I got Boyz in the Hood again!!!!!!

I would have to say that all of you are very lucky, because I almost never post this close together.  But with what just transpired with me yesterday I fee that it is my duty to let everyone know about it.  

Now for as long as I can really remember in my life I've been my dad's bitch.  And I say that as pretty much a totally good thing.  And for the past lets say 10 years or so it has been a running joke between me and my friends that my relationship with my father closely resembles that of Laurence Fishburne and Cuba Gooding Jr. from Boyz in the Hood.  

Now this legend was created a long time about when I was in high school.  There were often times when my friends were going to the lake or going to hang out somewhere and it would be a Saturday or during the summer and a lot of times I would get shot down by my dad.  He would say things like, "You ain't going to the mall til you rake them leaves." or "You got some mowing and edging to do before you go to the lake."  So a lot of my time was spent pissed off not hanging out with my friends but doing projects around the house with my dad.

Now the legend was cemented when I was at OU living with my roommate one mister Cooper Hagedorn(The Machine himself). So my dad comes down I guess when I first really moved in and was getting settled in and he took me to buy a few groceries and the legend has it that when we got back and were unloading everything Cooper and Cory were hanging out and Cooper made a bit of a joke thanking my dad for all the food he got for him to eat, or something along those lines, and my dad just looked up at them both and gave them a single HA. I wasn't there at the time, but it doesn't surprise me, and so it really became a joke with all of them that I was in fact my dad's bitch.

Now fast forward to now, where I am 28 years old with my very own life but of course it's never too late for my dad to Boyz in the Hood me.  Yesterday I was suppose to get into a little bit of an afternoon drinking session with a good friend of mine, one Cody Jack Merrell, when my dad called and told me to come over because he needed help with a falling beam at his house. It was only suppose to be an hour job, but like so many times before which I guess I had forgotten, no job is just and hour job when you're with Chris Ponder.  

The first two hours of the job were spent driving back and forth to the store getting things that he had forgotten or new supplies that he needed, because we had made things worse than they were when we started.  Like I posted yesterday "Classic Chris making things worse before they get better." 

So of course the afternoon drinking with my friend is pretty much going right out the window not to mention this is the last free day of my vacation and I'm spending it doing manual labor. I'm so pissed, and I feel like a little high schooler again out mowing the lawn while my friends are at the lake.  

As the job moves into hour 4 my dad tells me that I can go ahead and go, but of course I say no, because for all the bitching that I'm doing he is still my dad, and for some reason I will never leave until the job gets done.(really a testament of how he raised me.)  And in hour 4 as we finally start to make progress and we are actually putting the beam back up I am reminded of the end of all those times that my dad forced me to do something with him instead of going out and hanging out with my friends.  And that feeling of accomplishment when you do something yourself and you finish a project and you can say to yourself, you know what I did that.  I mowed and raked up this yard and it looks good, or I painted the outside of this house and it looks great, or I changed the starter in my car and now it runs because of me.  

It just almost never fails when it comes to my dad, but some how he always when I least expect it Boyz in the Hood my ass, and it always seems to work out for the better.  It's ridiculous but in some sick and twisted way I have come to enjoy these things. I love my dad, and I love that fact that I have one more Boyz in the Hood story to tell all of my friends.

If you haven't seen it, well you should!!!!!

The GUTTY Life of Brandon Ponder

I'd like to start this whole thing off by saying you are welcome to anyone who reads this whole bit.  I should probably also say that I'm sorry because when I get going I seem to be a little long winded. but that's just me so deal with it.  

This whole ordeal started around the time of the Super Bowl, which I don't want to get too much into for personal reasons, and anybody who really knows me knows exactly what I'm talking about. But back to the reason I'm writing this in the first place. So during halftime everyone was given a little treat.  They all go to hear and interview from "The Bod".  I know you don't know who that is but long story short it was a persona I had for myself in my early 20's. A completely ridiculous character with a great bod(in actuality mediocre at best) and he went around slaying chicks with big tits as he would say. 

I should say that "The Bod" was not a sexist at all, in reality he celebrated women and their beauty, no matter how he sounded. He was a visionary if I do say so myself.  Well as you could imagine everyone enjoyed the interviews a great deal, and that really got me thinking, the world needs "The Bod". So I decided to go on a quest right then and there to reinvent "The Bod" and bring him back to glory.  

