Basic Instinct - Shark Attack! Ooh, Aah... Ooh, Aah - Part 5

I have never been one to embrace change all that well, but less than change I hate the mystery of the unknown. I don’t mind busses and at this point I know some people by at least their last names so I’m not alone, but getting into a mysterious white bus and not knowing what will be outside the door when it comes to a stop is maddening. I have all of my new belongings firmly stowed away in a safe place. Firmly alright, since I’m almost choking to death because its all in my lap. I would have never thought that bringing one change of clothing would seem like heavy packing, but it felt now like that was the feather that was turning the scales from one side to the other.

This nerve racking ride is just too much for me to take in. As much as I hate the unknown I would rather live forever in limbo then face whatever was waiting when we did actually stop. I really can’t imagine that Sand Hill is so vast that we must travel 15 minutes to get to our new “home” so we must be doing the whole “drive in circles to confuse the new guys” bit again. No worries here, drive around all day for all I care. For once in my life I can stand to be patient and have no struggles at all doing it. The bus is screeching to a halt. Gosh, here we go again. Just when I think I’m getting used to this bus it has to stop. I can’t even hardly turn my head to see what is waiting for us outside. How long are we going to sit here with the doors closed? Absolutely nobody is saying a word at all. If I had ever wondered what is was like to be a cow loaded on a truck to slaughter, there was no question in my mind anymore. From what I can make out there are little brown hats all over the place outside just bouncing around ready to snap at anything that passes by.

“Get off the Bus” another man in a big round hat calmly says. Of course nobody moves because they are in shock that he sounds somewhat kind at this point. There are Drill Sergeants running around like fuming red ants outside and this guy sounds like he could be our uncle.

False alarm; He is definitely not related to anybody on this bus because he is screaming something about someone’s mom and how much he hates her etc, etc. Its amazing looking back on some of the phrases that I have heard in the past few days. They are all extremely awful but in some way very “artistic” in a way. This man is an artist of words that will provoke fear in just about anybody, and yet we are all just sitting here like he is some type of entertainer.

I’m not sure when it began for me, but if you ask my Mom she would probably tell you it started right from the beginning with me. Two things actually.

a. I have a very strong aversion to authority unless it is well earned and even then I have my hesitations.

b. I am very logical and most things to me are very cut and dry. Put shortly, I have an opinion and you can either choose to believe me or choose to be wrong.

In my mind when someone who is very obviously an authority figure (in this case someone in a big round hat yelling many colorful phrases about how this is their bus and how we should move all of our bodies and belongings to the outside of it) asks you to do something you should probably act quickly to whatever request that they have made. This was one of those situations that just makes you go mentally insane on the inside. Here I am stuck at the back of a crowded bus of guys all holding at least 3 bags a piece and if one of us moves we all feel it. Someone wants us to all get out a tiny door up front, but the first ten rows of the bus are frozen solid with fear. Even if I wanted to there is no way that I could get to the front of this bus.

“YOU HAVE ONE MINUTE TO GET OFF MY BUS!” The drill sergeant all but screams at us. I’m thinking that this is never going to happen, but this was our first assignment of basic training and we were going to try. To my surprise we all got off the bus in what could be the farthest thing from orderly on this planet, but the point is that we had just pulled it off. The second my feet hit the ground someone is screaming in my face to “RUN!” I don’t even have time to look up and see where I’m going, but I do know that I’m following another set of boots so at least I won’t be alone when I get there. Someone is screaming on a megaphone instructions and I can’t even tell what they are saying. I look around to see what everyone else has decided we should be doing and decide to go with standing in a line and dropping nothing on the ground yet. At least if I do what most of the people are doing I can’t be told that I wasn’t being consistent. All I can do is stare at the head in front of me and be as “unnoticeable” as possible. Though at this point I’m not sure that any amount of trying to be discrete is going to work.

Basic Instinct - A not so Beautiful Mind - Part 3

Yes, it has been a long while... and yes, I'm well aware that I started with Part 3

