Archive for June, 2004

“…maybe that’s all family really is. a group of people who miss the same imaginary place.”

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 30, 2004
in Funny, Life, Movies, Spanish and Story
. 0 Comments

I finally figured out what that line is in the Garden State trailer. It seems kinda profound if you ask me.

So I wrote that quote thing during my lunch break cause I didn’t want to forget. Today after work I went and hung out with Professor Colleymore. He’s a really awesome person. I help him out with computer things sometimes and drive him around and then he usually takes me to get some food somewhere. He’s legally blind so he can’t do things like drive to Wal-Mart or Staples or the grocery store or whatever. I always love spending time with him because every second is quality. I feel comfortable talking about absolutely whatever with the man. He’s also one of those kind of people that’s just on fire for God. It’s something I usually realize how much I miss after I spend time with him. Working at a christian university and spending time with a lot of christians, a lot of times the God factor is just “assumed” and gets left out of things. It’s great to hang out with Colleymore cause I can talk about things God has done for me, how I feel God is directing my life at the moment, etc. I know I could bring that up with other people…it just doesn’t always seem natural though. Well today we ate at a place called Ugaldes Family Restaurant. It’s run by a mexican or spanish guy and the owner’s brother has another restaurant in Wabash I think…well, somewhere. Colleymore has gone there a lot so I think everybody kinda knows him. Our waitress was this small mexican girl and when we sat down Colleymore said I was Chalupa. She kinda looked at me weird and then he announced I was his son. That really confused her. Then later on she asked if we needed anything and Colleymore says, “I’m alright, but Chalupa here was hoping he could get your number.” She kinda stops in mid-stride, starts to take a pen out of her pocket then I laugh and she looks at me then kinda laughs and puts her pen away. I don’t know if she didn’t realize what he said or was actually going to write her number down. It was funny nonetheless. I think every single time I’ve gone somewhere with Colleymore, he’s always tried to get a girl’s phone number for somebody.

Well, anyways, getting back to the family thing. Colleymore always says he has no friends. He just has familia. It’s something he picked up when he was in jail from a latino guy once. Basically he’s been through a LOT of stuff. He’s also found out who his friends are and who aren’t his friends. Many times somebody will say they’re your friend, but as we all know, actions speak about 3.6 billion times louder than words. That’s why he calls me his son instead of his friend. I’m sure he’d do just about anything for me if I asked him. I would also try to do anything for him if he asked me. It’s kinda cool how that works out. I think it’s the way the church is supposed to work…it rarely does though from what I’ve experienced. Now don’t get me wrong, there are definate bright spots here and there, but the church as a whole isn’t living this out. I’m not talking about individuals, I’m talking about church bodies as a whole. I’m also just as guilty as anybody else though because I’ll bend over backwards for a friend. I’ve told some friends to call me whenever, wherever and I’ll do anything short of killing somebody, and maybe even that. Now I’m not exactly serious about the killing part…but you never know. Seriously, I’m not a violent person, but I think anybody reading this would know what I mean. Well, Squatz informed me I write a lot so I think I’ve hit my quota for tonight. hasta la vista

Transfer to campus safety?

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 30, 2004
in Funny and Story
. 4 Comments

So I go out for my midnight run tonight. On the way back I’m about 90% sure I caught some kids trying to break into cars in the parking lot. There were a couple cars with the lights on inside like what happens when you try the handle. They were huddled around one and when they saw me they both ran into the dumpster enclosure. So I walk over to the dumpster and ask if they need some help. They come up with a lame story that one of them had to pee. So I walked around the parking lot for a bit stretching my legs out while they ran from the dumpster to a house and then behind a bush waiting for me to leave. So I sat down in my yard to stretch. They watched me for about 4min. I yelled out I was gonna call the cops so they ran off over by Fairlane. So then I walked in and talked to “Bill” from campus safety and told him what was up. He got all excited cause he thought they were in the middle of doing it, then got all dejected when I told him I scared them away. Poor campus safety. So he said they’d do some “extra patrolling”. Probably the highlight of his evening.

