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Hey, kids, want to make your cell phone look and sound like mine? Of course you do! Well, now you can! Download the following files and transfer them to your phone for the full experience!

Background:

Don't tell Apple, but it's a shrunken version of their "Aqua Blue" background for OSX. Shhhhh!

Next up, ringtone! It's a MIDI version of "Mahna Mahna" from The Muppet Show, specifically the sketch entitled "Mahna Mahna and the Two Snowths." If you've never seen the sketch, well, shame on you. If you click here you can watch it. The pink cow-like creatures are the "Snowths." I'll let you figure out who "Mahna Mahna" is.

Last but not least, the message tone. Any time I get a voice mail or a text message this is what I hear: the attack cry of a Murloc from World of Warcraft. It scares the cats and I get weird looks when it goes off in bookstores.

So there you go! Everything you need to make your cell phone look and sound like mine!

Labels: video

8 comments

I am happy to finally be able to say that they've finally made a good Superman movie. String me up or ride me out of town on a rail if you like, but the previous Superman movies weren't very good at all. People like to talk about how awful IV was, but I think III was the bigger insult. The second one had Zod, but wimped out in the "letting Lois keep information" department. The second one also gave Superman (and his ilk) weird telekinetic powers, which didn't make any sense at all. The first movie's best contribution to the Superman canon is the score. It's not PC to say you didn't like Christopher Reeve as Superman, but ... I didn't. I also didn't like Margot Kidder's Lois or Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor. Too campy and silly for my tastes.

Superman Returns fixes a lot of the problems, in my opinion. The characters are treated as real people, which I think is the most important aspect when making a superhero/comic book movie. People react believeably to the events that unfold. Lex Luthor still has some humor around the edges, but Kevin Spacey gives him an under-the-surface anger that hints at future confrontations in the Lex-vs.-Superman story. Lois is understandably angry at Superman for leaving (he's been gone for five years and the movie begins with him coming back). Superman himself, though alien, is very human, trying desperately to deal with his self-prescribed duty to help humanity and his desire for love.

Then there's Lois's boyfriend, Cyclops. There's no way to envy this guy. He's been dating Lois for five years, helping to raise her son, knowing full well the whole time that her first and biggest love is The Big Guy himself. Sure she's hurt because he left, but Cyke knows she'll always have him in her heart and mind.

So when Superman ret-- comes back, it's easy to tell he's not so okay with this. Sure, he's glad that airplanes are brought back to earth gently and not as many people are being killed by falling pieces of buildings and all, but when it comes right down to it, he's jealous.

This is where I experience a little disconnect. I guess I can understand being jealous of someone who your girlfriend used to love, but being jealous of Superman is like bulimia: it might seem like a good idea, but it ultimately doesn't make any sense. Jealousy is based in comparisons, most of the time: what does he have that I don't? (superpowers), what makes him so great? (uh... superpowers), why does she like him more than she likes me? (....superpowers, maybe?) About the only thing he's got over Superman, really, is that he didn't go off into space for five years. I guess that's something. Relationships have been built on less.

I guess it's the natural (human) response to be jealous, but I think maybe Cyclops should call that nice Jean girl he used to know because I happen to know who Lois picks in the end (Hint: he can lift continents).

So, it was a good movie overall, and I recommend it, even though I guessed the "twist" pretty much when the movie was announced a year ago. I guess the "twist" wasn't the point, though, and it should be interesting to see where that goes.

Now to go back to waiting for the next season of Smallville. 14 comments

I can't sleep. I thought I was tired earlier, but after lying in bed for 20 minutes staring at the ceiling, I figured I was lying in bed - lying to myself about being able to go to sleep. I don't know what the deal is. I don't drink any caffeinated beverages or anything else that would be doing this. I can't remember the last time I had raspberry tea.

My new thing is water. I can't really drink a lot of "regular" water, though. The taste of it bores me enough that sometimes I kind of feel like I'm gagging on it. I discovered, though, that Target has these wonderful flavored waters that I absolutely love. They have all sorts of really weird flavor combinations, and I've discovered I don't like many of them (like "spearmint" - it sounds good, but it's nasty), but I do like the lemon/raspberry and especially the blueberry/tangerine. So good! In fact, between that exclamation point and the beginning of this sentence I nipped downstairs and got myself one. I don't understand how they can add flavor to the water without adding anything else, but all of the Nutrition Facts are at zero except for sodium, which clocks in at a paltry 5mg.

I'm actually thinking about going into work. If I knew I could work a regular shift, just shifted a few hours forward, I'd do it. I'd go in right now, work until 9:30, and then come home and sleep. You can't call your boss at one in the morning and get that okayed, though, and I'm fairly certain I couldn't go in now and work until 3 p.m. like I'm supposed to.

I started reading In Cold Blood the other day. I'd never heard about it before the Capote movie came out last year, but once I stated hearing about it, I got interested in it. The only other "true crime" book I've read was Helter Skelter, about the Manson murders, and the style of this one is completely different. Frankly, it's really sad. I'm only a quarter of the way through it and it's making me sad. I had to stop reading tonight because I couldn't take it. Probably part of the reason I'm still awake is that by the time tears get to your ears, they're cold and feel weird.

