Annnnnd, I'm over it.

Just because of who I am, I'm interested in things for about 2 weeks before I'm over them. It's really a wonder why I'm still interested in anything, like earning multi-year degrees.
As of today, for the next two weeks, what I'm all about:
1. Abe Lincoln
2. Buying a ferret as a pet
3. Learning to sail (In Illinois? Sorry folks, I can't pick rational stuff)
4. Playing in a chess tournament
5. Buying Fight Night: Round 3 (I don't even like boxing, which leads to the question, Josh, why do you own a rugby game?)
6. Hang Gliding (ehh, I'm really just about over that too)
7. Geocacheing (mostly because I'm a nerd, this will last 3 more days, tops)
8. Making a sail for my longboard (This might be a little more realistic than said #3)

Seriously? In the Head?

Quickly, Did you know that Lincoln got kicked in the noggin when he was 10, giving him a slight lazy eye? And this guy went on to be a rock star of a president. I just got back from the Lincoln Museum and it rocked most of my internal organs to the core for the better part of two hours. They even let me play with the hoop rolling game in the kids area, and when I say let, I mean tolerated with some disapproving stares.

This blog also supports Arrested Development as brilliant and will be sorry to see it go.

Wrap that Up

With Monday's stale air already in and out of our collective lungs, I would like to present you with a few options for next week, as something to look forward to, something to possibly revive us.
Just a few selections from the Cinema,
The Inside Man: easily the best heist movie that I've seen in some time. When will Hollywood stop providing fool-proof bank heist to the criminals of America? I hope never.

She's the Man: I know, I know. However, did you know this was based on our very own Mr. Shakespeare's Twelfth Night? Does that save the movie? Nope, not even close. But Amanda Bines sure does.

Money or No Money

It has come to my attention that a great epidemic spreading through the networks. This plague among us is giving away money. That's the problem, the plague isn't actually giving away money, giving away money is the problem. Plus you'd never want to take money from a plague, you don't know where it's been, and you never want to be in a position to owe a plague anything.
This problem manifests itself in a number of ways. Today we'll investigate TV and that mystical prize of a million dollars.
Every show gives away this cure-all amount. Honestly, a mil isn't as much as it sounds. If I had a million, I'd spend it in an afternoon and only have a stealth bomber to show for it. Either that or a monkey farm, it's really a toss up.
The one show that lines itself up as the cash cow? Deal or No Deal. Hosted every week by Howie Mandell, now in "shaved head midnight poser" flavor this show exists to give away money. People pick suitcases to open, models smile at them, and then they get money. It's quite easy.

Then they get greedy, they forget the $100K in their pocket and go for the million that's obviously odds against them.
To demonstrate this, try it yourself, Deal or No Deal. I just played a quick six games, winning an average of $100,000, with a high of $133,000.
Close to a million? Nope.
Good enough for me? Of course.

Hands in the air when you take Mr.Mandell seriously.

The Oppression Continues

Scrabble v. Chess. Both games seemingly for the hyper-intelligent, rooted in academia, reserved for those familiar with the atomic weight of Boron. Ahhh Greg Church, if only I would have listened.

Cut Scene
Allyn v. Josh. When these epic battles break out, the underdog always hopes for the impossible, the dream always present, but always elusive.

Break for commercial sponsor.
For those of you just joining us, I routinely beg Allyn to play chess with me and she gives in after I've emptied the dishwasher or ran a 4-minute mile, whatever comes first. Allyn has yet to beat me, it's a year-long goal to reign victorious just once.

Station Identification
Our story takes a sharp and darker turn. I'll routinely ask Allyn if she's interested in a game of Scrabble. Masochist? Perhaps. Do I know how to spell that word without looking it up? No.
I have yet to beat Allyn in a game of Scrabble, so that pulls my overall lifetime wins to just about zero.
However, after the best game of my life last night, 200+ points put on the board, boosted by a 58 point turn, I failed by the hairbreadth of 9 points. Again.

I'm also pondering who would be our commercial sponsor if we had one.

