

"Joe, what are we doing for Power Hour?"

"Playing a game with Stever and Annie."

"What game?"

"I don't know."

"Why not?"

"I don't participate in the game, so I don't ask what it is. I'm not even there for it, so I don't know."

Tuesday:

"Joe, what are we doing for Power Hour?"

"Remember what you did yesterday for Power Hour?"

"...Carpet ball?"

"Nope. You guys played a game with Stever and Annie, right?"

"Oh, yeah!"

"You're doing that again."

"What game?"

"I don't know."

"Is it 'Everybody's It Tag'?"

"Did you play that yesterday?"

"Yes!"

"Then no."

Wednesday:

"Joe, what are we doing for Power Hour?"

"I'm gonna go way out on a limb here and guess that you're going to play a game, and that it'll probably be with Stever and Annie."

"What game?"

"When was the last time I answered that question for you?"

"Umm...I don't know."

"I don't know what game you're playing."

Thursday:

"Joe, what are we doing for Power Hour?"

"I'm curious - what do you think you're doing for Power Hour today?"

"I don't know."

"Well, what did you do yesterday?"

"Play games with Stever and Annie?"

"Right! And what did you do the day before that?"

"Play games with Stever and Annie...?"

"Right again! And do you remember what you did the day before that?"

"Play games with Stever and Annie..."

"Exactly! So, if you were to just venture a guess as to what you are doing for Power Hour today, what would you guess?"

"...What game are we playing?"

"Sigh...Have I ever known what game you're playing for Power Hour?"

"No..."

"Right. And today is no different. I do not know what game you are playing."

There are a few more scenarios that are similar to this one, but I used up a ton of space with dialogue and I think it would be cruel to continue. Just believe me when I tell you that this cabin tested my patience more than any other cabin I have had. It was fun, though.

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Belated Posts #2: Camp Poops

As I said in my previous post, camp is now over. However, I have some untold stories I'd like to tell regarding camp. This one is about Camp Poops. Okay, it's actually called Camp Hoops, but say that kind of fast. It sounds like Camp Poops, doesn't it? Yes. Yes it does. This year, camp decided to have a bunch of specialty camps. For instance, there was Horse Camp, Music and Drama Camp, some other camps that I can't remember, and Camp Poops. I'm not entirely sure why, out of all of the camps, Camp Poops was the one where Camp was the first word, but whatever. Since my domination at the game of lightning is pretty much legendary, I was asked if I could counsel at Camp Poops. Of course I said yes.

If you've been to either Shores or Green Lake, you probably noticed that our basketball facilities are lacking. Camp Poops was held at Green Lake since it was for kids who are actually old enough to do basketball things. Green Lake has five(?) hoops, but none of them are very nice, and the court is also pretty meh. However, for Camp Poops, the court was repaved and some new hoops were put up. Also, a parking lot was transformed into a a court with four hoops. It was actually really nice. I was impressed. When I saw the parking lot court, I got really excited. I mean, I was going to get to play basketball. It's not like I'm good at basketball or anything, I just really like to play. I guess I'm okay at basketball, just not compared to most people who have actually played basketball.

It turned out, though, that the other two counselors and I didn't even get to play basketball. We didn't even really get to counsel. All we did was make sure the kids got to where they were supposed to be, which usually meant the basketball court. It was frustrating for us, though, because Camp Poops wasn't very coordinated. It took until Wednesday for there to be a set schedule. It didn't help that it rained a few times, so we had to get all of the kids to a gym. Also, for some reason, Camp Poops kids had to stay in different cabins from the rest of the campers. At Green Lake, all of the campers stay in a lodge with different rooms. Camp Poopers (those who were part of Camp Poops) had to stay in actual cabins, which I was totally fine with, except we only had one shower. One shower for nine sweaty kids is not ideal. Somehow, all of us, including me, managed to shower in one hour. I was so proud. Another bad thing about being secluded from the rest of camp was that our banquet for the end of the week was lame. Usually everyone dresses up, but since it was just a bunch of guys, we had no one to dress up for. Also, our cabins were not air conditioned, and we needed air conditioning more than everyone. Granted, the rooms in the lodge aren't air conditioned, either, but the dining hall in the lodge is. Whatever. Camp Poops was still fun. I got to hang out with the Green Lake staff, which I normally don't get to do, and I got a sweet shirt. I'd say that's pretty worth it.

Oh, I almost forgot. It was decided that I'm a little baby and need to have a friend from Shores come with me to work at Green Lake. Mic-Mac was chosen. I feel like that was a great choice, but it was kinda dumb because I was secluded from actual camp things most of the time. Oh well. We played a few games of LOL/WOW/MOM, and it was awesome.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Belated Posts #1: LOL Week

Guys, camp wrapped up last week. I'm pretty distraught about that. As you may have noticed, my posts had become less common throughout the summer. Consequently, I have a few things about which I have wanted to write on queue. This post is about one of those things - LOL (Lord Of Life) Week. LOL Week is when Lord Of Life, a church located near the Twin Cities (or in that direction, anyway. I can't really tell you where it is. I mean, I know the town but I'm not going to say it. I'm not sure why), rents out the camp and sends it's kids there. For Lord Of Life Week, all of the counselors ride a bus to the church, which is about two and a half hours away, to pick up the kids. During LOL Week, we have the regular campers who stay for the whole week, and we have two groups of half-blast campers who each stay for only half the week. During LOL Week, I was assigned to double half-blast, which meant I would have one group of kids for the first half of the week and a different group of kids for the second half. Since it was LOL week, this meant I got to ride the bus four times. Once on Sunday with all of the counselors who were picking up their full week's worth of campers (even though I wasn't getting any campers on Sunday. Please tell me how that makes sense. I served no purpose. However, I did get a pretty good lunch at the church. Still wasn't worth the 5 hours of bus riding, though), again on Monday to go get my first batch of half-blasters, back again on Wednesday to drop off my first group and pick up my second, and then lastly on Friday, again with everybody, to drop off the campers. Let me tell you, riding on a bus full of kids is not something I would volunteer to do. Fun fact: kids love the song, "Call Me Maybe" so much, that they sing it almost continuously for over an hour sometimes. One of those times was on the bus. Of my eight bus rides (I said four earlier, but I just now decided to count each trip back as a bus ride, too), the first one was the only one during which I did not fall asleep. That was one without kids. I'm pretty much pro when it comes to sleeping. Is it irresponsible to fall asleep when I'm supposed to be supervising kids? Debatable. On one hand, I am supposed to be supervising children, and that's pretty hard to do when I'm asleep. On the other hand, we were on a bus, and who supervises children when they're on the bus to school? Nobody. I think it was acceptable for me to fall asleep.

Unfortunately, since I waited so long to write this (LOL week was like four weeks ago. Maybe five), I can't remember much about my first batch of half-blasters. One thing I do remember, though, is that I had two kids who looked very similar. Almost all of the staff, including myself, was fairly certain that they were brothers. "Nope. Everyone always says that, though. We're just neighbors." The "We're just neighbors," part lead us all to the same conclusion - one child's father had an affair with the other child's mother. Inappropriate to jump to such a dramatic conclusion? Possibly, especially considering we all work at a Bible camp. But come on - it was scary how much like brothers they looked.

My second half-blast, though, I remember very vividly. Well, I remember one kid very vividly. He was quite obnoxious. When everyone else was trying to sleep, he would just sit in his bed and talk. Not necessarily to anyone in particular, either. One time he woke me up at 6:52. "Joe? Joe? ...Joe? Hey, Joe?"

"........What."

"It's 7:00"

"No it's not - it's 6:52."

"I was rounding up."

"Oh. Wait, why does it matter if it's 7:00? We don't get up until 7:20."

"Oh, really?"

"Yes. Now go back to bed."

