[some title thing here]

well, today I was driving from somewhere to somewhere (I forget the specifics) and I looked at my speedometer and lo and behold (gosh, I always wanted to say that) It said I was going 35 on this 25 road from somewhere to somewhere else. And we're talking mph's here, not kmph's. so, naturally, I slowed down to somewhere around 29ish, and then tried to go slower, but I realized that anywhere under 29 drives me somewhere near insane. So why would lower speeds bother me so much?

well, there's several possible reasons for this feeling, maybe I needed to be somewhere, maybe I was running from the police, maybe I was trying to catch up with an old assassination trainer ahead of me, or maybe it was just instinct left over from my former life as a cheetah. At the time, though, none of these seemed to apply. (except for maybe that last one, hoo boy.) soooo... why can't I go slow? the more realistic reasons I can see are that my gas pedal is oversensitive, long straight roads give me no good reason to slow down, and G forces from acceleration feel awfully nice.

well, none of these reasons really seem to quite cover the problem, so I can only conclude that my former life as a cheetah hasn't quite worn off.

by the way, the police won't pull me over unless I'm going like 15 over, so don't bother calling them.

RHSMUN

This weekend I went to rhsmun, also known as regional high school model united nations, but that's a long name. anyway, it was pretty fun, I mean, when isn't it fun to go and stay in a hotel with your friends for 3 days? the bad part was the actual mun, which usually I like, but this time, it was boring, dumb, and otherwise not cool.

first, it was boring because my committee was really small, there were only like 20 people in the room, and somehow, almost all of them were uptight nerds. especially the guy representing the U.S. you know, fat, short creepy little guy with glasses and a high voice, and took himself way too seriously. well, he was the worst, but most of the other people were bad too. There were a bunch of different ways that they were annoying, the most blatant of them being: first, that they were all too serious, like, as zac put it, they thought they were in the real un or something. Second, that they kept getting off the topic, and not even trying to solve the problems we were supposed to. like during the first topic, which was children in armed conflict, they talked the whole time about how we should educate the children, and then kept going off on tangents about how we should have celebrities come and talk to them! I mean, we're supposed to get them OUT of armed conflict. what are they going to do? "hey, you kids stop killing each other for a minute and come listen to this celebrity!"

Well, it was dumb because not only the delegates (all the kids from the schools) were annoying and dumb, but the chair was a nazi! she wouldn't let us go in the hall during unmoderated caucuses, didn't understand how anything worked, and whenever a caucus was over, she would try to beat the life out of her table with the gavel until eveyone was quiet, and then she'd do it again. After we had finished both topics, she wouldn't let us go, and then took half an hour talking about how laid back she was, and how she didn't bang the gavel hard at all because it was hers and she was afraid of breaking it. yeah right.

well, in addition to this, they took all the good restaurants out of the mall that we ate at most of the time, and joon woo had to leave early. so it doesn't sound like I completely hated the whole thing though, it was pretty fun aside from all that. zac brought his gamecube and we stole some of doug's games to play, and we went to the new mac store (that's right joon) that they just opened in salt lake. that was cool. and I'm done with this post.

all I want for christmas adds up to nothing

so lately my mom's been bugging me to give her a christmas list, but I can't think of anything I really want, well, I can, but it's all either too expensive, or so cheap that I could just go buy it myself. nothing in that great hundred dollarish range. this is really weird. a few years ago my unhesitating, and probaby before-she-even-asked reply would be legos. I didn't even have to think about it. just legos. well, as long as they weren't that boring city kind, nobody likes those. How did I come to this point that I actually have to think about what I want?

One reason for this dilemma is that the pressures of society compel us to move on from playing with toys like legos. These things are denounced as childish and to be put aside after reaching the age of 12, along with pacifiers and wanting those cool little cars that you could actually drive, but could never afford. In addition to this, most toys have ceased to retain their powers of entertainment for teenagers. They just aren't as fun anymore, (maybe) and even if they were, you just don't have as much time to play with them when you're in high school.

So after moving on from toys, mainly I wanted electronics, first palm pilots, because my parents will never let me get a game boy (I'll show them when I'm in college,) Then mp3 players. Well, now I have a pocket pc a digital camera, and an iPod. other than cars and laptops (too expensive) and things like ipod cases (too cheap) what am I supposed to ask for?

well, eventually I ended up asking for either a guitar, which I hardly even play, or iPod speakers, which are slightly more practical, but not much. Really though, I just want legos.

