Thoughts of a Narcissistic Dutchman

Me in Anime

2007-03-18T23:51:00.000-04:00

What Neon Genesis Evangelion character are you?

Kill the fatted calf!

2007-03-18T23:28:00.000-04:00

That's right boys and girls, the prodigal son has returned... well, at least for the time being. A kind woman from Time Warner came by the apartment yesterday to install Road Runner, so now I am able to access the web on my off time -- not simply between classes. To celebrate, I thought I'd post in my blog that hasn't been touched in nearly eight months. There's not too much to say about life. Classes are a bit of a pain this semester, but I've only got six or seven more weeks of the little monsters. Today is Big Daddy's birthday, so I dined on pizza and ice cream with the whole famn damily at lunch, then Lamar and the rest of the Nisly's had several of us over for dinner at their place. It was a good Sunday, following a good St. Patty's Day.

I'm debating renewing my Newsweek subscription, as they continually refuse to spell my name correctly.

Tuesday night marks the beginning of another season of Workout on the Bravo channel. My friend (who happens to have cable) and I plan on getting together in sweatpants to throw back some chips and beer and watch the over dramatic gym employees interact with one another.

In two weeks I begin a Saturday graduate grammar class. I'm not sure which is more disturbing: the fact that I have to surrender six of my Saturdays between March 31 and May 19, or the fact that I'm looking forward to spending six hours each of those Saturdays drawing tree diagrams and comparing descriptive and prescriptive grammars.

I need a talent to perform at a TESOL talent show being held Friday evening. Right now all I've got is singing Kermit the Frog's "The Rainbow Connection" while a Japanese classmate accompanies me on her ukulele.

Finally, the semi-warm weather is supposed to return later this week. The weather people are calling for 68 degrees on Thursday. The short shorts cometh!

Play nicely with each other.

Oppressive Heat and Automated Electric Companies

2006-07-31T21:13:00.000-04:00

It's so hot, even the backs of my kneecaps are sweating.

Today was one of those days that comes with a check list of things to do. For the most part I was successful in accomplishing everything on my list: I shaved manually; finished and turned in grades; went to the dentist to get my permanent crown; returned to the university to change my mailing address and direct deposit information; had a blueberry doughnut; picked up the keys to my new apartment; took some measurements of my new place to see how many of my belongings can fit; called the electric company no fewer than eleven times in order to have the utility switched over to my name, only to be greeted every time by an automated voice telling me that all operators are currently busy and to please try again later; ate dinner; and made a pathetic game plan to get me through this week of moving and transitions.

Tomorrow I begin the process of moving in by purchasing renter's insurance from our local agent and then taking the "bare essentials" to the apartment -- items belonging to the kitchen and bathroom -- as well as a few random boxes. The rest will follow in some sort of disorganized fashion. I've got a decent view of an alley and the backs of several of Main Street's old, historic buildings. I'm also only half a block from the river. I like it; it gives me the illusion of big city life. My goal is to be entirely moved in by Saturday afternoon... maybe sooner if I can round up enough people and vehicles to move the bed, couch, dresser, and other more difficult items. I'll be sure to post pictures once I'm established.

Now I'm going to close this muggy day of perspiration by retiring to my air conditioned bedroom with a good book and a White Russian, thankful for the inovation of climate control, and even slightly appreciative of weather I presently despise, but will yearn for come January.

If we are to eat, we must first be eaten

2006-07-24T08:00:00.000-04:00

"Will you let me be your servant..."

As I was drying off after showering, I noticed an irregularly shaped, bulbous mole on my right thigh. Just above my knee was this dark brown bump that, after running my finger over it, seemed to actually be more of a scab than a cancerous mole. However, after picking at the scab (like I do to most scabs I encounter... both my own and others') I discovered that it was not dead skin at all. It was, in fact, a TICK!

I took a very short walk through some very cut-back woods yesterday with Maria and friends, was wearing pants, and even had tick repellent spray on my exposed feet, so I was very surprised to find this tag along tapping into my blood supply. I was also slightly concerned, considering that if the tick was from the woods, I had been playing host to its feasting for some sixteen hours. Eeep. However, I put on shorts when I got home last night, and it seems like I would have noticed this thing when I got undressed last night. But if it didn't come from the woods, how else did I get "ticked" when I went straight into the house upon my return home? I didn't even take a stroll through the vegetable patch or anything.

It's been a puzzling and humbling experience all the same.

Me Undermining Higher Education?

2006-01-20T08:20:00.000-05:00

I'M A TEACHER!

An adjunct instructor of ESL, actually!

Oh Daddy, it's so surreal.