Pushing the N.Q. (nerd quotient) up to Defcon 2, I played ANIME last night. However I felt better after Hasbro defined it as "a resin obtained from a tropical tree".

If only there were someone here to easily explain Tax Codes!

My brother starting his job, a real one without the addition of feathers, as well as operating out of an office, rather than a birdcage- all on the Vernal Equinox, it's a coincidence of cosmic proportions.
Speaking of which, Spring has indeed sprung(sprang?) by virtue of the Vernal Equinox. And just what is this cosmological event of which I speak? In laymans, it is when the Sun crosses the Earth's equator, this happens just twice a year, the other being the autumnal Equinox. Interest peaked, want to learn more? Who doesn't, Interrobang! Here's the explanation for nerds, I'll see you there.

A second quick thought, why is Equinox isolated only to a rare astrological function? It seems better suited as a superhero, unless he is one already? Nerd Brother, I'm looking your way. And I think LayMan would make a fantastic sidekick, explaining away the most complicated theorems in easy to approach language. Awesome. Mint it, that's gold.

A parting gift for Monday, dogs naturally cool on their on their own, they're bred for radness, but wait! How could they get super rad? Easy, Doggles. I only go there because honestly, dogs in glasses, is there anything better?

Have a fantastic week.

Nine Hours of Gelatin

Until 4 this afternoon, I'll be here in this chair, in class, learning. What follows will be a list of some of the more enlightening thoughts that venture across my frontal lobes.

8:13- I'm pretty sure that I could hang glide without any training.
8:49- Where can I go to adopt a monkey? How much does it cost to adopt a monkey anyway?
9:25- Is it to early to think about lunch? What am I hungry for today? Jimmy John's? Nah.
9:30- Maybe soup, is today a soupy day? It could easily become one.
11:01- Is flying a helicopter hard?
11:08- I should buy a model helicopter.
11:23- I for sure should be break dancing right now.
12:15- If I really needed to, I could probably perform surgery on myself.
12:16- There has to be instructions on the internet for doing just that.
12:17- I'd break a model helicopter in under 4 minutes.
1:08- I'm pretty sure this swivel chair is sinking.
1:26- yep, the hydraulics on this chair sinks every 20 minutes.
2:03- if you stop using your brain, or portions of your brain for long enough does it turn to jello?
2:07- should I delete all of the "the's" from band names in my itunes playlist? This would put everything in order and get rid of the "the-lump" at the bottom of my list
3:19- I could beat up Thomas Jefferson, but not Lincoln
3:25- I'm actually not so sure about Jefferson anymore.
3:55- Why didn't I know that Scott had a surfing kite?
3:57- Where can I get the monkey?
4:02- if I had a chance to drive through a loop with my car, I'd do it. Man, why isn't there a huge mini-golf course that you'd have to use your car as the ball? Someone needs to get on that.
4:09- Bees v. Squirrels, who wins?
4:16- free, sucker

Pancakes with the In-Laws

Sorry for the temporary hold in posts and nearly up to the date news, but we're having the world blown apart down here. Sunday night we had an F2 category tornado sweep through and decide that it had enough of where some of Springfield had placed itself. Promptly taking it upon itself, it reorganized a little bit of everything.
By Sunday night Allyn and I were with some friends reading the paper in our storage space in the garage while the tornado sirens calmly informed us that the world was in fact coming apart.
We would spend that night on our in-laws floor and they would spend the next on our futon.
If you haven't seen pictures yet, check them out. I'm not taking credit for these shots, they were lifted from Rob's blog.
It's fantastic that no one has died and that we were fortunate to escape pretty well off.

In other news, the entirety of our tangible childhood was auctioned off in about two and a half hours Saturday morning. Instead of it being hard or emotional, it was hilarious. Layla was hilarious, people bid on our junk, and now our flotsam is evenly distributed around Jersey county. People buy the silliest stuff.

Also, congrats to my brother for nailing down two jobs. He's going for the brass ring, or at least he will if he can wake up by 8.

