Well, I've got a paper to write, so of course I'm finding other things to do before it comes right down to the last minute.

I was thinking to myself that I should start writing music again, but I think the reason the music I wrote in the past always sucked so much was because I really didn't have anything to say with my lyrics. I would strum out some chord progression I liked, make up some weak little melody, and then slap on some crappy lyrics that I would write in about a day. Perfect recipe for suckage. The one song that I wrote that I can still stand to listen to is one that I didn't even write the lyrics for; it's based on a poem that was written by the girl I dated my senior year of high school (hi, Sarah!). It's solid poetry, and I really like the tune, but whenever I play it for people they just tune out. And I can see why, really; it's pretty repetitive, and you can only hear the same chord progression so many times before you're ready for something else.

But you would think that since I'm in college studying music practically 24/7, I'd be writing like a madman. This, however, is not the case. Since coming to school, I haven't written a single song. The closest I've come was my first semester here when I was thinking about writing a song about how awkward it was to have a gay roommate (even got as far as a nice chord progression... but then, same problem: shortage of lyrics that aren't high in suckitude). Since then, I've gotten over my homophobia but not my writer's block. But now that I think about it, I can't even call it writer's block; I never had anything to block in the first place. My experience in life, thus far, has just been normal. No suicidally depressing lows, no mind-blowing highs, just some stuff that sucked and some other stuff that was pretty cool. I've got no major political stances, no spiritual agenda, and no special insight into what God has to say to anybody else. Heck, I'm lucky if I can figure out what He's trying to say to me, and even if I could I doubt I'd want to lay it out in song for all the world to see/hear.

Okay, time to change the subject. If, for some strange reason, you have some great insight into this or simply would like to offer me a word or two of good advice, shoot me an email or give me a call and we'll talk. And if you have neither my email address or phone number, then how the heck did you find me here?

So Bryan and I went down to New Braunsfeld and went "Toobing" down the river. It was quite fun; we met Bryan's friend Carly, and her friend Nina, and we all went and got nice and cold in the river water. On our ride down the lazy river, we encountered a massive number of groups of inebriated individuals who had also decided to take advantage of the sunny weather and cold water. After all of that, all I have to say is this: after you reach a certain degree of largeness, you really should stop making that bikini. Sizes 0-18 is enough. Once you reach a size 44, you are no only encouraging a person of that size to wear such a thing, you're forcing everyone else on the river that day to see it. That kind of thing should be a crime. In fact, I'll bet it is a crime in Canada. Canada, after all, is awesome. And in an awesome country 300-pound women would almost certainly wear very large overcoats to swim.

Listening to - SE 101 by Ace Troubleshooter

You can't go home again... I guess.

I'm heading to Hinton again. Sarah Ray needs a ride and can't get a train ticket, so I'm using that as an excuse to help my family unpack in their new house. Not sure how it's going to work out, but we'll get it somehow.

Well, sometimes you just don't know how to feel.

I left my house in Hinton yesterday for the last time. I know that moving isn't such a big deal for lots of people, and there's a ton of folks who have done it several times in their life. But me, I've always had that house. In fact, the house was built in preparation for my birth... I've been living in it since day one. Even when my parents got divorced and my dad moved us in with his parents while the courts decided how to divy up the marriage, my mom was still living there. Then when the divorce became final, dad got the house and custody of Rob and I (among other things).

In the end, all I could do yesterday was give my dad a hug and walk out the door. Had I really put any thought into at that point, had I let myself really think about what leaving my house meant, I probably wouldn't have made it to my car without breaking down. Gosh, it's just a house! Why do I care so much? My family's intact, everybody's alive, and the new house is really great (though hardly an upgrade, in my own humble opinion). I shouldn't be moping about over something like this; Josh and Lorie will be happier, and dad and Jason will probably be just fine, and they're the only ones who will ever actually live in the house. Rob and I are in Texas for school and hardly make it up to Oklahoma more than two or three times a year, so we don't have any room to complain (not that Rob would; he was never one for emotional attachments).

Losing my train of thought, time to go elsewhere. Happy birthday, dad.

Listening to - Man of God by Audio Adrenaline

Well, tomorrow I'm going home to Hinton, Oklahoma. This will probably be the last time I ever spend the night in the house I grew up in... and I don't like it one bit.

Initially, I chalked up my dissatisfaction with the move up to the fact that sometimes I react badly to change. For instance, whenever a girl I'm dating gets a haircut and radically changes the style, no matter how much I may like the hairstyle my first reaction is always, "Why did you do that?" instead of, "Hey, that looks nice." And so when dad first told me he'd bought a house in Oklahoma City, I felt the temptation to say, "Why?" and instead said "Well, I guess that's good." Right now, I'm wishing I'd let myself get upset about it. I don't want to leave my house. I don't care that I don't live there, and I don't really care that I'm only there for maybe two weeks out of the year anymore. That's my house, that's my town, and by golly I'm going to miss it. I'll miss being able to bring people home and tell me how beautiful my house is. I'll miss seeing their reactions to how small and quaint the town is. After this week, I won't be able to bring people home to sleep in "The Cave" (props to Mandie for naming the bedroom in my basement). I'll miss having people over to sit in the hot tub, I'll miss the patio that I helped stain while Roy MacLemore built it for us.

