i havent been able to post on here for a while and it sucks. ive really gotten used to putting my thoughts on here over the past year, but now i am unable to.
heres the deal: the only computer i have access to on a regular basis (at work) now has a blocker so i cant go to this site anymore.
argh.
im thinking i may actually have to cave in and replace my six year old imac and actually buy a new computer. maybe. we'll see if i actually cave in...
friday
i was thinking about going home today because i thought everyone would be busy, but then i got a call from aaron asking if i wanted to hang out tonight. so i decided to wait until tomorrow.i headed back out to sandy pines for dinner to see my parents once more before i go home. when i got there they were about to start making the food, i had some time so i headed over to my sisters place to say hi to the kids. they are having some friends out there this weekend and they were all about to eat too, so i mostly just got to hold my niece so my sister could get everything ready. after about five minutes they were ready, so i said my goodbyes and head back to the folks. we ate burgers and chatted; it was nice. i told them my sad plight about the mp3 player, and they understood. after a funny 'stash' match between mom and dad and many laughs, i headed out.
i first stopped at best buy to return the mp3 player and get the money (i figure i will use this as the start of my saving for the nintendo wii) i went to the house and met up with aaron and steve. we spent a good hour trying to figure out what we should do tonight, during which rex called to find out the result- which turned into a very funny argument and an equally silly abrupt hang-up (on my part). we decided to watch a few episodes of animaniacs (which i had just bought on dvd). the show holds up surprisingly well considering its from 1993. one observation aaron made what that it was alot more 'a.d.d.' then we remembered, but thats what kept it fun!
soon after we met up with rex and jeffry lee at fridays. we hung out there for a few hours and had some fun discussions. i tell you what, i sure do like hanging out with those guys...
ill be heading home tomorrow afternoon, so i guess this ends the day-by-day account of the fun and excitement of this vacation back home. i dont usually like to use this blog as a journal like this, but i think i will really enjoy reading over these posts later and remembering the fun! i hope they havent been too boring to read...
thursday
i gave rex a call and met up with him for dinner tonight. he was downtown doing homework (no surprise there) so we met at logans. he was feeling really good because he had spend some time enjoying the late afternoon with some of his engineering buddies... we had a good meal and good conversation, it was nice because it was the first time i got to see him since ive been home. that guy has been way too busy on his class projects! oh well, only one more week then hes a free man (well, except for that whole job thing). around nine we met up with jeffry lee at the theater. we then proceeded to see 'lady in the water' (review forthcoming). when the credits were done we noticed a strange thing in the theater: there was a door at the top of the stadium seating with an exit sign above it. being rather adventuresum guys that we are, we decided to take it. we opened the door and found our selves on the second floor! how strange, the theater has a second floor! we lerked around for a bit trying to think of naughty things we could do up there, but then an employee walked by and killed any chance of our tomfoolery. so we headed to the stairs and went out to the cars. we stood around in the parking lot for a while talking about the movie and what ever else we wanted. eventually rex headed out (you know, work at 7:00am and all). but jeffry lee and i were not quite finished for the night. so we headed over to steak and shake and hung out for another hour or two. its kind of funny what kind of freaks and geeks youll find there at two in the morning...
wednesday
today was the big day: my birthday! i met up with my parents, sister, and brother-in-law for dinner. i got to choose the place to eat, so i picked ruby tuesdays. i havent been there in a long time and i really love their salads. jill and tim were pretty happy because they got to leave the kids at home with a babysitter- finally some peace and quite for them! at dinner my parents gave me my birthday gift: an mp3 player! i was quite excited, ive been wanting one for a while now. but heres the problem: i dont own a computer it will work on. i have an old imac from 2000, and the mp3 player only works on windows xp. a bit of a bother. my parents said i could bring it back and find one that would work. then i realize the full extent of my problem: sure, an ipod works on macs, but my mac is so old it runs on os9, and all ipods are only compatable with os10. lucky me. i guess i could keep this one and just load it up with songs when i come home to visit (even my computer at work doesnt have windows xp, so my parents laptop would be my only option). but that seems stupid. then i thought 'well, maybe i should get a new computer'. yeh, right, like ive got the money for that. and if i did id want the internet at home, which would be even more expensive. i dont know, maybe ill just bring it back and plan on getting one later.after dinner i met up with aaron. we hung out for a while and caught up on life. we wondered around target and meijers looking for season 1 of animaniacs, but wound up empty handed. soon after dusty called and wondered if we wanted to go out for the night. he had just finished taking the bar exam (he graduated from law school in may) and needed a little release. i was up for it, but aaron figured he should get a good night sleep for work the next day (i cant blame him, it was already 10:30 by then). so dusty, cary and i head out to what used to be lennys mexican grill. on the way we were all on our cell phones inviting anyone else we could think of to make the night even more fun. we were able to actually round up seven or eight people. so we talked and sang (it was karaoke night) the night away. certainly a fun way to spend a birthday!
