a little clarification
PUERTO PEÑASCO, Sonora, México — Apparently, the U.S. governors weren't upstairs. The Cronkite News Service and NewsWatch peeps who went in to get B-roll and photos of the meeting said it was all staff, no govs.
Fun (and frustrating) times in Rocky Point
PUERTO PEÑASCO, Sonora, México — Just as before, working in Mexico has proven to be both fun and frustrating. Right now the governors of the U.S. border states are meeting directly upstairs from where I'm sitting, but the event staff are just ushering TV camera crews and print photogs in for a few minutes at a time. No reporting on the entire meeting allowed. (I asked.)
Other meetings here at the Border Governors Conference have had similar press setups or they've been closed altogether, and we've run into a few conflicts over credentials to boot. Así es la Conferencia de los Gobernadores Fronterizos, I suppose.
This is what happens when you have a two-hour Church Council meeting
Ross Hall is basically Utah:
"That's what Brigham Young said: 'This is the place!'" –Dave
The finer points of a discussion on a Tempe city ordinance:
Dave: Jesus says, "Eat your cookies."
John: The 11th Commandment: Buy cookies.
Time and temperature are not enough:
Bev?: And to go along with that, Charlie would like to have the football scores.
Charlie: It's OK; I've got texting.
But honestly, it was a good (albeit longish) meeting. And it was just one part of an all-around good day.
This morning, I got to meet the Canadian ambassador to the United States. I spent this afternoon running up and down stairs to drop a rubber ball and a wiffle ball from the fourth floor of PSH.
And today I got everything in order so that I can go to Rocky Point, Sonora, tomorrow. Wooo, spring break! Uh, I mean... Wooooooo, Border Governors Conference!
Yes, I'll be continuing my grand tradition of going to Mexico with motives other than partying tomorrow when I head down to cover the governors conference for my in-depth reporting class. It should be fun.
I feel so weird right now.
Maybe this is just some remnant of last week's cold talkin', but I feel so out of it today... like I'm not fully myself or something.
There was even one point this afternoon where I felt like I had completely lost my drive and my passion for everything. I saw no real purpose for my life that I felt any excitement for. I couldn't think of any worthwhile reason for me to get out of bed in the morning. (Although, full disclosure: This is that magical week of the semester when literally sleeping all week becomes my No. 1 fantasy.)
Anyway, that was a hella weird feeling... to just not care about anything that I care about.
And then tonight I was presented with the potential of a rapid and radical change of my plans for about half of this week, which, frankly, was busy enough as it was. And that kinda threw me off kilter too.
Yeah, it's almost, but not quite, like I'm living in an alternate universe. But that might just be the weird influence of living by myself with no family and no roommates for the first time; I've heard that messes with you.
Well, anyway, I feel a bit better now — a bit more like myself now that I've engaged in the time-honored Brian tradition of putting lengthy and mostly incoherent ramblings about my life on the Internet. :)
So now it's off to the homework mines... Yay!
Tonight was Journey night…
...and if you missed it, you should be very sad.
One of the guys who plays on Saturday nights at Macayo's kicked it off and kept it going for a while. The Journey festivities then continued with the greatest-hits album and Escape on shuffle... and then we moved on to the greatest-hits DVD.
Yeah, it was a lot of Journey.
You know you're jealous.
So on October 13, just remember that, as has been proven tonight, postgaming with Chris and Judith and Brian makes for lots of fun times... and the occasional all-night Journey fest.
Things I shouldn’t be focusing on right now
OK, so it's almost 01:00 and I'm in the Computing Commons since I haven't brought my computer up to my new apartment yet and wouldn't have Internet access for it anyway. I'm here to, ya know, do homework, but since it's past my coherence's bedtime, I'm a little bit distracted, so here's a list of things that I need to stop thinking about until tomorrow:
• Since it's been a while since I last posted, I should mention that more people ended up coming to the game on Saturday, and the student section filled up after all. (However, way more people took off early, and by the end of the game it was a sad, sad sight.)
• Google Docs does PowerPoint-esque presentations now! My online life is complete and I can now start to seriously think about not buying Microsoft Office software with the next computer I get.
• Ummm, I forget what else. So I should do homework now. Yes. Homework good... because it make sleep be closer.
SUN DEVIL FOOTBALL
There's like no one here this week... :/I have a Tempe address once again!
It's official, kids!
I've got keys to an apartment in a complex near University and Hardy. So very soon I won't have to drive a half hour just to hang out in Tempe.
It's a beautiful thing.
Route 81: Out with a bang
Well, for those of you who don't know, I've been living at my mom's house in Chandler since I got back from SSP since I didn't line up an apartment before the summer and hadn't found one since coming back.
