Tonight was the last of my 3 musical performances for this week. I play lead alto saxophone in the jazz band "Notochords". The group started in 1949, and was originally a group for doctors and nurses who who worked at the Mayo Clinic. Over the years it's diversified, and we have quite a mix of musicians in it now.
Tonight we were playing a concert at the Charter House. This is probably my favorite place to play every year. Besides the fantastic room (with great acoustics) that we get to play in, the people there are always a great audience, very attentive, and I can tell they truly appreciate us coming there. I think one of the big reasons they love having us so much is because much of the music we play is from "their time" - big band music like Glenn Miller and others, which is probably the stuff they grew up with. I love to see their eyes light up when we start a song that I can tell they know and have fond memories of.
There are so many aspects to what a person likes about music. Some of them, like the memories you have associated with them, are explainable. But others can't be explained in words - why do you like this song but not that one? Why does this song make you feel a certain way and this one make you feel another way? And then things like tonight, where I get extra excited and energetic playing for a crowd I know wants to hear us. Musical tastes are something we all seem to share with each other, and yet also a very individualistic thing too. I would imagine no two people's iPods have the same set of songs on them :)
So my request for tonight is for everyone to share a "music" memory - some song at school dance, something you played in a band, church, etc. I'll share one of mine - I was in the ISU marching band for 5 years in college. After each game, we'd march back from the stadium, have announcements, and sing the alma mater "The Bells of Iowa State". My final game of my last year, it had been a cold and extremely wet day - it had rained all night the night before and our morning practice and been in puddles of water and mud. As we all huddled together at the end and sang the alma mater one last time, I was in tears looking around at everyone who was cold and tired and wet, so proud to be a part of that group of 300 people who were dedicated to entertaining the crowd with their music and energy. Most of my other senior friends were in tears as well...I will never forget that song or singing it that day.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Income Tax Rules GRRR
Woke up this morning and had breakfast with Erin at Panera, coffee and a bagel are always a good way to start the day :) Church was a double-feature today - Peer Ministry commissioning (see my last blog post) and the annual youth choirs musical, which is always a treat. This year's musical was on the story of Noah's Ark and it was just fun to watch - at one point there were about 50 kids on stage dressed up as pairs of animals. I am so glad our church recognizes this kind of thing as another form of ministry - and probably one that a lot more people pay attention to, as well as something that gets young kids involved.
At 1:30, I headed over to the American Legion and played until 3:00 with the Notochords band (the jazz band I'm in) for their annual musicians guild meeting - really probably an excuse for the guild to have drinks afterwards, but fun for us to be there playing for other musicians who really appreciated what we were doing.
I got home and started working on my taxes - that's when the day went down hill. Usually my taxes are fairly straight-forward - I make an income, I have some deductions, and I get a refund. Not this year - I guess there are some rules about Roth IRAs that I never knew about, and now I'm going to get hit with a bunch of penalties. Whenever stuff like this happens, I wonder why again we have this complicated, vague, convoluted tax system instead of a flat tax or just a national sales tax. In my heart I probably know WHY we don't change it - politicians have a large amount of financial control in this system, with exceptions, loopholes, etc. and then there is the IRS and accountants which I guess needs to keep their jobs (?) But it sure seems like it would be a lot fairer to everyone, and save the government a whole lot of money (and everyone else a whole lot of time and headache) if we were simply flatly taxed on what we make or, better yet, IMHO, what we SPEND. That way people who spend more money get taxed more. Period. I'm sure that's just way too simple for some reason or another, but it would be a whole lot more efficient.
At 1:30, I headed over to the American Legion and played until 3:00 with the Notochords band (the jazz band I'm in) for their annual musicians guild meeting - really probably an excuse for the guild to have drinks afterwards, but fun for us to be there playing for other musicians who really appreciated what we were doing.
