A Dangerous Idea... Almost Makes...Sense

I've been listening lately to the soundtrack for Baz Lurhmann's The Great Gatsby. It's an interesting soundtrack, produced by Jay-Z including everything from this Jack White cover of a U2 song (Love is Blindness) to a songs from Andre 3000, Florence and the Machine, and a bunch of music you wouldn't expect to work together but it does.

This week has been quite stressful, and from about Tuesday on I've been sleep deprived. What have I learned? I have made it pretty far with what I want to do, yet I have miles and miles to go before I sleep (see? I can't even be original I've stooped to stealing from Robert Frost for heaven's sake!*).

Stress is an interesting thing for me. I produce some of my best work under deadlines and under crazy stress, but if I get past a certain point I just stop. Stop everything. It's really counterproductive, kills my grades, and drives those around me (family and my few close friends) into maddening confrontation. But unfortunately, like I said, I do some of my best work in my dizzying solitary stress circle.

Dizzying solitary stress circle? I like that, but it seems like one of those "writings of a madman" you'd see painted on the walls in a comic-sans-esque manner.

In Physics this week, we watched one of those Mechanical Universe videos. According to our physics teacher, these were originally on laser disk, and then migrated to VHS tape, and now is on DVD. It always (and I mean always) starts in a CalTech lecture room with the same guy explaining some physics concept and it fades off to some voiceover lady with 80s echo-synth background explaining math derivations. Every time they go to have some historical background, they cut to these historical dramatizations of Newton just creating things, and Keppler as a mathematical wanderer, and it goes on.

It was through this sort of bizarre historical dramatization that I learned that Newton went insane. Like, literally insane. Now I'm not sure how they determined this, or how he became insane, considering he was a solitary individual who was obsessed with math, gravity, and how it all coexists (I think he was insane the whole time, just good at hiding it...). Newton was brilliant, but he was still crazy.

In completely unrelated news, I am in talks with WYEP and Reimagine Media to start a podcast. We have already recorded at least one episode of it, but we are in the process of finding a home for it. Hopefully in a weeks time I'll have a link where you can listen in.

I'm in the middle of planning my eagle project as well as about ten thousand other projects. Sorry it's not all that coherent. Though I love writing, and I love posting here and talking with people (who never comment) about stuff I write about here, I have to have my priorities straight. My posting schedule and sanity suffers immensely for this.

*See what I did there? I cited the source, sort of.

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Ben Franklin

In a stunning turn of events, I didn't use song lyrics as a title. Mostly because I can't find a song disjointed enough to describe my week.

Monday I got a filling. Back at my regular appointment in December, my dentist noticed that one of my teeth had cracked or chipped or something, so he decided it needed fixed. I was escorted into some dentist-operation room. He told me that it wasn't deep enough for me to need numbed, so he just started drilling. It was really weird, because I knew I was supposed to be feeling something but I didn't. Nevertheless, that's done and over with.

Tuesday I learned sports reporter extraordinaire Bob Pompeani (this only makes sense if you are from Pittsburgh and watch KDKA) was coming to honor one of my friends, Conor Richardson, with the Extra Effort Award. I learned that he would be coming the next day, and it was an auditorium event, so it was on Carlynton Tech turf. We were able to set the stage (major props to my brother/sound guy Matt for putting up with my annoying nagging about sound checks) and the event went on without a hitch.

I ran lights, and when I am at the helm, I am hyper-sensitive about the entire auditorium's lighting. When an outside door opened, I was about to go down to shut it before thinking "oh, that's just our auditorium adviser" before realizing that that wasn't Mr. Pedersen, but instead Bob Pompeani. Conor was honored (which you can see the feature here: http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/video?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=9762659) and it was great.

I helped tear down our setup and ran into Mr. Pompeani in the process. He was an amazingly nice guy, and complimented our stage work. I didn't introduce myself except as "Marie Popichak's nephew" but he recognized me from twitter, so that in and of itself was pretty cool.

Remember how I said this week was disjointed?  Yeah, I wasn't kidding. So is my thought process....

