Built to Spill

I tried to find a better clip with moving pictures but the best I could find was just the song:



But this is very reminiscent for me. This was one of my favorite bands back in the day and this is one of their great songs. I stumbled on an article somewhere about them and I instantly remembered my like for this band so I had to find their music again. So here's a taste. I hope you enjoy.

I like Christmas

I just yawned and my eyes watered. It always happens every time I yawn and this time I wandered if that happens to everyone. Hmm. So there's a bunch that happens but where to start or do I even want to write about everything in my head or what do I want to share. Here's one thing, and I don't know if I've shared this before but here it goes: I'm try get a car, and I know this guy that's a dealer that goes to car auctions and gets cars cheap and doesn't mark them up very much. The thing is that you can only choose what's at auction. So I'm pretty much looking for something like a Honda Civic with good gas mileage and will run well. Here's what's happening: I also want a Saab and this guy knows it too and when he gets to these auctions he'll see one, call me up, and I'll tell him to go for it. He does but there's always something that comes up that prevents me from getting this car. The auctions are almost every Wednesday, not last because of Christmas, but the one before that this guy, Dan, was bidding on a nice '04 Saab 9-3 and yells out $7000. The auctionier hears $11000 "sold". So the car was supposed to go through the auction again after all the cars went through but didn't. So I'm still carless and it's driving me crazy! This Wednesday better be the day. My parents got a car from him the first week they called him. The very same auction as the story above.

About Christmas. It was great. My whole family was there except for my older brother who couldn't get two consecutive days off of work. But we were all there and every one of us got what we wanted for Christmas. I got some bike stuff that I've wanted for awhile. Tools mostly so I could take stuff apart and see how they worked. It's been fun since Christmas. My next brother down the line got snowboarding stuff like a nice wax iron he's been wanting. My next brother got a nice crash cymbal for his drum set. My sister got a nice longboard, nicer than mine...different, but more in what I would want; it has a fin on it one side that's just padding. It's pretty cool. And my baby brother got a bunch of toys, a little bit of everything. Christmas still isn't a big deal for him. I doubt he understands it. And did you know that he's so spoiled that every Sunday when we're in church my grandfather gives him new toys and a bunch of candy as soon as we sit down? Well...it's cleary not fair. Didn't mean that. But I do think that it makes getting gifts less special.



I just looked at the tree in this photo and I must apologize for it. We usually take time to make the tree look nice for Christmas but for some reason this year no one seemed to care. We've been busy with other things and never got around to putting more work into it.

Oh, my grandfather's wife should be coming here from the Philippines late next month or early February. I took way to long to get her visa. But when she comes he'll be moving out. He married her like a year and half ago, more, I think, and all the paper work and examinations and other bs has taken too long. I think his new wife is a little older than my mom. It's creepy.

Let me tell you a story about a couch. I thought it would be nice to replace an old futon couch that was in our tv room in the basement. It would be a Christmas present for my family so I wouldn't have to get them all individual gifts (I got them other stuff too). So I head over to Ikea with me mum to have a look see. We found one we (I) liked, went over the self-help area, and asked to get this sofa. So over at Ikea they sell their couches as a canvas and the buyer will usually pick out a cover they like to go with their decor. We'll come back to this. So we ask for help and a guy helps us get what we need to bring this couch home. This guy sucks at his job. He finds the place where people get the packaged furniture and tell us to take only one box when I thought it was in two total boxes, which I mentioned to the guy, but he reassured us that it was only one. We get home and I was right. We went back the next day to get the other box. No problem. We get home and we find that one of the major pieces has a rip in it. We take it back and git it replaced. No hassle. There is the matter of the cove,r though. It didn't come with a cover and they were out of the one we wanted. When we where there to get the ripped piece replaced we asked about it and a customer serviced guy, who also didn't know his job very well, told us to come back two days later and if they didn't have the one we wanted they would sell us the one in their showroom at a discounted price. We go back again and tell them what we were told. They didn't do what they said. I had my brother, Greg, with me on this trip and he sort of yelled at one of the young associates but those guys wouldn't budge. They told us that they were expecting more shipments of the cover want next week, which means that we need to call them up during the week, ask for the cover, and go over there again to get it. Do you see how long this paragraph is? Just to get a couch. We'll have to take a total of 5 trips to get couch all put together. It's actually put together now and it sits in our tv room, but without a cover. It's still comfortable but the cushions slide out because that's something the cover will handle. I'm so sick of this stupid couch.

Here's something else. I'm not sure if you remember how much I was looking forward to the game Rock Band, but they sent me the wrong one and after many emails they still haven't gotten back to me. But one day whilst I was waltzing around a Target store I came across an isle end where they had a big stack of game bundle for the ps3 and xbox. I was literally stopped in my tracks. I had been asking around for that game for a long time at many places and here it was at Target, just casually at the isle end. I had to buy it and it was sooo worth it. The game is all that I imagined and more. It so much more fun than guitar hero that words don't describe it. Come over some time and try it. It's awesome.



This is a terrible photo of my sibling playing it. If you look at the white couch you will be looking at an Ikea couch without a cover on it.

There are other stories but I don't feel like typing anymore. And I'll add more pictures later to show ya'll what I'm talking about.

Laser Cats 2

Holiday treat

chicken dance

Big move

So it's been about a month since my last post. Sorry to all you faithful readers. A lot has changes since the last post, probably the biggest change is my move back to Utah. It sort of came fast. I moved back here the day after Thanksgiving, mostly because I could take advantage of the long weekend and fly my brother out to Michigan to help me move. We got it going pretty fast. I made the decision to move out on the previous Monday, made all the calls needed on Tuesday, flew my brother out on Wednesday, and moved on Friday. Packing all my crap and stuff in between was fun with a holiday in there but I don't really have that much stuff. But it was enough stuff to where I had to rent a moving truck. Those suckers are expensive. You know if you rent one you have to rent it for a week with no discounts for returning it earlier. It kinda sucks. I moved to Michigan with my stuff in a minivan; far cheaper. Good thing a van hit me over a year earlier so i could afford it all. The ride was fun with my brother there. Much better than me doing on my own, and it was long; some of it really boring, like driving through Nebraska and Wyoming. Driving that van wasn't that cool though. There obviously isn't a rear view mirror so changing to the right lane takes some close attention. One time my brother was trying for the right lane and a minivan was there in the way. He didn't see it but I did and was telling him that when he was entering their lane. He barely got in there when the van started freaking out. He first swerved right to avoid us but he turned a little too much; he then over-corrected and almost hit us. I think he slammed on his brakes after that and the result was him spinning out. I mean a complete 180. It was pretty cool. It was my brother's fault but the guy made some poor decisions. My brother didn't stop but he felt real bad. We drove all the way to Nebraska and got a cheap hotel room. Oh, my brother has an Iphone which came in handy when finding that crappy hotel. It was cool for a bunch of things, mostly the internet, but I had fun playing with it on the road. In Nebraska I downloaded a couple of audio books that made the trip better. I got I am Legand, like the new movie coming out which will be interesting to see their take on the book. They're going to have to change a bunch of stuff to make that movie interesting. The book was good but I don't see it in a movie. The other book I got was I am America (and so can you!) by Stephen Colbert. He read it for the audio book. It was great. If you haven't read or listened to it I highly recommend it. Maybe for a loved one for Christmas that you could borrow some time (although the book speaks strongly against lending).

