The intellectual equivalent of a ham sandwich.

Archive for the ‘Weekly Wacko’ Category

U.S. Army – Wrecker of Love

The end of sixth grade was coming fast, and with it, a move. This time I’d be going from Leavenworth, Kansas to West Point, New York.
School would finish, I’d go to Arizona to see family on summer break, and then on to NY. Life was going to roll on by pretty quick for a while – but not before an important life event.
My first girlfriend.

At school with about a week of school left I was stopped by a girl.
Would I want to go out with her best friend?!
I did some quick thinking. The obvious answer was: no.
I didn’t want to go out with anybody.
I’d found girls pretty, or at least appealing since I was young. I’d just never wanted to date a girl. Really, I didn’t mind not talking to them. I liked it a lot if they found me funny, and I liked to imagine dating girls – but reality is much harder to control than my imagination, so I stuck with that.
I had no confidence. I was a romantic conspiracy theorist. Why did that girl just smile at me? Oh, it’s a joke! That’s so mean! Any thing that should’ve been perceived as a girl having a crush on me I saw as some attempt for me to lower my guard, only to then be made fun of.
But if this girl wanted to date me until I moved, whatever floats her boat.
Thus began my romantic life!

You’d think – with me ‘going steady’ (that’s just funny to me), that my life would change a lot.
I’d have to sit with the girl at lunch, or nearby her at class, or walk with her in the hallways – but no, none of this happened. Looking back, I probably was supposed to do these things.
I assumed our relationship was just in title, not in deed. So she could say, “yeah, that’s my boyfriend over there … He’s so … Oh … Don’t look at him, he’s trying to figure out how much of his peanut butter sandwich he can fit in his mouth at once. Gross.”
Unfortunately, I didn’t know until then that middle school girls love the telephone.
“Hello … may I ask who’s calling? … Oh! … One second! … BRAD!”
Who would call me? I thought, Why is my mom grinning?
“Hello?”
“Hey Brad!”
What? First, who calls me? Second, a girl?!

I came to realize it was the “girlfriend.” And her friend who had asked me out.
I got the cordless and headed to my room. Once I was in my room I was sure a family member (possibly several, led by my mother) would creep up and eavesdrop. Fuel for making fun of me.
I didn’t want to be talking on the phone – it cut into my video game time. Or TV time. Or playing with my dog. Or anything-but-talking-on-the-phone time.

One day the two called and they sang me a song. Yes, they sang to me. At the conclusion of the phone call I applied my best charm to say, “Yeah … well … it stinks about my going to New York, huh?”
“Huh?”
“Ya know, New York …”
“You’re going on a trip to New York!!”
“Ha, no! I’m moving … there …”
Uh oh. Had I forgotten …
“… What?”

I had forgotten to tell everyone but my closest friends that I was moving. And my closest friends didn’t include a single female. I hadn’t thought much of it but this was especially bad because we lived off-Post in Kansas so my friends didn’t up and move like clockwork. What a weird concept!

My budding love came to a screeching halt. All blame, of course, goes to the U.S. Army.
How dare you, wrecker of love!

Category:

Weekly Wacko

Tagged with:

Happy Birthday to … GMa and G Pat

October is a big birthday month in my family. I decided to do a little post for some of the birthday boys and girls I know.

I’m combining these guys into one post for two reasons – 1, so that I can do the birthday posts in one week (which is much more soothing to my engineering-side than to have this in one week plus one day); 2, because they’re not immediate family. Sorry guys, I’m biased.

GMa

My grandma is crazy in the best way possible. She’s got an awesome sense of humor and has the classic grandma look down. Sweet, little lady? You betcha.

My senior year of high school my parents were going to be gone for a while on a trip to visit my sister who was then studying in Spain. They decided to have my grandma come stay with me for the duration of the trip. I have to admit I was not happy about this.

They had gone on trips in the past without feeling the need to have someone their to supervise me, and yet there I was, needing a babysitter. In retrospect they probably just wanted me to spend some time with my grandma, but I was too thick to see that.

