wes: u know relient k right?
me: yeap
wes: u know the song pressin on?
me: yeap
wes: good song
me: yeap
wes: u know how to play it?
me: i might...
wes: maybe we can play it for worship sometime along w/ a number of other songs
me: yeah, that'd be tight
wes: hehe we start to practive now so it'd be like the real them when we play

i've realizing my left index finger's been hurting right where the free edge of the cuticle starts recently... perhaps i clipped some skin when i clipped my nails.

norman wanted me to hit jonathan, so i'll do that tonight.

so much to do... gotta make sure i do as much as possible b4 taking off to socal.

where do we draw the line between needing to grow more in christ and being ready to minister? i admit you can and should never stop your walk, but at what point are you considered able to minister to others by God? at what point? recently mike put off the decision to preach to us on december cause he felt he wasn't ready. but all of us are still growing as christians... our job is not to scrutinize others and say well, maybe i'm not fully sound in the gospel to do this... if you have the heart, God will give you the preparation you need. that's the truth. if preachers and pastors are still constantly growing as they help us grow in God, how much more us, when we try to minister to others!

jerm and me had a semi-online prayer session praying for others... might be a kinda cool idea to pray on AIM...

memorable conversation tidbit w/grace:
me: hey
grace: HIIIiiiii
me: i thought you said milk was gross :-)
me: so why are you drinking it?
me: not gonna answer me huh?
grace: IT IS!
grace: i madea deal with my aunt
grace: ahahha
grace: hold up shower timee
me: oh, leaving now that you can't answer me huh?
me: hey did my words pass over your head? :-)
grace: HAHA HEY
grace: THA'TS MESSED UP!
...
me: gnite... and drink more milk
me: or i'll have to talk down at ya... get it? *slaps knee*
grace: ... dork. hahahah gnitte

nobody's on aim at 9:13 AM; only i am. jon's still sleeping like the lazy bum he is, according to joe. speaking of which...

haha... joe lin's online! 10:15 AM! what a rarity! i gotta jot this down! ;)

criteria for church/fellowship:
-----------------------------------------
goes beyond sensationalism
concentrates on fellowship/accountability
teaching based upon the Bible(not topical based)

recent tidbit conversations w/joe:
joe: sitting in a conference call right now
me: oh; so you haven't quit like you said yet?
joe: nope
joe: i suck'
joe: :-P

me: jon's still sleeping
joe: lazy bum
me: haha... did you know he fell outta bed while sleeping maybe 2-3 wks ago?
joe: nope
joe: but i did hear that he got a speeding ticket

me: CTCC's youth group is crumbling apart ever since we left...
me: although there's potential
me: david's been telling me how no youth leaders, but a lotta ppl wanna get into leading worship
me: cept no one cept bob has a guitar
joe: yeah
joe: that's a problem
me: and most ppl don't know how to play the guitar; those that do, like i said, don't have a guitar and only know like 1/2 chords
me: like grace and clement
joe: well...u gotta start somewhere
joe: but i dun think ppl really encourage others to learn
joe: 'cause our church some ppl had interest so a bunch of folks got together a jam session every wk
joe: where the ppl that knew taught folks that didn't
joe: and if there's enough interest...ppl will go buy themselves a guitar

joe: anyways, i gotta go...finished my morning mtgs...gotta go in the office now
me: alright; talk to ya later... maybe i should just call you up if i wanna talk instead, seemingly how you're never online
me: heheh, you gotta go just when jon gets up
me: no wait, he's lying down again
me: now he's trying to type from his bed :-)
joe: lazy bum
joe: haha...i've gone through 3 meetings and countless e-mails already by the time he gets up
joe: haha
joe: ah...the college life

one of the three boards(the middle one) holding up my matress in my dorm room is broken, so if i die, it's totally God's will. and if i live to see the light on this earth after this school year in 1 single piece, then praise God.

"isn't it a beautiful day, Mr. Sun?"
"it's always great with 2 scoops of raisins, Peter"(proceeds to dump, no, HAIL gigantic raisins on the earth; one smashes into a car and sets off its alarm)

"Peter points to the sky and Chris looks up to see batsignal; Chris then points to the sky and Peter looks up to see a shadow of a dog in front of a light, Brian then gets up and leaves* heh heh... too good.

"what the hell is this? for crying out loud somebody throw a pie!"

nha un doc... ngay... masturchise...

enough.. must read some before hitting the bed...

just finished writing my SAS midterm paper... while listening to Lifehouse- Spin for about 2 hours worth... glad that's over(not the song i mean). i'm too tired to do editing... i'll do that tomorrow. right now i gotta eat. then figure out more about the courses i wanna take. and read/study... augh, so much.

veterans' day's coming up... kinda weird how we "honor" it by going down to socal to meet with laura, lydia, sam, norm, tim, josh... heh heh... now i'll see just how good UCLA's dorm food is...

i dunno why everyone acts like they'll starve to death if they skip a meal... i'm at best slightly hungry around mealtimes(not that i don't eat up)... and it doesn't really hurt me... maybe i've mastered the spiritual discipline of mini-fasting?

"...while the world keeps spinning around... my world's upside down and i would never change a thing... i've got nothing else to lose... i lost it all and i found you and i would never change a thing... oooh you and i would never change a thing..."

g'luck david on writing a skit for Xmas... hope the black man idea gave you hints... then you can call it "A Very Black Christmas..." heh heh

ok, after trying the reload-with-your-finger trick at Area 51 yesterday AGAIN, i truly have to say it's much better than conventionally reloading by shooting offscreen... got some killer 25 shot streak, and was able to hit a lot more stuff in a smaller portion of time. might make the game too fun.

i just came back from 1 church... Davis Chinese Christian Church. very small, just like CTCC... only even smaller, space-wise. man, i miss the way CTCC is; the way i used to worship on sundays, the sermon(this is a new one, but it was kinda hard to get used to the pastor's way of preaching... seeing how the transparency was tilted due to the wall and more bible verses than explanation), even... dare i say... the legroom ;) will probably look for another church... we've only started, but not next week... will be back... and go even south to visit some of our CTCC friends... whoopdeedo

kinda pissed that they didn't show us the registration guide stuff about winter quarter more specifically... but it's ok... i still have time to register and figure what to take.

family guy- the one where stewie's a cheerleader's hilarious... hearing chris talk black and stuff.

current faves on puzzle games: internet reversi and atomica... you can find out more about both at www.zone.com. i like reversi cause it's very simple, but lotsa mind games to go over... and the games go faster than chess, which a GREAT thing. i really love the competition of that game... i also like atomica, cause you can do combinations, and it's very interesting. i still want a gamepad for VirtuaFighter though

oh yeah... i've been recently trying to change the look of this site... some notable changes:
mini-profile on left: i say some stuff about myself, some you may care about, some you may not... i even list my current music gear and some of my abilities, some of my philosophies, ht/wt, etc.
constant thoughts: thoughts that i put at the top since i don't think i'll change these often... kinda like when you have an AIM profile and leave something a constant on it, but change everything else.
variable thoughts: my actual blogs, which change day to day
links: i've been updating these a couple of times, some notable ones that i've added:

mp3.com; if you wanna dl some free music, but aren't too sure if it's legal, go here first... and often the dl times will be better than on kazaa. i've been recently spending more time dling music from here than at kazaa, though i still use kazaa to dl family guy episodes
VF4fx, Daioh, Tbzone... if you don't think VF is a fun competitive game... go here and dl the videos of top players playing... it's beautiful, and you can learn a lot from watching them.
Translate to ebonics... haha... now this is my favorite! i got this from spending time on VF.com and finding out someone posted this site... when you go there, type in the address of a website, and all the contents will be translated to ebonics! check out what they translated for 11/2/2002 for me:
"anotha glorious dizzay from God... 'n all whack i'll be spendin' most of todizzay hustlin' on ma midterm SAS paper... more to be like as i think up stuff"
very funny... but do beware that they use swearing... if you're paranoid about that stuff

tired, but i'm gonna try to work a bit today... got to find out more about registering classes, read some chem, and work on my paper... talk to me if i'm online.

another glorious day from God... too bad i'll be spending most of today working on my midterm SAS paper...

more to say as i think up stuff.

bob(or any CTCC or former CTCC bud); Eddy Foye's a pretty interesting worship leader. well, from what i got from at mp3.com, i haven't seen any original stuff of his. BUT, he has some interesting interpretations of some popular worship songs. go over to mp3.com, type in Eddy Foye in the search engine, then find his artist page.

click on the 2 songs:
Everything That Has Breath(i say this one's interesting cause you get more soft distortion in this, plus the electric guitar fills; i personally like it; gives me ideas of what i could do next time i help out a worship band, and i won't have to worry about my pedal drying up the batteries this time)
Be Glorified(again, very interesting fills for the bassist; i'm sorry, i meant electric guitarist, i wasn't listening too carefully)

and if you have the current Windows Media Player, i think you might even be able to save the .mp3 files.

i should go to sleep; i'm gonna pull a later again. but i really should finish my SAS journal before that.

hah hah; grace w. talks SO FAST and SO INACCURATELY on aim; it's like a runaway ferrari. (thinks of possible buddy icon project)

oh yeah bob; i finished Ch 8; if you wanna chat sat, i'm open.

.... everything that.... everything that.... everything that has breath the praise the lord....

what i learned this week:

look at jesus when he was crucified... THAT was how much God HATED SIN... i guess it's a new spin on an old viewpoint... we tend to think that THAT was how much God LOVED US, and in many ways, it's true. but this is a new concept i picked up from a fellowship today... THAT was how each of us was going to suffer for our sin... actually worse, cause in hell, you just die an everlasting death for the rest of eternity. so, you were going to suffer worse than 40 lashes in the back, wearing a crown of thorns, mocked, spit, and struck, then carry this large burdensome piece of wood up to a hill where they were going to drive nails through your limbs into the wood and hang you up until you couldn't breathe and die. makes you so thankful that Jesus DID die for us now, eh?

