(8)Its the end of the world as we know it(8)

Alrighty, the end of blogaday. I really haven't felt like writing for the past while, which explains why I've been floundering for the last long time. Well, I'm finally ending it. Not with a philosophical masterpiece, but with answers to questions, cause Marissa suggested that, and cause I'm too lazy to think of anything cool to write about for now.

Jason asked: "Are you homosexual?"

Answer: No..... just no. That's wrong on so many levels. No.

Anonymous asked: "What kind of girls are you interested in?"

Answer: Cute modest smart athletic mormon girls. That's not asking too much is it? It seems as it is, but I'm not backing down. Perhaps I'll be lonely the rest of my life. In fact, chances are I will be. Oh well.

Marissa, Nick, and Jason asked: "Who do you like?"

Answer: Good question chaps. One that I have about 12 different answers to, each as valid as the last. It's one of those things that I just don't quite know about. Needless to say, there is no new wonder girl that has suddenly popped into my life that I am enamored with.

Whatever, I guess I'll explain the last couple months of lady-business. So, during the summer, a couple weeks before school started again I started liking Marissa again. Well, I thought this was pretty bad news. First off, she had just stopped liking me, after a long time of liking me, and from the looks of things, she pretty much thought I was a loser at this point. And then, there was the whole deal of facing my boys, who would most likely string me up and try to purge the evil spirits from me.

So, I'm like "Alright, I'll hold off, hide underneath a rock till school starts, and then I'll meet some amazing new girl, and I won't have to tell Marissa that I like her and have her tell me I'm stupid, and the boys won't ban me from all future halo parties. Score." So, by this point I really did for sure like Marissa, but I wasn't gonna do anything about it, because it was just gonna be a messy situation if I did.

so, school comes around without me making a fool of myself, and that's good. So, I go questing to find somebody to like. Yeah, that search was fruitless. My algebra class looked like the best possibility, but all the girls either wouldn't talk to me, or only talked to me when they needed help with math. So, I kept on questing. All this while I still like Marissa.

Then one day, I pull a squints, yell "I can't take it anymore!" and tell Marissa that I like her. That turned out better than could have been expected, but she definitely didn't like me. So, that was just the way things were, so I went back to daily normal life, same old same old. I still liked her, and I knew that she'd never like me again, just because of what had happened.

And, that's the way things stand today. I do like Marissa, but I don't know if you can call it that. I know that there's no hope, y'all don't have to remind me of that one;). Things are alright though. I'm alright with things the way they are, I'm not gonna jump off a building or anything. This leaves me free other fun things and not worry about girls. See, normal guys have to be like "Hmm, I wonder if the girl I like likes me" Whereas me, I can just say "Yep, definitely no" and go on with life, and devise cunning plans to make an awesome ultimate frisbee team instead of cunning plans to trick girls into liking me. It's a good situation.

So, who do I like? When you say it that way, it sounds like there's hope involved, so nobody really. Who do I still miss, and kinda wish things were different? Marissa. I know things won't be different, no need to go hide under a rock. But hey, you all asked, so you got my emotional rant. This should teach you a valuable lesson kids, never ask Thatcher who he likes.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody, it's been a good day:D

Blogaday day 7

Alright, this isn't a real post. I'm asking for another day to finish this, cause I feel pretty poo-ey right now. My throat hurts, and I think I'm getting sick. This wasn't helped by playing Frisbee in my slacks and 50's shirt in the cold. Inhaling most of a full sized ceiling tile didn't help either. It's a long story, one that I'm sure I'll forget about before you'll ask. So, go read my other stuff, I'm not ready for the last blogaday. Sorry chilluns.

11:17 - I'm out.

Blogaday Day 6!!!

That's right, day 6. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6! None of this wussing out of the blogaday action, oh no, its day 6, and I got one more day to go. There are some who doubted, I'll admit I was sceptical myself. But today, I can't help but feel like the luckiest man alive.

