I guess I didn't commit to this blog like I wanted to. It'll come around.
Here's what I've been thinking about:
--Work is crazy as hell. Four and a half weeks until our first race. I'm quietly excited, but still pretty reserved. Can't celebrate anything until we deserve to. A lot on the line here, but I really believe we're going to pull it off. I suppose I wouldn't have signed on if I didn't.
--Rose and I are planning our first move-in together for May 1. She found us a nice place in West Addison, and the back yard is quite literally Lake Champlain. We can walk up the driveway to one general store, or paddle a canoe over to Port Henry, NY to another. Cows everywhere. Small but pretty perfect for what we need.
--I love technology more and more by the day.
--I can't believe that poor woman Melissa Jenkins was killed up in St. Johnsbury in front of her kid on the side of the road. I mean, I read about a dozen murders a day in big cities, but it's so rare in Vermont that it just hits so much harder. I'm sure I know 20 people that knew her. Absolutely tragic.
--The trip to Stony Brook with Ed, Pich', and Al a few weeks ago was just awesome. We were gone for a total of about 26 hours but have enough stories from that day to tell for the next 26 years. I am so proud to be a UVM Superfan, and we danced on the host floor in the host gym right in front of the host fans on national television. When UVM wins big, all of Vermont wins big and the country takes notice because (not unlike the murders up here) it's so rare. Love. This Team.
--I miss the ever-living hell out of Landon, and I can't afford to do a damn thing about it. My son is almost six years old and I've seen him a total of one hour and 40 minutes since July 24, 2009, but for Christ's sakes, I'm worse off financially now than I was even back then. "Be patient," I keep telling myself. It sure to hell doesn't get any easier. At least with my father, he's passed on and I know he's not coming back. That doesn't make that easy, either, but at least that's a definite, final thing. I got closure out of that. I was there for his last breath. The difference with Landon is that I was there for his first breath, and I want to be a part of his life every day until my last breath. I guess I just deal with it for now by staying busy and paying some of my bills. (By the way, I'm proud to say I've made full child support payments to the tune of $117.70 every week since the middle of November. Then again, it's ridiculous that I should even be proud of that.)
--Speaking of patience, John Adams has got to be one of the most patient people I've ever met. I owe the guy $200 and not once has he ever asked for it. He knows I'll make good on it, and I will, but he'll never know how much I appreciate his friendship and understanding. Times are tough. He gets it.
--Back to Rose, she makes me feel like a man should feel. Never really had that before in my adult life. She doesn't have to have me around 24/7, she lets me do my thing and doesn't even really ask any questions, but she needs me when it's important. And I feel exactly the same about her. She's my rock, even if I'm away for ten days in a row. She's truly my best friend. I love her very much, and I really feel like I struck a gold mine by being at JP's to sing a couple of stupid karaoke songs in the middle of February a year ago. She wasn't impressed, so I cranked it up a notch with "Oh, Darlin'" by The Beatles, I kissed her on the cheek, and that was about it. More than a year later, it still feels like it's only two weeks old. I'm a lucky guy.
--Can't stop humming Weezer's "El Scorcho" today. Also, can't stop listening to Gov't Mule on the tape deck in the car whenever I drive these last two weeks.
--Yep, tape deck. I'm friggin' exhausted. Night.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Ode to Rose, on her birthday, for which I am not home
Math equations of love:
--If someone stared at the sun for 12 minutes without blinking, the number of times people would say, "Well that was stupid," is how much I love you.
--If a tree fell in the forest and no one was around, the number of ants displaced and unaccounted for until the park rangers arrived is equal to one-third of half of my love for one quarter of you. So 1/24, basically.
--Robert is on a train leaving San Francisco and heading for Macadoo, Tennessee at 42 mph. Gustav is sitting by the pool doing nothing. In the time it takes for Alice to find someone to help her push her stalled 1987 AMC Eagle off of Williston Road, I could find at least eight ways to tell you that I love you.
***
A poem of love:
She's a very kinky girl
The kind you don't take home to mother
She will never let your spirits down
Once you get her off the street, ow girl
She likes the boys in the band
She says that I'm her all-time fav... I just realized that I may not have written this poem.
***
Now, a seal stealing some penguins' thunder:
Next, a squirrel doing the same to this nice couple on vacation:
Finally, a very small pig:
I'm sorry I'm stuck at work and couldn't come home tonight, Baby. I love you. Happy birthday.
--If someone stared at the sun for 12 minutes without blinking, the number of times people would say, "Well that was stupid," is how much I love you.
--If a tree fell in the forest and no one was around, the number of ants displaced and unaccounted for until the park rangers arrived is equal to one-third of half of my love for one quarter of you. So 1/24, basically.
