Day 41 - finally

Sorry about the problems I'm having here. Hopefully this all works out ok. If not, I'll fix it tomorrow. (editors note, I fixed it today, since were dead at work so far)

I really don't know if I can adequately describe the awesomeness that happened last night at Llywelyns. We had perhaps the best band on the face of the Earth, Sudden Impact. If you don't believe me, just aask them, I'm sure they'll tell you the same.

I am not sure about the order of the pictures (one reason I don't like e-mailing in the blog, but I don't have many other options), but I'll describe them in the order I think they are in.

First you should know most of the band is in their upper 40s at best and the lead singer spent more time fixing his hair on stage than singing.

There is a picture of a girl holding up what appears to be a thong. Actually, it is a thong, and yes, they are branded with the Sudden Impact logo. Awesome.

There is also a picture of that same girl (who happens to be my awesome manager Wendi) modeling said thongs. And just then, just at the moment you thought it couldn't possibly get any more awesome, someone tells me to check out their van.

Yes, that is the band van, and yes it does say, "2008 Pole Dancer Tour" with a picture of what someone described as a monkey climbing a rope, which I can only guess is supposed to be a picture of a pole dancer. I think they think that their shows will be packed with women that want to "do" them right there on stage.

In fact, the door guy actually told me they have a website with pictures of all these wanna be Sudden Impact "pole dancers". I actually looked up the website on my phone, and totally worth your while to check out this band from Eureka. I don't necessarily recommend going to see them play, but you've gotta check out the website.

http://suddenimpactrocks.com/

And finally, there is my pic of the day of me enjoying my day off in my bathrobe. Yes I have a bathrobe, and yes it is awesome.

See yall tomorrow!

Day 40

Well, I've made it as long as Noah. I can't even imagine living in an ark for this long.

Man (and woman), I had an awesome whole day yesterday. It started with a business meeting early that went well, then some golf that you already read about. Then I had a good dinner at Lemmon's (or read a review here). Then it was off to Tom Petty.

So, here's the story. I'm on the way to golf when I get this text message:

"Free ticket to Tom Petty row 10 and
backstage passes meet the drummer,
all for free tonight!
Just say yes"

Well, I did what most people would and said yes. The tickets turned out not to be totally free and we were in the 14th row, but we really did have backstage passes.

Our backstage pass

The view from the seats before the show

The view during the show

The entire experience was awesome. I rode with Joe (the guy that got lost in Oklahoma, who, after reading my blog about his lack of directional skills bought a new car that has a GPS thingy, and also is friends with the drummer and got the tix and passes) and his friend Joe. We had a lot of fun on the way and saw a bunch of interesting people in the parking lot (shocking at a Petty show, I know).

When we finally get in the show, Steve Winwood is just starting to play, but we're not super-huge fans, and we have backstage passes, so we go backstage (and yes, we made several Wayne's World references).

Backstage is nothing like I expected. Here is what I totally unrealistically expected. We would walk through some doors into a chill room where all kinds of people are hanging out, including the band. I see several band members just chilling on a couch with a guitar talking about when they wrote the song, or perhaps when they played it in front of hundreds of thousand of people. I would walk over to Tommy (we'd totally be on a first name basis by now) and have him take a picture with me for this ol' blog. And basically we'd just hang with the band until it was time for them to go on. Then when they played, they would totally point to us and give a little wave or something. It'd be cool, you know?

Here is what did happen. Backstage has several levels of access. We had pretty much the lowest one. We were to the right of the stage behind a big wooden privacy fence. There was a blue tent over us and about 4 people hanging out. Tom's kid came out with about 6 girls and was running all over the place. Then the bass player came out and actually chatted with us for a minute, until the hot girls he met at a bar the night before came, then he took them to the "real" backstage. And we just kinda hung there for a while. It was pretty cool, and they did have private bathrooms, so there's that.

"Our" backstage

The "real" backstage (through the door)

When we saw the lights go down and heard them start playing, we figured no one else from the band was likely to come out and say hey to us, so we went to our seats. The show was really awesome. The lights and videos were pretty sweet, and we were close enough to see pretty much everything. And, even if you're not a huge fan, you know most of the songs he plays well enough to sing along to.

Tom Petty on our end of the stage

All around everything was awesome (maybe except for the guys right behind us that were smoking a huge blunt for most of the show, but again, it's Petty, what else can you expect?).

Here is a video I took with my phone of "American Girl". As my friend Sean pointed out, it may be best to mute it, or at least turn down the speakers before you watch, the audio didn't turn out so hot. If you do listen to it, I think that the voices you can hear towards the end are Joe and I singing along (what else are you gonna do, right?)



And, of course, here's the picture of the day, where I look like I don't have a liver and my eye is swollen shut (my camera phone really does suck, but I assure you I am in good health).


