Sorry - Buckcherry

So as you all now know, Bryan and I are officially retiring our positions on TPA.  Today is a perfect example of why this has been forced upon us.

My agenda for today was school, German homework, TPA blogging, then 5 poems to read and write about, 3 more blogs to post, an article to find and analyze, and a newspaper story to write.  You see which the those is least important?  TPA.

Both of us are at a point where we want to keep posting, but it truly does feel like a chore for us.  During the summer, it was starting to get tiring, but it never caused me stress knowing that it was basically my homework every other night.

When Bryan forgot to post that day, I could have easily called that it would happen.  It was easy to predict.  Friday's are full of festivities crammed into a 9 hour period of time.  Bryan and I literally have 15 minutes some nights to post our blogs if we don't feel like pre-writing all of these blogs.

We hope that you all will go on with your lives once we stop.  Thank you all for your support as we accumulated over 100 posts in just over 3 months.  My personal goal was 1,000 page views when we started this adventure.  In less than a quarter of the time allotted, we SHATTERED my goal.

So until tomorrow Bryan,
What shall we do to conclude this?

Good Evening!

That was my last title. My creativity level is related to the time of day in a manner I could graph if I weren't so tired. If any of this is incoherent, I blame the tiredness factor.

For those who are curious, here is the situation of TPA. It's going to end eeaaarlier than Max and I originally planned. In fact, Max, while I think it's important for us to have a few wrapping-up posts in the coming days, we probably don't have to keep up our one-post-a-day commitment.

Here are things that will happen before TPA comes to an end:

• I'm going to complete my punishment song about how Max is better than I am because that's a punishment I definitely deserve.
• That's all we have planned!

So if you have any thoughts about some sort of closing ceremony things -- like planking or a TPA book club or something like that -- let us know in the comments.

There will be more posts after this one, but things are winding down. Thanks for a great few months, everyone!

Good Evening!

For the next four days -- Friday, September 9th, through Monday, September 12th -- Two Planes the Asymptote will be on hiatus. This is an agreement between Max and me.

In the meantime, here are 31 jokes for nerds many of you have probably already heard. Tell them to your friends -- they will be intimidated by your knowledge.

Have a great weekend and a reflective weekend as we mark the tenth anniversary of September 11th. According to Mrs. Bohn, there's going to be an excellent special on CBS at 8pm of that day, but I'm sure you can find tons of stuff on any channel.

Come Together - Beatles

Bryan, we have a predicament.

This morning, I wake up to see two texts from Bryan.

Mm, let me be honest about that – your comment was not loaded on my computer when I posted that.  I was very conscious of not wanting another punishment

, and I thought I was first. *nodnod*

For those of you who are as I was when I received this text, his hysteria roots from this picture.

Now Bryan, I would ordinarily agree with you judging by the times, but the fact that you even mentioned me makes me suspicious.  We talked earlier and I said that I would not give you another punishment, but that obviously does not mean that you are off the hook.

Bryan, in addition to your current song that you are writing, I want you to be wearing a strange attire when you are recording it.  I think that this is a fair addition to your current punishment under the given circumstances.

I must point out that you have now broken three rules, while I have yet to break any.

This post is too serious; I must break it up with a song!

Do you watch

Anyways, I hope you enjoy PopLyfe as much as I do!

Until tomorrow, Bryan,

I should probably start on that poster!

I will never get "Fever" out of my head.

In Max's defense, he said that some of his points were "not so accepted truths," so we probably shouldn't take them as seriously as some of us are. <coughcough>

In Max's not defense, I never promised to make all of my Mondays Question Mondays! About a month ago, I said, "I think I'm going to make my Mondays question days occasionally, and Max, you are free to make your Mondays question days occasionally, as well."

