2007 GOALS

I know it's almost February. You'll get over it though. I've been trying to come up with some good goals for this year and I also wanted to hold off announcing one of said goals until I was at least 75% sure I could make it happen. I only have 3. I feel like I should have more. Especially since one of them will be over by the middle of May. But I guess 3 will have to do. There are of course other things I would like to accomplish this year but I don't want to commit myself to the point of having it in writing. So here goes ... in no particular order ... unless you consider least important to most important a particular order.

1) Learn to like coffee.
-I hate coffee. Absolutely hate it. I wanted so much to like it in college just for the caffeine, but I couldn't stomach it. And it's one of the coolest drinks in the world I think. I would place it second behind beer in a list of coolest drinks. It's practically universal. Can you tell me a place on Earth you can go and not get coffee? Like beer it is always referred to by its name and not by its brand. It's simple. And it's timeless. And for some reason I hate the taste of it. Everyone says you have to fight through the bad taste until you acquire a taste for it. I used to think this was horrible advice but I have experienced this process with root beer and with regular beer and now I am a believer in the acquired taste theory. So I will give it my all. I've tried coffee with sween 'n low before. I've tried mochas. Never tried it with cream or milk though. Does that make it better? Thoughts on this?

2) Learn to cook.
-another thing I'm not so good at. This is definitely an underappreciated skill. My grandmother always makes it look so easy so I figured there wasn't much to it and anyone could do it. I was wrong. I think my problem is I just dabble in it and never really commit myself to any one dish or any one meal. Plus I'm usually just cooking for one which is hard to get motivated for. So there are 12 months in the year and my goal is to learn to prepare and cook 12 different meals. Not 12 items. 12 meals. I think that's a good mix of challenging and reasonable. And that will give me a nice arsenal of options.

3) MS150
-this is the one I was holding off on until I was at least 75% sure I would do it. Let me give you some background. On a purely physical level ... I've been running more lately and I began to have thoughts of training for a marathon or maybe a half marathon. You see, everyone gets so freaked out by the 26.2 miles, but the part that gets you and that really sets people apart is the training. It's tough. And it takes a long time. Unless you're just some freak of nature who can get up off the couch and run that far. I had a friend that ran one back in October and I remember in the months leading up to the race I would often ask her what she was doing the next day and she almost always responded with something like, "I'm running 20 miles to train for the marathon." All that to say, I decided to opt out of marathon training. I did however have the desire to train for some sort of physical activity so I began looking in other areas. I used to mountain bike in college. Loved it. But it's been a while since I've done it. I talked to my college roomate Quincy a few weeks ago and he was telling me about how he's gotten into road biking. I had been thinking of this for a while and then it all of a sudden hit me that I should check into the MS150.

Now let me give you some personal background. For those of you who don't know ... the MS150 is an annual bike tour who's purpose is to raise money and awareness for multiple sclerosis and specifically for the Lone Star chapter of the National MS Society. Within the past several years I have had two very close family members diagnosed with MS. The fight to find a cure for this disease has become something that is very close to the hearts and minds of everyone in my family and I couldn't think of a better opportunity to continue to be involved with and in support of the vital research that is being done.

I will try to update very regularly on my progress in preparing for this. The tour takes place on May 5-6 here in the DFW area so I have several months to prepare ... and I have a feeling it will take every bit of that.

So there you have it everyone. I know there are only 3 goals, but I like them and look forward to the challenge. Here's to the beginning of what I hope proves to be another wonderful year. It's my 30th one you know, so I want to make it a great one.

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Alright everyone. You're in for quite a treat. The other day I remembered I had saved a lot of pictures on Yahoo several years ago so I went back through them to see what was on there. There were some in there that had me on the floor laughing. These pictures I'm going to show you will provide a small snapshot into winter/spring 2002 for me and you'll understand that the levels of ridiculousness around here know no bounds.

So let me take you on a journey down memory lane.