I got home and started working on my taxes - that's when the day went down hill. Usually my taxes are fairly straight-forward - I make an income, I have some deductions, and I get a refund. Not this year - I guess there are some rules about Roth IRAs that I never knew about, and now I'm going to get hit with a bunch of penalties. Whenever stuff like this happens, I wonder why again we have this complicated, vague, convoluted tax system instead of a flat tax or just a national sales tax. In my heart I probably know WHY we don't change it - politicians have a large amount of financial control in this system, with exceptions, loopholes, etc. and then there is the IRS and accountants which I guess needs to keep their jobs (?) But it sure seems like it would be a lot fairer to everyone, and save the government a whole lot of money (and everyone else a whole lot of time and headache) if we were simply flatly taxed on what we make or, better yet, IMHO, what we SPEND. That way people who spend more money get taxed more. Period. I'm sure that's just way too simple for some reason or another, but it would be a whole lot more efficient.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Snowtubing
I'm catching up on posts here - after a late night last night with my band, I got up early this morning and headed out to Ironwood Springs Christian Ranch to catch the second half of a Peer Ministry retreat. Peer Ministry is a program my church sponsors for 10th-12th graders who have been through confirmation. It gives them something to be involved with after confirmation is done, and goes more in-depth into life types of issues they might face or have to help friends with. There are usually 10-20 kids a year that participate in the 16-session program, started and ended by a weekend retreat.
This year the end retreat was at Ironwood Springs, which has nice lodges, walking trails, and snowtubing. After our last morning session, we all headed out to the hill for some snowy fun. I wasn't expecting the hills to be as steep or rough as they were - they were fairly steep, fairly icy, and not supervised. It was a lot of fun, but I am aching a little bit now, and hit my elbow really hard on one run. But all in all a good time and no one got hurt.
When I got home I had to snowblow/shovel all the snow that piled up yesterday as I hadn't had time to do it last night or this morning. Even with a snowblower it was a workout, I didn't realize how much we actually got.
I'm looking forward to a nice relaxing evening inside where it's warm :)
This year the end retreat was at Ironwood Springs, which has nice lodges, walking trails, and snowtubing. After our last morning session, we all headed out to the hill for some snowy fun. I wasn't expecting the hills to be as steep or rough as they were - they were fairly steep, fairly icy, and not supervised. It was a lot of fun, but I am aching a little bit now, and hit my elbow really hard on one run. But all in all a good time and no one got hurt.
When I got home I had to snowblow/shovel all the snow that piled up yesterday as I hadn't had time to do it last night or this morning. Even with a snowblower it was a workout, I didn't realize how much we actually got.
I'm looking forward to a nice relaxing evening inside where it's warm :)
en "Fuego" !
Despite all the snow (3 times!) yesterday, Latin Night at the Blue Moon Ballroom went ahead as planned, featuring my salsa band "Fuego". Even with the weather, 65 people turned out for a night of great music, dancing, and socializing. By far the best performance we've ever had - I think maybe we're finally getting the hang of this :)
And the snow started up for us again just as we finished and were loading. But it was still a great night! Some pictures of the event:
And the snow started up for us again just as we finished and were loading. But it was still a great night! Some pictures of the event:
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Salsa!
I probably mentioned this before, but just to plug my band one more time - "Fuego", my salsa band, will be playing at the Blue Moon Ballroom this Friday, January 25th, from 8:00pm-11:00pm for their regular Latin Night. Group salsa dance lesson at 7:30pm. Just to give you an idea of what we play, this isn't what most Americans think of as salsa/latin - Ricky Martin, Enrique Iglesias, Gloria Estefan, etc. - that is POP music by latin-born artists :) This is real African salsa, Spanish bolero, Caribbean, and some other types.
If you aren't interested in salsa or dancing, next Wednesday, January 30th, my jazz band "Notochords" will be playing at the Charter House great room at 7:30pm for an hour concert. While not technically a "public" concert, they always encourage us to invite friends and family.
