Bizarre Bradyisms

Lonely

I’m tired of being lonely. 

I can do the whole “hanging out thing” with a group of people every now and then, but I can’t do it on a recurring basis like others I know.  Plus, once it gets much past 10:00 at night, I start to shutdown and become oblivious to what is going on around me.  This kind of makes me the “party-pooper,” so I try and avoid it.  Instead, I think I’d much rather prefer spending one-on-one time with someone who would be okay with not making sure every single moment was filled with unnecessary conversation, loud music, or other random noise. 

I went home teaching the other night and found that I am not the only who is in the same situation.  Apparently there are others who go to work each morning, spend all day doing what you do to support yourself, then come home at night only to try and find some way to spend the next few hours doing something constructive (as in not TV) before you end up falling asleep because of boredom.

I guess I could try and make some guys friends, but I’ve never really been good at or really enjoyed going on “man-dates” since I was in middle school and had one of those things people call a “best friend.”

So, in short, I need a girlfriend.  Anyone feel like setting me up?

Choice of Music

For the past two or three weeks, I’ve been listening almost exclusively to the classical music radio station here in town instead of my usual rock / pop / alternative selections that I have grown accustomed to.  I don’t know exactly why I decided to do it, but it has been a fun experiment to observe my little and minute behavioral changes that have occurred because of it.  As a disclaimer, I know I cannot attribute everything to the change in music selection, however, I have noticed that there are some differences worth noting. 

For my job, I’m in and out of my car a lot during the course of the day, and I had noticed that even though I was never really late in arriving somewhere, I always felt nervous and had this innate desire to go faster and rush everything, even after I had arrived.  Since deciding to listen to something less, can I say “aggravating,” it has definitely not been  the case.  Instead, I find myself relaxed, reflective, and resigned.  I don’t go much above the speed limit like I used to, I’m not weaving in and out of lanes and traffic patterns just to move up in line during traffic, and I don’t care if I have to wait for a full light cycle because I didn’t rush through the yellow light. 

For those who are close enough to me to already know, I did recently get a traffic ticket due to being caught in a speed trap coming off of the highway where 5 cops were sitting and waiting for suspects, I still support my theory.  While speaking of cars, Gwen (the name of my car) got her first flat last week since I have had her.  One flat in almost two years is not bad at all.  I was quite proud to be able to have changed the tire and replaced it with the spare on my own with nothing more than a phone call to ensure I was turning the lug-nuts the right direction.

Back to what I was saying, I also have a reputation in my family of always eating dinner really quickly.  So much so that I am usually already done, clearing the table and doing the dishes before anyone else has come close to finishing.  I can’t say I’m a completely changed person, however, I have made it a personal goal to slow down and sit at the table for 5 minutes after everyone else is done and think nothing of it.

I have always been bothered by the fact that others around be cannot even seem to arrive on time.  Whether it is for a church meeting or a job appointment or anything, when someone is consistently late, it aggravated me.  I would never really show it or make it apparent, but on the inside, it would disturb me to no end.  Now, I honestly don’t care one why or the other.  I still try my best, and usually succeed, at being on time where ever I am going.  But when others don’t do the same, I shrug it off and don’t dwell on it.

What’s my point?  I don’t know.  I’ll have to get back to you on that one.

PS – On a completely unrelated side note, why is that when you are rejected by a girl, you feel the need to go spend large sums of money on unnecessary indulgences?  It is really weird. I’ve noticed that it has happened to me on multiple occasions before, however, this is the first time in my life where I have had any real sum of money with which I could get myself into trouble.  I haven’t caved yet and the temptation is waning, it sucks trying to deal with it.

Skydiving

It’s true. I went skydiving today. After multiple failed attempts due to bad weather conditions, I finally made it happen.

It all started sometime last summer.  I’m not sure exactly where the idea came from, but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to go.  Then, when I attended the Stadium of Fire in Provo for the 4th of July and they had some skydivers jump and land right in the middle of the stadium, I promised myself I was going to make it happen.  So, I did some research, saved some cash, and made an appointment.  I wasn’t even going to tell anyone at all until after I had done it.  The morning of the appointment came and I was so psyched.  I printed out a map to where I was going and just as I was walking out the door of my apartment to head up there, the jumping place called and said it was too windy to jump for today.  Talk about disappointment.