On Friday, after we had gotten back to camp from dropping off all of the campers, Micayla, the other counselor who had double half blast with me, and whom I like to call "Mic-Mac," informed me that this kid had autism. Not severe autism; it was more like asperger's. Still, though, the kid's parents did not tell me this. I feel like that is something that you would want the person who is in charge of your kid to know. What's worse, I think, is that the kid didn't even know. Are you kidding me, parents? I was appalled, to say the least.

Also during LOL Week, Mic-Mac and I made up a sweet game. It's similar to Rock/Paper/Scissors but way more awesome. What happens is you and your opponent do a double knuck bump and explode. When you explode your knucks, though, you form a word using your hands and your mouth, one hand on each side of your mouth, which makes an "O." The three words you can form are "LOL" (for LOL week), "WOW," and "MOM." "LOL" beats "WOW," "WOW" beats "MOM," and "MOM" beats "LOL." I encourage you all to play. I hear it's going to be in the Olympics in 2016. Train up!

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

License Renewal

I know it's eight days after my birthday, but I finally got my license renewed today. Since it took so long for me to actually get it done, I figured that things would go wrong once I actually made an effort to renew it. Well, nothing major went wrong, but there were definitely a few hiccups. These are those:

1. I thought I had to go to the courthouse to renew my license.
This makes sense, I think. I mean, that's how it is in Litchfield, where I'm from. I also thought I had to go to the courthouse because it was super convenient. Since I'm on a day camp, I spend most of my time at the church. Guess where the church is. Right across the street from the courthouse. So I went over to the courthouse and, since I'm not from Morris, I had no idea how to navigate my way through the courthouse. Luckily, A lady saw me staring at a map of the place in befuddlement and asked if I needed help.

"Yeah, actually. I'm looking to renew my driver's license...?" I tend to trail off and turn statements into questions frequently because I'm just very awkward in conversation settings. I can formulate fragments but then I get lost and just end everything with a "...?"

"Oh, you can't do that here. We do that at the (driver's license place)." I don't remember what she said, but it translates to "driver's license place" in Joe language. She went on to explain where that place was by saying that it was across the street from the post office and the library. That was really confusing because the post office and the library are on opposite sides of the street. Since I knew where the post office and the library were, though, I went in that direction.

2. The door to the driver's license place was "locked."
The License Bureau  (which is what the driver's license place was actually called (the helpful lady didn't call it that)) shares a building with an attorney's office, apparently. I hate when that happens because I'm never confident that I found the right place. That happened this time, but I figured you gotta risk it to get the biscuit, so I walked up to the building. The door said pull. I turned the knob. Well, I tried to turn the knob. It was locked! Confused and distraught, I continued walking around the block. I decided to go to the church without renewing my license, but before I got there I had a change of heart. I continued right around the block back to the Bureau/attorney's office. I looked at the "pull" sign again. I mean really looked at it. I examined the word and thought really hard about it. "Pull." Then it dawned on me: I should pull the door. So I did, without turning the knob! Miraculously, it opened right up and I walked in.

3. Camera malfunction.
I walked up to the counter and the lady asked if she could help me. "Ummm, I'm looking to renew my driver's license...? Is this- can I do that here?" I totally could, and she let me. I filled out the form and stuff and she told me to sit in front of the camera so it could take my picture. That happened. There was a problem though, and it started off as my bad. The lady said not to move until I saw the flash. I moved right before the flash. "That one is a little blurry, let's try again." So we tried again. I didn't move this time. "It's saying that one isn't sharp." That happened for the next three picture attempts. "Let's try it without the chair this time. Just stand there." I did, and it worked. I got my papers and left, and now I have an acceptable replacement for a driver's license.

Monday, July 30, 2012

Joyce From Morris - The Story of a Creepy Old Lady

I'm on a day camp in Morris right now. First of all, let me just tell you that despite the fact that Morris is a pretty small town, this day camp is awesome. Probably because the kids we're working with are fantastic, our host family is nice, and they have a really nice house with nice things.

Today, for one of our scheduled game times, the other counselors and I decided to take the kids outside to play a game (ships and sailors, if you were wondering. I'm sure you don't know what that even means unless you work or have worked at camp, though). During the third round of the game, I realized that there was an elderly lady holding a newspaper and a glass of beverage (I'm not entirely sure what the beverage was), standing on the sidewalk watching us. "Well, okay," I thought, because old people love kids - it didn't seem too weird to me. She cheered for the winners of that round and said, "You're all winners to me!" I still wasn't too weirded out at this point. Then she came over to me. I was holding my guitar for some reason - probably because I'm weird (there were exactly zero reasons for me to have my guitar) - and the lady asked if I could play in A minor. I can't, because I don't know what that even means. "Um, I can play an A minor! Lolz," I replied.

"Can you finish it?" I have no idea what that means. To be honest, I'm not sure she knows what that means.

"Uhh...wha-? Probably not...?"

"Can you follow me?"

"Umm, no."

"Do you know how to play 'This Land Is Your Land?'"

"Nope."

"Is it okay if I sing it with the kids? I'll do it a capella."

"Um, yeah! Wait, ...yeah? Sure. I think."

"Okay!" She then walked up to the kids, who were assembled in three lines because they were waiting to start another round of ships and sailors. "Hello, children! My name is Joyce, and I want to see if you can put your hands together." The kids all clapped once. "That's right! Put your hands together for our country!" Then she started singing 'This Land Is Your Land' and all of us counselors and all of the children were equally confused and weirded out. Once she finished the song, I started the next round of ships and sailors. One kid didn't want to play, though. He was probably traumatized from that crazy lady. She hadn't left, though, and offered her help. "Hey, kiddo, come on over here," she said. He did, but only because she was standing in the designated area for kids who had gotten out. "Let me tell you what I like about you, kiddo," she said, bending over so she could look him right in the eyes. Like anything with a brain would do, the poor lil' fella backed way up. "Come back over here. I'm not gonna bite ya. I'm not even gonna touch ya. You're a redhead, and us redheads gotta stick together." She then extended her arm and held out her hand. "Can I have a high five?" and the kid backed away even more. Then Joyce just left, and we hurried all the kids back into the church, away from the crazy ladies that apparently just roam the streets of Morris, searching for children to creep on.

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Paz Y Esperanza, Parte Dos: El Primer Dia - ¡Aye, No!

I've already gone into detail about my concerns heading into the Paz Y Esperanza day camp, yeah? Well, this post is going to be about the first day.

On Sunday, Jenna, Katelyn (the two other counselors on my day camp team), and I had met a few of the kids we'd be working with. On Monday, predictably, there were a lot more kids. There were even a few kids who never attended the church there, even. That's totally fine. That's actually great - maybe they'll learn something. There were two, though, that were not doing any learning. I honestly have no idea why they even showed up. All they did was cause problems. They wouldn't participate in any activity we did. Instead, they'd either go off by themselves and dink around or stay in the group and be disruptive. The helpers on the day camp were really surprised after the group those two kids were in finished their Bible study with me.

"Wow, they were so quiet! What did you do to them?" The weird thing is, they weren't quiet at all. I was horrified to think that maybe they weren't even trying to be disruptive and maybe later they would be trying.

"Well, if they didn't pay attention to me when I was reading, I'd start the whole reading over again, or if they couldn't tell me what I had just read, I'd make them read it to me." That actually worked kind of. I feel like they at least received the information, anyway. It didn't work to keep them quiet.

The two troublemakers also realized that Jenna, Katelyn, and I all struggle with Spanish, so they would speak Spanish to each other and then laugh and look around to see if they were going to get in trouble, which led me to believe that they were saying inappropriate things. I don't know why, but I'm bothered when people do things that warrant punishment but don't get punished. I tell myself it's because I'm really into justice, but I feel like I may have some sort of disorder. One time those two kids were off with a couple other kids while the rest were playing a game. I went over to stand by them to keep them in line (I'm really into justice, remember).

"Oh, Joe, what are you doing here?"

"I'm just over here so I can keep an eye on you guys."

"Which one?"

