I got tagged to do this by Jessica. So....the ABCs of Random Stuff Associated with Wesley...
A - Age - 22.
B - Biggest Fear - Um....
C - Current Time - 7:47 a.m.
D - Drink You Last Had - Diet Coke.
E - Easiest Person To Talk With - Hmm....Idk. Mom or Courtney? If it's friends that we're talking about here, Dylan, Daniel, Jon, Jessica, Amanda and Ashland are all pretty easy to talk with.
F - Favorite Song - Uh....this is extremely impossible to decide....
G - Greatest Memory - ...Really? This is even more vague than the "Favorite Song" question...
H - Hometown - (Said in the voice of the Captain from Wall-E) Computer, define "hometown". Maybe either Morris, OK or Tahlequah, OK?
I - In Love With - If I was with anyone, would I really say it on here?
J - Jealous Of - Again....
K - Killed Someone? - SMH....
L - Longest Relationship - What kind of relationship are we talking about here?
M - Middle Name - Wesley.
N - Number of Siblings - Four. Two sisters, two brothers. And then one "adopted" friend "sister".
O - One Wish - That my life and actions will be for the glory of God.
P - Person You Last Called - Courtney. I had to look that one up...don't call people very often.
Q - Question You're Always Asked - "When are you getting a haircut?!" "What are you gonna do after school?" "How old are you, fifteen?"
R - Reason To Smile - Someone said something entertaining? I don't know...
S - Song Last Sung - "Follow Love", FFH.
T - Time You Woke Up Today - 6:40 a.m.
U - Under Your Bed is...? - Three pairs of variously-worn-out sneakers, two Monopoly sets, several books.
V - Vacation Destination - "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around every once in a while, you could miss it." - Matthew Broderick in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. "You can observe a lot just by watching." - Yogi Berra. There's a lot of places I'd like to see.
W - Worst Habit - There's a lot....Worrying, I guess.
X - X-Rays You've Had - On my left hand, definitely. Not sure about anywhere else.
Y - Your Favorite Food - I really have no idea....I like chocolate.
Z - Zodiac Sign - Gemini.
Friday, July 31, 2015
Thursday, July 30, 2015
News of Late Summer
I'm a college student, so time is usually measured in semesters. And since fall comes before spring on an academic calendar, camp is kind of the "New Year" reckoning place. Part of the charm is being free from electronics; but some pop-cultural stuff can be missed(which doesn't matter, spiritual things are more important), but it's interesting.
In the category of "Celebrity News", Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton announced that they're getting divorced; which is incredibly sad and disappointing. I'm not sure why, it's not like I actually know them, but it seemed like things were good.
Other musical news, Jon's band Heroes At Large just released their second single, it's called "Remedies". Give it a listen!
In more local(Tulsa) news, GBC and Mingo Valley Bible Fellowship are considering merging. Greg Rusco just announced it on Sunday, and once it had been carefully explained, the immediate reaction was cautiously in favor and optimistic. My guess is that it'll be a done deal by January.
It's been a weird year for our church. The past couple years have been, really. We've been losing members left and right, mostly for good reasons(moving due to job; getting married, dying, etc). They have, too, from what I've heard. The two youth groups held a combined get-together event last night, which sounded like it went really well.
I think Bennett, Laura, Courtney and some other people are planning on going to the Roughnecks game tomorrow night; that should be fun.
Not really sure where this goes, but a while back I watched the 1969 Paul Newman/Robert Redford movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which I really liked. It was written by William Goldman; so that helps a lot, but also, Old West outlaws are especially interesting historical figures. Besides - and this is what Goldman liked so much about them - outlaws just don't run away in movies. Which is exactly what the real-life Cassidy and Sundance did; they were a minor outlaw team who ran to South America with Sundance's girlfriend and became the James Brothers of Bolivia. Also, there was great dialogue all throughout, and some extremely well-written scenes.
2000's M. Night Shyamalan-directed Unbreakable, starring Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson, I watched yesterday morning. It was really good; used strange camera techniques and angles, but it worked very well. Basically, it's about a security guard who survives a train wreck. Robin Wright plays Willis' wife. Jackson plays a comic-book art historian.
Then last night I rewatched Megamind, the 2010 superhero parody starring Will Ferrell, Tina Fey and Brad Pitt. J.K. Simmons has a minor role as the Warden. (2010 was a great year for animated movies. There was Toy Story 3, of course; but then for quotable purposes you also had Monsters Vs. Aliens, Despicable Me, and How To Train Your Dragon.) It's almost a parody of parodies; which flips it back into real-movie status. Kind of hard to describe, but it has some of the best transitions between scenes and sequences that I've ever seen. (I know, you're not supposed to notice things like transitions, but....I do, so....yeah.) Lots of snarky dialogue throughout, too, which is great.
Read through Catherine Marshall's novel Christy; which is based on her mother's adventures as a schoolteacher in the Appalachians of East Tennessee in 1912. I think she must have read a lot of Lucy Maud Montgomery and Harold Bell Wright(The Shepherd of the Hills), based on her writing style. I liked it, though I didn't care much for the ending. But then, I tend to like books set around mountains; whether it's in western North Carolina like Jan Karon's Mitford books, the southwest Missouri Ozarks of Shepherd of the Hills, the northeast Oklahoma Ozarks of Wilson Rawls's Where the Red Fern Grows or Summer of the Monkeys, or the north Georgia section of Appalachians of Maud Lindsay's Posey and the Peddler. Also, Brad Paisley grew up in West Virginia, and I love his writing.
This doesn't always apply, though; for example, even though Katniss and Peeta are from somewhere around West Virginia, I'm really not much a fan of The Hunger Games books. (The best is Mockingjay; because of its emphasis on the role of the media in war.) I just don't much care for YA fiction in general, though every once in a while I find something that's okay. (The Book Thief, by Markus Zuzak, for example.)
Also read through Agatha Christie's N or M?, a WWII Tommy and Tuppence adventure. It's great. And The Essential Calvin and Hobbes and The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes, collections by Bill Watterson. Also great. Calvin's imagination....Hobbes' voice of sanity....those expressions of surprise...it's terrific.
In the category of "Celebrity News", Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton announced that they're getting divorced; which is incredibly sad and disappointing. I'm not sure why, it's not like I actually know them, but it seemed like things were good.
Other musical news, Jon's band Heroes At Large just released their second single, it's called "Remedies". Give it a listen!
In more local(Tulsa) news, GBC and Mingo Valley Bible Fellowship are considering merging. Greg Rusco just announced it on Sunday, and once it had been carefully explained, the immediate reaction was cautiously in favor and optimistic. My guess is that it'll be a done deal by January.
It's been a weird year for our church. The past couple years have been, really. We've been losing members left and right, mostly for good reasons(moving due to job; getting married, dying, etc). They have, too, from what I've heard. The two youth groups held a combined get-together event last night, which sounded like it went really well.
I think Bennett, Laura, Courtney and some other people are planning on going to the Roughnecks game tomorrow night; that should be fun.
Not really sure where this goes, but a while back I watched the 1969 Paul Newman/Robert Redford movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which I really liked. It was written by William Goldman; so that helps a lot, but also, Old West outlaws are especially interesting historical figures. Besides - and this is what Goldman liked so much about them - outlaws just don't run away in movies. Which is exactly what the real-life Cassidy and Sundance did; they were a minor outlaw team who ran to South America with Sundance's girlfriend and became the James Brothers of Bolivia. Also, there was great dialogue all throughout, and some extremely well-written scenes.
2000's M. Night Shyamalan-directed Unbreakable, starring Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson, I watched yesterday morning. It was really good; used strange camera techniques and angles, but it worked very well. Basically, it's about a security guard who survives a train wreck. Robin Wright plays Willis' wife. Jackson plays a comic-book art historian.
Then last night I rewatched Megamind, the 2010 superhero parody starring Will Ferrell, Tina Fey and Brad Pitt. J.K. Simmons has a minor role as the Warden. (2010 was a great year for animated movies. There was Toy Story 3, of course; but then for quotable purposes you also had Monsters Vs. Aliens, Despicable Me, and How To Train Your Dragon.) It's almost a parody of parodies; which flips it back into real-movie status. Kind of hard to describe, but it has some of the best transitions between scenes and sequences that I've ever seen. (I know, you're not supposed to notice things like transitions, but....I do, so....yeah.) Lots of snarky dialogue throughout, too, which is great.
Read through Catherine Marshall's novel Christy; which is based on her mother's adventures as a schoolteacher in the Appalachians of East Tennessee in 1912. I think she must have read a lot of Lucy Maud Montgomery and Harold Bell Wright(The Shepherd of the Hills), based on her writing style. I liked it, though I didn't care much for the ending. But then, I tend to like books set around mountains; whether it's in western North Carolina like Jan Karon's Mitford books, the southwest Missouri Ozarks of Shepherd of the Hills, the northeast Oklahoma Ozarks of Wilson Rawls's Where the Red Fern Grows or Summer of the Monkeys, or the north Georgia section of Appalachians of Maud Lindsay's Posey and the Peddler. Also, Brad Paisley grew up in West Virginia, and I love his writing.
This doesn't always apply, though; for example, even though Katniss and Peeta are from somewhere around West Virginia, I'm really not much a fan of The Hunger Games books. (The best is Mockingjay; because of its emphasis on the role of the media in war.) I just don't much care for YA fiction in general, though every once in a while I find something that's okay. (The Book Thief, by Markus Zuzak, for example.)
Also read through Agatha Christie's N or M?, a WWII Tommy and Tuppence adventure. It's great. And The Essential Calvin and Hobbes and The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes, collections by Bill Watterson. Also great. Calvin's imagination....Hobbes' voice of sanity....those expressions of surprise...it's terrific.
Monday, July 27, 2015
CAMP: Part IX, How Firm a Foundation In Christ Alone
It's that time of year again: We just got back from the 2015 edition of the Sovereign Grace Youth Camp, and so a recap needed to be written. (See these earlier posts for the first, second, third, fourth and fifth years as a camper, as well as lessons learned while there; and then these for years one and two on the other side of the buffalo fence as a counselor. (That was a figure of speech. Stay VERY FAR AWAY from the buffalo. But y'all knew that already.)
We had a smaller group from Tulsa than expected; only fifteen, but that still was easily the most of any group. (By state, of course, Missouri had the most people overall.) The guys were Bennett, Wesley DeSpain, Trenton and Caleb, and then rookies in Wesley's brother Bailey and the Coxes' cousin Joe. The girls were Laura, Courtney, Callie, MattieGrace, Vivian, Lydia, and then rookies Chloe(the DeSpains' sister), Kate and Hope.
There were 25 guys, and about thirtyish girls; the final count was about 57 campers, so by far the smallest year that I've ever seen. I knew all the counselors; Tim, Brother Larry, Tom Henry, Curtis, Mrs. Boyer, Robin, Janets Crawford and Pokorny, Rachel, Miss Kathy, and then new camper-turned-counselors Anne and Abbey. Trevor Johnson spoke during the group sessions, and his wife and kids were back again, too. The camp pastor this year was Mark Webb from Mississippi, and his sermons were from the elements of Jesus' life that Luke looked at specifically, or gave more detail to than others did.
The camp books had a page dedicated to camp history for the first time; which was awesome. During the counselors' meeting on Tuesday morning we looked at a lot of pictures from 1985(the first year) and heard lots of stories about how awful Camp Sonrise was. (Ryan and Mary had both talked in earlier years about the electrifying showers, and Mrs. Boyer added that her first year as counselor she broke her ankle falling down a hill.)
Except for sermon notes, and scorekeeping for cabbage ball, I kept absolutely zero written record on what happened during the week. So what follows won't be chronological, and it probably won't be as detailed.
Things were really fixed up this year; the outer left cabin "ghetto" was walled over(insert complaining here...though it probably was a health hazard). The ceilings and walls of the guys' cabin had received new plywood covering and paint; the cabin had a completely new metal roof, replacing the shingles, and the chapel had gotten a total makeover; lights, paneling, carpet, everything. Most of the mini golf holes had been recarpeted as well. And the concrete of the tabernacle floor had been stained.
Almost nobody got hurt; which was great, and there weren't very many rule infractions, either. So that definitely helped, too. Forrest did break his nose digging a volleyball on Thursday night, and one girl got pretty dehydrated Monday/Tuesday, but other than that I don't think there was anything serious.
There was a food fight at lunch on Wednesday, which resulted in pudding splashed across several backpacks, and scrapes caused by fork attacks. But we learned later why that fight took place, and while it wasn't a good thing, it happened for a pretty good reason. Apparently one of the Beth-Eden staff was being a huge jerk in general, and he kept pestering Audrey in particular, causing a general freakout among everyone on the Black team. ("Freakout!" actually became the Black rally cry.) Her brothers and most of the Tulsa guys came to her defense by retaliating at the guy somehow over lunch.
There were a lot of hijinks in the cabins all week. Caleb Freeland and the Bebouts were playing pranks on everyone, beginning with moving a mattress into the shower. "What are you doing?" "I thought you said there weren't any counselors in here right now?!" Forrest hisses at Caleb. "We're moving this bed into the shower." "Who's is it?" "Drew Brashers's." "Uh-huh....Is it wet?" "Nope! We're just hiding it here." "Why?" "Cause it'll drive him crazy. Is that okay?" I think a minute. "That's hilarious. Go for it." One of the younger Mississippi kids, watching the scene, says, "That guy's my new favorite counselor." Drew then stole Hunter's mattress as payback.
A couple nights later Caleb F. and Chris Underwood markered on the faces of most people who were asleep, using a Sharpie I'd found in my backpack.
I think I must've been influenced a lot by Jon to allow/help with those pranks. But it was fun; and they'll remember how they had a blast doing all that stuff. And maybe Jed's comment about the spirit of adventure had something to do with it, too.
There was also a bunch of Nerf gun battles almost every night; which can be quite intense in such a confined space as the cabin.
Tim's nephew(and rookie) Matthew kept incessantly setting his flashlight on strobe mode and shining it in everyone's eyes; that was a little frustrating at times. Thus he will likely forever be known camp-wise as "Strobe".
I went with most of the guys down to the hidden meadow soccer field each day while the girls sang; playing on Tuesday, talking to Christian on Wednesday and serving as a goalie and dealing with a swarm of wasps flying around the whole time on Thursday. I just kept hoping none would land in my hair like that one last year did to Ashland. And the following mangled Scripture came to mind: :"When you encounter wasps of various kinds, consider it all joy; by doing these things for them, you have done them for me." (James 1:2 and Matthew 25:45)
I was assigned to work cabbage ball solo; which felt weird, taking over Brother Larry's spot there. And also, probably a nearsighted guy whose knowledge of baseball rules is shaky isn't the best candidate for serving as umpire? I tried to call things as best I could, but I got a lot of flak most games. Thankfully, Miss Kathy, Abbey and Janet P all helped out at various points with second-base calls.
The new cabbage ball I got from Amazon got broken in pretty well; the games used both mine and Brother Larry's well-used mushball, with the switches depending on how play was going. Remembering that Ryan, Dylan and I weighted down the archery targets with chunks of firewood, I pulled a couple chunks out of the woodpile down by the tabernacle to mark the pitcher's circle and Catcher Safety Zone. And not wanting a repeat of the time that Samara got a bat thrown at her ankle(she had a bruise for two months), I created a rule that a flung bat was an automatic out. It wasn't very popular, but no one got hurt.
