I Like The WWE, And That's Okay.

I realize this is a weird way to start a thought. I guess it stems from the fact that I have watched a lot of WWE recently. Not even that I have watched more than normal, I just noticed that I look forward to it weekly, and tend to not miss a week. I know that it's sort of weird that a 22 year old man likes "fake" wrestling. I am in the minority of fans, that's for sure. Me and most 8 year old kids get along because we can sit and talk about CM Punk, Dolph Ziggler, Fandango, and maybe even toss some Booker T in there. (Please reserve your pedophile jokes, you original sonsabitches.) I guess at the end of the day, I don't even give a shit what people think. Maybe it's weird that I like wrestling, but at least I have found something productive to do with a portion of my time and energy. Sorry that I'm not into Jersey Shore, Duck Dynasty, or any other brigade of incredibly mind numbing TV series.

I think that more people should seek after this mindset. I have always had a hard time understanding why people tend to like whatever their friends, or other public figures they idolize like. I guess from one standpoint I can understand that everyone wants to feel accepted somewhere. Whether that's in their school, their home, or on their sports team. Perhaps that requires you to like a certain type of music, or watch a certain TV show that you normally would not. Which, I guess is okay. But if they're really going to accept you, you won't have to change a damn thing. 

I guess I never really had an issue with all of this. When I was in high school, I was always listening to music that was never socially acceptable. I had Chiodos, Underoath, Silverstein, Coheed and Cambria, Circa Survive, and even a little Between The Buried and Me turned up really loud at a young age. Back in the early 2000's that wasn't the coolest thing. Listening to "screamo" music made you look depressed and sort of weird. I remember my mom worried about me, even though I functioned like any normal kid. It was just odd I guess. But, I never really cared. When we ran out for our last home wrestling match my senior year, we ran out to Mothership by Enter Shikari, and I thought people were going to fall out of their chairs. But I thought it was cool, and that was all that mattered. Sort of riding that same wave of wrestling in high school, I always wore a Stone Cold Steve Austin or Batista shirt to warm up in. The rest of Manti's wrestling team was wearing Manti Wrestling attire, then there was me. I don't really know why I felt like this was so awesome back then, but I'm glad I did it now. Cause that's really funny of young Jake. 

Sorry, got a little nostalgic there. I guess what I'm getting at is, it doesn't matter what other people think or what other people are doing. You shouldn't be that concerned with it. Too often I feel like people mold who they are or what they like in order for someone else (It happens all too often with men impressing women) to like or notice them. I guess I've just never had that mindset. If people think it's strange and irrational that I wear shorts all winter, I don't give 2 shits. If people don't like or can't accept me for what I am, they can kiss my giant white ass.

So, I know I have knocked Duck Dynasty and Jersey Shore, but that's because I hate them. And if you like them, okay. I don't care. And neither should you. If you like country music, like country music. If you like Prog metal like me, like prog metal. If you're into some weird anime shit, like weird anime shit. The people who will truly be your lasting friends/relationships will gravitate towards that. They won't care about all the weird shit that you're into, cause chances are, they're into it too. Don't hide who you are. You may never be able to come out from behind the mask. The lasting quote my brother and I use, is this; Don't talk about it, BE about it. ll. So when you're talking with potential friends about how much you love this or that, I hope that you actually are. I'm gonna leave you with one last quote from Frank Reynolds:

"But I love eggs Charlie! And I love crabs. And boiling denim and banging whores! And I don't care if anyone doesn't like that about me, they don't have to stick around."

Merry Christmas You Fil... Oh, You've Heard It All Before.

