Roads are dumb

dum dum dada da dum dum dada da dum dum dada da da dum dum dum (more on that later)

Hello everyone (the rest of this is all going to be one paragraph and more unproofread than usual and prolly even less senseible), i stand at the dawn of summer and in front of me is a wall. The wall has a name, exams. I hate exams, i cant sit and think for that long without well doing something. anyways yesterday was evan's concert at the docks. i think its important to note that like everything else in the watertown, johnson creek, lakeside area, has nothing to do with actual water. It was actually an unloading station for semis which worked really well for the event. Ali picked me up around for despite my horrible directions, which seemed to foreshadow are many detours. we were trying to make it up to the docks by 5 thirty. we might have made it sooner but we missed a road and wound up in sussex. i had to call ali's dad who fortunately is the god of the road and also very nice. he exlpained what we were to do and i actually understood it. we turned around, found our road, and all was safe in the world of ali's grand am. We also listened to the totally old-school "rooted...." cassette tape. the first one camp ever released. man that brought back memories. you dont seem to sing songs like tychicus anymore. i had forgotten how much rap, or at least attempted rap, was on the cd. good stuff. eventually we got to the docks at 5:45 and got to see evan's band play. i was impessed by there skills, i couldnt really understand the words but the guitars and drums were solid. afterwards evan kinda ignored us, of course we gave him a silver pine cone. he threw the pine cone in an ash tray, curses. anyways he was totally oblivious of everything. he then had to drive home to take his drums back. so me, chrissy, ali and adam igl (the camp people that showed up) played dum dum dada on the grass. i love camp. after that we walked around a bit, learned about flowers from chrissy and finally our conquering drummer appeared looking almost awake. oh well we were all happy to see him. then we took about ten minutes figuring out where to go eat, the conversation went like this us: evan were do you want eat? evan: i dont care. us: how about culvers? evan: guys i dont really care. us: evan its your birthday present too. finally after ten minutes of that we went to a diner called the pine cone, very fitting. chrissy almost drove off a cliff, twice. the pine cone was pretty good, except we spent 5 minutes trying to get ketchup out of this full bottle. that hole time chrissy was telling me to push on the 57 because it "works better". the she tried. it didnt work better. then i just used the other bottle. then we decided to go to evan's house. bork wasnt answering his phone so me and evan chose to go over to house cuz we missed the little guy. of course then we couldnt find his house and ended up talking to this very old, but fortunately very nice lady in a house that looked like bork's but on a completely different street as bork's. finally we found it 410 sandburn, or something like that. no one was home, so we drove back to evans and listend to some excellent ska on the way home. good stuff. at evan's we fought over a stress ball and i played bass guitar. or at least tried. it was fun. oh i forgot an amazing conversation between evan and chrissy, while we were all in chrissy's van, it was something like this: chrissy: why dont you have any streetlights? evan: oh, definetly. Chrissy: why is it so dark? EVan: its called night. good stuff. while at evans house someone said women love the A chord, if this is true thats some handy information--i can play the a chord. then ali and i had to go. we left on the highway going westward. we drove for a while having a pretty deep discussion until we got about 9 miles from madison. at that point we realized we were supposed to go east so we turned around after another talk with ali's dad. then we talked some more about how guys are dumb, and the differences between guys and girls. just to point this out i think guys and girls are equally inept at understanding each other and because of that dumb so dont be offended. or be offended and ill find you even dumber. (see i figure i threaten people who would be offended so they wont be offended out of fear of my threats that would just offend them more, i win.) later we talked about her amazingly awesome to have some sort of student bible study in the morning. thatd be an amazing way to open the day and we could even have breakfast together. anyways we finally got to my after taking about 1 hours more time than we should have. oh well it was a good time. camp is so close i can smell the juice bars. i went to the minute maid web site and found them there but didnt find a way to order boxes of them off the site. my quest will continue. see ya later every one and God's blessings. your buddy, jason schleef

