Changes in Latitude..... Or Changes in this blogs focus

So, if anyone still checks in on this blog (I don't blame anyone who's given up) I am alive and well!! I have recently began a new project that hasn't actually launched yet, and so I've been keeping busy getting ideas rolling for that, but let me get you all caught up on me!!

Since my last post in November (Oh crap, has it been that long?) I've found work (at times more than I could have hoped for) and been just generally pretty busy, which is much better than the last part of last year. By November I had started working some evenings at TOny N TIna's Wedding at the Rio, I got to the point that I was working 5 nights a week and having a lot of fun! I recommend the show to anyone visiting Vegas if a good romp is what you are looking for....

In January I started working at Zappos.com in the Customer Loyalty Department. For anyone who has worked in a call center (like my three years at the almost-a-scam hard sell merchant credit card place) I've got to say, this is the polar opposite of any other call center environment that I've ever seen. With 4 weeks of training and a pretty good starting pay, it's got to be the most rewarding job I've ever had not including my volunteering as a worship leader. The call center is covered in decorations, some have a theme from parties that were thrown in the past, some are just the CLT reps way of making their cube 'theirs' but all in all, it has a really home-y feeling and the core value of 'Build a positive Team and Family Spirit' is definitely felt among the folks there. Speaking of Core Values, Zappos has ten, and they really 'mean it' with all ten, from the way they deal with vendors all the way to customers and even all the way to employees!! I look forward to many years with Zappos, and the sky really is the limit there, so watch out Zappos, here I come!!

The Audio shop (Syntonic Design Group)I worked at last year called me back for my two off days from Zappos (Thurs and Fri) to repair gear and help out, so I'm working 7 days a week...

I continue to work for the City of North Las Vegas Special Events Dept doing sound and working with the City's Mobile Stage, which is still loads of fun (We've hired 3 new guys, so this year is looking to be nicely staffed!!!)

So for a few months I was working at Zappos or Syntonic during the day and Tony N Tina's at night, with on-call work for the City and still doing Nasty Habits gigs, I was getting a little burned out, so I've scaled back to just working during the days mostly (quit the show)

So now I've got my evenings back, K and I can actually spend some time together, and I'm going to be doing a website/blog about/for cover bands, I'm going to (hopefully) get some forums going and see if I can't have a little fun and keep my mind sharp, so look out in the future for Pubrocker.com (No content up yet) I've already bought the domain name, now I just need to get the hosting set up and I'll be ready to Rock and Roll!

For the time being I am going to start posting articles here that might be of interest to cover band type folks, along with more updates on ME ME ME!!!!

Somewhere a fat man is missing his hooded sweater.........

To the confused white guy at the gas station this morning....... I pulled up to the pump behind your nice little BMW 3 series and began my routine of processing my credit card and getting my gas tank ready to refuel when I was disturbed by the thumpity thump of your car radio.... Was it really necessary to turn it up so you could hear it at ALL the pumps? Don't the signs around the gas pumps say to remove your key from the ignition? So I settled into my pumping with your infectious beats pounding my head, then you get out of your car, and you appear to be wearing someone elses clothes, because they don't fit. Your baggy jeans are hanging below your ass and *Thank God* I was lucky enough that at 60 degrees most people here are equiped with sweaters, yours covered your boxers from my view.. Now regarding this sweater, if you may have worked hard and lost a lot of weight like Jared from the Subway commercials, good for you, otherwise, some fat guy is missing his sweater and probably wants it back! The sweater was easily twice the required size to keep you nice and warm, and so it looked really stupid. Speaking of stupid, if your ball cap isn't enough to keep your head warm, just wear the hood from your sweater over your head, but don't wear both, and the sunglasses don't help you either, that's what the ball cap is for...... Now your girlfriend has come out of the store, she's cute and white and wearing clothes that fit her properly, and it became obvious that it must be her car you are driving, surely you haven't earned that kind of money at an honest day job, because judging by the difficulty you had getting the gas pump to start you'd probably have a hard time operating the drive-thru headset at a fast food joint...... And so I stood, the bald chubby white guy that I am in all my morning jog attired glory in awe that you'd be so low as to take a fat mans sweater, bobbing my head to your slow jams......... in clothes that fit me..... I hope you know that there is no point to this rant, but I did postpone my morning jog to create it because that sweater was so huge and I was awe-struck..... now give the fat man back his sweater...... please...