Part of me wasn't going to write a Merry Christmas to you dweebs. Not for any real reason other than I didn't want to. But I got a bathrobe for Christmas, and I don't know that I have ever been more excited about a gift in my entire life. And I am sitting here in my room feeling somewhat philosophical, and somewhat sentimental. I'm not sure if that's the bathrobe, or the Christmas spirit penetrating my stone cold heart. But, in either instance, I felt it necessary to sit down and write something sentimental for you pecks.
First of all, I mostly hate Christmas. I went to the mall today, because I am an asshole and a last minute shopper, and it was terrible. I couldn't even do decent shopping because I was being hassled by workers and shoppers alike. I COULDN'T EVEN GET A DAMN PRETZEL CAUSE THE LINE WAS TOO LONG AND I WAS STARTING TO GET ANXIETY. And as I stood amidst this mass of bustling people, I had a lot of things come to mind. I have sort of broke it up into a couple of different thoughts.
The first is that of somewhat religious beef. See, I consider myself (somewhat) religious. I attend my meetings on Sunday, I try to treat others with dignity and respect (Laying aside the fight, that is) and I feel like year round I am doing my best, at being my best. I am in no way perfect, or an example that anyone should follow. But I don't think that's really the point of religion anyway. Since we are all sinners and imperfect, the goal of religion should be to help those also seeking perfection. Now, I will stray from other somewhat tangents I had running around in my mind. However, one of the biggest issues I have with Christmas is that it's one of the two times during a regular earth's trip around the sun that people feel even an inkling of being religious. It seems as though in one week everyone crams their well wishes, hearty phone calls/texts, and other somewhat half hearted attempts to cleanse themselves before the year ticks to a close. I have worked at the same hardware store for almost 2 years now, and this seems to be the only time of year people make an attempt to be friendly. Whether that's offering us candy, drinks, or even just a warm smile. See, on one side of it I understand that it's a "special" occasion and that sort of makes sense. But why does everyone need an excuse to be nice to people? Why is it that you need a reason to be kind? I just struggle with that. And touching back on base with my religious rant, why is it that people are only religious this time of year? It seems like they cram a years worth of Hail Mary's, Hail John Travolta's or whatever else it is they worship into one month (Two days even). I just feel like truly religious people would be thankful for the birth of Christ for the duration of the year rather than just on his birthday. And maybe that's the problem with America. We need an excuse to celebrate our life, to get together and eat with our families, to call our loved ones, to be kind and friendly to our fellow men. And it makes me realize that we are screwed.
Breaking over into my other thought, it will be an awful lot shorter. If you are one of the pushy people at the mall, I hope you realize what a dick you're being. I REALIZE YOU ARE IN A HURRY, BUT WE ALL ARE. THAT'S WHY WE ARE HERE ON CHRISTMAS EVE. CALM YOURSELF.
I guess what I hope we can all do this holiday season (myself included) is to practice what we preach. There is a theme at my brother and I's house. Don't talk about it, be about it.
Lastly, so as to be a hypocrite, I want to wish you all a safe and very Merry Christmas. Or whatever you celebrate. I get tons of support from this stupid freaking blog and it means a whole lot to me. I don't write as often as I would like, and I won't promise you that I will be writing more in the future. But I will say that I will do my best to only write things worth reading. To my consistent readers and lovers of this, God bless you. And thanks to those who spread the word. I do my very best to keep this light hearted so as to make my consistent joke of a life, a consistent joke for all of you. If you are traveling this holiday season, I hope you will travel safely. Again, from the bottom of my heart, I thank you. Merry Christmas.
-The King Himself.

A Bloody Mess

Okay okay okay. I know there has been some rumors spread, and things going around about what happened to me. I have been getting a fair amount of texts and calls in desperation wondering what happened. It doesn't help that Harrison sent out a Snapchat of me being prepped for stitches with the line "Jake is dying" on there. Or Josh putting #PrayForJake on Twitter. Although I know most of you wish I was dead, I am neither dead nor dying. But I do feel like you deserve to know the truth. So how about a funny, bloody story, eh? Good.
So, it begins where most of my idiotic stories begin. I was hanging out with my brother, Landon, and Harrison. We decided to go to Mt. Pleasant and get some doughnuts from Terrells Bakery, the best doughnuts in Sanpete county. So, we did just that. As we approached the store, I got a phone call from someone concerning my new job/move to SLC next week. So, my three friends went inside to get doughnuts while I was on an important phone call in the parking lot.
As I was standing there in the parking lot, a big truck pulled up next to mine that I was leaning against. And who is driving the car? None other than the kid I constantly beat the shit out of in wrestling my senior year. He was from Enterprise, and I don't want to post anything incriminating. But we will call him asshole #1 and his goon buddy asshole #2. As he got out of his truck, he purposely hit my car with the door of his truck. and gave me a snarling look. At this point, I knew nothing good was going to happen, and ended the phone call I was on.
I approached the yellow bastard by saying "Hey asshole, you got your shitty ass truck paint on my car. What are you gonna do about that?" He responded in something that sounded like an autistic person choking on baby food, but I made this out "Nothing fat ass. It makes your shitty car look a little better." I knew things were gonna come to blows anyway, so I said "I'll tell your mom you talk like that when I am done railing her later tonight."
In a sort of round about way, and filtering out a lot of swear words and minor pushing, I socked asshole #1 right in the mouth. As soon as he went down, asshole #2 socked me right in the face, and split my eyebrow open. As soon as asshole #2 saw the blood, he gathered his stupid friend and sped off in their shitty truck. When they were gone, I gathered my senses, and my friends came out from the store. We discussed chasing them down, but thought it best to just get me stitched up. And then proceeded the road trip to Gunnison. Laughter, pictures, and other nonsense.
So if you heard anything else, it's false. We did tell different stories because we didn't want anything police related to get back to me. And because we can do whatever we want. This is the true story. You know it's true, because you can't lie on the Internet, right?

