Piper's Blog
Just One More Person's Thoughts Cluttering Up the NetA June to Remember
The first three weekends of this month have been dedicated to getting Brad and Kolina happily married.
The first weekend was Brad’s bachelor party hosted by my hubby. Brad and Ben went to Elyria to party with the usual crew while Kolina and I stayed in Findlay. On Saturday, Kolina and I drove up to Toledo to a huge mall for shopping. We were mainly browsing but also had some wedding things to look for. There were some AMAZING sales going on and I definitely bought more than I meant to. But, I definitely love the Pink Sugar hair perfume and Urban Decay Eye Primer I bought from Sephora. I don’t know how I managed before! My eyeshadow is always fresh looking and my hair always smells great! We also did some craft projects like making signs for the ceremony and reception and putting ribbons on bubble bottles.
The second weekend was Kolina’s bachelorette party up in Michigan. Let’s just say the night of the party was interesting and I was dumped head-first into Brad’s family. The rest of the weekend went smoothly though and I got to know the other bridesmaids. More wedding things were checked off the checklist. All that remained was the wedding!!!!
The third weekend was the wedding. Ben and I had a fantastic suite with a king sized bed and a jacuzzi. After a long day of pictures and talking, Ben and I REALLY loved relaxing in the hot water of the jacuzzi. We definitely almost fell asleep…
The day was beautiful and everything went smoothly. Plus, we got to take home a lot of leftover cupcakes from the reception. Score!
As soon as Ben and I got back to Findlay from Michigan, I repacked and went to Bay Village to help mom with VBS. The theme was about bees so my name was Honey Bee. Of course, I became a rockstar to the kids and one of the girls gave me my first silly band! It was a lot of fun and took a lot of energy.
This past weekend was spent helping spruce up my mom-in-law’s house. Ben and I have been working there every spare weekend (*which obviously hasn’t been for a month*). I’ve been painting and developed a knack for staining. I sort of enjoy it and think it is therapeutic.
This coming weekend is the Fourth of July!!!! Ben and I are booked solid all weekend. I can’t wait! Also, I get to see Emma in the first time in a year or so!
I plan on making some red, white, and blue cupcakes and will post pictures if they come out pretty.
Currently, my loves include baking and making pixel portraits. (*I am working on one for my sis-in-law at the moment*) Perhaps I should post some pixel pix too…
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Graduation (sort of)
So many exciting things have happened since I’ve last posted and I’m mad at myself for not keeping up with it. I went to an Eluveitie concert with Trevor and Chip, drove up to Michigan for Kolina’s bridal shower, finished this semester, and finally got my Associates of Science degree.
The concert was a bit more violent than the last concert we went to and there weren’t as many fun people to talk about. A new band we discovered and liked was called Holy Grail and they are from California. They definitely have some old school glam rock going on. They reminded me a little of Queen so naturally I loved them! The other notable thing was that the lead singer of one of the other bands was huge (not fat just tall and beefy) and had a Thor’s hammer necklace on. Of course I refer to him as Thor now. Anywho, when people were moshing, if Thor got knocked down I swear the earth moved!
The Michigan trip was a fun roadtrip for Ben and myself. We had so much fun hanging out with Brad and Kolina and not doing much at all! We just got to talk and I got to know Kolina a lot better. Brad and Kolina are coming down this weekend so that Ben can throw Brad his bachelor party. I can’t believe how fast their wedding is approaching.
Got two A’s and two A-’s this semester so I am calling it a success! I’m just excited that I only have two more classes to take before I’m done forever.
This past Saturday I walked in LCCC’s graduation ceremony. The lady that was supposed to check us in was incredibly mean and unhelpful. She didn’t give us the correct tassel and didn’t tell us what to do. So, Trevor and I made up our own rules and got it all figured out in time. We did almost walk with the LPN degrees though… 
Go Piper!
Here is a bonus picture of me driving in my first autocross. http://racerslane.com/clubs/NORA%20-%20ASCC/seasons/1/events/7#runs
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DROID does…lots
First post from a mobile device! Prolly won’t use this much because I like to say a lot.
Most exciting things at the moment are waiting to hear from Sherwin Williams about a summer job and I did rather well in my first autocross event yesterday. W00t!!
I’m sure I have more to share but I’m going to bed. Kthxbai!
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Race to Finish Semester
Been busy working on Senior Design and Software Engineering. Both fun and unfun in their own ways.
