Random Thoughts

Dog Strategies III

2010-09-25T22:54:00.003-04:00

I have a dog who is a little too smart for his own good (or mine). I've written before here and then again here about how he works out sneaky ways to get toys and bones away from his sister. Now he's trying to pull a fast one on us. One of his bad habits is eating tissues. He'll get them any way he can. He's smart enough to know he isn't allowed to do this, so like any addict, he's modified his tactics in order to get his fix. When he finds a tissue he either tries to grab two or he tears the one he does find in half. Then he keeps one tissue in his mouth hidden, and allows the other one to be visible.

On two separate occasions, we have caught him with a tissue and told him to spit it out ("leave it!" is our command for this) which he dutifully does. After I disposed of the first tissue, I noticed he had a second one he was just finishing up. He pulled the same con on Shauna today. I don't know whether to be annoyed or proud. :-)

Riding on a bus

2010-07-16T16:45:00.009-04:00

Before I was old enough to drive, I took the bus everywhere. We lived in a little country town called Sissonville in southern West Virginia. The big town was Charleston, about 15 or so minutes away. My parents had a print shop and were usually in town. So in the summer, I was either going to be stranded or I could take the bus into Charleston.

Because I had a kind of base of operations in the guise of my parents' print shop, I felt pretty comfortable going downtown by myself. I had a summer bus pass so I could ride up and back as much as I wanted.

When I rode the bus into town, I spent a lot of time in the library. The main branch of the Kanawha County Public Library in downtown Charleston is a huge stone building. From the outside, it looks like a courthouse or museum. It’s just a magnificent old structure. I would spend hours reading books of all different types. I think there were three or four floors worth of books there. In the summer it was always cool and quiet.

Next to the library was a little nook with a tobacco shop, a tailor and a place called the Arcade News and Book store. It was a neat little place that had an entire wall full of magazines as well as a great selection of books.

Of course in those days, downtown Charleston was a thriving place with four department stores (Montgomery Ward, Sears, JC Penney and Stone & Thomas) and a lot of other shops so there were plenty of options if I got tired of books. There were a couple of record stores, one of which was called Budget Tapes & Records. They had a great music selection and a lot of drug paraphernalia, which was lost on me as a younger person. There also were at least two “real” movie theaters rather than the multiplexes they have now. These were the kind with big marquees and balconies.

It felt like a lot of freedom to walk around town unaccompanied, going wherever I wanted back then. I loved it, despite being periodically accosted by strange men trying to sell me pot.

The bus, though not as convenient as driving, was the next best thing to having a car for someone as young as I was. I continued to use it regularly up until I got my license. One of my favorite high school memories took place on a bus ride between Sissonville and Charleston.

I was in 10^th grade and was part of our school’s production of Fiddler on the Roof. One of the girls playing one of the main female roles was a senior named Tonja Horn. I didn’t know her very well. Most of the lead parts were filled by people in the choir, of which I was a member, so I knew those kids. She wasn't in the choir, despite having an absolutely beautiful voice. The play was a joint effort between the choir director and the drama teacher, so there was bound to be some political maneuvering involved. I seem to recall the drama teacher being annoyed with so many choir people getting the big parts, despite the fact that in our small school there was a significant cross over between the two groups. Tonja was in the drama club and was a fantastic singer, so she made the cut.

During all the rehearsals and after school time, we kind of got to know each another. I had a minor role. My character had a name, Avrum the Bookseller, but only one or two lines. Mostly I served to fill out the crowd and chorus scenes. So I had a lot of time to socialize and hang around with my fellow cast members which was how I got to know Tonja.

Before I knew what was going on, I developed a huge crush on her. Because she was a senior and I have incredibly low self esteem, I never made a move. After all, what would she want with a lowly sophomore anyway? Nevertheless, I pined from afar and enjoyed our times talking and laughing at rehearsal and occasionally before school and at lunchtime.

One day, I was on the bus headed for town and was thinking about her. I knew approximately where she lived and knew that it was on the bus route, but not the exact location. I was kind of daydreaming about her thinking how cool it would be if she rode the bus, but realizing that a girl of 18 was bound to have a driver’s license.

The brakes hissed as the bus pulled to a stop to admit another passenger. I looked up just in time to see Tonja board. She wore the expression everyone has when they get on the bus with a bunch of strangers: Kind of a desperate searching for a place that isn’t (a) next to a weirdo and (b) not too far in the back, where most weirdos like to gather.

Funnily enough, I was sitting in the back alone, sans weirdos unless you count me, when she spotted me. I caught the flash of recognition as I waved tentatively to her. Then the biggest smile I had ever seen spread across her face. She came to the back and sat with me for the rest of the ride into town.

I wish I could remember what we talked about, but it’s lost to me now. What I do recall is that for me, the bus was the best place in the world that afternoon.

Here is a cool video of downtown Charleston from more or less this same time period:

All I Really Need to Know I Learned from Peanuts

2010-01-01T16:19:00.008-05:00

Years ago, I had a great idea to write a book about the wisdom contained in the comic strip, Peanuts. At the time, there was a popular book called, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten by Robert Fulghum. I had read the book and thought it would be funny to do a semi-parody of his idea using the Charlie Brown universe. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that there really is a lot of wisdom in Charles M. Schulz's comics. I contacted a lot of cartoonists to get their perspectives and most answered. I even heard from Charles Schulz's publishers, but he was not interested in authorizing or even contributing to a book like I was imagining.

If I had been a real writer instead of a lazy bastard, I would have kept writing and sent it to him. I think, despite his initial reservations about it, he would have understood the intended spirit of the project. Sadly, I am lazy and of course, Charles Schulz passed away in February 2000.

After that, I kind of lost interest in the project, but always kept it in the back of my mind. A few years ago, Fantagraphics Books began releasing hard-bound editions of the daily and Sunday strips. This helped me to rekindle my love for those old comics. That, coupled with the relative ease of blogging led me to resurrect the project online. I will be posting what I've written and adding to it as I'm inspired to do so.

Below is the first bit I wrote for the book.
--------------------------------
There have been plenty of "All I Really Need To Know" books, posters and assorted paraphernalia on the market since the publication Robert Fulghum's All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. It seems that every subject has been covered, from Star Trek to Hilary Clinton. This is my humble contribution.

Though some may scoff, the ideas in this book actually predate the publication of Fulghum's book. But I do want to ensure that proper credit is given. His book did inspire me and helped provide a focus for my tribute to the brilliance of Charles M. Schulz, or "Sparky" to his friends.

So, I read Fulghum's book. I even liked most of it. But unlike him, I realized that all I really need to know about how to live, what to do, and how to be was not learned in kindergarten (Heads down, now!), but in the pages of Peanuts. While Fulghum found profundity on the playground, I see sagacity in Schulz.