For today's not-so-smooth transition, I'm going to post a picture of Professor Flitwick around the time he was stabbed with a fork by Hagrid:

I pride myself in my ability to come up with controversial and fairly equally divided poll questions. I certainly received help in coming up with a few of them because I like to use my resources, so I thank those people. Here are some examples:

• We first learned that a handful of people put their socks on first and a handful of people put on their pants first.
• Some people prefer Richard Harris, and others maintain that his replacement, Michael Gambon, is superior.
• The debate between crunchy and creamy peanut butter can get pretty intense.
• Cheese and chocolate: need I say more?

This time, Max, I have failed. I honestly thought that I would have people on my side who believe that bacon would be delicious in frozen drink form. Maybe somebody else besides me will vote "yes," but it's not looking good. Time will tell. Except we can't hear time -- can we, Max?

Until next time, Max,

I'll bring construction paper, scissors, glue, and colored pencils for our project tomorrow.

Facts of Life - Lazyboy

Bryan, you may have let down your promise of a weekly Question Monday, but I will continue to post my Top Ten Tuesday on every on which Tuesday that I post.

Today’s topic of discussion, as told earlier, will be my top ten general truths of life.  Bryan, these are all sentences that are so true, that it seems useless to state them, but they really make you think.

Without further ado, here goes something.

Right now, I am as old as I have ever been, but while I typed this, it made my sentence a lie.  The more depressing version of this is that right now is the youngest I will ever be in the future.  Unfortunately, I have aged about twenty seconds since I posted that last sentence.

You cannot see time.  Okay, this should be understood, but anything that I cannot see scares me.  If I cannot see time, then how will I ever know if it truly flies or if I have lost track of it?  So much pressure Bryan!

Winter is not cold; it simply lacks heat.  Bryan, nothing is cold per se, but I would have to agree that it certainly is not warm.  The sun warms up Earth, but I have never heard of an anti-sun that magically cools down the Earth.

Normal people dream every night when they sleep.  So Bryan, I suppose nothing is worse (as I believe you showed in an earlier post) than having this great dream where you were king of the world, but you forget it by the time you wake up, but I cannot actually remember ever having this feeling.

We taste with our tongue.  Bryan, if food does not look good, then it does not reach my mouth no matter how many people try to talk me into eating it.  I must disagree with this “generally accepted truth,” and I suppose call it a “half-heartedly accepted lie.”

There is a fine line between bullying and teasing.  Bryan, that statement is only true when you draw a line between the two; otherwise, there is simply a small difference.

Black is not a color.  Bryan, this has never really fazed me until a few days ago that black is not actually ever black.  I looked outside at 2:00 a.m. the other day and was amazed at how dark it was, but no matter how little I could see, I could always see something.

Had we never met, then I would not have known you the way I do now.  Sure, I may have seen you in the hall, leading to me knowing your name, but would I ever start a blog with some random person who I see in the hall on a semi-daily basis?

Of all the places I could be right now, I am right here.  Think about that Bryan; you could be in Brazil right now speaking Portuguese, and I would have never met you and this blog never would have been started.  On a more feasible side, I could be at Harvard right now and have forgotten about you.

“Twinkle, Twinkle” and the ABC’s are both sung to the same tune.  Seriously, people, grab a friend and have both of you begin to sing at the same time and you will quickly realize the coincidence.

Okay Bryan, those are some generally accepted truths, along with some not so accepted truths.  I hope you enjoyed them, and I will keep thinking of fun top ten lists.

Until tomorrow, Bryan,

Stop singing those songs, people are staring!

I felt some Bacon, in my Brain

. . . would make for a more entertaining and delicious poem, I think.

Lyrics websites are the worst. They take five times as long to load as any other website, they're loaded with scary advertisements, they're probably giving my computer a lot of viruses, and only a few of them are letting me copy and paste the lyrics. Thankfully, I have the lyrics to "Animal" printed out, and I have a few ideas. I need some more ideas, and then I need to rework these lyrics.

Today, I had 72 percent dark chocolate, and I felt very sophisticated.

That's all I have to say about that, so I'll move on. I've noticed that I'm still the only person who voted "Yes!" for bacon frappuccino, which is extremely baffling to me. Bacon might not be my favorite food, but it is my favorite scent, and anything bacon flavored is wonderful. Hear me out, Starbucks. "Why does the Internet like bacon so much?" Listen to John and Hank for an answer.

