Dang, you stink.

Just a quick post to start my 16 hour day today. I have the opportunity to drive over to a meeting in Thermopolis, Wyoming for the evening, and since the congress has decided not to do any real work so they can make republicans look bad, our budgets for travel are pretty cramped. That means driving home in the middle of the night.
Dang, today sucks. Something trivial to many people, losing, just kills me. It's strange that I should dislike something I'm so good at, but it happened again. Las night was the YMCA league championship game. I should have known last week what would happen this week. Last week I dropped 23, and since I'm notoriously streaky, I should have known that I would suck last night. Bad Timing, but I'm good at that too.
It's almost painful to admit, but I'm just not a lucky guy. Don't get me wrong, I do fairly well at most things, but it is not luck related. Fact is, I can't remmember the last time I really won something as in "I'm number 1" (which by the way was my basketball number). Let's see, softball, 2nd, bball, second, triathlon, not even close to second. Wait let's try college, let's see, bbal, second, battle-o-the bands, second, first chair in the orchestra, no, second. High school? Football, second in the league, bbal, second...Deacons quorum stake bbal champ...second.?? This is a disturbing trend. In fact it can no longer be considered a trend, it is a law of the universe. I have won a few things, pretty much all related to endeavors that I realy didn't think were up there with YMCA basketball God. Some debate and speech and knowledge stuff. You know, not the kind of stuff that chicks dig.
I hate losing. Some people dislike it, I HATE it. I still remmeber vividly the feeling of losing in football games, of getting bounced from the regional tourney. I just can't stand to lose, and I'm not the guy you want to go up to and say, "good game, nice try". If I had a good game, you'd be the loser.
I went home last night and had a long hot shower. I scrubbed alot trying to wash off the loser. I woke up and swam for half an hour hoping the endorphins and chlorine would kill the smell of loser, stil ripe on my countanence. It didn't work, I still stink.

Kids, competition for the cherios, or source thereof

My sister just started posting some stuff on her own, so now I have a willing victim who gets to have there life talked about in conjunction with mine. My wife is the greatest, but she's not nearly the extrovert that I am (she'd just as soon that I leave her out of my storytime, kinda the heavenly mother type) Luckily, Katie is.
My sister has to be one of my favorite people in the world. the truth is I think she is basically perfect. Ya, a little rough around the edges sometimes, but that just adds to the product. Personality-wise she's probably the most like me of all my siblings. Trust me, there are too many of us for you to run all the comparisons. Anyway, as if making a statement that she needed trials, the lord gave her...Kimber.
Kimber is my niece, who I love, at least I thought I did untill one fateful January 1st. We were getting along so well. We both love cars, Nogales, bacon, you get it, we realy clicked man. And then I discovered that the age old truth that I have always known apllies even to these little girls. All women have the capacity for great evil.
We all went out to my uncles place for new years eve. We had dinner and watched one of the world's coolest movies (Dust to Glory, go rent it). One of the aspects that makes this movie neat for us is that my uncle (basically one of my Heroes) had raced in the Baja 1000 several times and was familiar with most of the main charecters, having been a contemporary. He was pretty modest, "I only finished top ten..." Dude, your cool, you don't have to go any further. Anyway, it was all copacetic until bedtime.
My wife and I settled into some sleeping bags down by my uncles pool table, leaving Kate and her husband the spare bedroom next to us. Ah sleep, so good...but...what's this! I shot from the bed, 20 minutes after falling asleep, there was a terrible noise next door. Someone was trying to kill my niece, she was screaming, wheezing. I lept from my bed, in my totaly sweet NASCAR jamies, pulled one of the many rifles off the wall, and jumped to the next room ready to cut some stupid fool down. You don't mess with a Cole,..er an Anderson...well at least with some of the Coles/Andersons, cuz you are opening a can of "maybe I'll whoop your a-- if I'm bigger than you/have a gun." Imagine my shock when entering the room the animal attacking my niece was an Elmo. He wasn't even moving. "What the heck?" was all I could say. "Sorry" said Katie, "I think she's just sleeping in a different place." Realy, where, the 7th circle of hell?
We went back to sleep, ah, sleep, of course until 3 a.m. when the whole cycle repeated. This time I knew how to fix the problem. Kids love nothing more than spending time with "uncle Nephi". Against my sister's advice I said, "no, no, she can hang out here with us." Upon returning to the sleeping bags I found that my wife was missing. She had decided that the garage was much quieter than the basement, and had dragged her stuff out there where she was now curled in the fetal position trying to stay warm and sleep. No big deal, I got this kid thing handled. She was quiet. Of course she was punching me in the face and pulling my hair, but she was quiet. Well, a guy can only take so much. I returned her to her parents, upon which time she promptly began to wail, picked up my gear, and made my way to the garage.
The next morning I went in and she was there at the breakfast table smiling. I looked at her and said softly, "you look like an angel, but you're realy eeeeeevil...like the Devil..."
Someday I'll get my payback. Oh yes, there will come a time when Katie will want to sleep, and I will make sure that my offspring are there.........either that or I'll get a Basset Hound.

