Christmas Eve

Being the youngest of four children, it is an interesting experience coming home for christmas. This is the first christmas in 3 years that I am spending at home with all siblings present. There is a different dynamic involved now than there was when I still lived at home. The decorations barely went up today. I was thinking that there was something else about christmas that was different but I can't remember what it was. I remember as a kid thinking that christmas was great and that it was the best time of year. Not because of the gifts and such but christmas music, the decorations and all of the hoopla. But now, I hear christmas music and I get bothered(depending on the song of course). I still like being at home with my family and this is the first time in 2 and a half years that the whole family is going to be together for more than fifteen minutes. Interesting.
On a side note- multi-colored christmas lights only belong on the christmas tree and not on the outside of your house. Outside lights should consist of carefully selected color combinations or classic white, preferably no 'icicles' or crazy nylon blow up things. Not that icicle lights and the crazy blow up dolls aren't cool, it's just that they are way overdone. OK. SO I haven't gotten enough sleep lately and I still haven't wrapped a single present. kosherness. Happy 25th of December!

 

Documentaries and Josie and the Pussycats

I'm watching The Fog of War. It's pretty interesting to tell you the truth. I think I read about it online somewhere. Anyways, it's on satellite television here at my parents' house. But right now he's talking about Ford motorcars. I didn't see the beginning of the film, but the guy said that to explain the vietnam war he was going to have to explain about these automobiles and about padded instrument panels and such. I still don't know what dropping skulls down the dorm stairs at Cornell has to do with this all, but oh well. He seems really young to have been involved in firebombing Japan. Apparently 100,000 Japanese civilians were killed in one night by an American firebomb raid. Which is exactly why our motives for going into today's war are totally unfounded. If you look at the list of countries who have committed war crimes, America is right at the top of that list and has been for decades.
I watched Josie and the Pussycats on the plane. Like, supposedly it's like anti-consumerism but it lacks credibility simply because I wonder how they chose the brands that they plastered all over the place. I enjoyed it however, and that's more than I can say about a lot of movies that I have seen lately. It made me think about how people who try to be 'original' inevitably conform to the 'nonconformist' mold. It's pretty sad really.
Lesson # 8:
Be Prepared to Reassess your Reasoning

Whoa or :Things I thought on the 17th of December

I like this list format. It's clever (I also like the word clever way too much).
1. Six people getting stoned and drinking beer does not constitute a party. Being at said 'party' and doing neither of those two things makes it even less of a party.
2. Apparently the director's cut of the Butterfly Effect is vastly different than the theatrical edition. I think I wouldn't have been so deeply affected if I had seen the theatrical edition. I discovered this while on the phone with a girl in my ward who had just finished watching the theatrical edition. I'm glad she didn't have to see the end of the director's cut.
3. I've decided I need to write a book.
4. I wonder if the girl mentioned in my last entry will be here next semester.
5. Chai is really tasty.
6. Watching even a portion of Van Helsing twice within a week is just uncalled for.
7. No matter how many times you open the cupboard, it's going to be just as empty as it was the first time until you go shopping.
8. '63 Caddies are pimp even if they smell up the place.
9. A good excuse for people who want you to smoke up is 'My head is already messed up enough man, I'd be comatose if I smoked up'.
10. 11 is a good number for a list
11. I need a good definition of Emo.
Well, as you can see, my night could be called eventful. It could also be called screwed up. Either way, I'm really tired so I'm going to stop while I'm ahead. Basically, the two endings to the Butterfly Effect really threw me for a loop and I wanted to write it down before I forgot.

IDK what to make of this

Cuban Billboard

What?

Bush Proposes Turningoff GPS during Terrorist Attacks

How does that make any sense to turn off the GPS satellites? I mean seriously, what are terrorists going to do with it? Aren't the military and first-responders the ones who would need GPS in an emergency? I just don't get this guy.

Lessons learned during finals week

Lesson 1:
It's better to study all semester long and have your finals early on during finals week as to get it all over with. As it is, I have lots of studying to do and three days to do it in. Unfortunately with three completely empty days it's hard to find motivation.
Lesson 2:
No amount of me wishing that Van Helsing didn't suck made it not suck.
Lesson 3:
40 dollars will buy you a lot of Powerbars
Lesson 4:
When you are in a store and you can't find the bulk granola, ask the salespeople for help.
Lesson 5:
Girls are confusing. Meeting girls at a UVSC institute dance isn't the most effective way to go about it as you can't see what they really look like or hear what they are telling you. Further, church dances are incredibly corny and that's unfortunate because they are only corny because of the music/people and not the rules.
Lesson 6:
TXT messaging is a horrible way to have a conversation even though you feel really cool while doing it.
Lesson 7:
Coheed and Cambria rocks out hard core.(I didn't really learn that this week but I thought I'd throw it in there since I had to open Itunes just to listen to it because it was in my head)
Lesson 8:
Don't invite two people who don't know each other into the same chat room. It'll either turn into a 'Let's diss on Randy' session or they'll hate each other and one or the other will start randomly quoting scripture. It can only go downhill from there.
Lesson 9:
Music is depressing unless my romantic life is going well(...it never goes well). As are depressed friends who realized that the girl they thought was like their exgirlfriend who's on a mission ...really isn't.
Lesson 10:
It's very unnerving to see a girl you like kiss another guy. It's even more unnerving when you can't tell who that guy is because of all the winter clothing he's wearing.

In the Library until it closes

I really just don't like working on schoolwork. Like doing my own work and coming up with original ideas is really hard. I should really work on that. Like seriously, I need so much external direction to come up with a finished product that it's not even funny. I don't like making decisions and usually doing work involves making a grip of decisions. This leads me to wonder why I'm so critical of stupid politicians. I'm SO sure that I would do any better than they are at making decisions. I can't even choose food at the restaurant. Important decisions are way out of my scope. The good thing about me being critical of politicians is that I now refuse to watch cable news shows as much any more and so i don't have to worry about what they do as much anymore. Unfortunately that means that I watch Pimp My Ride and other assorted garbage way too much. But at least I got to make a cool comment in sunday school about Pimp My Ride. My first new year's resolution is to not use the television. The other is to go on freaking cool road trips. I'm pretty excited about going to Ouray for the Ice festival. It's going to kick off the Year of the Road Trips. It should be way cool and stuff. I just have to form a posse to go because I'm not all about going by myself.( and I have to stop being lazy and only doing one route when I go anywhere).
Additionally going to New York for christmas should be pretty dang cool. No climbing or skiing involved, but that's not really a typical Blades family activity. There's nothing wrong with that, I'm just saying that climbing road trips have to be way cool. I'm struggling on the whole buying presents front, but we're making slow and steady progress with the help of the internet.
I think that on my way out to New York for the summer(if that's the way things work out) I'm going to make a detour and hit up the New River Gorge and whatever it is that's in Kentucky that everybody is always talking about(ok...I really mean that I'm always reading about it) and do some crazy cool climbing and such. I just have to get some people to go with me so we can be all cool and be the awesome climbers from Utah. If I went by myself that would pretty much suck. So I'm working on the posse building front. So far it's not going well. This is probably because of my generally awkward nature.
Well, This silly paper is still not done. Not nearly done. Fortunately it's not due until wednesday. That's good.