...So That Others May Read

Funny Story

2009-12-27T13:06:00.002-05:00

We all decided we were going to go to Target one day and because of what we were buying (mainly large totes) we needed two carts so perhaps to the casual observer, I (who was pushing the cart filled with stuff) was chatting up a single mother. We both got in line and Kim bought something or other and I was behind her unloading the totes onto the conveyor belt.

The cashier's name was Adam. He's easy to remember. He has a mop for a hairstyle that mushrooms out from his head and a goofy look on his face all the time like he's in a curious limbo between being congested to the point of mouth breathing constantly and being in a state of total awe of the world around him. And his name is Adam.

Anyway, Kim's in front of me and he Adam says to her something like "hey, what's up?" and looks at me and I said "How's it going, Adam?"

Kim thinks this is a weird habit of mine but if you know someone's name, go ahead and use it, right?

Well, Kim says "It's really weird that you do that."

Adam looks at her and leans in a bit and says "I know. I totally don't even know that guy!"

This was around the time that my totes roll up to the front of the belt and Adam looks at me and I say "this too," because he had begun to close out the transaction. He looked at Kim like "WTF?" and she said "yeah, that too."

Then the realization that we're together spread across his teenage stoner-looking face. You could almost hear him curse to himself.

I thought it was hilarious.

Georgia On My Mind No More

2009-12-10T05:30:00.002-05:00

I've lived in quite a few places and almost all of them had some sort of food associated with them that I love and miss very much. Italy's delicious pizza, New Zealand's fish and chips, Japan's sushimi, etc. etc.

I try my hardest to recognize the area's specialty and eat as much of it as I can while I'm there and look for a recipe to be able to make it myself regardless of where I am. And it used to be that I thought the thing I would miss about Georgia was the barbecue. There are no cajun roots here, no deep fried whatevers, not a lot of "southern" stuff, but they do have a good and what Alton Brown would call "sickeningly sweet" barbecue.

Ah, but no more. A new buddy of mine exposed me to North Carolina barbecue and it's about a billion times (approximately) better than Georgia's. Not only that, but it was made by a Native American, which I'm sure doesn't influence the taste but it makes for that much cooler of a story.

You bet I've requested the recipe.

So with barbecue eliminated, what does Georgia have to offer?

Nothing.

At least, middle Georgia doesn't. There's an orchard in North Georgia's Ellijay where fried pies are made (like the hostess ones you find at gas stations) that are huge and delicious. There's also an amazing German restaurant in Helen, GA that has the most unique pizza I've every tried but I think that's a German restaurant and perhaps I can find something similar in Germany.

Anyhoo, there's nothing holding me back here anymore.

:-)

Everything Is About To Change

2009-12-01T06:02:00.002-05:00

Well, hopefully.

No wait, I take that back. Everything I know is about to change. The people I look up to at work, my professional heroes if you will, are all leaving to go to other bases to do other jobs. The people that are left that I know I feel an odd kinship with because I've known them for so dang long. You know how you feel at high school your first year when you don't know anyone but as time goes on and you become a senior, hey, all of a sudden it hits you that you know EVERYONE?

That's what it's like.

But without the people that I'm learning how to grow and mature from as an NCO, I don't want to be here for too much longer. I want to move on and do a different job at a different place myself. Maybe find some more heroes (you can never have enough).

Anyway, so there's a possibility that I might get a different job going someplace else and if that's the case I'm more than ready for it. I hear people say Georgia's not a bad first duty station and I'm inclined to disagree. There is a lot to do but it's at least a 30 minute drive and with little to do in the immediate area, that just leads to trouble.

For other people, I mean. I'm fine.

But yeah, folks tell me to stop complaining because it could be worse. Look buddy, I've been living on bases my whole life. This is not a "first" anything for me. This is merely one more base that I spent way too long at and now it's time to move on.

This makes me scared of retirement, this constant need to move every few years.

And I want to see the world - well, most of the world, anyway. More importantly I want to show my family the world, especially my kids. Being exposed to different cultures is what made me how I am for the most part, I believe. Those and the movies that raised me. I plan to have a different parental strategy, but different cultures is a must because I don't want my kids to become ethnocentric or xenophobic.

So while things WILL change for me at work with the loss of my mentors, I'm hoping they'll change a lot more than that!

As a side note, one of my mentors wore his Blues yesterday with his ribbons and no kidding, the guy has a million of them and he's in my career field. Now, I have something like 14 ribbons right now after less than five years and that's pretty good. I'm nervous about getting them if I get a ground job since their ribbon racks are usually so much smaller. I know it's a shallow thing, but I'm a sucker for getting ribbons and medals so this guy had me thinking twice about cross training into a ground job, but I just keep saying "the locations are better the locations are better the locations are better..."

Big Day

2009-11-29T21:43:00.002-05:00

It's been a big day for me.

First, while harvesting pretend crops on a pretend farm for pretend rewards on the ever-popular Facebook game Farmville, I decided that I was never really having any fun and it was more just something to do. Five to ten minutes once or twice a day and you're done.

But why do it when it isn't fun?

So I quit. The rice I planted has not fully grown yet, but it won't be harvested when it does. I'm not playing anymore. We'll see what the repercussions of that are.

Maybe I'll have a little more time to peruse the internet forums

Oh yeah, I'm not so hip to them right now either. I've got nothing against them, it's just that right now it doesn't look like anything really interesting is happening right now.

Though I will say that the Telecaster forum never fails to post some great looking pictures of worn out Teles and I want one pretty bad. Not a worn one (well, maybe a worn one) but a lacquered one and not JUST lacquered on the body but the neck too. Half the fun of showing wear is showing it on the neck. Unfortunately, Fender doesn't offer this except on the really high end guitars (about 17-2,000.00).

Now, there are builders that will build you a Tele to your specs and more and more are popping up every day so when I say that I've been thinking about a sea foam green la cabronita Tele with a single TV Jones Powertron in the bridge, there are people that can do it (for less than a real Fender too).

But I'm not close to getting a new guitar at all. Not at ALL. Oh well. I'm pretty happy with the ones I have. Sometimes I think I should replace the neck on my Tele for one that's a bit more chunky like an old Tele is, but the idea of carrying the whole guitar stock throughout my career is pretty tempting too. Maybe the frets just need leveled out or replaced. I'd be more prone to do that, honestly.

I also had an afternoon to myself and I drove up to Macon to a Mac store there. Not an official Apple Store with a glass front or anything, a small store that had a fairly knowledgeable staff that helped me out and answered my questions. I told them if I were to get the Macbook Pro like I want it would probably be while deployed and they didn't say they could ship it or that if I ordered it from THEM that I wouldn't pay tax.

Though I would like to order from them.

I'd like that very much.

It would be nice to support a small shop like this one and say that there is a market for this kind of stuff.

Perhaps I could email him from the desert and organize a mail-order.

When I went in there was a kid carrying out a 27" imac. His mother/grandmother referred to it as his toy and it blew me away. Here I am, 26, trying to convince my wife that a Mac is what I need to be able to jump into audio recording and hopefully not break a computer like I seem to have a knack for and this 15 year old kid is getting a "toy" from his relatives.

The manager of the store said that a soldier bought a macbook pro, a real expensive one, and also bought a super duper case. One that costs somewhere around 400.00 that has Kevlar and titanium and all that. In Iraq, while carrying the computer in the case a sniper shot two shots. One ripped the guy's leg right off. The other hit the case. The guy lived and brought the case and macbook in to show that the 400.00 was well spent because nothing on the inside was hurt though the outside looks like... well, like it was shot by a sniper.

The afternoon off was a big thing for me. Kim likes to think that me going to work is a break and I don't want one from the family or kids which just isn't true. I think everyone needs a little time to themselves and always try to give Kim that time because she's a little more vocal about needing it. When I told her it would be nice for ME to have a personal day she sat back and said it honestly hadn't occurred to her that I would want one.

Driving back, with the sun coming down from its apex, music up loud and going a bit faster than I should have, I was having a good time.

And I didn't spend a dime. Not even on a book I want to get called Love Is A Mix Tape.

So I got home, took Kim's library books back, took Annie to the park where no less than seven ladybugs landed on my shirt (must be the color), burned the living hell ut of some pork chops in the last grill of the season, and after putting the kids down for their sleep settled in for a good forty minutes of reading God's Middle Finger, a travel book about the Sierra Madre mountain range in Mexico. Very entertaining. Doing coke with cops, being chased by armed gunmen who want to kill you because they're bored, watching fat prostitutes (mucha carne) strut by batting eyelashes because no Mexican girl apparently feels bad about themselves and every one is confident in their looks, all of this makes for some great reading.

So yeah, big day.

Family: Bah!

2009-11-21T09:21:00.002-05:00

I think it's interesting, this idea that your family needs to be together, stick togethe rand help eachother through whatever life hands them regardless of how each family member feels about them.

Maybe I have a unique perspective because being raised in the military I rarely saw my family outside of the nuclear capacity and when I did, it was more than likely grandparents and few others.

So I don't exactly have strong ties. I didn't grow up playing with cousins and nephews and nieces. I don't mind that, either.

I don't mind it because when a person who happens to be related to me acts like an ass, I'm not incredibly torn up about severing the tie. I barely know whoever I'm talking to anyway, so what's the big deal? It's not like we have clans anymore where we'll wage war on an opposing house.

But you can't imagine the grief I get from other family members about "not caring," or "turning my back on a member of the family."

Nuts to that. I would much rather judge everyone equally because this whole tied by blood thing is a myth anyway. No one REALLY cares about that, they just pocket it until it's useful to them to manipulate and I need no more people manipulating me.

If someone's an ass, they're an ass and you don't need to be around them. Why let them depress you and drag you down? There is no reason.

Now, I'm not saying family doesn't matter. In my opinion the reason this whole family through and through mentality came to be is because in a good family, their attitudes and love for eachother make you WANT to give them everything you can and stick together and that's fine. That's a good thing. You should do the same with friends.

But if one of your friends was just an awful person, you wouldn't be their friend anymore right? The same rules apply to me and my family. If you're an awful person who's bringing me down, you won't be bringing me down for long.

Post #10

2009-11-11T12:34:00.002-05:00

So Adam, my sweet, sweet son who always seems to be happy and smiling and laughing - oh how he laughs when you play patty cake with him - woke at 3:30 in the morning.

THREE THIRTY!

Oh, but I'll survive, don't worry about me. I don't have any coffee, but somehow I'll make it through. At least I don't have to worry about making dinner tonight.

Why?

Because yesterday, with Ida straddling middle Georgia and pelting us with rain and wind (that's gross when you think about it), I took the kids to Publix. Oh, it was GREAT. First off, the rain. Glorious rain. I covered Adam's car seat and carried it and held Annie's hand as we booked it to the store and then into the cart with both of them.

For the record, this leaves very little room for food.

But I was getting so frustrated about not having dinner in the house that I had to do this and I picked up three frozen dinners to tide us over until payday when maybe I can leave a child with Kim and go grocery shopping with a little more real estate in the cart.

It was a nice little trip though. Annie laughed at how she was getting wet and I was just trying to make sure everyone was OK and as dry as possible. It did the kids good to get out too.

So you'll excuse me since I've been up for nine hours already that my blog isn't all that entertaining today. Sorry.

Maybe tomorrow.

Post #9

2009-11-10T13:58:00.002-05:00

It seems like I was wrong earlier when I wrote about the Nook, the Kindle and the Sony. Apparently it's only the Kindle that sucks. And by sucks I mean is more forced to get books from Amazon. There are workarounds, but they're still workarounds, while the Nook is open to get books from other sources and the Droid OS is going to help out eventually too.

At least, that's what I've been reading.

I'm pretty excited. I don't get embarrassed when I read books even though I read a little bit of trash, but I was recently thinking of reading the Twilight series purely to see what all the fuss is about. Even Kim devoured it in a little over a day (the first book) and was talking about how it's SO much better than she thought it would be and "oh, Edward..."

I have to know what everyone's so wrapped up about.

And I do NOT want to be caught reading the book with the actors' faces on the cover.

The idea is gross.

But on an ereader no one's the wiser. I could be reading 1776 for all anyone knows!

Post #8

2009-11-09T12:30:00.002-05:00

It's like some sort of Disney movie, I swear. On Friday we were in the car somewhere and Kim asked if I would be game for swapping jobs. She would go to work at my job and I would be a stay-at-home Dad. Of course this is impossible to actually do.

Right?

To an extent, I guess. She was mainly asking me to validate her job as a difficult one and it's true, her job is tough. I know this. I knew this before this whole ligament thing. I never for an instant thought her job was cake.

Well, I guess she pulled out a shrunken monkey's paw and made a wish because her back got hurt and now I'm a stay at home dad. But it's like stay at home dad XTREME! Where the usual grocery trip involves Kim taking Annie and me staying home with Adam or her going by herself, I have to go everywhere with both kids.

And we need to get groceries.

It's tough. But it's also mighty COINCIDENTAL that this happened when it did. Me thinks the lady put a curse on me (temporarily). I swear honey, I respect you.

Post #7

2009-11-08T11:40:00.002-05:00

Still alive! The 5th Fret dropped out of Nablopomo and so did New Rukian, so that leaves just me. Good thing I wrote that blog about God being a bit of a butt early yesterday.

So where to begin? Kim was in bed all day yesterday which meant I got to take care of the kids. So I did. It was everything I thought it would be, good parts and bad.

I went out to check the mail though, and there was a little boy, probably seven or eight sitting on top of a hill crying in direct view of me, with his back turned to me.

Just sitting there doing the boy cry which is less of a whaaaaa and more of a mmmmmMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmMMMMMMMMM. Campbell's should sue.

At first I was going to leave him alone. What business is it of mine? But I looked around and no one was coming for him, no one cared. There were people that could see him and they weren't doing anything. So I said nuts to this and went over there and tried to make myself as physically menacing as possible. Not to scare the poor kid, but to let him know that I'm an adult and can probably be trusted. No sense in me going over there to try to make the kid feel better only to have him run away screaming.

I squatted down next to him and asked if he was OK. He was not. He had a red line with spots of blood going down the side of his face. This is the result of another little boy breaking off a tree branch and beating him across the face with it. A little boy that happened to be watching this with his friends and mother. The crying child also said he was pushed into a big pile of dirt by the same little butthole.

I asked if he wanted to go home and he didn't know. Go figure. I convinced him that he needs to have his folks look at his face to put some neosporin or ice on it. I really wanted them to see the face so they can get good and pissed and put that little boy in his place. He was as good as guilty in my book.

I just thought, what if someone brought home Annie or Adam like that. Oh, I'd hand the kid off to Kim in a heartbeat to get fixed up while I went on a little walk. And woe to the kid and parents of that kid when I get to their step.

We walked past the group of oglers and the boy was telling his mom that it was an accident and the mom was eating it up. I wanted to explain that it could not have possibly been an accident. When you're running through bushes and a branch that you pushed through snaps back and hits your friend, that's an accident. But all of the trees/bushes are cut too high for that to happen in this neighborhood AND the mark was vertical not horizontal. That kid was hit.

I dropped the now-calmer child off with his dad who was concerned about what happened and I left to go back home. I had my own kids to tend to. But the little branch user tried to talk to me as I walked by saying it was an accident mister and I controlled myself enough not to look his way. Best not to get too involved. It would have been way too easy to escalate.

Meanwhile Kimmy was really hurt. Really hurt. I had to take her to the ER and then they told her that she had torn a ligament and it would take quite some time to heal but as for now she can't lift anything heavier than a book and I'm in charge of the kids now.

It will be interesting to see how much longer I can keep Nablopomo up.

Post #6

2009-11-07T10:00:00.002-05:00

I'll be completely honest here: I think God exists. I do. SOMEONE had to make this place.

But I for one don't like Him. He's kind of a dick. At the very least he makes life "interesting."

For instance, today we were supposed to drive to Macon. We would get breakfast on the way to an exit far past Macon and go to a park, a nature preserve-ish type of place where we would walk and everything would be fine. Kim would get good pictures, the kids would get air.

Except Kim woke up and while getting ready, her back started to hurt and get progressively worse. She swallowed some Aleve and we made our way to the car, her leaning on me quite a bit, both of us thinking if she still hurts by the time we get to 75, we'll turn back, but we didn't make it that far. No, we got breakfast and had to go back. Then I took the kids to Target to get icy hot back pads for Kimmy (and to give her some quiet relaxing time) and when I got back in the car to go home, the brake light came on. The constant DING DING DING DING DING DING came with it. I was annoyed, but no big deal. The brakes did feel squishy. I'll just pull off to a gas station and get some brake fluid.

Bought some break fluid and Adam was crying (howling) when I opened up the car door to pull the hood lever and guess what didn't release?

The hood.

I pushed it down and it seemed to connect, but when I pulled the lever, nothing happened. I couldn't get the damn hood to open up.

So I drove home with the constant DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING in my ears and when I got home and was feeding Adam his bottle as Annie tried to kiss Mommy better, Kim reminded me that a few months ago, something happened with the car and they said that eventually this one thing is going to need to be fixed and I said it's too expensive so we'll wait. Kim thinks it's that and I'm inclined to agree, but why today of all days?

And it's not like we have the extra money to fix the car right now either so it looks like we're going to be a one car family.

Maybe He is just using this little series of... events... to draw us together as a family.

But right now I just think it's messed up.

Post #5

2009-11-06T13:44:00.003-05:00

This is why everyone should consider joining the Air Force:

We had a fund raiser today to raise money for the squadron Christmas party and random things that pop up (like if a military spouse needs something and their husband/wife is deployed, the squadron may be able to help) so we had a golf tournament and had the day off from work to accomplish this. So we showed up in civilian clothes and golfed. Carts with beer, snacks, chips etc. were driven around to us in case we wanted to buy stuff to further support the squadron.

The carts were full of Hooters girls.

Now, I don't like going to Hooters. Their food is awful. But these girls volunteered their time for free to come out and help us out (not really doing anything but posing for pictures and flirting) and I think that's pretty cool.

For the record, this was my first time playing golf. I enjoyed it but after seven or so holes, I was done. I don't know how people can go a full 18. I think maybe if the kids are in to it, I'll get in to it too, but for now I'll save my money for more important things.

We received an award too. A spray-painted gold playstation controller that said stick to Tiger Woods golf because we sucked. The whole team, save one, was out on their first golf outing. So us sucking was expected.

But where else are you going to get a day off from work to golf, drink beer, hang out with friends, AND all the money raised will go to making your future parties great and your families a little more secure?

Go Air Force!

Post #4

2009-11-05T20:11:00.000-05:00

I have good news and I have bad news. And contrary to the way everyone usually likes to hear the delivery, I’ll tackle the good news first, then the bad.

So the good news: I found my iPod. It was under a couch cushion.

Unfortunately (bad news) I found it AFTER I took a PT test today. If you walk around a walking track twelve times, it’s tough to stay motivated, tough to stay moving at a decent pace and it gets REALLY boring. So boring your mind starts to drift and you don’t even realize that your pace has slowed drastically. No kidding, a blue jay landed on a tree branch and I almost stopped to look at it. I slowed considerably and caught myself just in time.

Man, I hate PT tests. I know I’m not alone in this either. I understand the need for them, I understand the desire for the AF to keep you trim (you look better in your uniform – no one wants a slob working for them) and fit (so you, you know, won’t die after running a mile in a bullet-proof vest) BUT it still sucks that you’re being evaluated in an official capacity on your body. I don’t know, there’s just SOMETHING about it that freaks me out, borderline scares me.

Maybe it’s because it feels like – as they wrap the tape measure around your waist – they’re measuring your worth. Your whole worth, summed up in your body, the thing that, as a member of the USAF, you probably don’t use that often. Nothing to do with your intellect, nothing to do with your job skills or leadership skills or anything that really matters, none of it comes in to play. But if you have a 40” waist, oh boy, you better watch out.

And this just seems a little wrong to me. Maybe it wouldn’t be as bad if it wasn’t such a HUGE thing to the AF. If you fail to meet the requirements, they can kick you out. How bad would it feel to be kicked out of a job you were qualified for, that you were good at, in a career where you were excelling in ALMOST every way, but you happened to eat fast food too much? And because of that, you got kicked out.

That’s a little ridiculous.

Oh well. It’s not like one guy is going to change this.

But I went out and walked my three miles (I can’t run) and my scores were good. Unfortunately it was a practice test so I get to do it again next week. I wouldn’t be so damn angry if I had FAILED the test, because it was a practice test and I was just seeing where I was after ALS. I’m more mad at myself for not having the confidence to say I can still do it.

But oh man, I’m mad at myself. Not cool, Russ. Not flipping cool.

I like to end most things on a positive note though so here we go: Next week, as I wake up early to drive to work to get evaluated again for a test I have absolutely zero faith in just so I can say that I’m worthy to stick around for one more year, I’ll step out into the chilly air and I will definitely have my iPod ready to go.

Post #3

2009-11-04T09:58:00.001-05:00

During Thanksgiving of 2007, Amazon released their Kindle. While ereaders had been around for a while, this was a big step forward both in terms of use and book availability. It was likened to the first iPod.

Then Amazon released the Kindle 2, which featured "upgrades" that slimmed down the body, streamlined the keyboard, made the page turn buttons smaller and stronger, sped up the page turning process and got rid of the expandable memory, supposedly in favor of getting the body as slim as possible.

But the Kindle has some problems too. Mainly that it's a little pricey. The price has dropped significantly since its release, but it's always been a bit high and there's also a big threat of them acting in a very Big Brother fashion.

They can reach into your device and take what you bought if it doesn't seem legitimate or make changes to your library without you knowing it. It would be like if someone went into your house and started marking out words in your books o taking them altogether because they were borrowed from a friend.

A student was using the Kindle and its handy note taking feature in a college class only to have Amazon pull the book off of his system and now he has no book for the class and is pissed. Amazon manned up though and said they're sorry and gave him back his notes but without the text nearby, the notes are practically useless. They also said they would never do something like this again.

They also offer services that other ereaders are offering but Amazon is wanting to charge you for the service and the others aren't.

