inside.my.mind

Originally uploaded by elemak.

Sunday I got to Cookeville pretty early so I could take some pictures around Tech. I have posted three on flickr. I like the one of the lights better than I do this one, but I think this one will look better in a blog post. Go check out flickr to see the other two.

It felt very strange to be back in Cookeville. Cookeville was home for 4 or 5 years. I don’t know how to explain it, but it was a very strange feeling.

After taking pictures I was still waiting on everyone to get there and decided to go drive around. I ended up going by place I used to rent from Kevin. His car was there so I just dropped in on him. I hate to do that to people, but the door was open. He has the place looking great.

I almost forgot I bought the latest Skillet album and have listened to nothing else for days. I am really enjoying it. Just thought you all should know.

Tomorrow is Friday! Isn’t it amazing how when you are waiting on a certain date it seems like it will never come and when it does it seems like it is gone all to fast. Time is funny like that.

Sunday is a busy day this week. Got to be in Cookeville to meet the family for Sis’s birthday lunch. This lunch has been so many different times and places that it is not even funny. Started out it was going to be at Granny’s house on a Saturday. It then moved to Mont Eagle on a Sunday. It is now in Cookeville this Sunday. I don’t really care where it is I just wish everyone would make up their minds and pick a time and place for sure.

Sunday night I have to be back in town to go to an Oscar party. I have never been to an Oscar party before. I am very nervous about it. I am sure it will be fun, but I always get nervous about new stuff.

I have Monday off so that will help with Sunday being so packed since it is normally laundry day.

How about the weather? Last weekend it was crazy cold with snow and ice and all that not nice stuff and the last couple of days it has been over 50! It has been very nice out. I hope it at least lasts until after next weekend. I am so glad that it is starting to be light when I leave and get home from work. It always sucks so bad when it is dark leaving and coming hope. Very hard to keep positive when all you see is dark.

And now I leave you with a song:

Here I am
Tonight
I can’t stand
To Fight

This feeling of despair
I hide
I wonder are You there?
Sometimes, sometimes (we all wonder)

Chorus:
Whoooooaaa
This is You, this is me
This is who we’re meant to be
Whoooooaaa
We are the real, the truth is unchanging
This is the call to hearts that are feeling
Whoooooaaa

So it is
Sometimes
That I feel
This life

Is far beyond repair
But I
I know that You are there
Tonight, tonight (I won’t give up)

Chorus:
Whoooooaaa
This is You, this is me
This is who we’re meant to be
Whoooooaaa
We are the real, the truth is unchanging
This is the call to hearts that are feeling
Whoooooaaa

Keep on
Breathing
Don’t you let this take you down
Don’t stop
Believing

The Real by Nevertheless

I don’t think I mentioned anything about this in my previous post.  I got in my truck to come back to Nashville Saturday and my freaking turn signals don’t work.  The whole way back every time I would change lanes I would hit the thing to trun on the signal and nothing would happen.  I felt like an idiot every time I did it for not remembering that they don’t work.  Crazy how hard it is to stop doing something you are in the habit of doing.

I took the truck at lunch today to try and get the turn signals fixed, but they did not get to it today, so I have to take it back tomorrow.  It is no secret that I know next to nothing about fixing cars so I am always stuck at the mercy of some mechanic and never know if I am getting ripped off or not.  I really don’t like that feeling, but I don’t have much of a choice.

Times like this is when it really sucks not living closer to people I know.  I am on no ones way to work or home so it is a pretty big bother if I need to catch a ride with anyone to work.  Luckily the place I take the truck to is kind enough to take me and drop me off at work.  They don’t open until 7, which is when I should be at work, so it always means I will be late when something like this happens, but this must be fixed it is driving me CRAZY.

Originally uploaded by elemak.

I went to Knoxville yesterday to take some pictures of Steven and Sara. They wanted some and I attempted, we will see if they like any of them or not. It is very rare that I get a good picture of a person.

It was snowing when I left yesterday morning and was still snowing when I got back last night. That is the most snow driving I have every done. It was a bit scary, but not to bad. I think the worse thing that happen was someone driving way to slow and I had to slow down pretty fast.

