Happy New Year!

2007 is upon us. I hope everyone has their resolutions in order and their 2006 worries properly filed away. This year will be a great year for Jodi and I. This year we will add another member to our family (Lyric) and buy our first home. We will be drinking our sparkling grape juice and listening to Auld Lang Syne performed by the Glenn Miller Orchestra tonight while attempting to figure out what the song is supposed to be saying. We wanted to wish you all a very happy and safe new ye...

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Back-Up Camera

Maybe it takes a twisted sense of humor to notice these things. Maybe everyone who saw this product made this observation. I don't know which of these is true, but I thought that I'd share with you what I saw. I can just hear the voice-over advertisement: "Backing up a vehicle can be hazardous. Knowing your surroundings while in the driver's seat can be a guessing game that leaves you losing all too often. This year alone, over a million Americans could lose their lives under the rear tires of the family station wagon. However, using the latest technological innovations, VR3 has designed a new life-saving device specifically designed for...

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There's Music In My Veins

I'm sure that all of my blog readers know already that I love music. You all are privy to my past musical obsessions, my current musical hobbies, and the future American citizen that my wife and I are manufacturing who is to be named Lyric. What you may not know is that my family tree has been a'rockin' for quite some time.His name was John Davenport and although it turns out that he was my mother's step-father and not my mother's biological father and therefore no relation to me, I still count him as my grandfather. After all, I didn't even know that he wasn't my blood until I was in my later teens. And, of course, it made no difference to me...

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Merry Christmas!!!

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Fixed Photo

Here is an example of the power of GIMP! The puddle was a distraction to the natural beauty of the photo, so it got the boot. Thanks, GI...

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Picture Practice

Last night, my wife and I went to dinner with our friends, James and Jennie, at Thai House. The food was exquisite. The atmosphere was warm and inviting. The service was friendly. The owners were photographed with Don Johnson. It was a perfect meal.After dinner, we went downtown and took some photos in Jordan Valley Park. We took advantage of the endless background possibilities and took lots of pictures of ourselves in front of various things. Here is a picture without us in it that I thought turned out really nice. Minus the puddle.I'll use GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) to take that puddle out of the picture later. GIMP is basically...

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St. Louis Trip

This last Friday we ran to St. Louis to see Jodi's sister, Diana, graduate from Interior Design School. We stayed the night and hung out all day Saturday. We had a lot of fun. Although, I must warn you about something important, but not well known. If you stay anywhere near the business district right off I-55 don't expect to walk to a restaurant on the weekend. Apparently, while there are a large number of eateries in the area, they are all closed on Saturday. I'm not sure of the exact number of miles that we walked, but if we had walked straight from the hotel to the mall where we ate it would have been 1.4 miles one way. However, we...

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New Slideshow

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International Harvester

About two weeks ago a friend of Jodi's aunt brought over several large boxes full of clothes and had told us to go through them and take what we could use and give away or donate the rest. We got a couple shirts for Jacob out of the deal, but aside from that there wasn't much in our sizes. So, we passed on the fortune to several others. But before doing so Jodi did save one shirt that she recognized as an International shirt. No, the shirt hasn't traveled the world like those magic pants that managed to create a sisterhood. International. As in the manufacturer of diesel trucks. Her dad drove one at one point in time. So, she decided...

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Useless Information (part two)

S.O.S pads. Where did they come from? Well, hold on to your butts, because I'm about to tell you.It starts back in 1917 with a travelling door-to-door pot salesman named Edwin Cox. Yes, I said pot. But, he was selling pots to cook in, not marijuana. Now some of the pots that he sold may still be around today being used to cook meth in, but that's another story.As the story goes, Mr. Cox was a terrible salesman. For whatever reason, he just couldn't sell pots like the other pot salesmen who were making a great living. So, he decided that he needed a gimmick.Looking back at the very short complaint list that he had he realized that the most-popular...

