home

ah, christmas time has come and passed. it was a good one this year, although i cant really remember a bad one. i came home on friday and met up with my moms side of the family for christmas stuff. always a blast to hang with the cousins. but i quickly ditched that party and headed out with my friends downtown grand rapids for the verve pipe show at the intersection- and boy did it rock!!!
saturday i slept in, then went shopping and got the rest of the gifts to give. the rest of the family came over, we went to church, then we opened prizes (thats what we call them, not presents. yes, i know we are wierd) and had a lot of fun.
this morning i slept in again (we went to church last night, so we called it good) and around noon my grandma stopped by for dinner. after we ate i went and visited my other grandma in the nursing home. i came home, hung out, then went to my sister and brother-in-law's place. we played trivial pursuit pop culture edition till two in the morning. it was a really great time. now i am home typing on the computer. its 3:09 and its too late (early?) to add anything witty to this post. sorry.

more converts

earlier this week i was at a friends house, a few buddies were playing poker, but i was playing scrabble with a friend (dang, i really do love that game...) she and i got talking about keeping in touch with people by checking out their blogs. i asked her if she had one. she said no. i decided that it was my responsiblity to fix this problem.
it was really fun! she didnt really know all that much about this blogging thing so i got to teach her the (very) basic things i have learned. it was really fun. i would share a link to her address, but she would probably kill me. (you know, first wants to see if its her thing or not)
also, another friend who was there was an old collegue i worked with for a couple years. she used to teach 4th grade here but left over the summer to be a missionary teacher in brazil (how amazing and crazy is that?!?) she had a blog started, but needed some help ironing out the details. her blog is here. its really cool stuff, her posts always have picture of what its like down there and some cool stories of the people she has met. check it out.

my christmas list

my family is always asking me what i want for christmas. i often struggle with this question- what do i want? inspired by this question, i am moved to write down what exactly i want for christmas. these are in no particular order, rather, they are listed in order of when i think of them. here goes:

1. world peace
2. the death of whoever is responsible for the 'career' of paris hilton (ditto for those who gave us nicole richie, hillary duff, ashley simpson, and lindsey lohan)
3. someone to stop smacking tom cruise over the head with the stupid stick
4. an apology from the guy who directed 'the longest yard'
5. more steve corell movies
6. my money back for 'war of the worlds'
7. people to finally realize just how stupid 'family guy' really is
8. more people to start watching 'office' and 'scrubs'
9. no more celebrity couple first names mashed into one
10. 'american idol' to be cancelled (oh, and survivor too)
11. a million dollars

i dont know, it doesnt seem like im asking too much...

me vs. my furnace

i have been having a fight with my furnace for a couple years now. actually, ever since i moved onto the place i live. usually its not a big deal because i like it to be a bit cold in my place. if its fifty outside i see no reason to turn on the heat, id rather just grab my fleece. the point is, if its cold enough for me to want to turn the heat on, its pretty darn cold so i really wont the heat on. anyway, heres the story:
my furnace always has a problem with being turned up. i usually keep it down around 62 during the night, and im only awake for about a half hour before i leave for work. so, the only time i ever turn it up is in the evenings, and even then i only turn it to about 68. here is the problem- my furnace does not know how to follow orders. i turn up the thermostat and it kicks on, but after about a minute of blowing it decides 'that aught to do' and shuts itself off even though my thermostat is set at 68 and the temp in the room is still only 62. this frustrates me. if i pester the furnace enough it will sometimes play along and actually get up to the temperature i want, but then it gets me back at night. when i turn it back down to 62 it will decide 'screw you!' and just take the night off and ill wake up with a house thats 53 degrees! (im a little bitter, because thats what it read this morning...) and that can make for a really cold start of the day. sometimes i can trick that little bugger into working, but it never stays tricked for long. does anyone know a heating guy who works for cheap?
oh, another important lesson i learned: yelling at inanimate objects doesnt help. i know, im shocked too...

by the way...

if you are coming around to check out my blog 'poke it with a stick', may i make a suggestion? this is only the main page of my blog, i also have pages designated just for music, movies, image gallery, and other random thoughts. the links to those other pages are right over there ----> under the 'poke it with a stick links', so if you are interested, dont forget to check them out too!

the eternal debate

pop. soda. which is it really called? this is the true eternal question... i think this is the real issue that is tearing our nation apart. blue states? red states? outdated. the new division is between pop states and soda states. something must be done about this before it destroys our country and leads to another civil war. and i feel i am just the man to bring about that resolution.