Pick up any Peanuts book, here's some of what you'll learn:

Happiness is a Warm Puppy
Psychiatric help should only cost five cents
Never waste a good worry
You can't talk to someone who keeps saying "Au contraire"
There's no sense being sought after if you can't be found
Winning isn't everything, but losing isn't anything
Studying the wrong chapter is like cutting your fingernails too short
Never trade a hit for a clobber
A good way to forget a love affair is to eat a lot of goop
Anyone who gives their dad a Father's Day card is a rare gem
Eyes deceive and legs fail, but it's the stomach that gets you in trouble
You not only can't explain love, you can't even talk about it
It's easy to get carried away on true or false tests
It really doesn't take much to make a dad happy
Until it is demonstrated, one forgets the really great difference that exists between the merely competent amateur and the very expert professional
A little rain never hurt anybody
Keep the ball low. Don't leave crayons in the sun. Use dental floss every day. Give four weeks notice when ordering a change of address. Don't spill the shoe polish. Always knock before entering. Don't let the ants get in the sugar. Never volunteer to be the program chairman. Always get your first serve in. Feed your dog whenever it's hungry
The secret of life is to have three things to look forward to and nothing to dread
There's a difference between a philosophy and a bumper sticker
You can accomplish a lot once you get the sympathy of the press
Bitter sarcasm always spoils an appetite
If you expect nothing, you get nothing
Life is full of rude awakenings
A thumb tastes best at room temperature
Hoping and praying should never be confused with studying
Receiving a chain letter is like discovering you have gum on the bottom of your shoe
One of the great joys in life is scarfing junk food
Everyone in the stands is an expert
Never try to discuss marriage with a musician
If you're smart, you can pass a true or false test without being smart
It doesn't matter where you go, you've never left
After a walk on a brisk fall day it's fun to come home and have a cup of hot chocolate and sit in front of a warm TV
A lot of great letters never get mailed
It's amazing how stupid you can be when you're in love
You never get a wrong number when you need one
Love is not knowing what you're talking about
In all of mankind's history there has never been more damage done than by people who "thought they were doing the right thing"
In the book of life the answers are not in the back
The trouble with tennis is you can't play it alone
A good businessman can't afford to be sarcastic
Never set your stomach for a jelly-bread sandwich until you're sure there's some jelly
Taking a true or false test is like having the wind at your back
If they ever took "cute" out of the English language, we'd all perish
Cats are the crab grass in the lawn of life
It's hard to imagine a holiday without a little greed attached to it
Daytime is so you can see where you're going, nighttime is so you can lie in bed and worry
It doesn't take much these days to attract a crowd
You don't miss an aerobics class, you escape it
Anything that falls on the floor legally belongs to the dog
Those who can't do, teach
When something bad is going to happen to you there shouldn't have to be a night before
The sidewalk always wins, the knees always lose
To dance is to live
In all this world there is nothing more inspiring than the sight of someone who has just been taken off the hook
Security, like liberty, has to be won and rewon many times
Whenever you try to hit somebody, there is a tendency for them to try and hit you back
The world belongs to whoever has the biggest teeth
If you're not sure, just don't say anything
So much in this world depends on who gets born first
Happiness should be shared
Security doesn't just come to a person, sometimes it has to be pursued
The sports page is the cruelest page in the paper
It's not wise to lie in bed at night asking questions that you can't answer
It's time to quit school when they even criticize your lunch
Losing a ball game is like dropping an ice cream cone on the sidewalk. It lays there and you know you've dropped it and there's nothing you can do, it's too late
How sharper than a serpent's tooth is a sister's “nyaah!”
A smile makes a lousy umbrella
On a beautiful day it's best to stay in bed so you don't get up and spoil it
A hot dog just doesn't taste right without a ball game in front of it
Dogs are born to sleep in the sun
Never jump into a pile of leaves holding a wet sucker
Heroes ride, goats walk
Life is full of rude awakenings
If you watch every word you say, you'll never get much said
There's nothing like a little physical pain to take your mind off of your emotional problems
Happiness is a side dish of french fries
It's impossible to eat dog food when your stomach is set for Shrimp Louie
In teacher-pupil struggles it's always the principal who loses
If you're going to hope to get elected, don't mention the Great Pumpkin
To lie awake at night and think about life's problems is terrible, but to lie awake and think about pizza is intolerable
Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter like unrequited love
School time doesn't roll around, it leaps right out at you
Sound theology has a way of easing the mind
It takes all kinds to make a world, but some kinds we could do without
A kiss on the nose does much toward turning aside anger
A person is never quite so stupid as when being smart
Good hot chocolate tastes even better with a ski lodge around it
Everyone should have a dog to greet them when they come home
When you play your heart out you get a stomach ache
When you walk from the bench to the plate it's about 30 feet, but when you walk from the plate to the bench it's four miles
Never take advice you can understand, it can't possibly be any good
Just wait til next year!

Believe it or not it's just the tip of the iceberg.

What follows are my observations on Peanuts, the familiar characters we've all grown up with, and how I think they relate to life in general. I'm not a psychologist or sociologist. I've never studied human behavior. In fact, my “averageness” borders on the appalling. Yet, my mediocity is exactly what makes me qualified to write this book. I'm simply a ordinary, unexceptional guy.

Just like good ol’ Charlie Brown.

A Visit to the LOST Beach

2009-11-11T11:27:00.004-05:00

Because so many of my friends are LOST fans, I decided to write up a longer description of what happened when we visited the beach where LOST is filmed.

First of all, we ended up visiting a lot of places where LOST is filmed without realizing it. There is a Web site called LOST Virtual Tour which can guide you if you set out to find the specific sites. However, looking at it after the fact showed me that we had been to a couple of the spots already. For example, there is a lookout point next to Hanauma Bay where Desmond confronted Kelvin. We went there, but didn't realize that's where we were. We just liked the view.

Since we had planned to visit the northern part of the island that day, we decided it would be fun to see the beach where many of the scenes from LOST are filmed. It's called Papa'iloa Beach and it's actually just a short drive from La'ie where BYU Hawaii is located.

We walked out on the beach and right away recognized some of the places where key scenes were filmed. We saw a group of people further down the beach, but still didn't realize it was the film crew. We assumed it was another group of tourists. Just then this kind of lanky older guy came walking over to us. He asked us if we minded walking up higher on the shore so we wouldn't end up accidentally on camera. It turned out he was one of the production guys for the shoot and they were actually filming a scene that day.

The cool thing is that since all Hawaiian beaches are public, he couldn't order us away, he could only ask. We readily agreed to move (because we're nice like that) and he asked us if we were coming out there to watch the filming. We explained that we didn't even know they were filming, but we wanted to see the location. He said, "Well, come with me. I'll take you around to the other side and you'll be able to see better what's going on."

The next thing we knew, we were walking through the makeshift campsite set up by the Oceanic Flight 815 survivors. We could see shelters with airplane wreckage and suitcases. We were in the middle of the set! I took a couple of pictures. We were passed over to a security guard who nicely asked me to not take anymore pictures. He said they were pretty paranoid about spoilers and that if I was seen taking photos, they might throw us out. We went around through the jungle past all these different props and sets, past trailers and miscellaneous crew members. I don't know if it was because it was Hawaii or what, but everyone was super mellow and nice. They seemed to go out of their way to say hello to us. I have visited a set or two in the past and can say that is not usually how it is. Everyone is usually all uptight.

So after pausing a few times to allow for something that was being filmed, we were escorted out past Eko's church structure to the beach. We stood there watching as the character Ilana was filming a scene where she kicked a guy and pointed a rifle at him after he fell. They did it again and again as the rain fell.

Just then Shauna grabbed my arm and said, "Oh, my gosh. That's Ben!" I looked through my rain spotted glasses and sure enough Michael Emerson, the actor who plays Benjamin Linus was sitting with another security guard under a tarp. He was chatting with the guard and at one point stood up to empty the rain-filled tarp.

We were there a few more minutes and then I looked up and saw a familiar face walking out to the tarp. It was Locke! John Locke (Terry O'Quinn) was standing maybe 40 feet away from us. He walked out and shook hands with Ben which I found sort of funny. At one point, he turned around and looked at us, but did not make eye contact. I don't blame him. I'm sure he didn't want to deal with a bunch of fans. Besides Shauna, Matt Hyatt and me, there were four other people there watching. At one point another person came out and was greeted enthusiastically by the two actors. It was a blonde woman, but it wasn't Juliet or Penny.

We realized we needed to leave because it was raining and we had tickets to the Polynesian Cultural Center that night. The snag was, the guard who brought us out there told us we couldn't just walk out. He said we needed to go over to the guard who was sitting with the actors and tell him to radio for someone to come get us. I wondered how reasonable it was to approach a guard who was with the actors. In the end, Shauna did it. However, the guard seemed to misunderstand her. Instead of radioing for an escort, he took us himself. He was pissed off because he wasn't supposed to leave the set. I told him like three times that he was supposed to radio someone, but he didn't listen to me. He was the only guy on the set that was jerky about us being there.

