31 August 2010

Don't you forget about me - like you did the yard...

Well we got a bit of good news today.  We had to sign up for COBRA insurance (so named for it's deadly effect on your bank account), so we went over to Beckwood, where I worked until a couple of weeks ago.  We've been dreading doing that, because it does cost so much!  We got there, and when we handed the gal our check, she said it was way too much - we had misunderstood the amount we had to pay as written in the information packet I received, so we "saved" a couple hundred clams!  Well, we didn't really save, because if I had a friggin' job with benefits I would hardly have to pay anything.  I guess "save" is a relative term here.  :-)

So after that we came on home, did some things around the house, dorked around on the internet here looking at some more jobs and such, and I watched a movie about 4 independent movie makers jointly making a documentary about the impact John Hughes had on modern movies, and their quest to find Hughes for an interview. 

Jenny wasn't feeling too hot, and didn't know why, until we heard that there was going to be thunderstorms.  I knew that I wouldn't have any more chances to mow the yard before we leave town to go to Chicago Friday, so I beat it outside and started mowing.  At least it's outta the way now, and I don't have to worry about doing it in the morning!

In honor of the "saving" of the money, and the mowing of the yard, I decided to do another green stroke this evening.  I've just been on a bit of a green kick lately.  Maybe something will come of it. 

30 August 2010

Theodor Geisel ain't got nuthin' on me...

Today was a day, a day which was grey. 
Would like to have gotten away
From the very grey day.

Almost done with the closet doors,
Didn't even start on the floors,
Tomorrow I may finish said doors,
I won't start anything more. 

Came in and watched a movie.
It was pretty darned groovy.
Actually it was very scary, Larry.
I was so frightened you couldn't move me.

"Come do your blog", my wife would say.
Alright then, please get out of the way.
I grabbed a brush, and swatched away,
giving you this stroke of grey. 

29 August 2010

Hey, you, I know you, I know you...

I'm about ready for bed right now, lemme tell ya!  Woke up early this morning to go play in church - which after staying up a bit too long last night was no easy feat!  I tried out some of that "Rockstar" brand caffeine gum, and that seemed to wake me up pretty well. 

After church Jenny and I went out to her mom's to meet her cousins and good friend, Anne, as well as her 3 boys for one last time in the pool before summer's end.  Man, can those kids play!  I jumped into the "deep end", among all of the floaty things: water noodles, loungers, lots of beach balls, and other things.  The boys took a little while to edge in, but Sweet Pea wasn't shy!  She was in there before any of us!  We wrestled around quite a bit trying to dump each other off of our rafts, played catch with the beach balls (which was pretty hard due to the heavy winds!) and just generally played hard.  All I know is that I'm gonna sleep really, really well tonight!  I already passed out on Carla's couch for a few minutes before dinner!  Of course that's just kind of tradition for me - I nap on that couch pretty much every single time I go over there!

Tonight's stroke is a light purple and bright green, the colors of a couple of water noodles we had today.  I already know I'm gonna be sore as hell tomorrow, so I think I'll go get the Icy Hot and get started!

28 August 2010

My mind's such a sweet thing/ I wanna do everything/ What a beautiful feeling'...

Well, I've gotta tell ya, kids, there really ain't a lot to talk about today!  I woke up way too early, went down stairs - Jenny followed me down.  We started looking at job stuff for her online, and I, having woken up way too early for my stupid internal clock, promptly went to sleep for an hour or so. 

When I finally woke up, she had been quite busy, applying for about 8 jobs!  That's no easy feat these days, either - you've gotta upload your resume, then you have to pretty much do it all over again line by line on their application site online.  Yeah, welcome to The Redundancy Department Of Redundancy.  God Bless the Corporate States of America (TM).  :-/

After that we just went out and finished up cleaning and detailing our cars - they're all sparkly and shiny and stuff now!  Love it!  We should really do that more often - we just don't. 

Jen got cleaned up and went out to her mom's house for a little "girl's night" action, and I just stayed around here, doing some painting.  I was pretty happy with what I did, really.  I just wanted to mess around a little with the Clear Tar Gel, and this is what I came up with:


As far as tonight's stroke, I really, honestly, had nothing in mind - by the time I'd gotten done with the other piece my mind was on everything BUT my blog, so I just reached into the big ol' bag o' paints and grabbed the Alizarin Crimson, and swiped a little bit across the upper right corner.  For some reason that corner was just calling my name.  And there you have it. I will now upload these pictures, hit the "publish post" button, and start a movie.  I think I'll watch "The Crow" this evening.  I haven't seen that in probably 15 years.  I used to love it - just never bought it on DVD.  Ya gotta love the St. Louis County Library!

27 August 2010

Wax on, wax off, lather, rinse, repeat...

Back in June of 1984, my buddy Jason Coffey's grandma, Sybil, took us to go see "The Karate Kid".  We thought that was the coolest thing ever!  Of course as we were walking out, Sybil started talking about all of these chores we should do - maybe we, too, could become black belts in karate somehow by working in the chicken house.  I dunno if it would have worked - we just went back and started riding his 4-wheeler.  That sounded like much more fun. 

Years later, every time I wash and wax my car (like that happens often :-D) I, of course, think of good ol' Mr. Miyagi saying that now famous phrase.  Nowadays, though, I also think of this song, by a band from L.A. called No More Kings, which my old band, Earl, played with a few years ago.  The video is hilarious!

In addition to the obvious reference to "The Karate Kid", when washing the cars, I also think about KYMC, which was a radio station owned by the West County YMCA from 1978 to 2008, and was the precursor to 105.7 The Point as far as playing alternative music in the 80s and early 90s. 

I remember the first time I'd ever heard that station was when Jenny and I first started dating, and I had just bought a '92 Mitsubishi Eclipse.  We were in her mom's driveway out there in Ballwin washing and waxing our cars and I had just run across that station, so we were listening to it.  At that particular time, though, instead of alternative, they were playing a bunch of 80s music - some more obscure stuff, not like the same tired crap you always heard on The River or Y98 - so I loved that. 

