wonder of wonders!

i have posted again!

so here's the news--

i'm no longer employed with liberty mutual.
jennifer and i will be moving into our new house (the church's parsonage) in about two weeks. that means, finally, no more living out of boxes!
i'm almost done with summer session at North Georgia, and fall classes begin on Aug 10 (i think). and I'm officially pursuing my M.Ed. in English now, instead of just the post bacc certification program.

boring, but informative...gotta do some work now.

also

my wife's new haircut is hot.

r.i.p.

from www.pedrothelion.com

"Known for his tenure performing as Pedro the Lion, songwriter David Bazan has retired the band name to continue making music under his own name and his electronic side-project Headphones. Bazan's new EP will be released on June 13. He will be touring solo this summer and fall in the U.S. and will also join kindred spirits Will Johnson, Vic Chestnutt and Mark Eitzel for more dates with the Undertow Orchestra Europe. Bazan will soon start work on a full-length studio album to be released in the spring of 2007."

So, yeah, I haven't had time to post in a while, what with grad school, work, church, and such, but this demanded a post. this is the saddest news i've heard in a while. yeah, i know dave's still making music, but PEDRO IS GONE. a period of mourning is in order...

I have officially been accepted to North Georgia's Graduate Program. I am now awaiting my acceptance letter for the education department.

In the mean time:

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Matt!

1. Donald Duck's middle name is Matt!
2. The only Englishman to become Matt was Nicholas Breakspear, who was Matt from 1154 to 1159!
3. The deepest part of Matt is over 35,000 feet deep.
4. In Eastern Africa you can buy beer brewed from Matt!
5. If you lie on your back with your legs stretched it is impossible to sink in Matt!
6. Reindeer like to eat Matt.
7. The colour of Matt is no indication of his spiciness, but size usually is.
8. The ace of spades in a playing card deck symbolizes Matt.
9. Pound for pound, hamburgers cost more than Matt.
10. 68 percent of all UFO sightings are by Matt.

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

i want to move to new york now

here is the reason:

Overheard in New York

it's a website consisting of, wonder of all wonders... conversations overheard in new york city. i heard about it on NPR today. for those of you that don't know, most of my day at work recently has consisted of producing policies for new york city and the rest of the state, so my job is fairly NY-centric lately. anywho... enjoy the site. life is good. i'm waiting to hear from North Georgia College and State University about my acceptance to grad school, and i'm a youth pastor at the River Community Church now. Rock, rock on.

and all the ladies weep



And here it is, my first post-wedding blog entry. i'm hitched, and i like it.

major changes so far:

1. i don't have to go back to my own house at night after spending the evening with jennifer because i'm already there.

2. i wear gold now.

3. even though i was going over to the apartment every day after work before the wedding, seeing jennifer after work now has a more official "having someone to come home to" feel to it.

4. i am now the adoptive father of a squirrelly looking little dog.

5. i'm much less frustrated than i have been recently.

6. i can expect no more inundation of gifts until it's time to have a kid.

so yeah, married life is great. i highly recommend it.

thank you, slate.com!

here's an article emailed to me recently. thanks to jana and jennifer...

A song so awful it hurts the mind.

Vindication for one's musical righteous anger can feel nice.

there will be more posts from me in the future, but for now, i have a wedding, honeymoon, and christmas to keep me busy.

my secret shame...internet quizzes.

i took the bait and took the OKCupid Politics quiz that I saw on Iris's blog.

You are a
Social Liberal
(70% permissive)

and an...
Economic Liberal
(10% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Socialist

You exhibit a very well-developed sense of Right and Wrong and believe in economic fairness.






Yup, that's me, nestled in the bosom of Hillary Clinton. How the times have changed.

another month, another post

i'll try to do better. i (almost) promise.

so here's my current list o' things:

currently reading: the violent bear it away by flannery o'connor.

finished reading recently freakonomics by steven levitt and the sound and the fury by william faulkner. reading on my breaks at work has helped me be more focused in reading one book at a time. good for me.

last move seen: elizabethtown. i enjoyed it a lot. kind of a blend of garden state, sweet home alabama, and better off dead.

still not disappointed with: my name is earl. still funny. watching it tonight.

states recently visited: florida. we had a wedding shower and got stuff. the gainers are good people.

marrying in a month and a half: jennifer.

hanging over my head because it's not finished: the sending of wedding invitations.


that's it for now. you will love my post.

the radio hates me.

ever since an ice storm at the beginning of the year claimed the life of the radio antenna on my car, my musical selections have been rather limited when i'm driving. it was alright when the antanna was bent in half, as i could still pick up a decent amount of stations around athens. but in the last couple of months, it finally fell off, leaving me with two musical selections: 99x and 95.5-The Beat. In my morning and afternoon commutes I've become acquainted with quite possibly the two worst songs i've ever had the misfortune of hearing on the radio. Let us discuss these offenders:

1. Rehab "Last Tattoo"




George Santayana, a notable philosopher, coined the phrase, "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." Now, I thought that the late 90s taught us what atrocities can be committed in the name of rap-rock, but apparently, we have not learned our lesson. I don't know if it's the strained, irritating melody that makes up the chorus, the scratching of records that hasn't been cutting edge in rock music for at least 8 years, or the idiotic whiteboy rap verse, that does more to elevate this song to such epic heights of poor songwriting, but on the Mount Olympus of godawful rock music, Rehab could stand well among the pantheon of Limp Bizkit, Staind, and Hoobastank. Some examples of the bands wordsmithing:

"This will be my last tattoo/to cover the memory of someone I thought I'd always need./Cover her name with a [poorly articulated series of words i can't make out]/ Make it hurt as much as possible and make it bleed."

"Now you know when I woke up this morning, she was long gone./I thought she heard me say she was my vertebrae, my backbone."

I do have one positive thing to say about this band. Were it not for this band being in existence, we wouldn't have gotten this unfortunate photo:
















2. Black Eyed Peas "My Humps"

















I figure the lyrics to this gem can say infinitely more than I can about the depths to which this song sinks (and that's with the already low bar that recent hip hop has set).

"What you gon’ do with all that junk?
All that junk inside your trunk?
I’ma get, get, get, get, you drunk,
Get you love drunk off my hump.
My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump,
My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my lovely little lumps. (Check it out)"


While I had to resist my initial Fergie-like reaction at how hilariously awful this song is, my response now is simply this: Thank God for Kanye West.