I want to start off by saying that things have been damned crazy with work, finances, and finding a place to live- then moving basically all on my own.

Work has been craptastic- the bosses can’t seem to get along, and the workers are paying the price. It’s been a long and hard summer with the conference groups that have come through. Let’s just say that ballerinas and some mission kids are a lot more pretentious and hypocritical  than they are willing to admit. I want nothing more than to put them all in a room with a single plate of food amongst them so that can kill each other for it.

Finances have been crazy: up and down, up and down; lather, rinse, repeat. I can only hope that soon I’ll get a raise at work and things will even out a little bit. That’s all I’m willing to share on that.

As for housing: I’ve fond a place in Ballard and I’m happy with it. While it is not the prettiest place I’ve ever lived in I like it and that’s all that matters.

It’s vacation time and now I’m going to get a little much needed R&R down South. I’m grabbing my longboard and hitting the flats.

No Side.

-C-

No Side.

~C.

I was once proud of my ability to just disappear from people’s lives after I’ve done them some wrong without looking back or giving it a second thought. It has unfortunately cost me many a friend. Now that I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on my life I realize that I’ve alienated myself from some of the best people who have entered my life. It can be said however that others have hurt me and I have disappeared from fear of further injury but now I am tired of letting fear and pain run my life.

I realize people that I’ve been a horrible person to you either on purpose or driven by fear. So now I will be reaching out to people who I’ve cut off from my life or who I have run away from in an attempt to reconcile the past. Just to name a few who I think I owe apologies:

Amudha Venugopalan

Greg Steel

Vanetia Cannon

There are more of you out there I am certain, I just have to remember all of you.

It was the fall quarter October to be exact. It was dark outside and the unwashed masses were besieging the mess hall. I was on duty as the “beverage runner.” This job title means you get to run around the mess hall all night restocking cups, coffee, tea, honey, plates for other stations, and generally working your ass off. Well, this particular shift wasn’t going well, there were a few dropped plates which resulted in shattered ceramic strewn about the floor which required me to drop whatever I was doing to sweep up the bits. I hate it when somebody breaks something at work because it’s obligatory that the entire mess hall go quiet then burst into applause; then one of us has to rush out and sweep up the pieces. Oh, so much fun.

On top of that we were out of chocolate milk and one particular customer of the female variety was quite unhappy. She would constantly ask me, (imagine a high nasal voice with a valley girl accent) “Excuse me sir, is there anymore chocolate milk?” Every time I’d have to reply “No miss, there is no chocolate milk,” then I’d walk off; only to be stopped a few minutes later and asked again only more obnoxiously for more chocolate milk. Finally at some point during the night she asked me again,

“Excuse me,” she paused to look at my name tag, “Chester, is there any more chocolate milk?”

“No there isn’t,” I replied.

“Then why don’t you go in the back and get another box and bring it out here; I want my chocolate milk.”

“Because miss, there is no chocolate milk and I’ve been telling you that all night.”

“Then why don’t you go down to the C-store (our campus connivence store) and get me some.”

“Because that costs money and you aren’t worth it.” I walked away. Truth be told there was another box of chocolate milk, but there was only about fifteen or twenty minutes of service time left, and the annoying girl had left. As an aside she does this about everything. Well with about five minutes left in the shift I decided to replace the chocolate milk. So I went to the back to get a box of milk. These aren’t just little gallon boxes of milk these are five (5) gallon boxes. If a gallon of milk weighs about 8.35 or so pounds so it’s safe to say that these boxes weight about forty (40) pounds, and I’m expected to replace those several times a shift; also mind this, they are ice cold in rickety plastic crates.