Today's stroke is a little dollop of Unbleached Titanium, because that's the color I thought of when I opened up the wax.  Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go "sand and stain the closet doors".  Jenny hasn't yet told me what kind of cool karate moves I'll be able to do once I finish those.  :-)

26 August 2010

Samoans: not just Girl Scout cookies!

Jenny loves Hawaiians and Samoans - at least she loves to say their names: Pisa Tinoisamoa, Brandon Manumaleuna, Troy Polamalu, Lofa Tatupu,  Matthew McConaughey (okay, so that last one wasn't a player, but she used to see him on the sidelines at the Texas games, and she thinks he's hot.  That's why she roots for Texas. Stupid Texas!).  Now she's got a new one to say on the Rams team - Michael Hoomanawanui.  Hey, that is fun to say!  Hoomanawanui.  Hoomanawanui.  HOOMANAWANUI!!!  Just try it!  :-)

We got a treat tonight: watching the 3rd Rams preseason game versus the New England Patriots (BOOO!!!) we got to see my guy, Sam Bradford, tear it up, leading to a big victory (okay, it was 36-35, but New England was playing tough, so that was a big win!).  For those of you who don't know, I'm a big Oklahoma fan (hence the Texas hate), and I was so-o-o-o-o-o-o happy when the Rams drafted him as a quarterback!  I didn't know how he was gonna do here, because the last several years - oh, okay, decade(!) - the Rams haven't exactly been known for having an offensive line that could actually protect it's quarterback.  There's a reason that Marc Bulger screams like a little girl every time he hears the word "HUT!" - even if he's the one saying it! :-)

The first couple of preseason games didn't look to promising for old Sammy - he got beat up a bit, and I was pretty nervous that it might be more of the same, but tonight the O-line stepped up and fought for the man.  I didn't get to see the whole game, but from what I did see it didn't look like he spent any time on the ground, so that's good. 

Anyway, in honor of our big V tonight, I give you the Rams uniform colors - blue and yellow. Okay they're the old school colors from the LA days, but that's only because I didn't have a good dark blue to go with the gold.  Oh, well.  I'm gonna go practice saying fun Hawaiian names.   Aloha kãkou!

 

25 August 2010

Stronger than dirt!!!

That wife of mine is working me to death!  I've gotta get a job somewhere just so's I can maybe get a little rest!  :-)  JUST KIDDING, BABY!  You know I love ya - gotta give you crap!

We were busy as all get-out today, though.  We got a lot accomplished, though.  I've almost finished the closet doors (need more urethane), we went through all of our clothes to see what we could get rid of, whether by donating it to charity or simply trashing it, we hung up a couple of pictures in the bedroom that we've been meaning to hang for a few months now, and Jenny painted the floor of our bedroom closet a nice light blue.  It was a deep, almost barn-type red, and it just needed something different.  The blue really lightens it up, too.  It'll look really good once I've completely finished the doors and re-hung them up there.  The bedroom might just finally be done after 6 years!

Today was a great day to get things done, though, simply because of the weather.  It was just gorgeous out there!  I didn't even have to bring a fan out to the garage when I worked.  We're coming up on Jenny's favorite time of the year: Autumn.  She lives for the fall!  She loves nothing more than temperatures in the 60s and 70s, and just all of the leaves turning and falling off - well, not so much the falling off part, because that means we have to rake 'em up.  We're not such big fans of that part.   The leaves off of our actual trees aren't so bad anymore, but we have the privelidge of raking up all of the leaves from the dude across the street, who just leaves them lay, or if he does rake, rakes them into the sewer ditch, clogging up the drain, and forcing all of the remaining leaves to once again come right over into our yard.  Joy. 

Anyway, today's stroke is a nice little orange with a hint of red, just for Jenny and her upcoming autumn.  Here in about a month, she'll be snug as a bug in a rug.  Except for the fact that she hates bugs.  I guess I'll just say that she'll be happy as a clam.  Except that she won't eat clams.  I just can't win.  Jenny loves the fall.  That is all.  HA!

24 August 2010

You run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking - racing around to come up behind you again...

Well, I don't have any time today.  Completely got away from me!  Spent the morning driving around with Jim and Joanne, looking at houses (not for us), then the afternoon searching and applying for jobs.   I just now looked up and realized how late it was!  I have to meet my buddy Jason up at the church at 5 to load up for a gig we're doing over at Saint Louis University this evening, and probably won't get back to 11 or so, so I figured I'd probably best do my stroke right now. 

The one thing that I saw in these subdivisions today, house after house was perfectly manicured lawns!  It was like hundreds of Hank Hills lived in southwest St. Louis county!  Therefore today's stroke is for those lawns: green!

23 August 2010

But when I see you darling, It's like we both are falling in love again...

Well, people, it really is gonna be a quick one tonight!  We got up early this morning (5am!) to go down to Barnes-Jewish  Hospital to be with Jenny's dad, Jim, as he had another minor surgery to take out the remainder of the cancer that was in and around his tonsils.  Everything seems to have gone well - he's in good spirits, talking, walking around, making jokes, etc.  He and his friend, Joanne, are staying with us the next night or two, just in the rare chance that something goes wrong and they need to go back to the hospital (which is unlikely).  We figured it'd be a lot closer to get to Kingshighway from here, as opposed to coming from the Lake of the Ozarks!

Anyway, my stroke tonight is dedicated to Jim.  They scraped the last of the cancer out of his tonsils, so it's kinda like getting a brand new start - a clean slate, if you will - so I put down a nice little white stroke.  White, to me, is just like starting over.  Good luck, Jim!  You're doing great!

22 August 2010

We're so bad we know we're good. Blowin' your mind like we knew we would.

It may just be the urethane talking, but man, am I tired!  After being up 'til after midnight last night, I got up early this morning and went over to the church to do my Sunday mornin' rockin'.   I didn't have my normal "church buddy" to sit by, though, because Jenny was up in Hannibal,MO, for a family reunion.  Most of her family on her mom's father's side live up there in or around Hannibal.  I went up last year, but I had already committed to playing this weekend, so I couldn't go.  I would like to go up there one of these days and spend some time visiting all of the historic sites.

