BCHS Graduation

Went to the 2012 BCHS Graduation Yesterday, and I gotta admit, it's an odd feeling knowing you're out of high school, and those four years you think drag by are gone and done so fast! I mean, I know it's only been a year for me since high school ended, but in that year I've found the girl I love, ended the first year of college, am holding down a great job, and there's so much more coming up! Life is truly an exciting thing.

This is for all you aisle enthusiasts. You know who you are.

Jami and Con Con. The adopted kid that lives in the garage behind my house. 

Great friend of mine and Jami's, Vanessa who gave the best speech.

Sorry guys, aside from Mr. Ward, she rocked the mic up there.

Justus. This dude kills a rad bass line, and rocks it hard with 

the band Streetside Vinyl. If you haven't checked them out,

go here: Streetside Vinyl's Fan Page

Cousin Natalie graduated!

My great friend Garrett. 

Alex

Jami and her nieces. Seriously, they're like, 18 levels of fun.

Jami and mini-reese witherspoon.

A book! With nothing but a paper saying "I just jumped through four years of hoops

to move onto another four years of jumping through hoops for an even more expensive paper!"

Jami and the speech girl.

Joke of high school. His name is Patrick Stewart. Therefor we rock the spock. 

We were rival catchers on the baseball team before his knee blew out. But I gotta say, he's a great guy. 

Cousins!

This guy and I used to get into so much trouble during film class..

Classic arm in arm. Wait for dapper day. We'll rock the Main Street.

Wade! He beat me to the dapper. 

Greatest teacher. EVER. She's the reason I love classic literature more than I did before.

And I still owe her a dole whip, churro, and 

copy of the Little Mermaid for all the bets I lost in her class.

Erin and Jami. Another lady who's inspired me in life, just not in English. This time it's photography.

You notice, given the dozens of photos I post...

She stole mah camera! Isn't she pretty?!

My girl and my second mama :)

We were both kind of tired after the day..ended it with a graduation party for Natalie.

Dinner and a Movie

It's been a while, but I'm going to try to keep up with my blogging daily. If I don't, send me a message telling me to get back to blogging. DO IT. It'll help me stay on this thing. 

Anyway..

Last night I cooked dinner for my girlfriend and family. Nothing too fancy, just spaghetti. After dinner Jami and I went out in my dad's truck and watched a movie on the iPad. Total drive in movie remixed. She's never seen my Big Fat Greek Wedding, so we watched that and cuddled up against the wind. What's crazy is that usually this time of year we're usually sweating our faces off, but last night it was in the low 60's with a strong wind that made it feel in the low 50's. But we braved the wind and had a great time watching the film and talking. 

Steamy noodahs!

My little helper

The good stuff

Noted!

Gooooooey!

Yum!

My girl :)

The best part of the meal!

Insane in the (Mouse) Ears

It's sad when something so fun and innocent has to be bruised and battered down by those so self proclaiming to be the biggest fans. Yes, I'm talking to you, MiceChat, VisionsFantastic, MouseWait, and so many more.

Look, I get it that you love the parks. I love them too. I grew up with Disneyland just like any other kid in SoCal. But there's a line that I realized needs to be drawn to loving it and being obsessed about it. Many have crossed this line and are hopelessly lost in their pie-eyed dreams of what they think the park needs to be, and get mad when theres too much "princess" or Marvel's "invading", or Walt-Forbid, the paint on Main Street isn't historically right to the time period (my personal favorite).

I've grown up loving Disney. Goodness, the first movie I watched was Aladdin, and I can still remember the Electrical Parade on Main Street. But as I grew up from just Disney movies and park visits, I started to look deeper into what the parks were, are, and will be. Yes, I searched the internet, and stumbled down the proverbial rabbit hole of fandom.

First it was Theme Park Review, then it was MiceChat. TPR was cool, but over time I got tired of the language and crude jokes. It's still a good site, and Mr. Alvey has done a GREAT job at maintaining it and building it to what it is today, but overall it's just not my style to be with. With MiceChat though, I thought I'd hit a jackpot with the cool fan community of Disney. Originally I thought it was great, because at the time people were nice and willing to chat nicely about what the parks were, discuss history and future rumors. But over time it fell to pieces. I started to make friends with people off the site, and some were cool. Others I questioned their motives, and later understood why I questioned it to begin with, but as time drew on, it got hostile.

Fans slamming each other over an idea that was just an afternoon commute's day dream.
Ripping apart young teen's logic on why Disney was redesigning something.
Shredding old folks for reminiscing on the Days of Old.
It was messy, and I wanted out.

The entire site now is a twisted web of Vinylmation wielding and oversized logo'd shirt wearing, cliques, with only the 'best' being in them. If you disagree, you're outcasted and de-repped. The thing is, even the mods are in on it too, especially when you get sarcastic and witty with your comebacks to things, because they see it as an "attack". If you stay under the wings of mods, you're safe to jab out at others. If you're outside the reach of wings, look out for the attack if you speak your mind too loudly.

And it's not just MiceChat. It's in general. I only used MiceChat because that's the only example of site hostility I had. All in all, I really don't see how people cannot just enjoy what Disney makes for the parks and resorts. They're obviously doing something right to be buying out companies for $4 billion, or working hand in hand with others that have more money than the government does...but the fans don't see it as that. They see it as removing what they love for something new. It's "invasive". The "sight lines are wrong, and intrusive to other lands." It's all stupid and insane in the membrane that people think this.

This all over the past while has actually burned me out on knowing what Disney's up to. I don't even care to go to the parks for now because I need a break from all of this. I need to not only focus on my own life and other things going on with that, but I need to step away from being a big fan, and let this storm spin itself out before I try to step on the beach again.