White and Yellow started the Tournament Challenge in cabbage ball; their game went back and forth for five innings before White erupted for 18 runs in the final inning; the final score was 25-6, which everyone talked about for most of the week. Mrs. Boyer even opened the lunch line by announcing "if your team got destroyed this morning, go ahead!" (Red was also obliterated in volleyball by Green; as best I could piece together, the final score was 15-8, 15-1, 21-0).
Red beat Yellow 8-6 in a fast-moving back-and-forth game during Worst/First Tuesday night. (It went seven and a half innings.)
Red won Wednesday morning 7-4 over Blue in another fast-moving game, which went eight and a half innings.
In the second Worst/First through Thursday morning mist, Yellow defeated Black in the rematch by a 7-4 score in eight full innings.
And to wrap things up, Green exploded for 13 runs in an extremely-slow-paced game to beat Black 16-0 in four innings, winning the Tournament Challenge with six points.
Most of the great camp songs were sung again - Daniel 4:35, "In Christ Alone", "Conquering Now and Still to Conquer", "Are You Washed in the Blood?", the camp "Come Thou Fount", among others.
For the talent share, the Grace Bible-Tulsa youth group sang a couple songs, including "Come Praise and Glorify"; the Fergusons sang the Chelsea Moon version of "How Firm a Foundation", the Knapps played several awesome fiddle/cello/piano pieces, the Underwoods and Dischers had some fantastic songs, including a teamup effort. Courtney and I did the Studio C sketch Evil Memory Lapse, she as Jemima and me playing Professor Murdoc, drafting Caleb as the soldier and Audrey as my assistant Dr. Jenny Graves, since she'd borrowed Courtney for The Triune Tale of Diminutive Swine last year. My SWAT T-shirt wasn't worn, but I did use it as a prop, on Courtney's suggestion. On a rather disappointing note, there was nothing done by Tim, Mrs. Boyer, or Miss Kathy this year. The talent share went by very quickly, probably 45 minutes until some encore performances, and still there was about a half-hour gap until general session started.
Rachel said the skit reminded her of Megamind; and Janet C thought it was hilarious, especially since it was clean. Tom joked that I better not go all Hollywood on everyone. Maybe the humor was too subtle or something - Courtney said a lot of people were a bit confused. Caleb Freeland asked me the next day, "Do you guys watch Studio C?" I grin and answer "Yep!" He laughs. "I thought that was one of theirs." (Comparison of our favorite sketches commenced here.)
Some of the girls asked for a tour of the guys' cabin once we'd gotten it all cleaned up, and their reactions were entertaining. They said it was like visiting a prison. Sure, it's not fancy. But it works. (Besides, footballs and karate kicks tend to break stuff and cause holes in walls and floors...and that's why we can't have nice things.)
The Gum Tree was freshly decorated, as it should be. (Old picture from several years ago.)
The general session sermons were from Luke, and going in order from Monday night, from Luke 1:1-4, which was basically an introduction to the book, and educated guesses about the character, life and work of Luke. Much like Mark worked closely with Peter, Luke worked closely with Paul. Luke's Gospel tends to emphasize the same things a lot of Paul's letter did; and it's written as a story in tone(which is why it's always been my favorite Gospel). Each Gospel writer stressed different points, as Mr. Evans' choir explained to Jane Blonde in The Mystery of the Manger, probably to reach different people. Luke was a careful historian and likely personally interviewed many of the key characters of Jesus' story , since he states in v3 that he has "carefully researched everything since the beginning".
Tuesday morning was from Luke 7:11-16, showing how Jesus' raising of the widow's only son in that little town called Nain connected with Old Testament history. It featured a lot of explanation about the area that Nazareth is in; how drenched in OT events the area is.
More interesting facts about Israeli geography in Tuesday night's sermon; apparently Jericho and Jerusalem are only separated by about fifteen miles, but Jerusalem is 3,500 feet above sea level, and Jericho is a thousand feet below sea level. And the road goes through an enormous dark canyon the locals call "the Valley of the Shadow of Death". In other words, this was(and is) the perfect place to get robbed. Which is exactly what happens to the traveler in the parable Jesus tells of in Luke 10:25-37. Here's something I hadn't thought about before; maybe the priest couldn't help the man, because he had his own job or task to do at the moment. I suppose that would have been God's will, too, one of those mysterious ways it works sometimes, that the right man would come along. The Levite was probably a kind of priest's assistant, so maybe he couldn't help, either. Or maybe he just didn't want to get involved. And then there's this Samaritan, of all people....Samaritans were kind of halfbreeds, and fully outcasts. Also, they hated the Jews almost as much as the Jews despised them. John Dugas preached from John 4 about the Samaritan woman at the well a couple months ago; that helped a lot in understanding this passage. Anyway, this Samaritan is the one to help the man, and in so doing, serve as the example for what it means to love one's neighbor. The lawyer asking the question that started this parable is looking for a loophole to close off the "neighbors" circle, but Jesus makes it clear that what the law demands is that anyone we come across that needs help is our neighbor. Which is basically everybody. And by helping that person, that is love. It's more of a chosen willful action than it is an emotion, though emotion sometimes goes with the action. Mr. Webb defined it like this: "A self-sacrificing determination to do good for the other person, as God defines what 'good' is." That's...really specific. And very hard. And highly encouraging. And really convicting. It goes back to the idea of Jesus becoming a servant, really. (Mark 10:45)
Didn't get any notes on Wednesday morning's sermon on prayer from Luke 11:1-10, but Wednesday night was the entirety of Luke 15 on the parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin and the Prodigal Son. I hadn't really connected before that they were all really parts of the same speech; or the common themes of lostness and grace. The stakes keep rising throughout the story; at first it's only one sheep out of a hundred. Sure, you want to find it, but if you don't, it's not a bad shrinkage rate. An individual coin is worth more than an isolated sheep; especially if there's only ten to start with. And then when it comes to people....well, it's hard to measure stakes that high; but it's easy to feel the weight of losing people. There were lots of stories about how dumb sheep are; they're experts at getting lost, they follow the leader all the time, they're helpless without any natural defenses, and they're stupid. It's almost like they stay up late at night in the barn plotting their suicide attempts for the next day. A lot of that....kind of really applies to people, too, spiritually speaking. Which is pretty embarrassing... Anyway, the lost thing is sought because it belongs to the seeker. But in order to find the object, the seeker must expose themselves to the same environment as the lost thing. Which is why Jesus came to live as a man. Grace is the Holy Spirit hunting down that lost object, or the soul of those God has chosen. It's invisible and gradual, but it happens, and as the sought soul draws closer to God, they reflect him more clearly. And the second half of the story of the Prodigal Son, I heard this explained really well on the radio by Ravi Zacharias one time, is that even "good" people need a Savior. Maybe more so, because they usually don't realize that they need him. Self-righteousness will keep you outside of heaven; and no matter what you do, you'll never be good enough to earn your salvation.
Didn't get any notes on Thursday morning, either; but it was about Zaccheus, from Luke 19:1-10. Paul was said to be 4'11" and bald, so maybe he particularly liked this story, and so that's why Luke included it. But from now on I'm probably going to imagine Paul as Wallace Shawn. Also, this response stood in sharp contrast to the rich young ruler(imagined as Tony Stark, due to one of our SWAT skits), who refused to surrender all his wealth.
Anyway, Thursday night's sermon was from Luke 23:39-43 about the Thief on the Cross. He mocked Jesus, too; but sometime during the horrific ordeal he changed his mind. Maybe because Jesus prayed for the Father to "forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). That rich young ruler asked what good works he could do to earn his salvation; this dude on the cross can't do ANY good works. And he can't promise to do any in the future, either; because he's gonna die in hours. It's all grace. No one deserves to go to heaven, but some are allowed to go there, because it's a gift. Mr. Webb quoted Matthew Henry the commentary guy, who once wrote that there were "Two thieves there on the crosses along with Jesus. One of them was saved; so that none might despair. But only one was saved, so that none might presume."
On Friday morning, the last sermon was from Luke 24-13-32, on the Road to Emmaus. These disciples had put their trust in Christ; but things looked extremely dark, and so they were sad(grave), because the world had been shattered and they realized that none of what they thought would happen actually would. They were probably confused, which is why Jesus explained all those Old Testament Scriptures about himself to them. They were ignorant; which doesn't mean stupid, it just means not being able to recognize something obvious. Before we can see God's glory, our eyes must be opened.
This year, going in, I had a really bad feeling about how things would go. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because almost none of the puzzle pieces last year fit together quite right. Maybe I realized that this would be the beginning of the end of the third generation that I'd known. But it really went pretty well. Bennett called it "a year of healing", which seemed to fit well.
Everywhere I look at Camp Beth-Eden, there's memories. Talking with Jed and Jon in the cabins(and making Tim really mad by keeping him awake with aforementioned conversations.) Duets with Jake on the trail and in the showers. Square dancing with Madelyn and Ashland. Mealtime chats with Daniel, Ryan, the Davises, the Freelands, the Hankinses or the Taillefers. INTENSE ping pong matches. Ultimate Frisbee mishaps. That tension of Final Jeopardy in Bible trivia. Plotting strategy with Ashland and Matt. Getting lost that first day with Josh, and the terror that was meeting Brother Larry. Jamming during Talent Share practice with me on guitar, Daniel on mandolin and Keely on viola. Learning how to throw a Frisbee from Matt, and then teaching it to Dylan Steeley several years later. The Great Rains of 2009. The Oppressive Heat of 2011. All those volleyball games; from learning to play(and Ash and I using each other as targets) to the "Sharkbait!" rally call to winning the Tournament Challenge to chasing runaway balls through the woods. Talent Share times; that first time to sing in front of strangers, "Temporary Home" with Samara, with the Jedites, and as part of Daniel's and Jed's choirs. Wednesday night in 2012. The Card Ceremony. Courtney and Paige's "Twelve Things of Camp". The momentous Thursday nights of '11 and '12. Experiencing things from a counselor's POV for the first time alongside Jed, Taylor, and Dylan Underwood.
I was able to appreciate the moment just by living in it, not necessarily having to capture it for later analyzation. I heard a lot of rather-sheepish comments by campers, as they realized I could probably hear them, that us counselors in general were "not as uptight as usual". But also, they knew where the boundaries were, so they didn't try to stretch them too much out of shape. There were times I wanted to yell at some people, sure, but overall everyone was very respectful. It was a blessing to work with everyone again; and very good to be able to serve the campers.
Other random bits; Square dancing went well, it was fun to dance again. Brad DeSpain and Mickey Buckmaster drove up in record time(three hours and thirteen minutes from GBC parking lot to sitting in front of the dining hall). Mrs. Mueller and Mrs. Wilson drove on the return trip back to Oklahoma, and it felt a little bit like a SWAT road trip, involving McDonald's mixups, a detour through someone's yard and driving in the wrong lane(I definitely thought of our motto.) Gary Long was the special speaker again this year; much to nearly everyone's dismay, but he didn't say anything offensive this time. Bailey DeSpain was accidentally listed in the camp book as a girl. Brother Larry is pretty good at ping pong.
###
CAMP BOOK SIGNINGS
"Enjoy working with you. Mrs. Janet (Pokorny)"
(Drew Blanton's signature)
"Your a good counsalor. John Thomas"
"Jesus said 'in this world you will have tribulation, but BE OF GOOD CHEER! I have overcome the world!' Mrs. Bebout To my sane and urbane friend!"
"Dear Wesley, Thank you for being such an encouragement to me each year. Your love for the Lord is evident and also your love for the kids. Lord willing I hope to serve with you again next year. Love, Janet (Crawford)"
"Wesley, thanks for the great job you did at camp! May God bless you in the days ahead. - PROV. 3:5 Mark Webb"
"Wesley, good to see you again as a councelor! Loved Cabbage ball you made it even more fun, Grayson H."
"Wesley, you are a very good counselor. I so much appreciate your willing spirit. Hope to work with you again next year. In Christ, Tom Henry"
"Wesley, you are one of those counselors I know will answer any question I have about games or help me out...sorry I have not been more friendly over the week. Thank you for your kindness and encouragement at camp! Keep coming back! Emily P."
"Hey Wes! For a counsler and a brother your not terrible....Love, Courtney"
"Thanks for keeping the belches under control. Yours truly, Benito" (Bennett)
"Wesley, thank you so much for all your work this week. I truly do appreciate it. Please come back next year! Jacob"
"Wesley! Thanks for being a soops cool counselor and letting Yellow win at cabbage ball. U da bomb! Laura F."
"thanks for being an amazing conselor and letting us do pranks :) and for playing soccer with us. Caleb Freeland"
"You are so sweet and awesome! Mary Kate"
"Glad to see you again this year. You're a great cousnelor! - Rachel"
"Thanks for being a good counselor Wesley - Forrest"
"You're a great counselor! Thanks for making the week even greater. - Mattie F."
"Wesley, thanks for being a good counselor! - Joe"
"Thank for being a good counselor and for taking away Strobe's flashlight. Wesley #2"
"Wesley, I hope you had a great time, and was blessed by the preaching! Hope to see you next year. Anne"
"Wesley, your a great counselor, and it was great hanging out this week!! - Andrew B."
(Tim Nehrbass's signature) "Thanks for serving again!"
"Nice seeing you again. Have a great year. - Christian"
"Wesley!! Hey, it was great to see you again!! By the way, you make a great evil doctor. Thanks for involving me in that. Hope to see you next year!! - Audrey Bebout"
"Wesley! You were a great counselor again. :) - Callie"
(Bailey DeSpain's signature)
"Wesley, so glad you could come back this year! You were a great counselor! - Brett"
"Wesley, Run the race with endurance, brother. In Christ, Curtis Knapp"
"Wesley, you were a great co-counselor this week! Hope you enjoyed it! Abbey"
"Great to see you again. May God bless you as you continue your education. See you on Facebook! L. Dean"
"Thanks for calling cabbage ball! Hunter B."
"Wesley! You have grown to such an excellent example of a yougn Christian man! I'm honored to know you! Praying often for you - you have a special place in my heart! Love you! :) Miss Terry"
We had a smaller group from Tulsa than expected; only fifteen, but that still was easily the most of any group. (By state, of course, Missouri had the most people overall.) The guys were Bennett, Wesley DeSpain, Trenton and Caleb, and then rookies in Wesley's brother Bailey and the Coxes' cousin Joe. The girls were Laura, Courtney, Callie, MattieGrace, Vivian, Lydia, and then rookies Chloe(the DeSpains' sister), Kate and Hope.
There were 25 guys, and about thirtyish girls; the final count was about 57 campers, so by far the smallest year that I've ever seen. I knew all the counselors; Tim, Brother Larry, Tom Henry, Curtis, Mrs. Boyer, Robin, Janets Crawford and Pokorny, Rachel, Miss Kathy, and then new camper-turned-counselors Anne and Abbey. Trevor Johnson spoke during the group sessions, and his wife and kids were back again, too. The camp pastor this year was Mark Webb from Mississippi, and his sermons were from the elements of Jesus' life that Luke looked at specifically, or gave more detail to than others did.
The camp books had a page dedicated to camp history for the first time; which was awesome. During the counselors' meeting on Tuesday morning we looked at a lot of pictures from 1985(the first year) and heard lots of stories about how awful Camp Sonrise was. (Ryan and Mary had both talked in earlier years about the electrifying showers, and Mrs. Boyer added that her first year as counselor she broke her ankle falling down a hill.)
Except for sermon notes, and scorekeeping for cabbage ball, I kept absolutely zero written record on what happened during the week. So what follows won't be chronological, and it probably won't be as detailed.
