Dancing In The Park(ing lot)

Something I've learned in my life is that when you do what you are supposed to, you are blessed. Sometimes those blessings are subtle, or it takes a while to notice them. Other times they are immediate and dancing in front of your face. Sometimes literally. Driving out of the church parking lot last Sunday, this is what we saw.

To All My Fans, Old and New

Anyone who knows me, knows I'm a little bit full of myself...okay, a lot a bit full of myself. Let me state that it's not completely unfounded though. I don't mean that in an "I'm gorgeous" way either (I am gorgeous, but not the point of this writing). No, I'm referring to my stalkers. There have been many through the years. I remember my first one my sophomore year of high school. We called her grody jody. She got my number through means still unclear to me. She'd call me daily. After a month of me ignoring her, she showed up at my house. Didn't ring the bell, just sat out front. She did that for about a week until she finally asked me to a school dance. After I declined, I stopped hearing from her.
More recently I've had a good friend who happens to be female. It's actually a first for me, having a close friend who is a girl. Let me tell you, it has some benefits. Benefit one: she does recon for me. She talks to all girls around her, girls who I have never met. I'm always shocked at how many girls tell her details of my life. Girls who I have never met. Girls who want to use her to meet me. In one case, a girl went as far as to hang out with her up until the point she found out I was dating someone else at the time.
Another girl who I had never met, or even seen went as far as to send me an e-mail over facebook. The e-mail, while flattering, may be one of the creepiest things I had seen. She informed me that though we had never met, she had been seeing me "around" and thought I was "beautiful." Then on Valentines Day this year, she sought me out in the institute parking lot and gave me a valentine. an "bleeding heart" she called it. It was a pink heart-shaped cookie with a large splotch of dark red food coloring. Yes, this is true.
Most recently, I've learned of another stalker. Though I'd consider her more of an admirer from a distance. I have to preface this story with an embarrassing story about myself: I tried on-line dating. Only once, but it happened. To be honest, it wasn't so bad. The girl was cute, and more importantly, normal. No trace of social backwards-ness at all. Just no chemistry. Anyways, After talking for a couple weeks and one date, we lost touch, or ended contact... either way... Just this week (it's been 6 months since I've heard from her) I got an e-mail from her. I had a brief panic attack. I wondered to myself "Is this one of those 'why did you never call?' e-mails?" Thankfully it wasn't. It was something far funnier and more flattering. Apparently this girl has a friend in her masters program who, according to my internet-date, is a lot like me. so internet date friend went out on a limb. Asked if the other girl knew me. Her reply? "I've never met him but we have friends in common and I've read some of his post on my friend's blog and he is totally awesome! I love his posts" Ah yes, this is why I have an internet presence. The flattery. Am I calling this girl? Absolutely.

We Are Adventurers

Oh yeah... Now I remember the reason I got rid of that last blog: the crushing guilt of not posting anything for two weeks. In reality, I've had plenty to write about, but I am lazy.
So, my adventures:
Two weeks ago, we took a trek out to a rope swing that launched into an icy cold lake. I would like to say I was the biggest man there, and that is why I was the first to launch into the water, but in reality, it was peer pressure. I will do a lot of things if my friends can convince me it will make me seem like more of a man. This also may be why I ended up doing that same rope swing later that day bare naked, but I digress.4th of July weekend we took a trip out to San Francisco. Despite the struggles in leaving an office like this for a weekend, we did make it out of Sacramento by about 9 on Saturday night. This is where I put my plug in for hotwire.com, we ended up in a 4-star room on the 21st floor at the Hilton just off the Embarcadero for $100. That night we went out to a dance club. I'm not generally a night club kinda guy, but I will admit, I enjoy the attention a tall guy with hilarious dancing abilities like me gets.
After the club we wandered downtown trying to find some 3am food, and this is where the real magic started. I've been in a lot of big cities, but I have never seen homeless like they have in SF, they are so pushy, it makes it really difficult for me to give. I generally do give change to homeless if I have it, but there are so many in SF and they give new definition to the term 'beggar'. Anyways, we found an all night pizza joint (Which, by the way, why can't you find decent pizza outside of NYC?) and we ate our slices out front. We hadn't been eating 10 seconds when the first guy came up asking for change. Let me tell you, he was a mumbler. Enunciate and maybe I'll give you something. The next one was my favorite. RR, he called me a "fat b****" I'll be honest, I was more offended by him calling my fat than a b-word. If it were remotely true, I would have been actually offended. He called brad a racist, and he shared is cheap 40 of vodka with Gene. Gene is one with the homeless of SF.