"Tag", the fat kid always gets tagged

So a challenge, if there's one thing that we compulsive competition freaks can't ressist... well I guess there's lots of stuff...but this would be one of those...stuffs...

First off let me go on the record as saying that sometimes you have to realize that God knows what's best for you, and it may be that I have finally located definative proof of that radiant truth. You see I love black beans, pinto beans, most beans except green beans, eggs, mayo, sour cream, cottage cheese, yogurt, sour krout, guacamole, alfredo sauce, fish including tuna, most seafood, potato salad, don't mind tap water, most cereals that are good for you, I love chocolate chip cookie dough, lamb, most game, cream cheese (or any derivative or product thereof), butter on bread (in moderation), RANCH DRESSING, thousand island dressing, ceasar salad dressing, pretty much any creamy dressings, any creamy sauces that would go on a burger or sandwich (especially generic Arctic Circle "white sauce and aforementioned ranch dressing), yams, pie crust, bananas, chicken pot pie, oatmeal, peanut butter and jelly anything...I also tend to like Canadians, although having read Janayas post, it's clear that dietarily, we were never compatible.

So what are five things that are uniquely me that most people don't already know. I have to think pretty hard on this one because these will come back up somehow when I don't want them to.

1: Remmebmer when people asked you as a kid what you wanted to be when you grew up. If you would have asked me when I was pretty young, the number one answer would have been "Truck Driver". Don't ask why, I don't know, and I'm actually not sure that I want to delve into that part of my psyche. I know that cowboy, astronaut, and pilot would've been up there. I'm not seeing my present occuaption in the top 10, but I guess that driving 50,000 miles a year puts me close to my childhood goal in a way.

2: I'm a level 5 meagan. Let me explain. I have always thought it was very interesting that people would choose a vegetarian lifestyle. Even more perplexing, vegans. I could look at it from a naturalist point of view, or from my personal moral bias, either way it's okay to eat cow. Not only okay, but actually I'd be giving the universe a great big slap in the face if I said "thanks for all the great stuff you put here that tastes good, but I think I'll stick to brocolli." Imagine then if you will my shock the day someone really close to me says "I think I want to be a vegetarian." Horror is a word, although it might not be the right word to describe the depth of my feelings. Horror turned into the realization that I'd just get to eat alot more of the stuff she ordered at restaurants. At least she still likes ranch dressing. Well anyway, I decided that there needs to be an equilibrium in all things, so, to offset those who are various levels of vegan, I'm a meagan. I may be the first, I'm not sure. Basically it's like this, I figure I shouldn't eat anything that doesn't have at least some kind of animal product in it. Doesn't have to be alot, but something. It only makes sense that that stuff is better for you, I mean look at how much higher it is on the food chain. That's high octane baby, and I'm like a top fuel dragster, I can't be runnin on that low grade stuff. I'll allow myself the occasional slip into the vegetable realm, and twinkies are basically animals, so they're okay, but in general, you get the jist. (Quick disclaimer, if your too much of a vegatable to understand the levity, please don't comment)

3: I am a math retard. Pretty amazing that someone with a masters degree that relied heavily on stats and science would be mathmatically challenged, but there it is. The only class I have ever had to retake was trig. Oddly enough, as soon as you make it theoretical instead of quantitative, I freakin clean up. I blame my parents, I don't know why it's their fault, but I'll find out.

4: I am planning for retirement, but don't neccesarily belive that I'll ever really get there. You know, I'm putting money into this and that and planning this and investing in that, but let's be honest, I am way to immature to actually think that I'll get to spend that money. Right now it just feels like I'm wasting money. In reality there are so many things that could happen before I get there. Anyone who has known me knows that I'm likely to die doing something stupid. Take your pick: climbing, jumping off something, falling off a cliff in the middle of nowhere with my stupid friend Cody trying not to kill my horse cuz it's the only way out of this God forsaken wilderness (theoretical of course, Cody's not stupid). In fact, I'm pretty sure there's a poll out in the state about how long it will take me to smeer myself down the highway while I'm doing my NASCAR impersonation (trying to cut drive time between meetings). Worse yet, I'm probably just too into working to ever retire. I like talking and meeting people, those things make people think you're crazy when your retired, not useful (unless your the Walmart greater). Of course there's always the chance of global destruction keeping me from retirement. Of all the morbid possible outcomes, my money (literally I guess) is on global destruction. I'm not sure how the end will come, but it'll probably be messy, and I won't get extra points for my fat 401(k), yet I still keep putting it in there. How bizarre is that.