Saying Goodbye........... well not yet.....

So I've decided that my Gibson Les Paul that sits in the corner collecting dust just needs to go, or I like to think that it will be finding a better home where it will be played and appreciated a little more......... I *made* the decision about three weeks ago, I MADE the decision (complete with craigslist post) today. I have posted it for a fair price and listed its condidtion honestly, so I should have no problem selling it. I will miss it, but I really don't play it that much, and haven't been the guitar player in a band since I played at Christ United Methodist Church years ago. She has been good to me, and I will always remember my first Real guitar....



I feel a little better about selling her after I heard that Gibson bought out Garrison Guitars, the make of my very nice acoustic guitar that I got for Christmas last year and are not honoring Garrison's lifetime warranty... Nothing makes you lose faith in a mega-corp like Gibson faster than knowing that the hard-earned money that was spent on something that was advertised as having a great warranty was now hard-earned money spent on a guitar with no warranty..... so I'm not selling it to spit in their faces, although I doubt if I'll ever buy another Gibson guitar..... There are plenty of options that sound great and feel great that cost much less, so that's probably what I'll look at next.

I really enjoy my Schecter bass, it is still blowing me away every time I play it, so I'll most likely look into one of their guitars when it comes time for a replacement.

Speaking of my Schecter bass, it is my main axe, and so I've also decided to sell my Fender Jazz bass deluxe 5 string that I had modified with my favorite pickups... it too was listed today. I have it listed for a fair price as well, it was my church bass, but even then I was missing my Schecter's thin neck.... so long Fender......

when either of these will sell I don't kow, I can only hope it is soon.

General ranting... it's been a while....

So I'd like to do a Craigslist style rant to start off.....

To the lady in the green Camry in front of me this afternoon, the one with the mobility scooter dangling on the hitch platform that barely supports it. I see you have a huge oxygen tank on your scooter, must be pretty serious because that thing is huge... I wanted to honk my horn and flash my lights to get your attention because I could swear that I saw smoke coming form your car window, surely your car must be on fire because I swear that you have an oxygen tank on your scooter, or is that a massive Nitro tank? You must race that bad boy against the other aging tuners in town, my bad, I'll let you go n your merry way, now get out of the left lane, or at least speed up to the speed limit...............

Cool, I;m back.... let me just say that you know you've been away from something too long when it takes you 20 minutes to get the correct username and password combination,......

So if you check out Nasty Habits Myspace you can see our new promo video, I have received very good reviews from peers and I think it looks and sounds pretty good!
So it's time to hit the streets again and pitch th band to more venues. I think we have a good enough product to try for some better rooms and may have a few contacts I can use!!! If I have my way we'll have a loaded schedule again soon!

So here's what is new with me.....

Still no full-time day work, I do have an opportunity to test again for the correction job, so I'll be training my butt off for the next month....... I have started working as a production assistant/audio tech at Tony N tina's wedding, a dinner show at the Rio Hotel, it is a fun show! I get to see it 4-5 nights a week, and I get dinner there too.... I am really enjoying it and I thinkit will make for a good mark on my resume (seeing as it is in a major hotel/casino....) .

Besides that I'm down by 4 pounds from 2 months ago, I had a cool trip back east to surprise my twin brother for our 30th birthday, and my migraines have made a little comeback.... hurray for coworkers keeping large amounts of ibuprofen with them at all times... imagine going to wwork with a migraine that you've had all day when you job is to mix the sound and do the lights, two things that you try to avoid when you are having a migraine.....

The worship band from Gracepoint has been pretty busy, playing a lot of things outside of churh services, we've played several youh gatherings and played at the Nevada Baptist Conference, and the 2th of this month we;ll be playing center ice after a las Vegas Wranglers hockey game for 'faith and family night' I'm looking forward to tat, as we'll probably get to watch the game!!!