Earlier today I finished watching King Kong (it took me two sittings to get through it). It was about 2/3rds of the way through that I realized no matter how much I rooted for the CGI monkey, he wasn't ever going to win.

I've had a real craving to buy a video camera lately and there's no good reason for it. I imagine myself making little movies and editing them together on my computer and being all creative and stuff, but I know that's not going to happen. And there's only so many movies you can take of your cats ("Look! Now she's sleeping!") before someone calls the state to have you placed into custody.

The air conditioning in my apartment decided to break on Friday night. I slept on the couch downstairs and actually opened a couple of windows a bit to get some air into the place - that's how bad it was. I never open windows. Frankly, I never open the blinds. I couldn't take it, though - it was too stuffy. I called and left a message with my landlord on Saturday morning, but never heard back from them. I went over lunch to pay my rent and mentioned it again just to make sure they had it, and when I got hom from work, the guy was actually there, just finishing up. He said he'd been there about three hours, so he'd been sent before I made my second plea. Turns out the main AC unit, the thermostat, and the ... thing outside all had shorted-out parts - he suspected there was lightning damage. So now I've got a spiffily working AC unit that's even doing a decent job cooling the upstairs plus a new digital thermostat. And if you know me at all, you know that I am a firm believer in all things digital. Digital > analog by a long shot.

I was balancing my checkbook over the weekend and got to the entries from Canada. I only used my debit card a few times up there, but I had originally entered them in the Canada-given amounts. Well, of course, my bank made the conversions automatically, so my statement had the American equivalents instead. I had to change each of the entries and it turns out my Canada trip cost me approximately $7 less than I thought. Wooo!

Even though I own Guitar Hero it's still fun to play it at the demo station at Best Buy for some reason. I was playing it there this weekend and a lady started asking me questions about it. I answered as best I could while Hendrixing out on "Spanish Castle Magic," and she ended up buying it for her kid. That's not the first time that's happened to me, either. I think I should be getting some sort of cut on these sales. Or at least a free copy of Guitar Hero II in November.

I wish I had an answer for everything. I've got a couple of friends going through some really, really hard times right now, and I wish I knew the exact right thing to say to each of them. My brain knows that sometimes people just need to know other people are available for listening, but my heart wants to fix everything for them by saying that one perfect thing that will make them say, "Oh! That's it exactly!" and go from there and be happy forever. Sure, it's not a realistic wish, but I call realistic, attainable wishes something else entirely: "goals."

The cats are weirded out by my being up this late. It's like I'm upsetting their sleep schedule somehow.

Note For Future Scientific Study Purposes: First yawn was at 1:41 a.m.

And, actually, with that yawn, I'm starting to feel like maybe I could sleep a bit. I shall go try. The alarm doesn't go off for another 4 hours, so I should be fine.

Labels: apropos of nothing

5 comments

Working with computers has taught me that brains are funny things. With a computer, when something’s saved to the hard drive, it’s there. Barring outside influences that would cause physical damage to the disk, or a virus, the information’s there to stay. Even if you delete the file, it’s still actually there and can be recovered with a little effort. Only specifically deleting the file and overwriting it and making extra sure will get rid of it. If you run out of room on a drive, you can copy the files over to a bigger drive and add more stuff to it. You can copy the files to a more permanent medium, too, or print out a physical copy.

My brain, on the other hand, forgets things. All the time. When people ask me about something that happened last week, last month, or last year, I often joke “I don’t even remember what happened yesterday.” It’s only half a joke, really. The older I’ve gotten, the harder it’s become to keep things in my brain. Sure, big events stay there, but details go away quickly. Specifics fade and the dots all merge into a blob.

This isn’t a problem unique to me, of course. People have been forgetting things for as long as there’ve been people, I’m sure. And, just like me, people have done whatever they could to help them remember. Some build monuments. Some paint pictures. Some write books. Some have write songs. Some write diaries. Some get tattoos. Some wear specific clothes. Some eat specific foods. Some write blogs. Some wear specific scents. It’s all an attempt to recapture a time, to not forget.

It’s a losing battle, though. It’s inevitable, it seems, that we’ll forget things. All we can do is take every precaution. We set aside special days and we make whatever memorials we can and we try to remember. Our experiences make us who we are, so who are we if we forget them?

Try to remember me. I’ll do my best to remember you. Deal? 4 comments

My friend Natchdan has just released his second album online - for free! - so I figured it must be all the rage to release music online. I didn't want to miss out on the trend, so I dug out some stuff Dave and I recorded at those wonderful little recording booths they have at amusement parks.

Let me just say: no one's more amused than Dave and I.

I have given the "album" the title "Evidence of Futility" for no reason other than I felt it showed we would need a lot of help and work before we'd "throw down" for real in an actual studio. If you've been visiting the site for a long time you've already heard a couple of these, but I thought I'd throw the whole thing out there for you.

If you'd like to start downloading the album here (33Mb), you can read the rest of this while it's transferring.

Here is the songlist. Asterisked songs are ones that Dave doesn't actually make an appearance on. It's not my fault - he just wasn't around.