Memory

I felt like blogging tonightLife is crazy, so is Dan Brunner. Last weekend we had our daycamp training weekend which seemed like just an excuse to get a free weekend at camp. I was a little disappointed that only 3 other junior staff members were up there but me dan aaron schulz and alicia hart all had a good time. At when we first got there it worked out pretty good. We hung out in the dining people with the actual daycamp people from congregations then it was pt talking about the billions of Christian recourses that he uses and i must admit i was amazed at his dedication to teaching kids the love of Christ. The night wore on and then everyone pretty much went to bed except for the junior staff members who had the whole camp to themselves. we started out watching a movie on dan's laptop but that was kinda boring. Aaron and i amused ourselves with things to swordfight with for a while (i killed him). then the woods called our name and we made the trek with just cell phones to light the path. good times. We finally got to bed around 12:30 or so. beth told us midnight so were weren’t too far past curfew. The weekend started out well.

The next day we got to breakfast and said hi to Isa, always a highlight, unfortunately we didn’t get any juice bars. we hung out some more and worked with puppets, snacks and a heat gun that cut though Styrofoam like butter. i liked that heat gun. and beth and sy did a song from Moulin rouge as puppets and had it down pat, especially as two puppets of old geezer men. of the non junior staff people up there it was alot of middle aged women and pastors and about 4 teenagers. 3 of the teenagers stayed in the same cabin as me aaron and dan and two were quiet and normal, the other, well........was an interesting fellow and said alot of things about himself that i really didnt need to hear. anyways i think all of them were hicks which made for some good conversation and they were all interesting, nice guys. later on saturday a day with perfect weather and almost no wind, i finally got to go disc golfing and played the best round of my life. tom aaron dan the two normal non junior staff teens i think their names were mark and nick started on the first whole which always bothers me. i i hit a tree but got a lucky bounce and was able to get a good approach and nail down a par. after that i could do no wrong. i birdied hole 2, and just felt the disc come off my hand perfectly. by the end of the day i finished with some insane score of either 6 or 7 under (not even joking) and also got my first eagle on whole 5. (later when i got to write my name on the board i accidentally wrote it differently from everyone else but oh well its my eagle) that was amazing i dont think ive ever been nearly as satisfied with my play on the disc golf course as that. (of course the next day i was lucky to pull out par so i still got alot of work to do.)

disc golf wasnt the only thing that held my interest that weekend. their was also this girl about my age who looked like a really cool person that i wanted to get to know but i think by then the only thing i had done was eat the snacks with her. later after campfire dan, who had also been eyeing this girl, Jill, went up to her and literally asked her, "do you have a phone?" she gave him kinda a blank look and dan was like, "what im trying to say is do you have phone service where you live?" dan is awesome any other guy would have just said hi and started normal conversation. dan made himslef well, memorable. though it was funny when jill's mom mentioned that jill had a boyfriend named jeff and you could just see dan's face just deflate. though i admit mine did a little bit but i was even happier when i found out she wanted to go to MLC. Actually this conversation started an amazing chain of events. we talked to jill and the people she was with for a while and she agreed to go play poker with us. we never ended up playing poker. we set up the table under the clouds where the stars should have been and just ended up just chilling, and listening to music on dan's computer. that guy has quite a library of songs. and also listened to aaron schulz talk to his girlfriend which was funny. one of the things he said to her, "theirs two people who love you in this world, your mom and jason schleef." i know this sounds kinda cruel but aaron is actually an incredibly loyal guy and wouldnt even give any girls a hug. eventaully we talked for a while and found out we had alot in common, jill even liked acdc and the theater. eventually we decied to head down to the lake chill out there. so me dan jill aaron and mark started the trek down. on the way there dan had to run around and try to scare us, but at least we had a flashlight this time. eventually we got down to the lake and we all sat on the pier and just looked up at the night sky and talked about life, God, peer pressure and watched fish in the water by shining the light on them. It was one of those amazing camp phillip moments where someone youve only known for days instantly becomes one of your best friends. we prolly would have stayed down there longer but at about 3:30 or so it started to rain. lucky we did run because by about 4:15 it was pouring. the only thing i really regret about the night was that dan had to work at 7 that same morning and had drive home without even getting in a nap. i remember praying for him to be safe and fortunately God was with him cuz he had a couple close calls but managed to get home fine. mark went to be so aaron jill and me just chilled for a little while longer but by then i was almost falling asleep and we all needed to get to bed.

