New Year’s Resolutions

I apologize in advance for this post. It is long, has no pictures, and deals mainly with my goals for the year. But, I figure if this blog is to help me intellectually, the best way to learn is through self reflection. Who knows, you might enjoy it.

So, I’ve tried to find the New Year’s Resolutions that I had for 2009, but I cannot find them anywhere. This year, however, I have my Blog to help me out.

The one thing I’ve noticed about resolutions is that they are hardly ever kept past February. One of the most common resolutions is to lose weight and get in shape. Thus, the gym at my school is always packed. Until February, that is. By that time people seem to be caught up in other things and pick up their old habits.

But 2010 will be different! (For me at least.) That is why I am posting my resolutions on here, and will keep everyone updated on them, perhaps at the first of every month. This way it will help me stay focused on my resolutions, because I clearly haven’t been. If I can’t even remember what my resolutions were for last year, how am I supposed to know if I’ve actually kept up with them?

So for this year’s resolutions, I will keep it to a minimum, and I will make them realistic. Hopefully this will help me reach all of the goals I set for myself.

Live A Healthier Life

This one is pretty straightforward. Right now I am the most overweight that I have ever been. It’s not really a surprise though, I’ve always been a bigger guy and lately it’s just been easier to go out to eat somewhere cheap than to actually make something at home. This must change!

I do realize that going cold turkey might be easier at first, but is usually the reason diets fail. People, myself included, tend to give up when things get harder. However, I think that for myself it is the best way to go. In my past diets, I allowed for one unhealthy meal a week. This way, it takes away the urge to cheat because one meal is allowed. What I have found that usually happens is that I will have a cheat meal early in the week, and then later in the week some friends will want to do something and I’ll end up going out with them as well. So, this year I will only allow myself to go out to eat with someone else. And when I do, I must eat the healthiest thing on the menu.

For this resolution, I will also run and work out every day. For the past two or three weeks, I have been running every day. But, that really is not enough. My freshman year of college we had a work out schedule that worked really well for me. It was a balance of working out and cardio exercises, and I lost a lot of weight doing this. So, as of my return to college, since I do not have a gym to go to here, I will work out 6 days a week, resting on Sunday. With this I must be strict, because it’s so easy to stop. But as long as one continues to push through it, it becomes habit.

Oh, as far as food and eating goes, I will only drink water. And lots of water. I am prone to headaches, and I have found that it usually starts when I don’t drink enough water. Also, cutting out all of the soft drinks and sweet tea will help in the weight loss goal.

Be A Better Scholar

Last year I lost HOPE (for my readers who are unfamiliar with GA scholarships, HOPE pays for all of tuition, and a little bit of books and fees) and it has been a lot harder financially. But, I worked my a$$ off last semester and now I have it back. So, maybe one of my most important resolutions is to not only keep HOPE, but to become an even better scholar than I have been in the past.

When you are an English major, you have a lot to read. And for me, that’s great because I love to read. However, with everything else I have to do, it’s easy to push off some of the short stories and smaller works. I tend to push off school after my RA and fraternity duties. This year will be different!

I resolve to put school ahead of everything else I have going on. My goal for this semester is a straight 4.0, something I have never done.

Go To The Blackbird Coffee Shop Once A Month

“But Beast,” you might say, “I thought you resolved not to go out? And to only drink water from now on? Isn’t this a direct violation of your other resolutions? Besides, isn’t paying $4 for a cup of coffee a little bit much?”

True, this does mean I’ll be violating some of my resolutions, but it’s important to have some personal time to do something you enjoy. And a cup of coffee is much better than a double cheeseburger.

I recently have been turned on to Blackbird by some friends, and I love it. I don’t mind paying the $4 for the cup of coffee either, because I understand that I’m really paying for the atmosphere. To me, there’s not much better than drinking a nice mocha and reading a good book.

 

…so, those are my resolutions for the year 2010. It might not be a long list, but that’s all the more reason that I should be able to better keep up with it. Plus, those are some big tasks to manage. In order to keep up with it, I will make a post about how I’ve been doing on the first of every month. In these posts, I will tell all. I will tell about anything I cheated on, and everything I did right. Hopefully, this will make me stick with them.

