The ever so famous Greg Young.
As he is the one that will guide you
through this convoluted mess.
Joke or Stupid Thought of the Day
Pictures From Various Locations
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The ever so famous Greg Young. As he is the one that will guide you through this convoluted mess. Joke or Stupid Thought of the Day Pictures From Various Locations |
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New
Year's Day - "Everything can change, on a New Year's Day, as
everything
changed, on a New Year's Day..." These are lyrics by Zack de la
Rocha
of Rage Against the Machine and it sums up the way the year started
quite
well. January 1 was not the changing point of everything
though.
It could have possibly been the weakest day of the first week of the
millennium.
It started out with a party at my friend Sharat's house. From
there,
we returned to my house to create some noise and disrupt people's
peace.
We used the camera a lot during the night, taking pictures of wacky
occurrences
and incoherent behavior. I also updated my website by adding the
Ebonics section about two hours into the millennium. Included in
this day was much more Racoon stuff, but all that nonsense was not to
be
seen for a few months, so it is useless to talk about that on this
page.
But through this day, Vinay and myself found ourselves creating a band
practice in the near future, one that would change our musical careers
more than ever before. And because this sleepover was at such a
high
scale, it temporarily (or in some cases, completely) put an end to many
of the traditions that had lasted for a while. A few examples
would
be Perfect Dark, Racoon sleepovers, and hanging out with Adam.
After
looking back on this day, it really was a great way to start the new
millennium.
Driving
With Children for the First Time - Student driving is definitely a
milestone in an adolescent's career. My first time happened when
I wanted to buy Perfect Dark at Best Buy, but I did not have a way to
get
there. I had recently insulted John Cloud on the joke page, so he
was not too friendly to me. He was telling me of his truck, and
how
he was driving it around, so it struck me to ask him if he could take
me
to Best Buy. Of course, he was not willing to do so unless there
was a deal made. He agreed to take me to Best Buy if I would
erase
the last two jokes on the website, because they insulted him. I
accepted
the deal, so his truck showed up at my house on a Wednesday
morning.
At first, I had a prolonged laughter at how he was driving a truck
forty-two
times his size. Then I quickly made my descent to his truck, in
which
I said, "Are you sure this is safe?" He responded with, "I'm the
best driver you'll ever drive with." From there, we headed to
Best
Buy to purchase Perfect Dark, and then we returned to my house to play
it. This was the first time I had ever driven around with a
student
driver that was not my brother or one of his friends. Because of
that, it was a learning experience, and if it did not happen the way it
did, I probably would be more wary of student drivers. He was
the best student driver I ever drove with, and if I had ever experience
d my first drive with someone else, I probably would have been scared
for
much longer. Added to that, we left to Best Buy in an almost
spontaneous
urge to get out of the house, which would carry on to later hangouts
that
we did random things to entertain ourselves. Also, because I
enjoyed
the day so much, I started to spend more time creating havoc with
Misled
Johnny, and that would become very apparent as the months went
on.
This day was the start of something new, an era that would change my
life
forever.
Those
Incredible Suckers - A parallel event to this was mentioned much
earlier
on the events page, and it inferred another event similar to it.
This is the event that was foreshadowed weeks ago. Those
Incredible
Suckers is the band Chelsea, Darren, and I formed, and it was one out
of
spontaneity. The formation was explained earlier on the events
page.
Because we do not have to discuss the actual unity of Chelsea, Darren,
and I, we can skip straight to the triggers. It was explained
before
that we were brought together as closer friends, but one that was not
to
last as strongly as it should. The reason this event ranks a much
higher spot than the other is that it was only the beginning of the
friendship,
whereas the actual band was to keep it alive. I did not mean that
the friendship did not last too long, as it seemed like. Rather,
it was trying to infer that Darren's cousin's visiting did not have
lasting
impact on the friendship Darren, Chelsea, and I had. Therefore,
it
did not "last as long as expected." That is why if we never
continued
to pursue the music we had tried to create, we probably would not be
the
great friends that we are now. A friendship can last a very long
time, and it can change your life in many ways, and that is why this
event
places here: it has the potential to influence my everyday life.
English-Biology
Research Paper - Close to the end of the year, a huge research
project
was assigned to test our English and Biology coping abilities. We
were allowed to work with one other person and I asked Darren to
accompany
me in this horrendous task. From there we split up the work
almost
50-50 and made our way through English. We had different English
and Biology teachers, so we had to abide by my teacher's rules.
This
caused a conflict when we were trying to receive due dates, because
they
were different in the classes, but soon we got the hang of it and
Darren
just never listen to dates in his class (he just listened to me).
Once all the technical stuff was complete, we resorted to following
each
other home to work on our project. This created quite a lot of
distractions,
because we were easily amused. We soon learned it is practically
impossible for us to work together efficiently, and we wasted most of
our
time laughing at completely irrelevant things. But once the
homework
was done, we looked back at our work and enjoyed the fact that we can
make
fun out of painful busy tasks. From this project, much was
learned.