So I'm here in Utah again. I'll be getting a car soon. My brother knows this guy that helps people in need...of a car. He's this super hero guy who helps the everyday joe. This guy knows how much cars are marked up by every dealer out there and he tries to make a difference. This is what he does: he finds people that want or need a car, they give him the specs on what they want, then he goes to these car auctions that only dealers can go to gets cars for these people. The HUGE difference is that he only charges like $500. Dealers, on the other hand, mark up cars by the thousands. He's a good guy and he'll get me a good deal on a something next Wednesday. I almost got a fairly new Saab 9-5 but I forgot to tell him the price ceiling I wanted. Next time, hopefully.

There's other stuff too but I won't bore you now. I'll take some pics and post them soon too.

Later

My own little world

It's getting cold here in Michigan. Today I walked to the grocery (food) store. When I walked out of my house I notice that there was some precipitation coming out of the sky. It was hail; small ones that didn't hurt but were accompanied by a little bit of rain. I walked nonetheless. I was wearing a jacket that I got from my grandfather. One that once belonged to an officer during world war two. I know this because I ripped the ranking patches off a few minutes before I left. Someone once told me that there was a law forbidding a non-militant from wearing those types of patches on military clothes out in public. So just to be sure I ripped them off. It was a warm jacket and this was my first time wearing it this season. As I said its getting cold now. The walk was fine. There's this band that I started listening to that I can't get enough of, Every Time I Die. I've been listening to them every time I go walking. Their sound is loud and fast, and every other music seems boring after listing to them. There isn't a band out there that I can compare them to but I'm looking. I bought these headphones a while back before we went to Costa Rica that use the same material as ear plugs to surround the headphone part that goes in ears. So when wearing them I can't hear very much outside my head. So when I'm walking and listing to Every Time I Die through my headphones I'm in my own little world. Wearing my warm jacket from WWII and enjoying fall is great. It's getting cold but there're things to enjoy.

Have I mentioned that I got another job? Yeah, I'm working at this vintage clothing store in downtown Ann Arbor and I love it. It's weird too. I got the job about a week ago, had two days of training and now I work two days a week, Monday and Tuesday, and I open, close, and run the store all by myself. I like it a lot. I get to meet tons of interesting people. Like on Tuesday I met this girl from New Zealand who was at the store her first in America. She was so happy to be at our store cause she thought everything was super cool. She was in love with American culture even our accents. I sold her a cool jacket. It was awesome. And at my job I play dress up all day. I've taken some pictures of myself wearing some clothes but I don't like any of the photos. I'll take some more next week and post them.

Rock Band comes out next week (the video game) and I'm excited. I've got it preordered and am so ready to play it. I hope I can get people to play with me. Everyone seems so busy with their lives now. But I'm okay if I have to go solo.

What to do? What to do?

A couple of monumental things happened since the last time I blogged. Maybe not monumental but some fun things that happened. The first being that Halloween has come and gone but not without a bunch of fun in between. Last week Friday we had a party in our house, our house's first, and it went pretty well. Here's some pics:



this is me. Pretty scary, huh? The stuff on my teeth to make them look yellow felt like I had to brush my teeth real bad.



Here's Ellie. She was a rockstar.



The guy in the middle is Ellie's brother, Gus. He's a rockstar too. I don't know who those others are.



These guys are dressed like Marty and Jennifer from the Back to the Future movies. the guy has a tape walkman too. I thought it was clever.







The party was awesome. We had some loud music and danced the night away. I was playing the dj most of the time too.

For the party I made a guy, Alexander, out of some of my clothes that I hung from the banister. I took him apart today and forgot to get a picture of him. He was creepy, mostly because I found an old mask from years ago that I used for a head. It looked real enough to make your heart jump to see him when not expecting it. After the party we took him down and did more scaring with him. First I think we put him Liz's bed, under the covers so you could only see his head but only from looking straight down at him. That night when she came home she knew something was there; not really believing that it was a person, but not really disbelieving it either. She threw her bag at it just to make sure, but she said she was too scared to take the blankets off.

Alexander then found his way in Ellie's bed. I don't remember if she got scared that time. But after that Ellie threw Alex over the railing to the ground floor. I picked him up and positioned him in the corner of the tv room where he creeped everyone out. I put him in a curled up position to make him look a bit more real. It looked real enough to make your head turn and wonder for a split second if he was going to eat you. It was here that he had the most effect.

His next move was to Ellie's closet where he stayed for a few days, I think. It kind of creeped her out. She then put it in my bed where it had zero effect and I took him apart today. He was a fun guy for not being able to move.

The other monumental thing other than Halloween was that Guitar Hero 3 came out last Sunday. Ellie's brother, Gus, who is shown above as the other rock star, bought it that very Sunday and brought it over to our house.







Unfortunately Gus doesn't own a gaming console and his love for Guitar Hero was so great that he had to play it that very day. His only solution was to buy it for someone else's console and come play it whenever he can. It's cool for us that live here because we have Guitar Hero 3 in our house. The game comes out for computer sometime next month, and if I don't buy Gus's game Gus will take it in for store credit and buy the computer version of the game. I'm up the air about buying it. Guitar Hero is a fun game but I'm waiting for Rock Band, which is very much like Guitar Hero except it adds drums and vocals to the mix. One dilemma is guitar compatibility: both Rock Band and Guitar Hero have their own guitars that work with their games and I'm trying to figure out if they are cross compatible, i.e. if Guitar Hero's guitar will work with Rock Band and vise versa. If they are compatible I think I would buy Gus's game. That way I would already have a guitar for Rockband when it comes out. I'm definitely going to buy Rock Band and the bundle that it is selling comes with the game, drums, one guitar, and a microphone. The bundle could use a second guitar to play the fourth part, and acquiring it through Guitar Hero wouldn't be bad. It's sort of cheaper to buy guitars in a bundle cause it's a bunch cheaper that way. Games are usually $60 and the guitars are between $60-80. Guitar Hero 3 bundle was $100 for the game and the guitar. The thing is though that I don't know the compatibility yet. Neither company has come out and announced any compatibility. The other thing, though, is that Rock Band's guitar is supposed to be much cooler than Guitar Hero's: they made the guitar look and feel more like a real guitar and theirs can do more on their game. So if I got a Guitar Hero guitar it wouldn't be able to do all the cool things that it could on Rock Band. What to do?

