The Idiot Line

So let me tell you a true story about my parking lot experience this morning. When I got out of class a few minutes early, I walked back to the OSU Med. Center parking lot where I always park in the morning. Most people don't show up till 9 so it's great for me and then I always get to make one person's lucky day by giving them a spot when I leave.

Up near the entrance, the traffic flow splits to go one way or the other and most people have little ingenuity or ability to think, let alone outside a box or other containment device that's less thick than their skull, so they stack up and just wait for a parking spot to free up. This can take forever, especially if you consider that there's very few parking spots opening up and that the smart people would roam the lot looking for the spots rather than waiting on the guy at the front of a line to see one and leave. It's impossible to describe the stupidity of this line.

Well, today as I walked into the lot, this girl started gesturing at me through her window. I was like, well, whatever, and pointed in the direction I was walking so she would know I was freeing up a spot. She rolls down her window and asks where I'm going. "Four rows down on the far end". We're talking about still a 3-4 minute walk down there on the ice. She then motions for me to come over. Thinking I could finagle a ride to my car, I walked over and then what she said shocked me, "You need to walk up to the front of that line and tell the person waiting for you to follow me so that they will get a spot and this line will move". Mind you, she's not even pulled into the line yet but I have deduced that this might truly be the biggest moron yet because she knows I'm opening up a spot and still, she's going to get into the idiot line to watch clouds float while telling me that I owe it to her to go get the guy at the front of the idiot line and take him to my spot.

My response after being dumbfounded for a moment was, "No, I'm walking over to my car". She replies, "Well, where are you parked?". I tell her again. She asks if I will lead her to my spot. "Well, will you give me a ride?". She hesitates and I gave up on her and started walking. As she rolls up her window, I left her sitting there. By the time I was in my car and pulling out of the lot she had finally found me and my spot, which was now filled by a car who had a happy driver with half a brain. Who are you that you thought you had the right to tell me what to do?

Go Bucks!

In light of "Beat Michigan Week", I will be donating blood today in support of the Buckeyes during the "blood battle". This being my first time donating blood, I'm pretty nervous. I'm scared to death of needles, so this ought to be a terrific experience for me. Topping it all off is my plan to run a race tomorrow, so hopefully my body makes a quick recovery because today I don't feel so good already.

I've included this link so that you can look up some Michigan jokes for yourself. I like this list and encourage you to read through them, but in case you don't, here's a teaser for you:

Q: How do you make U of M cookies?

A: Put them in a bowl and beat them for a few hours.

Go Bucks!

Why I love the Columbus Zoo

Amanda and I went to the Columbus Zoo on Saturday. I had previously planned with Mom to go with her, Amanda, and Jacob for my birthday and after calling Mom to tell her about how awesome the new polar bear exhibit was I realized that in all the hullabaloo that surrounded this week's crazy schedule, I had totally forgotten to figure out the zoo time with Mom. Instead, Amanda and I went alone (Dear Mom, we are still going, and once again I'm sorry I forgot.). This in itself was also good because as a newly married couple we are very short on alone time. Between her job and our school, we haven't gotten much time to do all the things we thought we'd get to do once we were married like weekends in or evening walks to enjoy the sunset. Instead we've been just taking each day at a time and supporting each other through what we call "life".

We didn't spend a whole lot of time at the zoo due to the necessity of getting back to see the Buckeyes pull off the victory over Illinois in what is always a conference struggle for OSU and then Liz, Chris and Jeremy came over to see the Spartans pull off a great and unexpected win vs. Wisconsin. I can't even believe that MSU is now 5-0, and it happened the first year that I wasn't there as a student.

As you'll be able to see from a few pictures I'm putting at the end of this blog, the new polar bear exhibit consists of a much more natural-appearing habitat for the animals. The brown bears are moved into this exhibit with a more expansive pen and a waterfall into a fish pond. The polar bear exhibit is similar but with a fun new twist. Visitors can go underwater and watch the polar bears as they swim around. Very few visits to the zoo can rival Amanda and I standing underneath the water exhibit, looking up at the polar bear swimming over us. I'm posting the picture and definitely plan to enter it in next year's county fair. I absolutely love it, and witnessing the beauty of God's creation is exactly why I love the Columbus Zoo. Thanks Amanda for going with me this Saturday! :)

Catching up

Because I’m without internet at my current location, but it’s so beautiful and cool here by Mirror Lake that I don’t want to leave, I am typing my blog now and posting it this evening.

