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I'm me. What else could you possibly want to know? Oh, right. I'm from Kentucky. I don't write as often as I feel I should. I can't explain why this text is green either.
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Friday, November 20, 2009
that general feeling of AAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!
Life seems to have spiraled from the kinda busy time of year to the really busy time of year. We've arrived at Thanksgiving time. That means my father and little brother have birthdays coming up in the next few weeks. The Christmas season is upon us, or me at least. Big Brothers Big Sisters has already set up their Christmas tree lots in the tri-state. I was out last Friday (another working "day off") helping deliver all the tree stands and then spent Saturday morning erecting them. The trees get delivered a week from tomorrow, which means another morning of heavy labor at the tree lot.
The Christmas season, which is technically from December 25 to January 6, gets preluded by all the Advent events at church. This weekend, my church is hosting the community Thanksgiving service, which, despite what my worship committee had been previously told, we have to do pretty much everything for and the other churches just kind of show up. There was a scramble on Wednesday when this became known to get greeters, ushers and all the other necessary people for the service as well as finding music the choir can learn on such short notice. (It's a darn good thing that we have an extremely talented choir!) On Monday, my committee is in charge of the hanging of the greens, since Advent starts the Sunday after Thanksgiving. There is stuff going on every Sunday afternoon (and sometimes evenings, too) between now and Christmas. I'll get to spend tonight and tomorrow baking pumpkin bread to take to shut-ins, assuming I can find some pumpkin to put into it. (Are you serious? There's a shortage of pumpkin?) While the bread is baking, I'll be trying to streamline the deliveries of pumpkin bread and Thanksgiving baskets for those in the area who can't afford a decent dinner, and there are a lot more than normal this year. Hopefully, I can find a way to combine the two lists, because otherwise, I'll still be delivering bread on Monday!
Once the BBBS tree sale starts, I'll be spending my days running from the office to the tree lot to get groups in and out. There's also two performances for the River Cities Chorus coming up in the next few weeks. The Ironton Council for the Arts has a concert in a few weeks as well. I'm sure there's something else I'm forgetting as well, like maybe Christmas shopping and arranging the church ski trip. When I think of all there is to do over the next month, I become extremely thankful for my iPod's calendar. Without that, I'd be tempted to just do my impression of an ostrich.
244.0
Posted at 02:05 pm by rab_lat
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Wednesday, November 04, 2009
I wrote two entries last week. Each of them was a long one. They both took hours to finish (because I'm easily distracted.) Both of them were Pulitzer Prize material. Both of them disappeared when I hit the "Publish" button and was told to log in again.
I had a fun, but tiring weekend of UK sports over the weekend. Friday night (technically Saturday morning,) I watched the UK hockey team play Kennesaw State University. The game started at midnight, so it was technically the Halloween game. They did a costume contest and gave away t-shirts. Kentucky won 10-2, and I saw one of the UK players score not just a hat trick, but later tack on a fourth goal. There was also a pretty good fight with just a couple of minutes left in the game. Being there reminded me of going to the Frozen Four in 2005. At the Frozen Four, I was sitting right behind the bench. Not only was the action on the ice up close, but you could smell the stink of the players. In Lexington, the stands are only opposite the benches, and they only seat a couple hundred people. (Kentucky has a club hockey team, not D-I.) The place was still loud and nobody sat down unless it was intermission. Once again, I was sitting... okay, standing... close enough to smell the players skating by. Yes, hockey players stink. They smell horrible. It's actually probably even more that their gear reeks. Still, you really feel like you're at the game when you can smell it. If you don't believe me, go watch a minor league team play. The tickets should be cheap enough that you can actually afford to get seats on the ice.
