guilty pleasure #8: American Idol
There is just no denying it: I really like American Idol.
I understand that’s not the coolest thing for a 24 year-old guy to say, but I stopped chasing after “cool” back when George H. was in office, so I’m ok with it.
I more than just like American Idol… I actually vote each week for my favorite contestant! In case you still thought I was cool after the second sentence, you’ve no doubt changed your mind now.
I tape Idol if I’m not going to be able to watch it when it airs. I watch Idol videos on YouTube. I’ve been (on more than one occasion) to americanidol.com. I seriously love it*. I love Kelly Clarkson (Kelly, I know you subscribe to odfm… can I take you to dinner sometime?). In fact, my love for American Idol isn’t even a guilty pleasure at all, because I don’t even feel bad about it. I’ll shamelessly tell anybody that I like the show, and here’s why:
You may recall from some previous posts that I simply love watching people do whatever it is they are good at - people who are in their element. It doesn’t even have to be cool. I’d enjoy watching a guy dig a hole if he was excellent at it. Even more though, I enjoy watching people who excel at something that I too dabble or take interest in. I’ll spare you the list of my dabblings, and share only the one that pertains to this post: singing.
I love to sing. That doesn’t mean that I’m singing all the time, or that if you ask me to sing I’ll actually do it, but I do love singing. Now given that little tidbit and having read the previous paragraph, is it any surprise that I love this show? And not even the part most people like. I’d much rather watch the actual competition than the painful auditions.
Add to the mix the fact that this season my fellow Aggie, Jason Castro, is in (at the time this was published) the top 16! How could I possibly not watch? (I faithfully vote each week for Jason… this week I did so twice…).
I love Idol (and singing) so much that if I can think of an appropriate song, I just might try out next time around. Not because I think I’ll make it, but just because I think it’d be fun. Maybe I could try out as Trial Man… Tony, I’ll come with you to audition, ok?
So why all this useless information of my adoration for American Idol? Because life ought to be shared, and since I can’t watch this season in the six chicks’ living room (oh how I miss those days), I have to share with the masses via the world wide web.
I’ll leave you with the best performance of this season so far. This kid is 17, and if you don’t love him, you might have no heart at all. Happy Leap Day.
*Don’t worry, just because it’s called American Idol and I’ve spent the past few hundred words talking about how much I love it, it’s not actually an idol. Just so there’s no confusion.
confessions of a baptist in a presbyterian format*
You know the ice-breaker questions that you’re inevitably asked in job interviews or when you find yourself in a new place with new people? Questions like, “If you were an animal, what kind would you be?” or “What’s your favorite ice cream?” or in more straight-forward crowds, “What are you passionate about?” We all know these questions. The more creative of the lot tend to enjoy them, while the more reserved bunch probably dislike them (unless they are cat people, and the animal question was asked, in which case they’ll gladly elaborate on why their answer is “cat”).
I think these questions are hit or miss. Sometimes they’re good, other times they’re lame. The degree to which I like the question is directly correlated to how clever I deem my answer to be. If the question were “What three words would you use to describe yourself?” then I’d be happy if I were mentally quick enough to realize that a very appropriate word for me, and likely worthy of a top-three placement, would be the word “slow”.
There are a number of things that I do slowly, perhaps none so apparent as the speed with which I eat. Growing up I was consistently left alone at the dinner table to my meal while my parents had moved to the kitchen to do dishes. In college, my friends at Sbisa would occasionally be spotted leaving me alone at the long cafeteria tables to finish my cookies or Crunch Bars (this would of course only happen on the second Crunch Bar, as they would never forgo the opportunity to crush my first).
It wasn’t until I showed up in Philly, however, that I found another place where my slow rate of ingestion would manifest itself. I go to a Presbyterian church here in the city, and insofar as this story in concerned, that means they take communion weekly, having each individual coming down, tearing off a piece of bread, dipping it in the cup, and turning to go back to their seat.
