First off, I agree with Stuart. Tourists suck, and I say that despite my family member's income deriving from those money spending morons. I pulled up behind three cars at a stop sign perpendicular to a one-way street in DownTown (as shown on the signs)Grand Haven. Two of the three cars in front of me turned the wrong way down the one-way! One may think, after watching another person make a mistake, they wouldn't even try. However, I realized the stupidity level is quite high among Georgian imports (no offense). My second complaint is to the fine people at Pincrest Bar and Bowling Alley in Fruitport, Michigan (population 1,200). Not only do they have a bar, but six lanes for bowling. This place hasn't been rebuilt, or even cleaned, since 1950. It also has the highest per capita mullet population in the world. Sure there are other places to bowl, but they lack the nostalgia and "colorful" people. I wish I could bowl, or the more hip term, "roll" as often as Nick.

|Brought to you with love by Jeff - Pissed off and wants to bowl |

Although it seems to exponentially decay in "funness" annually, the carnival is the other decent event offered by the festival. Today, I plan to flush out of my wallet excess funds received through actual work by trying my luck at the games and rides at the carnival. My cousin's in town from New Jersey, so it'll give me a chance to take him to our local fair, which seems like a good thing to do. Also, I hope to get my hands on some of the sweet goodness of Elephant Ears and Funnel Cakes. Nick, I'm sure they had these at The Taste?

|Brought to you with love by Stuart - Awake far too early for a bebé |

What do I mean by "By birth I am drop hammer"? You'll just have to wait and see.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Up Late |

WHOA, SIMBA! All because I'm older in age doesn't mean I'm necessarily more mature, or even around longer: I'm one of the youngest members and, quite probably, the most immature of any of you.

With that in mind, may I now present this OFFICIAL NICKD BOWLING SCORES UPDATE(TRADEMARK):
The first game, I had a great first half (X X 8/ 45 54), and then it went a little downhill after, with only one strike and a spare to keep track of. Final score: 135.
The second game sucked.
I got a 108. Why does my bowling game always go down in quality during the second game? By all logic, my skills would improve as I got into the "groove" of things. There can be many explanations for this: for example, the thick haze of cigarette smoke combined with the grease of fat people combined with the grease of the alley lanes could make me nauseous, forcing me to stumble as I go to throw the ball; or I could just suck ass; or I could just be overconfident.

*sigh* Anyone in the Chicago area want to go bowling? :)
Oh, and furthermore - what is with all these people making posts today? Wow! I go away for a single day to an emergency Cubs game outing, and I come back, and I see this copious number of FUN! posts! I need to catch up!

|Brought to you with love by Nick - part of some sick cult or *something* |

Go Team FUN! I'm working on some new ideas to make Team FUN! a happy FUN! land of happiness... To be continued...

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Your Mother |

Hello to the cast and crew of Fun! I have completed my hazing assignment, and if you have read it, I apologize for the glaring historical inaccuracy. There is no excuse for such a blunder. All of my field research on the Root Beer Float could not prevent it. However, the assignment was one of the most interesting pieces of writing I have accomplished, and I thank the board members Team FUN! for letting me become among the crew. Thanks again, and I also apologize for the boring factor (incidentally an 8) of this message. They will be more interesting in the future, and more grammatically correct.

|Brought to you with love by Jeff - Having a love/ hate relationship with Root Beer Floats |

Here at team FUN! we're a family. I was going to say, "One big happy family!", but I think we all know that phrase is a load of ass. As with any family, or any pack of estranged house cats, everybody has a very specific role that they must play in order for us to operate.

Judah: The Mom. Everybody tells you that your Mom really loves you; somewhere deep inside those hefty bosoms beats a heart of gold. All you know is that she keeps bitching at you to take all that garbage out of your car, start writing essays for college scholarships, or use the King's English whenever writing anything for silly Internet teams.

Adam: The Dad. He's always amiable, and up for a quick game of catch in the back yard. There's never a beef with him if you leave your dishes in the living room, or have a few incomplete sentences in your hazing assignment. The only problem is all the weeks that he's out boozing with the wanton harlots of the night...ahem, that translates to: "On vacation in Idaho".

