Today

This morning Jonathan was in my room. Because he lives here! His and Ryan's lease on the Beechwood house ran out this past weekend, so they moved out (Ryan to his new apartment, awaiting Christa his love) and now my room isn't all sparse and clean :-) Though it wasn't terribly clean before, anyway. Looks like he'll be working and job hunting a lot.

I gassed up at Sheetz on the way to NOVA this afternoon and it cost $40, but I only had 377 miles. Usually I can get 415 or so if I push the "E." Such is the price of the fast driving this past weekend. More on that later. For now, gaze at the beauty of my car!!!

This was taken on a Sunday night when Daniel and I stopped at one of our secret cool West Mifflin places that we know about and watched the sunset. And took this sweet picture as well.

J
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B

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That all was June 4th, a long time ago. But I saw the pictures on my iPod today and thought of it again.




So, about the fast driving this weekend. First off, we discuss WHAT I was driving.

<<< Secondly, we will discuss where we went. We went to Akron. Akron is where these people are. --->

Thirdly, we will discuss why we went. We went because the person on the right, plus the sister of the person on the left, plus a third person (Emily) were having their grad party. The triple threat. The party was Friday at 6pm, so we left around 3 in the afternoon from our house. It was a very well-put-together party, meaning the food was tasty and fitting, there were good places to stand around and talk, there was a field for games, and there was a purposeful time of acknowledging the reason for the party and honoring the graduees (heehee, new word!).

After hanging around till the bitter end (as always), my crew and I went to Steak 'n' Shake with 8 other peoples. We got shakes and a few got food (mm, chili mac), and had a relaxed and abundant time of enjoying each others' company and laughing a lot. It was there that I took the picture of the lovely ladies above. It was my second experience of "giggly Christin." :-)

Hah. Fool you are for thinking that that was the end of the night! We may have gotten back to the Hoffman's at 1:30am, but we weren't done. We hung out in this place

<<<

and watched "Signs" till 4am or so. Then I went to bed like the golden child I am while the other crazies played nintendo till 6.

Saturday morning I gradually pulled myself awake, and eventually decided that it would indeed be a good idea to go to guitar center for awhile before departing for Pittsburgh in time to get home to drive Mom and Matt to Carolyn's wedding. So we all got up, got dressed, packed up and headed out. And guitar center was closed! So we ate at McDonalds (which ended up being quite good IMO) till it opened at 10. We checked out acoustics and drums and a funky electric guitar there, rushed over to Lentine's to examine the bass amp Steve wants to buy, and then Matt, Justin and I headed out, 20-minutes past DDT (Desired Departure Time).


While I drove very fast and listened to Imogen Heep (the perfect music for the occasion), these guys did what you see them doing here.
When I was done with Heep I busted out Bon Jovi, which failed to wake the passengers. So we powered on, and then I started wondering where the 79 exit was. I had missed it, in a moment of distraction apparently, and now we were set for 20 miles of concrete medians, turnpike tolls, and 30 minutes extra travel time tacked onto a journey that was already late. I was quite ticked at that and tore us along at 90 or so 'till I saw a break in the median and yanked to a stop in the emergency pull-over. We ripped around Jason Bourne style and blasted back, cruising through the EZ-pass lane since I didn't know what to do with my toll ticket, being, as I was, unaccountably pointed in the opposite direction. So I was pretty much high on adrenaline, even as my mileage was low on sweetness. And nobody really woke up except Matt for awhile. I guess I was the "designated driver," sleeping last night while they partied :-) The hiccup on the turnpike completely nixed the appreciable time I had saved by doing 80 the whole time. Drat, and other words expressing my frustration at that waste.

Anyway, the crazy driving wasn't over. Mom, Matt and I were going to Carolyn Trunzo's wedding so Matt needed his suit, so I had to drive him to his house, and we only had 20 minutes. So I drove the fastest I ever have on urban streets and had an awesome time, sliding back into our driveway exactly 15 minutes after backing out. We made it to the wedding in non-destructively-late time, and proceeded to greet those around and watch the hitchin'.

