Nine Betweens.

1. I have been summoned for jury duty. Number four.

2. I am in the market for a second non-starbucksy job. One interview, and a few harrassing calls later, we'll see this through yet.

3. I have been sick for the past two weeks. Dizzy, nausea, and a bit of headaches...an no it's not due to the fact that I am on minimal caffeine. By the way I'm on minimal caffeine which means...er...whenever I can manage none. So far so good, I worked a double with barely a milligram of caffeine in me. I think I was snappy.

4. My voice sounds like a smoker who throws flames on the side after he's done recording stock screaming clips for the house of horrors.

5. I passed both of my classes! I didn't make the dean's list...Darnnabdigity.

6. Akward turtle moment! @___@

7. I had my first french style macaron. It was hard and I felt like it stuck to the back of my throat and I am questioning how they managed to sell them for 35.00 dollars a pound. (mine was free, although I want my money back) It was from West point Market, a gourmet market usually known for great pastries. I'll reserve my judgements until I get to go to pistachio on thursday in columbus.

8. I have a vacation this weekend!

9. My job is only going to schedule me nights all through jury duty.

The Finals.

Ah.



Yes.



Finals.



As many times as I will distract myself with thousands and thousands of recipes in my house that I want to make. I will commit.



Homework.



Three days.



...then I will tackle you my frondly friend named frodo the fennel.



Oh, anyone with fennel recipes? I'm clueless.

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Someday I'll get it.

Did you ever have that feeling that you're fly is down? Egg in your face? Toilet paper on your foot...even when absolutely nothing was wrong.

It's quite irritating.

It also accurately describes my ability to interact socially. Imagine this feeling every time you talk. You start off thinking you know what you know, but in the end you are just so unsure of why you said what you said in the first place that you don't even want to finish. All the while people are too nice to tell you that there is an enormous snot slug hanging from your left nostril. Ah, that and they forgot to pay attention to a word you were saying.

Maybe I'm just a little slow, but someday somewhere somehow, I will learn to shut my trap.

I'm ready, I am! --- Part Two

Recently I spent sometime in the project, and honestly I couldn't think of anything better than a camera and a few eclectic residents to get you thinking. Like this one girl, I didn't get her name but as soon as my and my friend pulled our camera's out she hollered out the window. She wanted us to take her picture!

It was rare.

Usually if I pull out a camera I get a select few reactions.

A - No pictures! No pictures! *smothers*
B - PEDOPHILIA! *insert screaming mother*
C - *insert a long string of profanity and a swinging bat...true story*

Yet here's this girl, just looking her best. Fixing her hair, strutting her stuff. No real bad intentions, she just wanted someone to capture her big smile. What does it take to get people to be that open, though?

Thinking about it, this openness is really lacking in our world. You think you're open until you realize you aren't. Hell, I thought I was open to a couple things. Honestly though...somethings in life you think you were always ready for; some things you have to prepare yourself for; and some things...no amount of preparation would ever help.

I am talking solely about the latter at this point, and last friday I had my first real date...and quite possibly my last ever. This is all strictly off the record by the way.


The set up: not only classic, it was downright surreal. It all started with a simple seat arrangement. I had been asked to move tables to give room to someone with a larger project and a need for space. Moving to the only available space sat me next to her. Now she was essentially an interest to start with, conveniantly placed in my class we would flirt occasionally, but it was all just harmless, witless banter.

Cue the catalyst: unnamed to protect his identity, this large jolly fellow has a solid grip on his surroundings.

Oh Noes!"

an exaggeration has been made with this dialogue for dramatic effect. In reality the catalyst is a real mumbler.

"What's wrong, man!" I respond.

"I have two tickets to see this magnificently wonderful show known as RENT (all rights reserved), but alas I cannot attend. What dismay has this world brought unto me?"

"Good Golly Grief man! Pull yourself together!"

"But...way off off broadway calls!"

"I have a solution!"

Enter the girl.

"I'll take them!" she says suavely, swooping in quick successive seconds to snatch the singing show's stubs.

*GASP*ed. Our gentlemanly ways were shocked by her forwardness.

"But I must attend in this kind fellow's honor!"

"Well...she might have plans" suggests the jolly man catalyst.

"I do...Do ya wanna?" She offers.

"I wanna".

There may have been some exaggerations with the sequencing, but it ended accurately. Honestly I had no idea what I was doing, this is something that has been constant with me in my life. I do not date. Why do I not date? I am asked that same exact question, every single day of my life. At least once, and I am really not exaggerating. I haven't quite figured out a solid answer to it, despite it being a constant topic.

So one little date won't hurt right?

Just one?

I told myself something along these lines over and over, but really the shear akwardness of the whole thing still makes my ears ring. I guess I was just infatuated with the idea of going on a date, and less so with my actual date. Not to downplay her beauty, she is quite the looker if I do say so myself.

It started off bad. Her "mom was in town and she didn't know if she could make it, she promised her mom she would meet her for lunch" which turned into "dinner", so there goes all of that small talk. Then she doesn't think she can make it, so I have to drive from work to pick up my ticket for a musical. We wouldn't want these tickets to go to waste right? So by the time I get home I reek of coffee and sweat and want to just...give up. But despite my tardiness I still try to make it. So now I look bad, because she decides to call and tell me she's gonna wait by the door for me. Forget the fact I am twenty minutes away and haven't even thought of parking.

Eight minutes left, I leave my ticket at my car in a parking area that's way off the path. Dashing back we make in the door to say the least. Our seat isn't on the first set so maybe it's up?

Not the second flight?

