Good news all around

Again, it's been awhile since my last post and I apologize. There's been some really great things that have happened but I'll start where I left off. I believe the last chapter in this series was when I was down in St. George going to see a WMMF show. So here it goes. We drove to Vegas for the show. Nice drive. We were all prepared to find where the show was going to be at. We were totally expecting a concert with a lot of people being there and according to google maps we drove into this little coldisac where there were a few people standing around and hardly any parking. This couldn't've been the place. So we scramble to find an internet connection which led us to a casinio where I had to dish out some money to one of those kiosks that charge an insane amount of money for the time you get. So I'm looking up the concert and I'm not finding a thing. No where was it posted that What Made Milwaukee Famous was playing in Vegas that day. so I keep checking and clicking on everything that led me to believe that there was a show at all and the more I read the more I thought that we were at the right place that that this was going to be a special show. We head back and we see a group of people dressed in black and we talked to them to get the down low. It turned out we were in the right place and the show was going to start in an hour or so. The show was actually a live internet broadcast. About a half hour before the show we go in and we were the only people there not the band or the stage hands. It felt weird. Others showed up a few minutes the thing started but the total fans not working or playing on stage was 7. SEVEN! It was awesome. It was like a private show just for us. We were standing feet from them playing with no chance of people standing in our way (except for the camera people). The best show ever. They played for about an hour, all their best songs, and afterward they all came over and talked with us that were watching the show. We had real conversations with them. The drummer took me on stage to show me his drum set that he bought a few months before, which was his first pro drum set. Here's some pics:





After the show Ashlee puked at In & Out Burger and we headed back to St. George where my car hit the 100,000 mile mark.

My grandfather's wife finally showed up after about a 2 years wait. She had to get her citizenship stuff in order cause she Filipino and they got married in the Philippines. Lots of forms and what not. When she got here she was really shy. It must be a big culture shock to move like that. I'm sure this was her first time here in the US of A. They stayed a few days then left for the warm weather of Las Vegas. The same day they moved out I took over the room. I cleaned and painted it the very same day



and it so far looks like this:



It's cozy and I like it.

There was an 80's party last weekend that was fun. My neighbor, Ashlee, graduated from college and this was part of her celebration:



check out my jacket. I got it at savers and look a bunch of white out to it. The skull on the back turned out amazing. I even surprised myself it was so good.





After the party we wanted to strut around in public so we went to a local Leatherby's to show us off. The whole place was staring at us. It was fun. A great night.







Some good news that I've been looking forward to for a while now was received last Wednesday. I was accepted to grad school in Sweden this fall. I was super nervous about it, but I got in and all is well. I'll be heading there in August. But first I need to apply for a student visa which can take months to get so I really need to send stuff into the Swedish embassy as soon as I can. But yeah, I'll be living in Sweden for a couple of years. You all have to come and visit me while I'm there.

Well, I'm off to a soccer game in a few hours and then to a comedy show. Should be another good weekend.

Even more updates

So yeah. It’s time to update the blog again. We’ll start at Easter. This was a pretty fun time because both of my brothers that don’t live with us came to visit. Nick, my older brother, who lives in Boise, Idaho was flown in by my parents and Greg came all the way from Logan (an hour and a half drive away). This was the first time we had all been together for awhile, I think since last year spring some time. It doesn’t happen very often and it didn’t last long either. Nick was only here for a couple of days. Not a whole lot was planned and there were things that were scheduled prior to the visit that couldn’t be altered so it was a lot of hanging out at the parents place. We played a lot of Call of Duty 4, skated around the neighborhood, and played some Frisbee.

I got a black eye and split lip playing frisbee. Can you believe that?

Other than that we did stuff that we used to when we where little kids before we moved to Idaho: we went to ice burg.

It’s a little ice cream place where we used to go on special occasions when we were kids. They make the best shakes and malts there. I hear they make some great good there to but I have yet to remember that place when I go to lunch. I work a couple of blocks away. We also did a game of bowling where everyone bowled their worst games ever.