the next morning everyone was totally wiped out but we still managed to only be 10 minutes late for breakfast. aaron and i got in 2 more rounds of disc golf and now im even more looking forward to camp. which is now 19 days away i believe. also evan’s thing should rock and ill definetly go if i can get a ride.

school is almost over for the summer. We’re gonna be seniors?
May the grace of Christ bless you all of your days
jason schleef

d-day, skim milk and oz

Hello everyone one out there who reads this. Today was pretty busy and just as well as any to blog about. In first hour history we watched the beach scene in Saving Private Ryan. This movie always reminds me of how much I need to thank those who fought for this nation we call America. That movie still puts chills down my spine and even though it wasn’t a typical way to open a school day it made me put my life and the struggles into perspective. Then in second hour econ with Mr Walz (an amazing teacher who specializes in sarcasm) we had a great discussion about fat content in milk. Mr. Walz loves whole milk and talked about how one time he had accidentally used whole milk on his golden grams and how amazing it was. Just the memory put him in a better mood. Of course others thought that skim milk was better but I thought that was gross. Have you ever eaten skim milk with cereal, there’s so much water and so little milk that parts are actually grey. Plus it practically tastes like water. Skim milk is gross. Besides talking about different varieties of milk he also gave us some life advice. The best of which consisted of two points. One, keep close to your Lord and work your tail off and you’ll be successful. The other: if you don’t love your job, your not getting paid enough. Both of these are very true. In the world we live if we stay close to Christ and work hard what can stop us from succeeding? And also that you should only do a job that you love doing because money doesn’t seem so great after you get used to your salary and what you can and can’t afford, but having a job that you love motivates you to come and work hard and work for Christ every day on the job.

Then in third hour I heard the typical trig jargon that goes over my head by leaps and bounds. Band was fun, were playing the lion king and I get to totally rock out on my tuba. Then I had chicken cordon blue and mashed potatoes. Then I talked to matt Kurtz who runs the concession stand and who loves classic rock about as much as anyone. I had loaned him the record player that I bought at the garage sale and I guess its alot older than I expected. I guess it only plays 78 rpm which is just for polka stuff and the needles don’t work with regular record players. This kinda bites but oh well, I like to polka. The rest of the day was kind of a blur as I studied my lines for oz callbacks.I went into the tryouts pretty nervous. I had only been brought back for one role, Uncle Henry, and wasn’t to sure if I could get it cuz there were a number of people that do an awesome job. Eventually I got to do my lines as Uncle Henry twice and tried to make them as different as possible. The first time I tried doing him as a subtle village idiot while the other was kinda detective/lawyer. Both went off ok but village idiot felt alot more natural. Then Ali German went up as like 5 different roles and could prolly do the whole play by herself if we only had more of her. Then the director asked me to do the lines of some professor guy who was supposed to act like a used car salesman (another role that came naturally to me) and I felt I did a much better job on him than the professor. and even if I don’t make it I can always hope to get the role that I’ve really always wanted: one of the flying monkeys.

see ya later, and ill be thinking of you all while im at camp (especially chrissy)
jason schleef
ps 24 DAYS TIL TRAINNING we should start planning a massive party!!!