Christianity isn't about what happens AFTER we die... it's about what we get NOW... well, it is partially, but it's more like what we get NOW, and FOREVER. many philosophies that ppl share are something like this:
"so why do you want to work your butt off?"
"so i can get a good job, find a wife, marry, have children and die..."
why wait to feel happiness in your life? do you realize that when you decide to live in communion with God everyday, your joy can start NOW, and never stop?

Christ preached revolutionary thinking; to LOVE others, to submit to others; by submitting you will listen to others and feel free to not HAVE to have your own way. he even commanded children and wives to obey this, like they HAD a free choice. he ALSO told masters to love their slaves... to take care of them, look after them. but we should only submit til it becomes destructive.

------

need a mic that can attach to my laptop... it'd be so cool to hear my own songs played back. i've never gotten the chance to record anything and save it. and after hearing a sample of what josh recorded on his computer... i admire him.
what else: gamepad, AC adaptor for flanger pedal, delay pedal?

g'luck wes on your sat2 tomorrow; chinse and math; don't get masturchis'd!

nice memorable quote: my SAS class on thursday had a guest speaker, and our teacher was trying to adjust the wireless, handless mic so he(the guest speaker) could speak. so he went up to him, and said, "let me just turn you on" ok, so i may have a sick mind, but that was funny.

to much to do, too little time: 1 paper due wednesday, 1 prelab due wednesday, a journal fill-in, math hw, and i STILL need to read some in every class, plus i need to find out more about registering for winter!

'k; i'm out, cause i have nothing to say.

i haven't been playing my electric guitar lately... i should start building up calluses on my left fingers again, and learn to play scales... scales are good practice to play riffs.

i have a feeling that halloween isn't all about evil or something like that, or going door to door to get candy. that's about as realistic as the idea that christmas is about a fat man wearing red clothes going around giving out gifts to kids who are good. the real story of halloween is that our deceased relatives come back to visit us(supposedly), and we're supposed to pay them respects. so while i'm not exactly getting into the mood by dressing up and trick-or-treating, i am celebrating this halloween by honoring my dad. i'm so sorry dad that i treated you so badly while you were still alive; i wish i could undo all the hurt i caused you. you didn't deserve it, at least not from your own son. i hope that you're reading this from heaven and accepting my apology. you really were more than the father i thought and treated you for.

just watched Family Guy - Too Sexy For His Fat... the episode where Chris is trying to lose weight; pretty hilarious; i should've kept it; i'm gonna go dl it again. the exterminator scene cracked me up like crazy.

more to add...

saw some guy who had like 10+ ice cream sandwiches trying to sneak out of the cafeteria... a woman caught him, and made him put all the sandwiches back, telling him that she was going to tell his room adviser that he was stealing. not good, not good. i was wondering why he was pulling all these ice cream sandwiches outta his sweatshirt pocket.
there's this good jap restaurant on J street, according to my doom floor neighbor; she said you get an all-you-can eat for 8.99. not bad. but all i want is some bento. btw, she said there was this weird debate at berkeley w/norcal and socal ppl; and the socal ppl said "we take the 5" whereas nocal ppl said "we take 5", referring to driving on interstate 5. i said to her, "well, you shoulve said, 'well, now you're in norcal, so get used to saying the 5.'" then i wondered to her whether there was such thing as a "CenCal," and of course i had to talk about the little incident in CTCC where we were discussing whether there was a CenCal.

yao ming sucked for his 1st game.. NO points and only 2 rebounds. you may say, big whup, it's his 1st game, but compare that to David Robinson, or Shaq, or the candy man, all which did a LOT better than that in their 1st game in the NBA.

yeah, KG...

heh heh... mj missed a dunk again... i mean, i like the guy(when he was still on the bulls, he was fav bball player), but seriously, miss a dunk AGAIN?!? sheesh, stop repeating the 2K2 all star game.

yeah... right now blazers are 20 pts ahead of the lakers at halftime...

(i'm a genius in a dumbass class... everytime i go to Short Calc, i falll asleep, because i can afford to do it, so far, that is)
fred: why do you go to the math lectures, ReCharred?
me: yeah... why DO i go to the lectures?

king david's wise... read my previous blog this day.

had a dream last night... thought the cops were going to my dorm and busting it open cause they thought i had illegally downloaded mp3 files and were putting me to jail for it... i'm sure it's slightly farfetched(since most of my mp3s are legal, cept for maybe 1 or 2), but it could happen. not to mention i think they can retrace all the things you did on your computer, which would reveal how many mp3s i've illegally dl'd and deleted. it's going to make me extremely paranoid; it already did for me; i had a hard time going back to sleep last night; tossed and turned quite a bit. i wonder if God's predicting the future for me.

strikes me how much King David was wise: there's a lotta examples, but here's a scenario i recently stumbled upon; 2 Sam 15:25-26; read it and compare it with 1 Sam 4:1-11. Do you see the difference? The Israelites in 1 Sam thought that by bringing the ark of God into battle, they would succeed; they trusted too much in earthly shelters, thinking that the ark of God was a good luck charm, in essence. Compare that with David's reaction when he was fleeing Absalom; though the priests were bringing the ark of God with him, he told them to take it back into the city, indicating that if God was pleased with him, he would bring David back into the city and let him see it again. But if God was displeased, then David would be ready for whatever God wanted to do. David recognized that God was not a good-luck charm who could be manipulated to do what he wanted. He saw that God was an actual being who could live anywhere he wanted. Now, i can't say the exact reason why God let David live and let disaster fall upon Absalom, but it could have been due to David's wisdom here.
moral of the story for you here? stop trusting in your temporary shelters, stop looking at the temporary, stop looking at the earthly ways to satisfy yourself, and look to the eternal, the heaven-bound rewards.

*sigh* today makes for the 2nd time i MISSED chem... skipping chem and missing chem are 2 entirely different things; i unintentionally skipped chem. and i blame it on the way i've been going to bed lately. do you hear me God? i need help... i've SKIPPED math before, but that was because i was confident enough sitting in the lecture and looking at the homework that i could figure out what it was... i guess God does give to us, but we're used to growing up in a culture that demands immediate results, and often those types of results are only temporary. i need to be more patient; the things that take just a bit longer to wait for are the things that are the most worthwhile in life.

i need self-control... just self-control. i can't control it when i'm playing VF, i lose track of time. and when i turn off the alarm clock, recently i have no incentive to get up, so i just lay back down and that just jacks up my day often. if you're reading this bob, it'd be nice if you pray for me here... also, i haven't gotten around to finishing Ch 8 yet though... i'm hoping to do so by the end of this week; i know i said i was going to finish it last week's thursday... just wait a bit.

what am i made of?
do i get up when i fall?
how bout when i'm overwhelmed?

i think the proverbs i put down under the constant thoughts can give hope to anyone.

http://artists.mp3s.com/artists/305/losing_daylight.html; Looking to that Day sounds really nice.

current list of stupid things we college freshman have done so far(i may or may not have been witness):
-jon falling outta bed while sleeping
-norm sleeping right through his midterm
-norm having trouble falling asleep then making farting sounds to himself and laughing about it
-sleeping through 1 class(i know we've all done that); i've slept through chemistry once(good thing it was only a lecture that i had prepped for)
-me falling asleep daily in my math class and doing fine(in fact i set the curve for the A range for the last test)
-weird photos that josh and norm do
-laura saying that she's been to the UCLA library and can't find the books cause she's a freshman(taken off of lydia' profile)
-mandy being asked if she would like to smoke pot
-me and jon falling asleep right through a possible oppurtunity to visit a davis church

ok, i'm sure there's more, but i'm too tired to write... i know this will carry right over to the next day, since i'll end up waking up, turning off my alarm clock, then wake up again at 10:00; i should go to sleep or this'll happen, i know it already will.

all we need is a spark... will a worship session and mike's talk in december be it? will it be a large enough spark? damnit i hope so.

it came to my mind that i'm not necessarily bored of Davis... it's the fact that i am bored with both my home AND Davis. so, that means me and jon actually need to explore around, instead of biatching every day. i sense a trip to sac...

sniff, giants lost. if any socaler goes "SO-CAL!" tomorrow, i will lose it. i'm tired of socalers acting like they're on top of the world. not to say that all socalers are like that... this guy named stanley on our dorm floor is actually pretty cool, and doesn't do any of that weird stuff.

i should bring my VF2 to Davis, and get a good gamepad for a laptop, or buy CS... nothing to do. the only disadvantage of doing this is i might get totally sidetracked from studies and worship... mwhahah... VF2 Lau juggle combos...

the only arcade games i play around in Davis is Tekken 3(Nina's awesome in that game), Area 51, sometimes MVC2, and Raiden(the raiden machine at Davis is on free play, so hey, it's a free game). i miss VF4 Evo...

something to try the next time i play Area 51 here in Davis; reload by putting my right index in front of the handgun and shooting; the gun only detects if i'm NOT shooting the screen, so in this way i could be able to fire more often... i saw a tip like this before, well, i'll have to try it myself... heh heh, doing this w/the automatic shotgun could be very nice.

the Man Show Boy is pretty funny.

ok, enough of this rambling... i need to do some hw... except i hear some saxophone going off in the building...

some blogs that i meant to put down for previous dates, but didn't have access to high-speed internet(well, there's one disadvantage to being not in Davis, if any)

10/26/02

deep thinking time:

Now i'm gracious that i actually had the oppurtunity to come back for the weekend and did; Mike, Wes, and Jerm were all there at church, and while we didn't really do anything, it was Mike's plan to talk about his experiences and what he wanted to pass onto us college freshmen as well as Sam and Tim that was the kicker. i was thinking, God, it's so good that Mike's here telling us this. anyways, he basically told us that so many ppl jump into relationships or want a friend who is a different sex. but at the age of around 18-21, you're probably not doing it for marriage, so for what? and if you seriously think about it, would you really want to be involved in something which you know is going to end? would you be comfortable telling your friend, i want to have a relationship with you just to see what it feels like? no, of course not. the fact is ppl are searching for the temporary things, and they think that that's all there is to life: work your way up to get money, get a lover, have children and die. the problem with ppl today isn't necessarily that they don't believe in God, it's that they don't take the time to sit down and deeply think.

here's something that might enforce this thinking; think of the cross as our relationships with each other, the 4 basic relationships of a christian: the 2 side extensions are spouse/lover and peers respectively, the one on top is your leaders, and the bottom are the ppl you lead. now if you concentrate too much on your lover when you're still developing, you're ignoring 3 aspects that would greatly influence the way you are, and what God wants you to be.

and believe me, God, i am so thankful for what you told me through Mike tonight. thanks for the message. thank you for everything you gave me and how far you've brought me. now help me not to forget this, ever. give me the strength, willingness, and love of you that you want me to have. help me to love worshipping you and communicating with you, and to never let this desire die down, but to continuously feed it the fuel needed for it to keep burning brighter and brighter(like the proverb that i noted beforehand). amen.

