A Horribly Bad Idea

So I've come to the conclusion that the GREATEST thing I could ever do as a father would be to name all of my children such that their initials are also three-letter abbreviations or acronyms. In trying to come up with a list of appropriate abbreviations, I have run into the problem that I can only use those that end in M... This limits my selection considerably, it seems. So far, with a little bit of research, I've been able to come up with:

- PPM : parts per million

- ISM : interstellar medium

- ZPM : zero-point module

- ADM : absolute distance meter

- APM : anti-personnel mine?

- AUM : arbitrary unit of mass

- DPM : disintigrations per minute

- FBM : fractional Brownian motion

I could probably go on forever, but I'll stop here. I will be in trouble if I end up having 8 kids. o.O

The next challenge is to find reasonable names to go with their initials. xD

100 Interesting Things About Me!

I've seen a couple other people that have done things like this, and they're kind of fun, so I figured that I'd do one, too. Also, since the gadget to take you to my stand-alone pages appears to be forever missing, I'll just have to put this here, instead. A fun fact before it starts, though, I wrote up this list instead of sleeping. I'm so smart. :)

1. I was born in Phoenix, Arizona on October 6th, 1988
2. I apparently had a death wish. At one point while living there, I drank an unspecified amount of rubbing alcohol for unknown reasons. It required me to have my stomach pumped. I am told that this was not a pleasant experience.
3. At another point, I was launched off of my parents' bed during a game involving jumping from piece of furniture to piece of furniture. My head made intimate contact with the corner of my Dad's desk. The wound required several stitches.
4. In my early years, I seem to have enjoyed covering myself - and everything else - in anything that I could get my hands on, be it spaghetti sauce, flour or peanut butter.
5. I moved from Phoenix to Pickerington, Ohio sometime in my fourth year.
6. I often have dreams involving our first house in Ohio. I was rather fond of that house
7. I absolutely adored my 1st, 3rd and 4th grade teachers.
8. I attended Kindergarten and 1st grade at Pickerington Elementary School.
9. The rest of my elementary years were at Fairfield Elementary, an identical, yet vastly inferior school as far as I was concerned.
10. I used to like Brussels Sprouts.
11. I first learned about the theory of relativity during an assembly at Fairfield Elementary.
12. I was also introduced to the song Feliz Navidad there... I will never forgive them.
13. I was very into the idea of getting married when I was younger.
14. I still am, actually. However, now it's more of a natural desire than it is adorable.
15. Did I mention that I'm really into the idea of getting married? ;)
16. My first real best friend was Eric Ratliff, who lived two doors down from my house on Wagram Road.
17. That was my second house in Ohio.
18. The construct that is currently Dakroth was originally conceived in 2nd or 3rd grade during recess.
19. I gained the nickname "Heifer Hands" from Eric's sisters. The reason behind it is unimportant.
20. I was baptized on my 8th birthday at the Columbus Ohio East Stake Center in 1996.
21. I still hold that building in high esteem in my memory.
22. It was about this time that I attempted the ill-fated mission of installing a Total Annihilation-style radar on my roof.
23. Speaking of which, Total Annihilation is my all-time favorite game. No RTS to date has quite matched its awesomeness.
24. I decided that Scouts was stupid when I was 11-ish.
25. I reconsidered that notion once I was in the Deacons Quorum.
26. The reason was that my Quorum adviser, Mike Hall, was the coolest guy ever.
27. The only year I ever went to Scout Camp was while I lived in Ohio.
28. The experience left me scarred with a deep resentment towards serious Scouting.
29. I still feel that way, though to a much lesser degree.
30. I was in a study hall in 7th grade when the planes struck the Towers on September 11th, 2001.
31. I moved to Liberty, Missouri in late December, 2001.
32. I met my next really good friend, Ammon, shortly after arriving.
33. I was awarded my Tote 'n' Chit card three times, the last time while in Liberty, but was never actually given the card.
34. This caused me much grief because of the doofuses who refused to allow me to use hatchets or axes on camp outs since I didn't physically have the card that they never gave me on me.
35. I was falsely accused of plagiarism by my German teacher in 9th grade for using material that my Dad helped me come up with for an oral assignment.
36. Okay, so the material was a bit farther ahead of where we were in class, but plagiarism? Seriously?
37. The situation was rectified, but not at all how I would have liked it to have been.
38. I was briefly concerned that I might be gay when I started taking a particular interest in one of my guy friends...
39. Turns out that I was just very lonely and was obsessing over a type of relationship that I wanted to have.
40. The first girl that I ever really fell for moved into the area while I was in 10th grade. Her name was Monica. I presume that it still is.
41. That relationship self-destructed rather unfortunately after I made the horrible mistake of being passive-aggressive towards her in order to garner sympathy.
