"What part of 'meet me at the stick' didn't he understand?"

Plants.

Take a moment, if you will, and think about them. If possible, go outside and take a look at what might be growing in your yard.

Got that?

Now, take a moment to ponder some of the stranger plants you've seen growing around. Odds are, there's not much around here that's too exciting. I will admit I've seen some pretty funky stuff growing on a bagel I left in a drawer for waaaaaaaaaay too long, but that stuff was so odd it may not even count as actual plant life.

Is a fungus a plant, or is it just a fungus? I'm not sure. Both tend to be green, and they grow. But I digress.

Getting back to weird plants. I can almost guarantee that whatever you thought of is nothing compared to some of the plants I saw today at the Botannical Gardens with Janice. Ho-Lee Cow. Damn, man. The climatron has got to be one of the strangest, weirdest, coolest place I've been in awhile. There are some trees in there that defy description. There were palm trees (I think) with leaves that had to be nearly 8 feet across, and almost as tall as the dome itself.

Do yourself a favor and check it out if you have the chance. The Gardens are vast, so it's easily an all day excursion.

I want to grow my own herbs now, too.

Just so you know.

Friday night is opening night for the 2004-05 Traffic Club Bowling League at the Trop. We're down to 3 person teams this year, so things will move along quicker, and, I think, more competitively. We'll see. I've not bowled since April or something like that, so I can only imagine how horridly I'm going to bowl. Despite the grueling pace of our league's season, we don't get anything like spring training. If we burn our mouths on the toasted ravioli, we don't get time on the DL. Blisters are suffered through. It's rough, yes, but we are professionals, and we do what we can.

Lets' compare some examples from the day in baseball.

Cardinals: Pitcher Jason Marquis picks a man off second, and pitches 7 innings of shut-out baseball en route to his 13th win of the season. The Cards win 4-0 and sweep the Pirates.

Cubs:Mike Remlinger hits a man to load the bases in the top of the 8th, and hits* the very next batter to drive in a run, before surrendering another4 runs as the Cubs lose to the Astros. At the moment, they are tied with San Diego for the wild card, and if the Giants hold on, the tie will be three-way.


*He may not have been hit. The ball was up near his head, and may have hit his bat and/or hand. Regardless, the pitch was way too high and inside.

I don't mean this as any slight against fans of the Cubs (Max, Leah), I just wanted to point out why I think the Cardinals have a good shot to go all the way this year, while the Cubs may have trouble making the playoffs. Time will tell. The Cubs have a good team, they just have trouble with the fundamentals and their emotions. When you can't consistently do the little things, it's hard to get anything big done over the course of a season.

Anyways, I think I have to go.

Don't I?


Turn the key. Start a revolution.
Dave


p.s. 24 and 48 are not the same number.

I could smell the cooking of my mother.

Exactly three people will understand that title.

I applaud you all.

Know what I'm saying?

Heh.

And remember: some people like to study rocks.

Whatever.

Aaaaaaaaaaaanyways.

While it's still fresh(ish) in my mind, let me try and recount the experience from dinner tonight. So Janice, Jess, myself, and a couple of my former coworkers are eating at the Bread Co. on Lindbergh. We're sitting around talking when an old guy (there's just no other way to put it) takes out one of those wooden train whistles, and gives it a couple toots. Why? I have no idea. If I'm not mistaken, he said something to the effect of "Here we go!" after he blew the whistle. I can't recall. After that, he walks up to us and starts talking. A lot. About....um....well, I'm not sure what, exactly, but the 4-5 stories he told had no real connection to each other. During the first story, he pulls out a yo-yo. When he finished, he yo-yos (?) once, and starts up again. When he's done, there goes the yo-yo. Then he starts talking again. His wife, who I believe had gone to get their car, comes in and tries to get him to leave. If he noticed her, he gave no indication, as he would keep on talking. A couple times he did notice her, but he'd just brush her off and keep going. And going. The whole thing lasted a good 10-15 minutes.

It was really hard not to laugh at the whole situation, but it was clear the man wasn't all there. Maybe Alzheimer's or something. I'm not an expert, so I'm not going to try and diagnose him. Point is, it made me feel bad when I was laughing, so I had to keep myself calm. In a way, it was sort of sad. I have the utmost respect for his wife (I assume she was his wife) for remaining calm, and just staying with him through everything.