let me begin with my story: i grew up in michigan, and up there it is called pop. when i moved out to iowa i was shocked and amazed that other people around the country had other names for a carbonated beverage. soda? that sounded so strange to me. after many arguments and late night discussions i was finally shown the light. it isnt pop. but to be honest, it isnt always soda either.
the fact of the matter is this: officially the correct term is soft drink. if it is a dark soft drink then it is called a cola, if it a light colored, or clear soft drink it is called soda. so those who call it soda are not always right. i drink diet pepsi and i call it a soda, but that would be inaccurate.
so i guess the moral of the story is that we are all wrong. suck on that.

a shout out

you want to know who is really cool? its jeffry lee. i havent known him for nearly long enough, but whenever we get talking it always feels like we were brothers seperated at birth. that kid is a superstar.

oh, the pressure!

tonight i am going to a 'white elephant' christmas party. im a bit worried. ive never been to one of these types of parties, so i dont really know what to bring. do i go out and buy something or am i supposed to find something around the house? what if i bring something that i think is crappy, and it turns out it really is crappy? thats the problem, i dont know the caliber of the gifts were are expected to bring, so i dont know if ill be way off one way or the other. screw it, ill just wrap up a box of soap.

a fun game

i always like to look for fun new games to play in my classroom. earlier this week i found a totally cool one. ive played it before, but i never knew it had a name. the kids really liked it too. i first heard it called a "rotating corpse." a link directed me to a definition on wikipedia. they call it an 'exquisite corpse', but its the same thing. give the definition a look here. (thanks reuben and matt for this one...)

one mans trash...

you know that cheesy old saying 'one mans trash is another mans treasure'? well, recently i found that to be very true...
a couple weeks ago my family came down to help me redo my living room. we put in new carpet and repainted the walls. my couch was till the same old nasty couch though. i originally bought it at the salvation army when i first moved here (so that should be some indication of its nastiness) since then, two years have passed, and the couch got even worse. it was one of those crappy hide-a-beds. by now thought the bottom had busted and the seat i would usually sit in had caved in about three inches. and it had a most indistinguishable oder. i dont know what it was, but it was bad. my brother and dad were so disgusted by the fact we had to wheel it out to put the carpet down, and then wheel it back in after. as luck would have it, that afternoon my mom and sister were out shopping and they happened to find a couch at a good price that would match my stuff. so we got it and put the old one out on the curb. afterward, we went out to eat.
when we got home, about an hour later, the couch was gone!!! dang, that was quick! we all had a good laugh at the fact someone actually wanted that pile of junk! we went inside and hung out for a while. when my family was leaving we happened to notice, just three doors down, an old couch on their curb! at first we thought they snagged my couch, got it into the light and realized how bad it was- but no, it was actually their old couch! my junky couch was actually an improvement for them. yikes. i wouldnt really call that couch 'treasure', but it was certainly my trash.

busy busy busy

ive been spending a lot of time blogging, but not putting up any posts. how does that work? well, actually i have a few kids (their not actually my children, but we go way back...) who have a new found interest in all things blog. since i have a basic (very basic) grasp of this whole blogging thing, i figured id step in and help. i keep getting questions left and right- 'how do i do this?', 'why isnt this working?' its been fun, but i know it will only take a week or two and these kids are going to be blogging circles around me! them crazy kids...

bad weekend

what did i do this weekend? nothing. i sat around the house all day feeling crappy. i didnt actually leave my house from the time i left work friday until the time i left for work monday. what a downer- its a waste of a perfectly good weekend! i would much prefer to be sick on a weekday, because then i could just call in! but noooo, i have to waste a weekend!
oh well, at least i got to catch up a bit on my movie watching, so it wasnt a total wash...

F U N. three point word score!

fun can be had in the least expected of places.
i remember in college going to a coffee shop in le mars with some friends and playing checkers, drinkin' java, and playing scrabble. i hadnt played scrabble since, but i remembered i liked it. a few years ago my mom and dad gave the game to me for christmas. i was excited and asked my mom if she wanted to play "no way, i hate that game!" she said. ive never actually found anyone else who want to play. so, ive had a scrabble game in my closet for the past three years. unopened and unplayed. finally, last night, i found an oponent. and it was glorious. i didnt remember the game being that much fun! and to top it off, in the box there was this little advertisement thingy that had all kinds of different versions of scrabble and other scrabble crap. one of the things it had one a t-shirt that had the scrabble logo on it!
needless to say, if you see me walking around wearing a scrabble shirt, dont be surprised...