Some of you might be laughing right about now, but believe you me this is no joke. So basically for the past couple of weeks I have been getting back into a workout routine after a very long sabbatical.  And let me just say for the record it has been some kind of terrible. The pains the I had wished to forget all about, the dreadful feeling of morning weights, the running, goddamn the running. It's all back and what a joy that has been. 

Now this is a part of a whole overall plan, but that's not really important right now. What's important is me tell you all a little story about last night when I went to workout. So I go to the gym at about 930 last night to get my workout on, get my Bod on if you will.  Now let me just say for the record it was miserable, but that's okay, that's what it's suppose to be.  For those of you that are there just having fun with it Fuck You, because that's not what it is for me. It's just me kicking my own ass for an hour and a half and then afterwards wanting a piece of cake, but whatever. 

So I'm on the "shredmill" my own personal nickname for it and I'm running.  Running where might you ask, well I'm running no where because I'm on a damn treadmill.  Now about halfway into my 30 minute run I realize jus how much I hate running.  Well that's not true,a but 45 seconds into my 30 minute run I realized just how much I hate running. (and now a quick moment where I talk shit to all those out there that enjoy running.)  So I hate running so much, always have by the way, that I want to say to all those out there that actually like it, that actually enjoy running Fuck You.  No seriously all of you Eat Shit, because I think you are absolutely crazy.  And not in a good way, not in a I think that chick is crazy so she'll probably bang the shit out of you. I'm talking the weird guy that cuts out pictures of cars from magazines and glues them to construction paper and jerks off to them crazy.  

And then there are those ass hole that actually want to go out there and run a marathon, certifiable.  Even though legend has it that  Pheidippides after running the distance from Marathon to Athens(or the 26 miles) to announce victory over the Persians he dropped dead. So yeah of course that is defiantly something that I want to do right away.  But even more important that than I'll just listen to the words of one Kenny Powers. "I play real sports, I'm not try to be the best at exercise."

I really don't know why I went on that tangent I just really wanted everyone out there to know just how much I hate running.  So I run and I blast my ass with a pretty great workout if I do say so myself and after it's done I go over and do some hardcore abs.  Because over the past few years as I have been cultivating mass, "The Bod's" ab situation has gotten away from him.  So I'm really locking in a good ab workout and by the time I am done I am just spent, so I walk over get a drink, get my stuff and head out to my car.

At this point in the story let me stop for a second and say that it is about 11:00 at night and Oklahoma has had some pretty bad weather the last couple of days so it's freezing outside. So jump into my car and start her up only to get the beginning of what happened to be a 20 minute cramp session that had me on the cold ground at 11:00 at night flopping around trying to make it go away.  That's right ladies and sirs, I am so GUTTY right not that this ab workout that I just went through put my body in such shock that  couldn't even get I'm my car and drive home. And let me just say that it was freezing cold outside as I lay on the ground thinking about some of my most humiliating points in my life.

And every time I thought that it was all over I would get up, get back in my car and the cramp session would start all over again. I finally got in my car and laid the seat back all the way while I fought through the cramp and tried to figure out if I could drive home.  I thought maybe I could drive completely laided back to the backseat with a partial cramp going on.  

Finally the cramp went away and I was able to make it home.  So that's my long story of basically how GUTTY I am and how bring "The Bod" back I feel in the very near future is going to kill me. I hope you all enjoyed it, I'm sure there will be more to come. Night.

BE BOLD

There's always this really weird feeling I seem to get when I've not written anything in a while.  I mean I've been jotting down things here and there in my journal, but not really putting the pen to pad like I'm suppose to, like I planned to.  There's this great quote from a movie that I really like, I can't really think of the movie right now (that's just how much I really like it) But the quote really sums up the way I've been behaving lately.  One of the characters in the movie says that they should go talk to somebody or do whatever it is that they are going to do some other time or some other day.  And the other character just simply says "Someday, ain't never today." Or something to that nature and a lot of times when I'm procrastinating that is exactly what I think of.

Don't really know where I was going with that, but back to this. So this weekend was just a tragic weekend for me. My Niners get beat in the Super Bowl which just crushes me by the way, and you know I really couldn't even express just how much it crushed me, because I was with my friends and I didn't want to completely freak them out by completely freaking out, so you are all welcome.  And then you had the fact that one of my best friends is skipping town so I can't let the Super Bowl effect me that much because this was much more of a crushing blow, and man I happy as hell for him, because I feel that he is on the road to realizing a dream of his that we all joked about years ago.  I think he is on his way to taking the sea, I really do so I'm happy about that.  But all I can really think about is how much I'm going to miss my friend. But I will say this, I'm quite proud of myself because I didn't even cry, and anyone that knows me, knows I'm a bit of a crier. So I guess good for me.