What about the last one...no really there's an elevator up to there?

Yeah, we went to see Rent. A musical that really is not to my tastes. It was showy and loud and we had quite possibly the worst seats in the house. Seats that I drove an extra hour and ran clear out of breath for. We hit intermission and there is no small talk, nothing. We have the lasting chemistry of water and oil. That's right, I ran to the bathroom because I felt like I had food poisoning and she ran to smoke as many cigarettes as humanly possible before they dragged her back in.

I didn't even know what to do afterwards, dinner, food, drinks? I'm not suave, I'm debonair, and most certainly am having intestinal malfunctions. So we just kind of part ways...

Yeah.

Somethings you really aren't ready for, dating for me is one of them. It's not just because I had a bad date. It's because when I do date, I want something to be there. I want to be able to understand the whole biblical side of it all. I want to not pursue something for entertainment purposes, but really put myself out there. Last thing I want to do is play with their heart. Right now, that's all me dating would be for me. God made women to have beautiful delicate hearts, I feel I should respect that for now.

I'm out.

Food blogdom is over for now, I'm going to still occasionally post recipes on my normal blog from now on, but for now a food blog is not the thing to focus on.


check me out at

theoverworkedbarista.blogspot.com

"I'm ready...I am!" - Part One

Yeah.

It's true.

I'm coming to Vancouver in September. I will be attending the Drive DTS. I will have a majority of my former classmates as staff members. On top of it all I have authority issues.

Hot Dang, what the hell am I doing? Holy freaking crap!

*INSERT LOUD EXPLETIVE HERE*

Holy hell, I'm doing it this time.

Must. Resist. Urge.

...To think too far ahead.

*twitches*

Found in the Footnotes

Have you ever really looked at the footnotes, voluntarily? In high school we dreaded footnotes our senior year because our evil term paper required it. The eleven years prior to that point, we were only asked to type up a simple (yet in reality entirely inaccurate) bibliography. So why now? Why must we bludge through the painstaking process of numbers and real sourcing!? Screw accuracy, score quotes, all sources are mine! Riot I tell you, RIOT!

Oh, how the times have changed.

Now...I kind of like reading the footnotes. They are like a long running commentary to help me really understand what I am reading, plus they usually lead me to something equally interesting to read. So I encourage you to read your footnotes! Mark it on your daily list, along with brushing your teeth, plotting world denomination, and fighting for a better pay! It will fit right in I tell you. So I present to you a first for this blog, a series---"Found in the Footnotes"

Taken From Sex God By Rob Bell "God Wears Lipstick" note 13.

"Recently I saw my friend Josh, who teaches fifth and sixth graders. He was preparing the lesson for that day and had his supplies with him: a large glass bowl, a can of beef, fatty tissue, sauerkraut, a jar of olives, some anchovies, and a hundred-dollar bill. I know---I was curious too. So I did exactly what you would have done. I asked him what his lesson was about. He replied, "I put all the ingredients in a bowl, including the money, and then I mix it together. then when it doesn't taste good, I pretend I'm going to throw it all away. At this point the kids go crazy, telling me not to. I ask them why I shouldn't, and they say, 'Because it's valuable.' And then I counter with, 'But it smells and it's disgusting.' At which point they rush to the front volunteering to reach into the bowl and pull out the hundred-dollar bill. Actually, I may have to start using a twenty for this lesson, because the last time I used a hundred, they trampled each other to get to the front. I then read to them from Genesis chapter one about how every single human being bears the image of God and how no matter what else is mixed in there, a person still has limitless worth in God's eyes."

Some days, I need little stories like this as a real reminder of what I should be doing in my daily interactions. Customer after Customer comes in daily, and all I seem to be able to do is judge them more and more each day. I had to actually walk into the back room the other day because I wanted to slap myself for what my mind was doing. I kept judging this frighteningly shrill and creaky woman who comes in every day and is just impossible. She is an older woman of an indiscernible age with small wisps of peroxide blond hair poking out in random places. Normally she is disheveled in an almost non functional way causing me to wonder what she actually does with the rest of her day, and her voice cracks and creaks like an old door scraping a rough floor. Regularly in at an early hour, every day she orders a coffee in a cup the size up, today I got it ready for her as she was walking to the counter. Smaller mistakes have been made, but the reaction wasn't a good signal to that. She accuses me of trying to sell her old coffee, so she changes her order: "I want two medium coffees in large cups". We pour her two fresh cups and she throws her hands up: "I won't drink stale coffee!" and she runs out the door. This isn't even the first time this happens, but she still comes in day after day. I've heard the people at work say they hate her, and that she's a ridiculous old bat. Truth is, I've thought the exact same things over and over. I want to hate her, but that's just too easy. There's got to be something behind it.

I want to understand. I really want to know what causes someone to get so frighteningly disconnected from reality, and to be able to care for her the best a barista/christian can and just maybe help her have a better day than the day before. I actually want to make a customer happy! Maybe I'm just trying to understand this concept: god loves equally, the diseased, the downtrodden, the depressed, the happy...or maybe I have just been there myself.

Disheveled, disconnected, and discontent with my surroundings. Those people we distance ourself from really aren't that far off when you think about it.

देवास्ताशन or Devestation.

Confession # 4 - I haven't watched a Hockey game in well over a year.

P.s. My Blog went hindi all on it's own and I had to retype my post!

Flash Flood Freeze Frame

Hey!

I have a food blog!

I just forgot about it for a few months.

So, since I forgot about it let's remodel a bit here and there, and honestly I think I need a mission statement.