Things were really fixed up this year; the outer left cabin "ghetto" was walled over(insert complaining here...though it probably was a health hazard). The ceilings and walls of the guys' cabin had received new plywood covering and paint; the cabin had a completely new metal roof, replacing the shingles, and the chapel had gotten a total makeover; lights, paneling, carpet, everything. Most of the mini golf holes had been recarpeted as well. And the concrete of the tabernacle floor had been stained.
Almost nobody got hurt; which was great, and there weren't very many rule infractions, either. So that definitely helped, too. Forrest did break his nose digging a volleyball on Thursday night, and one girl got pretty dehydrated Monday/Tuesday, but other than that I don't think there was anything serious.
There was a food fight at lunch on Wednesday, which resulted in pudding splashed across several backpacks, and scrapes caused by fork attacks. But we learned later why that fight took place, and while it wasn't a good thing, it happened for a pretty good reason. Apparently one of the Beth-Eden staff was being a huge jerk in general, and he kept pestering Audrey in particular, causing a general freakout among everyone on the Black team. ("Freakout!" actually became the Black rally cry.) Her brothers and most of the Tulsa guys came to her defense by retaliating at the guy somehow over lunch.
There were a lot of hijinks in the cabins all week. Caleb Freeland and the Bebouts were playing pranks on everyone, beginning with moving a mattress into the shower. "What are you doing?" "I thought you said there weren't any counselors in here right now?!" Forrest hisses at Caleb. "We're moving this bed into the shower." "Who's is it?" "Drew Brashers's." "Uh-huh....Is it wet?" "Nope! We're just hiding it here." "Why?" "Cause it'll drive him crazy. Is that okay?" I think a minute. "That's hilarious. Go for it." One of the younger Mississippi kids, watching the scene, says, "That guy's my new favorite counselor." Drew then stole Hunter's mattress as payback.
A couple nights later Caleb F. and Chris Underwood markered on the faces of most people who were asleep, using a Sharpie I'd found in my backpack.
I think I must've been influenced a lot by Jon to allow/help with those pranks. But it was fun; and they'll remember how they had a blast doing all that stuff. And maybe Jed's comment about the spirit of adventure had something to do with it, too.
There was also a bunch of Nerf gun battles almost every night; which can be quite intense in such a confined space as the cabin.
Tim's nephew(and rookie) Matthew kept incessantly setting his flashlight on strobe mode and shining it in everyone's eyes; that was a little frustrating at times. Thus he will likely forever be known camp-wise as "Strobe".
I went with most of the guys down to the hidden meadow soccer field each day while the girls sang; playing on Tuesday, talking to Christian on Wednesday and serving as a goalie and dealing with a swarm of wasps flying around the whole time on Thursday. I just kept hoping none would land in my hair like that one last year did to Ashland. And the following mangled Scripture came to mind: :"When you encounter wasps of various kinds, consider it all joy; by doing these things for them, you have done them for me." (James 1:2 and Matthew 25:45)
I was assigned to work cabbage ball solo; which felt weird, taking over Brother Larry's spot there. And also, probably a nearsighted guy whose knowledge of baseball rules is shaky isn't the best candidate for serving as umpire? I tried to call things as best I could, but I got a lot of flak most games. Thankfully, Miss Kathy, Abbey and Janet P all helped out at various points with second-base calls.
The new cabbage ball I got from Amazon got broken in pretty well; the games used both mine and Brother Larry's well-used mushball, with the switches depending on how play was going. Remembering that Ryan, Dylan and I weighted down the archery targets with chunks of firewood, I pulled a couple chunks out of the woodpile down by the tabernacle to mark the pitcher's circle and Catcher Safety Zone. And not wanting a repeat of the time that Samara got a bat thrown at her ankle(she had a bruise for two months), I created a rule that a flung bat was an automatic out. It wasn't very popular, but no one got hurt.
White and Yellow started the Tournament Challenge in cabbage ball; their game went back and forth for five innings before White erupted for 18 runs in the final inning; the final score was 25-6, which everyone talked about for most of the week. Mrs. Boyer even opened the lunch line by announcing "if your team got destroyed this morning, go ahead!" (Red was also obliterated in volleyball by Green; as best I could piece together, the final score was 15-8, 15-1, 21-0).
Red beat Yellow 8-6 in a fast-moving back-and-forth game during Worst/First Tuesday night. (It went seven and a half innings.)
Red won Wednesday morning 7-4 over Blue in another fast-moving game, which went eight and a half innings.
In the second Worst/First through Thursday morning mist, Yellow defeated Black in the rematch by a 7-4 score in eight full innings.
And to wrap things up, Green exploded for 13 runs in an extremely-slow-paced game to beat Black 16-0 in four innings, winning the Tournament Challenge with six points.
Most of the great camp songs were sung again - Daniel 4:35, "In Christ Alone", "Conquering Now and Still to Conquer", "Are You Washed in the Blood?", the camp "Come Thou Fount", among others.
For the talent share, the Grace Bible-Tulsa youth group sang a couple songs, including "Come Praise and Glorify"; the Fergusons sang the Chelsea Moon version of "How Firm a Foundation", the Knapps played several awesome fiddle/cello/piano pieces, the Underwoods and Dischers had some fantastic songs, including a teamup effort. Courtney and I did the Studio C sketch Evil Memory Lapse, she as Jemima and me playing Professor Murdoc, drafting Caleb as the soldier and Audrey as my assistant Dr. Jenny Graves, since she'd borrowed Courtney for The Triune Tale of Diminutive Swine last year. My SWAT T-shirt wasn't worn, but I did use it as a prop, on Courtney's suggestion. On a rather disappointing note, there was nothing done by Tim, Mrs. Boyer, or Miss Kathy this year. The talent share went by very quickly, probably 45 minutes until some encore performances, and still there was about a half-hour gap until general session started.
Rachel said the skit reminded her of Megamind; and Janet C thought it was hilarious, especially since it was clean. Tom joked that I better not go all Hollywood on everyone. Maybe the humor was too subtle or something - Courtney said a lot of people were a bit confused. Caleb Freeland asked me the next day, "Do you guys watch Studio C?" I grin and answer "Yep!" He laughs. "I thought that was one of theirs." (Comparison of our favorite sketches commenced here.)
Some of the girls asked for a tour of the guys' cabin once we'd gotten it all cleaned up, and their reactions were entertaining. They said it was like visiting a prison. Sure, it's not fancy. But it works. (Besides, footballs and karate kicks tend to break stuff and cause holes in walls and floors...and that's why we can't have nice things.)
The Gum Tree was freshly decorated, as it should be. (Old picture from several years ago.)
The general session sermons were from Luke, and going in order from Monday night, from Luke 1:1-4, which was basically an introduction to the book, and educated guesses about the character, life and work of Luke. Much like Mark worked closely with Peter, Luke worked closely with Paul. Luke's Gospel tends to emphasize the same things a lot of Paul's letter did; and it's written as a story in tone(which is why it's always been my favorite Gospel). Each Gospel writer stressed different points, as Mr. Evans' choir explained to Jane Blonde in The Mystery of the Manger, probably to reach different people. Luke was a careful historian and likely personally interviewed many of the key characters of Jesus' story , since he states in v3 that he has "carefully researched everything since the beginning".
Tuesday morning was from Luke 7:11-16, showing how Jesus' raising of the widow's only son in that little town called Nain connected with Old Testament history. It featured a lot of explanation about the area that Nazareth is in; how drenched in OT events the area is.
More interesting facts about Israeli geography in Tuesday night's sermon; apparently Jericho and Jerusalem are only separated by about fifteen miles, but Jerusalem is 3,500 feet above sea level, and Jericho is a thousand feet below sea level. And the road goes through an enormous dark canyon the locals call "the Valley of the Shadow of Death". In other words, this was(and is) the perfect place to get robbed. Which is exactly what happens to the traveler in the parable Jesus tells of in Luke 10:25-37. Here's something I hadn't thought about before; maybe the priest couldn't help the man, because he had his own job or task to do at the moment. I suppose that would have been God's will, too, one of those mysterious ways it works sometimes, that the right man would come along. The Levite was probably a kind of priest's assistant, so maybe he couldn't help, either. Or maybe he just didn't want to get involved. And then there's this Samaritan, of all people....Samaritans were kind of halfbreeds, and fully outcasts. Also, they hated the Jews almost as much as the Jews despised them. John Dugas preached from John 4 about the Samaritan woman at the well a couple months ago; that helped a lot in understanding this passage. Anyway, this Samaritan is the one to help the man, and in so doing, serve as the example for what it means to love one's neighbor. The lawyer asking the question that started this parable is looking for a loophole to close off the "neighbors" circle, but Jesus makes it clear that what the law demands is that anyone we come across that needs help is our neighbor. Which is basically everybody. And by helping that person, that is love. It's more of a chosen willful action than it is an emotion, though emotion sometimes goes with the action. Mr. Webb defined it like this: "A self-sacrificing determination to do good for the other person, as God defines what 'good' is." That's...really specific. And very hard. And highly encouraging. And really convicting. It goes back to the idea of Jesus becoming a servant, really. (Mark 10:45)
Didn't get any notes on Wednesday morning's sermon on prayer from Luke 11:1-10, but Wednesday night was the entirety of Luke 15 on the parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin and the Prodigal Son. I hadn't really connected before that they were all really parts of the same speech; or the common themes of lostness and grace. The stakes keep rising throughout the story; at first it's only one sheep out of a hundred. Sure, you want to find it, but if you don't, it's not a bad shrinkage rate. An individual coin is worth more than an isolated sheep; especially if there's only ten to start with. And then when it comes to people....well, it's hard to measure stakes that high; but it's easy to feel the weight of losing people. There were lots of stories about how dumb sheep are; they're experts at getting lost, they follow the leader all the time, they're helpless without any natural defenses, and they're stupid. It's almost like they stay up late at night in the barn plotting their suicide attempts for the next day. A lot of that....kind of really applies to people, too, spiritually speaking. Which is pretty embarrassing... Anyway, the lost thing is sought because it belongs to the seeker. But in order to find the object, the seeker must expose themselves to the same environment as the lost thing. Which is why Jesus came to live as a man. Grace is the Holy Spirit hunting down that lost object, or the soul of those God has chosen. It's invisible and gradual, but it happens, and as the sought soul draws closer to God, they reflect him more clearly. And the second half of the story of the Prodigal Son, I heard this explained really well on the radio by Ravi Zacharias one time, is that even "good" people need a Savior. Maybe more so, because they usually don't realize that they need him. Self-righteousness will keep you outside of heaven; and no matter what you do, you'll never be good enough to earn your salvation.
Didn't get any notes on Thursday morning, either; but it was about Zaccheus, from Luke 19:1-10. Paul was said to be 4'11" and bald, so maybe he particularly liked this story, and so that's why Luke included it. But from now on I'm probably going to imagine Paul as Wallace Shawn. Also, this response stood in sharp contrast to the rich young ruler(imagined as Tony Stark, due to one of our SWAT skits), who refused to surrender all his wealth.
Anyway, Thursday night's sermon was from Luke 23:39-43 about the Thief on the Cross. He mocked Jesus, too; but sometime during the horrific ordeal he changed his mind. Maybe because Jesus prayed for the Father to "forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). That rich young ruler asked what good works he could do to earn his salvation; this dude on the cross can't do ANY good works. And he can't promise to do any in the future, either; because he's gonna die in hours. It's all grace. No one deserves to go to heaven, but some are allowed to go there, because it's a gift. Mr. Webb quoted Matthew Henry the commentary guy, who once wrote that there were "Two thieves there on the crosses along with Jesus. One of them was saved; so that none might despair. But only one was saved, so that none might presume."
On Friday morning, the last sermon was from Luke 24-13-32, on the Road to Emmaus. These disciples had put their trust in Christ; but things looked extremely dark, and so they were sad(grave), because the world had been shattered and they realized that none of what they thought would happen actually would. They were probably confused, which is why Jesus explained all those Old Testament Scriptures about himself to them. They were ignorant; which doesn't mean stupid, it just means not being able to recognize something obvious. Before we can see God's glory, our eyes must be opened.
This year, going in, I had a really bad feeling about how things would go. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because almost none of the puzzle pieces last year fit together quite right. Maybe I realized that this would be the beginning of the end of the third generation that I'd known. But it really went pretty well. Bennett called it "a year of healing", which seemed to fit well.
Everywhere I look at Camp Beth-Eden, there's memories. Talking with Jed and Jon in the cabins(and making Tim really mad by keeping him awake with aforementioned conversations.) Duets with Jake on the trail and in the showers. Square dancing with Madelyn and Ashland. Mealtime chats with Daniel, Ryan, the Davises, the Freelands, the Hankinses or the Taillefers. INTENSE ping pong matches. Ultimate Frisbee mishaps. That tension of Final Jeopardy in Bible trivia. Plotting strategy with Ashland and Matt. Getting lost that first day with Josh, and the terror that was meeting Brother Larry. Jamming during Talent Share practice with me on guitar, Daniel on mandolin and Keely on viola. Learning how to throw a Frisbee from Matt, and then teaching it to Dylan Steeley several years later. The Great Rains of 2009. The Oppressive Heat of 2011. All those volleyball games; from learning to play(and Ash and I using each other as targets) to the "Sharkbait!" rally call to winning the Tournament Challenge to chasing runaway balls through the woods. Talent Share times; that first time to sing in front of strangers, "Temporary Home" with Samara, with the Jedites, and as part of Daniel's and Jed's choirs. Wednesday night in 2012. The Card Ceremony. Courtney and Paige's "Twelve Things of Camp". The momentous Thursday nights of '11 and '12. Experiencing things from a counselor's POV for the first time alongside Jed, Taylor, and Dylan Underwood.
I was able to appreciate the moment just by living in it, not necessarily having to capture it for later analyzation. I heard a lot of rather-sheepish comments by campers, as they realized I could probably hear them, that us counselors in general were "not as uptight as usual". But also, they knew where the boundaries were, so they didn't try to stretch them too much out of shape. There were times I wanted to yell at some people, sure, but overall everyone was very respectful. It was a blessing to work with everyone again; and very good to be able to serve the campers.
Other random bits; Square dancing went well, it was fun to dance again. Brad DeSpain and Mickey Buckmaster drove up in record time(three hours and thirteen minutes from GBC parking lot to sitting in front of the dining hall). Mrs. Mueller and Mrs. Wilson drove on the return trip back to Oklahoma, and it felt a little bit like a SWAT road trip, involving McDonald's mixups, a detour through someone's yard and driving in the wrong lane(I definitely thought of our motto.) Gary Long was the special speaker again this year; much to nearly everyone's dismay, but he didn't say anything offensive this time. Bailey DeSpain was accidentally listed in the camp book as a girl. Brother Larry is pretty good at ping pong.
###
CAMP BOOK SIGNINGS
"Enjoy working with you. Mrs. Janet (Pokorny)"
(Drew Blanton's signature)
"Your a good counsalor. John Thomas"
"Jesus said 'in this world you will have tribulation, but BE OF GOOD CHEER! I have overcome the world!' Mrs. Bebout To my sane and urbane friend!"
"Dear Wesley, Thank you for being such an encouragement to me each year. Your love for the Lord is evident and also your love for the kids. Lord willing I hope to serve with you again next year. Love, Janet (Crawford)"
"Wesley, thanks for the great job you did at camp! May God bless you in the days ahead. - PROV. 3:5 Mark Webb"
"Wesley, good to see you again as a councelor! Loved Cabbage ball you made it even more fun, Grayson H."