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High School Reunion

Next summer is the summer of my ten-year high school reunion. I can and can't believe that it has been ten years. It's like there is really two parts of me. One heard that it had been ten years and dropped his jaw like Wile E. Coyote after seeing the Roadrunner run right through the rock with a picture of a tunnel painted on it. The other one just shrugged his shoulders and said, "yup." After all, a lot has happened to me since I was a young pup. First, I've grown wiser. Not to say, I'm wise, but I can definitely say that I WAS stupid and I'm not as stupid as I was. We all were, though. And, yet, I remember being smarter than the whole...

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Christmas Monkey

I've never worked at a company that have had one of those Christmas parties that you hear about where employees get drunk, lose their inhibitions, and wind up giving their bosses a wedgie or something. Instead, I work for SRC who has had such terrible outcomes to their outings that they purposefully set out to find the most "family-friendly" environments. This year's party was at the Family YMCA. They rented out the whole thing which was great for Jacob, but a little boring for Jodi and I. I'm too smart to get all energetic around my co-workers. If my boss sees me running around he'll know that I can physically work harder than I do and...

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Mall shoppin'

I'm afraid that it happened. I was walking through the Battlefield Mall today carrying a shopping bag. It was a very small shopping bag, but a shopping bag nonetheless. Jodi and I went there today to get a couple things. One of the things to obtain was this year's Christmas ornament. Jodi decided to start this tradition three years ago and purchase a neat new Christmas ornament every year. We would make this purchase together and we'd mark it someway with the year in which we got it. This year we got a very appropriately themed ornament. Pictured above, you'll see that this year's theme is home improvement. We just put in our first ever...

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3rd Yeariversary!

Yesterday was mine and Jodi's third yeariversary! We're really excited about it even though the day would've come and gone without our notice if it hadn't been for Jodi's sudden epiphany last night right before we went to sleep. But, either way it's still a momentous milestone in our lives.You know, it just dawned on me that maybe you don't know what a yeariversary is. It's the anniversary to the day we met. We would call it our Anniversary, but then people would get confused as to when we were married. And, saying, "It's our third anniversary to the day in which we met" is cumbersome and takes too long. Then, people ask who we met? You...

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Time to wake up...

I have a story from a long time ago that I thought I'd share with you. It all started with the transition from morning person to night owl. As a child I was always a morning person. I awoke before my whole family. I remember the mornings watching paid programming while I waited for the cartoons to start at 6:00 a.m.As a seventeen-year-old who had liberated himself from the restrictions of a parental monarchy (in other words: I moved out), I would stay up until I just couldn't stay up any longer. My friends were the same way. We would scoff at those who went to sleep as if sleeping were some obvious sign of weakness. Sleepers were a new...

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Cold Winter Chill

We definitely live in the Ozarks. Just in case you're not familiar with this region, there is a saying around here that goes a little something like this, "If you don't like the weather, just stick around for five minutes and it'll change." The last 48 hours have been a testimony of sorts to this truth. 48 hours ago it was 70 degrees and sunny. 24 hours ago it was in the 60's and perfect. Right now it is soaking wet and literally freezing with a forecast claiming that it'll just get colder. The Ozarks is really the only region in which you can suffer from sunburns with swimsuit tanlines and from frostbite at the same time.Anyhoo, it's 8:26...

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Big News!

YYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYY!!!!!!!! The impossible has happened! Jodi and I have been approved for a home loan!!! And at a pretty decent rate I might add. This was definitely God's doing, because we know it wasn't ours. I've worked pretty hard at my disreputable, un-credit-worthy image, and Jodi has worked rather hard at being non-existent at a credit standpoint. So, trust me, getting this pre-approval is nothing less than a miracle. It is a glorious day!Now comes the fun part. We have many things that we are looking for in a house, so there will be many aspects to consider. Some requirements are bendable, but still more are not, so we will be extremely...

