Walking into a movie theater is scary

I'm not about to address the theaters themselves, but the lobbies and hallways. First off: other people. Raise your hand if you've had enough of that.

Also, there is a whole lot of popcorn on the ground and, if you walk next to my brother, you'll get an exhibition of what is known as the "Theater Shuffle." Which can double as a break dancing move, but only if you want to get beat up.

But that's not the point here, I'm going to describe to you why a theater I entered yesterday was scary.

My family was seeing, as a group, Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and as my Dad was buying the tickets, the remaining four of us walked into the lobby. I immediately noticed two separate movie posters, not next to each other in any way.

Okay, Thor. Or, more realistically: THOR! Black around him, turned away from the viewer. He's a brooder. Nice chain mail, too. But then, on the other side of the lobby, is this:

Yes it's Daniel Craig

This seems like when I'd lean to the person next to me in art class and copy what she (usually) was drawing. I mean, I know It's supposed to be edgy, but they, poster designers, are clearly running out of ideas.

But, unoriginality in movies is something that you have to deal with, so I moved on. The next poster that I took in made me face palm.

Don't get me wrong, I'm excited for this movie. But if your movie's title makes people laugh a little and then groan a lot you've done something wrong.

Update: The name of this movie is actually Kung Fu Panda 2. Not original, but at least it isn't Ska2oosh.

But nothing too bad, right? Well, imagine turning the corner and running into a giant 3-D version of this:

Yes, that's a real thing. And yes, we saw a preview for it. And yes, it looked just as good as it does here. What with the purple and whatnot.

I enjoy movies. Really I do. And when I see copy-cat posters, headache-inducing pun titles, and giant billboards angled towards girls between the ages of 12 and 12, I just want to go home, close the shades, and watch a back-to-back-to-back marathon of "Shawshank Redemption."

Well it's all out of my system now, and, because of good ol' Biebs up there I-

What? You're kidding me. That's not a real thing...it's a cracked article...right? Please?

Sigh. As I was saying, because I had to save a picture of Justin Bieber, this is going to happen:

Thanking

I'm thankful for, as of yet, no meteors.

I'm thankful for my spel check.

I'm thankful for other people, who let me know that I'm not the wierd one.

I'm thankful for Pixar (Except Finding Nemo).

I'm thankful for comfy couches.

I'm thankful for warm kitties.

Il Festival fantastica di Daniel

I'm thankful for the small Italian village that thinks I'm a 103-year-old warlock and sends me gifts each year.

I'm thankful for my parents.

I'm thankful for girls.

That last one sounds kind of creepy, let me rephrase.

I'm thankful for... the realization that there is no way to NOT sound creepy saying that. Let the record stand.

I'm thankful for hot soup.

I'm thankful that the Yakuza hasn't found me yet.

I'm thankful for my friends, at least those that have not been covered in other people-related thanks.

I'm thankful for pants. When I wear them. Otherwise they can eat sod.

I'm thankful for not having to carry sod.

I'm thankful for clouds.

I'm thankful for ghosts. When I make fun of them, they can't hit me.



I'm thankful for my roommates.

He never flushed.

I'm thankful that I am no longer roommates with Randy Moss.

I'm thankful that I know the secret of El Dorado.

No, no, you take a left at McGrinner Street, and then it's on the right after a few miles.

I'm thankful for my siblings.

I'm thankful for my faith.

I'm thankful for my sanity.

I'm thankful for Let this serve as a warning to others that would insult us! Yamaguchi-Gumi!

Bet George Washington Carver Never Saw This One Coming

Now there was a problem. I’d run out of shaving cream. And just before the big event that I was definitely going to. But I had read somewhere that it’s possible to shave using one of the two greatest foods ever: peanut butter. It is sadly hard to shave using bacon. This is how it was done.