After church I came on home and fixed something to eat and watched most of the Cards/Giants game (we won 9-0!), and then figured I'd better be productive, so I went back out to the garage to listen to the rest of the game and to work on sanding and finishing those closet doors again.  I got a lot done today, really!  I think I may be able to completely finish them in the next couple of days.  What helped me a lot to work was the music.  I always grab a handful of records to listen to every time I go out there.  It was "1973 Day".  First I listened to "Montrose", then Led Zeppelin's "Houses Of The Holy", and finally Pink Floyd's classic "Dark Side Of The Moon" - all recorded the year of my birth.  "Houses" and "DSOTM" are two of my favorite albums of all time, so I think that really helped me to work more efficiently.  Either that or the fumes got to me and I thought I was doing a better job than I really was.  Dunno. 

All I know is I'm really tired now - it was so hot, and I didn't have a fan.  I did drink plenty of water, though.  Still my clothes were absolutely soaked through when I came back inside. 

After that I just grabbed a shower and a bit of dinner, and now I'm just finishing up this blog and watching the Minnesota/San Fransisco football game.  In fact my stroke this evening is a burgundy/gold stripe - a tribute to the "Niners", who I liked back in the 80s with Joe Montana, and now I like Mike Singletary, their coach, and star of the 1985 hit song "The Super Bowl Shuffle".    Ahhh, Jim McMahon rapping.  Now that was awesome music (Disclaimer: that was not awesome music!)

 

Scaramouche, Scaramouche - won't you *please* do that crazy fandango?

Man, did we have a great time this evening!  Such a great time, in fact, that I'm writing just a really quick entry tonight, because 1) I've gotta get to bed because I've gotta be up early in the morning, and 2) it's almost midnight, and I've got to try to be on time here, ya know! :-)

We went over to our friends Carrie and Jeff's house for a little grillin' time.  We had some awesome steak and chicken, corn, salad, etc.  After that, we talked a while, then decided to play a game or two.  They've got one of those fancy Playstation machines that hooks up to the intarwebs.  Last time we were there we played "Scene It", and I kicked all sortsa butt!  I guess they were afraid of a repeat butt-kickin', so this time we started out with a friendly little game of "Trivial Pursuit".  Jeff and I took on our lovely brides, and barely - barely won, after about 47 tie breakers!

After that they wanted to show us this other game they had called "Sing Star", which is kinda like the vocal version of "Guitar Hero".  I've got no interest in the Guitar Hero, because since I play guitar, and I know a lot of the songs, I can't make my brain simply follow along with the dots and stuff - I'd rather just play the song on a real guitar.  This game, however, I was somewhat interested in because I knew that I was among friends who didn't care if I sounded like a strangled cat, and I didn't have to push any dern buttons in time with any blue or red dots on the screen!

We started off doing some old school rap, and then graduated to some Billy Joel (I nailed "Piano Man", which Jeff had bragged about being the best at all night! :-D)  The piece du resistance, though, was Jeff's and my version of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", which, of course, was completely awful.  I'm pretty sure Freddie Mercury is halfway to China from all the spinning he did in his grave!

Anyway, my voice is shot, my cheekbones are sore from laughing, and I'm about to fall asleep, but I wanted to come home and do my blog real quick, so here it is, and there's a nice little swatch of green, in honor of the color of the wedge that won the Trivial Pursuit game for Jeff and me!  It's so great to have good friends who can take your mind off of the "not-so-good" stuff in your life, even if just for an evening!  Well, G'night!

20 August 2010

I want my two dollars!!

Today it's just grey out.  We didn't really get any rain here (although apparently the Festival of the Little Hills up in St. Charles got hammered big time!), but it was just cloudy all day.  Despite that, and the obvious stuff on my mind, I stayed in a relatively decent mood.  Jenny and I got up pretty early, actually - a lot earlier than I thought I would after being up 'til midnight last night!  I woke up and wanted to go back to sleep, but as soon as my mind realized I was awake it just turned on and I just started thinking about all the job crap again.  Not good. 

So, I came downstairs and just got right on the ol' computer here and started the big search.  I worked for a few hours, then got up and let Jenny have some "search time".  While I was resting, I decided to watch an old 80s movie, "Better Off Dead".  I hadn't seen that in years, and I found it a while back at Target or something really cheeep, so I picked it up, but haven't had the time to watch until this morning.  It really is cheesy, but I think it's hilarious - it's kinda like the winter version of "One Crazy Summer", also starring John Cusack.

After the movie, though, it was right back to the grind.  I found a couple of things and applied for them.  I tell you what, though, the way they've got these online applications set up is stupid!  You've got to upload your resume, and then put in all of the exact same information on their application!  You're literally doing everything twice!  Who were the ad wizards who came up with that?

People, I'm sick of looking at a computer screen, so I'll tell you that I just mixed up kind of a medium-dark grey, a little on the purple side, with just a slight touch of yellow, just to warm it up a bit.  They just all happened to be there right next to each other on my palette, and it reminded me of the nasty-looking clouds and stuff outside.  I actually just heard that they ended up cancelling that festival up in St. Chuck and hurried everyone home.  Well, I guess a little rain won't hurt us - just keep that strong wind away from us!  I don't wanna wake up with a tree limb tickling my nose!

19 August 2010

There have been better days...

Wow, is this ever difficult!  I'm feeling so many emotions right now it's not even funny: anger, sadness, fright, nervousness, a slight, slight bit of relief/happiness, just general melancholy.   I got laid off from work today.  It wasn't anything I did, simply the crappy economy.  My boss was forced to lay off one person from each department, and, unfortunately, I am (or was) the only person in my department.

Man, does this ever put a cramp on things, though - Jenny had already gotten laid off from her job about a month and a half ago, so we were adjusting to that monetarily, and now this.  I'm not jumping to any conclusions - we'll have to see what happens as far as work goes in the next few weeks.  Hopefully we'll be able to keep up with the house payments, etc., and everything will be okay.