Since the Kindle has been released, I'm sure many people in the industry are thinking that this is the iPod of books and they want to get in on a lower floor. Look at what happened with Apple. No one else wanted to support MP3 formats and the iPod became the king of MP3 players and now you can ask someone if they have an iPod and they'll say yes and caveat it with "well, it's a Sansa." "Ipod" has become synonymous with MP3 player, much like Kleenex has become synonymous with tissues.

Because of this we have good looking competition from Sony and Barnes & Noble.

Honestly, for me the “benefits” of buying the Nook from Barnes & Noble or the Amazon Kindle just don’t work for me. I will never use text to speech, especially when it sounds like a robot. I can barely make it through automated phone recordings so how can I expect myself to make it through Brave New World? This is not an actor or the author reading the book, this is a machine reading it. Not cool to me.

Also, why on EARTH would I want MP3 features on my reader? It is NOT a computer, why should it be treated like one?

I don’t really understand pictures on readers either, but would rather have the reader to have that capability because it probably means that it could handle illustrations in books.

The dictionary. Whenever I didn’t know a word, my parents made me look it up in the big heavy dictionary. The work put forth in finding it helped me remember the word and its definition. I thank my parents for this because I’m pretty sure it’s what has helped the most with my vocabulary. The Sony does not have an instant dictionary where the Nook and Kindle does but again, the work of finding the word will help you remember what it means.

I also don’t need a web browser on my reader. I just don’t. The reason it’s there in the first place on the Nook and Kindle is because they want you to be able to buy books from them and since you have access to that, they have access to you.

I’m not TOO worried about Big Brother but stay the heck away from my devices.

All the perks of the Kindle and the Nook are probably not going to be applicable to me. I probably won’t be hanging out with other Nook users who have their reader on them and happen to want to lend me a book of theirs for 14 days. I’m not interested in paying way too much for newspapers and abbreviated magazines either.

But the Sony, ah, the Sony. What a great looking reader. It does not offer expandable memory, but honestly, since I’m not going to be paying for a NY Times subscription, and have no interest in MP3s or pictures, how am I going to fill up any level of memory when a normal book is 2mb? And when I finish, am I going to hold on to it or am I going to get it off of my device and into the folder that has all of my other finished books in it? I want my device as clean as possible so I can see which books I have that I’m in the middle of and which books I have that I still need to read.

The price is decent too. At 200 bucks I can get the reader, have access to Google Books which is all but a book dealer themselves now, AND Sony’s bookstore which might cause some healthy competition. Sony’s shop offers books in series at a discounted price too when they’re in bundles. Prices are comparable to Amazon’s shop (B&N is still pricey even in electronic form) too.

It doesn’t have text to speech nor a web browser, nor pictures, nor lending, nor any of that other stuff. It’s just a solid reader with the ability to get books from multiple sources (when Amazon and B&N realize that they should be offering an inexpensive device that can go to different sources they’ll sell more) and at a decent price point too. You can’t beat it, honestly. Not at the price.

I plan on getting it because it doesn’t have all that fluff that, while cool, I’ll never use. AND it doesn’t connect via internet and no one cares what I have on my device.

Take the hint, Amazon and B&N!

Post #2

2009-11-03T06:10:00.002-05:00

I seem to have misplaced my iPod. This really bumms me out. I know I had it the night that I graduated (the 28th), because my mom was commenting that Metallica whom the iPod was playing (Damage Inc.) came to town and she didn't even know it.

I'm not quite sure if Mom could handle a Metallica show. I can't remember the last time I ever saw a mosh pit break out at a Metallica show though so maybe she could. I know she REALLY likes the black album and not too much else, so it may end up a disappointing night for her until they play the obligatory Enter Sandman.

God I hate the black album. It was a fine album until my dad decided to play it in the car for (no exaggeration here) 14 months straight. If you listen to ANYTHING for 14 months, you're bound to feel the same way I do. And he would always go back to track number 1 to start the trip off so I could be sure to listen to the first five or six songs and little else.

*shudder*

But moving on. I know it's around somewhere. I need it though. The iPhone is not the best for listening to music in the car what with AT&T's screeching speaker interference, or the fact you have to slide to open then press track forward, backward, menu, etc. The classic set up is much easier to navigate without taking your eyes off the road.

I have got to find that thing.

Ah yes, tomorrow I plan on posting about ereaders, so watch out. My love for the Kindle has taken an odd turn, one I'm not sure it can come back from and what with Sony's new ones and now even Barnes & Noble has one so research needs to be done in case anyone out there is planning on using my info as research of their own for their ereader-buying experience (if so, please let me know your opinions because I'm still a bit on the fence about which to get).

Until tomorrow!

Post #1

2009-11-02T18:17:00.002-05:00

Well, it seems that I've missed day one of Noblopomo this year so... dangit. BUT I figured I'll do it anyway and extend to December 1st. I think that's fair.

So what's new in Kid Land? Annie moved to a big girl bed last night. We had to move the nightlight she's used to which is a brass turtle with light-up shell (very cool) because it was just too obvious that there was a plug attached. This might mean that she would follow the cord to the wall and pull out the plug. I'm not worried about her pulling the plug or putting her fingers in the holes afterward but perhaps completing the circuit with the plug halfway out and electrocuting herself... yeah, that crossed my mind.

But after the initial meltdown of not being in the familiar crib, she calmed down and actually slept pretty good. I hear she even had a great nap today.

In Adam news, Adam has a misshaped head. We were a little worried about it, and the pediatrician referred us to a shaping doctor (I think they're called "orthontists") who said that it's purely cosmetic and it isn't impacting his brain at all and the unevenness would probably work itself out as he grew BUT that didn't stop him from doing scans and seeing just how much is wrong with his head.

Now, an interjection. My kid is not Quasimodo or anything. He looks fine but we noticed that in the back of his head he has a flat spot.

Anyway, he said he wanted Adam to wear a helmet and work up to wearing it for 23 hours a day for an indeterminate amount of time.

Tricare does not cover the helmet. The nurses said it was because Tricare considers the helmet to be... optional. Whether that's true or not is beyond me. The helmet costs 2,100.00 and THAT means that Adam is going to have to develop a good personality because we just can't pay for that. He'll get dates, no worries though. He's got eyes that will probably attract the chicks like moths to a flame.

Meanwhile for me, it was supposed to be back to the grind today but between having to take Adam to the doc and having to do some currency things, I was just unable to do any work.

Tomorrow though...

Can I Brag A Little?

2009-10-28T21:02:00.002-04:00

Well, tonight was graduation night of Airman Leadership School. 192 class room hours, multiple homework assignments, several speeches, a large number of classroom discussions, interactions, learning about leadership, about taking care of your people and basically how to be the best Non Commissioned Office you can be. It was... rough. So many of the nights I spent doing homework or studying and my lovely wife would watch the kids or accommodate me in some way and it's been a bit trying, but I explained to her that this is worth it. This is the first time in my career that I stood up and took control of my CAREER and it wasn't just going along with the flow, or letting others dictate MY action. I stayed up and studied harder than necessary and before the last test, I was more than happy to volunteer my time helping out in study groups all weekend.

To my wife I say thank you because without you there to help me I wouldn't have done as good as I did.

And how good did I do? Well, there are several awards you can win. You can win an academic award which is just top dog for grades only, you can win a distinguished graduate award which is for those in the top 10% of the class that not only showed great academic excellence but also leadership capabilities. You also have the leadership award which is chosen by the school Commandant, and finally the Levitow award which trumps all awards in prestige. The thing about the Levitow though is that if you win it, you can't win anything else.

I was in direct competition with someone and it was mainly out of fun, but we have a bit of a history of rivalry so it was a motivator and in the end, the first award they called was for the academic and it went to me. I was shocked because I'm pretty sure I wasn't the top as far as grades. I was pretty sure I was in second place, but hey, who am I to turn down an award? So I haul myself up to the front and get my very first plaque from the USAF and go sit back down. Oh, there were handshakes from EVERYWHERE and I even got my very first coin handed to me by a commander which was pretty freaking awesome. To get a coin given to you by a person who gets coins ISSUED to them is awesome because they have to inventory all the coins they give out and to whom it was given.

I was pretty happy. Then they called the leadership award and it went to my flight commander and she was more than deserving. She dedicated a ton of personal time to make sure that her flight was taken care of (and she brought in cookies on test days)and there was never a question of whether or not she was there coaching everyone on. The great thing is usually flight commanders don't receive awards because their performance slips because they're too busy helping out their flight members.

Next up was distinguished graduate. They said my squadron and I looked at the only other guy from my squadron there and then they called my name.

My name.

The Colonel that handed me the statue said that what I did was really impressive to her.

I believe it. I was stunned. More handshakes, one more coin. I was super happy.

Then the next DG award (class size dictates how many are given out) was given to my new buddy Sparky who deserved it very much.

Finally the Levitow was given to the Airman with whom I was competing against and before we got our diplomas, I congratulated her and said I was proud of her and she said the same to me. Our flight took ALL the awards and every recipient was sitting next to each other in class too.

But getting the awards were just a small part of the joy, honestly. I felt great that I was now validated. I could look at my supervisor and let them know that their Airman did something that was pretty cool and honestly, I couldn't have done it if I hadn't been groomed by them beforehand. And my mom and her boyfriend was there and that was cool too. I've known Mom's boyfriend since I was ten and he's always been a very strong presence in my life and I'm glad that they could have been there to see it.

Unfortunately Kim wasn't there and to be honest, I missed her very much. I recorded a speech given by a Chief about the importance of spouses, but it would have been cool for her to see me get called up to the front both times. I can't give credit to my supervisors for grooming me without giving credit to my wife for letting me be groomed. She's been more than patient with me in the AF and I only hope that the small tangible things I get can somehow make her proud enough to forget or forgive the long nights alone with the kids while I was busy writing a paper or practicing a speech.

I love you, Kim. More than any amount of words these fingers could ever type. They could pound on keyboard after broken keyboard until the fingers were mere nubs at the end of time and it would still be sorely lacking in telling you the depth and strength of my love for you.

Well, everyone, I think I've bragged enough. Thanks for your time and have a great day!

-Pappy

The Annoying Guy

2009-10-23T05:55:00.002-04:00

You know what annoys the crap out me? Return characters that are bad. This applies to both TV, movies and real life, by the way. I hate it when some douche is in your life for some reason or another, then they leave and they're gone for so long that you let out that breath you never realized you were holding. Ah, a rush of relief.

But then that same person comes back in and you just want to scream at him that you were fine without them here. "WHY ARE YOU HERE?" You want to ask. "GET OUT! DON'T COME BACK! LIFE WAS MUCH BETTER WITHOUT YOU AND YOUR INPUT!"

I swear to god it's a like a stray dog you feed once.

So you ignore it and hope it goes away and eventually it does but then some stupid friend of yours drops half of a burger at a BBQ and doesn't clean it up enough and guess who comes back?

It's miserable.

Talk About Light!

2009-10-20T21:43:00.002-04:00

I'm in ALS right now. That stands for Airman Leadership School. It's where you go to learn how to be a supervisor and man is it fun. They pack a ton of education, speeches, papers, formulated writing, PT AND homework into a measly amount of time and it is NOT a good time at all.

But it's incredibly beneficial. See, I'm learning a lot, it's just a painful learning process. It doesn't help when there are those unavoidable stressors given to you by family or work but hey, you roll with the punches.

Tonight I was working on my very last brief for the class and then after that I worked on my last two written assignments for the class. In one night I have taken care of three of the six graded assignments and on one hand you would rather have your work, especially GRADED work, to be spread out, but on the other hand, if you knock half of your graded assignments out in one night, what more do you have to worry about?

It's relief.

And it's something else: it's the sign of the end of the time in class. I still have more to be graded on and more time in the class BUT with so much knocked out in one night I feel good.

Yeah.

I feel good.

The Cold Hard Truth About Kids

2009-10-13T05:45:00.002-04:00

Make no bones about it, kids are tough, even at the best of times. They cause you to constantly re-evaluate your values and principles and they wear you down like nothing else on this earth can.

They change your entire life.

And at first it is ALL bad. They do nothing but cry, you can't take them anywhere, they don't sleep, things happen naturally and they get sick but you don't know what's wrong with them (with a two year old you ask what hurts and they point to their ear, OK, a possible ear infection). They make everyone in the house tired and miserable which means the company you so desperately want with the other person is soured because they're in a miserable mood which makes you go into a miserable mood and for months life just plain sucks.

But then you start getting things back. Smiles, giggles, coos, and while all that's great, it's when they start being visibly glad to see you that starts making it worth it. There are great things about having kids but for me, they happen way down the line, not in the first few months where you can't talk or even whisper in your own bedroom for fear of waking up jr, or when sometimes everything's fine with the child and then other times he just cries and cries and cries and cries. It makes you think bad thoughts.

But they'll go away.

So.

Handy tips for non-parents. Make a list of everything you want to do in life and do it before you have kids.

Then do it again with kids. Well, some of it. Obviously you don't want to take kids to a GWAR concert.

Weight Watchers

2009-10-07T21:03:00.001-04:00

I am back on weight watchers. It's fun this time. Dieting may not SOUND fun but like everything else in life, if you incorporate it with something you like, you'll probably enjoy it a ton more. Like putting a dog's medicine in peanut butter.

And my thing is gadgets. I love them. I downloaded an app for my phone which keeps track of how many points I've eaten per day, has a calculator to figure out points and a favorites list so I don't have to keep inputting the same stuff.

Taking a tip from a review, everything I eat I favorite so eventually everything will be in there. So when someone says let's go to lunch I can ask where and if I've been there, I already have the information and I can say what I want before we even leave. It's awesome.

If I have not eaten there yet, no biggie, I also have an app with nutritional information from a ton of restaurants.

No more having to keep a slide rule with point conversions. No more having to keep a notepad to write in (and then forget to bring with you so lunch doesn't count today).

One makes dieting easy and it keeps me on track and the other makes it possible to make informed decisions, even on the go.

So I started at 171.6 lbs. I'll keep you posted on losses or gains hopefully.

By the way, if anyone out there has an iPod and Nike+, there's a 10K on October 24th at any time of the day. I'll probably be pushing an umbrella stroller with Annie in it, but that's fine. This will be my first 10K. I'm SUPER excited!

-Russ

Drowning

2009-09-29T05:46:00.003-04:00

So, the thing about life is that you're constantly learning new things, even if you don't realize it. Life experiences turn into lessons learned and it's because of this most people realize that they've been progressing in life. Remember what you steadfastly believed as a teen? Is it the same now?

Even in the professional area, you're always learning.

I've been an Airman now (E1-4) for about 4.5 years. It's be just about five when I sew on my Staff Sergeant stripe and become a Non-Commissioned Officer. During those four years I've had good supervisors, I've had bad supervisors, and I've had supervisors that give a lot of lip service.

In all three instances I have learned what I like, don't like, and REALLY don't like and I hope to apply those to my airmen when I get them.

For instance, right now I'm in Airmen Leadership School, the kind of place that epitomizes the "take a drink from the fire hose" mentality and it's hard to keep up and I feel like the things that I'm reading, I had access to for the last 4.5 years. I was just never told to read them, never told to start practicing these skills. The rank of Senior Airman, where I am right now is supposed to be a position where your supervisor is grooming you to be a leader by having you do these things.

And they aren't TOUGH things, they're just a LOT of things, but honestly, how much easier would all of this be if I had access to just the outside sources used in class? We have study guides for in the class and I understand they wouldn't want us giving those to our airmen, but we also use publications that I have seen but never paid attention to and maybe that falls on me, but I was never told to pay attention to them.

Anyway, I've been learning and I hope when I come out of it, I can hurry up and finish something that needs to be done and then I'll deploy, and while deployed, my cross training paperwork is going to be turned in. I hope to come home to find orders to go to a new tech school and learn a new job and I'll get some new airmen.

But as for right now, I'm just going to school, reading a TON of stuff, taking ltos of notes and trying not to drown.

School Is In

2009-09-01T15:57:00.002-04:00

We moved into our house in the summer time. I didn't pay any attention to the fact that it's right next to the entrance because honestly why would that matter?

Oh it matters.

Now my parking space disappears if I leave the house anytime between 2 and 4 in the afternoon and in its place is a parent who is usually very snappy about moving because it's THEIR spot where THEY'RE waiting to pick up THEIR kids.

My advice is simple. If you want to wait for your kids, that's fine. Walk to the gate to get them. Get some exercise. You're in the military anyway so suck it up and do at least a LITTLE PT.

It's like a freaking parking garage outside my house!

The Morning Routine

2009-08-31T05:03:00.002-04:00

When I was a kid and growing up, my dad always woke me up in the morning. Not deliberately, he didn't come into my room and shake me awake of turn on the light or anything like that but his boom boom boom walking around getting ready for the day woke me up.

And he got up so freaking EARLY!

So early in fact that even though I wanted to get up and tell him to have a great day at work and see what he looks like at that hour in the morning, I could never convince myself to get out of bed.

Ah, to be young again.

And now I'm on the other side. I don't think I wake Annie up because I take care not to, but here I am, waking up at five in the morning to get ready to work out.

Sometimes, especially with these little realizations that I'm doing a lot of the things my dad did, I hope that I can do a better job. I think every parent wants to be better than their parent but in my case, I want it more than most.

Adventures In Dad Land

2009-08-26T20:24:00.001-04:00

Well, today we had to take Adam to see the doc about acid reflux. That’s kind of like heartburn. It sucks. He has it, just like Annie did but he’s on meds and is doing well because of them. Today was just a check up to see if it’s working well.

So we walk in and there’s a woman with a baby and a Playboy diaper bag. Bleached hair, inch-long black roots, and gold slippers. I doubt the common sense of anyone who has a Playboy diaper bag.

Anyway, we take Adam to the examination room and lay him down and the nurse says to take his clothes and diaper off.

Taking the diaper off a boy is always a dangerous thing. There’s a weapon being housed in there after all.

I take the diaper off and he has pooped. No big deal. I grab some wipes and wipe him down because he has to be naked to be weighed. Well, as I’m wiping him down he flexes and a ton more poop flies right out of his butt.

By the way, a disclaimer: this blog deals with bodily functions. If this bugs you, you should probably stop reading.

Anyway, it’s pretty bad, like pushing the pump on a Play Doh toy and making a tube or something. So I’m waiting for him to be done so I can clean him up to get weighed. I’m holding his legs up so there’s as little mess as possible and he decides that NOW is the time to pee. So he let go and peed all over the place. Well, less all over the place and more all over his face. It was a direct hit. The best part is that he was shocked about this shaking his head like “WHAT’S GOING ON?! WHY AM I GETTING WET?!” And yet, the pee keeps coming.

So he finally finishes peeing and pooping and I clean him up and we weigh him (9.9 lbs by the way) and he’s crying as I take him back to the examination table and he locks his legs and I tell Kim it’s crazy, it’s like he wants to stand up. She looks away from the nurse and to Adam and apparently she looked like she was on fire and Adam decided he was going to put her out with the only tool he had available. He peed on her. It wasn’t like she was close either, she was a good distance away, but he still let her have it. I laughed hysterically. Oh, the table was all wet, there was still the nasty diaper around, Adam was crying, Kim was now wet, the nurse wasn’t too happy but here I was in uniform and clean as clean can be. Amazing.

Ah, being a dad…

Two Things...

2009-08-25T06:58:00.002-04:00

1) I was selected to pin on Staff Sergeant. That's E5, the same rank my dad was when he RETIRED after 20 years. Hopefully I'll make at least E6 before I do the same. A little less than half of the eligible Senior Airmen were selected so odds were pretty good, but still, it's cool that I made it.

I always wondered where I would be and what I would be doing when I passed the test and made the rank. I don't think I REALLY thought I would still be at my first duty station, in my first enlistment term, doing the same job but with two kids and four bedroom house. It's cool.

I haven't been promoted yet though. That should happen next time I deploy I think. It'll be great. I'll be out there and one day I'll be a SrA, the next day I'll be a SSGT. I'm going to need to order new nametags...

2) I finally figured out Nike+. The problem I was having with it was that I KNEW I was walking significantly further than I was getting credit for and frankly, it's disheartening. So I looked online for troubleshooting and whereas some people were saying it measures by impact and the strongest impact is in the sole of your shoe so get out a knife and cut out a niche in your shoe for the sensor, I also found a significantly less intrusive way of just turning the sensor over. Turns out this is a common problem. I guess Apple and Nike think you'll KNOW which way to put it in whatever case you do or that it even matters.

Well, it does matter. The difference is last time I got credit for 1.2 miles I think and this time I went 4.13 miles. That's a big difference and once again, I'm inspired to get back on this thing.

-Russ

Roto Rooter

2009-08-24T06:49:00.002-04:00

Rooting is a thing that infants do where they're looking for something with the only thing they actually know they have: their mouth. It freaks me out. I'm sure I'm the onyl one though because that's what people tell me. There's just something about a baby that doesn't know he has arms and legs yet squirming around on my chest, mouth open and searching for either his bottle or his nuk (pacifier and pronounced "nook"). It reminds me of aliens or bad guys from Doom 3.

I don't really mind though. Yeah, it freaks me out, but I'll get over it.

But last night, he was rooting around in his pack and play where he sleeps ALL night long grunting and whining and the onyl time he was quiet was when Kim fed him, I held him, or when I finally lulled him into sleep for about an hour. Apparently I'm a very sleep-inducing guy when I want to be.

All night.

In the long run, one night isn't a lot, so I'm not really looking for "you're overreacting" or anything, I just felt this frustration that comes with little sleep and is somehow attached to wearing the most uncomfortable uniform possible the next day on a Monday and running out of soda.

So I'm not complaining too much here, it's just a bad night of non-existant sleep. I feel worse for Kim though since she sleeps next to Adam and therefore the grunting is louder.

The Kindle

2009-08-22T15:12:00.003-04:00

It's no secret I'm a huge fan of the idea behind the Kindle, even if some of the things that come with it are flawed. Not every book is available on the Kindle (but the same applies for bookstores and even Amazon's book department), the new one does not have an SD card slot which was handy to archive your purchases, the fact that Amazon has the power whether they say they'll use it or not, to reach into your Kindle WITHOUT you permission and amend, or delete books from your library. That's ridiculous.

Even iTunes, which is what the Kindle gets compared to all the time anyway, has an OPTION to download updates to the apps you buy on your iPhone/iPod Touch.

