I experienced an odd feeling today. I was sore from head to toe from running, jumping, kicking, diving, and falling during kickball yesterday, but, I loved it. It felt oddly good. Of course, I am certainly not saying I want to feel this sore every day. I guess I enjoyed it because I still feel highly energized. This whole fatigue thing is so difficult to comprehend, even for me, but one thing that is absolute is that since I decided these past couple weeks to renew myself, I have felt absolutely amazing and I plan on staying this way. It upsets me somewhat to think that I let myself digress. The way I felt one month ago and how I feel today are completely opposite.
Anyway...today was recovery day from yesterday. After work, I pretty much rested my oddly good feeling pains. I am off tomorrow (Thursday), and will hopefully get my car registered and try to get insurance squared away fast.

I finally revamped the music on my ipod. Every time I tried to clear the music from it, it would not do it, but this time it worked. I cleared everything, then spent a couple hours going through all my tunes to get what I wanted on there. I will add more over the next week or so and create playlists so I can finally listen to what I want. There was a ridiculous amount of stuff I did not care for before.

That was essentially my entire day. Really not a ton going on right now. I want to find a way to record the song I wrote last year so I can upload it and share it. I never wanted to show anyone, but now maybe around 20 people have heard it and they all really liked it, plus I promised a friend I would give her a copy when I did. Hopefully soon.

It's on my mind right now, so the Song of the Day is "Manamana" by: The Muppets.

Holy cow, it's already 1 am and I had such an awesome day I have to type super fast so I can get it all in before I'm way way past bedtime (too late!).

First story, I went to bed at 10 last night and got up at 6:30 for work. I did wake up at 2 and had to use the facilities (keepin' it appropriate cuz I know Amelia and mom read), but it was a good rest last night.

Second story. At work I was making a crab salad with some imitation crab. I had latex gloves on as I was loading the crab in a mixer onto the mixing machine. As I pushed the mixing paddle into place, it snagged on my glove and tore a small piece off that fell into the crab (or, krab as the imitation meat is spelled). My mouth dropped and my eyes widened in a classic cartoon style as I realized the latex glove and the imitation crab were pretty much the EXACT same color. I spent the next 20 minutes going through the krab piece by piece until, thankfully, I finally found the piece of glove. It was a rare, but hilarious occurrence...though had I not found the glove it may have been less funny.

Third story. I was invited by friends to play kickball today, so I clocked out of work, changed and went and played kickball for an hour. It was so much fun and running around felt so good. I had a blast and we are already looking to schedule some ultimate frisbee and more kickball.

Final story. Straight from kickball, I went and picked up a friend we work with whose birthday it was and we made a birthday dinner for her. It's pretty much only the 3rd or 4th time cooking on our ghetto stove and guess-the-temp oven (the numbers are worn from the dial so we guess). I made island pork with coconut rice. I thought the spice rub was too salty, but Myles and the girl disagreed. I'm still changing it to have less salt. The rice was great though. Dessert was cookie's and cream pie, which is perhaps the best chocolate pie we've ever had. It is SUPER simple to make and absolutely chalked full of rich chocolatey goodness. I usually don't reveal my sources for recipes, but I want EVERYONE who reads this blog to go make one of these pies. We usually undercook it a bit so the inside is still super wet and gooey, but I would make it right once before trying that. Here it is:

http://www.thebudgetdiet.com/cookies-and-cream-pie 

End of stories, but I have news to share. My friend Evan Rogler announced his engagement today. I am super excited for him! It is especially pleasing because he set me up on a date without telling me with this other girl who liked him because she is best friends with the girl he liked and wanted to take out without the other one knowing. Now, over half a year later, the girl he wanted to take out is his fiancee!

Song of the Day is about sleep because I'm behind on it tonight. It is "I Need Some Sleep" by: Eels and appears in Shrek 2.

