Wow. I've had some fun times these past few days.

It started on Thursday night, when I drove some friends (three of which are forum members) down to an Air concert at The Rave in Milwaukee. While waiting for the concert in a nearby McDonalds, we were approached by a stereotypical crackhead looking for cash. Petey met him later than the rest of us and actually gave him a taped-up dollar. As we we're walking back to the rave, we saw the crackhead run into a parking car and limp around, pretending he got hit. Gotta love downtown.

The concert itself was great. The opening band was an odd little group called The Mosquitos. The lead singer girl was wearing a Marla-from-Fight Club dress that was constantly inches from falling off. The guitarist kept flirting with her throughout the performance. I hope for the band's sake, they never fight, or it'd be a very different show. The songs were OK, but I just wanted to see Air. I didn't know what to expect from a mostly electronic group, but that was because I forgot how much Air uses guitar in their music. So it was nice. And it was loud and everything, like a concert should be, but we had a pretty calm crowd, and the music was surprisingly clear. My ears didn't even care afterwards.

When it was over, I was happy to find my car nice and not-broken-in-to. We had some backwards adventures finding Clint's brother's place afterwards, but we eventually made it. About halfway home though, I was pulled over. I was going 80 on the freeway which didn't impress the officer on duty. He was very nice though, and I only got a warning. If I had gotten that ticket, my insurance would kill me, my parents would kill me, and my license would take another six month sabbatical. So thank you, officer. I owe you a nice lunch.

Next!

After a boring Friday at school, I was off to my next adventure: Muse in Chicago. Alyssa came along, and we met up with Shelby, Dave, and Heather (all forum members! woohoo!) in Mayville. We made it down to Dave's place in Milwaukee with out incident, and he drove us the rest of the way. After getting passed by an Illinois psycho in the breakdown lane, and only getting lost a few times, we made it to the Metro. I wish we had bought extra tickets, because about 10-20 people were buzzing around begging for them. The Metro was pretty cool. It was set up a lot like the Eagles Ballroom in the Rave, but it was a bit smaller. I hung out near the soundboards because I didn't feel like moshing and I'm pretty sure Alyssa didn't either. The opening band was called The Exit, and they were actually pretty decent. Dave bought the CD, which I plan on xeroxing. The guitar player looked like Hendrix. It was quite fun. Another cool thing was that the music they piped in while the roadies set up Muse included Don't Be Light by Air. Anyway, Muse starts up, and I realize three things:
1: The Air concert was downright quiet. Afterwards, my head felt the same as it did when a truck tire exploded at work.
2: Air put on quite a light show. Muse had lights and everything, but there was a big difference.
3: These aren't fans, they're fanatics. Everyone knew all of the words, and people were going absolutely crazy. It was quite a show. I was just glad to hear Newborn and Bliss live.

We made it back just fine, except I was trying to get wired for my part of the drive home (the 3:00am to 4:30am drive home) so I started making up voices and songs and generally drove Hüva to the brink of insanity. I think it was worth it, though. That was the most fun I've had in a long time.

An email I recieved:

The following message is sent on behalf of SEAC and Campus Greens.
The University of Wisconsin Oshkosh consumed a total of 31.5 Million KWH last school year resulting in a total cost of $1.3 Million.
NOT CONCERNED, WELL……
In a time of fiscal uncertainty and budget constraints it should be of real concern to every student, staff, and faculty where every cent of our money goes.
If electricity were to be conserved this would release more funds to where they really belong, in education.
TAKE ACTION!
April 21st, 2004
TURN OUT THE LIGHTS!
SEAC and the Campus Greens along with campus administration has organized a campus-wide blackout to create awareness about the University’s energy consumption. This is a chance for the campus community to organize, demonstrating their power in creating an environmentally sustainable world and taking fiscal control of their own future.
We can find ways to reduce our impacts on the natural world and counteract budget constraints by working together.
Later, join representatives from RENEW Wisconsin, WISPIRG, Johnson Controls, and WPS to find out what energy alternatives there are in Wisconsin and to find out how YOU can make a difference.

Ahh, the ignorance that college idealism inevitably brings forth. What do these people hope to accomplish? If all students on campus turned off all of their stuff for one day, lights included, the impact on the school’s total electric bill would be negligible. Think about it. Every building has to have its hall lights and emergency lights on. School computer labs and computer servers run 24 hours a day. Every science department has its own high voltage equipment ranging from a mass spectrometer to the heat lamps on the plants up on fourth floor Halsey. The vending machines chug away continuously keeping their contents cool. Security cameras and motion sensing equipment require constant power. Street lights. ATM machines. Card-swipe door locks. Exhaust fans. GFCI lights. Everything consumes power. Are you telling me that turning off my TV for one day will help make a difference? Who are you kidding?

Let’s say 1,000 students stop using electricity for a day. That could be hundreds of kilowatt hours saved, but still not be anywhere near enough of a dent in the total kWh used for campus to make any sort of difference. Perhaps these people should concentrate their efforts elsewhere. Why don’t they lobby to have all of the new computers for the school labs (and one-third of all lab computers are replaced annually) have low-wattage power supplies? Or for LED lighting to replace incandescent and fluorescent wherever possible? Or cut down on the number of vending machines. (We have way too many, anyway.) There are plenty of better things to do than delude yourself into thinking you’re important through student involvement in a cause that you only vaguely understand and believe in.