Do I have anything to write about tonight? Abolutely not. I got one bag of nothing. An empty bag in fact. And it's a big bag. None of this small bag crap, oh no, it's huge. Monstrous even.

So what is the solution? I've got to write something. I can't just say that I've got nothing to write, then post it, that wouldn't be ethical. And here I am, waiting for something to strike my brain, something to inspire me to write. It's 11:28, and I got nothing.

11:30, still nothing.


11:33, a good nothin'

11:35, still nothing, but those 2 minutes went by faster than the last couple.

11:37, inspiration hits. Maybe its not inspiration, maybe it's desperation, but I got something, and I'm running with it.

Things I want:

A job
some .9 graphite
an ultimate frisbee league
Andrew to either live here, or me to live in Logan with him and Nathan
A haircut
Some nice ball shoes


Alright, that idea got old fast.

11:40, desperation fails, back to the drawing board.

11:41: "Why are things the way they are? Why, because if they were any other way, we would be asking ourselves why are things the way they are, totally ignorant of the way that things might be if they weren't different."

11:42: that wasnt half as cool as I wanted it to be.

11:45: Im running out of ways to say that there is absolutely nothing worth writing in my head.

11:49 - entertained, but still nothing. "Walker told me I have AIDS" - Haley Joel Osmond

11:50 - I want to go to bed. I have a chemistry test tomorrow, and hopefully an ultimate frisbee pickup game. I will finish though!

11:51 - I need to go running!

11:52 - Halfway through writing that last one, the time changed to 11:52. So, is it 11:51, or 11:52, I just don't know.

11:54 - 2 wrongs don't make a right. But 3 lefts do.

11:57 - Steph took me driving today in the church parking lot. That was fun.

11:58 - I feel like Bizz.

12:01 - there are some people that you just think "wow, I wanna be like that guy" Austin Tallkid is one of those guys.

12:02 - exit human contact

12:03 - loneliness sets in.

12:03 again - Im gonna go test and stuff, brb.

12:10 - I tested, and I was 103. Thats perfect, that made me rather happy. So I did 25 units of Novolin, ate a banana, and drank a cup of milk. Now here I am, more ready for bed.

12:11 - This is kind of fun, I ought to do this more often.

12:13 - whoohoo, ninja pajamas!

12:14 - just cleaned up my backpack, and Ima go brush my teeth.

12:16 - Boy are my teeth clean.

Alright, I think it's time for me to head towards the bed. Tonight has been a good night though. I took it easy after school, practiced some frisbee fundamentals. I finally got the left hand classic down alright. I can at least make it go without floundering too much. I went out to eat with the family, got to go driving with Steph, studied some chem, wrote a worthless blog, and got to talk to an old friend I never talk to. It's been a nice night.

I'm really excited for Track to start. I'm excited for Thanksgiving, I'm excited for frisbee on friday with brad, I'm excited to go to sleep soon. I'm excited to finish the BOM, I'm excited to dress up tomorrow. I'm excited for my Chem test. I am excited for the future.

12:20 - My sister is snoring like a walrus.

So, stuff will be good. It's day 6, and I made it. Maybe this is worthless, but maybe it brings me one step closer to the weeklong goal. I hope it's been fun, I kind of enjoyed writing it. Have a nice day everybody, I wish you the best in all your endeavors.

12:21 - Christopher Thatcher.......out

Blogaday day 5!!!

Whee, one more day down, about a million left to go! Yay! I love Sundays, they are the very best.

Anyways, todays topic is an old one, but I think that it is a very important one. What is the difference between an A paper, and a B paper? What is the difference between a 5:30 mile, and a 6:30 mile? What is the difference between a cool girl, and an amazing girl? What is the difference between a respected individual, and an individual not worthy of respect? What is the line that seperates the amazing and the amazed?

The line is a bold one, and there is often very little confusion as to which side one belongs to. The great seperating factor is effort. When one puts forth an honest effort, he exalts himself above those around them, draws himself to a higher sphere, and becomes something greater than what he was before.