Stuff

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 30, 2004
in Funny, Life and Story
. 0 Comments

Not a whole lot going on today. I was pretty much scanning stuff all day at work. Kinda makes your eyes go crazy after a while. The chair I was sitting in also wasn’t exactly the correct height so it started to hurt to type after a while and my back started to hurt from trying to look at the monitor on those dumb desks. If you know where I work, then you know what I mean. They’re great space savers, but it’s not great for using long-term…and by long-term I mean more than 15min. Well I thought I was gonna be helping some people move, but never heard from them. Ended up moving back my chillin time with Colleymore to tomorrow. He’s got some great mexican restaurant he wants to take me to, well I guess I’ll be taking him since he sorta has a sight problem and can’t drive. Squatz is loving those tortillas I made yesterday. Slappin on the butter and beloved grape jelly. I’m gonna have to make some more soon.

So yesterday when I was gettin signed up for insurance and whatnot. Right before I left they wanted me to look at this list of racial categories and pick out which one I am. I think there were six options and I felt like I qualified for three. They were caucasian, mexican, and spanish surname/lation. I’m definitely white to look at me, my name is Benjamín “Chalupa” Alba de Ranfeld, and my grandpa taught me that I’m chicano way before I can remember. I told the lady I sorta qualify for 3 of them and she looked at me funny then said to just please pick one. Like I was pullin her leg or something. They should have had options for multiple answers like when Dr. Toll makes a multiple choice test. Answers would be A, B, C, AB, AC, BC, AC. And students wondered why students who have had a class with him before didn’t want a multiple choice test…poor ignorant fools.

Well, got a few pseudo drunk calls from some of my buddies from the deuce. You know, some of those guys that current residents have only heard stories about. I sometimes wonder if they tell stories about me up there. I saw pseudo cause they had been drinking and were planning on drinking more. I got Eric Dubya Davis to say he’s gonna vote for me. He wanted to know where I stand so I told him I’m all for guns. He asked me to explain so I said if you were eating a pizza and somebody came and stole it at gunpoint, you should be able to shoot him and take your pizza back. He really liked that. I sometimes wonder what exactly makes sense to drunk people sometimes. Since I’ve never been inebriated I can’t really comment. I’ve definitely messed with plenty of “sloshed” people before though. It can be quite entertaining. I suggest you try it sometime. Just make sure they aren’t the violent type.

On a side note I was talking to Bob Lay today and he was asking me where I go to church. He started talking about Muncie Alliance and his daughter went there or something and his daughter’s friend, Jenny, went there last Sunday with a friend of hers from Ireland. She was in town visiting his daughter, blah blah blah. Turns out that’s Ben’s wannabe stalker. What a small world!

Double Bonus

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 28, 2004
in Cooking, Friends and Movies
. 2 Comments

So I had a couple good things happen today. My tortilla press came in the mail. I wasn’t going to mess with it til later, but I ended up whipping up just one batch. They turned out pretty well. The first few I made were on the small side, but once I got the hang of it, they were about the right size and shaped well. I made corn tortillas so the taste by themselves is kinda bland, but if you throw some butter and honey or jelly on there they’re pretty darn good.

I also finally got signed up for insurance at work today. I’ve been trying to get this taken care of for months. Ended up paper work had been lost, blah blah blah. In these kind of situations it always seems like the person getting screwed is the only one who cares. I always hope I’m not one of those uncaring people when a customer comes in at work. It’s probably happened before though.

Mahan got his laptop today. It’s pretty sweet. We also got some more people recruited to go see Napoleon Dynamite with us. Looks like Mike, Crack Timmy, Squatz and Michael are all interested. It should be a good time. Well, I was gonna hang out with the legend himself, Ron Colleymore, tomorrow. But I might need to help some people move so we’re rescheduling. Well, it’s the end of a day and the start of another week. It seems like we work so hard to grow up and then all of a sudden we’re old and the days just fly by. Wish I was a kid again when a week seemed like a year.

Wannabe stalker?

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 28, 2004
in Funny, Movies, Spanish and Story
. 2 Comments

Ok, so there’s this girl that likes Ben. He met her when he went to Ireland and she likes him or something. He’s told her he doesn’t “like” her back, but she still likes to just hang around. So she was here visiting friends over the weekend and then made him promise he would hang out with her. Sounded like things were kinda awkward. Then she wanted to go to church with us this morning. Luckily she’s gone now. Ben was able to handle it cause he won’t have to see her for the rest of the summer. Pobrecito. All I got to say is that if she’s trying to stalk him she could definitely do a better job. I’ve witnessed it firsthand before.

