wordless wednesday - two years

growing up

It seems that all my life my teachers and counselors have told me to follow my dreams. That I need to find what I love and do that. I know what I love, comics. I really love the X-Men. I remember being about ten years old when I discovered the X-Men. Fox had a great cartoon for them. A cartoon I based all my X-Men knowledge on for years and got a lot of things right about the X-Men cannon. Then my first comic book ever was the X-Men Volume 2 Issue 5. I got it as a present. It was a sweet comic. Wolverine fought Omega Red. Since that time I've been a big X-Men fan. I might not always collect the comics, there are like ten to twenty a month to buy, but I keep track of what's going on.

Here's my problem. Since I was about ten I've wanted to be an X-Man. That has been one of my big problems. I figured I'd eventually get mutant powers. Something really cool like I could stop time and live between the moments of time. Maybe I could travel in time or fly. I also could end up with a lame power like talking to fish or being able to jump twenty feet in the air. I just figured by now I'd have power. The problem is I'm now 29 and don't have a mutant power. According to X-Men lore the power manifest themselves at puberty which I had quite awhile ago.

I feel like I should give up on my dream. I'm getting a bit old now. I'm married. I have a family I need to look out for. The X-Men don't seem to worry to much about having families. Most of the kids end up being sent to the future to be raised. I just hate to think that I could never be an X-Man. I don't really want to grow up. I love being a kid and just doing kid things. Sure I finished college. I work a regular job, but that doesn't mean I have to give up the dream, or does it?

Mormon:Facts (Monster Edition)

wordless wednesday

ten reasons

10. Her desire for adventure
9. The way she cheers me up all the time
8. Being determined
7. Looking at the bright side of life
6. The way she kisses me
5. Letting me be my weird self
4. The way she always wants to hold my hand
3. Her love of books
2. Making me a better man
1. Loving me enough to marrying me

These are the top ten reasons I love Allison!

the lost car wash

One of the perks of buying our new Jetta at the dealership we bought it at was that we get a free car wash every Saturday morning. Luckily the dealership is right in front of our house! Mind you we went all over town before we went to that dealership to look at cars. Today was the first time we decide to use the free car wash. I wasn't sure exactly how it was going to work, but it did. We got our car washed. The wash was really nice too. They did it by hand and detailed the outside of the car. They even shined the tires! So nice. The one problem with that is the fact that it takes a little longer than the five minute auto wash at the gas station. When we took it in they said about an hour to an hour and a half. We decide to go grocery shopping in that time frame. Everything is like a two minute walk from our apartment. Life is good. So good. When I went back I wasn't sure what I was suppose to do. I saw that they were still washing a Jetta. Not thinking about the fact I was at Volkswagen Dealership and there are lots of Jetta there, I thought it was mine. It was an older Jetta too. So I just waited outside while they finished up the wheels. When they pulled it out they were like here you go. I got a good look at it and realized it wasn't mine. I was like my bad, not my Jetta. I looked around for a second and couldn't even see my car in the back lot where they kept the car they were washing and working on. I finally asked someone what was up and they were like oh, go check with the cashier to get your keys. Not knowing where that was I ended up going to a couple different people before finding the cashier. As I got my keys I asked her where they might have put my car. She said to check along the side and back. Having already checked there I was thanks. Walking out the side doors to check if it was over there I noticed a nice looking Jetta parked out front of the dealership. Oh yes, my car was looking so fine they put it out front to attract customers. It's nice to have a good looking car that runs really good.

the new 52 - Static Shock

The new 52 has finished it first month. That would the total relaunch of DC comics line of comics. They rebooted their entire line in September. I stopped reading DC comics at this time too. It felt like it would be a good jumping off point since all the stories were wrapping up. I was only reading two Batman books at the time so not a big loss for me. Then this week was the first rounds of issue two for some of the comics. I also only had one comic I as picking up at the comic shop so I figured I might give one comic a shot. I was thinking about Men at War and Action Comics. I heard some good things about both. Who doesn't like a good Grant Morrison Superman story or a war comic? Well in the end I went a totally different direction. I went with Static Shock! I picked up the first two issues of this book mainly because of 00's cartoon. I didn't watch the cartoon regularly but I did like it.

After reading the first two issues, I have to give Static Shock a passing grade. It was a lot of fun to read. He held onto some of his Milestone roots. Milestone was the company that first published Static Shock comics. They have Hardware being Static mentor in superheroing, since he's still a teen. Hardware stayed back in Dakota while sending Static to New York City to investigate some crime. In the first two issues we start to see a criminal organization that Static will be fighting. He crosses their path by accident at first by stopping someone from stealing a powersuit for S.T.A.R. labs. This leads the organization to want to stop Static. They don't want any Superheroes in New York City. They are using a teenage gang of techheads to pull of most of their crimes, the Slate Gang. The organization puts a hit out on Static and all hell breaks loose, very entertaining. They use great cliff hangers at the end of each comic.