*contintues to plot the revolution*

Truth to the Fiction

Respectful Designer

I stole this quiz from Audrey's blog, Then I saw it on Ryan's and Hilary's blogs...I've just been working loads of doubles at work. It is quite an interesting quiz, with multiple levels of differences and very in depth analysis of your personal observations. I don't agree with all of it but some of it I do. I mean, I have some sense of style right? RIGHT?

*punches the silent crowd vigorously*

here that is...

According to it, I am an observer. Something that if there was any standard truth in my life that was it. I watch everything around me. I am fascinated by the way things are put into their own force of gravity. Sometimes though, I feel like I'm just not there. That faded into the distance feeling. The other cool thing about this little quiz was that it tells you something you can do to change the way you work. Simple suggestions, such as I am an observer who needs to experience a little more and watch just a wee bit less.

For some odd reason this specific thing reminded me of the title character in a movie titled "Train Man"（でんしゃおとこ）. The main character being this ridiculously shy nerd who really just can't seem to function on the same level as everyone else. Sometimes I feel like that. It might just be a cultural thing, but it seems like he doesn't really have any incentive to change in his life. He's not in the best situation, but the daily routine to him seems comforting. It gets him by moving from day to day, but still just a going through the motions. At some point in the future maybe things will change, or push come to shove he could stay the same the rest of his life and not really feel much chagrin over the whole ordeal. From the opening scent though the first thing they make apparent is that this man is a watcher, he knows and understands reactions better than anyone else.

He notices the couples, who pass by on the train stop and the stories of romance he watches in privacy. All the while, he wants to stay the watcher as long as he can. It's easy, you can see it from the outside and walk away from it ready to continue your day. He even listens to an ipod, as he people watches, something I very much can relate with.

Then something changes him.

For the first time in his life, something takes over. Something drives him to become part of this player's act. I like you, train man. He tries to save a girl from being groped by a drunkard. He shuns common sense for an oh-so brief moment and dives in as a man! Only quickly to be pushed away. But he still did it, he acted as a player in his own theatrical production. Now See something else the quiz does get right is that as much as we crave personal interactions and relationships, real solid relationships...we're very much afraid of taking any sort of step. I say we refering to both me and train man as we understand each other foo'. We truly lack confidence and usually this is only because at somepoint in our life we have been so broken down that we always feel this need to try and prove ourselves. A fruitless effort really.

After the interaction in the movie though this crazy dude called Train man finds himself reaching out into empty space---the internet. He posts on a message board of his grand tales, he met the girl of his dreams and all he had to tell was his computer. Shorty after though he gets one response, and then two and then a hundred! The movie smartly focuses on the lives of six really distinct charcters though. Each of them has someone in their life that reminds them of train man. He turns instead from a random along man into a brother, a lover, a friend and son. They want him to succeed with all their life and guide him along his mistrials and adventures with the woman on the train.

Now when I first looked at the results I disagreed with the comment that I have trust in others. Then I remember some of the people I have encountered in my life, as well as the instances where I may have indulged into more than what they really wanted to know. Truth is I have a lot to say and once I start I go on and on and on...and on. I trust people a lot and this has been my downfall. I really do listen to what people say and respect their opinions, I want their opinions---to grow and learn. Everyone should also have the chance to have someone listen to their story. I remember the people on hastings who would light up just to be looked at. Who really just wanted someone to shut up and listen to their story.

Train man ends the movie with the idea that: "Yeah, I can move on now"; Feeling like you've watched someone grow into who they were meant to be. I kinda like that.

You can find out how I really did here, and see if you agree =D

Lies about style, all lies I'm stylish some days...

A Little Bit

I called out to you, God;
I laid my case before you:
"Can you sell me for a profit when I'm dead?
auction me off at a cemetery yard sale?
When I'm 'dust to dust' my songs
and stories of you won't sell.
So listen! and be kind!
Help me out of this!"

You did it: you changed wild lament
into whirling dance;
You ripped off my black mourning band
and decked me with wildflowers.
I'm about to burst with song;
I can't keep quiet about you.
God, my God,
I can't thank you enough."

- Psalm 30:9-12 (Message)

Someone recently was asking about songs to make for a dance mix, and immediately I thought of a whirl of what I would put on it. I thought of the rises and falls I follow faithfully, that's when I am completely alone. I mean COMPLETELY by my lonesome.

Then I dance.

I move to the grooves of life in it's moment, I waltz for London and it's little symphony. I swing with the many mad men who know love better than the rest, and sway with a few lovely sirens, all the while raising that one fist in complete defiance to whatever be the most worth defying. Because happy or sad, sometimes you just have to move. I know I am all alone with really only god to see how stupid I look---and really how stupid do I look. When you feel a little stupid though it helps bring you back down, so you can feel a little bit better. Afterwards I feel almost invincible...at least for a little bit.

At least until I look around, I come back to the world facing me.

The wedding was this past weekend, and it was weird and wonderful as any wedding should be. I made too many scones, and the ones I made didn't taste terrible. I really look up to my sister at least for one thing, she likes to keep moving even up to the last minute! We got there and were thrown our own additional responsibilities. Then she took her bride (she did marry a man, just ask the pastor though he seemed to forget and I quote"Do you take her to be your lovelyhusband?") and ran. You think during weddings you're involved in that you happen to be the only one who is going nuts. Oh those silly lies we believe. I think there should be a full documentation of the bride during her wedding planning phase just so she can go back and see how crazy she drove everyone. It would be a magnificent tenth anniversary present, we could hold a private screening!