I tell you what, though - I'm pretty much ready to look anywhere for work. I love St. Louis, and I love our house, but maybe this is just a sign that we need to get the heck outta Dodge!  You never know what God's got in store for ya.  I know that before we got laid off, both of us were pretty much sick of the jobs, and both felt like we were just stuck in a rut.  We both want to go back to school, too - try to figure out what we wanna do when we grow up! ;-)

I really would love to get back to what I originally wanted to do when I moved up here (almost 20 years ago!), which is to be a recording studio engineer.  I'd love to focus on recording bands, but I understand that very few bands even use studios anymore - they do it all at home in their basements!  Ad agencies, PR firms, and other professional firms like that use them all the time, though, and that's good enough for me.  Anything in the studio is alright with me - I just love to be in that environment, whether you're recording music for a "hit single", or a local commercial, or just telling people that they should appreciate soybeans, I would love to record your stuff!  I just need to learn everything all over again - it's all changed so much since I was in college and interning at Clayton StudiosProTools , which is the main program used for recording/editing, had just come out at that time, and now it's almost commonplace in every musician's basement!

Well, here's a little bright yellow stripe for you, and for me - to remind me that brighter times are ahead.  They have to be!  We won't give up!

18 August 2010

Fogey-ism is alive and well in Affton, MO...

First day of school around these parts.  Every year we're reminded of how many kids do actually live on our block.  We never know during the summer - you never see any of them outside!  Never!  I don't know about you, but we used to play outside when we were growing up.  Granted I spent my share of time in front of the television, but it was mostly in the evening.  I used to ride my bike over to Jason Coffey's house, or Terrell Varner's house all of the time! Both houses were a good several miles away - sometimes I'd make the trip more than once in a day! 

I'm guessing that none of these kids ventured off of the couch the entire summer.  We've probably got well over 20 kids on our block, and Jenny and I literally saw 2 of them the whole time - one of them simply because he lives across the street!  It makes me sad, actually, that the parents don't make them put down the Nintendo control and get outside.  It's really no wonder the childhood obesity rate is through the roof!  Okay, I'll take my Geritol and shut up now. :-)

Anyway, another thing that I always forget about on the first day of school is the traffic.  I was just barely on time for work!  I forgot to leave a couple of minutes earlier, but I guess everyone else didn't!  Today's stroke is yellow and red, for all of the school buses and brake lights I saw this morning.  Coming home wasn't quite as bad, though - and I even saw a couple of kids outside on our block!  It's a "First Day Of School Miracle"! :-D

17 August 2010

A little bit o' this and that...

Man, this morning it was absolutely beautiful out - about 69° and less humid.  That's the kind of weather Jenny lives for!  She was just as happy as a clam!  My sister, Katie, even commented that she immediately thought of Jen when she felt how cool and nice it was outside.

It wasn't even that bad at work - didn't even use a fan all day!  I kinda wanted to a couple of times, but apparently the fellas at work stole mine while I was off the last few days, and I was just too busy to try to look for it, or to beat anyone up and take it back! :-)

After lunch, though, something happened to that weather.  I don't know if something's moving in, or what, but ever since about 1:30 or so I've just been feeling worse and worse.  It's awfully cloudy out now, so I'm guessing it's gonna rain.  I wish it would just hurry up and do it- get it over with!  Maybe my head would feel better!

The highlight of my day, though, was the Chinese dinner Jenny made.  She wasn't very happy with it, but I was proud of her for trying, and it really wasn't anywhere near as bad as she thought!  Just a few short years ago she wouldn't even try Chinese food, much less cook it!  Oh, there was also ice cream - the other love of my life, aside from Jenny!  Ice cream will cure what ails ya, or at least take your mind off of it for a while!

So since it's looking a bit green outside, and about all I can see right now are trees, I went with a bit o' green.  And now I will go rest.  Another long day ahead of me tomorrow!

16 August 2010

Get while the gettin's good!

Today is the last day of my "vacation".  I put that in quotes because to me, a proper vacation is when you actually GO SOMEWHERE, not just sit at home, or even just stay in the same zip code.  That being said, I still had a good "time off" from work, which I desperately needed!  Like any job, no matter how much you love it or hate it, you need some time off every once in a while just to "re-charge your batteries"! 

Jenny and I got up early this morning (well, early compared to "vacation" standards, in which we didn't even open our eyes before 8:30 or so) because my buddy Tom Pollard was coming by to spray the place for bugs.  We really needed it, too - many Silverfish and Wolf Spiders have been found lately, much to the consternation of my lovely bride.  I tell you what, if there was ever anyone who hates bugs and anything else crawly, Jenny's the one!

After the "Great Bug-Out" of 2010, we went outside (amongst the many creatures we were currently attempting to destroy) to mow the yard.  We hadn't done that in over two weeks!  Because of the high temperatures and lack of steady rain, though, there was really only about 1/5 of our yard that really needed cutting!  Stupid "water grass"!  If not for that section of the yard, we could probably get by not even mowing until next year (maybe)!

After that we cleaned up and took a drive out to Ballwin (near where she grew up) to go to Joanne's Fabric (slash-art-supply-store) to get some gesso for me.   I got to take home a couple of pieces of partitions from office cubicles a couple of months ago, and I thought they'd really make some cool (if not really large) canvases.  Only problem is that they're completely bare - basically like a piece of particle board with some sort of half-assed canvas stretched across it.  What the gesso does is to "primer" the "canvas" so that I can paint on it and the paint will actually stick to it, rather than to merely soak into the fiber and the particle board, asi it would if not primered. 

While we were out, we both noticed a couple of things:  1) school's gonna be starting this week, so that means the little rodents will be invading our yard again, and 2) for some reason, there are already (at only August 16th) trees changing colors, and even dropping leaves!  This kinda freaked both of us out!

Now don't get me wrong - I love autumn!  Not as much as Jenny does, but I love it just the same.  Jenny would rather it be Autumn all year around - about 70°-75° during the day and about 60° at night - that would be Jen's ideal situation!  I could go for the evening temperature, but I'd much rather have it about 80° during the day!  I'm easy - I don't even need any variation!  For the longest time I've wanted to move to either San Diego (too damned expensive) or Arizona (yeah, not doing that 'til things simmer down).   I really hate cold and rain, as you (the faithful follower of this blog) know well, but I don't have all the pieces of the puzzle to actually make that a reality right now.