Tomorrow I go to the station (weather permitting, because it is looking like January 7th temperatures all week...) and square away some things with Reimagination 2014. Insanity. Plus there are 12,920 pageviews to this site, so within the next few weeks I'll break 13,000. I don't think I can fathom that.

Home, Let Me Come Home Home Is Wherever I'm With You

So I keep track of my analytics, which are how many people come here, what they read, and that sort of thing. The mission is simple: see what people who read my blog like to read, and write more like that.

Honestly, I've been writing this blog pretty blindly for the past four years. And since my last post (yeah, I realize I'm slacking writing on a Tuesday of all days) this blog has reached 10,000 views. Wow. I mean, I realize that it's not unique views, but I reckon there are roughly 200 posts here, and if I do the math, that's roughly 50 people per post. That's crazy.

So first off, thank you. Whoever on earth you are, from whatever country, thank you for reading this blog. It really means a lot to me to know that someone somewhere is visiting. Okay, enough whit the nonsense gushy stuff.

This past weekend I spent up at camp, and saw firey flashes of AMERICA (fireworks) shot up at camp amongst other things. It was a lovely weekend despite the rain, and I learned about these paper lantern things.

They work off of the same principles as hot air balloons. A little candle is lit in them and using the heat inside them, they float up and are quite a sight to behold. Granted, every time I tried to take a picture they ended in blurs. But that led me to thinking...

After tweaking the settings on my camera, and playing with some America sparklers, I produced these pictures:

This was one of the lanterns

Matt and the America Sparklers

Me and the America Sparklers

Yeah, this didn't end too well...

Well, that's all I got. See you Friday.

On Writing Stuff.

So I've been writing a lot lately, but with no particular aim. I've found that I can snap into three modes with writing: The one where I write deep and profound prose and the sort, The one where I basically regurgitate facts, and The freeform stuff.

They are independent modes and if I try mixing two, it ends poorly. Unfortunately I'm forced to from time to time to write essays. Now I'm pretty sure this blog has posts from all of the categories... and I'm fine with it.

Apparently some people at my school read last week's post about the antiquated lighting system at the elementary school, and were motivated to at least try to do something. This both excites and scares me. It excites me that someone is willing to take action about things that are important to them. It scares me that people read what I write.

I mean, I want people to read what I write, but there's something about the knowledge that someone is reading something you wrote that sort of scares me. This especially applies to printing out something, and having someone read it next to you. As the person who spent hours working on such a piece, you are constantly wondering what they think, where the plot or essay or whatever the medium is should go next.

So when I read that my site hit 8,000 views I came to a realization that if each post had equal representation, there are like 46 hits per each post. Which means that someone other than I and my parents and friends and the sort are reading this thing.

So I guess what the answer here is to not base my drive or success on numbers (I hate math to start with) but rather on the quality of the content, or at least in this case the frequency.

I realize this was a movement on YouTube in December with Charlie McDonnell's "I'm Scared" movement and what JayScribble was talking about with Becoming YouTube, that content creators get scared of their audiences, but I think (selfish as it may seem) the thing to worry about is the content itself, and whether it's doing good.

This may just be some rant that I stayed up until 11 on a Friday night to write, but it might be something profound. I don't know. Maybe you do? Je ne sais pas.

Lets See How Far We've Come 2012: A Review

So Apparently 2012 is over now. For me, it was an interesting one to be certain. I sort of summed it up in my Christmas Letter in about a sentence:

This year was a challenge to see how full a schedule could be, and how much we could change.

Change in this case can be a good thing and a bad thing. At the beginning of 2012 I made a resolution to post once a week, on a Friday if I could, and this resulted in the 59 you see on the sidebar.

January brought Bishop Daniel to Carnegie. I invited the bishop to Slickville, and He said that he would try his best to come out sometime. I visited the nationality rooms on the campus of Pitt, and I also read John Green's new Book, the Fault in Our Stars.

February brought yet another college campus visit - this time to Carnegie Mellon for a Merit Badge program. March brought an adventure to the wilds of West Virginia, the wilds of the studios of WYEP, and the wilds of theater.

