Time Capsule

One time in Primary Sunday school our teacher had us put some things in a time capsule. We were supposed to open it a year later. Well being that teachers change and people move, we never did open it. To this day I wonder what I put in it.

I Was a Butt

I was the kid in school that corrected other kids when they didn’t know how to pronounce something. I thought I was so smart... Shaking my head at that one.

She Didn’t Believe Me

When I was in the 7th Grade I read Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton and did a book report on it. My teacher questioned me about the book. She didn’t explain why she was questioning me but based on her questions I knew that she didn’t believe that I had read the book, and thought that I’d only seen the movie. On of the questions she asked it what happened to Hammond. You see in the book he is killed by pack of Procompsognathus, and in the movie he lives. Of course I’d read it so I was able to answer that question correctly.

My First Website

In the mid 90s the internet was new and search engines were just beginning to evolve. My friend Wes showed me this website he made, which was basically Wes’ Cool Home Page with some boring information about Wes on it. I realized that the internet needed to contain important information so I decided to make a website about the planet Jupiter because one of my friends was doing a paper on Jupiter. So I made a site on Geocities called the Official Jupiter Home Page. I ran into a problem making the site, though, I didn’t know anything about the planet, so I plagiarized the whole thing out of a Microsoft Encarta ’95 article by Reta F. Beebe. The website was pretty much the only one on Jupiter at the time so I got hundreds of thousands of views (and if you search for http://www.geocities.com/athens/thebes/7870/ you can still find citations to it today!). I even monetized on it by putting a goto.com search box on it. I ended up making around $15.00. Eventually I got an email from some kid saying that they knew I had just copy and pasted Encarta’s article. I immediately took down the website, because I knew sooner or later someone at Microsoft might realize the same and ask me to take it down and preferred not to get that email.

The Most Boring Book

I signed up for AP English for 12th Grade, and for the summer between 11th and 12th Grade we were supposed to read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, so I did. It was the most boring book I ever read in my life and I fell asleep multiple times while reading it. A few weeks after school started I found myself failing the class. I transferred to the regular English class (not even honors). It was so much easier I called it Retard English (I feel bad about calling it that, but it was what it was), and because of that my reading of Jane Eyre had all been pointless.

Bad Employee

I was fired from my job as a grocery store bagger. I always like to tell people I got fired for sleeping on the salt bags when I was supposed to be doing carts. But really I never did that. The real reason I got fired was because I was supposed to say Hi how are you doing? to every single customer, but I didn’t like asking them that because the cashier had just asked them that and I didn’t want to annoy the customer, so I’d just say Would you like paper or plastic. They tried to correct me multiple times and I refused to do it. I also would not ask a man if he needed help out with the groceries I’d only ask women since I felt a man should be able to handle it himself. They tried to correct me on that but I refused to do it as well. That’s really why I got fired, I simply failed to do my job as instructed, and instead did it the way I thought was best. I was wrong. I was getting paid to do what they wanted, and I failed to do that. There was rumor’s of this one girl that got fired for making out with her boyfriend in the stock room. I wonder if that was true, or if it was the same deal as me sleeping on the salt bags.

Buying Diablo II

I was 16 when the game Diablo II came out, and the guy at the department store wouldn’t sell it to me because it was M rated (for gamers 17 and up). I went home and got my brother so he could buy it for me since he was a year older. Well when I went back the electronics department was not staffed so I took the game to a regular checkout stand and the girl there sold it to me with no questions asked since she didn’t know about video game ratings.

Death Takes a Vacation

When I was really young I saw this sketch on the show In Living Color called Death Takes a Vacation. It featured Jim Carrey. I didn’t know who Jim Carrey was at the time, but the horrible images of death in that sketch haunted me for life. Only recently did I find the sketch and see that it was Jim Carrey. I never really liked Jim Carrey and I have a funny feeling that seeing that was the reason why.

Party of Five

I suppose like any kid I was fascinated by sex, and my best source of information for sex was TV. This show came out called Party of Five, and I had to watch it behind my mom’s back, I only saw one episode, and I think it was the 2nd one, and it it this kid had to go to the store with his sister to buy maxi pads and the whole time he was impatient because this shopping excursion was keeping him away from this girl he wanted to see. Well once they finished shopping he saw the girl, and I remember they got in a bed together and I was excited by the prospect of getting into a bed with a girl.

