Random Ramblings: Memorial Day Weekend

Listening: It is the 40th Anniversary of Queen and to celebrate they are re-releasing their albums 5 at a time with a bonus disc of extra material. And thankfully iTunes has allowed us to buy just those songs instead of it being the dreaded Album Only. The new "Beeb" renditions of Nevermore and Teo Torriatte are spectacular.

Scaring: Last Sunday we helped out some friends of ours by watching their kids while they went to Salt Lake to pick up a relative from the airport. We first took them back to our house for some lunch and then we headed to their house to play while we waited for their parents. They were happily playing with Logan and then it was time to eat lunch. I snuck up the corner of our stairs to scare the next person who came down the stairs which was unfortunate for Shelby. I scared that poor girl good! Afterwards we took them back to their house and played by the river in their backyard. The girls showed me two large duck nests that were full of eggs. And then we played Fish until their parents came home.

Logan, Cassiday and Shelby

Their house was right on the river. Logan is at the bottom of the stairs leading to their backyard, which is now the Logan River.

Cooking: The morning of Memorial Day we had a neighborhood breakfast at the park. I was partly in charge of cooking up the French Toast. We had a real good showing and it was fun to spend the morning with my great neighbors. I cooked for the first hour and a half (with help from Kristy) and then went inside to socialize with everyone and play basketball with the Young Men and Women.

Freezing: I cannot believe that we woke up Monday to snow! It was not a lot of snow but I did have to scrape it off the car!

Really? Snow?

Riding: Yesterday for Memorial Day we took a road trip with my mom and visited a couple of cemeteries (Wellsville, Logan, Hyrum and Richmond) and looked at some of our deceased relatives. It was a beautiful day for the most part. It got sunny and warm and then cold and rainy. The weather made every cemetery clean and green. It was so awesome to see all the flowers and flags. Visiting these gravesides always puts me in a sober and reflective mood. But I am glad that I was able to do it. It is fun hanging out with my mom and driving around. It takes me back to our road trips to Idaho and Colorado. We stopped for some dinner at Big J's and had a nice drive back to Logan.

I cannot believe that it has been 7 years since my grandparents passed away.

Feeling Strange: We dropped by the USU Trailer Court (where Kristy and I lived right after we got married) and our trailer is gone! And so is every trailer that was on our block. The whole trailer park was stripped with only a few trailers remaining. It was like a tornado cleared it out. Both Kristy and I felt strange. A part of our early married life is gone forever. All that remained was a few bricks that Kristy put in for a flower bed.

Logan is standing where the bathroom used to be.

Riding Part II: I rode my bike to my dad's house today for work. 4.13 miles is not to shabby. But I can already tell that my butt is going to be sore.

Tempting: You know I just might have to go see X-Men: First Class at midnight Thursday by myself.

SMASH!

I did something today that I have never done before. I have seen it done but I never was the one that did it.

It was my serve and I smashed the ball and it the wall with a thud and came back with a strange spin. I didn't know I made the ball explode until my friend Joseph tried to return it.

I totally killed it.

30 Day Song Challenge: The Conclusion

I'm kinda sad that this is ending. I hate coming up with new topics.

Day 26 - A Song That You Can Play On An Instrument

Vertigo - U2

I love the bass line of this song that I had to learn it. It was a little more complex (and fast!) than I am used to but after much time and practice, I think I have it down. Now if I could just sing the song along with playing the bass which is a lot harder to do than you think.

Day 27 - A Song That You Wish You Could Play

Dragon Attack - Queen

If I could play this on the bass guitar, I could play ANY Queen song on the bass guitar. I was never a huge fan of this song until I heard it live. The bass guitar was just so loud and thumping, you could feel it in your chest. The song was so awesome live that it made me a huge fan of this song.