SO just a quick catch-up, I'll be back here more often!!! stay tuned.

Owwwwwwwww......ch

So it's been a while... Let me start from the top and work my way to the ouch.....

The lat week in June was awesome, we went to North Carolina's Outer Banks for a week and spent some great time with family, what was not so awesome was that the shop I'd been working in since last October had let me go, there were no shows on the schedule.. Get back from vacation and K's boss calls to lay her off... nothing either of us did, just not needed I guess........ Kelly found a job at xy7.com, and affiliate marketing company, and I've been calling around and a lot of other audio shops seem to be very slow right now, so I'm relying on my part time work that I get from the City (very part time) and some band gigs.. I've applied at a number of places, one place, a rental car company I even went for an interview, then I never heard from the HR lady at all, even after I called and E-mailed her. Ihope this is because she got herself fired, why else would she be so unprofessional? I've got the experience and she had spots to fill...... oh well... I applied at a gym, the interview felt likea hustle, it was very obvious that the person who was interviewing me was a sales person, a hustler and not an HR person in the least... Besides the grammatical errors, he was too cocky... He mentioned that he has three houses a Hummer and a Mustang, like that was going to win me over into wanting this job so bad I'd give up gig nights for it... that was his thing, my needing weekend nights off was a 'red flag' for him and his boss (even though I clearly staed that ANY hours during the week would be fine for me, it's a 24 hour business), well they can stick those red flags where the sun don't shine...... I've done a hard-sell before and I can whipe the floor with their numbers doing sales for a gym, if they don't want me to bring them that much money then fine.....

So I saw a lsiting on Craigslist.org for Corrections Officers.. My twin does this back east, and it seems to be a pretty good career. the starting pay is great, and the benefits are awesome (hell, the fact that it has bennies is better than we've had for the last 4 years....) I've filled out the application and the next step is the test on Sept 17th. I'm pretty sure the written test will be a breeze (if it's anything like the MD state CO test I took 5 years ago) and I'm pretty confident tat I can meet the physical requirements (with this month to train for them).. So It's a long process, I'm going to call a few folks who have e-mailed me for interviews (a moving company and a sign shop) so I'll at least have part time work going on while I wait to hear and do the testing for the CO job..... I've prayed about this. I've prayed a little less than I should, but still the Big Guy answers! I really feel this is the right next step for us, K will be able to go to school, maybe even full time (the pay is pretty good as a CO) and we won't be fighting to keep above the bills as they come in. we would even be able to look into a second vehicle!!!!!

Now for the OUCH....

the GPkids were meeting at the Crystal Palace, a local roller rink and K does a lot with the kids sets... Let me tell you, I was a good roller skater and used to go quite often, yers ago.. I was a good roller blader, not so long ago...... I stink now. My first lap around I fell, prompting me to remove my wallet from my back pocket..... then I fell again before I had hit 6 laps....... I fell another time to avoid a very little girl who fell in front of me (there was no way to get around her, so I dropped to avoid rolling over her) and I fell again because some teenie-boppers were cutting through the middle to get to the exit...... my knees are sore... my legs in general are sore...... but my knees took the brunt of the falls....... BUt you know what? It was a lot of fun! we met a few parents who are our age and had some good fellowship with some folks from church, and that was worth it!!!! Now that the kids will be going back to school I might just start going there more often! ! ! !

Date night interrupted.

so as K and I were getting ready to go out to see Spamalot (see previous post) when my phone rang.... Wojo (GP worship leader) called to ask if I was available to run sound at a local Rock club.... He didn't have all the info handy, but gave me the number of the guy in charge, so I called and it was aparent that I would have time after the show (Spamalot) to take K home and get myself down to the club...

The mixer was a Mackie TT24 (digital mixing console) that I have not worked on before... I downloaded the manual and looked over the basics, seemed easy enough. The sound system is installed, so I knew it couldn't be too hard to run.. Sure enough, the staff got me into the sound booth and into the closet that holds the microphones and cables, and I was ready to rock!