What are your resolutions? How did you do on your resolutions for 2009? Whatever your plans for tonight are, remember to stay safe, and that if you’re drinking, a cab is always the best way home. Stay safe,

-Beast

Sherlock Holmes

One of the books that I got for Christmas was The Complete Sherlock Holmes. I had never read it before, and I was very excited to do so. I’ve already read two of the books, and I must say that it is very good.

I also saw the movie yesterday in Milly with my sister as part of our daytrip down to Milledgeville and oh man, it was freakin’ awesome.

From what I’ve read, it was close to the book. One of my favorite parts was the relationship between Holmes and Watson. I would recommend seeing the movie in theaters, because some of the shots and sounds need to be seen on the big screen.

What are you reading right now? Or what movie have you recently seen that was excellent?

-Beast

MillyVegas with Megan

So my Christmas present to Megan was a day trip down to MillyVegas to show her my college and everything. Here are a lot of pictures from the trip.

 

And these are of my little sister and I.

So that was my present to her. She and I had a really good time and I hope she decides to go to GCSU. And hey, maybe these pictures will make you want to come to GCSU!

-Beast

New Books!

So I’m a dork. To be more precise, an English dork. Thus, I got a stack of books for Christmas!

The list includes: The Great Gatsby, What the Dog Saw, The Picture of Dorian Grey, The Secret Garden, The Three Musketeers, Needful Things, The Iliad, and then collections from Plato, Emerson, Machiavelli, and some others. Not pictured above is When You Are Engulfed In Flames and The Complete Sherlock Holmes. Because of all of the new books, I had to reorganize my bookshelf.

As you can see, it’s getting crammed. It doesn’t help that I have 17 new books that I have to get for classes next semester. So, what I’m thinking is dad and I need to build a new one. It would be really nice to have a bookshelf that will house all of my books and one which would be sturdy.

Because I haven’t posted in a while, there are a couple other things that I wanted to say, but I’ll do those in other posts. Enjoy!

-Beast

The Day After Christmas Report

It’s the day after Christmas! Here’s the rundown on the loot (and sorry, no pics today):

1. New shoes! I’m especially happy about this one because my old ones were shot to hell and back.

2. The Hangover: Unrated Edition! 100 New Photos! OMG I can’t wait to watch it!

3. Cologne: Polo Blue. Now I smell good.

4. A Swiss Army Knife. And this one has everything: magnifying glass, scissors, even a pen. And oh yeah, a knife.

5. Money and gift cards.

6. A pony! So it’s been a longstanding joke between my family and I about getting a pony. So this year they put a little fake pony thing in my stocking. It was really funny.

7. I got some books, and some other things as well, but these are most of the things I got.

So how about you? What did you get? I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

-Beast

Merry Christmas

I hope you had a wonderful holiday! Updates on the presents tomorrow. As for now, sleep.

An Introduction to Lucy!

So here we are, a week into winter break, and I’m enjoying the relaxation oh so much. It’s nice to just kick back and relax. Oh and to see my two sweet dogs, Angel and RC. But you already met them. But because my dad thinks I don’t love her, I need to introduce my other dog, Lucy.

We just recently got her, and by recently I mean a year or two ago. And just because I haven’t mentioned her yet doesn’t mean I don’t love her. She’s a sweet puppy. Well, she’s not really a puppy anymore…

And she’s a pain to get pictures of because she won’t stay still.

But sometimes she’s a good girl and sits still.

…if you hold her collar at least. But there she is, my other sweetest dog, Lucy. Hope everyone’s enjoying the weekend.

-Beast

Project For Awesome and Iron Man 2

So I have some new videos for you today; one that I made and one that is of professional quality.

The first is the one that I made. It’s my first video and all I have is the built in webcam, so the quality is really low, but it’s for a good cause. If you don’t know, the Project For Awesome (P4A) is when all of YouTube gets together and make movies that promote their favorite charities. The charity that I promoted is Push America. If you you would like to donate, you can do so here.

Now for a much cooler video! The new Iron Man 2 trailer was released and OHMAHGAWD it looks amazing. I realized after I posted this that the video is too big for the blog, but you can watch the whole thing here.

So that’s what I’ve been watching. If you’ve got some free time you should really check out all of the P4A videos, like this one. When you watch them be sure to rate and comment so that they make it to the top of the YouTube list.

