Happy belated back to school everybody!!! This is my first of what will most likely be many late nights. Oh well, this one is somewhat optional. I could technically go to bed with all of my homework due tomorrow done, but there’s other things I wanted to do. Like write this post.
To whoever first said that Senior year is the best – so far, you are dead on. This year has started out in such a kickass manner. Much of this can be accredited to a certain event that took place last Thursday: the arrival of the long-awaited Blink-182 concert withFall Out Boy and Panic! At the Disco (yes, for all of you who do not know, the “!” has been reinserted into the band name) (also, Chester French was there, but they really aren’t worth mentioning. but I guess I just did).
Blink-182….. HOLY HELL
Blink… where to start… quick history. Quoting wikipedia:
After being expelled from Poway High School, Tom DeLonge attended Rancho Bernardo High Schoolwhere he became friends with Anne Hoppus. DeLonge often expressed wanting to be in a band, so in August 1992 Anne introduced him to her brother Mark Hoppus, who also wanted to be in a band.[14]The two played for hours in DeLonge’s garage, showing each other songs they had previously written, and writing new songs together. One of these songs would eventually become what is now “Carousel”.[15]That night the two decided they needed to officially start a band, so DeLonge recruited friend Scott Raynor, who he had met at his school’s Battle of the Bands competition. The three began playing together and called themselves Duck Tape, until DeLonge thought of the name Blink.[15]
The band practiced constantly, which angered Hoppus’s girlfriend.[15]She told him he had to choose between the band and her, so he left the band just as it was starting. DeLonge then informed Hoppus that he borrowed a 4-track from a friend and he and Raynor were using it to make a demo tape. Upon hearing this, Hoppus decided he would leave his girlfriend and return to the band.
Not that it was necessarily the right thing to do, but thank God Hoppus left his girlfriend.
Also, I just wanna throw in the fact that Raynor eventually left Blink and was replaced by Travis Barker.
They started back in ‘92 (yeeeeeaaa ‘92!) but I didn’t really hear any of their stuff until Rachel bought Enema of State in ‘99. Blink was one of those bands where you fall in love with them or dislike them the second you hear a song. They’re primarily a punk rock band, but there’s so much more that goes into them that make them so great. The first song of theirs I heard was “All the Small Things” and I was hooked.
Anyway, I loved the band. Throughout any type of music phase I’ve ever been in, Blink’s always been a band I’d be up for listening to. When my family was living in Columbus, IN for a few months my 5th grade year, Blink was a way me and Kristina bonded. Both of us had all of our friends back at Westfield, so there really wasn’t anything to do in Columbus (we were home-schooled during that small stay in Columbus). When we weren’t in school, adventuring in town, or running, we would listen to Take Off Your Pants And Jacket, which had been released in 2001. We loved Give Me One Good Reason. It’s rebellious, it’s funny, and the music’s good too.
Near the end of 2003, Blink released a self-title album that made you do a musical double-take. It was blink, and it still had the blink attitude, but it wasn’t like the previous four other albums (yes I know I’ve only mentioned two of the previous four). If I had to describe the change, I would say the focus shifted from the punk attitude to the sound of the music. The combination is amazing. What I would have to say is my favorite of all the Blink songs, Always, is on the album.
The album was right up there next to System with how much I listened to it throughout middle school. In fact, I might have listened to them a little bit more, because most other people preferred Blink over System.
Then, the hiatus…
To make a long story extremely short, there was a lot of tension going on. The tension caused DeLonge to quit the band in early 2005. He went on to create his own band, Angels & Airwaves, while the other two stayed together as +44. It was sad, but there was a ton of Blink to listen to, and the other bands were good too.
In 2008, Baker was involved in a plane crash, killing all but himself and one other. While in the hospital, the other two members visited. Who knows if it had anything to do with it, but on February 8th, 2009, Blink officially was back together. I nearly pissed myself.
Then I figured out that I was going to get to see them live. I virtually pissed myself.
Going into the concert, I was really wondering how they would be. Most of the punk rock attitude that Blink had was because of DeLonge. However, his band Angels & Airwaves sounded like the exact opposite of punk. The music is amazing, it just doesn’t seem like the blink style at all. My favorite song from AVA would have to be The Adventure.
AVA gave me the impression that DeLonge had… matured? (Word choice, bleh). Because of that, I didn’t know if it would be the same Blink or a new style of music. Well, the things he said at the concert gave me that answer:
Tom: “This next song’s about Mark Hoppus’s (body part)”
Mark: “Is it called ‘The Great Adventure?’”
Tom: “No! All the Small Things!”
Instead of “She gave me roses by the stairs” in All the Small Things, she gave him something else, making the song very sexual.