Bacon, bacon, bacon. Did you know that Meijer discontinued my favorite snack? My mom would have to go to Meijer every week and get two or three boxes of "bacon crackers," but apparently I was the only one who liked them, so they don't exist anymore.

One time, I was in the shower, and I could smell the bacon that my mom was making. Do you know how impressive that is? The bacon smell traveled all the way from the kitchen to the bathroom door, went through the tiny crack at the bottom, spread out within the volume of the bathroom, and caught my attention even with the other prominent smells of water and Suave for Men shampoo. That's crazy. Bacon is awesome!

Until next time, Max,
What is all this juice and all this joy? Bacon. I mean, Spring.

The Math - Hilary Duff

Hallo Bryan,

I hope that all is going well in the world of punishments.

Today, I really want to go over some of our blog’s statistics.

Here goes nothing.

• 7249 views have been looked upon our page all time.
• 7,048 views were made from the U.S.
• 2,651 views were made in June, making it our most popular month.
• 488 views were made on an iPod.
• 277 comments have been made.
• 262 people viewed us after a link on Facebook.
• 235 people found us through Google.
• 189 page views have already came in September.
• 187 views were made on mobile Safari.
• 147 views have been made on our original post with the rules.
• 101 posts have been posted on this blog.
• 78 of our views are from Germany.
• 68 views were made on Bryan’s bonus, punishment post.
• 60 people are currently creeping on us.
• 45 views were made on Max’s punishment post.
• 35 views were made on an iPad.
• 19 views come from over the sea in Ireland.
• 13 comments were made on Bryan’s post “Four apples; awesome pants” making it the most commented upon post.
• 3 punishments have been issued.
• 2 punishments have been completed.
• 1 day Bryan forgot to post.
• 0 comments have been marked as spam.

That is a quick look at some of the statistics, which I found interesting.

I still have 400 words to play around with Bryan, so I will continue this post after a quick break.

Okay, I am back.

Bryan, your poll confuses me.  Why would anyone in the right mind want bacon in their Frappuccino?  Actually, why would anyone want any meat in a drink at all?

Rant over.

I still have just under 200 words to work with so I will give you all a sneak peak on my upcoming Top Ten Tuesday.

Bryan, I have been tossing around ideas, but I think I will post about some general facts of life I have learned throughout my life.

They will be just blatantly obvious facts that hold a general truth.  They are like paradoxes, but they are not.

Until tomorrow Bryan,

I am always good to the last drop.

100!

I just thought of something, Max -- PUN-ishment. I'm going to work on that over the next week. I have to listen to it a lot, and then I have to spend quality time on the lyrics, and then I need to practice for a while. It will happen sometime.

Do I regret not posting last Friday? Let me answer your question with an exclamation.

I get to celebrate the hundredth post of TPA! Yay!

Technically, two of our posts are not really posts. The first post has the rules, and June 19th's post was a bonus post. Either way you count it, I'm getting the hundredth post in this deal.

Today, Max and I walked and marched in the Miracle Mile Parade, respectively. I don't know about Max, but I got to Roncalli at ten, and then from about ten thirty to two thirty, I suffered from a horrible lack of air conditioning. And my arms were shiny after a while. And I drank four bottles of water and peed a LOT when I got back to Roncalli. I couldn't pee at the parade because none of the facilities were unportable.

Max and I had two different jobs at the parade. He walked with Stu Co behind the bus, and his job was to cheer and wave flags. I walked behind those people and in front of the band, and my job was to blow my whistle and sweat a lot. It was actually really hard to march between those two groups of people. The drumline would be playing a cadence in one meter, and Stu Co would be shaking their booties at a different tempo, and I got off a couple of times because of distractions.