In December 2001, myself, Brandon Johnson and Dave Kiesel (better known as Red Five Standing By) went into the studio to record a 6 song EP which we titled "Would You Date A Robot?". It was a first for all of us and was a great learning experience. We didn't have much money so we had to work quickly and it all came out pretty rough. But we were pleased. This is a picture of me recording vocal tracks for the record. That's my friend Mike looking on for moral support and a little entertainment of his own. Apparently I was attempting to work a little Cobain magic with that shirt. My high school girlfriend gave me that shirt my sophomore year. Why do I wear things so long?
This is David Dreeson. He was recommended to us by the guys we shared a practice room with ... who incidentally hated us because we never paid our half of the rent on time. What kind of rockstar pays up on time? They were oddly responsible for a group of guys who stayed high most of the time. Anyways, our chance connection with Dreeson has led to a long friendship with a cool guy and great engineer/producer. At the time we were recording in his taken in garage. Now he has a full studio set up at his place in Austin and has recorded several records for Dave and Brandon as they have continued making music. Brandon is currently working alongside Dave at the studio to bring in new business and to make them all pay a fair rate as Dave tends to do everything at cost just because he loves to help people make music. I love that about this guy.


We had a song on the record called "No Good With Girls". It sort of became our theme song. An anthem if you will. Some saw it as a form of self deprecating humor. But I'm here to tell you. We really were no good with girls. We were however great with ideas for making songs unique and funny. We invited several girls into the studio to record lines we had written for the end of the song. So as the song winds down you begin to hear these girls throwing out all the excuses we could think of for not wanting to hang out with us. For example, "I only date football players." "I don't date musicians." So on and so forth. You get the idea. So this is our friend Brandi (on the right) and one of her friends whose name eludes me at the moment. They were really cool about the whole thing and did a great job. It was only about a week later that Brandi would begin her longtime hatred of me for writing a song about an experience I had with her best friend Ashley. I think this was the last time I ever saw her smile around me. So sad.

A couple of reasons why this picture makes me laugh. First of all, notice how Dave is playing the guitar behind his head. Think you've seen this somewhere before? That's right. It's a move that Marty McFly pulled at the Enchantment Under the Sea dance back in 1955. Dave was doing it because we were closing this show with our version of Johnny Be Good ... as we often times did for a crowd full of screaming fans. Funny thing number 2 ... you see the red sign on stage that says, "Red Five Rocks ... Sucks"? That thing kicked so much butt. We had this thing were after a song we would put up points for whether we thought we rocked or sucked. Sometimes we asked the crowd what they thought but we were kind of afraid they would all yell "SUCK!" so we usually just judged ourselves. Of course "suck" always jumped out to an early lead but "rock" came thundering back as we closed out the show with the aforementioned "Johnny Be Good".

Whose seen Spinal Tap? I hope you all raised your hands. If not, then shame on you who have not beheld the glory that is The Tap. Go now and watch this movie to end all movies and then come back to this post so you will understand this picture. This is our friend Graeme. He is 6'7" tall. Here you will see him dressed as dwarf (I know it looks more like an elf, but we made the costume ourselves ... and seamstresses we are not. So just go with us on this one) dancing around a tiny model of Stonehenge dangling from the top of the stage by a wire controlled by Brandon behind the drums. While this is going on we are covering the song "Stonehenge" by Spinal Tap. I don't think there was ever a greater moment in Red Five history than this one right here. As a musician you always want to make the best music possible. As a performer you always want to put on the best show possible. In order to do so you usually need to do something that no one else is doing. I'm pretty sure no one else was doing this.

This I believe is a little later in the same show. This was at The Backroom in Austin which was sort of home base for us when it came to playing shows. Notice Graeme in the front without his elf suit. That's my friend Aaron from high school in the crowd. Not sure if I realized he was there or not. Surely I did. That's Princess Leia on stage with the Red Five t-shirt. Product placement people. Product placement. Looks like Dave and I are doing one of our simultaneous drum riser jumps. Apparently I'm about to slam my head into the back of the sign that we used to conceal the tiny stonehenge earlier in the show. Never felt a thing. It's rock 'n roll you know. Just comes with the territory. That does remind me of the time Dave did the same thing but he hit a steel pole above his head. I thought he was going to pass out on stage. Good times I tell you. Good times.

We did some pretty ridiculous stuff during the relatively short time we were a band, but I promise you nothing topped what you are about to see next. We were needing some press photos and of course we didn't want to do anything that was currently being done by all the other bands out there. Again, not so good with the girls. But great with wild ideas that involved girls. We were always playing off the whole "No Good With Girls" thing. And I guess we were also in a sports mood at the time so we decided to do a sort of sports spoof typed theme. We found several female friends that we (it should be noted that I have to stop every few lines because I'm still laughing hysterically as I write this) convinced to play the part of cheerleaders and headed out to the football field at Westlake High School. We started with some ideas of what we wanted but this quickly got out of hand and we ended up with hundreds of hilarious pictures from the day. In this first shot, notice the attempted bad ass looks on all our faces. That part makes me laugh as does the fact that we rented those letter jackets from a costume store (which we pretty much kept in business during those months) as does the fact that we were able to talk those girls into doing this. What a bizarre day.