It was kind of crazy parts of the interstate had nothing on them, but people still had to go at least 30 mph slower than the speed limit.

I hope someone gets some laughs out of the since I am going to admit it. I made it all the way to Knoxville and back with pretty much no problems. I get back to the apartment and the parking lot is nothing but ice. I go to get out of my truck and came very close to hitting the ground. That is what happens when you get over confident.

This is what my girls got me for Valentines day!

Can’t touch this on Vimeo

Originally uploaded by elemak.

This weekend was the youth retreat in Blowing Rock, North Carolina. I took off Friday and today for trip prep and clean up. I think we all had a really good time, maybe not so much with the stuff they had going on for us, but our group its self.

The view in the area was wonderful. I did not have a whole lot of time to go and take pictures, but I found a few that are ok and posted them. I have some funny pictures, but they had kids in them and only special people get to see them, sorry.

We rented a 12 passenger van for the trip. It was massive, but handled pretty good. I whipped it around McDonald’s parking lot like a mad man and it went exactly where I wanted it to. It felt really strange getting back in to the truck and being all low to the ground and all.

Saturday night me and one of the kids got in a crazy/hyperish mood. Those of you who know me would recognize it as being close to the way I used to get with DP in the middle of the night on road trips. So we were jumping around in McDonald’s have a good old time. We were being so crazy that the rest of the group moved to another part of the dinning room. I think we even made a homeless guy go back into the cold so he did not have to listen to us. If you are not convinced I was in a strange mood then listen to this. I sang out loud in the van where everyone could hear me. I can’t sing. It was not good and I woke up Sunday morning embarrassed about it.

So we did a tubbing thing that was a lot of fun. I hate to brag, but I was awesome. Fastest on the slopes when on my belly and did the most spins when on my back. When going down on your back you can’t help but spin. When I would get to the bottom I would be falling down from spinning so much. Oh and the kids had a blast doing it as well. After being there I think I would like to try and ski at some point. It looks like a lot of fun.

Anyway good trip, good memories and it was so nice to get away for a weekend. I think I made it a whole 2 day without even thinking about work, which was wonderful. At some point I am going to take a fully week off. Just need to figure out where I want to go during that time, or if I want to stay home and hide.

Went and got my taxes done today. It sucked bad. Lets just say that what I had to pay is quite a bit more than I make in two weeks. Not happy about that at all. That computer I was talking about building is on hold for sure, well it was anyway since I decided I needed a car more than a new computer, but now both are on hold for a while. At least I had been saving for those things and had the money to spend. Next year everything will be better as far as taxes go.

I would just like to say that Mars looks wonderful from Blowing Rock, in fact the whole sky looked great. I kept going outside to look at the stars, would have stayed out, but it was cold! I stood in a stair case for at least thirty minutes watching the sun go down one night. I need to make sure I take time for things like that more often.

Why is it that when on bad thing happens at least 4 more bad things have to happen right after.

I don’t understand. Why does the world have to be the way it is? Why do good people have to hurt just because they don’t match the norm? Why can’t families just love each other instead of hurting each other? Why is it so easy to lose site of what matters in life? When did we get so far off track? Can something good exist in this world or am I searching for something that no longer exists? Why can we do everything right and still end up with nothing? How can we promise things and then pretend like we never did? Why do we feel the need to belittle others? What are we going to do? How are we going to make it? Should we even be allowed to make it?

Before anyone gets any ideas this is not inspired by what I was talking about yesterday. It played some part, but in large this is just life questions not tied to any single thing, but a combination of things. Some times life just weighs more on us than other and this seems to be another one of those times for me.

The boss is out this week at work, lots more stress, so that is not helping my state of mind at all. Speaking of work what the heck is the deal with my boss leaving me to do the builds and related activities? I am a great assistant, that does not mean I should be put in charge of anything. Did I ever talk about that on here? I can’t remember. I have decided that all I will ever be is an assistant. I just don’t have the personality to be a leader, not that I always follow just because others lead, this is relating to work. In the rest of life I don’t follow just because everyone else is doing something.

I am sure everyone is getting tired of reading song lyrics, but I have another to share:

You come to me with scars on your wrist
You tell me this will be the last night feeling like this
I just came to say goodbye
I didn’t want you to see me cry, I’m fine
But I know it’s a lie.