I jog this forty pound box out to the service floor and get ready to put it into the milk dispenser; I notice that the crate looks cracked. I don’t think much of it as I lift the crate into the dispenser  but then the milk bladder shifts and breaks through the lid of the crate. With both hands I shove the bladder and jagged edges of the broken crate back into the dispenser. I hear a quiet pop and then the next thing I know there is a wall of chocolate milk coming down on me. I got an ice cold chocolate milk bath in front of some two hundred (200) of my school mates. I was covered from chest two toe in freezing chocolate milk. Calmly I pulled the now shattered crate from the dispenser and laid it aside. I then made a bee line for the back of the house and stood shaking in the loading bay of the mess hall where my boss found me a few minutes later. She asked me if I wanted to go home early to clean up. Rather I asked for only a clean shirt. I returned to the service floor my shoes making squishing sounds my pants soaked in chocolate milk but with a clean shirt. I finished the shift and went back to the dorm.

I missed the elevator to my floor so I ended up walking up three flights of stairs to my floor and then to my room where my roommate at the time was busy playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. He looked up only long enough to tell me that I looked like shit before he returned to his game.

If you like this please let me know. If I get any interest I will continue

No Side.

CGVP

Let’s recap January…

New quarter and new classes:

University Core 3000 (Philosophy AND Theology)

Health, Wellness and Spirituality (I could do very well without the spirituality)

American History until 1877

Same old shit at Gwinn (the mess hall where I work on campus)

Emotional state: I’m unsteady

So I don’t really remember January very well since it was hazed by painkillers; what I do remember however is that I miss my friend back home. No commission s yet for Guardian Longboards. Somebody owes me a great deal of money.

February

By God I hate Valentines Day- I believe that it is nothing more than a holiday created by Hallmark to guilt men to buy their over priced greeting cards and knick-knacks. I will say though it was interesting to work the “Valentine’s Supper” at work, romantic music and comfort foods while the staff were running around in red shirts and hats.

School projects were coming out my eyes this month.

Guardian Longboards got a commission.

March

Spring Break is just around the corner, I just have to keep telling myself that. My time work hours are a blur. I’m living paycheck to paycheck and just barely able to pay the rent. I’m writing a paper basically everyday and reading a chapter every night. The group project still isn’t done by the last week of the quarter. The last two weeks are going to be hell, I just know it.

SPRING BREAK

I made it more or less intact. Onward to Castle Rock, Colorado; my folks new home and “home” for me. I will say though that home will ALWAYS be in Texas. I got to see my little cousins, my aunt, and my grandma; I’ve missed them a great deal.

I’m working on the template for the “Kitty Board” that I was commissioned to build at the beginning of the month.

Spring break is a day away from over and I actually can’t wait to be back in Seattle ( I never thought I’d hear myself say that.)

Lately I’ve been bouncing between lonely and tired while it is nice to be “home” it still doesn’t feel like Home to me. Maybe something good will come down the pipes for me this quarter, who knows?

No Side.

C.

1. Pull myself back together

Long story short the end of a relationship saw me falling to pieces. Accomplished

2. Finish writing a book

I had three unfinished projects at the time and I decided that at least one of them had to be finished. Accomplished, as a matter of fact I finished two of them and started two more.

3. Find a new hobby

I need ways to keep myself occupied other than video games and I decided it was time for me to find a new one. Accomplished , I founded Guardian Longboards after deciding to design and build longboards.

4. Find a new look

Yes, a new look. People have known me and my mustache forever so I wanted to find something new to do. Failed, I tried a soul patch, growing out my hair, trimmed down my mustache, and lost some weight. I wasn’t happy with any of it (except for the lost weight). Maybe I really accomplished it, I don’t know.

5. Find someone new

I wanted to find someone new to be in my life. Failed, no excuses here.

6. Get into the school of education

I wanted to get into the school of education at SPU and officially change my major from Business to Education. Accomplished

7. Get published

I was working with an agent for several months and I was hoping it would go somewhere. Failed I worked with the agent for seven months only to be dropped without any notice.

All in all I think I did well in 2009 but I still think I could’ve done better.

–So for 2010 I have decided to attempt my failed resolutions again and add a few more.

