The Weekend That Was

This past weekend found me once again in Gainesville. I was there because...well, because I needed to get the hell out of Jacksonville. I don't know if you know this, but Jacksonville blows. I was talking to Rachel this weekend about not moving to Greenville, SC because its a crappy town. My clinching argument: I live in Jacksonville, I know crappy towns.

Jacksonville...God how I loathe thee.

So what did I do while in the great city of Titletown? I drank, I helped paint Amos' and Christina's apartment, but there were a few things that stood out:

1. The fight. I know its sad when I say that I've been going to parties in Gainesville for six years, but its true. And in that entire time, I've seen maybe one fight, and even that, from what I remember, was pretty tame. The fight on Saturday, not so much. From what I gathered, someone spit on one of the hosts, and work was done. I was playing beer pong on the patio when the tussle spilled out into the patio, knocking over the table. I was stuck in the corner, so there was no place for me to go except through the screen. Sorry about that, whoever's house that was.

The parts of the fight I saw where hilarious and intense. Intense because the participants in the fight kept going at it about every 20 seconds. Hilarious because by 'going at it', I mean 'ineffectively slapping at each other faces until they got pulled away from each other.' That actually kinda killed the mood of the party, which was eventually broken up by the cops, who immediately demanded that all the drunk people get the hell out of there. Good job, GPD. Very smart of you.

2. The Search. Cush showed up drunk at Amo's while we were painting and watching Heroes. He needed one thing for his costume for the party that night: a cowbell. And we could not find one. Anywhere. We got to the Western Wear place about 3 minutes after it closed, Cracker Barrel had a very helpful and very cute girl who helped us look around the store, but still nothing. We eventually went to the costume store, where we found a tiny fake one which Cush never actually used. But I do have to say that Center Stage was still a great experience, as they sold us the cowbell 40 minutes after they had closed. Very nice of them.

This is all we wanted. Is that so hard?

3. The Game. I watched a quarter at the PSP watching party, a quarter at Jess's, where my cheering kept scaring her cats, and the last half at the Dojo. Watching games at the Dojo is fun. If we aren't doing well, Cush has to immediately run out and get victory chicken from Publix. This always works. As soon as he gave Publix money, Tony Joiner intercepted a pass. It went well. Also, the shotgunning a beer every time Tebow scores leads to drunkenness. Not on my part, cause I'm horrible at shottgunning, but Cush was really drunk, Michael was feeling and good, and Dave I'm pretty sure was buzzing.

Other features of the weekend was actually motherfucking going out, something I haven't done in a while, with Christina, seeing Erin and getting in on old job drama (apparently everything went to hell when I left) and the best game of volleyball I've played (this does not mean much).

Until next time, I remain,
Matt McKenzie

Still reading Reality Dysfunction by Peter Hamilton.

Update On My Life

Good Evening.

I discovered Allison's blog today, and it made me ashamed that I can't find the time to write in mine. Also, it made me miss my little, but that's as its supposed to be.

Allison and I in a simpler time, and a much much simpler place (there really is nothing in Arcadia)

I know no one really cares all that much about what's going on in my life, but I need to keep my mind going somehow, and I need to write to do that. So congrats! Here's my blog, started all over again.

- First, an update on the Navy. I took the Aviation Training Selection Battery last Thursday. This is the test that they use to select officers. It tests reading comprehension, math skills, mechanical knowledge, as well as of aviation and naval terms. I'll get my scores tomorrow or Friday, but I'm pretty confident about it. I knew most of the answers in the first three sections, and was able to figure out most of the aviation and naval stuff.

The good news is that I finally met my new recruiter, and I was very impressed with him. He knew what he was talking about, was organized, and made me very happy to work with him. It didn't hurt that he was really impressed with me. When I handed him my college transcript, he asked "Where's the rest of it?"

I gave him a confused look and responded, "What do you mean?"

"Do you have anything from a community college or something?"

Still perplexed, I said, "No....I just went to UF." It wasn't till later that I realized that most of the people who he sees probably don't have degrees from UF, let alone went there alone, and then want to join the Navy. He was even more impressed when he saw my GPA and that I had graduated Cum Laude. Later, as he fingerprinted me, he told me that as long as I got in shape, I'll be a shoo-in.

- Which brings me to getting in shape. I'm not there yet. I'm pushing myself harder, doing cardio every morning (either running, or this boot camp class at the Y, which is taught by an old Marine, which is awesome if very tiring), and then weight lifting in the afternoon. I also signed up for a 5k, so I'm working on being in shape for that. It's Oct. 20th. Hopefully I can get there.

- If you've seen my Facebook profile recently, you'll see that I find Jacksonville really boring. And it is, but a lot of that has to do with the fact that I'm not really trying to find things to do. I'm not going to be here for long, and if I'm bored, I go to the gym.

But what's saving my sanity right now are the weekly trips to Gainesville, for which I am forever thankful to Dave, Cush, Rachel, and Lex, who haven't complained about me crashing on their couch yet. The ability to go crazy for two days allows me to get through the rest of the week.

There's more, but I think thats enough for now.

Till Next Time,
Matt

Currently Reading: The Reality Dysfunciton by Peter F. Hamilton

Mental Health Day

I skipped work today.

I decided last night that I needed a day off. The job has really been getting to me recently. The meaningless jobs have been piling up, each one seemingly more mundane and mindless as the next. For the last few days, each time someone dropped something new on my desk, I felt like throwing it back. It doesn't help that what they say while they do the dropping usually is along the lines of "Matt, could you change these peoples' addresses in the KSS database?" or "I noticed the phone messages are really out of date. Could you change it?"

I think the fact that this is a temporary stop is finally catching up with me, especially with the prospect of other jobs on the horizon. And if I'm bad now, I'm scared to think how I'll feel when I actually have another job. It'll be Applebee's all over again.

I worked at Applebee's for a few months over the summer while I looked for a less temporary job. Once I got my current job and gave my manager my two weeks notice (actually, that happened while I was enjoying a few beers there with Oded, who was in town looking for a job of his own), I got antsy. Or maybe I just realized how much that job really sucked. With about a week before my official last day, I walked out. It was the only time I've ever done that, and probably will be the only time that I ever do, but man did that feel good.

That probably won't be happening at the OTL, because unlike Applebee's, I respect the people I work with at my current job. But if I get a job offer that I like, expect me to bouncing in my chair until that new career path starts.