On Love, Superheros, and Hastags

Oh dear… where does a girl even begin? Clearly these cats have had a crazy combo of topics under their sleeves these past few months. I don’t know about them, but blogging is hard to get back into. Sort of like working out after a weekend (or two) of late nights and crappy food, ya know? (Damn you Jillian Michaels!)

So let’s just go ahead and get started with #1: Love. Sort of deep for the first topic after a hiatus, but I don’t run the #BD&LL show. (Yup, that #hashtag was for you Pat!) I digress…

Loooooveeeee... (*cue Barry White* Er, wait. Not that type of post. My bad...) I think it’s safe to say we've either all had or know of,  good, bad, and ugly experiences with this topic. That’s the funny thing about life: You can’t really have much of a life without love. (Deep stuff, right?!?) When thinking about love (and life in general) I like to remind myself of the old adage: “Treat others as you would like to be treated.” Swap out the word “treat” with “love” and I’m pretty sure we’d all be set for life. Ok, ok, I realize it’s not that easy, (nothing is, right?) but if we all tried to do as much, we’d all be better off. 

Now if you excuse me, I've got to go pull the glitter, sunshine, and rainbows out of my pet unicorn's rear...

Moving on. #2: Superheroes.

As a mother or two boys, pretty sure I see enough of these characters in my daily life. Superman underoos? Check. Spiderman jammies? Check. Random outfit made out of knee socks and an ice cream pail resembling a superhero? You betcha. 

As someone that has never seen a real superhero movie, I decided what better to breach this subject than a Google search. (Because Bing is for hippies.) I came across a few gems, but my favorite was the “Which Superhero are You?” quiz. (Doooo it!) Turns out my superhero likeness is that of Poison Ivy, followed by Lex Luthor. Whoever that is… 

Apparently this is Lex Luthor (thanks Google). And apparently, I'm he's an asshole.

Considering I don’t follow any of this stuff, I’m not even sure how to take these results. What was more concerning to me was the ads on the site asking if I suffer from ADHD. Um, what was I talking about again??

(Yup, that about sums it up.)

At any rate, I’m pretty sure my time with these characters (superheroes and children alike) is just beginning. So stay tuned readers, stay tuned…

Finally, topic 3: #hashtags. (Thanks to you fellow ADHD-ers for sticking with me!) As a social media guru wanna-be, this topic even seems silly to me. Don't get me wrong, I get the idea. What I don't get is the peeps that feel the need to only speak in hashtag terms. Do I care that you #workout and post on Facebook? No. Do I care that you think you're #awesome #lunch is worthy of a photo AND a hashtag? Nope. Do I mind that you post in #all #hashtags #all #the #time? YES! Stop it. You sound like an idiot. For reals, nobody cares and it's not that cool. Rant over. 

Thanks to the BD&LL team for having me. But, where's my complimentary banana daiquiri already?!?  

#PoisonIvy Out!

#LifeLessons

Using hashtags on Twitter

Definition: The # symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages.

Using hashtags to categorize Tweets by keyword:
• People use the hashtag symbol # before a relevant keyword or phrase (no spaces) in their Tweet to categorize those Tweets and help them show more easily in Twitter Search.
• Clicking on a hashtagged word in any message shows you all other Tweets marked with that keyword.
• Hashtags can occur anywhere in the Tweet – at the beginning, middle, or end.
• Hashtagged words that become very popular are often Trending Topics.


Using hashtags correctly:
• If you Tweet with a hashtag on a public account, anyone who does a search for that hashtag may find your Tweet
• Don't #spam #with #hashtags. Don't over-tag a single Tweet. (Best practices recommend using no more than 2 hashtags per Tweet.)
• Use hashtags only on Tweets relevant to the topic.


So, there you have it. Not a bad blog if I do say so myself!

Fine. I’ll try and write some of my own thoughts on the subject…

When Pat said he was working on a blog about hashtags I couldn’t quite figure out what he wanted to get out there, but then I started noticing more and more how products, television shows, and users on Facebook were using #. I’m not really that up on Twitter, but from what I’ve been hearing more and more people are using it. For our business we started a Facebook page a few years ago to keep people up-to-date with what’s going on and I think it has really helped our business, but when discussing it with someone recently they told me that we should really have a Twitter account too as most young people are using that more now. First of all, how dare they talk to me about “young people” as if I’m no longer in that category?! Gall Darn rat scallions. Secondly, I think it’s time for me to figure out this whole Twitter thing.

