45 days until...

My birthday is in 1 month, graduation is in 45 days, and almost every day in between something that thinks it is important happens. I think I just might be stressed out. I have been stuck in rhyming couplets all week. While there is nothing wrong with couplets or rhyming in general it just did not carry my thoughts well and I never even got to the point of writing something down. Props to R'Ed for a little lighter fluid cause even if yunz don't care I always feel better when the words finally come out.

Pass me by, I promise (RRC 03/29/06)

Not quite a stain
Not humanities gain
Just there to been seen if you want to
To be saw if the wanting stops
And if you never wished a want
Pass me by

Sidewalk corner serenade
A tear or two, a sob
From knowing the truth
Always
But not paying no mind
From reading the bits in between the lines
And forgetting a forest of trees

I’m not on my knees
Just bent headed and tear streaked
Won’t let you see
Wrapped up in glitter light-dark
A lonely midnight rain
Shadows mixed with rivulets
Washing gutter pennies clean

Not quite a stain
Not humanities gain
Just there to been seen if you want to
To be saw if the wanting stops
And if you never wished a want
Pass me by

You stay with what you know
And I will go
There are no tears in these eyes
Soul forced lies
A collection of pieces
I promise, I promise, I promise
I’m fine

I know you love her
You only wanted me
Stepping in to silence
This is not a walk of shame
But I’ll be damned before you know
The way these dreams go
Watch me walk in this rain
Watch them wash away

I’m not quite a stain
Not humanities gain
Just there to been seen if you want to
To be saw if the wanting stops
And if you never wished a want
Pass me by

I promise…I don’t lie

-Jn

The blood of W-PA

There is carbon in my clothing, carbon in the food that I eat, carbon in my bones, carbon in my blood, carbon in the air I breathe but coal made me...

Neverland

Someday, I want to own the Gringo Bar. I will fix drinks, make food, run a little hostel (and really broke college students can camp on the beach for like $2), and lead tours (of the alligator infested laguna, the mountains, the reef, whatever). I will live in a little house outside of town and purify my own ocean water in some sustainible way. I will set up a hammock under the mango tree and write and I will walk the beach under the stars where you can still see them. If there are no tours of happy Germans or Russians or American yuppie divers (or missionary teams that seem to frequent the area) I will head off into the forest on my own to see what the frogs are doing and how fast the evil fungus is growing in my population. When I colaborate with the folks back home we might have some great ideas about why hylids have fewer parasites and publish a bit on why everyone should be nomadic. And if dendrobatids dont get the fungus, wow that would be cool, that would be....SO cool. I think I need to get my masters first...maybe even my doctorate if I want to publish on my own. Mrrrr. Someday...I will own the gringo bar...

Dog Blog

This week I am babysitting a house...only you don't babysit a house and this house doesnt need sat...so I guess really I am dogsitting. This involves taking the pooch out for walks in the afternoon springy aired goodness. It alsoinvolves learning a bit about dog dynamics. See I bet you didn't know dogs had blogs but they do. Strider its actually a pretty frequent poster. He has a few places where he says a little more (and I can't understand dog but I am pretty sure those are his personal blogs) then there are a few where he says less but even if he doesnt leave a comment every day he still checks up on the status of things. Kinda like me, if he is checking every day his read time goes faster but if he skips a day it takes longer to catch up and well he always seems to have more to share at the begining of the walk than at the end. I guess he just gets kinda drained.

Anyways, we have walked. Strider has posted (a lot) and so have I. Now I make a far to early dinner and chill and practice introspection until the recital...

We live here

So stolen from Lu's blog...but not really stolen because I was there too, she just wrote it down first...

