Culmer's Thoughts

We Bought Stuff...

2008-07-26T21:01:00.002-05:00

Today our tv/internet stopped working for a bit, usually when that happens I spend the whole time on the phone with the company being really annoying wanting my technology turned back on. Well today I was good, I only called once. After the call to annoy, Patti and I were like well lets go out and do something, it had been a while since we’ve just gone out and shopped a little.

Let me talk first a little about when you loose something like the tv/internet, you find yourself being bored, so what do you do when you bored? You buy things! It was like a win win situation, Patti loves Guitar Hero, and I Like video games (I love not thinking) so when we saw it we were like sweet!

Then it was off to Borders, Patti had finished her book the other night and I'm already half way through the new book I've started. Well ok here's the thing I like to just go and walk around book stores, it makes me feel smarter, it seems to me that all the cool people are doing it, they walk around with their mocha vanilla frap. latte non fat creamer lightly iced with a strongly grounded bean flavor with a twist of orange drink, browsing the literature with a look like they have gas and are holding it in, I think its awesome, I got a couple books that I've been looking at for a couple weeks now. Well I've been looking at one of 'em for a couple weeks, Fars told me about the top one a couple days ago. Patti got a couple as well.

I just wish I was able to read supper fast, I mean are there really people out there that can read a 500 page book in less than a week, and still be able to watch tv, and you know have a life?

After searching around a bit, the internet says that the average person reads 200-250 words a minute, I've taken the test, I read at around 200 words a minute, so I guess that means that I'm at the bottom of average. (sigh)

Dessert

2008-07-26T16:06:00.002-05:00

Who's the first person to say that desserts are bad for you? I know its all the ingredients of the dessert that make it bad for you, but, don't you think that at the end of a meal you deserve to have something that's full of sugar, or have something that has a piece of fruit on it thats surrounded by whip cream or dipped in chocolate.

All I'm saying is maybe we need to start skipping more meals and eating more desserts! And we should not talk to the person that decided that desserts are a treat, their not a treat, its a way of means to make ones self happy at the end of crummy day, or after cramming down a meal that you particularly didn't want in the first place! You just ate to get to the dessert.

Finishing With A Feeling...

2008-07-25T00:02:00.000-05:00

When getting to the end of a book and you close it for the last time (unless you want to read it again) I always have that sense of completion, fulfillment, consummation, it almost feels like I’m just a tad bit smarter because of it. Well ok that may be taking it to far, but there is that feeling, when finishing a book do you ever find yourself, saying job well done on finishing that book but now I’m going to take a break from reading for a bit? I’m the opposite, I find myself wanting to read another book right away, almost thinking that I’ll be able to finish the next book even faster than the last, and I’ll understand all the words in this one!

Course there’s that inevitable procrastinating that shows up.

It’s still a great feeling putting the book on the shelf with the others that you’ve read. Some people read books like I watch movies, and that’s cool but like I’ve said before I’m un-cool so when I finish a book it’s a good feeling.

It Comes Out Nov. 7th!

2008-07-24T18:50:00.003-05:00

A couple days ago I saw the trailer for the new 007 movie. I am a geek when it comes to these movies, I almost have every 007 movie that's on dvd. I'm always in the mood to watch any of 'em. And unlike a lot of people out there I think the new Bond is great, he fits the new darker Bond movies.

Four!!

2008-07-24T00:01:00.003-05:00

That's right folks, for the first time in a while todays blog doesn't have anything to do with work! I know! It's craziness, today was a really good day, it started with Farns and I golfing in the morning. (first time this year) Last year by this time we had already been a good 2 or 3 dozen times, but we've both been pretty busy, so we decided to just say the heck with everything and lets go golfing. So we did, we didn't really keep score, but it was fun just swinging the club around, I only lost about 17 balls total. But it was just to much fun, telling stories, and laughing at the horrible shots we were taking. And then theres me hitting the ball over a bunch of tree's and just about hitting a group of ladies, course in my defense we didn't know they were a head of us! And it was a great shot, it landed about a 100 yards from the green in the middle of the fairway, the lady that I almost hit picked up my ball and kept it because she was mad at me! (haha)

Then from there we headed all the way out to the Imax theater, thats right to see the new Batman movie, and well I don't want to ruin it for anyone, (he dies) so I'm not going to say anything. (I'm wanna see it again)

Then it was back to the apartment, Nick and Jenkins had joined up with myself and Farns for the movie and some more stories, while sitting on the porch, course after Farns left this was the sight, and then some how by the end of the night we were singing "The Golden Girls" theme song. It's better if I don't explain how we got to that point, just know that the world is in a better place now because of it.