There's also the fact that the thing is freaking EXPENSIVE. The price went DOWN to 300.00!

Then there's the price of the books. 10.00 may seem cheap, but considering that I don't really OWN the item, it's not cheap at all. I can't loan it to friends or sell it, and for this inconvenience I'd like to see the price of books drop to reflect the fact that they aren't selling me an item but an "experience" as another blogger put so eloquently. Not to mention the money everyone's saving by not actually printing a book.

Some reviews suggest a price of 3-5.00 which seems right to me as a consumer because I would probably buy more books, but what about as an author? Well, the same blogger that called the item an "experience" also said that money paid to authors needs to be re-thought and looked at like at a library where certain countries acknowledge the fact that the author is getting zero money when a customer borrows a book vs. buys one and pays them either a flat rate or an amount per time the book is checked out.

The main thing is the price though. Amazon needs to get this device into the hands of the public and the public will make it rise or fall accordingly. Nintendo had a habit of taking hits on hardware costs because they knew that they would get the money back with software sales. The same applies here.

Also, publishing companies need to realize they aren't going to get away with charging Amazon the same amount of money for an ebook which would give them who knows how many percentage points more in profit. They need to adjust the price they sell Amazon the books for to reflect the same profit margin or maybe a little less to pay the author a little more.

However with all of this, I still want one. They're damn pricey but cool as all get out.

8.19.09

2009-08-19T19:59:00.002-04:00

Alright, everyone, settle down. Lots to go over today.

1) I was published in the October issue of Vintage Guitar. I’m pretty pleased about it, not only because I’m helping out a charity and actually lending more credence to it by getting it published in a major publication which makes people that approve grants more likely to approve but because I finally achieved my dreams of writing for a magazine, limited though it was.

How limited? About one hundred words limited. It was painful to write so little after I had just gotten done writing so much on my own for the blog that led VG to agree to the article.

I’m not complaining though, I was published in a magazine which would have been enough, but I was published in a GUITAR magazine which has always been a dream of mine.

I’m pretty proud.

2) I’ve added a guitarist to my crazy list. I’ll share more about this at a later date, don’t worry. You don’t think I’d keep YOU in the dark, right?

3) The angry whopper. It’s not so angry. It’s actually pretty good. Kim says she was able to work through half of one before giving up and going to chicken nuggets. I say she eats like a girl!

4) I have a target audience of one for the 5th Fret. I just wanted to write and say that when I write for the Fret, I’m basically writing with this person in mind and because they’re so dang cool, smart, funny, caring, etc, hopefully everyone else can enjoy it. I think it’s working. To that one person: you’re awesome. I don’t even know if they read the Fret (or this blog for that matter) but they should feel good knowing they’re who I imagine I’m writing to every time. It helps keep me in line.

5) That’s about it, I guess. I did want to say I’m grateful for the friends that I have because sometimes I feel like certain members of my family are a great big letdown. Of course I can’t say WHO just in case one of them is reading (they like to talk to each other), and tons will claim we’re family and need to stick together no matter what. I disagree. I think there’s a breaking point and a couple are teetering dangerously close to it and like Everclear’s “Santa Monica” I’ll want to move on to something better (though I won’t be attempting suicide by jumping off the Santa Monica Pier like Art Alexakis did).

6) OK, one more. The results of my recent promotion test come out tomorrow. We're well beyond jinxing it so I'm not worried about putting the information out there. Last time I took I had a distinct feeling when I looked at every single multiple choice question and it was "Well, I have no F'ing clue which one to pick." This time I only felt that way about two of the four possible answers so hopefully enough well-placed stabs in the dark will end up tacking another stripe to my arm. I certainly hope so. The money would be welcome.

That's it!

Until next time!

8.16.09

2009-08-16T15:05:00.003-04:00

Oddly enough, it's been really easy recently to write blogs for the Fret, but not so much here. You woudn't think that's the case though. Here I could just jot down my thoughts for the date or what happened where on the Fret there's research, and they're usually quite a bit longer so I have to type more and more time is dedicated to it. Honestly, I think that's why I don't write here quite as much as I would like to. After writing a Fret blog I'm exhausted. I enjoy it though.

And things are going fairly well for the Fret. We're well on our way to breaking another record for amount of hits per month and while that number is NOWHERE near what other guitar blogs do, I post quite a bit less and I honestly think I'm getting those numbers honestly. I don't post much news and I don't flood reader boxes. One of the blogs I read has parenthesis for amount of blogs (like are next to the months on the left)only the parenthesis are next to the DAY. That's craziness!

No, I write blogs that are saying something that's in my mind and I don't want to flood the inboxes and succeed in both making blog readers stop caring about what I write and burn myself out in the process. I love the guitar and blogging just as much as always so I'm still going strong. The Fret's only a little ways away from it's first birthday. Whoo!

Adam's doing good, still growing. He slept through the night last night. He's way more comfortably with Kim than me.

Kim's doing good too. Healed and ready to go.

Annie is Annie. I love her to death. We went to Home Depot and walked in and she said "WOW!" and while I'm not too keen on HD, it's cool that she is.

I'm happy. Tired, but happy.

-Russ

BBBRRRRAAAAIIIINNNNSSSS.....

2009-08-13T16:39:00.001-04:00

Sorry I haven’t written in a while. Since Kim had major abdominal surgery when Adam was born, she’s been fairly immobile. It takes her about five minutes (literally) to sit up in bed so if Adam woke up needing changed and fed (because it’s a package deal in our household when it comes to infants) it would take her forever to get to it and there would be a lot of bending over to get the tote with all the stuff in it, twist around to get Adam, getting back to where she can sit comfortable, etc. etc.

So I’ve been sleeping on Kim’s side and taking care of Adam. A couple of times Kim has helped out usually around 4 in the morning when I’m feeling particularly… non-sympathetic. I’m not a bad guy or anything, there are just times when you lean on your spouse and say I can’t do it this time, I’ll go insane, you do it. It happens and that boat rows both ways.

But lately I’ve been doing it all at night and I am worn OUT. People come in at work and talk to me and I’m not my usual chipper self. I have tried to write a couple of blogs for the 5th Fret but they came out bitter, incredibly sarcastic, jumbled and ultimately boring. I couldn’t even proof read them, they were so boring. I couldn’t in good conscience post those, now could I?

I feel very zombie right now. And each day it gets worse and worse. It’s rough. Honestly, a ton of people LOVE the newborn phase. I honestly can’t see why. The baby doesn’t smile, talk, recognize you, sleep through the night, or reward you in ANY way besides breathing. I don’t mean to sound like a douche or anything, but that’s the truth. The first few months is ROUGH.

But then the fog clears and smiles start coming out, babbling starts, maybe some rolling or crawling, but honestly it’s just that smile that really matters because that probably happens first and with it you know that things are going to be OK, and they’re only going to get better.

I wonder if post partum depression occurs more with first time parents or parents who already have kid(s). My money’s on parents without kids. Parents with kids know it’s going to get better, no worries, just keep. Pushing. Through.

That’s what we’re doing right now, just pushing through.

Status Update

2009-08-07T07:40:00.002-04:00

Wow, 208 posts. That's craziness.

So what's the status update? Well, let me tell you. For a little while it looked like I would get no sleep whatsoever because Adam refused to sleep at night. That was the first night. Then the second night he slept quite a bit more during the night and last night he only woke up once for a feeding and changing and then it was back to sleep until 7 in the morning.

Annie was most definitely NOT like that.

So how else do they differ? Well, Annie didn't lift her head for a very long time or show any motivation to go anywhere. If you put her down on her stomach she would stay on her stomach with a "meh" kind of attitude only to be super pissed seconds later because when you're on your stomach, EVERYTHING is exercise. A baby does this thing called the Superman where they lift their head, arms and legs off the floor while keeping their belly on the floor.

Give it a shot and you can see why they would be pissed. Their brain wants to do this and their body needs to be trained to. The good thing is it requires nothing from parents other than putting them on the floor.

Like I said earlier, Annie didn't sleep through the night or close to it for a long time too. I think this may have had something to do with Kim and me though since we were both wicked stressed because a baby is a huge change to life and we weren't really ready to let it go right then. This impacted our marriage and there was some stress in the house. And Kim had wicked post partum depression. But the stress is gone and this time around Kim's fine depression-wise.

I was so freaking excited about Adam waking up only once (this means he also didn't wake up playing the Nook game which is where the pacifier falls out of their mouth and they grunt and moan and eventually cry for it back only to lose it mere seconds after you put it back in their mouth. This game was not played last night by HIS choice, not mine) that I practically SPRANG out of bed saying my little rockstar slept almost all the way through the night AND let me sleep to a decent hour. How about that, I'm going to buy you a guitar.

I already had the guitar picked out too. A Gretsch Corvette.

I've been giving this some thought, buying the kids a guitar. At first I was thinking a Telecast because they're strong guitars, but a Corvette isn't exactly fragile. They're light, with fairly thin necks and short scales so while it may be easier to fret than, say, a Tele, it wouldn't lead to a dependence on a kid-size guitar.

So I'm thinking both will get guitars if they show interest in it. I know Annie's showing interest and if she still has that interest by age three where she can understand not to poke the strings that are sticking out at the headstock and avoid cutting herself, I'll get her one and even try to track down one made in the same month and year that she was born.

Same with Adam.

I may get one for myself too. That way they can say they play a guitar just like Daddy.

And your very first new Dad tip:

Sleep with a shirt on. I know it's all the rage to go to bed bare-chested but with kids there are two things you want to wear to bed: pants and a shirt. Most importantly a shirt. Your baby will be puking and snotting and all that on your chest during midnight feedings (if you're doing the bottle thing). It's best for that to go into the shirt and then just change your shirt instead of on your chest where no matter how hard you scrub with a towel the feeling of its presence just won't go away.

-Russ

7.28.09

2009-07-28T06:24:00.002-04:00

Well, still no baby yet. I'm not worried, he'll come eventually, but I really want him to come soon. So does Kim. She wants it to be natural, the whole she's doing something and then oh god, time to go to the hospital thing.

I'm cool with waiting for that too. It's just that right now there will be at least two days in the beginning of August where I won't be there all day, one day to shoot and one day to fly, both to maintain currencies (I'm not a guy that enjoys shooting very much so it wouldn't count as a hobby) for work and all so I can go to ALS.

For those not in the know, ALS stands for Airman Leadership School and there are a couple of ways you get put in it. You can either make Staff Sergeant and need the class (you have to graduate before you can sew on your rank) OR you have to be in the AF for more than four years and be a Senior Airman. That's the route I took.

Honestly it's best to knock this out now anyway, even with a baby hot from the oven. Later on family will be coming down, then more family, then I'll deploy, and then I'll be trying to cross train into a different job so when else does it look like I can dedicate weeks to studying?

Anyhoo, the baby can come whenever he wants, I'm not worried. I don't have to take all of the days the AF will give me off work at once, so it'll work out.

Annie is a recent convert to the world of George of the Jungle from 1967. Hilarious show. I used to watch it as a kid and now I still enjoy watching it.

Anyway, here we sit with fingers crossed. I hope the baby comes soon.

-Russ

7.23.09

2009-07-23T07:22:00.001-04:00

I don’t understand why companies release exclusive stuff and keep it exclusive.

Consider this: a company releases something REALLY cool, but only in limited numbers. Then the collectability of the thing goes up and resale value is huge. Does this do ANYTHING for the company? No. This only positively impacts the buyer who is now the seller because he makes more money.

Look at Beanie Babies. They had a few rare ones and the collectability was huge and there was a gargantuan market for these little bean bags and the company did what? They made more of the rare ones. Makes sense. There is no reason someone should be making more on a company’s product than the company, right?

I’m all for releasing something exclusively at first, but then just go ahead and release it. DVDs documenting the construction of custom guitars that only come with the custom multi-thousand dollar guitar. Just go ahead and release it. I bet at 15-20.00 it would sell and the company could see that maybe there’s a small market for this kind of thing. Yep Roc’s cover CD of Reverend Horton Heat songs is an exclusive only included in a fifty dollar limited edition package for the Rev’s new CD. It’s just not practical for me to buy it because 1) I need a real CD case and 2) I DON’T need a shot glass. It just doesn’t make any sense.

I’m bummed though because I DO want to listen to that cover CD.

Anyhoo, it’s silly guys. Stop it. You underestimate the pack rat’s mentality and over estimate their self control.

-Russ

7.21.09

2009-07-22T07:53:00.001-04:00

Man, what an opportune/inopportune time for Kim to have a baby!

I mean, I guessed the baby would come closer to the 23rd, Kim said SHE thought the baby would come closer to the 3rd. There’s money on who’s date is closest (both post and past, not Price is Right rules). And I feel… I feel like I need a break from work.

Let me clarify: I don’t think I need a BREAK, because looking after a two year old while going back and forth to the hospital to check on Kim and see the new baby and make sure everything is fine on two, maybe three fronts if work decides to get in my business, that’s not a break.

But the AF is absolutely amazing when it comes to family time and I doubt they would do anything more than come over to visit, see the baby, make sure everything is fine, that kind of thing. It’s pretty awesome that the boss would do that, by the way.

However, I am sick. Annie is sick. I’m not lying on the floor dying, but I am sick and I wonder if the doc would say “you stay back. I don’t need your baby to come out only to get a cold and die.”

If that could happen, I mean.

Yesterday a co worker who I look up to had his going-away lunch. I feel wicked bad but I couldn’t go. I was tied up at work. How lame of an excuse is that? Well, it happened anyway. So I felt bad and went to the BX where they have greeting cards and they were all sold out of going-away cards. What a bummer. So I ended up getting a blank card and writing a note.

I feel pretty bad that he’s going away, honestly. There are so few people in the world and in the military in particular that are smart and compassionate and professional. He’s what I want to end up being in the military.

So anyway, I went home and wrote the note as I’m eating a delicious peanut butter and apple jelly sandwich and Kim is looking at me kind of smiling and she says she thinks she’s going into labor but she doesn’t know for sure. She thinks she’s going into back labor. I had never heard the term, but apparently you can have wicked pain in your back that blocks the knowledge of contractions and when they come and go. How about that? The back is a curious thing though what with all the nerves clustered at the base. When you have a kidney stone, you have absolutely no idea what’s wrong with you because EVERYTHING seems to be wrong with you. You think you need to pee, to poop, the stand up, lie down, sit up, walk, stop. Nothing helps and in the end the pain that can show up in places like your stomach, your side (obviously your side), your genitals, all of that pain can build up to such agony that you say OK! Nuts to this, I’M going to the hospital.

So I didn’t doubt that she was in labor. To be fair she did say she wasn’t sure. I called work who gave me the rest of the day off just in case and after Annie went down for a nap, Kim relaxed and the pain went away. So we figured we would try to induce with a walk. Kim wanted to walk in the AC so we walked through Home Deopt a couple of times and then took Annie to a park and nothing happened.

I don’t feel bad that nothing happened though, I’m just excited to get this ball rolling and get Kim in the hospital, the baby out, and Kim and the baby back in the house separately.

Anyhoo, that was MY day.

-Russ

7.16.09

2009-07-16T19:59:00.001-04:00

I like to Google old schools occasionally. I don’t know why, really, but I do. I like to see how the buildings have changed or if the grounds have been altered.

I always start with Roydvale Primary school which was the first school I went to when I moved to New Zealand. I loved it there, though the other kids weren’t always the friendliest. I understand though. I’m not your average bear in any way so I could see how I didn’t fit in exactly with the other kids. I’m not worried about that, and it doesn’t hinder the fact that the kids and staff were amazingly nice for the most part and that New Zealand is the most beautiful place in the world.

It is.

I’ve checked.

They have new pictures up and the buildings are the same, they still have the same tree standing that I used to eat under. They changed the park and added a new one for the smaller kids. The uniform is the same.

The staff doesn’t look familiar at all, but why would they? I went there about fifteen years ago, so why anyone would still be kicking around would be beyond me.

It’s bittersweet in ways that I can’t really describe. Not that I’m holding back or anything, I’m not. I don’t like the idea of putting out less than everything (that’s the extremist in me). I really can’t describe it. Maybe I ache for the days when there was so little to worry about and I know those days will never be back again.

Maybe I just miss the surroundings and nice folks.

Maybe I miss reading during lunch.

I don’t know. I just look at these pictures and think of the times I had.

And before anyone starts thinking bad about me, this isn’t really different than dragging out a dusty photo album to stroll down memory lane.

I really wish I could put Annie and the baby in that school. It’s a good one. I learned a ton from that school and did a LOT of things under adult supervision that most American parents would flip out about.

We read a book for three hours straight and took care of math the next day.

We make miniature hot air balloons and filled the basket with ethanol spirits as fuel. Let me repeat: we were in fourth grade.

Ah, youth. I miss it.

Sometimes I’m tempted to email back and see if someone can get me a phone number or email (preferably email) for one of the teachers from there that taught me, but I don’t. I’m not kidding, I didn’t fit in as a kid. I don’t even know what made me so weird, but I was nonetheless. I don’t think anyone really liked me.

Oh well. There are still some memories from there that I really liked. Going to the parks, going to movies, playing cricket. I definitely miss playing cricket.

-Russ

7.15.09

2009-07-15T19:58:00.000-04:00

This morning I woke up and decided that today was the day that I got to work calibrating my Nike + system. For those of you who don’t know, Nike + is a glorified pedometer that takes the amount of steps you’ve taken and equates that into distance so you know you’ve run half a mile or whatever, all while keeping the time and giving you vocal reminders. This is going on while you listen to your iPod. The music will fade out and you’ll hear a woman say “half mile completed” or something like that, then the music will rise back up.

It’s a pretty sweet thing.

When it works right.

But on Friday I walked/ran for an hour and it said I only went 1.62 miles which is slower than a slow stroll. That was completely bogus. I got in my car and found out I really went a little over three miles and THAT means there’s a BIG problem. Especially if you’re looking at my little avatar off to the left that says how many times I’ve worked out and how far I’ve gone.

It’s not that the distance is what’s bugging me but it is a big thing.

My thing is this: for years I’ve had an injured hip, I hurt it on duty my first year in and since then I’ve had problems running. So much so that I have taken the walk test where you walk three miles as fast as you can for the past three years. Twelve laps is a bummer and I have future hopes of getting jobs that require you to be able to run 1.5 miles.

So I’ve begun my own rehabilitation. I walk and for the last one minute, I’ll run. Then the next week I’ll run the last two minutes. The next three minutes and so on and so on until I can run 1.5 miles after warming up a little.

I’m using the Nike + system as a stopwatch more than anything in this regard but I want to know when I’ve hit 1.5 miles and when I’ve hit 3 miles. If I can get my walking to a point where I don’t need to run and still go 1.5 miles in a good time, then hey, no need to run and no worries about my hip. I can just work on walking from then on.

So this morning I went out and went to the school next to my house. Every gate was locked though (it is summer time after all) so I hopped the fence and went to the track. I started the system and started walking and after a quarter of a mile it said I had walked .01 miles. But this is why I’m calibrating right? I end the calibration after the quarter mile and (surprise) it says I did not walk a quarter of a mile. It won’t let me say “yes I did” and reset itself to that, either.

What a bummer!

I’m going to have to wait until the middle of the night and get in my car and drive to the 1.5 mile mark on my path and spray paint a little line so I’ll know to look at my timer, then the three mile mark too.

So I came home a little upset and went in and decided to upload a bunch of Led Zeppelin a friend had burned for me. I’ve always wanted to check them out a little more in depth and the last few days I’ve been working myself up into a frenzy to do this. But I also want to spend time with Kim so I don’t get on long enough to upload it all.

Since she was still asleep though I could. So I started and iTunes would only take certain songs and claim an error with others. Then iTunes would crash. It took me an hour to get most of their stuff on and I’ve figured out how to upload the rest though it seems to create a huge strain on iTunes.

Then I forgot to drag it into the playlist my phone syncs to and now I don’t have my Zepp for the day.

Bummer!

On the plus side, I did order Kim’s anniversary present. She should be pretty stoked when she gets all that smell-good stuff. I really hope she likes it.

That’s all for now.

-Russ

7.14.2009

2009-07-14T07:57:00.003-04:00

Annie decided to wake up at four in the morning today. I wasn't so worried. She'll eventuall go back to sleep I said. Except she wasn't doing what she normally does when she wakes up which is talk to herself, playing with the assorted dolls in her crib. There was some consitsant banging which may or may not be coming from her room (certainly was coming over the monitor though) and Kim was getting worried. What if she was choking, her neck wrapped by a five inch cord tethering a magnetic pen to a magnadoodle. Maybe someone was trying to break the window to kidnap her.

Well, like I said I wasn't worried, but I did what any good husband would and went to check on her.

To say she was awake was an understatement.

She was AWAKE.

She popped up when I opened the door and insisted on me picking her up and I figured that since Mommy was so worried about her, I should bring her in to our room so she can see her with her own eyes.

I did and Annie bounced around on our bed until Kim got sick enough of her constant moving at 4 in the morning that she picked her up and put her to bed in the most soothing possible way which just pissed Annie off and she screamed bloody murder. Then, within minutes, she quieted down again and went back to drawing on her magna doodle (which is one of the greatest inventions ever) before going back to sleep.

The morning is starting off well.

I will say a shining moment so far is that Kim updated the iTunes account and I bought two apps, a countdown app because I need to know stuff like that, and a post card app where I can take pictures and send them in a "post card" complete with message and fake stamp. I'm pretty excited about them.

I was thinking about getting the famous fourtrack app but it's ten bucks and I want to try something out first which is just using the voice memo feature. It isn't four tracks, but I may like it just as much.

Blue Monday #1

2009-07-14T07:04:00.000-04:00

Wearing blues on Monday sucks. It just does. They’re uncomfortable and you never have a pen. Well, almost never. As a flyer, I keep my pens on my sleeve in handy pen pockets. They are always there. If you do not have pens in those pockets, you fail as a flyer. That’s like not bringing beer to a check ride.

On Monday though, those pens are still in your flight suit and you are in your blues. Your itchy, non-breathing blues. It sucks getting into them anyway but that first time when you need to write/sign something and reach for your pen only to realize it’s at home is a horrible moment.