Nick: The Eldest Brother. He's in and out the back door late at night, you know that he's living in the house; although you only catch glimpses of him, and a few posts. Actually, he's just older than the other kids.. that's about it, really.

Matt: The Middle Son. Doomed to placement that sentences him to sing karaoke to: "Stuck in the Middle with You," at all the family reunions. He makes the best of it all, despite his attempts to mask his alcoholism.

Peter: The Youngest "real" person. Following in the footsteps of any true younger brother, Peter enjoys complaining about things that nobody really cares about, and he likes toilet humor. [Okay, maybe not; but he did say "toilet" in one of his posts, and complained that his computer was/is broken.]

Stuart: El bebé. He was born yesterday, so he doesn't count much. [yet]

Alex, Jeff, & Meg: We're all buns in the oven, thus far.

|Brought to you with love by meg : traveling though the filopian tube. |

I admit curiosity as to which of the members who have not yet posted, Meg, Alex, or Jeff, will make the first appearance.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Administrative Dynamo |

Again, welcome Jeff.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Lone Administrator of the Apocalypse |

Hey everybody, as Judah so graciously pointed out, I'm the newest member of Team FUN! (unless somebody newer posts above this one and then someone reads this and takes me for a fool- but for the time being, I'm it.) My obligatory task before attaining posting rights to FUN! was to write fifty original, non-rhyming Haiku poems pertaining to the subject of gravel. It seemed daunting at first, but after a while, the ideas began to flow like Visine. It really is surprising, the amount of inspiration that comes from The Best Kept Secret of Rural Life(c). Still, it took a hell of a lot of time. I'd like to thank the current members of Team FUN! for the opportunity to be here, and I look forward to posting something a bit more interesting in the near future.

|Brought to you with love by Stuart - with a newfound love for gravel and haiku |

My bazillions of apologies go out to the folks who have sorely missed my updates in past days, as I have been undergoing what could be easily described as THE MOST UNHAPPY SURGICAL PROCEDURE KNOWN TO MAN! Essentially, large sections of bone were cut away from my nose, among other equally horrific exploitations in my nasal region which we shall not be going into full detail here. In short, this allows me to use Levine's previously-used cop-out of my certainly not having any "fun" in the slightest over the past week and two days.

At any rate, I happen to be back now, after Judah's unceremonious prodding. This is no matter, though, as I was planning on posting a log entry sometime tonight or tomorrow; this works too. So, um, HI! I posted it on my web site already, but I strongly implore - nay, recommend - that you promptly click on this link. Man, if I got that kind of deal after beating Doom, I'd be damned pissed (no pun intended).

I've been talking to Peter, also, and his computer is still Really Really Really Really Broken And Bad(TM). It should be back around Wednesday, which is to say it'll be back around when he realizes that his computer officially "suxbad" and that he'll purchase a new one. This could very well mean Wednesday, April 25, 4139 for all I know (or care)! At any rate, stop by his web site to rack up his hit counter in a show of, um, appreciation and support. Yeah.

|Brought to you with love by Nick - constant searing pain is antithetical to fun |

So, welcome aboard, Stuart and Meg, and bad on the rest of you for being lazy.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Who just updated GPN anyway [hint hint] |

My parents leaving the house is a very rare occasion, especially when it's for more than an hour or two. What makes this weekend extraordinarily rare is that my parents have left for the whole time! They took off to Eagle Crest with their friends yesterday afternoon and will return tomorrow afternoon. Sadly, at my 17 years of age, this is probably the longest time I've ever been left home alone. It's very nice, but I can definitely see the cleanliness of the house decreasing and the unhealthiness of my diet increasing rapidly without parents around.