And since parking on campus costs $600 or so this year, I've been riding the bus from my mom's house to ASU most days... sometimes just walking to the bus stop, sometimes driving to the Target/Park-and-Ride parking lot by Justine's house and only once just driving to school and parking quasilegally.
The tricky thing is that the bus route I take only comes down into Chandler every other trip during most of the day and doesn't go past the ASU Research Park (at Warner and the 101) at all after about 5 or 6 p.m.
So today I was up in Tempe past my usual weekend start time of noon because of a meeting and also because I was working on getting an apartment in Tempe, a process which should be finalized tomorrow!
So tonight, on what may be my last ride for a while on Route 81, I discovered that I had missed the last bus to Chandler and would be dumped off at the research park. But apparently the last scheduled bus for the full route just didn't ever run because there was a woman on the bus who was headed to basically the same cross streets that I was. So I got to share most of the couple-mile walk with Lisa, which was a nice way to (hopefully) end my intercity bus commuting career for the time being.
This is like a party in a post.
There were just too many good quotes and jokes from Wesley tonight, so instead of going in the "inside jokes" sidebar, they're spilling over into the mainbar:
"Lunas is like a party in a person." –Rachel
Jenn's sunglasses make stories better
My Baby: The Musical
A Lifetime Original Movie
Starring Dakota Fanning... or Ashley Tisdale
a real break-out role
"My January is birthday, 19th." –Erin Lee
Capricorn Crew
Rob: When I get bored in my office because no one's coming to visit me, I go out on campus—
Stacey: I mean, yeah... I woke up from a nap in the library, and he's sitting right next to me.
Chris: It's official; we're renaming you Grace.
Ross: But wait; her name is Stubby!
15888
It's amazing what a little drive can do.
I was feeling kind of off-balance, off-center or something like that a half-hour ago, but after some driving around Chandler with the radio turned up, I'm feelin' just fine.
A ‘Who knew?’ addendum
Sept. 11 is also the date of the Mountain Meadows Massacre in southern Utah.
The 1857 massacre is the subject of the recently released movie September Dawn (a title that now makes a lot more sense to me) and also of a statement from an LDS church leader given at the site today.
The Salt Lake papers took Henry Eyring's statement as an apology (See stories in the Deseret Morning News and Salt Lake Tribune.), but a church spokesman told the AP that the church didn't apologize; it just expressed "profound regret."
Kingston ‘in denial’ on Radio Disney
Flipping through radio stations in the car this afternoon, I stopped on Radio Disney. Hey now. Stop rolling your eyes. It's the only station in the Valley that plays songs from High School Musical... 1 and 2. :) (Yeah, I just went there.)
Anyway, this afternoon on Radio Disney, I heard Sean Kingston's "Beautiful Girls" playing. You know, the "suicidal, suicidal" song. Great for the kids, right?
Well, I listened on and found that in the Radio Disney version, Kingston isn't "suicidal," only "in denial." Full disclosure: I'm not a fan of any version of the song... but still, it doesn't seem like "Beautiful Girls" ought to be the latest preschool jam.
Who knew?
I just read in the AP's Today in History for Sept. 11 (which is technically still tomorrow out here in the West) that the day that's more often referred to as "9/11" or "September 11th" is officially recognized as Patriot Day.
Congress designated it as such back in the fall of 2001, and President Bush signed a Patriot Day proclamation last week.
I wonder if Patriot Day will ever become the dominant name for Sept. 11. And if it happens, I sure hope I never have some young whippersnapper try to wish me a "Happy Patriot Day." That just sounds so wrong.
And speaking of new revelations, the AP story I read was hosted on a Google server as part of a new deal I just noticed today.
weekend weekend weekend weekend… rockin’ everywhere
Well, Weekend No. 3 of the fall semester has pretty much been the best so far.
Thursday: Apartment shopping, getting a new job, movie night at Jenn's, clubbing at Sky Lounge
Friday: Hanging out in the Northwest Valley, Mean Girls, etc.
Saturday: Sun Lakesing, pregaming on Elna Rae, Baconating, ASU vs. CU, postgaming at Chris'
Sunday: Church, the Comin' Home luncheon, seeing SSPers
Of course, now it's 23:00 on Sunday night, so it's finally time for... homework!
B I T C H, P L E A S E . . .We own the heat.
Last night, the CU marching band played some heat-themed song at halftime. And the East Coast ASU, Appalachian State University, has been... uh... "promoting" itself as "hot hot hot" for a few years now. But let me just say, in the words of Robchel, "Bitch, please!"