April brought the Drowsy Chaperone, my first ever musical that I performed in. It also brought a rant on Love timed around Easter.

May may have been the craziest for one weekend: Cinco de Mayo weekend. Friday brought a Camporee for which I designed the patch for. Saturday brought the first ever Re(imagiNATION) competition. The following day Bishop Daniel kept true to his promise and visited Slickville. He called the Tuesday before, and said that he had remembered me inviting him. I also became a Life Scout in May.

June brought NYLT, a training course made by the devils of the scouting world to change you from whatever it was you were to a leading man. It also brought me to Camp Seph Mack. We had developed a tradition of inviting the staff down to our site for a bonfire. It seems that bonfires bring people together, and this was no exception. On outpost night at NYLT, we had a bonfire I will remember for years.

July brought my first ever guest post, from my father, regarding vacations. I took my first ever vacation with my family out to Delaware. I celebrated 3 years of writing this website, and I started taking almost weekly bus rides out to WYEP to work on various projects.

August brought back school, and I quoted some songs for blog titles. I also started book reviews.

September brought my debut into announcing for the Carlynton Golden Cougar Marching band, and some side adventures with that.

October brought Homecoming, which I had the pleasure of sharing with a good friend of mine. It also brought Jamboree on the Air, and the end of the Football Season,

November brought the Ten Commandment Hike, references here to Squanto, and some reflection on natural disasters and the sort.

December brought me some good music, the 2012 HOOTENANNY and the 'end of the world as we know it'.

So this is where I break off and say thank you. I decided to write every week because I wanted to work on my writing skills a little, and develop a voice for this. Anyone that knows me can tell you I am not good at finishing things. I will start, or add a middle part, but finishing doesn't work with me. But I've had motivation

Back at the end of 2011, I had a total view count of 3,000 something. It's doubled in the past year, now at nearly 7500. All I can say is thank you. It helps to know that someone out there is reading what I'm writing. Friends, Family, Canadians, I don't care who you are, I just want to thank you, and invite you to join my little site here in 2013.

I plan on writing by the way until at least 2015. From there only time will tell, but that seems to me to be a tad far off. Thanks again, Happy New Year, and May God Bless You All!
-Alexander Popichak, the 2015Blogger

Brilliance, Both Literally and Figuratively.

Brilliant is also apparently a town in Ohio...

So, by definition means "having or showing great intelligence, talent, quality, etc.". So, in essence, when I called Lana Meyer's play brilliant I was justified, because it had all of the elements of a talented production. I mention this for two reasons... to give a shoutout to her, and to make light of the fact she signed my playbill during a second period study hall in an art room. Granted, she only did the writing and dialogue and that end, but I got to thinking... what does it mean to create something?

About three years ago, I created a website and called it "the 2015 blogger" and now, this being the 150th post, an award nomination, and over 6 thousand hits later, it's still here.

I have done countless projects, and have helped in projects where I've seen something go from just a sticky note or note into something real---something tangible, something other people can see, and it's crazy satisfying.

Brilliant brings up the connotation of either enlightenment or something else involving light. Look at the stars/Look how they shine for you are familiar lyrics to the Coldplay song "Yellow". It kind of seems that when you do something, you take pride in it.

Take for example, the town where you live... I take major pride in being from Pittsburgh, because I feel as a person living in the metro area that I have helped build it (not literally).

So where am I going with this? If you work hard enough at something, and you build it up, you want to see it shine. There's nothing more satisfying than seeing something you've had a hand in creating finally coming together and shining with brilliance.

On a final note, I took a picture of when the Carlynton School District had their anti-bullying kickoff. The whole district came together on the track and had a parade of anti-bullying banners.

But in my mind, this holds a much larger significance in that the whole district became one that day. The teachers talked with colleagues from the Elementary schools et cetera, as well as the students coming together---Crafton, Carnegie, and Rosslyn Farms---as one district for the first time, ever.

I leave you on my 150th post with that picture I took:

Click For Larger.

Celebrating 3 Years!