42. I'm an idiot, I know.
43. I would love to reestablish contact with her, but it appears that she isn't interested. How sad. :(
44. I had my first experience of real kissing (over a period of a few weeks) when I was 15.
45. There wasn't much about it that I found to be enjoyable...
46. However, I still have faith that my next experience will be much more pleasant. :P
47. My all-time favorite excessively long board game is Axis & Allies.
48. I was enrolled in a Tae Kwon Do class for my 16th birthday. I absolutely loved it.
49. I'm rather surprised that I've gotten this far so easily.
50. I worked at Sonic for 8 months while I lived in Liberty
51. I will never work fast food or any other food service again.
52. I was in the Liberty High School Concert Choir in 11th grade. That was a lot of fun.
53. I wish I had been more self-confident back then. I could have taken some of those solo parts and done such a better job at them...
54. I also wouldn't have tolerated the crap that they pulled on me towards the end of the year.
55. Although I didn't graduate from Liberty High School, I still consider myself a Blue Jay Alumnus.
56. I graduated from Timberline High School in Boise, Idaho in 2007.
57. I was only there for one semester.
58. I was asked to Senior Prom. Mmm... Role reversal.
59. It wasn't that spectacular an experience. The steak was good, though.
60. I got really into Airsoft while in Boise.
61. I spent a lot of time playing in organized Airsoft battles with other kids in the area.
62. As a result, I spent a lot of time being really sick. Turns out I'm rather allergic to sagebrush.
63. While on that subject, I managed to get shot in the eye by my brother Tobi during one of the matches.
64. Quick eye lid reaction saved me from suffering a direct strike to the eye, but I was unable to see clearly - initially not at all - out of my right eye for about two weeks.
65. In case you were wondering, taking a plastic BB to the eye from two yards hurts like a b****.
66. I'm still extra prone to painful eye aches in that eye from fluorescent lighting.
67. Fluorescent lights have always given me headaches, only now much more so.
68. From the time that I graduated to July 2011, I essentially did absolutely nothing.
69. The only exception was a two-semester stint at New Mexico Tech.
70. I would eventually like to go back there.
71. I also met my bestest lady friend, Sara, while at NMT. :D
72. My favorite colors are red, blue and purple.
73. It was only a few years ago that I realized that my first two favorite colors combine to make the third.
74. That realization left me greatly astonished.
75. I don't enjoy eating all that much. The only reason I eat these days is so that I don't die.
76. I blame my stimulant meds for that.
77. I would die for a bag of strawberry creme savers.
78. Cinnamon Altoids are another vice of mine.
79. I am a fan of the Battlefield series.
80. I am one of the probably few Mormons you'll ever meet that does *NOT* want to go to BYU.
81. The question is commonly posed, "Boxers of briefs?" My answer is: combo!
82. If there was a gene therapy for stopping the growth of body hair, I would be all over that like a fat kid on a Twinkie.
83. In other words, I hate hair. It's gross.
84. I was once an Officer of the rank of Commander in Starfleet.
85. I'm currently back to being a Lieutenant Commander, and that isn't likely to change.
86. I have never been outside the USA.
87. I have been to both the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.
88. I'm counting the Gulf of Mexico as the Atlantic Ocean, too.
89. I drink Diet Dr. Pepper like its going out of style.
90. I still don't understand how that expression is supposed to mean "like crazy."
91. I have a serious interest in LFTR technology. (energyfromthorium.com)
92. I have twelve toes.
93. I'm just kidding. :P
94. If I could, I would use an M-2 Bradley IFV as my primary vehicle.
95. I like guns. Like, really like guns. Really.
96. I also really like cuddling.
97. I have an unfortunate shortage of opportunities to do so, however.
98. That's one of the things that I would like to see changed the most.
99. Oh, and I nearly forgot!! Favorite all-time TV show: Stargate SG-1!!!!! Woo!!!!

Air Five!!

Well, hello again! I have finally returned to a state of mind to be able to write, as well as actually having sufficient material to even write about! Celebration!

Now let's calm back down. Excessive amounts of glee and glee-like behavior make me uncomfortable. :P

So, first I really want to mention how I really dislike my propensity towards being such a nice person all of the time. No, I do not want to give you a ride to somewhere that will end up not being quite where you actually intended on going and then sticking around. First of all, not giving me the full driving plan is rather rude. A ride to a pharmacy implies a significant number of things different than a ride to a restaurant located near the pharmacy. Second, I'm not a taxi and I don't charge for rides. Calling me for rides to nearby places and for nothing else is very annoying. Thirdly, I am not a particularly engaging person unless engaged. If you are not a particularly engaging person, either, then it's just going to be awkward and unpleasant for the both of us. (In other words, you're boring, but I'm not going to mention it directly because that's RUDE.)