night club night

Sunday, we got up and found a delightful creperie where I had some of the best eggs benedict of my life. Oooooooh hollandaise sauce, how I love you. We went to church, where there was an adorable girl with a mohawk, who I didn't have the guts to talk to. If she, by some miracle, sees this blog, I want her to know she inspired me to get my hawk back. After that, we went for a bit of sight-seeing. Most notably, we went to the house where the opening credits of Full House were filmed. If you're wondering, the answer is yes, I frolicked in the grass. (Head over to my buddy Brad's Blog to see said frolicking)

That night we went out to Fisherman's Wharf for fireworks over the bay. In reality, fireworks are kinda boring. Especially when you can only see about half of the actual firework because the top half was covered in a layer of fog. But, the bay was beautiful, and it kinda had a neat effect seeing the clouds light up, very war-zone-esque. As we were walking home we were coming up behind a guy who seemed to have a very odd fashion sense. As we got closer we realized he was sagging his pants completely below both cheeks, and he was not wearing underwear. That's right, bare-butt on a chilly night. Of course Gene had to talk to him, and that's when the magic happened. Yup, Gene got a bare-butt hug from a stranger.
Monday morning we drove out to the beach in a thick layer of fog and got there while the temp was still in the low 50's. I for one was not willing to touch the water, Brad and Gene were at least slightly bigger men than me, and got ankle high. Thanks to that cold weather, however, we found an amazing little cafe in this tiny beach town. I had biscuits and gravy, but it was an extremely original take on it, with antouille sausage gravy. Brad's meal was the most impressive, however. Eggs Benedict with avocado and pulled pork. Really an impressive place. I drove home while the other three slept in a food coma, which is really against the rules of roadtripping, but it was ok, I'm a steady driver.

Finally, Friday was Cow Appreciation Day, which at Chick-Fil-A means free chicken if you dress like a cow. Did we cash in? Absolutely. 3 times. The first stop, we discovered it's any meal on the menu for free. So of course we drove the 20 minutes south to the next closest restaurant, ate a great meal, and decided to drive 45 minutes north to the 3rd closest restaurant. we got there right as they were closing. The girl working the counter informed us that we could have gotten as many meals as we wanted at any of the Chick-Fil-A's. There was no need to the absurd driving. Still, do I regret it? Absolutely not, it was an adventure.

Where Hemingway and Salinger Intersect

I want to live here. The streets in this development were all named for American authors. Notably absent were Fitzgerald and Kerouac. I guess no one wants to live on a street whose namesake was a notorious drug addict.

Call Me Jeffrey

So, Planet Earth, it's been a while. Well over a year now. At the behest of many friends and family members, I've returned to the strange world of blogging. You may be asking yourself, why the return? Well, in truth, it's for my own vanity. Go ahead, compliment my writing style, my use of prose, my verbiage, how handsome I am in all my pictures. Don't be shy, it's why I do this.

I thought for those who are new to a blog written by me, I'd introduce myself. I am Jeffrey. Not Jeff (I'm always amazed at how often I introduce myself as Jeffrey, and instantly someone says "Nice to meet you, Jeff."). Not JD, though I did try to make that happen at one point in my life. No, Jeffrey has been my name since the day I was born. For the 9 months prior to my birth, I was Levi Daniel, or some other ridiculously Biblical name. I really can't remember if that was it for sure. That stage of my life is a little hazy for me to remember. It is Jeffrey.

I was born 25 and some change years ago, to what I consider to be goodly parents, though they are my only parents so I have no comparison. In between birth and now, I did some fun things, not so fun things, I grew, I waxed strong. (Ok, so that's a lie. I have approximately the same muscle mass now as I did when I was 1 year old.) Now, today, I'm in Sacramento, California. It's a temporary state of being, I will make a triumphant return to my still-temporary-but-more-permanent-than-Sacramento-home in Tempe, Arizona.

Many people are surprised to learn that I am an avid runner, and have been on and off for the past 12 years. People are surprised, because 1. I am not a fit person. Sure I'm thin, but by no means does that mean I'm fit. 2. I'm lazy. I'm pretty open about this laziness. Some call it a flaw, I call it a great way to live. 3. I don't exactly live what people call a "healthy lifestyle." Don't get me wrong, I don't drink or smoke or anything of the like, but I do love fast food. Taco Bell and I have a very close relationship, Mcdonalds and I are definitely well acquainted, Coca-Cola and I are the best of friends. And I spend a lot of time with these acquaintances.

Music...Well, what can I say, it's a very big part of my life. Have you ever noticed in movies when the lead character loses his entire family and all his friends in a tragic 19 car pile-up, and then some horribly depressing song comes on by Morrissey or Elliott Smith or some equally tragic artist? Or when the guy you're really hoping gets the girl, succeeds and lands that big kiss and then some sappy love song or other plays? Well, I was raised on films, and thanks to that, I can only understand my life through the filter of music. Luckily for me, my taste in music is impeccable and my musical knowledge is second to none.

So that's it...that's me, or at least as much of me as I want to share right now. Thoughts?