Thank you so much for supporting my site! I'd like to especially thank all of my family and friends that have stuck with me since the start. If this published correctly, 6:30PM July the 16th marks THREE years that I've been blogging.

Got Bored... Made an Anniversary Logo

Walking into the Shot, Becoming a Photographer, and SIX THOUSAND VIEWS

Sample: Riding Shotgun Westbound on the Chesapeake Bay
Bridge in Maryland

Hello there! So I've been taking advantage of the sights around me and living life through the lens of the camera my brother found at a yard sale. This little thing takes fantastic pictures (see my sample) and I have been learning (through trial, error, and YouTube) to take better pictures as a semi-photographer.

What I've decided doing is from now on, attempting to illustrate whatever the heck I am talking about with pictures that I've taken. Granted, I can't wander aimlessly taking pictures of my whole life, but I can take pictures of some things.

I've been experimenting in a largely populated area which has a lot of awesome stuff to see, but it's one of those "you can see it, but you can't get there" area. So, I have to set the camera to super-hyper-shutter mode, and attempt to shoot from a car going at 30 or whatever through a windshield. To say the least, it's a challenge.

Anyway, one of the things that make it more challenging is people strolling right into the middle of your shot. As is, you may get one shot of the thing that you are highway-filming, and the last you need is a blur of old man in swimming suit, lack of shirt, and hat.

I am going to ask you (Most Pittsburghers are okay with this one) to look around as you're wandering in front of something semi-picturesque. If you see a photographer, STOP!!!!

I apologize for the brevity of this post. Hopefully pictures to come with the next one...\

and an ANNOUNCEMENT!

On Friday the Thirteenth, this site hit 6,000 views. I'd like to thank everyone that has been here for the first 6,000, and I invite you to stick around for the next three years and 6,000 hits...

IF you have suggestions for what I should blog about... be it Pittsburgh, Scouts, Q&A, whatever, comment or shoot me an email!

Wild, Wonderful, and Apparently Not Wireless

So this past weekend, my backwards troop fulfilled a tradition that has been going on for about 15 years and took a trip to the West Virginian wilderness to spend a weekend at a Girl Scout camp.

It is kind of a feat just getting there. As with many places, there is no direct way to get from my house or for that matter, the Greater Pittsburgh area, to the tiny town of Bruceton Mills. So, what should take about an hour directly takes about two going further south than needed via the highways, and then the magical back roads to this camp.

I didn’t know why we went to a Girl Scout camp until we got there. The “cabin” we were in was basically a secluded ski lodge with indoor and two outdoor fireplaces, bunk beds, heated floors, and a huge kitchen. This “camp” was a hotel in comparison to winter camping in Guyasuta in tents.

So Saturday rolls around and our Scoutmaster Extraordinaire proclaims that we have a “mandatory hike” to a place called Coopers Rock. I am not a huge fan of large rocks, or hikes for that matter, but because it was mandatory I went.

He had proclaimed that this hike would take a little while and would be a short hike. What he hadn’t accounted for was the fact that the road leading to the part where we would have started was closed. So we start at the trailhead which proclaims about 3.2 miles to go.

Anyone that has been to Laurel Caverns can testify that the signs proclaiming usually one mile are in fact terribly wrong. Coopers Rock is no exception.

About 4 miles and a change in elevation of at least a good 300 or so feet brought us to the actual site which had a drop of about 1700 feet. To say the absolute least, the view was fantastic.

After successfully injuring my ankle and my knee, we hiked the 3.2 miles back to the car. Unfortunately, when I got back to the luxury cabin, it donned on me that I had not even tried getting WiFi to publish my previously written blog. A few clicks and it would have been published. But alas, the beautiful views and amazing wilderness-ism came at the cost of not having Wifi. I also attempted to text from there. I am however trying to piece together a hike video that I filmed as a “Thoughts from Places Video” a la Vlogbrothers.

I learned later (Keep this in mind) that our carrier (Verizon) does not have any towers in the entire state of West Virginia. (I am dead serious here – West Virginia and Verizon almost had a monopoly deal a few years back but decided that they didn’t need West Virginia, so consequentially there are no towers there) So, West Virginia is amazing, mountainous, wild, and wonderful but apparently not wireless.