~~Senior Design~~
Fun: For Senior Design, I get to work closely with two good friends of mine. I’m learning about hardware, prototypes, and autocrossing. I drive in my first autocross event this Sunday to test our system! For as silly as it sounds I’m glad that Bret and Chip aren’t big on writing documents because I get to practice my technical writing skills. Granted, lately I just create a skeleton for them to dump information into and I clean it up.
Unfun: I feel like I don’t have enough to contribute and have let them down. It is scary knowing that we present our project in 19 days.
~~Software Engineering~~
Fun: I have discovered I have a knack for creating 8-bit images and I really enjoy making them. I may have found a new hobby! Trevor and I have had a blast figuring out sound effects and background music for various things.
Unfun: Development is a mess due to unclear project guidelines in the beginning. It’s a group of eleven people all trying do stuff at once. So, sometimes it’s two steps forward and one back.
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Spring Break 2010
Quite a rollercoster of experiences.
UP: Bought a hot riding jacket and gloves for motorcycling.
DOWN: Bike was broke the entire time and I couldn’t learn how to ride.
UP: Got to watch a ton of favorite shows. (*Robin Hood BBC FTW*)
LOOP: Developed a UTI. Had a rough 24 hours of no sleep and peeing blood.
CORKSCREW: On antibiotics and a painkiller that made my pee crazy, neon, alien orange.
TURN: Baking and spending time with hubby.
DOWN: Had to do some homework (*BUT I discovered a slight knack for pixel art and enjoy it. So this is only partially down*)
UP: Saw Alice in Wonderland 3D with hubby and enjoyed it.
CREST OF LAST HILL: Traded the old Blackberry Storm for a Motorola Droid!!!
RACING TO THE LOADING STATION: I have to go back to the real world tomorrow…
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Screw the Technological Revolution
Technology is amazing! It creates streamlined, more efficient processes in corporate America. It connects people and families across the globe. It contains so much knowledge just waiting to be discovered. Yet…when are we TOO interconnected?
Nowadays, most people in the workplace are on a computer 8 hours a day. They come home at night to sit on the computer or gaming console. They need to catch up on email, news, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, blogs, and forums. If that isn’t overwhelming enough, we have smartphones which stream all this information to you instantly wherever you are! I feel like we are beginning to use real life to find anything amusing to share in the virtual world. As soon as something happens you can have it on the internet awaiting comments from other people. I’m tired of seeing people with a phone permanently attached to their hands because they simply MUST know what their friends are doing/thinking at the same moment. People act like if you aren’t online doing something you no longer exist and quickly get left behind.
Nothing is private anymore. If you try to keep to yourself, people think you are anti-social. You can’t just have a regular cell phone for phone calls and texts. You can’t just have an email address and check it once a day. It’s not enough anymore.
I always felt that if any one of my old friends really wanted to get in touch with me they most definitely had ways to do it. But I never heard from them. So, I didn’t have to keep track of their stories in my life. That may sound mean but I’m trying to explain that life was quietier and I wasn’t missing anything because there was nothing to be missed. I enjoyed being a part of the lives of people I was interacting with at work or college on a daily basis. I’m not saying that if I don’t see you for a certain amount of time you will get replaced with new friends. No. It’s just when lives take friends in different directions sometimes it’s okay to let go. Sometimes, it’s a special friendship that will last despite time or distance. Now, with Facebook and similar things you get bombarded with every else’s lives. You could simply ignore them but then what was the point of reconnecting with them.
Not everyone you meet in life has to become some sort of permanent fixture that you have to keep up on. I find it more refreshing to run into someone (*in real life*) and simply catch up the old fashioned way by talking. Then you go on your merry way. No strings attached.
If the world is this interconnected now I really am worried about how much time will be eaten up trying to stay on top of everything in the future. Children grow up seeing their parents waste time on forums. Children are encouraged to sit and play video games because it keeps them quiet. People are terrified that their children will get injured or sick so things are padded and sterilized. I think we are actually hurting the future. Look at the baby boomers! They were born to run around outside and get hurt! Experiment with theories and human interactions. As a result we have some of the most powerful companies of today. IBM, Apple, Microsoft, and Ford were founded by baby boomers. http://www.bbhq.com/whatsabm.htm
Yes, there are still some creative people looking for the next “it” thing. I’m not trying to say everyone is worthless.
The world is a little too close for comfort and I want space!