It snows at CU and The Other ASU. And if you ask me, you do not earn the right to talk or sing or play about heat until you've walked to class four days in a row in 110° weather.
So, Colorado and Appalachian, y'all need to just leave the hot stuff to us experts at Arizona State. Thanks...
so so so so so good good good good good good
Today didn't go quite as planned, but I consider that a very good thing.
Startin’ the weekend off right
Let me just say that I'm eternally grateful that I have friends who plan stuff and invite me along on nights when I would otherwise just stay at home and do nothing.
Tonight I went over to Jenn's apartment to watch "Wedding Crashers," and then Justine and Ross and I went to Sky Lounge in Downtown Phoenix, where it was an 18+ gay night. Talk about a slightly-scary-yet-fun combination!
But the underager factor wasn't too creepy, and it was a fun night. I leaned like a cholo. My London, London Bridge wanted to go down. I liked Timbaland just the way he are... er, is. (Although I was kinda pissed since, at the beginning of the song, I thought the DJ was gonna play some JT.) And I tried to dance to the lip gloss song... with limited success. :)
Yes, my friends, this is what a Thursday night is supposed to be: a good kickoff for a kickass weekend. Tomorrow, I've got some HSM-related plans, and it's also Tanequia's birthday! Saturday, there's a barbeque goin' on, and the Sun Devils are playing the Buffs. And Sunday's a big day around church, our annual Comin' Home Sunday. Plus, the Tempe Center for the Arts is opening Sunday with much hoopla.
night drive
Tonight while driving down the 101, I heard John Mellencamp's song "Small Town" on the radio, and I decided that it was time to get out of the city.
Since it's pretty hard to get out of the sprawl within the city limits of Chandler anymore (Have you seen all the crap they built just south of Hamilton?!) I took a drive down to Coolidge... you know, just for kicks.
(For the uninitiated, this is the time in your reading where you're allowed/encouraged to say, "Brian, you're so weird!")
Anyway, it was nice. I got to drive fast on a rural stretch of the 87 accompanied by little else than some classic rock. I also spent some quality time down at the Coolidge Wal-Mart, where I of course had to pick up some CPs.
Oh, and I wrote a poem while I was down there too... which reminds me: I've got reading to do for my poetry class.
Guess how stupid I am.
This stupid: I left my $90-something (and that's the used price, mind you) mass communication law textbook somewhere in Tempe this afternoon.
I know I had it in my 2:40 class, but I forget if I left class with it or not. (It wasn't in the classroom at 8:30 tonight.) And I forget if I instead set it down outside of P.F. Chang's on Mill when I set my backpack down to get my camera out and snap a picture.
Normally, all my books would be in my backpack at this point of the day, my trek to the bus stop, or in this case, car. But the mass comm law book is frickin' huge and bulky... you know, my biggest, most expensive textbook of the semester.
I'm so pissed that I'll probably end up having to buy another one.
So lame... and so stupid.
I’m proud of myself.
I built a small Web application from scratch today, teaching myself how to work with MySQL databases and PHP programming in the process.
I'll put up a link when all the content is in the database, the programming kinks are worked out, and I take the application live.
post-retreat quotes and such
white trash
elephants in China
Ashley and her interest in... everything
"I had something I was going to ask you, but I can't remember what it is."
"Well, the answer is yes, we will have insurance at the Baby Farm."
"Oh! It was, 'What are your thoughts on abortion?'"
Bank of Fucking America
refinancing rims
credit bling
"We want to come into your pants."
"I was talking to noodles, not people."
Suck 'n' Fuck ATMs
"Suck the money out, bitch!"
"You're not a slightly overweight Hispanic woman."
"Well, not until I enter Bank of Fucking America!"
"I'm Mxxxxxx Cxxxxxx, bitch!"
the processional curtain rod and other Target merchandise
P.F. Chang's
"It's getting hot in here..."
short people
labyrinth race
Skank 'n' Bank
"Promiscuous" banking
"Protect your money."
Labor Day quotes and happenings
"Do you want to be in movies like High School Musical 1 and 2?"
Jenn's boob magazine
"This is what happens when you get married. You start checking out other guys."
"I'm not gonna lie; that one is on fire."
"I've done most of Virginia."
1:30
fro yo at Yo Yo's
sharks
nap time
"Warren, put that down!"
wolverines and baby back hair
Sundays and holidays excepted!
bumpin' "Umbrella" in downtown San Diego
"Dee Dee, can I ask you a personal question? Do you know the milkshake song?"
"Bitch, please!"
Belle's babies
"I think Belle and I have a lot in common."
"If they had DNA testing, I could just blame Hannah."
"I just thought it was some cunt action."
the car of guys that flipped us off on the 347