Two bands on the bill, local original bands, I was expecting heavy metal screamers (there are a lot of them in Vegas) but was pleasantly suprised by the two bands. A good mix of jam-band stuff and rock and blues, both bands were pretty good!
The first band was doing grat, then the bass player broke a string... no backup bass and no extra strings.... so it was the guitar player/vocalist and drummer jamming out some tunes.... people were leaving, the MOD gave them the 'last song' and it was back to the house music and stage swap...

Second band used the same drumset and bass rig, so the larger half of the swap was already done. These guys were jamming! I can't say enough about how good these guys were, everybody knew their part, good interaction between the guitar and the keyboard, and the vocalist knew how to work the crowd!!

I got a lot of compliments from the bands and their friends/family but the least expected came near the end of the second bands set.... the sound booth at the Rainbow is a little room a full-sized door with a window on the top half ..... so this cute girl knocks on the window, I wasn't sure what she wanted/needed and the band was a little on the loud side, so I leaned in her direction (ear first) she said 'Thanks for doing a great job" and kissed me on the cheek.... Happy St. Patty's Day!!!! I'm not sure if I was being hit on... didn't realy occur to me at the time, I said 'thank you, happy St Patricks day." and went back to my little stifling box (it was really hot in the booth)...

All in all I'd say it was a good night. It was good to get behind the board again, and to know that I can walk into a foreign situation and handle it like a pro, had I not told the bands that it was my first night ever working this room, they probably wouldn't have known, and that's my goal, to be as professional as I can no matter what is thrown my way.

My mix was awesome (in my not-so humble opinion)

Spamalot!!!! Good Show!!!

K and I decided that we needed to go out, really do a date night in Vegas.... we chose Monty Python's Spamalot and dessert out. We got the show part, dessert was interrupted....

So take a Monty Python movie (or parts from many), put it (them) to music, add dance scenes, and voila! a great 90 minute show filled with all the best parts of Monty Python bits! You knew what was coming, the whole crowd recited the lines along with the actors, and the laughs were loud and many!

Now.... add J O'Hurley in the lead role (he was J peterman on Seinfeld and won on Dancing with te stars), absolutley hillarious. What a nice touch, to have O'Hurley's dry delivery and timing along with a good cast, it really made for a great night.

The scenery was top-notch small theatre stuff, really good us of props and scenery, it was kind of like waching a high school musical that had a really big budget. Good use of modern projection technology, without making it the focus of the show (ala Celine....)

I was pleased to see that the show uses a real band, tucked away somewhere under the stage.

So my final word on Spamalot...... COME OUT TO VEGAS AND WE'LL GO SEE IT!!! I could easily recommend this show to anyone and everyone!!!

My first Vegas Implosion, pretty cool stuff!!

So this is what the Stardust looked like, with MR. Las Vegas headlining in his own showroom and a fireworks show going off (probably from it's official opening..) It was a neat older casino, with a lot of smoke hanging in the air, and a cool oldschool vibe. I only went a few times to see some bands play in the lounge or while I was walking around aimlessly (which I used to do a lot when I got off work early...) It's been closed, they've auctioned offeverything they could and stripped the building to a shell. Ready to go.

The implosion was reported as after 1:00 AM before 5:00 AM, I guess they gave themselves a big window for wind conditions or smething (don't want to screw around when you'r loading dynamite......) I got there at 1:00 AM (on a little back story, I ate dinner and hit the sack at 6:30 PM so I wouldn't be too fried.......) I found a nice spot across from the doomed structure and set up my tripod withmy SLR camera on it and hung my digital from the tripod so it would be handy. I heard a worker say 2:30, so I knew I had some time to hang out and get comfortable. people kept piling in to the area I was in , it was pretty cool, they were shining colored lights on the building, the streets were blocked off from traffic, there was definite tension in the air. I snapped a few pictures with my SLR and forgot to look at the photo count, so I only got some B&W pics before the fireworks/implosion.... I'm really glad I brought the digital.