I was going to try and do it again, but during the next month my life became really messy.  A month or two passed by, I’m no longer living in Provo, I have no job and no cash.  Call me crazy, but it is a little hard to justify skydiving when you’ve just used what remaining money you have on a car payment.  Then, fast forward to two weeks ago.  I was thinking in the shower on  Friday about how bored I was with the monotony of life.  I go to work each day, come home at night, and usually change from “work clothes” directly into “PJs.”  Somehow I thought I needed to mix things up a bit.  Can you blame me? 

I did some research again for places in Colorado, called around and made an appointment for the next day.  This time, I actually made the one hour drive up to the little airport, paid cash for the jump and a video, stood around for two hours waiting for my turn, only to find out the wind was not going to die down enough to jump.  Strike two.

Now, this morning, I woke up, looked out the window to see cloudy skies, and wondered if today was the day.  I got everything done I needed to accomplish as quickly as possible while keeping my eye on window for a possible break in the gloomy weather.  Around 10:30, things began to clear up, blue was actually visible across the skies, and my hope was rising quickly.  Instead of driving all the way up there to be disappointed again, I called and asked the how likely it would be that they would be jumping today.  What was their response?  Although there was some wind, the temperature was ~52 degrees and the forecast for the rest of the afternoon was very promising.  Int fact, the first plane just took off full of jumpers.  Today was going to be MY day.

Although the anticipation was huge, I decided to take the scenic route up to airport through the city of Golden and Boulder and finally up to Longmont.  All the way up there I was watched as flags flapped back and forth, as trees swayed from side to side, as the voice of nature threatened my hope of accomplishment once again.  The first thing I said as I walked through the door of the hangar with an awkward smile was, “Is it too windy again?”  Everyone in the office laughed.  It must have been obvious it was my first time.

Around 45 minutes later after everything was organized, I was able to meet my trainer and videographer who each gave me a brief 5 minute overview of what was going to happen.  I got suited up in what some would consider a horrible outfit, but I didn’t care.  I was going skydiving.  Around 15-20 of us (most of them trained professionals who had tens if not hundreds of jumps under their belt), took a short ride on the back of a trailer out to the runway and piled into the plane.  Some guy who didn’t have the right license to jump without one, forgot his helmet, so we had to wait for it to be brought to him.  Then, the clouds showed up.  In fact, it even began to rain a little.  I thought to myself, “No, not again.” 

I asked my trainer if they would really cancel at this point after everyone was in the plane and ready to go.  He was happy to report that it was quite unlikely.  To my sudden surprise, the pilot jumped in the plane with such force I was more that a little startled.  He fired up the two-prop and began to make his way out into the skies.  The plane ride itself was quite fun too.  It is a little different than riding commercial jet.  A little different in a good way. 

After around 7 minutes of climbing up to the right altitude, the plane door opens up and people start taking their turns hoping out into the wide open air.  We were the last one out, so my trainer who was now latched into my harness had to waddle along with me to the back of the plane.  The air was so cold as I stood there ready to take the plunge when without much fanfare, my trainer simply leapt with a sort of grace that I would never have previously associated with skydiving. 

Ah, the feeling was grand.  Although it was hard to breathe and the rapidly changing air pressure felt slightly uncomfortable, I felt remarkably free.  I could see the city off into the horizon and I could feel my cheeks flapping in the wind.  It was all worth it.  I think it must have only been 50 seconds or so before my trainer pulled the chute, but when he did, the force of the rapid deceleration hurt more than just a little.  He asked if I was okay and then proceeded to let me help fly the parachute.  It was so fun.  The ride down was around 3 – 4 minutes and then I had what could be considered a pretty rough landing.  Oh well.  I had just fallen at 120+ miles an hour from 12,000 feet above the ground.  Not 12,000 feet above sea level, but 12,000 feet from where I took off. 

I loved it and would easily do it again.  In fact, depending on where life takes me during the next 6 months, I may decide to become AFF certified so I can then jump on my own whenever life again becomes too monotonous.

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Some Fish, Rembrandt, and Dinner

Yesterday I went on a date with this girl from my ward who I had been working up the courage to ask out for about a month (actually longer than that, but that is another complicated story).  I had been trying for more than a week to get a hold of this tour company in Denver that supposedly rented Segways, but they would never answer or return my calls.  Maybe they are only a seasonal company and will open again come spring time.  It probably turned out better anyways, because it was quite cold that day and being.