A Rant About Leadership..

2008-07-22T22:25:00.003-05:00

My day was full of wind, the people speaking were full of wind, the people singing were full of wind, (except the first band, not sure who the guy was but sweet goodness it was some good music) the tents with the gear in them was full of wind, and the day was for the first time only slightly windy.

You ever sit and just listen to people, how they talk? How they handle things based on who the person their talking too is? I was amused the last couple days sitting back and watching people. I guess in some way we all act a little different around people that we think are important or famous. One of the types of people that I’ve been observing are people who are in charge of /manage companies, the way they make decisions based on wanting more work in the future from a client, or how they talk to people that are in other departments (If you don’t own the gear, you don’t get a say in it!!) I’ve been around several owner/management type people that act all important the last couple weeks, one was such a go getter that he was obnoxious about things he had back at his warehouse to help solve any little problem the client had. I mean good grief let the person know you have an object, then drop it will ya? I don’t understand the obsessive need to annoy someone to the point of awkwardness just so you can say their renting this stuff from you?

I had twice! Let me say it again Twice, two (2) different owners of companies on two (2) different gigs tell me what to do with the LED walls if the weather gets bad! And they were completely different suggestions, and both very inappropriate advise. Today I had a guy telling me the things I need to do in case of a storm, I was like “I appreciate your concern bro, but I know what to do, we’re good, no worries”, well he proceeded to follow me around and tell me how to my job. (haha) I just stared at him for a minute, then he said “these are all things you probably already know?” I continued to stare, this time adding a smirk, and said, “It’s all good”.

The point of my rant tonight/today is, if you find yourself reading a book in a coffee shop, or waiting in the airport, or just being out to lunch with a bunch of suits and ties around, just take a moment and listen. Listen to how they talk, how they treat the people around them, how they treat their server, how they act on the phone, how their demeanor is when they tell someone to do something, and if they hide in their arrogance because of their ignorance of leadership or lack of ability to lead, all the while wanting more responsibility so they can have a higher pay grade! (Still ranting) Ask yourself, “do I have any of these tendencies, that cause me to roll my eyes at this person?” the world needs better leaders, ones who actually make a difference in what they do and who surrounds them, as apposed to only wanting to make a difference to their wallet.

Ok now I’m done ranting today. (sorry)

Why Was It Such A Long Day...

2008-07-21T21:22:00.003-05:00

My day was suppose to be pretty easy, just check in here and there though out the day with the client, sounds easy enough doesn’t it? Run around and do things, check back in, run around some more, well that turned out to be wrong. I show up this morning to a forklift that is about to keel over, and not from the weight of my wall but rather a leek from somewhere internal, lets put it this way, in one hour the wall dropped 7 inches, that may not sound like a lot, but the wall has to be up tomorrow at 630am and won’t be down till about 630pm, that’s a long time, and lets just say we didn’t think it was going to make it!

Well after we make the decision to change what the wall is hanging on, I sat around and waited for the fire marshal, then I spent the rest of the afternoon working and dealing with people. Then finally around 530pm they show up with the solution to our forklift problems.

I have to say that the last couple posts have been really short stories and I've been so tired that my posts have been stupid.

I Blog About Work To Much..

2008-07-20T22:14:00.004-05:00

It seems to me that in my going back and skimming through my previous posts I spend a lot of time bloggin about work things, I try to just blog about my day, I guess I could pick things that happen that don’t have to do with my job, but I really haven’t had a lot of time not working. And the worst part of is, there were two highlights to my day yesterday, and one of them was that I got a exit row, and there was no seat in front of me. Yup that was one of two highlights yesterday.

The second is two part, one half actually getting to hang with an old friend (Schwarz) and half he cooked dinner, I won't go in to detail as to what he cooked but I will let you know that the cake was really good.

I had to use the bathroom, (it was a long flight) and while in his bathroom, I noticed a few things that might be out of place in my own bathroom now that I'm married, for starters the plate and fork, the pitcher of water, the old man hat, the bottles of wine. (Just for starters) It was awesome, when I told him that I took a picture of his bathroom, he started laughing, and made a reference to himself being "Kramer" from that stupid show that I never really watched all that much.

It was really fun hanging out with him, we need to get together more often.

What Does That Even Mean?....

