YAY Technology

It's been many moons since I last updated the few that still take the time to look at this word-vomit on a computer screen. However, due to the acquisition of a computer (thanks parents :-]) I'm able to let you all (both of you) know what's been going on in the life of a 22-year-old dude struggling to find direction as the arrival of adulthood is fully realized.

So I suppose I will start at the beginning of the summer, since I haven't written since mid-June. I began my summer job on a sunny Monday doing something I didn't think I'd ever actually enjoy: I'm a custodian. From 7:30 AM to 4:00 PM every day, I slog a mop back and forth, wrestle with wet vacs, buffers, and obstinate waxing materials, lean out of windows four stories up to ensure their cleanliness, and shove furniture around. And yes, I actually enjoy it. Mostly. Ecclesiastes (and Proverbs, and Psalms, I believe) talk about the "sluggard," how they barely work and prosper for it. Some of my most frustrating moments have been had when I have to take over someone else's job because they have simply "disappeared," vanished to another room behind a locked door on a previous floor, getting paid to take a nap. For the most part, though, I pop in my head phones and listen to sermons while mopping or waxing, where interactions with others are limited.

On weekends, I typically climb rocks. I don't know why I enjoy it, but I do. I don't know many others who will take an afternoon to brave a scary, strenuous overhang with a 15 foot fall onto barnacle covered rocks, or lunge for a hold barely wide enough for their fingertips 50 feet above the ground while they face face an at-least fifteen foot "whipper," a fall away from the wall until the rope catches and then swings them back towards it, if their tendons can't hold the strain. I can't explain its attraction. But it's there. Yes, I'm probably crazy.

Currently, I was looking for a job, then got tired of filling out random forms and online resumes and attempting to remember the phone numbers off all the employers I've had. I am hoping to find something with the National Park Service, although permanent jobs with them are hard to come by. Money only gets tighter the more I try to save, and I realize how SOL I am without Jesus. I am really trying to trust him with everything I have, and when I don't have much, it's hard to let go of what I do have. As I try and figure out what to do next in life, I know the only lasting thing that I can do is trust him with my life, and everything else is kindling, according to 2 Peter. Awesome. :-)

Joining the Proletariat

Many of you have known me long enough to know what I think of Karl Marx. While I'm not as much of a proponant of his ideas as I once was, I have definitely become a member of the proletariat: the workers party. I own nothing but my labor, some climbing gear, $3000 worth of music gear, and a beat-up pickup truck. The only way to continue living as I do is to sell the labor that I have. So I mop floors, wash windows, sweeps, scrape gum from the floors and duct tape from the walls. At least I get to listen to sermons while I do it.

It does, however, feel FANTASTIC to be working again. It will take awhile to figure out how much food I have to eat to fuel my lifestyle, because a few cups of pork stirfry, an apple, pop tarts, and maybe a sandwich for dinner just aren't cutting 8 hours of work in additon to afternoons spent climbing. I'm chillin' out today, but I am trying to keep busy.

GRADUATION!?

So just the other day, I was a student at Clark College, sitting through the wrong English 101 class on my first day as a college kid. As I apologized profusely I stumbled out of class, probably tripping over everyone's bags on my exit from Hannah Hall 103, as I asked myself what I was going to do now. Luckily I found the appropriate classroom, which I discovered as Larry Blakely told me that I had found a chemistry classroom. The look on my face must have been classic, because everyone laughed at me as Mr. Blakely let me feel awkward for a second before telling me I was in the right place. I found my seat and sunk into my chair. So this is college, I thought.

The next day, I threw my few possessions into my Ridgeway Gamma 921, my dorm room at Western Washington University. As I attempted to get acquainted with my new roommate, I hoped not everyone felt nearly as awkwawrd as I did. I was a sophomore surrounded by freshman, a history major surrounded by art majors, a musician surrounded by graphic designers. All of a sudden, I was a "good" Christian guy stuck in a sea of people talking about sex, drugs, and alcohol, and grew immune to the huge pile of Busch and PBR cans that appeared in the recycle bin on Sunday morning as I deposited the bottles left over from my weekly ration of Henry Weinhardt's Root Beer. As I walked onto north campus for the first time, not knowing a soul, trying to find Old Main 480 at 8 AM on a Tuesday morning, coffee in hand I looked around and tried to envision what I was getting myself into. So this is university, I thought.

365 days later, I started my job as a resident advisor in addition to, as Residents Life will tell you (falsely,) being a "student first." Fresh off a summer spent rafting in Idaho, a was thrust back into an environment similar to that of my first day. Unable to handle the stress of the job, I quickly discovered it wasn't for me, resigned, and relocated to an apartment on the southern edge of campus. I had given up my security in housing during a time that jobs were near impossible to find, and baerly being able to scrape up rent for the next month became the norm. After my first meeting with my new landlord, I walked back to my room with less money than I had coming out. Junk, so this is life, I thought.

I just finished my application to graduate in fall 2009. Hitting "print" was like a punch in the sternum. I'm almost done. Out on my own. Kind of.

I wonder what'll happen "tomorrow." I'm sure it'll be entertaining.

Shoot. What is Today? Thursday?

The sun is shining here in Bellingham. The little clock on the bottom right hand corner of the screen says that I have 40 minutes until I need to be across campus, sitting, listening to presentations about democracy promotion in various countries. I haven't written for awhile, so I figured I'd give a quick update.