If you haven’t read Pat’s blog, cycle back through our list of blogs here and find “#.” When I first read it, I was extremely confused, but then I read it aloud to my brother…and that’s when it really shined! Is “shined” right, or is it shone?! When Twitter first came out I was talking with one of our fellow bloggers about it and we were trying to decide what the past tense of “tweet” was…they figured it was “twat.” I probably should have done more research on Twitter…

The # Blog that Pat wrote really did nail the use of it in a lot of ways, and the information I posted above helps define how to use it for those of us who really have no clue, but for my blog I decided not to fill it with sentences using #sentence, but what I found when I searched for certain things using the # symbol. The most obvious one for the writers of this blog would be #LifeLessons, so that’s what I centered a lot of my searching on.

I first searched #bananadaiquiris, and surprisingly…there are quite a few people who use this hashtag, I think we deserve some royalties! But most of those were along the lines of how people had just got to town and couldn’t wait to meet up with “Kathy!” #bananadaiquiris…apparently there are not a lot of men confident enough to saddle up to a bar and order the most delicious cocktail known to man, or woman! But, as usual, I digress.

I also had asked all of our faithful readers to tweet us using the #BDandLL or just @BDandLL…turns out you are all a bunch of assholes that don’t really care about our blog…or our feelings. I’m over it, as long as you keep reading!

So, I came to search #LifeLessons. I “re-tweeted” some of the best ones I found during this search so you can check those out on our twitter feed which can be found under “Banana Daiquiri’s on the Go” to your right here. But a lot of these were links to other articles such as “33 life lessons learned by my 33rd year,” and different series where someone would write about the life lessons learned from different television shows or movies, which are great but what I was looking for were posts from individuals. Twitter is supposed to be a feed for people to get out what’s happening right now in your life, and most life lessons take a while to sink in. None of the articles on life lessons learned from television shows or movies were done about currently airing shows, they were done about shows that we watched when we were younger, they ended, and now we’ve had some time to reflect upon them. The point is that life lessons aren’t learned in the moment, they’re learned upon our reflection of the past. Once we open our eyes to learning these life lessons, I think it means we’re ready to move forward from them. But some lessons such as not to shower after being maced, are instantaneous!

We’ve had our Twitter account open for something like two years now and we only have about 150 tweets or so, not a lot when you think about how much truth and knowledge we’ve dropped on all of you through our blog here, but we’re just figuring out this Twitter thing, Pat obviously has the best handle on it, so we may have to rely mostly on him for life lessons on the go, but as we reflect back on some of our past blogs and look towards our future ones, hopefully we’ll have some quick life lessons we can shoot your way in 150 words or less!

One of the articles I found while searching #LifeLessons was, first of all way over my head, but secondly, it made some awesome points. It talked about how we often live our lives centered too much on the past or the future and don’t spend enough time living in the now. A lot of us, myself included, look at our past as a way to figure out our future…and that doesn’t always work. Sometimes it’s best to leave our past in the past, and although we can always benefit from a plan on what we want our future to be like, the saying goes, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.” So, live in the now, drink banana daiquiris, make mistakes, learn from them and move on. It takes time, and we may need to live in the past for a while to get over some of the crap life throws our way, but don’t miss out on too much of the stuff that’s happening right now. I know I’ve wasted enough time thinking about things I can’t change, and planning for futures that may never come, and from reflecting on this I know that I’m happiest when I’m living for the day, the now. Que sera, sera. Carpe Diem, and all of that! Tonight, we’re going to drink too many Banana Daiquiris, go clubbing and make some mistakes. In a week or so, when I’ve had some time to learn that I’m too old to club, I’ll let you know what #LifeLessons I learned!