"You. And you, and you, and you, and-"

"Y tu, y tu, y tu..."

"Exactly."

"Wait, how do you know what that means?"

"I took Spanish in college," (just for two semesters, but I mean, come on. "Y tu, y tu, y tu?" I understand that).

"So you know what we've been saying?"

"Yeah, and you're lucky I'm letting it slide."

"Nah-uh. What am I saying now? 'Junior, vamonos.'"

"Junior, let's go."

"......"

Really? He's gonna test my Spanish comprehension with "vamonos"? I knew what that meant just from watching Dora the Explorer. It got them to stop speaking Spanish, though.

Near the end of the day, we had a song fest because the kids need to know the songs for the parents program at the end of the week. When we told the kids this, the two turds said they weren't going to come back. That was the happiest I was during the whole first day. I feel like this post is not doing an adequate job of explaining just how turdish these two kids were, so don't judge me.

Also, they didn't come back, and that was awesome.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Paz Y Esperanza

Hola, mis amigos. I'm not sure if that's right, so I'm gonna stop with the Spanish. Last week I had to be a day camp leader for the first time in my still-brief counseling career. I was a little nervous because if you know me, you know that a leadership role does not play to my strengths. My strengths, if you're wondering, are making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and texting with one hand. Sadly, those help me in a very limited number of real life situations. One of those situations is not leading day camp. Day camp, by the way, is pretty much vacation bible school, where a few counselors from camp will go to a church and do camp things with the kids. Camp things consist of playing games, singing songs, doing bible studies, and making crafts. Normally, the counselors will stay at a host family's house for the week, but the day camp I was on was only twenty minutes away from camp, so we would commute every day. I started the week with a few concerns. They are as follows:

1. I was the DCL (Day Camp Leader)
Like I said, I've never been a DCL before, but I was aware that I probably wouldn't succeed in that role. I feel like I know what's going on most of the time, but to have to organize everything is a little overwhelming for me. Like, I'm not 100% sure on protocol for most things day camp related, and I feel like that's not a good trait for a DCL. Also, I had not received any DCL training, so I wasn't aware of most of things I was supposed to do. Luckily, I had a resource (the day camp binder), and when I get nervous and have access to a resource, I use that resource. A lot. I read through that binder probably three times every day, and that's how I realized I should probably fill out most of the forms regarding the day camp. However, there was another stressor related to this one...

2. I didn't have my binder for the first day
Since I'd never been a DCL before, I wasn't really sure of how the whole process of receiving the day camp binder worked. I assumed someone at the site I work at (Shores of St. Andrew) would have the binder, find me, say, "Joe, here's your binder for day camp," give me the binder, and walk away. None of those things were true. Apparently, I was sent an email from our sister site (Green Lake) which said I needed to drive there to pick up the binder and the car we would be using. I never got that email. So, on Sunday morning when we were supposed to be going to our church for day camp, I was freaking out because I didn't have my binder. The binder contains useful information such as, but not limited to, who I'm supposed to meet with at the church, directions on how to get to the church, if we are participating in the service at all, and if we're supposed to do something after the service at all. Kris, the waterfront director, looked up directions on his phone for me and we had an unused camp car at Shores, so those two things were taken care of. Luckily, the first person we saw in the church was the person who we were supposed to meet with. However, we were supposed to sing songs during the service, but we were not prepared for that. We ended up doing a skit during the children's sermon and called it good.


3. I was the only "guitar player" in the group
If you're wondering why "guitar player" is in quotes, it's because I wouldn't exactly call myself a guitar player. I'm just someone who knows chords on the guitar. Unfortunately, I was the only one on my day camp team who could even say that. Thus, I was the guitar player. I had never been the guitar player for a day camp before, and it was something near the top of my "I Never Want To Do This In My Lifetime" list (first and second on that list would be to pass a kidney stone and to receive a catheter. On a different note, is "receive" the right word to use in regard to a catheter? I mean, what else would you use? I'm gonna go with "receive").


4. I'm not fluent in Spanish
"Paz Y Esperanza" is actually Spanish for "Peace and Hope." The fact that the church is named "Paz Y Esperanza" is a pretty dead giveaway that the congregation is mostly Hispanic. They definitely are. My Spanish is spotty at best. Fortunately, the kids all spoke English and the helpers were bilingual. Everything went better than expected!

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Classic: Power Outage

Yesterday was pretty hot, yes? Also humid? Consequently, a lot of people had their air conditioners on, which is perfectly acceptable. However, in my mom's neighborhood, since so many people were using their air conditioners at the same time, the power went out. Twice. Let's delve a little deeper, shall we?

When I woke up yesterday, I wanted nothing more than to watch sports. I turned on the TV and flipped it over to ESPN, because that's a sports channel. Much to my chagrin, Wimbledon (that's tennis) was on. "Well, I guess I'll settle for whatever is on ESPN2," I thought. Oh no - it's Wimbledon here, too. Bad news bears. There was nothing else on any other channel that interested me, either, so I watched some tennis. Guys, tennis isn't nearly as bad as I thought it was. That's not saying a whole lot, though, because I thought tennis was the most boring sport to watch. It's not, but after a while when I saw that the replay of the Twins game from the night before was on, I did not hesitate to switch to that. I already knew we had won the game, what the score was, and how we scored, but I didn't actually see us score the runs, so I thought this would hold my attention. I really wanted to see Josh Willingham and Trevor Plouffe hit their home runs, because when the game was actually happening the night before, I turned it on right as Willingham was rounding the bases and again right after Plouffe touched home plate. It got to Willingham's at bat. I said to my mom, "I bet Willingham hits a home run right here," and that's when the power went out. Classic. All I wanted to do was see the home run. Just my luck. I guess I have it pretty good, though, if I use the phrase, "just my luck" because I missed seeing a home run that had already happened. I guess it could've been much worse, but I'm not sure how. The power came back on a few hours later and that was that.

At two in the morning, however, the power went back off, presumably because of the same thing, i.e. people using their air conditioners. As soon as it turned off, I woke up. How do I know this? Because I watched the blades of my fan slowly spin to a stop which brought tears to my eyes because it was like my fan had just died. Also because I was now awake and was very aware that the temperature would rapidly rise, which it did. Despite the fact that this power outage woke me up, made me hot, and prevented me from falling back asleep, I was still more distraught about the first one. That's actually mildly disconcerting and makes me question my priorities.

And now, a relevant joke:

Q: When does Sean Connery go to Wimbledon?
A: Tennish.

Saturday, June 23, 2012

Worst* Night of Camp 2: Electric Boogaloo

*This was the worst night for campers. If you've read my post, "Worst Night of Camp," that night was much worse than this night for me. Even if you haven't read that post, that night was still worse for me. I actually enjoyed the night about which I am going to write.

'Twas the first night of camp for the summer. I had just completed the Bible study for the evening and was about to bring my cabin to beach orientation when Kris, the water front director, informed me that the aqua challenge (where it is determined if kids are deep or shallow water swimmers) will not be held after beach orientation due to the impending rain. My kids and I went back to our cabin so they could change out of their swimming attire, and very shortly after I was informed that we would be heading to the party room. The party room is our storm shelter. We call it the party room because that sounds a lot more fun than storm shelter and the goal here is to not have the kids freak out.

Within the first two minutes of being in the party room, one of the campers (not mine, thank God) threw up. It was gross, as throw up usually is. Surprisingly, we somehow avoided the inevitable chain reaction of throw up that usually happens with children (and me). We still had to sit with the smell for about ten minutes, though.

