One of my biggest hobbies(obsessions) is juggling. Anytime I see round objects lying around I instinctively pick them up and start to juggle. I love juggling so much that before coming to college I decided that I would create a juggling club when I got there. Unfortunately, after scouring the campus for people to juggle with, I was only able to find four or five students, hardly enough to constitute a club, and so my dream of having a club slowly dissipated.

At the end of my freshman year I learned that one of my best friends from high school would be coming to my university. But not only was he one of my best friends, but he was also my only friend who was legitimately interested in juggling. Back in high school we created a juggling club (one that quickly failed), however we juggled a lot with each other and it helped us to progress both of our skills. After I learned that he was coming, my hope for creating a juggling club was quickly revitalized.

In the last few days, we have juggled every chance we got. Today we decided to juggle in the most high-traffic area we could find. Our hopes were that other jugglers would see us and come inquire about why we were juggling, and whether or not a juggling club existed. Now I had done this before (last year), and not much happened, so it was difficult for me to act too optimistic, but within five minutes we had already found a few club candidates. The ploy worked better than we ever could have expected, and I now hold in my hand a list of 15 students whom all seemed extremely interested in starting a juggling club. There were students practiced in all disciplines (from unicycle, to juggling, to poi), students from all parts of the university (from freshmen to second year graduate students), and students with all different levels of experience (from just starting, to extremely seasoned jugglers). I don't know how long it has been since I've been this excited. It looks like my dream of creating a juggling club will finally become a reality.

On Friday I was at work taking my break at about 7:30. I was sitting with a couple co-workers at a picnic table, when this large red bird flies into the chain link fence next to us. I could only see it from behind, and I couldn't tell what it was, but it had wedged itself between the fence and the barbed-wire that sits on top of the fence. The bird was an unfamiliar red hue, and it's feathers were quite ruffled. As I studied it from afar, it turned its head and looked towards us. At that instance I could tell that something wasn't right. The bird had a short, very curved beak, so I knew instantly that it was a tropical bird. This might not have been unusual, were it not for the fact that I live in Maine. On this night it was quite cool, and this bird could not have been comfortable. We guessed that he flew into the fence because he was disoriented from the cold.

At this point I felt rather sad for this bird. We couldn't do anything for it because we had to go in from our break, and I was quite sure that it would (eventually) die out there in the cold. So, as we went inside I told someone who was working in a different department and had more free time on his hands about the situation. I knew the bird must be someones pet, and there would have to be some way of finding it's owner.

As the night went on I slowly forgot about the bird, being that I was quite consumed with my work. Just a few minutes before the end of the night, the guy who I had told about the bird came up to me and told me that they had located the owner of the bird, and that it was safe. Apparently someone had lost the bird and put out an ad in the paper about it. It was a breeding bird, and was probably worth quite a bit of money. Helping to initiate the rescue of this bird was my good-deed for the summer.

Forgive me webblog for I have wandered. It has been almost two weeks since my last publication...

Today I have yet another police story. As I've said before, I've never had many problems with the police before, however, I have many friends who are constantly harassed by police. For this reason, my respect for the "keepers of justice" is beginning to dwindle.

This story starts with me leaving work. It is 11:00pm, and I am ready to leave the hell-hole where I work and start my arduous 45 minute drive home. I get into my car, and drive about a mile down the road, when I see blue lights behind me. My heart sinks. I'm not watching my speedometer, and could very likely be speeding. I choke down my frustration, and quickly pull over. The officer, lets call him officer Big (because I don't know his real name, and he looks like he's been through the drive-through at dunkin donuts one too many times), walks up beside my car and points a flashlight in my face. I am effectively blinded, and officer Big asks me for my license, registration, and proof of insurance. This is my first time being pulled over, so I am not used to this routine. I quickly pull out my license, and then hand him the pile of papers I got when I bought my car (cause its dark and I don't really know what is what). He doesn't seem to enthused.

After looking my papers over, he asks me where I'm coming from. I tell him that I'm just leaving work. I want to tell him that it's none of his business, but I don't know how fast I was going, and I don't really want to piss off Officer Big be for I know how deep I'm in. He then asks me if I just got gas at the Irving down the street. I tell him no, and that I don't even know what gas-station he is talking about. I wasn't playing stupid, I actually don't know where there is an Irving along that road. He tells me that they called the police, and that they reported my license plate as a drive off. He then walks back to his car with my license and papers in his hands. I turn up my music (a Jack Johnson CD) and try to relax. In a couple of minutes Officer Big returns. He tells me that they reported a black car, not a maroon car (like mine), and so that I am free to go. He hands me my license and stuff back, and then waddles back to his car.

I don't exactly believe Officer Big's story, for a couple of reasons. For one, I highly doubt a gas-station gave my license plate number as a drive off, given that I have never been to that gas station, and the probability that they randomly mistook another plate number for my plate number is VERY low. Reason two is because if he knew the car that was driven was black, he could have easily seen that it wasn't me because I was in a very well-lighted area. Reason three is because I've heard of the antics of police. They like to pull over teenagers whenever they can. The story of a mistaken drive-off is a great excuse to pull over a teenager who is suspiciously driving around at 11:00pm at night. This gives the police time to check to see if I'm on drugs, or wearing a seatbelt, or doing one of numerous other illegal activities which teenagers often do. This may seem random for me to be saying this, but I believe whole-heartidly that teenagers are profiled by police. For example, I have a friend who was pulled over and taken out of the car at gun-point just for speeding a couple of weeks ago.

I can't wait to get back to college, where the only police I have to deal with are campus police