Now during the Super Bowl there was an event that happened that really got me thinking. Cory read some interviews that me and him would do in class the first year we got to OU.  Back when I took on this persona of "The Bod" and the interviews were called "The Bod Chronicles". Now I wish I was making this up but I'm not, we really were characters. But sitting around hearing what 19 or 20 Brandon had to say for himself made me realize some things about myself. 1) I was kind of out of hand back then, but more importantly 2) I was so very bold. For any of you that are reading this that were actually there when it was being read aloud let me just say, I'm sorry and you're welcome. Of course a lot of the things that I said were very ridiculous and lets just say not very PC, but really and truly for those that really know me, know that's just me.  That is very much my brand of humor, I like to say uncomfortable things and see people squirm after I say them. and of course I go too far sometimes but really who doesn't.

The thing that really gets me about the whole thing though is that I just sit back and look at myself now I and think what happen to this bold guy you once were? What happened to the guy that loved his friends, loved his family, and didn't give a shit what people thought about him. That wasn't afraid to make a complete ass out of himself just to get a laugh from his friends.  I mean I'm still that guy, but now I am a little more afraid to go after that laugh. I think what I'm trying to say here is no more of that.  I think I got turned a little sideways about who I am. Kind of doubted myself. I think I fell in love and then decided that I need to put myself in this box that could fit into any situation, but that's not the guy I was meant to be, so that's not the guy I will be going forward. Going forward and going to write and do the things that I am passionate about, and I'm not going to give a shit what anybody thinks about it. Because here is the thing, I am a WRITER, it's just that simple, and I will be great and this world will be great because I am in it. "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better." -Samuel Beckett

Oh and I want to let everyone know that in honor of a special little lady that will be here very soon, I will be adding little exerts of a story that I'll be working on.  THE ADVENTURES OF DARREL, HARELD, and LITTLE CAROL MERRELL

I saw this movie, and I knew, I'd always be in love with writing.

I shouldn't have but I did

Now against my better judgement I did something that i knew I shouldn't have tonight.  I mean I just knew deep down in the pit of my stomach that I just shouldn't do it but I just for the life of me couldn't help myself. I'm like a child that wonders in to the middle of the conversation with no frame of reference(for all you nerds out there that now what I'm talking about, you're welcome). And because I did what I knew I shouldn't have done, I ended up just exactly where I thought I would end up.  Where is that you might ask?  Well in my bed crying like a baby of course.  Well maybe not like a baby, more like heroic man tears, if you get my drift.

SO I bet right about now you're wondering what could make a grown make cry such manly heroic tears, well the answer to that could be a number of things.  Like for instance, watching that jack ass who shall remain nameless in my book muff two punts and cost the 49ers a chance to make it back to the Super Bowl where they would have won their 6th championship, that's just one thing.  Watching the movie SUPER 8 and being reminded just what it felt like the be a kid and be filled will wonder and excitement.  These are just two examples I thought of right off the top of my head but that is not what caused me to cry tonight.  It was something very different.

Tonight..... I decided to even though I told myself not to I did it anyway and watched the second trailer for the movie MAN OF STEEL!!!! Oh no he didn't... Yes I most certainly did, and wow did it hit me right in the kisser.  And that folks is saying something.  I say that because I'm not the biggest Superman fan.  There are so many people that I know would love nothing more than to tear my head off for saying that but seriously I just don't have that Superman button in my that so many other people that I  know do. I always preferred the darkness of Batman more, or even the cockiness of Iron Man, or the straight badassness of Wolverine.  Superman just never quite registered with me like he did with all the rest of my classmates.

That is until right now.  Holy Balls, it looks to me like Zach Snyder is trying to make a believer out of me, in the same way that J. J. Abrams made a believer out of me with the new Star Trek.  I can still remember the first trailer for that movie there was a line in that trailer that just gave me chills and made me tear up after he first time I saw it, and I knew after that I was going to see Star Trek.  Christopher Pike: "Now, your father was captain of a Starship for 12 minutes.  He saved 800 lives including yours. I dare you to do better."  Oh my god I was hooked after that. and if I didn't just have a blast watching that movie.

And now comes this damn MAN OF STEEL trailer and damn if it didn't just hit me on every different level.  I just makes me realize how much I love movies. The imagination and wonder of it all.  Reading these comic books as a kid.  Feeling tall and awkward and goofy and completely out of place, but being able to completely lose yourself in your imagination and now seeing people put this stuff that I could only imagine on the big screen.  God it makes me fall in love all over again, time after time.  So please go watch the trailer, or watch this trailer I'm about to post and go see some movies this weekend for god sake, it'll make you feel good.  Trust me I know all about these things.