In the party room, we usually sing the camp songs of the week until the storm passes and it's safe for us to go back to our cabins. This time, however, we ran out of camp songs, as the storm lasted for three hours. We then started to sing camp songs that weren't from that week. Mark and I were leading my all-time favorite camp song, Psalm 150, when the power went out. We flawlessly executed a distraction by singing louder, and since Psalm 150 is a call and response style of song, the kids sang louder, too, not even noticing that the power went out. Eventually, though, even after about 15 verses of "Peace," we were out of viable camp song options. Mark, Kris, and I then sang Adam Sandler's "Lunch Lady Land," and I feel like that went over pretty well. Mark and I then did an impression of Hootie and the Blowfish which, predictably, did not go over well because the kids have no idea who that is. As a last-ditch attempt to keep order in the party room, Mark and I performed a stirring rendition of the Flintstones theme song. I don't think the kids knew who the Flintstones were, either, so that didn't go as well as I had hoped, but it was a ton of fun for me.

Three hours after we arrived at the party room, the storm subsided and we were allowed to return to our cabins. It was still raining pretty hard, though. Once my kids and I got back to our cabin, I asked if any of them had to go to the bathroom. Of course, they all had to, so we all grabbed our flashlights (the power was still out) and began to leave. Just before I went out the door, I remembered I had a rain jacket. "Oh! I can wear my rain jacket, because I have one. Ha, ha, ha." After I had said this, about five of my seven campers remembered that their mothers made them bring a rain jacket, too. We all went down and went to the bathroom. When we got back, one of my campers took off his jacket with a huge smile on his face. "I'm so glad my mom makes me do stuff now!"

The power didn't come back on until about 10:45. All of my campers were still awake and they were very excited about the power returning. Since I had already yelled at them to be quiet about six times, though, they only uttered whispers of jubilation.

And we all slept happily ever after. The end.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

Things I've Learned At Camp (So Far)

Camp is almost in full swing for the summer; staff training just finished up and on Sunday, campers will be coming. Even though I've already experienced life as a camp counselor last year, I feel like there are many things for me to learn. For instance, here are ten things I learned from the first week of staff training and the day camp I went on this last week.

1. A weed whacker doubles as a lawn mower and triples as a hedge trimmer.

2. When a kid poops her pants - twice - it does not decrease her cuteness at all.

3. When said kid says, "My mommy says I have soft stools," after pooping her pants, pooping her pants actually makes her cuter.

4. My "angry dad" voice scares kids like nothing else.

5. The best way to avoid the Lutheran theology seminar is to be sick.

6. The best meal of the day is late-night cereal.

7. There's no shame in going to bed at 9:30, even though it's summer.

8. Sometimes teddy bears are actually horrifying instead of cute (my host family had the most terrifying teddy bear I've ever seen. Like, seriously - this is the stuff from which nightmares are made).

9. If the meal is beef commercials and hashbrowns, I can put it down like Kobayashi.

10. Sometimes people will just steal your Cheez-Its and give them to the kids for snack.

Monday, June 4, 2012

Lifeguard Training

I'm at camp again now, guys, and this year, I decided to try to be a lifeguard here. In order to become lifeguard certified, though, I need to pass lifeguard training. I had lifeguard training tonight and, well, let's just say it didn't go as well as I'd hoped. Actually, that's not true. It didn't go well, but I wasn't expecting it to go well at all. When people brought it up today, I would tell them that, too. Sure enough, since camp folk are genuinely nice folk, they would offer reassurance that I would certainly pass and that it's really easy, etc. I fought hard to not buy into their nonsense, but I was unsuccessful; they managed to make me believe that I could possibly pass it. Then we got to the pool.

We arrived at the pool half an hour before we were supposed to get there. We weren't aware of this, though. Well, actually, I was aware of this, but I didn't say anything because the site director here told me I needed to hurry to get there. Anyway, we all changed into our swimming attire and waited by the pool as a middle school swim team practiced. I actually have no idea if they were a middle school swim team or not, but there were some middle aged-ish girls swimming with two high school aged-ish girls "coaching." They kicked us out. The seven of us from camp sat in the hallway eating our bag lunches-that-were-actually-suppers until a high school kid came up and stood by us. Being the friendly folk that we are, we started to chat with the little youngster. We quickly learned that he was also doing lifeguard training. As soon as I heard that, I was struck by a realization: I'm gonna get shown up by this sophomore in high school. A few minutes later, our instructors arrived and the middle school team left.

After leaving the hallway and entering the pool area, I stood face-to-face with the pool. Well, I mean, not really because pools don't have faces, but you know what I mean. Anyway, what little confidence I had quickly vanished. The guy instructor (with whom my dad is good friends (I thought this could give me a leg up on the competition (there actually was no competition between potential lifeguards (there was a huge competition between all potential lifeguards and the pool, though)))) told us that before we start, we'd have to meet three prerequisites before we could continue with the class. The three prerequisites were retrieving a ten pound brick in 12 feet of water, treading water for two minutes without using your hands, and swimming 300 yards without stopping. When he said 300 yards we were all a little surprised - we were under the impression that we had to swim 550 yards. My hopes rose a little bit, but then we did the brick retrieval. The first three guys did it with no problem at all. This would raise some people's hopes, but not me. I thought, "There's no way. There's just no way. I can't do that." However, I got in the pool and watched the instructor toss the brick to the bottom of the pool. I swam over (much slower than the other guys, by the way) and began scanning the pool floor for the brick. I couldn't find it, but I was in the place where I saw it hit the water, so I decided to dive, anyway. Unfortunately, I am awful at diving. I stuck my head under water and kicked. I didn't go anywhere. I kicked again. Still didn't move. I kicked a third time and finally started to descend. I spiraled down to the bottom of the pool with my arm extended. In my head, I looked like Harry Potter reaching out for the snitch whilst on the edge of his broom. You know what I'm talking about. I grabbed the brick and looked up. I gave a powerful kick. I moved on the first kick this time, which was very reassuring for me. I kicked again and again. To my horror, I was only halfway to the surface. I began to kick frantically, releasing my inhaled breath. Gasping I reached the surface. I set the brick on my stomach and swam back to the side of the pool and got out.

Before I had time to celebrate in my head, the instructor told us to get back in the pool and tread water for two minutes without using our hands. I thought I could do this one. Nope. The four guys (including myself) jumped in and kept our hands above the water. After about thirty seconds I started to sink. I submerged my hands a few times (aka cheated) and the instructor let me get away with it. Then at the one minute mark I couldn't discreetly tread with my hands anymore (though it wasn't discreet to begin with, anyway), and I gave up.

I showered up and changed back into my clothes and expected to wait for only half an hour or so. Nope. I waited for THREE AND A HALF HOURS for the training to be over. It's really fun having three and a half hours of free time at a pool in a high school, especially when the high school is the one from which you graduated. There wasn't even anything for me to explore. And that's how I became a lifeguard.

Thursday, May 31, 2012

Thoughts Of A Samuel: Pokémon And Ethics

For Christmas last year, my brothers each got a Nintendo DSi (apparently the "i" is important because every time I say "DS" they correct me). When I found out that my dad and step mom were getting them the DSis, I remembered a Christmas many years ago when I got a Gameboy color. What game did I get with my Gameboy? Pokémon, of course! So, naturally, I decided I'd get my brothers a Pokémon game as well. Sometimes I regret that decision, because they ask me questions all the time. 90% of conversations they have with me are related to Pokémon. At first I didn't mind. I think it was nostalgia - me remembering how captivating Pokémon was for me when I was their age. Now, though, I sometimes don't want them to talk to me. The other day they had taken the hint that I wasn't in the mood for Pokémon talk, so they discussed it amongst themselves. I don't really remember what they were talking about, but then Sam said something I thought was noteworthy: "Liam, we should release some of our Pokémon that we caught." Liam and I both looked at him questioningly and simultaneously asked, "Why?"

"Well, I mean, the ones that we never use. Since we don't use them, they just stay locked up inside and that doesn't seem very nice. I bet they'd rather be free." He was very concerned for their well-being, and I feel like he was genuinely upset that the fictional creatures were not able to roam about freely.

Really? My nine year old brother just brought ethics into Pokémon? Next he's gonna start talking about how it's wrong to make them fight and make a joke about Michael Vick just trying to be a Pokémon master.