My hand hurts

There was one thing that I forgot to add about Ceder Point: while there i was wearing a shirt that lots of people took notice of. During the day I saw tons of tons of people staring at my chest. I bet you're wondering what they were staying at. Here a link to the shirt:

http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/gallery-panflute.php

What I wanted to add was that while in one of the large lines for the newest roller coaster they got there I was stopped by another patron in line saying something along the lines of this: "Hi. I've read your shirt like eight times and I have to ask you what a panflute is."

I would try to describe it but I'd rather just show you by pointing you to a panflute shop in the amazing internet:

http://panflute.net/shop/index.html?http%3A//panflute.net/shop/main.html

You don't need one, btw.

I had a little mishap on my bike today. The weather was a bit foul today, raining most of the morning, and I had an appointment with my financial adviser. I didn't think I was in any danger but things just seem to happen when you least expect them to. I had to travel down state street where there's a decent shoulder/bike lane and out of nowhere my front tire slid to the left side hurling me to the ground. The first thing I noticed was that my head had hit a two-fist-sized rock. Don't be too alarmed. I was wearing my helmet. But I hit this rock pretty hard and I was surprised there wasn't any serious head wound. My bell was rung pretty hard. I also sprained my thumb on my right hand. This seems to be the only lasting injury that I acquired. The sprain is kinda bad, but I'll be over it soon. After I fell I got back on my bike to go to my appointment.

The appointment was the one where I actually wrote out checks to get my investments going. I'm excited. I wrote out bigger checks that I would have ever dreamed of writing while still 26 and not bounce. I'm really hoping this is a good move. I'll have to wait years to really know, but I'm optimistic. At least I think I think so.

Back to Ceder Point!

A few days ago I went on a 40 miler on my bike. The thing was that half of those miles were heading into a 20mph wind. Another problem was that I wasn't planning on going that far and hadn't eaten very much food the last couple of days. Getting to that half way point was tough but turning away from the wind was amazing. But by the time I got home I was super tired, so tired, in fact, that when I got home and laid down to do my stretches I feel asleep. I went at it a little too hard. While down something weird happened; I remember hearing snoring and I thought it was one of my housemates in the next room, but it turned out to be me.

The day after that we went to CEDER POINT! It was awesome. And it was really hot for October, around 75 degrees or hotter. I'm not sure how hot it got, but it felt like summer. It didn't matter though, cause it was super fun. We went on a bunch of roller coasters. My favorite is Millennium. This roller coaster starts out with this huge drop of 300 feet and continues for probably a couple of minutes with a bunch drops and loops and pure fun. It even makes people's nauseated stomachs feel better (based on a case study [you know who your are]). We went down there because Ceder Point is doing there Hallo-weekend thing where the theme park is Halloween themed and there were some discount tickets. We jumped on it and it payed off.

And Tomorrow I'm meeting with my financial adviser who's going to invest my money into a bunch of mutual funds. I'm excited about it but also a little nervous, mostly because I'll be writing a huge check over to this guy that I don't know that well. And I've never had this amount of money or even close to this amount of money. I'm basically jumping into foreign territory. And I hope I'm not going to be one of those people that check the ticker every minute. Just slap me if I do. Maybe.

Back from the rich coast

Guess what? We went to Costa Rica for the weekend! Why? Because it was cheap! Ellie found an amazing deal to go down there for four days, flight and hotel, for under four hundred clams (under 200,000 colons [Costa Rican money {Christopher Columbus' last name in Spanish}]) and, boy, was it worth it. We stayed in San Jose which is sort of in the middle of the country which means that we had to take day trips out to other pieces of the country. We arrived Friday night after only about six hours on two planes and one layover. Tired and hungry we left our hotel in search of dinner. Unfortunately we didn't have any colons at the time and didn't know any Spanish, or very little Spanish. So we walked around a little bit and decided to eat at one of the many Burger Kings we saw in the country. We made that decision based on the fact that they took my master card. It was a bad decision; the meat tasted weird, so after that we didn't eat any more American based fast food.

Day two we went our to the beach. Because we didn't know any better we took the scenic route, which wasn't bad, but slow. By doing this we saw a lot of small towns and went over a bunch of mountains and things on sometimes very scary roads including this bridge:



We safely made it to a beach but the sun lazily didn't show up





The rain started falling and it chased us back to the car. It did it's damage cause we were soaked by the time we got back. We thought there was damage on the rental car we had too cause when we started driving the whole car would start shaking. We had no idea what was going on. It wasn't a flat tire or anything obvious to two people who don't know much about cars. We looked pretty hard around the car and couldn't find anything so we decided to find the nearest office of the rental agency. But on the way Ellie, who was driving, noticed that the hand brake was still on. I laughed and laughed. She didn't so much, but it was still pretty funny.

The next day we went to see a volcano. The roads going there were friendlier than the ones from the day previous so we got there in good time. This day was sunny and it got hot and humid. It was better than rain though. Here's some pics:



Here's the volcano. I've been told that we were lucky to see the top of it. Most of the time it's said to be covered by clouds. So we were happy.



We drove to the base of it in the national park and hiked around to a recent lava flow.



It was pretty cool. It was also nice to walk around a bit cause we were in the car quite a bit to get to these places.

After we got back to San Jose we got hungry. It happens. So we look in a travel book to find a good place to eat and head out to find it. The thing about San Jose is that they don't name their streets; they do number them but they don't post those numbers often enough to know where one stands. It took awhile but we but we found the place we were looking for (it was raining pretty hard, btw) but it wasn't what we thought it would be (it was a crappy casino restaurant) so we went down the street and found an Irish Pub. It looked fine inside. I ordered a Reuben sandwich thinking I was going to get a hearty piece of food. I have never been more wrong in my life. It was the worst reuben ever. I don't even want to talk about it, but suffice it to say that it only had one thin piece of meat and no sauerkraut. Maybe that was the night before, but it happened and it sucked.