Anyway (!), seeing all of these trees already turning made me realize that there isn't much summer left!  What the hell happened to the last 3 months?!?  I swear I was just writing a blog about Memorial Day!  It's just not right that these times go faster and faster!  I realize that I'm getting older and older, and as we get older the days fly by faster, but man, this ain't right!  I can literally remember the day a few months ago when I was thinking that we had all of this time to enjoy the summer, and now it's gone! 

So today's stroke, as light as it may look, is a nice yellow/orange with some brown in it - with a touch of red, too.  I may do another one of these later, but I wanted to commemorate the fact that Autumn was coming rapidly and ya better enjoy that summer breeze while you can!

15 August 2010

That Old Funky Cross...

This morning Rooftop Community Church got a special treat.  While they were taking communion, Paul, Aaron and I played an old Dixieland dirge-type version of "The Old Rugged Cross", with Aaron (far left in this pic with his main band, the Funky Butt Brass Band) taking the lead on trombone.  Man, did it sound hot!  First service gave us a round of applause - AFTER COMMUNION!  How often does that happen? :-)  2nd service was a little more subdued, but we got word that there were many in the congregation that were actually moved to tears.  Aaron is the man!  He sounded so good that Paul and I just kinda kicked back and let him wail!

After that, Jenny and I went out to her mom's place again so I could try to bring her computer back from the intensive care unit.  She had so much crap, and so much malware on there it was just running slower than Christmas!  I updated her anti-virus software and some other stuff, and I think I did some good - seemed like it was running a lot better, so that made me happy.  I would have been a lot happier, but I was also watching the Cards game, and they were looking like a little league team playing the Cubs.  Wow, was the pitching horrible today!

I got a call later on, actually while I was working on this blog this evening, from my best friend, Brian.  We'd been wanting to get together for quite a while, and both of us love movies, so we went to go see "Dinner With Schmucks".  I tell you what, this was honestly one of the funniest movies I've seen in friggin' *years*!  Just one laugh after another - and not just chuckles, we're talking full-on belly laughs!  I'm sure there were several people around us that were sick of hearing us laugh (I'm not one to hold back if I find something really funny)!

Tonight's stroke is a light blue - the color of Steve Carell's jacket in the movie "Dinner For Schmucks".  Man, was that guy hilarious!

14 August 2010

Draggin'

Today started off a bit slo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-ow.  Dave was feeling just a little bit rough after the gig last night.  Man, was I draggin'!  The show went really well - extremely hot (we were all wringing out our t-shirts, or changed them, if you had the forethought to bring extras) but so much fun!   The Free Dirt boys always seem to have a good time, wherever we are - even if we're only playing to a handful of people!  It was also really cool to see that short film, and to see how our music was used in it. 

So this morning, in a post-beer-and-bourbon haze, Jenny and I started cleaning up the back room so we could finally set up our new computer!  We carried one of the wooden desks downstairs from the loft and set it up down here, after cleaning the walls and dusting off all of the crap that's accumulated for the last few years.  After we set the computer up, we decided that we liked the old computer desk better, so we switched back to the old desk and carried the other one back upstairs.  Nothing like doing double work, eh?  Anyway, this is the first blog being done on the new computer - so fancy and shiny - and fast!  I feel so special! :-)  

After setting it up and downloading all the anti-virus and anti-malware software I needed (and played around a bit, of course), we loaded up and went out to her mom's place for a great dinner of this awesome sausage that we get every year out at St. Paul's Lutheran church way out Highway 109.  They get it from some meat market in New Melle, MO, not too far from the church.  Man, is it good, though - especially on a sandwich with some fresh horseradish and some sauerkraut!

So, it's been a long day, and I'm tired now - think I may watch some teevee and hit the hay!  Today's stroke is black (yes, Annie, I can hear you groaning and rolling your eyes all the way over here!) and white, for our shiny new Gateway computer.  How in the world did a Holstein cow become synonymous with a computer company, anyway?

13 August 2010

Friggatriskaidekaphobia? Uh, what, now?

I've had another relatively uneventful, yet relaxing day of vacation.  Got up, lazed around, chatted with my beautiful wife, and then I left her.  No, not for good, silly!  I just wanted to do my thang for a little while. 

I grabbed my bass and took it over to Skip Goez' place to get fixed.  We're doing the big Free Dirt show tonight, kind of a warm up for a short comedy movie, also entitled "Free Dirt" (not about us, just featuring our music). 

Now I'm not superstitious - never really have been, but I did find it a bit odd that this morning, all of a sudden, I realized I had lost a set screw out of the bridge on my bass.  That's not something that you can find *snap* just like that.  Great.  What am I gonna do about a bass for this evening?  Luckily Paul, the awesome dude who plays keyboards at church, as well as my main band, The Janson Gates, happens to have exactly the same bass as mine, just in a different color.  Score!

Anyway, after I dropped my bass off to get fixed, I headed towards Clayton/U.City to bum around the old college stomping grounds a bit.  Drove through the parking lot there at Fontbonne and looked around at St. Joe's dorm, just to reminisce a bit, then drove on down to The Loop (kind of an artsy-college-kid-hipster area of town) and dropped by Vintage Vinyl, an old record store I used to spend way too much time and money in, to see if my buddy Leon was there.  We've been wanting to get together to just grab a beer and shoot the breeze for quite a while now.   Unfortunately, he was busy (so busy, in fact that they couldn't even find him there at VV!), so I guess our rendezvous will have to wait some more.  No problem. 

I decided to go to one of my favorite restaurants, Seki, for a little bite o' sushi.  Other than the mediocre (at best) sushi my sister, Jo Beth, and I had a few weeks ago in Springfield, I hadn't had sushi in a couple of years!  I really love that stuff!  My stroke today is a bright orange, just lightly dragged across some of the glass beads, to look like the smelt roe (fish eggs) that they use in sushi rolls. 

After that, I stopped by Componere, an art gallery, just to look around, maybe get some ideas.  There were a LOT of great pieces in there - mostly by artists from Missouri and neighboring states.  It's amazing to me how much talent is around here!  I'll tell you more about some of that stuff later on, but right now I gotta go RAWK!  In 100° weather, outside, but rawk nonetheless. \m/

12 August 2010

All I ever wanted, had to get away...