Just kidding - he doesn't know who Michael Vick is.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Twins Game (Kind Of)

Last night, I went to the Twins game with my mom and sister. The three of us had gone a couple of weeks ago on Mother's Day, as well. For that game, we had really great seats along the third base line. Since it was my mom's first time at the new stadium, though, she wanted to get up and explore a bit. During the seventh inning, we got up and walked around and ended up watching the top of the ninth inning from way up in foul territory. My mom really liked being up that high, though, so for the game last night,we got tickets way up in the upper deck along the first base line.

The game started out a little shaky. Actually, before the game started out a little shaky. My sister came home from work early the day before because she was feeling sick, so we weren't sure if she'd even be able to make it to the game. She felt better the day of the game, so we figured it would be okay. However, once we got to the stadium, she started to feel pretty sick again. I think she made it through the first inning before she decided she wouldn't be able to stay for the whole game. She left and walked to a friend's house who drove her home.

Before we even got to the stadium, we got to the parking ramp. We had to take an elevator to the street so we could get to the stadium, obviously. We got into the elevator, along with a bunch of other people, and were waiting for the doors to close when a man came sprinting over. He was comin' in hot and a few people inside the elevator reached out to keep the doors from closing. "There's always room for one more," the late comer said with a smile. That's completely false. In this instance, there was barely room for one more, so he gets a pass, but to say there's always room for one more? Totally not true. A couple seconds after that happened, a rather large couple came into view. Nobody made an attempt to hold the doors because there wasn't any room. Mr. Largeman thought there was, though, and jammed his arm in between the doors to keep them from closing. I thought for sure he'd realize there wasn't room for him and his lady once the doors were completely opened, but he didn't. Mr. and Mrs. Largeman waddled in, putting everyone in an uncomfortably tight squeeze. I did not hear that one guy say there was room for one more at this point.

The game, itself, was pretty bad. Our pitcher couldn't throw strikes, which meant the game went by very slowly. It was cold, too. My mom had said we'd be cold, but I thought I'd be okay with a sweatshirt under my jersey, and was very adamant about it. There's nothing worse than arguing over something with one of your parents and then being completely wrong about it, so I said I wasn't cold at all. I mean, I wasn't freezing, but I was pretty chilly. After the seventh inning, my mom (and secretly me) wanted to move around so we could warm up a little bit. We walked around and ultimately ended up behind the lower level seats near home plate. Here, we watched the rest of the game, which, by the way, ended with a three-run, walk-off homerun by Josh Willingham in the bottom of the ninth. It was incredible.

Saturday, May 26, 2012

Happy New Year!

Five years ago (I think. I don't really know, but I'm just going to say it's five), I went to Hastings, MN to visit my cousins, the Jacksons, over New Year's Eve weekend. Billy's parents, Evangeline and Randy (my cousins) had plans to go out for the evening, leaving the house to Billy, his little brother, Elijah, his little sister, Shayna, and myself. Billy had asked if he could have his friend, Mike, come over, too. His parents agreed, so Mike was also there. Shayna was in the living room watching movies while Billy, Mike, Elijah, and I were in the basement playing Halo for a while until, inevitably, we got bored. "Hey, let's have a snowball fight!" someone suggested. We all agreed that was a good idea, so the four of us put on our shoes and sweatshirts and went outside. We threw snowballs at each other for probably half an hour until we got bored. I mean, you can only throw snowballs for so long until it becomes monotonous. Billy's house was located right next to the highway that goes through Hastings. Naturally, we started lobbing snowballs onto the highway. At first, it was just to see if we could throw across. It was a six lane highway with a pretty wide median, and we were throwing from a few yards away, so, I mean, don't judge. It was a long toss. Someone - I don't remember who - didn't quite make it all the way across the highway and accidentally hit a car. Then the goal changed - let's see who can hit the most cars. We'd unleash a barrage of snowballs whenever a car passed the house. Once, a car pulled over to turn at the intersection that was a few yards away from Billy's house. The four of us panicked, thinking they were going to yell at us or something, so we ran to seek shelter in the Jackson's large van. We all jumped in and closed the blinds in the windows of the van, peeking out periodically to see if the people were looking for us. They weren't, so we all got out of the van. That rush was incentive enough for us to keep throwing snowballs at cars, and we continued for probably an hour and a half, retreating back to the van a few times.

We were getting ready to go back inside, but decided we'd hit just a few more. We hit one, and I saw it turn at the intersection, but didn't say anything since nothing happened the previous times a car had turned there. We had just missed a car and I was watching it drive away. In the distance, though, I saw three dark figures. I thought they were dogs, so I didn't pay them much attention. We missed another car and I watched that one drive away, too. The dark figures were closer than before and I realized they were people that were sneaking towards us. "Hey, what are those people doing?" I asked. No one knew, but we all had a bad feeling. Mike and Elijah went inside, but Billy and I decided to try to hit just one last car. We hit the very next one. To our surprise and horror, the car pulled over immediately. At that time, the people that were sneaking up on us began sprinting toward us. To this day, I have no idea why Billy and I didn't just go into the house, but we didn't. Instead, we ran behind the house and hid behind the shed in the back yard. The people trying to...attack us...? I guess I don't know what they were trying to do, but those people went around the house to try to cut us off. When we weren't behind the house, they got confused, and we ran inside the house, locked the door, and hid in Billy's parents' room because that was the farthest from the door. Then we heard a pound on the door, and Mike, Elijah, and Shayna wanted to know what was going on. Billy and I came out of the room and looked down the hall. There was a very angry looking man peering in through the window on the door. I told Billy he should answer it. "No! You answer it!"

"No way! It's your house - you answer it!" Finally, Billy and I both answered the door, and the man was livid. This was the guy who was driving the last car we hit - the one that pulled over right away. "What the f*** are you kids doing?! Throwing f***ing snowballs at my G****** car?! I could've f***ing died!" Yeah, he was kind of angry.

"Um, would you mind not swearing? My little siblings are right here..." Billy replied.

"Oh, your little siblings, huh? Well a fine f***ing example you're setting for them, huh?"

"Sir, please leave our house." At this point, Shayna's chihuahua, Sheeba, began to bark at the angry man.

"Oh, is this your dog? I'm gonna eat this f***er for dinner. I'm gonna eat your f***ing dog!"

"Please leave."

"No. I'm gonna call the G****** cops. You're gonna be in big f***ing trouble!" Billy then shut the door and  we went into the living room to explain what happened. We said that the crazy guy was going to eat Sheeba. This greatly upset Shayna. Then we said that he was going to call the cops. This greatly upset Mike. He asked Billy what he was going to do. "I know!" he said, and went downstairs. Mike and I followed him. Once in the basement, Billy turned on his Xbox and started playing Halo. This didn't make Mike very happy. "Halo?! You're playing Halo?! The guy's calling the cops, and you're playing Halo. Billy! I'm gonna get in so much trouble if my mom finds out the cops got called!"

"Well, then don't let your mom find out. Easy!" Seeing that he wasn't going to win this battle, Mike went back upstairs. I sat down and started to watch Billy play. Just as Billy was about to win, Mike came storming back downstairs and turned off the Xbox. "Hey! I was just about to win!" Billy said.

"I don't care! The cops are coming and you're going to do something about it!" demanded Mike.

"Fine!"

The three of us went back upstairs, and as soon as we reached the top step, there was another knock on the door. Billy and I went to answer the door, and we saw three cop cars, four cops, the angry/crazy man, and the three people who were chasing us. Three cop cars? I was curious as to what the angry guy had said on the phone. "So, do you boys know why we're here?" one of the cops asked, trying not to smile.

"Um, because we threw snowballs at cars?" I replied.

"Yes," he said, now stifling laughter. It was clear they didn't think it was necessary that they were called about snowballs when I'm sure they were supposed to be on the lookout for drunk drivers. "Now, why were you throwing snowballs at cars?"