10/27/02

technically, this should be 10/26, but i'm writing this very late, so i guess that's the irony of it, if any.

anyways, actions speak louder than words. why am i repeating this cliche? because the presence of God is not reflected in how many things we spew outta our mouths. it's reflected in how i think everyday when i'm NOT reading my bible or playing my guitar. it's reflected in whether i take a few quiet moments each day(whenever i can) to think of what i'm sensing and it's connections with God or what he's trying to tell me. in a sense, it's like bob said once, "God is most real in your everyday life." i can tell everyone that on my profile that i say that God is my #1 priority in my life, but unless if i prove it to you by how i act, it's nothing more than me just being another present-day Pharisee. isn't that why so many ppl get turned off by Christians? they're in your face, telling you this and that, then they lose their lover and lose it. or adversity comes down in their face and they cower before it. which brings me to another thought...

what makes you think God can't do what he wants? ok, so he's merciful, but don't you think he knows so much better than we do? so we get pissed when we fail our midterm or get a B or something. or when we lose our lover. and so we biatch about it, thinking why, why, why... i'll tell you why; God knows better. and who can tell God, what have you done? God is God, as Steven Curtis Chapman put it, and like so, can we tell God what to do? no... of course not. of course, not to say i'm above any of you, i struggle with problems like these a couple of times, since i DO have my dreams and such. but if we feel that it should only be about us, you have forgotten to try to see things the way God would see it. don't ever doubt God's strength; what makes you think his arm is too short?

CTCC youth group is crumbling apart... i sense it. in fact, i sense impending doom, drawing closer and closer each day in just about everything... i need to have a word w/God...

i have a feeling we're all growing and maturing with wisdom... mike feels that the next time we gather together, we're probably going to be talking about DEEP things, rather than shallow things such as farts and CS. i feel it too; even though some of us(like me) have kept deep thoughts under rapts, maybe it'll all just come out soon.

finally, i close with this thought... we don't resolve problems in the world by b***hing about them; we solve them by actions... it doesn't matter whether they're small actions or large actions, but if we keep at them, they will make a difference. you may not see the difference you make, the results might not even be reaped in your lifetime, but they WILL be reaped. don't tell me what you want done... SHOW ME.

be a good sport when i play internet reversi against ya. plz.

REALLY funny Family Guy episodes:
British Pub(too many spoofs to list; the King of the Hill spoof cracked me and jon up)
Screwed the Pooch(this one's the most funny Family Guy i've ever seen)
And the Weiner Is(some sexual references, but it'll make you crack up)

(to self): Reach! Reach! you have to start setting a regular sleep schedule, like 11:00 to 6:30; if you don't, you're seriously going to eff yourself to hell everyday!

i am very sure that God flows around us, and that he knows everything. sometimes, i wonder if it's even necessary to tell him what i want or am thankful for, because he knows what i'm grateful for or what i need. so why tell him? you don't need to thank him or tell him what you need; not like God forgets. not like God's sitting in heaven going "did i do something wrong," and we need to go, "no, God; you're doing a great job" and God goes "that's GREAT!" but i see it like this: God created us in his own image; in that sense, he wants company as much as we do. that's why; he wants to converse w/us everyday, in every aspect.

1st priority to God is worship, the 2nd priority is servitude... worshipping IS the way to follow God. so when i let ya pervade my soul, it's all good.

will be back for the weekend

Terminator 3's coming out July 2K3... i dunno whether it'll be worth it... part of me tells me it's going to be a rehash of the past stuff, but yet, i dunno... a lotta us guys have grown up on Terminator, so, oh man.... at least now we get to see John Connor as an adult and the future world. but now the cyborg against the humans is... a female? heh, when i brought up that tidbit to jerm, he told me she was probably sexy, so we'll all know the REAL reason jerm goes to see T3; for the rest of us, though, heh heh.

oh yeah, i finally found out who the band behind the Pepsi Blue commercial... Sev. the song? Same Old Song(monk mix). i don't think they're christian though; checked the site; no references to God, Jesus or Christ. still, it's a nice, creative song. it's closer-sounding to Linkin Park than most of the other hip-hop/rock hybrids that i've heard, but still just not it.

just came back from another fellowship, called Real Life. my impressions? very similar to the College Life(which was lovingly referred to as the "white fellowship" by me and jon for a bit), in that great worship band(drummer, percussionist, pianist, bassist, 2 guitarists, the worship leader, who is one of the guitarist, had about 5+ fx pedals on the ground next to him, and had an acoustic and electric guitar to work with.), good speaker(guy reminded me of a white, old Joe Lin, whatever that means, ask me if you don't get it), and a LARGE mainly white fellowship. UNLIKE College Life though, no one talked to me AT ALL, and it seems their emphasis is more upon God than fellowship(while you should be concentrating on God, the point of a fellowship is to get together and build each other up), but then again, they are also known as "Campus Crusade," so maybe that explains it. while they have good worship, i feel that delving into this group would cause me to look more into spreading the word than growing and keeping others accountable.

YYYEEEEAAAA... giants won game 5, 16-4. all you need to do now, is clean up on game 6 and then IIIITTTT'SSSSS OOOOOOVVVVVVVVVAAAAA! (and don't get fresh with me, all you ppl who are from SoCal)

heh heh... also just had my 1st cream-sicle in a long time... those things are a real treat. i've forgotten how good they are(now i'll have to grab more the next time i frequent the cafeteria).

if i'm hungry because it's 2 hours past my usual chowtime and my stomach's acting up, i won't complain, i'll take the pain, and remember that it will help me to build myself back towards God. it will help me to remember my dependance upon God, then i'll go eat. besides, it takes about 40 days before your body actually starts feeling the pain from hunger... if you drink adequate water before then, it won't matter(although you'll lose a buncha weight before then i think). all you ppl who don't act like this is true, go read Celebration of Discipline by Richard J. Foster, and look into the Discipline of Fasting.

i am really pissed at the way some ppl who play the Internet Reversi on windows behave... while i get some really good comp against others around the world, some ppl just leave the game without saying anything when they notice that i'm probably going to win... nothing, no "good game," or anything. i just played(i might comment, a REALLY competitive game against) this intermediate chinese player who just left when he(or it could be she) saw that i got 1 corner. nothing, just left. like being a bad sport or something. auuugh, you piss me off. if i weren't about halfway around the globe and so cool-headed on the outside, i would've smacked you upside the head just about now.

mwhahahah.... jon fell out of bed while he was sleeping! i think he rolled over too much and just fell right out. i wasn't wearing my glasses, so all i heard was a loud noise similar to dropping a huge block of metal onto the ground from 5ft rather recklessly. my comments when he actually told me what happened during the night?
"good thing i don't have 20/20 vision, or i would've laughed my ass off the rest of the night." ;)
now how did other ppl react? most of the church guys gave a nice hahah, jerm and norm said i should've taped it, laura gave an "awww, poor jon", lewis said it funniest; "what a loser."

keep your eyes open, in order to see dif perspectives from different sides of the picture... (lemme just rest my eyes for a bit, i just got up to the sound of my jarring alarm clock)... oh shoot! it's 7:30 AM! i'm late for chem! (augh, screw it, i already took notes)... and now i find out i didn't study, well, enough for that test. @#%#$%$^!!@?!!?!?

(some recent Davis dormroom conversation between some guy named Brice and me and Jon)
Brice: so you doing anything thursday night? we got bible study, it'd be awesome, come along
Jon: (casually) oh lemme see... (a moment passes by)oh... (casually)i got to go to the World Series
hahahah....

it is currently 10:38 PM desolation time, and my head SO FRIGGGIN HUUUURRRTTTTSSSS!!!

just got my test score for Chem... 83. not too bad, except the problem is that i really wanted a 90+ and i felt for the amount of effort that i put in as well as the problems on the test i thought i really knew my stuff... what the hell is going on? and don't tell me that it's curved... that was the RAW score... ?!?!? i hope i find out soon why the heck i got such a messed up grade(i really hope it's an error)... geez it blows when you really think you know it on the test, and then you get your grade and it's totally 20+% lower than you thought. do TAs dock off 13+ pts on a single question?!?

keep your eyes open... always look at perspectives from both sides of the picture. that's what i'm learning.

"what makes what goes down, get back up?"

and as i struggle not to be the hypocrite, i have to keep telling myself, "Reach, don't eat your own words." auuuughh, so hard. i think i have to talk to God sometime.

(some recent Davis dormroom conversation between some guy named Brice and me and Jon)
Brice: so you doing anything thursday night? we got bible study, it'd be awesome, come along
Jon: (casually) oh lemme see... (a moment passes by)oh... (casually)i got to go to the World Series
hahahah....

i think i'm going for the delay pedal.... both the chorus and phase pedal are essentially modified effects pedals... maybe just get adaptors for the stereo flanger and wah that i have, so i won't have to use batteries.

just listened to Delirious- Deeper, the '99 Mezzamorphis album version.... that's so NIIIICCCCEE... so full sounding. i guessing the use of a wah. you HAVE to listen to this! BIG encouragement to get a wah pedal, dist pedal... fender... full band ;)

should i sign up for IM vball? should i? 5'11 ppl don't get too many spikes...