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The Problem is…
I am by no means a politically savvy person and I don’t pretend to be. But, one thing I do know is that appearances and respect are everything. The world already has a skewed view of our country. We are the overly powerful meddlers and self-proclaimed world police. I know we have the best intentions and do much more good than harm yet how can other countries respect us when we don’t respect ourselves?
What I mean to say is …lay-off personally insulting the president!
I’m not a big fan of the man…but having people call him a “slow learner” (*like the Mayor of Las Vegas did http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/president-obama-las-vegas/story?id=9885429 *) is inexcusable! You most certainly can disagree with Obama and voice your opinions. Resorting to name calling is immature. We look like a country that appointed a man that none of us respect to govern us. So how can other countries take him or us seriously? We are only hurting ourselves and our foreign relationships.
By all means, disagree with the president’s decisions but please do so respectfully. Don’t just say he is dumb because he is dumb. That just makes us look dumb…
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To Bring to Ruin or Naught
I don’t understand.
Critics never cease to surprise me. Granted, I have learned that my taste in movies and their taste in movies were vastly different. I discovered that we were searching for two different things. They loved a movie if it was insightful, serious, and had a purpose. I liked comedy, explosions, and lovable characters. I wanted an escape while they wanted to teach the world something. Not that I don’t see what the critics were saying about “heavier” movies. I can appreciate the finer movies and regard them as art. But, I didn’t want real life or a moral. Real life is sad as is. Movies are eye candy to me. I have accepted our differences and am moving on.
Alas, I was shocked by critics of literature. Recently, I read “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” (PPZ) and “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters” (SSSM). Both are obviously parody novels and I was excited to see how they would mash-up the two worlds. PPZ was praised for its originality and clever union of stories. SSSM was condemned as having the monster/Austin genre jump the shark. PPZ was released roughly 5 months prior to SSSM. How quickly fads fade these days! Interestingly enough, I also disagree with them about which book is better! This to me is not a matter of taste but of quality writing!!!!!!
Now before I get dismissed as just liking something for the sake of liking something, I must explain that I consider myself extremely well-read. Everything from Machiavelli and Shakespeare to Christie and Rowling. I’ve read C.S. Lewis’ more thought provoking novels and the clever social studies of Orson Scott Card. I devour poems and love discovering forgotten novels. Finally, of course I have read Jane Austin. I can read a book I love but concede that the author is rather amateur. Conversely, I can admit to quality writing even if I don’t like the story/topic.
So…after all that…I must say that PPZ was a joke!
It really could have been absolutely brilliant. But they didn’t even TRY to integrate the worlds. It felt truly forced. I know, I know it is just a silly book. But, it doesn’t deserve the praise it was getting. The zombie bits were written in between things and didn’t feel like they were actively in the story. Then, there were the ninja bits. Zombies are one thing…but adding weird ninja lore into the book didn’t help at all. I thought it made a silly book cheesy! How is that possible!?
SSSM…on the other hand…is rather well done.
This was written by a different author than PPZ. He didn’t change the story or the names of things but completely changed settings and added characters. It was closer to what O Brother Where Art Thou was to The Odyssey. The overall effect felt much more integrated. My favorite part is that rather than the characters going to London, they went to a sub-marine station on the ocean floor. They had to take a submarine to get there!
I liked both books for what they were but I feel that SSSM was better written and should not be dismissed just because it came AFTER PPZ.
The End.
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An Epic(a) Night
Settle back…get some hot chocolate…this is going to be a long one…
On February 3, I traveled to Peabody’s Downunder in Cleveland with some friends of mine. The night was billed as Epica plus 2 other bands. First off, Epica is not my most favorite band in the symphonic rock genre BUT I knew it was going to be a really fun show. I really like the band that Epica named their band in honor of; Kamelot. Anywho, I would first like to describe some of the people in the crowd. I do not do this to ridicule. But to give you an idea of the interesting people that one sees at rock concerts.
~The Players~
The Clogger – A tall and big man with a ginormous knit orange hat with a big puff ball on top waded into the crowd and stood close to us. He had some sort of carved wooden figurine earring in his left ear. He was also wearing Dutch wooden clogs that had been painted white with blue detailing.
The Jedi – An athletic, fit man with closely cropped blonde hair. He had a striking profile with a strong jaw and was rather reserved the whole night. Best part? He had one long braid tucked behind his left ear that went down in front of his shoulder like Obi-Wan in Phantom Menace. On anyone else, it would have looked really weird. But he totally rocked it!