I just finished Revelation today. Which is cool, because I started in Genesis at the beginning of August. Done in 9 months, if my math is correct. That's pretty cool. The plan now is to spend a week in Hebrews, which is hands down my favorite NT book.

I love when people talk on the phone in the library. Loudly. It's my favorite.

Climbing isn't happening as often as I would like it to. In between being tired of all the local spots, it's hard to find climbing buddies, and my left arm is feeling kinda funny, which perhaps has something to do with the awkward bump on my left arm. I'm climbing with my finger taped up, which helps give support to the tendon, but to blow a tendon now would be the worst thing I could do. ANYWAY. I'm going to the doctor today to see what's up. I know. Shocker.

I would love to keep going, but there's people wandering around the library looking for computers, even if it's just to check their Facebook. SO I should go. I'll try to write more later. We'll see how that goes.

So This Is What I Do

I'm at it again: writing papers based on almost entirely primary source evidence. It's so much more fun and interesting than looking through secondary source material (stuff that was written about other stuff, to over-simplify it) writing the page number, and giving credit to the person that does it.



So, because it's more fun, I sit in front of a light-emitting screen and sift through newspapers on a microfilm machine. This is fantastic in small doses. However, I'm going on hour number four of it, and my search has turned up surprisingly little evidence. The objective? To analyze newpaper advertisements searching for ways in which women during the early-mid 1940's were encouraged to operate under war industrialization, rationing, and general traditional gender role flip-flopping. While good evidence has been hard to come by, I keep seeing ads directed at women saying that something is "so easy to wear," typically in reference to wool something- or- other.



QUESTION: Don't ya just put something on? The ability to wear something is not the issue (unless we're talking about the armor of God: that stuff'll just fall off if we're not careful.) Rather, it seems to me that whether or not you can do ANYTHING in it is the question. What the heck is "garbandine?" Terms like "bodice" just confuse me.


As you partake in my boredom while August issues of the New York Times scroll unfruitfully before my eyes, think about this...



What if humans were actually called slugs? what if we renamed the two species right now, because those are the species names that were actually intended in our creation? Would they If you were a human, how would it feel to get salted by a slug?



This is just a taste of the micro film room at WWU. Where the university setting turns otherwise intelligent slugs into mere humans in the process of being salted.

Life is good, by the way. Confusing, busy, but entertaining. Thank goodness it's almost summer.

My Day Started Earlier Than Expected

After a later-than-intended evening, I went to bed about two hours past my new bed-time (right around 10:30 PM.) I awoke with a start at about 4:50 AM soaked with sweat from too many sheets, then became even more awake when my roommate returning home at about 5 AM. About five minutes later, I received a strange phone call from a friend. At first I ignored it, but felt uneasy about it. A quick return phone call revealed that my friend was in the hospital and needed a ride home.

Well. Now I'm up.

I have a paper to write today, and I'm about halfway through it. Then I remembered something a fellow musician and worship team member had told me about...a 300W Genz-Benz bass amp that weighed less than 3 lbs. I took a break to investigate and then realized that there was a reason I hadn't looked at gear in a while. I tend to want it. The fact that my acoustic guitar is slowly breaking, the crack in the bridge slowly expanding doesn't make it any easier.

I used to use a lot of gear. Those who have witnessed me on Glenwood's worship team can attest to this. Options are good. Bigger is better.

False. As I enter a stage in my life where frequent relocation is all but imminant, less really is more. My bass amp is shoved under a desk because it's the only place it'll fit. My computer's broken, and thusly my system for playing amp-less is gone. At church, I now plug directly into a direct input box, something I HATED doing at Glenwood. In my closet in Vancouver, I have tubs and drawers full of cables, pedals, strings, tubes, and assorted guitar parts. Oh, to have all that money back. Yet the thought of off-ing a guitar scares me, because I love them and the sounds they make. I really have scared down too. But to think that I could go even more bare bones and be ok with it makes me better able to part with all the stuff I don't use at all.

Anyway.

Back to work.

WOW. It's Actually Happening.

I've spent the last few months of my life living in the cave that is Wilson 2w, the microfilm room in Western Washington University's library. Full of primary source documents and the means to access them, it lacks a reliable internet connection and any computers that can be used to figure out what's going on outside of my little history bubble. A shortage of time forced me to forgo my daily edition of the New York Times. All this to say, I have no idea what's going on in this world. As I get back in the loop, I grow increasingly more frustrated with the times of the day.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/business/31auto.html?_r=1&hp

This article really got me fired up. For years, we've mostly clung to the capitalist market. Competition is good. It keeps prices somewhat low, and keeps the manufacturers responsible for the quality of goods. When a company can no longer remain competitive, it dies off, and makes room for others to enter the market. However, if this last step fails to occur, the system is shaken up and no longer ceases to function as it should.

However, this last step is precisely what is NOT being allowed to happen. The Obama administration is continuing to prop up dying businesses. That's not what fired me up about this article though. The source of this proverbial "riled-up-ness" is this: Obama is quoted as saying that leadership from Washington is what caused the current failure of the American auto industry.

Here's the deal: The American auto industry shouldn't need the leadership of the American government. What it does need is the ability to DIE. I love my Chevy to death, and I really hope that the Feds will allow me to continue driving it in spite of it's emissions problems, but I would rather see GM die than give it more money so that the CEO can keep their summer home. People buy more foreign cars anyway. Cause' they're better.

I'll try to keep more on top of this thing this quarter, as I document the downfall of the American economy. Clinch your buttocks folks: we're going socialist.