Hitler Show on Family Guy's hilarious!(don't worry you pacifists... it's nothing racial)
Kool-Aid Man! mwhahahah!

list of notable Proverbs I wrote down(so far), as well as some comments:
4:18-just sounds awesome; i will look to blue horizons, anyone? ;)
9:10-fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom- nuf said
10:25-the righteous have what it takes to stand a storm
11:2-pride leads to disgrace, but humility leads to wisdom
11:4-wealth's worthless in the days of doom, but righteousness delivers
11:28-see 11:4; just another way of saying it; don't trust in your riches
11:30-fruit of the righteous=tree of life; remember this? the tree of life seen in the beginning of time which Adam and Eve DIDN'T EAT?
13:7-better to pretend you're nothing when you have everything than vise-versa... is Soloman telling us to lie? or is he hinting at humility?
13:8-see 11:4; another way of saying it
14:9-make amends for sin... fools mock it, but goodwill's found amongst the upright
14:12-what seems a right way to man... leads to death
14:21-God commands us to love our neighbor, so if we despise those, we sin... we are blessed if we are kind to the needy though
14:26-A God-fearing man has a secure fortress... so it protects his children
14:27-Fear of the Lord=fountain of life... turns a man from the snares of death
15:3-God's everywhere, he sees everything
15:4-A tongue that heals=tree of life(think of the tree Adam and Eve DIDN'T EAT), and a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit

chorus, delay, or phase pedal? one thing's for sure... no octave pedal... found out you can't play chords on it w/o messing up the sound! i would've meant to buy that for uping my chord sounds, but i guess that's a no-no. that's what the other pedals are for(btw, i'm still figuring out if a phase pedal's basically a flanger pedal except more options)

ugh... arm cramps from chem... prelab AND lab report, both of which need to be written instead of typed...

i think i should hit the SNOOZE button on my alarm clock when i'm getting up... i tend to shut off the alarm, then say to myself, just lay down for a few more minutes, and of course, i'm back asleep, except this time i've got nothing to pull me back up... cept maybe jon's alarm clock. but he gets up a LOT later than i do. it should be only after i've gotten up that i turn the alarm off.

currently it's 11:10 PM here in davis... time for a shower, then get back, and maybe jam some before i hit the bed... g'luck for all you guys who know me who are taking a midterm or a test or quiz or something this week... i'll hold up a prayer for all of ya.

note to self; NEVER go to sleep past 1:00; it's already pushing my ability to get up; i should really go to bed around 11:30; me and jon missed an oppurtunity to visit some church here in davis due to that. at least i visited some new fellowship during friday; AACF. comparing it CTCC youth group when i was a freshman... small size, ignorant ppl to the newcomers, good worship attitude.

i should write down the funny stuff i remember from family guy; one episode:
Peter: so you want me to whack a guy? off a guy? whack off a guy?
another part of the episode:
On board navigation computer: There is a fork in the road... (russian accent)In Russia, road forks you!

another episode(which was FUNNY)
Chris: is dad mad at me?
Lois: No, of course not... now get some cereal and meet me at the 10 inches or less line... ITEMS!

hehe... and Mintos

I am tired of byron style food in the Davis Cafeteria!

yeah... whatever... worship tomorrow... with me and God!

thank God it's over! 1st midterm over! and not only that, i have a REALLY GOOD FEELING that i did well... thanks a lot God, i owe you one...actually, i owe you more than a couple ;)

jon went to berzerkeley to visit some friends, while i'm still stuck here in davis doin my own thing... how boring of me. but then most of the ppl from MVHS who went to berzerkeley are nerds, ppl who i wouldn't care about. so desolate on saturday here in davis.

what i think so far of the fellowships i've gone to:

College Life: well-intentioned, great worship band, friendly, but possibly over-friendly(they literally won't leave you alone)
ABSK: just-right friendly, good speaker, but a bit large, and i still don't know about how well their worship is
AACF: think CTCC size... somewhat friendly, good worship attitude, but they didn't really talk to me, aside from the get-together times and this one girl who was a bible study leader... ahhh, feels just like CTCC youth group when i was a freshman... heh heh.

i think my song's lyrics need tweaking... figures, you can't figure out the lyrics and expect ALL good guitar fills to go along with it.

Giants: 1 game, Angels: 0

btw, while i was walking around today in davis, i noticed some recycle trash can with a small hole in it: on the top, a label: "cans, ass, plastic." ok, so the ass was really glass, with the gl part off, but it was so funny to me... think about it... small hole, etc. made me crack up for a good 15 sec while no one was luckily around... how childish of me.

yeaaaa.... 1 last test, and it's math! study? are you kidding? i could fall asleep in that class and still do ok(which i do often, heh heh)!

you won't believe the free stuff you get from on-campus christian groups; what i've gotten so far... 4 new testaments(i've been running past the gideons guys for about 2+ times, and got a paperback one(!?!) from an on-campus christian fellowship), "The Case For Christ" by Lee Strobel, 3 christian CDs(2 are multimedia, one is a sample of an underground music group, one is a "witness CD" and the last one is a collection of some of the common christian artists), a weird yoyo, a drawstring mesh bag, tons of candy/munchies, and 2 free dinners.

steak dinner yesterday... great.

phil hartman's hilarious, so are peter and stewie griffin.

one man pretends to be rich, yet has nothing; another pretends to be poor, yet has great wealth -proverbs 13:7
the fear of the lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding - proverbs 9:10

chorus, delay, or phase pedal?
(after looking at the online prices, i am so freaking shocked; ~$100/pedal?!? ack; worship isn't true worship unless you sacrifice something, but oh man...)

paper down, 2 tests to go this week; i feel a trip to the library coming... today. and i need scantrons.

haha... snl... w/phil hartman(his voice's so funny when he's trying to act funny)
-may i introduce you to the classic b**ch electric shaver... but when i say classic b**ch, i mean it in a good way! it not only shaves, it pulls and tangles your hair up... or you can get the classic lesbo electric shaver!
mwhahahahahah! ;)

in SAS1, we were discussing environmental problems as well the current UC strike going on and one guy brought up the thought of "what can we do to help? i dunno where to start." and i replied, "well, we can do either big or small actions." we don't need to do anything big; there are ppl who choose to picket, but we can just do everyday small decisions, like actually eating all the food that's placed on our plate, instead of throwing some away. it doesn't matter whether the actions are big or small, they'll add up, and make a difference. just like how we can't see the difference our misdeeds make in the short term, ditto with our good deeds; we might not even be able to see the fruits of our labor in our lifetime. but it all makes a difference. and who cares really how the other countries act towards us when they don't realize that we HAVE helped? do hungry ppl need to really know where food is coming from?
and that's how i view our ministry of christianity; we don't need to get on the streets and preach to make a difference; the way we live our lives, the kindness we show to others, the gratitude we give, it all adds up. we may not see the fruits of our labor in our lifetime, we may even get insulted and falsely accused for not helping others, but do the hungry really need to know who helped them, as long as someone from God brought them back to him? do they?
(maybe SAS1 IS interesting... still a lotta work though, but i'm getting there)

guess how many free pocket bibles i've gotten from gideons international at davis so far ;) come back to me with an answer

http://www.lpfan.com/main.php3?page=video; currently like looking at the Linkin Park live videos of:
Conan: 1 step closer
House of Blues: Papercut
House of Blues: Pushing Me Away

i've been meaning to say this for a long time, so lemme just get it off my chest:
as far as i can tell; FIRST-BORNS HAVE ALWAYS GOT IT BETTER THAN THE SECOND-BORNS. there, i said it. and you can see it, even today in our beloved CTCC church. for the most part, it's been true. daniel goes to berkeley, mike goes to some community college. joyce goes to davis, sam goes to santa barbara. laura goes to UCLA, jen... i dunno what she's going to get into. grace goes to berkeley, lydia goes to UCLA(marginal here, and arguable, but based on college prestige, yeah, it works). dan goes to berkeley, mandy also goes, but has to start later in the school year. joyce goes to UCLA, carolyn doesn't get into UCLA, but goes to berkeley(now i'm basing it on the fact that she didn't make her 1st choice school). jon goes to davis, lewis goes to... i dunno. and not to exclude me, my AWESOME bro phil goes to UCLA, i get into davis. of course, there's probably going to be differences once in a while(like maybe jerm and his sister, or grace and norman, wes and steph, justin and calvin's a push), but not many times i think. you 1st borns always get it easier; be glad if you're 1st born. ;)
(except for the two albinos Nikhil and Vikas; both of them go to riverside, but they're all cool)

go look at my 10/13/2K2 entry to see my praise to God; i gotta figure out how to play this rant with an electric strat sometime, but i think i'll need to toy around with my flanger. will i need a phase, reverb/delay or chorus pedal? or another AC adapter? i hope not as that means i'll have to shell out even more bringbring. tempting though.

alright; i'm out. been a hectic day of writing, writing, typing, more writing. but yet, i feel that something's been carrying me through, like something "saw me and called me 'gain, pulled me up now i find what it takes to float," to quote myself ;)

final lyrics to my new christian rock song:

Unknown to the world
(the fat of this based upon Proverbs 9:10)

-ReCharredSigh

(everything is rushing right over my head
drowning down right in a pool of thoughts
not swimming just sinking trapped down
in a world of shallowness
now, inside this world knowledge is power
but you saw me and called me 'gain
pulled me up now i find what it takes to float
and i can say)

doom crowds near
word penetrates the filth
unknown to the world
are the secrets you show me
this gives me strength
the fact that i know you
(lost my wealth
kept my hide
they can't take away my faith
only ruin my pride)
the fact that i can rise