Anyhow, my sister and I have been free to be as loud as we want whenever we feel like it and have a bunch of friends over. It's quite a cool feeling to be able to have this much freedom. The highlight so far definitely had to be last night when I played foosball at 2:30 AM with Joe. With parents home sleeping right above where we have our foosball table, this would not have been possible in the least. All in all, having your parents leave for the weekend is a blast! Urge them to take a vacation from their hard work and parenting...it'll be fun!

|Brought to you with love by Matt - Home free |

In an effort to keep with the theme of our little group, I have avoided posting things for the past few weeks because of the following conditions:

1. My computer has been/is still broken.
2. I haven't had any fun.

Condition 1, in combination with several other things that I will neglect to mention here, has generally been seen to lead directly to Condition 2. However, with the arrival of my new toy (if you read my website religiously, as you should, you would already know of this toy) I have been able to do something I had long since placed in the back of my mind, never to be reconsidered again because the mere probability of it happening was so infinitesimal I had a better chance of scratching off the winning lottery ticket in my home state (where there is no lottery) at the exact instant a meteorite, deflected from its path by a stray lightning bolt, hit NASA's Mission Control and knocked out all of its power, causing the space shuttle to crash directly onto my roof, destroying my room and everything in it, but not disturbing even slightly the rest of the house.

I was on IRC while sitting on the toilet.

I cannot begin to describe the amount of ownage this situation possesses, all thanks to ThinCom's Handspring Visor modem and around 12 feet of phone cable.

|Brought to you with love by Peter - El Chupacabra |

So the upshot is, maybe I've been living in my own fantasy world all this time, and my hair is really stupid. I'm gonna get a crew cut this weekend.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Now quite concerned |

I mean, Fuck!

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Vexed |

Matt - it's ok. You don't need to be afraid anymore.

|Brought to you with love by Adam - Here to help |

So I've been pretty lazy this summer and haven't gotten a job. Lucky for me, my grandpa got a big pile of barkdust in his driveway to spread all throughout his yard. It took us two different days to get it all transported and spread everywhere, but hey, at least I got some sun. You know what else I got? A lot more money than I expected for maybe, oh, 7 hours of work total. Seeing how $50 is roughly $5 more than I would have made working for minimum wage, I guess it's not that incredible. But believe me - having $50 in cash handed to you for working with a nice grandpa is pretty damn cool!

|Brought to you with love by Matt - Loaded...kinda |

I'll be home in Salem tomorrow - then I can administrate like I was born to do.

|Brought to you with love by Adam - Sending out an S.O.S. |

Additionally, if you have completed your hazing assignment and mailed it to adam@ratmonkey.com as some versions of our acceptance letter instructed, and have not heard back, please re-send them to judah@mmright.com. I don't know the exact date Adam will be back to administrate, but I expect another couple of days at least, so emailing me will get the ball rolling.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Waterlogged |

A brief summary of the "restaurant" known as Steak and Shake:

Chicken Fingers: very very very good. Always fresh, always delicious. Especially with good old barbeque sauce.
Steakburgers: Deemed unedible by the FDA, only designed for ornamental purposes on your plate. For extra money-wasting, purchase the double.
Fries: Chopped too thin. Curly fries from Hooters are much, much tastier and addictive. If you get the Two Platter special, don't shoot for fries: get the 'slaw or something.
Soup: Cream of broccoli is your sole god. Possibly the best thing to eat here.
Shakes: good, as expected, but pop is better with real food. Either get a shake and only a shake or a full meal with a Sprite or a Coke.

On another off-topic note: Peter's computer, Intrepid, is broken. Hard. A moment of silence, please...

|Brought to you with love by Nick - too moronic to find a slogan for this log entry |

Thank you, Dr. Gil, for a yummy grilled chicken sandwich.

|Brought to you with love by Judah - Master of Motion Sickness |

A friend - for anonymity purposes, we can call him Brian Anderson - and myself were talking at Gino's East about the differences between Garfield and Heathcliff. Both of them are orange cats, fat, with black stripes. But which one is truly the better feline?

We decided to weigh the differences between each: Garfield seems to be more intelligent and cunning, whereas Heathcliff is far more agressive and "living for the moment." Garfield has Odie, Heathcliff has real friends. Heathcliff has popularity while Garfield has the total lack thereof (Jon Arbuckle).

What do you think? This fictional cat-related quandary is really troubling myself and my esteemed colleagues.

|Brought to you with love by Nick - frosty warm |

[note: It smells like strawberries because I use Suave Strawberry shampoo, which is what I've always used.]

|Brought to you with love by Judah - He of the sexy hair |

So what I'm really trying to figure out is why the hell can't I have nice hair like Judah? His smells like strawberries, he tells me.

|Brought to you with love by Adam - Bad Hair Day, Everyday |

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