Day 28 - A Song That Makes You Feel Guilty

Lit Up - Buckcherry

I love, LOVE this song. The guitars, the raspy voice, the pounding drums. This song has everything. The only drawback is it is all about cocaine. And there is a rather large f-bomb smack plum in the middle of the song. I have a copy of the radio edit which does not have the f-bomb in it but I couldn't find one to share here. If you have iTunes you can sample a copy of the radio version there. I know I shouldn't like it (which is why I feel a tiny bit guilty when I listen to it) but I absolutely love it.

Day 29 - A Song From Your Childhood

Total Eclipse of the Heart - Bonnie Tyler

Yeah, I really liked the theatrical feel of this song and I still like it because of that grand, sweeping feeling. The video I remember being a little strange and weird (hey, it was the 80's). Now some very clever people have remade the song so it matches the video in a literal sense. You totally need to see this video. I laugh every time I even think about this video.

Total Eclipse of the Heart - Literal Video Version by BalloDaSballo

Day 30 - Your Favorite Song At This Time Last Year

The Other Side - Pendulum

My British friend Tim introduced me to this band awhile ago (it might have been longer than a year) and I really like a few of their songs. It has a driving drum and bass line (see the trend here?) that appeals to me.

Guns

I have seen this blimp on my way to my dad's for work for the past six months or so.

It does make me a little curious to see what this is all about.

Nuff' said.

Random Ramblings: Bottoms Up!

Eating: Our family was invited to a birthday BBQ for our neighbor yesterday. The food was wonderful, and the company was even better. My family and I are blessed to have such awesome neighbors. I thought it was cute that Kara told Logan that he needs to kick Kristy and I out so she can babysit him again.
 

This was thier backyard. The river is pretty full, last year when we were here, the water was nowhere near this level.

Drinking: Mountain Dew Livewire. Not only had it finally returned to Cache Valley, the 12-pack has also returned!

Drinking II: So I was at the store picking up some Livewire when I found another soda that I used to love. Tahitian Treat! This was one of the best fruit punch sodas ever! I thought it was only available in Canada but I did find some limited quantities in New York. But I have not had one since then. And then I found a 12-pack so I had to have it. And it tastes just like I remembered.

Listening: To a fun mix of the 80's. Bangles, Rick Springfield, the Spoons... ...I definitely grew up in the BEST decade!

Eating II: I ate way too much last Saturday. Saturday was Richmond's annual Black and White Days. So we headed up to Richmond to watch the parade. We first picked up Kristy's sister Lynn and her daughter Jessica since their jeep was on the fritz. We headed up and dropped off some chairs at my mom's house and then went to Big J's (a local burger joint) and got an early dinner. Then we headed up to watch the parade. The parade was nice but not as good as it has been in years past. Funny thing is that we see a couple of our neighbors in the parade. Logan did get a bunch of candy and it was nice to see Jennifer and her family as well. After the parade we waited for Justin to come back (he was leading the parade in his cop car) and headed back to Big J's and got some ice cream. I got a large (and I really shouldn't have) Rice Krispie Treat shake and it was awesome!

Waiting for candy...

I told Logan that he needs to wave cutely to the cute girls. Here he is awarded a candy from one of the girls. Logan should trust me on this.

Our neighbor Sister Weeks playing the bass drum.

Winning: Kara's little brother Justin has been wanting to kick my trash in Madden. Finally last Saturday we had a showdown. It was close for a little while and then I pulled away and won the game. I guess I should feel bad for beating a 10-11 year old but he was a huge Steelers fan so it was deserved. The winner had to make cookies and so he made his sister Kara make me a plate of delicious cookies. Don't worry, I will pay them both back with a batch of cookies sometime this week.

Itching: Last week Logan was at a basketball camp for three days and he came home with a case of Athlete's Foot!

Reading: I am still a kid. I just finished a comic trade paperback G.I. Joe: Cobra and it was absolutely enthralling. This is not your daddy's G.I. Joe!

