DUDE! We will turn TWENTY this year! TWENTY! Do you know what that means??? TWENTY is two fucking decades. TWO DECADES!!! I must admit that arbitrary momuments of time are stupid to mean, but 20 is a glaring exception. For some strange reason I have this vivid memory of my aunt anne talking to me when I was nine about turning 10 and being a decade old. Soon enough I'll be two decades old. Wow! I had low expectations for 2004 and it delivered those low expectations beautifully. So for 2005 I expect good things. I doubt these good things will happen, but I do feel much better this New Years than last. So we shall raise our non-alcoholic beverages to what was in 2004, what will be in 2005, and that whole turning 20 thing.

A quick anecdote loosely related to age:
I was watching a clip show about things that happened in 2004 and there some excerpt from a local news show. The off-camera interviewer asked what looked to be an older military vet how old he was.
"I'm 84 years old," the stiffly standing vet answers.
The young-voiced interviewer adds, "84 years young may be a better answerr..."
The vet retorts, "SCREW YOU!!!!," before the interviewer could finish his summation.

Let us spend the moment recapping this past year and look forward (hesitantly) to next year.

This year started off with a month of nothingness. I had just moved home from Iowa and I did nothing for about a year. Accomplishments of this year in order of importance: started surfing again; applied to schools (success yet to be determined); first and second real jobs; for a very short time I reached the peak of my existence thus far; running; good-enough grades; changed my major to my actual major; asserted myself (only to be denied). Goals for next year: ASSERT MYSELF WIHOUT GETTING REJECTED; get into a/the school; figure out school (summer or not); get a better job; stop paralysis by over-analysis; more surfing.

cheers.

I need to stop vomiting all my emotions, thoughts and ideas onto this blog. I write things on here and they exist outside myself and that gives me some sort of comfort. But that is so very unhealthy. I need a better outlet. Correction: I need something far greater than an outlet. I shouldn't pent anything up, well I shouldn't pent everything up. There is so much angst in such a regular-sized young man, and it's rather overwhelming at times. I need to fix this.

When I first come into people's lives I come off rather bland, rather 'typical white guy', rather uremarkable (note: I'm not remarkable by any stretch. It's just the I'm unremarkable in a much different way than people first think). People have no clue about the madness that's swimming inside my head while I speak to them. They know nothing about me, except for surfing and other random things. I want that to stop. I want someone to meet me and think 'hey he's a little insane, that's cool'! I have no idea how I'm going to pull this off. But the first step has got to be showing emotion. I'm so bloodless 99.9% of the time. I have probably known you for a year or more and I doubt you can think of an example when I was REALLY happy or REALLY sad. My internalization of EVERY DAMN THOUGHT OR EMOTION THAT MIGHT MAKE SOMEONE UNCOMFORTABLE NEEDS TO STOP!!!! Fuck people. If they're uncomfortable they deserve to be uncomfortable. I'm not going to be rude, but I'm not going to be this gray, emotionless guy anymore. I am rejecting the cold comfort of the middle and embracing passionate extremes.

This is mostly bullshit, and I know you know it. Fact is that I'm rather gray on the outside. I don't like the idea of revealing too much about myself to someone I don't know. I feel very uncomfortable with making others uncomfortable. I have as many opinions as the next guy but I don't see why the next guy should know what my opinions are. That being said, I think I could definitely ease up a bit. I need to shift as much as possible. It may be bending my disposition, but dispositions need to be bent sometimes. I still haven't figured it out yet, but I will.

"Hi."
"hi."
"So how are you?"
"I'm ____. How are you?"
"I'm ____. Sorry about not calling you."
"(To be determined)"
goodbye

I just started Neither Here Nor There by the magnificent author/thinker/linguist/man--Bill Bryson (thanks!!! :O)). And just a few pages in I wanted to get in my car, drive to the airport and fly to europe. If I couldn't get a ticket I planned to hijack a plane. I realized this was neither practical nor possible. Thus began the rapid thought process of how to get to Europe.

Unlike most everyone I know I have never been to Europe. I don't even have a fucking passport. When foreigners talk about those selfish, single-minded, anti-progressive, no-passport-holdin', mcdonalds lovin', gas-guzzlin', beer-chuggin', non-readin', good-for-nothing Americans I feel they're talking about me (only because of the passport thing). So, yes, I am sheltered as far as tanglible travel is concerned. I've been to Alaska, Canada (for about a day), and Mexico. That's pretty much excepting several jaunts through the continental 48. I REALLY want to correct this. I would love to go anywhere, and for SO many reasons Europe is where I'd like to go first.

How/When do I correct this? The most obvious solution would be study abroad. Unfortunately, being a transfer student severely limits one's options. Obviously I can't do the standard junior year abroad scenario, because I would be spending my first real semester as a Universit student in another country. Perhaps I could do a semester quarter abroad, but I would be losing 25% of my real college experience off campus. That's fine and everything, but I REALLY WANT to feel like I went to college at A SPECIFIC place, not just a series of stops on the way to a degree. A summer session abroad wouldn't mitigate my college experience. Summer sessions require money I don't necessarily need to spend, and they don't provide the same feel of a regular session. Summer abroad programs are definitely a possibility for the 2006 summer, but, when I really think about it, even a year abroad wouldn't give me enough of Europe.

The only real solution I see is a long term European experience, Neither here nor there-style. Perhaps I could do this in addition to a summer trip to Europe in '06, either academic or just travelling. In fact a summer '06 trip would be a great way to familiarize myself with Europe. In other words it'll give me a sip of Europe's majesty so I know what to expect for the later gulp. But the long term European adventure, the gulp, is what I really need. I want to go everywhere, see most things, meet every type, drink everything, try many things and climb everything I can see. There are so many places and so many beautiful experiences to be had that I NEED to be in Europe for at least half a year. A year or two is probably a better estimation of the time necessary to achieve my ultimate European experience. So that's the 'how I go to/experience Europe'; now I need to figure out when to this.

By far the most obvious time to do this would be right after graduation. This is my ideal time to go, but I think there will be some logistical problems with this time. I'll probably have ZERO money after 2 years of paying my way. Well, that's a lie. I'll probably be in BIG TIME debt after graduation. But as I type this I realize who the fuck cares about money. Fuck logistics. The plan is to go to Europe within a month or two of graduation. This will give me plenty of time to figure out what I want to do with my life. What a great detour from depressing, angst-ridden, futile posts.

I spent 50 unnecessary dollars today and the chargers lost in a heartbreaker. December 26 has sucked thus far.