“it makes me sick to see that font size” - JJ
“yes, but I saved like half a tree” - Steph!
“it would be easier to save trees by killing beavers” - Jn
“that is so fundamentally wrong” - Tybo
“because you can’t get paper from beavers!” – JJ


Somehow on tuesday we all ended up in the penthouse 'working.' There was more than a little commotion and lots of idealistic road trip planning and rolling of prof eyes but some work did get done. Have I mentioned how happy these people make me? Tybo came over last night to entertain me and by entertain I mean we both sat in the same room doing homework and only speaking when we had a question or the dog did something strange. I don't know if it worked for him but it was pretty much exactly what I needed.

Shift is over...the day begins...

A box truck of chocolates

The first thing I thought of when I woke up this morning was the word 'copacetic' with no context whatsoever.

I have a feeling its one of those days...but the coffee man got a new box truck and I will walk the dog this afternoon (even if the homework doesn't get done).

Smile (3/22/06 RRC)

You smile like you mean it
But I’m not the only one who’s seen it
The same things turn up to down
Right to around to the other way
Something like left
If you get my drift
Hell maybe you get it
The world is copasetic
The aesthetics poetic
When you see me
The irony?
Money costs plastic
But hey love comes free
It’s not worth it to me
And I’m walking away still singing
“Baby why you always gotta bring my world down?”

Take Your Wambat to Work Day

Take a little trip. Take a little trip. Take a little trip with me.

Friday brought Sex chapel which was more than less enjoyable and food in crops-the-class-I-am-not-in but it also brought death in the form of a Physics test of Satan. Spent my St. Patty's day night in the back of a police cruiser...It was like COPS Gordon style. And no mom I don't need you to post bail. Didn't get much sleep and turned Saturday into a disaster. Seems I had these alcohol classes to go to in a place that didn't exist or something. Saturday was really just like a bad dream. Periods of nonrememberance that equate with those nondreaming sections of sleep. 'Woke up' at 630pm and started the day over with dinner and writing a draft of a play. Not THE play. Another play. But I think I am too selfish to be a playwright. You have to give your work up into the hands of others who turn it in to real life but it will never be the real life you see in your head. Its a nervous proposition. I am going to start turning it over to others to get opinions and see if I can take criticism. We will see.

Sunday was church, a bit of hunting and gathering, and trying to fix when there is no way to fix. I mean duct tape is pretty spectacular but eventually the patches come off and you have to patch it again or try another way. So we patch and hope it stays together for just a little while more.

And my weekend ended with 106 and a rousing discussion about how the earth is due for any number of cataclysmic events and some bits about vocabulary and the loss of pricision in speach. Tonight the Happy Hippies meet (plus one) for dinner and fellowship and to talk about our summer community (Oh look at me dropping bad christianeese cliches-man I'm good today) And Tuesday I pack myself into the Rectory for a week to watch the pooch. I don't think I will be writing much worth a post. So supplement with some pieces from the masses that are mmm mmm good. . .

Steph! posted stellar pictures of their trip...click her link.

5L is ranting about the talking box in some pretty well composed prose.

"A television in a refrigerator. Next we'll be building them into shower stalls. This way you never have to be separated from noise and moving colors."

You can read more by...clicking her link.

And R'ed is tossing out some good little bits of memory and poetry. I am especially liking Second 19 March, 2006 because it says something that I wanted to say once and never got the words around. Click the link...

Drill bits and two pieces

Been thinking a lot about what if's. The big one is what if I had gone to school there instead. It's not like what if's to change things, just to throw some perspective into the wind and see where it lands. I could be this happy had I made a few descisions differently (big or little) but I bet I would be a different person. I am where I want to be, where I need to be, doing my thing, not complaining, just thinking.

No name yet (3/14/06 -Ipswich)

How many times will I look your way
And wonder why
How many times will you pass by
That make me want to say
I’m sorry for those time when
And those things I said
And those moments I could have
When I spoke instead

To Hear You Say (3/16/06 -DPS)

I am happy where I am
I’m not happy where I’m not
I suppose I could be more than happy
But happy’s all I got

I can look to tomorrow
And hope to hear you say…
But if I’m pining for tomorrow
Then I ain’t got today
Catch my eye and I’ll close them
Smile, I’ll look away
Otherwise I might need to want to hear you say…

But I’m happy where I am I think
And not happy where I’m not
I suppose I could be more than happy
But right now happy’s all I got

Propaganda (3/15/06- Penthouse)

Well if you no means yes
Then I guess we all agree
There is no problem
Never pain
No broken bones
Away away
I digress
Duress duress duress
But never distress
Yes?