So for lack of a better phrasing, it's OVER! My sister knows I love her despite it all, and I gladly welcome whathisface...*ahem* Michael into the family. The rest of us will all step away and leave it up to Beaver, first though I have to see if I can think of 100 more jokes about the fact she is now a Beaver quite literally. Now though I have to get back to homework. The facts, the hard truth, the unsurmountable odds towering over me with its looming shadow leaving me with plenty room to hide.

Truth is...I am a twenty one year man who is loosing a life long fight with PAPERWORK! Come on now, how ridiculous can you really get? It's not like it has any special moves or that final left throw, it's just paper. I say I tried even though I really didn't, because my mind was thinking about how much I had to do and even more about how much I didn't.

I'm in a bit of a pickle here. I know that I need to just start, somewhere. I just want to stop feeling so darn stretched first.

EDIT: Just so yall know, I love this picture. It's of a scarf show from about four months ago that was held in a small gallery. It was such a crap shot and after I figured out color correction...it POPPED. I love it.

Once In a While

Sometimes everything you thought could go wrong...didn't.

Goodnight peeps.

Closing In

"...Sometimes the person who needs help the most is the last person to ask for it."
- Shannon Leone Fowler

Confession #2 - Most of the time I really do need help, but am far beyond stubborn to ask for it. Chalk it up to my stubborn nature or maybe even just my lack of the ability to process everything as fast as I'd like...I just plain am in need. A lot of the times I should be able to do something but I'm too caught up in my little web of lies to admit I was wrong. I even attempt to put on this faux, everything together act; despite my acting background, I'm rather bad at this.

Truth be told, with the exception of the occasional moment of clarity---my life is a complete mess. I really need to work on that.

A Spoonful Weighs a Ton

"Those who make the worst use of their time are
the first to complain of its brevity"

- Le Bruyere, Characters

So.

Three months haven't passed, and I'm blogging again. God forbid this ever come a regular thing, that would be like...a real blog!

I know!

I KNOW!

Honestly I really do have a purpose.

A couple of oddly interesting things happened this past week. Firstly, I seemed to actually communicate with a certain individual *ahem* mark *ahemcoughhack* whom I just never seem to be able to communicate with these days. Letters would fly between the wires, questions asked, but rarely answered. But without asking, I received a wonderous response, making me look forward to fall a little bit more and really cut back financially wherever I can. All it took was a little give on my part. Well a lot of reflection, and a give in attempting to control the uncontrollable. It seems to go without saying I'm as stubborn as three day old baguettes.

Really though, I think I'm ready to go back to that place there. Unlike the thrusting reentry into the USA, I have ideas. I have hope for something else than what is turning into the mundane and ritual. We'll see. Don't put all of your eggs in one basket or something quirky and not really insiteful like that, right?

I'm oddly enjoying writing a little bit more, and I've found it and other things to be oddly calming. So I decided to change my blog a bit. Template number four for this budding blossom of a bloggity nook, and finally a picture (albeit the absolute worst I could find) to go along with all nine of the languages you might be able to read my blog in. My writing looks pretty in Korean!

I haven't a clue if it actually makes any sense but sure, play with the buttons in the upper right corner and have a ball.

Working on a few things here personally though. One of which was really being able to ask questions of people without seeing them. Not one who readily flung their lives into a mad phone text flurry the minute they hit the market; I am a hiding texter. I lurked and hovered. Adding to that---the person I was on IM was a completely different person than who I really was in person. The merging of the two created an overliterate long-winded gobble. I was trying hard to ask questions with weight without making it seem like these are little blippy boxes on a screen. Yet recently It's just been different. I realized I can't change the world with the text message; more likely that I can't make someone like me either. It can really be great to hear real news from people though.

Acceptance of this was an attempt to throw away surface conversation, but without it how would I be able to be the chatty barista I've caught myself being recently?

I guess it helps to not be in control all the time, and just let things flow. Now about that whole authority issue...we'll get to that soon!

Random bit. I watch Grey's Anatomy religiously by the way, and am continually impressed with the filming production on that show. That pass in the hall between Denny and Izzy was amazingly shot and really captured the emotion. I was slightly less impressed with this recent arc, although it was nicely cut into chunks to keep drawing me in and almost caring about Meredith. It helps that she finally slapped off her wishy wash attitude and confronted her mother. So dark, so twisty.

I Turn My Camera On

Sometimes things just have to come down

“What you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing;
it also depends on what kind of a person you are”
- C.S. Lewis

Truth be told. I've been thinking...

...and you all know what happens when I THINK.

There are few things in this world that truly get me going. By nature I am as lazy a being as one could expect from a twenty something aimless undergrad; by nature I have no motive. Which is for the longest time I thought was true. Then presented before my eyes were millisecond long blips of hope.

Simply Ideas. In and out with barely a spark of reflection. Almost as if something, somewhere was trying to just tell me something; usually something I know, have always known, and just really needed a nudge in some direction. So one day at a time, I try to fight nature. I thought I couldn't get a job, I got a job. I thought I couldn't get up in the morning to work those five o'clock opens, I haven't missed one yet. For some unknown reason though, when it comes to seeing the light in any given situation---I seem to only see it in everyone else. I don't expect anything from me. Keep with me, I do have a point.

So what do I do when I find something a little maddeningly enjoyable. I think I can't keep up. I make excuse after excuse. And then not surprisingly, I fall behind. It's my vicious cycle of life self destruction, and this unusually selective warpath knows right where to hit me. Despite this, I'm going to give some things I left behind another chance. Heck I even looked things up in the BIBLE!