Likewise, when one does not put forth an effort, he agrees to wallow in the mud of defeat, and be trodden upon by those willing to fight for what they want.

Every day in fitness for life we run. Generally we run 6 laps inside, 3 of which have to be jogged. The other 3 can be walked if you'd like, it's up to you. Every day in fitness for life, I run all 6 laps, and I run them pretty fast. I'm capable of running them all fast because of Cross Country, I enjoy doing it, and it's good training for the mile. It's nowhere near a mile long, but I need speed training, so I try to run it fast. I assume that people think that I'm stupid for doing so, that i'm a buttkiss, and a square, but I don't mind so much. I am everyday appalled at the lack of effort being put forth. As I run my laps, I see 90% of the class walking it. Not jogging slow, not putting forth any effort at all, just walking it. They are content to walk 2 laps in the time I can run 6, and then call it good and return to the gym.

Now, what consequences does this bring to them? I can tell you, absolutely none. Their grade is the same as mine, they get credit for it no matter what they do. Some are proud of it, some don't feel anything about it, it's just something to do. So why do I run, and they walk? Why don't I walk too?

I believe that every day we have an oppurtunity to learn and to grow. We are faced with choices every few minutes, and what we do with them adds up to make us the people that we are today, we all know that. However, I believe that every time we choose to not put forth an effort, a part of us dies. Not a large part, but a small part of us. I don't know where this part comes from, but I think that it's there. When we put forth an effort we become greater people. Every time we do, we grow a little bit more. After a lifetime of effort, books are written about us. After a lifetime of nothing, nobody cares, and the prisons are one inmate less crowded.

Last time I clocked a mile, i ran a 5:22. Zack Sievert beat me by a couple seconds, I think he got 5:18. I can guarantee that today I can kick his butt. Zack has alot more physical talent than I do, he always has. I've known him for a long time, we grew up in the same ward, and he was always good at all the sports, and I was always good at anything that required my brain. We are all born with individual gifts, we all know that. Zack was born with more physical talent than I was, and that was apparent all through our childhoods. At the end of 9th grade, he could still run faster than me, partly because he tried harder, and partly because of his talent.

Well, it's 10th grade now, and by all means he ought to run alot faster than me. He doesn't put forth an effort. I put forth alot of effort in Cross country, and now I can beat him, I'm sure of it. Does that matter? No, not to anybody but me.

Pleadingly I ask that you all put forth your effort at everything you do. The difference between the common man and the Hero lies only in the effort put forth. Each of us has the potential and power within us to change the history of the world, but the percentage of people that do that is alarmingly low. It's hard to change the world, but it's always possible. We are faced with choices every day, to do things the easy way, or to do them the right way. It's up to you, to be amazing, or to sit back and be amazed.

The choice is yours, take it.

Blogaday day 4!!!

I gotta tell you, I didn't think I'd make it this far. It's day 4, only 3 more days to go.

You know, I really love my family. They're just amazing. I went camping yesterday, and since my dad is the scout master, he went too. Me, him and braeden were in one car, and all the other guys were in the other car. As we drove up, me and my dad talked about alot of stuff, most of which was seriously nerdy. We talked about smelting, then water purification systems, and then nuclear waste. When we got to our campsite, we learned that the other car had talked about the importance of claiming your farts on scout camp the whole time. The whole time..... My dad is a super smart guy, which is pretty cool, cause you get to have nerdy conversations with him. It made me appreciate him alot.

Anyways, I wanna talk about nuclear waste, because I think it's important.

I am not too well read on this subject. I don't know exactly what nuclear waste can do. Im not sure what it looks like, but from what I understand, it's pretty bad news. Radioactive stuff generally is. Nobody wants it, which is why it's such an issue.

Alot of people want to ship nuclear waste to Utah and have us bury it here. There are a couple reasons for this. The first and foremost is that we have alot of empty space. There are places in the state where you can bury the waste and nobody would be around to complain about it, there's just lost of space. Another reason is our relative lack of rain. We're a desert people, and that means less water to run around and spread the bad stuff. We've got a primo setup to accept all this waste, but the politicians are against it.