Again, we were held up in the production area. I head a familiar voice saying, "I gotta do an interview in a minute." I looked to my right and in the trailer right next to us, maybe 10 feet away this time was Terry O' Quinn again. We didn't push our luck to ask for an autograph or anything, but it was cool to be there. The same hippified old production dude took over for the guard and took us back out to the beach. I apologized for our causing a hassle with guard and he said, "Ah, he'll do what we tell him to."

We went out to the beach and left. Shauna took a couple of pictures of Ben under the tarp as we left, but it was zoomed in and shaky. It's not the best picture, but it's what we have.

Honestly, we thought we would be lucky to see the beach, but to be taken through the set and to see a couple of the actors was so far beyond what we expected. Plus, everyone was so gracious (the one guard excepted) and were even saying goodbye to us as we were leaving.

One picture is included in this note, but this link will take you to the rest of them, if you're interested: http://tinyurl.com/LOSTBeach09

Disturbing Trend

2009-10-06T12:10:00.004-04:00

Several months ago, I posted a video clip of my old band performing a song I wrote when I was 19 called, "Kill Your Girlfriend." The entry also told the story of how the song was written.

Since then, I installed a traffic monitor on my blog and have found that way too many people come to this blog after searching for terms like "How to kill your girlfriend" or "Kill your girlfriend and get away with it." That's a bit creepy. No, it's really creepy.

Therefore, I would like to issue the disclaimer that the author of the blog entitled Random Thoughts does not and has not ever seriously endorsed the killing of one's girlfriend, boyfriend or any combination of the above.

Thank you.

Dog Strategies II

2009-05-28T19:20:00.007-04:00

So my dog Odin is smarter than any pet I've ever had, bar none. I wrote before about his strategy to take his sister's bone without having to fight for it. He used a new technique just the other day.

The dogs were laying on the bed while my wife was resting. Daisy had a bone which she was happily gnawing on while Odin plotted. Suddenly he perked up and cocked his head as if he heard something he sprang to the edge of the bed. Daisy, realizing she must be missing something, sprang to action and was off the bed and out the bedroom door in a split second. Odin, however, never moved beyond the edge of the bed. He pretended to hear something because he knew she would fall for it! He faked her out. As soon as she jumped off the bed, he very casually walked to her bone and lay down to chew it in peace.

About a minute later, Daisy walked back to the doorway and stared at Odin in seeming disbelief. She had been had. Again.

I nominate Odin for President of all dogs.

24: Day Seven

2009-04-21T17:30:00.000-04:00

I've been watching 24 since midway through Season Three. After seeing that, I caught up on DVD and have watched ever since. I admit that the horrific Season Six nearly made me give up on the show, but I had heard this season would be better so I gave it a chance. So far it has been better.

Nevertheless, I have a complaint or two.

One of the things that made 24 such a great show was the fact that anyone was expendable. It makes the viewer feel some of the danger that Jack is in and thus become more invested in the show. Having said that, I think that it's lazy to simply kill characters as an emotional wrench. They have failed to consider what cast chemistry means. A good example of this is Tony Almeida. In Season Six, they unceremoniously killed his wife, the former president and then Tony himself. This seemed to have almost no purpose, particularly the death of Tony. Then through a somewhat contrived plot twist worthy of As the World Turns, Tony is alive.

At first, we were sure Tony was a bad guy, but then we learned he was double crossing the bad guys to uncover their plot. Tony was working with other former CTU operatives and quickly agreed to help Jack. As everyone who has been watching has since learned, Tony seems to be bad again. This will lead to the inevitable showdown which will undoubtedly result in Tony's death.

I'm disappointed in this twist because I think it's a lazy way to create tension. I'm not saying I know what would be better, but I think these writers underestimate the importance of cast chemistry when they decide to knock of a character or make them turn evil. Now I suppose it's possible that Tony is double-double crossing the secret group that apparently is at the head of this plot, but he's already killed one agent directly and blew up a whole bunch on last night's episode.

I just don't see how they will write their way out of this one and make it seem satisfying. If this is the end of Tony as a good guy and a character on the show I'm going to be really pissed. Again.

Don't even get me started on what's wrong with Heroes.

Windy

2009-04-05T13:04:00.006-04:00

I know people who live in places like Chicago would smirk, but we get some pretty strong winds here in Lovettsville. When I was a kid, it had snowed several inches and then rained on top of it. The rain froze so that there was about a inch or more of solid ice over the snow. My brother and I nailed our sleds together and added a sail to it. We used the gusts coming off the Blue Ridge Mountains to fly across our fields. It was a blast ... literally.

The past few days have been really windy. I was walking over by the elementary school and saw this:

I really hope no one was inside.

How to Make American Idol Better

2009-03-26T20:18:00.002-04:00

Despite it's popularity, American Idol's ratings have waned. Watching it last night, it occurred to me how it could be an interesting show again.

Each week, a random contestant would be given a gun with one bullet. During the feedback from the judges section if the contestant doesn't like what he or she hears, then BANG!

I'm guessing either Randy or Kara would be the first to go.

16 Albums

2009-02-21T22:46:00.007-05:00

This has been going around Facebook and I wanted to post it here as well.

Think of 15 - 20 albums that had such a profound effect on you they changed your life or the way you looked at it. They sucked you in and took you over for days, weeks, months, years. These are the albums that you can use to identify time, places, people, emotions.

These are the albums that no matter what they were thought of musically shaped your world. These are my picks. I tried to limit it to 15, but ended up with 16 so sue me. There are a few more who came close, but these are mine.

1. The Beatles (White Album) - The Beatles
My aunt was a cool hippie, but in her late 20s became born again. She gave me all of her old albums. Among them was the White Album. This was not the Beatles I was used to hearing and stylistically it opened up a whole new musical world for me.

2. Rock and Roll Music - The Beatles
This isn't a real release, but rather a compilation released by Capitol Records in the mid 70s. When the Beatles broke up, they still had a contractual obligation to Capitol which was fulfilled via the release of several of these compilation discs. My parents got this for me before it was actually available to the general public because they donated money to NPR here in D.C. This double album focused on the rock and roll side of the Beatles catalog. For me, it marked my first time hearing songs like Taxman and Hey Bulldog.

3. Live at Folsom Prison - Johnny Cash
My dad was into country music more than anything. For the most part, I hated it. Johnny Cash was the exception. His voice and his stories spoke to me in a way other other country artists never did. He seemed like part of our family.

4. Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy - Elton John
While Goodbye Yellow Brick Road gets most of the attention from his fans, Captain Fantastic is more or less a sequel. This is pretty much perfect pop music. Incredible melodies, brilliant lyrics. I can't here this without thinking of muggy summers in Virginia.

5. Destroyer - KISS
Destroyer was when KISS became bigger than life. Purists might say this is when they sold out and truth be told, it's not really a favorite anymore, but it was huge for me when I was 13. It was a perfect mix of music and comic books. What more would any boy want?

6. Never Mind the Bullocks, Here's the Sex Pistols - The Sex Pistols
Hearing the Sex Pistols for the first time felt like an audio assault. Everything about it seemed wrong, yet I couldn't turn it off.

7. The Clash - The Clash
The Clash, even on their first album, showed that there was more more to punk rock than anarchy and screaming. They took what the Sex Pistols did and went a step further.

8. Live at Budokan - Cheap Trick
I never heard Cheap Trick until I heard the live version of I Want You to Want Me on the radio. It was heavy like KISS, but melodic like The Beatles.