I took a knife and plunged it into the pristine plastic jar of taste, scooping up a generous serving and holding it poised over my bristly cheek. Was there a better way to do this, as in without using a knife? I thought about using a plastic spatula, and went hunting for one before I realized that two men living in a college dorm don’t ever have a plastic spatula. So it was back to the knife. My roommate suggested I use a butter knife instead of a steak knife, and I decided that was a good idea. So I had my instrument ready, and a fresh jar of peanut butter, I was ready to go for real.

Me. Sometimes.

But how much to use? How thinly to spread it? As much as I liked the idea of a beard made out of peanut butter, I needed to be smart. It would be irresponsible to have to tell my R.A. that I had clogged our bathroom sink with peanut butter.

Again.

It took me a while to learn how to spread it. If you think it’s hard spreading it on a piece of toast you’ve lived an easy life. I had to remove a good bit of the PB before I got what I determined to be an acceptable layer. While too much PB isn’t a bad thing, it does cause quite a mess. Too little may result in razor burn, an uneven shave, or ingrown hairs. So, with this information in mind, I aired on the side of “too much,” but not too much.

After the spreading was done, I let my face marinate for a little bit, which was not a step unique to peanut butter, but was only part of my own shaving ritual. I liked the fact that I smelt like a bagel.

Next it is important to point out that I dislike shaving advertisements. I like the products, as shaving is an art and I am an artist, but the ads themselves disgust me. One, the man shaving is clearly clean-shaven already. Two, making a hideously long cut from below the sideburns to the bottom of the neck is a terribly inefficient way to shave, usually resulting in missed hairs and a general mess. It is much more efficient and gentlemanly to shave using short vertical strokes, washing the blade after every five or six cuts.

I got to work and scraped the peanut butter away from my cheek, relishing the pressure of the blade. I was of course using a real shaving-razor by this point and not a knife. It worked well, though it seemed as if I had indeed applied more peanut butter than needed. I had to wash a good bit off of my razor into the sink. I did my cheeks and nodded with satisfaction.

Next I did the upper lip, a sensitive area. I admit I’m glad I talked myself out of using chunky peanut butter, as this section would have been difficult with it. It went well, and I was pleased.

Next I did the lower lip. I realize that another bonus of using peanut butter is that if you get some on your lip you can just lick it off instead of spitting it out. The chin also went well, and I was left with a respectable result. Now on to the neck, my least favorite part of the process.

It was fine at first, the PB peeled away and brought the hairs with it. The hot water from the sink needed to clean the razor added to the comfort and pleasure of the chore. But then disaster. In the past I learned how to avoid cutting myself but I had gotten sloppy. Maybe it was the peanut butter or maybe it was my wandering mind but it happened. I sliced a cut directly under my chin and lived through the initial pain . Then oh my goodness it hurts and it burns so much.

I wiped the tears from my eyes. How could peanut butter hurt more than a normal cut? I couldn’t figure it out for the life of me. What was I supposed to do? Dab it with a piece of bread? But the pain left after a minute or two, and I continued shaving, more careful now. Finally I finished.

Tools of the trade

I considered doing a second draft of my face, as the writer does a second draft of his book, but allowed myself the realization that I had done well enough the first, and smiled. The cut bled but it was nothing to worry about. I almost ended up with a face covered in strawberry jelly, but corrected myself and put on normal aftershave. I admired the finished product.

My face had a healthy brown sheen; noticeable but not in-your-face. It smelled like the peanut fields of Georgia after a harvest; pleasant but not overpowering. The cut still hurt but was dulling. The sink hadn’t clogged and the mess present was the usual one. I dubbed it a job well-done.

The Perfect Plan

Among my friends and I, we have a running joke. A prank. We have all been Geested at one time or another.

Professor Fred Armstrong Van Geest works in the political "Sciences" department at Bethel University. He also, on occasion, is one-fourth of a Christianity and Western Culture, a standard class for freshmen. He is the most boring teacher alive. Not being a poli-sci major, I don't know what it could be like to take a three-hour class with him and I never wish to know.