Nuclear waste is dangerous stuff, I gotta give them that. They say that if we start to accept all this junk, we'll become the nations dumping ground. They think that this will have a negative connotation, and that nobody will want to come to Utah. It'll hurt tourism, and make everybody think we're lame trashbags.

And so there is a rift here. Industry wants to send the waste here, and the state politicians say no dice. Since the politicians have more power, it doesn't get done. Our governor recently said that he'd veto anything that came by proposing that stuff. He totally axed a proposal to let envirocare accept more waste. He was very stubborn about it, and seemed pretty confident that he had made the right choice.

See, I don't know much about our governor, but when I saw that on the news I lost nearly all respect I had for the guy. That letter we got from him for nerds? Yeah, it's worthless now.

I think that we ought to accept the nuclear waste, and bury the crap out of it. I do not see any valid reasons why we shouldn't. We have a near perfect set up in this state for it. It is safe here, which it isn't right now. Right now it is sitting scattered across the country by the plants that use it, and its just chillin. Which is preferred, a bunch of spent uranium rods sitting buried in the west desert, or a bunch of spent uranium rods hanging out by some plant in new jersey? If something were to happen at all those local storage facilities, alot of people would be in danger of some seriously bad stuff happening. If anything happened in the west desert, a couple of coyotes might lose a little fur over it. The stuff is safe here, thats why they want to send it here. Right now it is dangerous, and we could eliminate alot of that danger.

Honestly, there is a reason that envirocare does what it does. They make that crap safe. They go crazy over it. They don't bury when it's not safe, and they make sure they bury it right, with the right stuff on top of it, to the sides of it, and underneath it. They make it safe for us. Why wouldn't we want them to do that with everything else? The governor is saying that he would rather endanger the people of Oklahoma with low level radioactive waste than allow envirocare to bury it, making it safe for everyone. Does anyone see the logic in that?

Letting us accept nuclear waste would bring alot of money to the state, potentially more than we would lose in tourism. I think that in the 1950s, we would have stood more to lose than we do now. Despite everything I've said about everybody being stupid, I think that the level of intelligence, and the level of information getting passed around to everyone is high enough that people would understand what's going on. Sure there'd be idiots that wouldn't come here to ski, but most people would appreciate what we're doing for the country. I don't think we'd lose all that much tourism. If Utah gets a negative connotation for accepting nuclear waste, so be it. Everybody calls us the Mormon state, why not add Nuclear waste land to the list of things to call us?

Politicians argue that since Utah doesn't produce any nuclear waste, we shouldn't have to accept it. That is true, it's not necessarily our responsibility. Its not endangering us now, why should we have to import their junk? It's their problem, not ours.

I can understand that attitude, I've felt the same way. However, I've always been raised believing that when we have the power to help someone else out, we should do it, even if we don't stand to gain anything from it. Utah is in a position to help the country out, and nobody is holding a gun to our head telling us we have to. Accepting the waste makes the world a safer place, so what if we lose a few dollars in tourism? We can help, we ought to help. I think that the politicians of the state are being pretty stupid about this. I'm sure they know alot of fun secrets that I don't know, I'd be happy to sit down and hear about them, maybe they could change my mind. But based on what I know now, I am pretty upset that we continue to prevent this from happening. Why wait until people start growing 3rd arms to do something about the problem? Get it out of there, and get it here, where it's not gonna do any damage.

Maybe I'm wrong, maybe you think I'm an idiot. If so, leave a comment telling me so. If you agree with me, leave a comment telling me why, c'mon, it'll be fun.

Blogaday day 3!!

Wow, it's 4:22 PM, approximately 13 hours after my last post. I am going crazy with this sleep deprivation. It feels like my glasses are on, my eyes really think they're there, but they're not, so they keep wigging out. I fall asleep every couple minutes, just kinda fall. Good crap, insane business. Note to self: Get more sleep.