The Beauty of Rummage Sales

Yesterday was a beautiful day, the Jackson rummage sale. If you are unfamiliar with this awesome holiday, it takes place in Jackson and everyone in the small town who sets up a rummage sale puts it up that day, my church allows people to set there stuff up in the church parking lot and also offers people food, the gospel and restrooms. I don’t remember getting up, but I know I was at my church a half hour later working the evangelism booth with Sara Cvickle (I cant spell her last name) and giving away bracelets, mini Frisbees and a smorgasbord of other great stuff. During this day I also found time to get some excellent deals on some pretty wicked-sweet stuff.

Hackey-sack-50 cents: it has an alien on it and its missing some beads but it works pretty well, pretty sweet gift from Sara (later her I bought her a duck phone which quacks instead of ringing and she loved it) unfortunately my hackey sack skills are not nearly as quality as the hackey sack.

Mug made bassically of a pirates head-75 cents: my pastor bought this for me cuz he knew how awesome I thought it was and also because he’s one of the coolest people I’ve ever met. It’s very cool as at the moment it gives my room a seaman's feel to it and also holds my penci. Also has a stylish eyepatch.

Model kendo stick with holder- 1 dollar: kendo sticks are the wooden practice swords that samurai would train with. It’s not really good for sword fighting because it’s only about the size of a dagger but looks cool in my room and I like it.

Dare t-shirt-50 cents: it’s pretty much your basic dare shirt but it fits like a glove and tells people not to do drugs or violence. Which is an important message and made even better because it comes on a quality item of clothing.

A brass bike horn-1 dollar: I probably could have waited and got it for 50 cents but it makes the classic bike horn sound and looks really old. I couldn’t not buy it.

An antique record player-10 dollars: 10 dollars is a lot to spend at a rummage sale for one thing, but I really couldn’t pass on this even though its power cord needs to be replaced and I’m not even sure if it works. Also I don’t have any records but I think it plays 710s and some other sizes too. I’m sure Bork, Shinnick and others will be able to make use of it and appreciate the fact that I bought it. The thing also came with 4 needles and seems to be in good shape.

A Brass Jewish Menorah-2 dollars: This is definitely the diamond in the rough of the day. It is slightly dented but other than that only has minor patches where the paint is discolored. The thing is very heavy for its size which is over a foot off the ground and has all seven candle slots. I just need a yammukka and I could totally pass as a Jew. Seriously, how many other 17 year old WELS Lutherans have a Menorah in their rooms. The thing also makes an excellent chair for my Spongebob Squarepants plush toy.

Knowing that all this stuff will probably end up in my own rummage sale many years from now-priceless.

Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey

It takes a big man to cry, but it takes a bigger man to laugh at that man.

Why does the color blue mean rasberry flavoring? (the random question on my profile)

Blue has become synonymous with raspberry because so many other flavors had taken up the color red (strawberries, watermelon, etc.) raspberry needed to be a different color so I could stand on its own. Also people would become confused if so many flavors were red. Candy is for enjoyment, not confusion. Furthermore blue raspberry just flows off the tongue. People can put the word blue in front of raspberry without the word sounding forced. Though some may argue that this is because people have simply been able to get used to the idea of blue raspberry, I contend that the fact that people have been able to get used to the name proves that the name works. Finally, blueberries aren’t that popular for flavored candies. After that, what else is blue? Water,.... antifreeze,... neither of which would make good candy. Unless sucking on antifreeze is a passion of yours and if that is the case I have a question for you. How do you sleep at night without dying? All things considered blue raspberry makes perfect sense in the world of flavored foods.

