the long drive home

today i made the drive from my grandma's house in salt lake city to my home in los altos, california.  its more or less a straight trip west that took about 12-13 or so hours.  it was fun, because i got to ride with my older sister and brother and my sisters three little kids.  yeah.

here are some things that made the trip quite memorable:

i got to relive some parts of my childhood.  my brother brought tons of old disney cartoons to watch on the trip.  the kids really liked gummi bears, which i haven't watched since i was like 5.  a great cartoon, though, i think i was about ready to be done when it was done.

i told my niece that i am 7 years old and she believed me.  she kept saying, "when Miles was 7, he wasn't as big as you are."  (Miles, her brother, is currently 8, and he still isn't as big as i am).  but she never decided that i wasn't 7 and in fact when her mom told her that i'm not she was like "yeah he is.  he told me."

it was my turn to drive during the middle stretch of the trip, which was basically all of nevada.  i've always felt like nevada is one of those states that gets the cursed reputation of being a desolate wasteland that you only see cause you have to drive through it to get to where you're actually going.  now i've never actually been to nevada and i've only been there to get to utah or home, so i guess i can see why people think that way.  but since i had like 4 1/2 hours on the same road going down through the state i really didn't see any problems with it.  sure, it aint green like the south, its mountains aren't as big as utah's, and it doesn't have pines and stuff that appeared once we got to california, but i still thought it was a nice drive.  it wasn't like this totally barren waste that people say it is; i thought the yellowish brown grass looked pretty and the mountains were cool but not so high that it just like blocks out the sky and whatnot.  really, i figure if you're expected a wasteland that's what you'll find but if you look for whats good in anything you'll find that too. 


after dinner i came to a sort of monumental realization about my sister's three kids.  i realized that they are all very much like the animaniacs.  my oldest nephew talks a lot... like, a lot, as does yakko.  the middle brother is a goof and a joker like wakko, and my niece is just super cute like dot.  yeah.. it was just funny when that hit me.  its like they're a parallel family or something.

well then we got home and now i'm here.  i honestly do tend to get bored when i come home.. but with so many of my friends leaving provo as it is for the break, its more or less of a choice between being bored here and bored there.  and it is my only chance to be here until the Christmas break.  however i really am looking forward to my time here.  there's friends who i want/need to spend some time with.  there's family that i can get a lot closer to.  there's a lil dog who's itchin to get walked  there is a harry potter marathon that has been begging my brother and i to conquer it.  bottom line is, there's a lot of good that can be done wherever you are, and there's a lot to appreciate about the people and places you know.. or don't really know at all.  

dirtbags & dorkwards 2

 so i actually wrote this one back in May.  but i noticed a minor grammar mistake and corrected it, and i guess since its been so long since i wrote it it now thinks that this got published in August.  yeah.  go technology.


recently i have allowed myself to become somewhat frustrated with the lady-types over matters that are very much insignificant and shouldn't really frustrate me.  luckily for me, said frustration has not lasted long thanks to some humblings experiences which i have had in my child development class (which, by the way i am actually taking at the suggesting of a girl that i know).

so on monday while semi-grouchily sitting there in class we were learning about like genetics and stuff and how babies inherit stuff from parents and whatnot.  yeah.  after the first half the teacher was like, 'ok now let's have a break and when we come back we're gonna watch some birthing videos.'


holy. crap.



well i couldn't be frustrated with women after that.  compared to pregnancy and childbirth i can't really say that i've ever had any problems.  like ever.

so watching these.. videos and the subsequent discussion made me think about some of my own experiences.  being the youngest i obviously never saw my own mom carry children.  my sister grew up and left the house when i was pretty young so i just didn't really learn a whole lot about what women have to deal with till later.

so to continue my life education my sister moved back into the area around the same time that she was having her kids so i got to see what is was like to have someone that i was close to go through the whole thing.  i figure her experience was similar to most pregnancies, with the illness, tiredness, nausea, constant hunger, and getting kicked in the guts regularly.  not to mention that when she's pregnant she tends to burp in front of me.

now i wasn't there to see it, but i know that my mom had a pretty hard time carrying children cause whenever i annoyed her or teased her too much she'd just remind me that when she was pregnant with me that her blood pressure was so high that she was bedridden for like forever (or whatever) and that it almost killed her.  that would basically always end my teasing cause there's really no way around the pregnancy/childbirth card.  really, there isn't.

and then my mom and sister are always saying how its worth it to deal with such a ridiculously painful process, and how much they love their kids and stuff like that.  wow. just wow

now, a majority of the women that i know are my age and do not yet have children.  but at some point or another i've heard most of the girls that i know talk about how they look forward to having their own kids and being mothers sometime in the future. 

i'd have to be a pile of crap not to have respect for moms and what they do.  yeah,  i know, mothers day was like last sunday, but i also didn't watch birthing videos on mothers day.  so yeah.

now, while this class period was an effective reminder for me to respect women, i still let myself get a bit annoyed and frustrated again.  looks like i'm a slow learner.  in order to fix this problem, i had another humbling class period in the same child development class.

so this time a lot of the discussion was on infancy as well as puberty/adolescence  (yeah.. that a lot in one day hahah).  we got on the subject of eating disorders and our teacher told us that this is basically the #1 problem for women at BYU. 

this was both surprising and depressing for me.  the other sad thing is that a major reason that a lot of girls develop eating disorders is cause guys say stupid things to them.  some dirtbag that a girl's dating tells her that she's not pretty.  or even her dad.  i don't really want to think about it cause it pisses me off.

this probably aint the only factor, but its probably the biggest.  and of course, most guys who are my friends and are reading this aren't piles of crap.  but i'm really disappointed that despite all the awesome studmuffin cool cool super good guys that can be found at this university, there are still enough dirtbags who make girls feel worthless.

