RyanHarne.com

Now I turn off my music to write. Sidebar: for some odd reason I simply cannot write a blog while actually listening to the music I claim to be ‘jamming’ along with below, but in fact my Music listing is normally something I heard during the day that somehow highlighted a mood of the day or some song I’ve been overlaying in my brain throughout the course of the day. Now that I’ve killed that…

I spent this ending weekend in MD once again. It’s always enjoyable to see relatives and talk about whatnot. And always fun to cruise the 4wheelers/ATVs along orchards and to play the never-ending game of bocce. I must say I had a good time. This also was my first weekend with a digicam and so, naturally, I took a hundred pictures that got deleted down to about 45 odd shots. Some of the better moments are highlighted in the photographs section.

Ok, so we went to the National Zoological Park today on the way home (aka #2 on my list of things to do this summer). I thought it would be incredibly exciting to see these animals but that was not the case. Perhaps I never even thought of it before entering the main gate, but I never realized the effect of this type of imprisonment on animals. While some of the more instinctive species may have not cared (aka giraffes elephants zebras seals) because they are only used to attention and solicitation all day long, I really felt bad for those animals that you could truly consider ‘wild.’ For example, the tiger was pacing in circles in front of its exit door as if waiting for either more food or a quick execution from the massive attention and annoying cries of the children calling it by the wrong animal name. And ::sigh:: I wanted to die when I went in the primate house. Some of the smartest animals on this planet and they are all entrapt in plexiglass and steel. This one gorilla stared with the saddest eyes into every passerby who desired to tell his/her friends “I was this close from a gorilla!.” It was horrifying to watch this confinement in reality. Perhaps it wouldn’t have been nearly an issue if the zoo park area were much larger and allowed ample space for each animal, but the boundaries and areas were just depressingly packed. I do have some pictures that aren’t grotesquely saddening that I will put in the photos section of the site. I may never return to a zoo again.

On other notes, this Friday at work was very full of liveliness. I had the theme from My Girl stuck in my head for quite some time, and it made me want to see that immediate classic once again (mental note: I still have plenty of free rentals for HV somewhere). That is a great movie. Also cars seemed to have a late-day impact, per se. First, the vehicle in front of the door I leave was an official Hokie Mobile. A 2003 Ford Explorer XLT ‘Hokie Edition’ with special upholstered seating and exterior decals. This wasn’t some window static operation but a serious workmanship of VT pride. I liked it (well actually I liked the concept, not the vehicle ::gag Ford…::). Then as I was leaving the parking lot itself onto Old Graves Mill Road there was a huge accident right in front of me. Everyone was ok though, thank God. Then on 811 a flat bed dump truck-like vehicle right in front of me dropped a stack of cinderblocks into the oncoming lane. Luckily, they didn’t come back my way nor were there any cars approaching immediately in that lane. So it slowed down traffic for a while.

Plenty more to talk about cars. Mercedes was definitely the highlight vehicle in NoVa and Washington today. In this area most MB are the 300 series. Up there, nearly everything is the 400 or 500 series. I saw, consecutively, a CL500, an E500, and an SL500. Pretty nice. Unfortunately there is about a 98% chance that there were all automatic transmission (if you don’t realize why this is a negative thing, then email me) because MB has begun to make about that same percentage of its vehicles with auto transmissions. Very sad as well.

Looks like another week. VT is close. So very very close. Oh well.

Some more recapping I didn’t get to in my last update:

On my way up to Creation, literally because we were travelling north on 81, I noticed dozens and dozens of Corvettes going south. Eventually I realized that it was the Corvette’s 50th anniversary. In my earlier fascination with cars, I truly adored the Chevrolet Corvette. Not only for its performance figures but also for its enormous value ratios; in terms of dollar for kick, you definitely get your money’s worth. So, after my return home I did some web-searching and found out that Nashville was hosting the 50th anniversary celebration. I guess my assumption was proved correct. But yeah, it was very exciting to see unthinkable amounts of all-aged Corvettes travelling in groups of nearly every size. If I ever buy an American vehicle, I believe I’ll go for the Vette.