Summary of my life this past week…

Amanda and I drove up and spent a night in Detroit, then passed over to East Lansing for an IHOP encounter and a whole day of hanging out with the Dani and her family at their tailgate. The Notre Dame/MSU game was fantastic, and stereotypically frustrating with more than enough penalties and turnovers. But this is the tradition, and we came out the victors as Amanda and I began the day of our 3-month anniversary driving back from the game. Thanks to Amanda for driving clear from Brighton to home and not falling asleep. We then went to the sheep show that night and while we were waiting for a urine sample that evening as Katherine’s Reserve Grand Champion Lamb was standing on the shearing stand, Amanda says to me “Happy 3 Months! I’m going home”. What a long day! Congratulations to both Katherine and Jacob (and Josiah) on a great fair.

County fair was in general a very hectic week, even worse than I had expected. Between classes starting, and my volunteering at Farm Science Review, and cattle clipping and our photo entries, combined with my photographer position with the fair board, there were few moments to slow down and enjoy things without feeling the urge to just fall asleep. Now that I’m at the end of the week, I’m still exhausted and struggling through the day. I’m taking a nap before my next class just to stay awake through it.

Classes have been interesting so far. My biochem class promises to be more challenging than my previous interaction with the subject but thankfully my determination to study is also doubled and I am sure I will make it through the quarter. However, I was short on any good impressions of class or my fellow students when I stumbled into class late on Wednesday morning. It took far too long for me to get across campus and I am proud to say that today I corrected my error and was 10 minutes early. Campus here is just so much bigger than I expected once you get on the ground and start walking places. The people here have been really rude and pretentious as well. I have yet to interact positively with any of my classmates who seem to think that God gave them the right to go first everywhere and take up three seats in a full classroom with their stuff piled everywhere. Give me a break.

Other than that, all is well here, and I will be spending my internet time tonight trying to update my other blog with a whole series of ag-related newsletters I’ve received since last week. Go Bucks and Spartans this weekend and try not to beat your opponents too badly, since you’re playing 2 of the worst teams in the NCAA.

Customer Service

I just want to congratulate ClicknPrint on their great service and cordial help. Being a genius, I naturally forgot what day it was when I got online to purchase tickets for the COSI Titanic exhibit (which is where we're headed this morning). I then realized my error after clicking the confirm button right beside the notification that once I sealed the deal, I couldn't get any adjustments. Freaked out at my own stupidity, I proceeded to call the service number and was told there were 3 people in line in front of me. Then it asked me if I wanted to have it call me back on my current number when it was my turn? Wait... that can't be right. You mean I don't have to listen to cheesy music for an hour while I wait for some across the meridian and equator call center to remember I exist? Nope, they called me back and then it took all of 30 seconds for the lady on the other end to edit my tickets for the proper day. And then she apologized for the delay! Delay? I hardly even noticed it. I was so impressed, especially as I compared to my recent Dell experiences.

Included today is a picture from my first game at OSU as a Buckeye! I really enjoyed the game this past Thursday and am glad to be in this state with my lovely wife and old friends.



Also included today is a link courtesy of both Scott and Jeremy via Facebook about a Nerf cannon linked to infrared and shooting speed control. Amazing!

Big Ten divisions

I'm not hugely fond of the divisions, but if this is what it takes to make OSU more BCS eligible, then I'm all for it. So in honor of Michigan and MSU playing every year, MSU and OSU not playing often, and Michigan and Ohio State playing The Game as always, I thought I'd include a few old rivalry videos from the best one in all of college football. Go Bucks and try not to kill Marshall too bad.





And then hopefully these old guys have a terrible year...

Once again this year, this was rated the Number 1 College Football Tradition!



While we're at it, who doesn't want to see that old badger get dozed over?