Vacation.  One of the greatest words in the English language.  I just love to say it: VACATION!  Although, I suppose if we were truly speaking proper English, the "Queen's English", it would be "holiday". 

I ended up having a few days of vacation left that I had to use before my anniversary date at work, so I'm off today, tomorrow, and Monday - 5 day weekend, baybee!

It's been awesome, too, doing all the things I never get to do: last night I stayed up watching Letterman and Craig Ferguson, even had a bowl of Rocky Road ice cream at midnight!  Jenny and I slept in, then just laid in bed relaxing and listening to NPR until about 10 or so.  After that we just hem-hawed around and  went to the grocery store, but other than that, not a whole lot else; maybe just a little cleaning - we're trying to straighten up the back room a bit to make room for the new computer (yay!).  

My mom ended up making a spur-of-the-moment trip up here to see my lovely niece, Savannah, so Jenny and I went over to Erica and Keith's house for a little BBQ and SavannahSlobbers (tm).

I'd say that the only thing that I didn't care for today was the weather - it was about 100° again, and the air quality was orange (hence tonight's stroke), meaning allergies were through the roof and it's harder to breathe, so that was fun.  :-/  But, countering that was the fact that I'M ON VACATION, IN THE A/C!  Everything's gonna be fine! :-D  

Tomorrow: more of the same nothingness!

11 August 2010

Whew! What a relief!

About 5 years ago, Jenny and I went down to the South County Honda dealer and traded in my old Mitsubishi Eclipse (or "The Rolls", as in Rolls Royce, which is what the dealer called the Eclipse, because of the shape it was in - sun roof sealed shut due to leakage, windows didn't roll down, air conditioner didn't work, etc.) on my very first brand new car: a 2005 Honda Element. 

Tomorrow marks a very important occasion:  the final payment!  We're so excited!  I still love the car so much, so I'm sorry, Mr. Car Salesman down at the Honda dealer, I did get your email, and as tempting as it might seem, I must pass on the whole "trading in for another new car" thing.  Ain't no way in hell I'm gonna take on another payment!  Jenny and I both drive Hondas - hers is just a year older than mine - and we're gonna drive both of these things until they won't drive no mo'!

I figured I would pay tribute to my awesome little soon-to-be-paid-off car tonight with a nice little blue stroke, trying to mix it up to look like the actual color.   I forgot, however, that my "stay-wet palette" was maybe a bit too wet, and also I keep it in the little dorm fridge out here in the back room, so there's a lot of condensation, and it made my paint really watery when I mixed it up.  Oh, well, you still get the idea, right?

10 August 2010

...with nothing more to buy, ever!

For some strange reason, while on my way home from work this afternoon, this popped into my head.  I'll never forget the first time I saw in some magazine "Get 7 tapes for ONE PENNY!" and then the fine print down below, stating that you had to buy one more at some price that was higher than a cat's back in the next year or they'd send Guido and Fat Tony after your kneecaps or something. 

I don't remember what I got the first time I enrolled in this - I think one of them was "Then And Now: The Best Of The Monkees".   I went through a pretty serious Monkees phase when I was younger.  I still love their music - "Pleasant Valley Sunday", even though not written by them, is one of my all time favorite songs!

I do, however, remember that once I got my first shipment of tapes, something was missing: there were no liner notes and no lyrics.  They had a picture of the album cover on the front, but then it was just blank on the inside.  What a ripoff!  Also, when the music industry started putting out the clear tapes, as opposed to white or beige, BMG - nope!  No clear tapes for Dave!  And I thought those were the coolest!  They had a certain smell to them, too - I'm not sure how to explain it, it was just some sort of plastic smell (not the toxic kind).  I still catch a whiff of it every once in a while in random places, and it always reminds me of those awesome clear tapes!  

I wanted my tapes to be the proper derned color, whether they were clear or white, plus I really wanted the liner notes - so I bought my one tape from BMG, cancelled the contract, then joined the Columbia House tape club, where I got 12 tapes for a penny!  What a bargain!  Of course now I had to buy 2 or 3 tapes at those same sky-high prices.

I still prefer CDs to mp3s now, because I want to be able to open up and read all about the album - who's in the band, where they recorded it, what other stories they have about it, what kind of other famous people they thanked, etc.   I really miss actual vinyl albums!  Those covers were the greatest!  Just think if the Rolling Stones' "Sticky Fingers" were just released as an mp3 - you can't put a working zipper on a computer file!  By golly there was one on the vinyl album sleeve, though!  Album artwork is, unfortunately, becoming a lost art form - and a lot of those covers truly were art!  Just check out any of the stuff Hipgnosis did for Pink Floyd!

Anyway, I figured tonight I could have a little bit of both worlds:  I threw down a nice heavy slice of matte gel.  It'll be white right now (as you can see in the pic) but then it'll dry clear.  From BMG to Columbia House in one night!

09 August 2010

I am NOT a "Bieber Believer"!

So we're flipping through the channels tonight (man, is this ever a night I wish we had cable!) and happened upon the "Teen Choice Awards".  This show pretty much encapsulates everything that's wrong with the entertainment industry.  Two words: Justin Bieber.  Two more words: Kar Dashian.  Yes, I know it's just one word, but I didn't feel like listing all of the twits, and kinda had a theme going. 

Anyway, I'm doing a quickie blog tonight, just because I've got some other things going on, and I'm also trying to transfer a buncha files to an external hard drive.  We ended up finally getting a new computer!  YAY!  No more griping cuz this one's slower than molasses rolling uphill in January! 

So, I'm gonna try to talk Jenny into turning this dreck off, and watching an old comfort movie: "Better Off Dead".  It stars John Cusack, and is basically the winter version of his movie "One Crazy Summer", with skiing instead of boating.  It's got some hilarious scenes, though, and I just like it!  Stop judging me!

Anyway, I figured in honor of that movie, I'd do a little white tonight.  Not 100% pure white, but white with a little bit of color in it - I learned that from my painting instructor.  It's called "optical white".  It still "reads" white, but it's not as stark, because it's been toned down a bit with whatever color you put in it. 

