Captain Madden vs Snow

In the beginning there was God and well, God got lonely so God decided to make some stuff.

(We'll call this  next part: Genesis Chapter 1, abridged)

God made some dirt, some sky, some sun and moon, made some animals, made some plants, made this pair of f*ck ups named Adam and Eve, and along the way, God made something pretty frickin' sweet. Water.

Just think about it. Water is like the swiss army knife of creation. You can swim in it, you can drink it, you can shoot it at people, you can put out fires with it, and you can even wear down a mountain with the stuff (This only really works if you're a wizard or something and happen to be immortal).

Yes, I'd say that water is in fact, pretty frickin' sweet.

But like all things pretty frickin' sweet, it got royally screwed over when Frick and Frack (Adam and Eve) decided that taking advice from the Almighty was lame and that the serpent would make a great life coach. Way to go, assholes.

Here's my train of thought:

God=Good

Water=Good

God made water.

Satan=Bad

Snow=Bad

Snow is Satan's perversion of water.

Think about it. What is snow really good for?


Snowmen?

They come to life, kidnap your children, and take them on deadly "adventures"
 to the North Pole to see the Chief Pedophile, Santa.


Snowballs?

They'll put your eye out and never work out as well as in Calvin and Hobbes. (It pains me to say it, but this fact leads me to believe that Bill Watterson is in fact an agent of the devil.)

White Christmases?

People drive to see their families on Christmas. Going over the river and through the woods becomes a lot more perilous when there's a damn BLIZZARD trying to kill you and your loved ones.

Now, I haven't always felt this way about snow. When I was a little kid and we lived in Mississippi, I thought snow was the best thing ever, but snow only fell in amounts of 2-3 inches at a time in Mississippi and only lasted a day.

I was a fool.

In Nebraska, snow falls TWELVE FEET at a time and makes you want to die every time you leave the safety of your dorm room. Also, IT NEVER MELTS!!! It just hangs around like the awkward kid that no one invited to the party, but ends up staying the longest.

However, you needn't fear. Together we can end the menace of snow and win back our winters. We can fight back against Satan and return water to its sacred, holy, liquid form.

Here's the plan:

I want everyone to go out and buy 12 cans of Aquanet and a couple packages of styrofoam cups.

Go outside and build a bonfire.

Burn purchased items.

Note: After throwing the items on the fire, you should probably run like hell since cans of hairspray tend to explode when heated excessively.

Enjoy the acrid, black smoke as it swirls up toward the vulnerable ozone.

Global warming is our last, best hope for survival.

(Sorry 'bout it, Mr. Polar Bear.)

Blogging. Ready, Set, Go....

Someone stole my creativity.

They found out that I finally got the nerve to start a blog and they stole my friggin' creativity.

Most people don't know this, but creativity actually takes the form of cute, little, furry monsters that dance and frolic in your brain, spreading their creativity sparkles.

Sadly, some people hate creativity monsters. Tea Party members, Communists, Sara Palin, and people who watch Jersey Shore are all trying to gather these gentle creatures into work camps and harness their powers for evil.

I, however, shall not stand for this evil. I will not stand idly by and watch as one of God's greatest gifts to humanity (I'd say creativity is 3rd behind oxygen and Leontyne Price) is tortured. I will ramble mindlessly until the Powers of Evil surrender and return creativity to the world.

My blog shall be a beacon in the darkness.

Some of you (Hannah Kurth) may be saying that creativity isn't a cute, little, furry little monster, and that it's not something that can be stolen. You're probably saying that I just suck at blogging. 

This is obviously false.

I mean, look at me, I have 22 followers.

22 people have decided that my ramblings are worth 5 minutes of their time. 

That's 110 minutes every time I blog. 110 minutes is longer than most class meetings in college. 

If I blog 2-3 times a week I'm practically the professor of my own course. 

BS 101: A Discourse on the Intricacies of Being an Enormous Douche.

.........................................

I notice I haven't received any tuition checks yet. This course is based in Montana, so you all owe me 

 $588.25 (Isn't out of state a bitch?) 

 x         3 credit hours

1,764.75

I decided my class is full of worthwhile information and therefore worth 3 credit hours.

Better start writing those checks. 

Address them to: 

Professor Timothy Madden 

Department of Sarcasm

Awesome University

Nimrod, MN 56478 (Real place, Google it)

Class dismissed.

How Standardized Testing Made Me its Bitch

Once upon a time, I wanted to be a doctor when I grew up, but somehow, I've ended up majoring in poverty (music).

 How did this happen?

Well, it all started one fateful day in the 6th grade.....

