And the Search Goes On

So I realize I came down as a bit harsh yesterday on the whole "close match" situation. I've checked again today and he hasn't responded back so I think the whole thing is over. I'm not angry in a sense but more frustrated and somewhat upset about the situation. Given what he hold me about his upbringing I guess it would make sense that he would probably be uncomfortable rooming with a gay guy. He seemed like such a nice person and I'm sure he is, so, if I do meet him I hope we can still be friends.

With this, I'm continuing on my search for a roommate. I've contacted three other people and I hope they'll respond back. One of them outright said he was gay in his profile and says he's "eclectic" which I will be asking him to expand on later if he responds but we share a good bit in common so we'll see how it turns out. I labeled him as "eclectic gay" in my CHARMS contacts. The other person I've contacted is a bit more athletic, he plans to get more involved but he seems to be pretty study oriented as well. He wants to go out and explore the city however which I would gladly oblige to do (hey, I'm an area native, it's practically my duty). I nicknamed him "sporty". The final guy I messaged was this really fun sounding guy. He also is rather laid back but he seems to like to have fun and balance that with studying it as well. He's a 6'3" unicycle rider which is freaking awesome. I labeled him as "fun guy"

I know, those are some of the stupidest names of all time but they get the point across and I can easily tell who's who at least.

Well, wish me luck. Hopefully I can avoid a "close match" debacle repeat.

All the best,

JP

I'm Delicious All Over

-don't ask.-

Anyways, I learned five things as a result of my first camping trip yesterday.

1. Bug spray not only keeps bugs away, it makes an excellent flame booster when building a fire.

2. Bring a pillow...or two, a rolled up pair of running pants will not effectively provide any comfort whatsoever.

3. Metal coat hangers are a bit too flimsy to hold a hot dog over a fire, they're excellent for marshmallows however.

4. Don't flirt with the group of hot, young campground managers, it's awkward.

5. If you're going to be the only guy in a tent with four girls, be prepared to talk about past/present crushes, your favorite names, slutty girls from school, pregnant slutty girls from school and the inevitable bringing up of once a month lady-functions (ew.)

I'm convinced Abercrombie guys are stuck in a never ending camping trip

So camping was fun; I made it out alive, and learned I'm an ace when it comes to filling up my car's trunk up to the brim. Sure, it was hot, muggy, dirty and bug infested but hey, who cares, you're effing camping.

Anyways, update on the "Close Match" saga, well he didn't respond to my message in the end. Usually he responds within a day but given he has broken his otherwise perfect on-time performance, I'll take it as "Hey, no, I can't share a room with a queer, and no, I'm not sorry"

Dude, I asked you a fair question, and rather than just leaving a conversation like that, man up and have the balls to actually say it to my face, that way I can at leave still have some tiny fleck on respect for you rather than the absolute lack of any I have right now.

I'll give him one more day, and if he still can't muster a response by then, screw him.

All the best,

JP

"Close Match"

Finding a roommate is normally a random process. If you go to a school where you can request a specific person then power to ya, but part of college is to meet new people, and a roommate is a good place to start.

At my university, there's a roommate matching program that's pretty unique. It's called CHARMS (stands for something, I swear) and it's the official "roommate search/dating service". Humourous description for sure. How it works is that you first fill out a questionnaire about your living preferences like when you like to go to bed, what volume of music you listen to, whether you mind sharing items etc. and then you're given a list of all your top matches.

When I was given my list of top roommates (annonymous, everyone is just a number), I messaged my top match who I nicknamed uncreatively "Close Match". We got to talking and he seems to be a very nice guy. He says he's originally from Arizona and is an outdoorsy type of person despite not having gone backpacking in a few years. We share a lot in common - be both like the same music, have the same sleep patterns and seemingly similar personalities.