1. “Kokomo” – You should have seen the dirty (and disappointed) look I got from Dave when I came in too early on “There’s a …” on the very first verse. I thought maybe our friendship was over right then. The ending is so abrupt because the people in the booth apparently didn’t know how to fade out.
2. “Brown-Eyed Girl” – My favorite off the “album,” most likely because Dave sings lead. There’s “banter” at the very end, so make sure not to miss that.
3. “Everything I Do”* – Ballads. Why’d it have to be ballads? It seemed like a good idea at the time.
4. “Under the Boardwalk” – I don’t think Dave will disagree: this is the worst one in the bunch. If you can make it all the way through this one you’re made of sterner stuff than I am.
5. “Don’t Be Cruel” – It’s fun to sing Elvis songs. Give it a try!
6. “Lean On Me”* – The funky version! This is the oldest song in the bunch. At the very end I actually say the phrase, “Call on me, baby.”
7. “The Gambler”* - In which I inexplicably change “whisky” to “root beer” but leave “cigarette” right where it is.
8. “Twist & Shout” – Probably the most fun one to do. Please note Dave’s Axl Rose impression at the very end.
9. “Yesterday”* - This is the most-covered song in the history of recorded songs. Really. So here’s one more cover.

There are a few other songs that I've recorded over the years, but I don't have them anymore:

• "Eat It" - my very first recording ever, and I wish I had it. I foolishly loaned it to a girlfriend in high school and never saw it again.
• "When A Man Loves A Woman" - the Michael Bolton version. While I somehow managed to get the key change right, that was about the only thing. Awful, just awful. But not as bad as
• "Unchained Melody" - A duet with a friend from college that was so bad I even have a hard time listening to the Righteous Brothers' version of it anymore. I was never that good at falsetto, so I'm not sure what possessed me to even try this song, but it was bad, bad, bad. Jeff M. (the friend) had the recording last I knew, and I always worry it'll show up sometime when I'm least expecting it. This is another reason I can never run for President.
• "Old Time Rock And Roll" - I learned while doing this song that this song is much higher than you think it is when you're singing along with it on the radio.

Anyway, I hope you get some laughs out of these. I know I still do. 4 comments

Years: 1986-87
Teachers: Mr. Braughler, Mr. Flaming, Mrs. Litke,

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I almost hesitate to dive back into this series, my school memories posts tend to not garner many comments, so it’s easy to think that no one’s enjoying them. But I intended to finish it, so I shall – consider it a character-building exercise, I guess. I have actual documentation from my high school years (yearbooks and friends who actually went through it with me), so there’s the danger these entries could be longer. I also have actual pictures of me from these sources, and it remains to be seen if I’ll include them with these posts.
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It’s easy to look back at the beginning of my high school days and see that big changes were afoot, but I don’t think I noticed while I was living them. I wonder if anyone ever does…

Our high school was small, really small. Our class was one of the biggest they’d seen, and I count 27 of us in the yearbook. There were less than 100 students in the whole high school. Considering I now work at a high school that has over 1,500 students and I know of even larger ones, well, I guess ours was smaller than small. Tiny, maybe.

My absolutely first memory from high school was my friend Jamie M. seeing me on the first day of school and saying, “Mark! You grew!” In eighth grade, as is the norm, most of the girls were taller than most of the guys. I did some growing in the summer, I guess. That’s another thing you don’t necessarily notice while it’s happening.

I made a few life-changing decisions early on in my high school career:

1. Stop bringing my lunch in a lunch box. “The Fall Guy” might have been cool in elementary school, but it will get you laughed at in high school. Brown paper bag lunches became the norm pretty quickly – most likely the first week of school.
2. Get new friends. More specifically, “get out of old friendships.” High school seemed so much bigger and so different, but I still had a small circle of friends whose idea of being friends was to hit each other and snicker. I remember thinking it seemed so childish, which is funny to think about now. I somehow got into a different group that included Josh, Phil, and Malia (pronounced mah-LEE-uh), and that shaped my next four years and beyond.
3. Get rid of my quick temper. I got into a couple of actual fights with Paul Z. early on in my Freshman year, mostly because he was a jerk and I had an instant temper. One day in PE he was tripping me from behind while we ran laps, and when we got to the end, I laid into him. Coach Terrill pulled me off him and kneeled on my chest (he was heavy and it hurt!) and yelled at me (he hadn’t seen the tripping, of course – not that it made my actions right). I’d like to say that’s what caused me to make my decision, but it was really because I figured out somehow that girls wouldn’t like me if I had a bad temper. So. I decided to not have one any more, and I didn’t. Sure, I’ve my temper since then, but never so instantly. As a side note, this decision is what sticks out to me when I have trouble doing any other life alterations: if I can just decide to not have a temper and then not have one, I should be able to decide and do all the other stuff. When it doesn’t work, I blame myself for being weak.
4. Go out for football. There were two reasons I did this:
   -It was sort of expected. All the freshman guys were doing it and my brother had played for two years already.
   - To get out of piano practice. I’d had lessons for four years, and I hated practicing. Going out for football meant my after-school time was taken up and I couldn’t take lessons anymore. Looking back, I think this is one of my biggest regrets. While I enjoyed football to a certain extent and have some good memories from my years of playing, I wish that I could play the piano now.

