Snow Forts!

Who doesn't want to be in complete galactic control of the universe? Why would you not want to be the terror of the the town? How could you not want to be the big dog of your neighborhood? Could I possibly somehow own these titles? Actually yes I can. You see, I have, in my front yard...a snow fort. Now here's a lesson that I think everone can learn. The person with the best snow fort, gets to be in control. And I've been working pretty hard on mine, even through the nasty weather we've been having. I was out there working at it through the snow, ice, wind, slush, mush, cold, hail, sleet, snowplows, blizzards, hurricanes, tornados, and even through the birth of some little Canadian boy somewhere. It takes commitment, building a snow fort. I guess mine may not be the greatest in the world, but in my own little world, it's something. I'm proud of it because I put work into it. It can shield me from any of the forces I've already listed plus snowballs. It's solid, not to be broken. So if anyone wants to have a snowball fight you can come on over, I'm ready.

My world upside-down.

When I was younger, one of my favorite things to do was to be upside-down. I would sit in my room or in the living room hanging backwards off the couch. The ceiling (the floor in upside-down land) seemed so neat and tidy. Space and openness just seemed to flow like eggnog from and eggnog carton. Lights hanging from the ceiling would become lamps sitting in the middle of the room. Doorways had to be stepped over, because most doors (as we all know) don't go all the way to the ceiling. They stop about a foot-and-a-half short of it, resulting in a lip that must be stepped over in upside-down land. It was an exhilarating feeling, being upside-down. I felt like an astronaut, defying gravity. Or like some sort of explorer, discovering a new dimension of the world.
I still sit upside-down occasionally in my room, but now I recognize the force of the blood rushing to my head a lot faster, so It's not quite as frequent of an activity. I don't know if anyone else ever did this, or still does, but I thought I'd just share and fun pastime of mine.

Heads Up!

Everyone knows what a quarter is. It is one of the simplest forms of currency in the U.S. Most people simply use them to pay for things or they collect them. But all those people that are so narrow minded don't see the endless possibilities of uses for quarters.

A good friend of mine and I were feeling in a sort of "think-outside-the-box" mood, the other day. So we dug in our pockets to see what we could do. My friend found a quarter. All I had was some pocket lint and a pencil, so we chose to use the quarter instead. We started spinning it on top of some lockers and trying to find a pattern of which side it landed on most after spinning. We spun it multiple times, both clockwise and counter-clockwise, but it usually ended up being Tails. Next we added another variable. Starting the rotations of the spin on the locker-tops, we would then let it drop to the floor and continue revolving.

Fascinated by such a simple object, doing a very basic movement, we came up with many more cool ideas of what to do with the quarter. Eventually we got so far as to bowling. I put my pencil on the floor and we would try and hit it from some distance away. You may think that this is an easy task, just like we did at first, but it proves to be very difficult. Getting the quarter to stay in a straight line is the trick. It always seems to curve on direction. The last activity that we were able to complete was a "rolling distance contest." I'm sure that most of you at one point have done this. You take the quarter and roll it as far as you can. What I thought was interesting about that, is that you loose sight of the quarter very easily. Once you loose track of it, you occasionally catch a shimmer of light reflecting off that quarter down at the other end of the hallway. (At least that's where we were situated)

Don't screw it up, please.

I've been thinking quite a bit lately. Actually I usually do quite a bit of thinking, but lately the topic of my thoughts has had a sort of different angle. I was wondering about what our lives are going to be like in five or ten years. The people that we see everyday, we know, we've befriended and we hang around with...where are they gonna be? That thought really scares me. I'm not afraid of change, I've had plenty in my life, I'm used to it, but I'm afraid of what the changes will do to the people. The decisions we made now and in the near future may dictate our whole lives. I don't want to see people just throw their lives away. Really, if it came down to it, I would give up my life just so someone could have a successful one themselves. This is something I'm really passionate about.

As one of everyone's "favorite" teachers in the school says, "Life has no retests." There is a lot of truth and validity behind that.

I guess, ultimately what I'm trying to say is that I don't want to see our friends waste their lives. During high school I want to be able to make as much of an impact on everyone, so that there might possibly be a smaller chance of them screwing up. (Not that I'm all that great at not screwing up either...)

Success

You know the tough thing about success? It doesn't come easy. Well at least not for most. Isn't that kind of a bummer? The thing that so many people desperately want, is so hard to get. Success requires focus, determination, perserverance, patience, and a passion. On top of having all those you have to combine them all and put them into action as you work toward your goal. For example, if you want to be a star runner, you've gotta work to be the best. You can't just say, I wanna be the fastest guy (or girl) out there, work out a few times, and hope that that's enough. No, you've gotta spend months, maybe years working out pretty much everyday. You have to push yourself, it you don't push yourself, how do you expect to get better? Probably not gonna happen.