Finding stuff in that town was hard. I just remembered that the reuben was the night before. The volcano night we hired a taxi to take us to a restaurant we saw in the book. So we go down to the lobby of the hotel and ask for a taxi. Somehow we get some guy who wants to be our taxi (not really a taxi) and we're trying to tell him where we want to go, but they don't name their darn streets and they don't assign numbers to the businesses. He still wanted the address. So we did a lot of pointing and we finally got through to each other and we were off. It was kind of weird, and I'll admit that i was a little scared when he took us down this dark alley way in the opposite direction we wanted to go, but we soon got around to where we wanted to go. We didn't find our restaurant but found a good Italian place.

So now it's Monday, our last full day in the country. We were a little tired of driving so we spent the day walking around San Jose. I bought a Costa Rican bike jersey with bike shorts as my souvenir. Ellie got a bunch of stuff to for her and her family and friends. It was a nice day, not too rainy, but nothing touristy was open, like a few museums that we wanted to check out. It was okay, we had fun walking around checking out the local shops.



That's basically it. I did buy the new Stephen Colbert book and read it on the trip and I do declare that it was a good read. It gets my seal of approval.

thanks for reading.

Costa Rica, Baby!

So I finally got some money from getting hit by a car and I bought a TV. Check it out:








So that's our living room. Let me tell you the tv is awesome. I've been told that its a guy thing but those who have seen this thing appreciate it. It's accepted unisexually. I got the full high definition of a beautiful 47". I love playing my PS3 on it. The games are sooo cool. I was playing a regular tube tv, not too big, and the difference is night and day. It's so rad. We rented Kingdom of Heaven from Blockbuster the other day and the picture is amazing. I love it.

And this weekend I'm headed over to Costa Rica with my friend, Ellie. She found some great deal and we signed up. We're going to be there from Friday, this Friday, to Tuesday I think. I'm excited. The weather is supposed show us some T-storms but I don't care. We're going to Costa Rica!

I'll take tons of pics, Ellie will too, and we'll be happy to show anyone who wants to see them. It should be great.

I've also had the thought to buy a truck out here for the winter. It's like 48 degrees outside now. So I would buy the truck now and use it to bring my stuff over to Utah where my parents live before I leave for Sweden, business school. And one night I was lying in bed and thinking about getting a truck, I was supposed to go look at one the next morning, and I was thinking that I don't really want a truck. I'm not really of that persuasion. I had also talked with a brother of mine that has a connection for getting vehicles for fairly good prices. There were a lot of things going through my mind that night and I had one of those epiphanies where I thought that it might be better for me to move home. There were a ton of pros and cons that I don't want to get into now, but it's still a viable option that I'm thinking about. so who knows, I might go back to Utah soon.

Money!!!

Man, I can't believe it's October already. September raced by. So guess what? I finally got some money from my bike accident. That's right it's almost all over. There are a bunch of bills to pay and the lawyer is trying to get those dollar figures lowered so I can get more money later. But the settlement is all over, no more negotiations or anything. Soon all the bills will be paid and I can say goodbye to all the bad stuff that this has caused.

So what am I going to do with the money, you ask? Well, there isn't really much that I want, other than invest it so I can save for whatever life throws at me, but there is something. I'm told it's a boy thing, but I've been looking into getting a big, flat-screen tv. The main reason i want one is because I have a PS3 that doesn't look that great on a tube tv. Plus if I get one then we can watch movies and sports in HD and we could throw parties here to watch the Office or whatever. So I've been reading a bunch of stuff and decided on getting 1080p tv that's 40 inches or more.

After reading a bunch of stuff online I went to Sam's club to look at some. It was dangerous. I came really close to buying one. It was 50" and would've been awesome to play stuff on. I even asked a guy to get it for me, which would've entailed getting a forklift and pulling down off of some high shelf. During this time Ellie and I discovered that the box would definitely not fit in her car. So we told the guy and he said it was okay, cause if we wanted it we would have to wait a while to get it access to the forklift and everything. So that was the day the check came in the mail and I was a little sad that we drove home without the spoils. But it gave me time to look around and become more educated.

Today I rode my bike over to BestBuy to ask questions and to see if what I was reading had any truth to it. Once again I got really close to buying one. I was shown more of the capabilities and the difference between 720 and 1080 and getting to know the other brand, or at least seeing them. I actually told the sales guy that was helping that I wanted to buy it and have it shipped to my home. He was helping others as well as myself and that's what made him loose his sale. When I was looking at other stuff I remembered that I could probably get a really good deal on the same kind of tv at Sam's. I felt bad to not buy from that guy. I was there talking to him for at least a half hour. We were talking about gaming and other stuff too. The guy was cool. So I'm opting to save a few hundred dollars by opting for Sam's. I think it was a good choice, but it wasn't fun to tell the guy that I didn't want the tv anymore. I tried to come up with excuses but I know he knew that I didn't mean what I said when I uttered them . So I've emailed Liz, the other girl that lives with me, to see if she could call her dad and have him drive us over to get a tv. It should be good.

Another thing that I'm thinking about getting is a truck. yeah, a truck. I know, and you're right. I'm not really a truck guy. But here's the thing: I'm planning on moving in less than a year and I don't want to rent something to do it. I also need something for winter. So I figured I could kill two birds with one stone. It would be great to have the utility of a truck. And if I go to Sweden next year my family could use it. They've used a minivan for everything that a truck would be great for and this would help them out. So I'm going to look at a truck on Saturday morning to see if its in good shape. And right after that I'm going to the Michigan game (my first).

So things are going well. I'm glad to have money now. I highly recommend it.

good future?

I figured my resting heart rate recently and couldn't be more pleased: 48 bpm. It's finally getting back to where it used to be. You know, before the thing. The rest of me isn't back yet but I'm not dead yet so I'll keep working on it.

But speaking of numbers, I should be getting a check in the mail with a bunch of'em. Last week I got one check that I couldn't keep. It was made out to me but it needs to go to a bunch of things; my lawyer and bills and things. So I had to sign it as well as a few other documents. One thing I had to get notarized which required a trip to the bank. While I was at the key bank where I do business the guy who had the fancy stamp noticed that i was going to get a great sum of money. We started talking a little about investing. Now, I really don't know much about this stuff so I pretty much sat there and absorbed a bunch of stuff about mutual funds, stocks, etc. I thought it was interesting, so interesting, in fact, that I made an appointment with another guy who knew more that this guy did. This meeting took place yesterday. I met with Eric, who is an employee of Key Bank as well as other places. He gave me the skinny on mutual funds and threw a bunch of numbers that made me excited about investing money. It came down to this: if someone has some money that they can hold off on spending for more than a decade then if they invest that money they can make a lot more money. There's risk and stuff but stuff generally goes up over the long run. so now I have another appointment with eric and we're going to start this investing thing. With that said I it's obvious that I'm finally getting some cash very soon. It's finally happening.