Anyway, after arriving at home at 4:30 in the morning, I got a couple of hours of sleep before getting up and getting ready to head back to Lexington for a UK football game that did not go so excellently. Kentucky ended up losing by 7. I don't have a huge problem when the team loses a close game. That's probably from cheering on years and years of bad UK and Bengals football teams. Some of the game decisions have furthered my belief that the coach is either an idiot or a jack@$$. (hmmm... Maybe I should have chosen better editing symbols.) I can't believe that Brooks would actually say after the game last week that a running back isn't the type of player who can play every down in a game. The guy is only 175 pounds and would get creamed by the defensive line if he did. That's all paraphrased, but very true. This week, Brooks played that back on half the plays in the first half, until he was injured, and then on nearly every play in the second half. In the post game interview, Brooks said that he thinks he "tore" something in his knee again that he had needed surgery to repair during the off-season. I can't for the life of me understand how a coach can say a player is not an every down player, which I agree with, one week, and then the next week after what he believes is a substantial injury, go on to play him on every down. Would I feel differently if UK had won? I seriously doubt it. I'd rather have UK lose by 30 than see one of the players unnecessarily risk an injury that could affect him for the rest of his life.
Sunday, I caught up on sleep. Thank you, time change!
146.8
Posted at 09:12 am by rab_lat
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Tuesday, October 20, 2009
I was going to post an entry about musicals, but for some reason, IE shut itself down when I was nearing the end of it. I have no desire at this time to retype it, so instead you get this entry, which has been sitting on my entry page as a draft for about two weeks.
I was tagged on facebook in a note to put your MP3 player on shuffle and put down the song, artist and genre of the first 25 songs that come up. It also left no room for adding commentary, so I've decided to do it again and add comments about the songs, artists or whatever. I also reserve the right to cheat and skip a song if I want to!
1. Real Wild Child - Iggy Pop
I first heard this song in Crocodile Dundee 2. It always reminds me of 1980s gangs that were just delinquents that loitered instead of actually killing people. Those were friendlier days.
2. Rembrants - I'll Be There
Yes, this IS the Friends theme, but after the show became a hit, they went back and filled it out to a full song about being there for each other.
3. Hot For Teacher - Van Halen
Aside from the obvious fantasy of every schoolboy (and a number of schoolgirls, too, apparently,) I love the parts of the music video where the band is supposed to be dancing in unison and one can't seem to get it right.
4. Hot Corn, Cold Corn - Flatt and Scruggs
It's bluegrass. It's live. It's Carnegie Hall!
5. I Like It, I Love It - Tim McGraw
I will look at it as either a view of how great love is that you'd be willing to give up these things or a lesson in why to avoid relationships, depending on my mood.
6. Baby, I Love Your Way - Peter Frampton
AAAAHHHH!!!!!!! It's Peter Frampton! As soon as I can find Lisa Bonet's version of this, Pete will go bye-bye, but I think John Cusack said it best in High Fidelty, "I always hated that song. Now I kinda like it." *WARNING!!! Video may not be suitable for work.*
7. Another One Bites the Dust - Queen
It's Queen. There will probably be more of it, even if I have to arrange it that way. Deal with it!
8. I Hope You Dance - Lee Ann Womack
Dancing may not be the most masculine thing, but it is fun. So is making the most of life.
9. Everyone's a Little Bit Racist - Avenue Q Cast
Funny and probably true, to some extent.
10. Oh, Atlanta - Alison Krauss
You can go home, and some things WILL still be the same. It's also okay to love where you're from, even if it is Atlanta.
11. Walking On the Sun - Smashmouth
The song is like a mini history lesson and a tribute to the '60s, with the message to not do drugs.
12. When You Say Nothing At All - Alison Krauss
I fell in love with this song the first time that I heard it. That rarely happens. I still love this song. That almost never happens in conjunction with my first statement. It's sweet, beautiful and haunting at the same time.
13. I Want You - Savage Garden
Three words: Chica Cherry Cola. There's that and remembering teasing Keri about music freshman year of college and then realizing that she liked a song that I liked, too.
14. Is It Still Over - Randy Travis
Based on the lyrics, I'd say the answer is yes, but I still think you're an amazing singer, Randy.