Thanks to Cusack

I must admit to you all right here and now that I am rather partial to John Cusack.  Now granted I'm not saying that everything he's done has been gold, i.e. Must Love Dogs, Pushing Tin, and god 2012.  But let me just say that some of the characters he's created I will remember forever.  He does that rare thing for me, and this is the problem with movies in this day and age I think.  He just makes a number of solid movies.

I feel like there use to be so many more solid movies that would come out.  Now it's like Blockbusters, Shit, More Shit, then it's Oscar Season movies.  Were did all the just solid that was a good movie go?  I'm either watching movies that are built for tweens, or I'm watching the latest in gore, freaky, crazy, did you see that ghost are all around us that's why is scary, or shit blowing up everywhere from start to finish, so much stuff in the frame my eyes can't keep up, or heavy handed performance pieces... Now granted I can watch the latter any day of the week, but seriously what ever happened to just going in and watching a good solid movie?

That's what a lot of Cusack is for me.  Just solid shit that I really dig.  And I was reminded of that from a quote from one of his greatest movies might I add(thank you Jamie) "Where are all the good men dead? In the heart or in the head?"-Grosse Pointe Blank   If you haven't seen it, child please, go out and watch it as soon as you can.  If you don't like it, well then you're and idiot and I can't help you. KIDDING.  

Then there is the weirdo he plays in Being John Malkovich, seriously you'll hardly recognize him, and it's such a sweet movie. There's High Fidelity which I know so many people have to love because it's solid. Then there is one of my personal favorites, The Sure Thing... I mean it's just totally 80's in the best possible way, and it's a road trip movie so clutch.  

And let us not forget about Lloyd Dobler.  I mean really the eternal optimist that just gets it done in the weirdest of ways. The guy that is more self assured at 18 than most people are there whole lives.  Good I love love Say Anything...  Yeah I know all about the cliche Peter Gabrielle song that everyone  has to know from the movie. But damn it cliches are that for a reason that song and that seen and that movie is just the tits, that's all there is to it.

"What I really want to do with my life - What I want to do for a living - Is I want to be with you daughter. I'm good at it." -Say Anything...

"Don't be a guy, be a man. The world is full of guys." -Say Anything...

Anyway, that's my thing for the night, I guess I'm gonna go polish off John Cusack and then maybe go to bed... Tell me what you think... Who is one of your favorite random actors that you don't think gets enough love?

Dirty Shoes

So this is kind of depressing.  Don't you just hate it when something you are reading starts off that way.  I suggest you all stop reading right now... No kidding keep reading I need you to, other wise I'm just a hack writing to myself, which I guess wouldn't be so bad because I kind of like myself at the moment.

This weird thing has been happening to me the last few days. I go to my room, get my computer out start to write but then I don't and I just kind of lay down and as I do I turn my head and what do I see... Well I see a pair of shoes I bought about a year ago. Wow, a year ago. It's already a year ago, where does the time go???? So I see these shoes and I just become fixated on them, it's really quite weird.  I mean the last two days I've laid here and stared at them for at least five minutes.  Now granted five minutes is a glint of dust if we think about the history of time and space, but five minutes looking at a pair of shoes.  That's a fucking(pardon my French) eternity. 

They are a year old, and they are still perfectly fine.  They are a good pair of shoes. But they are dirty and dusty and no where near brand new. But they're shoes I guess they aren't meant to be spotless, and after all I do stick my stinky feet into them so what can I expect.  I mean I know they are dusty because I've worn them out to the tailgate and kicked up a little dust and had a good time in them. And they are still as comfortable as the day I bought them with no problems, but they aren't necessarily the kicks you wear out on your first date with somebody.

And I'll be damned if this thought doesn't just keep creaking up in my head. "Am I these shoes?? Are these shoes me?? I can't be these shoes can I?? I am more than a dusty old pair of good time shoes aren't I???" I know how this sounds crazy right? After all I am a live real boy.

But sometimes you just don't know.  You start to think to yourself, I am those shoes.  Sure I'm nice and comfortable and perfectly adequate, but also I am dusty and worn out and I'm there for a good time if you need one, but I'm not your first choice.  I'm not your go to shoe in the clutch. I am the dusty old shoes in the corner.