Awake - Where am I? Oh, right, I’m on a plane still. It seems like it has been ages since I left. My book sucked and I have no electronics with me so sleep seemed like a good idea. It still seemed so wasteful to use my last few “free” hours asleep. Wish I had a phone so I could call home, but that might just make things worse. Landing, getting off the plane: Seems like everything is drawn out so long. Almost like the clock won’t move or the world has slowed down some how. Maybe I’m in a Stephen King movie? Nah, I wouldn’t be that lucky.
Its amazing that with how similar each airports basic function is they all are so much different in shape, size, smell and... feel. Man the feel to this airport is creepy. I feel like someone is watching me from around a corner that I can’t see or peering into my every thought and step. The paper in my hands that the people at MEPS said were “directions” are amazing. They may as well have given me a map of Africa and told me it was similar to the airport terminal I was headed to. I can see other confused groups of people staring at the same sheet of paper that I have and probably thinking the same thing I was. I think I’ll follow one of these groups that appears to understand the hieroglyphics on the map and sneak in behind them.
I’m so glad that I have no luggage with me. I followed the instructions to only bring a change of clothing and nothing else. I guess that means something else to some people because I see cell phones and iPods like we are headed to summer camp or something.
Finally! some resemblance of a line is forming somewhere with other living-dead souls being counted off. What a strange place to gather up right between two escalators. “Form 2 lines” some stranger yells to the cluster (expletive) of people that are still on their phones and iPods. Time is moving faster now. “Lambert, Jordan” I tell someone with a clipboard. Marched single file like lemmings through the airport everything is so blurry now. These stairs and hallways look familiar from my hour long stroll trying to find where to go.
Buses are lined up outside and look a lot nicer than one would expect for Army transport. Dang it, everyone seems to have the same stupid single strapped bag that I do and they want me to put my bag under the bus? Good thing I tied a white strip of cloth to my bag so I could dig it out of a pile in 10 seconds or less.
A movie? Is this a freaking joke? What are they trying to trick us into thinking we are actually going to have fun in a few hours or what? At least the movie isn’t one that I’ve seen before (Fast and the Furious - Tokyo Drift) and at least it isn’t “Platoon” or “Full Metal Jacket”. I can’t sleep now anyway so at least I have something to watch.
Awake - Movie still on. Asleep. Awake - Movie still on. Asleep. Awake - Movie is just finishing. Looking around to get my bearings “Welcome to Fort Benning” on a very “inviting” sign passes by the window. I think we are driving in circles. In fact I’m 99% sure we are driving in circles. Not a good sign if they think that we need to be confused so that we can’t escape. The sound of the air brakes finally sound and the doors open up. The sign on the building right out the door should have read “Welcome to the Army! There is no backing out now!”

A short man in a uniform and a big round hat boards the bus...

Oh crap! Here we go!

Sampsonite!

Geolocate this post

Posted with LifeCast

Moving on up

Been awhile again... Summer has really taken a toll on my blogging. I'm loving the weather and my new ride! My last bike finally bit the dust and I'm parting it out. A few weeks ago I upgraded to something a little more reliable. (and with push button start!) Also if you look to the right you can see my Twitter / Loopt blogroll. I update that with my iPhone throughout the day/week so keep an eye on that.

Here is a picture of my new (to me) bike. '05 Yamaha TW200

"Obama"nos

Who's Your Daddy?

Happy Father's Day!

So it has been awhile since any blogs have been put up on any of our blogs (Seven's, Michael's and Mine.) I have no excuses except laziness as the weather hasn't been good enough until this weekend to keep me outside. I will say that I will get some pictures up of the boys and hopefully have Haley help me with some kid blogs and updates.

I have been thinking also about doing some writing on things that I can remember going through boot camp and other training before I soon forget it all. Leave a comment if that would be something that you would be interested in reading.

Idiocracy to the Max

This is an actual post on a forum for helping people with fixing up their cars. I'm not sure that it is real, but if it is this guy should win some sort of an award and they should revoke his rights to procreate. 

Hey guys, please help with my mods gone wrong..... - 11/1/2007

Hey guys, I've got a 98 1.8T. I've had a k04 and chip for a while and wanted to get more performance. I was recommended to port and polish the intake and exhaust. We found out they used abrasive material to do it like gritty sand. So I got with my friend that tunes Hondas and we decided to try it ourselves. We got a bag of sandblasting sand and hooked up into the intake and started the car. We had to hold the gas so it would run. He wanted to let the engine suck in the sand through the intake so it would port it out and then push it out the ehxaust so it would port the exhaust manifold. 

I was worried that it might cause problems but he figured it'd be OK as long as we didn't make boost and it get sucked in the turbo. After running the car and letting it suck in sand we got about half way through a 25 lb bag. The check engine light was on and the engine was bucking and kicking and sounding really weird. We stopped and hooked the car back up normal and took off the sand supply. We tried to start it again and it was really hard. Once started it couldn't idle and kept making weird noises. We took it out and drove it and it started to make scraping and knocking noises. 
Help! Can anyone tell me what to do! My buddy only does Hondas so he doesn't know much about Audis.

Traded the Van for It Straight Up

Well here is a picture of  my daily transportation. Seven loves to talk about the "motorcycle", but has been deathly afraid of even sitting on it since I got it. I slowly got him used to sitting on it while it was turned off and showed him all the buttons. This weekend it was pretty warm out and we live near Matt and Jules' house so I had him try a short 3 block ride out. Needless to say he now thinks that he should always get to ride on the motorcycle and runs for his helmet every time he thinks that we should go somewhere. Every day when I get home he runs smiling into the garage to meet me with his arms thrown into the air and yells "you go to work on the motorcycle today?" Its a pleasant welcome home and I look forward to it every evening.

