Choklit Blog #14: New song! Sort of...

A while back, way back when I first recorded "Which Way?", I wrote and recorded this song called "The Diet Black Cherry Vanilla Coke Song." It was basically horrible, as was everything I recorded back then, so I never put it on soundclick. Well I rerecorded it last night with a new verse and a new beat, and it's still not all that great, but oh well! You can listen to it and download it at: http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=634247&songID=6923952

KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP! --MC

Choklit Blog #13: Tech guys rock my socks off.

It's taken me a while to get around to finally writing this... day 2 of the Franklin Graham Festival was pure awesomeness! I didn't make day 3 tho, but I heard it wasn't that good anyway :P. 

When I first got there and got backstage, I sat outside the catering room with Joy again to take people's tickets. We started talking about how hot Manwell from Group 1 Crew is (they were there that night, and so were the Newsboys). We sat there for a while and talked about him. Then Joy was like "Violet! They're coming!" Joy had been taking everyone's tickets the whole time so far, so I decided it was my turn (since Manwell was coming and wanted him to hand me his ticket... yes, I realize that I have loser-ish tendencies :D). So I was like "I want the tickets Joy!" and she gave them to me so I could take Manwell's ticket. Then, they walked around the corner. Blanca said hi to us, and then they just walked in. They didn't even have tickets. It was insanely disappointing.

After that slight disappointment, we decided to go eat (in the same room where Manwell was, of course). I was sitting like 6 feet away from him while Joy was eating and I was... sitting. Then I ate a cookie. While I was eating the wonderfully delicious chocolate chip cookie, Blanca got up to get one and Manwell told her to get him one. She didn't though, so he kept asking her. It was quite entertaining. Then this other guy got up and went to get one, so Manwell told the other guy to get him one. Then he changed his mind and told him to only get him half of one. The guy brought back half a cookie and Manwell said, "This isn't chocolate chip! What, are you trying to poison me with this oatmeal?" So the guy went back to get him a different one while saying "But this was the only half of one that was up there!" At this point, I had a half-eaten chocolate chip cookie in my hand, and I almost jokingly offered it to him. It would have been awesome and then I could have talked to him, but of course, I didn't. But I should have. Of course, there are other things I should have done that night that I didn't do :'(.

A little later, the Newsboys got there and Joy and I immediately saw our next target for a hug and picture. We didn't know who he was because we didn't know who any of them were. She actually called her brother and had him look them up on wikipedia and tell her their names so we wouldn't seem clueless when we met them! All we knew about the guy was that he was tall, blond, and hot. Who better to take a picture with?

We did some more random stuff for a while, we got to go inside and go on the floor for the Newsboys' concert, we walked around... just stuff. Oh, and we met Peter Furler (lead singer of the Newsboys). When Group 1 Crew was on stage, we just kind of walked around and what not. Then we saw our target, who we were calling "blond guy". Yeah... nothing really eventful.

I don't remember when this happened, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't during a concert. Joy and I were sitting outside the catering room again just because there were chairs there. Her mom was standing there talking to us and telling us we needed to ask people for pictures, because we had let so many people just walk past us. While we were talking, Joy suddenly pointed out that "blond guy" was walking towards us. He walked past us and looked in the room, then turned around to walk away, when Mrs. Brenda stopped him and said "These two girls would like to meet you." I almost died, but now I'm glad I didn't cuz that was the only time we ever got to talk to him or anything. So he shook my hand and said his name was Ben and asked what my name was, so obviously I told him my name, then he did the same thing to Joy. He asked if we liked the show and we said we did. And then he left. We never got to talk to him again, which is tragic. Insanely tragic.

So anyway, after all the concerts were over and everything was done, we took a picture with Peter and waited for Group 1 Crew to come back. Pablo was already in the room, but we didn't really care cuz we wanted to meet Manwell and tell Blanca we loved her shoes. We waited and waited, and finally Manwell came back. Someone told him we had been waiting for him, so he came over to say hi, and I told him, "We just want a hug" and he was like "Okay!" and gave me a hug. Then he hugged Joy and we took a pic with him. Of course, I had to get him sign my shoe (the still unsigned one). He gives insanely awesome hugs.

While we waited for Blanca (and Ben... we were waiting for him to come back too), we decided to go hug Adam, the guitarist that no one knows. He signed my shoe too. We had already met him earlier, first when he was going in to the catering room and he had already turned in his ticket, so he had to make sure I believed him when he said he was already there. Then we saw him in the hall again and I just said, "Hey can we take a picture with you? You're cool." So we did. He gives pretty sweet hugs too. And I found him on myspace. I don't have an account tho, so Joy added him and sent him a message. Creepy...