Playing football is actually why you’re at MadMup.com today, actually. One day I walked into the locker room for practice and Todd T., a senior, said, “Hey, Muppet.” Someone else asked, “What’d you call him?” “Muppet.” “Why?” “Because he looks like one.” And there it was: my new nickname. It morphed into “Mup” over time, and when I started playing games online years later, I morphed it into “MadMup” in an attempt to give it an ironic, pseudo-tough edge. I think I was supposed to be embarrassed about looking like a Muppet, but truth be told I liked having a recognizable identity. I was a weird-looking odd kid, so anything helped. People that might not ever have talked to me before would say “Hey, Muppet” in the halls occasionally now. My brother still calls me “Mup” to this day, and there’ve been at least two occasions when he’s referred to me that way in Sunday dinner prayers.

My first three classes every day my Freshman year were taught by the same teacher: Mr. Flaming (pronounced like “flamming,” not like “flaming”). History, Science, and Bible (or maybe Science, History, and Bible, I’m not sure). Mr. Flaming was not the most exciting teacher in the world, and having a first-hour class with him would have been bad enough. Three in a row was killer. He never really liked me that much, which I can appreciate – I wasn’t the easiest student to have in class – and one day for science class he had me come up to the front for a demonstration. He put the science textbook on my head and then hit the book with a hammer. I think he was trying to show “transference of energy” or some such, but the upshot is that he got to hit me in the head with a hammer and call it “teaching.”

I was sitting in the front row of English class one day holding a finger to my lips and puffing my cheeks out (for what reason, I do not know – perhaps to see how far out they’d go) when Mr. Braughler stopped talking mid-sentence, looked at me with incredulous eyes, proclaimed, “Rubberface!” and went back to teaching. It was a little surreal. To this day, though, I still make faces while I’m doing other things. People often think I’m younger than I actually am, and I wonder if it’s because making faces is like a face workout or something. Of course, nobody wants to look this young:

Me in 1986

My Freshman year seems like a transition year in retrospect. My Sophomore year was more like the beginning of high school in my memory.

Labels: school memories

13 comments

I had the chance to see Sheryl Crow in concert this past Monday, and I took it. She's just now starting to get back into touring after having cancer surgery, and the show in Indianapolis was a rescheduled date from earlier this year.

It would be stupid to say I enjoyed the concert, I think. Who pays that much money to go to a concert they're not sure they'll like? Not me. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

But as I sat there, I got hit with a wave of "Man, I need to"s. As in:

• Man, I need to learn how to play the guitar.
• Man, I need to record my Snakes on a Plane song.
• Man, I need to get that children's book that's in my head out on paper and find someone to illustrate it.
• Man, I need to start that webcomic I've been thinking about.
• Man, I need to get in shape.
• Man, I need to do something.

There's Sheryl up on stage, 44 years old, having the time of her life, and looking great.

Here's me in my chair, 34 years old, trying to figure out my life, and looking tired.

Maybe Sheryl's onto something:

Live it up, like there's no time left
Just like there's no tomorrow
Live it up, like there's no time left
And there's no time to kill
Live it up, like there's no time left
And no time left to borrow
Why don't you try to get it right this time
Get it right this time

Labels: music

4 comments

Josh, Dave, and I have been talking about getting together for some time now. We haven't seen each other in a long time and life keeps going, so you've got to make things happen. I'd seen Dave at Christmas, but I hadn't seen Josh in probably four years. Josh lives in Michigan, Dave lives in Ohio, and I live in Indiana, so we looked for a place that was "somewhere in the middle" that we could maybe meet up for lunch some Saturday. The talking never gets past "Yeah, we should do that," but it gets brought up every other month or so. Dave even went so far as to find a place that was "sorta" in the middle. When specific Saturdays were mentioned, though, it was always "I'm on a trip" or "I'm re-roofing the house" or some such nonsense. Josh has five kids, Dave has three, so that made some sort of difference, too, I guess.

This past Thursday, though, Dave said, "I'm free tomorrow night." So was I. And, after a while, so was Josh. So the plan was made: meet at Welch's Ribs in Sturgis, MI, at 7:00 p.m. Friday.

Remember when Dave said it was "sorta" in the middle? That apparently meant "mile-wise." Time-wise their trips were a smidgen over two hours. Mine was three hours. Meh. No big deal, I guess. Dave got there first, I got there a little afterwards, and Josh was late. Slacker.

This is us:

They say that friends are people who know all about you but love you anyway. These are those friends for me. I've been friends with them for 20 years and known them even longer. They've been around me during all of my biggest mistakes and still love me. They've laughed with me, cried with me, preached at me, persuaded me, corrected me, and accepted me. If I haven't talked to one of them in months, I can pick up the phone and we can pick up right where we left off. If I were to start listing memories I have about these two, we'd be here forever and you'd get bored - we'd be in stitches, but you'd be bored.

Everybody should have friends like Josh and Dave. I hope you do. I hope I've been 1/10th the friend to them that they've been to me. Thank you, Aundrea (Mrs. Josh) and Angela (Mrs. Dave), for not only letting them come but actually encouraging them to do so.

We left Welch's a little after 11:00 on Friday after having talked about family, former friends, theology, surgery, movies, and all manner of other things. It was raining and hard to see on my way home, and I didn't get back until 3:00 Saturday morning, dog-tired and feeling physically awful.