If a Picture is Worth a Thousand Words... I Wasted a Ton of Time in College

I'm famous! Well sort of if you count getting a picture you took onto a blog somewhere. I have been playing around with HDR photos the last week or so after seeing some pictures that people had created using the technique and staring in amazement at what they looked like. I borrowed my dads camera so that I could get some higher quality shots and began learning how to create them for myself.

The picture to the left I took thursday night on our street after I got home from work. I spent some time getting the coloring changed (I know... funny for a colorblind person to be doing this). I really liked how it turned out so I submitted it to a blog that does a daily photo in Stayton Oregon (the town we live in). Images like this seem to be hit and miss with the Photo community, but I wanted to share what I created anyway. Long story short the lady that has the blog loved the picture and used as the daily photo on the blog. Click here to view the blog

I have some other pictures that I have taken and edited in the same way as well so if you would like to see some more of my HDR photos click the link below.

HDR Pictures and Originals

On the Road Again

So it has been awhile again I know. I wish I could say it won't keep happening but I would probably be lying. I have "some" pictures of the boys to update as well, but we have been really bad lately about taking pictures. Tomorrow is Easter and I'm sure we will have some from that as well as today. The weather has been getting better too so we have began venturing outside as well. 

Also, I have given up on the idea of getting a car for awhile and bought 2 motorcycles. I have gotten one running that I will be commuting with this summer to save on gas and have also fixed up the other one to sell. I didn't plan on buying multiple bikes but a deal came up where I could get both of them for $700 and I decided to do so with plans to sell one and keep one for myself. I love being back on 2 wheels again and will post some pictures of the bikes soon for all to see.

It'sa Me Mario!

I never gave this much thought, but this answers the question "where does mario go when he falls off the screen?" I guess the movie Tron wasn't too far off in its suggestion that the characters that we play lead real lives and when we kill them it has some adverse effect on the characters "lives". Interesting I think. Well, I gotta go play some Call of Duty 4... No harm in that right?

Norm!

So the dust has begun to settle some after this long past few weeks and I thought I should post something up more cheery. 

#1 I mentioned I got a new computer (I think). Its a MacBook Pro and I love it

#2 Did I mention the new computer?

I have had more time to get some of the updates up on my blog and the boys blogs, but still plan to do some more. It is much easier now that my screen has a bit more "real-estate" and I have more room to work on things. Also we have an internet Cafe' at the state building that I work in and on my lunch break I can go downstairs, sit on a couch and get my "tech" on in silence. I'm still in the process of getting our pictures sorted, but got most of them back up and running online for all to see. I should be getting some more recent ones added and posted up pretty soon. I have a 3 day weekend so on top of getting the taxes done I should be getting some of that stuff up soon.

Excuses are like... You get the point

So I haven't been very active on the blogs lately. Which means most, if not no one, will read this. It is late and I'm tired. A lot has been going on but as the title says we all have excuses. I guess since this is technically my bathroom wall on the internet I can list some of mine.

- We have now moved into our own place... this takes time and energy away from blogs

- Our internet took awhile to get hooked up... Though this hasn't stopped me before

- Our kids have been sick... Who hasn't had sick kids

- I thought it would be fun to install vista on my new computer and wiped out every piece of data I had collected for the past decade... just another speed bump.

I truly did have big plans to get my blog and the boys updated and I still plan to do that (hopefully tomorrow) but our world took another spin. Some of you know the Newell family. A link to Logan Newell's blog is on the right if you haven't. Their family has been going through some tough times again.

Ben Logan's dad is in the hospital awaiting a heart transplant that is his only hope for survival. Logan had an MRI and the tumor is still growing and they plan to start Kemo in 3 weeks. This alone would cripple most families, but while all of this was going on John Newell who is Ben's dad suffered a heart attack and now rests across the hall from Ben at OHSU in a coma. 

Needless to say updating my blog has been on the bottom of my list. Life takes on a new meaning when death seems to be all around. "But they aren't your family" you may ask. Oh, they are family. We may not have the same blood in us, but we are as family as you can get. All this to say I would ask anyone reading this to lift up this family in prayer. Its one thing when we are asked to cast our cares on God with something we think we could handle on our own. But that verse takes on a whole new meaning when there is absolutely nowhere else to turn.

Hater Pants!

I stole that title from The Totally Rad Show but it fits my recent posts very well. I have been on the verge of Microsoft bashing with my last few posts when there are many things that they do well. One of my personal favorites is the Xbox 360 and Halo 3. Recently Bungie (the makers of Halo 1,2 and 3) has separated from Microsoft but this is close enough. Bungie has a podcast and to keep this short have an "NFL Minute" segment where they all argue for their teams. Recently the Seahawks beat the 49ers (click here to read more on the game at Jason's blog) and one of the Bungie guys contacted some of the players on the 49ers to have them over to the Bungie studios in Kirkland Washington to play some of the new maps they are getting ready to release. The story cracked me up and the picture of them with the players is hilarious. How much more opposite can you get than computer programers and football players?