Because since everyone keeps pens ON them, there are NO pens in the office. They have a way of growing legs if you know what I mean. Several people I know label their pens “Stolen from XXXXXX.”

Today though, was especially sweet because it was starting to rain on my way out to the car. I’m not worried about a little rain though it’s obvious it’s a great idea to get the raincoat out and hang it up to get the wrinkles out. And buy some new rank for it (it still has one stripe after all while I have three).

I got to work and the rain had slowed from drizzle to nothing and went in unscathed. However I went in the wrong door and entered oven by mistake. Apparently the air conditioning for the building broke over the weekend and it didn’t send out an alert to someone to come fix it. Instead the ever growing volume of complaints from flyers (who like to complain anyway) that are wearing blues (so they’re already in a bad mood) apparently woke up someone and a repairman was sent out.

I wanted to get out of the office though and a suggestion was brought to me that a group of us should go out to Target and buy soda for the squadron bar.

OK.

No problem.

The A/C sure was nice in the car. And in Target. And back in the car. But then an idea came to me that all this soda would need to be brought up to the second floor and put in the fridge in the bar that is now fittingly a Furnace (it’s called the Furnace officially, by the way).

And yeah, it sucked all right. I was there, loading up all these sodas into the fridge sweating through my blues thinking that life is pretty awful right now. After a while though, it was done.

I was on my way back to my office and someone popped up from NOWHERE and said that I looked like I was really hot. I was. Well, he needed help unloading his car because he had a similar idea and went to get food for the bar. So back downstairs, get the food, bring it upstairs and load it up.

On the way to lunch the A/C was pushed to the max on unsympathetic passengers.

-Russ

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"

2009-07-11T07:37:00.002-04:00

In conversation, I often mention that I'm putting paperwork to cross train into a different career field. It isn't that m job is awful, it's just not for me. People fly and love to fly. I love to fly commercially as a passenger, but I'm not so keen on the added responsibilities that flyer's have. That's just me though.

So when I say this people often ask me what job I want to cross train into. Well, there's a few. Mainly they are the ones on the ground that wear their blues often, but there are some that stand out.

I do plan on auditioning for AFN (or Armed Forces Network) hopefully as a radio personality. TV's fine, but I don't feel it is where I would excel. I also want to put in to be a journalist for the Air Force.

These are both dream jobs, sure, but I've been told all my life that I have a vivid personality that would work for entertainment but a face that demands to be seen on the radio. I've also been told from a young age that I am excellent in writing and over the time that I have been writing, especially things like the 5th Fret, I feel like I've been honing my style into something that is both unique and awesome.

I'm not trying to brag or anything. I've read a ton of official or semi-official documents and they are dry as dirt. Who would WANT to read that? And I'm not even trying to write official documents, but articles for base newspapers or magazines. I think my conversational style of writing would come across well.

At least, since writing for the 5th Fret I haven't received any hate mail saying that my writing is crap.

However, recently I've begun to doubt my writing ability. I can't help but feel passed over when something else gets more attention. I'm sure there's a childhood psychological reason to this, but it makes me feel that perhaps I'm not good enough.

After all, tons of people tell other people that they are great singers - amazing singers and if they went on American Idol they would win for sure. The people then go to the audition and find out they aren't good at all and that their friends were just being nice.

It's hard to take that pill. I write and think I'm good at it, other people say I'm good at it, it feels good to be behind the keyboard, typing away, sometimes just watching my fingers FLY and think to myself this is fun. Because it is. It's fun and it seems to be a talent.

I'm not complaining too loud about a particular event or anything because it isn't just ONE event, but it definitely does feel like I'm being ignored and maybe it IS because I'm not good enough.

And if I'm not good at something that I genuinely think I'm talented at, how good am I at anything else?

Ah well. Dont' worry about me, I'll bounce back. I always do. And I'll probably write even more when I do. Maybe if I'm not good enough now, I just need more practice. Charles Schulz was of that mind and look where he ended up. I just need to keep working at it and keep putting things out there.

Until then it's nice to have this seperate space to vent when things aren't going all that well. Charles Schulz didn't have that. He ended up going a little nuts because of it.

-Russ

Sometimes

2009-07-03T13:05:00.002-04:00

Sometimes I feel pretty great abotu what I do. There are a lot of perks to being a flyer. You get to wear the flight suit, you get to wear wings, you get to know you are part of less than 1.5% of the enlisted AF and most of the other jobs either exist to directly or indrectly serve you (meaing to get you in the air and keep you there, not serve YOU specifically). Whenever there are check rides there is check ride beer and in very few other jobs would you finish with a mission and sit around and talk about it while you drink FREE beer (unless it's your check ride, then you're buying the beer).

My AF coin, a thing every AF member is supposed to have on them at all times for the coin chellenge game (someone throws down their coin with an audible slap and everyone has to produce a military coin of their own. If they do NOT have a coin, they buy the next round. If they DO have a coin, YOU buy the next round. This can make for a fun time) is a bottle opener with my wings on it.

We're a very proud people.

But flying jobs are limited both to aircrafts and to bases. My particular plane is INCREDIBY limited and as a result you see a lot of folks stay at a base for far longer than a non-flying enlisted AF member (some people stay upwards of TEN years before moving, some even SIXTEEN meaning they would go ONE other place and probably retire). I joined the AF to see the world and pay the bills and hopefully have a lot of fun along the way and while I AM having fun (now more than ever in my career), I am about to turn in my cross training paperwork to ground myself and get a different job.

Part of me is bummed about it. I know a lot of people are going to ask why I wanted to LEAVE flying when so many people are trying to get into the fields, and the wings are permanently attached to my uniform (it's a rule) so I'll always be open to those questions, but I want to go more places and see more things. I want to go back to Tucson, and go overseas. I don't want to be limited.

That's pretty much it. I don't want to be limited.

So while flying is awesome for some people, and is something that I would probably enjoy if I weren't surveillance (perhaps a boom operator, or load master), I'll be leaving it (hopefully) soon.

Meanwhile, let me tell you about this morning:

We woke up, and took Annie to the Air Museum because she loves planes. It's odd to see her love things that we don't really expose her to, but she comes to naturally. I think the thing she loves more than anything in the world is trains. All the time, if she sees a train, she's happy and she wants to touch it or play with it. She loves trains. She loves planes too. And cars. She's very tomboy.

Of course she loves guitars too...

Anyway, after the museum we went to Cracker Barrel and ate, then went to Target and picked up some assorted chemicals and the movie Cars for Annie.

It doesn't SOUND like a lot, but to a two year old it is. She went down for a nap and she really went DOWN. I think she was asleep within five minutes of closing the door.

Awesome.

Back!

2009-06-23T20:40:00.000-04:00

I apologize for not writing recently. I’ve been obsessed with keeping the maps updated and on the front page. That’s my fault. And I’m sorry.

But hey! I have news!

I bought an iPhone. I’m pretty freaking stoked about it though I do have SOME minor complaints, like how in the office it makes for an awful iPod. After a little while the iPhone locks so when a song comes on that you aren’t in the mood to listen to, you have to unlock the iPhone, select iPod if you’ve gone to any other screen and then press next track. Good thing I have an actual iPod.

Anyhoo, I love my iPhone. I have a Facebook app and a Myspace app though honestly I’m on Facebook much more. Facebook just seems to have more friends though I really wish everyone in the world would log onto one system and keep everything updated like maiden names, schools you attended, etc. etc. That way I could find anyone I’m after.

Ah, but that’s the crux of the matter, eh? Enticing people to go to a different social networking site? Look at Virb. I haven’t heard anything on Virb’s front, but when I was on it, it was very very slow. Almost dead...

I’m ALSO very excited to have my iPhone because I plan to get a blogging app so I can update the blog when Kim goes the hospital to have our next child, a baby boy.

I’m hoping it works out and I can add pictures directly from my phone AND type in landscape mode (it’s the only way to go, really) so I can keep everyone updated on what’s happening.

I know you’ll be just as anxious as I will be.:-)

Should be good stuff!

2009

2009-06-16T06:41:00.003-04:00

2009 is the year of activity for me. I want to see just how much stuff I can do before the year is up and so far I think I'm doing pretty good. I've read something like 25 books, written over 50 blogs for the 5th Fret, took three pretty challenging professional tests, took something like 13 CLEPs out in the desert (they're free for the military to take, by the way, so you take them and if you fail you just try again in six months) and I'm only six credit hours away from my associates.

Now, a little tangent. I fully realize how sad it is that I graduated in 2002 and here in 2009 am planning on finishing my FIRST degree. That's seven years for a two year degree. Yeah, I don't feel so great about that. But rather than let it beat me down and give up altogether because it's just easier to say you never went to college or you could do it if you weren't so damn busy, I'm not playing that game, at least this year. Besides, it's still kind of a big thing and at the core, it's something to be proud of. I THINK - I'm pretty sure - that I'll be the first person to get a degree higher than a high school diploma or a technical degree. I'm pretty excited about it, but I'm even more excited to get started on my bachelors.

Anyhoo, back to the activity. I moved, I took my Staff Sergeant test, and (don't say this too loud) I don't think I did TOO bad on it so let's hope the cut off score is really low and everyone else was sick or distracted when they took it so I can be really high and get my stripe soon.

For those in the know, making Staff is a big deal. My dad retired as an E-5 in the Navy (which is a petty-officer 2nd class, but in the AF is Staff Sergeant) after being in the Navy for 20 (I wish I could capitalize numbers) years. Here I am, I've been in for a little over four years now, and I've taken the test once and missed the cut off score so I'm hoping to get my stripe before my fifth year mark and start working on E-6. While I wouldn't be happy at ALL retiring as an E-6, I could at least know I did one better than dad. And if I make it to E-8 (one step away from E-9, the highest you can go) I will have made it past my father in law.

Of COURSE let's not forget the baby that's on the way. That'll be quite the hash mark on the "things done" list.

Tons of stuff and I'm trying not to be lazy about it. I'm pretty excited.

Video for Mark!

2009-06-07T20:14:00.002-04:00

I guess everyone else can enjoy it too:

Progress

2009-06-03T06:23:00.003-04:00

I know you want to know. May was a record month for the 5th Fret. I have been accepted by Guitar World on their blips page which isn't THAT big of an honor but one more place that my blog can be read giving me a wider audience and probably GW some more money in some way. I don't mind.

Because of this GW thing I was able to join a forum of blog writers where I'm learning all sorts of stuff like their monthly numbers and let me say right now, I'm pretty sure I'm the lowest number-getting person there. I don't beat myself up about it though because if you look at my numbers, so long as I'm posting, the numbers are going up.

There was that time when I deployed where the numbers did go down, fairly steadily while I was gone but then I came back early May, started blogging as soon as I could and the numbers went past the previous record of 1,1XX (x=something I can't remember) to 2,0XX. The website was visited over 2,000 times in May. And that seems so small written out, I know, but honestly, when I started writing, I was happy that over 100 people came to visit. So there's progress being made, the numbers are going up, I think my writing is improving and there are even guest contributions about cool stuff I happened upon, one of them scheduled to come out on the 12th has an incredibly well-written article to go along with his amazing pictures.

I'm proud.

One Of THOSE Days

2009-06-01T07:23:00.002-04:00

So, in a nutshell, I came back from a deployment to the desert and got a ton of stuff done with not that many breaks. It isn't a big deal.

But then we moved.

When we moved we didn't feel like paying the movers an arm and a leg to move EVERYTHING wanting them to focus instead on the furniture or heavy things (like boxes of books). They'd take apart the beds, crib, dresser, etc. and put them back together at the house. It makes sense to us to move like this because I think my time and energy is worth the money I paid these guys. I don't want to lift that crazy stuff.

The apartment was not done the day we moved (Tuesday) so we worked on it, section by section until it was done (yesterday). We tackled Annie's room, bathroom and the porch, then we tackled the master bedroom, closet, and bathroom which took all day (the closet took all day and it was my fault), then we did a hallway, the kitchen, the dining room and living room. It SUCKED to sit down last night, WICKED tired from all this work, work that just spread out all over the place and think to myself, NOW I get to go to work.

I'm not excited.

But at least I'll be in a different office, so there's good news.

Grudgingly Talking

2009-05-21T14:28:00.002-04:00

While I would love to sit here and type that really WANT to be here typing, I only feel a compulsion to do so. I don't actually WANT to. The reason I don't want to is because I know it'll knock down my maps. Has anyone noticed the change in states or countries that have been going to the 5th Fret and if so (or not, I guess it applies to both camps) does anyone really care?

There's this guy named Henry Rollins who has a show and writes a blog too. A blog Google Reader can't subscribe to (which is an awful shame, by the way) but a blog nonetheless and I like the behind the scenes kind of feel to it. I've toyed with the idea of blogging about how the 5th Fret is doing on a more personal level. I mean, if CNN (Hey! I'm not comparing myself or the 5th Fret to CNN, it's just for an analogy) were to let the anchors talk during the time where they would normally be reporting the news about how happy they are to be there and how they've come so far and all that, wouldn't you be a little pissed? I know I would.

But if you had a favorite reporter and they had a blog about that kind of stuff, you may find that interesting, right?

I'm looking for a little encouragement here. I mean look at the maps! Those are current places, just the current places. I KNOW the 5th Fret has been viewed before from Africa but did not mark it off on the map because it was not currently visible (the log only goes back 500 entries). This month has already become the record holding month. I've interviewed my favorite podcast hosts, I've got a couple of ideas in motion, and Guitar World has picked up the blog for the Blips page, a page where tons of guitar blogs are funnelled in perhaps to ease the worry of a guitar player who is looking for all the blogs but I think it has more to do with the fact GW wants some money. That has to be it.

Honestly though, I couldn't take myself off the page if I wanted to, so instead I'm trying to focus on things that might not be so mainstream. Companies and products that are not as big as they should be. Maybe my blog can help out a little and if it can, that's great, and if not, I tried.

Anyway, I'm not saying this blog is going to turn into the 5th Fret Pt. 2, or anything like that. More average blogs will be coming when I have more time to write them. Right now there's a lot going on at home.

But I'll be back, you know I will. Until I do come back, keep checking the maps. You see I have more than 20% of the WORLD covered?

The Whole Conquer Thing

2009-05-13T20:21:00.002-04:00

I'm pretty proud of how many people are reading the 5th Fret and where those people are from. There's a ton of people in the US reading and there's quite a few in Europe (it started out with more visitors in Europe than the States) and I've been looking at visitor maps for a while and the site I use only keeps so much of a log.

Well, I wanted to see just how much of the world the blog has been read by so I started cataloging them and you can now see what's going on. As I was putting it together I thought that I'd like to share that with YOU so you can see. The little blog that is making its way into more and more homes and I'm so incredibly proud of it, I don't really know what to say. This is the first time in my life I've ever made something that people are reacting to positively (or at least not sending me angry or disappointed emails), something I started from scratch and with the help of my excellent writer friends, has become accepted in a few circles, acquired quite a few hits, and the longer it goes on the more I feel like I'm part of this thing I love so much - the guitar.

So I apologize if I seem a little proud or gushy but this is the first time anything like this has happened to me and I'm so stoked that it's grown to what it is and hope it will keep growing.

The 5th Fret Conquers the World Pt 2 (The WORLD!)

2009-05-13T20:20:00.069-04:00

visited 135 states (60%)
Create your own visited map of The World

The 5th Fret Conquers the World Pt. 1 (USA)

2009-05-13T14:55:00.014-04:00

visited 50 states (100%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or jurisdische veraling duits?

Just What Did I Watch?

2009-05-08T15:46:00.003-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it71O2KupEE

I know you're curious what we do in the desert, well, what we may watch on TV in the desert anyway. This was a video that was constantly on and I think it would serve as a WONDERFUL thing to show at sexual harassment seminars because even though you can't tell what she's saying (or I can't tell what she's saying, anyway) the message is clear: Sexually harass, and you're going to jail, Bozo.

Enjoy!

More of these to come. There are some CRAZY videos out there!

Hey Everyone!

2009-05-03T06:54:00.002-04:00

I'm back. It's awesome to be back and hopefully you can look forward to ruglar blogs once more. Once I get all set up, I mean. You know how it is.

I'd post pictures but they're being edited by my super talented photographer of a wife. Once she's done, I'll post them.

Thanks for reading. It's really good to be back.

A Noble Attempt

2009-03-30T04:00:00.000-04:00

If you’re reading this, that means you’ve reached the end of the well of blogs I had built up to cover the time that I am deployed.

When you think about it though, it wasn’t that bad. I came back to Georgia in mid January, and started writing and today is the 9th of February. So if today’s February 9th and that isn’t the date that this blog came out, that’s pretty great, right? In the past month I’ve built up more than a month into the future AND published at least one blog per day, so I don’t think I’m doing too bad.

Unfortunately, I didn’t do good ENOUGH and as a result, you’re reading this.

I apologize to you.

Apparently, even though I can blog quite a bit, I’m not nearly as verbose as I thought I was.

Oh well. I’ll come back eventually and get this ball rolling again.

I just hope you’ll come back too.

Podcast CRAZY!

2009-03-18T04:00:00.002-04:00

I have a long trip ahead of me and thought it would be cool to bring both of my iPods, the new 8gb nano with all of my favorite music on it as well as some new CDs that I either haven't heard or feel I haven't given a fair enough shake, and a few podcasts as well (and photos too) and the older 40gb model that will be brought out there with the same music on it (so one can charge while I listen to the other one).

Since the much older 40gb model will have less than, say, 6gb of music on it there's a lot of space to fill and I am all for hearing something new and trying things out.

So I went on iTunes and went podcast crazy.

The podcasts that I will be bringing with me are as follows:

The Adam Carolla Radio Show (over 7,500 podcasts in that one)

Book Chat with Rainn Wilson where he interviews Slash

Gibson.com's audio podcast

Guitar Music Theory Lessons

Guitar Player Podcast

The Guitar Shop Podcast

How To Play Guitar

Jazzpath Podcast

Monster Guitar Podcats (who's length is not so monster)

Premier Guitar Podcast

Pro Tone Pedals Podcast (I've listened to them all already, but the music in them is something I need to dedicate more time to)

Rock Star Guitars and Rigs

Stuff Mom Never Told You (bound to be entertaining)

Stuff You Missed In History Class

Stuff You Should Know

And my personal favorite Six String Bliss

I've got a TON of stuff to listen to now and tons of variety too.

I'm pretty excited.

AND IT WAS ALL FREE!!! FFFFRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

iTunes / eMusic

2009-03-17T04:00:00.002-04:00

I've been reading reviews of eMusic all morning (because I woke up early, was bored, and curious about the site). The whole reason I'm reading reviews of it is because they don't really let you go in and poke around on your own, instead offering you 25 free downloads for trying the program out or 50 free downloads for subscribing (plus the number of downloads you bought). Without being able to peruse the catalog, how was I to know if this would be something I would be interested in?

I mean, have you ever seen a CD store in a strip mall and decided to go in only to find that the ENTIRE store catered to a specific genre that you did not like? It's happened to me a couple of times and I felt pretty disappointed. Just imagine how disappointed I would feel if I had to give them my credit card even if they promised me they wouldn't use it before going in and seeing they had nothing I want.

So there's a little tip, eMusic. Open up the catalog.

But their subscription plan is what REALLY entices me. For about $12.00 you get 30 songs of your choice. They also say there are free songs every day which I think it cool because it seems to me that this would most likely be used or allowed by bands that are just starting out that you probably wouldn't be interested in/find on your own so while it's sure to be hit and miss, those hits will be unexpected.

Cnet's review of eMusic said that while it was all well and good with the prices, the program and the interface (though a little confusing to the novice they say) eMusic does not really stock mainstream music.

I don't know if this is still true because I can't look at the freaking catalog.

And I'm not a really big mainstream guy. There are some mainstream bands I like: Metallica and Fall Out Boy jump to mind immediately but most of the stuff I listen to, my neighbors would have never heard of, even if the band is pretty popular in their own right (Alkaline Trio, the Misfits, the Quakes, etc etc). So while I'm not a huge mainstream guy I DO like the ability to choose that if I want. Just because something is mainstream doesn't mean it's bad (same goes for pop music), so I'd like to peruse that as well.

Now, if iTunes were to offer a subscription-based plan for the same price I would be all over it. You have from the 1st of the month to the last day of the month to download your 30 tracks (or more because there are more expensive plans) and there will be no carry-over with unused tracks. You can't bank them.

But here's a cool little tip I thought of. You should be able to drop the songs you want into your subscription cart and not be limited in the amount of songs you can have in there. Then arrange them as you see fit and click download and it'll download the first thirty songs on the list. This way if you're out of town for months like when I go out of town, you can tell your wife that all she needs to do is click download and that's it.

Another complaint I hear about eMusic is the lack of "a la cart" option where you can buy song by song. iTunes already has that in the bag so that problem is already solved, though personally, if I could get 30 downloads for $12.00 and after that it would be $1.00 per song, I would just be patient and wait for the next month.

So somewhere between these two companies is a system that works perfectly. If iTunes offered a subscription-based service that was cheaper considering that the money would practically be guaranteed to come in every month, that would be great. It would be nice if they offered more indie stuff too. It would also be great if eMusic let you look at their catalog before giving them your card information and had more mainstream music (apparently).

But since I'm already using iTunes, I say "Come on iTunes! Let's get the music to the people at a lower price on a subscription-based service!"

Space Saver Bags

2009-03-16T04:00:00.002-04:00

Whenever I see ads on TV I almost immediately say to myself that no matter how great the product looks, it's bound to be crap. That's how I was raised.

The more I have experiences with products that were advertised on TV though, the more I doubt that idea.

Sham-Wow. They do make a very handy bathroom mat to soak up the dripping water, and they make an even better spill picker-upper. Annie spilled water all over the carpet and it was picked up in a jiffy. Now true, it was just water so it's not like I'm vouching for its ability to pick up stains too, but still. That one spill probably saved me half a roll of paper towels.

And now the Space Saver bags.

You've probably seen these. Huge plastic bags you stuff your clothes or belongings into and then you close the bag and attach a vaccuum's hose to it and suck out all the air. It compresses the clothes and you're left with something that doesn't take up much space at all.