If you aren't interested in salsa or dancing, next Wednesday, January 30th, my jazz band "Notochords" will be playing at the Charter House great room at 7:30pm for an hour concert. While not technically a "public" concert, they always encourage us to invite friends and family.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Snow Blowers and Spock
Hooray for snow! One of the things I love best about living in Minnesota is that we get real snow, and this year lots of it. However yesterday, after having dinner and watching Battlestar Galactica:Razor with my friend Bill, I was dreading getting home to see how much snow was in the driveway, because my snowblower was back in the shop - the original set of repairs they did didn't quite fix everything (it would die after about 7 minutes of work). So last Friday they picked it up again. The first time they had it in for a couple weeks, so I didn't expect it back very soon - to my great surprise it was sitting in the driveway when I got home - AND kept going through half an hour of heavy use. So the driveway and sidewalks are super-clean. I highly recommend "Earl's Small Engine" in Byron - they were reasonable on the first set of repairs (especially given the snowblower I had was fairly old and needed work) and did not charge me for this set. They have convenient pickup/dropoff too.
My other story from yesterday - most mornings I stop in at Caribou Coffee to get my morning dose of caffeine. Anyone who goes to Caribou knows they have a daily trivia question, worth 10 cents off your drink if you get it right (usually the questions are fairly easy, although they cover a wide range of topics). Yesterday the question was "Who was the science officer on the Starship Enterprise?" When I got up to the counter, I said to the woman taking my order "OK, my question about the trivia question is, Which Enterprise?". She gave me a look, and said that if I was asking that, I obviously know more than enough to get the 10 cents off :) I then told her I knew all of them...Spock, Data, T'Pol...maybe too much? Oh well, I've always been a proud member of the geek community.
My other story from yesterday - most mornings I stop in at Caribou Coffee to get my morning dose of caffeine. Anyone who goes to Caribou knows they have a daily trivia question, worth 10 cents off your drink if you get it right (usually the questions are fairly easy, although they cover a wide range of topics). Yesterday the question was "Who was the science officer on the Starship Enterprise?" When I got up to the counter, I said to the woman taking my order "OK, my question about the trivia question is, Which Enterprise?". She gave me a look, and said that if I was asking that, I obviously know more than enough to get the 10 cents off :) I then told her I knew all of them...Spock, Data, T'Pol...maybe too much? Oh well, I've always been a proud member of the geek community.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Get off my plane
Wow, two blogs in two days...must be the cold!
Last night the gang all went to Whistle Binkies for CP's birthday party. There were about 8 of us there, and we ended up doing two "Das Boot"s, the 1-gallon boot-shaped glass that was filled with Grain Belt. Fun to take pictures of everyone trying to drink out of this thing...CP ended up drinking most of it, but we all took our turns! Ended up back at Chris's and watched the Family Guy Star Wars episode, so funny.
Up early for church this morning, as my handbell choir was playing. Since I had to be there for both services I went to the adult forum, where they have different topics every week so adults have something to do between services besides drink coffee and eat donuts. Today's topic was on the First Amendment and Civil Religion, a topic I find interesting. In addition to having a speaker, there were several articles printed/copied about different issues surrounding religion in politics and government, and two were very relevant to this election year. One was a transcript of JFK's speech back in 1960 about the fact that he was Catholic, and his belief that a person's religious beliefs or lack thereof should not be a direct influence on any elected government official, and that a person should not win or lose an election because of their personal religious beliefs. It is impossible for any person to be completely unbiased or uninfluenced by the things in their life, but he was saying that the office of the President should be accountable to every citizen, every group in this country equally. The second article was a speech made by Mitt Romney last year about this same topic. Now I will probably never be a Mitt Romney fan as I don't agree much with his political stances, but I also don't think he should be disqualified or penalized as a candidate for office simply because he is a Mormon. The speaker of the adult forum was pointing out how dangerous it is to have a government that is a theocracy - it's easy to look at history and even current governments and see how badly theocracies end up. The Crusades were one of the most horrific examples of a theocracy gone bad, and the recent government in Afghanistan, the Taliban, was another example of how bad that kind of government can get. It was an interesting presentation.
Reading/watching
I guess this isn't "reading" but have been listening to a podcast called "Coffee Break Spanish", kind of an easy learn-spanish thing, which has been fun (and easy to fit in).
Besides the great Family Guy Star Wars episode, this morning I saw "Air Force One" on in HD, and recorded it while I was at church, watched the rest when I got back - the scene where the F-15s are fighting off the Migs and the one pilot flies in front of the missle that's about to hit Air Force One...that scene just gets me every time! Don't know how much of the AFC and NFC championship games I'll watch today but I'm sure I'll hit them for awhile.
