That's how I roll.

so last weekend was a reminder of the high quality partying that is to be had at MSU. having been gone for a while, you start to forget--especially when the last couple times you were there you just chilled cuz it was monday night.

anyway, the re-education commenced friday night when at the peanut barrel (on the deck--i LOVE indian summer!) for dinner and a few drinks with abbey/morgan/ninja, then to morgan's for more drinking with todd/rachel/tony/jacki/tom. moose and flip-cup were in full swing, and ninja got drunk enough to smartly comment, "love is robotic, like the matrix." then it was to harper's to meet brian et. al. we closed down the bar (of course), and walked out into the still-fairly warm night to abbey's friend tom's house.

you know it's a good night when you GET TO a party at 2:30, especially when that party's still going. unfortunately, the party died down fairly quickly when the keg ran dry. however, abbey and morgan still pwned some n00bs at beer pong, further cementing the fact that people associated with the MSU ultimate frisbee team are the best drinkers/drinking game players on campus--this is a scientific fact. i know, because i am a scientist.

saturday started for me around 11, which was too early a morning after a night that didn't end till 5am. oh well. abbey and i met ninja/morgan/tony/jacki at tony's (the restaurant, not the appartment) for breakfast (at 2pm), and to watch the MSU football team suck it up vs purdue. i then returned to todd and rachel's to help with the Moving-To-Colorado preparations, and everyone went to morgan's to chill out. i'm such a better friend than the rest of those losers.

the extent of my helping-to-move friendship only goes so far, however, and after a couple hours i was slouching on the couch at morgan's, watching the ben stiller marathon on HBO like the rest of them. after some food it was time for more flip-cup and moose to get the party started, then time for a classic--Crunchy's.

the rest of the crew assembled (abbey/ninja/tracy/adam/todd/rachel/morgantony/jacki) and we headed out. as usual, crunchy's was rocking the karaoke. our table had no view of the poor souls singing, but we could hear well enough for mocking. we of course cheered for morgan and abbey when they sang, but all others blew. i love crunchy's because of the excellent beer selection, but i just want to sit there and drink delicious beers all night! around midnight the time had come to be gone...and use some coupons the ninja had printed off for us.

lock up your daughters, lock up your wife, me and the crew are hitting deja vu tonight! oh man, the debauchery level skyrocketed up to about 11 at this point. clearly, anywhere where there are naked women walking and dancing around is gonna be a sinful place... and this was no exception. though unfortunately there was no drinking (state law), things got plenty exciting. we sat in back for most of the night, but by the end, the 10 of us were taking up the entire sitting area in the front row (as usual). eventually one of our girls got up onstage and did her thing with one of the house girls for a while... (not gonna say who, but she wasn't married and she wasn't dating anyone that has a blog)...much to the chagrin of one of the boys in the group (not gonna name names, but his initials are "NINJA").

there was something about the girls and a private dance, but us boys were largely kept in the dark about what went on...biiiiitch....

once again, the night ended late, and bedtime was 530am. pretty early when yours truly has to wake up at 9 to get to work in GR at 11. oh well. anyway, hopefully i'll be able to link to some pics of saturday if ninja ever gets them on his site.

so there you have it, one more rocking weekend at MSU in the books.

we ARE professional grade, bitch.

Ignoring the Obvious

Okay, so i haven't exactly "posted recently." Sux to your ass-mar if you don't like it. Rather than try to update the last 6 months, I'll just skip it all and start up here. I may be talking about current events, or I may focus on random thoughts and musical musings! In fact, the latter is the subject of and inspiration for this return-from-exile post.

As many of you may know, I have been searching for the "heaviest metal band in the world." The reason for this is I wanted to know the endpoint of music. The lowest, darkest, craziest point at which a person could conceiveably say, "Okay, I'll release this as music."

It started with my realization that I do, in fact, like Heavy Metal. This in itself surprised me, as I am (as many of you may have suspected) extremely chill and not metal-esque in the least. However, my suspicions were confirmed when last spring I bought and totally rocked out to Metallica--S&M, their live album with the San Francisco Philharmonic. As I continued to explore the glorious skull-vibrating, palm-muted, million-notes-per-minute sonics that is Metallica, I wondered to myself (for I was still too frightened of the idea to verbalize it), "How far can this go?"

How heavy is heavy? How fast is fast? How scary is Death Metal? These are the questions I set out to answer, and o, how I answered them. The first, and most obvious starting point, is Slayer. Obviously Slayer is an eminent metal band, and intimidatingly heavy for a beginner such as myself. However, I was certain that they could not be IT. There had to be something harder than Slayer. I was stuck, however, unable to find worthy contestants until I read an article in Spin magazine about Scandinavian Black Metal... and lo! My the search was moshed into its final stage. This was where I left the realm of "Wow that's fast" for the realm of "Okay, I don't like this game anymore."

This article described the off-stage habits of several Norwegian metal bands, of which Mayhem was one. I won't go into details, but another (earlier) article in Spin pretty much sums up that these guys have been touched pretty hard in the head, and certainly weren't wearing their valkyrie helmets. Mayhem is the real shining star here, as far as off-stage goes...suicide, cannibalism, and arson are standard operating procedures. HOWEVER, this was not a quest for the craziest group of people that play music, this was a search for the heaviest metal around. And for THAT, my friends, we come to MORGOTH.

Named for a Tolkein character (in the Lord of the Rings prequel The Silmarillion), Morgoth is just freaky and disturbing to listen to. Maybe "disturbing" is going to far, but you just feel jittery and upset while listening to it. Though not from Norway, these Germans are pretty much as heavy as it gets.