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Professional Beginnings

Saturday morning I woke up around 9:00 and got up quietly so I wouldn't wake Jodi. Prego girls need their sleep. Anyway, Jacob and I were both just sitting around not being productive, so I decided to make a trip to Wal-Mart and get some stuff for taking pictures. I bought 8 yards of black material, 2 halogen lighting fixtures, and some lithium batteries to replace the ones I killed over the weekend. I did nothing with this stuff until last night. I decided to go ahead and take on the project that I had in mind Saturday morning. I took the 24' x 4' black shroud and (with Jodi's help) did a lot of cutting and sewing until we wound up with...

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Funny Video from Thanksgiving

I love to take pictures and so it works out great that my wife loves to have her picture taken. She comes from a long line of posers who immediately change their look when a lens is spotted. This video is evidence of the aforementioned posing. Here is three of the third generation posers....

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Useless Information (part one)

It's been a little while since I wrote a blog and I'm terribly ashamed of this. By writing extremely interesting pieces that change my reader's lives, I have set a standard that I must keep up with. I apologize for the suspense, but without further ado...I have decided to start a series of writings that will help fill in the gaps between my other blogs. The only problem was that I couldn't think of an appropriately interesting theme for my series. I was thinking long and hard and suffering some considerable mental anguish over this before it came to me in a self-given complaint, "everything you know, Levi, is useless!" Out of that put-down to...

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If you don't succeed...

Well, here we go again. It's time to once again try our luck at obtaining financing for purchasing a home. We have been down this road before and we have met many useless smiling faces. These faces were full of empty promises and confidence-building absolute statements, but when it came down to the nitty gritty they dropped us like a hot potato in a circle of one. Finally, we ran across a decent loan officer at First Home National Bank (plug, plug). When he ran our credit report and saw some issues with it he didn't just drop us. Instead, he told us what was wrong with our credit report and what I needed to do to improve it. There was a couple...

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As requested...

SRC Leadership University Graduating Class of 2006I'm the second from the right. You can click on the picture and it will bring it up bigger on your screen. Here are all 23 of us with our two main trainers, Brenda Descamps (far left) and Dan Spore (far righ...

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My Pree sentation

Some of you knew about it. Some of you didn't. Last Thursday was graduation day for the SRC Leadership University Class of 2006. This graduation meant a lot to me after all I had never before been part of a graduation ceremony. I graduated high school in the summer after my senior year, because I flunked out my senior second semester due to a lack of attendance. See, I moved out at 17 and had a full-time job and was atempting to go to school full-time as well. I would've done just fine doing it except that I was also partying full-time. Anyway, by flunking out I saw the error in my ways and straightened up and graduated by way of summer school....

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It's Voting Day!

It's that day again when all brain-functioning adults are to go to the polls and prove that they aren't just complainers, but American citizens who'll actually do something about what they talk about. What I mean by this is simple: If you don't vote today, then I don't want to hear you complain about gas prices, our deficient school systems, the amount of taxes taken out of your paychecks, the war in Iraq, etc. I personally can't stand to hear someone talk about what they believe in when they don't back it up at the polls. If you believe that you're paying too many taxes and nothing good is coming from it then research who is running and vote accordingly. If you think that it's not right that we have hundreds of thousands of our military personnel in some other country then research the candidates...

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Some Pictures

Create Your O...

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New Neighbor

We have a brand new neighbor. I saw him (or her) moving into a freshly dug hole underneath one of the landscaping logs/railroad ties that separate our driveway from our front yard. He's definitely a city bunny since he wouldn't run off until I got closer than about seven feet away. And, even then he she only hops enough distance to keep that seven foot safety area. I like this neighbor the best already. Unlike our other neighbors, (we'll call him a boy just so I no longer have to refer to both sexes when using a pronoun for it) he doesn't burn questionable firewood that almost smokes us out of our house, he doesn't grind/sand/bang out/weld...

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Happy Halloween!