I indefinitely learned how to have fun while working. Other than
that, this really strengthened Darren and my friendship, because we
spent
so much time working on this project. We found out what amuses us
both, and that was found directly in our writing. To think, if we
never had this project, I probably would not have thought once about
having
fun while doing rigorous homework. It really was a fun time
messing
with this project, the way any kind of friend hangout should be.
Working
at Centennial - After being put to work by the school because of
the
Scandal, Darren and I decided to complete most of our hours by tutoring
at Centennial. The lasting impact of this situation was about the
same as the last event, but in my opinion, this holds a bit more than
the
other one. First off, we started to hate the work here because it
was too repetitive, and we would try and get something planned for
after
the service to have fun. Also, we would walk to Centennial, and
every
once in a while, we had other people join us. Some of these
people
were mere acquaintances at the time, but later before really good
friends.
During the service, sometimes we had visitors (actually really only
one,
our friend Robin), and we entertained them for a while. When
looking
back at these things, it seems like a broken puzzle of friends that was
put together in the coming months. For example, Erica, who walked
with us every now and then, Robin, who visited us, and Chelsea, who
gave
us rides, were all on opposite ends of the friend spectrum.
Through
the similarities, we were good friends, or became good friends, with
all
of them and linked them together, to create one big happy family, or
something.
That is the lasting impact of this situation, but there is also more to
why I considered Centennial revisits a bit more important than the
English-Biology
research. See, there were many memories had by both Darren and I
in our old school, and remembering them touched us. We spent a
lot
of time just wandering the school remembering how life was in
Centennialian
society. And when the service was over, we took a deep breath and
left our old school after having another hardship in the place. I
love Centennial, and I will always remember the great times I had
there. 
Desk
Parting - Okay, I know this sounds ridiculous, but it deserves to
be
here. I feel so dumb even mentioning something this stupid on the
events page. And the great thing is that I have it quite high on
the list. Well, anyway, to get on with what "desk parting"
means.
Late in the school year, I noticed a seat back from a desk in one of my
classroom's garbage cans. I found it amusing and my teacher just
told me that there is a lot more where it came from. So we ended
up having fun with more than just a seat back, but rather a crowbar and
two frogsticks (code names we use for the parts). Darren and I
were
so amused by this really idiotic humor that we carried on trying to
find
things that are really odd to have. When I mean odd, I mean
things
that people usually do not see normally (for example, a plastic
flamingo,
a huge orange cone, a pink kiddie car, a random tire, or a broken
microwave
door). Also, stupid humor was used with these kind of
things.
Toilets were used to provide fun, especially when it was detached from
its plumbing and it was free to park in the middle of the street.
Now really, why did I have to put this up here, if it did not really
trigger
anything other than being more stupid? Well, it is because if we
never happened to start this dumb phenomenon, we would not have had as
much fun as we did. And really, we do it so often, it cannot be
looked
over. I do not really know where I would be if I did not get any
entertainment from possessing stupid random objects. So yeah, it
needs to be on this list, indefinitely. 
Winter
Break Talks With Ronnie - During the turn of the millennium,
Ronnie,
an acquaintance of mine, and I were plotting interesting
mischief.
Ronnie was a new friend to me, especially because I barely ever talked
to him before the break we had for winter. He left Phoenix in
September,
and I really had not got to know him before them. Regardless, we
still had our fun over the Internet. There was a select group of
people that he did not like, and I decided to assist him in annoying
them.
It worked out well, because the people that we were trying to anger
became
very angry, very quickly. We started to do this on a continual
basis,
which helped strengthen the ties between us (we both were very good
friends
with Darren). Also, the main reason this event is this far up is
because it happened during a confusing period of time. In this
time,
I had just started to hang out with Darren and Cassie. On a
different
note, I had also started to hang out with Christopher Dean on a more
continual
basis. So when I was speaking with Ronnie, I was pretty much
colliding
different ends of a spectrum once again. But when looking at all
of the conversation we had as a whole, it shows how much we had in
common.
We had the same humor, and expressed that over and over again while we
irritated people. And that really shows that we became good
friends
over these talks. If I never talked to Ronnie during this time
and
had the fun we did, I do not think I would be awaiting his Phoenix
visitation.
And hey, he told me to download a Sum 41 song over the break. It
was some instrumental track that I was quite fond of. Later I
realized
how popular they had got, and I thought, "Heh, Ronnie told me to
download
them a while back." 