See ya tomorrow!

Day 39

Wow, I still can't believe my persistence at this. Oh, and get your vote in today, should people be my awesomosity?

So, if any of you follow my twitter, you probably already know what I did today, which was totally awesome and today's winner, but first, I will tell you the runner up, which was my activities last night.

Many of you are aware that I am playing on a 25 and up men's baseball league this year. If you didn't know, you do now. I have been pitching (and was woefully unprepared, just ask my elbow). I have also caught and played shortstop (I know, whoda thunk it?). My team is 2-14. We rock. Most of our games have been losses by more than 12-15 runs, which are no fun. But last night, no, last night we truly made a game of it.

We were down 4-2 in the 4th when one of our more powerful hitters hit a 3-run jack, prompting his wife who was in the stands to stand and scream, "That's my husband!". Totally awesome.

I personally had a good night at the plate with a walk, an RBI (my first of the year, I suck at hitting) single, and a sac bunt to put the tying run on second in the last inning. I also played passable defense at short, with just one error.

That was awesome, but what beat it? Golf. Golf is always awesome. Always.

Today we (myself, Alvan Sage from EmbroidMe, and Harold Long with AAA insurance) played The Missouri Bluffs, a beautiful course just off 40 between the Boone bridge and 94. It was a little pricey, but totally worth it. Here, take a look at the 13th (sorry my phone's camera sucks):


I know it's hard to tell, but the fairway is down probably 100 yards on this gorgeous par 5 (I think I parred this hole). This really is a beautiful course.

The most awesome thing of the day was my score though. For the first time ever, I shot under 100. I got a 99 (I didn't say far under 100). I was quite proud of myself. If it weren't for a few totally shanked shots, I would have done much better.

So that's awesome today. I encourage you to go play golf sometime soon. There are plenty of reasonably priced ($20-$30) public courses around, and if you aren't really into the whole "playing 18 holes" thing, go to a driving range, they will even let you borrow clubs if necessary. If that is too much work, go play miniature golf, that is also a ton of fun.

I will be happy to do any of these things with you (including throwing a baseball around), just let me know if you're interested.

Thanks for reading, don't neglect those Google ads, I'm up to $8.01 so far, almost 10% to actually money in my pocket. Here is my picture, taken from that beautiful 13th hole.

Day 38

Well today friends, I am feeling a little lethargic. I was up too late last night. It was my own fault though. You see, I go to this group every Tuesday night, and last night was our biannual elections, a process that can take quite a while. This group is awful fond of coffee, as I am, so I had about 6 cups of regular coffee between 7 and 11. Not smart for someone that wants to sleep.

So, I went home (after stopping at Taco Bell for a high quality meal) and ate while watching episode 2 of the first season of Heroes from Netflix. Heroes isn't too bad, I guess it keeps me interested enough to watch more. But there are definitely better shows out there. I will wait until I'm through with the entire first season before I make a final judgment though. Some of my other favorites from Netflix include: Flight of the Conchords and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

So I finish my tacos and nachos along with Heroes, but I'm still pretty wide-eyed, so I turn to today's awesomosity, the writing of Stephen King. Notice Stephen King is NOT the awesomosity, but his writing is. No one else can make me turn pages like he can. It makes no difference what his stories are about, you just have to keep reading. He is an incredible storyteller.


This is the book I happened to be reading last night until about 1:30 in the morning. It is a book well grounded in reality. Same old stuff really; enchanted island, one-armed contractor turned painter whose paintings effect the real world and cause people to kill each other due to a death ship called Persephone (pronounced "Percy" for short) whose spirit lives in a ceramic doll that must be drowned in fresh water to end the nightmare, you know, the type of stuff that could happen to any of us. In the end it really makes no difference what the book is about, if Stephen King wrote it, it will keep me enthralled (except for "From a Buick 8", which I couldn't even finish).

Now I know many of you are thinking, "I'll never pick up a Stephen King book, I don't care how awesome his writing is!" Well, he has written several books that are quite entertaining and not the least bit scary. You may have seen the movie "The Shawshank Redemption" starring Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins. Well, that started as a short story in a collection called "Different Seasons" by Stephen King. One of my absolute favorite books of his is called "The Eyes of the Dragon" which is a fairy tale almost and a great read (probably still not kosher for those of you with small children to read, but that's what Judy Blume and Dr. Seuess are for, right?) And of course, he has an epic work (7 novels totalling over 10,000 pages) called the Dark Tower Series. The first in the series, The Gunslinger, is what got me into Stephen King in the first place.

So, I hope you check out a Stephen King book at your local library sometime soon. Tell me how it goes. Check out his website here, it's actually quite a website.

Here is my picture, looking tired in the office. See you tomorrow, have a splenderiffic day!