That said, the man was better on that yo-yo than I've ever been.

Infinite points to Cindy for being so patient and, well, talkative with the guy the whole time.

Last night was trip two (dos) to Six Flags this month. The lines were much shorter, and I enjoyed the rides a lot more, probably because I could just enjoy them, as opposed to getting jolted by the new experiences. Mr. Freeze is still the, yes, coolest coaster around. The Boss still is, and still no Bruce. Special kudos to Jess for a.) riding the Boss, and b.) not biting Janice's arm off.

We also saw "Weird Al" Yankovic, although he may have been downgraded to slightly unusual. He was, of course, highly entertaining. The Eminem 'interview' was probably the funniest thing I've seen since I saw it last year. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. And, believe it or not, I think I enjoyed the concert itself much more than the 4-pack show from last week. Jim West is one bad-ass guitar player, and Steve Jay is almost as hot as Mr. Womack.

And that's saying something.

October 24. The Pageant. Joe Satriani. Oh. Yes.

November 22. New U2. Hot. Damn.



Know what I'm saying?
Dave

25 Minutes to Go

A bit more, maybe.

I'm sitting at work, waiting for an author to speak tonight. It's sure to be a smash, especially considering no one seems to have heard of this guy. Yep. Yee-ha.

Actually, my only real point here is something I forgot to mention last night.

After mass yesterday, we stopped off in Krakow (that would be Crocko to me and you) for, drum roll please, the greatest hamburgers in the world! According to mum and Mike, anyways. Of course, it's pretty hard to screw up a hamburger. Anydangways, I had me a double cheesburger, and I gotta admit, it was really great.* Not skimpy little burgers, not too dry, not over seasoned or anything. Damn tasty burgers. I approve.

World's greatest?

Maybe not the best, but definitely up in my top 3 or so. It's a tough call between those, Steak 'n Shake, and Kenrod's. Actually, K-burgers are probably out just because it's impossible to fully enjoy one. Any burger that requires a day of fasting just to finish is hard to consider the tops. And S'nS is a bit pricey.

So I guess they are the best.

See what a little thinking will do for you?

Crap. Now I'm hungry.


Swarthily,
Dave



*Do you know who said that? Have you figured it out?

Astronomy Domine

Whew...lots to get to tonight.

First- greatest name for a band I've heard this weekend: Butch Wax and the Hollywoods. More on them in a bit.

Jump back to Friday. I went with Tom to see Effervesence. I mean Emminessence. No, wait. Evenesence. I think that's it. Anyways, I went to see that band at the Um.B.Pav. They were also playing with, in no particular order; Seether, Breaking Benjamin, and Three Days Grace. I'd like to tell you a lot about the night, but I can barely recall anything about any of the bands. Seether covered a Pearl Jam song and Ev. covered a Smashing Pumpkins song. Other than that....

Wait. All four bands had 2 (2) guitarists. Usually not a bad thing, but in this case, totally pointless, as both guitarists, 98% of the time, were playing the same thing. So why bother? And to top it off, none of it was really all that good. There were some cool riffs, and a handful of decent solos, but overall, the show was unremarkable. The band members of Ev. had zero interaction with each other. The bass player moved once.

Maybe I've set my standards too high or something. After a steady diet of CM, 'Tones, U2, Pearl Jam, and the like, it could be that I've come to expect a lot of my live acts, and none of those bands lived up to them.

Or they sucked.

No, they didn't suck. Simple Plan sucks. These guys......they just need to expand their horizons a bit.

That said, I had a good time with Tom, which is always a plus, and easily made up for the ho-humness of the music.

I went with Streudel to visit mum and Mike last night. We ate at a really snazzy Italian place in New Haven called Aldo's. Pizza was superb, and the town, which was right on the Missouri River, was a wonderful little place. That's counting the place that advertised "Gun's, Knife's" and something else which escapes me. We saw a "big ass rock" dedicated to the grandfather of streakers, whose name also escapes me. It was pretty weird. Once it got dark, we trucked up road a little ways and pulled off in a park-y kinda area so I could do some fine astrophotography.