"But I have raised you up ^[a] for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. "

Exodus 9:16

So yeah. I still have a point.

This past may I bought a camera.

Now I had almost all but given up on art but I felt the need for a creative output. My photos started off crappy, and I didn't really have much faith in them. This camera is my first real camera. I picked it out and I bought. Since then, I tried a little harder. Now they are just a little bit less crappy. Who knows! Maybe in the future I would consider them subpar (as I am my own worse critic). The point being when I turn my camera on, something in me is slowly changing for a positive direction. The photos that go along with every entry were always taken by me. Crappy or not, I couldn't bare to use someone else's work alongside my dribble, changing their intention---so I had to take action. If I can't use something I get, then something had to be created. I even urge you to take a look. It's been a slow learning process, but it's an awe-inspiring revelation when it something just clicks---quite literally.

Recently though, it seems just a pleasure to learn about anything. I still want to know when I do a good job. I want to know how to take that compliment, but more importantly I want to know when I don't. I want those failures, and missed chances. They are becoming less of a burden and more of a repurposed force. I was directed back to a church that I felt slightly burned on. Big, showy, flashing lights, and overinflated egos preaching to hundreds of hormonal teen christianese shells. Well since I've been gone, the old pastor has moved on. They have a few less lights, and a few less bodies...but they seem to want that connection now. It's like maybe the spirit is coming back to them after they turned off some of those shiny bright lights. Horrid, Blasphemous, insect comparisons aside---I think I can understand them a little now. I even went so far as to join a life group.

Now if only we could do something constructive, despite how fun monopoly and Wii Sports can be in a group setting.

One day at a time, right?

Word of the Moment.

Repurpose (re-pur'pes)tr.v.
re·pur·posed, re·pur·pos·ing, re·pur·pos·es To use or convert for use in another format or product: repurposed the book as a compact disk

That Was the Worst Christmas Ever! - Part II

“I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.”

-Robert McCloskey

I distinctly remember baking and rushing my last batch of christmas cookies, god knows they tasted awful.

Somewhere someone told me that with anything you create, your emotions can determine the outcome; this was the case. Somehow I managed to make them wrong (normally taking ten minutes they took 30 just to set up). Internally I was thinking of just going out on a good note, but in reality I was just trying to stretch my time and stay there---just squeezing in that last ounce of the atmosphere I was about to leave behind. I just wanted to stay.

The ride to the airport was quiet, on my front at least, but everyone else seemed to have something to say. They had their questions, stifled with an unabashedly akward silence. All the while I was just trying to hold back from crying, something I had done quite the fair share of in the few days I had between the announcement I wasn't ready to attend out reach and the flight date home. We said our goodbyes, and like most good Christian people we hugged. Out of All of the hugs in my life, those hugs lasted just a little bit longer than usual; as if to say: ‘I’m sorry’, ‘Don’t give up’, and a thousand other forms of what is the one-two punch of guilt and regret.

I remember when they first told me that I was not going to go. I looked like a patient about to be forced into a psych ward---minus the straight-jacket. Flailing aimlessly, angrily screeching; something in me was dying...and then I crashed. I couldn’t handle them telling me that, and I was digressing into my most basic animal instincts. I was fighting it both inside and out, feeling as if an unbearable poison was forcing its way through my veins, paralyzing all rational thought. Over the next few days I mellowed, or more so I was tranquilized by irrational fear.

I was going home a failure, a then incomplete mess. Standing in front of me was the daunting fact that everything, and I mean everything I had planned for in the next months was going by the wayside. I was returning to Ohio---but I wasn’t supposed to be back yet. I was seeing my family---who weren’t expecting me until March. I was turning twenty and thrust into “Happy Holidays” mode, but I honestly wasn’t happy. I was pushed back into my life, my reality, questioning everything that had happened in the previous months. I was home. The sad part though is really just how hard people tried to make me happy. It was like trying to warm over a slab of marble. Something in me had felt like it died, and I was regressing into the stages of grief; or maybe it was a good grief I just don’t know.

"This is what I'm thinking, this is my point."

When I got home, when I decided I wanted to be a little better than I was last year, I took off like a rocket. This past year had a definite direction to it. Despite being severely depressed for a majority of it I was a force of movement. A week into it I had a job, that same week I had two, and then I just took off. I wanted something and I wanted control over it. There were times this past year where I was ridiculously angry. I tried not once but twice to retry a discipleship training school. People would say they were proud of me, but I knew that it wasn’t my time yet. The first time was in October, I had hoped and prayed for a school, finally finding one that just screamed me. It was in Montreal, and I was enchanted by the idea of attending a working internship of a school. It was my first big rejection in a while, but they where honest---they felt they couldn't help me. So I talked to Mark, which took forever. Only to hear from Hilary in a Newsletter the school I wanted to attend was canceled. I almost applied to another school, they actually called me three times, but I didn't go. Looking at my situation left me a little troubled differencing reality and determination, holding on to an archaic tendency to move in that fixed direction. Something about the fixation to leave a town combined with the impatience of being stuck in a town really throws you.

It’s weird looking back at mistakes made, because initially I would have just dwelled on not being able to correct them---but now? Now I have this innate want to hold onto my mistakes, to actually…learn from them. I know now that I want to learn, I desire to learn. That’s probably the healthiest habit I’ve ever picked up in my life. So as the one year mark came around I was feeling just a little bit of a failure. I was finishing up a semester, and slightly worried of failing. I was at one job for the longest period I’ve ever been in my life, and slightly worried of being fired. Was anything really wrong? No! Nothing big, I just didn’t want to be at this point at this time. I wanted things to work out slightly differently. I was quite literrally worried because I really had nothing to worry about, go figure.