Oh yes, one more message to the “environmentalists” who sent me this message. My computer has a 400 watt power supply. I’m sure my big CRT monitor needs at least 100 watts to light up. And I needed them both on to read your email. Multiply that by the 10,000 or so students you just sent this email to, and cry your little green tears all over your hemp rug.

Okie damn dokie, this is gonna bother someone or two.

What in the fucking goddamn awful-ass holy hell is so amazingly transcendingly orgasmically wonderous about getting drunk?! Someone needs to explain this to me intellgently before I can shut up about it.

Seriously. I've been drunk recently in an effort to understand the mysteries of inebriation. It wasn't that great. I had eaten Burger King that night, and besides being louder and having some seriously shitty acid burps, I noticed no real difference in my experience of the evening. Perhaps I wasn't drunk enough? Perhaps I should have drank so much alcohol that my body would need so much of it's own reserves to fight of the poison I had given it that it would temporarily suspend several important brain functions and ultimately my own conciousness until it got the whole toxic mess sorted out? Yeah, that must be what I'm supposed to do: drink so much that I can sleep through the fun part of the weekend, only to wake up for the throwing up/headache part. Ahh, the mark of a true fun and cool person. Vomit and fuzzy memories. No wonder I'm such a loser; my weekends are generally spent lucid in the loving arms of my beautiful girlfriend.

I've missed out this whole time. As soon as I'm done posting this, I'm going to break up with my girlfriend (why the hell am I buying her flowers when I could be buying beer?!) and get sloshed, so I can come back on here, alone and buzzed, and type incoherently about nothing. Yeah! I'm about to live life to the fullest!!!!

Fuck that.

Listen, if you drink, good for you. It's the fun you choose; it's sure as hell not mine. But it's not just because I disagree with your choices that you piss me off. It's that you wave your drunken lifestyle around as if it were a badge of honor, a thing to be coveted and congratulated for. Well, my friend, you'll get none of that from me. You don't wanna hear about what I do with my girlfriend, and I don't wanna hear about how you puked in your friend's trash can full of wop. So if you're going to slowly kill yourself by having the only fun you know and understand, by all means, go ahead. I just don't need to hear about it.

Wow. A recent conversation has reminded me of just how much things have changed for me this past year, and how ignorant I've been of the changes. Moving to Oshkosh has completely changed my life, moreso than staying with may parents and commuting to school could have ever hoped to.

I am more confident in myself now. I've met people who haven't let college change a thing about them, and I've met people who have let the entire experience change them for the better. Let me tell you, the people who've changed are more fun to be around. Realizing that you don't have to be who you were in high school, and you have no one's expectations to live up to but your own is extremely liberating. I finally feel like an adult.

I've fallen in love. For the first time, for the right reasons, I am truly in love. I never would have suspected that leaving Mayville for here would allow me to meet someone so perfect for me. I knew I'd find more interesting people, more people that want something better than to live in the town their grandparents grew up in, but I never suspected to finally meet a woman who appreciates the person I am, accepts me without question, and loves me as much as I love her. I have never been this happy with another person, and the feelings have yet to fade; if anything, they've grown stronger with each passing day. I finally accept myself as I am.

I still mourn my grandfather's death, and not a day goes by that I don't wish I could see him one more time. But I'm filled with a new drive to become the man he would have wanted to see me be, a man he would be proud of. I've made a lot of mistakes this past year, but I've paid the consequences, and they're fading away with time. I finally have a chance to make him proud.

I have everything I could want, short of petty material concerns, and I appreciate it all. I love my family, my girlfriend, and my friends. I have Puckaway now, and I will pick up where Grandpa left off. I'm finally happy.

Remember what an Amoco used to look like? Why the hell did they all turn green? OK, I can understand that acquiring a company can make you want to enact some changes to make your mark, but why in the hell did BP have to redesign every Amoco station in America? People liked Amoco and trusted it. As far as I know, it wasn't struggling or anything...
Isn't the point of capitalist business to make money, not blow it all away? Think of how many Amocos there are in the US. Now think about how much it must have cost to turn them all green. It doesn't add up; WHO WINS HERE?! It's so stupid!! BP gets to smile, since its big green sun is all over the damn place now, but imagine what else they could have done with that money... Lower gas prices by 5 cents to totally fuck their competition? I don't care if it's illegal. If WalMart can do it, everyone should be able to.
I guess the only thing that came out of this is that some of the BPs are getting their big gas price signs replaced with LED boards. This saves paying some dolt $5.15 an hour to poke the numbers with a plunger on a stick. But I've only seen this on about 3 stores across Wisconsin, and that's a pretty small percentage of the BPs I've seen.
People are stupid. Big businesses, listen up. Next time you're going to blow millions on a pointless facelift, give me $50,000 first, and I'll smile through the whole, stupid process.

Note for those who have heard all this before:
Yeah, this is an old rant, but I never took the time to type it out before. Maybe now I can shut up when I drive by a BP.