frustrations

I'm quite frustrated.

The Juniors are having a fundraiser tomorrow morning, selling doughnuts and hot chocolate. That's just fantastic. Only problem is, our class had that idea at the beginning of this year. Of course, the fundraiser was declined because the doughnuts and hot chocolate contain too much sugar, which would make the students hyper/distracted throughout the morning. The teachers didn't feel like they needed to deal with that. Well, that was then.

Now, though, the Juniors are doing it. And why? I really have no clue why. Maybe I'm missing something, but as far as I can see, the administration approved the exact same fundraiser for the Juniors, which was declined for us months before. Now, if our class and the Junior class had turned in the idea at around the same time, I would understand it to be nothing more than a seniority issue, and that is something I can deal with. But I can't deal with the fact that they changed their minds just in time for someone else to have the same brilliant idea. I'm not frustrated with the Juniors at all. I'm frustrated with whoever it is that allowed that fundraiser to pass (or whoever didn't let it pass for us in the first place.) What's most frustrating is that we've been spending a lot of time brainstorming on how we can provide a healthier, lower-sugar breakfast option that we can do in the mornings instead, that the administration would approve of. We were trying to work with the system! And then what happens? That's what happens.

We're also thinking of selling Jamba Juice after school Fridays, but hey! Would you look at that! The Juniors are selling "It's Its" after school on Fridays. So congrats Juniors, it's a double-whammy! We're probably going to try passing it anyways. There's nothing wrong with a little friendly competition, is there? Or perhaps it could be an every-other-Friday thing. I hope not, though. We don't have enough Fridays left in the year for that.

I will say, we Sophomores have been slow to act as far as fundraisers, but that's partly because of our fear of something that would cause it to be turned down, not to mention disasters that have occured in the past (like our valentines' day grams--I won't get into that. Let's just say it was a disaster, overall). But now it feels like our meticulous planning and precision has resulted in someone else blundering in with an idea we were already forced to dispose of and being successful with it. Not that I'm calling the Juniors stupid or blundering or anything like that;) Anyways, I'll support the Juniors however I can, but in the meantime I will have to find out the root of this problem and how it can be prevented in the future. Stuff like this just shouldn't happen at all. It's completely ridiculous and unacceptable.

why i'm considering quitting World of Warcraft

This is probably one of the few times I'll do this, but I'm going to copy an entry from my personal journal. The other day I was thinking/writing, and this is what came out of it.
____________________
February 20, 2006

So far, this week has been good. Of course, that's mostly because I didn't have school today. I feel like I'm slipping more deeply into a pattern of neglect.
It's World of Warcraft. That stupid game has me addicted, and it's taking $15 from my bank account every month. The past month or so was WoW-free, but I'm back on it now that Matt has recently gotten it. I'm seriusly considering eliminating it. A: It sucks up all my time. B: In order to keep up with my friends (as far as levelling), I'd have to play as frequently as they do, which means I couldn't really "cut down" on my time to make room for other things, like reading. C: If I am going to have a set time limit for computer usage, I would much rather spend it on my blogs and podcast; in this way I would accomplish something mildly useful and exercise my creative skills. These things could actually help me in my future, whereas WoW is just a complete waste of time. WoW not only cuts out useful computer time, but makes it easy for me to skip over homework and instrument practice, not to mention sleep/reading time. The more I write, the more I am convinced that quitting is an excellent idea. I cannot think of a reason to continue, other than because it's fun. But really, I don't need it. Blogging is fun. Podcasting is fun. WoW and other electronic games can be compared to sweets. Eating them is awesome; they taste delicious and are pleasantly filling. But afterwards, sweets make me feel like crap. Reading, media prodcution, and instrument playing are like healthy foods, like fruit. Equally delicious and filling, and they make me feel great afterward. In a way, "Junk in, junk out" isn't entirely inaccurate. I guess now it's settled. I'm quitting.
I'm taking an agressive approach on my time management. I only have approx. 14.5 hours each day, so anything that does nothing but waste my valuable time (exept people) will be purged. I've got a future, and a life, and people around me; those are my top priority.
God needs to help me with this one. It'll be easy for me to "forget" all of this and slip back into my reckless patterns. It's time for change.
_____________________

Now, I wasn't very clear in some of those illustrations, but I wasn't exactly presenting a well-thought-out argument; I was merely writing what was on my mind. So I'll expand from that now.