Stay Warm!
Last night the gang all went to Whistle Binkies for CP's birthday party. There were about 8 of us there, and we ended up doing two "Das Boot"s, the 1-gallon boot-shaped glass that was filled with Grain Belt. Fun to take pictures of everyone trying to drink out of this thing...CP ended up drinking most of it, but we all took our turns! Ended up back at Chris's and watched the Family Guy Star Wars episode, so funny.
Up early for church this morning, as my handbell choir was playing. Since I had to be there for both services I went to the adult forum, where they have different topics every week so adults have something to do between services besides drink coffee and eat donuts. Today's topic was on the First Amendment and Civil Religion, a topic I find interesting. In addition to having a speaker, there were several articles printed/copied about different issues surrounding religion in politics and government, and two were very relevant to this election year. One was a transcript of JFK's speech back in 1960 about the fact that he was Catholic, and his belief that a person's religious beliefs or lack thereof should not be a direct influence on any elected government official, and that a person should not win or lose an election because of their personal religious beliefs. It is impossible for any person to be completely unbiased or uninfluenced by the things in their life, but he was saying that the office of the President should be accountable to every citizen, every group in this country equally. The second article was a speech made by Mitt Romney last year about this same topic. Now I will probably never be a Mitt Romney fan as I don't agree much with his political stances, but I also don't think he should be disqualified or penalized as a candidate for office simply because he is a Mormon. The speaker of the adult forum was pointing out how dangerous it is to have a government that is a theocracy - it's easy to look at history and even current governments and see how badly theocracies end up. The Crusades were one of the most horrific examples of a theocracy gone bad, and the recent government in Afghanistan, the Taliban, was another example of how bad that kind of government can get. It was an interesting presentation.
Reading/watching
I guess this isn't "reading" but have been listening to a podcast called "Coffee Break Spanish", kind of an easy learn-spanish thing, which has been fun (and easy to fit in).
Besides the great Family Guy Star Wars episode, this morning I saw "Air Force One" on in HD, and recorded it while I was at church, watched the rest when I got back - the scene where the F-15s are fighting off the Migs and the one pilot flies in front of the missle that's about to hit Air Force One...that scene just gets me every time! Don't know how much of the AFC and NFC championship games I'll watch today but I'm sure I'll hit them for awhile.
Stay Warm!
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Nebraska and beyond
I'm a little behind on my blogging, as I meant to write one after my trip to Nebraska last weekend, so this one might include a few topics.
Last weekend I made a trip to the great state of Nebraska with my cousin Andy and his friend Tony - they were visiting their friend Will who goes to the University of Nebraska, and I was there to visit the many friends I still have living there (and since I missed making the trip in October). Thursday at 5pm we left Rochester with Caribou coffees in hand. After a short stop in Des Moines for gas, we pulled into Lincoln about 11:30pm, to Will's apartment in Lincoln. The 3 of them stayed up talking and playing video games until like 5am, while I happily took Will's bed and slept :)
Friday morning, I got up about 8 and headed back to Omaha (about 45 miles on I-80). I planned on spending the day with my good friends Trevor and Karli, but they were both working until lunch, so I drove into Omaha on Dodge Street to find a coffee shop and see how much farther west Omaha has gotten (my curiosity with development and roads always gets the best of me). When I was growing up, Omaha ended at about 120th street on Dodge Street, most of everything after that was a 4-lane road passing by a few smaller towns. Omaha now starts around 210th street, and is close to taking over Elkhorn, which used to be WAY outside Omaha. I finally found a Starbucks on 136th & Dodge, and was about to hook up to their wireless internet, only to find out that theirs isn't free (I don't know if they're all that way or not). So I read the old technology newspaper instead :) At 11:30 I headed down to the "Spaghetti Works" one of my favorite places to eat, to meet my friends. We spent the afternoon hanging out, playing video games (they have "Rock Band" for the Xbox 360 which is pretty fun!), and hit Old Chicago for dinner, and then back to their house to watch "Casino Royale" on Blu-ray, a movie I hadn't seen before.