“WHO TOOK THAT GUYS SHIRT! You Indiana people are all perverted, stealing each others shirts. Somebody give him his shirt back, you Indiana pervs!”
“I smell (illegal drug)!”
(In the middle of a song) “BUUUURRRRRRRPPPP”
“We are making musical love to you”
“Two words: Strawberry Yogurt. This shit is delicious!”
Those are the just the ones I can remember off the top of my head. Point is, it’s the same old Blink I’ve grown up with, and I loved it. The concert blew me away. Even Danny, who’s been to like, 20 concerts, said this one was the best. Everything about it was great. The music, the band members, the lights, the drum solo encore with Barker being lifted and spun around in the air, facing up to the sky at one point, everything…. It was a night I’m never going to forget. BLINK!!!!!!!!!!!!
So, I really don’t know if anyone actually is going to read this, seeing how this is from junior year and we’re not in Haffley’s class anymore. Man, that thoughts a sad panda. =( Anyway, I thought I’d just ramble on for a bit because I have nothing else to do but I have to keep my computer on for another 35 minutes. I’m backing up my hard drive onto a external hard drive, so the whole copy paste method takes a bit of time and I really don’t feel like going through the process again once I’ve already gotten it started.
This year’s been crazy. Since about this time last year, so much has come and gone and changed and twisted and turned and mutated and – you get the point. And I’d have to say that along with how crazy its been, I’ve most likely felt any and every single emotion that exists. Looking back on last summer and the school year, I gotta ask myself why I caused half the shit that happened. Then there’s a part of me that says hey, take a step back. Maybe some of this stuff wasn’t so bad after all. I mean, of course both bad and good things are gonna happen during the year. Honestly, with where I’m at now, I wouldn’t change a whole lot if I got the chance. Maybe I wouldn’t have signed up for community service during the year. Or in the summer after I dropped it during the school year. It’s not a big deal, but I feel bad have to tell Mr. Klingler that I was dropping it AGAIN and had to wait until spring semester next year. Oh well, like I said, craziness…
Summer started out with a bang, thats for sure. The mood kinda got set with the crash course that was the end of the school year. AP exams and finals mixed with baseball and actually trying to hang out juuuussssssttttt a little bit with friends basically caused an overload. But hey, the two that have always been there for me helped out when I needed it and I pulled through that period just fine. Actually, better than fine, I somehow pulled off raising my Cum. GPA to 4.12. Sweet! Now I’m just afraid to see my AP Chem ezam score… eek =P
When school ended I was still a junior because baseball was still going on. Somewhere between returning back to baseball as a catcher and the end of the high school season I was transformed into a relief pitcher, and got to throw in the majority of the varsity games at the end of the season. I closed both the games in sectionals, and threw a complete game to win the regional championship. I don’t know what we were more excited about, making it to semi-state or simply beating Crawfordsville. They’ve always been the team to knock us out of the tournament in the past. Also, they won state last year and were ranked second this year. So beating them was reeeeaaaalllllyyyyy nice. Unfortunately, we got beat last Saturday by a team known as the West Vigo Vikings. My hats off to you guys, you were good. No offense, Andrean will most like whoop you. Can’t do much when over half of the other teams starting lineup are D1 recruits.
So now that that’s all done and fine and dandy, its okay to actually relax a little right? Y’know, sleep in some, go out and have some fun, just kinda enjoy summer? I mean, I’m enjoying summer don’t get me wrong. But yeah, no, relaxing’s not how I work. It’s kinda easy to see in the fact that instead of just laying down for 15 more minutes, I’m typing this. Constantly doing something has always been a part of me. It makes life interesting. What’s life without organized chaos, yknow?
So what’s going on with life now? Lets see…
Well, I’m babysitting from 10-2 every day. I did this last year, and had so much fun I came back to the family. I “watch” an 11 year old boy as well as an 11 and 8 year old girls, and I use the quotation marks because the majority of the time I think I’m more into whatever game we’re playing than they are. Not that they don’t have fun, they love it. I just feel like a little kid again, it’s great. Mainly as a joke from last year, I used to call the kids “the maggots” based off of the title the band Slipknot gives to their fans. They look up to me, and that makes me feel really good. Eventually, I got pretty close to them and stopped calling them maggots. Now they’re simply the kids.
Travel baseball started the day after we lost to West Vigo. I pitched a complete game shutout, so I guess I’m still in the swing of things. This years going to be a lot of fun, my teammates are great to play with.
My girlfriend’s in Japan… wtf??? Yeah, but at the same time kinda cool. I mean, I’ve never left America, so to me Japan sounds pretty awesome.
DANNY GOT HIS HAIR CUT!!! AHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He was doing locks of love, so now his hair’s really short. I’ve been told he looks kinda like me.