Anyhow. Out she flew from Phoenix to Georgia. And off my parents went to Spain (those punks).

My grandma has always been a pretty healthy eater. As part of this she didn’t work with salt too often. Salt – a mystery food! Nevertheless, she wanted to cook us some nice food while she was there. One night this involved mashed potatoes.

They were, easily, the worst mashed potatoes I’ve ever eaten.

They had enough salt on them to satisfy 30 deer (like a salt lick … get it?). I took a bite and my face just about caved in. But I trudged on. And grandma, wanting this to be a nice meal, ate too. For her, a salt rookie, she didn’t know how much salt was the right amount and apparently thought more was better.

At some point during the meal she looked up and said, “this seems a bit salty.” I would’ve laughed but my face had dehydrated into nothingness.

Why am I telling this seemingly insulting story about my grandma for her birthday? Because I stink at compliments, and also because it shows that she was there, being kind, and trying to do something with me even though it wasn’t her bag of chips. (Her bag of insanely salted chips probably.)

If I could go back in time I would be less of a snotty teenage, and appreciate her visit much more.

Happy bday grandma!, and thanks for being awesome!

And no, I don’t want seconds.

Cousin G Pat

My cousin G Pat is an all-around nice guy. When I was in D.C. this past summer I got to spend an afternoon with him which was great. I hadn’t seen him in a number of years but I knew, and he has stated this, that it made no difference.

For G Pat family is family – and you look out for them.

G Pat and I talked a bit about work and it was clear he has himself a nice spot – he’s a guy who knows how to talk, and knows geeky stuff. (That’s more rare than you’d think. Usually it’s one or the other.)

The odd thing is, I think I’ll always associate G Pat with solitaire.

When I was younger I saw him on two different occasions. He was crazy for little handheld solitaire games (great for road trips). Each time he’d let me borrow one to play, and then tell me to keep it – he was too addicted to them anyway.

Apparently this is true because between trip one and two he’d bought himself a new one. I imagine if I had asked to see his phone when I saw him last I would’ve found ten different types of solitaire on it.

Although handheld solitaire games aren’t much it clearly illustrates (in my mind) the kind of guy G Pat is – that is, like I said before, all-around nice.

Thanks G Pat for grabbing lunch with me in D.C., the handheld solitaires (they killed many hours on a number of road trips for me), and being my cousin!

Happy Bday!

Category:

Weekly Wacko

Tagged with:

Happy Birthday to … My Big Bro

October is a big birthday month in my family. I decided to do a little post for some of the birthday boys and girls I know.

I already told what is possibly my favorite story of my brother – here in this video log. (I’m afraid to go back and watch it because I probably look like a dummy, but I’ll link it.)

Instead I’ll tell a nice story about the broham.

My senior year of high school my history teacher was a Notre Dame graduate. Notre Dame was the school I really wanted to get into.  I had asked my teacher to write a recommendation for me for Notre Dame and he gladly agreed. In fact, on my way out of class one day, he called me to stay behind.

He told me that he still had connections at the school and if I could tell him that, if I got in I would definitely go there, he figured he could get me in. I knew that if I got in that I would go there, but I told my teacher I’d have to think about it. I didn’t like the idea of getting somewhere because of some favor – I wanted to go because of my own merits.

I made a bigger deal out of this decision than I needed to, and as part of my deliberations that night I called my brother. This was a rarity. He and I pretty much never spoke on the phone.

I explained the situation to him and he told me to take the offer from my teacher. Along with that he told me something that went along the lines of this – “none of my teachers in high school would’ve offered this to me. You earned this offer of help.”

I hadn’t thought of it that way at all, but it was a statement that I thought was very nice and a good point. I didn’t end up asking my teacher for that “special” recommendation but it’s advice that I’ve always carried with me.

If anyone reading happens to be stubborn and want to pave your road with your own merits, you earn help like you earn anything else. Help’s not a bad thing!

Happy bday to my wise older bro!

Category:

Weekly Wacko

Tagged with: