Skiing!

Today we went to Ober Gatlinburg, which is, I think, the only skiing place in this area. It was pretty nice, but we haven't been out west so I hear that I don't really know what nice is. It has been a year since I last skied, which was my first time in NC. I think I like Gatlinburg better. Although it might be since I was a whole lot better here than I was on our last trip. I went down all the blues and one of the two black diamonds. It was really really fun. I wish sometimes that Alabama had some good skiing places, then I would ski all the time. That would mean Alabama would have to be colder though, and I wouldn't like that very much. I think I pretty much like where I live, really I would almost like it better if it was warmer. So I don't want to live near a skiing place I guess. Maybe something closer to the beach.

Posting From Gatlinburg..Berg...whatever

Ok so here I am in Gatlinburg(that's how I'll spell it) in this nice hotel called the Inn at Christmas Place. Yes you heard it right. It is all Christmas all the time here. It can be good or bad...depending on how much you love Christmas trees, Christmas smells, Christmas decor, and Christmas pictures. Regardless of whether you love or hate Christmas, there is a definite advantage of staying at a hotel that focuses solely on one season...freakishly low rates. For some reason, it seems that a lot of people don't like staying at hotels that scream CHRISTMAS in the great month of March. Who would have thought?

Anyway, we have a great schedule planned. We are going skiing tomorrow! Then we are going to a water park the next day. It's the first trip I've ever been on where I had to pack jackets and swimsuits. There's a lot to do here. You can go to the MAGIC place 2 places down from our hotel. It is very strange...people walk around in capes and hats and look like they're from a Harry Potter movie...or a cult...I'm not sure yet. G wants to go to this place badly. I think it's a trap. It looks happy and fun on the outside but I have seen glimpses of the inside. I think they secretly teach people witchcraft or something :P

Then you can go to the Applewood Grill, which is where we ate tonight. It is a wonderful place where all their recipes revolve around apples. If it doesn't actually have apple in it, it's apple flavored. Amazing stuff. However great confusion revolves around this place, for you see there is another store called The Applewood Barn. They are sort of related but the Applewood Barn is a family style restaurant , whereas the Applewood Grill is an individual plate style restaurant. Very complicated. Made more so by the fact they are right next to each other.

Moving on...I found out there are psychics in Gatlinburg as well. Unfortunately they don't appear to be the cool kind that work for police stations as "consultants" I think they are mostly old weird ladies that have poorly kept up storefronts in strip malls. Oh well, so much for that.

There are a lot of weird stores here. There's about a million AS SEEN ON TV stores, but oddly, they mostly have Confederate flags and 2 for 5 dollar t-shirts. I've never seen those on TV. Although they do have snuggies there. I am still not getting those things. I know I know they are blankets with sleeves, but do they have backs? No! So then they are really like the gowns they give you at doctor's offices, and who would want to wear those around the house?

There is also this huuuuuuggeeee knife store here. It's amazingly big. They say it's the biggest knife store in the world. I don't really believe them though, there has to be bigger ones, say in the former Soviet Union, mixed in with the guns, and nukes and such. Maybe it's just the biggest LEGAL knife store in the world. Or the biggest knife store whose owners don't work for the Mafia. Who knows?

Moving on again...Man I'm tired, I don't write very well when I'm tired. I'm looking around my room. There are lots of Christmas ornaments on the walls. I count two wreaths, two reindeer, a holly looking thing, and an assortment of bows on everything. Lots of Christmas...all the time...

Ok I guess I better go to bed,

I'll try to post about cool things,

less about the knife store.

For the sake of having a new post...

I can't believe it! I broke 14 seconds on 25 freestyle yesterday! My time is now 13.9 seconds. Aaron and I both broke it at the same time, both getting 13.9. I also got 16 seconds on my butterfly!

hahahahahhahahaha I'm thrilled, but this will mean nothing to anyone who reads my blog...but at least I have a post.

And so the membership ends...