2008-07-20T21:12:00.003-05:00

I don't really feel smarter. I've been trying to use these words on a regular bases, and on a regular bases I feel stupid after saying them. I do feel pretty smart on the other hand when I write them. (sort of)

Stupid Roofing..,

2008-07-19T00:06:00.008-05:00

I really for the most part don't have a whole lot to say about today just a lot of pictures. Roger and I went down early to the venue (Town Park) we were setting up at this morning a little earlier than needed to scope things out, which what we found was the staging roof was still down, for those of you who don’t know, when the production people (i.e. sound, lighting, LED, video etc.) load in the stage and roof that our motors hang from, has been up for at least a full day, well the roof guy thought he would just finish his gig, when he felt like it, and there was a big mud puddle, where I was about to set the wall.

So we start unloading our truck anyway, I lay out our stage decks, in the mud to help keep the expensive stuff clean, I get our motors all situated, thinking well maybe the roof guy is waiting on that? (Nope) I turn around and here’s one of the head production guys with a shop vac sucking up all the water in the puddle. He looks at me and says “somebody's gotta do it”, and I replied “yea… that’s going on the internet”. But bless his heart, the mud actually starting to be less nasty later in the day.

And then I sat around for ever it seamed like, waiting on the bloody roof! Finally around noon (we were suppose to be done by 1pm) the roof started going up! But, then it stopped, where it shows in the pic. And I went back to sitting there.

I know what your thinking, "holy cow the LED screen is actually being built!" (at 230pm) I got three rows then I had to wait for the roof guys, again.

For the best part of my day, the part where the PM comes over and says, “we’re going to be getting 50-60mph winds and a pretty big storm! Did I mention the softball sized hail that’s with it?” I just laughed, after the last couple weeks, I’m convinced its just not a festival, unless there’s some nasty storm involved! (haha) So being that the wall is waterproof, and the wind is being blocked for the most part by stuff, I focused on the hail part of things, and created an awning. It was so redneck I had stuff bungeed, roped, tucked, glued, and hog tied, when I was done, I kept waiting for it just to blow away, like in some stupid movie or something, I’m not entirely sure it would have protected the wall in the end, but I think I should at least get a b+ for the effort. (there was no hail in the end)

Nice Hotel!

2008-07-18T00:13:00.005-05:00

(The dark spot in the photo is my finger, thought I should tell ya)

My day started out pretty good, course I was sitting at home in my own bed, around 830 I just laid there wondering if I was suppose to get up, if I was suppose to go to the airport today, or if that was tomorrow? Then my alarm rang, meaning I had stuff to do, which meant that I had to go the airport today. Once I got that all figured out, I went and got a new book for the several 3 hour flights I have in the next couple days, and I’m almost done with the current book I’m reading. (Rambling)

Anyway, the first of two flights wasn’t all that bad, there was a tv in the back of the seat in front of you, which was nice (if you wanted to $5 for it to be turned on $8 for a movie), the lady next to me watched a movie that I actually watched wed. night. So I told here the ending (I was lying of course) and found it really funny when she kept looking at me, and I would tense up looking at the screen, then she would get all tense and whatever. Nothing would happen of course at that moment in the movie, I then would go back to reading. (I was really bored)

Then for the second flight, I walk through this huge airport with all these flight gates, I keep walking and walking finally getting to my gate, I look for a minute trying to find the LED sign that tells you the flight info for that particular gate, I can’t find anything so I look around some more and then the lady puts up the sheet of paper with the flight info on it! So naturally I think well maybe the LED sign is broken, get to looking at the other gates in the area, and nope! There all paper flight info signs. And the seating area was pretty much the hallway. (haha) It was alright till it started to get busy, with people getting off of planes and trying to make other connections, and everybody walking by you smelled like sweaty feet, it was actually pretty gross.

Which brings me to a question, you ever label a person by smell, based on the current smell they smell like at the moment you meet them? Cause I can only imagine the smells that label me!

Sorry, I’ve put up a picture of the plane I flew on to get to the small city in my two-city destination. It had been a while since I’ve been on a plane that was propelled by propellers! (SIGH)

I get to hotel finally, and I have to say it’s the nicest hotel I’ve ever been in!! I’ve taken some pic’s of what it looks like! It’s that good

I don't if you saw it or not but theres a dish washer, full sized fridge, stove top, microwave, a tv hanging in the bedroom, a tv and coach apart from the beds.

I'm kind of geeking out a little, its a really nice hotel!

