The Boys of Summer

John Mayer---Battle Studies

There is a good chance condoning John Mayer as a great musician as a male fan will get the homo card pulled but like my not-so-secret love for Harry Potter at this point I don't care. John Mayer's new album "Battle Studies" is pure genius. To preface my allegiance, I have every album, live and recorded that John Mayer has ever made and I like it all. His music and lyrics alike are top notch. "Battle Studies" is a similar yet more mature sound from Mr. Mayer. The lyrics from "Battle Studies" are very identifiable for younger people and the battle ensued during young relationships. It is all about love and not-so-much love interaction and how it affects us as people. Mayer used a lot of experience and emotion from what some might say his several past relationships. His viewpoint comes from a musician that is on the older end of his prime and has been a lot of places and loved and lost in many diverse ways. He is getting to the point where the pressure of a must have love bares down on him in the form of social acceptance. Besides the past and present Mayer remarks about how he is "perfectly lonely" and in the future he knows love is important but there is no use rushing it because we have no control. Mayer has written about a lot of things but his focus on love as a battle and the identification as experiences as "studies" is brilliant. I like all of the songs on the damn thing but "Heartbreak Warfare" is a great song that supports the idea of "Battle Studies" as the title. Many of the songs fit with this theme. I suggest you check it out, you won't regret it, or you will call me a big homo but that is fine. Though the Harry Potter love doesn't help my case, it could be worse than John Mayer support. (Coldplay support)

Losing A Family Member: Something I Couldn't Do

I recently heard of a colleague of mine that lost a family member very close to them. Though at the age of 21 this isn't the first time I have heard of death happening but it further reminds me how lucky I have been and how hard it is going to be for me to lose a close relative or friend. Honestly the only family I have lost would be great grandparents. I've only been to 4 or 5 funerals in my life and that is a lot less than most can say. The moral of the story is I don't know how to grieve and it isn't going to be pretty the first time I have to do it. It hurts me to hear of people, even people I don't know very well to have lost a love one because I can't imagine it. At this point I know it would take a lot of help from other people to get through it. There are people that have lost a lot of people but I doubt it gets easier. I doubt people "get the hold of" funerals. Though losing those close to us never gets easier, the first one for me is going to be really hard because I honestly don't know what it feels like. The thought of it makes me want to jump out a window. I'm on the second floor. Knowing this tells me I need to be their for those around me that lose someone and hope and pray to god that I have people their for me when it happens to me. Most importantly I hope my luck continues and that day is farther away than closer. It is hard for me to accept that it will happen because I don't want to admit it. I just hope I can make it through it.

End of the Year at College

Boy all tell you what! At this point in the college year it gets pretty rough for students and teachers a like. It seems like their is this breaking point where professors go "O Shit! We need to pile it on and get everything done!" All the tests, quizzes and presentations, seemed to all overlap. It all hits at once like a thunderstorm that you don't see coming. It is hard to feel sorry for yourself because it seems to hit everyone equally. It is one of those things that may not happen on purpose but in the long run it prepares us for the piling on that the work place will create for us. I told my dad the other day "if I make it through the month I will live to be a hundred" and he laughed and said "I have been telling myself that every month for about 25 years Andy!" It just tells me that this isn't a new thing and it isn't going to stop here after college. It is just one of those things that it takes to be successful in a working enviornment, you have to be able to handle a rigourous work load. I can't say I like the stack I have on my desk right now but I do believe that work feeds the soul and this will all pay off someday: hopefully.

Closing Time:Nebraska Passes State Law to Increase Bar Time by an Hour------Final Draft

Legislative Bill 262 was passed as an amendment in the Nebraska Legislative Unicameral to make the closing time for beer and liquor sales to 2 a.m.

On the legislative floor issues involving economic benefits, relieving tax increases and safety issues were discussed. The largest Nebraskan city Omaha was the topic of much discussion as it boarders the Iowa city of Council Bluffs that remains open until 2 a.m.

I think a lot of the motive behind this bill was drawn from Omaha. For good reason as the restaurant and bar scene there has brought a lot of money into the state and has a lot of potential for further growth. It is obvious to business owners and customers a like that patrons have consistently left early from Nebraska bars to go over to Iowa to finish off the night. Often times leaving earlier than the 1 a.m. closing time to settle in Iowa earlier.

Besides the economic issue this provides for Nebraska it also pauses a safety issue with drunk drivers that head across the board after several drinks rather than heading home. By adding an hour to Nebraska’s closing time and equalizing Iowa’s cutoff time it will minimize the drunken boarder hopers that increase travel distance from there Nebraskan homes. This bill could not only keep customers in Nebraska but also reduce drunken driving risks on the interstate roadways.

Moving west of Omaha to the 2^nd largest Nebraska city of Lincoln there are a lot of benefits that this bill create for our capital city. One of the main Lincoln effects would be the extra income on the University of Nebraska Cornhusker football Saturdays that bring almost 86,000 to the stadium every home game and aside from the after-gamers it will cater to the thousands of other unlucky fans that didn’t get a ticket on account of the record 304 game sellout that leaves many left to head to O street to restaurants and bars to watch the game on TV, many times on pay-per-view. The financial benefit from after game and during game customers would be remarkable by adding an hour.

Besides the football Saturdays there are several large events at the Lied Center, Devaney Sports Complex, Pershing Coliseum and UNL campus that bring large numbers to the downtown area. Naming all those venues, leads to the most important opportunity to fill a new need for restaurant and bar owners that will be coming soon as the Lincoln city council addresses a financial plan that will increase a 2% occupational tax to Lincoln restaurants and bars to pay for a new sports arena in the area, if approved. Many believe that adding the extra hour would really help alleviate the thousands of dollars in taxes that Lincoln businesses will very likely encounter to put in yet another new arena.