How I Owned Doug at Golf.

So me and Doug and Eric were playing golf a while ago, I think it was on halloween, but I can't remember those kinds of details. Anyway, this was my first time playing golf, I had a very vague understanding of the rules, and I completely owned both of them. and I got a hole it one.☺ well, how did this happen? partially beginner's luck, partially because I might be better at golf then I thoght I was, but mostly because this was all on a gamecube.

So the actual question I'm addressing here is not "how did I completely own doug at golf" but, why do we sit on the couch in a state of partial coma and play these kinds of things on a gamecube instead of actually doing it? well for some games, like halo and timesplitters, the answer is pretty obvious, A: we don't actually have all those guns and courses to shoot at each other, and B: because dying in real life probably isn't quite as fun as on a gamecube. But golf? All you have to do is get some clubs and drive over to a golf course, I mean, there's at least three around here that I know of. For me, mostly it's because I'm not rich enough to play classy sports like that, but eric and doug both have enough money to do whatever they want! well, actually the point is moot if I talk about them, because they have actually played golf before. So other than money, why would I rather play a sport on nintendo than in real life?

first, because on the nintendo, you're a lot better at whatever sport it is. for instance: where in the actual game, I would probably be lucky and happy to get a hole in 10 shots, on the nintendo, I can get a hole in one, and get mad if I shoot par. weird how that works.

second, I'm lazy. getting up and getting clubs and driving to a golf course is a lot of work! I mean, It's hardly worth it if you have to do all that stuff first! why do that when you could stay where you are, play the same game, and do a lot better at it? don't ask me.

well, I think that pretty much sums it up, while neither of those are really good reasons, they sound that way when you're sitting on a couch in a state of partial coma.

procrastinationalizing

Why do I always put things off? well, to answer this bluntly: because I don't want to do it right now, here, in this moment. well, that would answer it simply, except that I already know perfectly well that I won't want to do it later, because that will be the new now, and applying rule one, I don't want to do it right now. and yet I still put it off because of rule one again. I don't want to do it right now. well, I'm just really confusing myself, so I'm going to move on from this part.

For an example, last night I thought about doing some of my homework so that I wouldn't have so much to do today. seems simple enough. but then I thought, "well, I don't want to do it 'right now', but I'm sure my future-tomorrow self will be happy to do all of it for me." Of course I realized that this was completely stupid, and that if my future-tomorrow self was there to hear me say something like that, he would likely kill or maim me. well then I put it off anyway, and probably thought something along the lines of, "if only my past-yesterday self had done this, then I wouldn't have had this problem right now. This is all his fault, the jerk." but of course, that past-yesterday self didn't want to do it "right now" either, so he laid the load on me, and probably blamed it on the past-day-before-yesterday self, who was the first one to know about it. well, the only real solution to this problem is to get me, my past-yesterday self, and my future-tomorrow self, and everybody in between, take them back in time, and beat up that first guy until he does it for us. the jerk. unfortunately, that's not possible.

Well, that's pretty much the train of thought that piled all of this work on me. (which is now the future-tomorrow guy, who was probably the only one who shouldn't have had to do it, but I'll stay out of all that) aaaaand... I'll finish this later.

Term Two Premiere!

I think all my blogs actually have to be analytical this term. (<-concrete detail) hm. hmhmhm.... this ain't cool. (<-Analysis)

Technically that would work mr. rich, but I'll try to abide by the spirit of the law and actually write something longer than a sentence and two fragments.

er, if I could think of something to write, hold on a minute.


Since time began, males have all wanted the same thing. This is a natural instinct that we are born with, and it continues to drive all of our actions throughout life. Whenever a male has a major decision to make in life, this ultimate goal guides him as he asks himself this question to determine what direction to take: "What choice will bring me closer to achieving that greater enlightened state of owning an actual lightsaber?"

No seriously, maybe it's not a guiding force in everybody's life (we're allowing for the type of people who camp out at theaters that aren't even showing the movie, here), but can any male person honestly say they've never dreamed of having a lightsaber? I certainly can't.