Another great thing that's happening that I'm excited for is that NBC's the Office is starting up its fourth season tomorrow. My friend, Ellie, bought not just seasons one and two, but three as well in a lovely three package pack of all the available Office seasons. We finished watching season three last night and very ready for what's to come. Will Pam and Jim finally get together now that the other obstacles are taken away? What role with Ryan (the temp) play?

Other than that I'm noticing that Michigan is starting to cool off. I hear from a lot of people that they love the Fall, but what I'm thinking when they say that is that this is just a short step to Winter. I've heard the horror winter stories and I'm wondering how much warm clothing I'm going to need. I prefer summer. I love being war, hot even, I really don't mind. I'd much rather have that than freezing, humid cold. I can get through this but we'll see how miserable it'll be. stay tuned.

Good things to come

Hey blog family. Let me tell you of a great example of resilience -- my current tube of toothpaste. I brush my teeth at least once every day this tube keeps on giving the goods. I bought a tube probably a month ago expecting it to give out but it hasn't happened, but everyday when I try to squeeze some more of the stuff out it keeps on coming. I wish we all could be more like my tube of toothpaste (You can quote me on that).

Not that much new going on. I have, however, starting my bike on longer distances; I found a great 40 mile loop that I've been riding. It's from here in Ann Arbor over to Chelsea which is 20 miles a way the route I go, then up to Dexter (another 10), and back to A2 (the last 10). It's pretty cool. The ride is more backroads which are a lot less trafficy than the road linking Dexter and Ann Arbor. These are roads the I love riding on. They remind of the roads that I used to ride on when I fell in love with riding my bike long distances way back around Fruitland, Idaho. So I've done this ride twice before and last week I racked up a 100 mile week which I haven't done since before my accident. So I'm happy that my body can do this stuff again.

A few days ago we took another trip to Ikea, you know, the big Swedish furniture store that most people love for their stylish northern European designs as well as low prices. I got a few things that I've been wanting for a while, one of which is another couch (loveseat really, but I'd rather write loveseat in parentheses) for our ground floor TV area. I got the cheapest piece of sh!te they got. It was only like $150 with no color options and it's not the most comfortable thing but I like it anyway. The back to the thing is nice and firm and gives good support for trying to sit up, which I really like. I also got a couple of rugs, and a lamp. One rug for my room and other for the same TV area. I made me happy getting that stuff so we can make our house a little more liveable and less like a college house.

Not much else. Did I tell you guys about my idea of going to business school in Sweden? Yeah! I've even emailed a school there and they wrote me back that they won't need a GRE or GMAT score and that they're increasing the number of students from the US. I think it sounds great. I wouldn't need to pay for tuition, but I would have to pay for room and board on my own. So I'm going for it. I want to do business school sumwhere so why not sumplace cool? If I would make it in that school I would probably do my best to try and live over there too. I love it there and I think it fits me more than the US does. But we'll see what happens. Applications will be accepted at the beginning of the year which is when I want to apply and hopefully I know soon after that of whether I get accepted or not. Cross your fingers.

Sum more good news is that my settlement with the other guy's insurance over how much I'll be getting is just about over. I'm talking about finally getting cash money for getting hit by a car. The day is almost there. I can feel it. All the bills will be paid and I'll have some financial freedom. It feels good.

Labor Day is awesome

There this guy at Smithy, the place where I work, that has been there for a couple of weeks and I found out he was a guy yesterday. I seriously thought he was a woman for two whole weeks. Here's the deal though, I haven't really had any contact with him the whole time, I just passed him in the warehouse there and I'm stationed mostly in an office. The reason why I thought he was a she was because he was so fat and the clothes that he wore were very androgynous. He also had longer hair. But the kicker was that he was fat. When a person gets really big they tend to lose their gender or the characteristics of their gender. I think it's sad. The way I found out the truth was because I was working on something in the warehouse and this guy walks near me and was looking at what I was doing, he said mumbled something under his throat in a deep voice, and he had stubble. I really hope he's a guy, not really. More for me being right than anything else. With the evidence that I wrote down the verdict isn't that conclusive, is it? I'll keep working on it.

On another note Labor Day weekend kicked ass. Liz, another girl who lives in the same house as I who is also a good friend, invited me, Ellie, and her boyfriend Ryan up to her family cabin by Hubbard Lake somewhere in Northern Michigan. It was awesome up there. The cabin had a bunch of beds, a pool table, and some grand parents there that rocked. The grandma kept making tons of great good that we all constantly ate. I'm sure I gained a few pounds from it all. The lake was fun. We did some tubing, water skiing, frisbee in the water, swam, and found a platform that we could almost tip over with all four of us standing on one corner. A few rounds of king of the platform was played which gave us a few injuries. I got a bruise on my left arm from my elbow to my wrist from falling on it and then dragging it on the platform till I slid off. It still hurts, but I'll be okay. Ryan got kicked in the balls accidentally, and Ellie bled in a couple of places, all in good fun, of course. It was hard to leave but by the end of the weekend we were all sore all over and burnt in other places. The weather was great most of the time too, just some strong wind on Sunday. It was all pretty great. Here's some pics:















Great stuff.

I've also heard from my lawyer and he says that he and the other person's insurance company are now negotiating on a final settlement sum, which means it will all be over very soon. All the bills will be paid and I'll get some money.

Right now what I want to do most is go to business school in Sweden next fall. There this school that doesn't want a GRE or GMAT score and is increasing the number of US students for 2008. I'm going to shoot for it. Wish me luck.

There more stuff going on but I don't feel like typing about it right now.

Peace.

Nice weekend

Man I hate stupid cars. I just got back from another ride and while out there there was a car was a little in front of me and turned on his turn signal so I slowed down so he could make his turn. He was slowing down too and we got to his turn and he had plenty of room to make his turn and I was stopped on my bike so he could go. He didn't. He was waiting for me. So I went even though I was letting him go. He shouldn't've gotten in front of me and turned on his signal. I know that he was being nice and if I were a car he did the right thing, but at the time he pulled up right in front of me and turned on his signal. Most times cars don't really see me and so I'm the one who has to watch out for them. Another reason why it was frustrating is because I was pretty tired and has some good momentum and this guy completely robbed me of it on my way up to another hill. It was a good ride otherwise.