I personally use them for packing on long trips as it cuts down on the bulk of the bag I'm packing but I can see using them for bedding at home. I really like flannel sheets in the winter time so those can be stored in the bag along with the comforter and the other parts of the set (because I'm sure there's a set) for as long as I like and then when the time comes I can just pull it out, unzip it and everything pops back up. It's crazy!

So if you need a little more storage, give these bags a shot. I think they're pretty cool.

The Kindle Experiment

2009-03-15T04:00:00.002-04:00

It's no secret I want an Amazon Kindle. I think the potential for the device is pretty great, even if it is never realized. I also think it would be very cool to stop cluttering up the house with books because even though I love the look of stacks and stacks of books, I do move a lot and I'm not too keen on lugging them all around.

And since I blog I figured I'd go ahead and make a promise now about an experiment.

If I ever do get a Kindle I will keep track of the purchases made on it and their cost vs. buying them at the bookstore AND as a book on Amazon.com. This will not be a padded list and when I do buy the books it will be on that day or at the most that week when I go to the store to see if the books is available there (or newspaper) and check on Amazon's own website to see how much the most current version of the book costs. If I'm late to the game and the most current version is an eight dollar paperback, that'll be what makes the list because it will be about what I COULD have done instead.

I'm incredibly curious if over the course of, say, a year, that the amount of money saved would surpass the amount charged for a Kindle.

A Stroke of Genius?

2009-03-14T04:00:00.000-04:00

I'll admit, I'm a bit (a lot) of a nerd, but I've never reached my nerdy potential. I can feel it, the potential, but I've never been able to reach it, mainly because I don't have any time to dedicate to the start-up or up-keep of RPG characters. I don't have access to 1) many people I'd like to play with, 2) baby-sitters or 3) the amount of people needed to play something like Dungeons and Dragons for instance.

But I'm not keen on starting something in a video game as a way to try to fill that hole. There's something cool I associate with the pencil and paper kind of games and WoW isn't going to fill that hole.

So I say how come you can't play something like Dungeons and Dragons or some other RPG game on an IM?

Imagine: You set up a game of however many people are playing and the person running the game to the same messenger, and set aside a particular time where everyone can get to a laptop or home computer and play. Just so long as they promise to stay honest with the dice rolls, I don't see it as being too bad.

It's definitely something I'd like to try.

If I Could Turn Back Time

2009-03-13T04:00:00.000-04:00

I'm sure you've thought "if only I could go back in time and tell myself this or that," right? It's natural.

I often think about it and say things like if I could go back in time I wouldn't have wasted so much time and energy on a girlfriend who didn't deserve it. I would have told myself to pay attention in college so I would have had more options than just joining the military. I would have told myself that if I COULDN'T pay attention in school to save some money and not buy DVD's so I could mail clothes and whatnot to Arizona where we fled to after college because the car we drove was full and I had to trade an amp that I liked for an amp that I didn't.

I traded a Mesa Boogie 2X12 cab and a Marshall head for a Marshall combo that was wired wrong and didn't sound all that great BUT it was smaller and therefore OK for the trade.

That was a bad move. The head wasn't go great but I really wish I had that cab.

Anyway, I would have told myself to move away from home much earlier and spare myself a lot of grief. I would have told myself to work more and save some money to buy some quality stuff (again, don't buy DVD's Past Russ. They'll only sit on the shelf) that I would use.

I also would have told myself that even though I have this potential to go back in time and warn against things, that it is probably those things that make my life what it is and frankly, I like my life a lot.

I had to foolishly dedicate myself to a girl who didn't like me for anything more than a security blanket so that I could feel the gut-wrenching pain of the breakup. I had to, so when I met my wife I could make a conscious decision about just what exactly it is I'm giving her. It's awfully tough to give someone the potential to break your heart knowing how bad it hurts. Falling in love the first time is easy.

I had to work a horrible job or I wouldn't have met my wife. I had to drop out of college or I wouldn't have moved to Arizona or joined the military and honestly the military isn't so bad especially in these days. Sure, there are some hiccups and wrinkles, but I challenge you to find a job that doesn't have those.

Honestly, if given the opportunity to go back in time and warn myself about things, I wouldn't change anything major. I definitely wouldn't amass a collection of DVDs and I wouldn't have sold or traded some of my gear. Sometimes I really miss my LTD Explorer (the lawsuit version) and the lack of having a 2X12 cab is the lack of having more amps. It's frustrating.

But other than that, I'd leave myself alone.

I wouldn't want to change then's future or what is the current time.

I just hope the rest of life is like that.

Those Days

2009-03-12T04:00:00.000-04:00

Have you ever had one of those days where you think "if I just get through today, I'll be fine?"

Today's one of those days, but more importantly, this year is one of those years.

There's a lot of change coming this year in my personal life and while happy and excited for every bit of it, I can't help but feel a bit apprehensive too. I mean, come on, change - even when good - is still change and most times change takes some getting used to. When you first have a kid, there might be a few minutes/hours/days/months before you feel like a parent. You're just adjusting to the change of being a parent.

Hopefully that moment of feeling comes to you eventually though.

So right now, I'm a bit nervous and excited but so much of this year is wondering what's coming NEXT year and next year is when some big changes are official. This year is just a countdown more or less.

Besides my Peanut. That's happening this year at the end of July actually. I'm pretty stoked.

Tons of stuff on the horizon! It's a beautiful scenery! I hope it doesn't turn into a raging 15 year torrent of rain and misery!

Attention People! I'm Here To Help!

2009-03-11T04:00:00.000-04:00

I feel it is my duty to come to you people and inform you that you are being emotionally, and mentally manipulated. I know in these days it’s almost expected, but it is completely and totally true.

And what’s worse than the fact that you are being manipulated is that everyone saw how easily it was done and as a result everyone and their mom is trying to dog-pile on you.

But I’m not going to let that happen to you.

OK, here we go.

Thomas Beadie made headlines all over the place with a picture of him obviously pregnant. The headline was obviously attention grabbing saying something like “Man Pregnant” and instinctively the knee began to jerk.

Thomas Bedie started out life as a woman and is a trans-gender. I do not know if this is STILL called a disorder as so often misunderstood things are labeled as “disorders” until someone gets a good grasp on it and then it’s just another thing. Look at homosexuality.

Anyway, Thomas’ wife is infertile so Thomas manned up and got pregnant for her. I think that would qualify as the best present you could give someone and would automatically get you out of all Valentine’s Days, anniversaries, birthdays and Christmas’ for the rest of eternity.

“Honey what are you going to get me for my birthday?”

“That would be the child out on the swing, sweetie.”

Anyway, the fact that this “man” was really a woman was the source of all sorts of confusion and knee-jerking. If you just flat out went up to someone and said “a man is pregnant” then that would illicit an entirely different reaction than if you were to say “a woman who wants to be a man is pregnant.”

Because you know what that boils down to? A woman is pregnant.

And as awesome as that is, it’s nothing so spectacularly out of the ordinary that you say “WHAT?!?!”

So there you go. Nothing to worry about, folks. It isn’t worth the research, it isn’t worth the attention.

It is NOT “opening up the world to more diverse things.”

My question is why is Thomas writing for a gay magazine? I mean, he’s supposedly a man, yes? He’s got the beard, he looks like a dude, he’s got a wife and kids. I mean, that would be like if I wrote for a gay magazine.

Which doesn’t really sound like a bad idea as I think that homosexuality is really no big deal and more straight people need to come out and say so. I think homophobia is just plain silly and should be exposed as such, not as “the norm.”

But there you go, all sorts of people are supplying half-stories and half-truths in an effort to freak you out and practically force you to read what’s supplied, watch what’s broadcasted and engage in horribly emotional debates about what’s right, wrong, natural and unnatural.

The naturality of this is pretty cut and dry when you get down to it.

How Come?

2009-03-10T04:00:00.000-04:00

How come, when I go to Books-A-Million I see entire ROWS of books filled with the Bible, Books about the Bible, religious history, religious journals, devotionals, etc. etc. but I can’t find books about the occult?

Now look: I am not a fan of the occult in the sense that I’m a devil worshipper, but I don’t like being fed select stories and ideas by National Geographic. I like doing my own reading, my own research. I do NOT like feeling like I’m entirely out of the loop.

It’s a minor annoyance, I guess, but it gets under my skin like nothing else. I wish Nat Geo would say “like this show? Want to learn more? Check out THESE books.”

And then I wish bookstores would stock them.

Them and the Anarchist Cookbook. Not because I particularly want to BUY the Cookbook, but because I think we should be able to get any book we want.

To quote Rage Against The Machine:

“You don’t got to burn the books, you just remove them.”

Husband Tip #1

2009-03-09T04:00:00.000-04:00

My grandfather, who died before I got a real opportunity to get to know him, apparently really had a grasp on philosophies for life.

The story goes like this: My mom was just dating my dad way back when and Dad was doing something or other with his car and requested my mom’s help. My grandfather advised her against helping him with this, but wouldn’t elaborate more than to say “you won’t like it.”

Well, she didn’t like it. My dad got frustrated with the lack of help he was getting and yelling commenced and my mom scurried away in tears.

It wasn’t that Dad was abusive or anything, either. There’s just something about doing a project with a family member that should generally be avoided. It should be avoided ALL the time. The only times I could see good collaboration happening is in raising a kid, or doing things side by side, not together if that makes sense.

OK, imagine you’re building a model plane. You don’t want help building your own model, right? That’s just going to slow you down! They’ll have to find the piece after you take the time to request it, and then what? They’ll be bored while you’re gluing the piece on, right? They’ll be looking at you – staring at you – and you’ll get frustrated. And what if they don’t understand the piece you’re asking for?

It’s just easier to build it yourself.

It’s even more fun to work side by side though. The model plane: you’re building yours while they’re building theirs. That is fun stuff right there. I used to do that with friends all the time. It makes for good times.

So, my husband tip for you (or wife tip if you happen to be of the female persuasion) is to try and not get into anything that could possibly be frustrating just because you THINK you might need some help. You don’t. Trust me. Tack another hour to the project time and call it good. Because there’s nothing worse than getting into a fight over something ridiculously stupid like fixing a car, or building a kid’s pretend dining room.

Dad Tip #3: Watch TV

2009-03-08T04:00:00.000-04:00

If you're like any other American adult, you're probably the kind of guy that enjoys watching shows that are violent or sexual, adult oriented at least. Maybe the shows you like would be considered boring by those of a younger stature. Shows like 24, the Office, Top Chef, Dexter, Lost, The Shield, Nip/Tuck etc. etc.

But if you're like any parent that wants to be a good parent you're probably willing to sacrifice those shows or maybe DVR them to watch later and watch shows like Dora the Explorer or Go, Diego, Go with your kid. If so, that's great. I've got some handy dandy advice for you.

Watching these shows can be pretty boring. Shown on Noggin or Nick Jr all day every day, there are many reruns but your kid won't mind. You may though and you may want to do something else while your child watches TV. This is perfectly understandable, but here's my advice. Your child probably likes watching stuff WITH you. They probably get some bonding feeling out of it, much like your wife might if you both watch something like Bridezillas.

So by all means watch with your kid, but you can shift your look at the show and instead of sitting there letting the images blast your mind away, take a look at it from an adult's perspective. Ask yourself engaging questions that a child would not usually ask and then you can talk to your spouse about it later.

Questions like:

"Where are Max & Ruby's parents?"

"Is Wubbzy and adult? If not, why does he own his own house?" This can apply to Spongebob too.

"Can you ever look at Fred Savage the same way knowing he's the voice for Oswald the Octopus?"

Don't be scared to watch your kid's TV shows, if you let them watch TV. I let mine watch TV and so far she's pretty smart. She can repeat a ton of the words you say and she remembers motions to songs, you can tell her to get something specific and most times she gets it, you can tell her not to do something specific ("Get your foot off of that.") and she'll do it. She's smart. Maybe Noggin has something to do with this.

KFC's Amazing Employees

2009-03-07T04:00:00.000-05:00

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2008/12/11/2008-12-11_kentucky_fried_chicken_trio_photographed.html

How often do I post links in my blog? Not very often. I’d say a pretty amazing story would need to come through for me to link to it for your pleasure.

This is one of those articles. Go ahead and read it. I’ll wait.

…

That’s GROSS, eh? Not the fact that girls had been bathing in the sink but that they would want to bathe in a sink that others use to wash dishes or even prepare food in.

The garbage disposal in my kitchen sink often pushes up food that had been theoretically disposed of through the disposal. The dishwasher does something or other and it freaks out the sink and up comes all sorts of nastiness. But that nastiness is just food, food that I had eaten (well, not the EXACT food that I had eaten) so how gross could it be?

It’s still pretty gross and I don’t think the idea would EVER pop into my head naturally that MAYBE I should bathe in it.

You know who WOULD think of that?

Gross people.

Also, did you know that ladies are not supposed to take bubble baths as there has been a correlation shown between bubble baths and UTIs? So, if bubble – soap essentially – isn’t supposed to be in the bath with you, how good would all the stuff in THIS sink be?

The idea makes me shudder.

And yeah, maybe I shouldn’t post a blog like this because it reflects poorly on KFC (and Burger King too) BUT I think this blog SHOULD be posted and EVERYONE should either read it here, or tell their friends, send out mass emails, make phone calls, whatever it takes to get this out there and make it become mass knowledge. WE should do this so KFC learns the lesson that their restaurants should always have managers on duty. Always.

At least a shift lead. Someone who is making enough money and who has enough personal responsibility that they would not let this happen.

Because this just plain shouldn’t happen. The fact that it popped into someone’s head perplexes me to no end and to think that one of the chicks tries on a seductive face in the picture?! Look, little girlie, if you bathe with the Colonel, I know I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near you sexually (though you may smell AMAZING). That’s faulty logic on her part.

Meet The Buttertons!

2009-03-06T04:00:00.000-05:00

Some vegetable oil spread commercial shows your typical Leave it to Beaver family in a black and white setting with a whole stick of butter in their potatoes, whole sticks of butter in just about everything and a condescending announcer says that we didn’t know then what we know of now about cholesterol and trans fats and as a result we can never go back to that.

Because we’re smarter.

But I say that while butter may be bad for you (what isn’t?) it sure does taste a lot better than any of that healthy or healthier oil spread any company is advertising. None of it tastes convincing and I frankly feel like I’m being ripped off.

I think FOOD is being ripped off.

There’s a reason that cooks like Paula Dean are so famous, that everyone is after a “home-cooked” taste. It’s because it tastes better. All the fat, all the grease, everything that will kill you but tastes amazing is what draws people back again and again.

Yes, Americans are having a tough time controlling how much fattening food they eat and their exercise programs so there is a shift in the balance toward the obese BUT the food IS delicious.

So maybe we need to rethink how we eat. I mean, what we have right now is substitution with no change in quantity or frequency. What we sacrifice in an effort to improve health matters while maintain quantity and frequency is taste. Without the taste, that itch just won’t get scratched. You will get full though from all that food AND probably overweight if you eat it every day.

So here’s what I propose. Use butter and whole milk and everything that they tell you NOT to use, but limit the amount of these meals to once a week or once every two weeks and then limit the portion. Whereas you might have just eaten chicken until the bucket was empty you can now say “two or three pieces and that’s it.”

For the other six or thirteen days eat healthy stuff. Lots of vegetables, grilled chicken, seafood, that kind of stuff. Sea salt instead of regular salt.

And exercise. Help yourself speed up your metabolism by exercising and not popping pills.

I think with this change, though radical, you’ll be happier. The taste itch is scratched, the other meals are healthy and if you cook like my wife does, they’re just as delicious (she can grill the hell out of some chicken and my god, it is DELICIOUS!) and seafood is awesome anyway.

Here’s a tip with the seafood though: there’s no need for melted butter. With stuff like crab legs, just eat them right out of the shell. There’s no need to dip them in anything. If you need flavor, pull the meat and shake your favorite seasoning on it.

So here’s to you, healthy America!

The Tucson Children's Museum

2009-03-05T04:00:00.001-05:00

During our vacation to Tucson, AZ we went to the Children’s Museum downtown. It definitely deserves to be written about.

We pulled into the parking spot beside a beautiful building I would normally associate with California in the Hollywood section. Pretty trees, nice landscaping and a very… California feel to it. I liked it.

However, there were two homeless folks outside the museum. I couldn’t help but wonder, if you’re homeless, why would you want to go to a children’s museum? There doesn’t seem to be any logic to that at all. It’s one thing to hang out at a bus station or someplace that’s free and warm but outside a children’s museum seems like quite a stretch.

And, not to sound like a douche or anything, but it didn’t make me feel that safe about getting out of the car. Now, I know they’re probably great people who just had a bit of bad luck and they ended up where they were, but as a Dad, like I said before, I’m a protector first.

There wasn’t much to worry about though because between the time I got out of the car and the time I got my daughter out of the car, the cops had shown up and was writing one a ticket while the other waited for his. I guess they don’t mess around there. Again, not to sound like a douche, but I was glad.

Inside, Derrick at the desk wanted to know where we were from and how old our daughter was. We had to sign in on their welcome sheet and he remarked “Georgia? That’s pretty far away.”

Indeed, Derrick. Indeed.

The first room was specifically made for little kids. The littlest of kids. Of course, you may not want to bring your babies there, but if you kid can walk around and pick stuff up, they’ll probably have a good time in the room. It was designed like a rainforest with a Mayan temple you could build in the corner from lightweight foam block and once the temple was built the pressure of the blocks would press two buttons on the wall and red lights would flash on the temple. It was pretty cool.

There was a small slide that was what skateboards call a pyramid, where you have an incline that you climb and then a flat surface and THEN the slide down. Below the flat part at the top, there was a scene of plants and large plastic insects that you could see through plexi-glass. Annie wasn’t so interested in this though. She wasn’t really interested in anything that the museum wanted her to be interested in when it came to this room. She was content to stand in the middle and just stare at everything. I’d climb in some foam block builder things and try to coax her in but she wasn’t having it. She just wanted to stare.

And then these kids came in, kids way too old for the room, and started terrorizing the place. It was the kind of situation where you felt bad for the things in the room, inanimate things. Their parents were there on the sidelines saying “now Johnny, don’t do that,” but they said it without feeling and you could tell they weren’t really interested.

I hate parents like that. You should be interested and willing to put some feeling into everything you do for your kid, even if you’re disciplining them. ESPECIALLY if you’re disciplining them. If you need to be like “Hey! Johnny, you do that one more time and we’re going to go someplace with video surveillance!” even if it’s an empty threat, you do that. Go ahead. Unless you’re literally BEATING your kid they need to be kept in line when you’re out so do what you need to do. Just don’t break the law. And for god’s sake, watch out for little kids. I may be a protector but I can’t be right next to my daughter all the time and I swear to god if your nine-year-old who’s playing in the 2-and-below room runs into and hurts my kid, him and I are going to have words and if you want to join in, feel free. I seriously doubt there’s going to be much of a nice guy in that situation.

The next room was the train room, and man oh man, Annie loves trains. She loved this room too. There was a giant train in the middle of the room that had a giant tube running through it and Annie was happy as all get-out walking back and forth through the tube. I think if I made a similar thing for her room I’d never see her because she’d be walking all day.

She’d be wicked fit though.

Next up was the health room which was a weird room that had doctor’s coats, this cool drum that was connected to a handprint. You put your hand on the handprint and the drum beat out your heartbeat. It was awesome. But there was all sorts of weird stuff like a large Operation game. The thing was about the size of Annie. There was also a grocery store in there and Annie grabbed a shopping cart and started throwing stuff in it and then taking stuff out and then throwing it back in.

And these OTHER kids came in with the same kind of inattentive parents and this little brat walked right up to Annie, emptied out the cart and took it away. Instinct said grab the kid by the hair, move him and take the cart back, but I restrained. Surely his parents would discipline him for taking something that someone else was using but THEY were too busy playing Dance Dance Revolution (seriously). Good job parents.

Anyway, Kim was on me about talking too loud when I mentioned that it’s CRAZY THAT YOU CAN’T GO OUT WITHOUT SOME FREAKING BRAT TAKING SOMETHING THAT SOMEONE ELSE WAS USING and that kind of stuff. She shut me up pretty quick, but I was pissed. I mean, Annie wasn’t bugging anyone, she’s small as can be and here’s this little kid that you just KNOW is going to grow up to be a douche taking stuff from her. I wanted to tell her and have her understand that this is the kind of guy she’s going to see all her life and she is never to date them. Ever. But she’s not even two, so I’ll have to wait.

Next up was the dinosaur room. I’m a HUGE fan of dinosaurs, have been since I was a kid and I’m always interested in seeing them. If a movie has them in it, I’ll watch it. If a museum has a display, I’ll go to it. I’ll go by myself if I have to. I don’t mind. This room had dinos that looked real and more importantly, they looked like they could move. There was a fence between you and them, but you could tell by the joints that they could indeed move.

Now, when I was a kid and went to a similar museum, they had a holograph of a T Rex skull that looked like it was about five feet long and it was looking right at you. Of course it was flat but as I got closer I started getting a little nervous and greatly excited and my freaking mom grabbed me and shocked the hell out of me leaving me struggling for breath. Ever since then, if a dinosaur looks like it can move, I approach with caution and an ever present eye to the peripherals.

And they did indeed move. They didn’t move nearly as much as I thought they would but they DID move and it was fun to watch. Annie enjoyed it.

Yet, again, even MORE annoying kids came in and tried to ruin it. They went right up to the fence blocking the view, their parents were trying to take pictures of them and the kids were even leaning over the fence grabbing a T Rex’s teeth and all without any yelling ro warning. Look, I know this blog is coming off like I think kids should be heavily disciplined. I don’t. I think they should be disciplined accordingly, that’s all. And some freaking kid trying to climb into a dinosaur’s mouth is how things get broken, more visually intrusive fences go up and the distance between you and them gets bigger and bigger and less fun.

Don’t let your kid be the douche that is responsible for this.

The funny thing that happened though was one kid was trying to grab a tooth in the T Rex’s mouth and his sister says AND I QUOTE: “He’s going to eat you!”

And Andrew (his real name. Screw the innocent) said “I like being eaten!”

I thought that was funny.

It was a great trip altogether though. I had a blast and Annie enjoyed it too.

Anticipation For Guest Blogs!

