Sunday, January 20, 2008

Late Christmas in the Smokies

Right now, I am in a cabin in Gatlinburg, TN with Alex's family. We have watched a bunch of movies and played munchkin and SoC. Yesterday, Alex and I search the town for a sports bar that was showing the UFC but we didn't fine one. Apparently, the UFC hasn't caught on in TN. It snowed yesterday and we rode some go carts. It was pretty fun, but cold. We also visited this shop
the artist, who was really nice and welcoming, had a gallery upstairs with an awesome swirly floor. We were really impressed with one painting but I didn't have the $ to shell out for it and $24 print really didn't do the work justice. Maybe later, I will add it to my wish list. Today , we might be going ice skating or to a magic show. I found a cool black light indoor mini golf place that looked like fun. It's hard to plan activities for 15 people. We'll see what the day brings. I miss my puppies but my sweet family is taking care of them.

Ciao!

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Wanderlust



The weather has been great this week! The high temp most days has been over 70 degrees. I keep catching myself thinking of springtime activities and I get all depressed when I realize its still early January. I guess I shouldn't be wishing my life away.


I just finished reading Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. My crazy neighbor gave me the book before she went way crazy. I didn't realize it was a movie until I started looking for the cover art a minute ago. My cover looks like this:




I hate it when a movie comes out and the book covers change to the film art. I'm glad I got to this one before it was ruined. The book was good. If you haven't read it, its about a young man that leaves his family and a bright future to roam the country. He meets interesting people and has a lot of adventures but ends up dead in a bus in the Alaskan wilderness. I have trouble figuring out if I should admire him for living life by his own rules and taking chances or if I should think that he is selfish for putting himself in harms way and making his poor family and friends worry. Now I remember why I don't read non-fiction (except weblogs, Bust, and Game Informer). I get stuck on this stuff and can't get it out of my head. Dragons, wizards, and vampires really aren't that deep. I should stick with them. Now I want to hit the road, get rid of everything and not be held prisoner by my possessions. I was tempted to go out and buy some Tolstoy, Thoreau, and London-and I still may- but I got a different book. I am hoping its going to make me want to sit on the couch, play video games, and hoard things (just kidding). It's called Death of a Squire. Hehe, the title is making me feel lazy already.


Wednesday, January 2, 2008

we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet. . .

Happy New Year! I am making two resolutions this year besides the usual eat right and exercise one.

1. I am going to post more often. For some reason it's important to me. I don't know why. It just always seems to be the easiest thing to forget. I am a list maker, I write lists for everything: movies I want to see, music I want to try, games I want to play, books I need to read, sites I want to visit, and the usual groceries, chores, and to-do's. Blogging is going on the list or maybe it will have its own list.

2. I am going to stop swearing. This is pretty self-explanatory. I don't really have a potty mouth or anything but I got into an argument with my crazy neighbor the other day about our dogs and how he and his wife are insane and all. I thought he was going to hit me, it was scary- really. I used some profanity, I was really ashamed of myself. I felt like a big red neck. I am not going to let that happen again.

Christmas was kind of strange this year. I've had a growing problem with the way it celebrated for a while now and this year my family decided not to buy gifts and to just enjoy each other and remember the whole reason that we celebrate. It's kind of hard to explain to everyone that I am not buying gifts anymore. Everyone that I talk to thinks that we are being anti-Christian or that we are just trying not to conform. I don't understand how Christians can even go to the mall or watch poor people overextend themselves or have children that shred piles and piles of wrapping paper without even seeing their gifts and not be completely disgusted. I am not a scrooge. I am just confused about how I want to celebrate Christmas. I didn't even decorate and I was really annoyed when I passed home after home with giant blow up snow globes and santas in the yards. I started thinking about the people overseas that make the giant snowglobes and santas and I can't imagine where they think that they will end up. Surely, they would be surprised if they knew that they would be on a bunch of peoples front lawns. I hate those things. I want to pop one.