I guess that's one of the problems we see in schools these days. Kids don't have any insentive to push themselves to learn, so they don't and the consequence is that kids not getting the knowledge or grades they want. Here in America most kids just care about good grades, not the actual knowledge, they take that for granted. In other parts of the world however, if you want to live a successful life, you need to spend extra time studying, learing and truly understading the stuff. I guess that fact that success is kind of hard to achieve is a good thing...I mean what would the world be like if everyone were successful. Where would they go from there?

The Pointlessness of Words

The pointlessness of words. So often we open our mouths, vibrate our vocal chords and forms syllables with our lips and tongues, yet say nothing at all. It would be very interesting to have a log of all the words we have ever said and their context. I'm positive that close to 75% of the words we say are unnecessary. So little thought is put into what we actually say, we just let it flow out. Think about it, some day just try and remember most of the stuff you said and then analyze it. Give it considerable thought and I'm sure that you will realize that you could have gone without lots of your statements. A major problem in our world today is that people speak before they act. Now this isn't a new problem, but it is current and therefore somewhat relevant. (Notive how I added the words "somewhat" in that last sentence. If I hadn't thought about what I was writing and left that word out, I would have implied that everything current is relevant, which is not necessarily true.)
Not that I'm perfect, or even good at filtering my speech, but I think this is something that everyone can work at more. Even if you have something that you should say, doesn't mean that you have to. Just like if you have something you need to say, you should. Obviously when you say whatever it is you say depends on the situation and scenario, so there are exceptions. Ultimately the point I'm trying to convey is that you should think about what you say a little bit more than you do already.

Blogging: Challenge or Trivia?

Blogging is really not that hard to do. In many cases...In others, it can be the most impossible thing to do. An easy way to blog is to simply blog about your feelings, to let yourself be exposed to cyberspace and everyone out there. It's easy to just write, with no care of what you put. Easy to just let yourself go.
If you don't want to put your life into the grasp of someone you don't know it can tend to much harder to blog. You have to think of somewhat random topics, which can be very difficult to do for a whole year. Or I suppose you can choose a relatively safe topic to write about continuously. The problem with that second option is that you might insert some of your personal views into your writing, unknowingly.
Now I'm not saying that that is a bad thing or that writing about your life is in any way not something you should do. I'm just putting it out there that there are many different ways to blog. Some are easy, some are harder, doesn't neccessarily have to be either one. It just happens that some people have problems with different methods and don't want to choose another one, for whatever reason. When that happens the blogs will become uninsightful and boring, which is not really a good thing considering you have to do it for a whole year.

Remembering

I was looking through some old school stuff the other day, remembering. Remembering all the good memories that I've made from kindergarden up to 10th grade. All the places I've been, things I've seen, people I've met, friends I've made. Even though I'm only 15, I get the feeling that I'm much older when I look at my old school papers/yearbooks. It seems strange to think of how much has happened in just the past 10 years. Where has all that time gone, where are all the people now, how are they, what are they doing? I know it's not quite as extreme as it will be when we're 25, 35, 45, and on, but it's interesting even now. Between 1999 and 2005 I moved 7 times, went to 5 different schools, lived in 5 different cities, and 2 different continents. Over the course of those years I accumilated a compilation of memories that I would trade for nothing in the world. I am so thankful for the education that I've been offered and given, I wouldn't trade that either. Even now, in high school, although I may not always like it at the moment, the memories being made will be worth it in the end.

Cross Country Treat

I had a chance this weekend to go to my first ever cross country meet. The state meet was held in Northfield at St. Olaf college on saturday. I didn't know quite what to expect, but I had a general idea. The neat part about it was that it wasn't just any cross country meet, it was the state meet. The best runners in Minnesota all there to run. Plus two of my friends were running in it, which was even more exciting. After watching the races I have to say that cross country looks like a rather enjoyable sport, one that I would probably join if our school didn't have soccer. As a bonus to going up to see the meet, I also got to see my best friend. He moved up north last year and we havent been able to see each other much, so every chance is special. He joined the cross country team up there and one of his teamates made it to state, so his team came down to support her. That made my day just about perfect...I go up to see my first ever meet, I get to see the state meet, I get to see some of my friends compete, and I get to hang out with my best friend for awhile. I don't think it could have been a mucher better experience than that!