My poooint is that Max and I have been doing TPA for one hundred (or ninety-eight) posts, and I'm not the kind of person who would enjoy shaking my booty in front of lots of people, and he's not the kind of person who would enjoy playing an instrument in front of lots of people, but we got to march in the same parade.

But that's life, I suppose! You go along and then suddenly -- poof!

Poof.

Poof.

The first marching band song I played was "Everybody's Everything," and this is the last marching band song I'm going to play:

Wake Me up When September Ends - Green Day

Yes, Bryan,

Fall is here.  A fall, is here.  Time for sneezing and time for cheer.

Well, you catch my drift.

Today marks my first post in September and we are already up to 7150 page views, not to mention that we have our 100^th post tomorrow, which is a huge leap for us.  We should probably hope that nothing happens after 100 posts on our blog to make it funky.

It’s Friday, which for the time being means that I will post numerous media resources in an effort to make my blogging quick to compensate for my lack of time.

Here is my first one.  Bryan, not only do they sing to my name, but they also sing a song that we will be using for our religion project.

Okay, so many people have been wondering what Bryan’s punishment will be, including me.  After long meditation and contemplation, I have determined the optimal punishment that is neither too difficult nor too torturous.

Bryan, you will be glorifying all the ways in which I am better than you to the tune of Animal by Neon Trees.  Please be aware that if you just change a few words, then I will just make you do another song, so do it right the first time!  Lastly, I do give you permission to change parts of the music part so long as you keep the song recognizable.

Here is the song in case you have not heard it recently.

Until tomorrow,

Sing purdy, Bryan!

Study Tips from Bryan

I'm actually not going to give you any study tips. Depending on how you view this post, I'm either going to give you one or zero pieces of advice. I'll get to that in a moment.

First of all, Max, my punishment (fragment). If you're going to give me a punishment, you should just give me a punishment. If you wait forever, then our graduation is going to happen eventually, and we won't even be blogging anymore by the time you give me a punishment. You knooow what you want to do, and I would like to start working on it as soon as possible. I'm just that kind of person.

Oh, let's increase the number of study tips in this post by one -- work on everything as soon as you possibly can. Then, when it's ten o' clock, you can go to sleep! Or in my case, you can get on the Internet and blog to a nerdy kid with glasses. Ah. I should work on my insults -- that one was not very effective.

Second of all, Max, Blogger's status (fragment). It's weird, and I don't think I like it. I'm usually a pretty adaptable person, but this seems like a common sense issue. The old interface is multicolored shows you everything you need to see without scrolling anywhere, and the new one is three colors on the brightest background in the world and everything's off center.

Oh, let's increase the number of study tips in this post by one again -- be adaptable. Then, when somebody throws you for a loop in the real world, you'll be prepared. You'll be, like, "Nice try, but on a homework assignment fifteen years ago, I had to answer a trick question, and now I'm prepared for anything!" This is speaking from experience, of course.

My third piece of advice which isn't really advice is Tom Lehrer.

I thoroughly studied for tomorrow's literary terms quiz. I'm ready to provide an example of anything. Why? Tom Lehrer. You could steal these, but it would be extremely lame, and the proof is right here. Busted.

Oxymoron: a figure of speech that combines opposite or contradictory terms in a brief phrase. "Your heart is hard as stone or mahogany; that's why I'm in such exquisite agony" (Tom Lehrer, The Masochism Tango).

Quatrain: a poem consisting of four lines, or four lines of a poem that can be considered a unit. "A friend of mine in a B-29 / Dropped another load for luck. / As he flew away, he was heard to say, / A hubba-hubba-hubba, yuk yuk!" (Tom Lehrer's favorite wartime quatrain which he feels reveals that war brings out the best in people).

Satire: a type of writing that ridicules the shortcomings of people or institutions in an attempt to bring about change. "Sleep, baby, sleep. In peace may you slumber. No danger lurks your sleep to encumber. We've got the missiles -- peace to determine -- and one of the fingers on the button will be German" (Tom Lehrer, MLF Lullaby).

Need I say more?

Max, until next time,

You've been fretting about that newspaper for weeks!