All and all Scott McDaniels does an excellent job writing Static Shock. I've always enjoyed his writing since I can remember. He did a lot of great comics in the 90's and 00's. He wrote my favorite run of Nightwing comics. I hope that he continues with his awesomeness and keep Static Shock in my read list. That's it for the new 52 for me. I plan to read more of it, but probably in trade from the public library. When I get my hands on that I'll let you know if the other new 52 is worth reading.

Mormon Culture: Music Festivals

When I was a junior in High School I had a friend that dad was a Baptist Preacher. Luckily the kid wasn’t all about making a Baptist or even hating on my Mormon beliefs. He kind of got me confused with Amish people and was always asking me if I had electricity in my house. One thing he convinced me to do one Saturday was go to a music festival. This music festival wasn’t a normal one though, it was Christian music festival. I wasn’t really sure what I was going to be hearing when I agreed to go. If it was anything like the religious music I had been hearing in my youth, it was going to suck. To my surprise it was nothing like bad contemporary Mormon music. They had rock bands, rap groups, singer song writers. It was really amazing. Since then I’ve always wondered why Mormons can’t make good music. Sure there are some famous rock stars that are Mormon, but are they really?

Music has always been an important part in Mormon culture. During the pioneer treks Brigham Young would have people break out their fiddles and play upbeat music to dance too. At the time this would be considered the latest music styles. Young was all about the pop music of his time. Lately it seems that the church is against rock music or just popular music, which is fine. I don’t think I would want Weezer approved by my church leaders. The thing is why aren’t Mormons making their own rock music? Why are there not Mormon music festivals? When I hear about, Mormon music it takes place in the church chapel. Why can’t there be some good punk bands that are Mormon. There are a few good Christian punk bands, MxPx, Owl City, and Reliant K. They don’t sing about Christ and how they saved them. They just sing music and are very open about their religious views. How awesome would it be if we had some Mormon bands like that? I know Aquabats might be considered our Mormon band, but the lineup has changed and I don’t know if they are Mormon anymore. I’m not saying I need big bands, but some rock bands. I remember listening to Sweet Haven, whatever happened to them. They would be the perfect band to get behind and build an awesome rock community behind.

Here’s what I want to see:
1. More Mormon rock bands
2. A Mormon Rock band festival that happens once a year
3. No more crap music by the other Michael McLean

I don’t think that is asking for too much. Okay maybe it is. I mean, Mormons hate rock music. That’s what I learned from my church leaders. Of course they’re the same people that say listening to anything other than Mormon Tabernacle Choir will send me to hell. So I never really listen to them. Yeah, I might be a little bad, or more.

my nightmares are weird

I had nightmare last night. They happen every once and awhile. I usually don’t talk about them because they’re really boring nightmares, like I have to work for hours and hours at UPS. That is a nightmare I have regularly. Last night I had a really weird dream. I was living in Cedar Rapids again. In the brown house I grew up in. I was upstairs in the big bedroom; it was big when I was five. I was there with Allison just hanging out. I heard some noise from the window. When I went to look out it there were some large gazelles; I’m not sure how big they get but they were bigger than mule deer. It was night time too. The sky was a weird navy blue; kind of like in the movies when they are saying it night. There was a light fog covering the ground. I couldn’t see the hooves of the gazelles. Scanning the backyard a little more I saw a lion too. It was a normal size lion, but not a normal lion. The lion wasn’t hunting the gazelles. He was just lying there on the ground. He turned its head up towards the window. That was when I noticed it wasn’t a normal lion. It had a pug face, like those cute little dogs. It had a burned yellow pug face with gold locks of a mane. It was beautiful and ugly all at the same time. I told Allison I needed the camera. I need to get proof of this crazy beast. I couldn’t get any good shoots from the window I was at. Luckily the pug lion was down by our sliding door in our backyard. I figured I would be safe if I went downstairs to take the picture. As I got downstairs I noticed something was wrong. Someone had left the glass sliding door ajar. There was no way I was safe anywhere in the house if pug lion could get into the house. I crept up slow to the door trying not to be heard by the beast. As I got right up to the door the pug lion swung his head right towards me. His eyes flared up. He wanted me. I tried to close the door but his huge paw with his pearl colored claws caught the door before it closed. He started to pull the door open. I ran back upstairs to Allison and slammed the door shut. Hoping the pug lion wouldn’t get to us. No luck for that. He smelt the fear on me. He started to bang on the door. I tried to hold it shut with my body. I yelled to Allison for help. The pug lion started to pry open the door. I could see those deadly paws again. Then I sort of woke up and was like I’ll get the X-Men to help me. I asked Nightcrawler to teleport out there and teleport the lion out of my house. He was like no way. He wasn’t going to fight a lion. Then I woke up all the way. It was one of those weird dreams.