Good News Confirmed... (no, the rapture didn't happen)

2006-01-19T08:14:00.000-05:00

It's official: I DO have good news to share! Whee!

News?

2006-01-13T10:33:00.000-05:00

I may have exciting news to share in the very near future...

Everyone cross your fingers and think of pleasant things like cheesecake and manatees.

Glimpses of the Emerald Isle

2005-11-23T13:01:00.000-05:00

Following are a few pictures from my excursion across the pond. I've only included six of my 470-something digital pictures to save time and space. If you'd like to see more, come to my house for a weekend and we'll eat and discuss. Another entry detailing the trip and pre-Thanksgiving misadventures will follow soon. Enjoy.

Since Joel's flight arrived about an hour after ours, Lowell and I had begun to grow slightly Joel-sick. Here you see Lowell rushing to greet our long-lost companion at baggage claim.

One of the many lakes we saw while meandering through the Irish countryside. Oh Daddy, me legs have gone all-a-wobble! So beautiful.

"The Great Valley!"

Joel, Lowell and I on a cliff above one of Ireland's many secluded lakes. This lake is known by the locals as "Lake Guinness," due to its especially dark water, coupled with the frothy, shallow water near the sandy shore. We should have made the 400+ foot dive into the lake to "test" the brew.

If only I had grown up in a church like that... during the early 1700s... surrounded by underaffectionate monks... oh hum.

The great Zen master, Father Koerner, engaging in deep meditation from on high. (With the glare in his eyes, he looks slightly evil.)

...and they're off!

2005-11-11T15:06:00.000-05:00

Wow, where did the time go? Ummm... I'm kind of leaving for Ireland...right now actually. Sorry for the lack of posting. I'll fill everyone in when I get back in about a week and a half. Take care and eat some cheese!

Cheers!

I think I'm losing my TIME!

2005-11-06T13:15:00.000-05:00

I have wanted to blog for nearly a week now, but every time I sit down at the computer some greater power (often the Pizza Gods) prevents me from writing a post. Why should today be any different? Just as I was finish'n me lunch, mentally outlining my blog post, the phone rings and I'm being called into work two hours early. Uhg.

But fret not, faithful readers, I have a day off tomorrow. Somewhere in between a friend's birthday party, shopping/pre-packing for Ireland, hopefully meeting with Joel and Lowell to iron out last minute traveling wrinkles, and making several potentially important phone calls, I am determined to purge the contents of my mind onto this webpage. Fare thee well!

P.S. I had to check my calendar twice to believe it was Sunday... sure looks like a Windsday to me.

Denny's, Catholics, and The Red Cross

2005-10-24T16:17:00.000-04:00

A glimpse into the past weekend:

On Friday I worked a busy afternoon shift that included an enormous delivery to a local nursing home -- I suspect they were trying to kill off some of the patients with all the grease that comes with twelve pizzas. The bill came to $98 and some odd change. The guy pays me with a $100 bill and says "keep the change." My eyes nearly bugged out when he said this, and it took all of the restraint I had been forced to learn during Capstone (which was a lot considering some of the "characters" we had in that class) to keep from asking the man where my tip was. I usually get a dollar tip when I deliver a $10 or $20 order, but for a $100 order I expected a bit more. Heck, the starving ER doctors usually give me at least $5 for their $30 orders. Oh well, I ought to be thankful I got anything, considering how tight so many people around here are.

Friday night I drove to Findlay and met everyone's friend Erin Miller for dinner at Denny's. We got to chat and "catch up" over some great diner food. Mmmm... We were later joined by my buddy Joel and our mutual friend Laura Schlabaugh (sp?). Finally, the candle on the cake arrived when Ms. Mandella Wolke stopped in to join the gathering. Erin had to eventually leave so that she could rest before a long day of library-esque work the next day, but the remaining four of us stayed at Denny's and discussed theology until around 1:00a.m. It was great conversation, and it was good to talk with friends (who are college students) after a long week of conversations that revolved around pizza production and Kenton gossip. After bidding farewell to my Bluffton friends, I stopped by one of Findlay's pubs to rescue an intoxicated friend from a boring group of people and get her tucked into bed. I then drove back to Kenton and Cherry Street to find my faithful, friendly bed waiting to receive me.