But you know what? I'd do it again. I hope we get the chance.

Labels: friends

13 comments

The airport in Halifax had one of those "buy stuff made in this area" stores in it, which worked out well for me since I was having "I'm leaving the country without anything to remember it with!" thoughts. They had shirts, throw rugs, painted shells, food - all the normal things stores like that have.

I picked up a couple of small things for gifts, but didn't really see anything I wanted for myself. I was just about to leave the store when something caught my eye. It was a little statue made up of flat stones and it was labeled "Inukshuk." I didn't know what to make of it, but there was a sheet of paper with a description in the case with the statues. After I read it, I decided very much I wanted one of the little statues. When I asked the lady to get one for me I mentioned that what really did it for me was the printed description. She, being Canadian and therefore extra-nice, offered to run a photocopy of it for me. I thanked her, bought my statue, and headed for my gate.

Here is a picture of my Inukshuk and then the text of the description in the case:

The Inukshuk, a construction of rocks configured to resemble the human form, has been used by the Inuit for thousands of years. Literally translated the word "Inukshuk" means "pretend person," a useful construction in a land so sparsely populated.

In this vast and often lonely land, the Inukshuk has served many purposes for Arctic travellers. Constructed without arms, an Inukshuk traditionally indicated the territory of a family group. In the barren lands of the Arctic, an Inukshuk with one arm served as a guide for travellers, pointing them in the direction of the most favourable route. Some Inukshuk featured a peephole in the centre through which travellers could view the tiny dot of another distant Inukshuk.

Often, an Inukshuk indicated the presence of a food cache intended to sustain a traveller on the next leg of a journey, or the abundance of fish, caribou, muskoxen or other animals in the area. Always, the Inukshuk was a sign that, though it may have been thousands of years ago, another human being had been there before and survived. The Inukshuk is a timeless sign of the mortal, a part of the human continuum.

"Whenever I am around an Inukshuk, I am never afraid. I see the Inukshuk and know that it was built by people, and as a result, it will protect me from bad spirits." - Inuit belief

While I don't believe a statue will "protect me from bad spirits," it particularly hit me that the Inukshuk was a sign that other people had been there before and had made it through. It reminded me that we all go through the same things because we're all human.

King Solomon said it best "That which has been is what will be, That which is done is what will be done, And there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which it may be said, 'See, this is new'? It has already been in ancient times before us."

The shame of it, though, is that even though we all go through similar problems and heartaches, we rarely talk to other people about them. We don't feel like we can because it's something too personal, too embarrassing. The exact help we need is in the people around us. It's a two-way street: if someone comes to me, it's my responsibilty to do what I can for them. Being shocked or not wanting to help or belittling their situation is a betrayal to our connection as humans.

Maybe this won't seem all that great to you and you might even think it's a little weird or funny that it struck me so much, but I like being reminded that, no matter what I'm going through, someone else has been there before, and they made it.

Somehow, that's comforting. 4 comments

There are so many things you worry about before traveling – Did you pack enough clothes? Have you made all the right reservations? Do you have all the contact information for the people you’re meeting? – that you never think you’re going to fall in love.

It happened so fast. I never saw it coming and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I wasn’t looking for it, I didn’t need it, and now I’m stuck.

See, it will never work. Nothing I can do will make it work. Long distance relationships are hard in most cases, and impossible in this one.

I might as well tell you how it happened, I suppose…

It was Friday afternoon. Mike, Holly, and I had dropped Jamie off to get her nails done and had some time to kill, so we wandered down Main Street in Yarmouth. Holly needed to check with a store that does business with her and do some banking, so Mike and I wandered. As we passed a used games/movies/computers store, the tattooed and lip-pierced girl cleaning the inside window smiled at us. We’d been planning to go in anyway, but as we did, I told her it was because she smiled – that got another smile and a laugh.

We didn’t find any great bargains in the store, so we moved on to the craft store next door where Holly was. Everything in the store was locally made, and there were some neat things, but, again, I didn’t buy anything.

Keep in mind, it’s been raining this whole time. In fact, once I hit Canadian soil, I didn’t see the sun until I was in a plane above the clouds on my way back to Newark. It didn’t rain the whole time, but it was cloudy the whole time and rained about 87.63% of the time. So we were wet and chilly when we decided to go into the Tim Hortons.

Tim Hortons is like a combination Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts. They’re about as prolific in Canada as Starbucks are here. They’ve got sandwiches, donuts, coffee – the works. If you’re in Canada, you really must go to one.

I’ll never forget Tim Hortons because that’s where I fell in love.

I walked in with the usual hesitance I walk into new places with – it was a nice place, clean, and well-lit. They had pictures of donuts and coffee and “Timbits” (which turned out to be their name for donut holes. What an odd, cannibalistic name for nice food.). I decided to order a hot chocolate (of course). They don’t take credit/debit cards there, so I had to pony up some actual cash, which caused a minor amount of consternation, since I only had American monies. But I finally worked it out (and got a Toonie in change!) and received my beverage.

And that’s when I fell in love.

I would like to offer some sort of public apology to Starbucks and Barnes & Noble, but I have found something better. I must proclaim to the world that the hot chocolate with whipped cream at Tim Hortons FAR surpasses the hot chocolate with whipped cream at Starbucks. I – I know it’s hard to hear, but I don’t know how else to break it to you. The whipped cream is thick and tasteful and the chocolate is exactly what chocolate should taste like.