This is Dave and I watching Brandon get beat up by the cheerleaders. I don't know which is funnier. Brandon being beat up by girls or Brandon posing as a football player. Both hilarious. We thought this would have made a perfect 8x10 for a press kit. Don't you think this would have gotten the attention of club owners when trying to book shows? Sadly, I think this may be the first public showing of these pictures. In true rockstar fashion we spent a full day on a photo shoot and in the end didn't have exactly what we were looking for. Thanks to Taffy, LeeAnn, Stacey and Jasmine for being good sports and great cheerleaders. And to Brandon, Dave and I for being less than average excuses for football players.

Several months later I took a sales job in Houston. This marked the beginning of the end for Red Five Standing By. We played shows on and off the rest of the year, but in the end it was too much of a challenge to keep it going and Dave and Brandon were working on new material for a new project that was taking their time and focus. Since then they have gone on to work on several projects ... the latest being their band Hundred Year Storm which was signed to Floodgate Records this past year. These are a few snapshots of where it all began though. And although at the time I was really wrestling with a lot of decisions about my future and in the coming months would take my life in a drastically different direction ... I can still say that spring 2002 was one of the great times of my life. Our goal for the time being was to make rock 'n roll and to have a great time doing it. We made some great friends along the way and lost a few as well. The memories are wonderful and the laughs even better. Hope you enjoy finding them as much as I did.

ELEVEN HUNDRED SPRINGS

Saw these guys at The Granada about a week ago. The show was unbelievable. Every time I see them it seems to be better. They are one of my favorites right now and probably will be for a long time. They are doing a great job of bringing back that old country western (with emphasis on western) style of music. Lots of fiddle. Lots of pedal steel. Honky tonk sound. It's just great. Reminds me of my roots and it's so refreshing to see other people my age (or at least close to my age) making this kind of music. If you want to listen go here or here.

ICE STORM CONSPIRACY

Well, we had an ice storm ... so they say. By "they" I mean ... you know ... "they". The powers that be. The ones running this whole thing. At first I thought maybe Troy Duncan was one of "they" but I think it goes much deeper and he is just a pawn in this game of weather related cloak and dagger. You see, it started raining here on thursday or friday of lastweek. It was still very warm but apparently cold air and freezing rain were on the way. Friday night it turned cold and we were supposed to be iced in by Saturday afternoon. I drove 20 miles to Dallas and 20 miles back to my house that night ... no ice. We dodged a bullet they said. Sunday we would be iced in though. It worked out since I had made plans to do absolutely nothing anyways. I'll tell you ... it's been freakin' cold. And there has been ice on all the trees outside. So much so that many of them are leaning over. But the roads on Sunday again were fine. I wake up this morning and look outside. Ice on the trees, but the roads are dry. So where was all the ice? Why do you get us all psyched up for this stuff and then this is all we get. And yes, I saw all your television broadcasts of the people sliding around in there cars and getting into wrecks. Everyone else may believe you, but in the same way that my friend Dave believes the moon landing was shot on a sound stage, I believe we are seeing old footage of other apparent "ice storms" and not actual events that happened today. I just don't believe it. This ice stuff is nothing but a hoax. So go back to work people. Go back to school. It's okay to drive. And maybe it was best to heed their caution today as things don't always turn out so well for those who dig just a little too deep when it comes to north Texas ice storms.

WALK IT OUT, WALK IT OUT ...

A COUPLE THINGS YOU PROBABLY SHOULDN'T DO ON THE TRAIN

So I'm riding the train home lastnight from the Mavs game and experienced a few things that were very funny but are probably things you shouldn't really do when riding the DART train.

1) Please don't fart ... ever. But especially not when the doors are closed and the thing is so full that people are standing in the aisles. There's just no place for that stuff to go. It was awful. Everyone I was with was dying of laughter as we're trying our best to discreetly figure out who the cause of this awful smell was. We think it was the guy in front of me. This brings us to my next point ...