"Wesley, you are a very good counselor. I so much appreciate your willing spirit. Hope to work with you again next year. In Christ, Tom Henry"
"Wesley, you are one of those counselors I know will answer any question I have about games or help me out...sorry I have not been more friendly over the week. Thank you for your kindness and encouragement at camp! Keep coming back! Emily P."
"Hey Wes! For a counsler and a brother your not terrible....Love, Courtney"
"Thanks for keeping the belches under control. Yours truly, Benito" (Bennett)
"Wesley, thank you so much for all your work this week. I truly do appreciate it. Please come back next year! Jacob"
"Wesley! Thanks for being a soops cool counselor and letting Yellow win at cabbage ball. U da bomb! Laura F."
"thanks for being an amazing conselor and letting us do pranks :) and for playing soccer with us. Caleb Freeland"
"You are so sweet and awesome! Mary Kate"
"Glad to see you again this year. You're a great cousnelor! - Rachel"
"Thanks for being a good counselor Wesley - Forrest"
"You're a great counselor! Thanks for making the week even greater. - Mattie F."
"Wesley, thanks for being a good counselor! - Joe"
"Thank for being a good counselor and for taking away Strobe's flashlight. Wesley #2"
"Wesley, I hope you had a great time, and was blessed by the preaching! Hope to see you next year. Anne"
"Wesley, your a great counselor, and it was great hanging out this week!! - Andrew B."
(Tim Nehrbass's signature) "Thanks for serving again!"
"Nice seeing you again. Have a great year. - Christian"
"Wesley!! Hey, it was great to see you again!! By the way, you make a great evil doctor. Thanks for involving me in that. Hope to see you next year!! - Audrey Bebout"
"Wesley! You were a great counselor again. :) - Callie"
(Bailey DeSpain's signature)
"Wesley, so glad you could come back this year! You were a great counselor! - Brett"
"Wesley, Run the race with endurance, brother. In Christ, Curtis Knapp"
"Wesley, you were a great co-counselor this week! Hope you enjoyed it! Abbey"
"Great to see you again. May God bless you as you continue your education. See you on Facebook! L. Dean"
"Thanks for calling cabbage ball! Hunter B."
"Wesley! You have grown to such an excellent example of a yougn Christian man! I'm honored to know you! Praying often for you - you have a special place in my heart! Love you! :) Miss Terry"
Sunday, July 19, 2015
A Short Post About Books and Movies
First off, Trevor's knee surgery was moved from Monday to next Friday because of paperwork not being filled out correctly. So it'll have been about three weeks from the time he fell out of the tree to when they repair the meniscus.
Watched the 1983 movie WarGames with Matthew Broderick and Ally Sheedy the other night. It was pretty good. I enjoy most stuff from the 80's, so I liked it. The whole Cold War element that was very real; the fact that since hardly anyone knew about computers a high schooler could by luck break into a military database; and it was interesting watching how to research stuff in a library before there were computers. That part looked very time-consuming.
Then Friday night we went and saw Ant-Man at the Orpheum in Okmulgee. That's such a cool old theater. Mom, Trevor and Caleb loved the movie. Courtney liked it. I thought it was all right. It was pretty much what I expected it would be; which is always a strange feeling, because that doesn't happen too often. There were elements of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man, in some of the photography and lighting, and The Amazing Spider-Man movies in terms of writing quality; and some Fast and Furious as far as the plot goes.
The previews were for the hilarious-looking Adam Sandler and Kevin James movie Pixels, about aliens who attack Earth with video-game characters from 1982, and the arcade masters of Pac-Man, Centipede, Donkey Kong and Space Invaders have to save the planet. (I love the 80's. Siblings thought it looked incredibly stupid; Mom thought it looked funny). Mom also liked the preview for Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, because it stars Wonder Woman. It'll set up the beginnings of the DC Movie Universe, which might be interesting. (It doesn't connect to their TV universe, which is weird.) That title is awful, though...sounds like a court case. And it's about a million syllables long. Also previewed were a Disney movie about a wintertime Coast Guard rescue mission called The Finest Hours that looks dull and super-serious, and Star Wars: Episode VII: The Force Awakens, which Caleb, Trevor and Mom are now eagerly looking forward to.
Anyway, back to the movie...Scott Lang is played by Paul Rudd, leading to my questioning before the movie came out, "We're needing someone to save the world. And so we're looking for help from....Bobby Newport." Michael Douglas(of Romancing the Stone) played Dr. Hank Pym, and Evangeline Lilly(from Lost) played Hank's daughter Hope Van Dyne. Together, they need to steal the new Yellowjacket suit from Hank's former assistant Darren Cross. Then a little girl's bedroom is beaten up pretty severely during the major battle at the end.
At one point, the writers got stuck when trying to get the team to escape from a collapsing building, so they materialized a TANK from nowhere to get the job done. I heard several laughs from the audience(about fifteen people, guessing high) right there. I shook my head in amazement. (Though for Two for the Treasure I have had the main characters eaten by velociraptors when I was out of ideas. Turned out my cowriter Ashland loved it.)
The phrase that came to mind while the credits were rolling was that this movie was about as subtle as a graham cracker. There's a slightly nutty flavor; it's somewhat nutritious, and makes a good, filling, tasty snack. It doesn't feel very Marvel-ish. Everyone's character seemed fairly one-dimensional; the Criminal Seeking to Go Straight and Do Good, the Nefarious Businessman, the Very Strained Relationship between Father and Daughter.
Sunday morning I woke up early, so I watched Rocky III to kill time. It was pretty good; better than the first. (Skipped the second, cause it opened too slowly and I got bored.) Plus, it introduced "Eye of the Tiger" to the world, so that's cool.
Read Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing as part of skimming through textbooks for school; I think it might be my favorite of his plays, because of the insults between Benedick and Beatrice. Shakespeare's still rather hard to understand, sometimes, though.
Also read Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman, which came out on Tuesday. It was also about like I expected; pretty good, but nothing great. And if it had been great, then we never would have had To Kill a Mockingbird. And there's a lot of little details that don't add up right if you look at Watchman as a sequel, which is mildly annoying. As a parent, though, it makes sense that details would be reshaped during rewriting. The third-person POV is clunky; constantly referring to the now-grown Scout as Jean Louise also gets a bit repetitive. This version of Uncle Jack is much weirder than the one we met later/before.
Headed for Missouri in the morning for SGYC; this will be the third time I've been a counselor; after five years of being a camper.
Watched the 1983 movie WarGames with Matthew Broderick and Ally Sheedy the other night. It was pretty good. I enjoy most stuff from the 80's, so I liked it. The whole Cold War element that was very real; the fact that since hardly anyone knew about computers a high schooler could by luck break into a military database; and it was interesting watching how to research stuff in a library before there were computers. That part looked very time-consuming.
Then Friday night we went and saw Ant-Man at the Orpheum in Okmulgee. That's such a cool old theater. Mom, Trevor and Caleb loved the movie. Courtney liked it. I thought it was all right. It was pretty much what I expected it would be; which is always a strange feeling, because that doesn't happen too often. There were elements of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man, in some of the photography and lighting, and The Amazing Spider-Man movies in terms of writing quality; and some Fast and Furious as far as the plot goes.
The previews were for the hilarious-looking Adam Sandler and Kevin James movie Pixels, about aliens who attack Earth with video-game characters from 1982, and the arcade masters of Pac-Man, Centipede, Donkey Kong and Space Invaders have to save the planet. (I love the 80's. Siblings thought it looked incredibly stupid; Mom thought it looked funny). Mom also liked the preview for Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, because it stars Wonder Woman. It'll set up the beginnings of the DC Movie Universe, which might be interesting. (It doesn't connect to their TV universe, which is weird.) That title is awful, though...sounds like a court case. And it's about a million syllables long. Also previewed were a Disney movie about a wintertime Coast Guard rescue mission called The Finest Hours that looks dull and super-serious, and Star Wars: Episode VII: The Force Awakens, which Caleb, Trevor and Mom are now eagerly looking forward to.
Anyway, back to the movie...Scott Lang is played by Paul Rudd, leading to my questioning before the movie came out, "We're needing someone to save the world. And so we're looking for help from....Bobby Newport." Michael Douglas(of Romancing the Stone) played Dr. Hank Pym, and Evangeline Lilly(from Lost) played Hank's daughter Hope Van Dyne. Together, they need to steal the new Yellowjacket suit from Hank's former assistant Darren Cross. Then a little girl's bedroom is beaten up pretty severely during the major battle at the end.
At one point, the writers got stuck when trying to get the team to escape from a collapsing building, so they materialized a TANK from nowhere to get the job done. I heard several laughs from the audience(about fifteen people, guessing high) right there. I shook my head in amazement. (Though for Two for the Treasure I have had the main characters eaten by velociraptors when I was out of ideas. Turned out my cowriter Ashland loved it.)
The phrase that came to mind while the credits were rolling was that this movie was about as subtle as a graham cracker. There's a slightly nutty flavor; it's somewhat nutritious, and makes a good, filling, tasty snack. It doesn't feel very Marvel-ish. Everyone's character seemed fairly one-dimensional; the Criminal Seeking to Go Straight and Do Good, the Nefarious Businessman, the Very Strained Relationship between Father and Daughter.
Sunday morning I woke up early, so I watched Rocky III to kill time. It was pretty good; better than the first. (Skipped the second, cause it opened too slowly and I got bored.) Plus, it introduced "Eye of the Tiger" to the world, so that's cool.
Read Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing as part of skimming through textbooks for school; I think it might be my favorite of his plays, because of the insults between Benedick and Beatrice. Shakespeare's still rather hard to understand, sometimes, though.
Also read Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman, which came out on Tuesday. It was also about like I expected; pretty good, but nothing great. And if it had been great, then we never would have had To Kill a Mockingbird. And there's a lot of little details that don't add up right if you look at Watchman as a sequel, which is mildly annoying. As a parent, though, it makes sense that details would be reshaped during rewriting. The third-person POV is clunky; constantly referring to the now-grown Scout as Jean Louise also gets a bit repetitive. This version of Uncle Jack is much weirder than the one we met later/before.
Headed for Missouri in the morning for SGYC; this will be the third time I've been a counselor; after five years of being a camper.
Thursday, July 9, 2015
July Readings
Been reading a lot of mysteries recently. The Secret Adversary, by Agatha Christie; that was the first to use Tommy and Tuppence. (They make a great team. Plus it's just a really fun read.) And I could use a fun read after following up Aldous Huxley's Brave New World with C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters imediately afterward.
Also read through the second and third books of a cozy-mystery series by Blanche Manos and Barbara Burgess this weekend, Grave Shift and Best Left Buried. (I read the first, The Cemetery Club, in April.) I wouldn't have read them if Blanche hadn't been the author, but they were nice. (She was one of Mimi's best friends, so...)
And Chasing the Wind, by Robert Elmer. (It's the fifth of an eight-book series about the adventures of 12-year-old Danish twins and their best friend during WWII. Research for a project Ashland and I are working on. Secret Adversary was, too.)
Currently working on How To Read a Book, by Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren. (Yep, THAT Charles Van Doren, who caused the Quiz Show Scandal of the 1950's.) It's interesting so far. Courtney just read it recently. Her internship with Tim Challies started on Tuesday, that's pretty neat.
Haven't had much of a chance to write very often; Caleb and Trevor switched bedrooms, so moving all that stuff and then rearranging furniture, etc. Also, dishes and laundry and stuff. Trevor hurt his knee falling out of a tree after church on Sunday, so that's been kinda rough on him.
Also read through the second and third books of a cozy-mystery series by Blanche Manos and Barbara Burgess this weekend, Grave Shift and Best Left Buried. (I read the first, The Cemetery Club, in April.) I wouldn't have read them if Blanche hadn't been the author, but they were nice. (She was one of Mimi's best friends, so...)
And Chasing the Wind, by Robert Elmer. (It's the fifth of an eight-book series about the adventures of 12-year-old Danish twins and their best friend during WWII. Research for a project Ashland and I are working on. Secret Adversary was, too.)
Currently working on How To Read a Book, by Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren. (Yep, THAT Charles Van Doren, who caused the Quiz Show Scandal of the 1950's.) It's interesting so far. Courtney just read it recently. Her internship with Tim Challies started on Tuesday, that's pretty neat.
Haven't had much of a chance to write very often; Caleb and Trevor switched bedrooms, so moving all that stuff and then rearranging furniture, etc. Also, dishes and laundry and stuff. Trevor hurt his knee falling out of a tree after church on Sunday, so that's been kinda rough on him.
Parks and Rec Quotes - Season Two, Part II
A continuation of listing (in my opinion) the greatest quotes from Parks and Recreation's second season. Season one is here, and part one of season two is here.
Episode Nine, "The Camel".
"So...the 'Spirit of Pawnee' was defaced again last night..." - Paul the City Manager. "What was it this time?" - Leslie. "Chocolate pudding." "Huh...that's new." (Later, Paul still talking.) "So, the City Council has determined that the mural should be changed to something...a little less....horrifying."
(Staff meeting.) "No offense, Leslie, but I am not an artist." "Oh, that is not true, Donna! I've seen your fingernails." "Um...I pay someone to do this." "Really? ...Oh. Well, shoot...Anyway, I am ordering all of you to design a mural." "Uh....only Ron can order the whole department to do something." - Tom. "Ron! Order them to do this!" "Do whatever Leslie says!"
(Andy is shining Ron's shoes.) "Do you have a key in there?"
"Dude, what is this? It looks like a lizard puking up Skittles!" - Tom, about an art student's painting.
"I am a terrible artist, but the Parks Department has done so much for me....I'll be glad to help them out however I can." (Ann stares critically at her mural.) "Ugh...maybe I should give them all free flu shots..."
"I'm starting to feel right at home as a shoeshine. I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'm doing it really, really well." - Andy.
"That looks like something a death-row convict would make in Art Therapy." - Tom complaining about Ann's mural. "Dude...I tried." "And you failed." (They argue about their paintings, then the whole department argues about whether Greg Kinear was on ER.)
"Hey, Jerry, why don'tcha put that murinal in the men's room so people can murinate all over it?" - April jeers Jerry's mispronunciation.
(April and Ann are fighting.) "You both have a point. Ann, yours was a little trite; and April, yours was...hellish, and might make someone vomit." - Leslie. "Thank you." - April.
"Well....you've made yourselves a camel." - Mark appraises the awful combination mural entry the gang has created. They stare blankly. "You've never heard that saying, that a camel is really a horse designed by committee? Well, what you've got there is one ugly camel. Featuring Bill Paxton...?"
"I'm not really an artist, Leslie." - Mark. "I've seen you sketch things!" "Yeah...like poles for stop signs." "That everybody looks at!" "By law, they're required to..."
Episode Ten, "Hunting Trip".
"Every year Ron takes a secret hunting trip with all the guys in the office." - Leslie. "Not all the guys. He's never taken me." - Tom. "Okay, fine. All the men."
"April, I need you to do something for me. I am going hunting tomorrow, so call the State Parks Office and get verbal confirmation that our budget documentation is in. Can I just tell you the 16-digit tracking number, or should I write it down? I'll just write it down...Can you handle this?" - Leslie. (April thinks a minute.) "You want me to..dial a number and read off another number? "Yes. Can you handle this?" "No?" "Well, try, okay? And if you do it, I will name the first turkey I shoot after you." "Cool."
"Ann! Ready to bag some birds?" "No, but I am ready to relax in front of the fire and get my Real Simple magazine on," she answers Leslie, smiling. "Great. Well, if you change your mind, you are now an officially licensed Indiana hunter." (Leslie flips hunting license over the car's roof to Ann.) "Oh. Gross."