To love, to laugh, to learn—that is the meaning of life.

-Beast

Video Editing Is Hard…

So the Project For Awesome is tomorrow and I just finished editing the video that I will upload for it.

I have to admit, video editing is hard. Well, maybe it’s easier if you have actual recording equipment instead of some crappy webcam and built in mic, but I imagine that it’s still hard.

Other than that, I haven’t been up to much. I worked with Dad today, and we’re going to work tomorrow.

How’s your winter break going?

-Beast

Fun With Old Friends

So last night I went to a zoo! Well, not really, it was just my friend Britnay’s house.

 

Her parents take in rescue animals, so there are a lot of cats.

She also has frogs.

And a giant Santa Claus that freaked me out the first time I saw it.

So we hung out for a while and decided that it had been such a long time since we had a picture taken together, so we decided to take one. But then it kinda turned into this…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, as you can tell we never took our serious picture, but that’s ok. These pictures are a better representation of us than any other picture could be.

-Beast

Song Mood

One of the reasons I love music is because no matter how you feel, there is a song that describes it exactly. And that reminds me that, no matter what, someone else has already gone through what you’ve been through, good or bad. Here’s the lyrics to “Goodnight, Good Guy” by Collective Soul which are a good reflection on my mood right now.

Somebody told me about a worn out distraction

That I had let slip away.

Then it comes back and it rides my shoulders

And it burdens me every new day.

Well I’ll just sit here like a slow burnout

And try to figure how to do without,

Without you…

 

[Chorus]

Who’s going to straighten me up

When I’m leaning?

Who’s going to soothe my heart

When it’s burning?

Who’s going to be the one

To tell me everything’s alright?

Well, goodnight, good guy.

 

I’ll break the bread of a new day and wonder

If faith will carry me along

But days are longer as my heart gets weaker

And I can only stay so strong

Well I’ll just sit here like a wounded soul

Who’s finding it difficult to just let go

Let it go…

 

[Chorus]

 

Well I’m going to let you sleep

I’ll let you fade off in the night

I pray the Lord to keep

I pray the Lord to hold you tight

Goodnight

Truck Troubles

Whenever my truck breaks down it seems to be at the most inopportune times, like just a few minutes ago.

Pictured: The Smurphmobile not broken down.

It’s currently three in the morning and I just got back to the apartment. The truck is still on the side of the road though, and will be so until I can get to the auto store to buy some transmission fluid. One of the hoses came undone.

Oh the joys of owning a car.

An Epic Tale of Finals Week

The Battles were imminent. I prepare with the weapons I have. My Pen is my Sword, my Notes are Enemy Secrets I had intercepted. My Enemies are International Lit, Writing About Lit, German, and American Lit. The was to be the Week of Wars; the week to see who who would be the Victor, my Enemies or myself!

International Lit decided to attack first. Tuesday at 11AM I was met with my first Battle. Luckily, I was prepared with and reacted with speed and grace. With my Sword struck quick and fast, and I brought the Animal down with grace.

I had a day to recover and prepare for the next Attack. Writing About Lit charged, and we met head on. I was not expecting the Endurance the Enemy came with. It took me three hours before the Animal was slain. I was tired, but I emerged the Victor.

The next day, Friday, came faster than I had planned. German moved on the offensive and we met head on. It was easy prey.

My last Opponent, American Lit, took its time before we met. It was 5:30PM when we met on the Battlefield. I was tired and my energy had been spent on the other Fallen Enemies, but persevere I must.

Unbeknownst to American Lit, I had used the Notes I had acquired in preparation for our battle. Though I was wounded, I met my last Enemy with full force. Two hours later, I was the last one standing.

Having killed all of my Enemies, I look back at the week. Corpses of my Exams lay scattered, defeated. I emerge the Victor. Finals Week is over.

Hathbanger

So today, while I was taking a break from studying finals, I browsed YouTube and found some really cool songs from the mash up DJ Hathbanger. Here’s the first video I found. It’s a mix of Biggie and Miley Cyrus:

The next video I found is a mix of a couple of artists, and it’s the first time I’ve heard Lil Wayne sound better than Notorious B.I.G.:

I hope you enjoyed these as much as I did.