Day 37

Day 37, but much more importantly, voting day. I hope you all get out and vote today, I've already got my sticker.

I'm not even gonna skirt around the issue today, voting is the obvious awesomosity. It's what makes our country special, and I feel privileged to be able to cast my vote every time I do. And I do every chance I get. I mean, I vote in the school board elections.

There are a few things that are especially awesome about today's election that I wanted to mention. First, my vote for Sheriff. I don't know if it was for the city or not, so some of you may not get to vote on the issue, but I voted for Ken Griffey. How could I not, seriously? Anytime you see a famous baseball player's name on a ballot, vote for it, thats my rule.

The sweet electronic ballots (sorry about the bad pic, my camera phone sucks)

The second thing that was awesome about voting today was that I voted electronically. I have done that before, but that doesn't make it any less awesome. What was different was that I voted on the Democratic ticket. That was a first. My reason for this was that most of the Republican candidates are running unopposed and I got a lot of democratic mailers, so I wanted to put those to good use. By that, I mean that the more mail you sent me, the less likely you are to get my vote. Rodney L. Hubbard sent me 1-3 pieces a day for the past few weeks, I was definitely not voting for him. Although, that was a tough one, because I know that he knows and loves me. How do I know? He sent me a birthday card! Some of my friends and family didn't even do that, so it was hard, but the over 20 total postcards and flyers he sent me are causing me to empty the trash more than ever, so not vote for you Rodney.

The last awesome thing is the only proposition on the ballot this time around, Prop. Y. (I don't get how they name these things, but who cares, really?) Anywho, I just love how they write these things so that no one can ever truly understand what they are voting for. I hope that doesn't make people vote no, because this thing passing would be a good thing. (Yes, I am encouraging you to vote yes on Prop. Y. Hopefully the last time I try to sway your vote.) Here is what I don't understand. These things are written by lawyers (presumably) and you would think they have a basic grasp on the English language (presumably) and understand basic grammar (presumably). Here is the proposition as it appears on the ballot (courtesy of www.urbanreviewstl.com, a cool site I found today and added to the blogroll along with my friend Kris's blog)

To comply with federal and state clean water requirements, shall The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (MSD) issue its sewer system revenue bonds in the amount of Two Hundred Seventy-five Million Dollars ($275,000,000) for the purpose of designing, constructing, improving, renovating, repairing, replacing and equipping new and existing MSD sewer facilities and system, including sewer disposal and treatment plants, sanitary and combined sanitary and stormwater sewers, and acquisition of easements and real property related thereto, the cost of operation and maintenance of said sewer system and the principal of and interest on said revenue bonds to be payable solely from the revenues derived by MSD from the operation of its sanitary sewer system, including all future extensions and improvements thereto?

Is it just me, or is that one big grammar mistake? I am pretty sure my grade school English teacher would call that a "run-on sentence". But I have only the basic grip on our language, I am sure lawyers are much better at this than I am.

So, vote today (if you haven't already), both at the polls and on the blog. Here is me right after I cast my ballot:


Have a great election day everyone!! See you tomorrow!

Day 36

The start of week 6. Only 46 more to go after this (unless I write this for more than a year, we'll see).

Yes, anyone that want a Llywelyns cup can just ave one. You don't have to give me anything. Just let me know.

Anything else uniquely St. Louis?

It is hot today. I know this because I have spent a decent portion of the day on the exterior of the world. I'll start in the middle somewhere, because that suits my purpose better.

So, my parents have a huge yard. On a hill. I mean, it's almost an acre. And all on a hill. And all of the grass was pretty tall. Dangit. At least my parents have a 42" walk-behind (where you get to ride one of those little platforms on wheels things), so that certainly helped the cause, but those things are way harder to control than you might think. I know, you're saying, "I've seen hundreds of I am sure legal immigrants riding those things all over, it looks easy." Well, it's not incredibly tough, but it is tiring and can be a little tricky. So, I mowed the lawn. I almost made the lawnmower the awesomosity, but really, a lawnmower, just not that awesome.

After that I helped my dad replace some incredibly hard to reach spark plugs in his van. Soooo fun. Let me tell you. Well, after we got all those in, we tried to start the van. The alarm (of which he hasn't used in years and doesn't even have the remote for anymore) start shrieking. That is annoying (I eventually stuffed some rags in it because it kept going off). Now neither of us are experts when it comes to anything vehicular (see post where my brother helped fix my truck), so we can't figure out how to disarm this thing. Worse than that is that it has a starter kill feature. So the truck won't start. And we can't disable the alarm. Aarrrghhh!

After crawling in some very awkward positions to look at all the wiring under the steering column (and after we disconnected some stuff like the backup battery for the alarm), I found some fuses connected to wires going to a black box that looked like an alarm brain. I pulled one of those fuses just for fun and...presto, van starts. Woohoo!