A Eulogy for A Man I Never Met.

So recently I logged onto my magical Blogger account (Why must they always change designs and whatnot?) and the stat thingy told me that this website has 3000 pageviews. My question is... why? Then again, I shouldn't question the logic of the internet.

SO this past weekend I was in the woods. I spent Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday morning at camp Guyasuta in Pittsburgh. It was sort of a homecoming for me because this is the same camp where I discovered what camping actually was about 7 years ago as a Cub Scout. My experience this time was quite different though in the minor fact that I was an SPL (basically Ruler Of Scout Troop) for the troop that I had just joined 4 years earlier. It was also different in the fact that it was about 20 degrees (Farenheit) overnight as we slept in tents. Please remind me not to do that again.

I emerged from the woods a different person yet again. Its something about fresh air and being a small person in large wooded areas that gives perspective as to what matters to a certain degree. At least, it kind of clears your head.

I emerged from the woods and into my parent's car and after about three or four blocks they said "Im sorry...". I didn't know what they meant until they explained that while we were at camp, Andy Rooney had died.
{Source: Wikipedia}

Rooney was hospitalized on October 25, 2011, after developing postoperative complications from an undisclosed surgery,^[40] and died on November 4, 2011, at the age of 92, almost five weeks after his last appearance on 60 Minutes

So now why does this matter? Mr. Rooney was one of the unique journalists in a dying breed. Walter Cronkite pioneered cable news, and Mr. Rooney the video editorial. In a way, I guess people like John and Hank Green owe it to Mr. Rooney for being one of the first to speak his mind and have other people actually care.

I admired him because he spoke his mind and never cared what others thought. He told it how he saw it and wasn't warped otherwise. I only learned of his existence about a year ago... It seems that every time I discover some relatively old guy that does good journalist stuff (Andy Rooney, Walter Cronkite, etc.) they either retire or die. I don't like this track record. Luckily for me though, I think Scott Pelley is locked into a contract with CBS for the next few years or so.

So thank you to those who pioneered speaking their mind. Thank you Peter Zenger for paving freedom of press and thank you Andy Rooney for being the cranky old guy at the end of 60 Minutes that everyone hated to love.

Questioned Mentality

So a while back I was wondering where I was going to try and lead my friends into for the next video project. We started with a variety show (JSVH) which demanded 4 hours realtime to film and 15 minutes of a viewer's time. Then we stopped for a while and invented a series that required little effort (The Total Randomness Series) and that kind of worked for us, but it wasn't ideal. Then we invented BBC 2 1/2 which kind of worked again, but it is a relatively repetitive format. Then I met a few creative people, and we created the idea I'd like to call "Questioned Mentality".

Screenshot from Possible QMentality Filming

This idea is modeled after our bizarre lives (Write and Film What You Know) and its ups and downs. My friend Alex (xanderqwerty123 on youtube) and Dan (MrXigbar22 on youtube) as well as Clay Bodnar (JSVH, TR series, Lapsing Reality) and David Wovchko are helping bring to life a youtube channel bent on one mission: The most random and Creative short videos all posted to one channel. Thus, we are starting this project within the next two months.

Yes, I did that just to use "thus" in a sentence. For the record, I am optimistic about this. As Isabella  once said "Negative Attitudes Lead To Negative Outcomes." Granted, she was talking about a relationship with a girl, but it still applies here.

My Questioned Mentality

Sanity is defined by what? Some say its an average of everyone else. Others say its staying out of an asylum. Others say sanity is staying out of love, some in. The issue I personally have is that sanity is almost always defined by comparing to someone else.

Do I not like other people? No, I like people... why else would I be writing to people through the internet. I just don't like how the definition of mentality depends on what others think. If I let them be their own person, who are they to call me insane? 

I am questionably mental because of three main things: the way I interact with people, the way I think, and the way I express myself. What would the world be like without Self Expression?