--Robert is on a train leaving San Francisco and heading for Macadoo, Tennessee at 42 mph. Gustav is sitting by the pool doing nothing. In the time it takes for Alice to find someone to help her push her stalled 1987 AMC Eagle off of Williston Road, I could find at least eight ways to tell you that I love you.
***
A poem of love:
She's a very kinky girl
The kind you don't take home to mother
She will never let your spirits down
Once you get her off the street, ow girl
She likes the boys in the band
She says that I'm her all-time fav... I just realized that I may not have written this poem.
***
Now, a seal stealing some penguins' thunder:
Next, a squirrel doing the same to this nice couple on vacation:
Finally, a very small pig:
I'm sorry I'm stuck at work and couldn't come home tonight, Baby. I love you. Happy birthday.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
VIDEO: Golden Claws at The Monkey House
Golden Claws playing at The Monkey House in Winooski, VT on Friday, January 20, 2012.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
A Band You Should Listen To: Golden Claws
Band: Golden Claws
Origin: Vermont
Genre: I have no idea
Lineup: Graham Forward/guitar and vocals, Tucker Andrews/bass and vocals, Carl Irving/keys vocals, Brennan Mangan/percussion and vocals
These are all guys that I went to high school with, and while it's easy to want to like a band full of guys you know, the truth is I really "know" only Brennan, whom I would count as one of my closest friends since childhood. Brennan played drums, keys, and guitars in a band called Almost Perfict, in which I also played along with Christian Courtemanche and Andy Gordon. Brennan, at least in the school years, was the only musician we had who was worth a damn. Come to think of it, the same held true for the post-school years.
All that said, I truly enjoy Golden Claws' music, and I feel confident in saying that the band employs some of the most talented multi-discipline musicians I've ever heard.
It's hard to describe what they play, so I'll let them do it themselves:
"Golden Claws is an band from the cultural heartland of Burlington, Vermont. When all the 80's retro hipsters, 70's synth dronesters, and Noise evangelists have fallen out of fashion yet again, there will remain the likes of Golden Claws who make compelling music by utilizing whatever sounds and tools serve their vision. You can't pigeon-hole Golden Claws because they sound like themselves. They sound old and new."
Jazz? Folk? Electronica? Prog Rock? Radiohead on sedatives? Take your pick, because each is both correct and totally inaccurate at the same time. You can't, after all, pigeon-hole Golden Claws.
Check out this online sample of their work from Burlington-based Fundamental Frequency, and enjoy the hell out of it. "Broken Rolling Sun" should be playing on the radio all the time, and "Mel's Tearoom" is so catchy - but also so incredibly dreamy - that I can't get it out of my head.
Golden Claws are part of a four-band set playing this Friday at The Monkey House in my hometown, Winooski, VT, and you owe it to yourself to check them out. You'll either love 'em or hate 'em, but I doubt you'll hate 'em.
Doing nothing, but really friggin busy
It's been a couple weeks since I wrote anything here. Don't feel bad, though, it's been three months since I wrote anything for VMM.
I'm not ignoring anyone, I'm just amazingly busy of late, and there are other things on my mind. The racing season, on paper, is almost four months away. You may see that as a third of a year, but I see it as holy-shit-that's-tomorrow. I've been hard at work helping to build a new company at one track, keeping another track in the news, helping some racers get a few sponsorship bucks on the side, and trying to help the new VMM management without being a nuisance, all pretty much non-stop since October.
I'm effin' psyched for everything to start in late April/early May, but at the same time, I could use six more months to prepare and probably still want more time. Our momentum is rolling, and that's a great thing, but there are also a ton of loose ends to tie up before the first race. A TON.
Either way, I feel like I'm really helping to make a difference this year. I feel like what I'm helping to build from the ground up is going to mean something to people and make them happy. I feel that way because I've already seen some of it. It's very, very rewarding.
I've stopped to smell the roses (and occasionally Rose) a few times, even if only for a couple of hours. I've taken in a few UVM basketball and hockey games, went to a show with Rose a few weeks ago, and we're headed to another one on Friday, but it seems like it's all been between breaths. We're also looking for a new apartment in the Vergennes/Middlebury area so that I'm a bit closer to work but that she's not a billion miles from school and her own jobs, and that has taken some time up, too.