Saturday morning we went to breakfast at a great new restaurant in Omaha called Wheat Fields. My favorite Aunt JoAnne happened to be there with friends, and so I got to say hi to her. I then headed over to Glenwood, IA, to see my friends Paul and Jeremy, and we met up at our friend Justin's house for an afternoon of more video games (you can tell what I spent a lot of time doing growing up!) We played our traditional Tecmo Super Bowl tournament (I actually won!) as well as lots of Wii Sports and Bioshock. Saturday night was back to Lincoln to play some poker with some more friends I hadn't seen in awhile. Poker and watching football until about 3AM, when I headed back to Will's apartement (of course they were all still up!) and a bit of sleep so that we could head back to Rochester on Sunday around noon.
One of my theories on friends is that it's about half things in common/proximity and half shared experiences. I don't see these guys more than once or twice a year, but when we get together it's like no time has passed - the thousands of hours we all spent growing up together are always there and we still have a good time. I've been very blessed in my life to have so many "sets" of friends in all the places I've lived, and I still love to see them.
This weekend has been a little quieter - dinner last night with some of Erin's friends, coffee and the world's problems with Shelley this morning, and tonight going out for CP's birthday to Whistle Binkies. We're going to do "the boot" - a glass boot-shaped pitcher containing one gallon of beer (shared among all of us of course). We'll see how that goes :) Tomorrow morning the many-talented Accelerando handbell choir of which I am the director will play for church services.
On the horizon, next Friday night my salsa band, "Fuego", is playing at the Blue Moon Ballroom for latin night. Always a great turnout, and a lively dance crowd.
Last but not least, a couple of pictures of my nieces - I know I'm biased but how cute are these :) Laynie (6 months) and Keagann (3 1/2)
Last weekend I made a trip to the great state of Nebraska with my cousin Andy and his friend Tony - they were visiting their friend Will who goes to the University of Nebraska, and I was there to visit the many friends I still have living there (and since I missed making the trip in October). Thursday at 5pm we left Rochester with Caribou coffees in hand. After a short stop in Des Moines for gas, we pulled into Lincoln about 11:30pm, to Will's apartment in Lincoln. The 3 of them stayed up talking and playing video games until like 5am, while I happily took Will's bed and slept :)
Friday morning, I got up about 8 and headed back to Omaha (about 45 miles on I-80). I planned on spending the day with my good friends Trevor and Karli, but they were both working until lunch, so I drove into Omaha on Dodge Street to find a coffee shop and see how much farther west Omaha has gotten (my curiosity with development and roads always gets the best of me). When I was growing up, Omaha ended at about 120th street on Dodge Street, most of everything after that was a 4-lane road passing by a few smaller towns. Omaha now starts around 210th street, and is close to taking over Elkhorn, which used to be WAY outside Omaha. I finally found a Starbucks on 136th & Dodge, and was about to hook up to their wireless internet, only to find out that theirs isn't free (I don't know if they're all that way or not). So I read the old technology newspaper instead :) At 11:30 I headed down to the "Spaghetti Works" one of my favorite places to eat, to meet my friends. We spent the afternoon hanging out, playing video games (they have "Rock Band" for the Xbox 360 which is pretty fun!), and hit Old Chicago for dinner, and then back to their house to watch "Casino Royale" on Blu-ray, a movie I hadn't seen before.
Saturday morning we went to breakfast at a great new restaurant in Omaha called Wheat Fields. My favorite Aunt JoAnne happened to be there with friends, and so I got to say hi to her. I then headed over to Glenwood, IA, to see my friends Paul and Jeremy, and we met up at our friend Justin's house for an afternoon of more video games (you can tell what I spent a lot of time doing growing up!) We played our traditional Tecmo Super Bowl tournament (I actually won!) as well as lots of Wii Sports and Bioshock. Saturday night was back to Lincoln to play some poker with some more friends I hadn't seen in awhile. Poker and watching football until about 3AM, when I headed back to Will's apartement (of course they were all still up!) and a bit of sleep so that we could head back to Rochester on Sunday around noon.