After Adam, Blanca came back and we took a pic with her. I asked her if I could steal her awesome shoes, and she said I couldn't, so I told her she had already stolen my belt (we were wearing the same one :o). We talked for a minute, then she signed my shoe, and went back into the room with Manwell and Pablo. Someone told us Pablo was in the room and we could take a pic with him if we wanted, but we just said we didn't care. We didn't. We were too busy waiting for Ben to come back.

We waited a while longer for Ben, and we sang "New Design" by Thousand Foot Krutch while we did. We had been walking around singing it all weekend actually. Manwell came out and talked to someone... Adam I think... and he was standing right next to Joy. It was pretty awesome. Anyway, we waited for Ben while we talked about how hot he was (even though could have walked up behind us at any point). My parents called me and said it was time to leave, so I had to. I walked out to the parking lot, and when I got to the car (about 5 minutes after I left backstage), I called Joy and she said she had seen Ben, but she didn't talk to him or anything. It turns out she saw him like 3 times after I left, but she wouldn't just say "Hey can I take a picture with you?" (she probably wouldn't even say that to me! :D) We both knew that I would have done that if I had still been there, but I wasn't. And now I'll probably spend the rest of my life wishing I had asked for a picture earlier or stayed 5 more minutes. Or maybe I'll just do that the rest of this week... we actually decided to get our youth pastor to book them just so we can take a picture with and hug Ben! Yeah... for real...

When Joy got a chance to get on her computer, she somehow found one of their blogs where they talked about him and found out that his last name is Walton. I tried to find out something but I found nothing. Then she found that in like 5 minutes! :P Anyway... we found 2 pics of him and we think we found him on myspace. Yes, we're crazy, thank you for noticing.

Oh, and by the way, Ben is the Newsboys' tech guy. Hence the title of this blog. He has the most awesome accent ever.

OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT HAPPENED... THE LAST FEW DAYS: I got a 95 on my english paper! Yay! / A random guy at school talked to me when he was supposed to be in class... it was weird... / I wore by backstage pass to school on Monday / Jimmy got 100 on a test! YAY Jimmy! (Ok that doesn't really have anything to do with me, does it? :P) / KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP --MC

Choklit Blog #12: Toby gives awesome hugs!

I know I JUST posted a new blog like two days ago, but I'll probably post another tonight or tomorrow morning/afternoon, and another one either Sunday night or Monday, because I'll be working backstage at the Franklin Graham Festival tonight and Sunday night meeting cool bands and what not. And I did last night too, which is why I'm writing this. I can't believe my brother ever talked me into not liking tobyMac, but oh well... at least I'm smart now :D

Before I start with the wonderful story of meeting Toby, there are a few names I'll be using a lot, and I probably won't stop to explain who they are:

Joy - My friend who I was backstage with

Mrs. Brenda - Joy's mom

Brent - My brother

Mike - My other brother

When I first got backstage, nothing all that eventful happened, except we had to take a steamer to some guy who apparently was with Toby. And I drank Mountain Dew. Oh yeah, and a bunch of people from Toby's crew came and ate and we saw them. But that wasn't really that big of a deal, because I wasn't even completely sure at first if that was who they were or not. But yeah.

After waiting a while and missing him twice, we finally had our first encounter with Toby. It was one of the strangest but most awesome moments of my entire life. I was just walking down the hall backstage with Joy and Mrs. Brenda, when all of a sudden, I noticed this short guy walking down the hall a few yards or so in front of me with hair that looked like tobyMac's. I was kind of in shock and I was pointing at him like "Is that... is... is that Toby?" But before I could even say that, Mrs. Brenda was like "Go catch him before he goes on stage!" because that's where he was going. I was sort of trying not to catch up with him, because I really thought it couldn't possibly be him since he was so short. But then I saw him walk through this door to the stage and it really was him. We waited just outside the door for a minute to see if he would come back, but we thought it was time for his show, so we turned around to walk off. As I was walking down the hall, I turned around and suddenly realized that tobyMac was walking down the hall behind me! I was trying to figure out what to do, because it's not every day that I turn around and see tobyMac walking behind me. It was insanely crazy.... Well then I decided to stop, so I was like "Joy... Joy stop walking" but she still had no clue what was going on. Then we both turned around and just like... didn't know what to say, and Mrs. Brenda kept whispering "Say hi to him" and all we could really say was "Hey." So he said hey back, and we were still speechless, and we were just standing there, so he walked over and shook my hand. Then I had something to say, of course, so I asked him for a hug. He gave us both hugs and then went in his room. But that's just the beginning of the story :D.