Ultimately, I think this desire for a lightsaber comes from several sources. First, the male's love of technology, whether he knows what it does or not, combined with the elegant grace of a sword (a.k.a. "something that you can break stuff with") makes the possession of the jedi's weapon of choice irresistible to us. Second, they're dang cool! and that's my analysis, because that pretty much sums it up.

It's a Picture

well, I took this picture in color, and then went and edited it into black and while and added the sun there, which actually makes it look a lot better. I find it kinda odd to go and change nature so that it looks better on a computer. "hm, that's pretty good, but the sun should be in the center." The power given to us by technology seems endless, unto the placement of the sun in the sky. Ah, it makes me feel omnipotent.

Don't kill me Mr. Rich

DISCLAIMER: The Author cannot be held responsible for the opinions contained within this entry, but merely the general existence thereof, thus, hypothetically, were it to be given point based grade, the author's views would be considered no grounds for bias against, and subsequent lowering of, the aforementioned hypothetical grade.

So I have this class, we'll call it english, and for this class, we are constantly analyzing literary works in order to find the deeper meanings therein. This is perfectly fine, to a point. Many works do contain a deeper meaning, cleverly designed to get a message across to the reader, however, many and all are two very different things. Many would seem to connotate a large number, or portion of a whole, generally, somewhere beteen 50 and 99 percent. All, though, has no connotation as such, but an exact definition, meaning, all of them, the entirety of a whole, 100 percent, precisely. I point this out to say that sometimes a literary work just might mean (gasp) exactly what it says.

Why do we feel this need to analyze things? The same reason I'm doing it right now, because the need is imposed upon us by english teachers, who were imposed upon to impose upon us this need, etcetera, etcetera, all the way back to when literature was first appraised as analyzable, and who knows who's idea that was. This is not always true, some people really like analyzing things, I mean, I don't mind when it's only in my head, but why take it outside of that boundary? Do we really need to write down all of our thoughts about other people's thoughts? it just doesn't seem quite right does it?

Well, I decided that the reasons all boil down to analysis being ultimately for the betterment of our thinking society. When one person expresses their thoughts about someone else's thoughts, then another person can read those thoughts, and express their own thoughts about the first persons thoughts about someone elses thoughts, and so on and so forth, until, eventually, we get down to the true meaning of a poes, which, of course, the author never intended in the first place.

The people- "Well, we've finally figured out what your poem was about."
Author- "oh?"
The people- "yes. it's about the inner struggle between human nature and the will to do that which they believe is right, when confronted with pressures and temptations, and other large mammals"
Author- "um, actually it was about the small bits of broccoli that were in my butter while I was trying to butter my toast that morning, you know, like the poem said"
The people- "no, you're wrong, that's what you said, but it was too simple to be what you meant."
Author- "hm, I hadn't thought of that"

the demon which lives within my ipod

I have a dillema. For the last few weeks, my ipod has been blatantly disobeying my every command, request, plea, and even flat out humble appeal. Primarily, I've been trying again and again to put three death cab for cutie songs which I bought on real player back onto my ipod, not even ONTO my ipod, but back on. I mean, they worked perfectly before!

There was also another song which wasn't working, same format, same program, everything I can conceive about it is the same, but then, as I had my ipod on shuffle it just popped up and started working! "Hm," I thought, "Maybe my DCFC songs are working too!" nope. sure, they show up on the ipod, but as soon as you try to play them, it comes up on the screen, pauses for about two seconds, probably for dramatic irony, and then moves on, while laughing hysterically in it's little computerized head, to the next, and lesser, song. and added to all this, somebody went and changed my computer account so that I'm no longer an administrator, meaning, basically, I can't do anything about any of this.

Well, I tried every conceivable technical way of fixing the problem, and failing in all of them, I determined that my iPod has a grudge against me. Why? because I betrayed her. I lured the poor thing into a false sense of security, bringing her everywhere with me, only listening to her. Then, just when she thought she was the most important digital music player in my life, I went behind her gleaming silver back, and bought a new, slimmer, smaller, younger iPod. Now some iPods would take this in step and try to be the best they could be in order to keep their position, I just had to get one that feels nothing like this, but instead vows utmost revenge.