"All right, safety basics: Donna, can you tell me why it's a bad idea to look down the barrel of your gun?" - Leslie. "Is that a trick question?" (She bends over to look at the barrel of her shotgun.) "Rule Number One: Do not point the weapon at another person. That includes your own face, Donna." - Ron.
(Back at the office, April's been on hold with the Indiana State Parks Department for the last 59 minutes and 54 seconds.) "Andy! Andy! Can you come in here? Please?" "Yeah. What's up?" "I've been on hold for, like, an hour, and now I really have to pee. Can you just sit here for like two seconds and just listen? Please?" "Yes!" "Okay. If they answer, can you just read off those numbers? Out loud?" "Yeah!" "Okay. Thanks." (She dashes towards bathroom. This is memorable because it's awkward-but-realistic, sure, but more importantly, this was their first real interaction on the show. Also, by the end of the episode, they've been on hold for at least 179 minutes.)
"I think this is gonna be a really good bonding sesh with Ron. Guys love it when you show them that you're better than they are at something they love." - Leslie.
(April's back, Andy is complaining about Mark.) "Maybe a deer will eat him." (Andy laughs.) "That would be really awesome. But I don't think that will happen, probably."
(Jerry, Tom and Donna are hunting together.) "Your favorite kind of cake can't be birthday cake. That's like saying that your favorite type of cereal is breakfast cereal." - Tom. "Mmm. I love breakfast cereal." - Donna. "Look! Some kind of bird! Let's kill it!" - Tom.
(Mark is trying to teach Ann how to shoot a shotgun.) "All right! I can see why people like this!" "And, uh, keeping your eyes open is always a good idea around guns."
Episode Eleven, "Tom's Divorce".
"Ew, no, Ron! I don't wanna go up to the fourth floor. It's the creepiest place on Earth!" - Leslie. Then, during interview: "The fourth floor is awful. The DMV, divorce filings, probation offices...Ugh. They put a popcorn machine in there, just to brighten things up, but they used the wrong kind of oil and a bunch of people had to get their throats replaced." Back during conversation: "They'll only talk to you or me. And I can't go, because I don't want to." - Ron.
"I think Tom is fine." - Ron. "I know, that's the problem. Tom always seems like this slickster cool guy, but in reality he's just hiding his emotions under a very thick layer of Axe body spray." - Leslie.
(Mark and Andy are playing pool. Mark's crushing Andy.) "Okay, new game. Let's say that if you win, you don't actually owe me any money. But if I win, then you have to stop bugging me and Ann all the time when we're hanging out. And you can't make comments and stuff." - Mark. "That....doesn't sound very fair..." (April's watching.) "Ugh...somebody punch somebody already!"
"Now the sadness is pouring out of Tom, like the blood of a pterodactyl after it's been attacked by a T. rex." - Leslie.
Episode Twelve, "Christmas Scandal".
"The story of this story is that it won't stop developing!" - Perd Hapley.
"Okay, I've made copies of Leslie's daily work schedule, so we'll all split things up and each take...um....damn, ten items, and we'll knock this out." - Ron to the department. (Leslie's schedule is written in song, apparently, too, BTW.)
"Which meeting is this?" - Ron. "Um...the Association of Local Auditing Systems." - April. "Kill me." Paul the City Manager calls on Leslie to deliver a presentation. "Uh, Leslie's not here. I...gave her the day off." "All right, Ron. I guess you'll be giving her presentation, then?" (Ron, completely blindsided.) "...Yep. Yes, I will..." (April's giggling.)
"Well, I don't know...that, uh, that's kind of a weird question. I mean, I - I joined to put myself through college, and, uh, it's, ya know....I'm just a desk jockey, but it's...rewarding, so...um, yeah, so....I guess I'm in love with the Army." - Dave the cop. (Jump cut during interview.) "Oh, yeah, Leslie! That makes a lot more sense. Yeah, I'm definitely in love with Leslie. That's affirmative."
(Reading Leslie's to-do lists.) "All right...sort out that payroll issue, that's done!" - Tom. "Deliver a case of beer to Sanitation. Why?" - Mark. "Let's skip that one. They can buy their own beer. I'm getting hungry, let's grab something to eat. So, have you figured out what you're getting Ann for Christmas?" "Oh, I already did, actually. I got her a new computer bag." "That's a terrible gift." "No, she mentioned that she needed a new one, like, two months ago, and I wrote it down. That's what's called being an amazing boyfriend."
"Hey, Ann! I've been thinking about your gay boyfriend all day, what you should get him." - Andy. "Great! What'd you come up with?" "Spray tan gift cirtificate." "Eh....no." "Trip to Germany. Germany is awesome."And expensive." "Good call. I didn't think of that."
Episode Thirteen, "The Set Up".
"I've been getting a lot of visitors recently...thanks to a...stupid, worthless, new push to make government officials more accessible to the public. This is my hell." - Ron.
(Ann comes in from a lunch run.) "All right, Tom...here's your chicken Caesar salad; no dressing, no cheese, no croutons, no taste." "And no carbs." "And for you, madame, the Leslie Knope." "Thank you!" "I cannot believe the cafeteria named a sandwich after you, that is so cool!" "Isn't it?! Salami on pumpernickle with olive juice and extra iceberg." (Ann frowns in disgust.) "It was the only sandwich on the board that wasn't named. I just wish I liked it..."
"I feel sorry for Leslie...it's terrible to have a relationship end by distance. Although, that's pretty much why I broke up with Andy...He lived way too close to me." - Ann.
"You get an assistant now?" - Tom asks Ron. "Yeah, I've always been able to have one, but I've turned it down because it's a waste of money. In the eight years that I've been at this job, I've saved the taxpayers more than a hundred and fifty grand. But now, I need the taxpayers' money, to save me from the taxpayers. Please post this at your college." (He hands ad to April.) "This looks like an ad for nothing." (It says, "Job: assistant to a man. Low pay. Apply at Parks Department."
"You....are very organized, Leslie." - Justin the lawyer.
"Hey, how's the date going?" - Ann. "...Good. We just finished the MRI." - Leslie. "What?" "This guy is nuts!" "I'm sorry, Les....I'll try to get somebody better next time. Just don't let this sour you on dating, okay?"
"Well, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy, so...naturally I came to you for reassurance." - Mark to Andy.
(Tom has just tried to get Ron to hire Jean-Ralphio as his assistant.) "I want to punch you in the face so bad right now." - Ron. "Okayy. Message received. I'll keep looking." "Thank you. Bring me the opposite of him."
"I like it when you hang out here." - Andy to April. (She stalks into Ron's office.) "I want to be your assistant." "Really. You hate it here." "So do you." (He nods.) "I'll make sure you don't have to go to any meetings. If anyone comes to see you...I'll scare them away." (Tom tries to get April to decide between two ties, she slams the door in his face.) "You're hired."
"I just figured that I might as well get paid for being here." - April.
"Ten months ago, she was an intern who could give a C-R-A-P about local government. Now, she's our newest employee. To April." - Leslie. "Cheers!" - Tom and Donna. "Yay." - April. "Jerry, come and celebrate." - Leslie. "No thanks." "Well, everybody, let's get back to work." (Jerry walks towards Ron's office.) "Where are you going?" - April. "I want to talk to Ron about the size of my desk." "Jerry. You have to schedule an appointment." "Okay. How 'bout now?" "Ron 's not here." "He's right there! I can see him!" "I'll let you know when he's available." (She smiles sweetly; Jerry huffs away, Ron raises his coffee cup in salute.) "Atta girl." - Ron.
Episode Fourteen, "Leslie's House".
"I know what you meant, but I took your idea and made it better. It's called a think tank, Ann." - Leslie. "What is?" "Our lunches. Our lunches are like think tanks."
"'Hey, it's Justin. Here, take my coat, but be careful, cause I got it from the King of Africa when we were walkin' along the Berlin Wall together.' Really, Justin? What instruments do you play? ...Actually, he's a pretty sick keyboardist." - Andy.
"Hey, Ann! Welcome to my house for the very first time." - Leslie. "I know, I can't believe that you've never invited me here before." "Well, come on in." (Leslie's house is AWFUL. Ann looks around in shock.) "Now I can believe it..." "Now you can just help me put on the finishing touches." "This newspaper is from November 1986." "Oh, the first rumblings of Iran-Contra! Don't throw that out!"
"I think I need to call Child Protective Services and have Leslie taken away from herself." - Ann.
"Don't take this the wrong way, but your house is like a crazy person's garage!" - Ann to Leslie.
"Justin is hip. Pawnee is...not hip. People around here are just starting to get into Nirvana. I don't have the heart to tell 'em what's gonna happen to Kurt Cobain in 1994." - Tom.
"Ew....it's like touching raw chicken." - April complains while shaking Tom's hand.
"I can't wait to talk with Justin again....last time he told me about when he snorkeled with whale sharks in Madagascar. That was after I told him that I sometimes go swimming at the Y." - Mark.
(Justin tries to shake April's hand at Leslie's dinner party.) "I have the swine flu."
"Yo." - April. "Yo." - Andy. "Is that Justin's coat?" "Oh, yeah. He got it in Cambodia when he was hiking Mount Everest." "Let's put chewed-up gum in his pockets." "That's genius. But I can't...Leslie's being super-cool with me, and I can't screw over her boyfriend, so..." "I'll do it when you aren't in the room, then." "That would be terrible." (Andy nods.)
"Well, this is great. I'm heading home, so as to not have to be here anymore." - Ron, during Barney the accountant's presentation on QuickBooks.
Episode Fifteen, "Sweetums".
(Tom's giving a fashion show for Leslie and Justin, since he's getting divorced to Wendy and all.) "Well, as far as white leather suits go...." - Leslie. "Horrible." - Justin.
"That was really nice of you to compliment my truck without any ulterior motive." - Mark to Tom. (Tom then asks for help moving over the weekend.) "I'm totally blanking on a valid excuse, so....yeah, sure."
"Ann needs to butt out. The point of America is, if you want to eat garbage, balloon up to 600 pounds, and die of a heart attack at 43, you can! You are free to do so! To me, that's beautiful." - Ron.
(After helping April, Mark, Andy and Donna help Tom move, her gay boyfriend Derek and his boyfriend Ben are making fun of Andy Eventually, she's had enough of listening to it.) "You know....for a gay couple, you guys are being really gay."
"By the way, maybe it's none of my business, but if you eat three pounds of steak every day, you're gonna die. And although I've already written your eulogy, and it's incredibly touching, I would prefer not to give it for a while." - Leslie to a drunk Ron.
Episode Sixteen, "Galentine's Day".
"Some of those senior citizens have been married for half a century. We could learn a lot from them. Because, no offense, but everyone in this office is terrible at love. (Looking in turn at Tom, April, Ron, An and Mark.) "Divorced. Dating a gay guy. Divorced twice. Jury's still out on you two. And Jerry, who knows?" - Leslie. "I've been happily married for twenty-eight years! You've met my wife Gail many times."
"I've never really had a chance to get a girl a cliche Valentine's Day gift before, so....I got you all of 'em." - Mark to Ann.
"If that happens here...my eyes will fall out of the back of my head and I'll die!" - Andy, worrying about elderly women flashing him while Mouse Rat is up on stage.
"You guys are really adorable. That's - that's all I wanted to say." - April to an elderly couple.
"So..your plan was to sue me, and then use that to blackmail me into falling in love with you?" - Wendy to Tom. "Well....YEAH!"
"Are you guys...? Wait, never mind, don't answer that." - Ann to April. "Why do you care?"
"Why does everything we do have to be cloaked in like fifteen layers of irony?!" - April to Derek and Ben.
"He's a tourist. He vacations in people's lives, takes pictures, puts 'em in a scrapbook and then moves on. All he's interested in are stories." - Ron to Leslie about Justin. "Huh." "Basically, he's selfish. And you're not. And that's why you don't like him."
Episode Nine, "The Camel".
"So...the 'Spirit of Pawnee' was defaced again last night..." - Paul the City Manager. "What was it this time?" - Leslie. "Chocolate pudding." "Huh...that's new." (Later, Paul still talking.) "So, the City Council has determined that the mural should be changed to something...a little less....horrifying."
(Staff meeting.) "No offense, Leslie, but I am not an artist." "Oh, that is not true, Donna! I've seen your fingernails." "Um...I pay someone to do this." "Really? ...Oh. Well, shoot...Anyway, I am ordering all of you to design a mural." "Uh....only Ron can order the whole department to do something." - Tom. "Ron! Order them to do this!" "Do whatever Leslie says!"
(Andy is shining Ron's shoes.) "Do you have a key in there?"
"Dude, what is this? It looks like a lizard puking up Skittles!" - Tom, about an art student's painting.
"I am a terrible artist, but the Parks Department has done so much for me....I'll be glad to help them out however I can." (Ann stares critically at her mural.) "Ugh...maybe I should give them all free flu shots..."
"I'm starting to feel right at home as a shoeshine. I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'm doing it really, really well." - Andy.
"That looks like something a death-row convict would make in Art Therapy." - Tom complaining about Ann's mural. "Dude...I tried." "And you failed." (They argue about their paintings, then the whole department argues about whether Greg Kinear was on ER.)
"Hey, Jerry, why don'tcha put that murinal in the men's room so people can murinate all over it?" - April jeers Jerry's mispronunciation.
(April and Ann are fighting.) "You both have a point. Ann, yours was a little trite; and April, yours was...hellish, and might make someone vomit." - Leslie. "Thank you." - April.
"Well....you've made yourselves a camel." - Mark appraises the awful combination mural entry the gang has created. They stare blankly. "You've never heard that saying, that a camel is really a horse designed by committee? Well, what you've got there is one ugly camel. Featuring Bill Paxton...?"
"I'm not really an artist, Leslie." - Mark. "I've seen you sketch things!" "Yeah...like poles for stop signs." "That everybody looks at!" "By law, they're required to..."
Episode Ten, "Hunting Trip".
"Every year Ron takes a secret hunting trip with all the guys in the office." - Leslie. "Not all the guys. He's never taken me." - Tom. "Okay, fine. All the men."
"April, I need you to do something for me. I am going hunting tomorrow, so call the State Parks Office and get verbal confirmation that our budget documentation is in. Can I just tell you the 16-digit tracking number, or should I write it down? I'll just write it down...Can you handle this?" - Leslie. (April thinks a minute.) "You want me to..dial a number and read off another number? "Yes. Can you handle this?" "No?" "Well, try, okay? And if you do it, I will name the first turkey I shoot after you." "Cool."
"Ann! Ready to bag some birds?" "No, but I am ready to relax in front of the fire and get my Real Simple magazine on," she answers Leslie, smiling. "Great. Well, if you change your mind, you are now an officially licensed Indiana hunter." (Leslie flips hunting license over the car's roof to Ann.) "Oh. Gross."
"All right, safety basics: Donna, can you tell me why it's a bad idea to look down the barrel of your gun?" - Leslie. "Is that a trick question?" (She bends over to look at the barrel of her shotgun.) "Rule Number One: Do not point the weapon at another person. That includes your own face, Donna." - Ron.
(Back at the office, April's been on hold with the Indiana State Parks Department for the last 59 minutes and 54 seconds.) "Andy! Andy! Can you come in here? Please?" "Yeah. What's up?" "I've been on hold for, like, an hour, and now I really have to pee. Can you just sit here for like two seconds and just listen? Please?" "Yes!" "Okay. If they answer, can you just read off those numbers? Out loud?" "Yeah!" "Okay. Thanks." (She dashes towards bathroom. This is memorable because it's awkward-but-realistic, sure, but more importantly, this was their first real interaction on the show. Also, by the end of the episode, they've been on hold for at least 179 minutes.)