3D, Zone 1

2008-07-16T23:32:00.003-05:00

I’m still trying to play catch up with my bloggin’, I’m almost there, since I slept the last two days, not much to blog about, that only leaves Monday. On Monday I was loading out at the beginning of the day, (12am – 6am) then a nice fella that we knew in Tulsa picked me up for the hour drive back to Tulsa on his day off to get me to the airport, course I was so tired that, I kept nodding off during the drive, it was rather embarrassing to say the least, only because, instead of saying I’m going to close my eyes for a little bit if you don’t mind? I kept trying to carry on a conversation, and then finally falling a sleep for a good 15 minutes, then waking up, and again instead of saying something to the effect of sorry about that, I say “Yea so anyway..” then after feeling like an idiot, I say “I’m sorry bro, how long was I out?” He was like “a little bit”. Once at the airport, the first flight was one of the most uncomfortable ones, I’ve been on in a long time I don’t want to go into details just because whatever.

The second flight on the other hand was interesting, what I was awake for! So here I sit in the airport my ticket says 3D Zone 1, I don’t think much about it, they seat first class and the people that need help, then zone 1, so I board the plane looking, naturally tired from the working for 24 hours, only getting 4 hours the night before the 24 hour work day, and then being up for 32 hours, I get to what is the third row in coach, and look up to see the seat number is 9, I stand there now, holding up the line just staring at the row number and my ticket, then coming to the realization that I’m on the wrong flight, (there were multiple) so again now I’m that guy trying to go the wrong way, I finally get to the front of the plane I stand off to the side where the flight attendant stands, she looks at me and says “sweety can I help you?” I looked at her with what I can imagine a look a defeat, and say “I think I’m on the wrong flight?” she says “well let me see your ticket”, I give her my ticket, and she smiles and say “No your on the right flight, your seat is right here” pointing at a seat in first class. Which by this time I had brought some attention to myself being tired, and her being loud, people start laughing.

I then sit in my seat; she asks, “What would you like to drink, once we take off? Beer? Wine? I mean you look like you’ve had a rough couple days?” I follow with “how much does it cost?” that gets some more laughs, she says, “honey is this the first time you’ve flown first class?” I just smiled, said "water would be great" and put my head against the seat. The next thing I remember is waking up and the guy next to me says, “she brought your water but you were already asleep!” I said “thanks how much longer?” Then I felt the landing gear go down.

It Was A Long Day...

2008-07-15T23:05:00.008-05:00

I have to many things to talk about, to many stories, (that I’ve been already telling people) I wasn’t sure how to start, or even where to start. So I decided to start with the day after I blogged last, essentially the beginning I guess.

Ok, so you’ve seen the pic’s of me tying down my walls, so you know that I’ve pretty cautious about them, you know about the wind from my previous posts, all that stuff, well what I don’t’ think I’ve mentioned is there was a family weather team out there, that have some pretty cool stuff, I relied on them most of the week, even though, I really didn’t trust them a whole lot, just because the wind on one side of the building would be completely different than on the other side of the building, but yet they would tell people that we were only getting 15mph winds, well they were right, where the wind meter thingy was, and if you looked at the flag 30 feet away it wasn’t really moving a whole lot, but you looked at the flag on the other side (south side) the flag pole was bending the wind was blowing so hard. So that just gives you an example of the my trust, and having to guess a little bit, about what to do with the weather people.
Alright now that you know a little bit about the wind people, here’s there set up it was pretty impressive, and it was nice to see, when the storms were going be hitting us or if they were going around us, well there was one storm that didn’t decide to go around us, more like several storms that decided to not go around us, as you can see. The first one that hit us had what they were calling a front gust they kept saying “there’s going to be some pretty strong wind, but at the moment we’re only seeing 13mph winds”, so after standing there with them for a minute watching this thing on the computer screen, I made the decision to land the walls, (landing them is one of the safest things you can do, all the weight is on the ground) So I yell at the video director to stop I’m landing the walls, so he starts to get all his guys in and the camera’s in, well by the time I get the ropes untied on the south side (the really windy side) the rain started just to down pour and the wind started to pick up speed.

So I go running through the stage (the fastest rout) and of course all the posers are standing in there out of the rain, and in the hall ways of the building, so I’m screaming at them to move while running through (I totally hit this lady that walked right in front of me, and I mean like I was in a full sprint, screaming move Move!! And she stepped in front of me, it was like a rhino hitting a house cat, she got really mad and said something to the security guard which called her a bad word and said “you should have moved you dumb lady”) I get to the other side, and the wall is tied down, but now the wind is up to 70mph (I didn’t know at the time) so I start to bring the wall down to get the ropes untied, and to land it, I start bringing it in, and usually when its really windy the wall will swing, but this time no swinging,, the wind was blowing so consistently that the wall wasn’t swinging, the bottom was about 3ft. difference than the top, it took 3 of us to get it down after cutting the ropes of course.