We still needed a picture with Toby, so we went and watched his show (and sang along with every song, killed our voices screaming, and got Brent down on the floor), then ran backstage to catch him before he ran off to his room and we never saw him again. I mean, the world could have come to an end at any moment. So we got back there and he was just coming off stage. We went and stood over by his room and when he walked past and I said "Hey Toby, can we get a picture?" and he was like "Yeah, just one minute," and went in his room to wipe off his sweat and change his hat. We sang TFK songs while we waited for him (like we had been doing all night), and then he came back out and had to go back onstage during the sermon (they have all the bands sit up there for some reason). Well as he was walking past, I thought he had forgotten and was gonna just walk past, so I was just like, "Uh... hey..." and he stopped and said, "Oh you wanted a picture?" We got some random guy to take a picture for us, and then I asked him, "Are you gonna be signing autographs or something afterward? Cuz my brother wanted to meet you, but he couldn't get backstage." From the look on his face, I was guessing he wasn't, but then he said, "Well, you know what, just bring him back here." Then he left to go back on stage, and Joy and I went to find a security guard who would actually let us bring him back there.

(Yes, I realize this is insanely long, but I can't leave out unimportant details!)

So after searching long and hard, the guy we were looking for was nowhere to be found. So we asked a different security guard. He said since the event was over for the night (which it was at this point), he wouldn't mind as long as it was ok with Toby, but he said he didn't have the authority to let us do that. So we waited a while longer for the other guy to come back, and he did eventually come back while Toby was still there. We asked him if it was ok to bring Brent back there to meet Toby, and he sent some guy with us to go get him so he wouldn't get kicked out or anything. So we went and got him and took him back where Toby was, and the first thing Brent said to him was, "You're not as tall as I expected." It was pretty funny and Toby didn't seem to mind, so he signed Joy's CD cover, my shoe, and... I don't think Brent had anything to get signed. So we took another pic with him. We were about to leave, when I remembered that I was disappointed. I have some kind of aversion to hugging people in bands with only one arm, like I had done when I hugged Toby earlier. Since he was standing right there anyway, I just asked him, "Can I have another hug?" and of course, he said, "Yeah" and hugged me. So all was well.

We also met Israel Houghton (I think I spelled his last name right) and this guy who sings, and took pics with them. We didn't get to meet Franklin Graham tho :(. But maybe we will tonight... or maybe they have him locked up in a big metal box in the back like we thought they had done to Toby at first... yeah don't ask.

OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT HAPPENED LAST NIGHT: The random guy who sings was wearing this jacket made of like velvet or something... I just thought that was interesting :P / I drank Mountain Dew / I ate chocolate!!! / I got about a million text messages trying to communicate with Brent somehow during the insanely loud event / I walked past so many "Staff Only" signs... insanely fun... / KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP! --MC

Choklit Blog #11: Surviving my first test, selling cookie dough, and bringin' "groovy" back!

Hey people... if anyone may suddenly decide to read my blog (that would be shocking). I haven't had time to post a new blog lately, because I've been insanely tired or busy with... yes..... college :(. 

English hasn't been all that bad... until a few days ago. I have to write a short story analysis on "The Fall River Axe Murders" by Angela Carter, one of the dumbest stories I've ever read and probably the most disappointing one. I had guessed that it would be an ok story judging by the non-boring sounding title. I was wrong. It's about Lizzie Borden like a week before she killed her parents. It doesn't even get up to the part where she kills them or anything that happens after that. It stops the morning of the murders. My thesis was about the fact that if she hadn't been so spoiled, she wouldn't have killed them, but I can't write 1000 words about it! I have 600 something right now, and I have NOTHING else to say! Oh well... the teacher doesn't seem to be taking this paper too insanely seriously...

Math is... blahish... still. I had my first test on Friday, and I thought it was pretty much easy. I made a lot of stupid little mistakes tho, and ended up getting an 81. But I guess that's good compared to the two quizzes I've gotten 0s on this year. And the other one I got a 78 on. For some reason, I don't see myself getting an A in this class. Hm... I wonder why... and now that the test is over, I'm back to having tons and tons of homework. Anti-business.

And because being insanely busy with college while feeling sleep-deprived wasn't bad enough, I have to sell cookie dough for the National Honor Society! I sold like 8 tubs already, so I hope everyone else has too, or else we'll have to return all this money because we can't sell 56 tubs... or however many it was. I can't even remember anymore how many we have to sell! But it's 50 something. It's not fun to sell, but I'm sure it'll be insanely tasty once it finally gets here :D

Ooh ooh! One more thing! In two days, I get to work backstage with tobyMac at a Franklin Graham Festival! YAY! Ok that's it this time...

No wait! No it's not! If you exist, join this Facebook group: I'm Bringin' Groovy Back! My brother Mike started this group to bring back the word "groovy", just cuz. It's the business, so go join, and help us out! And while I'm talking about Facebook groups... if you're female, you NEED to join this group too: Jimmy Fangirls Jimmy is way more the business than Alex Evans anyway!

OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK: A random guy at school asked me if he could use my phone... kinda creepy / Insanely creepy bugs are suddenly all over around my house (outside, thank goodness) / We still haven't gotten the part to fix our microwave after like a month and a half... and it was supposed to be coming like two weeks ago / Brent finally joined Yeega! / I witnessed the most horrible moment in all of facebook history for most facebook users... it switched to the new facebook! :O And I saw it happen! / Mike had a birthday... two days ago / I ate some tasty cheesecake / KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP! --MC

Choklit Blog #10: Eating is good, starving is bad, and almost passing out is not fun

Blah.

I feel insanely smart today!!!!! (That was sarcastic in case you didn't notice). I just started taking karate lessons again like a week ago, and today was my second class. I ended up having to sit out for almost the whole class though...

I woke up this morning knowing I had a lot to do today, but I still had tons of math homework to do before tomorrow, so I started it as soon as I could and ended up doing 2 problems in one hour. After that painful hour, I went to my karate class, which started off with some painful exercises. After the painful exercises, I started to feel a little nauseous, but I figured I would feel better in a few seconds. In a few seconds, I felt even worse. Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, I got insanely dizzy and my vision started messing up. Just as I was on the verge of falling over, I asked the teacher if I could sit down since I felt like I was about to pass out. I sat there for the rest of the class with a wet paper towel on the back of my neck feeling like a was about to die, when I suddenly remembered I hadn't eaten all day. I was too busy doing insane amounts of math homework to remember to eat. So yeah... don't try it! I came home and ate and pretty much felt better, but I still feel just a little nauseous :(

AAAAAAAAAND... in case you haven't noticed, or if you're reading this blog somewhere besides http://crunkpunk.blogspot.com, I've added some nifty new features to the Choklit Blog! :D It now plays awesome music by Thousand Foot Krutch, Hawk Nelson, Relient K, Family Force 5, Manafest, FM Static, Anberlin, Philmont, The Afters... I think that may be all of them. But anyway, there's also a poll, which is insanely the business! And you better vote! And there's this cool little thingy that makes it even easier than it already was to subscribe to the blog! I think it does... I haven't tried to subscribe to my blog, so I wouldn't know. But anyway whatever.

 OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK: I watched more Arthur!!!!! :D / I decided that "insanely" is my new favorite word (in case you couldn't tell by how many times I said it in this blog... wait... that happened last week) / I also decided that I like the word "nifty" because it's quite nifty... actually I think Jimmy decided that... but I agreed! / I made a new facebook quiz / I got my bro AND my friend prom dates... each other! / I downloaded "Sadie Hawkins Dance" by Relient k / KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP --MC

Choklit Blog #9: Being insanely happy is the business!

*sings*

I love being insanely happy. Why am I insanely happy? Well... there are a few different reasons...

I finally got a haircut! I've been wanting to cut my hair for the  last few weeks but... I just never got around to it I guess :P. But yesterday I finally went and got it cut, and now I can breathe again! And when I came home, I took a bunch of pictures, and some of them were really emo-looking! I'm not sure if that's good or bad, but oh well! I'm not sure if I've ever cut my hair this short before... well, except once when I was like 10, but that was an accident (my mom's accident... she was cutting it). I just got really sick of it being so long, which would make sense, since I have insanely thick hair, it's really hot here, and I have an abnormally high body temperature anyway.

I studied for my math test! Yes, that's right, I actually took time to study for a test! And it wasn't that bad! Now I just have to hope all that time spent studying pays off and I get at least an F+ on the test. Wait... I don't think those exist... I guess I'll just have to do good enough to get a D!

And finally... the most important reason why I've been insanely happy lately. I woke up on Wednesday morning to go to school. I had just had a 4-day weekend, so obviously I wouldn't want to go to school, and I was sick. Not fun. For some strange reason, I decided to check my email before school, which I don't usually do until I get home. I had like 7 emails, mostly notifications of messages on message boards and what not. But there was one that was a notification on Facebook. Before I even read the email, I already knew what it was, because the subject clearly said "Trevor McNevan sent you a message on Facebook." For those of you who don't know (which would be those of you who don't talk to me), Trevor McNevan is my hero, and I'm his biggest fan (even though you probably don't believe me, but I really am!) Well my awesome friend Jimmy, who is the business, got him to send me a message :D. It was so awesome that I took a screenshot of it, just like I did with my conversation with Manafest!!!!! Why yes, I am crazy.

OTHER RANDOM THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK: I read a stupid story for my english class / I found out that soon, the new facebook will take over the world, and there will no longer be a normal facebook :( / My doggy got sick AND got well / I also got sick and am still slightly congested / I watched Arthur / KEEP ROCKIN AND NEVER STOP --MC