tuesday
tuesday night i made plans to hang out with nathan & ang, and steve & cary and have burgers on the grill. i hadnt seen any of them in quite a while, so i was looking forward to catching up with all of them. nathan and i have been friends for a very long time, weve been friends and gone to school together from elementary school all the way through college. ang became friends with us on about day two of freshman year, and by about day 6 we all knew that they were going to get married. and they did. after dordt nate went to calvin seminary and has now been preaching up in canada for the past three years. they dont get a chance to come down very often, so it was really great to see them again. steve and i became friends freshman year of college, and we became friends of cary about 2 days later. by about day 6 it was obvious that they were going to get married. and they did. after dordt steve went to pharmacy school in sioux falls, and last year moved to west minneapolis. it was really great to see them as well.but heres the thing: they have kids. nates got two, steves got one. this fact totally changes everything. it was fun to see them again, but it was just so different. i am in a totally different world than they are at this point. just as we would start talking about something we would be interupted by one of the children screaming or getting into trouble. i know this is totally normal for couples with children, but ive never seen my friends in that light. another one of those times when i am forced to accept the fact that we are all growing old.
monday
after being awoken by my sisters phone calls, i got ready and headed over to see her and the kids. i picked up burger king for everyone on my way (jacksons favorite- mostly for the kids meal toys...). i hung out over there for a while and played with the kids.we went down to the play room and i asked jackson what he wanted to play with 'i wanna play legos!' now this i can appreciate! i played with legos all the time growing up, i loved to build cars and stuff, but my favorite was always building spaceships. the most coveted piece of legos in our house were anything that we could make into strange wings (oh, and the ones with bendy joints). i was curious as to what kind of stuff he liked to make with legos so i asked him 'what should we make?' out of the clear blue i get this response: 'a cactus'. what?!? this three and a half year old is given limitless possibilities of what to make, and he wants to make a cactus?!? maybe this kid is stranger than i thought...
that night i headed downtown grand rapids to meet up with sara and adam. we went to a pretty cool bar that had a super comfy sofa and lounge chair in the corner, so we took advantage. it had been quite a while since i have been able to talk with those two together, so we spent the evening catching up and discussing how we had each gotten to where we are. but, as usual with adam, it degressed into a 'remember when...' nastalgia-fest (which i totally love, so i didnt mind at all). finally we called it quits and i headed home for the day.
sunday
sunday morning came up quick on me. i had to pick up my gramma in the morning at her house and bring her out to sandy pines (if you dont know what sandy pines is, its kind of hard to explain. its a camp ground, but its more like a resort. most of the trailors dont move, and the main mode of transportation is golf carts. sounds wierd, but when i was younger it was the coolest thing ever!) so we could have lunch with my parents at their place. on the way there we were driving through the town of dorr and my gramma, out of the blue, starts pointing out building and telling stories about them. i had no idea, but she grew up around there! we were driving and she would say 'see that house? thats the house i was born in, right in the bedroom there!' what?!? that just struck me as so strange, first of all because i didnt know that, and second because she wasnt born in a hospital. we kept driving, 'see that cemetary? thats where my parents are burried' wow! how cool! it kind of makes me want to go to the cemetary and find out where they are. i must say, i got a pretty interesting history lesson on the way to lunch.later that day i headed back out to sandy pines with aaron and jeffry lee. we tooled around the place on the golf cart and saw a trailor that had recently burned down. cool. then we had hot dogs on the grill with my parents. it was really cool for me because my parents never really spend any time with my friends. they have become close with many of my sisters friends, and my dad will actually go golfing sometimes with her friends (actually, i guess that is kind of wierd, huh?) but they have never really been able to spend time with my friends. it was the first time they had met jeff and it had been a year or two since they had seen aaron, so we had a bit to talk about and stuff.
it was really fun. i dont just mean it was enjoyable, i mean it was a joyful, fulfilling, loving kind of fun.
after we got back we hung out at my parents house. zaagman came over and we headed to the backyard. it was really cool, we pulled out a few of my nephews toys and started playing. we played trackball and velcro ball (im sure youve seen those- its like baseball, but the mitts are flat and have velcro on the fronts). it felt like we were just kids having fun and playing in the backyard. it felt like i was ten years old again. i loved it!