College stuff…. do I really need to get into that? Actually, it’s my post, so as the creator, I refuse to even if you wanted me to.
Besides that, most of the other stuff just kinda branches from one of the above. I’m usually up and constantly doing things from when I wake up around 7:30 until about 9:30 or 10 at night, when I can watch tv with my dad or talk on the phone. It’s exhausting, but it’s been a lot of fun so far.
My hard drive only has 3 minutes left so I’m getting off of here now to edit/format, but goodnight to anyone who actually might read this someday!
For our Spring Break trip, we (the baseball team) went to Louisville to play a couple of games against Providence H.S. It was a quick trip but was a lot of fun.
First stop was at Victory Field just as we left. We got to go into the dugout and just “get over the awe” as our coach put it. We’ll be playing there during the Marion County tournament and the State Finals are also held at the field. It was funny, I had fallen asleep basically right away on the bus, so when somebody woke me up and said “We’re in Louisville,” I actually believed them until I looked out the window. Fail. Then later we started pulling out of the parking lot and Brad was still in the bathroom. Again, Fail.
Once we got down there we drove by Providence to check out their field. The school looked like a prison, I have a picture of it on my phone. The field itself was pretty odd; there was no warning track and the fences were DEEP. It was 360′ at the corners and 440′ in center. To kind of put that into perspective for some of you, a Major League ballpark is usually between 320′-340′ in the corners and about 420′ in center if its a deep fence. Needless to say there were no home runs, although there were a few that would have easily cleared Brebeuf’s fences.
After seeing the field, we went to the Louisville Bat Factory, where the majority of all wooden baseball bats (any age, any league) are made. The tour was pretty awesome, and we all got free mini-bats. Those things were a nice form of entertainment – sword fighting, drums, just poking people, anything to keep us busy really. I also bought this key-chain thing, which I’m sure you’ll see me with at some point or another. It’ll be good during a class that has a workday and I’ve finished my work, because I’ll just sit there and play with it.
The hotel that night was hilarious. I played Euchre with three of my teammates. My partner had never played before, and we still managed to score 8 points. It was great though, he’d get really lucky and we’d all flip out laughing because he had no clue of what was going on. Today on the bus ride back it was even better; he was wondering of he should go alone. I let him ask his partner (which thankfully wasn’t me this time) and all of a sudden his partner cracks up and turns over his cards: he was asking if he should go alone with both the left and right bowers and the ace and king of the trump. Fail Wes. Fail. Actually, you win. But still.
The games went alright, we split when we should have won both games. But as our coach put it, we were bound to lose at some point or another this season, might as well get it out of the way. We’ll just take it to Avon Wednesday and get back on track.
Most people go places or hang out with friends and all that. I’ve just been lazy and relaxing. The only time I do something for more than an hour is baseball. It feels so good to just slow down. That being said, I am excited to go back to school and see everyone again. But still, this is so nice. Very much needed.
Soooo this is hilarious, our class is talking about different ways to ask a girl to Prom.
So far, my JV baseball coach has – oh GOD people quit asking me! – come up with the best idea. His senior year, he plotted with his friends. They laid out Hershey Kisses into every classroom that she had, and then had a trail leading up to her bedroom before she got home. When she walked in, he said, “Now that I’ve kissed the ground you’ve walked on all day, will you go to Prom with me?” It was a great discussion during practice.
I gotta say, people are having some good ideas as to what to do. The sign in the entrance was pretty good, except Mary kinda missed seeing the sign. Good job, Mary.
Gault’s cookies were pretty awesome, and even Baker approved of the idea. Can’t really miss cookies laid out on a desk.
Grant’s idea was… a typical Grant move, but still funny. He was the one who put up the paper’s on the ceiling.
The idea of using the “un-cool” wasn’t bad, but I think it wasn’t the best knowing the fact that people hardly listen to the announcements.
Honestly, I think it’s a little better to do something outside of school. I mean, friends think it’s cute when it happens, but you can be a little more personal outside of school.
And thanks to whoever it was that drew the attention AWAY from me just a few minutes ago. hahaha
Welcome, to the soldier side,
Where theres no one here but me
People all grow up to die,
There is no one here but me.
When System of a Down began to produce their fourth album, the original plan was for it to be a special, two-disk set. Somewhere along the road however (and actually very close to the 2005 release date), they decided to add some more songs and break up the two disc set. Even though there were more songs and different release dates, the band still decided to have the two albums run along the same theme. The second album had an extra slot so the two cases connected, and Mesmerize/Hypnotize was born.