On more than one occasion the stage in which the believer tears his or her piece of bread from the loaf has given me difficulties. I find myself going back and forth in the mental battle of whether it is better for me to take the extra few seconds to tear off an appropriately sized piece and in doing so disrupt the natural flow of the line behind me, or if it’s nobler to roll with whatever size you end up grabbing (too small and your fingers are in the wine, too large and…).
So twice now, this has happened: I step up, place my hands on the bread, and as the guy holding it says, “the Body of Christ, broken for you” all I can think about is how giant this piece is that I just tore off. One of them, I’m not exaggerating, was the size of a small dinner roll. I knew that nothing good could come of this. The guy holding the loaf had to have been holding back laughter as the person behind me approached him. I go to dip it in the juice (not the wine… I made that mistake in Dallas… a rude awakening in the midst of communion), and I insert that giant ball of baked dough in my mouth, and make my way back to my seat.
Keeping in mind that I just do not eat quickly (it’s less of a preference thing and more of a I-just-can’t-eat-fast idea), I was only about a third of the way done with my body and blood by the time I’d sat back down. Nobody else in the entire building is still chewing by the time they’ve returned to their seat. After everyone’s partaken of the elements, the pastor tells us to rise and sing a hymn of response. As those around me worship, I’m still chewing, but trying to do so as inconspicuously as is humanly possible. Finally I’m able to stomach the holy sacraments, just in time to sing the final refrain of whatever song is being played before the closing prayer. Those last 10 minutes of each service are always so intense, and for all the wrong reasons…
This story was brought to mind by Jon’s recent post on the Lord’s Supper. His post is a million times more edifying than mine was. Go check it out.
*That is to say, a kid raised in a baptist church where tearing bread was never a necessary art, who currently attends a presbyterian church where such skills are much more necessary (far too long for the title bar).
my moleskine: exposed!
The content displayed in the image above is something no eyes have beheld until now: the innards of my moleskine* journal. Click on the image to enlarge it and in-so-doing making the text readable (not legible). Read, comment, cast your vote, and know that there will be plenty more on this matter in the near future.
Hat tips to Megan Shuffle for letting me blatantly steal your idea without your knowledge or permission, and to Nat-town for providing me with the j that I can write on both in landscape and portrait mode.
*For those of you who think I’ve misspelled “moleskine” by adding an extra “e”, check yourselves, for you are wrong.
public transit: portable people watching
Public transportation has provided me with a great number of pleasantries to date in Philly. In fact, it’d probably make my list of top three most enjoyable things about the city (provided the weather is cooperating) if such a list existed. There are many people with whom I’m familiar that I would never come in contact were it not for my dependence on Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority. So too, there are some social phenomena that I’ve been made aware of thanks to my twice daily commutes. These are their stories (rather, my story and how they fall in it).
Each morning before I go downstairs to leave for the day, one of two things happen. If I have SEPTA tokens, I grab two and place them in my front left pocket, in order that they’ll avoid the congestion the right pocket offers with a wallet and keys. If I’ve depleted my store of tokens, I walk South to the check cashing/lottery ticket place where Loretta - who works on the other side of the plexiglass and iron bars and who thinks me weird for asking her name - sells me two packets of tokens weekly. I hand her my $15 and she in turn gives me my packets and two quarters.
From here I go to any given bus stop along 3rd Street between Spring Garden and Girard where I wait anywhere from 2 seconds (a feeling that’s hard to beat) to 20 minutes on the next bus with yellow LED’s displaying “5 Frankford Market” atop the windshield. I offer the driver a “morning, how’s it going?” as I insert my token in it’s proper place. Depending on the driver, he or she will respond with appropriate niceties as I make my way to my preferred seat: the first forward facing pair. It is here that my people watching and well-meaning eve’s dropping takes place.