Also, I drive school bus and I’ve decided that it’s never too early to start learning life lessons, we’ll hold the Banana Daiquiris…but I’m going to put a new life lesson on the wall of my bus for the kids to see every day and also have a box where they can leave their own life lessons that might make the wall as well. We have a poster on our wall at our business that my mom had found a long time ago that says, “I’ve Learned…” at the top and then has all of these responses from individuals of all different ages, maybe that’s where we got the idea for this blog in the first place?! But I will tweet some of the lessons learned from the kids riding my bus…that is if they aren’t like my friends that read this blog and actually respond! Want to drop some life lessons on our youth with me? Tweet us @BDandLL or comment on this blog!

HERO COMPLEX

I’m having a bit of writer’s block here and I’ve only written one blog since last year! I’m pretty sure the problem is that I have been pretty busy working and have not had enough time to drink. As most of my life lesson’s have involved at least a banana daiquiri or two, you can see how one may develop writer’s block while going through detox…so I wrote a couple versions of this next blog and I’m just going to try and piece them together. I’m sticking with the concept that we will all write about the same topics and as Pat has written about hero’s and hash tags I will next try to do one on twitter or hash tags…but he owes us one on his journey to finding “Wonder Woman!” So, here are my ramblings…enjoy!

When I was a kid I spent a lot of time by myself in my room playing with action figures. That’s not a confession, it’s just the truth. I’ve always been pretty good at entertaining myself and I think after reading so many comics and watching a lot of cartoons that featured these hero’s that I had action figures of, I enjoyed acting out different scenarios where the hero’s would be put into situations where they would have to save people. What a concept, for one person to save another?! What an amazing thing this is, the basic concept of super heroes. The writers may have added these “powers” that assist in this endeavor and it may seem like in the Amazing Spiderman where the line, “with great power comes great responsibility” comes from, that these heroes are thrust into action rather than choosing it, but we also see the opposite side of the coin, the super villains. The basic idea is this, we all have the ability to do good or bad, what we choose to do is up to each and every one of us.

I’d like to think that I have always been a strong proponent of doing good. I have a very strong belief in people and their ability to do good, but that doesn’t mean that bad things don’t happen and that I haven’t done bad things in my life. I’ve drank too much, said mean things that I later regretted, ran naked through the streets of Grand Forks, got involved with some shady drug deals in Minneapolis, and last fall I was maced in Minneapolis while trying to defend one of my friends…

So, I’ve done bad. So, how, you may ask, could I consider myself to be a good person and even title this blog “Hero Complex?” Well, besides being a huge “fan boy” who enjoys playing with action figures, I also believe that some things are worth fighting for, and that somehow I can make a direct impact on these things. I believe in myself, and my ability to do good as well. I sometimes get down on myself when my attempts fail, but the important thing to remember is that I tried…

Who hasn’t wanted to fly like Superman, or swing from building to building like Spiderman, have all the sweet gadgets of Batman, or be almost indestructible like Wolverine?! We probably all have had those days when we feel indestructible, where nothing can hurt us and everything just seems to be going right, and on those days we feel very much “Super.”

Sometimes we take those feelings a little too far, and thus begins my latest blog…

I’ve always had an uncontrollable urge to help people, which I would say is one of my greatest qualities, but it has also lead me into a lot of predicaments. I think one moment that really stands out to me as a lesson learned and never forgotten came from my Grandpa Al one Sunday when he was over for dinner. My mom and I were arguing about something and I said something mean or yelled at her, and my Grandpa, who was always such an easy going, fun loving guy, reamed me a new one. I’d never seen him so upset and I felt absolutely terrible afterwards. I apologized to my mom and have always tried to treat women with the utmost respect ever since.

One day while working at our family business, I was cutting apart tubes when I could swear that I saw a guy behind me push his girlfriend…I thought my eyes must have been deceiving me because I had never seen someone do something like that in public before, but sure enough she came back by him and he smacked her across the face! …and that I cannot abide! It didn’t take long for me to get into it with the P.O.S and before long I was trying out my super skills with him and several of his buddies. Luckily for me, at that precise moment several of my “super friends” were getting off of the river and joined in the battle. Now I’ll be the first to admit that fighting is one of the dumbest things I think you can do, other than punching a brick wall, but having said that…don’t let me catch you ever hitting a woman or bullying anyone. I’m not big on bullies and let’s just say that the brick wall got off light.