Its almost over, I hop into the semi, (cause it was lightning out) and start to dry off, and look over to where the North side stage is, and say to Roger “oh wow they lowered the side stage roof really quick”, then got to looking, and thought where are the up right towers? And then realize oh no the roof collapsed, so I go running back in side to see if any one had noticed, and find out that both side stages collapsed, there was a south side and north side

South Stage

North Stage

There are to many pictures for me to show you, but I thought I would just share a pic from both stages.

The Chair that seen it all

Nobody got hurt except a few broken bones, but nothing real serious.

When I was walking through the airport, I saw this article in the local newspaper, and thought I should see what they have to say about the festival weather. They did the normal stuff, and then in the middle the writer says, "Metal latticework over a story high crumpled onto both stage areas. The jumbo projection screens flanking the main stage were also damaged." That's awesome! "jumbo projections screens" is one of the funniest names I've heard in a while, usually people just call them jumbotrons. Well they weren't "damaged", if the writer would have stuck around for the last band, one would have noticed my LED SCREENS were on and working with no problems. But it did give me chuckle, and that my screens are big enough that their "flanking the main stage".

What Does That Even Mean?....

2008-07-14T06:40:00.005-05:00

This word pretty much sums up my attitude last night, or this morning which ever you wanna go with, for going home today!

Yesterday...

2008-07-12T07:06:00.000-05:00

No rain today, but that didn’t stop the wind from speeding through our little area, at gusts up to 35-40mph, its been crazy how windy its been, the walls were swinging even with my ropes and my handy tent/trucker knots, or as Roger told somebody today “the walls are hogged tied”.

The fly was the only thing not blown away today by the wind. (This is me trying to stay positive by taking a pic, and then showing it for no real reason)

I Just Want To Rip It Down!!

2008-07-11T07:26:00.000-05:00

I have hit my head so many times in the last couple days that my head hurts all over! I’m always hitting my head on things, it’s inevitable, its that “tall guy syndrome” that my chiropractor talks about, but this week I’ve hit my head on the same two frames, you would think I would learn they were there by now. But before you go judging, in my defense the frames weren’t there last year, some dude (that I had to wait for) welded them on during load in, so its not like they’ve been there from the start.
I’ve pointed out which piece of framing I’ve hit my head on at least 8 times this week, one of which I hit the side of my head and my ear so hard that it knocked me on to the ground, (in the rain) which caused me to get even more soaked from the down pour!

I can hear my dad as I’m writing this saying (jokingly of course) “well the first time you hit your head, it should have knocked some since into ya” and then laughing at the fact that I’ve repeatedly hit my head, and then saying “what an idiot!” (the idiot thing is a on going joke between us!) Meaning of course common since.

OH!! And for the first time in a couple days we saw the sun! Tonight after a monsoon, the sun came out to play, it wasn’t out for very long, but since I was still soaking wet from the day’s copious rain! It felt good to sort of dry off.

Here's the LINK to the lineup/festival page, for those interested in checking why I've gone back to 1986.

Quick Over View Of My Day ...

2008-07-10T06:04:00.000-05:00

My day started like this, if you can't tell by looking, maybe you should click on the picture, get a better look and see that there's a lagoon in the middle of the audience, it was pretty much the same way back stage as well, I don't have a pic because I was to busy, working in the rain, and standing in large amounts of water. (haha?, when reading this paragraph back to myself I sound like I'm complaining about getting rained on, and being soaking wet the whole day, I should say that I'm not, cause better to be drenched, then sun burnt!)

And this is how my day ended, except this picture was taken during the day, and when these stupid things were on, it was more like midnight, then midnight plus 30, then... you get the point, I did want to show you this pic just give an example of what kind of festival this is since I had time in the previous post describing it. (loud)

Trying to be Postitive Post Tuesday ...

2008-07-08T22:39:00.005-05:00

This weeks PPT isn't about objects or people, but more in hopes of being positive! This week is one of the hardest festivals we do, just because of the genre, and the people are a little less... well its hard to explain, lets just say their different. One of the other things about it is, most of the festivals we do, we'll have the occasional storm, some really bad, but not like its threatening the gear weather, (except for maybe that one gig) this festival is in OK. where its flat, theres lots of storms, and the wind just never dies. As you can see in the pic above, the flag is whipping inexorably, big heavy LED walls and wind don't exactly mix to well, because there's just several variables that can go wrong. But won't. (knock on wood) So theres where I'm trying to be positive, its hard when you watch and check the weather outlook for the week! (haha) But seriously!