The Hair – This man had classic rocker hair. But it was beautifully kempt and hung down to his lower back. He started the night with a baseball hat on. The rest of the crowd did indeed bob their heads with the music and almost every musician on stage did the hair bang circle thing. But no one in the crowd had their hair fly. My friends and I were standing off to the side could see the whole room. All of a sudden…out of the sea of bobbing heads was this explosion of hair! He took off his hat and did the whole hair bang circle thing! I know it isn’t that big of a deal but it looked particularly impressive when everyone around him was simply nodding to the beat. It sort of looked like a fire!
The Emo-Mutant – This man literally made me jump. I was happily listening to the first band of the night and was surveying the crowd when I noticed this dark figure next to me. I actually started when I saw him! He was ridiculously tall with an emo haircut that hung in front of his face. He had on stylish black pants, shoes, and some sort of short trench coat jacket. The whole thing together made him look like he was from some anime cartoon or comic book. He didn’t look real. I asked my friend, Chip, who is rather tall himself to tell me how tall he is and if he could estimate how tall the emo guy was. Chip reckoned the man was about 6′7”! Not every day do you run into someone that tall and looking like that! He should be a super hero!
~The Bands~
Cellbound – Homegrown from the Cleveland area. They have a big sound and big potential. Something about them still sounds a little like a local band rather than a huge name like Angra or Symphony X. BUT, I really enjoyed them. Probably my favorite thing about them though was that one of their guitar players reminded me of Karl Urban, who I find completely dreamy.
Black Guard – Love them! They are high energy and their front man really knows how to put on a show. He is more of a barker than a singer but he is hands down my favorite growly singer. He constantly got the crowd involved and knew how to move around on the stage. They had some great guitar solos and (*my apologies to my husband*) I have a crush on their lead guitarist! Picture a typical rocker man with long brown hair and a beard that has two short braids coming out of it. He had strong arms and a massive skull tattoo on his right arm. Amidst all this bad assery though, he managed to wink! WINK! He is in a metal band with tattoos and wailing on the guitar and he still finds time to look into the crowd, smile, and wink!
NOTE: BTW this was a surprise band of the night. I said that we thought there were only 2 bands plus Epica. But it ended up being 3 bands. This Black Guard was out of left field for me but I’m so glad they were there.
Threat Signal – This one is a little tricky to explain. I have always felt that the band “Red” was a more rocker-y version of Linkin Park. Well, Threat Signal is a more metal-ly rocker-y version of Red. Honestly, I thought they were kind of a mess musically which was really sad because they had a very talented lead guitarist. The drawback, though, was that the guitarist sorta hid in the corner like he is shy and just wants to be alone with his music. I understand what the guy is feeling but you can’t really do that in a metal band. I will say that the band was younger looking than I thought they were going to be so they could be pretty good after some maturing. They weren’t awful…but I was disappointed. Also, they were the type of band that encouraged mosh pits. So, some of the teens just ran into each other. Thankfully, Chip and the Jedi were standing in such a way as to block the moshers from running into us.
Epica – It is amazing the difference between newer bands and well established ones. Epica was definitely a step up in their presence of the stage. They played a mix of new and old songs for them. But my two favorite songs weren’t Epica songs. One, the stage went dark and they walked off. Then, the Imperial March began to play. The guitarists, the bass player, and the drummer returned to play with it! It was truly epic! Second, later in their set the drummer ran into some problems with his bass pedal. While everyone was waiting for him to fix it, the keyboardist played this funky ragtimey jazz song! It was completely random and totally not in keeping with the mood! I loved it! The male vocalist also served as their MC and he was a great host. He explained that they were from the Netherlands and that they don’t always wear wooden shoes. He went on to say that unfortunately a man from the Netherlands was there and was wearing clogs, thereby making it even harder to dispel that myth. It was The Clogger!!!! LOL!!! Also, they pointed out that their youngest fan was there that night…a little girl, who had to have been about 3, was sitting on her dad’s shoulders with over sized noise cancelling headphones. She was absolutely precious! She even tried to make the devil horns with her hands like everyone else was.
~Summary~
Awesome night with awesome friends listening to awesome music! I had such a great time and would love to do something like that again. Granted I will be sure to wear ear protection next time because my ears did indeed ring the next day. I feel as though I had even more to write about that night but this’ll do…this’ll do…
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