I write, occasionally

Here's a collection of 653 pieces of nonsense that I've written over the past 24.72 years.

  • Beer

    Sometime after I started at Pioneer, some co-workers and I visited this small (smoke free) bar in Johnston called The cAb. The cAb had this contest that if you put your business card in this bowl you could be drawn for the After Work Club. We all put our cards in, and almost all of us won. This club entitled us to 1 free drink per day for the year of 2004, so we decided, that we would attempt to sample every beer (~70) and rate them.

    Since I was a late bloomer in actually enjoying beer, I decided this would be good for me. So we started on our Journey. Sadly, we lost a couple along the way, but Nehru, Nick, and I are still going strong... Nehru and Nick are going a bit stronger than I am though, haha. So here are the combined …

  • Tug Fest 2004

    On Friday Marv organized our first RC Regatta on the Pioneer campus pond. It was a ton of fun. First we raced the little boats, then a few of us got to race the big boats. Awesome.

    After work, Kari and I drove to my parent's house for Tug Fest, which is a tug-o-war competition across the Mississippi River between Iowa and Illinois. It was fun. Friday night, Rich, Mitch, Kari and I watched fireworks from my dad's little "beach." Then we did a lot of walking around down town. It's weird to run into my H.S. friends.

    Saturday we hung out on my dad's newly built patio/fish pond. Then Kari and I went down to watch the Tugs. Ben tugged this year, which was awesome. I also saw my old buddy Josh tug.

    It's so funny how serious the fest is. Kari was in …

  • My Bathroom Theory (No. 1): Washing Your Hands

    Washing your hands after using the bathroom. I've been thinking about this quite a lot lately. This joke (with several variations) comes to mind but it goes something like:

    There's a kid that just gets done peeing and starts to walk out of the bathroom. A guy says, "Hey kid, didn't your mom teach you to wash your hands after you pee?" The kid then replies, "No, she taught me not to pee on my hands."

    I mean, how necessary is it that I wash my hands after taking a pee? I don't pee on my hands. How many germs are residing on my recently washed penis? I wake up every morning, take a thorough shower, put on my freshly washed underwear, and start my day. Then, throughout the day my hands touch a thousand different things, but my …

  • Twenty Three n Stuff

    Yep, Thursday I turned 23. Here's what went down...
    After work, a bunch of guys met me up at the cAb. Friggin Rico and Doug bought me a gigantic fishbowl drink - I paid them back by playing Christmas music and other crappy songs on the jukebox. Then I met Kari for dinner at 801 grand. I was super pumped to eat on the top floor of the Principle building... but apparently you have to be some kind of member or something, because that did not happen - sad. The food was really really good, really expensive, and I really felt like crap after eating my rare steak. Stupid 12 hour digestion process, haha.

    After that I met more friends at The Original Fun Bar for Birthday Thursdays. It was a good time - aside from the extreme mellowness and …

  • Denver - Jason's Wedding

    So after driving 40 MPH for 45 minutes on the interstate and then through 1 foot deep water, I'm back from Colorado.

    It was a really good time which leads to quite a bit to talk about, but I'll try to sum it up...

    On Friday I met up with Jason and a bunch of other guys for his bachelor party. We started out with a BBQ (where I ate the best marinated/grilled tenderloin that I think I will ever eat in my life). Then we piled into the 20 person Excursion and did a bar crawl around Denver. Tons of fun.

    Saturday afternoon, Kari got a new celtic cross tattoo, then we ate at PF Chang's with Victor. I'm so happy one is opening here. I heart lettuce wraps. Then Kari and I went out at the 16th Street Ped Mall and hit up club Beyond. …

  • Eternal Apprehension

    Over the weekend, Kevi and I decided to make a short film. So we sat down and started planning this really dope skit. But the more we planned the more we realized that we didn't have the resources to make it happen. So instead we came up with another idea in about 5 minutes. It was supposed to be a lot different than it turned out. But once Kevin suggested that I use the song "Konstantine" everything just got a lot more gay. So I played off that and it turned out to be a bit more funny. You know... because we're all a little gay.

    Check it out on the videos page.

  • 515 Alive

    So Des Moines puts on this annual festival called 515 Alive. I decided to give it a shot this year and it was surprisingly really cool. First we (Nick, Nicole, Kari, Kevi, and I) checked out the bmx / skateboarding setup... which was pretty lame. They only had 1 spine and 1 fun box. Both of which had obviously been sitting in some dude's back yard or something - made out of plywood, no coping, and a huge lip to get over. Their was no way that a skateboard could even get onto the ramp.. poor skateboarders. Plus most of the bikers were just stalling on their back peg or wheel. So this part made me sad...

    We also watched some grafitti artists and breakdancers. Then we walked around to different venues and outdoor stages watching …

  • Straight off the plane from L.A.

    And I.. am.. ready to... rock.