In Christianity and Western Culture (CWC) there are four professors, each teaching a week or so and then switching out. A great deal of information is presented in the class, so that by the end of the semester there are many terms and ideas related to it. We play a game at the end of the year called Before or After.

The class would be divided into four teams, and professors would hold up cards with terms, people, or events. Teams must guess, as the name suggests, before or after. Say you get Martin Luther. He was 500 years ago, but we started in Greek history so it would be safe to assume the next term is before.

500 years young

My team got the term Declaration of Independence. A term at the cutting end of the class, so we confidently guessed "before." Our team's professor held up the next card.

On it was "Professor Van Geest."

We were livid. We cried foul but he was technically part of the class. Because of that trick my team lost the game and Van Geest's won.

I told my roommates about it, and we started "Geesting" each other by changing the backgrounds on our computers. It moved to physical pictures printed off and hidden away for a certain person to find. Once I hid it under my mattress but above the springs, so that my roommate, in the bed below me, would look straight up into Geest's eyes at night. Danny 1, roommate 0. The next day roommate took it and taped it to the back of another roommate's shampoo bottle, resulting in him finding while in the shower.

I got the good idea of placing Geest's face inside Faceinthehole pictures, resulting in things like "The Mona Geesta," "Osama bin Geest," and "Edward Scissorgeest." We did things like put his face in video or send pictures over the phone, but not until last night did we get the best one of all.

It started when Gabe and I went to Heritage to visit friends. I brought along "Gheestbusters" and taped it to a wall when they weren't looking. Before they found it, we discussed the possibility of Geesting Michael, my roommate. He was, at the time, working the graveyard shift at Fountain Terrace (an off-campus dorm) security. We pasted Mike's face into a Canadian Mountie and four of us piled into Rob's car. Along with Gabe, Rob, and I was Lenny.

Lenny

We drove over discussing strategy. Would it be silent, allowing him to find it on his own time? Or would it be a Geestkrieg, slapping the picture loudly onto a window of his security car? So many options. We spotted his car idling at the end of the lot and parked on the other side, with the Fountain Terrace buildings in between us. We moved toward him, still trying to figure out what we should do. We came to the consensus of a slap-and-run, and I said it would be a good idea to test sticking the sheet of paper onto a window. We started back to Rob's car.

Around the corner came Michael in his white security car. It wasn't close, but it was coming closer. We screamed and scattered, running in the opposite direction, around the side of the buildings and behind a dumpster. I got a cramp. Much to our dismay, Michael coasted past twice within a matter of minutes. We were sure the game was up.

But he moved on and we got back to planning. His normal idling spot was on the other side of a wooden fence from us, and so we split up. Rob and I went to Rob's car as the getaway; Gabe and Lenny stayed put to launch the attack.

Rob and I got to the car without trouble, but couldn't find Michael. We craned our necks, trying to look behind us, when he rolled past. We snapped forward, keeping ourselves stock-still until he was out of sight. I called Lenny quickly and told him Mike had just gone past. "He's right next to us, on the other side of the dumpster. It's the perfect time," Lenny said. I agreed and told Rob to get the car started.

We motored to the pick-up-point and looked at the situation. Michael's white security car was indeed mere feet from the dumpster, pointed away. I called Lenny again and told him we were set, and hung up.

We waited on hooks.

One minute later, Gabe and Lenny come tearing around the corner, full tilt. We shouted at them and they made a beeline for the car's open seats. As soon as they were in Rob punched it, as much as a decade old Saab could be punched. The story was, Gabe had lifted a windshield wiper and smacked the picture down.

As we roared away, Lenny got a text that was only this: GEESTED! Lenny called him and Mike was placed on speaker phone. We laughed and reveled, and of course Mike was a good sport about it. We returned to the main campus and went to Lenny and Rob's dorm.

Us

Then they found "Gheestbusters."