Question? How come when you bite into an ice cream sandwich it always seems to flatten out, smoosh all the icecream to the outside, and all you end up with is a mouth full of cookie? (and some times wrapper)

Oop, would you look at that, a nasty storm! We get done eating dinner and Roger says, "hey get your camera, you have to take some pictures of these clouds!" and I'm only showing you a glimpse of the craziness thats out there, its dark enough and big enough that while Roger and I were standing out there discussing some sort of strategy on if it gets to wild and crazy, that most the people in the hotel were coming out to have a look! So I'm keeping positive that all my gear will be fine! (haha)

Some More Grillin'...

2008-07-08T06:02:00.001-05:00

Tonight Patti checked the mail, and in it was a Time magazine with Mark Twain on the cover, I thought that was funny, because you know, I was just talking about.....

Anyway ...

(yea that's me)

I don't usually go for swims, I'm not a big fan of swimming at the hotels I'm staying at for work, for one I don't like swimming with a bunch a people around, (I call that "the chubby guy" syndrome) I like to relax, and today it was exactly that, I just floated there gathering my thoughts, I've been thinking about the book I'm reading, work, what's the next step in what I'm doing, how, when I wrote my last blog I must have been tired, cause it was a piece of poop of a blog, as far as the writing, then I thought, maybe that's how I really write? Maybe I sound like that when I talk? (haha) It was really nice just hanging out listening to the sound of the room echo.

Then the real reason that actually got me to go into the pool, the hot tub, it looked more like somebody dropped a huge tablet of Alkazelter in it, but it was still relaxing, and it made my ankle feel better.

Meet Roger ...

I had to show you this pick, cause for the first time since I've known Roger, (which has only been a year) he's wearing shorts! He always wears blue jeans and a white t-shirt.

Roger, is our faithful Truck driver, he's not really a truck driver per se , I've decided that a truck driver is someone that doesn't do much else but drive a truck, and talk with some sort of trucker slang on a cb radio that only truck drivers understand, they sound a lot like Brad Pitt in that movie snatch, you know the one where he's Irish, and after he stops talking you like "what?" Thats truck drivers, oh and they all carry a 64oz mug with coffee in it, (sorry, got side tracked) He's retired from his real job, and enjoys making a few extra bucks while working for his son in-law, (my boss) and hanging out with us crew guys, always laughing, and telling jokes, Over all just a fun/good guy!

(Roger in his normal dress attire)

Well, him and I decided to get a decent meal tonight, instead we got a grill, and got a few things from the store, and had a little cook out! It was actually fun just standing around, talking about how the trailer looks so clean, and that he's going to be polishing the wheel wells some more! (haha) he's crazy for polishing! But the truck sure does look good!

Course most of the conversation was on whether or not the corn was done, and how do you know when the corn is done, after a couple calls to Mom & Dad, we decided that they were done, that and they were burnt on all sides. And wouldn't you know it, they were perfect, just by happenstance tho I'm sure!

Land Of Twain...

2008-07-06T20:38:00.007-05:00

The Land of Twain, Missouri, (haha) or I as called while riding in the semi today, Misery, if your from MO don't get me wrong its not a bad state, I mean at least semi's can drive over 55mph in the "show me state", as apposed to IL, (where we came from) I was just joking around about the misery thing. (sortof) It's like any other state that you see from the interstate, rather boring, full of bill boards, except everything in MO is filled with Mark Twain everything, gas stations, grocery stores, Natl. Forests.

It got me thinking, I don't remember reading any of his books? I'm pretty sure I have, when I was a kid in school, but I don't remember any of it. And the other thing I got to thinking about, was why did I eat what I ate for lunch!? You ever go on long trip, stop for for some food, and your so hungry that when you ordered your like man that looks good! I think I'll order it, forgetting that, the item in which you just ordered can put you behind schedule, and has done so to many a costumers! But you still find yourself ordering it anyway?

(Gosh darn it!) It looked so good in the picture, but about an hour afterwards I instantly regretted my decision!

Once we found a hotel to call it a night in tonight, I get up to my room and open my drapes, and wouldn't you know it, the scenery wasn't all that bad!

What Does That Even Mean?....

2008-07-06T08:00:00.002-05:00

I wasn't sure about this word, I saw it in a book, naturally, and thought that it meant to soak something up, but that's absorb, which I guess they sort of sound alike but, well ok I'm an idiot, their totally different, especially in the spelling, and when I was reading I thought, man that doesn't make any since? But now that I know what it means, that sentence totally makes since now! I don't know how many times I've done that!