But that’s a good example of the crap comic books have put into my mind. For some odd reason I thought that one man could take on a whole group of guys despite how badly I was outnumbered simply because it was the right thing to do. So yeah, super hero complex.

That story turned out pretty well in the long run for me, as I did not get hurt and the next time the guy came down to the campground the young lady was no longer with him, so hopefully that was a win for her! (He was quickly reminded of his last experience at our facility and I suggested that he leave as soon as possible…)
So that was a win, more recently I had a harsh reminder that you cannot always save everybody and that all super heroes have weaknesses.

Last fall we went to Minneapolis for a bachelor party for one of my best friends. We had finished at one bar and were on our way over to a very seedy gentleman’s club when one of our friends was thrown into traffic by some random person! He was able to avoid any serious danger, but I ran up to see what was going on when two guys came after me. I wrestled one to the ground but then the other one started kicking me while I was down…then the cops showed up. Turns out it must have looked like I was the instigator as I was being choked by the guy on the ground and kicked in the head by the guy standing above me because the nice officer decided to unleash his entire bottle of pepper spray on me. Apparently my whole head and all of my clothes were completely white from the spray…I couldn’t say, I couldn’t see anything.

On a side note, if anyone out there ever has the wonderful experience of being pepper sprayed, make sure you take a shower to flush out the spray from your eyes…that way it covers your entire body and you don’t sleep for two days because you are on fire. On a bright side, I am now officially certified to carry and use pepper spray!

I’ve spent a lot of time reading comic books and graphic novels over the years, I still do even today…yeah, I know, I’m a bit of a “fan boy” but what the heck. The stories are usually about someone developing powers that they ultimately use to stick up for people in need. I’m not very religious but the one thing I do believe in is people, and their ability to do good, so super heroes have always been of great interest to me. But you don’t need to get bit by a radioactive spider, get exposed to gamma rays, or be born on Krypton to be a super hero. Sometimes all you need to do is stick up for someone getting bullied, or be there when a friend needs you. It may not seem like a “super” act to you at the time but it can mean the world to them.

In Pat’s blog he talked a lot about that last point, that he saw the “super” qualities in the people in his life, be it his parents rescuing him when he “flew” off the garage, or comparing his wife to Wonder Woman. He showed us all how doing those little things can make us appear “super” in someone’s eyes…and isn’t it pretty cool how he thinks of his wife as a super hero?! Shouldn’t we all hope for that kind of a relationship?

For me, the super heroes in my life are my family and friends. They’re the people who take the time to give me a call when I’m feeling down, give me a job when they know I’m struggling, and the ones who stick out the tough times with me and let me know that they’ll always be there for me. They’re the ones that take in their brothers and sisters when they lose their parents, or bring thousands of dollars worth of silent auction items to our charity auction (just to buy most of them back at the end!), and hell, they’re the ones who write blogs with me, and all of you that read them. I have a lot of super heroes in my life, and for that I’m thankful!

Now, it’s Sunday and it’s time for my alone time with my super hero action figures. Today we’re going to save the world from the severe banana shortage…

Superheroes

Growing up, superheroes weren’t just people we looked up to, they were opportunities to become more than we were. Tossing on the Batman PJs to play hide-and-go-seek – BOOM, no one can find the greatest detective, besides the greatest detective himself. Then you get that Superman cape for Christmas – OMG, life has changed! Until you put it on and fall off the garage and realize that you’re not the Man of Steel, but you are the son of the Flash. I couldn’t believe how quickly my parents got to me and took me to the hospital.

-Life Lessons: PJS with a bright yellow Batman symbol aren’t great for hide-and-go-seek. A Superman cape does not help you fly. Parents can move really fast when they’re scared as shit.

I practiced being the Flash for many years in athletics. In football, I mostly ran my mouth super-fast and loud. I may have been the last person on the pile, but I was the first to start talking trash. In basketball, I certainly wasn’t the most talented, but I could usually out-run someone…just couldn’t always stop. I ran into many walls, benches, and crowds.