Obviously that is completely melodramatic but please don't tell me I'm the only one that feels like this from time to time. When I was younger I had a person, well full disclosure a person of interest send me, "Should I smile because we are friends, or cry because that's all we'll ever be?" Ouch, talk about a loaded gun.  I think that was the very moment that I feel in love with bittersweet and tragic endings.  People think I'm crazy for that but there just seems to be so much of it out there and I just get it.  I just get how something can leave such a profound and optimistic look on how you feel while crushing you all at the same time. 

I can tell you this, I must make a damn good friend, because people always seem to want to make sure nothing happens with that.  Oh god now it really sounds melodramatic. This isn't a whoa is me, this is just a guy talking about some shit he's been thinking about. There's this seen in a short, Hotel Chevalier, where Natalie Portman asks if they can still be friends.  And he says to her, "I promise I will never be your friend."  One of the most penetrating and baller lines I've ever seen delivered in a movie. And then after he banged her, and there is a side shot of Natalie Portman naked with "Where do you go to my lovely." by Peter Sarstedt playing(one of my favorite songs because of this by the way)

I don't know why I've decided to write all this but if felt kind of good tonight. If you read this and think this guy is a poor sad sack, don't, because I'm not.  This is all something I just felt needed to be said.  I mean the past two weeks I've had three of the best conversations I've had all year. By and man named Don, a man named Mike, and a man named Cooper.  One urging me to never give up the good fight no matter how down and out you are. One telling me to do it, follow my dreams to where ever they may take me, and one telling me , "Yes Brandon, you are a writer."

So you all tell me, does I guy that has friends like that really have a right to be a sad sack.  I certainly don't think so, and hey maybe I am a dirty pair of shoes. I'm sure there are those out there that might like the mess.

disregard this box

Check this one out

Becoming a THE

Tonight I think I'll start off and end with talking about something near and dear to my heart, and that's people.  More importantly it is the people that I am close to.  Over the past month I got the chance to spend time with some of my favorite people in the history of the world, and over this time period there has been something that has just been sort of building in me, and I knew I was going to write about it in some way or another, and tonight I just figured I would write so that all you might know exactly how I feel.

There has been this thing sort of building in me lately.  It's something that maybe a lot of people go through at one point or another in their lives or maybe I'm the only crazy person that has this kind of stuff happening to him, my therapist says it's something about child abandonment issues. Just kidding I don't go to a therapist, I mean I don't need somebody else to tell me I'm crazy. But anyway I digress, so I've been having this "what does it all mean?" "where is my place in this world?" kind of moments lately and just this overall feeling of what am I doing.  And over the past month spending time with my favorite people has lead me to realize something about myself.

I'm an IS, and at some point, and I'm not saying today or tomorrow, but someday I know that I want to be a part of a THE.  I know that sentence is really confusing so let me explain this to you and you all be the judge and tell me what you think. 

When I go out or I'm at a party or I'm just meeting people for the first time somebody will normally introduce me by saying, "hey, this IS Brandon, or this IS Ponder." Which is cool perfectly understandable because I am and IS.  But what I'm telling all of you tonight is that I can't wait until the point the I'm a part of a THE. As in "hey, let me introduce you to THE Ponders." Because in the past month or so I've seen first hand just how special it is to be a part of a THE.

I know this sounds really weird, believe me I know what the things that come out of my head sound like, but on this one I'm so serious.  And you need to know not everyone can be a THE.  Just because you're in a relationship or you're a part of a family unit it doesn't mean that you are automatically a THE. 

I know it all sounds crazy but you just don't know about this stuff first hand like I do.  But if you did you would know exactly what I'm talking about.  If you had a chance to spend a Saturday with THE Nievars watching college football and yelling at the tv trying to will Pittsburg to beat Notre Dame you would. Or if you were lucky enough to spend a two and a half hour meal with THE Hagedorns listening to them going back and forth trying to keep up and get some of the worst service ever you'd know. Or spend an evening with THE hoopers eating homemade tacos talking about books and movies and cutting a new demo in the studio you would. Or is you had the chance to have a few too many beers and crash at THE Merrells and get the chance to see them lovingly go back and forth with each other you would know just what I'm talking about.

And I just want to thank these people because they seem to without even knowing they did teach me a very valuable lesson. Because as awesome as my life is now, and believe me it is and even though I do complain I'm thankful for every breath I get to take.  I have to admit to myself that I am looking forward to the time when I can become a part of a THE.  Just an entirely random thought I know, but I figured what the hell, why not share it with all of you.