As we've talked more, I've learned more about him, he has siblings and was raised a devout Catholic. Today, when I checked my messages I found out he even attended a Jesuit high school and he says his Catholic upbringing has strongly influenced his beliefs. When I heard this I became slightly concerned. You see, there isn't a question on the questionnaire about sexual orientation. I was going to mention that I was gay in the "additional information" section of my profile but I don't want people to judge me based only on that detail from the start so I decided to leave that out.

For some time now, I've been feeling that I'd like to be roommates with Close Match but now that I've learned about his beliefs I felt that it was the right time ot let him know. I guess I came out to him in my last message where I explained that I wasn't the stereotypical gay guy and all that so he wouldn't get uncomfortable if he would in the first place. At the end of my message, I asked him if that would be a deal breaker and if we do become roommates in the end, whether he would respect that or not. He usually responds the next day so I'll end up hoping he responds before I leave for my camping trip tomorrow at 2. Otherwise, I'll have to wait until Saturday and I don't think I'll be able to bear the anticipation if I had to wait until then.

I hope my impression of him as a nice, fair guy holds up because I'd really like Close Match to be my roommate.

All the best,

JP

Guys, I think I have.....

Dammit, I still can't say it.

You know the feeling you get when you've done something you know you just can't let anyone else know about? An unspeakable act, something you know you never should ever do or have done, well I think I've done just that.

There's been a strange disease that's slowly been spreading across the nation, it's primarily been afflicting tweenaged girls but it hasn't been picky about who it's been trying to touch it's sticky, lecherous hands on. Scientists have yet to discover a cure and some fear it will get much worse before time will ultimately provide some sort of cure, until then, more and more people are catching this unspeakable disease. I think I've caught.....Bieber fever.

Me developing a liking for the music of Justin Bieber is the ultimate musical sin in my mind, he represents eveyrthing I stand against. Since he hit the airwaves, I've derided him as a one-hit wonder, the pewny little teenager whose voice is bound to crack soon enough and end his high-pitched musical career. Okay, so that's admittedly a bit harsh. especially coming from someone who did chorus back in elementary school and was a Soprano I of all things (aka, highest pitched position at the time). I hit notes twice as high as him back in the day which is disturbing now that I think about it. But the thing is, his popularity is so unfathomable to me, I think I went immediately to defence mode.

His synth-heavy, booming beat, pop music shouldn't be good, it just shouldn't, but before me in my itunes library, my collection is inexplicably growing like a group of mice going at it all day and night. Why? Someone please tell me why. Maybe I've been too closed minded, I mean, his music isn't horrible, I've heard some monstrosities in my life and so far at leats his music is okay. Also, despite having critisizing him as looking like a 12 year old, in more recent evolutions he's grown up a bit more and he isn't horribly bad looking either. Maybe all this subliminal catchy dance music/nice smile business is subliminally appealing to my gayness.

I feel like Tina Fey in that SNL skit a few weeks back, the one where she's a teacher and is having weird feelings of attraction to student-Bieber and fantasizes about pushing him around in a baby carriage (okay, that's just weird by any measure). Nevertheless, Justin Bieber will probably be a point of contension for me for the time being; I'm at an intersection of what I like and what I vehemeantly stand against.


I still can't wait for the moment puberty shows it's ugly face and his voice cracks though. >:)

All the best,

JP

Graduation - 2010ve

13 years of hard work and dedication all led up to this day; Congratulations Class of 2010, we did it!

Bowling Under a Star Speckled Sky

Help! The time-space continuum seems to be breaking down. Yesterday's senior picnic barbecue seems like ages ago and today day seemed twice as long as usual.

I woke up at the ungodly hour of 7:45AM on a day I don't even have school, and after failing to force myself back asleep I reluctantly got up. Given nothing to really do until Dutch's grad party at 6 in the evening, I made myself breakfast and began what would end up being a three and a half hour marathon of The Sarah Jane Adventures (A Doctor Who spin-off for those not as nerdalicious as me) on Syfy. After a brief respite for a series of conversations on Facebook, I returned this time to my laptop and watch the Andrew-Justin storyline from Desperate Housewives on Youtube (and they say our generation is lazy, pff).