Well, it's that time of year again. It's that wonderful time to use your creativity and come up with a fake persona for an evening. We were going for a "Cleaver family era" look. We get to also put my '59 Ford to good use and let it play its role as well. It was a fun evening at Andy & Bridget's on Saturday night despite the little fact that the boys lost to the girls in a game of Trivial Pursuit. We intend to dress up again Tuesday. Jodi will once again bake a fresh apple pie to top off her costume of which we will delight in eating afterwards. The pie, not the costume. If you have been reading my blogs for some time back in my MySpace...

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Our relaxing weekend

My wife and I are busy people. Sometimes, we get so caught up in busy-ness that we actually have to schedule and plan a relaxing weekend. And even other times we have to pick up and leave town to stay relaxed for any amount of time. (sidenote: Earlier I said "busy-ness". This was very much on purpose. I wanted to stress the "busy" part and I also did not want to confuse the reader into thinking that I own a business. That time I meant business like bizness. Or maybe bidness if that's how you pronounce it. I just would like to clarify that I can spell and that public schools in Missouri may get a bad rap, but they get the job done. ...

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A good movie choice...

We rented a good movie last night and I thought that I would officially recommend it by writing a personal review. The movie is Brick. It's one of those independent films that carries a recommendation on the cover from one of the well known film festivals of which the name escapes me. Maybe Sundance? Anyway, I found it to be an excellent movie. It starts out in the middle of the movie and then backs up to show you the events leading up to it. It catches up to it rather quickly (maybe 20 minutes in) and then the movie gets thrust into action from there. I won't ruin the movie by discussing any of it's plot so don't worry. But, I will say that the movie has a somewhat unique style. It is written in a "Cloak and Dagger" mystery/action/thriller style. You know the movies where a crime...

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Hmm... which one should I vote for?

(spoken like George from Seinfeld) Well, they've done it now! I'm getting really angry here! I'm so mad right now. First of all, I no longer fall for the old trick that the Democrats and Republicans pull every election year. They both use their corporate influence and their blood money to convince voting Americans that there is really only two people to choose from in the elections. The sad thing is that most people fall for it. They go with the "sucker's choice." What's a sucker's choice, you say? I'm glad you asked. It's a cheap argument tactic. Here's how it goes: "Of course I'm going to drive to Kansas City! What do you expect me to do? Take a magic carpet?" It's the classic sucker's choice when the argumentative person shuts down constructive conversation by making a statement...

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Attention: Heroes watchers!

I'm sorry, but I must take back something I said in my last blog: Past episodes of Heroes cannot be watched on YouTube. I'm not sure who to blame on this one. It may be YouTube itself removing these videos or maybe it was them pressured by NBC. I don't know the exact events surrounding the removal of the past episodes from YouTube, but I will say this, "what?!" I personally have no interest at stake here, after all I've seen all the episodes to date, because I was one of the lucky ones who watched the illegal videos before they were ripped away from the copyright nazis. However, I can't help but defend the poor people out there who are just like me and actually might want to watch a decent television series and also have the added benefit of making sense out of it by having seen all...

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Maybe Television Is Not So Bad...

Ok, ok. I know I mouth our modern day television programming a lot. I can't help it. I never find anything that I want to watch. There's those shows that I don't mind watching to kill an hour or to be entertained with while we get a chance to relax for once, but no station ever comes up with something that I feel I just can't miss. That is, until now. NBC is doing something different. They're using an age-old idea, but modernizing it and bringing the story of it once a week into our living rooms. Heroes. The idea for the show is not all that creative what with Superman, Batman, and the like being hit shows back in the 40's and 50's. The thing is super-heroes are loved by the majority of people, however their popularity tends to fluctuate between different audiences. One generation...

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What's my motivation?