Tonight I figured I'd throw a little bit of blue in there - kind of a cool, icy color, just perfect for a day like today, which was once again up in the high 90s, almost to 100°, with a heat index of 110°!  I may just eat some Cool Ranch Doritos, too.  I gotta cool off!  Later!

08 August 2010

ARE YOU READY?!?!?

It's time, folks!  Tonight is the first night of FOOTBALL!!!!!  As you know, I love me some football.  Baseball's still my favorite, but I'm ready for some football again!   It's not regular season - not even pre-season, just the "Hall Of Fame Game" - the Dallas Cowboys (BOOOOOOOO!!!! "America's Team" my butt!) vs. the Cincinnati Bengals ("meh", but better than the Cowboys!) - but it's still football, and I'll take it!

I never really paid much attention to football (or any sport, really) growing up - I was too busy listening to heavy metal and discovering the wonderful world of women!  It wasn't really until I got up here and the Rams started getting really good about 10-11 years ago that I really started paying attention.   Even then, it was just sporadic; just a few Rams games here and there.  It wasn't until about 5 years ago that I really started watching - until Jenny became a "semi-football-widow"! :-)  I actually watch a lot more college ball than I do NFL.  College kids want it more - they're hungrier, and the games are better.  Can't wait for college season to start!

I am, however, really anxious to see how my boy, Sam Bradford, does this year as the new quarterback for the Rams.   He really was an awesome QB at the University of Oklahoma, which is my favorite college team (yes, along with Mizzou - I'm always torn when they play each other).  What I'm interested to see, though, is how well he plays after being off the better part of a year - he was badly injured in the first game of the season (stupid BYU!), out for 3 weeks, then re-injured it during the Red River Rivalry game vs. Texas (stupid Longhorns!  /''\ ), ending his season.  Hopefully the Rams have got an offensive line to protect him - they paid friggin' $78 million for the kid! 

Anyway, the stroke tonight is kind of a green with just a little hint of yellow in it.  It's the color of the football field up there in Cincinnati, where they're playing tonight.  And now I will end this blog, so I can watch the rest of the game.  GOOOOOOOO ANYONE BUT THE COWBOYS!

07 August 2010

The green green grass of home...

Back in college, in St. Joseph's dorm, we had a pool table down in the common area.  We spent a good amount of time down there, so I actually got to be a pretty decent player.   There was always a good deal of trash talk going on, too.  One of my favorites was (when trying to shoot the entire length of the table) telling the shooter,"That's a lot of green there, Arnie!"  Every once in a while you could really get inside their head, and they'd mess the shot up. 

Green has been a big part of my day today, actually.  I went to painting class this morning, and, after I finished up the first of two paintings of the Sailboat Bridge in Grove, OK (which was very intricate), I decided I wanted to just let go, slap some paint onto a canvas, and just go to town with a palette knife.  I started out with some yellow, but then I grabbed my green and slathered a bunch on there.  At that point I decided what I wanted to make it a very abstract picture of a sunset, while looking out the side window of a car, driving by. 

After I got home, Jenny and I rolled a bunch of coins into wrappers to take to the bank.  More green.  Then we remembered it was "no-tax" weekend for school supplies and things, and we need a new computer like flowers need rain, so we went on down to Best Buy to look around.  We found one we kinda like, but we wanted to make sure we're doing the right thing, so we decided to go back tomorrow to actually get it.  That's a lot more green, lemme tell ya!  We'll see tomorrow if we definitely get it or not!

Tonight, for all the green that pervaded my every move, I have put a green stroke .  Too bad I can't just draw myself some real green to be able to grab that computer!  :-)

06 August 2010

Dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah!

You say it's yer birthday?  Well, it ain't my birthday, too.  Sorry, Paul.  We did, however, have a nice little birthday dinner for Jenny's dad, who just turned 69 the other day.  He lives down in Osage Beach right on the Lake Of The Ozarks, which is about 3 hours away, so we didn't get a chance to celebrate on his actual birthday, but he happened to be in town tonight, so we decided we'd have a little get-together. 

Jenny made an awesome dish of chicken breasts on a bed of dried beef with a gravy of cream of chicken soup and sour cream.  Man, was that good!  So moist - I can't stand meat that's dry, and chicken and turkey just tends to get dry really easily, so moist is a good thing - even if it's just a nasty sounding word (that's for you, Katie :-D).

Ya know who else had a birthday today? Soleil Moon Frye -Punky Brewster is friggin' 34 years old!  Granted, it's a few years younger than I am, but still - it's another indication that I'm getting old, just like the fact that Madonna was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!  I mean, she came on the scene when I was in 5th grade!  C'mon - it hasn't been that long, has it?  Really?

Anyway, the colors of tonight's stroke (purple and orange) are for a couple of the colors from the cake Jenny made for her dad - it had a buncha clowns on it.  It was really a great looking cake!  Happy birthday, Jim, and happy birthday, Punky!

05 August 2010

A bunny with a pancake on it's head...


People, I've got no idea what to talk about today.  My mind, for some reason, is a complete blank (quiet, you - there will be no "empty head" jokes!).  It was a really up and down day - started out kinda "blah", because it was so darned hot, and a couple of my co-workers had commandeered my fan before I got there this morning.  After I wrangled it back, I cooled off a little (literally) and my mood definitely elevated.  I was having a pretty good day, and then I heard about the big bus/truck/car accident  on east-bound Interstate 44.  A bunch of students from a high school in St. James, MO, were on their way to Six Flags when they were caught in a big chain reaction accident.  One of the guys I work with lives down that way, and he took off pretty quickly after he heard about it to make sure his kids were okay (they were).
After that, it was just kind of a heavy day, but I kept my spirits up for the most part.  Music had a lot to do with that - gotta listen to fun stuff that reminds me of fun times!

I decided that today, since I couldn't really think of a whole lot, that I'd maybe start trying to shape some things here and there on the painting.  While I'm doing this, I don't think I'll say what I'm seeing in the picture, I'll let you decide what things look like. 