-Jn

Pictures per Request

The Tools of the Trade















Mom playing in the water





















Dad working















Mom working

Just like...

I had a dream over break.... call it a nightmare... I woke up all freaked out and more than a little bit disconcerted. I had a dream that I was talking to Steph! and she said that basically my 3 hippies at ECHO had a huge falling out over the course of break and refused to live together. The happy hippie house just dissolved in front of me and i was left stuttering. Then mom woke me up. I felt very ill for a good portion of the day. If you are taking notes this was also the day that I broke the saw and the boards, attacked the table into a million pieces, sprayed the fire ants with WD40 and raked them all over the yard and was just generally unpleasant among other adjectives.

Don't worry this is not a post of badness. I will spoil the ending but things all turn around for good in the end.

Yesterday marks the 22nd birth of Steph! or something like that anyways. As this is a celebration there are exemptions from the Lent game. This means we went out to a happy little Irish Pub in our backyard. There was a contingent of 4 from the happy hippie house and Steph!'s apartment mates plus entourage (I think I counted 11 total). I would tell you all the pieces but that would sort of be pointless cause the pieces don't make the whole. Its the kind of goodness that you just let out a big sigh and smile and then sigh again and smile bigger. Good drinks and good people and goodness all around. And I keep thinking, yeah this is what our happy hippie house is all about- Goodness all around.

In other HHH news the 5th of the HHH is turning 21 in days and we are excited on her behalf. There is talk of moving our class forward again to the weeks it was originally scheduled for tambien because 5 of 6 have a place to stay off campus and well the 6th just might. Who knows but that would mean more weeks free in a chunk to work which is good for poor starving college students. And it gets me to thinking about the 6th. I don't know all too much about her but I feel like I should work on this. She is a freshman, orthodox (I think greek), Marine Bio, has a hippie sort of look to her, offered to play DD for our excursions over the summer (which was wicked sweet) and really thats about all I got. I don't even know enough about her to shorten her into a wee name for posting purposes. Basically this translates I think in to and attempt to get to know her better. There are 5 of us who know each other fairly well and better every day which could translate into exclusion and I don't want that at all. Something to work on anyways.

Yeah there are a myriad of other little good bits that make coming back from spring break a little less painful like a test getting moved and a class canceled or a night for driving or a long chat with a friend who is far away from home but like I said these are all just bits and they really don't make up the whole. I guess if you had to describe me right now it would be like content and hopeful both. I am good in the now and things will be better in the soon.

Something like this...

Break It All Down (03/13/06 - Ipswich)

It's the perfect kind of day
To take it
Make it
Break it all down
For me
For you
I like the sound of us
Just because
The perfectest two
Beyond true
Because it never was
An unfortunate fact
What you used to lack
The 'know' of past tense
Is never 'know enough'
When matched with 'know now'
And somehow we missed it
Ways came and went
Time well spent
On nothing and all
It's the way the tide flows
Rolls in and out goes
Those ideas I never had
I should have had
Could have had
Would have if I had
It's just too bad
Chance out of luck
You're happily stuck
And I can't blame you
Any more than me
But I'm still free my friend
If you decide to roll the dice again

-Jn

Of mice and snowmen...

This is Sandy the Snowmen. Like any typical snowman he has weird seeds for his nose and spikey seeds for buttons. Stick hands and a seedpod cane. His eyes are acorns and his nose is a ball from a pellet gun. He has some variety of sea grass for a smile and a compilation of sea grass algae and a feather for his super special hat. He survived one round of high tide but he did not make it through round two. The buttons were the last thing to go. More pictures later...