So I procrastinated a little...then a little more...then a lot until today really.

So what has happened since---November?

I went on vacation, a real honest to god vacation with beaches, gelato and everything! It wasn't quite wonderful, but it was something. Especially our last meal---easily the most gourmet meal I ever had (and I picked it). I learned a bit about Gullah. I've watched fifty Korean movies (eight Japaneses, two chinese and one soap opera too). I survived the three month mark at my job, and now the six month mark. This is a landmark of commitment. I stayed home...so far. I catered the deserts for my work Christmas party. I went to North Carolina, and realized Durham has a street that looks like Commercial Drive. I saw my family again, they're all a little older---yet exactly the same. Christmas came, Christmas went, and then I turned twenty-one. Heck I went out and bought a SINGLE beer. It was bitey, with hints of coffee and the color of Guinness. I passed with a B, and signed up for two more classes. I realized I liked photos, and even started a page for them. I watched an entire movie in a theater without talking, and with smuggled cheesecake. I made Sugar cookies from scratch; gingersnaps too. I also chased seagulls.

So here I am. A little over one year later, a little bit older, and not so much the wiser but all the more eager to try a little more. What have I learned...well. God is slow. Painfully slow. In perfect conjuction, I'm obnoxiously impatient.

So he continues to push my patience just a little bit more. Maybe I'll see some of you in September?

That was the worst christmas ever!

All at Once

So. This Picture has nothing to do with the post, but I refuse to waste it, now...

I really want to be selfish. It's true, I really want to be mean and spiteful and full of hate, anger; I could go so EMO right now it's not even funny. Unfortunately though, in this situation It just wouldn't be right.

So this post is about my sister, first a congratulations, because she is getting married. I really hope that my sister respects me and doesn't read this because despite the fact I know where her blog is, I won't read it. It's something personal, and a side of my sister that isn't for me to see. Knowing this, you have to know that despite me not reading the rough equivalent of her open paged journal, I still do know something. I know when she has trouble, I can tell. I know when she feels ganged up on, and when people think everyone is against her. I know everyone of her little ticks she does when she's aggravated and I can call it to the second when she'll break down.

Truth is her and me are both painfully alike in that aspect. We each have different insecurities, we both had different problems growing up, but we are both very visual. Creatively and annoyingly we tell our problems before people can even ask. We tell it by our pained expressions, our upset looks, our posture, our silence. Who needs words with all of this glaring you smack in the face. The worst part though is that when it comes to confrontations, we have somehow managed to be opposite types. If someone really does bother me, I will go up to their face at any point and tell them the best way I can that they need to do something about it. My sister, when she's mad she goes away. She retreats until she knows what she wants to say. I process things aloud, sometimes while walking around. She processes things internally. Now---put these two in a room and let them disagree---GO! Many of our friends can attest to this monstrous and immature display.

Despite our fighting sometimes we still can't really understand each other. Currently this is the situation.

My sister is getting married. My sister is getting married! You have no idea how happy I am for her; despite this though I have a predicament. I don't think my sister is quite ready personally to join with another in holy matrimony. She knows she has issues, but I just don't know if she's open to seeing them all. Her roommates can seem them, her family can see them, but why is she is blatantly unaware. When I look at how her and Mike get along I trust they want god to be a big part of their relationship, but I also think that they're strong emotional attraction has but a bias on their views of each other. I know I seem skeptical. Maybe that's another big character flaw on my part, or maybe I'm just being a brother. I just had to ask myself, Is this the best thing for her at this time, or will she need more time?

Bring in more to this equation my sister has set the date for her wedding in March. When she is married she will know her fiance Mike for one whole year. One whole year. What do I know really, what experience do I have in dating and relationships? The real answer is none, which further adds to a malicious motive some may skew me towards. Truth is by my sister having a wedding it further puts me in a financial straight shot situation of not knowing what to do. I want to go to a school in January. I need my parents to help me with that. Key Words: I want. What I want doesn't really matter at this point, except for the fact that I want my sister to be happy.

" 9known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; 10sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything." 2 Corinthians 6:3-10 (NIV)

This is phrasing that was quoted through somewhere, I'm not sure where, but I remembered it involved patience. I remember that it talks about dying, where at times it's honestly what I felt was happening to me. I could relate to that feeling of dying, of part of you thoroughly wasting away with every heaving step. Yet we live on. It seems I've been saying I'm sorry a lot lately. Now though, I need to say again...but to god. I keep telling myself that I'm ready. I keep telling people around me that I have changed and grown enough that I can do this again. I keep remembering things that made me so sad to see, like when I was in Manitoba. I was so sad to be there and not have that connection everyone else had. I was jealous they had the freedom to move on while I had still more work to do. I was jealous of a connection I lacked amongst them. At the very same time I was ridiculously happy, I saw them moving on with their lives and I saw that they were affected. It's frakking beautiful. However there is nothing I can particularly do now except hold on and wait. I love god, but dang him for making me wait.

It better be worth it.

So. Back to my sister to end this annoyingly hovering and long long entry full of depressing typed diarhea spewed on to the page. My struggle with her is that, I wish I could be more happy for her. So to do that, I'll pretty much have to wait a little longer for my stuff to happen, at least until god tells me something else. I want her to have the best wedding she can, because you only do get one...if you do it right and make it count. So my parents shouldn't have to worry about my school and the wedding at the same time. It's annoyingly easier, which makes it harder for me to do.