For some reason when I get home from work a lot I feel sick. That happened today, so I'm going to do what I've wanted to do for months now. I'm going to bed at 10. It won't be that hard since I worked 11 hours today (I was scheduled for 8, but we had work that had to get done).

Today, I'll just leave with you with a video from my favorite duo of John Schmidt and Steven Sharp Nelson. I hope the beautiful scenery and the phenomenal music in the video help you all have an enjoyable Tuesday.

So the other night when I was bragging about being in bed earlier, I ended up being up for longer than I should have. Thus, tonight, I have to be really quick about this so I can be asleep before midnight. That gives me 40 minutes from this moment to write, brush my teeth, wash my face, pray, and count those sheep. I count slow, so I gotta hurry!!

I wanted to share a few things today. First, Happy Earth Day. I stumbled across a really neat video you may have heard of. It's called "One Day on Earth". Some guys wanted to get video filmed in every country in the world on one day and make a film out of it. I watched the trailer for it and it looked really inspiring. I want to see the film. It is awe inspiring to actually see video from all around the world filmed around the same time. Here are some links if you wanna check it out:

http://www.onedayonearth.org/
http://news.yahoo.com/one-day-earth-most-international-movie-premiere-ever-140219959.html

Second, I cleaned for 4 hours today. I used to clean my apartment all the time, but since I moved to Logan, I have not. Weird as it may sound, cleaning relaxes me and contributes a lot to how I feel. Right now, I feel pretty good. In my cleaning, I put away my winter gear and unpacked all my summer clothes. It has been unseasonably warm this week and there will be ups and downs for sure, but I am ready for the summer now.

Blogging more and cleaning are part of my quest, if you will, for renewing my energy and restoring myself to a full, happy lifestyle. I have lots of things I used to do that I am working towards doing again to get back to the great lifestyle I had a year ago. If you noticed, I changed my Facebook profile to a picture of me back in Provo. This picture was taken almost exactly one year ago, right before I headed down to the resort. I loved my life one year ago and I really want to be the guy in this picture again.

I'm down to a half hour before I have to be asleep so it's time to pick the Song of the Day. Today, I have a good song that kind of says how I've felt up until recently. It's "Some Days are Diamonds" sung by: John Denver. In how I feel, I refer particularly to the following lines:

The long week continued today. The dag-blasted sun rises I swear at like 5 am. I woke up to the morning light shining on my face at about 6:30. I did not work until 8. I did not plan on waking up until 7:30. Once I was awake, I had to pee, so I had to go relieve myself in order to try to sleep again...but, I kept waking up every 10 minutes, so the morning was miserable.

Work itself was not too bad. I kept busy most of the day. I do have an interesting story to tell. I made some shredded chicken today for some luau type party. We added some pineapple to it to make it "Hawaiian" and put it in the warmer to, well, stay warm. That was just before noon. So, tonight, they come and get their chicken, only to return a few minutes later with a cup full of gravy. Turns out, it was not gravy. The liquid in the cup was the chicken. Somehow, either the enzymes in the pineapple or perhaps the chemical they use to preserve the fresh cut fruit with broke the proteins down and all that remained was a liquid. The chicken literally disintegrated from nice, tender, shredded pieces to a gross looking, almost puke quality goop. I thought it was cool.

I'm doing a bit better tonight on getting to sleep. It's not yet midnight (though will be when I click post) and I may be asleep soon. Tomorrow I work at 8 again but I'm the only catering cook (I won't call myself a chef) there. Jeff and Chef of the Year Corey are going down to showcase the meal that won him Chef of the Year (a story I have not yet shared on the blog) on the local news.

I swear I had something else to share but I cannot think at all right now, so I'll just stop trying.

Song of the Day is an indie hit released last year that was launched into the spotlight by that annoying show Glee and has now become a major hit, it's "We Are Young" by Fun.