The fireworks were pretty good, many people around me were saying they were better than New Years Eve of last year.... Fireworks mounted on the side of the building made for a cool vision, and then the fireworks made big numbers 10, 9, 8, 7, 6 (you get the picture...) a series of booms and nothing.... another set of booms, and down she came, in around ten seconds the tower cam crashing down, a cloud of dust filled the air (and sent the crowd running, those of us who were smart enough to see how slow it was moving too our time getting back to our cars...)

Traffic was backed up getting out ofthere, but I'm gad I went, it was pretty cool.... a lot of staning around and waiting, but worth every second of it!!!

CLICK HERE TO SEE MY FLICKR PHOTOSET

For some reason the Flickr uploader puts these in bacwards order, so start from the end and work your way back if seeing them in chronological order is important to you....

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Wild Hogs!!! RRRRUUUUAAAAHHHH!

I can see the conversation now, two guys having a beer at a little bar, they see some biker types and the conversation starts:

Guy 1 " Hey, lets do a movie about bikers, you know weekend warrior types, old guys who go on an adventure to break the monontany of every day life...."

Guy 2 " Come on now, stay focused, we've got to get a movie idea to the studio execs tomorrow morning.."

Guy 1 " No really, we could get a great cast, Tom Arnold, maybe Tim Allen, biker types, but not really, the kind of guy you could imagine being on a bike 20 years ago, maybe even a Steve Buscemi to play a haphazardly computer geek...."

Guy 2 " Ok, now your talking crazy talk, a biker movie witha decent cast..... we'd need a modern, more hip figure, but not too hip, yesterdays news, someone who hasn't been seen in a while, how about Martin Lawrence... Yeah, that's it...."

Guy 1 " A black guy on a harley, now you're talking crazy talk......."

So I don't know if that's exactly how it went down, but I do know that the end result, Wild Hogs, is one funny flick with suprising chemestry amongst the cast.

With Tim Allen, John Travolta, William H Macy and Martin Lawrence in th leading roles, this light-hearted romp didn't fail to keep us laughing. I don't want to spoil the flick, so I'm not going to go into great detail, lets just sum it up like this: A dentist, a Computer programmer, a House-husband/plumber, and a hot shot something-erother get together to go on bona fide road trip on their Harleys and end up getting into a little trouble... Not a thinking man's film, unless you consider grunting like TIm the Tool Man, RRRRUUUUAAAAHHHH! ?!?!?

THe antagonist in this movie was Ray Liotta, who just came off as annoying to me, a little too much prep work went into his character, emodying all the bad-guy traits a biker gang leader should, only in an annoying way, maybe it's just me.... and the overly stupid biker freak was just a little over the top, although I must admit, he made me laugh (and I think I used to hang out with that guy...).

In the end, all is good (I won't tell you what happens) and lifeis a beautiful thing. Lots of good shots of Motorcycles and plenty of humour for everyone! I highly recommend that every guy gets to see this movie, heck, it should be required viewing!!!

Hot Dame!!!!!!

SO, as part of my trade-in with K, I've been open to more chick-flicks when we go to the movies. K decided that she wanted to see 'Notes on a Scandal' yesterday.... wow..

I am a big fan of Judy Dench (Check her out in 'Mrs. Henderson Presents, a hillarious movie), but now I know why she is Dame Judy Dench. If you are planning on seeing this flic, please stop reading now...

The character she plays in Scandal is a teacher, she seems to be a bit of a stick-in-the-mud type, very traditional, she's been teaching for a while. Her character unfolds like an onion on the skillet as the movie goes on, and her acting is top-notch!! I can't say enough about her ability to become someone different, even from moment to moment. One moment she is an old lady who is very lonely, others, she is a plotting veil woman with only the thought of having a relationship that will ast for the rest of her life, but that's just it, the relationship she wants is not traditional in the least. There was not one moment that she didn't have the audience wondering what she was up to (or for thoose of us who figured it out early, we were laughing because she acts it out so well.)

So yes, I enjoyed a chick flick. I can't wait to see what The Dame has in store.

A Dare, A Tat, A Beer and a pound of chocolate cake.....