So I guess it all comes down to how much authenticity you crave. To me, Morgoth's music is the heaviest and scariest I've ever heard, but once you're familiar with the story behind the scenes, Mayhem gets a whole lot worse (or better). The music itself is not particularly faster, harder, heavier, or darker than other Death/Speed metal bands I've heard. However, the back-story leaves no doubt that these are the most Fucked-Up Metal Dudes ever concieved by Mother Earth.

For those of you that have skipped the body of this article and are instead drawn to bulleted lists, look at this instead: it's kinda funny.

• Snoop Doggy Dogg - Weed+maybe guns
  
• Radiohead - Bourbon+"too much weed paranoia"
  
• Phish - Weed+Fat Tire Ale
  
• Led Zeppelin - Jack Daniel's
  
• Metallica - Jolt Cola
• Slayer - Red Bull+homophobia/xenophobia
  
• Mayhem (before reading this) - Speedball+Punch in the Skull+Creeped-out Feeling
  
• Morgoth - Incurable Insomnia+Horror film festival+Crystal Meth+Case of Jack Daniel's
• Mayhem (after reading that) - All of the above+Jefferey Dahmer+burning churches

So there you have it, faithful readers. I have plumbed the depths of Heavy Metal and have found the nadir, the point at which one can say with reasonable certainty, "This is as heavy as it gets." The journey was long and at times disturbing, but I did it so that you would not have to.

Till next time, keep on rockin' in the free world, and keep checking for updates! As for me, I'm gonna go listen to Christian Easy-Listening for about a week, just to even things out.

Peace!

Head Out on the Highway...

...Looking for adventure! that's right readers, i have purchased an automobile. it's awesome. i won't bore you with all the specifics, but it's a '97 jetta trek and it's cool cool cool. the redness contributes to its speed (naturally), and the roof rack provides extra down force for those fast corners...it's like a spoiler for front-wheel-drive cars!

it's too soon to know what it's name is, or even whether it is a boy car or a girl car, but the tenative name is "Jetta Jameson." we'll see whether that sticks. ninja's been calling it the "SARS-mobile," on account of the Saris decal on the front of the rack (Saris is the company that made it)...also unsure about that one. anyway, here's a picture of my ride:


Jetta Jameson?

so...i'm pretty much done studying. it's not that i know everything i need to know; it's more that i can't concentrate on ANYTHING. even while i'm typing this, i'm taking breaks to play my guitar and surf other websites. the time of this post is set to whenever i started typing it, 9:47, but it won't be up till probably 10:15...a long time for such a short post. anyway, i'm going climbing this morning, hopefully the relaxation will help me concentrate this afternoon during my final final.

speaking of finals, and graduation, and me graduating, and also todd graduating, todd and i are having a graduation fiesta at his house saturday after commencement, and if you're all invited! todd's ceremony is at 1230, so i'm guessing nothing will be getting going until 3 at the earliest, but hopefully it will go well into the night. harper's spartan wheat will abound, as will various foodstuffs, grilled and otherwise. AND, you can all take a look at my new car! depending on how early you get there (and how long i've been enjoying the party), i may even take you for a spin! anyway, i hope to see you all there, call or IM me or todd for directions if you need them.

welp, i'd better get moving if i want to make it to the ledges early enough to make climbing worthwhile...PEACE OUT!!!

"That is the Coolest Thing I Have Ever Seen. And I've Seen a Girl NAKED!"

the original title for this post was going to be "The Beginning of a New Era," but the above phrase came about while i was talking to todd about this. you all might not be amazed but i think it's killer.

well, now that i have officially abandonded my xanga site, i feel freer somehow. lighter. more modular, if you will. i can post pictures, as you can see below. my page is clean and white instead of a garish orange. i am using the ipod of blog sites. i am also linking all over the dang place. that sounds like an incontinence problem...for a squid.

so, as my away message read, i considered yesterday officially "seized." after working all day, i went climbing for a few hours at grand ledge with geoff, sarah, and brian. didn't really accomplish much, but we climbed from about 6-dark. immediately after that, it was hockey time at wharton, and we played till nearly midnight. after a full day of carpe-ing the diem, i was spent and very grateful for my bed... and boy, 9am came early this morning. all day i've been feeling tired, and i'm sure some of it is the relatively high humidity, but i have come to the conclusion that seizing the day is hard work!
there is a calvin and hobbes strip where calvin's in the tub (hobbes is sitting next to it) and he's listing off; "my elbows are scraped, there's grass stains on my knees..." etc. and hobbes declares; "i consider this day seized!" calvin, always the ebullient one, responds: "i say tomorrow we seize the day and THROTTLE it!"
i like that one.

um...i might be out of stories. like i said, i was kinda dragging today. anyway, i'm gonna clean my room. kinda.

"It says CONDOM?! Oh my!"

when i click on the "title" bar while posting on this site, THAT is the first thing that shows up. there are others, and i have no idea how they got there! after perusing through the list, i have come to the conclusion that they are captions from abbey's webshots page. how these random quotations found their way into THIS particular list is beyond me, but when disembodied from their accompanying photos they make for interesting titles!

anyway, i didn't have much to say...i'm just playing with this new blogging page to see what it can do. did anyone happen to read the comics in the state news today? check out get fuzzy and foxtrot for a little april fool's joke.

ok, i'm hungry and hungover. i'ma go for a run...for once.

A new and Life-Changing website

so...i got sick of xanga. i felt stifled by its refusal to let me post pictures...its desire for me to use COLORS...its overall suckyness, you could say. aaaanyw00t, i'm blogging here now. i don't have a whole hex of a lot to say at the moment, so i'll start out by sharing this lovely photo of brian.


B-Lam in fine form

ah yes... what a man is brian. this is after several hours of imbibing, followed by a good hour of losing at drinking poker.
ok, i'ma go...do something else. more wildness later.