I'm pretty sure I have posted on the fact that about a month ago I purchased an Xbox360. It is a wonderful thing with many great games and fun features, but therein lies the trap. The majority of the great and wonderful features come with the GOLD MEMBERSHIP. For you non Xbox players, a gold membership is rather like a magizine subscription you can either pay monthly, or yearly to use Gold's features( Online gaming, etc.) I (like many others) bought an Xbox thinking that even when I didn't have Gold I could still be happy. I hear Microsoft laughing now. Cruel, evil laughs of "we have him now." You see my friends, I made the mistake, the ever so small one, of play halo online with Co. Now my gaming life is changed, I MUST have xbox gold or I cannot fully enjoy the great thing called the Xbox 360 Elite, purchased with every last dime of my hard earned savings. It was a small thing at first, my dependance on Gold. The occasional firefight with F and Lu, the online game with Co here and there, then it happened, I became committed to Gold. Xbox's ploy is simple but effective. You buy an Xbox, they give you a free month of Gold, the consumer (like me) absurdly believes that the free month lasts longer than a month and that he can live without it, the month ends, the gamer, now addicted, feels as though they cannot ever enjoy gaming again without Gold. The gamer spends 50 bucks on a year's subscription. The process continues. Here is the worst thing--my spendthriftness is so great, (thank you mom) that I realize that unless I spend 50 whole stinkin' dollars on the year's membership, I will be getting a bad deal. You see, anything less is substantially more pricey per month.

Here's the real kicker,

I don't have 50 dollars,

here's another,

Walmart.com has 12 month subscriptions for 30,

Walmart.com doesn't have them in stock,

How can you not have a virtual subscription in stock?

I think they are playing with me.....

Just like Microsoft....

I'm going to become a communist, I now hate capitalism

Just kidding,

Branson

Well people say that I should post more on my blog. "People" say many things, some of which I don't believe in, so I probably shouldn't be writing this out of peer pressure--but I am. Oh well.

Really and truly, I would have written on the blog a lot sooner, but I had a problem. It's called writer's block. Writer's block is horrible. I mean I want to write all the time on the blog and have a bazillion entries like R has or someone, but it just doesn't flow. R suggested writing about peanut butter and other random things, but she's already written about peanut butter, so it would just be a rip off. Plus, I haven't tasted REAL peanut butter in forever.... Since the fateful day my mom brought home the "all natural"peanut butter. It's ground up peanuts.....and salt....that's all. Wow, I've started writing about peanut butter, I'd better stop. What else....chairs no, chocolate, no....music...no. I think someone does that a lot *cough* Kt *cough* So you can see my problem? I want to be original, but with R spouting out randomness here and there and that someone who writes about music...it leaves me nothing. NOTHING.

I mean seriously there isn't anything to write about. It makes me wonder "Why am I writing anyway?"

Oh yes, peer pressure.

Champions

What is it about sports that compels so many people to root for it? What is it about games with a ball that causes such deep emotions of joy, happiness, anger, and even hatred? How is it that an 18 year old kid that we have never even seen in person can cause us to either have one of the happiest or saddest moments in our lives? It's crazy, it's insane, and in my case-- it's football.

Last night I saw something on TV that I've never seen before--Alabama win a national championship. It wasn't what I was expecting. I was envisioning being glued to my seat in captivation, watching every single play with excited anticipation, but it didn't happen that way. Alabama has a way of winning and not looking awesome half the time while they're doing it. The final score was 37-21, Alabama defeating Texas. Although there were quite a few moments of utter glee on our little gang of faithful Bama watchers part, it wasn't the intense, or thrilling game I was hoping for. Although I jumped and high-fived C in jubilation when the clock hit zero, the thrill stopped soon afterwards. This was it? This is what I had been dreaming of ever since I saw Bama snap the ball for my first time--and it didn't feel complete. That's when I realized the real reason why we watch sports. It's not the championship win that we want to see; it's the hope of a championship that we want to feel. We live and breathe the promise of seeing our favorite team win the ultimate game....only to live and breathe it again the next season, and the next. Because in sports, the best is never good enough, there's always more you can do, always more you can achieve. And so, day in and day out, as we take our alloted time as sports fans to dwell on our favorite conglomeration of young men and women that play with balls, we live and we hope and we imagine what the "consummation" of the season, or the career will be. We put so much faith and love and trust into our athletes, it makes you wonder how passionate we could be about the things that really matter.