By the way, it's clear that things in my current apartment are deteriorating in a hurry, which makes me want to spend even less time there than I already do (and at an average of 1-3 nights per week, that ain't much, Ted). There's a steadily-building pressure cooker of resentment and anger among us roomies, which I've totally seen coming since, well, the beginning. I'm a pretty easy-going dude. I was fine, and I didn't have a problem with anyone that I was aware of until today, and it seems to be the latest in a months-long line of problems within those walls. "The lease is up in May," I keep reminding myself, but still, it kinda blows feeling like none of us will be able to be friends after the end of our lease, if we're even still friends at this point now. It seems so forced lately a great deal of the time, and that's a shame. I feel like it's affecting my other friends' opinions of me, too, and that's simply because I'm not around enough to see them on a regular basis and let them know that I'm not as big an asshole as the picture that may or may not have been painted of me might suggest. Seems I don't get invited to much anymore. Maybe it's out-of-sight-out-of-mind with them since I'm not around a lot, and I hope that's all it is, but I have a feeling that there may be outside influence at work, and I don't care for that too much.
As negative and nasty as that all sounds, I assure you that it's not something that consumes me on a daily basis. Do I miss my friends? Of course. But there is so much more in my life that is positive right now that I don't care enough to dwell on the negativity. I did that for far too long. In fact I spent more time writing all that out just now than I've spent thinking about it.
One of the constants I can depend on, as always, is music. I've been listening a lot lately and taking an interest in stuff that's new to me that I may not have ever found if I hadn't gone looking for it. It's not necessarily weird or "different" as much as it is unfamiliar. I love the thrill of discovering new music, or of discovering highlights in familiar songs that had escaped me.
But now know this: I love my job, but I hear an unacceptable amount of country music at the office. It has only reaffirmed by belief that I don't like country music not because I wasn't willing to give it a shot, but rather because the genre, as a whole, gargles my balls. At least the majority of the last 10-15 years' worth of work, anyway. The number of half-assed, pop-laced, strictly-for-record-selling, franchise-building, vomit-inducing "country" songs that are being churned out of Opryland these days just blows me the fuck away. The number of shitsack rock or pop songs (almost none of which were good to begin with) covered by country artists these days is goddamn astounding. And, of course, America fucking loves it. Apparently, though, the record companies and radio stations are beginning to notice that their product sucks, and rather than playing the songs written for country radio, they're just saying "Ah, fuck it," and playing the actual pop songs themselves, as originally recorded. But then, of course, the retarded mother fuckers over at the pop stations are scooping up Toby Keith and Taylor Swift and whatever the fuck band did that "Life Is A Highway" remake a few years ago like they're the next MJ or Britney or fucking Led Goddamn Zeppelin. Mumford & Sons, you assholes, are not a country band. They're folk-pop at best. The Pixies didn't write country songs, and something tells me that the band that covered "Where Is My Mind?" might agree. And the first sonofabitch who tries to tell me with a straight face how the christ Adele ended up on country stations is getting a right hook to the goddamn jaw. I can't stand her bullshit on regular pop stations, and I sure as hell don't want to hear it on country stations. Fuck.
I'm not even sure where this rant is going. All I know is that I'm right. And I'm tired.
I'm not ignoring anyone, I'm just amazingly busy of late, and there are other things on my mind. The racing season, on paper, is almost four months away. You may see that as a third of a year, but I see it as holy-shit-that's-tomorrow. I've been hard at work helping to build a new company at one track, keeping another track in the news, helping some racers get a few sponsorship bucks on the side, and trying to help the new VMM management without being a nuisance, all pretty much non-stop since October.
I'm effin' psyched for everything to start in late April/early May, but at the same time, I could use six more months to prepare and probably still want more time. Our momentum is rolling, and that's a great thing, but there are also a ton of loose ends to tie up before the first race. A TON.
Either way, I feel like I'm really helping to make a difference this year. I feel like what I'm helping to build from the ground up is going to mean something to people and make them happy. I feel that way because I've already seen some of it. It's very, very rewarding.
I've stopped to smell the roses (and occasionally Rose) a few times, even if only for a couple of hours. I've taken in a few UVM basketball and hockey games, went to a show with Rose a few weeks ago, and we're headed to another one on Friday, but it seems like it's all been between breaths. We're also looking for a new apartment in the Vergennes/Middlebury area so that I'm a bit closer to work but that she's not a billion miles from school and her own jobs, and that has taken some time up, too.
By the way, it's clear that things in my current apartment are deteriorating in a hurry, which makes me want to spend even less time there than I already do (and at an average of 1-3 nights per week, that ain't much, Ted). There's a steadily-building pressure cooker of resentment and anger among us roomies, which I've totally seen coming since, well, the beginning. I'm a pretty easy-going dude. I was fine, and I didn't have a problem with anyone that I was aware of until today, and it seems to be the latest in a months-long line of problems within those walls. "The lease is up in May," I keep reminding myself, but still, it kinda blows feeling like none of us will be able to be friends after the end of our lease, if we're even still friends at this point now. It seems so forced lately a great deal of the time, and that's a shame. I feel like it's affecting my other friends' opinions of me, too, and that's simply because I'm not around enough to see them on a regular basis and let them know that I'm not as big an asshole as the picture that may or may not have been painted of me might suggest. Seems I don't get invited to much anymore. Maybe it's out-of-sight-out-of-mind with them since I'm not around a lot, and I hope that's all it is, but I have a feeling that there may be outside influence at work, and I don't care for that too much.
