so basically, today is my 21st birthday. good job me. i know what you are saying ... that it isnt really an accomplishment just to have a birthday. but i am here to tell you that it is. it did take me almost as long as everyone else to make it here, but i did have to overcome unbelievable odds. here are some memorable events over the past 21 years in which i am lucky to have escaped with my life. by the way, these will be in no kind of order other than the order in which i painfully remembert them. also, only one drug/alcohol story will be mentioned but ive had my share (of both) without any real bad consequences. but everyone has 'drunk i almost got killed stories'.

1. Age 15, myself, tristen lucas, and jesse bodwell decided to tube down the mascoma river after being warned the water was too high and quick. it was all good till our tubes and bodies were slashed and caught under a fallen tree beneath the water. we almost drowned only saved by our lightning quick reflexes and superhuman strength

2. Age 18, while in ecuador my girlfriend at the time got ahold of some hallucinegenic flowers that we ate. i however, went home to my host family and acted like a madman. they were not impressed and said that i was throwing things at my reflection in the mirror, running around naked, things of this nature.

3. Age 16, after breaking into saul lelchucks house, jesse bodwell, dennis clark, tristen lucas and myself escaped off the roof of his house and crawled navy seal style through the soggy forest to elude law enforcement agents.

4. Age ~5, i was smashed in the face with an aluminum baseball bat by my loving older brother leaving me with the hideous crunched in face i now have.

5. Age 18, again in ecuador celebrating the stunning kathryn spruill's birthday, i smashed my hand through a window in a (poor and fruitless) attempt to get at some candy from a recently smashed pinata. i received 8 stitches in easily the sketchiest hospital ive ever been in.

6. Age 6, while enjoying my only trip to florida in beautiful orlando, i sliced my index finger open with a knife trying to get the little plastic straw from a juicebox out of its plastic package. i consequently received 3 stitches, and was unable to go to Epcot(t?) center with my parents and siblings.

7. Age 16, with beau crawford, ben cochrane, andre lalimiuere, we constructed a pipe bomb and exploded a refridgerator. not our brightest moment.

8. Age 16, the same crew except we went into the forest filled a 5-gallon bucket with gasoline and threw a flaming object into it from a short distance away. no explosion, but the forest rained fire that day. oops.

9. Age 14, trying to be a hero, i went up onto my roof to retrieve a frisby that had been up there for years. i fell off right onto my moms garden. i never confessed, plus this is the first time ive ever told anyone i even fell off the roof. it was a crushing blow to my pride.

10. Age 19, after partying hard at keene state, jacob kramer and i returned for an early morning of work. i dozed off while on the highway and woke up with my truck on an on ramp to a weigh station. so if the weigh station wasnt there i would have been in the woods. dead.

11. Age 16, driving home from work on a backroad in danbury, i miscalculated a turn due to my rapid velocity and flipped my car atleast once. i was hanging from my seatbelt, and didnt even have a scratch on me.

12. Age 15, i said "fuck you" to my father for the first time. he tried to strangle me then sent me to my room after kicking me several times. i was VERY scared.

13. Age 15-18, going to school in my high school was very dangerous. as i walked the halls one out of every 3 people is a potential columbine gun toting maniac. there were many incidents throughout my stay at the fine Mascoma Valley Regional High School that make this a valid addition to the list.

14. Age 8, while performing a risky dismount from a lowquality set of swings, i landed on my neck and though i was paralyzed. then i got up and did some more swinging.

15. Age 18, in ecuador i (and friends) got mugged outside a club by some street toughs. one of whom i got into a moderate altercation with. if they had had weapons ... bye bye silly americans.

16. Age 13, i think i got poisoned by something. anyway, i got real real sick and it sucked.

17. Age 7, i was desperately trying to win an under water breath holding contest and i cut it pretty close, by passing out under water nearly foreiting my life. another good choice.