"Ummmmm..." Billy and I both responded.

"Thought it was a good idea at the time?"

"Yeah!"

"But it doesn't seem like a good idea now, does it?" Both of the officers at the door started laughing.

"No..." we said, both chuckling. The cop doing most of the talking then asked the crazy guy and the three people who were chasing us to come over to where we all were.

"Now, was your car damaged at all by the snowballs?" the cop asked the angry man.

"Well, no...but it d*** well could've been!"

"So, no damage was done?"

"No! But-"

"Okay. No damage," the cop said, as he motioned to the other two cops in their cars that they could leave. "And you three - was your car damaged?" These three people had been laughing the whole time because of the ridiculousness of the situation.

"Of course not! It was a snowball! We were just gonna give these guys whities and throw snowballs at them. We thought it was funny."

"Uh-huh, so no damage here either. Alright, I'm gonna take down your names and addresses," the cop said, now talking to Billy and me, but he couldn't find a piece of paper. He ripped the corner off of a used piece of paper he had and handed it to us. "Write small because there's not a lot of room." We both wrote our names and addresses and handed the piece of paper back to the cop, who folded it up and put it in his pocket. I feel like he probably threw it away as soon as he could. "Alright, you boys have a nice night, and stay out of trouble," he said, and was on his way.

When Billy and I got back in the house, we explained to everyone what had happened, and we all agreed that it would be best if nobody's parents knew what had happened.

And then I wrote about it and posted it on the internet for everybody's parents to see.

Heh, oopsies.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Perpetual Failure: Minnesota Sports

Thus far, my life as a sports fan has been nothing short of tragic. The only championship from a major pro sports team that I've witnessed was the Twins winning the World Series in 1991. I was three months old. Sure, just last year the Lynx won the WNBA title, but that just doesn't give me the same kind of excitement that I would expect from a championship. The major pro sports, I think, are football, baseball, basketball, and hockey. That means that, in order for me to witness a championship by one of my beloved Minnesota teams, either the Vikings, Twins, Timberwolves, or Wild would have to win one. The Vikings, Twins, and Wild are pretty awful, meaning the Timberwolves have the best shot at a title, though I think the Vikes will be a lot better this year (I'll get to that in a moment). You know Minnesota's sports outlook is pretty bleak when the Timberwolves have the best shot at a title. Their odds aren't good, either. They're not even decent. Sure, we've got Ricky Rubio and Kevin Love, arguably two of the best (if not the best in Kevin Love's case) at their respective positions of point guard and power forward, but outside of those two, we're not very good. Nikola Pekovic showed a lot of promise this year as the team's center, actually, so add him to the Love and Rubio group of "at-least-solid-starters. Derrick Williams showed flashes at times and, given that he was just a rookie, could end up being a very good player. The only problem is that he's more of a power forward than a small forward, and we've got the best power forward in basketball. The team desperately needs a shooting guard that can actually shoot (that seems like it should be easy to find, but apparently it's harder than it seems) and an athletic small forward. If we can get those this off-season, and if Rubio can fully recover from his knee injury, the Wolves will be a contender for a top-four spot in the west next year. Yeah, I said it.

*Sigh*... The Twins. This team is such a mess, I don't even know where to start. Yeah, we've won five of our last seven, which is good (it's actually really good. 1/3 of our wins have come in the last seven games), but frankly, we're a bad team. Without doing any research on this, I believe that Carl Pavano is the only current starter that was in the rotation at the start of the year. That's actually good because, even though all five of them were garbage, he was the best one. Consequently, I believe our starters had the highest ERA among starting rotations in baseball. Now we have three guys I've not heard of and Duensing in the rotation (I think), and I feel a lot more comfortable with that. It's not just the pitching though. Our hitting, though explosive at times, is inconsistent at best. It's unfortunate, too, because when the five guys on the team who can actually hit (Denard Span, Joe Mauer, Josh Willingham, Justin Morneau, and Ryan Doumit) are hitting well, we score a lot of runs. When they're not, though, that means it's up to guys like Alexi Casilla, Jamey Carroll, and Erik Komatsu to get hits. They can't get hits. Mauer and Morneau, though still good-very good, are shells of their former selves. If they were the Mauer and Morneau from five or six years ago, this team would be drastically better.

The definition of heartbreaker when it comes to sports has got to be the Minnesota Vikings. I mean, not last year. Last year they were pitiful. It's not like we've never been good, though. It's not even like we haven't been good recently, because we have. Remember 2009? Yeah, the 12-4, Brett-Favre-led Minnesota Vikings won the NFC North division, and should've at least made the Super Bowl. Yeah, I'm going to complain about that NFC Championship game a bit. First, though, I will reminisce. I remember week 3, Favre's last second, desperation heave to the endzone, miraculously caught by none other than Greg Lewis. I remember sprinting to my dorm room from my Monday night class to watch Favre beat the Packers on Monday Night Football. I remember all the "experts" saying the Cowboys would beat us in the Divisional round of the playoffs, their only reason being that the Cowboys won their Wild Card game. I remember saying, numerous times, "I hope we beat the Cowboys by 30, just so everyone will realize how dumb they are." I remember the Vikings winning 34-3, and the Cowboys complaining that we ran up the score. That game couldn't have been more perfect for me. Then, yes, I remember the NFC Championship game against my new-least-favorite team - the New Orleans Saints. The game in which Saints linebacker, Jonathan Vilma, offered $10,000 to whichever player knocked Favre out of the game. A sense of vindication came over me when the Saints' bounty system was discovered; I, along with many other Vikings fans, knew that the Saints players were playing dirty. Non-Vikings fans called us sore losers. What really bothers me, though, is that the referees just let that happen. They're just as pathetic as the Saints players.

That's not all with the heartbreak of the Vikings, though. Remember 1998? The '98 Vikings are the second best team to never win a Super Bowl, behind only the Patriots team that went 16-0 in the regular season. In '98, the Vikings went 15-1. Our kicker, Gary Andersen, didn't miss a single kick the whole year. That's unheard of! 100% accuracy on field goals for the whole year. Granted, we scored a ton of touchdowns, so Andersen didn't need to kick a lot of field goals. However, in the NFC Championship game that year, he not only kicked field goals, he missed field goals. We ended up losing in overtime, and seven-year-old Joe Russell cried.

Currently, the Vikings are not very good. We do, however, have the best running back in the league (Adrian Peterson) and the best defensive end in the league (Jared Allen). Christian Ponder, now that he has a decent left tackle in Matt Kalil, should improve drastically this year. An awful defensive secondary was improved (though only slightly) with the drafting of safety Harrison Smith and cornerback Josh Robinson. For some reason, no matter how bad the Vikings were the year before, I am always optimistic about the upcoming season at this time during the year. Knowing how horrible we were last year, looking at this year's schedule, I think six or seven wins is realistic. That's still not very good, but it's at least twice as good as last year.

(I know next to nothing about hockey, so I'm just going to assume the Wild will be bad again next year)

The thing about Minnesota sports teams is that we're not always bad, we're just never the best. I feel like if you want emotional balance in your life, you need to be a Minnesota sports fan. That sounds kind of crazy, given that it's pretty depressing here, sports-wise, but hear me out. You have to be optimistic to be a Minnesota sports fan. If you're pessimistic, the frustration, depression, and heart break will be too much, and you'll abandon ship. However, Minnesota sports turns anyone into a pessimist because Murphy's Law (what can go wrong will go wrong) is in full effect for every single sporting event. Actually, I guess it could go either way: you'll either find emotional balance, or you'll become a schizophrenic. Heh, well, good luck with that.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Oh, Canada

Whenever I travel to a different country (which is only like thrice, maybe four times), I try to not live to the stereotypes of being American - lazy, stupid, entitled, etc. I've done a pretty good job of that, I think, except for one time. About six or seven years ago, I went to Edmonton (that's in Canada) with my cousins, the Jackson family. They have a pretty large family, so we traveled in a really big van. I mean really big. We had a generator and a TV in there. My second cousin (that's his relation to me, he's not my second cousin, like the second one to exist or whatever), Billy, and I played Xbox for almost the whole drive.