This conversation occurred a while ago, but I haven’t forgotten about it at all. Jeremiah commented about his refridgerator kicking in whenever he opened the door. He said that it was pointless for it to turn on while open because it was wasting energy against the outside air temperature. I agreed somewhat, but explained the story entirely for convenience. First, it must be understood that a fridge is just a powerful air conditioner tuned to cool a small volume. Air conditioners and fridges alike turn on when the temperature increases. Why? It is their programmed duty to return the room/space temperature to an equilibrium (whether it be 68 degF or 43 degF) as soon as possible. The reason why refridgerators turn on while the door is open is that they are attempting at reducing the amount of change in temperature for that, hopefully, short period of time when the open door allows warmer air inside. It is, in fact, easier for a fridge to bring the temp back down by ‘wasting’ power when the door is open than to let it kick in after the warm air has quickly destroyed every trace of heat before the door has closed without help from a cooling unit. While I may have lost you, this truly does make sense. Maybe you’ve noticed water vapor escape from a freezer when you open it. That is not a loss of heat per se, but a faculty of enduring the heat. Who’s right? Well, I’ll let you decide. ……..by now I can reasonably assume that you have chosen me as the victor to this conversation. End.

Um…following that. I’ve realized how much of a digital being I’ve turned myself into. Normally, when I go to bed there are about 4 to 5 lights from electronics on indicating that they are in standby or off mode. Now, post-laptop and peripherals, there are more than a dozen running mini-lights that alert me to their ceaseless presence. I ended up just unplugging most everything because this seriously creates an inability for me to sleep. Although I may have implanted one too many chips in my neck by now, I’m enjoying the simple pleasures of digicam-ming and ultra-hi-res images/gaming. Yeah, I’m definitely a computer geek.

So on the topic, I’ve decided to go on a fast. An internet fast. For a month. Details: no web-site browsing/no IMs/no downloads for a month. I’ll still allow myself to blog and check email, but I want to test myself here. I’d like to understand the limits of my existence online and also would like to uncover my shallow need for world wide web info. I’ll try several things to occupy this time that I currently spend chatting/surfing/etc. Hopefully, I’ll get more exercise from this free time. But the point is, I want to discover myself - strengths and weaknesses. And with sincerity, I apologize to my friends who will later say “Haven’t you read my website lately? I already wrote about this or that…” because I will temporarily halt myself from that source of connection. So try not to IM me for a while unless you are to tell me how wonderful I am or something. Also please temporarily send all email to pudn26 at AOL dot com. Thanks for your consideration.

Well, the server officially went offline on the 16th of June. Some of you who have AOL as your browser would have still seen my site for a time since AOL has a heavy cache file system. So while you may have seen my site after the 16th, you were actually seeing a past version of it. And for a week or so, I did update things fairly often, but after the new computer ordeal I definitely took a break from offline blogging. So here is what has happened following my offline blogs which have now been archived.

My Dell Inspiron 8500 came in through FedEx. I have no complaints, although I still would have begged the engineering department at VT to let me have something other than XP if I knew I had a chance. So the laptop is pretty nice. Great performance also with room to upgrade things myself and a great screen. I have officially been swayed to never return to 1074×768; 1900×1200 is just so fun. Especially in gaming, of which I only do to an extent. The first couple days of ownership were simply moving files from comp to comp. Through CD-RW’s mind you. It took three days, not bad for 30GB of info. Then I started installing software. During which the comp crashed (not simply froze but died) and would refuse to turn on. So I found the Dell Express Tech Support number I payed for and called. Within about 45 minutes I had set up for a Dell technician to be at my house working on this thing. Forty-eight hours later he was here and had fixed the computer. The problem? A bad/faulty Motherboard!!! That certainly doesn’t happen often. So that got fixed. And I’m rather enjoying the quasi-Plug-and-Play of this system.

Following that was the 4th of July. I went to Williams Stadium, Liberty, with Jeremiah, Rianna, Melanie, and Allison. I was seriously impressed at the quality of the music productions; last year was just hymns and the patriotic like, but this year was a variety of well-performed and well-rehearsed material. And the fireworks were great ::”Explosion!!!”::. So that was a very good time. Very reverent and honored event in rememberance of our country’s freedom through sacrifice.

I suppose not long following that I went to see How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days with this ’sister’ of mine, Allison. I have to admit, chick flicks are coming out of the girl-interest-only gutter. More and more people are, statistically, seeing these types of movies, and my opinion of them has increased steadily since the first Legally Blonde. 10 Days was enjoyed as a simple, casual, humorous, and fairly well-plotted film. 5.8 out of 10.

Then I had a long streak of just plain working and getting more stuff situated with this laptop, including accessories and add-ons.