15. Flight Of the Passing Fancy - Squirrel Nut Zippers
It's an upbeat, peppy, swinging instrumental, whose name describes it well. It's kinda ADD, like me.
16. Will the Circle Be Unbroken - The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band et al
This is a bluegrass standard for a reason: It's an amazingly good description of grieving in the southern Appalachians.
17. Jump, Jive an' Wail - The Brian Setzer Orchestra
This is one of the songs that brought in the latest resurgence of swing music. All it took is the former front man of the Stray Cats with a song with repetitive lyrics that don't mean a whole lot and a great beat.
18. Foggy Mountain Breakdown - Hot Rize
Yes, "hot rise" is what was in Martha White's self-rising flour that baked better biscuits, cakes and pies.
19. Country Grammar - Nelly
I started liking this song in college, when I hung out at one of the fraternity houses, where they'd play this all the time, and lived with a roommate who liked this kind of music. For some reason, I also thought it was alright to have no taste, but now it's one of those songs that stuck in my mind as one that I like.
20. Simply Irresistible - Robert Palmer
The video is full of models, as were his other big videos. This is also where Shania Twain got the idea for her video for "Man, I Feel Like a Woman."
21. 1999 - Prince
I never did party like it was 1999 in 1999. I wish I had.
22. Somewhere Nice Forever - Ricky Skaggs
This song always reminds me of a friend who was diagnosed with Leukemia shortly after we graduated college. Unfortunately, I haven't talked to her since about January or February, so I can't say she's doing okay now, but she was then.
23. Mother - Pink Floyd
I love listening to Pink Floyd whenever I'm feeling a little bit sane. It fixes that problem right up. This is also a great example of what happens when you overprotect your kids.
24. Simple Life - Ricky Skaggs
Unlike 22, this is a happy and upbeat song about how life is great, even when you don't have everything... at least until the last part about the cell phone, the internet, GPS and satellites. Even then, it's still about appreciating the little things all around you.
25. Crash Into Me - Dave Matthews Band
The best way to describe my feelings towards Dave Matthews is to say that it grew on me.... like a fungus. This is the Dixie Chicken version. Blame Tall Red Amanda.
Hope you enjoyed (possibly again) seeing how bizarre my music preferences are.
241.6
Posted at 01:55 pm by rab_lat
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Monday, October 19, 2009
I had promised an update on last weekend, and here it is! Friday, a week ago, I jumped in my truck and headed up to PA. I got to hang out with some wonderful friends, whom I had not seen in almost three years. We, being reenactors and musicians, went to an olde tyme days faire thing near where they live and played. Since they were doing strings instead of brass and I haven't learned how to play a string instrument yet, I picked up the tambourine. My tamborine skills are laughable. After our first break, Dreamy mentioned that she had a set of bones in her violin case and that I could teach myself how to use them if I wanted to. I think she figured that I'd give it a shot, fail, and then give up. By lunch time, I was playing them with my right hand. (Still not well, but I was playing them.) Dreamy gave me a glare at one point. Actually, she glared at me a number of times, and she threatened to poke me with her violin bow. Apparently, she had not yet figured out how to play them. By the time we packed up that afternoon, I had gotten pretty good at playing the bones with my right hand, and I was even functional with my left one. Now I'm thinking that I might want to get a couple pairs of them to take around with me.
On Sunday, I left cool, sunny Altoona, PA, and headed towards Pittsburgh for the world premier of Dog Jack. I got about 10 miles before my "check gages" light came on. At that point, I noticed that my engine was overheating. I slowed down, and my engine cooled a bit and stayed out of the red for the rest of my trip. (After I got home, I took the truck in to get an oil change, and they told me my coolant was low and I should get my radiator serviced soon.) I made it to Pittsburgh a couple hours before the show started so I walked around in an attempt to find a place to eat and Heinz Chapel. On my way to Heinz Chapel, I made mental notes of various eateries in the Pitt area of town. Heinz Chapel is definitely one of the most interesting churches that I've ever been to. If you don't pay attention, you'd swear it was a small Catholic or Orthodox cathedral. The big difference is the stain glass windows of people like Isaac Newton, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. After the site seeing, I ended up eating at Five Guys Burgers & Fries. I ordered a cheeseburger and fries. Upon recieving my food, I realized my mistake. I managed to eat all the fries, but I ended up saving the burger for the trip back home. (Even cold, it was still one of the best burgers I've eaten in my entire life.)