Why Traveling The World Sounds As Terrible As Hell.

On any given night around 11:30 you would be safe to assume that I am in my bed, lights out, and well on my way into my 3rd REM cycle of sleep. It's not very often that I find an activity or person that I value more than I do my sleep. I used to think that I could just sleep when I am dead, but have quickly come to the realization that that is bullshit. If I don't sleep while I am alive, I will more likely kill everyone else and sleep when they're dead.
I just can't seem to come up with anything that is more enjoyable than a full nights sleep. Waking up the next day feeling refreshed and ready to accomplish the days tasks of eating, surviving, and genuinely kicking ass. Perhaps I am just getting old, and maybe that's okay. But I don't really see the merit of hanging out at people's apartments until all hours of the night, just talking or watching movies when I could be fast asleep. Especially at people's apartments that I am not really gaining anything from, which I realize sounds super shallow and mean. But I have spent so much time spinning my wheels at girls apartments that I really don't gain a whole lot from. I mean, friends are nice and all, but I have friends. I have awesome friends. HOW MANY FRIENDS DOES A GUY NEED?
Allow me to tangent briefly, I really don't understand women's logic when it comes to friends. See, you must know that the main reason men come hang out with you is because they're looking for something. Whether that's a hookup, a relationship, whatever. But they sure as hell aren't coming over because they prefer the company of women to men. If I were to go hang out with anyone, it sure as shit wouldn't be some drama ridden girls house. I would be here watching Lord Of The Rings with Josh, Harrison, Kasey and Landon. Because men are so much nicer to hang out with. Now, this isn't to be taken in the context of homosexuality or anything like that. Sure, I would be willing to go and put forth the effort into hanging out with girls and enjoy myself. But if we are strictly speaking of friends, I one billion times infinity would rather be around my own kind.
Also before I get back on track, I just want to make something perfectly clear. If you have to tell a guy that you just want to be "Friends" you wont be friends at all. It's just not how the world turns. Obviously the only reason this person was coming around was because he was interested in you. So when you tell him off, the last thing he is going to continue doing is coming around. Unless he is an idiot. This ties into what i have aforementioned. They don't want to be friends with you. It's just.. life. So if you ever have to tell someone you want to be just friends you're better off telling them to go to hell. Because you aren't going to be friends if you have to say it. (Granted; there are exceptions to all of these things.)
Relating back to my idea of sleep. See, I would rather sleep than do most things. Regardless of what they are. On top of this, when I don't sleep well, I usually become erratic and incredibly temperamental. If I don't get at the very least 6.5 hours of sleep, I hate everyone and everything ever.
I seem to only find girls my age that are interested in traveling. They want to see the world and all that shit. Which is fine, I try to never knock someones dreams or aspirations. But what bothers me is that these young girls think that they are incredibly original in saying these things. But honestly, I know more people that want to travel than people who do not. You are horribly stereotypical by saying these things. If you wanna be original, say you wanna take long naps and get full nights rest. Possibly work at a bowling alley or something, I dunno.
Whats worse than all this, is that they are looking for someone to travel with. And my biggest problem in the dating community, is my complete disdain for travel. I don't sleep well in places that are not my own bed. hotels are probably the least conducive thing to a good nights rest that I have ever experienced. I don't want to go anywhere, because I know I won't sleep. And if I don't sleep, I won't have a good time. And if I don't have a good time, you probably won't either.
I guess what I am getting at is, sorry that I don't want to travel or can't afford to. Sorry my dad doesn't have deep pockets that will fund my lascivious trips to wherever the hell you wanna go. Sorry I have to stay home and work to bring home the bacon. But have fun on your trips. And let me know when they invent a way for my bed to travel with me, then maybe we can talk about leaving the state.