I guess, I'm losing steam on this whole blog writing thing. I've been really busy with work and fun lately. At work, I'm in the SRC Leadership Academy and am spending a lot of time trying to get my project together. We are presenting in front of the "big-wigs" in four weeks from now. It has to be a 20 minute presentation. It's going well, but there is still much work and adjustments to be made as well as speeches to memorize. Outside of work it seems that my wife and I are in a hurry to get as many activities in as we can before it gets too cold to do anything. Maybe we'll slow down when it drops below freezing, but until then we're getting passed around like a hot potato. Then, of course, there was my gimp-maker injury. I twisted my ankle while working in the backyard on a fun little...

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I'm sorry...I'm back!

I've been neglecting my blog page, I know. I promise that it has not been on purpose. I bet you guys must be picturing me laying around the house watching television and stuffing my face with potato chips. I'm not. I've been diligently working on a web page for the cell group that I attend. I've put a lot of work into the page and I am very happy with the results. You should check it out. I managed to utilize some home made graphics to make the site look really good, in my opinion. And, with all the great ideas from James it should be a useful tool for our cell group. I'm excited about it if you can't tell. So, now that the site is in working order and doesn't really need any more work for now, I will be free to resume my regular blog posting habits. In the meantime, check out the page I'm...

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Bored, lonely, and pathetic.

I'm such a baby. I love my wife so much that it borders on obsession. She left yesterday evening to go to West Plains and help out with the preparations of her friend's wedding. I think that she also threw a wedding shower for her. She also was heading down to Moody, Missouri to take some photos of her dad's '49 Ford F-100. When I spoke to her last she said that she also stopped in on one of her family reunions. She's quite the multi-tasking productive woman. She's doing all these things while also producing a human being within. Amazing. That's the only word that describes it and still insufficiently at that. So here is the part where...

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A day in the life of...

I've never just written about my day, so I thought that maybe I could take you through a tour of a day in the life of me. Here we go... I woke yesterday morning at about 4:00 am in a terrible state. I had a bad cramp in my left calf muscle and since it woke me up it took me about 30 seconds before I could wake my brain up and discover the source of the intense pain. Once the cause was determined I quickly took the old soccer cramp routine and the pain subsided slowly but surely. I went back to sleep after this and then shut off the alarm the first time it went off at 5:45. Inevitably, I overslept and woke up at 6:40 which was just enough time to jump out of bed, throw on some clothes and go to my Leadership Academy class, but when I "jumped" out of bed I almost hit the floor face down when...

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It's a BOY!

I was definitely not expecting a boy, but I am very excited! Biased by growing up a boy with one brother, no doubt, I always wanted two boys. I did discover years ago that I did want a girl after all, though. I'm still a little in shock about this baby being male, but I'm sure it will take some time to sink in. I hope that Jodi doesn't mind being overrun even more by this masculine addition. I apologize for the quick and short blog, but we have to go back to the doctor now to get told all the details and the particulars about the size and all the measurements they took of the internal organs and all that good stuff. But, I wanted to let...

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City Council Backpedals!

I laughed at first when I saw this article, but City Council still doesn't get it. They spent the last month considering and deliberating and weighing the pros and cons of a supposed answer to a supposed problem, but the real problem is that they've wasted all that time and money talking about something that they dropped as soon as the public got wind of it. I do wonder what they mean by "subject to coucil scrutiny." Even though they did drop their crusade to put a stop to apartment development, they still unanimously approved Mayor Tom Carlson's alternatate proposal that requires these apartment projects to be "planned projects." Apparently, that places these projects under City Council's scrutinizing microscope. While, I do agree that Springfield City Council should be involved in large...

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Too Much Competition?

I don't get it. I heard several times this morning on news radio an odd thing that sparked my interest. Since I can't find any website that is updated fast enough to carry the story I will say that it went something like this, "Is Springfield over-run with new Apartment complexes? That's what city council will be voting on this week. A recent boom in new apartment complex construction has possibly contributed to an exodus of center-city apartments. City council intends to consider and vote on new proposals that will help to slow down new construction of these apartments. Proposals include the changing of city zoning laws." I heard this and couldn't believe it. It sounds like people are moving out of center-city apartments and into new apartments built elsewhere in the city and City Council...