(like a flame that consumes inside me again
flaming warmth setting fire so to mend
the spirit of one who loves the weary
his patience lasting for all
they will never extinguish out this gift
the burning for you the warmness of bliss
fearing you now my wisdom is tenfold
to jam in song)

a circle of tension surrounds the loner
the flames nearly consume him
a filter of light peeks outta his chest
and it disperses his pains

doom crowds near
word penetrates the filth
unknown to the world
are the secrets you show me
this gives me strength
the fact that i know you
(lost my wealth
kept my hide
they can't take away my faith
only ruin my pride)
this i cannot hide
(all in all
hype aside
i don't ever wanna leave you
be by my side)
the fact that i can rise

kinda hard to get your 5 fruits and vegetables a day at Davis WHEN THE FRUIT IS SO ROCK HARD I CAN'T SCOOP MY KIWIFRUIT OUT OF THE SKIN, ISN'T IT?!?!? geez, you're actually DISCOURAGING me from my 5-a-day.

still have to edit my lyrics of my new song a bit, then comes the fun part... the guitar filling.

http://www.computerpranks.com/download/images/megaflicks.jpg
mwhahaha! louis was right; megaflicks indeed! ;) (you HAVE to see this)

top this, shakespeare ;)
(this is what i've got so far for my next song)

Unknown to the world
-based upon Proverbs 1:7

(freestyle)
everything is rushing right over my head
drowning down right in a pool of thoughts
not swimming just sinking trapped down
in a world of shallowness
now, inside this world knowledge is power
but you saw me and called me 'gain
pulled me up now i find what it takes to float
and i can say

doom crowds near
a word permeates the filth
the unknown to the world
are the secrets you revealed
this gives me strength

(freestyle)
like a flame that consumes inside of me
a flaming warmth that you set on fire to see
the spirit of one who loves just cause it's he
and never ever forsakes me
they will never put it out this gift
the burning for you the warmness of bliss
fear the Lord and the wisdom begins
acknowledge him and the healing is in

a circle of tension surrounds the loner
the flames nearly consume him
a filter of light peeks outta his chest
and it disperses his pains

talked some w/this girl i knew back from the christian club at MVHS in short calc; weird how i know her name, but she doesn't know mine, but we talked some; mainly it was about math and fellowships though. no introductions to each other though; i guess it's just cause we've seen each other in the club, but never really talked w/each other.

current hobbies to pass the time(when i'm not studying) in Davis:
-watch Jon play CS
-chat on AIM w/ppl from back home
-watch Family Guy episodes dl'd from the net
-watch VF tourney videos
-surf the net: VF, effect pedals, music, email
-listen to (christian) rock/hip-hop
-jam on my guitar
-songwrite
-watch TV
-play MVC2, Tekken 3, CVS2 (sigh, no VF4 Evo)

and yet i'm bored... why? cause i can do ALL of those things at home, except the high-speed internet stuff and cable stuff, but that really doesn't bother me: i never really spent too much time online at home. and notice how there's no socializing placed up there, because that's how much ppl keep to themselves! but i guess it's not THAT bad; from what i gather from David's blogspot, it seems the youth group at home is getting just as desolate as well. all in all, all of us are probably looking forward to Thanksgiving when we come back.

yay... david from back home picked up me or bob's habit of typing crud on a website! (see link on left)

i feel so sleepy... 5.5 hours just doesn't cut it. feelin better as the day goes by though... until i have to go to my next class.

oh yeah, my headphones are great... they block out all the noise i heard outside, but everything sounds muffled outside. and since i wear glasses, it hurts my ears.

memorable quote for quite some time: i was in my Science and Society class, and we were discussing the issue of immigration. someone brought up that we aren't as mixed together as we think we are; for instance in high school we are intent on sticking together in our own little ethnic groups. that prompted some line from the professor that went along the lines of:
"so then America's not a melting pot; it's tossed salad?"
;) mwhahahahah

there really HAS got to be more to life than studying, work, and success. how can this ever keep you happy?

... blank for now, and i hate the fact that everything overwhelms me. EE-VEE-RYY-THING. nothing really lifting me up. or it could just be that the amount of work i think i need to do overwhelms me. i dislike the idea that i just can't get everything done right now. and that i have no motivation to do partway work right now.

...maybe i should just try going to the gym.

amp, flanger, (wah,) overdrive/distortion, (octave,) guitar; hmmm.... good setup? technically, i could just lose the flanger, but i'm not too good with the whole foot timing with the wah.

i'd really like to get an octave pedal. the octave pedal enables you to play @2 different octaves in the same key at one time. enables solo guitar playing to sound a bit more "full."

yeah... the wah or flanger CAN work into worship songs; Chris Tomlin - Forever; go back, listen to that(adds that to list of songs to play on Thanksgiving break)

still love the effect pedals.... LOOOOVE them.

pho is good.... it's the only sign of azn-ish ness around here in davis.

oh yeah, family guy is THE SHIZNIT!

recently found a new praise song that i like; or i should be more specific; that i've heard many times but forgot what it was and what it was called: Hungry. if you're sampling from the internet, i suggest the Matt Redman or Vineyard version, cause then you can hear the overdrive sound for the fills and the nice riff. still doesn't beat Not Be Shaken, Forever, and Arise though; i still think those give you the best ability to kick loose and just WORSHIP GOD! YEEEEAAA! and definitely doesn't beat 12 Stones(ok, so they're not a worship group, but they still KICK ARSE! heh heh)

i think i'm finding out more and more i am not really interested in electric guitars; what i mean is that while i LOVE my fender squire stratocaster, when i look up music-related gear on the web now, i find i'm becoming ever increasingly more interested in the various pedals such as those found on bossus.com. i mean, i'm finding more and more that most ppl have stuff that extends beyond the distortion, wah and flanger pedals. besides, if you have about 15+ effect pedals, you can cover up just about ANY mistake ;) i think weaver(12 stones' guitarist) uses these pedals(check this out):

Boss phase pedal
Boss delay/reverb
Voodoo groove chorus pedal
Crybaby wah pedal

and i think he has 3 more pedals. ack; how much money i need to shell out to be able to play like that(not to mention i still can't play riffs that complex). i think though if i can fool around with my flanger pedal so that it doesn't fluctuate the notes, i won't need a chorus pedal(i usually don't use the flanger for that purpose anyhow). that gives me SOME ideas. ack, does that mean i'll have to shell out 20 more bringbring, since i'll be using the flanger a LOT more? after all, i feel the undistorted part of their songs still doesn't sound exactly like it was clear, and it's definitely not overdrive. but i still don't get how the chorus part of "Broken" seems to play at 2 different octaves in distortion; he didn't mention that he uses an octave pedal on the website. (btw thanks george again for fixing the flanger for me); i think though i'm starting to get an idea of when you use certain effects; use overdrive for lead, distortion for chorus, and then chorus for the verse would be good. hooo... i'm learning.

i hate writers' block, and i'm not talking about writing a term paper(although i am, kinda); i'm talking about writing a song, when you feel the lyrics aren't good enough and your ability with the electric guitar just doesn't cut it, as if you can't improv and immediately find something good to work with. hate, hate it.

i think i pulled a lydia; i'm starting to hate school; i don't like chemistry on anticipation of the hard work, i don't like SAS because i need to write a term paper and don't know how to start, and i WILL hate math, although right now i'm ok with it. i know that's not the case w/laura though; probably loves school compared to all the rest of us; me and jon are bored, lydia hates school(seriously, how can you HATE UCLA?), norm wants to transfer, jerm just wants to get away.... i think mandy's ok with Berzerkeley, but i never asked her. me, personally, i kinda would be ok with it, as long as i could crank out as many creative, original, neat sounding songs on my electric guitar, but recently, that's not been happening. auuurrrggghhh! i need to find ppl to jam with(which is going to be so rare based on what i want; do you realize how rare it is to find ppl who love being a christian, love modern rock, some elements of hip-hop AND are musically talented with all the proper gear?)

still miss every1, all you SoCal ppl. and NorCal ppl. come back and jam w/me(those of you who can)!

hey you dummies! cut and paste the link below to see how you should REALLY learn guitar! heh eh
http://www.geocities.com/sage_tripper/guitar_guide.htm

possible topics for next song of mine:
-Graduation(i STILL haven't finished it)
-Being Grafted into God(STILL haven't finished this either)
-Prov 1:7(the fear of the Lord is knowledge; hey; i'm a dumbass in Davis)
-Standing alone(the flame in my heart should never die)

also, should i use freestyling in my song(i've touched upon the fact that i can freestyle while playing power chords)? should i use that WITH a complex riff? or just the riff?

help me out here you guys if you ever come across this! plz! i'm getting VERY bored here! you help me out, i just might come back and PLAY the song i wrote for you guys!

damnit; 12 Stones is touring with Creed, and they'll be in Mountain View, October the 11th! gonna miss a great show(i really like both bands), not to mention i don't buy concert tickets anyhow. what's ironic about the 2 bands is while 12 stones is just beginning to emerge and its members are young, not to mention they lay it on thick like metal, they're christian, and Creed, while they're much more successful so far and more like alt rock, they're searching for God, but NOT a christian band. but who cares; both guitarists are EXTREMELY good. and like i mentioned; both are GOOD. screw you all who can't see a good musical group beyond the singers.

after relistening to 12 Stones - Broken, i think maybe drums don't need to be that audible ALL the time; i still love the sound of drum sets when they're loud, but when you lay on the distortion REALLY THICK, you can't really hear anything else, eh?

Broken still has some of the coolest lyrics i've ever heard. great song. makes me wanna get out my electric guitar, except i've got chem in about 30 min; damn chem; you're keeping me from worshipping God with music! ;) www.12stones.com

currently at this moment the As are KILLING their opponents! 9-0; crazy!!

some thoughts about davis:

it's been a common occurance at Davis here for air raid sirens to go off near noon EVERY SINGLE DAY. of course, we then see a fire truck go speeding off in a direction. so we(me, jon, his friends) have been wondering, why the heck every day? there's nothing much around davis, crime rate's probably low. so why? well, pastor dan brought up the thought that it could be that they're on their lunch break ;) yea, i could see that; makes me wanna be an EMT.
-so, where you wanna go for lunch?
-how bout in n out?
-how long's THAT gonna take?
-oh... 1... 2 minutes?

also, there's a common sight of statues called "eggheads" around campus. while journeying towards the Shields library, i saw one with his face planted facedown into a book; that's not studying; that's FALLING ASLEEP WHILE STUDYING; heh heh.