(This Brees pic is for Austin G. Geaux Saints?)

It's hard to write content.

I recently came across the saying "Being happy is a choice." I always felt like that was bullshit. I felt like happiness often depends on your environment. It depends on the people who are around, and inside your life. It depends on the amount of stress in your life. It depends, it depends, it depends... For a vast majority of my life I have been living it not necessarily for others, but more for others approval. I have always done things that will make my parents proud. That my friends would approve of and enjoy. What strangers and people I don't care about would laugh at or find amusing. I was so consumed in myself, that I was willing to do things that make me unhappy for the satisfaction of others. Which I always thought was a selfless thing. I always felt a sense of entitlement because I was so "selfless".
I was so drawn out on others approval, that I couldn't make simple day to day decisions. When asked where I would like to eat, or what movie I would like to see I would always answer "I don't care. Whatever you want to do." Because I was willing to sit through an awful movie, or eat unsatisfactory food if it made this other person happy. I always felt in my heart that this was a good thing to be doing. This was something that is very rare in the world. And now that I am saying this out loud, I realize how crazy that is.
When people ask me what I like to do for fun, I always draw a blank. I don't know what I like to do. I like to do whatever my friends like to do. Play Xbox, cards, watch movies, road trip, gamble, anything my friends are doing, that's what I like to do. Which makes me sound like I don't have a personality. I know of a few things that I love to do; Eat. Sleep. Listen to music. Above all, I know for sure that I love to do these things. But I don't know of any hobbies. And that much is sad.
See, I always felt like in order to be happy, a set amount of things has to happen. Regardless of what they may be. I got in a fight at a concert a while back, and I was happy for a long time after that. It was like finally closing the door on that point of my life. Or eating a delicious meal in San Francisco made me very happy. Too often I rest my happiness contingently on events that are far out of my control. I could go to several concerts, and may not meet an enemy of mine in the pit. I could go back to the same restaurant in San Francisco and it may not be as good. I feel like this is a fault line of mine, and where this "Happiness is a choice" can come into play.
If you are like me and dwell on bizarre events of the day, and either let them make you or destroy you, there is a lot to be said about choosing to be happy. See in my simple opinion, You can dwell on the things that make you unhappy, or things that make you happy. You can focus on the hardships in your life, or the things that make your life awesome. In essence, happiness IS a choice.
Laying aside all the events that make you unhappy, and things that are beyond your control, I have learned one valuable lesson. When you run into seemingly unbearable hardships, which we all do, how you deal with it is totally up to you. I have learned that the depth of your mourning and sorrow is totally upon your head. If you do like I have been doing for the past several months, you may never get over it. If you lock yourself in a dark room alone for several hours, if you listen to sad music for extended periods of time, if you watch movies that play on your sad emotions, if you never make an effort to get better, you never will. I feel like hiding under the covers or ignoring the monster under your bed wont make him go away. However, getting out of bed and walking to where he cant follow you might.
I guess what I am getting at is, don't be a bitch like I was (am). Don't mope around your house for days on end. Don't listen to sad sack music so much that you can repeat every depressing detail about the song. Don't shut your friends and family out when you need them the most. Don't get hung up on something that is beyond your control. And most of all, don't let it consume and change you. Get up. Get out. Get better.
I am in no way a motivational speaker. But I have had this on my mind a lot recently. And it is my deepest wish that no one has to fight the same fights that I have, in the same depressed way that I have. I just wanted to put this out there. You can love it or hate it. I don't care anymore.