F'd Up

repeating parrot

mimics the sounds around him

re-vulgarity

Tara: Why do you have a Memorial Day gig for a retirement home on Thursday? Memorial Day was last week.

Me: They're senior citizens and don't know the difference.

Tara: Are you serious?! Shut the fuck up!

Gavin: Fuck up! Fuck up! Fuck up!

VegiPorn

cucumber, onion

a definite work of art

like vegetable porn

So I was out shopping tonight and came across this. Why are people so immature?

Why am I so immature that I laughed for the rest of the shopping trip and right back to my car?

Memorial Day

to all Veterans

ceremony, not enough

to make up for death

I played today at a Veteran's cemetery for a Memorial Day ceremony. I went in to this thinking it was just another day, just another gig. In fact, I even forgot to shave and had to do an emergency scrape in the men's bathroom, something I hate. I knew that there would be speeches, and from experience I knew that we would be outside, standing, in the hot sun. It's sad, but I admit that I was dreading the experience, and now that I think about it, I'm ashamed.

Once out there, we played a few patriotic tunes that were very well appreciated by the audience. It seemed nearly impossible to play in the hot humid atmosphere, the sweat getting in the way of even being able to hold my instrument. As we finished the National Anthem, a military fly-over swept over the audience. Perfect timing. The speakers had spoken about MIA/POWs and what the "missing man" formation means. All of things I knew but had forgotten. Then a woman came to the podium and was introduced as the local representative of the American Gold Star Mothers. This organization is for all mothers of fallen Veterans, all those mothers who gave up their son or daughter in the defense of our country.

I will never remember the words she said or the names of the men she spoke about, but I remember thinking about the mother of my own children, and how she would feel if she lost one of hers to war, to a violent death. It killed me standing there, hearing those stories and shamed me to think of the attitude I had going into the ceremony. I played the last song with everything I had, what little I had to give in honor of those whose mothers wished they could be there to hear. I imagined how little my personal struggle with the heat and humidity meant in comparison with the struggle of those young men and women, and the families they left behind. I don't consider myself a great patriot, and I may not always agree with war, but I can with all I have honor those that lost their lives fighting. To all of those who can't read my words, I thank you for your sacrifice and wish that you had never had to fight.

Thank you, to all Veterans.

Maine Lobster and Chowda

eating fresh lobster

like rich people in a band

chowda was good, too

Only a few days ago, I was in Maine with the band. I have to say that it was a very fun trip, meeting all expectations. It's the opportunities like this that always make me satisfied with my decision to join the band. I'm in the process of trying to earn a nursing degree, and fortunately there will be travel opportunities involved with that career as well, though maybe not as frequent or interesting.

For a band in Memphis to travel to Maine, it was a unique opportunity. I know that I will have little to no chance of getting back up to that area of the United States so I chose to experience a few of the things that the area is known for, namely Maine Lobster and New England Clam Chowder (chowda).

I have to say that the dinner was great, I ate it all up plus some of my friends' appetizers. (Thanks Tones for the glass of wine that went perfect. The golf-dude's wine, I remember). The company was loud, but thats only because we were all so excited to be able to enjoy something so rare. Even so, I'm pretty used to loud, so I opted to go back to my room and chill rather than stay out and drink. I'm not much of a social drinker and wonder at times if the social drinking friends think I'm flipping my nose at their idea of fun. Hope they know that I think they're great fun, but would rather not go out drinking. Anyhow, I had gotten what I came for and know that they all had fun as well. Overall a great trip! If you're ever in New Brunswick and want lobster or chowda (get the seafood chowder!) then try Joshua's, it's yummy and fun.

Things that make me look bad #1

Me: *Buuuuuuurp*

Wife (walking into burp): EEEUCK! Why does your burp smell like shit?!

Me (with a pause for thought): Oh... I farted and burped at the same time, sorry.

Wife: JESUS!! FUCK!

kooky?

clarinet teacher

full of crazy ideas

make the emails stop

I recently took lessons to better myself on clarinet. Yes, I play clarinet. Yes, I care enough about the clarinet to pay a teacher to try and get me better at playing the clarinet. Dorky, I know. Shut up. Anyway, the teacher turned out to be a little kooky. He had helpful things to say, but sort of just said them out of order, like some crazy professor chatty-kathy doll. Every time I went into a lesson I didn't know how he would be, or how he would react to me. I tried being serious, funny, awkward, and confident, but none of those proved to get a good response out of him. I settled on apathy and went on with my life. (You have to know that most of the lesson involved learning the proper attitude I should have about music, not really how to play it).

So, having moved on, I get a tad annoyed with all of his emails that he sends to the clarinet students. Yes I know I could email him to remove me from his mailing list, but considering how difficult it was getting him to put me on, I would rather just read them and marvel at the kookyness. Here is a little taste of the last one!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OQ5HrOwbTo&feature=related

I will give a hundred dollar bill to any student who gets this music to me,
WITH PARTS and complete SCORE ...ACCURATELY NOTATED, in a WEEK!!!!

When I first got this piece of spam I had two thoughts, first was "Hey, he isn't trying to get me to vote for Obama again, cool." and the next was that I might be able to do this and get a hundred bucks! It would be worth it to write out any piece of music for a quick benjamin.

THEN... I clicked the link. Go ahead if you haven't already, click it.

You know when you eat something really tasty and you say "mmm" to yourself without even thinking about it? I said "What the fuck" before I even knew I wanted to give a WTF.

The emails are like a car wreck. I want to avoid them but I can't help but stare.

Integration, Baby!

the old becomes new

lots of stories, some unseen

go ahead and read

I have managed to pull all of my old posts out of my MySpace Blog and into this one. Please check them out, my favorite being the story about being sprayed in the face with pepper spray :D One of those things you can laugh at when its happening to somebody else. Enjoy.

Claps or Steaks

the first of many

writing relaxes the soul

like many rain drops

I have been meaning to create a blog for a long time now and have met the challenge with mixed results ranging from procrastination to blogs that have been abandoned just after their creating. I feel pretty sad for these blogs-that-never-were and hope that this one goes on to live a long a fruitful life. My wife came up with a pretty neat name for the blog, so I'll go with it :D

Today was great, I mean really great. After spending the morning with my kids, I left for a gig in Marriana, AR. Oh wait, you didn't know that I am in a band. Well, now you do :D  Anyhow, you have to know that the population of Marriana is like 50 and they were mostly all there to watch us. It kills me to work up a show and play my heart out to a crowd that sort of stands there with a blank look on their face.  Next time you go to some kind of concert... clap. If not for the performer, then just for common decency. Non-clappers should all be shipped off to Antarctica where there isn't shit to clap for anyhow.

Well, funny story about the gig. One of the big-wigs in charge of the band was talking with one of the wigs who set up the show we were playing at, asking where the last place was we performed.  He told her and mentioned that one of the bandsmen had eaten a whole lot while we were there. She asked him what he ate and he replied telling her that the venue had provided us with steaks.  It was very true, they fed us steaks, good steaks.  She sort of looked at him sadly and said, "All we have is sandwiches for you, maybe next time we'll have steaks!"

Either clap or give us steaks, we'll take either >:0