Dog Jack was entertaining. It won't win any awards, I'm sure, unless they have Christian movie awards organizations. I'm sure I won't get any awards for my work in it, but I did appear in no less than a half dozen scenes. There was even one shot of me where I thought they were filming us for a behind the scenes documentary. The movie has plenty of historical inaccuracies, but they apparently managed to hide a number of them also. There is currently no distributor for the film, so it's doubtful that you'll get to see me in the theater for this work. (I'll let you know when one of my films does hit the theaters though!) Although the production company is talking to major Christian distributors, I think the realistic hope is to get someone to back them to take it straight to DVD.
That's outside the Soldiers & Sailors Museum. I'm obviously on the left, since that's Chipmonk on the right.
242.8
Posted at 01:36 pm by rab_lat
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Wednesday, October 14, 2009
I have an update to do from this past weekend, but it will have to wait for now. I took today (and plan to do the same tomorrow) off so I could get ready to do a presentation on ancient Greece and Rome to academic team students from several different schools in the area on Friday. I'll be giving the same presentation three times, and it will last an hour and a quarter each time. The subject matter will include history, culture and mythology. I barely remember any of it from college. Not only do I not remember as much as I should, I also can't figure out what I should include. So far, I have three pages of information on ancient Rome, and I'm not even to the Republic yet. I haven't yet started on Greece. It looks like I won't be sleeping for the next two nights. What am I doing on here?
244.8
Posted at 04:36 pm by rab_lat
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Thursday, October 08, 2009
A couple weeks ago, an old crush from high school got in touch with me. We had lost touch a couple years after high school, shortly after she briefly dated one of my best friends and then got married to one of her ex-boyfriends.
Now that the backstory is done, she had just gotten on facebook and looked me up. I friended her, as I have many old friends. It turns out that she's back in the area, too, and she's still married (which actually surprised me a little.) A little less than a week later, she sent me a message saying that she needed to talk to me and asked if I could give her a call at noon the next day, when she's on lunch. I gave her a call, but ended up just leaving a voice mail. She called me back a few days later, and we talked for about 15 minutes about what's been going on. This is the point where she tells me that she's thinking about getting a divorce. She's talked to one of the best divorce attorney's in the city, and she was advised that her husband would probably get custody of her son, who is the only reason that she didn't file for divorce several years ago. There's also much more to the story, but I'm not going to get into that.
On Tuesday, we went to get lunch and talk about how things are going and what old friends are doing and whatnot. We pretty much finished most of the catching up that there was to catch up. One interesting thing that I've learned in catching up with her is that a girl that I dated just after graduation was saying that we had been pretty hot and heavy with our fooling around. The way that I remember things is that we kissed... once. Oh, well.
Tuesday night, I got a text from her saying, "If i tell u something, promise u wont get mad?" I responded, "Sure," remembering that she always seemed worried that the slightest thing would set anybody off. She then texted back, "Im still attracted to you but im also still married." The next time we talked, I told her that I won't be "the other man" and that she can't use me to get back at her husband. She replied that she isn't going to cheat on her husband. I assumed that would be the end of it. Every conversation that we have seems to be about how bad her marriage is, how she doesn't trust her husband and how much she wants out but won't take the chance of losing her son. The last couple of times we've talked she's started asking about a trip we took when she was interviewing for a job (and how she had hoped we'd get a hotel instead of going home that night) and fun places to have sex.
At this point, I'm thinking (I would say I was "starting to think" except I've been thinking it since the text a couple of days ago.) that it's about time to cut her loose and go my separate way. While I originally thought she would be someone else around here I can hang out and talk to, I'm now seeing this as something that will only end in pain for someone.