The name Questioned Mentality is derived from the reactions that we (Project Contributors) get when we tell someone ideas. We want the channel to make people wonder if they are sane, if we are sane, and more importantly, we want to try and redefine entertainment.

And, just to throw this in... NO the Kardashians aren't my idea of entertainment. Try Wheezywaiter or Smosh or RayWilliamJohnson or even Meekakitty on for size.

And because this is running through my head right now, check out Paradise by Coldplay from their new album Mylo Xyloto

Local Blogger Reaches Milestone

Hello everyone and welcome to POST 100! I realize that this is only the beginning, so I don't feel like reflecting too much. Over the past two years, I have met so many people, and this blog has really been a great part of my career. We [Me, as well as my readers!] got nominated in 2011 for a CBS Pittsburgh MVB award, and consequently I have met a few new people. I recently was browsing through some of the comments on this site, and found another nominee, 2 Political Junkies. They are local Bloggers, and are quite good at what they do. Either way, I'd like to thank everyone that has helped along the way.

I was watching the CBS evening news with Scott Pelley earlier tonight, and they brought up yet another story about Steve Jobs. As any of my close friends can tell you, I have and probably will always be a PC. My world revolves around Windows 7, Google Chrome, and Youtube. I don't particularly idolize Bill Gates, but I do commend his Philanthropy. However, I will attempt to have my bias leave this post.

Anyway, the story was about how Steve Jobs gave a commencement speech (So did you Pelley) and how he talked not about his successes, but his failures. In life sometimes it is one step forward, and always two steps back. Steve Jobs quoted a magazine about "Stay Hungry, or Stay Foolish" and to a certain degree, I believe that is true. We must learn from our failures to succeed, or otherwise fail in the long run. I must leave this post to design something, but I promise more failure, so in the long run we can succeed.

I Can't Believe I Have Never Blogged About Canada!

So I decided to reblog some random blog post from here, just to generate traffic to this site, and to show what I do in my spare time. [For the record this is for my tumblr]

In order to decide what to reblog, I plugged the word "Canada" into my sidebar search thing-a-ma-jig. Amazingly, that word has never appeared in my blog before. I don't hate you Canadians, its just that you occasionally slip my mind! So, here goes nothing (really):

Canadian Please
So recently I discovered a Canadian vlogger through watching Elmify on Youtube religiously. Anyway, he posted a music video about how basically Canadians are awesome. You should really go check it out if you get a chance, as well as my other Favourites on Youtube.

We're Going to Canada (in 2016)!!!
This past year, I talked to my friends about going to Canada just as a trip when we were all 19. The plan was to go to Toronto, and have fun in Canada. The only two issues came up with transportation. The first is a small expense called a Passport and the other being a vessel to hold eight people. So basically, a school bus, or maybe just two cars. Another idea was a subway boring straight to Toronto. How we'll surface? Heck if I know.

TRANSITION!

Finally, I am working on some new projects... but those won't be out for a while. I am going to post next about maybe Elmify, Meekakitty, Vlogbrothers, or someone else. Wanna suggest something? Comment or email me at the link under "contact webmaster" or whatever I put at the bottom.

Peoples, Klondike, and Awesome People!

Ok, I decided to make a page to acknowledge and thank some really awesome people. This is in light of the recent Klondike incident. Due to legal issues, I wish not discuss details or names. What I am allowed to say is pushing James around in a sled (That is permanently installed with wheels) is NOT FUN. Also, if you think it might be about me attacking someone with a sled, that isn't true... at least as far as here goes.

Oh, and a PSA from Dennis Land:

Facebook will be closed for maintenance from February 29 to 31!! Facebook wants YOU to Share this message with at least 15 of your friends for the best chance of alerting everyone. Many people will try to login from February 29 to 31, just to find the site closed down for those days with no warning. HELP YOUR FACEBOOK FAMILY -- REPOST THIS!!

For the record, if you don't get it, you deserve to be taken off the awesome list. And, if you want to see this, the list is here.

Otherwise, check out the list. I decided that anyone that screams at me, slanders, or otherwise destroys me or my projects are not in the list.

I have to start working on this list now, so bye!