9. Get the Knack - The Knack
Sneer if you must, but this is a perfect album. The Knack took everything that made power pop fun and crammed it into every song. Forget the skinny ties and short hair and wanna-be Beatles vibe, The Knack were the real deal ... for exactly one album. Sadly, they put everything they had into the one album and never even came close again.

10. Armed Forces - Elvis Costello
Elvis Costello took the anger of punk rock, but added a more pop sensibility to it.

11. Are You Experienced? - The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Jimi blended the blues with rock, pop and folk. This album made me want to hear what influenced him.

12. East Side Story - Squeeze
I didn't want to give Squeeze a chance because everything I ever read about them included the notion that they were the "New Lennon and McCartney." I knew that couldn't be true so I blew them off. Fortunately for me, I accidentally heard them on MTV and was hooked. East Side Story is probably the best example of their particular blend of melody and storytelling. When I started writing songs, I spent years trying to write lyrics like these.

13. Spilt Milk - Jellyfish
Jellyfish was kind of overlooked amidst the 90s alt-rock explosion, but this is a perfect pop album in the absolute best sense of the term.

14. Nevermind - Nirvana
It's easy to take Nirvana for granted after all the hype and deification of Kurt Cobain. But this album was like the second coming of punk. Only this time, they took the best elements of punk, rock, metal and pop and mixed it into this amazing hybrid that sounded the death knell for 80s hair metal. I watched with amazement as overnight as BAM magazine stopped featuring ads for hair extensions and replaced them with ads for flannel shirts (as if the look alone gives a band credibility). Nirvana changed music formats and shattered conventions. The result was that bands no one ever would have given a chance made it onto the radio. What a lot of people miss about Nirvana is how poppy they were. Most don't get past the grinding guitar and primal scream of Cobain. Break down the songs and you'll hear real melodies there.

15. O.K. Computer - Radiohead
I think this may be one of the top five albums of all time. The last one before Radiohead descended into self-indulgence and pretension.

16. Welcome Interstate Managers - Fountains of Wayne
An amazing power pop album. Intelligent lyrics, great melodies and harmonies. You can tell they are influenced by all of the best bands.

Kill Your Girlfriend

2009-01-27T19:12:00.007-05:00

So when I was 19, I had this girlfriend. She moved away and we were broken hearted. Well, I called her when I could, but in reality it was inevitable that we both would move on. Still, it stung a little when I called her and her mom said, "She's not here. Is this Roger?" No. I wasn't Roger. I didn't know anyone named Roger. I hung up the phone and never called that girl again. To take out my frustration, I wrote an angry, wanna-be punk song called Kill Your Girlfriend.

I had recently read a book called, And I Don't Want to Live this Life by Deborah Spungeon. Deborah's daughter, Nancy was the girlfriend of Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols. Sid killed Nancy after a night of drug abuse.

I took that story as inspiration for my broken heart and wrote my song. To ease your mind, I didn't really want to kill my (ex) girlfriend. I was just blowing off steam. I actually recorded the song that night with overdubbed backwards guitars and a wannabe Johnny Rotten singing style and forgot about it for a while.

Fast forward a few years and I was in a band called Audrey Smilley and we needed to have three hours of original music for a gig at a local club called, Brodericks. We had one week to learn it all. We played anything and everything we had ever written or thought about writing. It was only natural that Kill Your Girlfriend was resurrected (ha!). It quickly became a very popular part of our live set. Even the girls liked it, because everyone has relationship frustrations. The girls would sing, "Kill your boyfriend!" instead of girlfriend.

Anyway, my former bandmate Dale Garrard recently posted a video performance on YouTube of us doing Kill Your Girlfriend at a club called The Backstage Cafe in Provo, Utah. Enjoy!

Dog Strategies

2009-01-04T21:08:00.004-05:00

We have two English Springer Spaniels: Odin and Daisy. They are siblings, but from different litters. Odin has been with us for two years and Daisy just since August. The other day, Odin brought me a tennis ball. He does that sometimes when he wants to play. I dutifully took it from him and threw it down the hall. He didn't even look at where I threw it or move a muscle. Instead, he stared at his sister who immediately jumped up and chased after the ball. Odin, then walked over to where she had been and confiscated the bone she had left behind. I never knew that dogs strategized until that moment. But clearly, he understood that (a) if he brought me a ball I'd probably throw it and (b) if I threw it, Daisy would probably chase it.

I know people who don't have that much foresight.

Music

2008-12-30T19:15:00.007-05:00

Here are a couple of cool things I found floating around YouTube.

This is Squeeze doing John Lennon's Cold Turkey. I've been a Squeeze fan since the 80s and I never knew they covered this song.

This one is Radiohead doing Paranoid Android from their O.K. Computer album. The arrangement is pretty elaborate and they make it seem effortless.

The other day, I watched the Martin Scorsese movie called Shine a Light which was a Rolling Stones concert film. I like the Stones right up until about Tattoo You. After that, they seemed to be doing a passable Rolling Stones impression. Still, I wanted to see this film. It was well made, but my biggest beef is that Mick just doesn't sing anymore. He yells. He used to have a silky, smooth voice and he threw the yelling in for good effect. Now he yells all the time.

However there were three highlights in the concert. One was when Buddy Guy came out to perform Muddy Waters' Champagne and Reefer:

The next was when Jack White (of the White Stripes) came out and joined the band for Loving Cup:

For the final highlight, Cristina Aguilera came out for the song, Live With Me:

Finally, last year VH1 did an honors special featuring Elvis Costello. In addition to his own material, he did a Fiona Apple song and she in turn did one of his. It is perhaps his most twisted and insane love song and there is no one more suited to perform it than the twisted and insane Fiona Apple:

Christmas Eve

2008-12-24T19:15:00.001-05:00

I admit I haven't been feeling very Christmasy this year. I don't know if it's because my kids are older or if I just have lost the capacity for that much excitement, but I just don't feel it.

Even listening to Christmas music or Christmas shopping hasn't helped. Maybe it's all the major negative economic news we keep getting. It's hard to lose oneself in a holiday when the news is all bad. Nevertheless, we are ready.

Every Christmas, I tend to reflect back on past Christmases. When I was a kid, I had this advent calendar. It was really a long strip of felt with yarn ties. On each tie was a Hershey kiss. You took one off each morning until Christmas.

My mom used to make home-made hard candy which my dad would take to work for his secretary and anyone else to whom he felt he had to give gifts. One morning, as he walked outside with a jar of candy, he slipped on the ice and it broke into a million pieces. Dad always had a bad back so it didn't do much good for that either.

I would be home from school for vacations, of course, and I always liked to watch Captain Kangaroo. Keep in mind that by this time, I was way too old to watch Captain Kangaroo, but there was something about his voice that was soothing. It was particularly so when he read books for us. At Christmastime, he read holiday-themed books so it really put me in the mood.

One tradition we had was that in the week or so leading up to Christmas, we would get out one of our toys from a previous Christmas. It was particularly fun to get out something we didn't play with much. It helped build the excitement leading up to the day.

Another tradition was that we were allowed to open one of our presents under the tree on Christmas Eve. That helped take the edge off the mania. You had to be careful though. If you didn't pay close attention, you might accidentally open up a sweater or some Avon gift my grandmother would get for us. No, the ideal Christmas Eve present was a toy. The success of that tradition varied from year to year, but I remember one year I opened up a GI Joe footlocker. This was a wooden box which could house GI Joe's various uniforms and weapons. You could also fit Joe in the bottom of it, so it was very cool.