I sat there, disbelieving. I tried some more, and sure enough – my heart was gone. I got the chills, the flutters, the shakes – all of it. I was gone. Signed on for life.

But… there’s a problem.

Tim Hortons is pretty much in Canada. While there are a few in The States, they are no nearer to Indiana than Michigan. While I’m willing to work at this relationship, I just won’t be able to any time soon. If I were a braver man I would quit my job and travel and make a public stand… but alas, I am a coward. I will have to love from afar.

I am doomed to unrequitedness.

I agree with Agent K when he responded to the question “Better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all, right?” with “Try it.”

Yeah, try it. Try to have a taste of heaven and then have it ripped from you. It’s no fun at all.

I miss you, Tim Hortons hot chocolate with whipped cream. Please call. 11 comments

(Warning: this is a long entry. You might want to pace yourself. Though I hope you enjoy reading about the wedding, this entry is more of a way for me to remember the weekend.)

If you haven't figured it out by now, I was in Canada this past weekend. Here's the whys and the whats of the trip.

Flash back about two years. The THorum had been having some trouble and had been reset a couple of times before. In January of 2004 it got reset again. Everyone started from scratch and everything old was wiped out. The new version was more stable and grew from there. People joined up, people met, and new friends were made.

A guy named Mike was integral to getting the THorum up and running and running well. He was some young kid from Texas, but he knew how to program a thing or two and got things done. Whenever there were issues, he was the guy to talk to. Since I'm one of those picky, notice-every-little-issue guys, it seemed like I was going to him a lot. We got to be friends and started talking on instant messenger outside the THorum.

After a while, some girl from Canada joined up and got involved in the community. Meags (rhymes with "eggs") was well-behaved and interesting and we soon got to be friends, too.

Meags had some questions about doing some things with her website, and she got pointed in the direction of Mike. He was very helpful and they started talking more and more. One day I was chatting with Meags and she said, "I think I like him. Can you find out how he feels about me?" A little IMing later and I had an answer for her. Short version: they got married two days ago.

They asked me a while ago if I would be a part of the wedding. Without hesitation, I jumped at the chance. They were both good friends of mine and I wanted to be part of such a neat story.

So now we’re up to last Thursday.

Thursday

I got up around 3:30 in the morning and got to the airport in plenty of time. I don’t care for flying much, but I’m somehow able to manage it. I have to try to distract myself, particularly during takeoffs and landings. It isn’t just the sensations and bumps and noises, it’s also the small, closed-in area. I have claustrophobic tendencies anyway, and a small room that flies isn’t any better than one that just sits there. The windows don’t help, for some reason. Seeing a shaking airplane wing doesn’t set my mind at ease. The planes were all three-seaters, two seats, an aisle, then another seat, and I’ve come to realize that the smaller the plane, the less I like it. Try taking me up in a Cessna if you want me to seriously freak out (please don’t).

I had a very short layover in Newark, NJ, and then was on my way to Halifax. Right off the bat things got weird. We had to walk down steps and across the tarmac to get to the terminal, something I’d only ever had to do once before. It’s an odd feeling. Once in the terminal, I got another odd feeling: they were doing construction in that wing, so it felt like I was walking in a plywood tunnel, and the tunnel went on a lot longer than I expected it to.

The customs fellow asked me where I was from and what I was doing in Canada. When I said I was there for a wedding, he asked where I’d met the bride and groom. “Well, uh, I haven’t, actually.” More questions, of course, but he seemed okay with my answers and I was let into Canada.

On to the car rental desk. Any time I’m slightly out of my element I’m pretty sure it’s not too much fun to have to deal with me – the simplest things stop making sense to me and I’m easily confused. They said they had a Ford Taurus for me, I asked if they had a Vibe or a Matrix, they didn’t but would give a Mustang for the same price as a Fusion, which they were also out of. If you’re going to drive, you might as well drive in style, right? I took the Mustang, but opted for grey instead of red – flashy, but not too flashy.

Three and a half hours later I’m in Yarmouth at the hotel where I’m told there’s a special rate for wedding party members. The girl behind the desk can’t find anything about that, so I say, “I’ll just take a room anyway.” After finding out how much the rooms were, though, I said, “Uh… I’m actually going to go check around. I might be back.” I didn’t intend to be. At the next slightly-cheaper place, I found out that my credit card wasn’t working. A call to the company revealed that they hadn’t gotten my last payment yet – a slightly larger payment to avoid just this sort of thing – and they weren’t willing to budge. So I sat down in the lobby to try to figure something out. My little brain wasn’t having much luck, but it was right about then that Meags called and asked how things were going. I didn’t want to worry her – she had plenty to deal with already, after all – but I also thought another brain might help me figure something out. So I told her what was going on and she said, “Hang on a few minutes.” She called back and said everything was taken care of, Mike had gotten a room and I could split it with him later. I argued a little, but knew it really was pretty much my only option at that point. I thanked her and she said they were actually in Halifax and would be back at some point.