-Life Lessons: Running your mouth on the field is fun. Having to catch a ball going across the middle of the field is not...especially when meeting Ray Lewis there. Being fast on the court is awesome, but if you don’t look where you’re running, you learn pretty quickly that walls don’t budge. (On a side-note, what’s with men and walls?)

Then you marry Wonder Woman. She has the power to withstand heat, which is great, because supper doesn’t cook itself. She also has the Lasso of Truth. She will use this when asking, “Does this outfit look good?” Doesn’t matter what you say – you will be wrong.

-Life Lessons: Realization that Wonder Woman has the power of Wisdom and yes, she is smarter than you. And looks good in tights.

As we get older, do these superheroes go away? Oh no, they stay with us and mold into one. I can’t even begin to count how many times I have been called Iron Man while I finish the laundry…or Aquaman while I’m taking a shower. And, oh boy, do I feel like Superman while I am driving down the road with my mattress strapped to the roof of my car and my left hand out the window holding it down. “I got this, I got this.”

-Life Lesson: Invest in a nice strap to hold down that mattress…or get All-State insurance to protect you from mayhem like me.

#

#hashtags#Ijusthasthtaggedahashtag#doesthatwork
#wasn’tthissymbolcalleda#numbersignonce#ohwait#itsapoundsign
#saywhat#omg#Imissed#whenthistookover
#hashtagisusedforeverthing#insteadofsaying“goingtothemall”#mallfun#shopping#jealouslife

Is it just me, or is that really hard to read? I will try English for a bit. I looked up “hashtag” on Wikipedia and discovered that the first use of the term "hash tag" was in a blog post by Stowe Boyd, “Hash Tags = Twitter Groupings,” on August 26, 2007. (1) So, I have Stowe Boyd to thank for this new phenomenon. I wonder if he is on Twitter…then I could hashtag him into a conversation.

Maybe if I understood what the point was, I would enjoy it a little bit more. They’re even hashtagging on SportsCenter now. #Icantwin. They want us to vote on Twitter for our favorite plays by hashtagging the player’s name. #Peterson#AP#ALLDAY#BEASTMODE.

In three years, this is how we will vote. #republicanpresident #democraticpresident. Is this how Obama Care was passed? Maybe I need to pay more attention. #politics

I guess they haven’t made a movie about it yet, so I have that going for me. They’ve made plenty of horror movies involving all other forms of communication.
Phone calls: One Missed Call or Scary Movie. “What’s your favorite scary movie, Cindy?”
Text messages: Text. “Death by Instagram”…just kidding – Never actually seen the movie.
There was even a horror movie about the CB radio, Joy Ride. “Come in, Candy Cane.”
I can just see the # movie coming…and when it does, I may just lose it.

Well, football is on and this blog isn’t going as well as I would like, so I’m out of here. #goodnight#mnf#worktomorrow#alsdjfasl#thisisradical#penis#thesweetlife#haha#LOL#asl#yessir#Thankyou

Thanks for your time. Follow us @BDandLL. If you like this blog, hashtag #hashtag.

PS: Jay, let’s totally write the #movie#hashtag.

Sources:
1. Wikipedia
2. Facebook News Feed

I suck at Zoosk... (follow up)

So we’re really going to blog again? Shit… I only have 10 minutes to kick something out, but I’m compelled to contribute.

I’m confused though… are we blogging about getting burned by girls or punching walls? I guess it doesn’t matter… I have experience with both… I just wanted a little direction. And what the hell is Zoosk, I had to Google that shit! (and yes I did use Google, because I f***ing hate bing!) Anyways, I accidentally have a profile now and have been getting a lot of inappropriate emails from someone with the handle of “pattycakes_3@USB” !?

Let’s start with getting shit-smacked by love. It happens to the best of us. In the past I have been cheated on, dumped on my birthday, and had other notable break-ups that have left me feeling worthless, leading to intoxication, & ultimately to punching walls... usually followed by crying. Actually I take that back… I only punch walls over sports. But I digress.

I don’t have the time to dive into the messy details of my past relationships… but I will say that I’m a better person for having gone through it all. I personally would not be happily married to my wife today if I had not previously had my heart broke by some whore of an ex-girlfriend from Bismarck who couldn’t go on a trip to Mexico without putting her dick-mitts on every dude she saw! But again, I digress.