When our family lived in Virginia (1971-1978), my grandmother, Nan, used to come stay with us for Christmas. I don't know why she didn't stay with my grandfather, but he only came with her once. The year he came, we lived in Lovettsville on a farm. My grandfather took me and my brother hunting. We were trying to get a pheasant for Christmas dinner. I wasn't really old enough to have a real gun, so they let me take a BB gun. I nearly got my head blown off when we flushed the pheasant and I inadvertently stepped in front of it. If my grandfather had worse reflexes, I wouldn't be writing this now. Fortunately, he didn't shoot me in the head and I lived to tell the tale. Instead, we bagged a rabbit, which my mother dutifully cleaned and served for Christmas Eve dinner. My great aunt Sue (Nan's sister) and her husband Daris were also there. Right as we sat down to bless the food, it started to snow. This would be a better story if the snow had stuck, but it just snowed for a while. Still it was a perfect moment.

My grandfather made a big noise before bed that my brother and I better not wake him up first thing in the morning because he needed his sleep. Of course, he was awake at about 5:30 a.m. screaming, "JINGLE BELLS! JINGLE BELLS! JINGLE ALL THE WAY!" at the top of his lungs. He was a big kid at heart.

Of course the most memorable Christmas eve was in 1989: the year John was born. I was still in college and we had only the barest insurance coverage It covered the birth and a 12 hour hospital stay. We were all sick that year. Shauna and Trevor had pneumonia and I had mono. John was born early Christmas Eve morning.

We took him home at about 9 that night. Trevor was two and a half so he was really super excited for Christmas. He was so excited and we were so determined not to traumatize him, what with the new brother and all. He woke up at about 3:30 in the morning and wanted to open presents. He was the first and only grandchild at the time (besides the recently born John) so he had a mountain of presents. He could only open so many before he was exhausted and we went back to bed.

At about 6:30 in the morning there was a hammering at our door. It was our pediatrician. He didn't explain or apologize, he only said "Where's the baby! I need to see him." I was dazed and led him in to where we had the basinet. He mumbled something to himself about his color and pulse and then said, "Get his coat on and come with me." He then explained that John had tested positive for Beta Strep. I'm still not exactly sure what it is, but it's very dangerous to babies. We took John to the hospital where he spent a week in intensive care. Shauna stayed there with him and I stayed home with Trevor, who needed a nebulizer about every two hours for his asthma complications and pneumonia. Luckily, Shauna's dad came up from California (we lived in Utah at the time) to help us out. It was pretty overwhelming for a while, but he pulled through.

He turned 19 today.

Sleepy Jeffers

2008-10-02T12:21:00.004-04:00

I was born and lived the first six years of my life in Charleston, W.Va. When I was small, WCHS TV still had local programming which I suppose many stations across the country did as well. One of the programs I watched was a kid's show called Uncle Willie. He was a goofy cartoony kind of guy, not unlike Captain Kangaroo, who told jokes, sang songs and introduced cartoons. He had a daughter on the show who looked to be about my age at the time. Her name was Little Linda. He could make his tie jump up and down with his Adam's Apple. That may not sound like much now, but it killed in my circle of five year olds.

Uncle Willie was played by a guy called Sleepy Jeffers. He was a big time, local radio guy who also had another show called, what else, The Sleepy Jeffers Show. This was a variety program which consisted primarily of down home country music. Not my favorite, but my parents watched it.

Years later when we moved back to W.Va., I got a job at WCHS Radio and who was the over night guy during the week? None other than Sleepy Jeffers himself! I was a part-timer so I never had to attend staff meetings, but I heard that when the meetings would get boring, Sleepy would get your attention and start wiggling his tie with his Adam's Apple.

I worked overnight Saturdays and late evening Sunday. When I worked Sunday nights, Sleepy was the guy who came in after me. He was pretty much always late. I would inevitably get a call from him at about five minutes before midnight.

"Hi Craig, this is Sleepy."

"Hi, Sleepy. What's going on?"

"I'll be there pretty soon, but I'm gonna stop by Shoney's and get something to eat. You wanna sammich?"

"That's o.k., thanks. I'll see you when you get here."

He would never be more than 10-20 minutes late and I always signed out at my regular time. I didn't want him to get in trouble. He was a local legend after all. I admit that despite the years, I was a bit starstruck. It was a pain to stay late when I had school the next day, but I'd always do it for Sleepy.

And sometimes he brought me a sandwich anyway.

Bleach

2008-08-23T18:15:00.006-04:00

When Nirvana's album Nevermind was released it was like a revelation. It had been years since I had heard music that sounded like it was sincere, like it meant something. We had endured the 80s with its hair metal and Euro trash keyboard pop. Here was music that was urgent, loud and unexpectedly melodic. One thing I noticed about Nirvana was that if you changed the arrangement and rerecorded it, you would have some pretty snappy pop music. They were the Gen. X Beatles. They came and everything changed.

At the time I lived in southern California, working in LA. There was a youngish girl of the indie persuasion working there too. I mentioned to her that I really like Nirvana and was curious about her opinion. With a touch of disdain she said, "Well, I liked Bleach ..." Bleach was Nirvana's first release on Sub Pop and almost no one had heard it at the time because they were just a Seattle band. Now there's nothing wrong with Bleach, but it's that phenomenon where people want to prove they were early fans so they reference some obscure work and act all shocked when no one knows what they are talking about. I bet you anything that there were Liverpudlians in 1963 who said, "Well, Please Please Me is all right, but I really liked My Bonnie ..."

I read an article about Barack Obama's campaign and how people who support him think it's cooler to have old, tattered Obama stickers because they showed they got into supporting him early. What is it about humans that they need to feel like they were the first into something?

In our family we now call it the Bleach Syndrome. Whenever anyone references liking something first or some obscure work, we all shout, "Bleach!"

Yes, we're dorks.

July 3

2008-07-03T23:51:00.000-04:00

In Lovettsville, we have an annual 3rd of July Parade and Fireworks. I'm not sure, but I think the idea is to allow people to go to celebrations for the Fourth of July in DC and some of the bigger cities. Anyway, it's something we do every year and it's quintessential small town America. There's nothing spectacular about it, but darned if I don't haul myself over to it every year, no matter how hot it is, and stand and watch the whole thing. It's kind of similar to our Oktoberfest celebration which I mentioned previously. It's just fun to get together as a community and celebrate something together. You get to see everyone and it's just fun.

In the evening, they do fireworks which we are able to see from our backyard. I took some pictures, but they didn't come out too well.

In a way, it's appropriate to have a celebration on the 3rd of July anyway. The Declaration of Independence was ratified on July 2 and signed on the 4th. So really, we should have a multi-day celebration anyway.

Crowdie Concert Karma

2008-05-05T14:22:00.005-04:00

I finally got to see Crowded House in concert on Friday night. I've been trying to see Neil Finn in one of his many iterations for several years, but each time I've had something happen to prevent it. The first time I had tickets to see Neil Finn on his own (also at the 9:30 Club which is where Crowded House was on Friday). That day, I came down with a massive migraine and simply couldn't face the idea of driving all the way down there and sitting through a concert while undergoing such pain.

Fast forward a few years and I had tickets to see the Finn Brothers at the Birchmere. This time, we planned to go with some friends. Instead, there was a huge snowstorm, which was not enough to cancel the show, but was enough to make our roads impassable. So I was foiled again.

On Friday, I waited all day for something horrible to happen to prevent our attendance. Yet, nothing did. We drove up and got to the club with no hassles at all. We walked in and Shauna wanted to walk up pretty close to the stage. This surprised me because she hates crowds and it would only get worse when the band came out. So up we went. A few minutes later Crowded House came out and started playing. They looked and sounded great. About the fourth song into the set, Shauna turned around and gave me a funny look and slowly sunk to her knees. It seems that, though it wasn't packed like sardines or anything, the heat in the enclosed space was enough to cause her to pass out.

People in the crowd helped me catch her and walk her off to the side. By this time she had recovered her senses enough to walk on her own. So we ended up going to a little alcove in the back with couches. I got her some ice water and she seemed to be all right, but the moment was kind of spoiled. I couldn't really concentrate on the music because I was stressed out and wondering if she was going to take another nose dive.