I went to the room and pretty much crashed – I watched Ghostbusters on the laptop, but I don’t remember parts of it, so I think I kind of dozed through parts. I decided to go to sleep but figured I should leave a light on for Mike whenever he got back.

Turns out, Meags got sick on the way back to Yarmouth, so they all (them and the bridesmaids) stopped somewhere for the night, so the light was on all night. I was tired enough that it didn’t bother me, so no big deal.

Friday

I got up when the phone rang for Meags to tell me they’d be there in a while. Sure enough, shortly after I was ready, they showed up in full force: Meags, Mike, Mandy, and Alyssa. This was the first time I met Meags, but after talking to her so much over the last year it didn’t feel like it. I’d had the “big brother vibe” going for a while, but it was nice to finally meet her face-to-face. Mandy and Alyssa were both very friendly and seemed happy to see me. From there we went down a floor to pick up Jamie and we headed to the RedCap for lunch. There I met Mike’s mom, Meags’ mom, Meags’ sister, Holly, (the last bridesmaid), and an aunt and uncle of Mike. Mike’s dad showed up soon, and for a while people were in and out and I was trying to keep them all straight. I had an egg salad sandwich and rice. A weird combination, I know, but when I asked for “fries” she heard “rice.” It was good rice, so I didn’t mind. I also tried poutine, which is basically fries with cheese and gravy. It was okay, but I doubt I’d order it myself ever. It’s a traditional dish there, though, so I needed to try it.

Somewhere along the line things started falling apart – phone calls started coming in about the Newark airport being closed down and people weren’t going to be able to make it to the wedding. The decision was made to push the wedding back from 1:00 to 5:00 on Saturday to give people time to get there. More stress for Meags…

The rehearsal went well – one of the moms (I’ll name no names!) teared up and was given a pretty hard time about it. After the dinner, the wedding party went to a local establishment for the purpose of playing pool. Much pool was played, much fun was had. It was mostly two vs. two, and any time I was on a team with Meags’ mom, I was on the winning team, no thanks to me. Towards the end as people dropped out, there were one vs. one matches, and I got beat by Jamie (I helped her out a lot, sinking the 8 ball waaay before I should have) but then beat Mandy by sinking the 8 ball at exactly the right time. It was a lot of fun.

Mike and I went back to our room and ended up chatting online with some THorumites (him on his computer, mine on mine) until about 3:00 in the morning. Probably not a good idea, but it seemed fitting on the eve of a THorumite wedding.

Saturday

We got up around 11:00 and met Mike’s parent’s at Pizza Delight for lunch. While there, Wes (another groomsman) and his wife Heidi showed up. I kept expecting to meet someone awful, but it didn’t happen. They were fantastic people, too. You know what they say – if you can’t figure out who the jerk is in a group, it’s probably you. They were all very nice to me, so they can apparently handle jerks and I appreciate it. The most amusing story of the lunch time came from Heidi, who told how Wes had wanted their honeymoon out of the country to be a surprise, but needed to get her passport ahead of time. The short version is that the picture on Heidi’s passport is actually of her twin sister. There was laughter after the initial shock, but then she explained that the instructions on the passport say the picture needs to be a “likeness,” so it’s apparently okay. Even if it isn’t, it’s one of the best stories I’ve ever heard.

There’s more running around to do before a wedding than you might realize. We probably should have gotten up a bit sooner, but we ended up getting everything done. We got to the photographer’s house on time and from there to the studio without any trouble. The photographer was a fantastic lady named Monique who took some fantastic pictures and was very nice about the way she set up the shots. Some photographers are kinda pushy and mean, but she was as nice as … well, a Canadian. You can see some of her work on her website: http://www.moniquedeon.com/

The wedding itself was sweet and nice. It felt like a good wedding. That’s a weird thing to say about a wedding, I’m sure, but it seems like the more formal and stiff a wedding feels, the less good it feels. Wes and I did double duty as ushers and groomsmen, and we got it done. People got sat and bridesmaids got escorted, and I think that’s pretty much what we needed to do. All of the standard wedding problems happened before the wedding actually started – we ended up one grandmother and one groomsman short – but the ceremony went very well, the bride was beautiful, and it went off with the one hitch it’s supposed to have.

At the reception, guests were encouraged to say a poem or sing a song about love to get the bride and groom to kiss. I’m always amazed by the willingness of people to do that sort of thing, but there were several takers. Just as I was working up the nerve, they moved on to the next part of the reception and I missed my chance.

Mike and Meags danced to the Michael W. Smith song “Love of My Life” for their first dance. I had introduced Meags to the song and I had forgotten she was planning to have it at their wedding. I might have teared up a bit during their dance, but you’ll never be able to prove it.

It wasn’t really until most people had left that the DJ started playing music that causes normal people to dance. The bridesmaids jumped in full force and pulled Wes and I on the floor as well. Now, I don’t dance. I just don’t. I did, however, participate in some synchronized clapping and I did twirl a little bit with one of the grandmothers. That’s all you get.

From there it was back to the hotel – sans Mike, of course. I did, however, pick up another roommate. A friend of Meags rode the bus from Halifax to get to the wedding, but needed a ride back, so it made sense for him to stay in the room rather than at a restaurant like he had the night before. Frankly, you should all be a little proud of me for stepping outside my misanthropic box on this trip. I was nervous, but I still have all my kidneys, so I guess it turned out okay.