And then you can tell I went off on a tangent... It's no wonder he's the best mascot in America.



Alright, off for today.

I love Gordon Gee

And for today here is reason number 1. That's the spirit! We have a picture with him from the Pelotonia which will be posted as soon as I have it from Liz.


It's great to be a Columbus area native and to feel that rush every fall when football season comes around. Today, Amanda and I picked up the first 3 tickets of the season from the Schottenstein Center. I'm not going to lie. I'm stoked about having OSU tickets, but there's no way that these games can be as exciting as going to an MSU game because when OSU plays a team, their opponents nearly never have a chance of winning. However, with MSU while I was a student there we were almost always the underdogs or fighting some form of adversity. I will miss you MSU, and Shadows runs through my mind more often than I thought it would. Captain Joe, you were right. KIN is where I practiced the 2 most important things from MSU: Position A and the Shadows.

For your entertainment today I credit 2 friends for posting this on Facebook this morning. I will warn you that this is definitely potentially offensive for language (for those readers who might be offended - don't visit it) but I know there will be those who find it humorous and in today's culture there is nothing in it as shocking as what kids have to hear in elementary school.

315 Closed at Ackerman, etc.

Flavored milk - unhealthy? So says Florida schools who are removing strawberry from the school menu already this year along with soda pop in an effort to fight obesity among children. I'll agree that's a problem we should be concerned with, but is removing milk the answer?


Also, Hogweed and Poison Hemlock are spreading through C. Ohio. I have inserted a picture of the burn that Hogweed causes as well as the appearance the Poison Hemlock plant. Please read both of these articles and learn to distinguish the difference. Eliminate both plants as quickly as possible.

Driving down today to campus was my first day with the 315 route closed because yesterday I was over at the Hippology Contest all day. (Congratulations to the Delaware County Team for their 2nd Place!). So today I headed down and realized just before I got on the highway that I'd forgotten my parking pass. Great. So I turned around and headed back to get the pass. Now, when I say my pass, I really should say Amanda's pass, because she is being gracious enough to share it with me so that we can save money, which especially works well when I don't forget it. Once I had gotten the pass I had to turn around and head back south. 71 S was running pretty smooth for 8 am, but when I tried to get off Weber there was a train. Well, that's just great. Train leaves and suddenly out of nowhere there's a service truck on the tracks. Not so great. So I drive down Silver to get to Hudson cause I'm not going to keep waiting on this. And then, there is this truck trying to back into a place on Silver. Well, if you know that road at all, you know he's go no chance in getting in there easy. So we sat while he tried to back in. Eventually he got in, after holding up everyone, trying 3-4 times and taking the fence in front of him off its posts. Then I still had to get all the way to campus. All told, my trip to OSU today took me 50 minutes. Pathetic.


Facebook continues to be goofy. I can't read any of my messages and my facebook isn't updating at all. I don't know why they haven't fixed it yet, but's been 4 days and this is not cool. I'm currently watching the World Cup on Fifa's Matchcast. It's nice to have it, but it's nothing like ESPN's 360.

No news yet from Tom Izzo, except that there is no news. I'm becoming numb to it all. For better or worse, I want him to make up his mind so that we can figure out where we stand for next year's season.

What now, USC?

Pete Carroll may be "shocked", but I'm on cloud 9. I can't even believe that we could get any more justification against USC and Reggie Bush's taunts than this. And honestly, I do hope that Bush would lose his Heisman. Classy players deserve the award, and he's not one of them.

On another note, I haven't seen a website this bad in a while. Try surfing around the Westerville Parks and Rec Site. And then try looking under helpful links once you've exhausted all other hope of finding what you wanted. Helpful links? No, just a link to Census 2010. Thanks West. Parks and Rec. Thanks for wasting 20 minutes of my time trying to find a basketball league. I know I'm not great with websites, but really?

Also, I went biking yesterday - 16.5 miles - and I'm finally feeling it a bit. This whole 100 miles 2 times is going to be a bit hard. However, I'm planning on taking an easy ride today with the fixi and then a longer ride tomorrow after I'm done with livestock judging practice.