a day of self-discovery

What did I discover on my first day of Fall Break? That I'm a lazy jerk. Oh, and that sometimes I really want to use sentence fragments, but generally keep myself from doing so.

As a recovering Calvinist, I have decided that wasting time needs to become a spiritual practice. In Calvinism we learn, "Let your 'yes' be 'yes,' and your 'no' be 'yes.'" Basically, we are expected to take responsibility for the fact that the world still has sin in it. Not that this concept in and of itself is totally wrong (as are very few concepts), but in practice it can be a mind-warping experience. Consider yours truly, who constantly castigated himself for being lazy while working 40 hours a week and taking a full load of classes as an undergrad.

Many Calvinists try to live like Ned Flanders, "I did everything in the Bible, I even did the stuff that contradicted the other stuff." The fact of the matter is, life is about balance—our bodies were designed for spending 60 hours a week in the fields, not 60 hours a week parsing deponent verbs.

So in honor of wasting time, I have decided to pursue self-knowledge by engaging in the blog(o/a)log(ue).

Let's start with internet personality tests. Liquid Generation provides some colorful fun. Of course, any test that claims to be the ultimate in anything must tell me something powerfully profound about my affinity or lack thereof for the darkside.


This somewhat disturbing result led me to try and discover my S.Q., or Simpson Quotient. Matching myself among such luminaries as Homer, O.J., Jessica, et al., I found a more comforting result.


Although initially relieved, this led to the somewhat unsettling question of my pure unadulterated nerdery.


To my delight, I had not yet reached level I nerdhood, but I realized that I was dangling precipitously close to the edge. Logically, I needed to take a purity test at that moment.


Having concluded that I may actually have dangled myself too far over the edge (hey, I didn't mean it that way), I took the quasi sequitur step (at least in terms of dangling precipitously) to my final internet self-knowledge query.


Ah, truly, the unexamined life is not worth living.

Of course, these quizzes did not come from such reputable sources as my fellow blog(o/a)loggers, most of whom I would actually trust to dangle my third-born child off a balcony in Berlin. Since Andrew's is shorter, I thought I'd tackle his first.

Five Publishable Idiosyncracies

1. I will buy one cereal over another if it includes a free prize inside (i.e. a children's book, or a Disney® Wobbler©.)


2. I collect recyclable items of trash (i.e. paper bags, paperboard) in my classroom until they grow into such a pile that I either (a) generally throw them away, or (b) stuff them in the trunk and forget about them for a month.


3. I often dream that I am back in high school, either teaching my peers (although we are all still teenagers), or being taught by my current colleagues.


4. Secretly, of all the things I own, my favorite posession is my Futbol Club Barcelona towel that I bought for €10.


5. All of my books at school are labeled and catalogued with a Dewey Decimal Number.

Lastly, I would be remiss, if I did not respond to Guamo's kind inference that I would be the most likely to respond to his brief biography. I take it as a sign of our closeness, which dates back to the days of LEGO® spaceships and first crushes. (Tom used to like Erin Feller—is the statute of limitations out on an already violated pledge of eternal secrecy?)

1. What is your occupation? Teacher
2. What are you listening to right now? The sound of electricity humming
3. What was your favorite vacation spot? Braga, Portugal
4. What was the last thing you ate? Falafel platter at Sticks.
5. Do you wish on stars? Only if I'm in the right mood
6. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? piña colada
7. How is the weather right now? Pacific Northwest Rainforest with a side of kudzu.
8. Last person you spoke to on the phone? la Juanita
9. How many different sizes of jeans are in your closet? enough to keep up with the swiftly changing contours of my ass
10. How old are you today? 26ish
11. Favorite drink? Diet Pepsi
12. Favorite sport to watch? Baseball is too depressing to watch right now.
13. Have you ever dyed your hair? Blondes have more fun.
14. Do you wear contacts? My eyesight is my only physical feature which does not require constant maintenance.
15. Pets? 3 beautiful turtles, wanna see pictures?
16. Favorite month? June at about the 15thish
17. Favorite food? Did someone say "gyro?"
18. What was the last movie you watched? Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow
19. Favorite day of the year? Did I mention June 15thish?
20. What do you do to vent anger? Ummmm..., you're reading it.
21. What was your favorite toy as a child? LEGO®, Transformers
22. Fall or Spring? I'm more of a nuclear winter.
23. Hugs or kisses? Are we talking candies, 'cause otherwise, why would one need to choose.
24. Cherry or Blueberry? 1 cup of berries is only 1 starch, whereas a whole banana or large apple might be 2.
25. Do you want your friends to email (blog) you back? Why else would I have a blog?
26. Who is most likely to respond? Maybe Judith, because she's nice, but nobody really reads this, do they?
27. Who is least likely to respond? I thought I was.
28. Living arrangements? Roommate, girlfriend, lover, and life partner (geez, that makes me sound like a ho)
29. When was the last time you cried? I get upset about a generation's loss of innocence.
30. What is on the floor of your closet? Worldly possessions.
31. Who is the friend you have had the longest? My brother is still my friend, even if he did vote for Dr. Evil. Also, I need to make a shout out here to my big sis, who has taken me one step closer to biological avuncularity.
32. What did you do last night? I skinned my knee while riding my bike to choir practice when I stopped too suddenly at the rapturous sight of la Juanita coming home from work. After choir practice, I rode past the Rolling Stones concert only to come by while the stadium was cleared due to a bomb threat. After watching a delightful episode of South Park at Jaimee's house, I went home and set out a bunch of trash for the large item pickup.
33. Favorite smell? Not fratboy puke before a Rolling Stones concert.
34. Who inspires you? Juh-EE-suhs
35. What are you afraid of? Acrophobia, Claustrophobia, Gephyrophobia
36. Favorite car? I wish I had a hybrid, or a car that ran on bio-diesel.
37. Favorite dog breed? Mutt
38. Number of keys on your key ring? Too many
39. How many years at your current job? I think I started this job while I was still in junior high.
40. Favorite day of the week? Friday night
41. How many states have you lived in? 3
42. How many cities have you lived in? 3

That was anti-climactic, or is it climatic? Well, now I know who I am, and you should too.

But seriously, folks, let's not take ourselves too seriously. I would be remiss if I didn't end this post with a final contradiction. As a middle-school teacher, I have learned that unless I act with the complete moral authority of the gospel, I can never develop the humility that will allow me to survive another year.

Peace.