2009-03-04T04:00:00.000-05:00

A blog has certain milestones to be considered legitimate and the only one that REALLY matters is “is someone reading this?” That’s pretty much it.

And good for you for reading.

However, there’s one milestone that I always thought was cool and that was the Guest Blog. I never understood why someone would want someone ELSE to write for their blog, their personal blog that is (the 5th Fret has five contributing writers right now, myself included but it is not a personal blog). And yet, I’m super excited to say that I am going to host a guest blog from another writer out there.

It just so happens that my wife is going to be writing the guest blog to give us all BIG news so stay tuned to the blog and keep coming back for your daily does of Russ’ Random Thoughts and be on the lookout for a blog from her.

I know I’m excited to see it!

The Dream Rig

2009-03-03T04:00:00.000-05:00

I’ve been thinking about, researching, tweaking, and swapping out various amps and pedals to make my dream rig, the rig that if I were to become famous (stranger things have happened) kids would go out and try to reproduce.

I’d like to share that rig with you and why I’d like it.

It starts with a guitar. My Gretsch 6118T is an amazing guitar. It’s comfortable, it doesn’t feedback unless I want it to, it is responsive and feels great. The frets are a comfortable size, the fingerboard is ebony and looks and feels amazing. The only thing I plan on doing is swapping the pickups. While I like the TV Jones Classics that are in it right now, I’d like something with a bit more output and a bit more hotness. I am NOT looking for super-hot, only-sounds-good-when-the-gain-is-cranked. I’m looking for a balance here.

The balance is hoped to be achieved by putting a TV Jones Powertron in the neck and a TV Jones Classic Plus in the bridge. I love the Gretsch sparkle, but LOVE to play dirty stuff and this just seems more up my alley. I also like a more Gibson-ey jazz sound so I’m hoping the Powertron is able to support that. I’m pretty sure it will be able to.

Then to the amp! A Fender Princeton Reverb clone through a 2X12. I think the Fender sound provides the greatest base possible for any sound because it has a great sound all on its own. I don’t need 100 watts. I don’t need 50 watts. I don’t even need 30 watts. I don’t need much at all, especially in these days of miking amps through PAs for live performances (assuming I’ll be playing live). Reverb is ALWAYS good to have, as an option at the very least. It’s great for recording and for bedroom playing, but obviously if you’re playing in a big room you may have all the reverb you want naturally. I REALLY like my reverb, so I’m betting I’d still turn it up.

So we have the guitar, amp, and pickups covered. There’s only one thing left:

Pedals.

Ah, pedals. Little boxes of joy. Toys for guitarists. Secret weapons in your sonic arsenal.

I love the attitude and response I received from Pro Tone pedals and was basically sold before I even started doing research on them, but now that I HAVE, I want my whole pedal section to come from Pro Tone.

And what would be in that section?

I used to think I’d like three distortion pedals, one for rockabilly “just a bit of hair on the notes” kind of tone, one that has balls-to-the-wall classic rock tone, like AC/DC where it’s distorted but in all the best ways. Clarity is maintained, but all the attitude and joy of cranking up amps is still there in the same package. I’d like a pedal with a metal tone too. Ungodly metal sounds. Kill ‘Em All kind of sounds.

And right next to these three distortion pedals would be a delay.

That would be all, actually. I know guitarists put all sorts of boxes in front of their amps and have wahs, and phasers, flangers (it’s the year of the flanger donchaknow), envelope filters, etc. etc. and honestly I’m just not that interested in that kind of stuff. I’m a pretty straightforward kind of player.

SPECIFICALLY, the pedals on the board would be a Digitech Bad Monkey which I already have. It’s basically a Tube Screamer and right now, it’s all I can justify for getting a sound I probably won’t use all that often. I love rockabilly, but I spend more time playing rhythm and chords than trying to rip out rockabilly single-note runs. It’s still nice to have though.

RIGHT NOW, both the classic rock sound and the metal sound would be supplied by the Pro Tone Body Rot II, which seems to be not only an incredibly versatile pedal, but one of the best sounding ones I’ve ever heard. Raw and urgent-sounding. Just what I’m after.

Now, if Pro Tone comes out with something more geared toward the classic tones, I’d be inclined to add that to the chain because I really like the idea of set-and-forget pedals where I know if I push the on button on this pedal I have Metallica and this pedal I have AC/DC and this one Brian Setzer. I don’t want to spend much time monkeying with knobs if I have the opportunity to play live.

The delay will come from Pro Tone too. The P.E. Delay specifically.

In all fairness, Pro Tone pedals are not the cheapest pedals in the world, but they are made by a guy who you can call and speak to directly or email anytime you want. Just writing back and forth I know that if I bought a pedal I’d have his support should anything go wrong and that peace of mind is pretty reassuring. The bragging rights of supporting a business here in the States is pretty cool too. That’s just an added bonus though. It also doesn’t hurt that they LOOK pretty awesome too.

And there you go. My dream rig. Pretty awesome, pretty versatile and equipped with just about anything you could ever want.

Filling That Big Ugly Hole Inside Of You

2009-03-02T04:00:00.000-05:00

I watched an episode of something, I think it was called Toddlers in Tiaras. It showed a dad who was obsessed with making his TWO-year-old daughter a beauty queen.

Look here, Bub: your kid – and this may come as a shock to you – is a flipping KID. No kid should ever be entered into these competitions. Ever.

I understand some teenage girl looking for validation or maybe someone looking to prove they still have it or maybe even someone looking for scholarship money, but the difference here is that these people CHOOSE to enter the competition. Their mommies and daddies didn’t choose for them.

This behavior, I’m not even kidding, is absolutely revolting to me.

My daughter is the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen. I’ve never been more proud, and to me (I’m sure others feel the same way about their own kids) she’s the prettiest, smartest, most awesome little person out there. She’s God to me and I’d do anything to help her and benefit her and I will not hesitate to die for her. I know this with such a certainty that frankly, I think it’s shocking. I am completely willing to lay down my life for that of my daughter’s and there’s not even a question to it. Just pure instinct.

And I’d do anything to protect her too.

That’s my job as a father, you know. To protect my kid(s). When they’re six or seven and want to watch a scary movie, it’s my job to say no way, Jose. It’s my job to give a good once-over to any date that comes to the door and scare the hell out of him with various means to guarantee nothing happens to my little girl that would make me take a lifetime trip to jail.

Parading her in front of judges for some sort of validation on MY part is NOT in the job description. I’m not entirely satisfied with myself as a person – I don’t think anyone is – but the holes inside me will never be filled by having my daughter judged in anything.

Anything.

And to think that there are parents out there who do this literally sickens me. They should have their parent-cards taken away from them and their kids should be given to people who want to have kids that they love and that will be good parents to them.

Fake and bake tans should never be ANYWHERE near a kid. Fake nails should never be near them. I take that back. I remember being a kid and knowing girls who used those press-on nails but that’s a little different than getting a professional nail job done, right? Styling your kid’s hair is something that does come with the territory, but hair should never be dyed, it should never be painfully teased and manipulated to make it bigger, prettier, and more cute in the eyes of judges at the expense of your kid.

That’s the big thing here: I can’t shake the feeling that this is ALL at the flat-out EXPENSE of your kid. That’s the worst part.

If my sweet little girl comes up to me at, let’s say age twelve and says she wants to enter a beauty contest, she can. She asked and she can enter it BUT there will be no dieting and a lot of the rules will still apply here. I don’t want her changing herself to try to be more desirable to someone else.

EVER.

That’s the biggest flaw with these contests, I think. These girls are out there trying to impress someone else and as a result they’re changing themselves to some preconceived notion of how THEY think I want them to look. I’d much rather have a beauty contest with girls who just get dressed up like they’re going to dinner. I’ve never gone to the Olive Garden and seen a sparkle-dress with a huge V cut down the front or back of it with a train unless it was prom night.

I don’t like beauty contests in general (I don’t know if that was obvious or not) but it’s one thing to see adults entering their flipping kids into contests. Oooohhh, and then freaking out about results? Telling your kid they LOST when they got a trophy? Isn’t that going to be the most confusing thing you’ll ever have to explain? “Yes sweetie, angel of mine at the age of only two, they DID give you a trophy as big as you are but it’s a pity trophy. Because you sucked.”

Awful people.

And the BEST thing about it is it seems to be a community unto itself. I have NEVER met ANYONE who would think it’s cool to do anything like this.

So many people say it is NOT OK AT ALL to do this, that I kind of want to go to a contest and ask the parents of these kids just who dropped them on the head or what exact phrase DIDN’T Daddy say to them as a kid. Something had to have happened.

Disgusting.

We're Breaking Up. We Can Still Be Friends Though.

2009-03-01T04:00:00.000-05:00

It was pointed out to me that I spend way too much time on the internet and that PERHAPS I should look at it and ask myself if there’s anything else I would rather be doing with my time.

So I looked at what I do online and it basically comes down to two things: I write blogs and I post on message boards. I go to two forums pretty religiously, and a couple off and on. Just talking about guitars pretty much.

So I thought IS there anything I would rather be doing with my time?

The answer is yes.

What I’d like to do is read, play guitar, maybe do some studying when I start going back to school, etc. etc.

So I stopped going the forums. Not cold turkey, I still visit from time to time, but I’m not on them with nearly the same passion. I think this is the first time I’ve ever done something in moderation.

That’s a big deal actually. I’m very much an all or nothing kind of guy so the idea of merely lessening an activity and not completely stopping it kind of blows my mind. It’s something I’m eager to try out.

But the blogging will continue. I was tempted to disconnect myself completely from the computer save putting new CDs on iTunes and updating my iPod, but I didn’t think that would be very fair to anyone. I didn’t think it would be fair to you because maybe you like coming here to kill time. I didn’t think it would be fair to me because I actually get quite a bit of satisfaction both from this blog and the 5th Fret. I’d feel pretty guilty leaving my blogs and their readers.

Anyway, so that’s what’s going on. I woke up today, day one of my lessened activity, spent maybe ten minutes on the internet (a good chunk of that trying to find videos of the Orange Dual Terror and emailing questions to Orange regarding it) checking the forums and not posting much, then finishing a blog for here and then I went to the bathroom to play guitar. I didn’t want to wake up my lovely wife with my horrible playing and it sounds the best in the bathroom (the acoustics are lovely). That, and I was feeling kind of like annoying the neighbors. If you’re in the bathroom at the same time as a neighbor (either next door or below, it doesn’t matter) you can hear what’s going on.

So maybe I made their *ahem* morning ritual interesting with some background music.

And how do I feel with this lessened amount of forum activity? Pretty good actually. I already miss talking about guitars as much, but I enjoyed actually playing guitar. I’m very excited for tomorrow morning where I start my jazz lessons. I figure, if I’m going to wake up that early anyway, I might as well learn stuff instead of just playing around.

The Seeds Of The Male Mid-Life Crisis

2009-02-28T04:00:00.000-05:00

I'm sure everyone is familiar with the mid-life crisis. God knows there's been enough jokes about them. The idea that a 35-45-year-old-man will snap one day and come hom in red convertible even though it's incredibly impractical to his by-now family life, the idea that he'll divrce his wife of twenty or so years and try his luck with girls half his age, the increible feeling of dissatisfaction.

And where does it come from? Does every guy have this to look forward to?

I don't think so. I actually think that the problem isn't as wide-spread as we are led to believe. I also have a way to cure it in future generations and a little insider-info on what causes it (according to me).

The quarterback who won the Super Bowl this year is 27. That's three years older than me. Patrick Stump, singer and leader of the multi-million ablum selling band Fall Out Boy is one year YOUNGER than me.

It's greatness that causes the crisis.

A guy can look around and see people about his age aspire to - and achieve - greatness, while he just kind of fades. He doesn't fade away, he's still very much there, but life isn't as he expected it to be. As he gets older, more and more people that are younger than him are rising to greatness, running multi-billion dollar companies, being famous rock stars, winning the Super Bowl, living out HIS dreams and he was always told that he could be great too.

Here's the cure. Parents, if you don't want your kid to suffer a mid-life crisis (which I don't think is a terrible thing, just something that needs to be addressed correctly and worked through like any other emotion or fit of depression especially) don't even tell them that they can be great. Don't ever say they can be the next Stephen King, John Elway, Eddie Van Halen, or Albert Einstein.

Of course they COULD be the next one and I am ALL for telling your kids that while they have infinite potential, maybe they need to realize that though they want it, though they DESPERATELY want it, they might not get it. It isn't in the stars for everyone.

Because kids do have potential, and I say go ahead and tell them that they could be great but don't just put their head in the clouds.

Imagine an empty landscape and one man stands alone in the middle of this landscape. It's flat, with nothing going on. He's the biggest thing around.

Now imagine skyscrapers ERUPTING from the ground and the landscape chnaging with blurring speed to something very similar to Manhattan. That's a mid life crisis right there. That guy who was the only thing around is now the smallest thing around.

That's pretty sad, right?

It's a sad emotion.

Football

2009-02-27T04:00:00.003-05:00

I have never watched a football game all the way through in my entire life. It's a boring sport that rewards some of my least favorite personality traits and personalities in general. They are way longer than the clock says and football fans have a downright spooky commitment to the game.

I know this isn't uncommon, but my Dad would watch a game on Sundays and I'd sit there on the couch watching the clock tick down, stop, two minutes later resume, stop, two minutes later resume etc. etc. just waiting for the end of the game.

The end would come (sometimes without the clock even running down to zero) and I'd say "hey Dad! Let's go do something," and my dad would say something like "No way! The game's about to start."

What game?

"The game I was waiting for."

THIS IS NOT UNCOMMON! It is freaking DEATH for someone who does not like football! You were watching a game, waiting for another game to start? Just how long do you plan on attempting to grow ROOTS to the couch?!

MAN I do NOT like football.

And then Monday rolls around and everyone comes to work yelling about how their team won, lost, rubbing in someone else's face, someone rubbing it in yours, etc. etc. all while other people are trying to work. That's real pleasant.

But I watched my very first football game last night (this is obviously written earlier and then scheduled to release on the next available day which is February 27th. It's really February 2nd) and it was pretty great.

I had a good time and it wasn't JUST because I had money on the game though that was kind of fun, but it was a good game, I thought. All the way to the end.

Maybe it was just a really great game but I had a good time and understood everything after it was done. I understand the excitement. I understand the idea of wanting to feel that excitement all day long on a day off. I understand wanting to get together with friends and family and bonding over the games. I can even understand the idea of coming to work on Monday and yelling with your co-workers about it.

I literally feel like a huge door in life has opened up.

It's crazy.

Obama Mail

2009-02-26T04:00:00.000-05:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/us/politics/01obama.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&src=ig

How about that? Do you think that there are elected officials having popularity contests in hopes of obtaining the President's email address, even if they never plan to use it? Just to be part of the elite crowd?

I think this is pretty interesting.

And even more interesting to me is the fact that the President is using email, something George W. Bush decided not to do when he went into office because of the Presidential Records Act.

Which makes me think that this Act is due for re-shaping? Do we really want to access every email sent by the President should the need arise?

I just think it's cool there's a cell phone in the White House (and probably a laptop in the Oval Office).

Good for you President Obama.

iPhone VS Blackberry Storm

2009-02-25T04:00:00.000-05:00

I love Apple. I just have to get that out there right away. I'm a huge fan of them, have been a huge fan of them ever since I first started typing.

I am also a huge fan of iPods.

And I like iPhones quite a bit too.

So whenever a company comes out with an "iPhone killer" I always chuckle. I personally don't own an iPhone but I have gotten the chance to play around with quite a few of them both pre-3G, and 3G and I think they're wicked cool.

The apps are wicked cool as well.

The new Blackberry Storm (new to some anyway) is Blackberry's attempt to kill the iPhone and I'm pretty shocked to say it just might work.

It's a little more big and bulky, I thought, when I got the chance to play with one on Friday, but the bulkiness made for an easier time gripping it. Holding an iPhone it didn't take long for me to feel like I couldn't type for much longer. I don't think I could carry on a conversation over instant messengers or type up a long email on an iPhone. It is thin, but being thin isn't ALWAYS such a great perk.

The fact that the whole screen is an real, god's honest button was something I thought I wouldn't like. Buttons wear down, become less sensitive and leave you THINKING you pushed it (because you know you pushed the button. You FELT the click) and it didn't register. But using the Storm, I really liked being able to actually click the button.

There are bummers with the Blackberry though, mainly that it is sold through Verizon who, though they have great reception, I have had absolutely HORRIBLE experiences with in customer service in the past. I will say (in all fairness to Verizon) that their store in Pensacola, FL next to Target on 9 Mile Rd had excellent service, but once I moved I experienced some of the worst experience possible in their Tucson, AZ stores, their Warner Robins, GA stores and even their central calling station where my wife was not informed that by tweaking our plan we were signing up for two more years that required NO signing whatsoever and they refused to let us out of the contract because of this. Those three bundles of experiences have left me feeling cold toward Verizon.

Other bummers include a lack of multi-touch technology, the fact that only one button can be pushed at a time and that, though apps are bountiful on Blackberries as well, they don't have the cool ones I see on the iPhone.

It's not like any of this matters to me personally. I'm not near enough the end of my two year contract with AT&T to think about new phones (though new technology always interests me) and the fact that the Storm is sold exclusively through Verizon means it is not applicable once I DO start thinking about a new phone.

Flight Of The Conchords

2009-02-24T04:00:00.000-05:00

I wrote a blog about Flight of the Conchords a while back and it basically consisted of a plea to the majority of humanity to check the show out. It's hilarious in its own right, but I think musicians especially will enjoy the humor.

That said, this is not a "musicians only" kind of show.

It's hilarious.

And now it's back for season two! I watched the first episode today and thought it was great. I am a little curious what happened to the Crazy Dogggz but I'm willing to let that slide. I think maybe they wanted to tell a whole story in one season so if it got cancelled the viewer could walk away feeling satisfied.

I'm still really glad it got picked up for season two AND I can't wait for the album to come out. That is, if it hasn't come out already. I need to go check on that.

But watch the show people! It's a great one and you're missing OUT.

Wal Mart: When The Chips Are Down

2009-02-23T04:00:00.000-05:00

In college, when you're allowed and encouraged to find a cause and be passionate about it, it was ridiculously popular to insult Wal Mart.

Because Wal Mart is a cancer in American society or haven't you heard? It took away all sorts of American jobs, ruined the main streets in Small Town USA, creates eyesores in towns, and supplies a handy place to get robbed raped or murdered in their parking lots.

I hopped on it, said no to Wal Mart and started doing my grocery shopping at Winn Dixie. The prices were higher but I thought I was doing good.

To an extent I still think was doing good, but I've mellowed out about all sorts of stuff in these last five or six years and now my thinking has shifted a bit in a variety of places, but Wal Mart is an important one.

I don't like to go to Wal Mart because it's not convenient to drive to VS Target. But when the chips are down and there's not a lot of money in the bank account, I will go to Wal Mart. You can't beat the prices.

Imagine (this one won't be too hard) that it's toward the end of the month and you have enough money in your bank account to get whatever you've budgeted for but you aren't exactly swimming in cash. Then you get a flat tire. Or something like that happens.

This happened to me early this month. My wife was driving back from a doctor's appointment and the tire went flat. She made it to the parking lot of a Tires Plus. Tires Plus charged us over 90.00 to replace the tire (the tire did need replacing) and it was their cheapest "we offer no warranty on this tire" tire.

But just last week the same thing happened on a different tire (the car needs new tires if you haven't gathered) and I took it to Wal Mart where the tire was 50.00 and you could get all sorts of warranties on it. The total with installation and everything came to something like 72.00.

I'm not insulting Tires Plus or anything, but times are tough. Too tough for me to go someplace that's more expensive just because I don't personally like Wal Mart.

And when I was looking through Wal Mart I found all SORTS of cool stuff. Stuff that would make me go back.

Here's an idea: Maybe Wal Mart should dedicate a section of the store to American-made products that don't have drastic reductions in prices that eventually lead to the manufacturer dying off due to lack of profit. Ask the manufacturer what price they would charge for the product, put the product on the shelf at that price.

Because face it: People are going to go to Wal Mart. Even when it just doesn't make any sense, like when you're only doing yourself and your country harm to do so, people are going to go. So offer some of America to them there too. I'm willing to bet that even at "high" prices that things would sell if they marketed it right.

The Ghost Of Your Past

2009-02-22T04:00:00.000-05:00

Imagine as you grow up and become older that there’s something from your youth that is easily seen and how… interesting situations could happen because of it.

For instance. My fairly new driver’s license has the same picture the one before it did that was taken when I was about 17. My hair was long enough to be unruly but short enough to stand on end. The remnants of a mohawk that was having the surrounding area grown out is still visible and my killer’s gaze and slight smile are kind of disturbing.

You wouldn’t think that people would be interested in your driver’s license as it peeks out of your wallet on your desk, but people ARE.

And man, they have some interesting comments.

I don’t worry about it too much but I think that maybe later on down the road, when I’m 35 (a mere ten years from now) and my kids are wanting to see it, I wonder what they’ll think. When I saw my dad’s picture in his high school yearbook with his period-correct haircut and interesting clothes, I couldn’t help but laugh.

I KNOW they’ll laugh at my Junior haircut (blue hair in 8” liberty spikes). It’s not flattering but you know what? It was me at the time and I was having fun. I’m sure I learned all sorts of stuff from my teenage years that made me who I am and hopefully who I am isn’t so bad.

But I’m REALLY glad THAT isn’t my driver’s license picture.

How Did I Do It?

2009-02-21T04:00:00.001-05:00

When I was a teen playing guitar, I was always plug in to play and I think I was pretty good at controlling the gain in the amp (the gain was always turned up as high as possible). I was playing all sorts of punk and thrash and never had a problem with unwanted noise or anything like that.

Now when I plug in and turn up the gain there’s all SORTS of noise and I need to relearn how to control it (and get my metal tone back up to where it used to be).

I just think back to then and I can’t think of anything special that I was doing. So what’s different? Well, I’m paying a lot more attention to details that used to not concern me at all. The type of guitar I play has changed (the physical guitar has gone from Les Paul to Gretsch hollowbody). I’ve broadened the spectrum of music I’m trying to play.