Absolutely amazing conditions last night. Clear and cool, and, even better, a number of leftovers from Thursday's Perseid meteor shower. Best of all, I actually got to see the Milky Way. I've not seen it in person before, and it's an amazing spectacle. I picked up the prints today, and even though Walgreen's didn't print them too well, I could see the incredible amount of detail I picked up. I have pictures of the Milky Way that I took. Myself. It's So. Freaking. Cool.

I look up at the stars, and I know a lot of people might feel insignificant, or tiny, or something like that. When I look up, I'm totally taken aback at the sheer coolness of it all, and I feel honored to be able to take it all in.

--End nerd section--

Tonight I went to St. Ferdinand for a Journal shoot of the above cool band. Very nice time. The band had infinitely more presence and overall coolness then anyone I saw Friday night. And all they were doing were old R&B covers. Hmm. Maybe the source material had something to do with it. But they were still cool.

And by R&B, I mean Aretha Franklin, et al. Back when there was real rhythm and real blues in the music. The stuff holds up really well over time, as all good music does.

I'm gonna go watch the Cardinals now.

"Reaching for the stars and I got my head in the clouds."
Dave

*%^$@!!!

Bowing to popular opinion, I am now going to try an "angry" post.

Are you ready?

Good. Here goes:



Snarl.

Whoa. Did you feel it? I'd better go cool down a bit before I go any further. Even better, I think I'll go kick me some puppies instead. Excellent way to relieve stress.

Oh yeah, I hate you all.

bye!
Dave

I am a donut.

Reason #47 why taking a day off work isn't always the best idea: you may come back and find your Godzilla figures kidnapped. I kid you not. I stroll in this morning and find a ransom note on my desk. Yes, a ransom note. Surprisingly, whoever kidnapped the Big G let him write his own note, as it's in first person. I've also been given a Polaroid of the poor guy, making a phone call from somewhere in the building. All of this because someone wants a bag of cookies (Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies, to be precise). I think my coworkers have too much time on their hands.

We'll, um, see how that plays out.

Here's something to chew on: as previously noted, we went to Six Flags on Saturday. I think we were there for maybe 7 hours or so. Well, six, if you take out our lunch break. So, six hours at the park, and maybe...oh, I don't know, 7 minutes or so were spent on actual ride business. So that's a lot of walking and/or standing in line. A lot of time was spent walking, because we didn't exactly plan our attack very well. But, in the end, is it worth it to wait so long for such short thrills? In this case, I say 'soitenly,' even if I did feel as though I might die every 3 seconds while riding the Boss (and no, Bruce didn't show up). I still think the basic premise of almost every amusement park ride is pretty silly (how many ways can we move you in circles?), but the coasters at Flags, Six are pretty good at keeping it interesting.

I shot the Relay for Life for the NorCo Journal on Friday, and it offered a stark contrast to last week's Miss USA day. That event was a bunch of fluff and hoo-ha for a lady who stood around and looked pretty, and this was a lot of cool stuff for people who were, and still are in some cases, fighting a tough illness. Basically, I think they deserve it more than she did. It was pretty spiffy, really. Many candles=visual goodness. The only downside, I think, was the somewhat lame version of 'Amazing Grace' on bagpipes. Usually a can't miss, I know, but the guy playing it didn't seem totally into it.

I think there was more I was going to say about it all, but I got distracted and forgot. Plus, I really should get to working, so....

Dave

...we came in?

Potentially exciting news from the Broadway world.

Huh? Yes. yes, I know seeing the word 'Broadway' in one of my posts is like going to the store and seeing a new line of llama spit from Pepsi. Or seeing the Cubs win a playoff series. But bear with me here, as this is pretty cool news.

May I?

Pulled this off of Yahoo!:

"Pink Floyd's "The Wall" is coming to the Great White Way.

 

Miramax Films has pacted with former Sony Music chief Tommy Mottola to develop and produce a Broadway musical based on the seminal rock opera.


Roger Waters (news), who co-founded Pink Floyd in 1965 and conceived the semi-autobiographical 1979 concept double album, will write the Broadway show's book and arrange and orchestrate music for the stage production.


The album, which includes such Pink Floyd hits as "Another Brock in the Wall," "Comfortably Numb" and "Hey You," follows the journey of disillusioned rock star Pink, who looks back at the experiences that forged his neuroses. Like Pink, Waters lost his father in World War II.


Waters, who acrimoniously left Pink Floyd in the 1980s, sold the stage rights to the project to Miramax and Mottola, who runs his own Universal Music-based label, Casablanca Records."