around 10:30 aaron went home because it was getting late and he had to work, but the rest of us headed over to adams. we spent the rest of the night joking around, remebering the 'good old days', watching his new childrens tv show, and listening to really bad songs submitted to a record company. it was as silly and strange as it sounds.
saturday
saturday i headed to my parents house (after sleeping in far too long...). i actually didnt go to my parents house today because i didnt get there until much much later.i met up with jeffry lee at the mall. we chilled, ate dinner, then rummaged through the local k b toys store. i always like to go into toy stores and check out what 'those crazy kids' are into these days. (actually, i want to see if theres anything cool that i might want to get). unfortunately their transformers supply was severely lacking. so we moved on. after a brief stop in barnes and noble and gamestop, we headed over to the theater. we went to see clerks 2, which i thought was much funnier than i would care to admit (i feel guilty about it. and a little dirty.)
after that we headed over to jeffry lees house. i had never been there before, and as it turns out, he lives way out in bfe. after the seven hour journey, we arrived at his place and chilled for the night. there was much talking and laughing, mostly at the movie we decided to watch- bloodrayne. it was so bad you dont even want to know...
it was a good old time, and i eventually rolled into my parents place around 4:30am. if today is any indication, its going to be a rad week!
the long trip home
i headed back up to the ol' grand rapids for my one long visit. i try and make an extended visit at least once during the summer, it gives me a chance to catch up with as many people as i can. usually i only hang out with three or four friends when i come up, but during this trip its time to check in on all the old pals i can.i usually have a lot of fun while im up here, so i think i will try and keep this thing updated a bit better than i have been lately, so i can actually have an accounting of all the fun stuff i typically forget about in a week or two!
a strange craving
the other night i had a craving. this is wierd for me, i cant remember a time that ive ever had a really strong craving for something to eat or drink, but it hit me hard. i felt like i was a pregant woman or something. it was just wierd.i finally gave in. at about 11:50pm i quickly drove to the grocery store before it closed at 12 and bought a gallon of chocolate milk. when i got to the register the clerk gave me a strange look and said 'so, just the chocolate milk then?'
'yup.'
wedding crashers
this past weekend i went with my buddy rex to minnesota for the wedding of an old college friend. last weekend rex invited me to go along with him. he had actually been invited, i was just coming along with him to do the crashing!we left thursday in his car and immediately got caught up in crappy chicago traffic. one hour and 10 miles later, the actual road trip began. its been a while since i have been on a road trip with someone else, so it was a nice change of pace for me. we had a great time on the road, we caught up on life, told funny stories, mocked others poor driving skills, and sang along loudly to the music. the only down side was the lack of air conditioning. ugh. we finally got there and got a hotel, enjoyed a good dinner, then chilled at the hotel.
friday we got up and went to go and get chris and amanda a wedding gift (nothing like waiting till the last minute, huh?), got ready for the wedding, then headed over. due to a timing error, which was no ones fault (chris), we got there about an hour early, so we just chilled for a while. eventually other people started coming, so we felt bettter. the wedding was outside at a golf resort. the weather was beautiful, the ceremony was even better, and the whole thing was really fun. afterward we went inside the club house and had the reception. it was alot of fun, a chance to catch up with old college friends who i havent seen in five years, and never actually thought id see ever again! so it was really cool got talk to them and see what they are up to all these years later.
rex and i were having so much fun talking with everyone and dancing (which he is considerably better at than i) that we ended up closing the place down! we helped pack up the gifts and stuff, and then one of the girls got the idea that we should so get some ice cream. in theory this is a great idea, the problem is that its 12:30 in the morning. the only place thats open is the grocery store, so we end up standing out front of cub foods eating ice cream out of the containers with plastic spoons. truly a site to see.
saturday we were invited over to hollys for a grill out before we headed back home. we had a great time talking, laughing, remembering, and renewing all the bonds we have together. good food and a great time.
satelite dish
im not quite sure how, but i got myself suckered into changing my tv service. a guy came to my door last week and we started talking and he was saying how much better his service is than the other one. also, its twenty buck cheaper, and theyll give me a dvr with 100 hours on it.i guess thats how i got suckered into it. the installers come tuesday. i hope it doesnt suck.