A couple of days ago I finally beat Resistance: The Fall of Man on my PS3. I had the game for a while now and it finally got done. I was a little proud of my self but it was a lonely victory. I would tell people and no one cares. I really don't expect them too, really, but it was something that took me months to do, not working consistently on it, but I did it. I also bought another game from the playstation network. I think it's called rub a dub. What you do is guide a rubber duck around a pool to where baby sized rubber ducks are who are in bubbles which are suspended where they are. Once you're duck touches the bubble the baby sized duck is in it will follow you around where ever you go. The more bubbles you touch the more ducks you have following you, and you need to lead all the ducks to a drain where they get sucked down. The catch to this game is that you control your duck by tilting the pool and you do that by tilting the controller, so you don't push any buttons. Your duck jumps too by pulling the controller up quickly like flipping a pancake. So this game is a time game. It seems really laim but it's addictive. Come over and try it.

I've been playing guitar hero a little bit too. But the more I play the more I want the rock band game to come out sooner. I comes out the 20th of November and should be about $200 for the game, 1 guitar, drum set, and microphone. I think it's a great deal. A really crappy electronic drum set, the cheapest I've seen is about $200. All games for the PS3 are $60, normal wireless guitars for GHII are about $70 I think, which comes to $150, and that meas that the drum set and mike come down to $50 for the both of them. I think it's a great price for the peripherals. Although it is a lot of money just to play a game, but if the experience is that much better than the other guitar hero games, which I really think it will be, it'll be worth it.

I also watched some Ultimate Fighting over the weekend at the Buffalo Wild Wings place downtown. I think that stuff is awesome. I mean two guys go into the octagon and one of them gets beaten so much that he has to give up or the ref makes him, usually. The main event for Saturday night's was this 44 year old guy against a twenty something year old from Brazil. the Brazilian got his nose broken up disgustingly good. His nose was bleeding all over the other guy's back. It was gross. and after he had his nose broken he didn't fight with as much zeal. But it was fun getting to see his butt getting kicked.

that's about it for now. Your stay classy, internet blog readers.

What am I trying to say?

Not a whole lot has been going on here, just things changing slowly to where they need to be. Here at the house we got rid of cable tv. We feel that tv sucks creativity out of life. It's so easy to turn in on and be entertained and that's what we're culturally programmed to do. We are living in a day of entertainment where everything has to be entertaining or we don't pay attention to it or don't even like it. I hear people complaining about things they don't like and don't want to do it. Sometimes in life you do things you don't want to do, actually all the time. I wonder sometimes if there is more pain in life that we would accept it better.

There is another blog that I stumbled on and keep reading because I think it's interesting. The writer is a young mother who became pregnant at 19 and was forced to marry the father, which wasn't a terrible thing, but parents made them choose to get married right after they found out that this girl was pregnant. This blog describes the joys of being a mother and dealing with money issues in their happy lives. The father is going to school so the mother is doing much of the house work as well as taking care of the child. In there also is a very open minded person who is finding the best way to do what she needs to do without following the norms of the culture around her. She is very strong and is a great mother. When I read the posts on her blog I see how she deals with all the trials that she goes through in her own way. She wishes things were better but she does the very best she can. Life for her is very consistently painful and she is still very used to and and very happy. Sometimes she compares herself to others or where she wants to go and when she does this it brings her down a little bit. Her strong self reliance is why I like reading her blog.

I really don't know what I'm writing. I'm actually a little bored now. Normally I would be sitting in front of the tv and let that trance wash over me and let my brain take a little break, and I'm glad I'm not there because I can use my time more effectively doing something else. I've been reading more which I like to do and I've been playing my guitar more, I've also been playing my playstation too. There a game called Lair that's coming out soon that I'm looking forward to. It's set in the middle ages and you ride and fight with dragons. It looks cool so go check it out. I think it comes out September 7th I think, which a few weeks later than posted on their advertisements.

Yeah. So we put the tv downstairs as well as a couch and a chair. One of my friends in the house also bought a couple of turn tables and dj mixer. She's going to be kickin it as a dj soon, as soon as she figures it out. It's cool that other people besides me will be hanging out in this level, but it's also kind of sad because I had been the only one doing stuff down here and now there's some ugly furniture here and more people. It's better though.

Yesterday I went up to the outlet mall they got up here. It's pretty big it was hard to find anything good. I guess that's how it is at every outlet mall. Someone told me that Gap makes clothes exclusively for their outlet store which seems weird to me. It seems that outlet malls are selling some of the stuff that stores couldn't sell in their normal stores which isn't bad in any way, but what trickles down to the outlets are a bunch of clothes that I couldn't wear. I try to have my own style and express myself in what I wear and the stuff I saw yesterday doesn't even come close. In my mind there are certain levels of fashion that the normal person shops at: for instance one level is buying clothes at the trendy places where it doesn't really matter what they're selling as long as it has the trendy name brand on it. Another level is buying clothes at those same stores but only the sale items to still fit in but not buying the stuff that you really want to buy because you don't have the money. Another level is shopping for clothes at Walmart or Meijer or Target. And I'm not judging anyone for shopping at any of these places. Everyone has motives to shop where they do for their own reasons. But there is the point of self expression. I think everyone should do it and not be afraid to do it. I know many people are and just want to fit in. I went through a faze like that and I think that most people do. And getting to my point that the more people shop at the outlet stores the less expressive they can get with their clothes. I don't extend that only to outlet stores but to the big chain stores that are in every town and city from coast to coast. I also know that it's how a person wears the clothes that dictates who they are as well. Getting more into my point: I see people becoming faceless consumers caught up in what the big companies are selling and not thinking. I also think that not watching tv helps a great deal with this.

Is anyone reading this? I'm surprised if you are. I feel like I'm rambling. I am actually, but I'm also thinking about stuff and not letting my brain slow its mental capacity by letting it watch tv. So I like where my life is heading. I will, however, miss some programs.

I almost died a few minutes ago, no joke

I just had one of my closest death defying nde that I've ever had with only walking away with a little scratch. So I was riding my bike and I came to the intersection of parckard and state, I was traveling up packard and turning onto state. At this intersection there's this third street leading to a residential area and I would be passing at the mouth of this street to get to state street. At this intersection cars go pretty fast so I take the sidewalk for precaution. And as I was coming off the curb at the mouth of this third street a car comes screeching past and I end up running into it. I get thrown off my bike by the bounce of us hitting and land on my back. The first thing I think of is what hurts so I can tell how injured I was. Geez, I ran into a car again. The last time that happened I was in the hospital for a week and recovering for a year. It turns out that I only had a lightly scraped up left elbow. My left hand would've been scraped up too and my butt if I weren't wearing cycling stuff. I next check my bike and miraculously it's okay too. I did find some kind of jelly on the tire but the wheel was fine. After I ascertained that everything was fine I notice that the car that I hit had stopped so I went to go talk to them. When I step up to the passenger side window a huge dog in the back seat starts barking at me and lunging its head out the back window. There was an old guy, well, about 50 driving and young teen girl in the passenger seat. They were pretty worried but I put their worry to ease by explaining that everything was alright. They drove away with nothing more than a good story.