Sometime between then and now I saw Chicago. Wow! If ever there was a movie that deserved six high honors Academy Awards this is one. Plus, it’s a musical. I was very impressed at the character progressions and implementation of the dog-eat-dog lifestyle of early 20th century America. Absolutely a fun movie. 7.2 out of 10.

Then a couple days ago I went off for VT Orientation. This ended up being an explosion of furious passion for something new and exciting. Living in L-burg all my life has limited me to harsh stereotypes of those who don’t live here. Meeting interesting people from all over in my group sessions was such a thrill. I met a true-to-life cowboy, with the accent to back it up. A football player going on scholarships for the football team, obviously; the one highlight of this person, he had a 3.6 GPA in high school and excelled in AP courses! woah, talk about non-cliche. I also met a girl who has lived in Williamsburg all her life (and for those of no knowledge, Williamsburg is the home of Busch Gardens and several other major attractions). It was interesting to hear her outlook on living in a tourist town. And the sessions, lectures, and videos were all great. I am so looking forward to going to Tech. I’m even started to be excited regarding their football games, oddly enough. This is true collegiate anticipation.

Then, yesterday I happened to be at BestBuy in Roanoke and happened to find the only Canon A70 Powershot. This camera has been put on a near-perpetual back order, and I’ve waited months and months and months to get my hands on one. So I took this one home. So much fun. Clarity. Refinement. Quality. Ahh, the digital age is delightful.

And then I had to call Dell Tech Support again about my wireless not working. Now it works. Honestly, I have been very pleased with their knowledge and answers about all these issues I’ve been having with the laptop. Although, I shouldn’t be having these problems in the first place. But at least they are there to fix them.

Huge appreciative shout out to Jeremiah. He has spent long weeks of curating over the phones and contact paths to get this server thing resolved quickly. Thank you for your time and effort.

Also, shout out to all the VT peeps I met at Orientation. Mail me if you are one of the few and proud (see contact above right).

So the server has been down for…a month?! Oh well, life has been one of the greatest experiences since then.

Right now, I definitely don’t have the focus and/or stamina to blog, so I’ll outline the past month (anything else has already been archived before the server went down completely).

July 4th at Liberty. Dell. Dell Tech Support. Dell Tech Support. Chicago. VT Orientation. Canon. Dell Tech Support.

Life has been just the greatest journey in the past month. I will blog very soon. Thanks for putting up for the site mishaps and errors and blank nothings. Also, I will get around to re-installing the webcam soon. But trust me, I’m nearly finished with everything else to do it.

::Sigh:: Collegiate anticipation.

Hopefully the new server will kick in soon. Hopefully…

I spent last week at Creation in Hershey Park, PA. It was relocated due to flooding of Agape Farm. So naturally, nearly a dozen bands had to drop out because the switch would somehow affect their tour route and a bunch of the attendance dropped. Wonderful. The camping areas were not good. Unlike Agape Farm, there is no way to concentrate campsites in Hershey Park simply because you’re in the middle of a busy city and highway system. The limited room increased cramping up against other campers and meant that the campsites were spread out for miles instead of a tidy little semicircle as implemented at Agape Farm. The campsites from end to end went on for about 4 miles…and don’t forget the satellite camp grounds 13 miles away! Oh, and not to complain, but to get to the Stadium (Main Stage) or Giant Center (Fringe Stage) you had to cross a 4 lane highway. Of course they had a crosswalk continually directed by cops and all types of law enforcement, but still. In terms of ergonomics, Creation 2003 was a flop.

Yet, let’s not forget, this isn’t supposed to be technical heaven but an experience. So our group left Tuesday morning for Hershey Park. The trip went fine, no vehicle issues at all. We got there to wait in one of the multi-hour-long lines, very normal. And then we found out that since due to the downsizing of the campsites we couldn’t camp with a group we were supposed to camp with. But we already had another campsite in the handicap area waiting for us, so we chose that one about .75 mile away. We set up camp, made a comfortable shade area, and enjoyed the night. Then we woke up Wednesday to get initially oriented to the layout of Creation 2003. It was rather easy to learn. Then the first festivities of the night. Tait was good. Eastman Curtis spoke ok. Rebecca St. James…riight. Hero was entirely taken out of the evening…::anger::. Third Day was very good. Then they had communion and we all retired.