gone swimming
sunday i was hanging with the family for fathers day. my little nephew (hes three and a half) was telling me that he started swimming lessons! he asked if i would come on monday and see him swim at his lesson. my sister said that he did really great at it last week and he could even jump in the deep end and swim all the way to the other side! i was quite impressed with this, because i remember that i was terrified of the water for many years when i was little. i didnt dare go in the pool in our backyard until i was about six (but thats probably due to my big brother telling me evil sea creatures lived in there...), so for him to be that good at his age really impressed me!first, it was a miracle that i actually made it to the lesson. i am on my summer schedule right now (which means that i stay up till 5am and wake up around 1pm) and the lesson started at 9:30am! it was a bit rough to get up at 9 after only four hours of sleep, but i knew i really wanted to because i dont get many chances to be a part of his life (i live about two hours away). i got there and he started doing his thing- the only problem is that he had forgotten everything he learned the week before! he had the hardest time jumping in, and by the end was crying his eyes out! poor guy! im sure he will have his confidence back by friday. you know, so he can forget everything for next week...
poke it with a stick.
where exactly does the name of this blog 'poke it with a stick' come from? well the simple answer is that its an inside joke that most of the people inside have since forgotten. but, the idea that was behind the joke, and the reason for my naming it that is much more complicated.the idea of 'poke it with a stick' is to examine something. to poke something and find out more about it. what is it? what does it do? why is it here? what is the meaning behind it? in a way that has been my intent for this journal: to look at my life, what i do, what i understand, what i think, and what i believe and poke it with a stick.
now, the title also has a funny element to it as well, which is where i have usually taken it. most of my posts are light hearted and opinionated, which is fine. but i am now realizing that i have lost sight of the real power and understanding that i was originally aiming for. i am reminded that i have all too often forgotten to look deeper, to think harder, to challenge myself farther. i have come to a realization that i need to be following that path as well. for these reasons, among others, i have decided that i would like to give myself a place to share those thoughts as well, a place to take the journey to better understanding. so, again the 'poke it with a stick' blog family grows to include another page for such thoughts. find them here.
mini golfing
this past thursday i finally got to meet up with a few students and gollow through on the event that had been auctioned off a while ago. i got together with these students and went mini golfing! it was a lot of fun. the kids that had won it were eight graders this year, so it was cool to see them one last time. we played a good 18 holes, but before we began, as is customary, we gave each other fake names while we played (i was gregory). none of us were any good, so that kept the game light and fun. after we finished that we headed over to the ice cream shop and gorged ourselves on the tasty treats there in. they had a table inside that has a checker board built in to it, so he had a few matches of play. i am typically good at checkers, but i was hustled big time. after that we headed home, but before i dropped them off, i had to take a little stop at gamestop (not really, but i knew these boys loved video games) so we wandered around there for ten to fifteen minutes, then we were off. after that i brought them home and bid them farewell. i hope it was worth their $325!in a couple weeks i look forward to doing it again with three other students!
a busy saturday
this past weekend was alot of fun (and im not just saying that because it was the start of my summer vacation. but that didnt hurt either...) on saturday a friend and i headed downtown chicago in the morning. they had a huge book fair going on, and it she really wanted to check it out. i was up for it and tagged along. it was really cool, there were current best sellers as well as some old original first printings and other relics from hundreds of years ago. it was fun to look through the different booths and check it out. i ended up finding a book that reinterpets the book of genesis into poetry. i figure maybe i can find some cool stuff in it to make that text come alive even more when i teach it. i got to talk to the author for a while and everything! quite cool. later that day i went to the merrillville mall to get a gift, then i went to one of my students open house (and then gave him the gift. the movie UHF. inside joke, long story...) where i met his uncle who turned out to be someone i knew from dordt days! how strange!all in all a fun and relaxing weekend. i guess i have a few more of them lined up here soon. cool.
oh, how embarassing
all of us teachers decided last week that we would get together today for lunch as a last get together of the year. we ended up going to red robin (great burgers!). after an hour and a half we wrap up and ali, the science teacher, remarks 'huh, where are my keys?' we didnt see them so she was worried that she may have locked them in her car. which is bad enough, but the story gets funnier: she did lock her keys in her car, they were right there in the ignition. and the car was still running!!! how ridiculous is that?!? we spent several minutes roaring with laughter as she stood there genuinely impressed with her own stupidity. fortunately she has another set at home, so rick brought her to her house and is now bringing her back to her car.for some reason, i dont think any of us will ever let her live this one down- we will be reminding her of it often next year, me thinks.
the end!!!
the much dreamed of day has finally arrived: schools out for the summer!!! i dont have much planned for the summer, ive been looking into a job to keep me busy, but so far all paths have been dead ends. if i dont end up finding anything ill probably have to plan a cool road trip for the end of the summer or something.i wont be posting on here as regularly after today (mostly because i dont actually have the internet at my house...) but ill try and keep updating whenever i get the chance!
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