So, I'm about to leave on a scout camp, and that's why I'm writing right now instead of later tonight. I'm pretty excited for the camp, despite my grumblings. At least I get to play frisbee, and even if I have to play by myself, it'll be good. I'm trying to work my left hand, so i can be ambidextrous. That'd make me super dangerous in a real game. Last night I played for about 20 minutes by myself, just tossing it from one side of the lawn, chasing it down, then tossing it back. My left got to be alright, it was pretty cool. So, I'm gonna go play frisbee for the next day, I'll be back around 12, oompah.

So, on to some philosophy.

I feel old. Today my body feels like its about 80, but that's not really what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the way I am. I swear that I was born old. In 8th grade Briahna told me that I had to act like a kid more often, but I haven't. I'm not sad about that at all, I just find it interesting. There are some people that can run around and not worry about a thing. They can fail every class, and be happy with things. They can yell at their mom, then go do a cartwheel in the front yard. They can kiss 2 girls in one day, while yelling at their mom and carthwheeling. See, I can't do that. Not only because I can't cartwheel, but because that's just not how I am. I don't think that's right, so I don't do it.

It's interesting how some people are like that. Predetermined ideas that we cling to for dear life. Everyone has different ones, but for sure, everybody has them. I seem to have more of them than most people, but that doesn't bother me too much. For example, my theory that baseball sucks. Now, have I ever really played a game of baseball? No, not really, it's too hard, I can't hit the ball. Have I ever sat down and watched a game? Nah, not really. However, I can still argue that baseball sucks. Why? Because sometime in my past, that idea got ingrained in my head. Maybe it was from my dad telling me that baseball sucks, maybe it was cause it was always on when I wanted simpsons to be on. Either way, sometime in my life I picked that up, and its hard to let it go. Maybe somebody will never cook in stainless steel, because they got burnt once as a kid, now they use teflon or something.

Look for these things, but don't make a deal out of them. Find your own, and ponder them. See if they still hold true now, and if they don't, think about getting rid of them. Last night I really enjoyed that harry potter movie, it was way good. However, I had that predetermined idea that harry potter movies suck cause they can't beat the book, and beacuse they're popular and promote illiteracy. Yeah, so I gave that up last night, look at me go. I feel 10 years younger already.

That's it for today folks, sometimes its not people's fault they're stubborn and stupid, sometimes thats just how they were raised, and they havent got around to fixing it.

Toodles, wish me luck on camp.

Blogaday day 2

Hello, it is 3:20 AM, I just got back from Harry Potter 4, and they did a super great job on it. I liked the movie alot. I was a little worried when the dancing communists came in, but we'll talk about that tomorrow in my other blog.

Im mostly doing this so I can say I blogged today, however, I have some important questions to make this worth while.

Is a person without fears and insecurities really a person?

Is it really not worth doing something if you don't do your best?

Do we truly with to be understood, or misunderstood so we can be pitied?

That's all I've got for now, dont put too much thought into them, they dont mean anything. I write more tomorrow, g'night.

Blogaday day 1!!!

wow, this blogaday stuff is tough! It's the first day, and I definitely have nothing up in my noggin. No philosophy, no huge complaints..... my head is just there right now. However, I will do my best.

Inside out

Nah, this has nothing to do with emotions, its about administration. Today as I walked home from school, I was dreaming alot about frisbee. Usually I dream about other stuff, sometimes about science, whatever. But today I dreamed about frisbee, and boy do I have some great ideas for the future. As I walked though, I saw a sign that said "No excuses, invest in public education" or something to that effect. I thought to myself "Duh, the budget is so screwed up anyways, it woulnd't do much good if we poured money into the system. The budget gets abused and messed with all over the place, Sharpe and Brough would end up spending the new money all by themselves. They ought to let me be in charge of that business, I'd clean it up, and I'd do this... this, and this."