As far as the guitar goes, it is most comfortable to me. I’m unwilling to change my main guitar back to a solid body. They feel awkward to me. I’m sure I could get used to them enough again, but I’m comfortable with the big hollowbody and it gives a very different and refreshing (IMO) attitude when cranked up. It’s more raw if you will. I DO want to change the pickups to a TV Jones Classic + in the bridge and a Powertron in the neck. I think this will help out in my goal quite a bit, while still retaining that “Great Gretsch Sound.”

As far as amps, I’m still looking for a good base amp and then I’ll be adding pedals to the front of it to change channels so to speak from the amp’s jazzy clean, to a rockabilly “just a bit of hair” to a raunchy AC/DC kind of tone, to a thrash-tastic metal tone. Four tones, three distortion pedals, and a delay.

I need to play through my amps a lot more too.

I can’t wait to move.

Attention World!

2009-02-20T04:00:00.001-05:00

I don't know if you get the show Wife Swap where you're at (which is nowhere near the show I thought it was going to be) but if you do, please know the families represented in the show are NOT a good representation of the USA.

On tonight's episode a mid-western woman proclaims that she finds the British accent annoying but hey "I've got friends from British so, you know." She did not know the word "symphony." She couldn't even pronounce it.

I think this car-wreck TV show method that is prevalent today in reality television is detrimental to the world's view of us if they are unfortunate enough to see it.

I also think we shouldn't be watching these shows and supplying the ratings needed to keep the shows alive.

Stop rubbernecking the car crash. Let's watch something with a little more substance.

Moms Need To Chill Out

2009-02-19T04:00:00.001-05:00

WHY IS IT A CRIME TO HAVE AN ONLY CHILD?By NATALY KOGAN

You know those moms who are easy-going and just take parenting in stride?

I am not one of them.

From the day my daughter was born, four and a half years ago, I’ve been a little obsessed with doing the right thing, parenting-wise. For example, when she was three months old I went back to work, and, even though my milk began to dry up almost immediately, I spent 45 minutes, three times each day, connected to the loud monster (a.k.a. breast pump) in my office, my assistant watching guard outside and some male colleagues making cow jokes in just-loud-enough voices. My doctor, my friends, my mom, my husband and my assistant, who was probably getting tired of the daily watchdog routine, all told me to just chill and give it up. No way. I had this artificially made-up goal to make it to six months and I was going to do the right thing and get there.

I tell you all this to show how hard I try to be a good parent. But apparently, my husband and I are completely messing up our daughter’s life anyway because we’re thinking she might be our only child.

The questions from, well, everyone, began around the time when our daughter turned three. I’d meet another mom who would ask me, a few minutes into our conversation, when we were having another. (It was usually “when”, and rarely “if”.)

“Oh, I am not sure, we might just have one,” I’d say, only to see the other mom’s face turn into one of disbelief, at best, and instant negative judgment, at worst. This would be followed by a range of comments, from the passive-aggressive “Are you serious?” to my personal favorite, “I’m sure you’ll change your mind soon.”

I got the same response from an OB GYN I visited recently, after we moved. When I said we might have just one child, I was given a look that made me feel like I’d just announced I planned to leave that child starving and alone in the house for days. I switched to a different OB, but I kept running into women who made it sound like having an only child is borderline criminal parent behavior.

This is probably a good time to tell you that I am an only child.

If you’re conjuring up images of a self-absorbed narcissist or a total loner without any friends, I’m going to disappoint you because while I have my quirks and “issues,” I’m actually quite nice. I like people; I am pretty good at sharing, unless it’s a piece of delicious dark chocolate for which you might have to fight me; I love my parents dearly and don’t think they ruined my life by not “giving” me a sibling. O.K., I’m a bit of a perfectionist and can’t sleep if the house isn’t clean, but I have enough friends from large families who are the same.

The other day I told a friend that I am getting really tired of the presumptuous “more kids” comments and she told me to just ignore them and do what’s best for our family.

She’s right. But first I have to figure out what IS best for our family. As much as my husband and I have talked endlessly about the reasons why we think having one is best, this is a ridiculously difficult and emotionally charged decision, and I obsess about it all the time. I hear a friend talk warmly about visiting her sister and I immediately think about how nice it would be for my daughter to experience that warmth when she is older. I see my daughter play with a little baby at the park and my eyes almost tear up as I daydream about her playing with her own sibling. I go through the good-things-about-having-siblings checklist in my mind, and come out convinced that yes, we should definitely have another.

And then I remember all the reasons why we think we may just want one. Some of them I hesitate to share here, but most have to do with worrying about maintaining our sanity, our relationship with each other and our daughter and having any time for horribly selfish things like our non-family and non-work interests.

It isn’t that I don’t think those reasons are good enough, but that I am struck at how many others don’t seem to think so. Sometimes I wish that I had a more “acceptable” reason to give them. If I were older I could say that, well, we’re too old to have another. If, like during my childhood spent in the former Soviet Union, we lived in extremely difficult conditions and literally didn’t have enough means for another child, I could use that as a justification. But we’re young, we have the means and, on top of it all, we appear to have gotten this parenting thing under control – we’ve got no “excuses.”

Which doesn’t mean, of course, that anyone has any business telling us what horrible parents we are for raising an only child or for well-meaning folks to give us endless insight about how great our daughter’s life will be if only she had a sibling. (This always makes me want to start telling them about all the people l know who don’t get along with their siblings, hate their siblings, don’t talk to their siblings or swear that their life would be so much better if they didn’t have to deal with their siblings. Last I checked, sibling love isn’t guaranteed.)

Like other parenting decisions — to breastfeed or not, to let kids cry it out or not, to go back to work or to stay home — figuring out how many kids to have is an extremely personal process, but it’s also one that causes others to share advice and opinions without much invitation.
My daughter recently asked me why we don’t buy her a brother or a sister. I tried not to laugh at the buy comment and asked her if she wanted one. “Nah,” she said, “I like being with you and Daddy.” And for that little moment I had no doubts — whatever we decide, we’re all going to be O.K.

That was a pretty good blog, eh? Very entertaining. Maybe it's the fact that I'm a guy (I hear that this is a trait that separates the sexes) but I couldn't really care less what other Dads think of my my fathering skills. If they think they're stellar parents, let's wait thirty years and compare kids.

Not to sound cocky or anything, but looking at the kids of today, I'm pretty confident in my abilities as a dad.

Anyway, I got that comment all the time "when are you going to have another kid?" To which I'd say "we''ll see what happens." Life has a way of listening to what you say and making your life go the opposite direction. Life is kind of a pain like that.

It's nobody's business but the people in my family anyway, but saying so always seems so rude to me. If the question were to be pressed to me I'd say anything to get them to stop talking because that's all I really want.

It isn't like they care anyway.

That's the root of it all, I think. I KNOW that these people, the people that want to become part of your life to the extent that THEY'RE helping you choose the number of your kids, they don't really care. They just want to be BFFs and that's all. They want to feel like they're closer to you than the other people in your circle.

Armed with this knowledge you can keep them at bay AND maintain your not-joined-at-the-hip mentality.

"That's between my wife and I, really."

Or if you want to be a bit more sassy: "What do you care?"

Because if you say that last one you'll ensure a little ego stroke too if you're in the mood where your friend rattles off all the times they've been there for you and how close you never even knew you were.

Ah, but even if this ISN'T the case and I'm just blowing smoke, it really ISN'T anyone's decision but the people in your family (I'd be inclined to think it's only between you and your spouse) so why worry about it.

Why worry about whether your OB GYN (the person YOU employ) thinks you should have more kids? You can tell them exactly where to stick the duck-bill shaped thing. What's it called? A speculum? Just for humor's sake we'll call it a quacker. You can tell them just where to stick that quacker.

So chill out, mom-who's-worried-about-everyone-else's-opinion. Life is short and while I am a go with the flow kind of person, I am also the kind of person who is very quick to cut off any unnecessary stress. Like worrying about what people at Story Time think of Annie being almost two when her little brother/sister is born.

Just Me Being Hopeful

2009-02-18T04:00:00.000-05:00

I think when you’re away on business (especially for the military) letters and correspondence is very important, both for the folks deployed and for the families and friends at home. At least, I hope it’s important to the friends and family at home.

I know for a FACT that every letter and package I got while away last time meant the world to me. I was in an unfamiliar place trying to get used to very unfamiliar settings and unfamiliar routines and the letters, packages and emails really did mean a lot. It didn’t even matter if it was just a card with no writing in it. There was some thought behind it and that’s all that mattered to me.

This time unfortunately I will not have nearly as much access to the internet so emails will not be able to be read and I think this is going to hurt quite a bit. I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining or anything but it WILL suck.

It will also mean the letters received will mean that much more.

I was thinking maybe these blogs would be cool to those who know I’m gone (when I’m gone) because even though they aren’t letters from the field, they are new thoughts for you to read. Maybe you think it’s cool?

I’m hoping my WIFE thinks it’s cool.

Letters from out there all start to sound the same after a while. It’s hot or cold, can’t wait to come home, I miss you guys so much, the food’s good, you know, that kind of stuff. My wife likes to say that when I’m gone I write some seriously depressing stuff. I do. I lament my mistakes from my misspent years in college and blame these mistakes for me being gone from her right then. I write apologies for dragging her into this situation too.

I am just awful with letters from the field.

But maybe these blogs will be a good replacement of my depressing letters. I certainly hope so.

I feel like my communications home are going to be so limited this time and it sucks. SO I have to write a serious amount of blogs before I leave. Kim says she doubts I can do it. She won’t bet me because she always loses bets, but she’s pretty confident that I can’t do it.

Oh, but I’ll prove her wrong on this one and in the process give her a hopefully pleasant present in her Google Reader every morning.

I think she’ll appreciate it.

As for you, other readers, you may or may not know if I’m gone thanks to the ever-so-awesome scheduled post dates, but I hope you find some level of enjoyment from the daily blogs and the idea that they might be coming while I am gone.

I don’t know. To me, that stuff is cool. If Kim were in the military I’d count down the hours until her daily blog came out. I’d be VERY into that.

Fall Out Boy

2009-02-17T04:00:00.000-05:00

When I was a teen, I was always in my room listening to music and the CDs that were always in rotation were Metallica’s Ride the Lightning and Garage Inc. Disc 2. These two CDs are mainly the reason I play guitar like I do and love quick chuggy rhythms.

But after these formative years, I discovered a lot of different bands and fell into a more casual kind of listening routine. I have not gotten wrapped up in a band since I was maybe 16.

While in Japan on business, I picked up a few CDs because I had some extra cash. I picked up Alkaline Trio’s Agony & Irony, and both Fall Out Boy’s From Under the Cork Tree and Infinity on High.

I didn’t listen to them until I got home though (I don’t have a laptop to bring out with me which is a MAJOR bummer when computers can house so much good stuff like photos, movies, all of your music and can be your portable entertainment center) and from the first moment I put in From Under the Cork Tree I was incredibly impressed. There are only two songs on the whole CD I click past which is pretty amazing. It’s as close to all killer no filler that I’ve seen or heard.

Infinity on High was incredibly different sound wise. There was less gain, and more funky feel to it but after a while it grew on me too and now I can say I’m a pretty big fan of this band.

Yes, there’s a ton of high school girls that are also fans of the band. I’m not so fond of this, but you know what? You like what you like and not liking something because someone you don’t like likes it is silly in all but the most rarest of cases. I’ll make the exception for some people though.

I’m excited to get their other albums, the new one (from Best Buy so it has extra tracks), and their live CD/DVD from Phoenix, AZ. My daughter likes them too music-wise, but she REALLY likes the cover of their new album picking out of a wall of CDs with NO problem (that girl has eagle eyes if there was a pair) and insisting on holding it throughout the trip to the store. I’m sure the day that I DO get it, I’ll lose the case to her permanently.

Anyway, their music stirs up all sorts of excited emotions in me and I really like it. I haven’t felt this invigorated with music in a long time.

Non-Dad Tip (Applicable Only If You Aren't a Dad Yet)

2009-02-16T06:00:00.002-05:00

I know it's tempting to rush right into fatherhood and try your hand at being a great dad. I get it. But there are things you should do before becoming a dad.

What those things are you need to figure out for yourself because they're different for each and every one of us. These are things that are going to be difficult or impossible with children or things that will have to wait until your youngest is, say, ten to be able to truly enjoy.

And what you want is to be able to have a good time with your wife (if you're married) before you have kids so you have fond memories to look back on when you are looking forward to your future. "More of that," you'll say.

For my wife and I we really wanted to go to Disney World for a few days and a cruise in the Caribbean. We wanted it to be just us, enjoying the company of each other with no stress from the normal world. A time when you can put away your cell phone and forget about it.

That was what we wanted. But times have never been easy and we ended up having Annie before we could do any of that. We did have a cruise booked and mostly paid off before the AF decided that right then would be a good time for me to go into some formal training. We had to cancel the cruise.

Anyway, now that I'm a dad I look at these things to do and think of how Annie will react to them, how Peanut will react to them, and I'm pretty excited, even though I'll have to wait a little while to do these things.

So tip to husbands, or men in husband-like roles: figure out what you want to do sans kids and do them. You'll build memories, you'll experience things in stress-free situations. If you're a dad, it's not the end of the world, heck, you might even enjoy them more, but there may be a bit of a wait in line.

Valentine's Day

2009-02-14T04:00:00.002-05:00

Ah, Valentine's Day. The day we all come to our significant others toward the end of the day (to allow time to go get the present you forgot) with stuffed burgundy bears and candy, and maybe a real present or two.

It's good stuff.

I don't even care that it's just a manufactured holiday created to make you go out and spend money at the approximated time that you would be bouncing back from Christmas' purge of cash. It's still cool.

Why? Because I love presents.

Call me shallow, I don't mind, but I do really like presents. Especially unexpected presents. I love it when my wife surprises me with something and it doesn't have to be big. If she sees a Wonka Bar somewhere (they're delicious) and picks one up for me, I'm pretty happy. It just means that she was thinking of me and cared enough to pick me up something.

It is certainly not the Michael Scott "I love you X dollars amount" mentality. It's just a sure-fire way to let someone know that you were indeed on their mind.

A preacher once told me to read a book called the Five Languages of Love and I was going to, I really was. I still might. But then he said I also needed to read Men Are Like Waffles, Women Are Like Spaghetti.

I'm not reading that. The title says everything that's in the book. If it ISN'T about how compartmentalized the male mind is and how mixed up the woman's mind it - about how men can leave work at work and leave situations right where they are while women let all experiences interweave and work together into a great big mess, then I am wrong.

Please correct me and I'll read the book.

Anyway, as much as I love Valentine's Day (or any present-giving holiday) I do NOT like waiting for the day to arrive. When I was a kid I was forced to wait until Christmas to open presents. The first year I was in the AF my wife and I opened up our presents on the 12th. Not because we didn't want to celebrate Jesus' birthday (I was still a religious person at the time) but because I didn't want it to be all about the presents and besides, have you ever gone to a party where the host gave all the gifts to the attendees? That's just rude.

So I gave Kim her Valentine's Day presents this weekend (the weekend of the 7th). She received Photoshop, two instructional books, one beginner and one advanced so she can work up to being an expert, some candy and a card about how no matter what life throws at us, I'll always enjoy the ride so long as she's right there by my side.

I still have to wait for Valentine's Day for my presents though.

I hope everyone has a good Valentine's Day.

A Confession And Possible Addiction

2009-02-14T04:00:00.000-05:00

My wife often says to me “Russ, you spend way too much time on the computer.”

I guess she’s right, too.

I come home from work and check my email and boards taking approximately five or so minutes and then get out of my uniform and into my comfy pants (PJ pants) and then I spend the rest of the night with my wife and daughter. I really try to spend as much time with my daughter as possible because I really don’t see her that much and know that in a while, I’ll see her even less because I’ll be gone on business.

When I’m gone I often think of how much time I’ve wasted doing this or that instead of being with her, so I’ve really tried to change my habits. I’m really trying to be the best dad I can be.

But then Annie goes to bed and I’m on the computer with a quickness that has to be seen to be believed. It’s the kind of quickness where all of a sudden there’s a Russ-shaped smoke pile like in the old cartoons.

I get on and check my email and boards, maybe write a blog or two, check out the statistics of people visiting both of my blogs, and maybe poke around a bit.

My line of thought has always been that if I’m just sitting there clicking “refresh” or just surfing aimlessly then yeah, I would have a problem. But I do stuff on the internet and there’s always a purpose.

I think it stems from this town, actually.

If I do have a problem, it’s this stupid town’s fault. The guitar store count is ONE and the people that work there, though nice enough, are not really people you would go to visit with. No one in town likes the same kind of music I do and if I want to play with anyone that even has an inkling of the same taste, I’ll have to drive about 45 minutes north.

There’s nothing to do and no one to do it with and since music is a passion of mine, something I care about very much, being in this town feels borderline suffocating. And sure, some of you out there might be saying “it’s only music,” but music is VERY important to me and without it, or talking about it, or being associated with it in some way, I feel like… I don’t know, like I’m missing out.

I know it’s “just” music and I can LIVE without it, but I don’t want to. I’m addicted to music and that is fine with me. I don’t mind the idea of being addicted to music in some way or another. Even if it’s just two people talking about music I’m listening and probably enjoying it even if I don’t agree with what they’re saying.

And maybe it’s this addiction to music that caused me to go to the internet, to message boards, blogs and podcasts. Maybe I’m just constantly hungry for more and more music and music stuff. In almost every other aspect of my life the trend runs in a similar way of me becoming almost obsessed with something and it building up to an apex when it collapses and I walk away from the addiction. The duration of obsession varies but with music it hasn’t waned at all.

There have been times when I’ve been so unsatisfied with my guitar playing I’ve toyed with the idea of giving it up. I think that with the money I spend on strings, pedals, amps, cords, straps, picks, etc. etc. I could be buying music. But the love of playing swings back and I laugh at the idea of giving it up.

Maybe it’s the fact that there isn’t enough conversation and my hunger, my flat out HUNGER for this kind of talk can’t be met that causes my obsession to go on without climax. That doesn’t sound too far-fetched.

I definitely think that the problem here doesn’t lie with me, I don’t think I have a problem. It isn’t like I’m siphoning money away from my family’s grocery fund to get a fix and buy strings. I’m pretty practical and I understand that I can’t buy a new guitar every month, can’t even buy strings every month. I’m fine with that so I don’t think I’m too bad. I buy MAYBE six CDs a YEAR so I don’t think I’m too bad.

Come on, people. Have a heart. As obsessed with my music as I am, I am not SO obsessed that I’ve lost all rationale.

But as far as the internet goes, I don’t know. I guess I could have a problem. That problem is this stupid, ridiculous, waste of time glorified truck stop of a town.

I thought I lived in a bad place when I lived in Biloxi, MS, but this place makes Biloxi look like heaven. There I played music with people, the guitar stores (more than one) had quality stuff, and there was always someone to talk music with.

Maybe this had something to do with the fact I was in high school. Maybe when you graduate you lose all love for music. Maybe it had something to do with my dad who, even though he probably wasn’t interested at all in guitar or music in general was always there to at least pretend to listen to me rattle on about new models from different companies, what’s going on with this band and that band, and he’d give my music a shot.

Now I’m an adult and drive by myself to work and there’s no one to talk to about music.

Honestly the lack of people to talk about music to is almost CERTAINLY the reason that I’m driven to the internet so much but it seems like maybe I shouldn’t feel that push toward the internet if I was truly a well-functioning member of society. Perhaps ANY obsession is a bad one, no matter how controlled?

Sometimes I think that at least I’m not a car guy, spending all of my spare time in the garage hitting things with wrenches and completely disregarding my family.

*Sigh*

I don’t know. Maybe I DO need help. I can’t imagine a life that has anywhere near the same awesomeness if it didn’t have music in it.

Tiny Laptops: HP Mini and Asus EE PC

2009-02-13T06:00:00.001-05:00

Tiny laptops seem to making a big splash in the market. It started with the Asus EE PC which, when it first came out had a 7" screen which is pretty cramped and has now come out with a slightly bigger screen to accommodate the user a bit more.

Apparently the demand for this tiny device, which used a flash hard drive and a Linux OS was great enough for HP to raise its head and decide to throw a model in for competition, the HP Mini.

My local Best Buy had both models and I toyed around with them for a little while.

If I had to choose one of the models, I would definitely choose the HP. It seemed, typing away at the keyboard and looking at the hinge that it had a bit more sturdiness to the package which is important for what kind of computer this is.

But what kind of computer IS this? The hard drive on the HP I was messing with was a mere 16gb and neither computer has an optical drive which means that unless you download absolutely everything over the Internet, it will never run as your sole computer. The option isn't even there.

This is surely meant to be a backup computer or travel computer, an auxiliary computer, or to-go computer. A commuter's computer. A web surfer's dream.

The small size means that it can go pretty much anywhere which is handy, especially in my line of work, but the lack of the ability to run as a sole computer is frankly a little disappointing. Everything is going to need to be transferred over to the computer some way or another, whether it be flash drive, or USB port or whatever other method you choose to use.

Out of the box, this is a great computer to lay in bed with and surf the web and type blogs (it would be an amazing computer to blog with). But with only 16gb of space you probably won't be storing your entire collection of music on this, nor will you be storing all of your videos or movies, any libraries of any kind and if you are using it as a student to write papers on, it would probably be smart to save them to a flash drive and import them to your daddy computer. That would be the primary computer, the one with the huge hard drive and disc drive.

However there is a way to make this a primary computer and it would only take a little bit of modification. My proposal would be to make cloth pockets with snaps or Velcro tops so they can be fastened shut. These pockets would be made big enough to fit in an external hard drive and an external disc drive. Hopefully the computer would be wide enough to accommodate the two needed accessories. Also, hopefully neither the hard drive nor the disc drive would require an external power source as well. That way both of them could run off of the computer's power and maintain the, you know, portability of the computer.

Because portability is why you buy this, right?

But then you start thinking of the price and your initial 400.00 investment jumps up to about 600.00 easily with the ability for prices to go even higher.

You have to ask yourself is that TINY laptop with these modification enough to keep you interested when you cross into the threshold of laptops WITH disc drives and non-laughable hard drive space?