Saw Dirty Pretty Things with Tim and Michael tonight. I’ve been wanting to see it cause Audrey Tautou is in it. It was a decent movie. I liked it. However, it wasn’t nearly as funny as Napoleon Dynamite. Tim and I are all excited cause we’re gonna see it again on Thursday…that’s not that many days away. Did a bit more studying the ol español tonight and also found a book of 4,000 spanish idioms for like $10 last night. Ordered it from amazon but I won’t be getting it for like a month cause it hasn’t actually come out yet. Well, as usual necesito dormir porque tengo que levantarme a las seis.

Napoleon Dynamite

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 26, 2004
in Cool, Faith, Life, Liz, Movies and Story
. 0 Comments

I just got back from a screening of Napoleon Dynamite. This movie rocked! It’s so hilarious. All I had to do was make a user name on the fan club site and sign up to see the movie. Mahan and I got there about 45min early and walked up to the doors. There were about 3 other people standing outside waiting. Right after we got there though, all of a sudden a ton of people showed up. Tim and I were the first ones in line so when we go up to the ticket counter the lady says, “Are you on the list?” I reply with, “Yeah,…Ranfeld?” She responds with, “Ben?…Ok, go ahead.” It was so cool. I’ve never been on ‘the list’ before. It was like when you see people try to get into a club on TV and there’s the big bouncer guy with his list of names. So after that we get 2 free t-shirts, a card where if we go to another screening and get it stamped we can get a “sweet prize package” sent to us, and free tickets to the next screening. Can you say totally sweet?

Took an hour long walk or so around the sprawling metropolis of Upland last night to collect my thoughts. Felt much better aft wards. I don’t know why I get like that sometimes. Sometimes I feel like I’m personifying the Israelites when they just had to have a king. God was their king but they wanted something tangible, somebody in person. Well God is my heavenly father and He definitely takes care of me all the time. However, like the dumb person I am I sometimes wish I had something tangible.

Well, if you want to get in on this sweet Napoleon action, check out http://www2.foxsearchlight.com/napoleondynamite/fanclub/main.php

If you think it’s as cool as Tim and I did, then thank Liz Boltz cause she’s the one who informed us.

House of Sand and Fog

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 26, 2004
in Life, Movies and Rambling
. 2 Comments

Have you ever had one of those days where something just seems to keep coming up? That’s what my day has been today and the thing that has kept coming up is my dad. It all started this morning at work when Dr. Heth came into the ETC. He was making a tape of a student he baptized in the Taylor pond recently to give to the person and was telling me a bit about the guy. He grew up without having a dad around and stuff and I made some comment about how I know what that’s like. So Dr. Heth was asking me some questions about it…I don’t know how long we talked. He was also telling me about a family that has been living with them in their home for a few months. The couple was having marital problems and the Heth’s were trying to help them out so the mother and five daughters have been living with them. He’s telling me about the husband and he sounds like a real winner…just like my dad. Then for the rest of the day scenes just keep playing themselves through my head. None of them really good…just memories. Then tonight Squatz and I order a pizza from Kay’s in Gas City, head over to the new and improved Block Buster across the street (previously Video Stop), I open a new account and get a free rental, we pick up our pizza then head back to the ol Briarwood Estates. Well, the movie I got was House of Sand and Fog. I hadn’t seen it before but knew it was good because Neville told me. Everything Neville has ever told me is good has always panned out, this movie included. The thing about this movie is it also kept reminding me of my dad. You have the cop that just up and leaves his family, doesn’t really explain anything and then you have Ben Kingsley’s character. Complete opposites. Ben Kingsley’s character didn’t always do the right things, but he always took responsibility for what he did and tried to make things right. The cop, played by Ron Eldard, was emotional, did dumb things on a whim, never thought through his actions and didn’t like to face up or take responsibility. This guy reminded me a lot of my dad. Kingsley’s character also reminded of how much I wish I had a cool dad…somebody that cared. I’ve asked myself and God many a time why I’ve had to deal with the things I have while growing up. Sometimes I’m stupid and even start feeling sorry for myself. I don’t need to do that cause there’s so many more people that have it so much worse than me. I do know though that what I’ve experienced has allowed me to reach out to more people than I could have ever imagined. It has made me grow in more ways than I could have ever imagined. It has also made into a much better person than I could have ever been. There’s a saying I’m sure most people have heard at some point in time and it goes sorta like this, “anything worth having has to be worked for.” I can’t think of some of the profound ways I’ve heard this before, but that’s the jist of it. Anything that’s worthwhile doesn’t come easy. It just doesn’t get dropped on your doorstep like a baby by a stork. I’ve met so many people that just don’t seem to have a grasp on reality and live their lives in an almost fantasy world. Then I know these other people that seem to sort of have it together. More often than not the ones that have it together have had to go through something tough at least one time in their lives. Of all the things that can be earned, I think character is one of the more expensive things.