A Colon Cleanse probably would've helped

Ahh sick, so I did in fact succumb to whatever was crawling around waiting to crush my immune system with kung-fu-like accuracy. Never fear, the fever broke this morning, and I'm at about 70% of my usual 110%.
But this doesn't stop me from...

The Flu Festival Wrapup!

Tylenol: always there, always helping out, I give you a A- for consistency.

Robitussin: When you ask someone where they were when JFK was shot or what they were doing when they first heard Tom Jones for the first time, they can tell you in explicit detail. Sociologists call this a "flashbulb memory", and 'Tussin has managed to encapsulate that in their mystical elixir. This miracle goo tastes just as horrible as when I was 8 and brought to mind every day spent in bed from illness. But, if it takes the sicks away, I'm voting for it. For that lousy trip down memory lane, B

Nyquil: I'd have to say, "the best sleep you got with a cold medicine"? I was skeptical. But if getting better is being dead to the world for 6 hours, its got my vote. A+

And what would getting sick be without some horrible TV viewing habits? Daytime TV is the unmined gold mine of quality programming. Here are some choice picks:

K-19:The Widowmaker: Harrison Ford as a Soviet sub captain? Say it ain't so. It's alright, only a few die from radiation poisoning needlessly.

Too Legit: The M.C. Hammer Story: VH1's treatment of the meortic rise to fame and plummet into bankruptcy. Did you know Hammer knew TuPac, and even saw him the night he moved to Mexico and started publishing records posthumously? VH1 wouldn't lie. This of course led straight into "I Married...M.C. Hammer" so interesting.

Some honorable mentions include:
I Love Toys, VH1 spinoff of I Love Anything variety
8th and Ocean, Britt is the next big thing
Cosby Show, there's nothing Bill can't make better
and to much CSI to mention

My name's Josh, and I watch crud on TV when I'm sick.

Setting the World right, at 5 to 1 odds.

I know, but I have to make up some stuff and put it into a paper. And I'm fighting my body. We're having a bet to see if I get sick. I have the immune system of a horse (I'm assuming that's good, I have no evidence to back that up. Except for "healthy as a horse"?) so suck it germs.

Yesterday's random though: Why do we have the phrase "if I were a betting man"? Is there a fundamental lack of betting men? Is there a shortage that I'm not aware of? Do we need more betting men? If so, I'm betting on a put-down from my brother, and something off-color from Scott.

Seriously. Cool Guy.

Allyn and I are headed off to CIY conference this weekend, which stands for A Bizzilion 7th graders loose in a hotel having elevator races. So I'm sure there will be stories to tell. In recent news I had a dream where I learned to surf. And I was awesome at it. Until the sea turned into potato soup, then it was a little harder. But we did solve world hunger.

In other recent news, my brother Tim got some headshots taken. Strangely enough, he manages to look almost professional. I'm of the opinion that the firstborn should rule over the family, however if that was true, we'd have a moat long ago. Also I would pick the "fat Tim in a kiddie pool" shot for promo. Honestly, that kid was double fat when was born.
Check him out.

My fav?
Easy,

Things I don't understand, vol. II

Phrases I don't understand, never have, have even heard used in conversation, in context, and still have no idea what they mean:

"Throwing the baby out with the bathwater" I'm more familiar with the cultural background of this idiom than the actual meaning.

"Proof is in the pudding" No idea

"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth" I had to look this one up to wrap my head around it, why would you look a horse in the mouth anyway? Dad, I'm looking to you on this one.

"Don't get your nose out of joint" Seriously, that's just random words strung together.

Things I don't understand, vol. II

Phrases I don't understand, never have, have even heard used in conversation, in context, and still have no idea what they mean:

"Throwing the baby out with the bathwater" I'm more farmiler with the cultural background of this idiom than the actual meaning.

"Proof is in the pudding" No idea

"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth" I had to look this one up to wrap my head around it, why would you look a horse in the mouth anyway? Dad, I'm looking to you on this one.

"Don't get your nose out of joint" Seriously, that's just random words strung together.