The Sharp Cut of Guilt

We live in a society seemingly without an external standard. People can pretty much do whatever they want and yeah there are laws and such but even those aren’t exactly enforced. Also groups of people encourage the idea by saying people have their rights and it’s wrong to stop them from doing what they want. For example a case in maybe Florida but I’m not sure took place where a young lady of about 16 or 17 sued her parents because they refused to let her leave the house to go have sex with some schlunko in his 30s. a group called the American civil liberties union or ACLU defended the girl saying that it was her right to go to this pervert and that the parents were denying her rights by stopping her from going. I use this situation to demonstrate just how far our nation has come in its refusal to acknowledge right from wrong. Oh and the girl won. What does this have to do with cutting? As our society pushes itself more toward a world without right or wrong people tend to shift more to the wrong, just look at Sodom and Gomorrah and Hollywood. All places without laws and standards and all suffered from indecency and God destroyed the first 2 with fire. Basically what I’m getting at so far is that in this world without standard, people still have to deal with their consciences. Even though everyone around them may say that the sins they do are perfectly ok, that person will still feel guilt that comes with sin. Paul tells us in the bible that it is a sin to go against your conscience. it is also a sin to coax someone into going against their conscience. What our nation is left with, especially teens, is lots and lots of guilt. Guilt doesn’t go away like a sickness; it can only be stopped through the loving grace of Christ. Jesus forgives us completely and even though we sin, he loves us just the same. The love of Christ knows no bounds. After experiencing this kind of love and seeing the mark it leaves in our hearts and the hole it fills in our soul how could anyone not live for Christ. This person would not avoid sin because of fear or guilt but because of love. But what happens without the love of Christ, where does that guilt lead. Eventually it can lead to things like depression and cutting.

I think cutting is one of the worst thing a person can do to themselves. First and most obviously that person is hurting the body God gave them. Our bodies are temples of the Lord and this is serious abuse. What may be even worse though is that cutting starts a vicious and repetitious cycle. People feel so guilty about something or just down in general to a point at or near depression. This horrible feeling manifests itself where a person will cut themselves to watch it bleed and maybe their guilt and depression will go away with the blood while it trickles down their arm. However once done does the person feel proud about cutting themselves? No, the blood stops flowing scars remain. The person knows how destructive the behavior is and guilt increases. Cutters are not people to be shunned or looked down upon. They, more than perhaps any other, need our friendship and our prayers. A good friend of mine, who does not attend my school, admitted to me that she used to cut herself and she had a number of scars which she was terrified that people would notice. Yet this friend showed perhaps more strength than anyone I’ve ever met and gave a speech to her English class about how horrible cutting is. To close her speech she faced up to her fears and told her class that she knew exactly how horrible cutting is because she had done it to herself.

We live in a society that gives people an infinite amount of opportunities to sin without external consequences. Yet internal consequences can be even worse. They can lead people to depression, cutting and other horrible self destructive behavior. Granted guilt is not the only reason people cut, it is a major reason. Because cutters often feel trapped, they need help more than most. Friends, parents, and others need to be understanding to their problem and not punish them but work with them. How can you punish someone for punishing themselves? Finally only the love of Christ has the power to change people's hearts. Christ loves and forgives us unconditionally and the worst thing we as sinners can do I avoid him and his love. Cutting is horrible, but a cutter is a redeemed child of God and needs love, support and prayers more than any.

my first and hopefully not my last

wow i never thought id be the type of person to write a blog, but here i am writing one at 12:27 am and wishing i could type a little faster and 28 words per minute. i prolly never would have joined this blogging thing but my good camp friend evan, wrote his blog site on his msn name and had the most amazing picture of the frostiest frosted minni wheat ever. After seeing this little peice of heaven i was inspired to comment about it and needed an account. Thus here i type, a blogger. So now i hve the question as to what to type about, with all the freedom at my disposal i think ill have to break it off into categories. these categories will prolly range from what my day was like to my thoughts on the US's economic policies and how taxes should be lower and flatter than a bottle of pepsi clear. I hope your as excited as i am.