"I think this is gonna be a really good bonding sesh with Ron. Guys love it when you show them that you're better than they are at something they love." - Leslie.
(April's back, Andy is complaining about Mark.) "Maybe a deer will eat him." (Andy laughs.) "That would be really awesome. But I don't think that will happen, probably."
(Jerry, Tom and Donna are hunting together.) "Your favorite kind of cake can't be birthday cake. That's like saying that your favorite type of cereal is breakfast cereal." - Tom. "Mmm. I love breakfast cereal." - Donna. "Look! Some kind of bird! Let's kill it!" - Tom.
(Mark is trying to teach Ann how to shoot a shotgun.) "All right! I can see why people like this!" "And, uh, keeping your eyes open is always a good idea around guns."
Episode Eleven, "Tom's Divorce".
"Ew, no, Ron! I don't wanna go up to the fourth floor. It's the creepiest place on Earth!" - Leslie. Then, during interview: "The fourth floor is awful. The DMV, divorce filings, probation offices...Ugh. They put a popcorn machine in there, just to brighten things up, but they used the wrong kind of oil and a bunch of people had to get their throats replaced." Back during conversation: "They'll only talk to you or me. And I can't go, because I don't want to." - Ron.
"I think Tom is fine." - Ron. "I know, that's the problem. Tom always seems like this slickster cool guy, but in reality he's just hiding his emotions under a very thick layer of Axe body spray." - Leslie.
(Mark and Andy are playing pool. Mark's crushing Andy.) "Okay, new game. Let's say that if you win, you don't actually owe me any money. But if I win, then you have to stop bugging me and Ann all the time when we're hanging out. And you can't make comments and stuff." - Mark. "That....doesn't sound very fair..." (April's watching.) "Ugh...somebody punch somebody already!"
"Now the sadness is pouring out of Tom, like the blood of a pterodactyl after it's been attacked by a T. rex." - Leslie.
Episode Twelve, "Christmas Scandal".
"The story of this story is that it won't stop developing!" - Perd Hapley.
"Okay, I've made copies of Leslie's daily work schedule, so we'll all split things up and each take...um....damn, ten items, and we'll knock this out." - Ron to the department. (Leslie's schedule is written in song, apparently, too, BTW.)
"Which meeting is this?" - Ron. "Um...the Association of Local Auditing Systems." - April. "Kill me." Paul the City Manager calls on Leslie to deliver a presentation. "Uh, Leslie's not here. I...gave her the day off." "All right, Ron. I guess you'll be giving her presentation, then?" (Ron, completely blindsided.) "...Yep. Yes, I will..." (April's giggling.)
"Well, I don't know...that, uh, that's kind of a weird question. I mean, I - I joined to put myself through college, and, uh, it's, ya know....I'm just a desk jockey, but it's...rewarding, so...um, yeah, so....I guess I'm in love with the Army." - Dave the cop. (Jump cut during interview.) "Oh, yeah, Leslie! That makes a lot more sense. Yeah, I'm definitely in love with Leslie. That's affirmative."
(Reading Leslie's to-do lists.) "All right...sort out that payroll issue, that's done!" - Tom. "Deliver a case of beer to Sanitation. Why?" - Mark. "Let's skip that one. They can buy their own beer. I'm getting hungry, let's grab something to eat. So, have you figured out what you're getting Ann for Christmas?" "Oh, I already did, actually. I got her a new computer bag." "That's a terrible gift." "No, she mentioned that she needed a new one, like, two months ago, and I wrote it down. That's what's called being an amazing boyfriend."
"Hey, Ann! I've been thinking about your gay boyfriend all day, what you should get him." - Andy. "Great! What'd you come up with?" "Spray tan gift cirtificate." "Eh....no." "Trip to Germany. Germany is awesome."And expensive." "Good call. I didn't think of that."
Episode Thirteen, "The Set Up".
"I've been getting a lot of visitors recently...thanks to a...stupid, worthless, new push to make government officials more accessible to the public. This is my hell." - Ron.
(Ann comes in from a lunch run.) "All right, Tom...here's your chicken Caesar salad; no dressing, no cheese, no croutons, no taste." "And no carbs." "And for you, madame, the Leslie Knope." "Thank you!" "I cannot believe the cafeteria named a sandwich after you, that is so cool!" "Isn't it?! Salami on pumpernickle with olive juice and extra iceberg." (Ann frowns in disgust.) "It was the only sandwich on the board that wasn't named. I just wish I liked it..."
"I feel sorry for Leslie...it's terrible to have a relationship end by distance. Although, that's pretty much why I broke up with Andy...He lived way too close to me." - Ann.
"You get an assistant now?" - Tom asks Ron. "Yeah, I've always been able to have one, but I've turned it down because it's a waste of money. In the eight years that I've been at this job, I've saved the taxpayers more than a hundred and fifty grand. But now, I need the taxpayers' money, to save me from the taxpayers. Please post this at your college." (He hands ad to April.) "This looks like an ad for nothing." (It says, "Job: assistant to a man. Low pay. Apply at Parks Department."
"You....are very organized, Leslie." - Justin the lawyer.
"Hey, how's the date going?" - Ann. "...Good. We just finished the MRI." - Leslie. "What?" "This guy is nuts!" "I'm sorry, Les....I'll try to get somebody better next time. Just don't let this sour you on dating, okay?"
"Well, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy, so...naturally I came to you for reassurance." - Mark to Andy.
(Tom has just tried to get Ron to hire Jean-Ralphio as his assistant.) "I want to punch you in the face so bad right now." - Ron. "Okayy. Message received. I'll keep looking." "Thank you. Bring me the opposite of him."
"I like it when you hang out here." - Andy to April. (She stalks into Ron's office.) "I want to be your assistant." "Really. You hate it here." "So do you." (He nods.) "I'll make sure you don't have to go to any meetings. If anyone comes to see you...I'll scare them away." (Tom tries to get April to decide between two ties, she slams the door in his face.) "You're hired."
"I just figured that I might as well get paid for being here." - April.
"Ten months ago, she was an intern who could give a C-R-A-P about local government. Now, she's our newest employee. To April." - Leslie. "Cheers!" - Tom and Donna. "Yay." - April. "Jerry, come and celebrate." - Leslie. "No thanks." "Well, everybody, let's get back to work." (Jerry walks towards Ron's office.) "Where are you going?" - April. "I want to talk to Ron about the size of my desk." "Jerry. You have to schedule an appointment." "Okay. How 'bout now?" "Ron 's not here." "He's right there! I can see him!" "I'll let you know when he's available." (She smiles sweetly; Jerry huffs away, Ron raises his coffee cup in salute.) "Atta girl." - Ron.
Episode Fourteen, "Leslie's House".
"I know what you meant, but I took your idea and made it better. It's called a think tank, Ann." - Leslie. "What is?" "Our lunches. Our lunches are like think tanks."
"'Hey, it's Justin. Here, take my coat, but be careful, cause I got it from the King of Africa when we were walkin' along the Berlin Wall together.' Really, Justin? What instruments do you play? ...Actually, he's a pretty sick keyboardist." - Andy.
"Hey, Ann! Welcome to my house for the very first time." - Leslie. "I know, I can't believe that you've never invited me here before." "Well, come on in." (Leslie's house is AWFUL. Ann looks around in shock.) "Now I can believe it..." "Now you can just help me put on the finishing touches." "This newspaper is from November 1986." "Oh, the first rumblings of Iran-Contra! Don't throw that out!"
"I think I need to call Child Protective Services and have Leslie taken away from herself." - Ann.
"Don't take this the wrong way, but your house is like a crazy person's garage!" - Ann to Leslie.
"Justin is hip. Pawnee is...not hip. People around here are just starting to get into Nirvana. I don't have the heart to tell 'em what's gonna happen to Kurt Cobain in 1994." - Tom.
"Ew....it's like touching raw chicken." - April complains while shaking Tom's hand.
"I can't wait to talk with Justin again....last time he told me about when he snorkeled with whale sharks in Madagascar. That was after I told him that I sometimes go swimming at the Y." - Mark.
(Justin tries to shake April's hand at Leslie's dinner party.) "I have the swine flu."
"Yo." - April. "Yo." - Andy. "Is that Justin's coat?" "Oh, yeah. He got it in Cambodia when he was hiking Mount Everest." "Let's put chewed-up gum in his pockets." "That's genius. But I can't...Leslie's being super-cool with me, and I can't screw over her boyfriend, so..." "I'll do it when you aren't in the room, then." "That would be terrible." (Andy nods.)
"Well, this is great. I'm heading home, so as to not have to be here anymore." - Ron, during Barney the accountant's presentation on QuickBooks.
Episode Fifteen, "Sweetums".
(Tom's giving a fashion show for Leslie and Justin, since he's getting divorced to Wendy and all.) "Well, as far as white leather suits go...." - Leslie. "Horrible." - Justin.
"That was really nice of you to compliment my truck without any ulterior motive." - Mark to Tom. (Tom then asks for help moving over the weekend.) "I'm totally blanking on a valid excuse, so....yeah, sure."
"Ann needs to butt out. The point of America is, if you want to eat garbage, balloon up to 600 pounds, and die of a heart attack at 43, you can! You are free to do so! To me, that's beautiful." - Ron.
(After helping April, Mark, Andy and Donna help Tom move, her gay boyfriend Derek and his boyfriend Ben are making fun of Andy Eventually, she's had enough of listening to it.) "You know....for a gay couple, you guys are being really gay."
"By the way, maybe it's none of my business, but if you eat three pounds of steak every day, you're gonna die. And although I've already written your eulogy, and it's incredibly touching, I would prefer not to give it for a while." - Leslie to a drunk Ron.
Episode Sixteen, "Galentine's Day".
"Some of those senior citizens have been married for half a century. We could learn a lot from them. Because, no offense, but everyone in this office is terrible at love. (Looking in turn at Tom, April, Ron, An and Mark.) "Divorced. Dating a gay guy. Divorced twice. Jury's still out on you two. And Jerry, who knows?" - Leslie. "I've been happily married for twenty-eight years! You've met my wife Gail many times."
"I've never really had a chance to get a girl a cliche Valentine's Day gift before, so....I got you all of 'em." - Mark to Ann.
"If that happens here...my eyes will fall out of the back of my head and I'll die!" - Andy, worrying about elderly women flashing him while Mouse Rat is up on stage.
"You guys are really adorable. That's - that's all I wanted to say." - April to an elderly couple.
"So..your plan was to sue me, and then use that to blackmail me into falling in love with you?" - Wendy to Tom. "Well....YEAH!"
"Are you guys...? Wait, never mind, don't answer that." - Ann to April. "Why do you care?"
"Why does everything we do have to be cloaked in like fifteen layers of irony?!" - April to Derek and Ben.
"He's a tourist. He vacations in people's lives, takes pictures, puts 'em in a scrapbook and then moves on. All he's interested in are stories." - Ron to Leslie about Justin. "Huh." "Basically, he's selfish. And you're not. And that's why you don't like him."
Saturday, July 4, 2015
July 4th Weekend
So, most of America is celebrating the Fourth of July, or "Independence Day", as it used to be called. Caleb and Trevor have been setting off firecrackers for most of the last few days. They've had fun with those. (The rest of us haven't.)
We spent the day cleaning the garage and burning trash, a very productive way to spend a day. And holidays are much the same as any others, yes? If you're going to burn stuff, make sure those flames are doing something useful. And ours certainly were - Dispatching a broken-freezer's worth of rotting meat and assorted scrapwood, limbs and hay. And most of the garage is now clean, too.
Last night we went to Tahlequah to Louise and Harry's for their 25th anniversary party; it was very good to be in Tahlequah again, even if it was only for a quick visit. And it was equally very good to spend time with Lankfords. Saw Grandpa and Robbie, met two of Harry's sons, talked some with Damon and Louise's friends Annie and Geneva, threw a football around with Clay and Hayden, and shot baskets and played ping pong with Lillyanne. Also got to hold my two-year-old cousin Lyla Rose; together we watched the fireworks shot off by the people across the street. It was a good time.
(Updated Sunday night...)
The U.S. women's soccer team played in the final of the World Cup against Japan. So of course we watched it. This made the third major tournament in a row that the two teams had faced each other with the title on the line, and the last World Cup Japan won in a shootout. Vancouver is much closer to America than Japan is....pretty large homefield advantage, eh? Carli Lloyd scored two goals within the first five minutes, and then Lauren Holliday added another goal, and about ten minutes late Lloyd earned a hat trick. It was pretty awesome. Sure, Japan scored late in the first half, and then early in the second on an own-goal by a defender's misplaced header, but Tobin Heath scored after passes from Alex Morgan and Morgan Brian.
Final score? U.S.A. 5, Japan 2. Twitter and Facebook go crazy with "Party Like It's 1999!" flashback photos.
In 1999, we'd just moved to Morris from Broken Arrow, and I was the starting defender for the Sonic Drive-In team, which won all five games, winning the 1st/2nd grade division of the Okmulgee County Y-league (Other teammates included neighbors Katie and Kelsie, and Logan, whose parents were/are the local vets. Katie's mom Becky was our coach.) Also, I played at least two more seasons with every other person from this team. And then in high school I covered Guy Kiehl's football games for the Free-Lance. (He's in between me and Kelsie in this photo.)
Elizabeth texts me right after the game ended, screaming "MERICA!" Then we compared favorite soccer movies that we reenacted in our backyards. We both loved (and love) The Big Green and Air Bud: World Pup. I really liked Switching Goals, and her favorite is Bend It Like Beckham. That got me to thinking about the stories I would write with Mimi's help about a YMCA soccer team called the Panthers, and the updated reboot/sequel that I wrote about some of those characters last summer. Might need to spend some more time with those characters, that was fun.
And now I'm winding this post up because the NASCAR race is finally dropping the green flag in Daytona after about a million years of rain delay. It's been a good weekend.
We spent the day cleaning the garage and burning trash, a very productive way to spend a day. And holidays are much the same as any others, yes? If you're going to burn stuff, make sure those flames are doing something useful. And ours certainly were - Dispatching a broken-freezer's worth of rotting meat and assorted scrapwood, limbs and hay. And most of the garage is now clean, too.
Last night we went to Tahlequah to Louise and Harry's for their 25th anniversary party; it was very good to be in Tahlequah again, even if it was only for a quick visit. And it was equally very good to spend time with Lankfords. Saw Grandpa and Robbie, met two of Harry's sons, talked some with Damon and Louise's friends Annie and Geneva, threw a football around with Clay and Hayden, and shot baskets and played ping pong with Lillyanne. Also got to hold my two-year-old cousin Lyla Rose; together we watched the fireworks shot off by the people across the street. It was a good time.
(Updated Sunday night...)
The U.S. women's soccer team played in the final of the World Cup against Japan. So of course we watched it. This made the third major tournament in a row that the two teams had faced each other with the title on the line, and the last World Cup Japan won in a shootout. Vancouver is much closer to America than Japan is....pretty large homefield advantage, eh? Carli Lloyd scored two goals within the first five minutes, and then Lauren Holliday added another goal, and about ten minutes late Lloyd earned a hat trick. It was pretty awesome. Sure, Japan scored late in the first half, and then early in the second on an own-goal by a defender's misplaced header, but Tobin Heath scored after passes from Alex Morgan and Morgan Brian.
Final score? U.S.A. 5, Japan 2. Twitter and Facebook go crazy with "Party Like It's 1999!" flashback photos.