    Alright to finalize the trip... Tuesday night, Kari and I went to a place called "Beauty Bar" in Hollywood. The description we found of it was "80s 'sexwave, proto hair metal, dirty electro sleazy pop.'" Which is obviously a sure shot at a place that I wanted to be. So Beauty Bar had sparkly pink walls, old salon chairs with the hair dryers still on them, lots of beauty artwork, etc. The DJs were really really good (spinning 80s, electronic, etc). Plus, halfway through the night, I saw randomly Chris Holmes standing at the end of the bar, haha. So we hung out for a bit, which was cool. ...Umm, fountains of Alize!

    Then on Wednesday, Kari and I went back to neighborhoodies to finally get my …

  • We do this in the LBC kinda way

    Alright, so yeah. We're staying in East Hollywood with Kari's cousin, liz. Right near the Church of Scientology, hehe. So here's sort of what's been going on...

    Saturday Night we ordered in Thai food then went to go see Bryndon at work... sometimes I really want to do video work for a living. Ok, then I really really wanted to go out to club avalon, but instead I fell asleep.

    Sunday we ate pho for lunch. It was my first pho experience... good stuff. Then we went rollerblading at Venice Beach and drove around Beverly Hills and all that. Every street is lined with a different kind of trees, it's pretty dope. Then we went out for pizza and lounged at a bar.

    Yesterday Liz's sister, Stephanie flew into town to hang out. We all went to …

  • Whoa. Yeah. You have to go to.. Los Angeles

    Ok, so kari and I woke up at 4:30 AM to catch our flight to L.A. today. That sucked.

    So far not much has happened, we're just sort of planning what we're going to do for the rest of the week.

    But I've seen some dope cars. Plus I've already gone to the Neighborhoodies shop here. It took them less than 20 minutes to make my "Not Bam" sweat shirt, and you suckers waited 3 weeks! haha.

    Anyway, we got to meet Danny, Mike, and Lauren. Lauren made my shirt and tomorrow they're hooking me up with a stitched heartagram for free, hehe. Kari and Liz got shirts made too. Pictures coming soon.

    It's so hot.

  • Golf is Weird

    OK so apparently it's not the hair. I really am a Bam Margera look alike. I was golfing tonight (for the Pioneer golf league) with Rick and Nehru from work. We were joined by this guy from financial that works down town. Anyway after the first hole and the guy is like, "you know, you look like the guy from 'Viva La Bam' ... Bam Margess or something like that." I was all like, "are you serious? I just cut my hair and figured I'd never hear that again." Then he called me Bam the rest of the game.

    As far as the round went. Rick bought new clubs and improved his game by 20 strokes, haha. That's so awesome. I started off really really crappy but then halfway through the game I started visualizing things and pulled it all back …

  • Heritage Days

    Mount Vernon had Heritage Days this weekend. Which is one of those small town festivals with music, about 2 rides, and lots of hanging out. Usually Cornellians go back for this as a little reunion in the summer... especially the Kappa Thetas. So I went along with Kari this year. Even though I was the only guy with 11 girls half the time... it was a lot of fun. I got to hang out with Kevi a lot... plus Big D, Paul, Scott, and many others. Kari's friends are always fun.

    I found that taking pictures of carnival rides rules. I'm gonna have to attend more carnivals to take pics now. Kevi likes carnivals too.

    So yeah, besides that, I tried to also be roxtar by wearing other people's sunglasses all weekend. Plus I tried to hang …

  • domicile'd

    Yesterday I put an offer on this house... and they accepted. I move in at the end of September.

    -2,000 sqft total
    --1,300 sqft main level
    --700 finished sqft walkout basement
    -loft office
    -fenced back yard
    -only 5 years old
    -wood floors
    -etc

    Guess I have to film a new cribs episode soon.

  • Cornerstone 2004 - finished

    rule. ok, so Cornerstone is done, and I am happy. I got to see a couple more shows since my post yesterday. And now that I have all my pictures consolidated. I changed the pictures of Zach and I.

    Saturday I saw...
    -Further Seems Forever - They're sort of pop rock, but not good. I mean, the band had some talent and sounded decent, but their lead singer (who I guess is new) sucked. There was this dude standing by us that sang way better than him. It was funny. But the lady in front of him didn't like him (note picture).
    -Blindside - Man, I really love Blindside. Christian Lindskog rules so much. It was sad that he had a corded mic because he couldn't come all the way out to the end of the cat walk (where Zach and I were …

  • Cornerstone Thus Far

    So I'm halfway through Cornerstone. So much fun. My only complaint is that there aren't as many people here this year. It's only Zach, Amy, and I at our camp site. I wish Aaron, Jordan, Gregg, Kevi, and Kyle Pitman would have come. Besides that, I've had quite a bit of fun and seen a lot of shows. I've stopped by quite a few of the small random hardcore stages that kids setup at their camp sites, good stuff.

    Anyway, Thursday we saw...
    -Slow Coming Day - Which is Cullen's brother's band. I like their music, it was nice to see Orion play. Indie Rock, yeah.
    -Kutless - They had a lot of trouble picking a style... Creed, Rapcore, Hardcore, etc.
    -Reliant K - Really good. I hadn't heard them before, but I liked the show.