Saturday I woke around 11 and went for a walk before showering and preparing for my cousing Adam's wedding. Adam is one of the few relatives I ever really hung out with much as a child, and we spent a significant portion of our childhood racing our bikes, burning G.I. Joe men tied to popcicle sticks in the sandbox, and jumping on the trampolene while thinking of how we could write revisions of folktales and Disney movies. So I was really looking forward to seeing Adam again and getting to meet the young lady he had chosen to marry. Then only thing that made me slightly fearful/anxious was that Adam's wedding was a very CATHOLIC wedding (terrifying words to we Protestants who are used to 40 minute weddings). Well, the service went very well, without clear signs of any Protestant faux pas... that is, until the recitation of The Lord's Prayer. As we were saying the words out loud, I kept thinking in my mind: "Now they do something different with this...but what could it be?" And right when I got done saying those words in my mind, the Catholics (and some of the more knowledgeable Protestants) stopped speaking after "... but deliver us from evil." However, I, along with several others in the church, continued with "for Thine is the --" stopping abruptly and turning rather red. I stood frozen with my lips clamped tightly together watching several Catholic shoulders rise and fall in suppressed giggles. It was quite amusing. But the wedding music was very beautiful -- I'm tempted to start attending mass once a week in order to treat my ears to the soloists' angelic voices. Oh daddy.

Anyway, that was the wedding. I got to speak with Adam at the reception and found out that they bought a house only a couple blocks from my parents' house. I told him he had a week to enjoy the Mrs., and then I would be stopping by regularly... probably at meal times.

Sunday was a day of pajama lounging, pleasure reading, laundry doing, and pizza delivering.

Today, my first day off in a week, has consisted of relaxing in my bath robe with a hot cup of tea while watching old reruns of Daria and Nightcourt -- what a great combination, eh? I also forced myself into the shower and then went to the local Moose Lodge to donate blood at the Red Cross' bloodmobile. It was pretty uneventful, except that I did get to hear a male nurse jokingly badger an old Amish woman for filling her bag too quickly. I may have just been goofy from the blood loss, but I found it hard not to laugh when I heard him say: "Mattie, you're going too fast. You're wearing me out, Mattie, you bad, bad girl."

They gave us free coney dogs afterwards. They were warm and delicious.

Squeaky cheese, public urination, and 14 hours of pizza

2005-10-15T15:50:00.000-04:00

I'm hoooooooome!

The autumn weather is next to perfect today and I want to take a walk before going to work, but I will make a quick post to update yalls on my most recent journey.

On Wednesday Joel and I left Bluffton around 2:30 on our sorjourn to Iowa (Joel's little brother had a cross-country competition of some kind). The trip there was pretty uneventful, although Joel nearly went the entire 500 miles without having to bring the van to a complete stop; he was determined to conserve as much gas as he could by not stopping the vehicle. We finally had to stop to pay a toll, wait for an acident to be cleared, and to get refill the gas tank somewhere in Iowa. We arrived at the Koerner homestead around 9p.m. Iowa time (not to be confused with Louisville time), and I crashed around 10:30, sleeping until 8:30 the next morning.

Thursday I explored some of Joel's town on foot while he did some visiting with relatives, and then his mom made us a great homemade meal for lunch. Mmmm... fresh mashed potatoes... mmm... Later that afternoon I went to the Kalona Cheese factory and bought some cheese curds (a.k.a. "squeaky cheese"), something I have made a point to buy everytime I'm in the area, and then Joel took me to meet a 99-year-old woman who is both a friend of the Koerner family, and is also Lynda Nyce's grandmother! She had me sign her guestbook and then had to dismiss herself, as she had two meetings to be getting to. I love that a 99-year-old lady has a busier agenda than I do! Ha-hyuck! We then went to watch the brother Koerner run, then we drove back to the Koerner house and prepared to depart for Ohio.

After getting through Chicago, a somewhat fatigued Joel pulled over somewhere in northwest Indiana to switch drivers. I needed to make water, so I had him pull up to a Taco Bell. The dinning room was closed, and all the other businesses around seemed closed as well. We didn't want to waste a lot of time driving around looking for a toilet, and I really needed to potty, so I waddled my Dutch self over to a group of pine trees that stood behind the Taco Bell drive thru menu board and did my business. The only bad thing was that after I was finished I realized that I was clearly visible from the opposite side of the drive thru...so a couple customers may have gotten a free show. Oh well, I would have been turned on by seeing me peeing, I'm sure they were too.

The rest of the drive home was great. I was growing more tired by the hour, but to stay awake I put in Joel's John Denver CD and sang "Country Roads," only changing "West Virginia, mountain mamma," to "Ooooohio, flat a## mamma." Yes, that was as creative as I could get at 2a.m. Joel and I also had some slightly disjointed conversation whenever I would wake him up to keep me awake. After dropping him off in Bluffton, I got home to my bed around 4:30a.m. and then had to get up at 10 for work. I was supposed to work 11 - 4, but because a driver quit, they asked if I would work an open to close (11a.m. - 1a.m.) I still don't know why I agreed to it, but I ended up working a 14 hour shift at Pizza Hut yesterday running on about 5 hours of sleep. It was painful to say the least, but I made about $60 in tips, so that helped. After work I bought some Pepsi to help me finish off some rum, went home, crawled in bed with my drinking glass, and slipped into one of the best sleeps of my life. *refreshing sigh*

Today found me rolling approximately $30 in coins, visiting the bank, and stuffing the last of the bell peppers from my garden. I now leave to walk before another -- much shorter -- shift at the Hut. Overall, it's been a good week. Friends, road trips, food from the garden, and urinating on a Taco Bell... life is good.