It is from these two seats where I watch with amazement how nice everybody is to the bus drivers. I’ve seen hundreds of people get on and off of buses, and the great majority of the time the driver is greeted very warmly. It could be the most gangsta-thug-lyfe person that you’d avoid eye contact with on the street, but they’re best friends with the drivers, just as the old lady who takes an entire minute to successfully get on the bus is his best friend (the driver, not the gangsta). The drivers may very well be the most well-liked people in the city.
It is from these seats that I watch the lady with the “Relax, God is in control” bag board with her earbuds pumping what I can only assume is Gospel music, carrying her Bible in hand as she executes her morning minor prophet reading, head bobbing full-force to the songs playing in her ears. I watch and listen to the old lady get on and announce for all to hear (save Obadiah lady) that she’s going to see her depressed daughter who hasn’t left her house in a week.
It’s from these seats that I watch four obviously close guys get on and talk loudly (everyone here is loud) about how long it’s been since they drank or did drugs of all varieties. They seem to have gone through recovery together. My favorite quote came from one member of this quartet who had been saying some genuinely nice things about God. Then he offered this gem: “Man, God’s good. A couple months ago I wanted to f*in’ kill myself but that’s all different now. I’m serious. God did that.” Later a guy with the token Philadelphia hoodie gets on and joins the four in conversation. I hear the formerly suicidal man talking with him. After hoodie guy gets off I hear my newly believing brother say, “Life’s crazy man. That guy remembered me. He asked if I remembered him and I said no. He said he used to sell me dime bags every week and he remembered my name. That’s crazy man.”
By the time these and other experiences transpire, it’s time for me to pull the cable and notify my friendly driver that I want off at Westmoreland (though some of them would know even if I didn’t). I exit, and walk to work reflecting on how amazing and crazy life is. It is here that I long for 6:00 pm, when I’ll walk back to Frankford and Westmoreland and wait for those South-bound yellow LED’s to beckon me into their welcoming doors.
new pics for the new site
Yesterday I went on a 4 hour walk with my camera. It was an extremely pleasant afternoon. I came home where I imported, edited, and uploaded some of the shots I liked best. You can see some of them at my photography page (under cityscape), and others on my flickr (the Philly set). I’ll address the dual-site photo issue momentarily.
First though, you should know that one photo you will not see on either of the afore mentioned sites is the one you see above this text. I really love this shot a lot, but after looking at it for a while I realized that some might take it as anti-American. Let me assure you, that is not the case. It’s more of a pro-reflection sort of agenda. Really. I promise.
So why post them at two separate places? Well here’s what I decided. I’m going to try and publish only photos I deem to be the best of the best to the in-house photography page. I’ll post those and others on my flickr site. So here’s how it’ll work for you:
If you weaseled your way through high school and college on Clif’s Notes, then you’ll want the photos page. You’ll also want the photos page if you enjoy flash transitions when scrolling through pictures.
If you actually read Watership Down and Moby Dick in their entirety, you’ll like the flickr page. You’re the type who listens to a whole CD, and doesn’t just skip around to the songs you like best.
Regardless of what camp you find yourself in, I’d appreciate it a great deal if you’d comment as a sort of roll call. I want to make sure everyone successfully made the switch from wordpress to here. You can comment about the photos that I’m sure you’re soon to go look at (or have already), or you can just leave a ever-so-clever, “here” or “present” or something of the sort.
I offer you my sincerest thanks in advance. Sincerest thanks.
welcome to derrickoliver.com!
Greetings to all. I’m happy that you made it here. As you can see, this is the hippest and classiest online diary for the masses has ever looked. Well don’t worry, because the quality of content that odfm will offer at this new (and permanent) address will certainly continue being less than hip and far from classy. I just thought an appearance to the contrary would suit the blog of such an anomaly as myself.
While you’re here, exploring previously unknown parts of the world wide web, let me give you an idea of what the new and sliiightly improved odfm has to offer.