It was super fun though. I think my dad was the only one who bowled over 100. Since Nick was here for only a couple of days the week went by very quickly before he had to leave. We had pictures taken and that was that. We didn’t do much for Easter. We have one tradition that we followed which is to place clues around the house that lead from one place in the house to the next until the clues lead us to the Easter baskets. The baskets and the clues were put together really fast but no one really cared. My little, four-year-old brother was the only one excited. The rest of us were pretty tired from staying up late playing video games. Good times

The Friday after that I went to see an apartment that one of my friends had moved to recently. She moved out of her parents place and into a fairly nice little place about half an hour away. Once there we couldn’t figure out how to get rock band working; well, the problem was that we couldn’t figure out how the xbox connected to the tv. It was really counter intuitive. None of us smart guys could figure it out and was frustrating. So we went dancing at Studio 900. And I’ve gone dancing a little bit but once there I was not in the mood at all. The dj sucked. He played a few songs like three times with very little transition. I could’ve done better than he did. They tried a few rave things too turning off all the lights and such. They had a guy get on a ladder in the middle of the dance room and he threw out 50 1’s and a ton of fake 20’s. the place when crazy but I got me a one dollar bill. Totally not worth it though. The people were vicious; grabbing whatever they could. Someone knocked my hat off me and I almost got knocked down. But I got my dollar. This one:


I also bought this cd and am officially awesome:



My little brother Alec turned 4 a little while back. We went to Chucky Cheese's. It was packed but it was a lot of fun for Alec.





Another thing I did sometime was go to a 1920's themed party. So we went to a costume store to be cool like that. the party was at some rich girls parents house. the place was huge with old art work all over the place. It was pretty awesome.











So right now I'm in St. George, Utah staying at a friend's sister's place on my way to seeing a What Made Milwaukee Famous concert later this day. I've got more pics and stuff to put on my computer, so don't worry. I'll update you on this trip too.

Why?

I just saw this video at macrumors.com and it reminded me of another reason why I don't like this country sometimes. This guy in the video is talking about how most of the developed world considers our top consumer internet speed to be the poor mans way to go. Our technology here in the states is not as great as it could be and the reason why is money. The people selling us our technology tells us that what we are buying is great and their top of the line stuff is the best. What they don't tell us is that they have access to much better stuff that they will release when they feel necessary to keep making top dollar. Most people just don't know any better and this is our reality. We are slaves to these corporations. Life can be greater than this but we are kept in the dark. And you know there isn't anything we can do; it's all up to big brother in D.C. but it's clear that those stuffed shirts are paid to go the way of the corporations. Too bad. That's my two cents.

Sweet

I finally got it back.



My guitar has been in the shop for... lets see... I brought it in December 27 and got it back yesterday, March 14. Yeah, too long. I think the guy gave me a discount because of it. I brought it in to get new tuners and to get the electronics fixed on it. The major problem was that the guy had to drill holes in the head to fit the new tuners in. The problem was that the guy had get a friend of his to come to his house to hold the guitar while he drilled the holes. When I first dropped it off I was told two weeks. I called a few weeks later and the guy still needed to find someone to hold the guitar for him. Then weeks turned into months and this loser still couldn't find someone to go to his house to get this done. I'm not sure how long it took till he got it done till another problem arose. There were a few times I called when he was on his breaks and didn't get through. Anyway, I find out that he got it done sometime and had been trying to call me. And each time he called he kept getting someone else, and this someone else was getting a little peeved from what I understand. So I called him last week and he told me it was done but I might want him to work on the frets. I told him okay so my guitar would be in good shape. So I went in yesterday to get it and he showed me how the phone number wasn't working. Guess what. It totally worked. My phone was ringing and his jaw dropped. So I got it back and it looks great and plays great. It's like having a new guitar. I haven't played this one for a while now and its fun now. I hope I can get some new music out of it.

There's other stuff that's happened. Work has been going well. Except that last week a kid broke my glasses. Yeah, it sucked. I was getting a kid out of his wheel chair and another kid was a few feet away from us and he threw a ball at my head and caught my glasses right at the hinge on the right side of the glasses. It didn't hurt, well my patience really took a shot too. I was pretty pissed and the kid knew it and he was suddenlly really nice. Well I got them fixed the same day but there wasn't any fund anywhere in the school to compensate. Working for schools really screws ya.

Last weekend I took the funbus to Wendover, a town right on the Utah/Nevada border where people go to gamble. It was awesome. It's a great deal to. You pay $15 for the ride buck you get a ton of it back. When you get there you get this booklet full of coupons that make the trip: one for the buffet (normally $12), a coupon redeemable for $5 cash, a $5 coupon for starbucks, and a few others that I don't remember. So I want with Ashlee, Heather, and Sterling. Here's a few pics from the trip:













There ya go. It was a good trip. didn't gamble much. I'm not that good at it and didn't want to loose a lot of money. We did however look around the casinos and the town. It's a small town. We played billiards for a while and we were all pooped about an hour before the bus was going to leave so we just watched a lounge band while we waited. It was all worth it.

The day before we went my cousin Abby got married and I attended the reception at the University of Utah's museum of fine art. They set it up all nice. Here's my cousin and my sister:



Here's my fam



Nice time

I think right after the reception my neighbor Ashlee tried her hand at making a three layer cake and this is what she made:



It turned out well. The frosting was a little thick and was hard to put on but the cake was good.

