The 5 Hour Energy LiveBlog

Don't get me wrong - I'm as accomplished a coffee drinker as anyone. But for the last several months, I've been trying to wean myself off of the stuff, the idea being that the less I consume, the greater the impact it will have when I do drink it.

Today I had my first 5 Hour Energy. I chose Pomegranate. What could go wrong?

4:06 p.m. Examining the bottle of 5 Hour Energy. Trying to decide if I really want to do this. Claims to be like coffee, but quicker. Comes with a warning label. Coffee doesn't come with a warning label, except when it's hot.

4:07 p.m. Reading about Niacin flush, a "natural warming sensation" that occurs when your body processes necessary minerals of which it was previously deficient. That's the 5 Hour Energy way of trying to convince you that the way you're about to feel is healthy.

4:08 p.m. What could go wrong? I love pomegranates.

4:09 p.m. Oh, gross.

4:13 p.m. Head upstairs feeling normal. Time to get to work and pound out some projects.

4:16 p.m. Notice a delightful jump in my typing WPM. That's if you count "pnusctuality" as a word. Unclear if this is due to 5 Hour Energy.

4:19 p.m. Niacin flush.

4:21 p.m. Toilet flush.

4:36 p.m. Working on a parent letter. You know how sometimes when you say a word too many times, it starts to sound funny? Every word is that word right now.

4:45 p.m. I literally cannot stop thinking about bridges - how they're made, who designs them. How do we really know they're safe? I can't focus on this letter right now. All I can think about is bridges.

4:47 p.m. Reading about bridges on Wikipedia.

4:50 p.m. Force myself to focus on the parent letter. Just spelled the word "contact" with a semicolon. And an umlaut.

4:57 p.m. Looking for Rick Keller's phone number. He's a structural engineer and I've got a lot of questions about bridges.

5:00 p.m. Saved from a very awkward conversation by the fact that I don't actually have his phone number.

5:10 p.m. Go downstairs to help with dinner. Hold the baby. Bounce the baby. I am not intentionally bouncing the baby.

5:15 p.m. I am literally yelling at a pot of green beans for what I suspect to be blatant malfeasance.

5:28 p.m. Drink a glass of water as an attempt to flush the 5 Hour Energy from my system.

5:29 p.m. I feel like I drank that glass of water awfully fast.

5:30 p.m. My shirt is soaking wet and there are ice cubes on the floor. Can't figure out why.

5:45 p.m. Eating dinner. Trying to hold it together.

6:00 p.m. Offer to clean up after dinner. Ask Lindsay to "time me." She declines.

6:02 p.m. Done. Wish she would have timed me.

6:05 p.m. Back to work. So excited AND so scared.

6:12 p.m. Just realized I'm not wearing a shirt. Not sure how long this has been.

6:44 p.m. Drooling. Thanks 5 Hour Energy.

7:00 p.m. 25 emails in 2 minutes. All to the same guy.

7:16 p.m. Less concerned about bridges than I am about asteroids all of a sudden.

7:40 p.m. Watching the 5 Hour Energy commercials online. That guy seems so happy at the office, but trust me, he's using every ounce of his willpower not to go outside, strangle a bunny, and eat it raw.

7:55 p.m. Well, this is the third time I've gone to the bathroom "just to be sure." And for what it's worth, I'm 0-for-3.

8:02 p.m. I'm Batman.

8:17 p.m. Parent letter finished nearly four hours after it started. Thanks 5 Hour Energy.

8:34 p.m. I wrote down "Great idea for sitcom." Post 5 Hour Energy, I have no idea what it was.

8:39 p.m. When did I take my pants off? I may have eaten dinner in my underwear.

8:45 p.m. What is the stuff made of? Chihuahua concentrate?

9:00 p.m. Is five hours over yet?

9:14 p.m. Struck by inexplicable urge to blog again.

9:16 p.m. Really just excited by all of the labels I get to use again.

A Year in Review

I know I've been a poor blogger for the better part of six months now.  It's just that I've been so busy not writing blog posts, that I haven't had any time to produce new material.  Anyway, check back tomorrow and I'll share my New Year's Resolutions, and I promise, one of them will be to blog more in 2009.

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For now, I think it's best that we take a step back and enjoy the year that was.  I think you'll agree that 2008 was the best year in Drawing Board history.  You enjoyed* 119 posts this year.  Here's the best of them.

* You probably didn't enjoy them.  You probably didn't even read all of them.  Indulge me.