Crazy Kids ...

2008-07-05T11:48:00.009-05:00

Its hard to see this is I'm sure, but if your able to make out all the little yellow sparkles, that would be a candle light service, last night they handed out all these candles, and then everybody starts lighting them, it looked pretty cool, until the mc's extemporaneously started throwing out free t-shirts and stuff from the stage, then realizing that this crowd is a little over zealous about free stuff, so after a few minutes of throwing out free stuff they decide to make the announcement to help us out by not catch things on fire, like the t-shirts we just threw out, and especially the very dry, dead grass that their sitting on!

I got one pic off before going to work, of the fireworks, I think I picked the wrong time to take my camera out, cause no more than a few minutes later, when I was almost done hobbling around and doing my gig, the big finally happened, you know where they shoot off everything they have left to explode, so yea all I wound up with is this lonely shot of "a" firework!

I've always said that blogging puts you in a better mood, I use to always try and be positive when I blogged, and I use to say that that use to help me be in a better mood, and then I started ranting a little bit here and there while blogging. So far today I'm in a bad mood, and I've tried to blog about things that would cheer me up, force me to write something, uplifting or positive, hoping that what I' writing would carry over to my attitude! Well so far it hasn't, I just went back and proof read my last two paragraphs, (proof reading haha... like I would know if theres something wrong with where a comma goes, or something isn't the right spelling) and you can see that I'm just in a bad mood! When your reading someone's blog can you tell when their in a bad mood but still blogging?

So in hopes that I get in a better mood, I've come up with a short series of pictures, that make me smile, (not this second) so I recently did a blog about these kids at this festival, playing games in large groups, making games up on their own, (one of the games I didn't tell you about and don't have a pic of is these kids trying to surf down this huge steap hill in kiddy pools! And pretty much getting mouth fulls of grass each time) well yesterday this is one of the games they came up with.
Standing at the bottom of the hill, they form a line of people all hunched over, and holding on to each other like their riding some really long scooter or something, anyway, then one person runs down the hill and tries to jump as far as he can in almost a leap frogging form, except not trying to jump completely over the group, but rather stacking as many people they can get on top of the base of people still hunched over, and holding on to each other, forming almost a human pyramid without falling over.
I think the goal is to get as many people on top, and to jump as far forward as possible, so that people that can't jump very high or as far can be in the back, course again you can go as high as you want, just don't fall off, or cause the whole group to fall over, then you have to start over! At one point they had 5 kids all on top in the back of the group and there was a kid that was little out of shape (thats the nice way of saying that he's over weight for a little kid!) runs and jumps and barely gets up there causing the whole pyramid to shift forward, he made on top but barely, more like holding on to the kid above him and kind of just hanging there in the back of the pyramid, that didn't stop the next kid from using him as a ladder and got all the way to the top before causing everyone to fall!

I took these pic's of this kid that was like 2nd or 3rd to jump, well he jumped a little to well, and leaped frogged the whole group, it was awesome, here's the pic's of the kid jumping, and then going head first over the whole group, it was impressive!

Yay For Crew Blogs!

2008-07-04T23:24:00.001-05:00

We have another crew blog that has been started. The Toby Crew has started a blog, in hopes to give away the behind the scenes of their coolness!
I'm pretty sure the master mind behind this decision is Nick. You need to go and take a look, and say hey, and check in on 'em every once in a while! Hopefully the stories will start flowin soon!

Some Funny and Some Sad

2008-07-04T01:35:00.016-05:00

So other than spiders and porta-potties, I thought I would share some of the things that have made me laugh and cry in the last couple days. This festival is one of the few that does the cardboard time schedule, I think its funny, I'm pretty sure that I did this exact shot a year go when I was here.

Our crew has dubbed this show the hippy fest, cause its a little different from the rest of the festivals, the free spirit of the attendee's, the festival allows to do pretty much anything, and camp anywhere, and that they allow kids to set up in their camp site with an audio system and play their own little concert, and everybody plays frisby, hacky sack, and some silly jumping game, lets talk about that for a minute, whats the deal with that game, these kids stand really still, then someone I guess makes or says something, or does something that cause everybody to jump to another location, and try to knock somebody over? I don't really get it, its by far the weirdest game I've ever seen.
Its not like theres small groups, theres always a crowd doing it, nobody really showers, they encourage in flyer's that if you are going to bathe to use environment friendly soap while taking a bath in the lake! But like I said the general attitude is "why bathe at all?" The bands are for the most part, well I've never heard of a lot of the bands that play this festival, course theres like 10 different stages, I guess I've heard of the headliners (except Saturdays headliner) and a few of the bands that play at the stage I'm at, but when reading the booklet that was given to us I'm like "nope haven't heard of any of 'em",