The band played a long time and it was good, it's just that I was too distracted to pay complete attention.

Oh well, below is a clip someone shot from the audience:

The Meadowblasters

2008-04-15T09:18:00.010-04:00

So I was going through some old photos the other day and I ran into this picture. It was taken in 1983. This is the band I was in at the time, The Meadowblasters. We stole the name from a Bloom County comic, but thought it was particularly apt because we practiced (and I lived) in a community called Laurel Meadows. Anyway, the Charleston Daily Mail had supplement sections for the various communities and this one ran in ours with a story about our band playing at Herbert Hoover High which was where our bass player, my cousin Steve, attended. The rest of the band went to Sissonville High. So that was me, Mike Derrick (drums) and Dave Hart (guitar). They didn't run this picture in the paper, opting instead for a shot taken during the performance. The reporter was kind enough to send us an 8x10 of this one though.

We did two performances that day, playing for half of the school each time. The crowd was insane. We felt like the Beatles. I swear to you, it's the only time in my life that I had girls shoving phone numbers into my pocket. It was awesome. We thought we had made it at last!

It all came crashing down when Dave and I listened to the tape of the performance afterwards. It turned out that the bass was slightly out of tune. It was just enough that everything else sounded sour. And it seemed to get worse each time we listened to it. Oh well, you would never have been able to tell from the crowd.

My Last Day as a Missionary

2008-02-27T19:07:00.004-05:00

I woke up early that Monday. Well let's be honest, we always got up early, but if I'm not mistaken, that day it was earlier than usual. It was the last day I was going to be a missionary and I wanted to catch the first bus out of town. I was serving in Gutierrez Zamora, Veracruz in Mexico. The Mission Office was located in the city of Veracruz. That was about two and half maybe three hours south, straight down the coast. I was hoping to catch the earliest bus so I would have the whole day in the city.

My mission took place at a time when missions were 18 months long. That would have been great except for the fact that right as I hit the halfway point, the church said, "My bad!" and decided to make them two years again. The good thing about it was we were given a choice on how long we wanted to serve. I could keep my original call or extend one to six more months if I wanted. Some missionaries didn't seem to think about it at all. They just immediately extended. More is always better right?

It wasn't that easy for me. Personally, I wanted to do what was "right" but I couldn't for the life of me figure out what that was. I prayed and prayed and prayed for an answer as to what God wanted me to do, but I got nothing for the longest time. After about a month of agony, I finally got my answer: stick with your original calling. This was great for me because I figured that if I changed my mind, I could always extend. However, I was pretty sure that if I extended then and decided I wanted to shorten it, I might get some grief. Would it surprise you to know that a lot of missionaries didn't believe me when I told them I had prayed to know what to do and was told to stick to 18 months? Yeah, I didn't think so.

But it was all over now and I was looking for a bus to take to the mission HQ. If I had really planned it, I would have taken the good bus line called ADO. When I say 'good' what I mean is you got an assigned seat. The other buses were more like school buses. We called them 'guajoloteros' which referred to the fact that they often included turkeys, chickens and other animals along with the people. A guajolote is the word most Mexicans use for Turkey. The Spanish word is 'pavo' but guajolote is Náhautl in origin. Its literal translation is big monster. I don't know how it evolved to mean turkey.

Besides the livestock, they liked to cram as many people as humanly possible onto these kind of buses. That meant you could end up standing for part or all of the journey. This was not a big deal if it was a short distance, but if you were traveling for a few hours, it was a major pain.

By the time I tried to get an ADO ticket, they were already sold out for that day. There was only one that went to Veracruz, so I knew I'd end up on a guajolotero. That was o.k. I had ridden on them before and it was going to be the last time. We lived about a mile from the bus station. I had two suitcases, plus a carry on so our landlord offered to drive us there. He was a good guy. He wasn't Mormon and we never once tried to teach him about the church. They had rented to the missionaries for years and I always assumed that if he wanted to hear anything, he would ask. I probably wasn't the world's greatest missionary.

As we got to the station, our landlord ejected the tape playing in the truck's stereo and gave it to me. A couple of months before, he had driven us to a zone conference in Poza Rica so we didn't have to spend money on the bus. On that trip, he had played the same tape during the drive. It was a Mexican band called El Grupo Audaz and I had mentioned how much I liked the music. He handed me the cassette and said, "So you don't forget your family here in Mexico." I was touched. He then hugged me goodbye and wished me a good journey.

My companion, my replacement and I all hopped out of the truck and took my stuff into the station waiting area. A couple of minutes later, two ward members came by to see me off. I was surprised because it was pretty early in the morning and they were both home on a break from school. I figured they would want to sleep. The church owned a private high school in Mexico City called Benemérito de las Américas. At one time, the church owned a lot of private schools down there, but they were beginning to divest themselves of those and this was one of the last, and biggest, ones around.

The bus finally came and to my horror, I couldn't get on. It was so packed full of people that I had to wait for the next one. I was pissed. I really wanted to get to Veracruz. My main mission was to purchase something for my grandmother. What I wanted to get her was a doll from Mexico. She was a collector and I happened to know that there was a store that specialized in dolls clothed in traditional Mexican dress right in the town of Veracruz. I knew because the mission president's wife, who was also a collector, told me about it.

So I waited. The next bus came about 30 minutes later. When I went to get on, the conductor informed us all that this bus would be traveling the long way to Veracruz: through the sierra region. This was going to take eight hours instead of three. Combine that with the fact that I was probably going to have to stand the whole way, I passed again. I had already loaded my bags on so I had to get them back off the bus.

Now I was very upset and totally stressed. I was looking at another hour to wait for the next bus. I was worried. What if I couldn't get to Veracruz today? Would I still be able to go home or would I have wait another month?

The bus finally came and the crowd to get on seemed just as big as last time. Someone decided to open the back door of the bus so I climbed in that way. My companion and friends handed me my bags which I had to place in the cargo area in the back. It made me nervous to be so far away from them. I wanted them in the luggage rack next to where I was, but there was simply no room. Of course I had to stand, but at least I was on the bus. I was only about two hours behind schedule. I looked down at my feet and there were two chickens in a little cage right up against my legs. I finally lightened up enough to laugh. This wasn't the first time I had a chicken with me on a bus, but it would probably be the last.

Riding on a bus standing up in Mexico is a very intimate experience but not in a good way. As we traveled down the coast, more people were getting off than on which meant that I might get to sit after all. As the crowd thinned, I noticed two cute 20-something women smiling at me. I nodded hello to them and they grinned even wider.

"Would you like to sit down?" one of them cooed.

"Thanks, but then you'd have to stand" I said.

"You could sit on our laps."

I knew then that Satan was making a last ditch effort to make me crash and burn before I was honorably released. The wily devil!

"No thanks" I said, smiling, but inwardly I was terrified. Luckily, it didn't take much longer before a seat opened up. Unluckily, it was in the aisle across from the ladies. Satan was having his way today! They started talking to me again. As it turned out, they were in fact just being nice and weren't trying to take my chastity. They just felt sorry for me having to stand all the way there. Plus, I must have looked pathetic. I was about 30 or so pounds underweight. Between all the walking and pretty much constant diarrhea, my 5'11" frame had gone from 165 pounds to about 130 pounds over the course of the mission. When I realized they weren't Jezebels sent by the dark lord himself to seduce me, I relaxed. I even gave them a mini lesson about the church right there on the bus.