Any thoughts from the peanut gallery?
245.4
Posted at 09:56 am by rab_lat
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Tuesday, October 06, 2009
At Saturday's battle at Perryville, KY, this past weekend, the Confederate cavalry ride straight into a company volley of fire, stop, shoot their revolvers until they're empty and then ride away. The Confederate infantry refuses to give up ground as they are supposed to according to the historical script for the battle, but instead fire THROUGH a hill at us for nearly 15 minutes while we kneel out of sight before they back up. The "fight" lasted 45 minutes and there was no direct fire between the infantry lines. The park service and the crowd loved it. The entire Union officer corps was shocked when we heard that, because we thought it was one of the worst we'd ever been involved in.
At Sunday's battle, the Confederate line marched straight towards to Federal artillery. As soon as the right half of their line was visible to the Federal infantry, they fired two volleys into it. That side of the line crumbled and the rest of the force retreated in an extremely historically and tactically correct manner. The Confederates then called an end to the battle. The fight lasted 15 minutes, and afterward the Federal army went through the historical village to look for Confederate stragglers to add some entertainment for the spectators. There were yells of fury from the park staff about how quickly it ended.
If I had been a spectator on Saturday, I would have been pissed at how inaccurate and poorly executed the battle was. If I had been a spectator on Sunday, I would have been pissed that I had driven all the way there for 15 minutes of show. Aside from the Saturday battle (and the morning tactical fight, that I won't bother getting into,) I thought that it was an excellent event, and in case you actually look and think, "How did he gain four and a half pounds in one day?!?!?!" it's from re-hydrating.
248.0
Posted at 09:44 am by rab_lat
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Monday, October 05, 2009
a weekend away from civilization
I was at another reenactment over the weekend. I have a picture, which I'll post later of me in my new uniform. I had a wonderful time at it and learned a lot, BUT I am experiencing the same problem that I always have after something like this. I have no idea what happened in the real world over the weekend. Between the announcement that Chicago got knocked out of Olympic contention in the first round and balloting and Rio winning the bid instead and the end of the Bengals-Browns game, which I never actually saw the final score to because I was talking to someone in a Pizza Hut, I have no idea what happened this weekend. For all I know, Chinese troops could be on the outskirts of Paris. Actually, I think someone would have said something about that on the radio.
I never can get used to that feeling of being lost. With the internet and 24-hour news, it's really easy to keep up with what's going on in the world on an up-to-the-minute basis, and I tend to utilize that. I try to keep an idea of what's going on in Russia and when the next new episode on Psych is going to be on. Going 48 hours without electricity, the internet and any sort of 20th century technology really messes me up. I never feel quite right on Monday morning. I always have a sort of mental fog until I've cracked open a news site and looked through the last couple issues of the newspaper, which I rarely look at otherwise. hmmm... Well, what do you know? The world didn't end because I was unavailable for the weekend.