Check out the story here

Check out the new maps here

Ask Not What Vista Can Do For You! Ask What You Can Buy For Vista!

Here are some funny videos for you. The first is a hilarious new video that touches on a topic from my last post.

This made me laugh out loud and is great timing with the new Guitar Hero III release. It is Cowbell Hero!

She Stole My Heart and My Cat...

Now I know that some of our readers here are faithful Microsoft fans, but over the recent years my loyalty to the Redmond giant has dwindled some. Don't get me wrong they get some things right, (don't forget I'm a huge Halo and Xbox 360 fan) but when it comes to operating systems I think it is only logical who is better at this point. I stood in line at the Bridgeport Village Apple store to get my copy Leopard (apple's new operating system) and have loved every minute of it since I upgraded. I won't get into all the new features here for fear of scaring you all away, but one thing I will say is that it is much faster. How many times have you upgraded your computer operating system on a 3 year old computer and had it run faster without upgrading hardware? I have never had that be the case in my short computer nerd history. 

 For all those that are Microsoft fans I do have a desktop that I upgraded to Windows Vista. I can't say I have any complaints about it at this point, but I do miss my iLife applications while using it. I installed the 64 bit version on a fairly up to date computer though and so far it seems to be running very well. I wouldn't say it runs any faster though and most of

 my friends that have it either complain about it or have downgraded back to windows XP. Over all though I'm happy with it for my windows desktop.

  All this to say I'm a happy Apple fan and user. Who would have thought that 5 years ago? For now I'm thrilled with my iPhone and Leopard!

E.T. iPhone Home

Call me a hopeless "iFanboy," but I have taken the plunge once again. Steve Job's RDF (reality distortion field) has lured me in once again. I have been living with the iPhone now for a little over a week. I hesitated to post right when I got it for fear I would find something wrong with it resulting in buyers remorse. But, as with all other Apple products I have purchased I have been more than ecstatic about this device (Haley as my witness). It has a 2 mega pixel camera, 8 gigabytes of memory, and works as an iPod to include videos which play in wide screen mode sideways on the screen (Seven now knows my phone has Cars Movie on it). It even surfs the internet with a full browser. It can play YouTube videos as well. I love the pictures for my contacts because when the phone rings it is a full screen photo of the person calling. All of the PDA-like features sync flawlessly with my contacts, calendar and email. The best part is that all of this is tied up in a nice, all "touch screen" interface. Thats right only 4 actual buttons are on this thing. The rest is all run by the touch interface. I wasn't sure how I would like the fact that there are no buttons, but after a few days of getting used to it I never want to go back. This is by far the best phone that I have ever had.

Oh and did I mention? It's also a Phone.

“Saying ‘I’m sorry’ is the same as saying ‘I apologize.’ Except at a funeral.”

You know how sometimes you catch a glimmer of a funny sign or something hilarious that you want to share with the world? I knew that funny signs and crazy cars were in the south (former residence to me), but I either have gotten really hard up for things to post or have become more perceptive to the humor living around us. I found this sign in Federal Way. Must be some fast "unloaders." But the humor doesn't stop there.

My parents have been getting ready to have new gutters installed, which means some boards had to be replaced. Well, my dad has been on the lookout for quite some time for a second tall ladder to finish one last board on the tallest end of the house. He came to me the other morning (we are currently living at my parents for the time being), and said "I have an idea." Immediately I was scared, but not nearly as much as when he told me the actual idea he planned to put into action. I can not do justice to explain in words so take a look at these pictures. I actually wasn't aware that I was afraid of heights until I trusted his contraption with my life. To his defense it did work out alright. It was just a bit "bouncy." After all, we do have an Aumsville address. We have to conform at some point.
The next will not fit in a simple blog post but has earned its own gallery of fame. It is one that I forgot I had taken pictures of while still in Louisiana, and never got around to posting them. I have put up a link on my pictures area called "Duct Tape Truck" and if that isn't enough to peek your interest I don't know what is.

Wooow!

For those that haven't heard yet (or don't read the "where is Jordan" section on the left) I will be returning to the West Coast on the 28th of August. I actually have a plane ticket to prove it this time and have almost finished all the paperwork needed to clear post. I should be back in Oregon on the 29th for those that care about that.

If You're Flammable and Have Legs, You Are Never Blocking a Fire Exit. Unless You're a Table

In case you can't read the sign in the picture the above poster reads "Do Not Block With Tables or Chairs... Fire Exit" The bottom one reads "This Door Must Remain Locked At All Times"