As Omaha is a growing business leader in a border war with Iowa and Lincoln builds more venues to continue to become a leading place of interest, other college towns like Kearney, Chadron and Wayne could see great economic benefit as well. Not to be forgotten are the small town Nebraska bars that usually make up one of the only if not the only source of entertainment and food and drink in these towns.

The big cities and the small town waterholes and eateries alike will benefit from this bill economically and it can help ease some other issues of tax increases and safety issues. As Nebraska would benefit from end to end this extension of the last call is a legislative good call and an opportunity to be taken advantage of.

An Answer to True Love and Relationships

I'm not gonna bullshit you and say I have it all figured out but I have learned a lot from my relationships both good and bad. The relationship I am in now is great. I am in love and I feel like I have developed a relationship with my girlfriend that works for both of us and makes it so it never gets old. I have had girls that I thought I loved that crushed my balls and I have had girls that loved me so much it freaked me out and/or got boring and I moved on. This little idea I have come up with will not magically make your love life bliss but it is an idea that you can check yourself with to see if your relationship is the real deal. It may seem simple but when you apply it and look at your relationship it really can help a ton, and it is how I check myself and my girl friend.

First and for most, yes this is one idea but it can apply to every. That is because rule number one is "everyone is different, and everyone wants different things" In a relationship sense, this means everyone has different expectations. These expectations in the simplest sense are looks, humor, interests and all that other bullshit you fill out on an eHarmony profile. The real shit, the stuff that is the difference between love and one party totally fooling themselves, is your flaws, your body language, and how you communicate. In other words, the stuff that longtime married people understand, ya know it makes sense.

You have to figure out what you want and those are your expectations. You don't have to write down a list on a piece of paper but you have to know what you expect and you have to learn from your partner. Your expectations can change but eventually they will set themselves. You have to know what you want, before someone else can. Everyone has different expectations. They also vary from person to person. The expectations I had for my high school girl friend are very different from my college girlfriend. In fact I have had different expectations for every girlfriend I have ever had. That is why relationships are so hard. You have to find someone that has expectations that fit with yours and it is a two way street.

When people say "communication is everything in relationships" they are absolutely right. But they leave out the next step. The difference between like and love is being able to talk about anything. If you keep anything from each other, or if you have something you couldn't tell your bf or gf, they probably aren't the one. When you figure out what your expectations are you need to make sure your partner knows. Continuing to communicate them is what makes relationships last. With time expectations change, when they change, if you don't adjust accordingly that is when relationships fade out. By "updating" eachothers expectations, you will in a sense re-ignite the flame between you and it sure won't get boring.

People can have high expectations, low expectations or just plain regular middle of the road expectations. It actually doesn't matter which, any of these can still be good, lasting relationships. Once the expecations are known and shared, and if they are continually updated as need, there is only one more piece of the puzzle and it is the hardest. No matter if you have low, medium or high expectations there is only one way to make a relationship work with these expectations and it involves your partner not you. Each of these senarios is from experience.

1.) Obviously, if the expectations aren't met its not going to work. Whether that means they didn't meet your low expetations of a phone call in the morning and I will see you tonight or if the high expectations of texting you all day and hanging out as much as possible aren't met its not going to work if someone doesn't compromise.
2.) If some goes above and beyond and reaches far above your expectations it won't work either. Some people like this and say they wouldn't have it any other way but the truth is it gets boring and it can also be really creepy. If I was a betting man I would say this is one of the highest situations for cheaters. They get bored with the "super gf or wife" and they do someone else and expect to still get super wife in the end. Everybody likes to be called out on their bullshit once in awhile, it is really annoying to have someone agree with you all the time and worship the ground you walk on, its sad but true.
3.) The Winner, is to do the best you can to meet eachothers expectations and compromise with eachother. Don't over do it, just do it. If they are expectations you can't meet or you don't think you should have to, it's not for you.

The moral of the story is when you find that person that meets the expectations you have communicated with them and you can meet theirs they have for you, with compromises benefiting both parties, that is the ultimate. Love is communication. Love is comprimise. Love is flexible.

This is an idea I have created based off experience and studying relationships all around me. I would like to believe anybody with experience could identify with this and people without experience could learn from this. If you have conflicting views I would appreciating hearing about it. True love is always a work in progress.

Low Self Asteem and Relationships

It happens everyday. In my 21 years I have seen several types of relationships. I have been in several different relationships but my least favorite I am afraid is becoming quite common. It has also plagues someone I really care about. In a nutshell it would be relationship where one party is "owned" by the other. I personally have been owned but it really didn't take long for me to figure out it wasn't healthy. Its always hard and everybody should probably experience a crush that they really want but can't have. The one that got away if you will. Just because it didn't workout means that is bad, in fact, it might be the best thing that has ever happened to you.

The rundown: someone that is very close to me continues to suffer through a long distance relationship that incorporates a ball-less dork that doesn't know how to treat a woman. Her expectations for the dude are lower than low and he still can't meet them. She is lying to herself and her friends and family to defend this guy when he really has no worth and provides no positive benefit to her life but still she sticks up for this guy because it is her "first love". Their love consists of facebook chatting, skyping, texts and random after bar hook-ups that occur when he comes to town and she finds our about it and catches him. Even if at one point if this dude would have been a good boyfriend (which he hasn't) he is done and she needs to move the hell on. She continues to defend him, lie to herself and deteriorate the little self esteem she has left and if she doesn't leave this dude she will continue to suffer and she will lose the little support she has left from her family and friends because she won't listen to them. Do yourself a favor and if you ever find someone that you know you shouldn't be with and your friends and family agree, though it might seem difficult at the time, turn and run the other way. If you do, you will save yourself further heartache and you will not destroy your self esteem.