I collected all the tuxes and took the down to Mike’s parents’ room, walked with Jamie as she took Maddie (the family Chihuahua and one of the cutest dogs ever) across the street to accomplish her “business,” and then went to bed.

Sunday

Pretty uneventful. Left Yarmouth around 9:00 a.m. and drove to Halifax. I returned the rental car after putting almost 1,000 kilometers on it, and the same very nice girl was at the lot. I thanked her for being so nice and helping me get acclimated to the Canadian climate. Then I got on a plane and flew to Newark. My seatmate for this leg of the journey was incredibly friendly and nice and we talked about such important things as chewing gum and the extended versions of The Lord of the Rings. The Newark-to-Cleveland flight was delayed, so when I got to Cleveland, my Cleveland-to-Indy flight had already gone. So… another night of sleeping in an airport. Though it was technically the next day, I won’t leave you hanging: I got home okay on Monday.

All in all, it was a great trip. To be honest, when I was preparing to go on the trip, I got a little worried about it. I was concerned that I couldn’t afford it, and I had my usual concerns about meeting new people. I’m always sure things will be awkward and people won’t like me and I’ll try to overcompensate and that will just make things worse. You can never really know what other people think of you, of course, but I can say that I felt at home the whole time. I didn’t want to leave and I certainly want to see them all again. The chances of all of them being together in the same place again are slim, I know, but they were that great a group of people. If you’re one of them, make sure to read the previous entry for your personalized message, and thank you again for such a wonderful time. Even though I just met most of you, I miss you already.

I have two more Canada-related entries planned, so use that info to decide whether or not you'll be back. 2 comments

There will be more later, but I am stuck overnight in the Cleveland airport and have little time left on my connection here, so I'll just say this for right now:

1. I had a FABULOUS time in Canada.
2. I was (and am still) sad to leave.
3. Canadians (in general) are a polite and pleasant bunch.

And now, personal messages to all the fantastic folk in Canada!

1. Mike & Meags - Thank you SO much for letting me share in your special day. It was an honor and I'd do it again (you know, if one or more governments require it).
2. Diana (Meags' Mom) - I think she might have adopted me if I would have asked - she seems like the sort to help those in need. WARNING: Do not be fooled into betting against her in a pool game, especially if she uses the "I haven't played in 20 years" line. It's a complete hustle! (Note to my mom: there was no actual betting.)
3. Jose (Mike's Dad) - You are too generous, sir! Thanks for paying for anything we tried to. I plan to come to Texas and hang out with you just for fun sometime.
4. Val (Mike's Mom) - It's easy to see where Mike got his niceness from. And don't worry, I shan't reveal here to the world who you were trying to set me up with ;)
5. Wes (Fellow groomsman, friend of Mike) - You and Heidi are really neat people and I intend to hang out with you when I visit Texas, too. A piece of advice: if a bridesmaid hauls you to the dancefloor, STAY THERE. I'm just concerned for your safety, is all!
6. Mandy (Maid of Honor, Meags' Friend) - Glad to finally meet you! You were a bundle of happiness the whole time - even when I beat you at pool. LET THE RECORD SHOW: I beat Mandy at pool.
7. Jamie (Mike's Sister) - LET THE RECORD SHOW: She beat me at pool. She also has a great Texan accent that she turns on and off at will and gives on-the-spot linedancing instructions should you need them. Go Jamie!
8. Alyssa (Meags' Friend) - The one person who might have smiled more than Mandy. Another friendly sort! Apparently Canada has a monopoly on them.
9. Holly (Meags' Friend) - The word "individual" was created specifically for you. Keep marching to your own beat.
10. Diana (Hertz Girl) - You were very nice to a strange harried American and all weekend I used you as an example of how nice Canadians were.
11. Jennifer (Woman on Plane) - You were nice right off the bat and I had you pegged for being Canadian right off, too. Sure enough! You Canadians. You can't even pretend to not be nice!

So. Today's lesson is: Canadians are nice.

Weekend details later!

4 comments

I post to you now from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Aside from a few naps, I've been up since 3:30 a.m. Indiana time. For some reason, it was easier for me to get up at 3:30 than it usually is to get up at 6:00. Weird. In that time I flew from Indy to Newark, NJ, and then to Halifax. Then a 3+ hour drive from Halifax to Yarmouth. Along the way I saw a giant raccoon cross the road, but no moose, sadly.

The Canadians I have met and talked to so far have been very nice, and the last one in particular had that ever-so-neat Canadian accent, so that was fun. I'm sure they've got me pegged as a Statesider right off the bat, but they're nice enough to not poke me with sticks or anything. The smile-and-nod does wonders when dealing with weirdo Americans.

There's been some credit card-related excitement that I don't want to get into right yet, but I am safely ensconced in a hotel with Internet access, so I guess things are okay for now.

More bulletins as events warrant, but for now, here's a complete list of what I've consumed today:

• a bottle of lemon-raspberry water
• two (2) Frosted Cherry Pop-Tarts
• some orange juice (first flight)
• some REALLY GOOD cranapple juice (on the second flight)
• pretzels (also second flight)
• peanuts (also second flight)

I spit right in the face of healthy eating. 2 comments