PB&C

One of the strange sandwiches I enjoy is Peanut Butter and Cheese. It first came about one time when my dad had me for the weekend. I had to make a lunch quick and I was making peanut butter but couldn’t find any jam, but I did find some cheese, and I liked cheese, so I put that on the sandwich. By lunch time the cheese had sort of melted and so it was this gooey mix of cheese with the peanut butter. It was really good, and I’ve had it many times since then.

My First Kiss

While technically my first kiss was much later, from a certain point of view my first kiss was in Kindergarten. The girl’s name was Ashley and I decided I liked her and that I was going to kiss her. I volunteered to hold open the doors after recess, and before she came through the door I kissed my fingertips and then pressed them against her lips. I suppose as far as she knew I was smacking her in the face for no apparent reason, but from my point of view I had kissed her.

A collection of anecdotes before I retire:

Tied to a Tree

One time at scout camp I wanted to sleep in. So I pretended to be asleep when everyone else was up. Some of the other boys tied me to a tree. I was awake the whole time and let them do it because I thought it was hilarious. My friend Wes didn’t realize I was aware of what was going on and felt bad for me and cut me down.

Endurance

I had a job in high school bagging groceries. Part of the job was to bring in the carts from outside. One time I was bringing in 10 or so carts and a fellow employee who happened to be an attractive young woman asked me how I was able to get so many at once. Being that I was an awkward kid that was afraid of girls, the only thing that came to my mind was character attributes from role-playing games, so I said, Umm, uh, endurance.

Help Me

When I was a young teenager I liked to make myself pass out. This was especially easy at church since I was wearing a tie and I could tighten it around my neck causing me to black out. One time I did this in church and when I came out of the blackout I was so unaware of what was going on that I said, Help me daddy I’m scared! really loud at church.

Give ’Em What They Want

I was once nominated for the a student award at my middle school. I can’t quite remember what the award was called but only one student got it per month, so supposedly getting nominated was an honor in it’s own right. Anyway, for all the kids that got nominated we had to answer one question and that would determine who would win the award. My friend Aaron was nominated that same month. They told us the question: Who is someone that you felt was an important influence on your life? and gave us a few minutes to think about an answer. We told the answer to the teachers in private, so no other students would know what we said. When it came time for me to give my answer I said, George Lucas. They asked me why, and I said, Because he invented Star Wars. And Star Wars was pretty cool. In retrospect they definitely weren’t impressed with my answer. After Aaron had had his turn we asked each other what we’d said. Aaron told me that he said his dad. And I thought that maybe I should have said my mom, because my mom was ten times the person that Aaron’s dad was. Neither one of us got the award. But I did learn a valuable lesson, a lot of times it’s better to just give someone the answer they want and not what is really in your heart.

I Adjust

My brother, sister, and I quite enjoyed playing chess. And we liked to follow some of the official rules. One of the official rules is that if you touch a piece you must move that piece unless you say I adjust before moving that piece, after which you can center that piece in it’s square. One thing we would like to do is say I adjust you queen! and then flick our opponent’s queen from the board.

A collection of anecdotes before I retire:

My Sixes

One time I threatened to tattle-tale on my friend Clint for doing something bad in class. To prove my threat was serious I walked up to the teacher, but I knew it was bad to tattle-tale so when she asked me what I wanted I said, Can I pass off my sixes? (As in the multiplication table of sixes.)

Scary Principal

In Cub Scouts you earn activity badges. One of the badges was for academics, and to complete it you had to have an interview with the principal of your school. I was dead afraid of that, because all I knew of principals was what I heard on TV and that they were the enemy. Ultimately my mom had to escort me there, and as it turned out, he was really nice. He even had a collection of McDonald’s toys, and I myself had a similar collection!

Soap Suds

Growing up with a single mom meant that I had to get babysat. So babysitters had to come up with activities for the kids they took care of. One of our baby sisters had the activity of soap suds! Many kids got excited for soap suds but I realized that soap suds always came after playing with play dough on the table, and all we were really doing was cleaning the table with soap and that was a chore and I did not like chores.

Cat Food is Good

When I was a kid it was popular to eat cat food and dog food. I liked cat food the best. My brother liked dog food the best. To this day I like cats better than dogs. Go figure.

Squirts

One time at cub scout camp the popular thing to buy from the trading post was a water pistol. So I wanted to get one too. Everyone buying them was calling them squirts instead of water pistols. I’d never heard a water pistol called a squirt before, but I guessed that’s what they were called, so I said to the guy behind the counter I want a squirt, and he sold me a water pistol for a dollar.