Super Size Me

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 25, 2004
in Castleton Arts, Favorite things, Free Stuff, Internet, Life, Liz, Movies, Music and Spanish
. 2 Comments

So I went to go see Super Size Me tonight after work today. Mahan and I picked up Liz at the truckstop and then made our down to that beloved place at Exit 1 on I-69 that I like to call “Castleton” but is referred to by others as the AMC Castleton Arts Theater. Neville and I would go down there every once in a while to see something. It’s a great little theater. So this movie was pretty interesting. If you don’t know the premise, there’s this guy named Morgan who decides to see the effect eating nothing but McDonald’s menu items for 30 days will do to his body. Let’s just say it wasn’t good. The movie was mostly entertaining and informative on different levels, depending on how much you know. Basically this movie just re-emphasized my feelings on fast food. I still eat it occasionally, but I haven’t really been able to stand McDonald’s food since I was in high school….there’s just something about it that makes me feel sick every time I’ve eaten it. In the 30 days this guy ate McD’s, he consumed 30lbs of sugar!!! And that’s just one statistic. I gots one word for yas…¡craziness!

So…switching topics…I’d like to thank people for making comments. Especially about my most recent mammoth post. I think this is one of the ambient features(mod sim terminology if you know what I mean) of a blog - getting thoughts out to multiple people w/o having to track them down individually and relaying your thoughts. Oh technology, where would we be without thee? I finally finished taping plastic over everything in these two tiny rooms at work. The plan is somebody is coming in to put a whole in the wall and create a window. Downside being these rooms were full, and still are, of dust-sensitive equipment. Luckily I didn’t have to work on this constantly. I would spend an hour and a half or so then take a break and then tackle it again. It was kinda tedious, but a nice change of pace from sitting at that counter. I did find a way to pass the time though. There’s this sweet website called http://www.shoutcast.com that lets you search for streaming radio stations and listen to them through winamp. So I eventually found this radio station of mexican folk music where they were playing songs like stuff I used to hear all the time as a kid AND had some songs on there my grandpa used to sing occasionally. Those were great memories…long car ride with the grandparents, my grandpa would start singing some song en español and we would love it. Always annoyed my abuela though and she would always ask my grandpa to stop. This would be followed up by him asking us if he should stop and we would always say, “Noooooo!” Which would be followed by him singing some more. Good times. My brother and I always joke about the day we’re both gonna be sitting around in dirty white t-shirts sporting thick mustaches and listening to music in spanish with accordions quite loudly while drinking icy cold beverages and sweating either in the garage or on a porch. Preferably while annoying the neighbors with our music. While this might sound racist, mi hermanito y yo feel it’s ok cause well…we’re a bit mexican ourselves. On a sadder note, I just found out my tortilla press has been rescheduled to arrive on Monday, not tomorrow morning as I was planning.

If Tim and Liz read this, I wanna say I had an awesome time tonight. Even though I’m usually described as a quiet person it’s not that I don’t talk, I just dislike meaningless chit chat. So I always enjoy car rides like the on the way down and back up where meaningful conversation took place. Well, it’s about time for this fried gordita to take his contacts out, read a little then hit the sack.

Lessons Learned

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 23, 2004
in Books, Faith, Life and Rambling
. 4 Comments

Latest on Blue Like Jazz…
So the chapter I’ve most recently read was on love. Miller was talking about how in the Christian world he’s mainly experienced conditional love. Oh Christians say they love you (I do the exact same thing) but usually don’t mean it. Our society seems to treat relationships like money. If you think about it most metaphors we use for relations are economically related. You invest, spend time, you value people, etc. He goes on to say,

“The problem with Christian culture is we think of love as a commodity. We use it like money…With love, we withheld affirmation from the people who did not agree with us, but we lavishly financed the ones who did.”

