I consider myself someone who is comfortable with conflict. Not that I go and pick fights or arguments, but I don't necessarily shy away from such opportunities. Although, there is one specific situation that I almost always try to avoid: explaining to someone that the pen they are putting in their pocket belongs to me. I say "almost always" because I have on occasion pointed this out (I've learned my lesson). The one instance in mind turned into a much longer argument than necessary. One summer in college, I worked at Walmart as a cashier (expect more on this later). On this particular day a middle aged woman decided to write a check for her items so I lent her my pen. Not to get off topic, but if you are still writing checks in the 21st century, you should probably have at least one pen handy. Now leading up to this, and even while she was filling everything out, we had a pretty great conversation and were enjoying each other's company. After handing her the receipt, she said goodbye and started to push her cart away. Realizing she still had my pen, I said something to the effect of, "oh by the way, could I have my pen back?"

"Um...this is my pen."

"Actually ma'am, I lent you that pen to write your check about 3 minutes ago."

"Well this is a Zebra* pen. I only use Zebra pens."

"That may be the case ma'am, but this particular Zebra pen is mine."

After huffing and puffing she finally handed me my pen and scoffed, walking away. This brings up the question at hand: is it worth sacrificing a pen to maintain a friendship? These friendships usually last no more than 5 minutes, so they're quite possibly meaningless, but one could argue those encounters are not. I am a firm believer that short conversations can largely impact someone's day, which in turn affects their week, and so on and so on. That being said, the pens that I carry around with me daily aren't necessarily cheap. They're not necessarily expensive either. It's just annoying when I have to replace one for reasons other than it simply ran out of ink. I have tossed around the idea of carrying around a "dummy" pen or something cheap enough to were if someone were to steal it, I would be less irritated. The problem is that shit adds up, and I'm not interested in carrying more than two pens in my pocket at a time (and yes, I carry two pens with me at all times). Recently, I've resorted to much more passive aggressive tactics. The pens that I currently use have a detachable cap, which I remove and keep when lending one out to someone. This gives said borrower a reminder. "Where's the cap? Oh wait, this isn't my pen. Here you are kind fellow. The use of your writing utensil was much appreciated," as he tips his hat to me. Pen retrieval success. For those borrowers who skip this brain process, prepare to have a pocket or purse full of ink. Pen retrieval failure, but retaliation success.

tl;dr I'm insane and have very strong opinions about pens.

*I no longer use Zebra pens. Been quite fond of Sharpie pens for the past couple years.

It's no secret to anyone that knows me that I absolutely love traveling. Growing up I traveled here and there, my family going on trips for summer vacation once in a while. I never considered myself a "traveler" until recently. I made it a point last year to take advantage of any opportunity to travel. There is just so much to see and experience, I have little excuse not to. Talking to friends and acquaintances, a common complaint was, "I would love to travel, but I just don't have the time or money." I subscribed to this train of thought for a while, but after dating someone long distance, I found how simple and affordable it can be to drive or fly somewhere. Since then I've gone more places in a single year than I had for the first couple decades of my life. In 2010, I visited Chicago, California (Palm Springs, Coachella), Washington DC (twice), Seattle, and Deal's Gap. Of course I had some one off trips to Columbia and KC, but those don't count. So far in 2011, I've visited Colorado (just got back a couple days ago) and plan to visit Seattle, Las Vegas, New York, Deal's Gap, and Florida.

In 2012, I plan to travel the world. It's probably the biggest decision I have made up to this point in my life. It's something I've always wanted to do, but figured it was near impossible. The more reading and living I do, I've realized it's definitely within reach, and there's no better time in my life to do it. The plan is to spend 2011 putting myself in a position to do this, and of course, doing a substantial amount of planning. Finding the places I want to go, figuring out how to get to these places, where to stay, how much money I will need, etc. That's the goal. I plan to update every so often with new developments, new ideas and such. I hope to spend that year traveling and blogging about it. It's just a matter of turning my dream into reality.

I'm also telling as many people as possible to make sure that in a situation where I don't spend 2012 traveling, my friends and family will make me feel awful about it. Thanks in advance.

So here's the deal. This blog has been rebooted. Every past post has been deleted. The theme has been changed, and will most likely be tweaked here and there until I'm content. It's time to start fresh. A fresh blog for a new year. Consider this the first change of many. I stopped blogging around mid-June. I just didn't really feel that I was offering much other than random nonsense whenever it was convenient, which is not necessarily a terrible thing. I enjoy nonsense and the absurd very much, but I grew bored with the type of blogging I was doing. The good news is that it was a start. Practice at the least. I was having fun with it for the most part, but overall I wasn't satisfied. This is why I'm starting again. I'm making some changes this time around. I'm sticking to somewhat of a schedule to keep things lively and avoid large gaps between posts. I absolutely hate visiting blogs that stop posting for a few days that turns into a few weeks that turns into a few months. After a while you give up and stop checking, eventually removing that blog's bookmark. I'll try to avoid that this time around. I'm also going to start posting more personally. What's the point of writing a blog under my name without providing much other than a few random pictures and reposted cat videos?* I don't really want to turn this into a personal rant blog, but I reserve the right to bitch and moan at times.

2010 was great, but 2011 is going to be even better. Stay tuned.

On another note, I wonder how many blogs started today, or how many people blogged today for the first time in months like myself. It's funny that in this decade a resolution to write more can be accomplished without lifting a pen, and then be viewed by thousands of people (or in my case thirteen) within moments. Hopefully such blogs will continue throughout the year, including my own.

Also this.

*continue to expect cat videos

- Michael J. Kraemer