-Beast

Life Without Facebook: Day Two, and Why I Love Being an English Major

It’s day two without facebook, and I must say it’s been quite a day.

It was foolish of me to think that I would not be tempted by the internet if I got rid of facebook. Today I just spent the day with my blog, which, you might have noticed, has gotten a face lift. I added a poll, a feature to where you can share the link on your Twitter or Facebook account, buttons you can click to say you Like, Dislike, or are Indifferent to the post, a tool where you can search my blog for any keyword, and I changed the theme around. I think it looks much better. I also browsed other people’s blogs and I found some very helpful ones.

The one thing I did notice about the blogging world today is that there are a lot of people who are trying to get a start at writing. And most of them were women. In fact, all of the blogs that I came across today were from women, regardless if they were about writing or something else. So am I the only guy out here?

On a different note, the end of the day was wonderful, and is the perfect example of why I love being an English major. While everyone else is pulling all-nighters and spending massive amounts of time pouring over massive accounting books or science books or business books, I was in our local coffee shop enjoying my coffee and reading Huckleberry Finn. Yup, that’s how I prepare for my finals.

So how about you? How has your finals week been? And if you’re not in college, how has your week been like?

I’ve traveled the world twice over,

Met the famous; saints and sinners,

Poets and artists, kings and queens,

Old stars and hopeful beginners,

I’ve been where no-one’s been before,

Learned secrets from writers and cooks

All with one library ticket

To the wonderful world of books.

-Beast

ZOMG! Life without facebook!

Finals week is here! That means no sleep, mountains of drained energy cans, and a zombie like state of mind until Friday evening.

And because I’m so easily distracted by facebook, I have vowed live without it until all of my finals are done.

That’s right! No facebook. For a week. Ok, it’s really like five days, but still. For a facebookaholic that’s a lot of time. The best part is now I have my friends doing it as well!

Other than not doing facebook, tonight we had midnight breakfast. I wish I could have gotten some photos, but instead I will try to paint a mental picture.

As you approach the dining hall, you see a line. From a distance it doesn’t look too bad, but as you get closer you notice that the line is a block long. After waiting for a half hour, you finally get into the dining hall.

There are no seats left. There are three separate food lines, with faculty members serving the food, and all of them are backed up. Everyone is going crazy because there is free stuff galore: trucker hats, shirts, and bingo prizes are being thrown around the room as crazed college kids fight over them.

After an eternity of waiting you finally get your food. When you sit down to eat you realize you weren’t hungry to begin with, but by God you’re going to eat it to justify waiting in line for so long. After you finish your meal you wonder why you put yourself through that.

Once you get back to your apartment you realize that you shouldn’t have gone because you have a final tomorrow at 11:00am. But then you think back to all the laughs that you shared in the line, all the crazy people you saw, and what a fun and hilarious time it was.

Then you realize the real learning in college takes place outside of the classroom. You realize that even though it might not be the most productive use of your time, it will be the time you’ll remember well after your college years. Then you’ll smile and get back to work.

Happy Monday everyone.

-Beast

Why people should back off Tim Tebow

Before start I want to point out that the first picture Google Images provides from the search “Tim Tebow” is his girlfriend.

So many people, mainly UGA fans, are so happy Tebow lost.

And the main thing I hear people make fun of him is because he cries when he loses games.

The reason this upsets me is because the two games he’s cried at are the two of the three biggest of his career, which is very impressive.

But why does it matter if he’s cried at these two games? The guy has more pressure to win than anyone else in college football. He’s talked about all the time and he had so much to live up to since his second year.

It is understood that there is no crying in football. I say bullshit.

If you put half the energy that he did into something you truly loved, and then you had an upsetting defeat, would you not feel like crying too?

What this comes down to is that football (and sports in general) is associated with manliness. And because men do not cry, then there is no crying in football.

The idea that men do not, and should not, cry is a dumb one. The reason so many mean suffer anger management problems is because they do not know how to release their anger. If they cannot cry, then what can they do? They can hit something. That’ll solve the issue.

Instead of making fun of Tebow for crying, society should understand that it’s ok for men to cry.

Not the best example, but…

But will people stop making fun of him? No, they won’t. Why? Because UGA fans suck.

-Beast