• American Gladiators returns
• Jesus didn't use powerpoint
• I played video games all Saturday night
• I ate ten pancakes and felt like I was going to die
• The greatest post in the history of the Drawing Board
• Someone wanted to kill me
• I eloped, basically
• I ate tuna for fifty days in a row
• I got nothin'
• This happened
• I announced my resignation at Calvary
• I'm a no-good, slow-moving son-of-a-bitch
• The most transformative day of my life - I just didn't realize it then
• I got pulled over
• This happened - again
• Crap fell on my house
• I rode a bicycle from Chicago to North Dakota

I Got Interrogated

“Aaron, get up and put some pants on, the police are here.”

“What?”

“Put your pants on, the police are here.”

That is how I was woken up on August 20, 2006 at about one-in-the-morning. Paul and I were living in a tent behind the church for forty days and forty nights, and the cops were woefully unaware of this fact.* They saw our cars in the parking lot, and somehow, without a guide, they were able to track us down, interrogate us, and later, they let us go back to bed.

*They really should have known. See below.

And that is precisely the fashion that the soundest sleep I’d experienced in 22 nights was broken up prematurely – “Put your pants on, the police are here.”

I Got Cased

Last week, Ben Hallett was visiting for the night. He was in town for a couple days and we spent some time together. We watched Ocean's 13.* We played football in the dark. We talked about lights. It was pleasant.

*I liked Ocean's 13. I also liked Ocean's 11. I like to pretend that Ocean's 12 never happened.

Then the bright lights started. I caught the glare of some sort of industrial flashlight through my window. After my retinas thawed,* I peered back out the window and saw a guy seriously casing my home. Dude was peering in windows, looking for God-knows-what. This was a source of some consternation.

*I actually used to have a label called "Molten Retinas." I deleted it because I thought, "I'll never use that one again." Who knew?

As my vision slowly returned, I noticed a police car in the driveway. So, it was a cop. This provided a lesser level of consternation; though I was still fairly consternated.

The cop banged on my door and asked me if I lived here. I said yes, and he explained that they had received a call that drifters had inhabited this empty house. I said, "Nope, I've got furniture and everything."

He said it was good enough for him, and said he hoped he hadn't inconvenienced me.

Let's visit that again. It was 3:00 a.m. I was standing at the front door - in my underwear - and the policeman said, "I hope this wasn't an inconvenience." Now let me get this out of the way: I respect law enforcement, and the guy did the right thing. But to pretend that it somehow wasn't an inconvenience? I'd say we're past that.

How to Make Friends with Anyone

W.B. Yeats* once said that "There are no strangers; only friends you haven't yet met." This quote runs in stark contrast to something my parents told me, which was "Never talk to strangers." This is because, sometimes, strangers can be creepy.

*I've never met Yeats, so I don't know if he lived by the principle or not. Truthfully, I had to look him up on Wikipedia to learn anything about him. More truthfully, I didn't even look him up on Wikipedia. I just Googled the quote.

I ride bicycles a lot and I wear bicycle clothes. This is usually all the icebreaker I need to kickstart a conversation. So I stopped at a place called the Fiddler's Hearth and I did what I do.


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I met a guy named Tony in Mishawaka. Tony's in the Army and rides bikes to stay in shape in between tours. He's getting ready for a sort-of-big ride into Michigan. Dude was blown away by my 125-mile ride. He has fought in wars, but I was the hero. Cool guy. He should quit smoking though. (His words, not mine.) (Also, my words.)

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I met a girl named Sam who dropped out of college a few years ago after three-and-a-half semesters. That's like quitting a race when you're only a couple hundred yards from winning the Triple Crown. (Bad example. Also, topical.) I told her to go back to school. She said she would. I have no way of holding her to it.

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I met the team of people that organized Michiana* Bike-to-Work Week. One guy owns a bike shop in town, another just finished a Habitat for Humanity project in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Eight weeks ago I knew one person in that town. Now I know a few dozen. This seems like a good sign.

*Michiana is the term used to describe the greater South Bend area, extended into Michigan. It includes, Niles, Dowagaic, and a number of other fairly inconsequential towns. People from South Bend hate the term Michiana. The Michiganders don't mind it so much.

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I met a guy named John who's a painter by trade, but his life's passion is hot sauce. He's been making, bottling, and distributing his own line of hot sauces since 1991, and I met him in downtown South Bend today. He had samples. I tried the samples. They were incredible. I think I will buy some. He told me it's all under-the-radar, and that he doesn't claim his revenue on his taxes and that this makes the hot sauce some sort of illegal contraband kind of hot sauce. Let's be honest; that makes you want it.

John got into hot sauce because he was always going to a jazz festival in New Orleans. He had wanted to be some kind of musician, but didn't have the drive or innate talent. But, he could hold on to the tastes he'd experienced and so he created a new hot sauce. Hot sauce enthusiasts are beyond excited about New Mexico.

He wished me luck and God speed. I'm not sure what that phrase means, but I'd be good with 18.5 miles per hour.