This cannot be the only explanation of my problems however, because there are other factors which cannot be attributed to my ipod's jealousy. Not only will my songs not go onto my ipod, but they happen to be some of my favorite songs, and apparently my friends favorite songs as well, but only since they stopped working. Every time somebody else is using my ipod with me, or by themselves, this is about what goes on:
Austin (while doing geology homework)- Hey, do you have soul meets body on there?
me- ...no.
Zac (while listening to my ipod himself)- Dang it! why won't it work?
me- lemme guess, you tried to play soul meets body.
Zac- yeah, how did you know?
me- (silence)
rachel (while going to get pizza in my car)- hey, do you have soul meets body on there?
me- I DON'T HAVE SOUL MEETS BODY, DANG IT!!! IT'S NOT MY FAULT!!! THERE'S 500 OTHER SONGS ON THERE AND ALL YOU PEOPLE CAN ASK ABOUT IS THAT ONE?!?!? WHY?!? WHY WHY WHY?!??!?

anyway, that last one is kinda dramatized, the response was really more of a "look, I spent at least an hour yesterday trying to put that one song on my ipod, and the only success I had is that is says the title and then laughs at me while it switches to a different and lesser song."

So my reason for the last plague? there's only one explanation, divine intervention. I am being punished for my unfaithfulness to the ipod that I had. It was loyal and true to me, and for no reason other than physical imperfection, I betrayed it and bought a new one. how could I be so unfeeling?
Stupid iPod.

"Soul Meets Body (Radio Edit)" - Death Cab for Cutie

"Soul Meets Body (Radio Edit)" - Death Cab for Cutie: "1. Soul Meets Body (Radio Edit) - Death Cab for Cutie"

man, what a sweet song. but I don't think that worked like it was supposed to, just like every other real player thing I've ever tried. grrrr...

Then it seems we are at an impass!

hm. So I'm sitting here wondering what to write about, yet again. this seems to be a constant plague for me. maybe I'll get over it if I sit here long enough................................................................
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Okay, I got over it just now when I was showing my little brother how I made this blog. (for some reason he seemed to think it was pretty special, don't ask me why.) So I was making another one, just to show him that I'm not really as good at nerdy internety stuff as he thought, and then I saw something really stupidcool, which is a term I just made up, meaning "both stupid and cool" (all rights reserved)

I was looking at the settings for the blog, and noticed something called adsense, apparently, you can sign up for it, and it will put ads on your blog! isn't that great?!? well I didn't think so either, but apparently, you actually get PAID for having ads on your blog. Pathetic. I mean, who's going to be so stupid that they'll go and sign up for something that, if anything, will earn you like a tenth of a cent per click? So obviously I signed up for it right away.

It says you get payed for how many times the ad is clicked on, and how many times it shows up on your blog. Naturally, nobody is going to visit my blog and click on ads enough for me to make any money, but hey, if I ever have time, I can always do it myself! man, I feel either dishonest or stupid.

Anyway, guys, if any of you ever feel like clicking on ads over and over again, my blog is open 24/7 remember, no shirts, no shoes, no pants, no service!

Until I know what's going on

From reading the title you would think that this would be a deep essay analyzing my most profound thoughts and feelings. Well it's not. You would have to be a pretty shallow person to find anything on this entire blog in the slightest bit insightful. Sorry to dissappoint you. That title is made up of completely random words that flew through my head as I stared at the wall. Sounds like a good name for a song or something though, doesn't it?

Anyway, has anybody else noticed that you can think of anything you want to, whenever you want to? Until you're actually told to do so. Typically, my mind is full of unanalyzed thoughts zipping around screaming profanities as they collide with each other. This is usually the case, honestly. Until, that is, I'm asked to write an analytical essay. Right then, my thoughts stop, lean on their cars, and stare at the sky. The blank, empty, silent sky of my head. The sky that's about as void of potentially analytical thoughts as the real sky is of hundred dollar bills. And that's where I'm at right now. Completely. Blank. So I start to wonder, Does this paragraph count as being analytical? Probably not. Should I get on with my life and go do my other homework? probably.

Lose Yourself in the Seeking of the Location?

"Hub."
"Hub? is that a city? Hub, utah?"
"Um, I don't think so, but that's what the sign says."

