Calcium, Campaigns, and a Single Oxford Comma.

Delicious skim milk from the local milkery. Best way to start off the day, dontcha know. I've never expected to become much of a milk connoisseur, but I can tell you the exact descending order, by quality, of the brands of skim milk around this town. This is number one. It might even be the best in the world. I'm lucky to live here at the moment, so I guess I'd better—wait for it—exploit this opportunity for all it's worth.

Were you expecting a pun? You did not receive a pun. Count your blessings. It's a great day to be alive.

I have some kind of personal rule, I guess, where I can't blog without extreme duress unless it's bright and early in the morning. I guess I feel like my future corporate overseers will look back and judge me on how I used every hour of the day except six to eight in the morning, since technically universal health care requires a man to shower and eat at least one meal a day; not even a highly-driven corporate tycoon and burgeoning captain of industry like myself can be counted exempt therefrom. (Speaking as though these accolades have already come to pass.)

I mean, if we're judging by my presence and we are so thoroughly underwhelmed by my hyper-benign social networking presence, what are we going to fail to hire me for? That's correct. Insufficient hygiene and late- to mid-morning blogging. That is my genuine fear. A man must have standards; these are mine.

Apart from calcium intake and blogging schedules, other standards of mine include: loving my job. Seriously and truly. I've had to shift around far too many of my hours over the last few weeks for a rather time-consuming midterm group project (which turned out very well, I'm happy to tell you). I hope the rest of my group projects will be able to meet at times convenient to myself alone. Because the hours between six and eight in the morning are not to be trifled with, and the legitimacy of my presidential and gubernatorial campaigns depend on timely blogging, skim milk consumption, and incredible student job. No pressure.

Adventures in Seafaring, Episode Two.

Yes, Zynga and like-missioned companies, I would be delighted to give your inane games access to my personal data. If they're going to get my hopes up with these notifications whenever I sign on, only for it to be an invitation to sign in to a worm-infested virus-ridden clone of a clone of a clone of an old arcade game, they could do me the courtesy of giving them silly names. Bubbledy-Boppity-Boo sounds good. That might actually be one. (And while I'm at it, no, my computer, I will never let you update Java again. Not until you deserve it. Pull yourself together, Oracle. Lives are on the line.) I tell you, folks. Facebook used to stand for something.

So, uh. Hi. I went tubing down the river yesterday, and I am just magnificently sunburned. It is just Farmer's Tan, USA over here. Unknown Zip code. It was all kinds of fun (for instance: one fun, two fun, red fun, blue fun—I could go on), considering I didn't fall in or scrape my flippity-floppity-foot-less feet across the rocks on the bottom, or the rogue tree branches to the sides. It was a jolly good time.

Here's my train of thought in advance, since I know you'll be asking: "Jolly good, what what. Pip pip, cheerio." I am currently feasting on Apple Cinnamon Cheerios. That's the number one perk of being a grown-up: getting your preferred mix of cereal. Parents can't control you forever, you know. Although, I still have never even tried Count Chocula, or Cookie Crisp, or basically any of the higher quality options out there (read: including chocolate). Maybe parents can control you forever? The research is inconclusive at this stage.

Point of order: when I said "being a grown-up," what I meant was "being old enough to be regularly mistaken for a grown-up." A subtle but crucial difference. I dare say the difference is even vital. Lives are on the line, here.

One downside to the tubing experience. (Obviously, having my brains so sunburned they're basically scrambled eggs trying to fall out my ears is not a downside. It's a neato parlor trick.) The downside is that I would emerge from my peaceful reverie every so often to catch a mosquito in the act, to catch them red-proboscissed. As I am merciful toward other such pathetic creatures, I was humane. But it's hard to know you are that much closer to being a vampire, or a superhero with powers from a radioactive mosquito. Being. Mosquito-Man. would. be. the. worst. thing. There, now that I used that punctuation style unironically, my transformation to a twentysomething female blogger is complete. Oh. my. goodness. so. cute.

Boating Is as Boating Does, I Always Say.

I have this theory I've been working on, that goes a little something like this: the more you blog, the more interesting things start happening to you. Or at least, enjoyable things. I am certain it has nothing to do with counting blessings that were already there that I didn't notice. 100% sure on that one. It would ruin my theory.

Last night I went to this activity for a stake not my own that was—I kid you not—the best stake activity I have ever been to. (Let's put that in perspective: I'm sure I've been to at least a couple, I think.) Why so magnificent, you ask? They had boats. The kind that float on water. And don't sink with you in them.

Here's how it happened: I showed up, bright-eyed, ignorant, and naive, to just look around and see what this "having fun" nonsense was all about. I hear tell of boats. It is an activity at the lake, after all. Makes perfect sense. After soaking in the resplendent karaokial magnificence, I run into a friend of a friend of a friend who, having passed my rigorous friendship-of-a-friendship written examination, I have since co-opted to be friend of my own. They've already been on the waterborne vessels of infinite joy a couple times, and I insist we go again. We do. It's fun. It's the best activity I have ever been to. Wasn't even for my own stake. Incredible. Boating in all its manifestations is the best thing there is. The end.

Okay, a little side note here about "karaokial." That should definitely be a word. I don't want to hear it, auto-correct. Like "parochial," which I almost certainly can define but just don't want to, okay? Or... any number of other doubtlessly fine examples. Fine, I coined it. That's the power of blogging, my friends. Ancient English Etymological Dictionary of the Year 7056: entry "karaokial." First recorded use on a particularly handsome gentleman's blog near the beginning of recorded history. Definition unknown; related to the lost practice of "karaoke," likely an order of martial arts focusing in hand-to-hand combat. Special notes: one of the best words ever.

Second footnote. My blog's written style guide indicates that third parties will be referred to using the gender-neutral pronoun "they." I just decided this because I was noticing I did it but didn't want to fix it. Call me rebellious if you must, but I prefer the term "visionary." Either way, a style guide is a style guide, as I always say. I can't just disregard it, now can I?