I love that place.

Okay, I can't talk about this anymore.

Okay, this just irks me. Not to hate on my friend, but today I saw this as her away message:

"Wait for the boy who will drop everything for you at any time of the day just to see you, whether it be the best or worst circumstances. Wait for the boy that will make an ordinary moment seem magical. Wait for the boy that you can't help but smile when you see, and when he smiles you know he needs you. Wait for the boy who will be your best friend, the one who wants to show you off to the world even in your sweats and with no makeup on just because...but most of all, wait for the boy who will put you in the center of the universe because he's obviously in the center of yours..."

That, my friends, is a big fat honkin' bunch of baloney. Romanticized bull without the slightest hint of actual thought behind it. Consider for a moment how selfish and childish that sounds.

"Wait for the boy who will drop everything for you at any time of the day just to see you, whether it be the best or worst circumstances."

The fact of the matter is, people are people. There are going to be times when a guy is going to want to be around people besides you. This doesn't mean he doesn't like you, it doesn't even mean that he's not in love with you. All that this means is that he has friends, relatives, and other such people in his life who are not you, and from time to time he likes to see them, too. In fact, if you're dating the guy at all, then he's probably not a huge loser and likely has a job (assuming he's not still in school). Would you expect him to risk getting fired by cutting out on work, just because you aren't happy about the slightest thing? If he is still in school, are you going to make him cut class because you can't make yourself happy for a lousy hour and a half? If you really require that kind of affection, get a dog.

"Wait for the boy that will make an ordinary moment seem magical."

You know what? There are times when I don't much feel like talking. Sometimes, I don't feel like trying to be funny. Sometimes, I just want to sit there and not have to cater to your every whim. Don't get me wrong, one of my favorite things ever is to take a girl out and make her feel like an absolute queen, but sometimes you're going to have to put up with a little bit of monotony and quite a few "ordinary moments." Guys do not exist for the sole purpose of fulfilling your every romantic fantasy, any more than you exist for the purpose of fulfilling our sexual fantasies.

"Wait for the boy that you can't help but smile when you see, and when he smiles you know he needs you."

So I guess that means that if you see your guy once and you don't smile at him, then you don't really love him? Man, that sucks. I'd hate to be the boyfriend of the girl who actually believes that line.

Also, why do you want to be needed? Do you have any idea how draining it is to be needed? This is why girls don't date needy guys; if a guy calls too many times in the first few weeks of a relationship, the girl stops calling back because they think he's "creepy" or "too aggresive." No, he's not. He's just being that very guy that you girls seem to think you want, but really don't.

"Wait for the boy who will be your best friend, the one who wants to show you off to the world even in your sweats and with no makeup on just because..."

Girls don't date their best friends. Girls' best friends are always "like a brother" or they don't "see him that way." Any girl who claims that her boyfriend is her best friend is only fooling themselves. Simply put, the kind of relationship you have with your boyfriend is substantially different than one you can have with a "friend." It's a completely different dynamic, and that's why we have a different word for it. Just because you're closest to that person doesn't mean they're your best friend.

The whole make-up and sweats thing... when are girls going to wake up and realize that pretty much every guy EVER is going to find you so much more attractive when you're not wearing make-up, when your hair is just pulled back or simply left down, and when you're just wearing whatever clothes make you feel the most comfortable. However, even though girls seem to think they want a guy like this, I've only met one girl in my lifetime who actually listened to me when I said, "You know, you really don't need the make-up." Instead, most of them freak out and can't believe I would suggest something so audacious as allowing your face to breath the clean air.

"but most of all, wait for the boy who will put you in the center of the universe because he's obviously in the center of yours..."

No. No, no, no. That is something that should be completely reserved for marriage. This sort of co-centric co-dependent relationship in a pre-marriage situation only leads to your friends disliking your significant other, resenting you for ignoring them, and just developing a feeling of bitterness towards you as a couple. When this happens, when you adopt this mentality, you're telling everybody around you that they're only important to you when you're not dating somebody. It makes your friends feel like your back-up, your "contingency plan" for when your significant other is busy. Good luck getting those same friends to invite you to stuff when you've broken up with your boyfriend for not smiling at you.

---

There may be a somewhat bitter tone to this post, but I should say that I'm not writing it out of a spirit of resentment. Things like this just rub me the wrong way. We live in a real world, and we need to stop pretending that we're each living our own personal fairy tale. Eventually, everyone around you is going to fail you.

Listening to: Layla by Eric Clapton