TO MY POINT: When something terrible happens… whether it’s getting your heart broke, dealing with the death of someone close to you, or something else that’s equally terrible… it’s easy to feel like your life is over and you will never be happy again. It can linger for days, weeks or years… and eat away at your self esteem and general quality of life. I know it did for me… several times! But then you get over it… no matter how tough it is, eventually you get over because you realize that you have a life to live and that crying over things you can’t change won’t help anything. Then as time goes on you grow a little tougher and a little smarter. And you learn to use that heartbreak to motivate you to build something positive from it. You have to grow from your experiences and learn to not make the same mistakes… otherwise you set yourself up for failure. And remember that friends, true friends, really do have your best interest at heart. And even though ladies will come and go… you will have friends there to back you up when life gets dirty. And they will remind you of stupid thing that you have ever done in order to make sure you don’t do it again!

And really the same goes with punching walls… I have to agree that it is a lesson best learned the hard way. So when love, life or sports get you down, I say punch a wall! It really puts things in perspective as you try to wipe your ass (or your tears) with your left hand for 6 weeks! (Right hand if you’re one of those freaky lefties like Kyle!)


Done! Next blog topic please!

I suck at Zoosk...

It's about time we got off our asses!

 

It has been over a year since our last Blog post and a lot of Daiquiri’s and Life Lessons have been consumed in that time! We once had a plan to put together 10 to 15 topics, have our members each write on the subjects and after some much needed editing, put together a book…we got through one topic. I blame myself mostly. I fell in love, learned a few more life lessons, and now it’s time to get back on track. I know that at least one of our members has another Blog in the works, centered around hash tags (#) but I figured since my most recent life lesson was learned on love, and one of our topics at one point was going to be based off of the book, “I Suck at Girls” that this may be a good subject to get going with once again. I’ll probably only touch base on the newest of love lessons learned in this blog as the wound is still pretty fresh but as Henry Miller said, “The best way to get over a woman is to turn her into literature.” At BDandLL…we have to settle for a Blog!

So, I’m not so hot when it comes to relations with the opposite sex, I think if you know me…you know this to be true. For the most part I believe that girls do tend to enjoy my company, and I think I’ve made at least one or two of them laugh over the years…but it turns out I just don’t currently have that “it” factor when it comes to settling down. Now I know what you’re thinking, this is going to be one of those “woe is me” type rantings but it’s not, I promise. I’m just going to try and give you a few examples of my failures at love and hopefully you can relate a bit, or at least get a laugh off of my misery!

There has certainly been a lot of girls over the years that I have been attracted to, be it looks, sense of humor, overall personality, etc. and when I find someone that I enjoy, I generally go after them. Life’s too short not to take chances and for the most part I would consider this a rewarding endeavor, even if I completely struck out, like the time some lovely co-ed had me give her a ride back to her place, showed me her room and talked about how comfortable her bed was, at which point I said,” it does look comfy! Oh, I guess my rides leaving, see you later!” I may have had a few cocktails at that point and when I realized what I had done and tried to call her the next day…she seemed to have forgotten who I was, but…life and love went on.

The first really bad breakup I ever had came my sophomore year of college. I had liked the girl I was dating for quite a while and I knew that she was going to be attending college in California the next semester through an exchange program but somehow I thought we could make it work. She being a female, and the smarter of the two sexes, knew better. I took her to a Poison concert (mind you we’re both still only 30) and after having a brief argument over the situation in the car, we decided to end it. Somehow I wasn’t quite in the mood to go to Poison with her after that, so we scalped the tickets in the parking lot and then I brought her home…so yes, one of my worst breakups took place at a Poison concert where I became an illegal ticket scalper, and really the break up made sense, and the two of us are actually still friends, if she reads this she will more than likely have a good chuckle over the whole situation as well. On the way home the song, “She F-ing Hates Me” came on the radio, it’s kind of funny how songs seem to pop up in the most opportune times! Looking back, the breakup wasn’t why this situation made me think I suck at girls, the fact that I thought it would be cool to go to a Poison concert, though, should give you some inclination as to why I continue to strike out…