243.3
Posted at 01:56 pm by rab_lat
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Monday, September 28, 2009
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the symptoms for the H1N1 influenza virus (aka swine flu) are... well, let me just cut and paste from their website. "The symptoms of 2009 H1N1 flu virus in people include fever, cough,
sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, body aches, headache, chills and
fatigue. Some people may have vomiting and diarrhea. People may be
infected with the flu, including 2009 H1N1 and have respiratory
symptoms without a fever. Severe illnesses and death has occurred as a
result of illness associated with this virus." Near the end of last week, I saw a list of those symptoms in an article about how the CDC should be telling anyone with these symptoms to say home instead of just those with a fever. As I was reading it, I jokingly thought, "Cough, check. Sore throat, check. Runny nose, check. Stuffy nose, check. Headache, check. Wow! I've had 5 out of the 11 symptoms in the past couple of days!" Since then, lets go on over the weekend. Fever, check. Body aches, check. Chills, check. Fatigue, check. I've also suffered from a mild loss of appetite, upset stomach and slight dehydration. Fortunately, there has been no vomiting or diarrhea. *knock on wood* Maybe I should take tomorrow off as a rest and recovery day, or rather, a don't get anybody else sick day. Although I know I probably don't have the swine flu, I know people who know people around here who have gotten it in the past week, so there is a possibility that I have it. It's around here and only two degrees of separation from me. That's like Val Kilmer was in Top Gun with Tom Cruise and Tom Cruise was in A Few Good Men with Kevin Bacon. Huh. That was a short one. 246.4
Posted at 03:08 pm by rab_lat
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Wednesday, September 23, 2009
a couple stories from this morning
I haven't posted in a pretty long time, so let me take a minute to share some things that I dug up while reading the news this morning. In July, scientists caught a giant squid (Yes, they really do exist.) in the Gulf of Mexico while researching the diet of sperm whales. (Yes, they really do exist, also.) The squid measured 19.5 feet long and weighed 103 pounds. You may noticed that I referenced the squid in the past tense. It did not survive being pulled from the deep waters of the Gulf. (Yes, there really are deep waters in the Gulf of Mexico.) The body of the squid has been donated to the Smithsonian's Natural Museum of Natural History for research. This is only the second giant squid found in the Gulf. The first was floating dead near the Mississippi delta in 1954. Scientists have known of their existence in the Gulf of Mexico though, because they have seen remnants of them in the stomachs of their predators. That does raise an interesting question: Exactly what eats giant squid? Perhaps they released more information than they had planned to about plesiosaurs. On a more serious note, the government has released full numbers for the Cash for Clunkers program. In early August, it was reported that the top ten selling vehicles sold under the program were as follows: 1. Ford Focus, 2. Toyota Corolla, 3. Honda Civic, 4. Toyota Prius, 5. Toyota Camry, 6. Ford Escape, 7. Hyundai Elantra, 8. Dodge Caliber, 9. Honda Fit and 10. Chevrolet Cobalt. Now that the government has released the final numbers from the sale, it is clear that this is only half the picture. The original release divided two-wheel drive and four-wheel drive vehicles as two different categories and did the same for standard motors and hybrids models. For example, the Honda Civic and the Honda Civic Hybrid were recorded as two different models. This was picked up by a few news sources, and they have combined the different setups for the same model to give a single number for the vehicle model. This has changed how the success of getting fuel-inefficient cars off the road with the program looks. The Toyota Corolla becomes the top seller with 29,488 vehicles sold. The Ford Escape SUV enters the top ten at number five with 21,894 vehicles sold, followed by the Honda CR-V crossover at number six with 20,106 vehicles sold. The Chevrolet Silverado full-size pickup truck is now number 8 with 16,330 sold, and the Ford F-150 full-size pickup truck is now number 10 with 16,263 vehicles sold. The Toyota RAV4 SUV was the thirteenth best selling vehicle with 15,255 units sold. Rounding out the new top 20 was the Toyota Tocoma "light-duty" pickup truck, which sold 10,692 vehicles. That means that three SUVs and three pickup trucks were "gas savers" sold through Cash for Clunkers. The AP also pointed out a couple of other surprising sellers through the program. Toyota sold 2,015 full-size Tundra pickup trucks through the program, and Hummer sold 15 H3Ts through the program. I'm sure glad we got those gas guzzlers off the road and took care of America's car-buying needs for the next three years. Now we can just sit back and watch the evil car dealerships fold because almost nobody will need a new car any time soon. I'll call this a win for the dealerships, the manufacturers, who will not be able to sell cars for years as a result of this program's "success," the environment and the American people, who will have to pay for this $3,000,000,000.00 program. Considering the average American income in roughly $32,000.00, it would take 93,750 Americans to pay for it, assuming they gave ALL their money to the government, without keeping any for food, housing, gas, car payments, medical bills, movies, cable, internet or any other necessities or nicities of life. That's just for the ONE program that ran for only 55 days. I'd say this was definitely a win for everybody! 248.0
Posted at 10:33 am by rab_lat
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