College Life as a 15-year old

This weekend I got a little bit better idea of what it would be like to be in college. I went to up to visit a friend at Northwestern College in the cities. It was a really fun time, not only because I got to see my friend, but also because I got a better understanding of what college is like. Granted it was on the weekend, but still, it's worth something. On saturday night we went walking around the cities playing soccer and attempting lots of fun parkour things. There were these two brothers from Brazil and they are really quite good at soccer. There was also a Spaniard there who was pretty good and so it made for some quality soccer playing. The Spaniard spoke Spanish, some Portugese, English, and even some German! It was awesome because he was talking with the two guys from Brazil in Portugese, to me in broken German, and to all the rest in English. That's just something that excites me I guess, a reason why I am really looking forward to college. The range of diversity in people is so much greater than in high school, it's amazing! Not that the people in high school aren't fun, but it just adds a whole nother dimension of things. It seems so much more like the real world and I think everyone wants to get out there, so college is another step in getting there. So yeah, that was a little bit of my weekend college experience.

To Drive or Not To Drive?

How many of you out there have an older sibling? Quite a few of you do. How many of you have an older sibling that is over the age of 16? Quite a few of you do. How many of you have an older sibling, over the age of 16, that still doesn't have their driver's liscense? Not so many of you. My older brother is going to be turning 18 in less than a month and still only has his permit. Most of the time, this doesn't really bother me. I could care less if he's driving around or not. Sometimes though it is rather bothersome. After awhile you get sick of having your parents drive you or you start feeling guilty about always asking others for rides. Those are the times that I wish he could drive. I mean really, I'm going to get my liscense within 6 months of him getting his. I guess it's kind of neat, sort of a brotherly bond, being able to drive at about the same time, but sometimes I just wish he could hop behind the wheel to give me a ride. He's not incompetent though, mind you. He's not that bad of a driver, he just hasn't bothered to get his liscense yet. He'll probably be getting it with a month or two and then all my problems will be solved. Well, not really...

Snow!

It snowed today! Hip Hip Hurray it snowed today! Not only did it snow (and continue to snow), but it's sticking so far! I tried making a snowman, but there just wasn't quite enough snow for that yet, so I just had to settle for snow angels. I'm not exactly sure why I'm always so excited for the first snow, it's not like we never have snow in Minnesota. I guess there's just something about that first time... however, by the end of winter I'm sure i'll be wishing for the snow to be gone. But for now... Hip Hip Hurray!

Biology...

You know something that bothers me? Biology class. I could go on and on about my problems with that class, but it's late and I'm just trying to get my two blogs in for the week. I really dislike biology class. It's not really the people in the class, I like them, but the material we're forced to learn and the way the teacher throws them on us. I know that I am not alone on this issue, I have many friends who have expressed the same opinion. Just to put this out there for a little perspective as to where I'm coming from, I'm a Christian. I try and follow Christ and to live my life in a way worthy of him. One thing that I feel strongly about is that His word is true. That is why I feel very contradicted when I enter into my biology classroom. I'm not saying that Christians are the only ones that might feel a little disturbed about all this by the way. In there we are supposed to learn about how the Earth "came into being." Or about how us humans evolved from globs of goo. Nothing personal (or actually, yes, maybe it is something personal), but I think that anyone that thinks we evolved from goo, has problems. Seriously...goo...wow. If you think about that, it's kind of sad...And the "Big Band 'Theory'", what a load of crap. The whole universe, everything there ever was and is, simply created by a big bang of nothing!? Yeah right! You can't just take a brand new, never-before been opened lego set, shake it and hope that the set will somehow be perfectly put together. If you think that...for one you have the knowledge of experience of a 2 year old, and for two you have a LOT of faith. I really don't know what that sort of faith would be in, but it doesn't seem very intelligent. Oh yeah, intelligence...That's another thing. If it's called the "Big Band 'THEORY' ", then why is it taught basically as a fact. That doesn't make sense. Most biologists or biology teachers (however nice of people they may be) always seem to think that they are right. And the way I see it, for them to be "right," they should have to explain other "theories" of creation of "evolution" if they want to present the Big Band Theory. You can't just explain one "theory" and not explain or talk about any others...that's just plain stupid...think about it.

Just to put this out there too, I repect everyone with their opinions, even if I don't respect their acutal opinions. I'm sure I'll write more about this issue over the course of the year, but I just thought I would lay some stuff out right now.