Now. Someone please, knit me a sweater, it's COLD.

"Dear, dear Corinthians, I can't tell you how much I long for you to enter this wide-open, spacious life. We didn't fence you in. The smallness you feel comes from within you. Your lives aren't small, but you're living them in a small way. I'm speaking as plainly as I can and with great affection. Open up your lives. Live openly and expansively!" 2 Corinthians 6:11-13 (the Message)

Food Makes All Apologies a Little Bit Easier...

It should be known that for any sort of apology one must present an offering of sincerity...which is usually food. In all honesty I couldn't think of a sweeter (pun intended) way of saying.

I'm sorry.

Might I also add I'm new in hopes that I can salvage my grand audience of two?

How about an explanation. I've been blinded by Wedding Bells, and my sister has decided to get married---in five months! God Bless Her! Now I congratulate her for this great step forward in life, but at the same time this caused me to shrink back and realize I really don't have much in my bank account. So I was faced with one of those whats-a-ma-call-it "life choices" and regressed to my ignore my blogging ways. Really, It was wonderful almost to not cook for three whole weeks. Then I realized I really really wanted to cook, because cooking is for lack of a better word, therapeutic. What was missed was a Chili with too much spice and Muffins that while sweet and lasted a whole day unfortunately were so complicated it made me scream. In other words true failures that I just wasn't ready to admit too. Am I in denial? Probably...I mean, yes, but that doesn't give me any excuse. In fact I make a lot of failures but every once in a while I hit a streak of pure gold. It just so happens that recently that streak of gold was from the flesh of some sort of slow-roasted vegetable. So enough with the sincerities and time for the real presents!
I don't know why, but this time of year...I am obsessed with squash. Maybe it's just us Americans or an obscure diet staple of upper midwest americas or what, but anywhere you go this time of year you will see a variety of fall-hued stemmed monstrosities. Children Carry around Plastic versions of the more popular ones, while our grocery aisles suddenly have endcap aisles devoted to Libby's Moneymaker. Our Coffee Shops create drinks devoted to them, our bakeries thrown them in cheesecakes and muffins and cookies, oh my! You cannot go anywhere without running into them, that's because any grower knows that when they really go to fruition they breed like happy bunnies and gerbils.

So I present a gift, orange and sweet and studded with crunchy pecans, this is loaf that is it's simplest form, frakking awesome! The best part is that it is from an old Cooking Light so it's almost good for you...well, admittedly eating a whole loaf in one sitting won't help your wasteline. I'd like to note I really couldn't bring myself to add water to a loaf recipe when you can really add something more flavorful, after a try I opted to add buttermilk to balance the flavor. (Which for a quarter cup it adds about 30 calories to the whole loaf and very little fat...which I should really look up)

I hope in the future after a stunning amount of butter consumption in preparing my first recipe I can actually slim down in the future. Think of this as a positive step in the right direction, a new effort, a season resolution so to speak.

AND Maybe...just maybe I'll figure out how to use my gorram camera some day too.

Pumpkin Cranberry Loaf (Adapted from Cooking Light - November 1995)

2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
(or Sub 3/4 tsp Ginger, 1/2 tsp Cinnamon,
1/4 tsp nutmeg, and 1/8 tsp cloves)
1 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 egg whites, lightly beaten
3/4 cup coarsely chopped cranberries

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Vegetable cooking spray
5 x 9 Loaf Pan
Wheat Germ or Flour for Dusting

Preheat your Oven to 350 Fahrenheit, (someday I will look up Celcius, but until then remember I am american and we all run on the "our system is the way" measuring system) and spray and dust your pan with whatever your choice of dusting items and fat. I use good old Canola Oil Cooking Spray. I spray the bottom, then add a fitted piece of parchment paper followed by more spraying along he sides. I usually dust with wheat germ, just because I think it really marries well with muffins and loafs (and my mother told me too), again I say use whatever you normally do.

Now, before you really do anything else, seperate the three eggs and leave the whites in a medium size bowl for later. Now Measure and Whisk Together all of the spices, the baking powder, salt, flour and sugars in a large bowl until combined. Now stop and clean up before you go any further because if you're like me---you just don't want to do this later. Now back to those egg whites; whisk them until right before they form those soft peaks; you want a thickness but not a meringue. Now fold in the pumpkin (or butternut puree if you're feeling bored yet adventerous), buttermilk, oil, and vanilla extract. Create a well in the middle the dry ingredients and add the wet to that well and fold lightly. Now just after the dry really starts to marry to the wet (but while there are still large streaks of flour) throw the cranberries into the fold. There should still be large some streams of flour when you decide to walk away. Just walk away. Let this baby rest and clean up any residual messes amongst your kitchen.

Spread the batter into that already coated 9 x 5-inch loaf pan, gently. Sprinkle the Pecans Evenly over the top and using whatever you used to spread the batter to just gently tuck in the pecans. Bake at 350° for 54 - 58 Minutes depending on your oven, I typically take it out just a little bit early. Let it cool in the pan for 15 minutes on a wire rack; remove from the pan, and let cool almost completely on wire rack before slicing. Resist the Temptation to eat it all the minute it comes out, a burnt mouth really ruins the experience, and that added in-pan cooking time seems to help it set.

Each Slice depending on the size from a twelve piece loaf will have around 225 calories, and about 6 grams of fat. Mostly Good fat, and there is nothing better than good fat.