That's about how descriptive utah street signs are, if they say anything at all. We were out looking for a friend's house which, inconveniently, seems to be located in Lindon, I mean, what's wrong with Orem? Hub, by the way, seems to be some sort of code word for American Fork. We left at about 7:10 PM and the preceding conversation took place at about 8:30.

How did we manage to take more than and hour and twenty minutes to get to somewhere about ten minutes away? well, after thinking about it, it can only be concluded that it started with an overconfidence in the internet. mapquest to be more exact. After calling the aforementioned friend whose house it was, we decided to just check mapquest for how to get there, this was because of a previous statement the friend had made regarding the uselessness of having his address alone. it probably would have been simpler to have just paid enough attention to our surroundings to know where lindon was beforehand, but sadly, neither of us did. So mapquest was the perfect solution, just follow the directions and you can't go wrong can you? well, yes, you can.

Well, all roads don't actually lead to rome, as the adage says. Most of them actually lead to other roads, and some of them break certain laws of physics in jumping from 200 East to 1500 East AND alternating cities in far less than the implied distance. Such were the roads on which we travelled, a single road could travel hundreds of yards and switch from pleasant grove, to lindon, to orem, and then to pleasant grove again, with occasional stops in AF (a.k.a. hub), in about 35 seconds. After travelling on such roads for maybe an hour, my first rebellious thought came:

"Austin, why are we on 800 North when the address clearly says 80 South?"
"Ummm... well... mapquest said..."
"Screw mapquest, we're 8 blocks farther north than we're supposed to be, and and I don't watch star trek enough to understand this road at all."

Well, we went to 80 south, and after avoiding some more laws-of-physics-breaking roads, we finally found the house at about 9:10, mostly by luck, about 2 hours after we left. Interestingly, when I was going home (which did take about 10 minutes, by the way) I looked at my gas, and it said my tank was completely full. I'm afraid I'll never understand that one.

So How did all this happen? Some blame has to go to mapquest for telling us the wrong freeway exit, the wrong street, and for trying to make us find non-existent streets in "Lindon", then the rest of the blame must go to me, for not thinking of looking at the actual address until after about an hour and forty-five minutes of choosing the roads less traveled, and not knowing where lindon was in the first place. So it can only be concluded that I'm an idiot.

isn't that great?!?

So I don't know exactly what to write about, but I do know that I officially hate this font so it'll change pretty soon... here... well, that was prompt. Um, anyway.

Okay, so my brother says I should write about just how dumb primary piano books are, and, not being able to think of anything better, I guess that's what I'll write about.

So just opening up to a random song in "Bastien Piano Basics: Performance Level 1" I come across a piece called "Robots Marching". Okay, so first, it has this faded, unnatractive picture of of seemingly happy, fake looking, robot... things. we'll call 'em clown-bots, because they look more like clowns, than bots, er, robots. I mean, that right there makes me want to turn to a different page immediately, and maybe throw up if I have time. So this is what cutting edge robotic technology will become? a bunch of baby blue and pink clown looking things with big smiles pasted on their heads and hollow eyes? If so, I'm off to Amish-ville. But for the sake of the blog, I won't be swayed by just the picture, so on I trudge.

After the awful first impression, we go on to the second, I mean, don't judge a book by it's cover and all. This is where we get to the music. I mean, the robots were bad, so what? a song about robots has got to be pretty good right? no. Anybody who can listen to this music and envision marching robots, even the cheesy clowny ones, has got to be issues. or have issues, whatever. At best, I listen to this music, close my eyes, and see a bunch of washed out 17th century aristocrats at a boring party. You would expect a moving piece with minor undertones suggesting the imminent destruction of mankind by the means of their mechanical creations gone wrong, sorry, you're a beginner, you won't get to play stuff like that until you're twenty five and still living with your mom. The music is lighthearted and mostly made up of pieces of scales and the same chord over and over again in the bass. You can just imagine the poor robots dying of boredom. It doesn't even have a marching tempo. But then, the piece was beyond saving to begin with.

So this is what piano playing society is based on. Lies. Lies and a completely altered and boringed up image of our future in technology. And parents wonder why their kids don't like practicing piano. I hereby blame all my and everyone elses dislike of practicing on this book. right here. with an initial introduction like that, It's no wonder I've been biased against the instrument since I was seven!

the dawning of the fourth age

just checking to see if this is working, I just started this blog.... um.... testing, 123.