Then I showered and here I sit. A/C feels so good about now.

Now, I skipped over this morning, because it includes today's awesomosity. You see, I have a good friend Ben Shepard (he and his wife Erin were previously mentioned on the blog for coming to watch my short film premiere, which you can see again at the Tivoli in November). Ben and I try to get together somewhat regularly to just talk about life, have some accountability, and just build our friendship. Ben works at SLU (dorm director or something, he lives on campus), and I live in South City, so the Central West End is a decent place to meet. We met at the Coffee Cartel this morning, and that is what is awesome today. For one reason, check out their TV commercial here. You can also look at their webcam (courtest of Fox 2) on their website here.

I think my personal favorite thing about the Cartel is that they have normal sizes. They even have the cups on the ledge by the register with the sizes written on them; small, medium, large; 12oz, 16 oz, 20oz; little, middle, biggest; etc. But then to beat it all, they have all the not sizes that other national coffee chains use such as grande, venti, etc. crossed out. (I'm the guy that always orders a medium or large at Starbucks, then when they say whatever Italian word that correlates to what I say, I reply, "sure".)

They have a huge patio, they have live music on weekends. People tell me they have decent food. They have FREE wi-fi (unlike some national chains). They are open 24 hours. They are not full of themselves. It's just a cool place, and I recommend it to anyone that has not been there before.

After that, I got home and noticed my parents outdoor cat, who had been getting pretty fat, was not so fat anymore. After a little searching and some help from my mother to get them situated nicely, here is what I found:

Awwww

Yes, she had 5 kittens last night. No, we are not keeping them. Does anyone want a kitten in about 6 weeks to go with the Llywelyns cup?

Here is a picture of me all sweaty and dirty in front of my parents huge lawnmower:


See you all tomorrow! Have a fantabulous Monday!

Day 35

I still can't believe I have done this 35 days in a row. That shocks me.

I apologize for the kind of weak blog yesterday, it was a long week and very busy day for me. As you can see, I did get the pictures up (it happened at like 3am this morning, don't ask how or why {cause I don't know}).

So, the end of my day last night was at Llywelyns. I really like working there. It is fun and most everyone that works there is cool. Most of the customers are pretty cool also. There's always a few jerks, but where are you not going to find that?

When I arrived around 6pm, I was about 10 minutes after the pre-game rush, so it was pretty dead. Slowly through the night it started picking up some steam. The late bartender (one comes in at 4 and one at 8) didn't really want to work, and we were kinda slow. I mean, there were people there, but not enough to warrant both bartenders plus me. Around 11 we let her go, then it was just Sean and I. It is a ton of fun (and I'm sure quite entertaining to the customers) to have two fairly large men working behind a not hugely large bar. Well, about 20 minutes after Sara (late bartender) left (and by left, I mean went to the back bar to drink with other employess that were hanging out on their night off) we got pretty well slammed. Both Sean and I were straight busy from about 11 until 1 when we stop serving. It took us over 2 hours to clean it all up, but in the end it was well worth it.

I also ran into a few girls I recognized from high school who are friends with the band we had playing, Willis (as in"What you talkin' about"). Willis is one of our favorties for a few reasons. They play good music, they play it well, they bring people out, and their fans are generally good people. Their friends don't necessarily break down the door in a rush to leave when we close, but there's worse things.

Why am I going in to all this detail you ask? Well, it leads me to the awesomosity for today. Llywelyn's souvenier cups.

20 oz. of plastic goodness. They are a very handy size and somewhat stylish. (By the way, if you want some, come see me any Friday or Saturday, or just let me know, I have 15-20 at home). What made me turn a plastic cup into the awesomeness for today? Well, I'm glad you asked.

You see, when we were closing last night, I'm just minding my own business, doing dishes, when a nice looking young lady named Shay came up to me. She asked if there was any way she could have one of these special cups. I said I would see what I could do. I got her a cup (what, did you expect me to really not give her one?). A few minutes later, she came to me and explained that her friend also wanted a cup. Then I got here 3 more and explained that now they each had a pair of cups. Do you want to know what her reply was?

She said, "Ben, you are awesome!" I decided then and there that the Llywelyn's cups were destined to be today's awesomosity. (Shay also kissed my cheek and wrote "I (heart) Ben" on a napkin).

So, there you have it, plastic cups are awesome.

And yes, we toast ravioli here (actually its usually fried). Keep up unique St. Louis (not quite the same ring as "unique New York", but it works) food stuffs comments. Vote (primaries are this Tuesday). Click on ads (I'm up to $4.25!!)

Here is me enjoying some water from an awesome cup:


Enjoy your Sunday!

Day 34