The Santa Monica Tales

A while ago I had to write an essay that was 1,500 words based on the General Prologue of the Canterbury Tales.

I think it turned out pretty well.

Read The Santa Monica Tales

Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall

So today I went so a someone’s house for a Shalom meeting. I had never been there before, and Google Maps was still acting up, so I was a little hesitant.

When I told my mom, she offered to drive. When I showed her where the place was, she all but withdrew her offer. She told me “maybe” and that she’d let me know a little bit before.

So fast forward to the night of. It’s six-thirty and the bus I would need to take (were I to need to take a bus) would leave at six-fifty. I call my mom and she says that because it’s dark, it’s raining really hard, and she didn’t know the area, that she’d be unable to drive me.

So, thirty minutes later, I find myself walking alone, through the dark, under heavy wind and rain, in an area I’d never been before, on my way to a house that was as far away from the nearest bus stop as possible.

You know how some parents tell their kids that if you’re ever drunk (or something) to just call them and they’d come and pick you up no matter where you were?
Apparently I don’t have those kind of parents.

… And to all a good night.

Watching Love Actually by myself and eating sushi and ice cream.
Could be worse.

Merry Christmas everyone!

When it rains it pours

Another bad day today.

Forever Day

This song is currently 21st on the Canadian iTunes charts. It’s already beating songs by Adele, Rhianna, and Snoop Dogg. The money it makes between 18th (today) and Christmas is going to World Vision so let’s try to push it to number 1.

Buy the song at: http://dft.ba/-foreveryours

Christmas Party

Today? Today was great.

Book Update

Here’s a picture of the books I bought since the last time I showed you the books I bought.

In the top left is a book in the Bunny Suicide series, Dawn of the Bunny Suicides. Really funny, really dark.

In the top right is How NOT to Write a Novel. Now, the key thing about this book is that it’s funny and has funny examples. Examples of topics covered are “Hello! I Am the Mommy!” – Where characters announce things they wouldn’t, “Revenge Is a Dish Best Served in Public“- Where the author has failed to move on, and “Love Me, Love My Cat” – Wherein there is a cat. To be honest I haven’t read much of it yet, but what I have read is pretty good.

In the bottom left is The History of the World According to Facebook. Also a funny book. It’s formatted like a bunch of status updates or someones ‘Wall’.

In the bottom right is World War Z. I found The Zombie Survival Guide pretty interesting, so I decided to buy this as well. It’s a book of interviews with people who survived the zombie apocalypse which is already over by the time the book takes place. It was pretty good. I hear they’re making a movie about it.

Woodworked Biplanes

In grade eight, before we got to choose our electives, we did a sort of trial run on each of the three options, each option taking a third of the year. One third was Info Tech, one third was Cooking/Sewing, and one third was Woodworking.

In woodworking the main project was making a small biplane (above). The teacher was very specific in how it was supposed to be made.For example, to make the propeller we were supposed to cut the whole shape out using a fretsaw, and not use the big sanding machine. What I did was use the fretsaw to make the general shape, and touched it up with the sandpaper machine. It was obvious from the way the wood looked that I had used a sander.

Also, while the fuselage is a single solid piece of wood, there is a little notch to glue in the bottom of the bottom wing and the glued on wheel module. It’s hard to tell from the picture, but it doesn’t fit all the way in; there is a small but visible gap between the wing and the fuselage.

On top of that there are some pencil marks that didn’t get erased before the glaze went on, the bumps where there was too much glaze, little tiny white spots where I tried to sand the extra glaze globs down, and the wheels don’t spin as well as they should.

I remember when I handed it in.

The teacher examined it, turning it over in his hand.
He ran his fingers along the flat top of the wing.
He spun the propeller. He spun the wheels.

He held my plane up in the air, for all the class to see. “This,” he began, “is what the plane is supposed to look like.”

He handed me back the plane and the only thought running through my head was “Seriously?”

A couple days later I saw my younger cousin playing with the plane, and when I asked her to be careful, she dropped it, snapping the propeller.

Karma, I think. Balance.

Boredom

I am bored.
I am bored.
I’m bored. I’m bored. I’m bored. I’m bored.

Holiday Apathy has set in early, it seems. All I did on Wednesday was walk to the 7-11 and buy some bags of Doritos and play video games. All I did on Thursday was hand in an English essay and play video games.

All I’m doing today is writing an English final (done) and go to Shalom. And I’ve got a huge chunk of time in between where I will be either saving Gotham City from the Joker, eating Doritos, or listening to Lovecraft themed Christmas carols. And unfortunately the rest of my winter break looks nearly identical.

I’ve noticed that procrastination is only fun if there’s something ELSE you’re supposed to be doing. The shows on TV are on their winter hiatus, I’ve watched all the DVDs I bought, and I’ve got some blog posts in the pipe but can’t bring myself to actually write them.

And come to think of it, Gotham City is already safe, so unless Batman suddenly develops an obsessive compulsive need to collect every single one of the 400 little trophies, then that well has run dry too.

I guess I’m just waiting for something to happen. Something cool. Something different.

/FirstWorldProblems