now sometimes we do gotta tell someone that we aren't interested.  something that i've learned recently is that if someone turns you down that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with you and there isn't something wrong with them either.  its not really anyone's fault.  most of the time people don't just see each other and meet and boom they like each other or whatever.  so yeah.  good people sometimes gotta hurt each other.

but its when the bad guy tells his girlfriend that she's not pretty or when an idiot father says something terrible to his daughter that girls will start having eating disorders or trouble trusting men.  again, its depressing to know that its such a problem here.

i can go on, but i don't want to.  i think i've made my point.  so instead, i want to end with a positive note.  (YEAH! POSITIVE!)

first off, i want to mention all the good guys out there.  seriously, you bros rock.  we live in a world were there's a lot of dirtbag men out there.  society likes to tell us that men are all terds.  but you don't care, cause you're a good guy.  you still do what you can to be nice to people.  you treat women like they deserve.  you love your mom.  you feel bad when you aren't as good as you want to be.  and you're just awesome dudes in general. 

keep it up, bros.  even when its hard.  cause yall are total muffins of the stud variety.

Treat women right, bros.  Mario is a great example.  He fights legions of goombas, koopa troopas, piranha plants, and bullet bills in order to give Boswer the axe and save the Princess.  And she appreciates a good man who treats her right.

Some of you dudes may feel like Luigi, just as good a guy as his brother Mario, yet many people don't even know his name.  Just keep fighting, bros.  Your princess is in another castle.

second, a word to all the really nice girls out there.  i've been able to meet a lot of really awesome women in the past few months.  i'm pretty sure that it's nice women that keep the world from falling apart.  so to all yall lady-types, don't give up on the good guys.  cause they're around.  sure, we're dumb, and yall are really patient with that, but we're still good.  don't give up.. and you'll find your own Mario... or Luigi.

anyways... yeah.  that's it.  i have a history book to go finish reading now... though i'd rather be playing Super Mario Bros..

leveling up

this is your time to shine.  the moment you've been waiting for.  you've just trudged through Victory Road.  the door to Indigo Plateau is open, and you're ready to become a master.  you're ready to take on the Elite Four.

you've trained hard, you've fought well, and your team is ready.  you step into the first room to challenge the greatest trainers in the world.

then it happens.

WHAT!? that dewgong is LEVEL 54!?!  thats way more than your level 46 pokemon can handle.  and thats only the first trainer!!

now, to be real here, probably the first time most of us played the game we all just had our starter at a ridiculously high level and then the rest of our team was pathetic.  or full of legendary birds.  we stocked up on full restores and max revives just to keep our venusaur/charizard/blastoise alive till the end.  but i'm talking about the time you actually played it through to train your whole team, all your favorites to the end. and you just happen to find that they're underleveled

yeah, go figure.  whats more embarrassing than having your team roughly 6-10 levels under the trainers that you're challenging?  what could have gone wrong?  yo have enough type variability to take on anyone.  they evolved and became poweful.  you taught your pokemon great moves from their natural learning and TMs, and you made sure to get rid of those useless moves, like LEER.  you even had empathy with them.

but its still not enough.  you're going to have to go through the same grueling process that tormented you when you couldn't beat that boss in final fantasy.  you're gonna have to get outside, march through that tall grass, and start leveling up.

its the most boring part of any RPG.  you're not strong enough to beat the boss, so you have to fight whatever to get enough experience, GP, and strength points to get the job done.  you go out.  you fight.  you get beat up.  you go to the pokemon center or the inn.  and then you start over.  and over.  and over.  and walked.. and walked.. and walked....

then you get there. you're strong enough.  your team is in the mid 50's and they're ready to tear it up. 

you slap around the elite for like they're nothing.  then you get to the end.  the real deal.  the final battle with your rival.

yeah.  he means business now.  he's even got a flashy jacket on...

and well, what happens?  you own him.  like a pro.  why?  cause you trained, you battled, and you know whats going on.  all that leveling up made your team strong enough to spank his.  you knew what types to use and when.  great job, champ.  you're a pokemon master.



when it comes to things that really matter, we're pretty much all like pokemon trainers.  we all want to be the best.  like no one ever was.  but sometimes, when we get to where we want to be going, when we think our journey's over... we realize that we're a little bit underleveled.  we're not quite who we thought we were.  and that could be a bit embarrassing.

well what can we do now?  is that it?  is it over, are we destined to be losers?

um, no.  we're not.  we just need to do some leveling up.  we need to get our there and march through the tall grass so to speak, looking for wild pokemon to battle.

i feel like thats where a lot of us are right now.  pretty much everyone has something they want to get better at.  they want to reach that next level, maybe even evolve to a more powerful version of themselves.  so we get our there and hone our skills.  sometimes its hard, sometimes it hurts, and sometimes we get beat up.  and unlike the video games, there isn't always a pokemon center or an inn that we can go to that will instantly recover all our HP and make our problems go away.  we may not always have a fairy telling us where to go next or a professor to wisely tell us not to ride our bike indoors.

but also unlike the video games, the skills we gain now and the 'leveling up' we do in life will actually get us somewhere.  we'll be good at some cool job or something.  or we'll be good at helping people in some way.  some of us are fire types.. some of us can learn moves like razor leaf or water gun.

i guess the point is, that we're all good at things, and we all want to be way better than we really are.  we want things in our lives but its hard to wait for the right time or to have to work for them.  its like we're in the middle of the treacherous 'leveling up' phase.


but in the end, when you beat your rival, when you become a master its all worth it.  its just being there in the middle of it all that's the hard part.