Yield: 12-16 servings (serving size: 1 slice)

Handle With Care

"Why Am I afraid to dance, I who love music and
ryhthm and grace and song and laughter?
Why am I afraid to live, I who love life and the
beauty of flesh and the living colors of the earth
and sky and sea? Why am I afraid to Love, I who love love?"

Eugene O'neil
The Great God Brown

Commercial Drive. Did anyone ever know how much I hated this place? How much I despised and loathed all of it. You knew I loved it, but did you really know that I hated it more than any other place in the earth. Heck, I thought I was done with it. It was like an old photograph, in that it found it's beauty in it's character and grime; It's life in it's nooks and crannies and down the alleys you never should go. The sky was beautiful, hell...the people were all gorgeous. All the while something so ugly, so hideous had tainted my own love for Vancouver. Now before I go any further I must say that I really do love this city, more than any I've been to...now continuing.

My crappy pride. My terrible evil inner self that caused me to be such a bratty child, all the while I would attempt to present myself as calm and composed. Have you ever seen a bratty child try to act grown up? It's a little cute and well-intentioned but all the while a ridiculous scene that never ends with maturity. I hated that I was not a good person there. I hate that some have considered me to be abusively angry and at times for no reason I would just be so mad, so mad. I know it seems silly, but I really can be that mad...at myself. You see it's all because of pride that I forget things that I love. I love to watch life happen, yet I'm afraid to live it. I love love, yet I fear and hide from it more than anything or anyone I know. I just didn't understand the concept of love.

So recently, I went back to something else biblical I didn't quite understand. The severity of the cross, so I listened to one of the most graphic, insensitive, vile, no mercy sermon on it. I loved it. It was by a speaker named mark driscoll, and he delivered this speech at the reform and resurge conference in Seattle this past august. I think because all of my life the cross was this fluffy happy symbol churches gave to you. It was on all bibles, and ornate necklaces but I never really understood it. I never understood just how much pain he had to go through. Looking back, it forces me to see myself as just how selfish I'd been. So I started reading Luke, again, and this time I'm working through it slowly but surely. I've never really read the bible through a whole chapter so bare with me, this is new.



I've learned something though, if not it was drilled into head by my mom, my family, my friends, my job, my own brain---which overworks every stinking thing. As much as I hate this terrible evil crappy place known as Ohio, if god wants me here...that's where I'll be. Where we have the coldest winters, and the hottest summers. Where drinking and watching men fight to the death uniformly over a small bundle of mess wrapped in a sheeth of rubber is the most popular form of entertainment, and the fumes of an old factory makes you dizzy with anger at the polution we cause. I hate rubber town so much, that if god really wants me to stay here, than that will have to do. Heck if God wanted me to spend the rest of my life in an amazing city, or a polar ice cap, or even the dodgy side of london in the back alleys---SO BE IT.

Because I would hate it more if I was somewhere I wasn't supposed to be. In this spirit of travel...I applied for another school. This time you may have heard of it, although I hear they're getting a new building and moving a little down the road; you might have passed them at some point walking through Vancouver. They would walk the streets wearing funny aprons and spouting silly promises, or better yet, I think you've tried their soap. Yes, my friends I have applied to that fun city you all know I hate.

More specifically I talked to Mark, which took a lot out of me. I haven't written a blog about it, simply because I wasn't sure. I think I'm sure. I've tried to apply for other schools because I just wanted to go somewhere, anywhere. Drats though to that crappy mean bully of a god who wants me to go somewhere specific, who pushed me in the direction of a city I had never heard of in the first place (in a country with play money none the less). Then to top it all of he sends me back to Ohio, because I wasn't ready yet. Darn him, but I think he knows what he's doing. I'm trying here, to see the plus side to it all. Ohio isn't a terrible place, I think people even move here because it isn't. We have great produce, and culture in our cities. We have an abundance of resources to dabble in, and places to create our dreams. Heck, Akron invented Purell, Instant Oatmeal, the first breakfast cereal, and the first graded school system among others. Alchoholics Anonymous originated here! That means Ohio was the first group of people to try and get help, so maybe it is a place for the refugees of life. Come and deal with your problems, before moving on and such.

Then after the first time I tried to post this message I get a post card from someone in San Fransisco, suggesting I apply to their January DTS. Go Figure. Like I really need anymore help second guessing myself, come on. Honestly! HONESTLY, GOD---you bully!

I want this Vancouver school to happen, key words though: I want. If it doesn't happen, I will wait, because I'm the only one who can make myself wait. A few things need some prayer though, first---It will need more students for a school in January (which they're are currently one other than me that I know of in both Vancouver and San Francisco) and secondly I will have to pull the funds and make it happen. I need God's help in this though, because I just can't have someone donating me a 1000 dollars at the last minute despite they're good intentions when it isn't supposed to happen. It's like the first picture I took in this post, where the statue is holding on to the water and it's just slipping through her hands. You don't try to grab water. You can help it a little though, to get where it needs to go. God will have to make it happen, and I've give that up to him. I'm just going to wait at the stop sign until then. So Hey God, won't you be my traffic light? Heck, why not drive the car, I'll just take a nap now.

Word of the Day - Clemency

Clemency is an associated term, meaning the lessening of the penalty of the crime without forgiving the crime itself. The act of clemency is a reprieve. Today, pardons and reprieves are granted in many countries when individuals have demonstrated that they have fulfilled their debt to society, or are otherwise deserving (in the opinion of the pardoning official) of a pardon or reprieve. Pardons are sometimes offered to persons who, it is claimed, have been wrongfully convicted. However, accepting such a pardon implicitly constitutes an admission of guilt, so in some cases the offer is refused.