In 1999, we'd just moved to Morris from Broken Arrow, and I was the starting defender for the Sonic Drive-In team, which won all five games, winning the 1st/2nd grade division of the Okmulgee County Y-league (Other teammates included neighbors Katie and Kelsie, and Logan, whose parents were/are the local vets. Katie's mom Becky was our coach.) Also, I played at least two more seasons with every other person from this team. And then in high school I covered Guy Kiehl's football games for the Free-Lance. (He's in between me and Kelsie in this photo.)
Elizabeth texts me right after the game ended, screaming "MERICA!" Then we compared favorite soccer movies that we reenacted in our backyards. We both loved (and love) The Big Green and Air Bud: World Pup. I really liked Switching Goals, and her favorite is Bend It Like Beckham. That got me to thinking about the stories I would write with Mimi's help about a YMCA soccer team called the Panthers, and the updated reboot/sequel that I wrote about some of those characters last summer. Might need to spend some more time with those characters, that was fun.
And now I'm winding this post up because the NASCAR race is finally dropping the green flag in Daytona after about a million years of rain delay. It's been a good weekend.
Wednesday, July 1, 2015
American Idol's Final Notes
Well, the American Idol tour bus was in Tulsa Monday. And I only just now found out(on Monday night). So, there goes the last chance I had of trying to compete on it. Sure, the show was horrid quality-wise for the last handful of years, but still... It's kind of disappointing.
We started watching during the auditions of Season 6 in January 2007, Mom was pregnant with Amy and was searching for TV shows to watch. It's just my opinion, but seasons 6 and 7 were the best of the show, by far. I mean, you had Gina Glocksen the rocker, Haley Scarnato(Simon said she sounded like a Disney-movie soundtrack singer), just flat-out nice Christian lady Melinda Doolittle, Phil Stacey the bald dude with the weird eyes, a really cool dude named Chris Richardson, awesome beat-boxerBlake Lewis, Sanjaya Malakar(known for his HAIR!) and Chris Sligh the hilarious dude with the Afro. Jordin Sparks won that year, which didn't exactly shock anyone, Blake finished second, and Melinda was third(which I still don't quite understand).
And the goodbye song that played during the eliminations on Wednesday nights was Daughtry's "Home", which was just perfect, with Chris Daughtry being the breakout contestant the year before and everything.
Also, the Okmulgee County homeschool group's play that semester was The American Ideal, a parody of Idol. And practices were on Thursdays, so of course those of us who watched the show debated amongst ourselves about who had left the night before, whether it was the right choice, etc. Everybody agreed that Quinton's portrayal of Simon was almost perfect; Cody did a good job playing Randy, and Roy did pretty well with his Ryan Seacrest imitation. Annette and Sarah had crushes on Chris Richardson and Phil Stacey, and Annette and I would argue over whether Phil Stacey was creepy-looking or not.
Among the music featured was a group performance of Steven Curtis Chapman's "The Change", and a mock-phone-service commercial for "PRA-YERS"(skip to 7:31 of some random Michigan church's video, if you're interested). Brenna played the girl in the commercial.
I played a bodybuilder named Neil Downe, whose solo performance was a song entitled "On My Knees"(yes, the script was full of semi-painfully bad puns like that). It felt ridiculous, but it was a really fun role. Billy played the producer, while Alton, Denver and Levi were the band(complete with Guitar Hero guitars). Little Jessica played Anita Ward, Sarah played Southern belle Willa Wynn to hilarious over-the-top perfection, and Annette played Emma Tate, who got all the rest of our characters back on track.
There were a handful of us(Wes, Annette, Julie, Alton, Quinton) who promised ourselves that we'd try out at some point, but that never actually happened, though Alton's girlfriend(now wife) JB did seriously consider trying out for America's Got Talent.
From season 7 in 2008, you had instruments available to use for the first time, which was huge. And this season featured an email discussion group with Damon, Trish, Mike and everybody, with night-by-night recaps, analysis and predictions.
Two of our favorites through auditions and Hollywood were Kady Malloy the impersonator and Alaina Whitaker(from Tulsa), but they were both cut. Michael Johns the Australian guy was awesome, and so was Oregon cowgirl Kristy Lee Cook. Some of our other favorites were Brooke White the nanny(Mom and Damon liked her), this season's Irish rocker chick Carly Smithson(one of Trish's favorites), Jason Castro(known for his dreadlocks, eyebrows and his goofy intense stare), then it came down to David Archuleta vs. David Cook, and everyone in the audience won. The left-handed Tulsa bartender became the season 7 champ, and his first single was "Time of My Life", which is the best winner's song there's been, I think.
We watched the last handful of episodes in Westville at the town house with Nano; that was entertaining, hearing her opinions on the contestants' performances.
The goodbye song was by a guy named Ruben Studdard, who was a contestant from season 2. (Was there anybody memorable from that season? Apparently not.)
The discussion group was kept up during season 8 in 2009, which was Paula's final season. Songwriter Kara DioGaurdi(who's written with Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson, Hilary Duff and Britney Spears) was added to the judges' panel, which didn't quite work. We all approved of her, and she gave great criticism, but it was weird having two girls on the panel.
Also, the clean-out/demolish stuff phases of remodeling the house after the fire were taking place during this time, so AI was a welcome break from the stresses of all that.
Of the "People We Liked Who Got Cut Before Finals", there were Brent Keith, Bixby welder Matt Breitzke, and Lacey Brown. And then there was the...uh, bizarre personages of Norman Gentle, Katrina "Bikini Girl" Darrell and Tatiana "ANNOYING CACKLER" Del Toro. There were a lot of personalities for the finalists this year. Down-to-earth Arkansawyer Kris Allen won, beating out glam-rocker Adam Lambert(one of Trish's favorites). Megan Joy Corkrey was a source of entertainment weekly with her atrocious dancing skills, and the large arm-tattoo was distracting, too. I'm not sure anybody ever really heard her sing between those two elements. There was also blind pianist Scott MacIntyre, who I liked a lot. Texas country dude Michael Sarver was another of my favorites. Anoop Desai, the Indian guy from North Carolina, kept us all in stitches. (Seriously, think Parks and Rec's Tom Haverford on a singing show.) Another great guy was widower/worship leader Danny Gokey. (Really, the guys were miles ahead of the girls this year. It was a running thread we were marveling at constantly.) Teen rocker chick Allison Iraheta was the best girl by far.
Guest performances on the elimination shows included Michael Johns and Carly Smithson, and the live premieres of Kelly Clarkson's "My Life Would Suck Without You", Brad Paisley's "Then", and Daughtry's "No Surprise"; as well as some of the first performances of Carrie Underwood and Randy Travis's duet version of "I Told You So", Miley Cyrus's "The Climb", and David Cook's "Come Back To Me".
And fittingly, Carrie sang the goodbye song for season 8, a Motley Crue cover called "Home Sweet Home". Not one of her best vocally, but it worked well.
The tour concert that summer, at least the stop in Tulsa at the BOK Center, was awesome. It was a really cool experience that doesn't happen very often(for one thing, the roof was twenty feet above our heads).
Season 9 in 2010 was helped by Paula's not being there, though it took some getting used to. Kara was back, and so was Randy, and it was Simon's final year. That took some getting used to, also. And then adding Ellen DeGeneres, who has zero connection with music other than being a fan, was strange. Led to some interesting one-liners, but it was odd.
The top moment of auditions came from Atlanta, with "the Coolest 62-year-old We've Never Actually Met", Larry Platt, with his rap song "Pants On the Ground". Our discussion group HIGHLY APPROVED of him.
Season 9's contestants were a little weird, but most of them seemed like they'd be interesting to know. The winner turned out to be Lee DeWyze, who came from nowhere to shock everybody in America. (We forgot he existed just as quickly.) The runner-up was Crystal Bowersox, All the women in America(including Trish and Sam) had a crush on Casey James, Siobhan Magnus was this season's quirky female rocker chick. Tim Urban was the friendly teenager who needed a haircut. Aaron Kelly was another guy you wanted to be friends with. Lacey Brown was back; she got to the finals this year. Katie Stevens was annoying. Big Mike Lynche was the group's comedian.
Besides being definitely noncommercial, everybody loved playing acoustic guitars almost every night. That probably had something to do with learning to play seriously. And besides the discussion group with the cousins, Samara also was a fan; so we'd argue over contestants, too, occasionally with Amanda, Josh, Jed and/or Jon as well. With the exception of Amanda, all that subset of the Race of Joseph played at least one instrument, and all of us(besides Josh) sang, so it was especially fun to debate with them about the show.
Some of Ellen's quips in commentary often related to the song itself: "There was a brief moment in the seventies when I did believe I could fly." "As a matter of fact, I have loved a woman." "That was a very horny song. Like, there were a lot of horns in it!" Other times it veered off into Paula-strange territory; comparing contestants to bananas or soup.
The finale featured a lot of emotional Simon moments and speeches. It was extremely sad, though, knowing we'd be saying goodbye to a grouch we all kinda loved to watch.
Season 10 in 2011 changed the judging panel again; with Kara, Simon and Ellen leaving, replaced by Steven Tyler and Jennifer Lopez. Steven kept things....unpredictable; while JayLo quickly wore out her welcome with that annoying giggle. The timeslots switched from Tuesdays and Wednesdays to Wednesdays and Thursdays, which was another change we viewers had to get used to. Jimmy Iovine was brought in to mentor the contestants each week, which was great. He gave a Simon-like straight-up critique of how they were doing, which was sorely needed.
Rocker James Durbin, who had Tourette's, was one of my favorites this season. Casey Abrams was weird(I mean, he plays the cello!) but it worked. Stefano Langone was this year's cool "chill" guy. Damon and I both liked Pia Toscano. Jacob Lusk DROVE ME UP THE WALL, but Trish and Damon liked him. Almost everybody teased me about hating Haley Reinhart and Lauren Alaina so vehemently; I think it was their superficiality that bothered me so much. As much as I disliked those three, I was a huge Scotty McCreery fan from the beginning. I was very glad that he won.
Overall, this season was overrun with lame themes and dumb choices by America.
David Cook covered the the Simple Minds' song "Don't You Forget About Me" as the goodbye song this year, which went really well.
Simon's new show The X-Factor debuted in September 2011, and it was a straight-up cloning of Idol, only changing paint colors, basically. The main color was red, not blue; Mario Lopez played Ryan Seacrest, Pepsi and Verizon took the places of Coke and AT&T, and Paula was even on the judging panel, along with another producer-guy who looked suspiciously like Randy. After watching about half the first episode, I lost interest. Demi Lovato and Britney Spears replaced Paula the next season, and the season after that it sputtered to a halt, a dismal failure.
Over on NBC in April 2011, there was this new competitor to Idol called The Voice; which judged contestants solely by their voice(how simple, yet so strange). Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Christina Aguilera and Blake Shelton were the judges, but also the coaches, selecting a team of singers and then the teams would battle it out into a manageable number for audiences to vote for. I haven't been able to keep up super-closely with it, but it's a cool show.
It's split into fall and spring seasons, which is a little confusing and seems like could be a bit of overkill. Coaches Christina and Cee Lo were replaced by Shakira and Usher, then Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams replaced them, and now Christina is back, replacing Stefani.
Once audiences heard about it, and then watched it, it quickly grew into the top singing show on TV.
I started this blog in February 2012, which meant I offered commentary on almost every episode during season 11 once it went live. (Mostly just copy-pasting my comments from the email chain, but I was still learning how this blogging thing worked. And also, that was my senior year of high school. Those keep you busy.) And I was leading worship (along with Josh) for the GBC youth group.
The siblings had pretty much lost interest with Steven Tyler coming onboard, and Mom hated JayLo's laugh.
Phillip Phillips won over Jessica Sanchez(who I consistently detested). I also couldn't stand Joshua Ledet, but Trish and Damon liked him. I'm still mystified that Skylar Laine doesn't have a record deal. She was amazing. And the same thing with Hollie Cavanagh - It should have been a battle between those two for the title. Mohawked Christian piano man Colton Dixon was one of my favorite guys, along with Phillip and goofy Asian Heejun Han.
Scotty McCreery sang the goodbye song this season, a cover of Tim McGraw's "Please Remember Me", which was very good. Not quite as good as the original(none of these covers seem to be), but very emotional and fitting. Though I've always thought what they really needed to play there was Chris Sligh's "Something Beautiful", since he was a former contestant, or even better, Taylor Swift's "Long Live".
For season 12, Steven and Jennifer were gone(thank goodness), replaced by Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban. Randy was still around. Mariah thought she was the Queen of the World, Randy was bland and uninteresting, Keith was awesome, and Nicki was wonderfully zany. I called them a "dysfunctional family" in one of my reviews...Randy as the Clueless Dad, Mariah as the Demanding Overbearing Mother, Keith as the Awesomely Cool "Normal" Big Brother, and Nicki as the Rebellious Teenage Daughter.
Also, I was watching all of these episodes by myself in my ice-cold freezer of an NSU dorm in Ross. The results shows being on Thursdays were why it took a while for me to get to one of the BCM's Impact meetings. But I'm glad I got involved with them. Really, for a lot of reasons, my freshman year was pretty bad. Usually while watching Idol, I'd get so bored with the eternal parade of poorly-sung ballads that I'd flip channels, usually to discover Full House reruns and watch them instead. (It's a great show.)
From the perspective of the discussion group, we all hated nearly everyone. Angie Miller, Kree Harrison and Lazaro Arbos were the only passably decent performers, and the contestants, themes and song choices were so awful that we went on strike halfway through the live performances.
If you put me and Amanda on a TV show as judges then, we would've been Keith and Nicki. They were by miles the greatest part of this season. The winner was Candice Glover; we were all very unimpressed.
Randy left before season 13, and Mariah and Nicki both bailed, too. Keith stayed on, Jennifer returned, and Harry Connick Jr. was added. I tried watching some of the auditions; but they wee so awful I just couldn't. (Nobody else I knew watched, either.) AT&T pulled its sponsorship. Some guy named Caleb Johnson won.
For season 14, all the judges came back, Coke pulled their sponsorship, and some guy named Nick Fradiani won.
So, I'll probably try to watch the final season once it starts in January. I was 13 when I started watching(we were rather late jumping on the bandwagon), and I'll be a couple weeks shy of 23 when they crown the final Idol. So, really, it's kind of like the final stroke of the end of growing up; far less sad than the passing of Mimi, Dado, Sport, Sunny, Copper, or Nano; much less challenging than dealing with the fire, high school, or college; but still sad to witness, like the state of the nation or the falling away of believers who walked beside you in earlier times.
Courtney plays mandolin and ukulele; Bennett, Laura and Wesley DeSpain have picked up leading the music where Josh and I left off, and along with Courtney, Paige and Callie, the leadership roles that Josh, Marie, Sam, Dylan and I once held.
Annette is studying theatre. JB has kind of taken a break with songwriting.
I play and sing when I can, and here and there dabble with songwriting. Jon's new band is getting off to a good start, and his songwriting is going well. Amanda still sings. Jed's studying to become a middle-school music teacher, I think. (We never really put together the band that were always going to; the Triumphant Toothbrushes. It would've been an awesome garage band, with homemade music video covers and everything, of songs by DC Talk, Bon Jovi, Owl City, Carrie Underwood, Taylor Swift and others. Closest we came to it was the Jedites at SGYC 2011.)
Idol emails were what connected us to our Lankford cousins, so we don't hear from them as much. But when we do, it usually means mandolin/guitar playing, singing, and good-natured teasing. Which are all good things that the world needs more of.