See, I told you it was cool. For anyone who's seen the movie, you'll be happy to know Roger Waters is going to put a few laughs in the musical, since, well, there wasn't anything very amusing in the film.

I'd also like to point out that the terrible error in the above is not mine, and that the show won't be containing any songs about the squinty dude from Pokemon. That's another show.

And, also, for what it's worth, 'Another Brick in the Wall' is a 3-part song, and part two is the popular one everybody and their brother knows. So if someone says "I love 'Another Brick in the Wall'" to you, be sure to ask which part they mean, and see if they look at you like you asked for some of the aforementioned llama spit.

Don't you hate it when you can't find a CD you want to listen to? I had nearly half my music collection with me yesterday, and not a single thing seemed worth listening to. It was pretty sad, really. This morning, I grabbed mu uber-case, with all the good stuff: U2, CM, BF&FT, Satch, and PJ. I should be good now. If not, that exasperated scream you hear around 11:43 this morning is me.

Someone's turning 19 tomorrow. Can you guess who?

Someone else has been taking guitar lessons for a little over 5 years now. Up until the past few months, I never considered stopping (although I did for a bit last year, when there wasn't an evening slot available), but now I'm giving it some thought again. Two reasons, really: 1.) it's $55; a month 2.) I'm think I may have got most of what I can, instruction wise. I'm gonna keep up for this month, and maybe next, and see how things go. If I don't feel like we're covering anything new, I might go ahead and stop. I'd hate to do that, as it's usually a fun time, even if we don't cover new stuff, but it's a bit too much to spend each month if I'm not really learning.

So, we'll see.


Isn't this where...?
Dave

"So what's your plan now? Let's run screaming!"

I went to buy some cat food on Friday afternoon, and it reminded me of an observation I made the last time I went to buy cat food. I noticed, as I was walking around the store (I had time to kill, mind you) the big bags of dried cat food all featured pictures of ladies holding their cats (the cats were, as I recall, unimpressed with the prospect of being on a cat food bag). Anyways, I got to thinking: are these bags implying cats are an inherently 'female' pet? And if so, what would society say about me, being the owner of not one, but two (two) cats? I never gave it much more thought after that, and I saw a guy shopping for his cat on my second trip, so I got over it.

Speaking of cats: Janice and I went to the zoo this afternoon. I find it interesting to note that no matter how large a cat may be, it still acts like my cats. You know, sleep 27 hours a day, come up every so often to eat, and maybe spend 10 minutes a week doing 'cat' things. Namely, scratching the furniture. I also didn't see anything remotely funny about the hyenas, but maybe that's because they took a cue from the cats and slept all day. Hell, the black monitor lizard in the herpetarium was far more active than the cats we saw. Now, I'm not saying I didn't enjoy myself. I had a smashing good time. I'm simply stating that cats are lazy

I went out last night for another round of astrophotography. Not much happened. My shots came out okay, I think. The prints from Walgreens are over exposed, since they don't know any better, and the scanner at home is pretty iffy at best. My scanner at work should provide some better results. I was shooting with a full moon (blue, even), so it was an uphill battle. I'll have to try again at month's end, when we have a new moon. I confused some poor lady at Walgreen's when I dropped the film off this morning. I asked for 'negatives only,' and she looked at me like I asked for a bottle of llama spit. So I settled for prints.

I don't necessarily feel like going into the specifics of my day yesterday, save for the fact I worked up more of a sweat keeping ahead of the parade then I did at soccer on Wednesday. Also, a note to parade planners: it's generally a good idea to put the main focus of your parade at the end, not first.

Just my thoughts, mind you.

And really, I find it silly to honor someone with an entire month in their name, a theater named for them, and blah blah blah, all because they stood around and looked pretty. Shoot, I work my butt off sometimes and don't even get a lousy 5 minutes in my name. What gives?

The main question is, of course, what would I do with 5 minutes in my name? Would I use the time for good or for awesome?

Something to ponder, for sure.

Another thorny issue: how do you best spend a week (4 days) when your boss is out of town? Stroll in at nine, leave at two? Two hour lunches? Rearrange his desk? Actually, I might go for the gusto and wear shorts one day this week. Maybe Thursday.

We'll see.


Iggins!!!
Dave