18. Age 16, at will meyers house, i let him run over my toe with his explorer. i wasnt close to death but it hurt a lot.

19. Age 6, while my father ran a boyscout camp in the summer of 89 i got lost in the vast forest surrounding the camp. eventually someone found me by walking toward the wailing and worried screams of some little lost kid.

well, that is all i can think of right now ... but if youve witnessed me doing something extra stupid in which i put my life at risk, please let me know.

this will likely be the best weekend of all time, and perhaps the last weekend of all time. last weekend was great with the lovely lindsay coming to visit me, but this weekend has absurd amounts of potential. theres the fact that the redsox might have the chance to win the pennant on sunday/saturday, plus, oh yeah, i turn 21 on saturday. oh sweet sassy molassy.

this is probably the best ad i have seen in a while.

many have heard me bitch about me 8 oclock class. physical chemistry. blah. nobody needs this garbage or atleast nobody needs it to be taught by the idiot that i have. Barry Mahoney. it just sounds like a bad name. yesterday, moments after my new discovery (see previous entry if confused), barry began blathering on for close to 20 minutes about how to balance chemical equations. now, for those who arent acquainted with my chemical background, i have taken about 15 chemistry courses in my lifetime and all but one at the fine university of northeastern. balancing equations is stupidly simple and was taught in only my very first class in both high school and college. so it should be known that this is skill well under the great umbrella that is my chemical intellect. when we tried to tell barry that everyone in the room knew how to do it, and had known for several years, he shrugged and continued on with his lifeless, dry, mind numbing lecture. teachers such as this should not be allowed to live let alone teach. jeez. dont even get me started on the lab associated with it. USELESS. what the fuck chemistry department. get your shit together.

over the last week i have been staying up late for playoff baseball, and getting up before my 8 am classes to write english assignments (that i didnt do while watching playoff baseball). keeping this in mind, on my way to class yesterday, i purchased a delicious energy drink at my neighborhood grocer. sure enough approximately 10 minutes into class i begin to fade. that is when i took out my red bull for consumption. one sip was all it took. the new worst taste ever. previous worst taste combinations came to me via toothpaste and orange juice and toothpaste and beer. New Champion: toothpaste and redbull. what can i take out of this as a conclusion? toothpaste makes everything taste gross and its mint and gross flavors should be discontinued.

i am supremely angry right now. no particular reason, just every small thing irritates the hell out of me. worse than being pissed off all the time at everyone, is having people ask me whats wrong. that adds to me being pissed off. a lot. please dont assume that i want to discuss anything at all with you if i seem irritable or generally mad. just let it go. dont worry, i will too. eventually. probably. maybe. ok, probably not for awhile.

you wanted a good time didnt you?

i was speaking with a friend of mine who plans on being a policeman when he finishes ROTC and gets his criminal justice degree. when i inquired as to whether or not he would arrest me when he was a cop, he gave me this answer (paraphrased cause i forgot my notepad):
"i never said that pot was bad, but it is a gateway drug and i know 3 people who smoked weed first and they all went on to other drugs".
this got me to thinking. first of all, i know a lot more than 3 people who did that, myself included. i fail to recognize the correlation however between a debatably harmless herb to say, cocaine or heroin. yes its true, they are all considered drugs. however, they are not the same kind of drug nor are they produced any kind of the same way. to outlaw marijuana because it is a gateway drug is not only wrong, its stupid. the cliche 'cutting off your head to cure a headache' comes to mind. lets think about it folks. what is life but a series of decisions? it is my understanding that each choice to try a new drug is completely independent of if you smoke weed or not. this can be backed up with several statements. for example, in my experience weed is used much more frequently than other drugs excluding tobacco and alcohol. this creates a feeling of 'no big deal'. so the thinking that you would see yourself smoking pot and immediately jump to the conclusion that no drugs will hurt you so try them all, is ridiculous. why not focus our efforts toward teaching smart decision making, rather than the ludicrous marketing scheme they currently use. those commercials are idiotic, and so far as ive experienced, not true. what can be said about the people who smoke weed and dont try any other drug ... they have superhuman will power? Preposterous. anyway, im getting frustrated even thinking about this so i will end my lecturing. stop being so stupid. sorry, not you, everyone else.

ps. english class has rekindled my writing ambition, hence the longer entries.

i woke up at 6 today to write a 4-5 page paper for my 9 oclock english paper. last night it seemed like a good idea, but today ... not so much. so i stumbled unprepared into my 8 am p. chem class and began to stare blankly at the board. i noticed that there was a sequence of numbers on the board and i inquired as to their meaning. evidently, they were the homework problems i was supposed to have done for class. everyone had a good laugh at my expense and needless to say, my "To Kill" list now has 18 more names on it. thats right, live it up, you all will pay for your treachery.