Just like my wordpress blog, this site also has separate pages (see the navigation bar above) to make for easy navigation and a greater variety of content. If you’re the type who likes to see everything that a particular site has to offer, feel free to click each of the links above and see if you can discern the changes I made from wordpress pages. If you’re just looking to subscribe for now (so that you can come back later to spend hours on end rereading everything I’ve said for the past three years), just click the word, “rss” above. If you’re more into things that are entirely new and exciting, awesome, wonderful, rad, bodacious, et cetera, then please, ladies and gentlemen, behold…
This was one of the main reasons I switched (yet again) to a new format. I’m still hosted by wordpress, but now I’ve got my own domain (for potential future needs of who knows what variety) and a whole heck of a lot more freedom to do what I want. You should have seen what this blog looked like when I started working on it. Let’s just say that there was no grey, black, or red. That’s exciting to me.
So please do what you gotta do to get adjusted to this new address. Change your links, bookmarks, feed, home pages. Get the “wordpress.” in your “www.derrickoliver.com” tattoo removed. Sell your “www.derrickoliver.com” t-shirts and other paraphernalia on eBay as “vintage”.
I’d like to take this next-to-last paragraph of my debut post to thank Thomas Supercinski for all of his help in making this and many other web projects possible. He’s answered countless freshman questions for me and taken plenty of time out of his schedule to help me with this. If you don’t subscribe to his blog, you really should. He and his wife talk about way more worth-while things than I do. Really. Check him out. Thomas, thanks so much man.
Thanks so much for tolerating all my moving around lately. I’m done now though. This is my new home. I like it here and I hope you feel comfy here as well.
the green bandit
If in the next few weeks you happen upon a particular Philadelphia bus stop on a cold, rainy and spot a human wearing three shades of green with red hair growing out of the only opening in his outfit, don’t be scared, it’s just me. You should stop and say hi… and offer him a ride.
one month down, three-ish to go
Yesterday I reached the one month mark of time spent in Philly. I had full intentions of posting this on the actual monthiversary, but I was having some issues with linksys 7, the internet gracious provided for me by my unassuming neighbors. It’s fairly unreliable, but I’m not paying for it, so I can’t complain. It just means that you get the one month update a day late. I apologize for hours of lost sleep that this delay may have caused.
One month in, I’m learning to appreciate certain things about living in the city. Things that I wouldn’t have noticed without spending 30 days in the same place. Things like public transportation (which will receive a full-length post in the near future), propaganda (pictured above), and the fact that everybody has a hoodie, which they utilize daily. Seriously. I feel like an outsider for not having one. That and the fact that I can’t avoid wearing outfits comprised exclusively of varying shades of green.
Conversely, I’m learning to live with the things that I doubt I’ll ever appreciate. Things like a painful lack of any green space (save my clothing), an abundance of trash (including every dirty thing you can imagine and more… I promise), the high cost of groceries, and the hair that is so prevalent all over my house compliments of Auggie. (I had previously referred to him as Oggy, and have since learned the correct spelling.)
[Warning: This post kinda takes an unexpected and slightly unhappy turn here. If you aren't in the mood, skip the following paragraph.]
Another thing I’ve learned after spending a month here is that you should never sign up to do something for four months unless you really believe in it. For the most part, the work I’m having to do for my internship isn’t working towards an end that I really care about. I don’t mind doing menial work for a cause that I truly believe in, but all in all that’s not the case here. I constantly have to remind myself that it (”it” in general, not just internship “it” stuff) is not about me. Colossians 3 and 23 tells me that I have to work diligently for this thing, even though almost no part of me wants to. I may or may not elaborate on the stuff I’m eluding to here in the future, just depends on how things go. But you can consider this an opportunity to pray for ol’ D.O., as I sure could use it (who couldn’t?).