As negative and nasty as that all sounds, I assure you that it's not something that consumes me on a daily basis. Do I miss my friends? Of course. But there is so much more in my life that is positive right now that I don't care enough to dwell on the negativity. I did that for far too long. In fact I spent more time writing all that out just now than I've spent thinking about it.
One of the constants I can depend on, as always, is music. I've been listening a lot lately and taking an interest in stuff that's new to me that I may not have ever found if I hadn't gone looking for it. It's not necessarily weird or "different" as much as it is unfamiliar. I love the thrill of discovering new music, or of discovering highlights in familiar songs that had escaped me.
But now know this: I love my job, but I hear an unacceptable amount of country music at the office. It has only reaffirmed by belief that I don't like country music not because I wasn't willing to give it a shot, but rather because the genre, as a whole, gargles my balls. At least the majority of the last 10-15 years' worth of work, anyway. The number of half-assed, pop-laced, strictly-for-record-selling, franchise-building, vomit-inducing "country" songs that are being churned out of Opryland these days just blows me the fuck away. The number of shitsack rock or pop songs (almost none of which were good to begin with) covered by country artists these days is goddamn astounding. And, of course, America fucking loves it. Apparently, though, the record companies and radio stations are beginning to notice that their product sucks, and rather than playing the songs written for country radio, they're just saying "Ah, fuck it," and playing the actual pop songs themselves, as originally recorded. But then, of course, the retarded mother fuckers over at the pop stations are scooping up Toby Keith and Taylor Swift and whatever the fuck band did that "Life Is A Highway" remake a few years ago like they're the next MJ or Britney or fucking Led Goddamn Zeppelin. Mumford & Sons, you assholes, are not a country band. They're folk-pop at best. The Pixies didn't write country songs, and something tells me that the band that covered "Where Is My Mind?" might agree. And the first sonofabitch who tries to tell me with a straight face how the christ Adele ended up on country stations is getting a right hook to the goddamn jaw. I can't stand her bullshit on regular pop stations, and I sure as hell don't want to hear it on country stations. Fuck.
I'm not even sure where this rant is going. All I know is that I'm right. And I'm tired.
Monday, January 2, 2012
The year in phone pics: 2011
Looking back at some of the cool things I got to do in 2011, seen through the lens of my cell phone camera. You can watch the slideshow, or click on the photos to go to my Picasa album. (Clicking means you can see the captions!)
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
A Band You Should Listen To: Elbow
Trying out a new thing here at (802)zoom called "A Band You Should Listen To". Basically, I like bands and tell you to listen to them. Pretty easy.
Band: Elbow
Origin: England
Genre: Rock, indie, progressive
Lineup: Guy Garvey/lead vocal and guitar, Mark Potter/lead guitar, Craig Potter/keys, Pete Turner/bass, Richard Jupp/percussion
Elbow is wicked popular outside the U.S. Front man Guy Garvey has an incredibly strong tenor voice and is a talented lyricist, and the rest of the band's instrumental and vocal support can be anywhere from solid rock to inspiring to chillingly haunting. The 2001 song "Newborn" from the album Asleep in the Back got some airtime in the U.S., and I've heard "Grounds for Divorce" from 2008's Seldom Seen Kid on the radio a few times, too. The clips from live shows that I've seen are outstanding.
Here are some of my favorite songs...
Band: Elbow
Origin: England
Genre: Rock, indie, progressive
Lineup: Guy Garvey/lead vocal and guitar, Mark Potter/lead guitar, Craig Potter/keys, Pete Turner/bass, Richard Jupp/percussion
Elbow is wicked popular outside the U.S. Front man Guy Garvey has an incredibly strong tenor voice and is a talented lyricist, and the rest of the band's instrumental and vocal support can be anywhere from solid rock to inspiring to chillingly haunting. The 2001 song "Newborn" from the album Asleep in the Back got some airtime in the U.S., and I've heard "Grounds for Divorce" from 2008's Seldom Seen Kid on the radio a few times, too. The clips from live shows that I've seen are outstanding.
Here are some of my favorite songs...
Powder Blue
Mirrorball
Red
Newborn (live)
Okay, that's Elbow. What do you think?
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