Mice? What about mice? -Jn

This feels wrong...

So I have been cutting things close for a while lately...like finishing up a project on the way to the airport and emailing my paper in 15 minutes before it was due. This emailing thing requires email which reqires internet which requires technology This either requires a password to break into our neighbors wireless or a trip to the library. I am not a very good hacker so guess where we are. This is bad for all of the reasons causing the ramble the other day but good for two reasons. 1 My mother can feed her addiction 2 I can publish my thoughts from my travels yesterday.

Consider thoughts published...

We are the neo-yuppies, a population of the same. We are well dressed attractive and so civil it will make you sick, but we are not nice. We do not make eye contact and we do not ask questions. We like us and are very suspicious if you are not us. We will scrutinize your every action, expression and bit of apparel and look with disapproving question if it does not resemble us. We would never think of dressing in something other than designer, even to work out.

We are always put together even if we are traveling with two young children. Are children are being everyday groomed to be the future us. We dress them in matching Patagonia fleeces when they are small and cart them around in designed strollers reminiscent of our SUVs and send them to private school as soon as they are old enough.

We find nothing wrong with walking around with an I-pod earbud in one ear and our hands free cell in the other telling to our business partner ‘I don’t think the new guy can cut it’ in the same breath as ‘that Starbucks is calling my name.’ If you asked us we would tell you that we agree with ideas like conservation of national parks, fair trade, helping those poor people in the third world, and recycling. If you looked at what we do you would realize that we have not thought these things through beyond the warm fuzzies we get when we drop a few coins in the Salvation Army well at Christmas.

I am not a Neo-yuppie. I am sitting here typing on my laptop with my cell phone close at hand yes, but I am sprawled out on the floor by the window. Every yuppie that passes by me looks twice and again to confirm that I am real, I am smiling at them, and I have a ring in my nose. (I like the double takes specific to the ring- these are new and met with more disgust than the normal looks.) If I was feeling slightly less introspective I would walk up to one or a few and comment on the fact that I don’t believe in the social constructs of deodorant, shampoo, or undergarments and that I buy organic. No one is shocked that I have become a happy hippie child. I am just trying to learn how to be my happy hippie self without hating the damn yuppies. I mean they are allowed to hate the damn dirty hippies, but hate and hippies do not go together. In my life I will suffer through a myriad of tropical diseases and maladies, but antimony drugs can help me and I don’t especially mind having my own personal ecosystem so long as it doesn’t kill me. These poor people suffer from affluenza; they grow nothing but interest and money cannot buy a cure. I should pity, not hate.

A final note- An add from the plane flight: "Without you we would just be a bunch of TV's flying around the country."

No hay mas-Jn

Break...

I'm sure y'all expected it if you know me and were paying attention but well somehow got myself sick. ::Shrug:: I think I just might survive. I am working the wee hours tomorrow and then 4 is taking me to the airport. My g-pa is going to meet me at the luggage spinny to kick spring break off right. The coolest of the cool kids (3 of my happy hippies) are going to Florida too but they are going to ECHO which is what makes them cooler than the other cool kids. Had my parents not bought my time I would be with them sept I think I would have stolen JJs spot which would have been sad for him. I have been there once and I can share. They should come back with cool stories anyways. My forever roommate is coming down post choir tour which makes me very happy. It will be nice to be roommates again if only for a week or so. I am sad for my housemates cause they aren't doing anything. One had a choice to leave the other one just has a different set of breaks. Regardless they are gonna watch the Iggies and make sure the pipes don't freeze/we dont run out of oil like last time. Ok I am done pointlessly rambling. I mostly just wanted to mention that I am gone til March 13 and I don't care if you do miss me, I am gonna avoid technology for a while.
Peace, love and rock and roll - Jn

Lent Begins...

Remember, you are dust and to dust you will return.