Soon we arrived in Veracruz and I was able to get a cab to the mission office. The mission president had chosen this week to host a special conference so all the zone leaders from the entire mission were present for meetings. In those days, our mission encompassed four states: Veracruz, Oaxaca, Puebla and Tlaxcala. There were quite a few of my good friends already in Veracruz. The mission president allowed me and one of my closest missionary buddies, we had been in the MTC together and served most of our missions in the same zones, to spend the whole day together as the meetings hadn't officially started yet. Monday was our P-day and that was a travel day.

My mission president was a really good guy. Very down to earth and not at all like some of the horror stories I have heard about other MPs. He had a very friendly smile and looked almost exactly like the British comedian, Benny Hill. It was sometimes hard not to imagine Benny Hill when he was standing in front of us all and talking. He was great, but that didn't mean he was a pushover either. He just trusted us to behave like adults.

He called me into his office and handed me the address of the store with the collectible dolls. Even though he was a busy guy, he remembered my request for a local shop that sold such things from about two months before. He gave me exact directions on how to get there and which bus would be the best to take.

My buddy and I went out and made the purchase and then had a leisurely lunch at an outdoor cafe across from the Gulf of Mexico. He was also near the end of his mission, but he had another month to go. We made plans to go out to BYU together, but mostly we just reminisced about the times we had spent together in the mission field. It was a great day.

That night, we were all assigned to the different companionships who regularly worked in Veracruz. Most of them were office elders who worked in the headquarters during the day, but still did missionary work in the evening. I don't remember much except that I was more than done with it all. I tried to rally my missionary spirit and just get into it, but I'm not sure I did very well. Finally, we went back to the mission home and called it a night.

The mission office was located in what used to be one of the private schools I mentioned before. The church still owned the building so they converted it over. They even had dorms attached which was were I and the other visiting missionaries stayed for the night. It was a lot like the MTC again, but in a good way. I spent most of my mission in small towns away from other missionaries so I rarely got to have the camaraderie that missionaries in larger areas have. I was usually at least an hour away from any other missionaries. So it was fun for me to hang with other guys and joke around. There were five of us heading home the next day and we were all invited to eat dinner with the mission president and his wife.

I had my final interview with the mission president that night. I don't remember much about it except that he didn't pressure me to get married. He did mention that marriage was my next 'mission' but he urged me to get some education and take my time to make a good choice. I wasn't particularly close to him, but I did like him. I've only seen him a couple of times since my return home. I always sort of hoped he would be made a general authority, but I think he's too normal for that. It's too bad. The church could use more normal.

I was up and out really early the very next morning. I jokingly said that I hoped there wouldn't be chickens on the airplane. Of course there weren't.

The Best Music Video Ever Made

2008-02-24T11:34:00.003-05:00

The song's not bad either.

The Avalanches
Frontier Psychiatrist

Ha!

2008-02-20T12:26:00.003-05:00

One of the wildest things I ever saw

2008-02-03T17:19:00.001-05:00

When I was in school, the grades between 7-9 were called Junior. High, at least that's what they called it where I went to school.

There can be a big difference maturity-wise between a 7th and 9th grader. We moved to the area there when I was in 8th grade, so I was in the middle. Still, if you've ever seen a prison movie, you have an idea of what it felt like to to go there. It was a rough and tumble place where disagreements were usually settled with fists.

One day, this big, dumb 9th grader named Wayne beat the holy crap out of a little, skinny 7th grader called Howard. I don't remember what it was about, but Howard was hurt pretty badly. Not crippled or anything, but he was pretty beat up. What happened as a result of this fight was truly extraordinary. I've never seen anything like it outside of a movie.

A group of 7th graders became angry about this fight so they decided to exact revenge on Wayne. An emissary was dispatched to let him know that he would need to be out on the football field before school started in order to explain himself. He smirked and said he'd be there.

Now, I heard about this 'meeting' and though I figured nothing would come of it, I went anyway. I was always game to see a good fight.

Wayne showed up and wasn't too worried. He was at least 6'2" and weighed about 200 pounds. He was a football player and though I always got along with him, I had heard he had a mean side. Before anyone knew what was happening, Wayne was soon surrounded by about 50-75 7th grade boys. They wanted to know why he beat up Howard.

Wayne was a bit taken aback by being confronted this way, but instead of being cautious he was cocky about it. "What are you gonna do about it? I'll fight you all now!" he screamed.

Rather than tell him what they would do, they showed him. The entire group swarmed him, beginning with a hit to the back of the knees from another football player who weighed in at about 250, and though only in 7th grade, was on the varsity team. Wayne then proceeded to get the beating that he so richly deserved. I saw one kid walk by, walk over, grab Wayne by the hair and punch him three times quickly in the face and then walk off to class.

Soon, the principal came to his rescue. Together with the football team's quarterback, he began pulling kids off of Wayne. When he got to his feet, bloody, bruised and dirty, he started screaming, "I meant one at a time! One at a time!" As far as I know, none of the 7th graders were disciplined for the fight. And Wayne never bothered any of them again.

I lIke this video ...

2008-01-30T20:28:00.000-05:00

Elvis Costello, Glenn Tilbrook, Chris Difford, Gilson Lavis & Nick Lowe.

Post Christmas Letdown

2007-12-28T07:58:00.000-05:00

Every year when Christmas rolls around, I start to dread it being over. It goes all the way back to when I was a kid and Christmas night would bring this terrible gloom crashing down on top of me. It still happens, but in varying degrees from year to year.

Since I've had my current job (12 years in June) I have always taken time off between Christmas and New Year's. Not much goes on at the office so no one misses me or needs anything in particular. Taking that time off helps stave off the gloom to a certain extent, although not completely.

During the break, I spend the time with the family and it was always great to play with my boys. I realized this year, that my boys have no particular interest in me or what I'm doing anymore. It's not like they're hostile, but they have their own things to do on their own timetable. This usually does not include me. They don't get toys anymore so they don't need help building anything. We always used to get Legos or Knex for them and it was a blast putting together different designs. It's a natural thing of course for one's children to distance themselves from you as a parent, but it doesn't make it any easier. It's not like they are babies (they are 20, 18 and 13), but I miss them even though I see them everyday.

Oktoberfest

2007-10-01T15:02:00.001-04:00

It was Oktoberfest this past weekend in the town of Lovettsville. It's an annual tradition and it's always a lot of fun. I like it because the library has a book sale and you can get some really great book deals. It's also fun to see everyone wandering around town. Then there's the Chinese food.

Chinese food? At Oktoberfest? What about German food? Well, they have that too and I have eaten that, but every year they have a Chinese food vendor who sells these great chicken thingies and lo mein and it's just too good to pass up. By the time I've eaten that, it's too late for bratwurst.

Anyway, my kids are older, but they still look forward to it. I think part of it because during Oktoberfest it was the first time we allowed any of them to go off with their friends without our parental oversight.

Well, it's over now, but it was great and the weather really cooperated.

What I Learned This Summer

2007-09-15T14:25:00.000-04:00

You can run over a Kong Super Ball twice with a Sears Craftsman Lawn Tractor (42" deck) before it is completely destroyed.

Saturday in the Park

2007-05-30T16:55:00.000-04:00

Chicago came on my iPod this morning. It was the song Saturday in the Park. I can't hear Chicago without thinking about the community pool I went to when I was a kid. It was in the community of Greenbriar in Northern Virginia. We lived on Majestic Lane (4313 to be precise) so we were within easy walking distance from the pool and Greenbriar East Elementary School where I attended 1-4 grades.

The pool was a lot of fun because, in my memory anyway, we seemed to spend practically the whole summer there. They always had the radio on loudspeakers and it was tuned to WEEL 1300 AM which was a top 40 station back in the day. For younger people, top 40 radio used to be just the best of music from all the different genres: rock, pop, R&B and even country. Anyway, it seems like that station played every Chicago song every recorded so whenever I hear Chicago, I think of the pool because they would have that station on all day long. Another song that reminds me of those days is D'yer Mak'er by Led Zeppelin.