One of my theories on friends is that it's about half things in common/proximity and half shared experiences. I don't see these guys more than once or twice a year, but when we get together it's like no time has passed - the thousands of hours we all spent growing up together are always there and we still have a good time. I've been very blessed in my life to have so many "sets" of friends in all the places I've lived, and I still love to see them.
This weekend has been a little quieter - dinner last night with some of Erin's friends, coffee and the world's problems with Shelley this morning, and tonight going out for CP's birthday to Whistle Binkies. We're going to do "the boot" - a glass boot-shaped pitcher containing one gallon of beer (shared among all of us of course). We'll see how that goes :) Tomorrow morning the many-talented Accelerando handbell choir of which I am the director will play for church services.
On the horizon, next Friday night my salsa band, "Fuego", is playing at the Blue Moon Ballroom for latin night. Always a great turnout, and a lively dance crowd.
Last but not least, a couple of pictures of my nieces - I know I'm biased but how cute are these :) Laynie (6 months) and Keagann (3 1/2)
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
This one's gotta take the cake...
This is proof that the ACLU does not discriminate....
http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid51654.asp
I've kinda said the same thing about Larry Craig - the same for other politicians and public figures (Bill Clinton, George Michael, etc.). While what they have done might be wrong, it isn't illegal, and in the grand scheme of the government, the country, national security, etc. it's pretty small. So why do we give it so much attention?
http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid51654.asp
I've kinda said the same thing about Larry Craig - the same for other politicians and public figures (Bill Clinton, George Michael, etc.). While what they have done might be wrong, it isn't illegal, and in the grand scheme of the government, the country, national security, etc. it's pretty small. So why do we give it so much attention?
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Government Hypocrisy
This has to be one of the most hypocritical policies our government has ever had:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-01-08-Manzella-me_N.htm
No matter what your views are or what you think of the policy, they are obviously not enforcing it uniformly, and with the war they are turning a blind eye when it's not convenient to let people go. In this case the guy told his commanding officer he was gay, went on 60 Minutes and told the world he was gay, and was on video kissing his boyfriend, yet their investigation found "no evidence of homosexuality". And from the Army's standpoint, really there isn't any relevant evidence - this is the guy's private life, and it obviously does not interfere with his job, so much that the commanding officer does not want to get rid of him.
My understanding is that everyone in the Armed Services must follow a code of conduct, and if you don't you get kicked out. If the code of conduct amounts to being professionals and not bringing your personal life to work, this should be no different.
OK, off to Nebraska for a fun weekend of visiting and catching up with friends!
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-01-08-Manzella-me_N.htm
No matter what your views are or what you think of the policy, they are obviously not enforcing it uniformly, and with the war they are turning a blind eye when it's not convenient to let people go. In this case the guy told his commanding officer he was gay, went on 60 Minutes and told the world he was gay, and was on video kissing his boyfriend, yet their investigation found "no evidence of homosexuality". And from the Army's standpoint, really there isn't any relevant evidence - this is the guy's private life, and it obviously does not interfere with his job, so much that the commanding officer does not want to get rid of him.
My understanding is that everyone in the Armed Services must follow a code of conduct, and if you don't you get kicked out. If the code of conduct amounts to being professionals and not bringing your personal life to work, this should be no different.
OK, off to Nebraska for a fun weekend of visiting and catching up with friends!