2) You probably shouldn't play loud music on your phone with iTunes and sing along. At first I thought the music was being piped in but then I saw the lady that was with the suspected farter holding her phone up and singing away. She sang the entire time she was on there. Mainly r&b with a little rap mixed in. Sometimes her farting husband would join in. This also made us all laugh a lot.

So in conclusion, it is obvious that both of these actions are very funny but I would probably suggest that you not do them on a regular basis when confined to such a small space with so many people. Just fyi.

ARE WE THROUGH WITH BLOGS?

I have a list of several blogs I like to read over to the right. I usually check these everyday. Some are notoriously bad about writing but for the most part I expect there to be new material from some people every now and then. So I can't figure out why there hasn't been much new stuff lately. Mark Cuban and Pepe Guzman are usually pretty reliable but I'm not sure what's going on with everyeone else. Is the craze over? Was it a craze at all? Is it only my friends who have stopped writing? Is there nothing else to write about? Have we decided to communicate less through blogs and more through actual conversation? I'm just asking.

And p.s. ... does anyone read this anymore? I know I went through some down time but I feel like I'm back and trying to be more regular. Just didn't know if anyone stuck around through the drought. Again ... just asking.

2006 GOALS

At the beginning of 2006 I posted a few goals I had for myself. That was one year ago to the day so let's have a little review.

1) professional - 100% of quota at work.
- how's 92%? Pretty good I think. This was actually a pretty lofty goal looking back on a lot of the difficulties that my job posed in 2006. It took a big surge at the end of the year to get to this point and that has made me proud of my effort and accomplishments of late. So even though I was 8% short we're going to call that goal accomplished.

2) personal - get a girlfriend
- accomplished. Fortunately "keep a girlfriend" was not one of the goals. I actually hesitated in writing about this one because I even though this was something I wanted to put a little more energy into I kind of said it as a joke. In the end it was something that came about all on its own and I think that's always the best way. At the time it was a really great thing and I in no way want to belittle it by simply checking it off a list. I had a girlfriend for almost 7 months of this year and we had a great time together. She was pretty, cool, and liked me back. I used to tell her those were the things I looked for in a girl. There obviously must be more to a realtionship than those things (although it's not a bad place to start) and I thought at some point we would have a deeper and more meaningful relationship. After a while though I realized we were never going to connect on the type of deep level that people need to connect on to continue a dating relationship in the direction of marriage. The hardest night of my year was trying to explain this to her in a way that was honest and open but mindful of her feelings and ultimately her future. It was impossible to say all that was on my mind and it pained me to know that she was hurt. In the end I hope we both realize it was better to end when it did than to go on for months and maybe even years with a relationship that would eventually end. I hope she is well and would say I'm thankful and happy for the time we had together.

3) attain beginner level on the piano
-failed miserably. I didn't even learn one note on the piano. I don't even have a piano. What was I thinking? This is actually something I'd really like to do but to be honest ... somewhere around the middle of February I think I may have forgot this was a goal of mine. I was so bad at accomplishing this that I'm not even going to make an attempt this year.

4) write enough songs for an album
-failed .... not miserably .... but failed. I have a real problem with follow through. I'm thinking I should probably end up someday with someone who is good at following through. Otherwise we're screwed. I'm constantly writing. Sometimes it goes down on paper and sometimes it is in my head until I fall asleep and is then gone forever. I've got several songs started and a few close to being finished. I think if I ever do decide to record anything I will most likely (and this will probably work to my advantage) take a bunch of unfinished pieces into the studio and pull them all together there. It's an environment where that is all you focus on and you know you have to finish.

So 50%. If this were baseball I'd be the best hitter of all time. I'm currently working on some goals for 2007. Stay tuned as I'm sure you're really excited to see what they are. Until then ...

CRAIG SANDWICH

Below I will provide you with a paraphrased conversation I was told about. It's in reference to a certain birthday party of mine that I may or may not write about in the near future. But for now, enjoy this piece of conversation from Julie and Jessica.

Julie: The other night a group went out for Craig's birthday. While we were dancing I told two slutty looking girls it was his birthday. They knew exactly what to do and proceeded to make a "Craig sandwich" on the dancefloor.

Jessica: That's really funny. What kind of bread was it?

Julie (without missing a beat): Ho-wheat!