The summer before my fourth grade year, my aunt and uncle and cousins came to stay with us. At the end of the stay, us kids decided it would be cool if we could get my cousin's parents to let them stay another couple of weeks. We realized that in two weeks, my mom was going to take us to West Virginia anyway so we might be able to talk them into letting the cousins stay. We asked but they were non committal. So we hooked a microphone up to my dad's guitar amp and started doing "commercials" to let our cousins stay with us: "Sick of those kids? Why not get rid of them for a couple of weeks. Send them off to scenic 4313 Majestic Lane. They'll have a pool, a park and someone to play with." We did this for what seems like an hour. We had various themes, but they always ended with "a pool, a park and someone to play with." Much to our surprise and amazement, our aunt and uncle agreed and the cousins got to stay with us.

That began a tradition of summer visits that carried on for several years. That year, my brother Doug, my cousin Randy, my cousin Steve and I spent part of every non-rainy day at that pool. The most fun was when we stayed long enough for it to start getting dark and we would get to see the lights come on under the water.

One day, my mom had to go to a hair appointment or something. It was raining that day so we didn't go to the pool, but she let us all say home alone. We played all day long with our Legos, Fort Apache, Hot Wheels, Army Men and some Freakies cereal figures we collected.

It was one of the best summers ever.

TV Redux

2007-05-23T20:25:00.000-04:00

So the Heroes finale met my expectations. I was thoroughly pleased. 24 didn't suck as badly as it had the rest of the season so that is actually a good thing (talk about damning with faint praise). They better do something for next year or I won't be watching.

Tonight is the Lost finale. Lost has been a mixed bag this season. The first part of the season sucked pretty hard, but the last few episodes have redeemed it somewhat. We'll see what happens tonight.

TV is pissing me off ..

2007-05-17T16:30:00.000-04:00

I'm pretty fed up with television this season. Only a few shows (Heroes, The Office and 30 Rock to name three) have been consistent. 24 has been a chore to watch this season. Is there any plot line they haven't recycled? Terrorists infiltrate CTU? Check? VP attempt to usurp the presidency? Check. Jack Bauer arrested? Check. This has been the worst of any of the seasons so far. Their problem is they have killed off all the interesting secondary characters (David Palmer, Tony, Michelle). The producers have forgotten the importance of cast chemistry.

Plus, this notion of killing cast regulars, which used to be shocking, has become a cheap way to attempt to emotionally manipulate viewers. It's the same trap JK Rowling has fallen into with her Harry Potter books. She thinks she has to kill someone for impact. What happened to, I don't know, good writing?

Lost has certainly done this too. This last part of the season has been a lot better, but they still try to use cheap emotional tactics to manipulate us. Lost pissed me off early on this season because of the lies told by the shows creators that the first part of the season would be a self-contained mini series that would wrap up and set up the second half of the season. Not only did it not resolve the story, it really didn't go anywhere once we learned the others had built mini suburbs on the island. Let's face it, those guys (Lost brass) just got greedy. They wanted to milk this franchise as long as possible.

Even my new favorite, Heroes, has fallen victim to this notion that main characters must die in order to be considered high impact.

Finally, I'm fed up with the season ending cliffhangers. Come on. If you have a good show, we'll keep watching. You don't need to end every season with a cliffhanger.

Five Pounds

2007-03-26T10:17:00.000-04:00

That's right, I lost five pounds this week, woo hoo! That means I'm down to 206. I excercised every weekday last week, and I followed the Weight Watchers point system pretty well. I think I got my focus back.

Taxman, Mr. Thief!

2007-03-25T09:39:00.000-04:00

So, I quit procrastinating and did my taxes yesterday. Ouch! I'm getting nailed. Last year between what I got back in State and owed in Federal, it was about a wash, but this year I made a little extra freelance money and my estimated tax payments didn't cover it. Plus, my son John no longer qualifies for the $1,000 child tax credit because he's now 17. Since when is 17 not still a child? Plus he turned 17 on December 24, so shouldn't they at least pro-rate the credit?

I know taxes are a necessary evil, but holy smoke. It's not like I'm rolling in the money. I make a good 30K/year less than the average here in this county. Could I be a better money manager? Sure. However, I think it kind of becomes a disincentive to earn extra money if you get hit so hard. Oh, well. Onward and upward, but it would be a lot easier to pay taxes if I knew they weren't wasting so much on inflated government salaries and pointless programs.

Get thee hence!

2007-03-21T10:57:00.000-04:00

So a few hours after that last post, I went to a meeting at work. The person who called the meeting always generously supplies tasty snacks as an incentive to attendees.

Anyway, the snacks happen to be three of my favorite things: pretzels, Garden Salsa Sun Chips and (worst of all) Peanut M&Ms! Arrgghh!

You'll be happy to know that I was able to resist even the pretty sparkly colors of the M&Ms. I may be finally in the zone. Once I'm locked in, I can't be locked out.

211

2007-03-20T12:26:00.000-04:00

All right, I'm officially a fatass.

I weighed in yesterday at 211 pounds. I have a small frame, thin arms and legs and stand barely over 5'10". I have stuggled with weight most of my life. I first put on weight in grade school, somewhere between first and second grade. I was the "fat kid" in class until I hit puberty. Once that happened, I was a rail. I stayed skinny until right about the time I got married. Then I put on a pound or two, but nothing serious until the kids came. The next thing I knew, I weighed about 220 pounds. I was not happy, I was not healthy.

I decided to join Jenny Craig and within three months, I was back to my high school weight (165). I managed to keep it off for several years, but as time and laziness crept in, I started to gain some back. Sometimes I could get control of it, sometimes I couldn't.

A few years ago, I had crept back up to close to 200 pounds so I went on Weight Watchers. Using their program, I lost all the weight again and again, kept it off until now. I just have lost my will power. It's not the excercise because I ride a stationary bike pretty much everyday. My problem is (a) snacking at work and (b) snacking in the evenings. As evidenced above, when I focus on it, I can lose weight pretty quickly, but it's getting that focus that has been hard for me lately.

You know what's annoying? You always hear about how women are forced to be thin and saddled with body image issues, but no one cares when it happens to a man. It's completely emasculating to be the fat guy, trust me. No one takes you as seriously. Plus, all the weight loss programs are geared for women. When I went to Jenny Craig, I almost turned around and left because it was so feminine in its approach. Is it so far-fetched to believe guys want to lose weight too?

Maybe if I track my progress here, it will help me get my focus back.

An elephant never forgets ...

2007-03-16T10:01:00.000-04:00

I had to go downtown yesterday for a meeting at the Department of Agriculture. I got there about an hour earlier than I needed to be there, so I killed the time over at the Museum of Natural History. I've always loved that elephant and I find it comforting that it's still there.

And then there's the king ...

He's just all around cool.

My dog

2007-03-11T12:24:00.000-04:00

Odin, my dog, head-butted me this morning. Well, I guess it wasn't really a head butt, it was more of a snout butt. He hit my in the eye with his giant, slobbery snout. It's what he considers to be "playing."

A Sign of the Apocalypse?

2006-01-10T15:36:00.000-05:00

I heard Motley Crüe on a classic rock radio station today. Hmmm...

Scenes from a Commute

2005-12-22T12:58:00.000-05:00

I work in the country.

In the middle of a field, in the middle of nowhere sits my building. It’s nine miles from my house. Every day I drive to work past fields and farms and would-be subdivisions. The new homes spoil what would otherwise be a perfect illusion of seclusion and country life. I guess people have to live somewhere, but I wish they didn’t build such ugly houses.

There’s an eagle (it could be a hawk, I’ve never checked its ID) I see sometimes when I’m driving. It likes to sit on the telephone post and look out over the two-lane road. Whenever I see it, I feel happy.