Oh, and listen to "Waiting for the End" by Linkin Park... its good. THANKS MATT!

Relationship Statuses and Wal*Mart (Part One)

It seems to be a groundbreaking issue when someone changes their relationship status or, for that matter, anything else on Facebook. GET OVER IT AMERICA, Facebook isn't gospel. The most obnoxious comments come from the people that have 30 people listed as their sibling. I drew the line at calling Clay my "Romanian Cousin" there. To a certain degree, that holds truth. That is a short story, but I won't put that here....

The reason, I guess, that I decided to title this the way it is, is that the past 72 hours really accomplished a lot... I got a major portion of my research regarding the CarLynTon project, and I now have a job as a docent there on Saturdays... and I suggest no one ask for me directly, as I won't start for a while.

I also add this post for the reason of probably the first Project 559 production: Wal*Mart. I think that as a whole, the company needs to be shut down. The man at the Electronics Dept. didn't even ask me if I wanted to keep my Gift card. He just tossed it away like day old banana peel. I was overall offended. Next, the guy charged me about $14 for a few audio adapters! Wing-chow, the usual suspect. "Designed in the US, and Manufactured in China" my left foot! The rest of the trauma will be posted later... besides, the Star in Wal*Mart doesn't need to be a star, it should really be a dot or dash. They aren't all American like originally, or so I am told (It's been Chinese since I was little)!

Halloween

I decided to even out the blog posts currently on here. As of today, this post that you are reading is #70! Anyway, I was passing out candy to small children. After a while, I got bored between people, so I started tallying them up.

This was another "Social Experiment" because the news always says what kids will be wearing... and I decided to prove, at least KeenObservers.com wrong!

K.O. Said:
-AVATAR (James Cameron) is popular
Popular:

• True Blood
• Twilight’s Edward and Bella
• Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland
• Jersey Shore’s Snooki (SERIOUSLY!!!! COME ON!)
• Harry Potter and the gang
• The Office
• Toy Story 3
• Super Mario and Luigi
• Batman
• Super-Man
• Darth Vader

 Well, Here are some of the actual popular costumes (2+ people, or unique)

• Witch (9)
• Princess(4)
• Spiderman (3)
• Pirate(2)
• The Incredible Hulk (2)
• Thing 1 or 2 (1 each)
• Dinosaur (2)

      I just plain liked these:

• Military Dude
• Fat Guy
• Horseman from some Apocalypse movie
• Ski-Masked Sombrero-Wearing Low-Budget Ninja (ok, that was me...)

I did, mind you, see Batman, Superman, Luigi, and Lady Gaga. However, to my pleasure, I didn't see SNOOKI or Twilight or any of that whole TEAM Jacob or TEAM Edward crap.

That ends Halloween, and now onto Thanksgiving and Christmas!


An After Note: I didn't see many people that I knew... I didn't see Clay or Andrew or Jeff, but I did see my friend's cousin Ivan!

Post Number 50!!!

To buy myself time, this technically is the 50th post since I began. HOWEVER, I deleted some of the pointless nonsense so I could rant before my real post fifty. So, in reality, this is post 48, again. Confusing, but I think I know what I will have on the REAL 50th post.

Well, It has certainly been a while since I have updated my own blog. Let's see what is new, and what I can elaborate on.


Spring Queen 2010

On May 15th, I went to spring queen with my best friend Clay who escorted his (girl)friend Natalie. As for me, I went with my very good friend Lindsey. One of the more interesting stories is that I was unofficially 30 minutes late. I was in the parking lot 15 minutes or so early, but Lindsey didn't show up. The doors opened, and everyone but I went in. Little did I know that Lindsey was inside the whole time. As ticked off as I was, I was caught off guard by what was to happen later. I had danced with Lindsey (I CANNOT dance), and ended up with at least 5 death threats from my assorted group of friends. I guess I deserved it, but still....