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Political Match Game
In case you're really bored waiting for NH election results
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/candidate-match-game.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/candidate-match-game.htm
Monday, January 7, 2008
Technology in TV plots, and Bent Pins
I meant to do a post this weekend, but alas, Super Mario Galaxy took precedence :)
Besides Super Mario Galaxy, Erin and I saw the Disney movie "Enchanted" on Saturday, a very fun and happy fairy tale movie. It was completely predictable, but still fun to watch, great for kids and adults. Also did a bunch of shopping, got a Good Food Store co-op membership, and went to the gym. Sunday night, unfortunately, I did a stupid thing. The fan on one of my PCs has been running very loudly lately, making it annoying when watching TV (or doing anything for that matter when it's on). So I finally took it apart to try and either fix the problem or determine what kind of new fan to order. In the process of checking each of the fans, I accidentally pulled the processor/heat sink out of the socket, which is a bad thing when you haven't released the processor from the socket. The result - several bent pins, too many to really fix (at least with my limited tool set). So it's newegg.com and $60 later and a new processor is on its way :(
SO, the story behind the blog title. As I've mentioned in past blogs, for whatever reason I am hooked on the hit 80s TV show "Dallas" and the SOAP channel is now on season 7 of the reruns. One of the big storylines this season is a man that comes to SouthFork and claims to be Jock Ewing, the father and husband of the Ewing family, who died 5 seasons earlier in a helicopter crash in South America, where his body was never found (yes, typical soap opera storyline). (The actual reason the writers had to write him out of the storyline was that the actor, Jim Davis, died in real life). Anyway, a man named Wes Parmalee comes to the ranch and is hired as the foreman to replace Ray who was starting his own horse business. Miss Ellie finds him in possession of a bunch of Jock's old things, confronts him, and he tells the story of how he was found by natives, he had amnesia, and all he wanted was to be close to the family again, but hadn't intended them to find out. He conveniently had plastic surgery, had all his teeth replaced because of the accident, and had some sort of virus which altered his voice. NOW, this season happened in 1986-87, and the character's original death in 1982-83. I was thinking about how they couldn't have done this storyline now with current technology (both the death and the resurrection). Now, they would have had satellite phones and GPS to track the helicopter and have been able to find him or his body when the helicopter crashed. And DNA testing would easily have proven who he was/wasn't. So is technology messing up the storylines available to TV? If you think of other examples, I'd love to hear them :)
Besides Super Mario Galaxy, Erin and I saw the Disney movie "Enchanted" on Saturday, a very fun and happy fairy tale movie. It was completely predictable, but still fun to watch, great for kids and adults. Also did a bunch of shopping, got a Good Food Store co-op membership, and went to the gym. Sunday night, unfortunately, I did a stupid thing. The fan on one of my PCs has been running very loudly lately, making it annoying when watching TV (or doing anything for that matter when it's on). So I finally took it apart to try and either fix the problem or determine what kind of new fan to order. In the process of checking each of the fans, I accidentally pulled the processor/heat sink out of the socket, which is a bad thing when you haven't released the processor from the socket. The result - several bent pins, too many to really fix (at least with my limited tool set). So it's newegg.com and $60 later and a new processor is on its way :(
SO, the story behind the blog title. As I've mentioned in past blogs, for whatever reason I am hooked on the hit 80s TV show "Dallas" and the SOAP channel is now on season 7 of the reruns. One of the big storylines this season is a man that comes to SouthFork and claims to be Jock Ewing, the father and husband of the Ewing family, who died 5 seasons earlier in a helicopter crash in South America, where his body was never found (yes, typical soap opera storyline). (The actual reason the writers had to write him out of the storyline was that the actor, Jim Davis, died in real life). Anyway, a man named Wes Parmalee comes to the ranch and is hired as the foreman to replace Ray who was starting his own horse business. Miss Ellie finds him in possession of a bunch of Jock's old things, confronts him, and he tells the story of how he was found by natives, he had amnesia, and all he wanted was to be close to the family again, but hadn't intended them to find out. He conveniently had plastic surgery, had all his teeth replaced because of the accident, and had some sort of virus which altered his voice. NOW, this season happened in 1986-87, and the character's original death in 1982-83. I was thinking about how they couldn't have done this storyline now with current technology (both the death and the resurrection). Now, they would have had satellite phones and GPS to track the helicopter and have been able to find him or his body when the helicopter crashed. And DNA testing would easily have proven who he was/wasn't. So is technology messing up the storylines available to TV? If you think of other examples, I'd love to hear them :)
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
"Great" Moments in Photography
Thanks to my friend Bill for sending me this - hilarious!
http://listoftheday.blogspot.com/2007/09/great-olan-mills-photos.html
http://listoftheday.blogspot.com/2007/09/great-olan-mills-photos.html
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