This is the last night you’ll spend alone
Look me in the eyes so I know you know
I’m everywhere you want me to be.
The last night you’ll spend alone,
I’ll wrap you in my arms and I won’t let go,
I’m everything you need me to be.

Your parents say everything is your fault
But they don’t know you like I know you they don’t know you at all
I’m so sick of when they say
It’s just a phase, you’ll be o.k. you’re fine
But I know it’s a lie.

This is the last night you’ll spend alone
Look me in the eyes so I know you know
I’m everywhere you want me to be.
The last night you’ll spend alone,
I’ll wrap you in my arms and I won’t let go,
I’m everything you need me to be.

The last night away from me

The night is so long when everything’s wrong
If you give me your hand I will help you hold on
Tonight,
Tonight.

This is the last night you’ll spend alone
Look me in the eyes so I know you know
I’m everywhere you want me to be.
The last night you’ll spend alone,
I’ll wrap you in my arms and I won’t let go,
I’m everything you need me to be.

I won’t let you say goodbye,
I’ll be your reason why.

The last night away from me,
Away from me.

The Last Night by Skillet

We beg to borrow
We beg to steal
We beg forgiveness
We beg to feel
We beg for love
I guess we beg for hate
We beg for everything
And pray it’s not too late

What everybody’s tryna’ feel
I guess we’re tryna’ heal
Everybody’s got to kneel
No way to reinvent the wheel
Everybody’s got to
Stand up on their feet
Everybody needs a dream
When the spirit gets too weak

Chorus:
So when your spirit gets too weak
When the water seems too deep
When you think there’s just no way
I’ll be there for you night and day
When the mountain
Seems too steep
When your spirit gets too weak
When you think there’s just no way
I’ll be there for you night and day

We beg for happiness
We beg for tears
We beg for courage
Just to overcome our fears
We beg to rise above
And hope we never fall
We beg for everything
And pray He hears our call

What everybody’s tryna’ feel
I guess we’re tryna’ heal
Everybody’s got to kneel
No way to reinvent the wheel
Everybody’s got to
Stand up on their feet
Gotta be there for your brother
When the spirit gets too weak

Although the road is rough
And sometimes you feel
Like it ain’t enough
We’ll be there for each other
We’ll find the way

Song seems to be by a ton of people, but I was listing to the Jason and  deMarco version.

I want to say a ton of stuff, but at this point I am afraid that it would come out wrong.  I am afraid that it would hurt people who do not deserve to be hurt.  I always hate it when people make obscure post leaving out names and all that, but in this case I have to.  I would have been out shouting world if things would have worked out different, and will be if things change.

I have written five or six paragraphs and went back in deleted them.  I don’t know what to say.  Thank you for your honesty and friendship I hope I never lose either of them.

It snowed Friday! Not enough to get me out of work, but it was nice to see some of the white stuff. I had some fun driving down the road I work on. It has very little traffic so I made myself slide around some. Reminded me of college. It also snowed today, but it went away after 5 or 6 hours.

We kept Sidda! Did I mention that before? Anyway we did. We had dinner with Donna and Sidda Saturday night. I pretty much played with Sidda the whole time. I am guessing some adult type conversation took place, but I pretty much missed the whole thing. She colored on me, I was totally not expecting a crayon to be coming my way, but it did and she got me. After dinner we went to church to try out the new Saturday night service. Sidda was very good she said “Momma” a couple of time, but other than that she just sat in my lap and was a very good girl. I was expecting that I would be in the kids room playing with her, but she was good. I had no idea that a two year old could sit still for that long, I thought they were crazy hyper or something.

I guess I am going to shut up now. We will just leave it at Sidda is a very good girl and I had a blast playing with her (playing is my area Leah and Mandy take care of all the other stuff, and they play too, but you know). I am hoping Donna will let us keep her again sometime.

I have a ton of other stuff going through my head at this point, but none of it that I am going to subject my loyal readers to at this point, believe me you don’t want me to try one of those stream of consciousness thing to try and get it out, not telling what you all would find about me and who knows who else. Point being I am finished with this post.