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Sushi Thursday!!!

A new weekly tradition has been birthed at the Felton household. It's called Sushi Thursday! One of my birthday gifts to Jodi last week was a box full of sushi tools and some of the key ingredients needed for this wonderful spread pictured above. So, with the first evening we had to actually take the time to make this succulent delight, we jumped on the opportunity and headed straight to one of our local Japanese grocery stores. Hooray for living in an actual city with real stores! I love having choices beyond "Beef, it's what's for dinner." Honestly people! If your mouth is not just watering with the prospect of sushi making friends...

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Shane & Shane Concert

What a concert! (spoken like Yakov Smirnov) Seriously it was an amazing evening with Shane & Shane (you'll get that little joke if you are a fan). We had a blast despite that we weren't the big group that we had originally set out to be at this event. We were a happy group of five, though. I have to say that if you missed the show, then you really did miss out on an awesome experience. I've only been listening to these guys for about six months, but I love what they do. The only grievance that I have is as a fellow guitarist and singer I have some extreme trouble trying to recreate their sound. I pretty much gave up trying. Anyway, I realize that this band is sort of undergound to most of you, so I recommend to you that you get your fanny on down to your local music store or click...

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"No! I'm da boss!"

Mwu Ha Ha Ha! My evil plan is right on schedule. I am moving into my old boss' desk today. I will soon run this company, then the corporation, then THE WORLD!!! Mwu Ha Ha Ha!! Cough! Couch! Hack! ... whew, gotta take it easy on the evil laughter. I'm not the young evil genius that I used to be. (That's pronounced gee-nee-iss, by the way) I'm putting on the years like Marlon Brando. It's cool, though. Honestly, I'm gonna miss my old desk that just screams "Number 2!" I'm gonna let someone else be number two to my number one, though. I'm an awfully nice guy, aren't I? In all seriousness, though, I really am having adjustment issues. I've been doing...

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What a sobering eye opener.

As kids, there is no doubt that my friends and I thought we were invincible. Some of the things that we did I think about today and wonder how I made it through puberty without ending up in a wheelchair or worse. I had some close calls and landed myself in the hospital more than once, but I always turned out alright and was ready for another round of walking that thin line. I'm sure that most of you can relate. It's completely understandable, too. In our culture we are used to our dead being wisked away so quickly that no one has an opportunity to see them. We use sheets to cover them out in public until a crew comes with a black zippered bag to hide them in and then that goes straight into the ambulance which discreetly makes a deposit at the morgue that no one knows the location of....

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A work in progress.

I'm currently in the process of changing over my blog site to this new fancy one. It looks a lot better and it is easier to access older blogs. I'm excited about using it instead of MySpace. I will still have my MySpace account, but it will only be used to keep in touch with people. I will no longer be posting blogs there. I will have this all set up within the next 24 hours, so be patient. I am studying up on all the ways to subscribe to this blog. I'm not a code writer, so it's taking all my brain power to set up an easy and convenient way for everyone to get notification of a new post on this site. I'll keep everyone updated.Thanks,L...

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Welcome!

I welcome myself to the world of professional bloggers! Yay! I have been such an amateur playing around with MySpace. Although, I do thank MySpace for taking a big chance with me. When no other website saw talent they said, "Give the kid a chance. What could it hurt?" For this, I am grateful. However, it is time to move on to bigger and brighter things and talk bad about the former things. One thing that I have learned from all this fame is that to continue to grow in popularity one must always remember to stomp on those little people that supposedly helped them get where they are now. So, to prove that I have what it takes to forget the little guy and move on towards stardom, I must say that MySpace sucks. It was fun for like a day. MySpace is like SO early 2006. Get with the...

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