How could I have forgotten?

Wow it just hit me that today, Saturday the second of January, is the beginning of a new year and a new decade! I guess I need to summarize the year( the decade would be to lengthy) Let's see where to begin.... Oh about this time last year our Church's youth pastor/ worship leader/ whatever we needed him to be, moved to Florida to start a new job. This was a very sad time for us. Right before he left he gave CW and me the task of leading the youth band ( which I have already posted about) as well as left our Church in a state of sadness. However, it did help our church realize what an amazing person Rick was ( more than we already thought) This post will not all be about sadness however. As the year progressed, I pushed through school with the hopes of having a long summer vacation. We had a youth retreat and then I went camping with the Macs to the beach, which was great fun as always. Summer vacation (shorter than it should have been thanks to my lack of pushing hard in school earlier in the year) was very fun. We went to the lake with friends, we had youth at peoples' houses, new awesome people joined youth, and so on. I also came in 3rd in a triathlon after training 3 days a week all summer. My church had a week long missions trip which was one of the best experiences I've ever had.

Then came the much hyped 9th grade year. This year is supposedly the year that you have to REALLY push in. I began to wonder if I would be able to have time to eat between all the school. And as those of you who know me (which I hope is everyone who reads the blog) know, I do in fact have time to eat as well as a plethora of other things. Several of which are not necessary to my schooling. Anyway, I progressed into the new school year, taking GREEK CLASS which is awesome, biology which is awesome (with the exception of having to do whole modules over Christmas break) and Christian ethics which is also cool. I continued to try to lead the youth band with CW, and we had a few new members join. School and life progressed as it always does when school first starts back...slowly. We went on a few more camping trips and a couple with our new camping buddies ( who have outclassed us with their insanely large camper.) I got sick A LOT which is very odd for me. I, of course, joined the swim team which has been..interesting.

Then came Thanksgiving, which was as always a time of food. Although we did have it with my mom's parents instead of my dad's as we normally do. School continued in the arduous stretch between thanksgiving and Christmas break, which for us starts on the 18th. We went to a few concerts, one of which was the fantastic Behold the Lamb of God tour. Alabama made Tim Tebow cry in the SEC championship, which was both fulfilling and sad at the same time. Alabama made it to the National Championship, which has yet to be played.

Then Christmas finally came. I got several things for Christmas, even though I didn't ask for as much as I normally do. One of my favorite gifts is the mic system I got. Now I torture my family all the time singing and playing REALLY loudly. Since I saved most of my birthday money, I had enough to combine it with my Christmas money and get an xbox360. In a weird twist of fate I suddenly found out that I could play Halo. Then came New years eve on which I went to bed at like 9. I woke up at 6:30 the next day however (haha.) On New Year's day we had the Macs and Wrens over for a get together thing. Tim Tebow the superman crushed Cincy. I laughed at the highlight real of AU vs. NW, the game which AU won 3 times. I played Frisbee today in super cold weather. Oh no I am suddenly lapsing into the new year! I guess I better stop.

09' was great for me, I feel like I have grown up a lot this year and learned a lot of things ( not all in school) and I thank God for another year.

Frisbee Today

Well I haven't posted in awhile. Today my faithful Ultimate Frisbee cohorts and I played in 25 degree weather. There were over 20 people too! I think we are a bit addicted. We play when we are sick, when it's raining, when it's over 100 degrees, when it's under 30 degrees, and everything in between. Today it was a wonderful mix of freezing coldness, even colder wind, and an icy-muddy ground. But, as always, we enjoyed it.

Pike

I really regret I haven't posted sooner on our amazing toy Australian shepherd puppy Pike. He got hit today by a car and died. I still can't believe he's gone. G and my Mom are beating themselves up over him getting hit. I am definitely waiting on the next life now.....

Quick update

I thought i'd type a quick post since I haven't posted anything in a while. Today at swim we swam 3000 yards! That's almost 2 miles! it was actually fun, kind of weirdly. Also we are going to be off of school in a few more days, just 11 more and then a two week Christmas break! Hopefully I'll have some more time post and more things to talk about during the holidays.

Merry Christmas!