Watching the auditions, I was always reminded of some of the lyrics to David Ball's song Riding With Private Malone; "For every dream that's shattered/Another one comes true..." There was always that hope, knowing full well how miniscule it was, that you, an ordinary person, could become famous and land on the radio. As the Rascal Flatts song "Stand" says, "Life's like a novel with the end ripped out/The edge of a canyon/With only one way down..." There'll be other cool things that will happen in my life, I just have to wait and see what they are when they come. And maybe there won't be, and nothing spectacular ever happens. You just got to keep on dreamin', Even If It Breaks Your Heart...
Even if you were one of the rare people who didn't pay attention to the show, you knew people who did; and it was something you could talk about with complete strangers without being weird. That's gone now. And it's sad.
"Good night, America."
We started watching during the auditions of Season 6 in January 2007, Mom was pregnant with Amy and was searching for TV shows to watch. It's just my opinion, but seasons 6 and 7 were the best of the show, by far. I mean, you had Gina Glocksen the rocker, Haley Scarnato(Simon said she sounded like a Disney-movie soundtrack singer), just flat-out nice Christian lady Melinda Doolittle, Phil Stacey the bald dude with the weird eyes, a really cool dude named Chris Richardson, awesome beat-boxerBlake Lewis, Sanjaya Malakar(known for his HAIR!) and Chris Sligh the hilarious dude with the Afro. Jordin Sparks won that year, which didn't exactly shock anyone, Blake finished second, and Melinda was third(which I still don't quite understand).
And the goodbye song that played during the eliminations on Wednesday nights was Daughtry's "Home", which was just perfect, with Chris Daughtry being the breakout contestant the year before and everything.
Also, the Okmulgee County homeschool group's play that semester was The American Ideal, a parody of Idol. And practices were on Thursdays, so of course those of us who watched the show debated amongst ourselves about who had left the night before, whether it was the right choice, etc. Everybody agreed that Quinton's portrayal of Simon was almost perfect; Cody did a good job playing Randy, and Roy did pretty well with his Ryan Seacrest imitation. Annette and Sarah had crushes on Chris Richardson and Phil Stacey, and Annette and I would argue over whether Phil Stacey was creepy-looking or not.
Among the music featured was a group performance of Steven Curtis Chapman's "The Change", and a mock-phone-service commercial for "PRA-YERS"(skip to 7:31 of some random Michigan church's video, if you're interested). Brenna played the girl in the commercial.
I played a bodybuilder named Neil Downe, whose solo performance was a song entitled "On My Knees"(yes, the script was full of semi-painfully bad puns like that). It felt ridiculous, but it was a really fun role. Billy played the producer, while Alton, Denver and Levi were the band(complete with Guitar Hero guitars). Little Jessica played Anita Ward, Sarah played Southern belle Willa Wynn to hilarious over-the-top perfection, and Annette played Emma Tate, who got all the rest of our characters back on track.
There were a handful of us(Wes, Annette, Julie, Alton, Quinton) who promised ourselves that we'd try out at some point, but that never actually happened, though Alton's girlfriend(now wife) JB did seriously consider trying out for America's Got Talent.
From season 7 in 2008, you had instruments available to use for the first time, which was huge. And this season featured an email discussion group with Damon, Trish, Mike and everybody, with night-by-night recaps, analysis and predictions.
Two of our favorites through auditions and Hollywood were Kady Malloy the impersonator and Alaina Whitaker(from Tulsa), but they were both cut. Michael Johns the Australian guy was awesome, and so was Oregon cowgirl Kristy Lee Cook. Some of our other favorites were Brooke White the nanny(Mom and Damon liked her), this season's Irish rocker chick Carly Smithson(one of Trish's favorites), Jason Castro(known for his dreadlocks, eyebrows and his goofy intense stare), then it came down to David Archuleta vs. David Cook, and everyone in the audience won. The left-handed Tulsa bartender became the season 7 champ, and his first single was "Time of My Life", which is the best winner's song there's been, I think.
We watched the last handful of episodes in Westville at the town house with Nano; that was entertaining, hearing her opinions on the contestants' performances.
The goodbye song was by a guy named Ruben Studdard, who was a contestant from season 2. (Was there anybody memorable from that season? Apparently not.)
The discussion group was kept up during season 8 in 2009, which was Paula's final season. Songwriter Kara DioGaurdi(who's written with Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson, Hilary Duff and Britney Spears) was added to the judges' panel, which didn't quite work. We all approved of her, and she gave great criticism, but it was weird having two girls on the panel.
Also, the clean-out/demolish stuff phases of remodeling the house after the fire were taking place during this time, so AI was a welcome break from the stresses of all that.
Of the "People We Liked Who Got Cut Before Finals", there were Brent Keith, Bixby welder Matt Breitzke, and Lacey Brown. And then there was the...uh, bizarre personages of Norman Gentle, Katrina "Bikini Girl" Darrell and Tatiana "ANNOYING CACKLER" Del Toro. There were a lot of personalities for the finalists this year. Down-to-earth Arkansawyer Kris Allen won, beating out glam-rocker Adam Lambert(one of Trish's favorites). Megan Joy Corkrey was a source of entertainment weekly with her atrocious dancing skills, and the large arm-tattoo was distracting, too. I'm not sure anybody ever really heard her sing between those two elements. There was also blind pianist Scott MacIntyre, who I liked a lot. Texas country dude Michael Sarver was another of my favorites. Anoop Desai, the Indian guy from North Carolina, kept us all in stitches. (Seriously, think Parks and Rec's Tom Haverford on a singing show.) Another great guy was widower/worship leader Danny Gokey. (Really, the guys were miles ahead of the girls this year. It was a running thread we were marveling at constantly.) Teen rocker chick Allison Iraheta was the best girl by far.
Guest performances on the elimination shows included Michael Johns and Carly Smithson, and the live premieres of Kelly Clarkson's "My Life Would Suck Without You", Brad Paisley's "Then", and Daughtry's "No Surprise"; as well as some of the first performances of Carrie Underwood and Randy Travis's duet version of "I Told You So", Miley Cyrus's "The Climb", and David Cook's "Come Back To Me".
And fittingly, Carrie sang the goodbye song for season 8, a Motley Crue cover called "Home Sweet Home". Not one of her best vocally, but it worked well.
The tour concert that summer, at least the stop in Tulsa at the BOK Center, was awesome. It was a really cool experience that doesn't happen very often(for one thing, the roof was twenty feet above our heads).
Season 9 in 2010 was helped by Paula's not being there, though it took some getting used to. Kara was back, and so was Randy, and it was Simon's final year. That took some getting used to, also. And then adding Ellen DeGeneres, who has zero connection with music other than being a fan, was strange. Led to some interesting one-liners, but it was odd.
The top moment of auditions came from Atlanta, with "the Coolest 62-year-old We've Never Actually Met", Larry Platt, with his rap song "Pants On the Ground". Our discussion group HIGHLY APPROVED of him.
Season 9's contestants were a little weird, but most of them seemed like they'd be interesting to know. The winner turned out to be Lee DeWyze, who came from nowhere to shock everybody in America. (We forgot he existed just as quickly.) The runner-up was Crystal Bowersox, All the women in America(including Trish and Sam) had a crush on Casey James, Siobhan Magnus was this season's quirky female rocker chick. Tim Urban was the friendly teenager who needed a haircut. Aaron Kelly was another guy you wanted to be friends with. Lacey Brown was back; she got to the finals this year. Katie Stevens was annoying. Big Mike Lynche was the group's comedian.
Besides being definitely noncommercial, everybody loved playing acoustic guitars almost every night. That probably had something to do with learning to play seriously. And besides the discussion group with the cousins, Samara also was a fan; so we'd argue over contestants, too, occasionally with Amanda, Josh, Jed and/or Jon as well. With the exception of Amanda, all that subset of the Race of Joseph played at least one instrument, and all of us(besides Josh) sang, so it was especially fun to debate with them about the show.
Some of Ellen's quips in commentary often related to the song itself: "There was a brief moment in the seventies when I did believe I could fly." "As a matter of fact, I have loved a woman." "That was a very horny song. Like, there were a lot of horns in it!" Other times it veered off into Paula-strange territory; comparing contestants to bananas or soup.
The finale featured a lot of emotional Simon moments and speeches. It was extremely sad, though, knowing we'd be saying goodbye to a grouch we all kinda loved to watch.
Season 10 in 2011 changed the judging panel again; with Kara, Simon and Ellen leaving, replaced by Steven Tyler and Jennifer Lopez. Steven kept things....unpredictable; while JayLo quickly wore out her welcome with that annoying giggle. The timeslots switched from Tuesdays and Wednesdays to Wednesdays and Thursdays, which was another change we viewers had to get used to. Jimmy Iovine was brought in to mentor the contestants each week, which was great. He gave a Simon-like straight-up critique of how they were doing, which was sorely needed.
Rocker James Durbin, who had Tourette's, was one of my favorites this season. Casey Abrams was weird(I mean, he plays the cello!) but it worked. Stefano Langone was this year's cool "chill" guy. Damon and I both liked Pia Toscano. Jacob Lusk DROVE ME UP THE WALL, but Trish and Damon liked him. Almost everybody teased me about hating Haley Reinhart and Lauren Alaina so vehemently; I think it was their superficiality that bothered me so much. As much as I disliked those three, I was a huge Scotty McCreery fan from the beginning. I was very glad that he won.
Overall, this season was overrun with lame themes and dumb choices by America.
David Cook covered the the Simple Minds' song "Don't You Forget About Me" as the goodbye song this year, which went really well.
Simon's new show The X-Factor debuted in September 2011, and it was a straight-up cloning of Idol, only changing paint colors, basically. The main color was red, not blue; Mario Lopez played Ryan Seacrest, Pepsi and Verizon took the places of Coke and AT&T, and Paula was even on the judging panel, along with another producer-guy who looked suspiciously like Randy. After watching about half the first episode, I lost interest. Demi Lovato and Britney Spears replaced Paula the next season, and the season after that it sputtered to a halt, a dismal failure.
Over on NBC in April 2011, there was this new competitor to Idol called The Voice; which judged contestants solely by their voice(how simple, yet so strange). Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Christina Aguilera and Blake Shelton were the judges, but also the coaches, selecting a team of singers and then the teams would battle it out into a manageable number for audiences to vote for. I haven't been able to keep up super-closely with it, but it's a cool show.
It's split into fall and spring seasons, which is a little confusing and seems like could be a bit of overkill. Coaches Christina and Cee Lo were replaced by Shakira and Usher, then Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams replaced them, and now Christina is back, replacing Stefani.
Once audiences heard about it, and then watched it, it quickly grew into the top singing show on TV.
I started this blog in February 2012, which meant I offered commentary on almost every episode during season 11 once it went live. (Mostly just copy-pasting my comments from the email chain, but I was still learning how this blogging thing worked. And also, that was my senior year of high school. Those keep you busy.) And I was leading worship (along with Josh) for the GBC youth group.
The siblings had pretty much lost interest with Steven Tyler coming onboard, and Mom hated JayLo's laugh.
Phillip Phillips won over Jessica Sanchez(who I consistently detested). I also couldn't stand Joshua Ledet, but Trish and Damon liked him. I'm still mystified that Skylar Laine doesn't have a record deal. She was amazing. And the same thing with Hollie Cavanagh - It should have been a battle between those two for the title. Mohawked Christian piano man Colton Dixon was one of my favorite guys, along with Phillip and goofy Asian Heejun Han.
Scotty McCreery sang the goodbye song this season, a cover of Tim McGraw's "Please Remember Me", which was very good. Not quite as good as the original(none of these covers seem to be), but very emotional and fitting. Though I've always thought what they really needed to play there was Chris Sligh's "Something Beautiful", since he was a former contestant, or even better, Taylor Swift's "Long Live".
For season 12, Steven and Jennifer were gone(thank goodness), replaced by Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban. Randy was still around. Mariah thought she was the Queen of the World, Randy was bland and uninteresting, Keith was awesome, and Nicki was wonderfully zany. I called them a "dysfunctional family" in one of my reviews...Randy as the Clueless Dad, Mariah as the Demanding Overbearing Mother, Keith as the Awesomely Cool "Normal" Big Brother, and Nicki as the Rebellious Teenage Daughter.
Also, I was watching all of these episodes by myself in my ice-cold freezer of an NSU dorm in Ross. The results shows being on Thursdays were why it took a while for me to get to one of the BCM's Impact meetings. But I'm glad I got involved with them. Really, for a lot of reasons, my freshman year was pretty bad. Usually while watching Idol, I'd get so bored with the eternal parade of poorly-sung ballads that I'd flip channels, usually to discover Full House reruns and watch them instead. (It's a great show.)
From the perspective of the discussion group, we all hated nearly everyone. Angie Miller, Kree Harrison and Lazaro Arbos were the only passably decent performers, and the contestants, themes and song choices were so awful that we went on strike halfway through the live performances.
If you put me and Amanda on a TV show as judges then, we would've been Keith and Nicki. They were by miles the greatest part of this season. The winner was Candice Glover; we were all very unimpressed.
Randy left before season 13, and Mariah and Nicki both bailed, too. Keith stayed on, Jennifer returned, and Harry Connick Jr. was added. I tried watching some of the auditions; but they wee so awful I just couldn't. (Nobody else I knew watched, either.) AT&T pulled its sponsorship. Some guy named Caleb Johnson won.
For season 14, all the judges came back, Coke pulled their sponsorship, and some guy named Nick Fradiani won.
So, I'll probably try to watch the final season once it starts in January. I was 13 when I started watching(we were rather late jumping on the bandwagon), and I'll be a couple weeks shy of 23 when they crown the final Idol. So, really, it's kind of like the final stroke of the end of growing up; far less sad than the passing of Mimi, Dado, Sport, Sunny, Copper, or Nano; much less challenging than dealing with the fire, high school, or college; but still sad to witness, like the state of the nation or the falling away of believers who walked beside you in earlier times.
Courtney plays mandolin and ukulele; Bennett, Laura and Wesley DeSpain have picked up leading the music where Josh and I left off, and along with Courtney, Paige and Callie, the leadership roles that Josh, Marie, Sam, Dylan and I once held.
Annette is studying theatre. JB has kind of taken a break with songwriting.
I play and sing when I can, and here and there dabble with songwriting. Jon's new band is getting off to a good start, and his songwriting is going well. Amanda still sings. Jed's studying to become a middle-school music teacher, I think. (We never really put together the band that were always going to; the Triumphant Toothbrushes. It would've been an awesome garage band, with homemade music video covers and everything, of songs by DC Talk, Bon Jovi, Owl City, Carrie Underwood, Taylor Swift and others. Closest we came to it was the Jedites at SGYC 2011.)
Idol emails were what connected us to our Lankford cousins, so we don't hear from them as much. But when we do, it usually means mandolin/guitar playing, singing, and good-natured teasing. Which are all good things that the world needs more of.
Watching the auditions, I was always reminded of some of the lyrics to David Ball's song Riding With Private Malone; "For every dream that's shattered/Another one comes true..." There was always that hope, knowing full well how miniscule it was, that you, an ordinary person, could become famous and land on the radio. As the Rascal Flatts song "Stand" says, "Life's like a novel with the end ripped out/The edge of a canyon/With only one way down..." There'll be other cool things that will happen in my life, I just have to wait and see what they are when they come. And maybe there won't be, and nothing spectacular ever happens. You just got to keep on dreamin', Even If It Breaks Your Heart...
Even if you were one of the rare people who didn't pay attention to the show, you knew people who did; and it was something you could talk about with complete strangers without being weird. That's gone now. And it's sad.
"Good night, America."
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