1. Find somebody

I wasn’t actively looking in 09, but now in 2010 I’m going to put serious effort into the gal I find myself so stricken with. She knows it too, but there are a couple things we both fear: distance (some 2000 miles) and somehow hurting the other. I only hope there is a way to quell our mutual fears. Accomplished

2. Loose a little more weight

So I lost some weight this year but it wasn’t in a healthy way: I wasn’t eating whether it was stress or the lack of time I wasn’t eating and I lost about 12 pounds in the first 6 weeks of the first quarter of this school year. I have since regained five of those in order to stay healthy. I am determined to loose weight healthily this year and keep it off.

3. Finish another book

Now instead of only three projects I find myself with seven, yes seven books, “projects” as I call them that remain unfinished. I am driven to finish at least one of them this year.

4. Be a better person

Yes I know, what exactly does that mean? Well this year I was called a lot of things that I’d rather not repeat so I’m going to really pour on the “good guy” charm.

5. Make a little more money

Good joke huh considering I work in a mess hall and plan to be a teacher? Well, I’m hoping that I can find a way to this year.

6. Make peace with myself

I present a fairly calm and collected face to the general populace but if you’ve ever seen me when I think nobody is watching I become my own worst enemy. I look at myself and I can’t stand what I see because of what I blame myself with. I don’t know how I’m going to do it but I’ve got to do it.

7. Take better care of myself

Something I am famous or rather infamous for is my mantra, “I take better care of others than I’ll ever take care of myself.” Well, I can think of at least one person who will be happy to hear that I’m going to try and balance the scales on that. I said I’d do it once before but then my reason for doing so up and left me, and as the saying goes the rest is history. I’d get injured and just shake it off and keep going. I had myself checked out over the Christmas break and to say the least my Dr. wasn’t happy with me.

Well on that note, I wish you a Happy New Year and I hope 2010 treats you well. Feel free to criticize me or leave your own input, I encourage it.

No Side.

C.

I told a longtime friend yesterday how I’ve felt about her for the past year. It was difficult and awkward but I felt it had to be done. I just hope that things don’t fall apart. Hopefully something will come of this; however I know myself and I don’t have faith for the situation. Who knows I just might be pleasantly surprised.

To Be Continued.

C.

School has been hectic and interesting. Somehow I’ve been finding a way to sleep, study, work, and build longboards all while grading papers, and making lesson plans.

It’s the end of the month and I’m so tired, I can’t wait to see my family again back in Dallas. I feel awkward for some reason and I can’t seem to shake it off.

No Side.

C.

Well for starters, I’m in what has been called “The Crash Quarter” by many a student of the School of Education here at SPU. At first blush it doesn’t seem to be much; three classes for eight credits total. Scratch the surface and then you realize just what the hell is going on; Introduction to Education, The Psychology of Education, and Diversity in the Classroom. At face value they seem to be fairly harmless classes until you start the work. 20 hours in classroom teaching accompanied by several papers and lesson plan assignments for Intro to Education. A 20 page psychology paper on my “teaching psychology” for Psych of Education and three “diversity assignments” that require me to go in costume into the public and consider their reactions and reflect on them. Top it all off with a Sociology course with five presentations and you have my quarter in a nutshell.

On a happier note I finally have the money saved up to ship my summer projects up to myself here in Seattle. I’m looking forward to it!

I thought I’d prepared myself for what would come ahead when one of my roommates told me that his girlfriend would be coming around for the weekend; well she’s here and I realized that I wasn’t prepared. I want to leave but I have nowhere to go currently.

No Side.

C.

When I arrived in Seattle it was a calm and cool day, overcast with some slight fog. It felt good to be back. Thanks to a friend I was brought “home” that is to the triplex he and another friend of mine share. It is strange to be living off campus, liberating at the same time however.

It has taken me over three weeks to get settled into my room here. During the first two weeks of that time I was working 13 0r 14 hour days in the campus mess hall to train little “Gwinnlings”, my word for the new trainees, to have them as ready as we could for the first day of class. It was a nightmare but well worth it; I am proud of my Gwinnlings.

The first week of class has been a bit rough, I will say that I am scared of what will happen. Wish me luck.

No Side.

C.