Today's stroke is a light blue/grey-ish kinda thing.  It really said "melancholy" to me, and that's exactly how I've felt today.  Not in a bad mood, just kinda...blah.  But getting better!  Here's one of the songs that helped to elevate my mood: Take it away, Al!

04 August 2010

A quiche - er, I mean a quickie...

Ooooh, it's a quick one today, folks!  After work, Jenny and I ended up going up to Alton, IL (a good 45 minutes away) to a little mom and pop grocery store which is famous for their bratwurst.  We've been meaning to go up there for quite a while, and Jenny just wanted to take a drive, so off we went.  We picked up a buncha brats, and took some out to her mom.  Then we decided we were hungry, so it was off to the Lazy River Grill for some awesome walleye.  We lost track of time a bit, and then realized I needed to get home to get ready for class, so here I am - with very little time to spare!

So today's stroke is a tiny one, for the tiny amount of time I had to finish it!  :-)    I did a nice little light blue/white stroke to symbolize something cold - it even almost looks like some ice crystals over on the right where the glass beads are!  That's what we need right now: a little cold.  It was over 100° again today!  Miserable!  St. Louis is too extreme weatherwise - we all gripe about the extreme bitter cold in the winter, then summer comes along and we gripe about the intense heat and humidity.  I think I need to move to San Diego.  :-)

By the way, the headline is for my sisters, Katie and Jo Beth.  I don't expect anyone else to get the reference - maybe I'll explain it sometime, but right now, I've gotta skedaddle!  Bye!

03 August 2010

Where's Johnny Carson when you need him?

How ya doin', folks?  Me?  I'm damn near ready to crawl inside the freezer.  Man, is it hot today!  I don't have any way of knowing how hot it was in the warehouse, and I don't know if I want to know.  I do know that it was 100° outside, with a heat index of around 112°.  There's not a whole lot of air moving in the warehouse, and definitely no air conditioning, so I'd say you could probably add a few more degrees onto that.  And tomorrow's supposed to be just as bad.  Wonder if I should use some of my remaining hours of vacation.  :-)  I've gotta use it up in the next 2 weeks, anyway.  I just may entertain that thought for a minute. 

I tried looking on Youtube for some old Carson footage of him doing the whole "How hot is it?" schtick with ol' Ed McMahon.  Couldn't find any though, so here's his buddy Dave Letterman doing something else with the heat.   I also looked for a clip of one of my favorite comedians, Bobcat Goldthwait, who did his own take on it - when the crowd came back at him with the usual, "How hot is it?" he just growled back, "It's really hot - I don't have a joke for everything, ya know?!?"  

Those clips are probably on there somewhere, I just don't have the time to look for it right now - I'm going over to my buddy Dan's house for Free Dirt practice.  YAY!   We're doing another show, this time in Illinois (Belleville, I think).  A few years ago some dude was making an independent film and asked if he could use some of our music for it.  I totally forgot about it - I think we all did - and then we got an email from him saying that the movie was getting ready to come out, and would we want to play at the premiere.  Sho 'nuf!  So,  the Dirt Boys ride again!  Yee Haw!

So anyway, I gathered three of the hottest looking colors I had, red, orange and yellow, and just slathered 'em on here this evening - I covered a good chunk, cuz it's just really that hot out.  Now I'm gonna go sweat.  And rock.  And sweat some more.  I may just lose a few pounds tonight!  :-)

02 August 2010

Feelin' like a wet noodle...

I am sooooooo relaxed right now.  Jenny and I just got back from having full body massages.  For our birthday, Carla bought us gift certificates  to Anthem College, where massage therapists do all of their practicing after they get through with all of the schoolin' part.  I've been there a few times now, and this was by far the best one. 

There were all of these posters on the wall, and shelves full of books, all about meditation and zen and the Dalai Lama.  This made me think of those Japanese rock gardens, which I love - the Japanese Garden in the St. Louis Botanical Garden is, along with the Climatron (also in the B.G.) my favorite place in all of St. Louis.  It is just so quiet, so serene - just a great place to sit and relax.

Since I was thinking about the rock garden, I thought I'd try something new.  I wanted to do my stroke with a comb, but I didn't have one (that I could screw up with paint, at least), so I just found a toothbrush that had ridges on it and dragged it across some Unbleached Titanium (sand-colored) paint.  It wasn't until I started writing this that I realized that I could have actually mixed it with some actual sand.  Oh, well - maybe next time.  Well, then again,  maybe not.  I probably won't be thinking about sand again tomorrow.  But if I am, you bet yer butt I'm gonna use the sand!

Right now, however, I'm gonna do some more relaxing! 

CANNONBALL!!!

Today we didn't get anything done that we should have, except for the laundry, and I just now put that in the dryer at 9:30 pm!  I played in church this morning (we played "Know Your Enemy" by Green Day - how many churches do you know do Green Day covers? :-D  What a blast!).  I came home, and we did the usual Sunday trip to Shop 'n' Save for lunch food for the week.  Came home, watched the Cards absolutely trounce the Pirates, thus sweeping them this series.

Jenny got a call from her cousin and her mom asking if we wanted to come out for a little while.  We hadn't seen Carla for a while, and I hadn't seen Kelly and Sweet Pea for a while, so we went on out.  Kel made her amazing - I mean absolutely phenomenal lasagna, and Carla made home-made ice cream!  Yay!  What an awesome dinner!  You know I had to have more than one bowl of the ice cream - you don't get home-made every day!

We finished up dinner, then went out to the pool to go swimming for a little while.  Sweet Pea jumped right in with a big ol' splash!  The water wasn't too cold, which was good, because it wasn't really that hot out - once you got out of the water it was actually pretty chilly!  Tonight's stroke is a combination of the aqua for the chlorinated water and a little purple and neon green for the "water noodles" Jenny had.   I tell ya what, though - even with the short amount of time we were in there, I'm just worn out!  I'm a-goin' to bed!  Mabye I'll wait 'til Jenny's in bed and I'll do a belly flop! :-)

*By the way, I did actually do this post last night but forgot to hit the "publish" button.   I didn't notice that until this morning. :-)