It felt kind of weird to get back on my bike after that but that's what I did. I was on my way to return something to my old roommate in my old apartment. After I had gotten there and left the thing I was standing around outside the place letting the accident sink in. If I had been a tiny second faster I would have been seriously injured. But to have that happen, me being thrown off my bike, and walking away with a scratch was miraculous. I really feel like should've had an ambulance ride today.

it was here btw:

http://maps.google.com/maps/mm?q=Ann+Arbor,+MI,+USA&ie=UTF8&hl=en&ll=42.270878,-83.740245&spn=0.001937,0.003648&t=h&z=18&om=1

At the daily grind

So today was one of those rare days that I worked. Weird. Okay, so now you're wondering what I'm doing with my life. Well, here I go: if you've read any of my blogs you know that I was in a bike vs. car accident and was out of the workforce for over a year. I also relocated to Ann Arbor, Michigan where I've been looking for a job other than food service. It seems that others have had that plan here because there are very few. While looking for a job a good friend of mine (I will call her Ellie to protect her true identity) has a father who owns his own business and they've let me do some office work there till I could find something else. Really nice people who I am very grateful to. So I was doing stuff there until I had the opportunity to work at Urban Outfitters for two weeks while there was an art fair where the streets downtown are blocked off and the art dealers go crazy selling art. Urban sells a lot of clothes then too so they need help. I was one of those helpers (peons) but this was done in the hope of getting a job later on. You see lots of people wanted a job there and having poor people jump through hoops to see who can jump the highest will separate the kangaroos from the turtles. I happened to be a kangaroo but they are busy at the moment in a transition period in the store after which I was promised a job. During which time the office job that I do was running out of money to pay me so they let me work only on Tuesdays. That gives me plenty of time to walk around naked around our house (knock before entering [for your sakes {I don't mind}]) and ride my bike.

Back to why I mentioned this: I was working on a project for a few hours and the stupid computer decides to end the program that I was using, and no, I did not save my work before the computer kicked me in the balls. It also made the decision to log me out too. Well I tore that Mother F@#ker a new one! Actually my boss said that it was okay and that she won't make me redo it. Phew. Don't you just hate computers?

I forgot to mention that a few days ago that I got my reverend card in the mail. That's right, I can legally marry people. My little card says so. All you have to do is go to a website, type in some info and you're a reverend. You have to pay for any kind of proof like a certificate or wallet sized card, but it's real. I'm a reverend. It says Rev Eric Smith right on the card. Go ahead and let me know when you want to get married. Go on, I'll marry you. Just you wait.

Oh yeah, and my lawyer wanted pics of my scars and my friend, "Ellie" is borrowing it while also being on the other side of the continent. So at work I had a co-worker take some pics. Here are my favs:





You can see the titanium plate on my collar bone.



this one shows that the scar tissue on my arm has adhered to the muscle and there for it dimples now.



It's all pretty disgusting isn't it? Oh and the farmers tan is from wearing cycling jerseys when i ride my bike. No laughing. I'm serious.

So that was my day. How was yours?

Bad things happen in and around the dmv

I went to the DMV today. I hate going to any DMV and this time doesn't break the mold. So this is how it went: I woke up up an 8 or so with the determination to go around the opening time which is at 9. Let's just say that I didn't make it over there till around 11. When I really don't want to go I'll come up with excuses and procrastinate by doing stupid little things. But I really needed to go. My license expired on June 21, my birthday of course, and I had been putting off for a long time. I ride my bike everywhere so I didn't see the need to hurrying in getting a new one. But I know it's an important piece of identification and I do drive occasionally. So I check the internet where it's at and I try to find out what I need to bring and what I need to do. All the DMV's or Secretary of State buildings that I've been to have been government buildings. I drove around a little bit looking for such a building but I came to find that there were strangely a lot a cars parked at one end of a strip mall. Yeah, they put the dmv in a strip mall. Weird. I walk in and there's a line of course and just a few seconds after I get in line a lady who works there came up to me and asked if I had all the documents I needed, i showed her what I had, and she tells me that I need another form of ID. I had my other drivers license and my passport which I though would be sufficient but I had to go home and get an old student ID card to prove who I was. The drive there and back sucked. I just wanted the whole thing over with as soon as possible, and the more time that I spent driving the more time I could have been in line widdling it down. So i get back in line and wait more that two hours or so till I get to the front of the line. And when it was my turn to get helped I felt like I had been on a journey and I looked around at all the other people still in line, they were looking back at me with some jealousy, and I was happy for a second.

One thing about dmv's that I don't like is that no one is happy to be there, that is till the get to the front of the line. No on likes to go, the people working there have to deal with people who have been waiting hours to see them, so the employees morale isn't that high, and what gets done there is all just a formality to what people do everyday of their lives. It's all lame.

Something weird that I should have noticed a long time ago but hadn't was that my birth date on my old drivers license off by a few days. I found this out when I went to open a checking account at a bank and they where taking in my info and the license wasn't congruent with a form I filled out. Here at the this dmv they made a little stink about it. I ended up waiting a while till they could confirm the right date of my glorious birth. The lady was a little bitchy too. I got a terrible picture taken for my little driving card and I was on my way.

To try to cheer me up I stopped at a deli that I love. It's called Dimo's. If you haven't tried it, go! They're only open for lunch and they're on E. Stadium. The food is great and you get a ton of it. I ate half for lunch and the rest I had for dinner. It's run by a family from New York so you get that demanding New York attitude with your sandwich. It adds character to the place. I highly recommend going.

Once again I did my ride to Dexter to get my frustration out and I had a near death experience (nde). It happened on my way back to Ann Arbor on Dexter road just in sight of the Maple traffic light (near the dmv, might I add) and some idiot coming from the opposite direction was making a left turn. He first veered into the other lane of the two lane road before completing his turn and just before he turned all the way in he sees me and slams on his breaks. Good thing too cause he would've ran me over. This was a lot like the accident I had a year ago. Stupid drivers. Just look where you're going. I know most of you don't think of looking for cyclists but just try to, please.

things to get excited for

I'm not that big of a gamer but I do own a PS3. It came about mostly through my little brother who's in high school who's into that sort of thing. But there is a game that I'm a little excited for: rock band! It from the guys who made Guitar Hero I and II. The developers got off that train, gave the reigns to others to make the third in that series and went on to make a new better creation. Rock Band is Guitar Hero expanded. It incorporates other instruments to make up a band. So it's got guitars, of course, but also drums and vocals to make it a complete band. I just saw a video of it being played, wait, here it is:





It's kind of long video but it got me excited about it. If you don't really know me then you probably don't know that I've dabbled in music. I've been playing guitar for a while, played in a bunch of bands since high school, learned the drums on the way. I even started my own music club at college (I teach guitar too). So making a video game out of it rocks in my mind. that way I can rock with my friends who don't really play. I'm a huge fan of the Guitar Hero games too. So yeah, it comes out on November 20th so come over to my house after that so you can come play.