"daily in my sin i take your life"
-how true, 12 Stones; and if you can keep forgiving me Jesus despite all this, that's really something.

just visited the Davis library; oh man; and i thought there were silent places in the world, but oh man! nothing tops this! it's like the closest thing to soundproof booths! really good place for studying! oh problem is that you hear EVERYTHING in there; i think everyone heard my broken sneakers as i was walking through there.

running out of things to do in Davis that are INTERESTING. only thing left? songwriting. yeap.

ok, i should sleep. seriously. the lack of sleep seriously affects my ability to stay awake in lectures; i think i woke up chuckling to myself in SAS 1; i hope no one heard me.

zzzzz
|/
-_-

and i miss the way it used to be in my senior yr in high school. REALLY BADLY. spent nearly the entire day studying. moral of this story? plan ahead; don't procrastinate. so you can get in your break times, instead of cramming in everything at 1 single shot. and find a good quiet study area.

38th Parallel - Horizon
"So you're at the end of this day, when the world is shaded in vain, I will look to blue horizons and watch for you to come, When my hope is tired and torn, when my faith is weathered and worn, I look to the blue horizons."*
The song, according to the band, is supposed to the "sound of hope." Lyrically and melodically. It does seem like that, as it starts out meloncholy, then adds a dash of tension, right into... glory. Too good. Too bad this is probably the best, and possibly only good song of theirs. Their other songs sound more like rock with hip-hop lyrics, with some vocalist sounding like the Guns N Roses vocalist. They have more influence from Korn than some actual hip-hop vocalist, explaining that too.

9/29/2K2 has a quick asessment of what i use for guitar playing.

* the lyrics may not be exactly what they say; i based this upon what i remembered

i FINALLY got that AC adapter for my Boss SD-2 pedal that i needed; thank God! almost like getting a new pedal for the money and the # of batteries that i use, plus the fact that the batteries run down SO FAST. this should be fun. but i still need a good set of speakers for my laptop, or it just won't seem like home.

hey you CTCC guys, check out what i use! maybe you can base the idea of your getting a sunday worship electric guitar on this:
list of MAIN electric guitar equipment that i use:
2 long guitar cables
1 Peavey Blazer 158 mini-amp(has built-in distortion) for the cases that i play by myself
Boss Dual OverDrive SD-2 pedal w/PSA 120 AC adapter(tite reliable pedal; options between overdrive, distortion, and clear)
American Squire Stratocaster electric guitar(which, sadly, i haven't figured how much Phil spent on it yet; sad, really, considering how so many ppl ask me all the time)
1 medium guitar pick
1 set of headphones(face it; not everyone will appreciate your jamming)
price of all this? i have NO idea; i'm guessing $500+; hey, true worship isn't worship unless if you sacrifice something eh? ;)

i usually don't fool around with the DOD flanger and Crybaby wah pedal that i have unless if i feel in the mood(which is rare).

i should study now, or at least go to sleep early so i can wake up early to study.

what else...

i miss all the jam sessions i used to have; "when 2 or 3 are gathered in my name, i am there with them," or some bible verse like that. jamming by myself just isn't the same. i need to find a drummer and bassist.

i miss all the ppl i used to know; can you believe some of the ppl i am mentioning are now 8 hrs away instead of 5 min?

show me the joy of worshipping you God!

Lifehouse-Spin's lyrics:
http://www.air1.com/chart/images/btn_lyric.gif
(really great, if you're listening while looking at them)

bob sez that 38th Parallel sounds like Linkin Park, so i'll look into them later.

i can tell when someone misses me from my old church, but when you place my name in your AIM profile and tell me that you miss me... man, that's something. goodness, i miss you too. just not the same.
"i'm miSSIng you ReaChArred33 like mad
cALLme"

i think Short Calc is so far TOO EASY; Jon's friend told me he saw me taking notes halfway, then nearly falling asleep, and this was not even halfway into the class ;)
whereas the textbook required for Science and Society was located OFF CAMPUS, on the near outskirts of Davis; oh man, i think i just lost my Freshman 15 yesterday running that far(btw, i saw some Pho/Chinese hybrid restaurant at Downtown Davis, which should be interesting)
Chem, as usual, is annoying as heck.

but maybe i just need a quiet study place, instead of trying to do this next to a computer w/CS going off every single moment ;)

Davis411.com for info.

i remember reading somewhere that you need to break a fast with LITTLE portions. you're stomach's probably slightly shrunk, which is why you need to eat slightly less to let it get used to being filled up again. it's better that way. so, your breakfasts and your fast-breaking should be like that. us CTCC ppl made a mistake in going to Hometown Buffet after a 30 hr famine. BIG mistake. otherwise, if any of you CTCC ppl wanna do it again, do it! (except this time, maybe do activites that actually reflect trying to ignore the pain and concentrating on God)

me and my tall, bony-ass self sitting here in my davis dorm.

some noteworthy things gathered about possible future plans for guitar worship at CTCC from talking to david:
-concerning the debate between starting with an acoustic or an electric, the plus of an acoustic is that you can play it anywhere, and it requires much less equipment to use. the problem is you're going to be shafted during sunday worship if you ever decide to try helping out there, as you need to buy a special pick-up and need to splurge more $ on batteries. also, an acoustic's slightly "fatter," if you have short hands, it's not as pleasant. plus side of an electric is that you have it easier playing on sunday worship; no need to buy batteries(unless if you're like me and like using distortion pedals), and it's thinner(short hands rejoice), plus, it's easier to slide your fingers along the fretboard(acoustic's fretboard has thick metal bars, so it's harder on your fingers). it's basically much easier to play than an acoustic. downside is the equipment goes beyond the guitar; you need a cable and a mini-amp. and if you want to use a pedal, you need ANOTHER cable, the pedal of course, and batteries or an AC adaptor.
-decent guitars are $300, really good ones are +$1000.
-a lotta ppl wanna learn to play guitar; i'm surprised about this. david himself, grace, joyce, joe, clement all wanna learn. bob, you've got some teaching to do ;)
-having ALL the ppl who wanna play guitar all get guitars might be hard; money might be a problem esp with our taiwanese parents(WHAT! you want spend $300 on gui-ta?? aiyo?!?) a suggestion would be to have all the youth pitch $ to get a youth guitar(since you're all pitching in, you can might as well aim for the $1000 one haha). now to do this you could start fundraising and say that the money will go to helping the youth group become more passionate about leading ppl to worshipping God. who knows; maybe someone's parents will bring $ that's sufficient to get one.
-concerning that youth guitar, it's basically the idea that you have 1 single guitar in the youth group room(i think we're using the farley garage now?!?), and anyone in the youth can use it. like a room piano. circulating it around the room might be kinda hard though. but it brings up interesting thoughts. or, just have ppl come up to the guitar and play a song or something. when they're done, have them sit back down, someone else comes up. and thus instead of 1 worship leader on friday playing 5 songs, you could have 5 different youth each playing a worship song for 5 songs. thus, it's easier for ppl to prep for worship(only 1 song to do), and easier on time(as i know high schoolers think they have so little time).
-david also brought up the idea that when we do do this, you could worship in the sanctuary instead of the farley garage. which would be nice. (coughcough*buyalaptopforpowerpointpresentations*coughcough) it might take a lotta time, but it'd be cool.
-downsides to having a youth guitar and not every1 owning their own guitar, from chats w/bob: can't really have every1 practice at home, where its easiest to break the learning curve barrier to make strumming and chord changing, and basically developing a pattern easy.

Tree63: Look What You've Done
now this is an AWESOME song!

portion of the lyrics:
"it's not a question of what you can do for me, but what i can do for you my Lord"
(ahh, it sounds better in the song)

tip: DON'T play any 3D computer shooting game with a touchpad... you are at a HUGE disadvantage, it's not even funny.

recent conversation clips w/ydnam:

me: btw, you see laura online lately...
her: mm no not lately
...
me: haha, she's probably outside getting about 29+ boyfriends :-)
her: haha
her: miss laura pimpster
me: you can say that again

(later)
her: not that busy..... ppl mostly keep to themselves
her: well i guess cuz i dont live in dorms i cant really say
me: oh yeah, that's true
her: but my neighbor asked me to smoke pot with him today
her: haha
me: haha
her: yeah i think that was the first time anyone's ever talked to me so casually about pot so that was pretty interesting
me: haha
me: save me some!
me: i wanna see what it looks like!
me: *mumbles* maybe smoke some of it
her: hahaha
her: no way!
her: =P

psalm 23 sounds awesome... i mean the song when the guys at "college life" at davis played it... nice. i gotta dl it sometime soon.
you ppl who tell me you wanna go to college... trust me, you don't. too much. i miss simplicity. simply kicking back, taking it 1 day at a time just worshiping God was THE life. now, i have to actually study.
haha, watching some guy put "popeye" in CS is funny! now, instead of "steak," maybe your screen name could be "spinach!" haha

ok, so i was somewhat wrong about the davis internet access; just about right now i downloaded something about 10+ MBs in about 16 sec. but then, no one was really around during then(jon was asleep). which is strange cause it's 10:20 AM.
1st lesson (re-)learned during davis; don't put your soda in the freezer, no matter how weak you think your refridgerator is. in other words, ice DOES expand. in other words, i found frozen pepsi splattered all around our little fridge. spent some time cleaning up our mini-fridge due to that.
btw, jon accidently went out of the davis gym by the emergency exit(bwoopbwoopbwoopbwoop)

more lessons to come. i shouldn't be typing like this, i'm supposed to do a final cram before the chem test, which ironically, i haven't found out where the heck it is. at least i know WHEN it'll occur.

complaining time at davis:

1) the internet connection as of right now is CRAP. period. it's clearing a bit, but this whole "high speed internet access" here is crap... it makes my 56K modem at home seem like cable.
2) i HATE registering for classes and the stuff like that... took me FOREVER to find a 4-credit class that WASN'T ON WAIT and fit my schedule.
3)i hope God comes through when i retake chem tommorow... or i will seriously be screwed over.
4)haha, there's no AM station here! and i miss my cupertino radio stations... 100.9, 104.9, 105.3, 106.1, 94.9.... almost every radio station here is crap.

and i still need to buy books. oh dear God, plz come through for me!

i gotta remind myself to go to worshiptogether.com later; supposedly maybe good stuff for worship leaders.

i am drawn to the fact that david danced before the Lord with all his might, half naked(based on 2nd Sam) THAT is how i should worship God; with everything i've got(not the half-naked part, well, maybe, but it depends which half).
oh yeah; btw, if you've ever seen me dance alone to worship songs, it looks funny... sorta like a mix between an air guitar played by a punk rocker and a hip-hopper, not to mention i occasionally rap along to the lyrics. but yeah, that's with "all my might," isn't it?