Now, at this point I stopped myself, because I realized that I was doing something that I really don't like at all, insideout management. See, people on the outside are able to look in on systems, be they systems in nature, systems set up by man, or whatever systems you want, and say "Boy, I could make that a whole lot better." Sometimes this does work, but more often than not, it fails miserably. These people have good intentions, but do not fully understand the system, and oftentimes they cannot.

Example: My Algebra teacher. She tries as hard as she can to teach us the stuff that we need to know to get past her class. She really does try, and generally she does an alright job, I don't have too many complaints. However, she is not a student, and thus doesn't know exactly how our brains work. She was a student once, but people forget, and I believe she has. She, as well as the other Algebra II teacher, have this crazy new age idea of teaching us. They use groups, posters, and all sorts of crazy hippy ideas. They are the polar opposites of Mrs. Jamieson.

These hippy ideas do actually look great on paper. Just sitting there thinking about it, it looks really great. And then, you get to the classroom and the whole thing collapses. It just doesn't work. Why not?

Because it is built on theory, theory that is built up by people that are outside the system. Everyone has certain beliefs about other humans. I have them, you've got them, Kyle has them. Everyone has different beliefs, and generally they aren't all that accurate. That's why this stuff doesn't work. In order to get truly functional management, you need to have management from inside the system.

A few months ago I really wanted to be a kindergarten teacher for a week. My sister teaches kindergarten at a charter school, and I thought about all the awesome stuff I could teach kids if you just gave me a week. I thought of all the activities I could do, all the problem solving I'd make them do, all the cool puzzles I'd make them think about to get. I thought it'd be so cool, I would make a generation of super kindergartners, and the world would be mine.

Yeah, then I realized that I've got no freakin' idea what I'm talking about. Do you know how long it's been since i've been in kindergarten? I don't remember that stuff. I was basing my ideas on the 10th grade me. I was stupid, and so is everybody else.

Insideout management is not half as effective as management from inside the system. That is why administrators that havent ever been teachers generally don't make very good admins.

Now, this brings up a very touchy subject for me: Government getting involved in entertainment. Specifically video games. Earlier this year there was a very big scandal over a GTA game because it had some explicit content in there that wasn't appropriate at all. People got upset, that is understandable. However, lame politicians (Hilary Clinton) saw this as an oppurtunity to further their career, and immediately set about writing up legislation to force the video game industry to be responsible or something.

You know what, I doubt she's ever played Halo. She doesn't know why we play halo. I bet she's convinced we all are honestly playing that game to take out our anger, and that we get crazy ideas from the game, like taking a plasma pistol to school and shooting robert while he sleeps. And so, because everybody thinks that Halo nuts are all gonna grow up and use a battle rifle to take out politicians, they freak out, and try to get rid of it. The problem is, they don't understand it, and they are supported by the voters that don't understand it either. Looking from the outside in, Halo does look bad. C'mon, you run around shooting each other. There's nothing wholesome about it, it's all out battle. People get into it, I get into it. So, looking from far away, it looks bad, and then you say "It's bad, lets further our career by taking it out, it'll be easy." Then lazy voters say "Ooooh, that does look bad, the newspaper said so, lets support the ideas!" Then, people from outside the system take control of it, and destroy it.

Those inside the system are really the only ones that can fully understand the system. I'm not for anarchy, I'm not for getting rid of teachers, I just don't think that they should impose things on us that they think will be amazing but prove not to be. Theory doesn't translate well from paper to humanity, we're too complex. We are too crazy to have any statement really apply to everybody. "Kids learn best from teaching others" doesn't apply to some kids. Some kids don't learn well by doing hands on stuff.

Don't do insideout management. End the madness, and support local Halo.

Blogaday is coming soon. I'm gonna do a philosoblog once a day for a week. I will start that tomorrow, right now, I just need a good place to upload this super cool Tupper-symbol to, so here it is. There's your update, expect something great tomorrow. Christopher Thatcher -out-