Up All Night- The Growing Prysocks

Some of you may know some of these things, but hopefully the rest will enlighten you:

1. When I was in high school, I was a huge nerd. I had only a small handful of friends and didn't interact much with the "cool kids" so I guess I one of those unnoticed neutral guys. As for the extent of my nerdiness, keep reading.

2. I played chess in high school. A lot. This included online at home against random people and in "chess club" at school which was basically just a group of us who played during lunch. I was never that great (I lost most of the time), but I did play quite a bit.

3. Another high school lunch past time was playing hacky sack. Now, THAT I actually had some talent at. We had our own little tree in the front of the school that we played next to everyday at lunch. In college, there was a group of theology students that regularly played in the hallway during breaks from class. I often eagerly desired to play with them and show off my neglected skills, but my peer group at the time considered it an activity worthy only of derision....

4. When I was little I was WAY into Ninja Turtles. My Dad actually built me a little fort in our backyard and I decided I wanted it to be Ninja Turtle green, and it was. Later on it was repainted to a brown color, I guess the phase ended.

5. While we're on the topic of my fort...I once broke off one of the posts on the front porch with the riding lawnmower. That was pretty awesome. Luckily Dad was more amused than angry.

6. I was obsessed with Jurassic Park when it first came out. I saw it for the first time with an older friend and I was terrified but amazed. I used to play the soundtrack at night to put me to sleep. When it came out on VHS I watched it regularly, as in multiple times a week. I kept a tally on a dry erase board on the fridge.

7. At church camp we once watched a PG Disney movie called The Watcher in the Woods. It was terrifying. I had nightmares.

8. During my first couple years of college, I was addicted to AIM. It functioned as my primary social outlet at times, which was sad.

9. Whenever asked what my hobbies are, my typical answer is "movies" because that's my one consistent primary interest. I follow movie news, go to premieres, and own lots of movies. I also know a bit too much about trivia related to some movies, especially sci-fi movies.

10. Most weekend nights during my high school years were spent playing Starcraft with friends from church. I'm talking like 4 or 5 hours every Friday and Saturday until 1 or 2 in the morning.

11. I was in golf CLASS in high school. My wife claims I was on "the team" but this is clearly false. I played golf three afternoons a week for one year of high school. I never got any better, but I did eat a lot of sunflower seeds.

12. I rode a tandem bike through the Austrian countryside during a weekend trip in my Oxford semester. It included finding an untouched, pristine grass field at the foot of a mountain and swimming in a crystal clear mountain pond. This is also the only interesting thing about myself I can come up with for those awkward ice-breaker games.

13. When I was in elementary school, both mine and my friend’s mom would take us out of school for a day once a year and take us to Six Flags. I happen to have inherited my mother’s weak gag reflex, which sometimes causes me to get nauseous easily. On one of these trips later in my elementary years, they were running the Judge Roy Scream backwards. This particular coaster was a basic up and down wooden coaster, simple as could be. So my friend and I rode it once and it was cool, I was alright. Then him and his older brother wanted to ride again right after. I was hesitant. This was because I had had a big plate of nasty greasy Six Flags nachos earlier that day. So I gave into peer pressure and sure enough, I hurled all over the place right as we were pulling back into the loading area.

14. I hate singing. Well actually, I hate singing when people can hear me. I really feel a huge amount of personal insecurity regarding my singing voice. I’ll belt out if no one can hear me, even myself, such as in church or in the car with the stereo blasting.

15. I have a short list of guilty movie pleasures, like I suspect most people do. You know, those little known or relatively unpopular comedies that only some find amusing. Mine include Dirty Work, Airheads, The Austin Powers Movies, Bandits, Galaxy Quest, Mystery Men, and Saving Silverman.

16. The following is the chronological progression of my future career hopes, beginning in elementary school until the present: NASA shuttle pilot, Air Force fighter pilot, youth minister, and currently, a therapist. Note the decrease in both “coolness” and potential salary.

There. Now you're enlightened.