Define Irony: Smoking a joint with Chuck immediately before going to talk to my english teacher about my middler year paper who's topic is medical marijuana.

Young Ladies of the 21st Century:
Inspired by an actual event, I have come to the rescue of all of you modern ladies struggling with any number of problems caused by the male gender. I am here to re-aquaint some of you with what I feel is the most powerful arsenal of non-violent weapons on the planet. Others of you are well aware of the weapons I am about to speak of, but I must reinforce their importance and significance to the world as a whole. Before I get into that, however, I must put a huge emphasis on the fact that if you are a bitch, then these methods may not be as effective for you. There is, as of yet, no way to mask the fact that you are a terrible person that no one wants to be around, except to look at from across the way. Do not fret if you consider yourself attractive. This does not necessarily mean you are a bitch. But it puts you at a major disadvantage because many times the reason bitchiness develops is due to egotistical thinking. This being said, the conclusion should NOT be drawn that a.) if you don't think you're ugly, then you're a bitch, or b.) that bitches can't be ugly. Now, onward with my persuasive analysis.

Mammary Glands:
Commonly spoken of as breasts, boobs, tits, knockers, jugs, guns, bombs, tiggle bitties (and a host of other vulgar terms) these are probably the most obvious and most utilized of the modern woman's weapons. Contrary to the male gender, size really does not matter. It is the understanding of most females that the effectiveness of mammary glands increase exponentially as they increase in size using the common A-DDD(D) scale. However, what many neglect to think about is proportionality. Yes, it is fun to wrap humongous breasts around your head, or even to have sex with the breasts themselves. However, picturing D-cups on a midget, while intriguing is still weird. Conversely, if you are a larger woman with A-cups then this is also bad .... sorry. But fear not: no matter the size of your knockers we want to see them. Remember this rule of thumb, Boobs are good. Using a strategically low cut shirt or blouse can be just the right thing to convince your boss or classmate to sleep with you do virtually anything for/with you. Bare breasts are especially powerful, and this idea will be explored further when examining the "panties no tops" theory of Joe Dooling in the thong section of this report.

Thongs:
According to VH1's I Love the 80's, thongs were a product of the modern business woman. With the evolution of dress suits and those delicious black pants it became increasingly evident what kind of underpants this business woman was wearing. This, coupled with women's "desire" not to be objectified, lead to the invention of the thong. With this new type of panties, women no longer had visible lines on their asses. What was inadvertently created was an even sexier panty, far exceeding just being able to see that your female coworker or boss was wearing underpants. Part of the thongs allure is its lack of material. This leaves a pleasingly small amount left up to the imagination. As we went into the 21st century thongs are becoming more popular than ever. Now even showing off a small piece of the thong can be a very effective method for getting your own way. Ironically, what was an attempt to prevent objectification actually had the complete opposite effect, but it's your own fault ladies. You must learn to use this invaluable article of clothing to your benefit. Even today I was nearly brought to my knees by the site of a sweet freshman baby wearing a skirt (dont worry, I'll speak of skirts later) leaving the small triangle of fabric in the back visible. Good lord, she was awesome. If that isn't your style, then a second less revealing technique is to show the straps of your thong (think of Sisqo's thong song and how all the hot mama's allowed their wonderful thongs to be viewed). The very site of any part of the thong lets us know immediately you have one on and your attractiveness increases (sort of sad to say, but thus is the world). Many men, have honed their skills so much that we can detect when thongs are being worn (thongdar)even when they are not intentially displayed so you may not even have to show any of it at all. After living with Joe Dooling for the better part of 2 years, I have picked up several pieces of information. One of these gems is of course the aforementioned "panties no tops" theory. The basic synopsis is that there is nothing more visually stimulating than seeing a girl with a thong on and no top. This is no more than a corollary of the last two sections ... i.e. boobs and thongs are good, and using mens weakness for them, many otherwise difficult situations are resolved.