Thursday was: Superchic[k] was incredibly fun. Jeremy Camp was amazing, but he started doing the praise/worship thing which nearly killed his show. Camp’s drummer was quite an amazement; everything was perfect but it wasn’t mechanical and he showed off with the most pleasing demonstrations of ability…fun. 38th Parallel was great, very nice. That night was Ken Davis speaking, good. Sixpence played, good. And we left without watching the other concerts because they didn’t look very enticing.

Friday was great. The Rock & Roll Worship Circus was, once again, great. They know how to turn praise into something more. Rachael Lampa was ok, but definitely her voice was processed. Sanctus Real was very good, but they started to do the praise thing too…ugh. Then John Reuben. What more do I have to say? Reuben was FUN. That night was ZOEgirl, ok somewhat. Supertones, very excitingly fun. Josh McDowell spoke and I was impressed. Then Sandtown, ok. TobyMac, great, but even he started doing the praise thing sadly enough. Then Michael W. Smith, great. After that they had candlelighting, awesome.

Saturday. I didn’t go to anything until the evening stuff because I was so very exhausted. Relient K was very good. The Paul Colman Trio was Great; they put on a fun show absolutely. David Nasser spoke, very nice. Mercy Me was great. Audio Adrenaline finished off the entire event with so much excitement, energy, and enticement that…wow…it was very nice.

Now of course, I didn’t go to nearly even half of the concerts of events that were happening.This is because most of them overlap and there are some points when you need to relax because, especially at Hershey Park, the walking and concert movement can really wear you out. Once I get pictures back (evil film) then you can enjoy whatever came out.

Ok to clarify my lite rage against bands who unnaturally do the ‘praise thing.’ My point in this is that bands who don’t start off (meaning their first album) with a praise cd should not jump genres to hop aboard the now increasing praise bandwagon. Why do I feel this way? Because nearly 90% of the bands that do jump ship don’t write their own praise music and therefore ’steal’ famous praise songs that were written by talented people like Paul Baloche and Matt Redman. Therefore these bands end up making money off of the great praise/worship leaders. Also, in a concert setting, adding a praise song[s] is often a way of making up for bad album tracks (ever get a cd that only has three or four incredible songs?). Bands need to stick to their original genres. I think it’s sad that they can’t write good music for themselves anymore. The Christian music industry definitely needs a jump start. And there are a few bands and record companies slowly progressing along that equator so maybe something will come about.

Well, we packed up Sunday. I was surprised how quickly that was. And we left.

Before I forget: As we were setting up camp Tuesday afternoon/evening, three vehicles past us by on the road immediately beside us. The first was a blue fifteen passenger van, the next a blue bus, the last another blue eighteen passenger van. Each was painted the exact same shade of blue and had Aslan Youth Ministries texted on the sides of the vehicles. The last fifteen passenger van had eighteen bicycles attached to its roof. But I don’t think that’s what caught my eye. It was probably more so the incredible organization among the vehicles and such. I don’t know. Something about it impressed me. Although their website isn’t nearly as enticing.

Now about the weather. After our 120981280 days of rain across the eastern seaboard, we suddenly got an entire week of sun and wind. I nearly buried myself in suntan lotion but still got burned here and there. But the heat never got really bad, I guess that’s more so humidity however. The wind got dangerous every now and then; that was when it started to move large objects…hmm. But overall a great week of bright weather.

So how did my Creation 2003 (and by the way, the 25th anniversary) experience go? Rather well and motivating. If anything it was a very humbling experience to be such a miniscule part of an event that touched all of us I hope. I had a good time.

Yet, over the course of the week I started getting sick again. I progressively started coughing randomly and then it became coughing of mucus/snot. So by the time I got home Sunday afternoon I felt weak and nearly feverish. I went to bed early to get some extra rest before another 40 hr. week. But that plan didn’t work out so well. I woke up Monday morning practically screaming because it felt like my body was on fire and I was soooo thirsty and I couldn’t breathe at all. So I was taken to the hospital quickly and on the way I vomitted/threw up/blew chunks/heaved an obscene amount of mucus/snot which helped alleviate much of the pain in my chest. So I was taken in having an unusually high fever and pneumonia. The fever has since gone down but I’ll be taking anti-biotics for my pneumonia for some time. While the fever did go away, it has seriously weakened my body. I can move moderately enough to make it around the house and type a blog about my time at Creation and the events following. So I ask for your prayers in this matter. And also prayers for my grandfather who I found out has cancer.

A long life to live, but it has to be taken day by day.