This made me really think about how I’m usually willing to bend over backwards for my friends but sometimes don’t give a *poo* when I don’t know the person. Example - One day at work there was this guy that needed to buy some matt board for a project due right away but didn’t have his wallet. A new policy had been made to stop taking I.O.U’s because people never came in to pay them. So I tell him no can do. He begs and pleads so I explain the policy and tell him I’m sorry. Now, I’m a staff person/management so I could have easily said sure, we can do that for you, but instead I just act like a jerk and turn him down. So Mel, the cashier working then, gives the guy $20 to pay for his materials out of her pocket. I would guess Mel usually doesn’t have $20 lying around to give to strangers but she did it seemingly without thinking about it. She saw somebody in need and decided to help. I felt like such a wanker immediately after she gave him the money. I’d have to say that was one of those times I’d be sooo embarrassed if Jesus walked around the corner.

He then goes to talk about a guy he knows, “I never chose not to like the guy. It felt more like the dislike of him chose me.” This one really hit home for me cause that’s the way I feel about one of my co-workers sometimes. He follows up with another comment related to getting along with people saying, “Nobody will listen to you unless they sense that you like them.” The sad part here is I can be very good at acting like somebody’s best friend when I really can’t stand them. I’ve had these internal monologues before where I argue with myself whether or not I’m exhibiting Christ’s love towards that person I don’t like or just really being deceitful. Any thoughts? Please fill me in if you want.

On the last page Miller follows up with, “I loved the fact that it wasn’t my responsibility to change somebody, that i was God’s, that my part was just to communicate love and approval.” So the lesson I got out of this was I just need to love my co-worker, and do all I can to make work go smoothly and let God worry about all those things that bother me and irk me. Definitely not easy to do, but definitely something to strive for.

So I feel like I’ve influenced somebody today. I was reading my Big Red Book of Spanish Verbs at work and felt the need to tell somebody about how cool it was so I IM Tara and she decided to get a copy of it. It’s always awesome when you find something cool and tell somebody else about it. Well, so far I’ve read the sections over the normal tenses. I’m starting to remember a lot. I also love this book because it explains things in proper terms. It has a section on use for a verb tense and then explains if blah is past tense and there’s a noun phrase that’s why this is used, blah blah blah. That makes so much more sense to me than when I was in high school and this one teacher I had would tell us this is the way it is…deal with it. Luckily I already knew how to do everything the two years I had that teacher(my high school wouldn’t let me skip some spanish classes), but there were kids in my class that were always confused and just never got it. She wasn’t teaching it, she was just trying to get you to regurgitate info. Well, I think I’m going to spend a few more days on these easy tenses and try to make sure I can remember all the different times you want use one over the other, etc, etc.

Well, I just got back from hanging out with Tim and Michael for a very long time and I really should get some sleep so I can be responsible and show up to work on time.

Rediscovered treasure

Published
by
Chalupa
on June 22, 2004
in Free Stuff, Life and Music
. 4 Comments

Ever listen to a band for so long you get sick of them and subconsciously decide to stop listening to them for a while and then randomly you find a CD of MP3 of them wonder why you ever stopped listening and then start the cycle all over again? Well I rediscovered my Weezer albums and my Motor City Ska album by Insyderz.

So last night Squatz and I decided to make the first ever JRod memorial medium chocolate shake run but BK decided to close before we got there…jerks. They should really be open whenever we feel like showing up. That way our american egos could be stroked and we’d feel like we’re on top of the world. Wait a minute…ok, just kidding. Felt the need for a little sarcasm. Yeah, so we used to always get chocolate shakes at BK with JRod and since he’s not here this summer we’ve been berating him about when he’s going to visit us and stuff. And since we miss him, we’ve started inventing JRod-esque events where we get shakes and stuff. Ended up getting some nasty food at Kir-tac instead cause that’s another JRod place. I really don’t know why I eat Taco Bell food sometimes. I eat it and it tastes like crap. Especially since I just finished up a huge batch of burritos a little over a week ago. Why do we torture ourselves sometimes?

Work wasn’t too bad today. Pretty much painted all afternoon. Way better than slouching on a chair behind a counter for 3+ hrs. Spent most of my evening washing clothes over at Nathan’s. He’s so awesome cause he lets me use his washer and dryer. He’s saved me a LOT of quarters. Well, not much else going on. Probably do a little studying then get some sleep as usual.