a musing julius…

on a recent visit to dc, i was introduced to potentially the greatest concept ever created by man, for man: top golf. what is top golf? well i’m happy you asked. it’s a driving range, with RFID tagged balls, which you hit out on to the range which has huge targets, which read the RFID tags and give you points based on where you hit the ball.

why it’s awesome?

• bay service: they come by and bring me delicious draft beer and food when i please
• golf has a purpose: you no longer just hit balls out into a field of previously hit golf balls. you actually try to aim at something (although some would argue this is the point of golf, for a driving range, i feel like people just try to whack the shit out of the ball)
• web 2.0 compliance: okay, so it’s not web 2.0, but you get a screen that shows you where you hit the ball, and how far it traveled. awesome.
• scoring system: forget stroke counting like regular golf. you get points, a handicap and can play different variations of the same game. massively super fun.
• did i mention they bring you beer?

anyway, the place was insanely fun. it rocked my face off. i want to sell all my earthly possessions and open one in michigan for the sole reason to play on it all day. also, to make a living after i sell all my earthly possessions.

the last 3 weeks of my life have been crazy, hence the break from blogging. my mind has been on overdrive consistently over these past few weeks. here’s a sampling of what’s happening.

• mom’s surgery, fairly self explanatory
• work. i recieved a promotion to leave my current team and go elsewhere to become a team lead.
• that offer was promptly matched by my current team in an effort to keep me. no decisions have been made yet
• i just had the most amazing weekend in dc with my aspiring radass, and i ache when i have to leave her
• work wants someone to go to germany for a month, and my name is on the list
• i want to start studying for the gmat
• my apartment is a disaster
• i haven’t seen my friends in many weeks, and i haven’t been in the d for longer than a week at a time in the last 2 months

i just want some sense of normalcy to return, first with mom, then with the remainder of my life.

i was telling my aspiring radass on friday night that northwest hates me. each and everytime i book a flight i’m seated next to someone that’s either:

• abnormally large
• has a quirk of some kind

so on my flight to d.c. this past friday, i was surprised to be seated next to a very LARGE person. and while there’s nothing wrong with this, i kept hearing from them how the airline seats are TOO small, that “normal” people can’t fit in those “damn seats” and “man, these seats are tight.” maybe they were uncomfortable, but i can tell you, on a flight to seattle two weeks ago, the gentleman i sat next to was so large that i couldn’t put my traytable down to enjoy my beverage.

granted, he was a nice person, but his thigh took up a third of my seat, and imposed on my airspace so much i felt guilty even trying to use my tray table (even after i lowered it, only hitting his thigh, leaving the tray at a 45 degree angle)

so on the flight back this morning (god awfully early) to detroit i thought, “maybe i’ll end up next to someone that isn’t huge.”

well, i got my wish. instead, the person sitting next to me was a snorer. a loud one. he would wake himself up he was so loud. the guy sitting across the aisle from me kept looking over, expecting me to do something to fix the grave in justice served him even though he was one seat and an aisle separated (about 7 inches) from the perpetrator.

anyway, i’m thinking when i book my flights, northwest must grab demographic data and put me next to people they know will annoy me. strangely, i’m sure the people i was sitting next to wanted to sit next to anyone than some d00d in his mid-twenties listening to his iPod all flight.

i had a ridiculous trip to dc this past weekend. between wandering old town alexandria, examining the torpedo factory (which sadly doesn’t make torpedoes anymore) and u street jazz, eastern market and meeting stephanie’s friends, the trip was a colossal success. and the packing was well worth it.

when i returned home to detroit and talked to stephanie, i heard one of her friends called me “an old soul.” never hearing the term, i asked stephanie what it meant, and she responded, “it’s someone who is wise in a way that’s comforting for others.”

this surprised me. for one, it was an extraordinary compliment from someone that knew me less than 2 hours. i’m 25 years old (almost) and never thought in my day that someone married with kids and a few years older could ever think i was wise in a way that comforted her. as i scour the internet for more definitions of old soul, i see words like sound, stable and experienced.  as you can imagine, i’m nearly dumbfounded. i don’t ever feel sound or stable. while knowledgable or intelligent, i can only think of a handful of areas where i would consider myself “experienced” and most of those have to do with computer stuff.

as i slowly come to the end of 25 years of being around on earth, i find it fascinating that someone felt i was comforting, or experienced or that i looked like i had my act together. as i mentioned to stephanie a number of times this weekend, i have a plan, and i want so desperately to live without one. i appreciate stephanie’s ebb and flow approach to life, and it challenges me consistently, just as i know my plan challenges her to make her own and be a bit more structured.

i guess we compliment each other in that way. for now, this old soul needs to actually figure out if he’s got any experience under his belt.