MSN Messenger

Do you remember when MSN Messenger was the coolest thing ever!? Back in the days of junior high it was the thing to do. I myself first got it at the end of 7th grade, though I felt like I was one of the last ones to get it (and maybe I was). Everyone would talk at school about the conversations they had had and how neat it all was and I was really glad when I finally could join the loop. I remember the first words were typed to me after I said the infamous "Hey" to a friend were "You can talk!" I was pretty excited at that point and thought that I was one of the coolest kids in school. I used MSN for all of our 8th grade school year, I was obsessed with it! But then the next summer it started to die...nobody was going on anymore. Early in the school year last year I pretty much completely gave up on MSN. Now I go on to check who's on for the heck of it about every 5 months or so. I don't talk to anyone anymore on it, but I always think back to the days of craze about MSN. I guess everyone's just moved on to bigger and better things, although, personally I thought it was great then. Actually I haven't gone on since last winter and after writing this, I think I'll just have to go and check and see who's on...I'm getting kind of excited about that for some reason, so I'm gonna end this blog right about....now.

Det is'n biskel anders...

Ja, ja, ich weiss. Ihr konnt meinen neuen blog nicht lesen. Ich weiss auch nicht ob dass fur mein Lehrer geht oder nicht. Trotzdem schreibe ich diessmal in meiner zweiter Sprache. Zu mir ist es ein bisschen komisch dass vasst keinen anderen Studenten noch 'ne Sprache konnen. Ausser vielleicht ein madchen mit dem ich Freunde bin, denn Sie spricht drei. Genau! Drei! Und ich dachte zwei wehr schon gut ha! Naja, ich hab noch'n biskel zu lernen. Mein Deutsch ist schon auch ein rustig geworden. Deswegen wurde es nicht so schlecht sein, wenn ich wieder nach's Vaterland umzog. Dass wehr aber traurig, denn ich mag es hier. Ein Teil von mir will nicht zuruck gehen, aber ein anderen Teil will. Ich wurde alle hier sehr vermissen, aber ich wurde auch viele neue Freunde machen. Es wahr auch nicht das erstes Mahl dass ich umzogte. Es wurde mein drittes Mahl sein glaube ich. Pah! Was glaube ich, ich weiss es! Ich weiss nicht mehr was ich schreiben soll also mach ich Schluss.

blogversity

At first, I didn't think that I would like the idea of having to blog twice a week. I still think that it is somewhat of a hassle, but not as much. Over the past couple weeks, I have aquired a sense of joy that was unknown to me before. When I check out someone elses blog, I get a chance to take a little peek at them from the inside, who they really are. It's amazing how some people can be very outgoing in real life, but don't have as much of a knack for writing and how others can be really shy, but great writers. Obviously there can be outgoing people that are good writers and shy people that aren't as great, but it's just interesting to see everyone in the same boat. Everyone has to (or gets the opportunity to) blog, whether they like it or not. Seeing how some of our classmates can take simple subjects and make them in to very entertaining pieces to read is something that makes my day. Even if you're not one of those people who enjoys reading and writing blogs, that's fine. Everyone is different and unique in their own way. So if you are always dreading having to blog because you think your writing isn't audience-worthy, just do it anyways. Write whatever you want to, whatever floats your boat.

Colored Coffee Cups

I'm sitting in my youth room right now thinking about what to blog about. A girl next to me told me to write about some colorful coffee cups up by the bar. So I sat down at the nice new Mac and logged on...The cups are hanging upside down from a rack hung up from the ceiling by chains. They almost appear to be floating in thin air, still and motionless. The colors blend in very well with the beigeish-white colored wall behind it. The cups are of a lime green, navy blue and grayish whitish color. Overall the cups add a very relaxed sort of touch to the room. The light coming from the center of the room casts their shadows on the wall. Someone opens the door to the room and a slight gust comes in from the outdoors. The mugs jingle quietly for a minute and then are silent again.

Unique Experiences

Some people have unique experiences everyday. Others only have them once a year. I had a very special unique experience the other day. It was one of those types of experiences that you've seen somewhere before and think that it'll never happen to you. Mine happened on Saturday during our soccer game in Byron. I had a "run in" with one of the goal posts as I almost scored a goal on a cross in. I had seen the same play before on YouTube somewhere about a year earlier. At that point I had laughed hysterically at the person to whom it occurred. However, after experiencing the exact same type of accident and feeling the same type of pain, I feel very guilty for laughing at him. Last night I watched the clip on YouTube again with some friends, but with a different perspective this time. When it came to the "pole split," all my friends laughed like crazy. I was reminded of my pain and felt a lot of empathy for that soccer player. I am glad now that I had that experience, however uncomfortable it may have been at the time. Not many people can honestly say that they have had such an experience (as a complete accident nonetheless), so I guess I now have some sort of bragging right.  (If you want to see the video just go to YouTube and search for "soccer pole crotch hit")