Go Ahead, Talk to Tucker

I'm starting a new thing now. I'm selling my first house. When I moved in, the place was cute, rustic living, and in need of a little TLC. What that actually means is: small, mostly damaged, and no running water.*

*That's entirely true by the way. I lived in a tent for 40 days in 2006, then moved in to this house only to discover that my new, more luxurious environs were still lacking in plumbing. We dug up the entire yard, ran a new supply line and worked the plumbing indoors. On September 29, 2006 - my birthday! - I took my first real shower since July. It was the greatest present a guy could ask for. Anyway, here's what makes all of this so poetic: In 2006, I moved from a tent into a house. Now, I'm moving from a house back into a tent; albeit, a different tent.

I always intended to flip the thing, but the schedule for sale quickened with the discovery of my new plans. Over the past year-and-a-half, I've managed to install a working plumbing system, discover two new bedrooms and another half-a-bath (!), and make the place quite presentable. Or, presentable as it is defined by a 24-year-old life-bachelor.*

*Good grief. Go back and count the number of hyphens in that paragraph. Then deal with it.

I met with my Realtor, and we've got the property listed (quite generously) at $79,900. There's a sign in the yard and a tricky sort of locked box on the door. This means that people are, maybe right now, waltzing through my house, marveling at the archways and cozy rooms. Then they're saying things like, "What a steal!" and "I could raise a family here!" and "This guy sure owns a lot of Cubs merchandise!"

My neighbors will probably be glad to get rid of me. I'm a 20-something male, I'm quiet, I don't have too many visitors, I work strange and erratic hours, I'm often gone late at nights, and occasionally, I'm gone for days at a time. I'm certain they believe that I operate a meth lab.

But, potential home-buyers, please be aware that I do not operate a meth lab out of my house. Really, I don't. The place is adorable, roomy, quiet, and at your desire, it can be as wet as you want it to be.

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I added the "Stories Where I'm Not Wearing Pants" label because it's my house and I almost never wear pants there.

I Beg of You to Repeat That

I sat at home Saturday night, ordered Chinese, and watched the Scripps-Howard National Spelling Bee. Yes, your gut is right. This is a "Reason I Will Always Be Single."

Explanation for My Extended Absence

Um, the weather got nice. So instead of sitting at my computer writing the love story that is you, me, and this blog; I've been outside doing the following things:

• Throwing Frisbees in the direction of pretty girls, hoping this will somehow spark a conversation. It doesn't.
• Watching people navigate the Indianapolis Canal Area with gyro-scooters. Wondering what's so bad about walking.
• Wearing bike cleats and spandex shorts at inappropriate times and in inappropriate places.
• Acquiring a lobster-like sunburn across my shoulders. I'm very excited by this. My shirts feel itchy.

Do You Know Me? Yeah, You Do.

Paul and I rode bikes to Noblesville this weekend. It was something like a 42-mile round trip, and it was awesome. The Cannondale Synapse excelled on its first big trip. We stopped for a chicken sandwich at Barley Island in Noblesville. We'd never met any of the dudes that were working there, but they all seemed to know who we were.


Maybe I have the "look" of a cyclist. Or more likely, it's the fact that I wore cleats and spandex into a bar.

I always wanted to be a "bike guy."

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Updated: I added the "Stories Where I'm Not Wearing Pants" label. I'm a little alarmed at how frequently I've had to use that one.

You Just Don't Get Me, Do You?

Sometimes I make jokes. And most of the time those jokes are dumb. Often, someone won't realize that I'm making a joke, and then they look at me weird.

As I left my house this morning, my neighbor was walking his German shepherds. They saw me. They went nuts. No big deal.

I run a few loads of stuff from the house to the car, and the guy calls over to me, "Hey, got a second?"

So, I walk over. He explains that the dogs get antsy around people they haven't sniffed. If I let them sniff me, they'll be more comfortable next time.

Me: "Yeah, I'm the same way around new people."

Neighbor: ...

Scientologists

So, some of the scientologists showed up at my house this morning to talk to me this morning. I had just gotten out of the shower and they did not make the best first impression.

Me: Hello?
Them: Hi. Are your parents home?
Me: I'm 24.
Them: Alright, well we'd like to talk to you and your parents then.
Me: I don't think you want to ride your bikes all the way to South Bend.
Them: We don't ride bikes. That's the Mormons.
Me: Oh, right. Sorry about that.
Them: Do you know when your parents might be home?
Me: I own this house.
Them: Oh, I'm sorry about the mix-up. Can we talk to you about Scientology?
Me: Now's not a good time.
Them: Oh, why not?
Me: I'm wearing a towel as pants.
Them: Oh. Maybe another time.
Me: (Whistles the theme to Top Gun.)

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Updated: I added the "Stories Where I'm Not Wearing Pants" label.