GIYA- Give It Your All

am i the only guy formally(or currently) in my youth group who has a healthy stomach? everyone else is either lactose intolerant, or has stomach problems, or doesn't like eating certain types of food(such as beef(WTF), cheese, milk). or just doesn't like eating. no wonder i'm the tallest person. (not that i guzzle milk by the gallon or anything... i just make sure i get my 3 cups per day, and then some if i feel like it. i'm about one inch away from 6 feet).

be grateful for what you've got, and USE IT TO YOUR BEST POTENTIAL.

once again, thanks for all the memories friends... the chapter closes, but the pages won't be sealed(if you get what i'm aiming at)

time's run out. the question now is, will i still be standing after i face my fears? and will i be able to STILL be more on-time than those 2 SoCal girls? but most importantly, will i NOT BE SHAKEN? (cue intro riff into drums, then add piano and acoustic guitar... oh man, i've known our worship team style a bit too much blindman ;D)

ok, i promised that i'd write that thought i had on prayer actually working, because God granted a request to me once... here's what i wrote down later about it after it occured on a sheet of paper(it's not that amazing, BUT it is proof nevertheless that prayer does work, at least according to this circumstance):

"Prayer does work; at 8:39, 7/14/02, after exiting 85 at Evelyn Ave, I prayed that all the traffic lights I encountered until I reached Farley St. would be green(if not for my sake, then at least for the ones on the worship team) because I was 10 minutes late and I knew if I encountered any red lights that would delay my arriving by 5 min.
Not only did God honor my request, he even turned the traffic light turning into Farley St. green, something I hadn't expected. So you see, God does answer prayer, but he looks at your heart, your intentions, and most importantly, your faith before deciding. In addition, he also looks to see if he knows you or sees if you're trying to get to know him."
at the bottom, i also noted that there were 8 traffic lights; one following a stop sign and right before a RxR, and one right afterward. with 8 traffic lights, that was a HUGE oppurtunity to get a red light, but... i zipped through all of them. it still sounds minor to a bunch of you, but to me at the moment(because i had travelled this path MANY times, and NEVER gotten all of them green), this was big. praise God, and I hope I can expect even greater things from him as i take off.

almost always a downside to everything....
i'm thinking davis is an abundance of cows... that's good for dairy products and meat... but i'm also thinking, by that same token, there must be a lot of anti-cow activists around there.

me: we should just one day go to chili's, order a fajita and try to pile as much stuff as we can onto a tortilla
tomato: or home depot
every1: ????
tomato: i mean hometown buffet
tk: build your own tortilla

i need an AC adaptor for my dist/od pedal... and i hope to God that what i studied for chem will be enough this time... (fingers crossed really badly)

i hate it when i get a mental lull...
i hate it when life seems dull...
i feel like i'm in the dark night of the soul or something like that.

i'm thinking, fortune cookies and horoscopes probably won't be able to tell you what your future is by itself. but i believe that God uses the circumstances around you to show you his will(or at least suggest it), according to "Experiencing God." so in that sense, sometimes God may use fortune cookies to tell you what he wants to do. one time at Tsing Tao(their #160 is SOOO good), my fortune cookie read,
"Sell your ideas, they're worthwhile."
another time,
"You have a deep appreciation for arts and music."
combining the two, is God telling me something? maybe he DOES like my idea of the possibility of becoming a Christian rock artist.

Soul Calibur 2 is very fun... too bad i got used to TTT-style blocking(not to mention VF4 Evo costs 3 tokens to play), so when some guy joined in, i got whupped... forgetting how to block.

i'm thinking of maybe moving my favorite songs section of my site to another blogspot... i spend too much time updating that page, as i find too many good songs too quickly.

bazaar was great... good food.

i'm... fazed. i can't think right now.

why oh why does Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution cost 3 tokens to play at SVGL? AND, no one plays it too. it's such a great game. the US' so anti-VF.
(btw if the reader doesn't think the VF scene is big because the arcade scene isn't big, that's not what i meant... amongst the variety of fighting games played in an arcade, VF series tends to rank near the lowest in the US... and yet in other parts of the world it would've been at the top of the list... japan you have to wait in line to play VF4, whereas there's no one in line for Tekken 4.... grrr....)

on a more happier note on arcade games, played TTT again... fun, fun. just use bruce and if 3,2,1 or df+2 connects, do:
b+4,3,4.

that's it... i gotta go... library's gonna close, and i'm supposed to get ready for a sleepover at a girl's house... oooh, 1st time for everything here eh? are we playing mahjong or pokemon puzzle into the night? :D

and if i'm done w/that, study for chem(always chem, dangit).

heh.

FFOOOOOOOSSSSSBBBBBBAAAAALLLLLLLLLL!!!!
(go to my site, find the links page, find the Foosball Clip...insanage)

ask me about the one goal we shot and the ball came to rest just right outside of the goal...started gathering around trying to cup the ball or blow it to make it go in... hah hah

hehe, homer simpson's MIS-TA SPA-KKKUUULLLL!!!!! (Mr. Sparkle with a japanese accent)

(recreated conversation during youth retreat)
-well, i wanna play just power chords
-well, i was writing down a short FAQ on power chords and was going to give it to Bob and Clement... you want it?
-do it! all i see when you play worship are power chords
-yeap, just do this, and slide up, down, etc.

take a teen, place him in a beach close to Costanoa, have a strong wind current blow away from him, have a pelican fly towards him low to the ground, have a kid chase the pelican to make it take off, and have the teen throw the football at the bird... *BAM*

Kirk Franklin/Mary Mary:
"Thank you for another chance, you gave me joy now I can dance
all the people open up your mouth and let me hear you say thank you"

time flies by when you're having fun, or when it's summer. friends fly by faster when it's time for the seniors to split. i gotta finish writing my song(and studying)

that's all i gotta say. i'm tired, bored stiff.

(ok, in this recent days i have created a special blog dedicated to 9.11.01, but it's located in the tuesday section of this week, and i've recently updated the OTHER tuesday section for some of today's non-9.11 thoughts.)

am currently typing this in the library... yes, some of us late teens DO frequent the library at times. weird, i saw a woman who sprayed water on a chair and wiping it before sitting down on it... what, do you think anthrax travels like that or something? some of these precautions are just rediculous and wouldn't necessarily be made if you trusted in a God more powerful than imagined. and i met calvin in the library.

oh yeah, i promised to write up the stuff about the situation where prayer worked for me, well, i'll put it down here tonight(me and my procrastination).

hehe, louis' impression of billy lee carrying a nunchaku... it still cracks me up.

for some reason, the word STRENGTH spelled out with rocks occasionally comes to my mind, actually quite frequently... maybe God's trying to show me inner strength is more powerful than anything else, when it's backed by an almighty god.

oh, my church and youth group are so flawed, and yet, i know i'm going to miss them SOOO much when i take off to davis, it's not even funny. oh well, i know i'm always 2 hours drive back(except i'm not bringing my car up there)

'k, i should take off...stuff to do tonight.

9.11.01; rest in peace, ye who died unknowningly. those who died knowing Christ, you never died.

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(i will in my spare time put up an ASCII art of the twin towers)

Sooo.... 1 year has passed...if it has not changed our attitude towards others, even that of our enemies, and caused us to reach out in love towards them... then i promise you, what happened about 1 year beforehand will happen again... racist attitudes towards others will ALWAYS result in bloodshed. and yet right after 9.11.01 rednecks began calling Palestinians living in America(one was even a Christian, not a Muslim) and harrassing them.

Those who trust in our greatest sanctuary will find it is not invulnerable...even the Israelites had their ark captured by the Philistines. Those who trust in a god who is has always been there from the beginning to the end? That's a different story.

Air1 is playing a special remixed Skillet "You Are My Hope" song today, 9.11.02, every hour... tune in and see if you can hear it.

DC Talk's new song, "Let's Roll"
-we stand together(mercy, love, hope and truth), brother with brother(hand in hand), please grant us strength(dear God do grant us strength), we'll shout your name(united as one), let's roll(echo), let's fight(echo), let's show the world what's right... his spirit is in our light

have faith and courage ppl! "the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour... resist him, and he will flee."
the war against terrorism is not one which we can decisively win against in our lifetime... we must constantly be on the alert, praying and watching each other's backs.

Pillar's "Fireproof" lyrics may help give us strength:

"Here's a chance to show you how I feel
A Chance for you to see it's real
To see just what I feel inside and who it is that's by my side
I will never change my mind
Try to torch me and you'll find
You can't turn me or deter me
No matter how you try
You can't burn me

I know where I stand and what'll happen if you try it
I am FIREPROOF
I know my heart and I just can't deny it
I am FIREPROOF
I tried to tell you but you wouldn't be quiet
I am FIREPROOF
I'll never bow down and you wont buy it
I am FIREPROOF

Now you know what I'm all about
Theres no chance I'll ever doubt
The only one who can control me
I extol the almighty
You want me to put it on the line
And give yield to you this time
See but I won't compromise and I realize
It's my time to rise"

new additions of songs i like:
Sonic Flood:
-in the secret
-write your name upon my heart
PAX217
-tonight
Jake
-army of love

grrr, stupid com DVD player lagging and slowing down on me...i will have to finish watching Platoon sometime later in my life.

www.sega-parts.com; i'm going to have to remember this later to replace my broken DC controllers.

yay, me and sock0 WILL be rooming together after all! a big fat YAAAAAYYY

one of my current hobbies is(get this) rapping to alternative/punk/metal or christian while it's playing on the speakers; interesting, eh?

one weird thought: if i become a father, i will think back to when i wrote this and realize that bringing a baby into the world is bittersweet; oh sure, he/she'll grow up and become blessed by God, have good times in their lives, etc. but i just brought one extra person into the world to suffer failure and bad grades, rejection, persecution by non-Christians and the like. oh, the dilemma.

oh, parting is such sweet sorrow! where'd all my time go? geez, i'm gonna be outta reach of about 50% of my closest friends REALLY soon!