The Power of Music

The power of music is absolutely amazing. Have you ever thought about how much of an impact songs can have on people? So many different emotions are stirred up inside you when you hear music. Sometimes when you hear a beautiful Mozart piece you feel relaxed and smart. Or you might hear a BackStreet Boys song and you just wish you could sing like them and you could get any girl you want to. Maybe heavy metal gets you psyched up and you feel like you could take on the whole world. Rap could make you feel all cool and give you the impression that you really are a gansta at heart. How about soul/gospel music? When I hear gospel songs I am sometimes convinced that I am truly black on the inside. While we're still down in the southern styles, why don't we take a look at the jazz. Jazz is such an easy going genre, you feel like all your worries have just gone all away. Or you could take it the opposite way with some blues and you feel like you can actually relate to others' problems. Of course then there is still country, all twangy and western sounding. With their funny voices you just wonder why anyone would sing like that. Yet somehow we always find ourselves trying to sing like when we hear country rhythms or western sounding music. There are so many great things about music where would we be without it?

American Dream

What ever happened to "American Dream?" What is it exactly? For some people it seems to have been over for a long time and for others it happening right now. When I think of the American Dream, I think back to the 50's and 60's. I picture a perfect little family with a couple boys and girls in the family. The father is a successful small business man or a teacher or some other respected occupation. The mother is a stay-at-home-mom, always working hard around the house to make the rest of the family feel safe and comfortable. She always has pancakes, eggs, and bacon ready for the kids and her husband in the morning before they head off to school and work and then a nice hot dinner ready by the time the husband comes home from work that evening. The kids are polite, but get into trouble just as any normal kids do (except for those few kids who ARE perfect). The oldest son is a senior in high school. He's a part of the football, basketball, and track teams, proudly wearing his letterman's jacket around town. He's got his fancy new car in which he takes all the ladies proudly all around town in. The second son is a freshmen in high school and is more into music. He's in a garage band with some of his best buds and they have their first gig at a local diner on friday night after the football game. That is just a little bit of the mental picture I have when I think of the "American Dream."

Hide-and-go-seek!

Have you ever thought that hide-and-go-seek should be a sport? How is hide-and-go-seek not good enough to be considered a sport? Take basketball for instance. Why do people neccessarily thing that putting a ball through a net is more fun than hide-and-go-seek. Both are games that require a certain amount of skill, training, enthusiasm, and luck and they are both games that you can play with your friends. So why is basketball a sport and hide-and-go-seek is not? Boxing is considered a sport, but all they do is violently punch and hit each other until one is simply to weak to stand any longer. Why is that a sport? Or even chess! I'm not sure that a lot of people would consider chess a sport, but they have international chess tournaments with the winner be rewarded with money, trophies, and glory. How on earth can you consider chess and sport and not hide-and-go-seek!? I have never heard of an international hide-and-go-seek match. If there were though, I'm almost positive that more people would tune in to watch that than to watch a 3 hour long chess match. You just don't hear people on the street saying, "I'll betcha 5 buckaroos that Sean "The Sneak" McSeekster will win the National HAGS (standing for hide-and-go-seek) Tournament on Friday night by finding everybody in under 2 minutes!" You just don't hear that...but wouldn't it be interesting if you did?

What to blog about...

What to blog about...you would think that with so many interesting things in this world, the topic of one simple blog would be very easy to choose. However, I am (and I'm sure I'm not alone in this) having a hard time thinking of a subject to write about. Perhaps I am just thinking too hard and missing some of the easier options. Just like that saying about concentrating so hard on the trees that you miss the forest, or vice virsa. As the minutes tick by and my train of thought picks up as little speed as a snail would going uphill against the wind, I become no more enlightened in my search for the right blog topic. Oho! I just looked at the bottom of my screen where it has some examples for post names. The three examples are "scooters", "vacation", and "fall." Seeing how I know nothing about scooters, nor do I own one, I will not write about those. Vacation is already over so I don't feel like writing about that either. That leaves me with the topic of fall. But after all this writing aboout what to write about, why should I bother to write about something new? I think that I shall conclude this blog shortly, seeing how it has not gone anywhere productive. How do I decide how to conclude an indecisive blog though? Perhaps with a question?