Two years since something exciting enough to write about: a summary

Well hello, my faithful blog followers (hi mom!). It's been almost two years since I've written here, meaning it's been two years since anything newsworthy has happened in my life. Well, not really, but the planets haven't aligned for that long for me to have both the material to write about and the motivation to face the shame of writing that first blog post in ages, facing the stigma of being 'that guy' who leaves his blog unmaintained for so long. Well, here I am. More for myself in 40 years than anything else, here's a summary of what I could have written about since 2008, in roughly chronological order:

• Returned to school in fall of 2008
• Started pursuing a young lady
• Was offered an internship in Iowa which would be for both spring and summer of 2009
• Accepted said internship, condemning myself to 9 months in the Corn State
• Traveled northeast for Christmas break, split time between family in Boston and work in NY state
• Saw my brother Ian get married in scenic Aurora, Ohio during the break
• Made entirely unplanned best-man speech at said wedding, fooled crowd into clapping somehow
• Drove to Iowa in sketchy Montero, made it alive
• Started intern work for Fisher, gained both good experience in engineering and renewed dread of office life
• Found cool church with awesome people in town, begin making cornbread for weekly bible studies
• Got in car crash after making sketchy left turn, first accident ever. Montero survives sketchier than ever, speeding white GMC Jimmy loses
• Start to think about prospect of RAing at LETU the next year
• Spend most of free time trying to troubleshoot mysterious electrical problems on Montero, biking to work in meantime
• Receive news that economic downturn may cause Fisher to lay off all interns, start looking for new job for summer
• Fisher layoff confirmed, however good job prospects exist
• Appointed as RA on 2A for 2009-2010, as does young lady on sister floor
• Fly to LETU for visit during easter, stay longer than planned, discover things are not well with young lady
• Receive job offer with Kinze only 1 hour away also in Iowa, failing to realize how big of a blessing this was at the time
• Pack all my stuff in super-sketchy Montero, somehow make it to new town alive (!) after crawling under car and starting engine with a section of 8-gauge wire across solenoid
• Move into new apartment before roommate does, living alone in new town is super lame
• Start work at Kinze, pleased by no-nonsense organizational style and freedom to work
• Find small church in new town, people are nice
• Furnish apartment after tiring of sleeping on floor and cooking with only crock-pot
• Young lady decides to put relationship on hold, summer becomes difficult
• Start learning how to program $250,000 robot at work, acquire new respect for Japan
• New roommate moves in, brings more furniture
• Receive 'talking to' at work for using internet too much at work, realize I need to actually close browser windows when not in use so it doesn't look like I'm checking my personal email for 25 hours per week
• Initiate a new project at work to save shielding gas ($$) and enjoy freedom of directing it
• Acquire PS2 and Guitar Hero 3 to abate boredom of Iowa, still can't play on 'hard'
• Travel to smalltown Iowa with roommate, realize that #1 hobby in Iowa is Miller Lite
• Catch self picking up Iowa-specific speech patterns, appending 'yet' to end of sentences
• Becoming very anxious about long silence from young lady
• Somehow unsketch-ify Montero enough for trip down to TX
• Finish big project at work, bosses pleased with $$ saving prospects
• Make super-sketchy journey to TX in Montero, almost lose foot when it falls off of a tiny jack while changing blown-out tire
• Young lady ends relationship upon return to school, much angst ensues
• Beginning of year busy-ness sets in, new RA responsibilities settle on shoulders
• Rebel somewhat against school with floor activities, nearly quit RA-ship in protest of policy
• Classwork fits in here somewhere
• Leave campus for a weekend on RA retreat, return to find that entire room (including loft) has been moved and set up identically to a room on the next floor up, swapped with their RA- live on Flooders for a week before I can move back down to 2A
• Start concocting plans for dubiously-wise ATV engine-swap project during Christmas break
• Stay in Longview over Christmas break, house-sit for couple and enjoy free laundry
• Spend nearly all of break transplanting too-powerful motorcycle engine into sketchy Chinese ATV, laugh maniacally when it works, mysteriously avoid death while riding
• Start leading study of book: Wild At Heart on floor, growing experience
• It snows in Longview, creating much confusion for first-time-in-Texas freshmen
• Realize that Dynamics, Senior Design, and RAing all in one semester was not best idea
• Decide to go to Utah to witness to Mormons for spring break mission trip, begin training
• Decide to get motorcycle license rather than grow to be 40 and realize I never did
• Spring break mission in Utah makes me realize God has given me a heart for the people there
• Realize I need to really bust my butt in Dynamics and Tech Calc II in order to graduate on time, begin doing so
• Acquire motorcycle license, permanent ear-to-ear grin under helmet
• Begin to concoct summer plans, a return to Utah to volunteer there among them
• Realize I don't have money to return to school in the fall, start applying for scholarships
• Resolve to volunteer in Utah the following summer before hearing results of scholarships
• Receive news in the negative about scholarships, swallow lump in throat
• Start wrapping up the academic year with classes and RAing, busy-ness meter tops out
• Pass Dynamics and Tech Calc II with requisite grades, pat self on back
• Receive gift of car to go to Utah in, rather sketchy
• Begin the adventure of actually getting myself to Utah... that's the whole next blog post.

There it is folks, the last two years of my life in sixty-two easy-to-browse bullet points. If I were more philosophically-inclined right now I might make a comment about an unbearable lightness of being within the irony of summing up two years of my life in such a fashion, but I am both disinclined and somewhat dubious of the correctness of such a comment.

All my faithful blog readers (hi mom!) will have to wait another day or two (hopefully not two years) for my next post, which will sum up the adventure I had getting from Longview to Utah. It will be a typical Ned-style post, entirely too long to be enjoyable by another but my mother and Titus, detailing the most inane points and stretching on and on as I lose all sense of how appropriate it is to ramble at length about what I had for breakfast when I got a flat tire.

I was going to wrap this up with a thanks to the reader and a slightly self-deprecatory comment about the value of this post, but I will refrain for a dearth of the required wit. Cheers!