(Let's do the time warp, again...)

I had only been living in Missouri for a year and I had not yet become fully assimilated into the Yankee culture. (No one whistles Dixie in Missouri. I felt VERY out of place.)

About halfway through the year, my science teacher uttered these fateful words: STANDARDIZED TEST.

Somewhere, in the back of my little 6th grade mind, a flash of recognition occurred.

"Standardized tests... TerraNova.... Oh yeah, I know those. Fill in the bubbles neatly, answer multiple choice, have lots of free time to read Star Trek novels in class..."

WRONG

In Missouri, standardized tests, called the MAP Test (Mutilating All Pupils) are EVIL, FOUL THINGS!

The teachers tell you that your future hangs in the balance if you don't get every answer correct and even worse, there are ESSAY QUESTIONS!

Having just left "Happy-Happy-Joy-Joy-Multiple-Choice Land", "Evil-Sulfurous-Hate-Essay-Question Land" came as a shock to my poor 6th grade system.

Imagine your greatest fear. Spiders, death, Oprah Winfrey, whatever. That's what the MAP Test became for me. It was my Oprah Winfrey.

I can honestly say that the preparation for the MAP Test went pretty well. However, this was obviously a plot created by all of the teachers at my school to trick me into thinking it wouldn't be so bad. I was a
fool.

Test day came and I found myself sitting in science, crappy fantasy novel in hand, ready to fly through the test and escape to the magical world Shannara. Little did I know that I was about to get my shit rocked by a speeding train of essay question and pure, unadulterated hate.

This is how it went:

 

 I sat in that room for 3 hours staring at the same questions: "How are stars born," "what is photosynthesis," and "can you explain the nitrogen cycle."

3 hours. 

The kid who was still a paste-eater at age 12 had finished an hour and a half ago. I was obviously floundering.

I made it through the test and actually did pretty well, but on that day, I had my first panic attack. They've been screwing with my life ever since.

Along with the panic attacks came a secondary symptom: a tremor. This is where we (FINALLY) come back to the point of this blog. 

Surgeons with shaky hands are surgeons with high legal fees.

 

And so died my dream of becoming a famous pediatric oncologist at St. Jude's Hospital.

Now, all I have to look forward to is becoming an opera critic and shaping the opera world in my image.

(Guess who I'm knocking off first?)

Goals

I came to a realization at the beginning this semester.

Everyone needs goals.

This started safely enough. I wrote a flurry of lists filled with goals focused on self-improvement and healthier living.

• Go to bed at 11 every night

• Wake up and eat breakfast every morning

• Practice an hour every day

But then, as shit is wont to do, shit got out of hand.

• I made running every day a goal.

• I made finding and possibly stalking Leontyne Price, my favorite opera singer, a goal.

• sub-goal: Find and destroy Renée Fleming, my least favorite opera singer.

and worst of all....

• I made saying only nice things to people a goal....

 If you know me, you know that as much as other people need oxygen, I need sarcasm. My face's default setting is judgmental and my heart is as black as the deepest pits of the earth. 

Well, maybe it's not that bad, but I do enjoy lacing every conversation with sarcasm and wit. It keeps people on their toes. 

In fact, I usually tell people, "If I make fun of you, it's because I can tolerate your existence. It's when I'm overly nice that you should be afraid." (You know who you are.)


Not a lot of people know I set this goal (Other than those who might remember that terrible week freshmen year, when it was forced upon me by my voice teacher.) Needless to say, it didn't last long.


I kept finding my head filled with snide comments and smart remarks. It was kind of like a maelstrom of bats decided that my skull was the place to be and they started screeching and flapping around in there. 

Have you ever had a maelstrom of bats inside of your head? It's not a pleasant experience. (Some, less creative person, started calling it a migraine a few years back. Mine is better.)

So, finally, in class, I let a comment fly directly into the face of one of my fellow students. Sadly, they received the culmination of 4.5 hours (Like I said, it didn't last long) of Grade A Verbal Bitchslap. It was probably kind of like get clawed in the face by a bat.


I actually felt a little bad, but the whole experience taught me some important lessons:

• Keeping sarcasm inside of your head is dangerous. After all, bats carry rabies, and brain rabies is probably what created the first zombie.

• Setting goals is great, but keep them small. Stuff like "I will brush my teeth," "I will not eat 12 brownies at dinner," and "I will not commit murder" is probably safe.

• Sometimes ridiculous goals ARE ok. I found Leontyne Price's address online and I'm writing her a letter.

(Watch your back Renée. I'm coming for you.)