That night was crazy because they had a DJ and after dinner he got everybody dancing. At first I groaned and anticipated an uncomfortable evening of forced physical merriment, but people actually just had fun with it, so I found myself out on the dance floor with the Caldwells, Rishels, Bates, Hertzogs, and even Mike and Chrissy Heymann. And Mom! Yes indeed, she was swingin' with the best of us. First time I've done something like that with church folks, and it was fun. I got SO sweaty...oy. It was fun chilling that much with Matt. Reminiscent of Youth Camp days of old :-)

So, that was the weekend. Sunday I played electric guitar as the main instrument, through the 70's Fender 75 awesome tube amp I just bought and will likely return 'cause I don't have as much money as I thought I did and I have $1000 of car insurance to pay and a trip to Japan in January. Then the Pirates game with Nate and Ken, which ended up being enjoyable despite choking humidity and then a 2-hour rain delay. Our seats were under cover, so we got to sit and watch one of the heaviest downpours I've ever seen. It went on and on, raining so hard for a few minutes once that we couldn't see a lick of downtown. The Buccos went on to win with an RBI in the 10th, which was SWEET. Then Ken made pan-cooked peppers, onions, shrooms and beef round for dinner. Good food. He's a good cook for the health-unconscious :-)

Today I worked 6 hours after class and a design group meeting. Good work. Listened to Bob Dylan's radio show on XM on the way back, which was cool. I could listen to that forever: a very knowledgeable and experienced music legend introducing and explaining eclectic, century-spanning songs.

Sorry, I'm probably losing your attention 'cause there no more pictures. So here. This is from Daniel's and my crazy Friday night two weeks ago. First we saw MI:3 with Nick Schuch and frolicked about the parking lot whilst pounding fourth gratuitious bass from my newfound subwoofer. Nick periodically stopped, faced the theater, cupped his hands and yelled with all his might "WE'RE AWESOME! WE'RE SOOO AWESOME!!!" :-)

Then Daniel and I tried and failed to compose a tenable plan to spend more of the evening with friends. So we took a virgin (to me) route to South Side and listened to Star Trek music, which utilizes the sub as little else has since.

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We pulled over into Station Square on our way 'cause we saw that Gin Blossoms were playing there, but we missed their show, so instead we walked on down past the sounds of loud music and loud people at the clubs, down to where the fence between the people and the railroad tracks ran out and we found ourselves under the gloom of the Liberty Bridge, in a concrete dump area for some industrial company. Then commenced a majorly sweet time of scrambling down to the river shore and wading about and watching the city and getting showered on. Then we wandered around the stuff by the tracks under the bridge, taking sweet pictures and being awed by the eerie stillness, the drifting sounds of the living city, and the movie-esque lighting. The temperature and humidity were utterly neutral, so it didn't feel like we were outside. What a time! Unique and unforgettable, and totally weird and sweet.

And THEN we continued on to South Side and got Gyros, sitting in the little restaurant amidst the mildly raucous Friday night college crowd watching the succulent lamb roasting before us and the employees spending their friday night slapping together gyros, dealing with drunks and grilling stuff. I'd put more pictures in, but photos.blogger.com is being belligerant and stupid, as computers so often are. Anyway, that Friday night was sweet, and there are more crazy and cool pictures from it.

I've changed my pocket arrangement, which is one of those little things that actually affects you many times each day. Rather than keys in my right pocket, wallet in my left and cell phone clipped to my belt, I'm going with keys in the back right pocket, wallet right, and uncased cell phone left. Carmex goes with the wallet when I bring it, mints and gum go with the cell phone usually. It works pretty nicely 'cause the keys are out of the rear pocket when I'm in the car, which is went stuff gets irritating back there. I like having the phone out of the case, too. Much slimmer and easier to use.

Ken's here for a few days. He flew in from Denver for one of his best friends Bill's wedding in Grove City. He leaves tomorrow morning. He is an interesting person, and basically thinks that the only life that has much meaning or respectability is living out on a ranch hours from the nearest appreciable town :-) He loves mountains like I love music and people. He might be going to Bolivia this fall for a month-long trip.

I have two WHOLE weeks of free time between summer and fall semesters, which I'm pumped for. I was hoping to do some big crazy trip, but Japan in the January (Lord willing) will take care of that, so I'm settling for dividing it up between Akron and here, and maybe Chicago. Work some extra days, remix some Pure Boss songs maybe, record stuff of my own...the possibilities are endless!

OK, enough brain-digging for now. Hopefully you, future John, are now caught up to some degree with your life right now. In general you are quite happy, though you wonder how long you can continue to be so in the absence of devotions. You're cutting down on music a bit to try to feed your mind more with God and His word. You're in a period of relative contentment with your social status and relationships, and you're feeling rather worried about Pure Boss, which seems to be drifting apart. You also don't know what you'll be doing after you graduate, and you don't want to work on job hunting. Boo. You've been playing a lot of electric guitar and are getting decent at it, though most riffs have been way overplayed.

Good night, fair future friend! Oh yeah, you need a haircut right now, too. Arg.

--Clear Ambassador