Instead, I decided it would be neat to visit Denver’s “Downtown Aquarium.”  I had been meaning to go there for a couple of years, I guess the opportunity never really arose.  So, with her approval, we went and saw quite a wide variety of aquatic life for an aquarium that is landlocked.  I never would have imagined something similar in a city that isn’t really a big tourist location.  There were some neat fish with really cool designs, eels, turtles, sharks, and others.  Something else that I personally enjoyed watching was this pseudo flash-flood they had there.  Basically, there was a fake tunnel or cave that, at random times, would shoot hundreds of gallons of water out of it and surprise those who were there.  Some people even took the opportunity to purposely stand in the area where you were bound to get soaked.  The kid in me kind of wanted to do the same, but, I was on a date, so I refrained.  Overall, it was really fun to see all that was there.

Afterwards, we took a fairly long drive down south past Parker into the city of Franktown, which I had never before heard of until then.  There church here in the metro area has four stakes that are each taking turns hosting an exhibit of a private collector’s prints done by artists such as Rembrandt and Dürer detailing the life of Christ as well as other scriptural stories from both the Old and New Testaments.  I did not ever know that prints were made from wood carvings, wax etchings, and other metal plates from as far back as sometime in the 1600s.  To think about having to carve with such detail and to do it in reverse just boggles the mind.  In case you were interested, this site has all the information about the event. 

I was quite atonished by the quality of the exhibit.  The cultural hall of the chapel had long, dark, thick drapes hung from the ceiling.  Professional and high quality lighting was arranged on each print, there was short introduction video done by the church itself (you could tell because it was Lloyd D. Newell’s voice who does Music and the Spoken Word each Sunday), and there was a full-color, printed guide provided to each visitor.  All this for free.  You can’t beat that.  So, after the introduction, they let you into the exhibit and provided you with a magnifying glass so you could, at your own pleasure, look at the print up close.  My date is a designer by profession who took a number of art classes in school, so she was able to help me understand and see some of the details I would have otherwise missed.  I think we spent close to an hour and a half before we realized we would not be able to look at each one closely and decided to leave.

Although I had already taken up a good 4 hours of my date’s time, she was good enough to spend a little bit more with me and let me take her out to dinner at Johnny Carrabba’s.  It had been awhile since I had visited that restaurant and my the end of the evening, I remembered how much I liked it.  The food was good, the conversation was good, and our waitress was good (not forgetful, but not too obtrusive).  A wonderful way to end an eventful afternoon. 

Superbowl

Yesterday was Super Bowl XLII (42 if my Roman numeral skills haven’t failed me yet) and we had everyone in the family who lives in Colorado over at the house together.  Truth be told, I don’t think I watched more than 1o minutes of the game and I think I even watched less than that of the commercials.  From what I hear, it was a pretty exciting game in the last quarter because the undefeated team of the season who was supposed to win and make a new-number-of games-won-in-a-single-season record actually ended up losing.  I didn’t even learn about the end result until this morning at work.  Instead, I was much more involved with family things. 

My nephew Hayden was there and he has really been progressing in how much and how well he talks.  He had been struggling for awhile and not saying a whole lot of anything until recently.  Now he has quickly moved from saying a few single words such as “wow” and “okay” into almost complete sentences like “no daddy, i do” and “i want piano on” (using the little ‘i’ on purpose, of course).  I’m sure it has been really exciting for his parents who have been concerned, but not really worried.  The joke of the evening was of course how he was saying my name.  Instead of saying, “Brady,” he started by saying “Petie” and then moved on in small forms to finally settle on, “Bady.”  Which is just fine with me.  Even if it had stayed as “Petie,” that would have been fine with me.  So it was cute.

So, instead of watching the Super Bowl, I sat and played with Hayden on the kitchen floor as we played with the magnetic alphabet letters on the fridge.  I was quite astonished to learn that he could identify and find each letter without much work at all.  Some letters were more difficult than others (an ‘N’ on its side looks like a ‘Z’), but impressive nonetheless.  Also, I guess Hayden really enjoys watching the Australian TV show for children called “Wiggles.”  I personally don’t know what the show consists of, I’ll let you operate the google if you so desire.  Anyways, he pretends to play the guitar when the watching the show, so Nelson, asked if I would get out my real guitar and let him have some fun.  And did he ever.  He wouldn’t stop pulling on the string and he wouldn’t let anyone else touch it for more than 10 seconds.  I think it was 45 minutes later when it was time for everyone to start heading home that I had go quickly take the guitar away and head upstairs for 5 minutes so he wouldn’t through a big fit. 

In short, it was good to have the family around and I enjoyed every minute of it.