[Ok, back to normal]
This past week my internship found me working for hours on end to create a few things I’d like to share with you guys. They probably don’t seem like much, but think of it as your kid (that may be a stretch… how about your neighbor’s kid) creating something and showing it to you. This map took a solid day and a half to get functioning properly, and this message board took about the same amount of time. Neither of these things have officially launched yet, so go and be one of the first in the world to see ‘em.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t make mention of how faithful the Lord has been in providing me with community here in Philly. I attend a small group on Wednesday nights that is absolutely the most life-giving thing that takes place throughout my week. The people that gather are so honest and real as they corporately explore the depths of the Gospel. It is truly a refreshing time, and I’d like to praise the Provider for allowing me to be a part of such a group in a city where one month ago I knew not a soul. He is good.
Amen and amen.
a public transit mini-epic
It was bound to happen. There was truly no way of avoiding it. Me, a kid raised in the burbs who shows up to the 6th most populous city in America where he relies entirely on public transportation to get from point A to point B… something like this was inevitable. Especially considering how long it’s been since my last epic.
As I looked in the pantry that fateful morning, the only groceries remaining from my last trip to Thrift Way were a single packet of oatmeal and a sleeve of crackers, which motivated me to hop on the 15 (which I’ve ridden once before) and head back to the local grocery store. Yeah, the 15. That’s how we Philly people say it. Well what happened next proved beyond any shadow of a doubt that I have no business including myself in the phrase “we Philly people”.
Equipped with my empty messenger bag (which I would fill with groceries), I walked up Lawrence to Girard and over to 4th. Just as I turned the corner to begin approaching 4th I saw the 15 passing by. I know from experience that missing a bus (or in this case, trolley) results in standing around for about 20 minutes at the bus stop. Any other day this would be of no consequence, but on this particular day Philly had scattered showers and high winds. I was currently dry, and in an effort to stay that way, I darted off after the trolley which, if my timing was right, was going to be stopped at a red light right as I arrived at it’s doors.
At this point I’d be remiss if I didn’t give you a better mental picture of what was going on. I stand out like a sore thumb without running full speed on one of the busiest streets in my neighborhood. Because of the threat of rain that day, I was wearing my green rain jacket. Again, this would normally be insignificant, but in order for me to stay warm in this city, I opt each morning to wear my warm weather pants, which are forest green. To (literally) top it all off, I was wearing a darker forest green hat to keep my judgment-lacking head warm. So those lucky enough to see what transpired saw a three-shades-of-green-with-a-fire-beard being sprinting in his hiking boots to catch the 15. And while I’m giving you visuals, you must know that the trolley stays in the center two lanes of four total lanes on Girard. See the picture above to clarify the confusion undoubtedly caused by the previous sentence. Moving on…
Despite how I looked approaching the trolley at 4th & Girard, I successfully reached it just before the light was turning green. I ran in between cars to get to the lane where the trolley was before it started to accelerate when much to my dismay, the driver refused to open the doors.
Good.
He was saying something about how he couldn’t pick me up at 4th. Apparently 4th and Girard isn’t a stop for the eastbound 15… So off he drove, and I made my way safely back to the sidewalk, resigned to the fact that I’d have to wait for the next trolley to pick me up at 3rd.
I walked slowly eastward to catch my breath and as I looked down the street I saw something I’ve never seen before in America (in China, yes; here, no): The trolley was stopped at 3rd street and the driver was standing in the street yelling and waving at me to hurry up.
Real good.
See, though I’d accepted the fact that I missed my chance at this particular trolley car, the driver wasn’t willing to give up so easily. He kindly waited (and yell at me). So I was off to the races again, dodging cars and angry stares from the trolley’s occupants, and after what seemed like a unbelievably long single-block run, I arrived at the (open) door of the trolley. Success! I placed my token in the slot and found a seat towards the front without making eye contact with anybody.
I’ll leave you with a picture of where the incident went down, knowledge that I ran the long way around the hand rail in said picture, and the assurance that the picture at the top of this post wasn’t taken during the freshman incident you just read about.