5: Sometimes, If I see them while they're actually on the plant, I will actually stop what I'm doing just to smell the roses. I made it a goal to do that After I figured something out. I have had some of the coolest experinces you could imagine, but I never realized how great they were until they're over. I remmeber thinking that vividly when I returned recently from a trip to southern France. I was there for business, but had the opoporunity to go to the Nemes fair after alot of proding from a colleague. We sat in a roman collasium and watched a bull fight. We sat on stones that had been worn smooth by 2,000 years of spectators coming and going. We went to Celtic castles that pre-dated chrisitanity. Those things make you realize how short life is. They also help you keep perspective in that you want to leave something lasting behind. I wish I wouldn't have taken so much of what I've done and seen for granted. If you could change one thing in your life, everybody always says they never would. I think that's a lie. I have a handful of decisions, that if I could have a mulligan, I might take it. I'm not going to share. Those are all special to me, but I know that If I knew in the past some of what I know now, I could do better, and I would.

St. Valentines Day Massacre

Febuary 14th, don't forget that date. The local YMCA did. They scheduled our basketball tourney for, you guessed it, Valentines day. I wish I was kiding, but I'm not. Can you imagine the type of stress that this puts on a guy, or to be selfish lets say me? You know the ESPN commercial with the guy "Jerry, Dr. Hoops". I am basically that guy. My youth has left me, as has an inch or two of the vertical, but in my own mind I'm basically "the man". Oh ya, I'm scoring like 17 points a night in the YMCA league. I'm like a YMCA quisi all-star, which means I'm basically the Mo Williams of YMCA basketball. You don't know who that is? I'm that guy.

Mediocrity is my thing. I think I have ADD, although I'm not quite sure what that means, it's so boring. I love to do alot of things. I'm passable at most, but not really great at too many. I start to do one, get bored and do another (some people call that well rounded, they're very confused). There are the few exceptions. It appears that I have a knack for talking. My wife calls this something else, something about bulls and...I don't know, I was distracted, I really didn't pay attention. So what's a mediocre YMCA wannabe baller who's better at talking than shooting to do? What else? I talked them into changing the tournament date. It was really pretty easy. I just pointed out that our community is fairly small, and the number of divorces that they were about to cause would likely be the demise of society as we know it.

You know what they say, "if you can't amaze them with your intellect, baffle them with bu.." Well, you know.

So this is life

Every once in a while I start to think about all the crap that I learn every day, and wonder when it will all end. If my theories on life are right then that time will truthfully never come, still sometimes it sems like sensory overload. At times it's nice to just shut down for awhile and retreat into something a little simpler. I was talking to some friends the other day and we began talking about life and all its complexities. We had spent the day putting some hardwood floor into my friend's house. We went to (insert national pizza chain here) for dinner. One of the pizzas ordered was canadian bacon and pinapple. I'm not sure why canadians call it bacon, and apparently neither was the waitress, becuase when she brought it back it had "bacon" bacon on it. Easily understood, anyone could have made the same mistake. Well, my friends wife looked at it and said "are you guys really going to eat that?" It was at this point that I got to expound one of the truisms of the universe. First I said "Ya, it's got bacon on it doesn't it?" She replied, "yes but that's not what we ordered." then she went on about how guys are weird, because we are "simple". I agree. We are simple. We generally like three things. 1-Bacon, which you already knew, 2- Friends, 3- Trucks with flames on them. Look at the next little boy you see and you should notice that we really haven't changed that much. We can't eat as much bacon for fear of the coronary, our friends are still convincing us to do stupid things, and we still love big trucks with flame jobs.

One of my good friends here commited suicide over the thanksgiving weekend. It was on a sunday. I was out of town. The last time I saw him he had invited us over to his house for a fish fry. It was Alaskan Halibut that he had brought back from a recent trip. He was always inviting us over for dumb stuff, and we all loved to go. He had 4 little girls and a wife. He was the nicest peron that I knew. When I moved here we weren't great friends. He thought that I was a cocky punk, which although true isn't the whole picture. Later he figured out that we were alot alike. Two kids who liked bacon, friends, and cars with flames on them. Our whole group of friends here (a bunch of youg married dopes) is pretty much like that.

On that sunday night I got the call from a friend, a Mormon bishop, who thought that I needed to know so I could help his family. I guess I started to think that maybe it was past the time for helping. My friend was addicted to prescription pain killers, and augmented them with some non-prescription pot smooking. We all knew, but we all avoided this subject. Over time, we spent less time with him because of it. It was a cold afternoon after church in Buffalo, Wyoming. His wife had just had a fight with him about his issues. He went out and sat in the bed of his pickup. I gues he was sitting on the tailgate, just like when we were kids. I still remmember how cool it was when dad would let you sit on the tailgate. He just took as many pills as he could, laid back and watched the sky for awhile.

I don't remmeber when I stopped being a little kid, or when my friends were more important than the balance in a bank acount. I don't remmeber the last time I had a fight with my wife, if I started it or if she did. I don't remmeber the last time that I invited my friend over to my house, but I wish I wouldn't have waited till Sunday.