When we got to Edmonton, we went to the West Edmonton Mall. I'm not sure if there is an East Edmonton Mall, but if there is, there shouldn't be because the West Edmonton Mall is the largest mall in North America. Since most of you aren't Canadian, very few of you have probably ever heard of the WEM (that's what I like to call it) and thought the Mall of America was the biggest mall in North America. Ha. Silly Americans.

The WEM has a hotel in it, and this is the hotel in which we stayed. Billy, his brother, Elijah, their cousin Joshua, and I shared a suite. Billy and I decided we should hook up the Xbox to the TV in our suite. Unfortunately, the audio and video ports on the TV were blocked. No problem - we'll just get the TV from the van, we thought. We went out to the parking lot and found the van. Unbeknownst to us, there had been a recent spree of crime in the area, and more cops were on patrol than normal. Billy was in the van unplugging the TV when a couple of cops pulled up in their car. I'm sure it looked pretty fishy - one teenager in a van and another teenager keeping watch. The cops called me over. "Oh, man. This probably looks a bit sketchy. Oh well - I'll clear things up," I thought. Unfortunately, I hadn't yet mastered the English language. Or problem solving.

"What are you guys doing?" asked one cop.

"Oh, we're just taking the TV out of the van," I responded. As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted saying them. I became flustered, which didn't make the situation any better.

"Uh-huh... I see. Is this your van?"

"No. Well it's not my van, it's his van," I said, motioning to Billy, who was still inside the van. "Well, it's not his van, it's his dad's van." I felt like telling the truth was the most important thing for me to do, regardless of the sketchiness used to tell it.

"Uh... right. Do you have any form of ID on you?"

"Um, I have a debit card...? Does that count?" I was only 14, I think. I didn't have my driver's permit, and I certainly didn't have my driver's license.

"Yeah, sure, let's see that." I handed the cop my debit card. I have no idea what purpose that could've served. I peeked at what they were writing, and it was just my name. "Alright, Joe, have a nice day," the one cop said, and they just drove off.

I poked my head in the van to see how close Billy was to having the TV unplugged from everything. He looked up and asked, "Hey, who were you talking to?"

Saturday, May 12, 2012

The Doctor's Office

The other day I had a doctor appointment. Not a big deal, right? Well, it was my first trip to the doctor's office in five years. Oh, still not a big deal? I'm going to write about it, anyway - deal with it.

One day a few weeks ago, I was shirtless in my house. My step-mom pointed to a birth mark on my back. "What's that?"

"Oh, that's just a birth mark."

"No, it looks like you got smacked or something."

"I know, but it's just a birth mark. I don't know what this is though," I said, pointing to a mole-looking bump on my side.

"You should get that checked out. An irregular mole? Yeah, you should get that checked out."

Fast forward to last week. I still hadn't made a doctor's appointment. This time my dad weighed in, too. He said I should get a physical since I hadn't had one since my sophomore year of high school, which was actually the last time I went to the doctor. He also suggested that I should get my cholesterol checked - he's pretty concerned about cholesterol and blood pressure and stuff since he had his heart attack last year. Incidentally, my doctor appointment was on the one year anniversary of my dad's heart attack. Yeah. So, there's that.

I arrived at the doctor's office and I was a little nervous because I had to talk to the receptionist lady. I had never done that before and I was afraid I may make a mistake in giving information. That's not an irrational fear for me, because I don't know my mom's address, and I don't know my dad's home phone number. Anticipating the phone number question, I opened my phone and went to "Dad Home" in my contacts. When the question was asked, I discretely read the number. Works every time.

I waited for a few minutes in the waiting room, as is customary, before a nurse called my name. She took me back to a room and I filled out a little questionnaire thing. Revealing that I had asthma gave me another questionnaire to fill out. After those were completed, the nurse left and said she'd tell the doctor I was ready.

The doctor came in and asked why I was there. "Why am I here?" I thought. "I feel like you should know why I'm here. I feel like the receptionist with whom I scheduled this appointment would tell you why I'm here. What kind of doctor's office is this? Where did you get your degree?" Instead of saying that, though, I smiled and said "Well, I'm here for a physical and I want to get a mole checked and my dad wants me to get my cholesterol checked, too."

"A physical, eh? Is this for sports, or..."

"No, just because I haven't been to the doctor in a long time."

"Huh. After the sports physical in high school, we usually don't see you until you're in your 40's having trouble breathing."

He wanted to start with the mole, since that would be the quickest. I lifted up my shirt and showed him. He leaned in really close, then took off his glasses. I was under the impression that glasses help people see, but I didn't say anything. He is a doctor, after all. Then he leaned back and said, "Hmmm. Yup, it's a fwibedibedoo..." He didn't actually say "fwibedibedoo," but it was some scientific name that I can't remember. That's all he said, though. So after a few silent seconds I asked, "Umm, what's that mean?"

"Oh, it's just a mass of nerves and scar tissue. You can have it removed if you want, but it won't do any harm to leave it." Huh, well, that's that, I suppose.

Then the physical started. He asked me what sort of health issues ran in my family. What? I have no idea. I'm no family historian. I don't even know if that's a thing. Look, doc, I don't ask my parents, "Hey, do you remember great-grandma? What sort of health problems did she have?" Also, apparently, if it's only happened once in your family, that counts as "running in the family." I answered the question with, "Uhh...I don't know. I mean, my dad had a heart attack last year, but - "

"A heart attack? Well, let's give him credit for that!" and he typed that into his computer. Okay, now, apparently, heart attacks run in my family.

We went through the rest of the physical, and the doctor never actually said I was healthy, but he didn't say I was unhealthy, either, so I guess no news is good news. He then took me to a separate waiting room and said someone would come by shortly and test my cholesterol. Sure enough, a few minutes later, another nurse came and took me back to a room.

As I turned the corner to the room and took in my environment, I thought, "Huh, this looks like a place where blood is drawn..." I'd never had my cholesterol tested before, and for some reason I thought it would be like a blood pressure thing where they just strap something on your arm and voila - done. I'm not afraid of needles or anything, but I do need a minute to mentally prepare. I mean, it's a needle being jabbed into my vein, sucking precious blood from my body. The thought makes me cringe. Unfortunately, I didn't have that minute. It was just, "You can take a seat right here," dab iodine or whatever on my arm, "Look away. 1, 2, 3, poke!" and there was a needle in my vein, snatchin' my blood up. My arm hurt for the next day, which I don't think is normal. I haven't passed out, though, so there's that.

Sunday, May 6, 2012

From Brookings, With Love, Part 2: Electric Boogaloo

When I left Brookings, the clouds were erupting with thunder and lightning. I was excited because I love thunderstorms. Driving in thunderstorms is a bad idea for me - not because driving conditions are poor, but because I love watching thunderstorms, and if I'm watching the thunderstorm I'm not watching the road. Every time lightning illuminated the sky, I took my eyes off of the road to watch.

It didn't start to rain until I was about a half hour out of Brookings. It was incredibly dark, and my headlights were almost no help in brightening the road. I would've switched on my high beams, but, of course, there was a car just far enough ahead of me where they weren't guiding me at all, but close enough where I couldn't use my brights.

By the time I got to Marshall - which is the halfway point between Brookings and home - it was raining hard. Much to my chagrin, I needed to get gas. At the first stop light in town, I merged into the left turn lane. Since my dresser was in the back seat, I couldn't see anything out of my rear-view mirror. As I was taking a sip from my Arnold Palmer (the beverage, not the old golfer after whom the beverage is named), I got rear ended, which not only caused my car to hit the car in front of me, it also caused my Arnie Palmie to fly out of my hand and onto the floor. To give you a sense of my priorities, the order of my subjects of concern went:

1. My Arnold Palmer
2. My iPod
3. My radio (I'm not sure why)
4. All of my stuff I was moving
5. My car
6. My body
7. The other people and their cars

Turns out, everything was fine. My license plate was bent a little bit, but that was the only damage done to any of the three cars. My Arnold Palmer, however, was half spilled on the floor of my car. It's probably a good thing that happened, though (foreshadowing is fun!).