Generically specific examples aside, I realize the problem lies in my inability to just say no. If I don't have a legitimate reason to say no, then I just can't seem to say it anyway. I also am unable to make up excuses on the spot that sound realistic, a trait that I find very particularly annoying. The other problem is that I'm never going to just be frank with a person, either. I'm far to NICE to do that. >.>

Alright, I do have other things to talk about that are less frustrated in nature. (Surprise!)

Primary is the fact that I have yet another date lined up for soon-ly. A very interesting story is behind this one, too. So it begins with consideration of my participation in the student choir at the LDS Institute of Religion at the UT campus. I figured that choir might be a place in which I might meet some new people, and for all intents and purposes, I was essentially right. Whether or not I actually became 'friends' with any of them is a different story. That was complicated by the fact that most of the people who I didn't know in the choir were members of another Singles Ward in more south Austin. Anyway, there were inevitably a few individuals who caught my attention. Amusingly, most of these people caught my attention because they reminded me very much of people whom I knew back in High School, whom I often rather liked. Appearances and behavior were congruous with my memories of certain people and that created a sensation of familiarity that made me comfortable with the prospect of being interested. (This is different from being comfortable with the prospect of actually talking to any of them, mind you. It's a weird and complicated system that even I don't quite understand.)

I went the first semester without really making any efforts to get to know anyone. My major hold-up was the fact that they all lived so far away from where I do. Yes, I have a car, but gas is expensive and Austin has very bad traffic during the times that I might have reason to go anywhere. Thus, I generally tried to stick to relatively nearby options. Well, fast forward to this semester, and we've recently started up the choir class again. I went to the second meeting (I was unaware of the significance of the date the week prior), and was intrigued to find that one of the girls that I had taken interest in was also attending again. This, in and of itself, would not have been enough to get me to do anything about it, but fortunately, towards the end of the class, Elder Smith decided to have the new-ish people introduce themselves. It was suggested that I introduce myself anyway, even though I was not necessarily new - people just probably didn't know me. So I did, and then mentioned in brief that I had Aspergers syndrome. I was going to continue with a forcedly brief explanation of what that was when someone on the other side of the room shouted, "Oh, me too!" Turns out it was the very girl that I have mentioned thus far.

The revelation surprised me initially - I never would have guessed based solely on my observations - but as I reconsidered things, I realized that I really wasn't so surprised. There were a number of interesting quirks that I had seen, though not necessarily noted, that now made absolute sense. Well, I had my 'in,' as it were, and I decided to take advantage of it. I stopped her after class and we had a nice, if somewhat brief conversation before I left. Later I determined that I might ask her to dinner the next week so I could get to know her better. Strangely, I always find it easier and more comfortable to get to know someone when on a date rather than just in casual conversation.

So this past Thursday I went to choir, enjoyed the experience and then forced myself to talk to her again. (As one might expect, there was a great cacophony in my mind as the blaring ABORT!!! sirens were silenced by the forces of my stoic acceptance-ish-ness.) So we talked for a few minutes, during which we discovered that she had gone to High School with two of my cousins from the Gregor McHardy family. It's rather funny how people are so closely connected without even realizing it sometimes. 

Afterwards (and after a short blue-screen-of-death effect inside my brain), I actually got around to asking her if she would have any interest in getting dinner sometime. I noticed (and smiled inwardly at) how her face instantly lit up once she interpreted what I was asking. I suspect that she may have a similar problem as I in which she feels that people often don't really take interest in her, so the unexpected nature of the encounter was probably pretty nice. I then threw away all of my practiced conversational facade as I switched to information gathering mode (I get very choppy and easily jumbled when I have to think of, and then ask for, what information I might need from someone). I think I did a pretty good job, getting everything but her cell number. A slightly embarrassing oversight, but I've still got next Thursday to acquire that information before the actual date. All I have to do now is plan out options for what we might do before the YSA dance that night.... Always seems so difficult, but ends up not being so. Oh well, I'll be fine. I'm excited either way. :P

A Short Update

I would absolutely love to make a full post here, but I am currently not able to use my brain well enough to think of anything. I blame an acute lack of anti-depressant drugs for this malfunction. Anyway, Just as a short status update, I am home again in Austin and finally living on my own! It's so very nice to have full use of my apartment for once and not have any unnecessary stress from having other persons around! Absolutely love it.

I went to the Austin Zoo today. Cute little animal sanctuary out in the apparent middle of nowhere. Wasn't a lot there, but there was enough interesting material to make the long drive worth it. 

I'll write more about... Something... a little later. Tomorrow, probably, once I've had time to get the levels of Pristiq in my body back up to where they should be. Buh-bye!