And how am I going to finance this purchase, you may be wondering? No, not the credit card. I've been in contact with my lawyer in Hawai'i (you've gotta separate'em) and I think the settlement thing/money should be done soon. Hopefully by this month. I got a letter from him the other day and he's asking for a lot of money. Six figures of course, and the lawyer gets a third of what I get cause he's doing the work and I probably wouldn't get nearly what he's asking had I not gotten a lawyer. But yeah. I'm getting some big cash soon. It might make it worth getting run over by a van, maybe.

Another fact that you might not know about me is that I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon). And I got a new calling today. I'm going to start teaching a class for our Sunday school, gospel principles, starting next Sunday. I'm excited for this too. I don't think of myself of much a teacher so this is going to be challenging and fun.

Another more journaly thing I'm adding now. Yesterday I saw the Hills Have Eyes II for the first time, it wasn't that bad or scary, really. My friends and I went out to rent it, but this rent came about in a round about kind of way. I DVR'd what the cable stating said was the new version of the Hills Have Eyes II, so I gathered a few people around the TV and the movie turned out to be the old one. It wasn't scary at all. It wasn't very good either, so you can't just call it quits when you're about to watch a scary movie, you're all prepared and ready to go. So we had to rent it. It wasn't that scary, but it was put in the "fun" movie category.

that's about it for now. Just enjoying summer.

P.S. No one here seems to have a digital camera. I actually have one, but I lent it to a friend who is on vacation at the moment. My lawyer asked for pics of my scars to help in the settlement thing. People, got get a camera and capture memories. You'll thank me later.

Blogger here I come

So I'm going to try and do the journal thing with this blog and I hope I don't offend anyone who reads it. No one's forcing you to read this so I don't apologize if it's boring.

It's Friday today with no plans and the first thing that I like to do a day like today is ride my bike. I've started to ride more distance rides to get back into shape, or more closely to where i was before my terrible accident. What accident, you ask? I guess now's as good a time an any to type it out again. It's been a while since the last time I tried and I think I've figured out a bit more:

I was on Oahu, Hawaii, just a few weeks after classes had finished and I was waiting for commencement a few weeks after that. I was riding my bike sort of far, probably about 150 miles a week on rides from 25 to 50 miles a pop. I was on such a ride on June 5 on Kam highway headed North. It was in the morning and the high school/elementary/middle school complex they got over in the next city was being fed kids from the many parents dropping them off. They got one traffic light over there that's at the mouth of this school. The time was 7:30, school starts around 8 and there were cars backed up pretty far from this light. What do I care? I ride on the shoulder so I don't have to deal with stupid car drivers. I'm going along, kind of fast, and a car coming from the other direction turns left and I ride into the side of it. I later learned that there was a preschool that the car was turning into, it was actually a Honda Odyssey, and a truck had made a space for the van to go through and had actually waved the van to make the turn. So when the van gunned it to make the turn so the other cars in back of them wouldn't get mad, the driver did that right when I was getting to the same spot.

So now you're asking what happened. I'm gonna tell you but it's not for the weak of heart. As I see this van getting in my way I had the time-slowing-down-thing happen and I know I didn't have time to touch my brakes and I remember thinking of the acceptance I had that I was going to hit them. After that I don't remember the events the occurred directly after but I do know that I was conscience. I do however have the accounts of some of the many people who saw what happened, or I've pieced together most of the story, I think. I ran into the side door of the van and from what I can tell I think my head broke through the window (I had a helmet on) and got cut up on my face, all over my right shoulder, and my right arm. Now I don't remember this but people tell me that I was sort of panicky but dazed. I even stood up after the impact but fell straight back down. I don't remember any of this but when my memory does kick in it's when I'm on the ground at the site of the accident with the paramedics surrounding me. It felt like coming out of a dream and entering a horrible nightmare and a flood of pain clouded everything. I soon got into the ambulance and was on a long ride to the hospital about 45 minutes away. At the hospital I learned that I broke my neck, shattered my collar bone, severed my radial nerve at the bicep on my right arm and deep lacerations on my neck, right shoulder, and right arm.





I was in the hospital for a week, then released to family, and eventually went to recover at my parents house in Salt Lake City, Utah where I didn't grow up or really know anyone. I wore a neck brace for about 4 months, a full arm brace for 3 months, I couldn't move my wrist for 4 months due to the severed nerve, and lots and lots of painful physical therapy.

It's been over a year now and I'm still not back to normal: I don't have my hand working as well as it did, but that might eventually come back, very very slowly, and my right arm is still weak. but no one can really tell anything is wrong, but I have some awesome scars on my neck and arm that everyone asks about. It's like having tattoos with cool stories behind them; great conversation pieces.

Back to what I was saying: I just barely started riding again. I'm living in Ann Arbor, Michigan and am exploring. I found a short trip that I've started going on regularly, from here to Dexter, which is only about 9 miles away. It has a nice shoulder and it isn't too busy with traffic. The only road worthy bike that I have now is just a single gear road bike. I like it a lot. I bought it mainly for commuting around town but it's a great bike; simple and fast. It's a Specialized Langster if you were wondering. It's a great little ride to try and get my endurance going again. I'm trying to do it a least three times a week.

You may be wondering if I'm scarred to be riding a bike. The answer to that one is "yes". I know how little a mistake it takes for me to get me severely injured again, but I love to ride.

One great thing about the accident is that I'm going to get a bunch of money from it real soon i think. I just moved to this house close to downtown and I need to get some furniture for it. I want to get a good bike, and who knows what else. So I spent some of the day planning how I want things. I'm living with two other girls who had lived here before I move in, both of whom are friends, who occupied the upstairs and now that I moved in we have opened the whole house up, both floors. And they're used to living upstairs and they both spend their time up there but we have a whole house, not just one floor. They have some ratty furniture that's up there too but I don't really want it down here. I sort of want to life in a nice place, not so college anymore.

After that I sort of hung out. I still don't know many people here. One of the girls is out of town for a while and the other one has a boyfriend with whom she spends a good deal of her free time with. So it was a quiet evening for me. I really don't mind it though. I like the quiet of just me.

well, this is my first blog here and hopefully i keep it up. thanks for reading.