Ok, so, last night, I added the Song of the Day to the playlist, but, since Myles was sleeping across the room, I only briefly listened to the song to make sure it was the right one. What was funny is that I had a feeling that something was wrong, but after listening to the intro, which was correct, I figured it was the right song. Well, earlier today, I got on the blog and all of a sudden some stupid rap came on instead of "Take on Me"...Don't know or care what wannabe rappers it was, but I apologize. I did not listen to it all, but I hope there was no foul language in it. Given this little mishap, I have opted to play the real "Take on Me" for the song of the day today, and, of course, it is dedicated to the same person.

Other than that, today was busy at work, and I did not play volleyball. I was too tired. I know...lame.

I did, however, play a good prank. Chef of the Year Corey and I joke about Chef Jeff's age (he's actually not that old, but we do it anyway). So, we wanted to edit an old timey picture and make it look like Jeff. We then had it printed on some glossy, thick paper, and framed it at work. Here is the picture. The editing is rough, but it's still hilarious!



Alrighty, this is the Colonel singing off until tomorrow.

Laughter truly is the best medicine, and, I swear some people might think the world is coming to an end to hear me, of all people, saying this, but...smiling really does make things better.

It's been a rough past month what with illness and other things, but I have been trying to make a very real effort to get out, have fun, and stop loafing around the house feeling like bleh. Now that my appetite has returned and I don't feel too bad, I am trying to do some hiking and maybe do some sports. Tonight though, I had a blast going over to the Cache Vally Fun Park (which is just a block down from us) for some classic skating. Usually, Tuesdays are 80s night, but, this week, I saw on Facebook it was Prom Night themed and you'd get in free with any formal dress...so, me, Myles, and a girl from work, who, for the sake of her privacy, shall remain nameless, dressed up and went. We got in free and even got skate rentals free, but apparently no one else knew it was supposed to be Prom Night and were in their 80s garb. It was a blast though and we saw some other people we work with and said hello. After skating, we watched some tv episodes in the theater. The night was just what I needed, and, for all you haters out there, I smiled.

Tomorrow, which is actually today for those of you reading (it's Wednesday), I'm going to play some volleyball at the institute building on campus. That will hopefully be really fun as well.

It's a long week at work, so I best get to sleep now. Super busy day tomorrow...er...today.

Song of the day is an 80s hit by Aha, it's "Take on Me" and is dedicated to our friend who suggested we go skating in the first place...she likes 80s music.

Not a ton of super exciting things going on right now, but I'm super busy nonetheless.

Today, I worked 10 hours (was only supposed to be 9 but I accidentally stayed until 5 when I was actually done at 4), filed and paid my taxes (which were actually completed at the end of January but because I owed money this year I decided to procrastinate for a couple months), got a blue cover to go over the red of my phone (and to prevent the little rascal from slipping out of my hands as it frequently does), and started trying to redefine a healthy lifestyle for myself that encompasses the physical, the mental, the emotional, and, the one that makes the biggest difference, the spiritual (I don't really have a comment to go with this but figured I'd be consistent and put something in parentheses).

If I had to offer a piece of advice to you today, I would say this: make sure you are properly having your taxes withheld so you do not get a surprise tax bill the following year, and if you do owe, file as soon as you can so paying it off is easier. As they say, if you think no one cares about you, try not paying your taxes one year...

Oh, today we signed off on a new loan on what was formerly my sister's Ford Explorer that I've been driving for just shy of a year now so that she has no debt and can submit her mission papers and so that the car is now mine. Lots of crazy stuff has gone on with this car but everything settled into place the past couple weeks and worked itself out.

Things are stressful financially still, but I have a vision of eliminating my debt and starting savings this summer and I think I can really accomplish that.

I gotta get to sleep here...I am trying to get to bed earlier but Hogan's Heroes and this kept me up tonight. Song of the Day is "Hallelujah" sung by Rufus Wainwright simply because it's a great mellow song to listen to and I want everyone to have a nice, mellow day, or at least a few moments of relaxation.

I came across this new video on Facebook today and I thought it was so awesome I had to share.