That about sums up my afternoon yesterday.

At Gracepoint Church, we do things a little differently, the pastor, Devin, does his messages as a 'series' so for three weeks, six weeks, or a similar amount of time, he will use a them and discuss the Bible. He has done such series' as: CSI (Crusafiction Scene Investigator) where he took an evidence trail to find out 'who crusified Jesus' (it turns out to be all of us, he died for all of us!!) and other great themes to get the word out. The next series we are going into is called 'Tattoo' and it is going to discuss what 'marks' us as people, I'm not exactly sure what angle(s) he is going to come at it, but knowing Devin, it will be good! Let's just say we are going to really step outside of the box for the series!!

My loving wife, K, made some excited comments about someone who is going to be getting a tattoo and I asked her when I was going to get mine (it's something I've wanted for quite some time) well, lets just say that she pretty much dared me, and said 'Get one tonight!' I said 'O.K., I will!'

After church we went to have lunch with Wojo and Jean, friends from GP, and the discussion came up, K mentioned a tattoo parlor we had heard good things about and the next thing we know, Wojo has his laptop out, has found the phone number, and is calling the place to make an appointment.... K and I went to the place early and looked at designs, chose lettering and waited (a busy tattoo parlor must be a good sign!) .. and waited. we spent the entire afternoon there and finally I was called in! The artist had been drawing up what I wanted, so I felt like a schmuck for having felt put-off by the time that it took to get to me.... Back east the artist would have taken the design and told me to come back in a couple of days when he had it all drawn up, this guy drew it freeehand and put the lettering on it freehand and it was ready to go!!! The guy looked a little intimidating, with a Slipknot shirt on and a bit of a brooding approach.... Again, I should smack myself for letting first impressions get to my thoughts, he was a really nice guy, was extremely easy on me, we talked about bass and motorcycles and stuff the whole time! An hour and a half after go time and he was done with the outline. I got a Celtic cross, so there was a lot of detail in the rope-work. I was stoked, it looked really good! We took a break so I could go to the bathroom and so he could get some fresh air (I bet staring at peoples arms/legs.backs could make your eyes go buggy after a while.) so another hour and a half later, it was finished. The fill-in work and shading wasn't on he original drawing, that would have taken a really long time, it looked even better than I could have hoped! Jay is certainly a pro! I will strongly recommend him to anyone who wants a tattoo (and has thought about the permanent nature of the art, and has made sure they aren't getting something they will regret... all improtant things to keep in mind)

I was touched the most by K's show of support, and the way that she showed me she cares. I was trying to think of what I had come up with (months ago) that I wanted to get wit my cross (I've known for a while that I wanted a cross to be my first tat) and at lunch she called it out like I had just told her what I wanted 'Lord Reign in Me' so an extra note of thanks and appreciation goes out to the LOML, thank you for listening to my silly ideas (some day they may become reality....)

I chose this phrase "Lord rign in me" because I have vises, we all do, and I've been trying for a long time (I've been leading worship to some degree for years and years) to get my mind in the right place, to remember that while I keep my words straight Sunday at church, I also need to keep them straight every day of my life. as a leader in the church, with any possibility that my actions might reflect negatively on my church life, I need to live my life for God, with God, and to live EVERY DAY like I do on Sunday. I can't help looking at this tatoo and singing the chorus to the song I got it from:

Lord reign in me, reign in Your power
Over all my dreams, in my darkest hour
You are the Lord of all I am
So won't You reign in me again

Wojo (the worship leader at GP) had just discussed a similar concept in our morning band meeting, and I just think it all came together for me. I need to get my temper under wraps, I need not sound like a sailor on shore leave when I'm out at bars, I need to focus my energy on me. I need to make sure I am living the way I should be, then I can truly feel better about my part in leading others in church. Thanks to God that he accepts all kinds and knows the meaning of the word forgiveness, only he knows how much I've been abusing that gift lately. Who knows, maybe my tattoo will start a conversation that leads someone to turn to God in their life. I can only pray that it will.


So there are tons of pictures from my experience!!!!