Peace.

Tour de Midwest

2005-10-12T01:35:00.000-04:00

What an interesting and exciting time the past several days have afforded me. To avoid repeating too much of Maweeah's Blog, I'll just offer a quick recap of my weekend. Last Friday I rose with the sun to practice a bit before my 9:30 piano lesson. After a fairly successful time of working with my teacher on the left hand fingering of "Be Thou My Vision" I returned home to ready myself for a fun-filled afternoon of Pizza Slutting. The cold, gray weather seemed to have affected the masses' appetites, as we were dead for a Friday lunch shift. I had three deliveries and made a whopping $2 in tips. Wee. I escaped the Hut around 5 and returned home where I laundered and ate while preparing for my trip to the land of blue grass and KFC with Joel to visit our good friend Maria Blough (bcblomea to some of you). I met Joel in Bluffton around midnight-ish, and we caught a few hours of shut eye before heading out for Kentucky around 7 Saturday morning.

We made excellent (yes Maria, I do say that a lot) time and completely avoided ANY road construction! As Maria stated, we had a great weekend full of delicious ethnic food, great theatrical entertainment, and enjoyable company. It was a great chance to visit with both Maria and Joel, as well as add a new state to my list -- yes, I had never been to Kentucky before, ha-hyuck! Louisville seems to be an amazing city, from what I was able to see of it. If no major opportunities arise in my life, perhaps I'll have to put some thought into getting to know the city a bit better by spending more time there...like Maria's one housemate continuously suggested :) Maybe she's onto something.

Sadly, we had to bid farewell to the Blah Monday morning when the time of our parting arrived. I am kicking myself for not stealing a couch cushion or ever climbing into the reading nook, but oh well. On the way home Joel and I stopped in Florence, Kentucky (who's water tower displays "Florence, y'alls") to dine at a Kentucky Fried Chicken. We were sad to find the Colonel not working that day. We then got back to Bluffton around 3 in the afternoon and ate, watched recorded episodes of Simpsons and Family Guy, and had an enjoyable somewhat-deep, semi-philosophical conversation that lasted an hour or three. It reminded me of why, and how much, I enjoyed having a roommate.

Upon arising this morning (Tuesday) I gathered my things and was about to leave for Kenton when Joel asked if I would be interested in riding with him to Iowa tomorrow. I think his brother is running in some cross-country race or something on Thursday, and since it is very easy for me to trade shifts at work, I was able to get someone to work my Thursday shift by closing tonight. So tomorrow afternoon we're driving to Iowa, we'll arrive sometime around 9 or 10pm, spend thursday eating squeaky cheese and watching little Koerner run, then leave Iowa Thursday night and drive all through the night to be back to Ohio in time for Joel to attend class and for me to go to work. I'm looking forward to the trip, and the spontaneity of it all makes me feel young and invincible. But anyway, it amuses me that between Monday noon and Wednesday 9pm I will have been in Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa, and will have crossed both the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. Have free time, will travel.

Oh, one more thing. Before heading to Iowa tomorrow, I will first be stopping in Findlay to accompany my friend Chani to her sentancing for her D.U.I. conviction. She wants me to erupt into a fit of hysteria when the judge bangs the gavel, screaming "Oh God, no!" inbetween sobs. We'll see if I'm able to summon tears at 8:30a.m. though. Oh well. I must now retire, seeing how I'm due in court in six hours.

Later.

In the beginning...

2005-10-04T16:59:00.000-04:00

After much pressure from a few individuals I have done the impossible and carved out my own little niche in the world wide web. Here you will find my observations of and rants about the world around me. Also, a recurring item of discussion will be my inability to overcome the indecision that has plagued my life of late. In the posts to come you will get to read of my struggles to discern what I can, want to, and need to do now that I am graduated from college. There will also be potentially humorous anecdotes shared from my life as a post-college pizza delivery boy in a small, Midwestern redneck town. Finally, as the title of my blog might suggest, one can plan on encountering some degree of narcissism and pro-Netherlands propoganda while navigating this site. AAAHHH Motherland!

Happy reading. Cheers!