I go to kettle moraine lutheran high school in jackson, wisconsin which by is pretty small, both of them. and i try to get along with the other 4oo some kids in my school as well as i can and also have some fun. today i brought a 24 oz can of arizona iced tea to hisotry class. i highly reccomend arizon iced tea as it is cheap enough to be purchased at aldis and taste wonderful and of course the best thing, comes in a 24 oz can which is twice as much as in your typical soda can. hopefully in the future ill realize my dream of becoming a licensed distributor of it because then i could buy even cheaper at wholesale and then after that drink as much as i wanted and sell it to people for cheap and compete directly against my schools concession stand and win with quality, price and service with a smile. My first hour teacher mr. zeamer, one of my role models, i hope some day i can bring such a positive attidude to a school as a teacher and just be such a genuinely nice guy. Mr. zeamer is also my neighbor and goes to my church, morning star lutheran. i think if jesus walked among us today, hed be alot like mr. zeamer. that being said i also have to admit that i absloutely love history and constantly find my self enjoyingly watching the history channel. but mr zeamer seemed to like that i had brought my tea and i think if i ever start selling the stuff he'd be my first customer. also the last time i brought 24 oz can of iced tea mr. granberg was also there and as i left i raised my tea to him and said hello. mr granberg is our new principal who just came this year and is a really nice guy. hes come across as very timid but he drives me home from sporting events sometimes and i know him pretty well, well enough to know that hes a pretty big rock fan and that makes me give him my undying respect. well i think thats all ill right about school for today because really after history first hour it kinda goes down hill from there even though im more awake in my other classes. i think school isnt so bad i just hate homework.

now to focus a little less on my self and arizona iced tea, i think i need to address america's situation with china. in the last two decades or so china has become probably the second most powerful country militarily and economically to the united states. this bugs me because china heavily persecutes christians and only sanctions state run churches that combine the teachings of mao ze dong with that of the bible. to be clear some reports have suggested that mao murdered more people than hitler and also enjoyed raping twelve year old girls. i hate mao and to try to mix his beliefs with those of our one true savior is not only desecration and blasphemy but also sends millions of people to hell because they never hear the true gospel of the mavrelous love christ showed and how we sinners (every person on earth) are forgiven, not for anything we did, but cause God loves us. but back to the present, china now has alot of power as most our cheap junk stuff that we buy at walmart comes from there, i think over 80 or 90 percent even. which is ok and even great cuz i love walmart and i hate how people bash it but ill save that for another blog. while china makes these goods in their sweat shops they pay their workers crap and force abortions through population conrol measures, more reasons to hate the chinese government. however china is also the worlds largest producer of steal coal and some other resources which is good cuz that keeps the price of coal and such down. now if only they would use their gasoline a little more efficietnly we could get prices down under 2 dollars a gallon. hower with china's growth they have just as much right to the oil as america does and they pay the same crappy price we do. obviouisly i could go for china a while so ill try to keep my last point as concise as possible. china also has this crappy policy of fixing the value of their currency so that it changes with the dollar. this means that their goods that come to america are automatically cheaper than they should be making it impossible for american companies to compete on a level playing field. theirs some measure floating around that would hike up tarrif rates to china cuz of their currency which is fair. usually i hate tarrifs but if they wanna play hardball were game. also we need to do more on how they rip off our patents. many products in china, especially computers are just copies of products that american companies had to spend money producing and chinese companies just copy it make a small change and sell it for less. thats illeagle but think it might be policially incorrect to enforce the law these days, just look at our immigration problem. finally as a solution we need to send more missionaries and also news reporters to china to first preach the gospel, and also show the world how horrible the government treats its people. hopefully the olympics of 2008 at beijing will bring the message out because of all the reporters in china for the games. and to battle them economically, american companies need to shape up and run more efficiently, we need to change our tax code to stop punishing success, support taiwan's independence and punish china for being a trading wiener. and china could start paying its workers and discover a new concept called human rights which it seems to have missed or simply ignored because its people have no rights. finally pray for the people of china, especially the believers there, they face persecution thats hard to imagine here in america and need the blessings of God and comfort that only being a christian can give.
please pray for the people of china, my grade point average, katy jahns, unbelievers, muslims, our armed forces, my brother who was in korea for a little while, America, camp phillip, your family, everyone else, and anything i missed.
God's blessings,
jason schleef