Yeah thats right, doesn't that just look amazing! Can you taste it? this picture of flammable goodness that causes my brauts, handburgers, hotdogs, steaks, turn into the sweet goodness they are! Speaking of which happy 4th of July, but lets get back to the pic, thats all the fire works I need... Wait for it.... Wait for it...
"MMmmmmmm" Look that goodness! theres nothing like grilling, especially under a dead tree, a bunch of dead leaves, and two really powerful generators! Makes you feel like a man! Course much like the spider, and my willingness to share that I freaked out about a spider story, I figure I might as well share this, the first day I set up the grill I'm standing out there I put the charcoal in the grill, then the liter fluid, lite it, it goes out pretty quick naturally, so I put more liter fluid on there, a buddy says hey from a far, as he's walking over, I'm still putting the liter fluid on the charcoal, when he's pretty close I go to lite it, and woosh! This huge flame goes up in the air, now you would think that, in a movie format of coolness I would stand there like nothing fazed me, (haha) no I jumped, and then ducked for cover. (sigh) my manliness this week is weak!

Ah yes, Chief Culmer, the menu was burgers or something you bought, since nobody bought anything, except me and one other guy, that means their options are with or without cheese, all week baby!

Then towards the end of the night, its dark I'm doing stuff here and there, I need to go into the RV and start cleaning up, from dinner, and on my way out of the camper, I step into the hole just to the left of the carpet, that's right out our stupid door! Let me rephrase that, I didn't just step into the hole but rather stepped half in the grass, and half in the crater, which caused my ankle to role in a direction that I'm pretty sure now its not suppose to role! Now given my week and the lack of manliness, I was like "ahh I'll walk it off, its nothing!" Well given my bellicosity for the situation was enthusiastic, it quickly became stultifying! Cause lets face the facts I'm just a big wuss.

Thankfully one of the guys had a ice pad thing that was in the freezer, and now even while I'm bloggin' I have it propped up and a bag of ice on it, hoping that I'll be able to go in to work today with out hopping in to work! (Haha so cheesy!)

Brody's linklove ...

2008-07-03T18:12:00.000-05:00

Brody wrote: It’s the beginning of the month and that means that it’s time again for “Link Loved”. The time where were celebrate those that are sending the most people to our blogs. Now for all of you people out there that will inevitably say, “to me it’s not about traffic and I think this is a lame thing”, I say…. neat. Then don’t play. I think it’s cool to focus on something other than ourselves a few times a month and this is one of them. So for those of you that know how, figure out who your top five referring blogs are, that is the five blogs that sent you the most traffic this month and write a post explaining their blog to people and sending people their way. Make sense? We’ve done this once before and it seemed to work well, so here goes.

I like to support Brody and his craziness, so here it is my link love.

1. Brody (haha) - I had to go back and look at what I wrote last time about Brody, oddly enough he was first then too, I find that funny, the guy that is starting all these blog trends can also be your biggest linked love! I think thats great, I still have nothing but affirmation for this guy, I can only hope that he and this guy take over the industry, in their internet wordary.

2. Jay Steven - Jay's my wife's little brother, he's recently started blogging again, and I love it, he is a great photographer, he shares his photo's and some really great stories, the one recently is pretty stinking funny. I'm always looking forward to see what pic's and stories he has next.

3. Eugene - You can't go wrong with this guys blog, he's starting to get comfortable in his own little style of blogging, has a great ratio of pic's and story telling, its not to much or, not enough story to the pictures, its some good reading!

4. Patti (My Wife) - She just recently started a blog, she hasn't blogged a whole lot, but when she does writing is awesome, and her decisions of what pic's go on her blog are just perfect, I'm a little bias cause she's my wife, but I wish she would blog more, cause I love reading what she's thinking about. Especially while I'm on the road, I have so much to say about her but I'm trying to make this quick. I'm so lucky to be married to such a wonderful women!

5. Kristin - This is Kristin is some good reading, I've only met Kristin once at a MM show, but I enjoy reading her blog, her stories of the kids are funny, her dedication to the things she's involved in are awesome! Her blog is always an encouraging blog read!

There you go, there's my top 5 linklove, now help support Brody's trend setting, and post your top 5.