NOTE: ladies, if you have a boyfriend that I consider my friend, do not exploit your breasts and thongs in the presence of anyone who is not your boyfriend, or a reliable friend of his for this is a common source of conflict. In this isolated case mammary glands and thongs are very counterproductive in resolving issues. If I do not know your boyfriend, then come on over and lets see some thongs and boobies.

Skirts:
An unsung hero in the fashion world, skirts are often a fun way to manipulate men. Considered by women not as risque as cleavage or skimpy undergarments, skirts can also be more appealing to women. I don't really have much to say about skirts. But they are good and are even better when used in combination with thongs and mammary glands.

So go forth ladies and pillage our wallets or steal our time by taking us to a crappy movie, just keep in mind that there are several additional ways of convincing should the male involved be not particularly excited about it. It's all part of the cat and mouse game that we call male-female interaction.

its a fairly subtle characteristic of our apartment. id even wager that a good number of people who have been here havent noticed. regardless, if there wasnt a second door in hamels room leading to the basement we would all be trapped INSIDE our apartment. the situation is this: last night while consuming a few beers, we locked the dead bolt on our door. to our surprise the dead bolt broke and now cannot be unlocked. the key just turns the lock round and round without permitting sweet freedom. so, if the normal unused door had not been in hamels room to grant us atleast some kind of exit we would be forced to use the windows as exits. if this had happened to anyone else i would have trouble believing it. but sure enough, im locked inside of my apartment.

you know those hover-boat things that zip around louisianna marshes in movies? with the huge fan on the back. it was a fan of this magnitude (approximately 2 meter diameter) that confronted me while trying to enter my building via the secret alley entrance. i was originally denied at the front door by intimidating signs and air tight plastic sealed over the door garrisoned and barricaded like a medieval castle. evidently it is painting season at forest properties. they decided it wouldnt be necessary to mention anything of this to we 3 residents. the floor is going to be red. and an ugly red. but our door is bright white now. thats kinda good. but basically there is a horrible smell (not so bad that you get high, just the headache), hoardes of peasant class hispanics smoking cigarettes 2 feet from our door, and when we leave we have to walk down a.) a secret ninja path by the torture chamber, or b.) down the length of the alley adding 10 minutes of annoying walking to any journey. what the fuck. there are no good things i can say about forest properties ... except that every single person working in there office is a beautiful baby. that is always nice to have in a landlord.

my professor for, get this, "Transport Processes and Separation Process Principles", has a very disconcerting habit. very often he pauses in his lecture and shakes the piece of chalk that is in his hand, you can more easily imagine it as being dice and he is preparing to make a killer yahtzee roll. anyway, this "shaking" motion looks suspiciously like the motion commonly attributed to masturbation. you know the one i mean, the "air jerk off" as it were. anyway, Professor Bac (read: Botch), will finish speaking about a topic that is fairly important then do the move. for example:
"That is why the viscosity of Ethanol is much greater than that of Methanol and this relationship can be easily discerned by analyzing their Reynolds numbers and Antoines constants" then, the air jerk off. how can i be expected to take any information seriously if it is always followed by a gesture ive always attributed to apathy and worthlessness. i cant. thats for damn sure. im probably the only cool kid who noticed that he does it too. unobservant bastards.

Horse Shit (hôrs shit) n. :
1. Northeastern University's financial aid policies
2. Excrement of such large proportions that it obviously came from a horse
3. The excuses given to me by my financial aid advisor about why im getting $1300 less then i applied for even though i am required to pay interest on that same $1300 starting today
4. The excuses given to me by my financial aid advisor regarding the 2 week late arrival of my $5500 $4200 check