9.11.02's coming up; special blog coming up. if you're in the spirit already, go find DC Talk's new song "Let's Roll."

interesting new song i heard recently; christian hip-hop: KJ-52: "Dear Slim" it's quite interesting, sorta like a parody to Eminem's song "Stan," except this guy doesn't run his car with his wife in the trunk over the water.

priorites on the bare necessities of life according to me:
1)sleep
2)water(drink)
3)food
4)clothing
5)shelter
did i forget something? oh yeah, god should be #1, and everything else should be bumped down, heh heh.

jerm's fob-glish is so funny:
-scrap-nel
-da pim-pin
-milli-pitis

i love retreats
-------------------
me: ok, so grace can you play "in the secret" now?
grace: hold on, G...C... wait hold on, hold on!(frantically trying to position her small left fingers on fretboard) the C's coming!

so the saturday night around the campfire ppl were asking me for special requests, and i was bored, so i just started playing power chords while freestyling(remember my 1st entry?), and then everyone stopped, someone asked "what song is that?" and i said, "oh nothing; just made something up." *pause* "oh...hey, you're freestyling!"
------------------

dang; http://my.ucdavis.edu is down; at least the "myphone" part is.

hey the computer wallpaper's done! that's nice; 1 last thing to do knocked out of the way; actually, technically i didn't HAVE to do it, but it was something i wanted to do.

ah, the joys of power chords. and even greater is spreading the knowledge to your friends who want to learn about them. which i am going to do soon before i take off.

Proverbs 27:17; as iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens another
Downhere; there's something else that tells me so, i was not meant to walk alone, it sharpens me, to know we stand as one

haha; Double Dragon 3 for the NES is soo funny! the Lee bros' neutral nunchaku pose looks so hilarious! also, Chin(Se), haha.

how many of us would rather follow God in order for some self gain rather than just for the fact that it's right? i know many of us would either do what's right because:
a: we are afraid of the consequences of doing wrong(we don't want to get caught, therefore we stay on our side)
b: we want to be more god-like(this is somewhat wrong because Adam and Eve disobeyed God for the reason of wanting to be like God himself)
c: we want to get into heaven(the "what's in it for me" motive)
and there's nothing wrong with that; God WANTS us to follow him, not matter what our reasons are. but IMO, kudos to the person who follows God because he is right and that he wants to do right. i mean, c'mon, one person once stated, "the only reason Bill Clinton was sorry about Monica Lewinsky was because he was caught!"

we can never truly experience complete freedom in the view of the supernatural world by the bible; if we choose to disobey God, we gain freedom, but later pay for it by suffering the rest of our eternal lives. if we choose to follow him, we escape hell, but must serve God. mind you, it's not like God drags you around like a slave, but you do have a leader, and by that sense you aren't completely free. but take what is better.

God predicted that when his people entered the land that he would provide for them and when they had their fill and drank and were satisfied, that they would turn to other gods and disobey him. so while wealth isn't necessarily a bad thing, often times it causes you to lose focus on the most important thing.

ok, that's it; my mind's run blank; any more time spent thinking and i could churn out more thoughts, but i'd waste my internet time and my life(and i am no get-up-at-one-person). g'nite every1.

Reliant K's "Pressing On" sounds so good(well, at least to me the ending sounds tight). that's all i am probably gonna say for today.

am in the process of creating a new wallpaper for my desktop. still need to finish writing my song, and still need to study. other than that, i am clueless. i seem to have a mental lull today. oh well; maybe something will come to me later; it always does.

detest superficiality and shallowness; always strive for something deeper.

Aydil hates school; Arual loves school; me and weng are just bored stiff; just BORED. :D

()xxxx|vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

Be my sword! -gnohsadnap

arcade fighting game thought(not many of you will care about this, but i wrote this down so i don't forget):
generally, people will say top tiers are the ones that tend to have the total package, or most well-roundedness, and in a lot of cases, i will agree. however, i think it boils down to:
-strikes:
execution speed, recovery, length(space control in projectile-used games), hit level, natural evading movements during the move, combobility or power and (in 3D games) circular-ness; while there is often no such thing as the perfect strike or poke, often a combination of strikes with each specializing in a different aspect will be good(example Akira in VF4); a BIG factor in determining a top-tier, with a good number of strikes, this basically spells out the word MINDGAME
(in 2D games, an effective cross-up and jump-in and an anti-air are also a must)
-damage potential:
this takes into account the quality of their combo starters, the damage that they can do with combos/single attacks, and damage(and complexity to escape in VF) of their throws; while damage potential will not by itself be a determining factor in deciding where a character is placed, often it makes a bigger impact than the other factors.
-mobility:
movement possibilities w/the character, and speed of those possibilities(can they triangle jump, can they wavedash, runaway etc)
and another reason, though more as a secondary reason:
-lifebar(or weight in VF): damage intake is important; while the character doesn't need to be the highest endurance, generally somewhere in the middle of the spectrum is good enough

that's what i think it comes down to, plus your skill of course :D other things, though they CAN make a factor, tend to fade into the background; reversals/parries and other weird things by themselves won't make or break a character(though they help), just look at Lau in the VF series.

new song that i like: Kutless, "Your Touch," it's an interesting song; starts out sounding like Stain'd, then in the middle sounds slightly like Tool before launching into what sounds like hard rock, then back to the Stain'd feel. oh, and it's christian

i remember once thinking "why are christian artists who play rock and hip-hop so underplayed?" then after listening to 100.9 FM, i have to say, i take that back. i love the music they play on that station!

i remember my senior high school contemp literature teacher explaining how when watching movies you need to get to the 3rd level, whereas most people are stuck at the 2nd level, and used an example:
there was this movie(forgot the name) where a kid(maybe he went to church or something i forgot) grows up and around his teens sees a KKK ad and joins it; he then ends up near the end of the movie on a tower, sniping people. the teacher went on to tell us how everyone in the movie theater was booing the teen, until some person in the movie manages to get up to the top of the tower and kill him. then everyone in the theater cheered. and she said, "I was thinking, why don't these people get it? This is a tragedy!" and i couldn't agree more. while i can explain the rest of that day's lit lesson to you if you want(which is irrelevant to my point), i think that's how christ saw us and why he was willing to die. some people look at a terrible person and say, "Lookit him! So much bigotry, violence, hatred for others!" then they cheer when these people fall into ill will and possibly die. but God looked at him and became sad, thinking: "what a tragedy; this person could have become something good, like a missionary, or a pastor or just someone who believes in me wholeheartedly!" imagine him then looking at the rest of the world and seeing more people like this, his heart breaking when he saw the same thing and then saying, "I'll die for these people, because i know what they are worth, and i love them. i will bring back these people because i know they can become something better." that's what it's like. (and btw that's also how you're supposed to see people for who they are, rather than what they do)

alright, i don't have much to say today, except that here's what i was thinking late to myself at 2:00 in the morning, which shows how sleep can affect your thinking:
"I feel that my sap is being strength'd, I mean, strength being sapped."

found a new song that i like:
1000 foot crutch, "When In Doubt" sounds punk rockish.

on techno games on the nes:
would you believe that the guys who created Double Dragon 3 are so creative? here's part of the ending:
"the double dragons defeated princess mairam, who was mariam under an evil spell"

don't cha love the concept of river city ransom? teaches us to go around beating up guys, taking their money, then buying stuff with it.

my summer break's seeping through my hands so quickly; i've gotta start studying!

here we go with monday's blog; technically it's tuesday's but i waited until late to write this.

have cartoons gotten soft? i remember when guys used to be into G.I.Joe(those were the good days), Transformers, X-Men, and Spider-Man. now, it's all japanese anime. not that it's bad, and nothing against the japs, but it's just pikachu and yu-gi-oh. or basically animes about weird pets and playing cards, to put it bluntly. even one of my friends who is 17 is addicted to this(panda, snap outta it!), then again, he watches almost anything on TV. an extremist view might be that parents are totally upset about the current seemingly huge surge of kid shootings and wanted the cartoons changed to some less violent, more fruity substitute. weak; what about the rest of us law-obeying goody-goody kids to teens? *sigh*

oh yeah, on sunday, you church guys should've been at fair oaks park... i saw along with bob and byron a black guy doing the iverson dribble(watch the I-3 reebok commercial where he rolls the ball between his hands, now imagine that after losing a dribble, then picking up the ball with one of the finger rolls and continuing the dribble...sweet). also, he was doing some mad fake-outs... crazy

after shopping w/the guys for tsua bing, you'd be surprised just how little nutritional content is found in canned fruit in heavy syrup; i thought they might have added nutrients after nuking it, but nooo.... you'd be lucky to get more than 2% vitamin C. instead you just get a TON of calories.

since by buying CDs of an artist you are basically supporting their works, and by downloading and burning the works of an artist you are contributing against their works, you could say that since you don't want those hip-hop artists on the street, that you burn all their works and sell them... evil, but you get the idea.

finally, to close tonight; yojoe's prayer; slightly nod head w/eyes closed, then place your right thumb on your right eyelid and your right index on your left eyelid; rub the two together while praying. congrats; you just prayed while looking like you rubbed your eyelids. :)

currently, in work of a new song, possibly dedicated to 2K2's seniors, you know who you are.