Video Projects and Other Assorted Things Like That
I must have ranted thousands of times about video projects in the past. However, whenever Jeffrey quit, I thought that was the worst I have seen. I was sadly wrong. After at least three tries at another project, I had to pull out of it. I had created a train without brakes, and I couldn't go any further. Soon after, the project (I guess) manager decided to work further on this project. To this date, I have not been able to find common ground with him or his production group.
JSVH: The Second Season
Ok, so about two days after pulling out of the trainwrecked project, I got a call from my other good friend Jeffrey. He wanted to know if we could do the second JSVH season. Something we had been talking about thousands of times before. I happily agreed, and soon after, so did Clay. We plan on meeting about this sometime during next week.

BSA Troop 831 in Carnegie

I have been working tirelessly on working on the troop831carnegie project by means of everything free. I have been using e-mail nonstop. I have been everything from blogger to Google Calendar and Facebook. But That is another story. Anyway, I am FINALLY Second Class, and working on First Class. Once I am First Class, I can do everything scouting has to offer. This is my true goal in life at this point. I attended an Eagle Court Of Honor on Sunday, and I heard nothing but good things about the scouting program, and that already I am one of the 17% of boys in the US that stick with scouts.
Over the next few weeks, I will redesign their website. Just another thing on my list.

The Future of This Blog and Website
Well, I now have a permanent domain at alexpopichak.com. I will have to work on that also. Until then, That's the way it is:
Alexander Popichak

So... we are approaching 50 posts.

Ok, so I have been keeping this blog for about 6 months. This is our 46th post, and we will probably have 50 posts by the end of this month. However, it should be earlier. In all reality, I have been neglecting this blog for a major project. I have been working over the past weekend and three snow days on something called a wiki.
Dave has been working REALLY hard alongside me om that Dave n' Clay show's wiki. Please feel free to check it out:
http://davenclay.wikia.com/wiki/That_Dave_n%27_Clay_Show_Wiki
Everyone has heard of "Wikipedia-The free encyclopedia." Now, just for kicks, I have created a wikipedia page for myself. Within one night, It has been nominated for deletion. That is fine, I don't need one. But within about 30 minutes of that comment by the admins at Wikipedia, some person deleted 90% of the information and added:

"fail"and later "haha he failsssssssssssssss"

so, they will delete a page, but let someone trash it without any contest. So, that's Wikipedia.
After that episode, I decided to create my own version of wikipedia. There, I have the administrator power, so anyone can edit or add an article if you have one of the free accounts:
http://ultimateguidetotheuniverse.wikia.com/wiki/Alex%27s_Ultimate_Guide_to_the_Universe_Wiki

So By The Way...

OK, so I haven't dropped completely off the earth, but I certainly feel like it. For some odd reason, we had a pep rally. So we are huddled together, the entire JR high, on the bleachers of this auxiliary gym above the locker rooms. I sit like this:
------BBBIIIGGGG SPACE-----Andrew  Clay   Alex   Lindsey
Then J'Quay shoves himself next to Lindsey, so we attempt to move down. Andrew refuses to move. Then Dave showed up he attempts to sit next to me:
------BBBIIIGGGG SPACE-----Andrew ClayAlexDaveLindseyJ'Quay SPACE
So Dave, being a gentleman, offered to move poor squished Lindsey down a row, so I was squished between Clay and Dave in a room where I didn't know why I was in it. Next thing I knew, the assembly was over.
The even better part to all of this is that the teachers didn't even know about this until the end of first period. Honestly, I kind of enjoyed the shortened classes. That was my Tuesday.
FYI this is the 45th post since I have began, obviously I did something right.

Website Stuff

40 posts, WOW! I logged into blogger, and this was the message: 41 posts, last posted yesterday. Anyway, so this is the longest time that I have ever done anything that didn't collapse, or get ended by other people.
Anyway, Last weekend was really entertaining, this weekend, the most exciting thing was getting to talk to Ricki on Facebook. This weekend, I went to AB Charles Hobby Shop and got Decals for a pinewood car. We took down, the Christmas tree, and I set up Google Analytics for this site. For the public results, please view the revolving globe on the sidebar. From what I have gathered over the past 3 days, we had 13 visits from 2 states: Alaska and Pennsylvaina. So I guess that's it,
Alex