All of that space you're saving in your backpack, the low weight of the tiny laptop, that all changes when you get the disc drive and hard drive so it becomes a wash to me. Which would take up less space? The 12" laptop or the 10" laptop with two accessories?

In the end, I would end up going for a normal laptop. I don't require a huge screen and the tiny laptops have always appealed to me but until they can squeeze in a decent hard drive and an optical reader (and maintain some level of ruggedness) I won't be interested in buying one.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you exactly which computer I picked to save up for.

HP Won Me Over From Mac

2009-02-12T04:00:00.000-05:00

I'll be honest, Macs are cool. Very cool. And all the cool people have Macs and seem to be able to do a lot with them.

So it's with this caveat that I enter this blog.

I've wanted a Mac since I was about 14. They had come out with those colorful all-in-ones and I was intrigued. My dad, who read magazines like PC Shopper was keen on saying no to the world of Macs because "there's no software for them."

Even if he were right, I was 14. I wanted it to type papers on and surf the web. How hard would THAT be to accommodate?

Now there's a wealth of software for the Mac and everyone is very impressed. My dad put a toe in the water and bought an iPhone and is turned off from Apple all together now. He hates it. He is the first person I've ever heard say so about their iPhone.

I personally think this has a little more to do with the user than the system.

Anyway, So I've wanted a Mac for about twelve years.

In particular, I'd like a laptop. I'm on the road more than I honestly want to be, sometimes for long stretches of time and I want the portability of a laptop. So I've been PLANNING on getting a Macbook for about ever now, and to this day, I'd like one but I'd like the Macbook pro because of the illuminated keyboard and minimum 250gb hard drive.

I type in the dark often and the lit keys would help immensely.

However, the cheapest Macbook pro is 2,000.00 which is a little steep. About 1,000.00 too steep for our family (and probably steeper still).

So I started poking around HP's site and built a laptop with 3gb of ram, something like 300gb of hard drive space, and an illuminated keyboard all for just under 1,000.00.

I'm impressed that HP is able to offer this kind of stuff and these kinds of prices and I'm a little sad I'll have to hold off yet AGAIN to get a Mac.

But mark my words, one day I'll get one, just not anytime soon. I'm not too bummed either because the computer I'd be settling for is still pretty impressive. Yes, it isn't housed in an aluminum shell with a fancy touchpad or cool keys that are far enough apart to increase accuracy while not increasing TOO much travel, and the size is a bit bigger and there's always the fact that it's Windows, not OS X, but I'll definitely live.

Amazon Kindle 2

2009-02-11T04:00:00.000-05:00

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00154JDAI/ref=amb_link_83626371_1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=gateway-center-column&pf_rd_r=0XZXK9RADVY8YN1Q1PEP&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=469548931&pf_rd_i=507846

Oh, happy day! Apparently the reception for the original Kindle was warm enough to create an updated version. Significantly sleeker, thinner, more ergonomic, and displaying a couple of changes, this Kindle is definitely different than the original.

Is it better though?

While I enjoy slender gadgets, I did not really think that it was in need of a redesign. I really liked the original. I still really like the original and if given the choice, I’d be inclined to side with the old one.

So let’s talk about big changes.

My best guess is that in an effort to slim the device down they got rid of the SD Card slot leaving under 1.5 gb to store your books on. Now, to be fair, that’s the storage space for over 1,500 books, but is that space enough?

The Kindle can play music and with that and your books, a mere 1.5 gb is NOT enough.

I liked the idea of storing specific books on cards too. For instance, in my profession I have a ton of professional books that would be nice to bring with me when I go places. The amount of pages is staggering, frankly and lugging these books around would cause some serious strain physically and worrying about them all the time wouldn’t be fun at all. The idea of having them all on an SD card is pretty sweet and the word-search feature would be more than handy.

That is my biggest complaint actually, is the lack of an SD Card slot. Expandable memory is where it’s at and both Amazon and Apple need to get in on this. Of course, then Apple couldn’t charge you a ton more money for double the space.

That’s MY biggest complaint, but surveying the web there are others and while I’m as sympathetic of a guy as you can find, some of the complaints are a little ridiculous.

1) It’s black and white. Some people say “We don’t watch black and white television, why should we read in black and white?”

I’m sure they were talking about illustrations, not the actual font.

Do you remember the first Game Boy Color? It had no backlight but the games had colors. The only problem is that the colors were subdued due to the screen’s natural color and the fact that there was no illumination underneath it.

You really WANT that? A great big washed-out mess? Straining your eyes to see what’s going on?

Besides that, it’s a book, not TV.

Now, there have been strides to developing a color electronic ink but the colors are washed out and the price would be towards and past the 1,000.00 mark. Do you want to pay 1,000.00 for an eReader JUST for color (color that hearkens back to the original Technicolor)?

2) No backlight.

This goes hand in hand with the first complaint, I guess, but it’s different enough to separate. Here goes:

You’re probably reading this on a computer, right? Find any website with a white background and LOTS of type, any site, or better yet, find a free book online (they’re out there) and open it in Word and read it. Read it for as long as you can.

While you’re at it, remember when you started and stopped.

I’m willing to bet that you could probably read for twice as long with much more comfort to your eyes if you were to read it on a screen without a backlight. It creates stress for your eyes and strains them. The contrast is better and sharper but the benefits are outweighed by the cons.

It isn’t an iPod, it isn’t a computer, it is supposed to be looked at as a BOOK.

The most common comment when you start talking about the backlight is that someone can’t see it at night. That is very true. Unless you turn on a light, you can’t see the words.

But they don’t want to keep their significant other up.

A small lamp probably won’t kill them and if it does they’re obviously too dang sensitive so hand them a sleeping mask and tell them to stow it.

If they INSIST on you turning off the light, use a clip on reading light like you can get for a real book. Five bucks and you’re set. No need for a backlight, no need for the strain.

I honestly think most of these complaints come from people who are expecting far too much for what the device is and what it was intended to be.

Those are the two BIG complaints, and the SD Card often falls way back in the priority.

I think this is entirely wrong.

Because of everyone’s unrealistic expectations, Amazon is going to cater to them and supply an eReader that now causes eye strain, less lengthy reading sessions, and a display that looks like the original Wizard of Oz instead of fixing the most important part (the SD Card Slot).

Now, I know I’m probably emphasizing a bit much for your tastes, but it IS important, especially is you subscribe to the still-costs-too-much newspaper subscriptions. They’ll fill up your memory quickly and reports say that there is NO backup for these on Amazon.com (like there is with your books).

Speaking of, the book count is over 250,000 books. That’s a lot of books. It is also not nearly ENOUGH books. There should be dedicated people making Kindle versions of every book they can get their hands on regardless of the size of the audience. Every book that comes out now should have an E version and Amazon should be working as hard and as quickly as they can to develop something that rivals the library of Congress with volume.

Next we come to price. The price of the device would not be nearly as hard to swallow (about 350.00) if the cost of the books was easier to deal with. 9.99 for a book might seem like a good deal for a book when compared to a brand new hardcover book that has no discount attached but I’ll let you in on a secret.

The Kindle is not a 350 page Hardcover book with premium paper. It is an electronic device that is merely displaying the appropriate software. Eventually you’ll stop comparing the price to a brand new hard cover and start comparing it to the current PAPER back version of the book that retails for three to five dollars more and say to yourself “Wait a minute. I hold in my hand a device that requires no printing presses or normal distribution costs. Shipping is borderline non-existant as we know it. Why are the costs so close?”

I hear that publishers are selling Amazon the ebooks at the same price as their regular books which, if correct is BAD on them. I know they’re looking to make more money but they’re shooting themselves in the foot in the long run. The potential, if the cost of books were low, for a person to buy books on whims whenever they want is ridiculously HIGH if they’re cheap enough. If they are NOT cheap, the whim will not be there and planning will be involved meaning you’re getting less money as a publisher.

Not only that, but you’re screwing the platform too because the costs of books and eBooks are so similar. The cost of the eBook should be 50% cheaper than the cost of the most current book which means if the hardcover edition is all that is out and costs 50.00 the eBook should cost 25.00. If the paperback that costs 14.00 is out then the ebook should cost 7.00. The prices would benefit the owners of the device and be enough of a temptation to lure in potential customers that are on the fence.

And speaking of the DEVICE, it costs way too much. Amazon should offer a stripped-down version for the people who just want a quality eReader. Here’s what I’m thinking: I do not want MP3 support. I do not want the ability to have the Kindle read to me. I do not want backlights or colors. I’m perfectly happy with gray. I DO want an SD Card slot.

If you can offer me a device for something close to 150.00 then I’d be tempted to pursue it. If the books and newspapers had costs that were more accommodating taking the technology into consideration THAT would be what pushed me over the edge to ownership.

But there’s still a ton of potential here, or at least, the same amount as there ever was.

I still think that this could be a great replacement to the thick college textbooks and their ridiculous prices, I still think this could be a replacement for newspapers so long as everything in a newspaper gets transferred to the Kindle including comics. I don’t care if the Sunday comics are in gray – I don’t care about that at all – so long as they are there.

Honestly, people, it has a ton of potential. It just needs some tweaks.

In Defense Of My Music

2009-02-10T06:00:00.000-05:00

I'm getting more and more into the White Stripes and the Raconteurs. Both are great bands to me and give off the vibe of classic rock. Especially the Raconteurs.

Unlike classic rock though, I don't get bored listening to it. I doubt this has anything to do with the lyrics because I can connect the same way to both the Raconteurs and any classic rock band (save the song Broken Boy Soldier) which is very little. But the music itself is very classic rock-ish just with a little more urgency and garage feel to it.

In the song Broken Boy Soldier there is this buzz going throughout almost the entire song and man, it bugs me. And a lot of the time I feel like I'm listening to something just a step above a demo.

But what a GREAT demo! The songs are cool and that urgency is appreciated. Whereas a lot of classic rock bands seemed to strive for perfection and in the process lose the soul of it (my opinion), the Raconteurs attack it a little differently.

Now, I know nothing about them, but will say that it certainly SEEMS like they write a song, run through it MAYBE two times and then press record and what they record is what's on the album.

I think this would be a GREAT way to tackle things too. Artists are always saying that the recorded version isn't the be all end all version of the song and you need to come hear it live. Well, if the album sounded so rough then can you imagine how great it's going to sound like after the band has been playing show after show of it? They'd be a well oiled machine and you would see progress like you wouldn't believe.

OR you would see a band that is just as raw onstage and that's not really so bad either.

Basically what I'm saying is that you could go either way and be fine with me. Not so great production, but a stellar show, or not so great production and an equal show, where there's just raw energy to it all. Either situation is more than fine with me.

I think the only way you could fail at this would be to record an album and process it to the point of perfection where the ONLY option is to go DOWN in live quality, not up or even level.

Now, all that being said, I'm not interested in hearing ridiculously rough albums from anyone. The White Stripes and Raconteurs get away with it because there's obvious skill there and while the production value SEEMS to be limited, I can still hear what's going on.

Hugh Hefner's Girlfriends

2009-02-09T06:00:00.000-05:00

Holly, Bridget and Kendra have been Hef's girls for a while now and I'm sure there's nothing sexual going on. At least, I don't want to think there's anything sexual going on. The mere idea - and it isn't allowed to progress past that point - makes me shudder and feel bad for the girls.

Anyway, those girls are OUT and new girls are in.

Twins.

While I think it's fine for a guy like Hef to have three or four girlfriends, I do wonder what the girls think.

Well, I wonder what the girls WOULD think if the relationship was indeed sexual and not so dang creepy. Surely at least one of the girls would be jealous over Hef's attention toward one of the others, right? I'm sure as of now, again, not thinking ANYTHING sexual is going on, these are just girls that are enjoying living in a mansion with tons of money and presents being showered on them. It looks like a sweet gig and I don't blame them for taking it.

However, I do have to pause and wonder about these new twins. I mean, Hef is calling you two his girlfriends, implying to anyone who will listen that he is INDEED having sex with you and that it's pretty sweet.

To be fair, these aren't the first twins in the adult business or anything, but I'm always wondering how they could stomach the idea of being sexual with the same person? If my brother proposed something similar (assuming he had a girlfriend of course) I'd flat out say no. Are you kidding?

That just smacks of grossness.

Yuck!

And I'm not passing judgement on the twins, I'm sure this is the best thing to ever happen to them and , you know, I doubt there's anything really going on, but I still wonder how they would feel if there WAS and Hef was a little more young and desirable to chicks.

Ugh.

Top Chef (Again)

2009-02-08T06:00:00.000-05:00

I know you are probably a little tired of hearing me talk (or reading my thoughts) about Top Chef, but I wanted to announce to anyone who reads this why it's the best reality show out there.

1) The people are real. The cast does not include a "cast" in the traditional sense where it consists of a bunch of obscenely colorful characters, scripted angels and demons, and a bunch of ridiculousness.

2) I don't get the impression that anything is scripted. With a lot of reality shows you DO get that feeling, and if it isn't flat out "read what I write for you," I'm sure the producers are poking and prodding the interviewed to say the desired lines anyway.

3) There is skill. Food Network's show, the Next Food Network Star does a great job at showcasing people with little or no talent. This isn't to say they can't COOK, but there's o culinary skill there and in the rare contestant where it does exist, the whole show is pretty much a dog and pony show to get to the end so he can officially become the winner and get his own show(s). Watching the first season, there was no doubt that Guy was going to win.

Hell's Kitchen takes it one step up getting (for the most part) chefs that do this for a living, NOT mom fresh from the house's kitchen, but they might work for a retirement home, or Waffle House. The culinary skill is a bit more obvious, but it still feels very... I don't know. Amateurish.

But Top Chef consists of (again, for the most part) chefs that are either executive chefs at real restaurants or people that OWN their own restaurant. I seriously doubt that winning the show is going to blast open a ton of doors for them as they are pretty much already set up. It just seems like a good competition, not something where at the end you get a job at a fancy new restaurant owned by one of the judges.

4) There's drama, but not a ridiculous amount. Sometimes with reality shows you just get so sick of the drama that you turn it off. That never happens with Top Chef.

It's a great show and I urge anyone to watch it. I watched one episode during a lunch break once at work and was hooked.

Winning The Lottery

2009-02-07T06:00:00.000-05:00

I definitely need to win the lottery. I spend way too much time at work and not enough time at home with my family. Even if you DIDN'T factor in the deployments and the strictly military stuff, there's the fact that I usually see my little girl for about, oh, fifteen hours a WEEK.

15 hours.

That's nuts.

Today, I wake up late because I'll be working late and Dora is on. I sit on the couch for a second and my beautiful little girl comes up to me, climbs o her little chair and onto the couch and sits in my lap with her head on my chest watching the show and I'm thinking "I have so much I need to do but I just can't bring myself to leave right now."

It's heartbreaking sometimes.

Ah, but if I won the lottery, I could spend all day with my little girl. I could help out my wife around the house, we could tackle education full time juggling time with Annie so that one parent can go to class while the other watches her because even if you never have to work another day in your life, there should still be a pursuit of knowledge in my opinion.

Hear that Annie?

No matter what, go to college.

Now sure, I know everyone would love to win the lottery and I'm sure there are other people out there who deserve winning borderline-free money (and lots of it) but if I ever won, I wouldn't complain or think twice about taking it. I have ALWAYS thought that I would be happier if I stayed at home with my family even telling Kim I'd be more than willing to be the stay-at-home dad if she wanted to work. Monotony doesn't bug me, chores don't bug me and life at home doesn't bug me.

Leaving my family to go to work, that kind of bugs me.

*Sigh* But this is being an adult. Doing what needs to be done for the benefit of your family. It's all very adult stuff, you see. I'm providing a good life (hopefully) for my family at the expense of not being able to be at home very much to see it.

Maybe You See Something New?

2009-02-06T07:24:00.001-05:00

STOMR now has a search engine and it can search all of Google.

Just to let you know. There's little reason for a different homepage now.:-)

Samantha Brown

2009-02-06T06:00:00.001-05:00

I don't know how Samantha Brown got her job with the Travel Channel, but I bet she loves it. While people who long to travel sit at home, loving her for showing her all of this cool stuff and hating her for the exact same reason (because they could all do it too, so they say), she's out trotting around the globe getting exclusive looks here, peeks behind the curtain there, crazy experiences and living out the dreams of millions of people.

And I don't think the job could have gone to anyone better.

While some people might attack this job with flair and quickly fade away in enthusiasm, Sam keeps trucking away, making every trip look like it's her first and her very visible awe is inspiring. She's cute, she's smart and if you wanted to go on vacation somewhere you've never been, you would probably want her by your side. She knows a ton of things and has so much fun wherever she goes.

I bet the few hours of sleep she gets aren't very restful, but it doesn't show. She's awesome.

I love Samantha Brown's shows. They would probably be a very welcome addition to military TV for the folks that are deployed. What could be better than sitting in a place you'd rather not be looking at a place you WOULD rather be thinking "maybe I should start planning that for when I get back"?

I know I would like that.

Oh, Toby. How Could You?

2009-02-05T06:00:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I said that Toby Young, one of the judges for Top Chef, was trying too hard at first but seemed to be mellowing out (and good for him).

I apparently was wrong.

I'm wrong often, but I really thought that after the episode maybe Tom or Padma had pulled him aside and said "listen, man, it's just TV and we're really high in the rankings. There's no need to be that over the top or harsh. No need to try so hard. You're going to end up making a contestant kill themselves."

But I was wrong and in what is apparently true Toby Young fashion he liked a meal to that of Elvis Presley's life. An entire life equated with one meal. Stunning and impressive at first and then you die fat and drugged up on the toilet.

THAT is pretty harsh.

Shame on you, Toby.

Shame.

Would You Rather...

2009-02-04T12:00:00.000-05:00

Shave your head once and get a tattoo on your entire scalp OR shave your eyebrows off permanently?

Ummmm... Being a guy I'd be worried about going bald and showing more and more tattoo off as the years go by.

But that's what hats are for, I guess. I'm going with the tattoo.

Top Chef: Toby Young

2009-02-04T06:00:00.000-05:00

Toby Young made quite a splash wen he first introduced himself to us as the new judge on Top Chef (Gail had to go off and get married). I got the feeling he was trying way too hard for the first challenge. He was trying way too hard to be funny and modern so instead of saying jeez, this stuff is pretty bad, he'd say stuff like "Call the NATO inspector because I have found the weapons of mass destruction and they are here in this bowl."

And when something was a shockingly pleasant treat he didn't say "this is definitely something the chef should be proud of because it took me by surprise in it's greatness." He said "Much like Tom Cruise's cameo in Tropic Thunder this was a..." I had stopped listening by then.

The critiques of the food was particularly harsh though. He didn't seem satisfied unless he tore something to shreds and disagreed with Tom (?!?) about dishes.

Look, I know that Toby's from England where things are very different culinary-wise, but Tom's no dummy. He a guitarist that happens to cook and when you can both cook and play guitar you're obviously a smart guy.

Anyhoo. I'm pleased to see his attitude simmering down, much like sequels to great movies tap the vein of the original to make more money without making anything worth... You see how that can be annoying? I'm glad to see he's stopped that and mellowed out a bit. He can still judge, but he seems to have gotten the idea that I can watch a judge with no need of a three ring circus mixed with a Family Guy episode to keep my attention.

And with Richard gone (you're still the best from this season, Richard!) I'm cheering for Fabio, who seems to be an amazing chef and has the rare talent of saying things that, when someone else would say it, I'd say in response "What a douche!" but not with him. He can say it and you say "Hm. I see your point."

That might be a good quality to have!

Would You Rather...

2009-02-03T12:00:00.000-05:00

When faced wth an attacking grizzly bear, be armed with a guitar made of solid maple OR with a saxophone?

As a guitarist I say the guitar, however I think if you can blow a sax enough to make it make a noise, that might work to your benefit.

Blues Clues

2009-02-03T06:00:00.001-05:00

Last night we bought a DVD at Target of all of the BIG Blues Clues stories. The real mile markers if you will. Now, keep in mind that Blues Clues has been going on for more than ten years now. It hit ten in 2006 and in that time a lot of mysteries have been solved and my daughter is a HUGE fan of the show.

The DVD was on sale too. For seven bucks, we could watch all of the episodes that really stand out.

Like the episode where we meet Steve's grandma. Do you know who plays Steve's grandma?

Blanche from the Golden Girls!

She popped out from behind a tress wearing a green striped long dress and it was awesome! She seemed to fit the role so well too. She seemed like she would be a great grandma.

Or how about the episode where Steve goes off to college. This is the big one, honestly, the reason we bought the DVD. See, I really liked Steve because, while Bues Clues is too new for me to have grown up with, I watched some kids that grew up with it and Steve was always cool with me. This Joe guy... He's alright, but not the familiar Steve.

Rumors abounded after Steve's departure from the show. I had heard That Steven "Steve" Burns had become a coke addict and died of an overdose. This isn't true though. I found him on MySpace. He's a musician in a band. Apparently he left because he wanted to focus on his music and there were some other, slightly less-important issues to be dealt with. Steve was losing his hair and wanted to shave his head, but the folks at Blues Clues said no.

Anyway, I never got the impression that Steve didn't want to be at Blues Clues, didn't like doing the show and helping out kids. He always struck me as a guy who was having a good time doing a job that wasn't bad at all. So when the college episode rolled around and they introduced his brother, Joe, it was an interesting one. Blue's Clues that day ended up being that Blue wanted Steve to take a phone with him to college so they can stay friends.

How sad is that?

And then all of the characters in the show had a surprise going-away party for him and I felt like this was pretty sad for Steve. If he was acting, he was doing a pretty good job. He said he would miss Blue and everyone else and then he looked at the camera and said "I'm going to miss you too."

Then he went off to college.

Later, Blue and Joe are playing hide and seek and the phone rang and it was Steve who wanted to talk to Blue of course, but then he wanted to to talk to us and he said he missed us. It was pretty sad.

The DVD though, well worth 7.00.

Would You Rather....

2009-02-02T12:00:00.000-05:00

If your life depended on victory, have to run a 100-yard race against a 6th grader OR against an 11-year-old dog?

100 yards isn't that much, but I think even a dying dog could beat me, so I'm going to have to go with the 6th grader.

I'd still probably lose.