Gimme some of that, please.

Tired of television, I decided that I should probably get myself moving again and go for a run/ab and upper body workout (got to look good for summer y'know). My workout consisted of a run around my neighborhood which is 2 miles or so in the end (way off) and a series of 40-30-20-10 crunches woven together with a 20-15-10-5 series of push-ups (actually stuck to). After a shower, I got lunch and some graduation gifts for my friends I finally got ready for the party.

We'd been told we would be allowed to use the pool so I packed my swimsuit and towel and got ready to leave. When I arrived, I stuffed my face with all sorts of delectable foods Dutch's mom, the cooking goddess, made, leaving nothing on my plate like the food vacuum I am. The party itself was rather dull to be perfectly honest, many people were there, but in the end, it was just the normal mix of people separating off into groups and gossiping. When the party moved outside, I mentioned to one of my friends a suggestions he made that we should go bowling one day. Well, as things work out, one thing led to another and seven of us (host included, I'm not that big of a douche) went to our local Bowl America for a late-night all-you-can-bowl special.

When we first walked in, we noticed something peculiar - half of the pretty packed 40-lane alley were people from out school, weird. We got to our lanes and got bowling. Now, I don't know how often you guys go bowling but for a sport that involves hurling a heavy bowl down a greased stretch of wood into a set of ten pins all for the sake of knocking them down, it's pretty damn entertaining. In the first ten minutes, we cheered, laughed and high-fived more than we had at the past two hours at the party, friendly competition made things even more fun. For me at least, one thing I personally enjoyed about the time at the alley would be that when I wasn't bowling, I got to just sit and watch the hot skinny semi-hipster guy in the lane next to us bowl. He was so much better than all of us and every time I made eye contact with him, I'd quickly turn my head back to the screen, pretending to concentrate on the rather dismal scores before me.

By the time we finished our second round, hot-hipster man had left but to our right was a new group of teens our age from a different school. They were just as loud and excitable as we were but one guy caught my eye. He wore a pink and white striped polo and walked over to the empty lane hot-hipster guy had left to get a ball for his game. He too was kinda cute, not terribly attractive, but enough to catch my attention. I didn't give him too much of a thought as we went through our third and final round for the night but caught one last glance as me and my group of friends got our stuff and went to return our shoes. Pink-polo kid was siting on another guy's lap with his arm around his shoulder. Now I knew some guys who did this as a bro-bonding experience, but this definitely was not one of those situations, this was more. I half-smiled as I caught one last glance of the pair as I walked away, thinking "god, I want that" with every step. By the time we left it was about 11:30 at the humid air was as thick as ever. I dropped my friend Dutch off back at her home and went home myself.

Final surprise of the night, my mom greets me at the door with "guess who called while you were gone". Crap, did I do something wrong? "who?" I innocently inquired. "Mr ______, your sixth grade history teacher." "What?" It turns out he saw me at the Varsity Awards Banquet last night when I won "Scholar Athlete" for crew and remembered me. In the back of the program, all the seniors had their names and college they were attending listed and he saw I was headed off to Georgetown. He had called to congratulate me and told my mom to have me call him back.

Am I surprised? yes. But I'm happily surprised that one of my elementary school teachers would actually remember me and take time out of his way and make a personall call of congratulations. So Mr. _______, I will be calling you tomorrow afternoon, and thanks for a sweet ending to what was initially a slow day.

Graduation countdown: T-minus 1 day


All the best,

JP

I love you, you picky, expensive-tasted, attention whore

I mean, why else would I deal with you almost every day? You only serve one purpose, to make my life easier...that's it. From time to time I ask you to carry my stuff but does that really justify all your obvious faults?

You just have to always have the most expensive drink despite knowing my wallets cries every time I take you out. And whenever I bring you to school there's always the little freshman girl who ogles over you and then I have to talk about how great you are and how you're always on my side (lies!).