The next in the line of why I suck at girls came shortly after my mom had passed away. I had seen the girl a few times working at one of my mom’s and my favorite restaurants and never quite had the courage to ask her out, but once my mom passed away I figured it was time to start taking more chances, so like the new man I had become, the next time my friends and I ate at her restaurant I left her a note on our bill that said, “How does Meagan Brumwell sound to you?” with my telephone number…yeah, manly and don’t forget, classy. Low and behold, minutes after we left I received a text message. We talked a few times, ended up getting together for a while, I even took her to Puerto Rico with our family and for a brief moment I thought she may have been the one for me, but then she wasn’t. The result of this break up, and to a greater extent the loss of my mom, was a cross country road trip taken by my brother and I. It was a month long trip that had us visiting a ton of friends and family we hadn’t seen for a very long time and mostly getting too drunk and almost dying in Western Texas. For more on that road trip, consult our “Get Jealous” Blog which we wrote in everyday on that trip. The heartache I felt after that break up was probably more of a combination of losing my mom and the girl I tried to replace her with. She was a great girl, and we had a lot of fun together, but we were both pretty young and both had a lot of living yet to do. On our road trip I would wake up every morning and take pictures of the sunrises over the different landscapes, and I don’t think I realized it until about midway through our trip, but despite the heartache I was feeling, that sun seemed to keep rising every day.

Now, like most of you, I see people post personal stuff on Facebook all of the time and I say to myself, come on man, you’re better than that. I’ve also seen plenty of drunken idiots punching walls and such that you just wonder, what the hell were they thinking?! My most recent break up decided to show me that sometimes, you just don’t think.

After my most recent break up went back to her ex, shortly after we broke up…I did the manly thing once again and posted a nasty comment for everyone to see on my Facebook wall, what an idiotic thing to do. Sometimes the mind seems to just go ahead and shut off, but thankfully Facebook has built in Life Lessons! My comment stated something along the lines of how I had been traded in for a guy with a six pack…and now it seems like my news feed is littered with suggested posts on how to achieve a six pack, secrets to achieving a six pack in 30 days, how to get rock hard abs…FML. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I think as soon as I changed my relationship status every dating sight on the web invaded my news feed as well. I’m sure I still have some friends out there doing some interesting things, but I’ll never know until I finish up this six pack and get my Zoosk on!

Now, punching a wall doesn’t seem like the smartest thing a person can do, and as I’ve now found out first hand, it’s not! A little over a week ago we had a live fantasy football draft in Fargo and got together with a bunch of our friends for it. We started drinking at about 11am, so you know this story is going to end well…

After the draft we decided to go bowling, and at about hour 11 or so of drinking I was informed that my ex had now gotten engaged to her ex boyfriend just a few months after we had broken up…My rational self probably would have just been pissed off and hurt by the situation, but my overly intoxicated self remembers it like a hurricane…I believe I recall my friends trying to talk me down, trying to say all the things friends say to let you know that you’re the better person, that the person you once loved just isn’t worth it…things that may have made sense to a sober rational person, but that’s not who I was that night and so after being told not to punch a wall about 100 times from everyone, I finally broke free and went ahead and punched a brick wall…Now, I’m pretty sure I broke at least one knuckle in the exchange but damn did it feel good…just kidding, it hurt like hell and still does…moral of the story, don’t be an idiot and punch walls, but the only way to really learn this lesson is to learn it for yourself!

The only way that could have ended worse is if I had taken to Facebook to talk about how I had punched a wall. The next thing you would know I would be getting overwhelmed with ads for hand surgery, or prosthesis!

So, as it currently stands…I kind of stink with girls, but I keep trying to remember that road trip and the fact that the sun continues to rise every day. Tomorrow keeps bringing forth new opportunities, and if you’ve read our blogs in the past you can see that it’s pretty easy for us to make fools out of ourselves and to take risks. Love is a leap of faith, you got to be willing to put yourself out there, and even though you may end up getting crushed a few times, in the end I think it must all be worth it.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to do 500 crunches before my IM Date with my latest Christian Mingle match…