That's about it for now. I'll keep my camera going.

Until next time.

More Fruit

So Saturday last week started out with me not taking a shower all day with the thought that I would ride my bike sometime. this didn't happen because of all this:

I had to take my three year old brother to Primary activity where he colored in a book, got fingerprinted, found out his weight and hight, and had an Easter Egg hunt



Pretty soon after I got home I watched the live action pilot for the Tick:



And in the middle of watching this a friend of my little brother came in to start the project that we were to embark on. You see, my little brother plays the drums and is in a few bands I think. One of these bands had been in the local battle of the bands a few weeks back and they came out fourth. This was good enough for them to make it to state and one of the requirements was to provide a recording of them playing the two songs they were to perform. That day we were getting the tracks of them playing. It's kinda fun doing this but it's also a lot of work. Here's some pics of them while they're laying it down:


This is the lead singer, obviously, who had a really flemmy throat that day and was not happy with his performance but had no choice since the project needed to go forward. Oh, the songs were due on Monday so this was the only day to get his track.



One of the guitarist. I think his name is Alex. I've got a 50% chance of being right because 2 out of the 4 people are named Alex in this band.



This is the guy who wrote one of their songs. I thinks it's pretty good. this guy has mad skills on the guitar.



Here's my brother drumming. The pics were presented in the opposite order that they played their tracks, btw. I forgot to take a picture of the bass player, probably named Alex. But here we all are before we picked up the singer. This is us at Carl's Jr. where I got a chili cheese burger, chili fries, and a Captain Crunch shake. That was my payment for being the sound guy recording their stuff and mixing it. Damn good deal if you ask me.



I just looked at the pic. I guess the bass player wasn't with us and that there are actually 5 people in the band. After they left I was mixing for a while till I went to one of my co workers place to meet her husband. We talked about music, I showed them the stuff I did that day and what not. Here's my co workers husband and for the life of me I can't remember his name. am i a bad person?



That was pretty fun hanging out. Then I went over to another house and watched the Darjeeling Limited. Not sure if I spelled that right. The house is owned by Dan and my old friends from Hawaii were there: Steve and Joel as well as another roommate, Mike, the guy who is not gay (probably). Downstairs they've got a projector that projects on a wall that is made to be a viewing screen. It's tight yo. and that's joel in the banana chair.



After that I stumbled in my car and made it home without passing out. It was a long fruitful day.

Leap day

I bought a hat today. Check it:



Almost got this one:



Got some chinese



And skated



Good day so far

Here come's the new year

Hey ya'll. I can't believe it's been so long since I've been blogging. Here's down low on what's up:

Okay, if you remember a couple of posts ago I was reminiscing about Built to Spill. Well, a couple of nights ago I went to see them play. And. It. Was. Awesome. They played at this dope club downtown called the Depot. The place is hot. But not only where BTS the headliner but the Meat Puppets played right before them. If you remember the Nirvana Unplugged album you might recall the MP sitting in and doing some guitar work with them on stage. I know that Built to Spill is very underground but the Meat Puppets had some nice lime light in the day. And I saw why. They put on a great show. they even played some Nirvana covers.

So when Built to Spill played it kicked my ass back to the day when I loved them to death. They were playing all the songs that I forgot I loved. There were some long jam session songs going on and a bunch of people smoking weed everywhere. It was a good time. Then I had to wake up early and go to work yesterday and (barely) do stuff. But It was sooo worth it.

The next show I want to go to real bad is What Made Milwaukee Famous who are coming at the end of next month. I've been waiting for a while to see them, and since their new album is coming out in four days, they be touring an they be coming here. I'm even a part of their street team so I might be seeing their show for free. How'bout that?

Other prominents: I'm working at Hartvigsen. It's an elementary school for mentally handicapped kids. I work with elementary kids in a motor development class. We work on things like learning to put wait on their feet when getting up from their wheelchairs, learning to count objects, ball catching and throwing skills. All sorts of skills with all sorts of kids with various sorts of severity in their development. I thinks it fun. A lot of it is structured play with kids all day.

I almost became a flight attendant for Delta. They flew me out to Atlanta for a very short interview with like 200 others that day. I didn't make it but it was a fun experience.

I'm now driving an '98 Audi A6. Pictures will come later. I like the car, it's good to me.

I got these shoes:



Yeah, their kick ass.



My little brother and his snowman that he built with my dad:



There you go. I'll try to do better with updating stuff. Who knows how I'll do. Oh it's finally getting warm outside and I've been out riding my bike. No accidents this year so far. Lets keep that record going. That's to all you jerk drivers!