When I first met you, you were wonderful, perfect, nothing I could ever complain about - you were so much better than the last one. But now, almost fours years later, you're really starting to let yourself go.

You grumble, nag, and complain every time I take you out, You don't even have the guts to voice it out loud, you just whisper your complaints, knowing that I will turn down the radio so I can hear what's the matter. Then you decide that you won't tell me what the problem is, you'd rather leave me guessing, trying day in and day out to figure why you act like you do.

When my mom first introduced me to you long all those years ago, I knew you were going to be mine, and when you became mine, I was elated to begin my journey with you, but the honeymoon's over. You know how to push my buttons alright, make me hate you, but you don't care because you know at the end of the day...

I love you.

...now take me to tonights grad party you whore

And the Countdown Begins

Hey guys, I haven't done a post about what's been going on in my life for quite some time now so here we go.

Today was my last full day of high school ever. From now until graduation next Thursday it's going to be senior finals and our Senior picnic. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm almost done with school. It really is an end of an era, thirteen years of work has all built up to this event. I've already done most of my finals since AP classes took their finals back in May so we're forced to do a "culminating activity" because watching a movie doesn't count apparently.

Graduating is bittersweet really. Since we got our yearbooks, every time I signed one, I would think back to all the great times I had with that person and feel sad that in all likelihood, I will rarely ever, or even never see that person again. Some of these people I have known since elementary school and while we have made a pact to stay in touch and visit each other, all those other friends don't have as concrete of a future contact-wise. I've accepted that this will be the end of the road for many of my friendships but there are a few people who I really hope I won't lose contact with, no matter how long we don't see each other.

But I guess I should focus on the positives. It's a time to celebrate, all my hard work had paid off - I'm going to college, there is a string of graduation parties coming up, and my friend who moved to Florida two years ago is coming up for a visit and we're having a welcome back party complete with Indian food.

I don't want to make another cheesy metaphor about life so I'll just end it here. Summer is coming up soon and so far I know I'll be going on a two week cruise to Alaska this year so that should be an adventure.

All the best,

JP

Five Parts Gin, One Part Vermouth...

Friday nights in the city see many an office secretary, lawyer, sales person and even teacher go out on the town for a drink. Things start out civil, and by 11 or so, most have gone home to bed for a well deserved day of not-work the morning after. Stick around a little longer however and you see quite an amazing sight.

With the moon high and the bars finally closing, the pressed and polished descend upon the streets once again, but this time a little less inhibited than before.

There's your eighth grade history teacher laughing up a storm at another unfunny joke

Over there's the library assistant twirling down the streets as if she were in some Disney movie remake.

And inevitably, around the corner is the poor pencil-pusher whose raring to pick a fight with the next person to walk by and have the misfortune of making eye contact with him.

With college around the corner and the inevitable parties soon to follow, I've come to wonder- what kind of hidden personality will come up as the drinks go down? I don't really drink. If anything, I've had a few cups of champagne over the holidays. Hard liquor is still a relative mystery to me, and beer, well let's just say it's an acquired taste, and at the moment at least, something I don't particularly subscribe to.

When the time comes however and the little devil on my shoulder defeats my common sense, I want to know what kind of person I will end up being.

Will I be the happy drunk that suddenly is best friends with the random stranger in the corner?

Or will I be the angry drunk, pissing and moaning about how there's one too many stripes on your favorite sweater and making sure the whole world knows about it?

Maybe I'll end up being the crazy drunk that ends up climbing on random pieces of furniture in my underwear claiming to conquer new lands for the British Empire.

I could just end up being the sleepy drunk that just collapses on the sofa and sleeps until the next afternoon.

Then again, I could end up being like some undiscovered specie, with behaviour so radical that men in white lab coats will be taking notes on my every move.

Well, time will tell how I will turn out, but if you see me stumbling around the streets of D.C. late at night one day, leave a comment telling me what type of drunk I am, 'cause I'll probably not remember the morning after.

JP