The way the two albums were produced together is amazing. You can tell that they are similar in overall mood, but each song is entirely different. Mesmerize has a bit more of an angrier, in your face type attitude about it while Hypnotize is more along the lines of an aggressive sadness, if that makes sense to any of you music junkies out there. It’s hard to really explain the two… you have to be a fan of SOAD to truely understand it. Danny, you know what I’m talking about.
Anyway, the opening song on the Mesmerize album (the first one released) is called Soldier Side Intro. THe lyrics you will find posted above. It’s definently not a bad opening at all, especially when it precedes the best song ever made by SOAD, the beastly B.Y.O.B.. However, I also wondered why they stuck into on there. I mean, I know it is one, but usually bands don’t do that. The good ones, anyway. But it all made since when Hypnotize came out. Along with the whole idea of connecting the two albums, the closing song on Hypnotize is Soldier Side. In my opinion, it’s the best track of the CD. While the two albums have this overall aggressive, upbeat pace to it, Soldier Side is nothing of the sort. It’s… a very sad song actually. But the emotion and everything that pours into the song is great. Listen for yourself, and tell me what you think.
System of a Down: Soldier Side
Dead men lying on the bottom of the grave
Wondering when savior comes, is he gonna be saved
Maybe you’re a sinner into your alternate life
Maybe you’re a joker, maybe you deserve to die
They were crying when their sons left
God is wearing black
He’s gone so far to find no hope
He’s never coming back
They were crying when their sons left
All young men must go
He’s come so far to find the truth
He’s never going home
Young men standing on the top of their own graves
Wondering when Jesus comes, are they gonna be saved
Cruelty to the winner, bishop tells the king his lies
Maybe you’re a mourner, maybe you deserve to die
They were crying when their sons left
God is wearing black
He’s gone so far to find no hope
He’s never coming back
They were crying when their sons left
All young men must go
He’s come so far to find no truth
He’s never going home
Welcome to the soldier side
Where there is no one here but me
People all grow up to die
There is no one here but me
Welcome to the soldier side
There is no one here but me
People on the soldier side
There is no one here but me
Okay, so not Monty Python. More of, Honors 11 English. But Still.
Who I am and where my beginning lies…
Well, (just so you know I’m going to try to keep this somewhat informal), I really don’t know how to describe myself. I’m a bit of an oddball, which is okay by me, I wouldn’t want to be a normal type of person. So I really don’t take offense at being called weird. If you want a better description, talk to my friends. You’ll probably get something similar. As far as where my beginning lies, I’d say the most accurate “beginning” for me would definently be when I decided to go to Brebeuf. It’s really changed me, the past three years…
Strengths…
I don’t like thinking about strengths a whole lot. I’m a perfectionist, so naturally I don’t see a lot of strengths in me. I guess my biggest two is that I’m pretty smart acedemically and I’m easy to talk to. I like to have fun a lot, so I guess my attitudes not bad, either. But thats about it.
Only a partial person? Yessss I think I always will be. Life finds creative ways of reminding us that none of us are actually God, and we tend to forget that a lot. We can always learn from experiences; we can always learn to be better people than we currently are. At least, that’s how I see it. It’s whether or not we choose to see those opportunities to learn that determines how they affect us.
So, the actual hunt:
As far as what I went for, I hunted for any item I was able to figure out. Like I just wrote, I think there is always more that can be done for me to improve as a person, in any area. Whether there is something that is a strenghth or a weakness, I think any improvement is beneficial.
So, what were the results? Here’s what I found
Courage = Crayon. It makes me think about artists. It takes a lot of courage to be an artist, because an artist is putting their best work out in the public, completely vulnerable to open rejection and criticism.
Compassion = Hand. Lending a hand to others – it can be one of the most meaningful things to the person being helped without you having a clue of what you’re doing. That’s happened to me, the other person didn’t have an idea at first…
Humor = Smiley Face. Pretty self-explanatory. Humor can make anyone’s mood brighter. Even if someone is really upset, dark humor can do more than you think. Also, smiling is contagious, it’s been scientifically proven.
Joy = Sucker. All I can say is this: Everytime my mom took me to the bank when I was a little kid, the people there would give me a sucker along with the money. It made my day.
Faith = Star. Yeah, that’s basically right on the button. The stars are always something you can look up to and regain your faith from. Even when you can’t see them, they’re always there. They can do wonders if you let them……I did…**********************************************************************
Patience = Thread. Threading things are hard! Don’t let it drive you insane, just keep trying, you’ll thread the needle eventually.
Perserverence = Stone. Stones put up with a lot of hardship. They always hang in there though. Goes well with patience.
I really enjoyed doing this whole hunt. It was a lot of fun, and deep reflections are always great. I wish I had more time to do more reflections…
Anyway, I’m going to go take a look at faith before going to bed. Yay dreams! =D
Entries (RSS)