March
Twelfth Hangout - This day does not have its own special name
because
I still do not know how this whole get together occurred. But on
March 12, a bunch of friends found themselves at my house ready to do
something
random to have fun. The party included AJ, Cassie, Chris, Erica
and
Darren. This was the first time we were going to hang out with
Erica
when school was not in session, so really it acted as a time where she
could get to know everyone else's split personalities. I do not
remember
too well exactly what we did, but we went to Desert Foothills park to
play
around in their playground. When we all went home, we talked
about
it over the Internet (like we usually do) and we discussed how the
night
was a lot of fun, especially because it grouped together a bunch of
people
that normally do not see each other after school. This is why
this
occasion is significant. After having this hangout, we became
really
good friends with Erica, and I do think it was because of this and a
few
more occasions. Also, five of the six people that were grouping
together
that day became a backbone for another group that was to be our
everyday
like during the summer. There really is not much more to say
about
this day, it happened at such a perfect time to change things. We
were ready to make new friends whoever they were to be, and those
people
would become an important part of our life. On a stupid note, if
it was not for this day, we would not have heard Erica call her father
"daddy," in which case we would not have continually made fun of
that.
We tend to use the phrase "mommy" or "daddy" quotidian, and it has got
on my nerves, thanks to this event. But oh well, it sure is fun
to
call your parents by a childish (chibadish) name.
Halloween
Stupidity - On Hallow's Eve of 2000, AJ invited me to get a scare
from
a haunted house with Christopher Dean and Mike. I accepted
because
I did not have any other plans for the night. Chris picked me up
during the night, so there were little kids running around the street
like
pack rats, and I was relived to get myself out of the area. The
haunted
house was the same one AJ and I went to with his brother and his
friends
a few years ago. I remembered a bunch of the effects in the
house,
but I still screamed like a maniac anyway. In fact, I yelled at
every
possible moment I could, and not too many of the other people in the
group
liked that. I mean, I was scared and I needed to get that kind of
stuff out, but the other people did not seem to understand. After
the haunted house, we paid Chris his gas money (something I would never
do again), and we left to go somewhere interesting. We found
ourselves
in a random Mesa neighborhood with nothing to do. As we thought
to
ourselves, we came up with the idea of going to random houses to trick
or treat. We headed out of the neighborhood, and went to the
nearest
shopping enter. In the center, we went to the grocery store and
picking
up a bunch of plastic bags. These would be pillow case
substitutes.
When we got back to the neighborhood, we parked and started to trick or
treat. A lot of the people were wondering why we were doing this
at our age and we just joked it off. After the Mesa neighborhood,
we stabbed westward to Tempe and rang a few doorbells there. It
was
getting quite late when we reached Tempe, so a few of the people seemed
a bit grumpy when they gave us candy. Then after our Tempe
nonsense,
Chris dropped off AJ and Mike, and then headed toward my house. I
repeatedly asked him when he got his license, because I had no idea
what
else to say to him. I find it ironic that in just a few months
from
then, Chris and I would be cruising the streets together with a lot of
stupidity to talk about. Regardless, he dropped me off and the
night
came to a close. This was the first time I ever hung out with
Chris
after school, and it was a significant event for that reason.
During
this night we found out that the four of us had many similarities when
it came to having fun, and that is what led to hanging out later.
For some reason, there was a long hiatus before I did hang out with
Chris
again, and I do not know why. The event did trigger Chris to IM
me
over the Internet, which was something important for me to get to know
him better. Like, do I make friends from any other place than the
Internet? I would answer that negative, just for kicks.
.com
Achievement - I think this event requires the least explaining to
do.
After the Tennessee Titans lost their only playoff game in the 2000
season,
I called up my father and he gave the thumbs up for the dot-com.
I was quite enthused at the time, and I immediately signed up.
Though
I had the address already, I did not move my site that instant. I
waited for a special date to open it on, and I allowed for some
foreshadowing
to occur on the current site. The first and only thing I remember
that I did to foreshadow the relocation was the deletion of the
Relocation
Fund page, but I do not think anyone caught on. But on January
12,
the day picked for many reasons (one being my mother's and Zack de la
Rocha's
birthday), I deleted everything on Freeservers and left the main page
saying
"hipposandrhinos-dot-com." Most people got the hint and were off
to the new site. There were some people, that for some reason,
did
not get the hint, and I had to change the Freeservers page to blatantly
say that the page was moved. In a matter of days, the site was
bustling.
That could be confirmed when I would walk around school hearing my web
address. Yes, that was the minuscule amount of days before the
Scandal
(the life of the forum was only eleven days, believe it or not).
But anyway, the .com achievement for the site is a milestone in its
history.
I really do not think that I would be making an events page if I was
still
on Freeservers. This would be because I would soon get low on
space,
and also because I have a 512K limit on files (foreshadowing later
events
here...). It seems like receiving a dot-com really pushed the
popularity
of the site to the next limits (though the Scandal helped here).
Still, look at the number of visitors that know the site by the dot-com
name, and then look at the number of people that frequently use the
dot-com
name to talk about the website. It is a very large number, and
the
site is definitely a large part of their Interent surfing. At
least
I hope it is.