I was sort of in a "fiery" mood when I wrote that journal entry, so my decisive nature has somewhat lessened since then. I'm still not as sure as I seemed to be then that I want to quit. However, evidence supporting my above claims is overwhelming. In a purely logical sense, it would be wiser for me to quit. I think another reason why I want to keep playing is for the fellowship between me and my friends. If it were just me on there, playing that game alone, I'd quit at the drop of a hat. But I have friends who are playing with me, and that makes it more fun, like I get to hang out with my friends. In a way, that ties in to my "spending more time concerned with people" goal. But there are other ways to spend time with my friends, and of all of them WoW is probably the most shallow.

So really, I think I'm going to quit. But I still have to think about it. Perhaps someone can present me with some reasons as to why I should continue other than "But JM! We need you in order to PWN those n00bs!! Otherwise, we won't have a guy to portal us everywhere!! Waaaa!"

Please don't get me wrong--I'm not judging anyone regarding the game. I don't think gaming is evil or anything like that. I'm pro-gaming. But my schedule is too busy to accomodate it, that's really the root of it. Some people have more time than I do, and that's fine. They can spend it playing games if they want, I'm not going to argue against that.

Still, to those of you who are limited in time and could be spending it better elsewhere, consider what I have said as an application for you, or at least as just some food for thought. Time is a gift God has given us, and I intend to use it to the best of my ability, before it all runs out.

Prayer requests--
->Pray that I am able to keep a disciplined schedule and not slip back into my laziness.

->Pray for my friend Molly Franklin; she's having some family troubles and needs some comfort and healing. Also pray that I can be a good friend to her and that God would use me to comfort and serve her in any way I can.

->Pray for my Dad; our church is undergoing a major change (a good one), but stressful and not without its complications. I don't know if I'm allowed to disclose any specific details, so I'll just leave it at that.

BNP Podcast

Big Nose Productions now has a podcast. I will soon be releasing downloadable versions of the Winter Retreat video, the SC Retreat video, and the Senior Interviews video, along with other productions that I may make in the future. Right now, you can download a movie we made for Miss Herber's English class (it's quite funny, I would recommend watching it.)
To visit the BNPodcast website, go to the link below:

http://web.mac.com/fredharrell/iWeb/sensesay/BNPodcast/BNPodcast.html

Or, to directly subscribe, click on the icon below:

golly gee, what's going ON??

I have a bit of a different setup with my blog now. Thanks to my genius and html skills, I set a redirect tag on my previous blog in order to lead all visitors to my main welcome center, where access to all my media projects (including my blog) can easily be accessed. In order to pull this off, I had to make a new blog, which is this one. It is identical to my previous blog (same posts, same dates, etc), but the web address is http://sensesay1.blogspot.com/. You may want that url in order to skip the "welcome page" and get straight to my blog, or if you have an RSS reader. I'm working on getting this to work on Xanga and Myspace as well, that way people will be FORCED to go to my actual blog! Muahaha! I feel like such a Mac user, limiting your options and making everything simple. Eventually, my Myspace, Xanga, and Blog, will all lead to the same place--that's the goal here. I'm tired of putting up with Myspace and Xanga, so when people want to comment or see what's up with me, they can come to my actual blog, no matter what service they happen to be using. No more pasting the same entry onto three sites! One Blog to rule them all...

Any tips on how to put the redirect tag into Xanga and/or Myspace would be much appreciated.

john mark has a podcast

Subscribe! The link below takes you to the website:

http://web.mac.com/fredharrell/iWeb/sensesay/Blog/Blog.html

I plan to (hopefully) make it a weekly podcast with around 5 songs that I really like. I hope other people will hear about new good music from it or appreciate my recognition of something they already like. It touches on many genres. The first episode is in it's embryonic stages, so bear with the rambling and and short cast for now. I may add more songs to future epidsodes; we'll see. Please give me feeback! I want to make my podcast as enjoyable as possible.

If you want to directly subscribe to it, click on the icon below:

snapshot of san francisco

Today I took a picture of the bumpers stickers which can be found on a car that has been parked on our block for a while. I've seen it many times before today, but only now realized the irony of it.

One one side of the bumper:


On the other side of the bumper: