It is the Beginning of the End

I just saw a Friday Night Lights commercial with "The Black Parade" by My Chemical Romance as the background music. I really hope this is not a sign for the apocalypse for a most excellent band. It might just be part of my music snobbery but this is really depressing.

A Christmas for the Records

As all of my readers should know my family does an interesting Christmas. Between opening everything on Christmas Eve because of an impatient great grandpa, to reading the Night Before Christmas with pages missing waiting for Santa with all rest of the kids (the youngest being 10 up to my brother Cory who is 27, still kids) , to mocking my little brother for accidentally tossing his a lift ticket into our fire place where it proceeded to it burn to his horror this event happened about six years ago and we will never let him live it down, and to all the guys wearing a pair of boxers on our head for our traditional Christmas photo we have quite a holiday that we celebrate. With all this going on it was still impossible to miss the massive milestone that I should have seen coming, but hindsight always makes you look oblivious to what seemed unavoidable.

I know that when I turned 21 it was an official marker that I was now a member of the adult world, but I did not think that things would change so fast and be seen most in a child's favorite day of the year. Everyone was receiving gifts appropriate for them and there places in life; my Dad gets a new kitchen knife, my little cousin received a football and a beavers hat to replace his ugly yellow one, and so on with the rest of the family. I was gifted a new Carhart beanie with an orange rain gear jacket from my father and a heating pad from my aunt and uncle. I am old. That is all there is to it because I liked all these things, and people knew to get them for me.

When I received these gifts it gave me an opportunity to look back at Christmases past and see all the changes. From the years where you could hardly see the tree or the mass of brightly covered boxes with my youngest cousin still being the baby and the elder cousin, along with my brother and I, were dreaming of the awesome toys we would receive, to those times where the family was not doing so well finacialy and family was even more important than ever, and finally to this year where my brother had to work and could not make it home for Christmas, and I got a heating pad. All this time the magic was depleting but my family has been filling what was left with great traditions of family togetherness. I guess I am satisfied with this shift in my Christmas status. Over the years the more and more practical girft have found their way under the tree with my name on the paper and I am alright with that. I will miss the Star Wars Legos, but I have friends and extra Christmas money for that. Maybe some day I might actually get to eat at the grown-up table, but I think Cory might have to be there for a while first, baby steps.

The Results Are In!

So the grades are in and they are about exactly what I expected them to be.

A. Western Civ 101

A. US Government 101

B+. US Politics 102

B. US History 201

I guessed that I would earn two A's and two B's, so the plus was an added bonus. I guess somewhere in my heart of hearts I hoped I would have pulled that third A, but that would have been greedy for the amount of class I missed. Now my accumulative GPA is a 3.38 and my original goal was to graduate college with at least a 3.0. That goal seems a bit minuscule compared to what it should be for my arrogant self, but who really knows how difficult it will be. Me being as I am, always wanting to put another bit of effort into things, I really want to try and graduate with a 3.5. It is really late in my college carrier to make too much of a dent in my GPA but I always like a challenge. I guess a 1.2 point shift would be tough a third of the way into my junior year. It would also be a bit meaningless since it will not be printed on my degree or taken in on a job application, but what the hell it will keep me focused on school since more and more I just want to get out.