His name is Chuckles. He's the Joes' top undercover agent. And he's just infiltrated a top secret, highly organized terrorist organization... one the Joes aren't familiar with... one with a snake motif. As Chuckles is pulled deeper and deeper into the dark underbelly of Cobra, where one misstep means death, can he pull off the ultimate deception and bring them down from within?

I am very surprised (and pleased) that Hasbro (the toy company that owns G.I. Joe) would allow a book like this to be published. This is a very dark book with a couple of surprising twists. This is nothing like the old cartoon, it is a much more serious look at America's top fighting force taking on a dangerous terrorist group. There are two more volumes in print that I definitely want to track down.

From the Soapbox: R-E-S-P-E-C-T

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Find out what it means to me

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Take care ... TCB

Sing it Aretha!

Respect is a big deal to me. If you search my blog you will see that I mention the word "respect" in about 40 of my blogs. One thing that I cannot stand is a lack of respect. That doesn't mean you have to like everything but you still need to have a decorum of decency and be respectful.

Everyone has their own foibles. Everyone is different and I understand that. I am sure that what I do and what I am interested in grates some people the wrong way. And I am sure that my sense of humor can be discerning and rub people wrong too. But at least I can claim that I try my best to be respectful. Everyone deserves respect and everyone needs respect. The world would be a much better place if everyone tried their hardest to be respectful. And it is the right thing to do.

So I am sitting in my dad's office watching the charts when suddenly the lights are turned off with no words being said. Now you might think that someone may have accidentally turned the lights off. But this is no mistake since this is not the first time that this has happened. Now it is not like we are completely in the dark here, there is some light but there isn't enough light to read. I would consider it dark but that is just me.

There is someone in this household that is very anal when it comes to saving energy by turning off lights. I can understand that and I can respect that as well. What I don't get is how this person goes around and completes this mission. They just go about doing it without any regard or respect for anyone.

This irritates me because it is showing my dad and I a lack of respect. Even if you are fanatical about lights you still should respect others and what they feel. Even though I do not understand why someone would be so driven to do this and that it irritated me beyond belief, I didn't say a word. I could have easily said something, and I really could have said something extremely rude but I took the high road and said nothing. And I did this out of respect even though I turned the light back on and shut the door.

I wouldn't have been so ticked off if this person would have simply asked. Sure, I still would have been puzzled since I couldn't see any good reason for the light in the office to be shut off but I would have at least humored this person and complied. 

All it would have took was just a couple of words and I wouldn't have felt like I was disrespected. It seems that something so small and simple is now just being skipped altogether. It is a sad trend in society.

30 Day Song Challenge: Part V

Some of these songs were really easy to come by but I have found that this set has been much more difficult for me to figure out. 

Day 22 - A Song That You Listen To When You’re Sad

Overkill - Colin Hay

There are a few songs that I listen to that make me sad/reflective but I don't think there is a song that I desire to listen to when I am sad. This was a hard one to pick out but I think I have found a song that I really, really like that does make me a bit somber. I prefer the acoustic version of this song but the original Men at Work version is just as good. The guitar on the acoustic version is such fantastic.

Day 23 - A Song That You Want To Play At Your Wedding

 Another One Bites The Dust - Queen

I guess if I had to get married again, I would go for this song. Kristy and I played the Wyclef Jean version of this song at her sister's wedding and she was less than thrilled. But I would want it played at my wedding especially if I was going to get married a second time.

Day 24 - A Song That You Want To Play At Your Funeral

The Imperial Theme - John Williams

I could have chosen the same song to play at my funeral as I did for my wedding. But if I am going to go out, I want to go out in style! Since I was recently at a funeral I have put some thought into this and I think I have made the right decision.

Day 25 - A Song That Makes You Laugh

Dead Puppies - Ogden Edsl

Didja know that I won a Ms. America pageant for singing this song as my talent? Will I go to hell for laughing at this? I hope none of you are offended by this song and if you are, you really need to rethink your (lack of) sense of humor.