After Marshall, I had the road to myself. That makes a ton of sense, actually, because who would be driving at 10:00pm in a roughly-180-mile-long severe thunderstorm? It was still incredibly dark outside (it's weird that it didn't get brighter as the night got later, right?) so my headlights did nothing. Unfortunately, it was raining so hard that my brights were even worse. Well, they were worse for visibility reasons, but in the entertainment area, they were a lot better - it looked like I had put my car into hyper drive! Very cool, but very unhelpful, also. I decided to keep my brights off.

After Granite Falls, which is the town after Marshall, I had to pee. Like, I really had to pee. I decided that I'd stop at the next gas station. Unfortunately, the next town was an hour away. By the time I made it to Spicer, the next town, I was strongly considering just peeing my pants. To my horror, nothing in Spicer was open. I wasn't really surprised. I mean, there are like six places in Spicer, and it was after 11:00pm. Normally, in a situation like this one, I'd just pull over and pee in a ditch or something. However, the torrential downpour was still in full effect, and was a great deterrent for that plan. After about ten more minutes of driving, my eyes started to tear up, except I was certain that the tears were made out of urine. I was excited for a little bit because I thought if I cried enough, that would empty my bladder. That didn't work. I accepted the fact that I was going to die. Police would come examine my totaled car, and the autopsy would reveal that my bladder had exploded, and if that wasn't enough to kill me, the fact that my lungs filled with urine certainly was. Eventually, I decided getting a little wet was better than getting a little dead, so I pulled over on the side of the road. Any time you pull over to the side of the road to pee, you hope it's gonna go by really quick. Unfortunately, if you get to the point where you have to pull over just to go to the bathroom, it's not gonna be a twenty second pee-session. The fact that I was braving a monsoon made me want this little pit stop to go as quickly as possible. It just so happened that I had pulled over behind a hill. After having the road to myself for over an hour and a half, not one, not two, not three, but four cars drove over the hill. I have a little bit of dignity, so I wasn't about to relieve myself in front of an audience. Unfortunately, more cars kept coming, spacing themselves so perfectly that as soon as I thought I was in the clear, another pair of headlights would appear. Eventually, I didn't care anymore, so I just let 'er go. I'm not crude enough to tell you how long it took, but I will tell you that three more cars drove by me before I was done. Taking solace in the fact that I would never see these people and the fact that I could actually function now that my bladder was empty, I hopped in my car and drove the last half hour to my home in Cold Spring.

I got home at midnight, and the first thing I did was turn on House Hunters on Home & Gardening TV. Yup. After not having cable for the whole school year, the first thing I turn on when I get home is House Hunters. Don't judge me.

From Brookings, With Love

On Thursday of this past week, I finished my final exams for the last semester of my junior* year. I was pretty excited, but instantly faced with a daunting task. My dad wasn't driving out to Brookings with the van or truck to get my stuff and there was no way all of the stuff would fit into my car. Consequently, I rented a storage unit. The daunting task, then, was that I had to move all of my stuff, mostly by myself. My plan was to move it all on Friday and, depending on when that got done, go home either Friday evening or Saturday morning. Unfortunately, it rained all day Friday, so I couldn't move anything. The new plan was the same as the old one, but moved up one day. I woke up Saturday morning and noticed it was raining again. Early in the afternoon, it stopped, and I began moving some things to my storage unit. I had a few things with which I needed help, though, like my desk, my fridge, and my bed. "The desk and fridge will fit in my car," I said, audibly, to myself, because no one else was home. "I need Krsnak's Suburban for my bed, though." Mike Krsnak was one of my roommates. I waited until 6:00 for Krs to get home from work. We loaded my bed into his Suburban and then carried my desk out to my car. "Are you sure this'll fit in your car?" he asked.

"Oh, yeah - it'll fit." I was pretty confident because I had measured my back seat and the desk, and it worked out. Unfortunately, I'm no architect. I tried my best to force that desk into my back seat, but the desk was having none of that. We left the desk out, grabbed my fridge and packed it in my back seat, and drove over to the storage unit. While unloading my bed and fridge, I noticed that the sky began to look ominous again. I got a little nervous because I remembered we left my desk outside. We got back to the house, loaded the desk into Krsnak's Suburban, and drove back to the unit without a single drop of rain falling.

When I got back to the house, it was time to pack up all of my belongings that I was taking home with me. For some reason, my dad wanted me to bring my dresser home instead of just bringing all of my clothes home. I had kept all of my clothes in a giant duffel bag last year, and that worked out just fine. I took out all of the drawers and carried the dresser out to my car. I had measured my dresser, too, and decided it would fit into my back seat. Like the desk, though, the dresser had other plans, and they did not involve the back seat of my car in any way. A bit distraught, I thought I'd try to fit the dresser in the trunk of my car. No dice, but I thought I could close the trunk enough where a bungee cord would do the job. At that moment, my other roommate, Ryan Ackman, drove up and looked skeptically at the dresser in my trunk. I told him it wouldn't fit in the back seat, but he didn't accept that. He eventually got the dresser into the back seat, and as soon as he did, the thunder and lightning started. I spent the next twenty minutes sprinting in and out of my house, trying to move the rest of my stuff into my car and have a farewell conversation with Ackman simultaneously before it started to rain. I'm still impressed with myself that I managed to fit everything into my car. Before I left, Krsnak said that we were in a tornado warning. "Ha, maybe you are, but I'm leaving. No tornadoes or thunderstorms for me," I thought.

*Though this year was my third at college, I'm hesitant to call it my "junior" year, because I'm not graduating after next year. As far as graduation is concerned, this year was my freshman year.

Friday, April 27, 2012

Internet Weather

First of all, I just want to say that by "Internet Weather," I mean checking the weather via the internet. I don't mean the weather conditions of the internet - that'd be ridiculous. Mostly because there is no such thing. If there was such a thing as internet weather, though, nobody would have to check it because the forecast would probably be the same everyday - mostly sketchy with a high chance of identity theft.

When I wake up on the mornings of days in which I have class, I go through the same routine, which starts out with waking up and opening my laptop. I open up three tabs: Facebook, Twitter, and a Google tab. Facebook is my home page, that's why I open that one. Then I figure, "Well, I already have Facebook open...might as well check out what's happening on Twitter," (I felt like I had to justify opening those two tabs right away). In the Google tab I search "weather brookings sd," so I can dress accordingly. There is a slight problem with this strategy, though, and that is that the internet weather is almost always wrong. It's right just often enough where I go by what it says, just in case. Most mornings it'll say it's about 45° with a high of around 57° or something. "Huh, that's pretty chilly. I should wear a sweatshirt. Even when it gets to 57°, I won't be too hot." I pick out my daily attire, shower, brush my teeth, get dressed, and head out the door. As soon as I step outside I think, "Wow, 45° is a lot warmer than I remember." After walking two blocks, I quickly realize that it is not 45° like the internet said - it's probably a lot closer to 65°.

There are some days, though, when I don't believe the internet weather at all. There are some days in which the internet says it is 38° and rainy. "Rainy, huh? How rainy is it?" I think. Then I open my curtains to see that it's actually quite sunny with very few clouds. "Well, you're 0 for 1 so far, internet," I sometimes-audibly state. Then I decide it's probably 60° and not 38°. These days fluster me a little bit because, then, I have to decide for myself what I will wear. It's a real gamble.

Just last week, I came up with a fantastic new strategy for weather checking. Now, after I wake up, I step outside. You know, where the weather is. Amazingly, this strategy works a lot more effectively. Go figure, eh?