Angus J Page

Music update

2011-03-07T16:28:00.003-06:00

Alright, so I managed to make two blog posts not only within a year, but a month! I decided to update my old music playlists last week by making a new one. And its been quite easy to see just how much my music taste has changed in the past 2-3 years. Well, not so much changed... expanded would be a better word. I listen to pop, alternative rock, new rock, old metal, classical, some country, and the occasional hip-hop song (the ones that get played on top 40 stations) as well as all the stuff I've always liked. A lot of it has to do with work... whatever's playing in the kitchen you just get to listen to for 4-5 hours 3-4 times a week. So it slowly grows on you.

More so than the other playlists I've posted, I've tried to keep the playlist diverse. So I couldn't get carried away with putting too many songs with one band or genre. But it should come as no surprise that The Beatles had more appearances on there than anybody else. Here's the breakdown:

The Beatles - 4
Metallica, Muse, Taylor Swift, Lady GaGa - 3
Led Zeppelin, Foo Fighters, Airborne, Elton John, the Beach Boys - 2
Everybody else - 1

Now, I didn't feel like going through it very thoroughly to double check but if that's correct I'd say that's a much more diverse playlist than my past. I don't even have a Guns N' Roses song on there (although I have Velvet Revolver) and only one AC/DC song (which is my 3rd favorite band).

As far as genre breakdown goes, this gets a little more tricky. One band can encompass several genres. For example, back in the 60s the Beatles were considered several things at one point or another... pop, rock, psychedelic, hard rock, etc. And today, Taylor Swift is considered both country and pop. So this is going to be a bit tricky. To keep it at its most basic, I'm just going to go with rock, pop, alternative, metal, country, etc.

Rock - 27
Pop - 13
Alternative - 10
Metal - 7
Country - 4
Everything else - 3

Rock still has the most, but I did a better job of not letting it get out of hand.

2011-02-07T01:08:00.004-06:00

I seem to have fallen prey to the "post one blog a year and then fall off the face of the earth" game. I've completely forgotten about this blog... again. I wouldn't have even logged on if not for the fact that one of my writing assignments is dealing with blogs so I got on to research some of them. Anyways, the rough draft is due in preciously 9 hours, 49 minutes (at the time of me typing that). Supposedly it is to be roughly at its final length, which = 4-5 pages long. Currently I'm around 2 pages... yay this has all the beginnings of an all nighter. Anyways, I'm tired and thought I'd take a break for a few minutes to post some random thoughts that have been running through my head.

I saw a lot of car commercials during the Super Bowl. I'm starting to really become a big fan of Audi. They make some really nice cars. If I had to get a car that wasn't a Chevy (I finally bought a car by the way. It was a Chevy, of course) and could afford an something like that then I'd get an Audi.

I like the Black Eyed Peas alright, but their halftime show was the pits. At least they didn't lip-sync... but we all found out why they normally do. And Slash... oh Slash, you made it half-relevant with your presence but why would you associate yourself with that?

Hollywood is really on a craze to cash in all the money it can by making movies for seemingly every popular comic book superhero. This most recent set of Batman films restarted it. Then there was Iron Man. Then the Hulk. Now we've got Superman being rebooted, the Green Hornet movie is out, an Avengers film is being made, Captain Marvel is coming out, what's next?

Congrats to all my Packers friends. I honestly didn't care who won. The Steelers are my favorite AFC team and the Packers I will root for if they aren't competing with the Bears. So I came out pretty indifferent.

I'm sick of snow. If its not those freaking bugs plastered on the front of my car during the summer then its stupid snow sticking to the wheel wells during the winter. I have covered parking at my apartment, and even so the snow blew in and covered my car (which I had finally cleaned up because it had been had been long enough since the last snow that most of it was off the streets). I'm still cursing about that and that happened five days ago.

I got Gran Turismo 5 for Christmas. I got the 2nd game 11 years ago and I loved it despite the glitches it had. So when they finally got around to releasing the 5th edition this fall (which took about three years for that to happen... video games' version of Chinese Democracy) I asked for it for Christmas and got it. It is a pretty cool game in lots of aspects. But for the amount of time that it took to be released, it is so not worth it in anything I've found yet. But what do I know, I spend most of my time buying Corvette's and Camaro's... not really the concept of the game.

I feel old.

Having used a BlackBerry in the past and since I use an iPhone now, I can safely say what kind of phone I want next. An iBerry. Take what I like best from both phones and put them together, because both of them do/don't do things that I want them to. Either that, or the Motorola Droid becomes available for AT&T like the iPhone has for Verizon.

And now we come to my most lengthy thought. Or rather rant.

I hate college. College is, for the most part, an overrated experience (for me anyway). I could live with going through with it before I got a job. But my whole view of it has changed dramatically since then. I think we look too highly at degrees these days. Sure, that Bachelor's or Master's Degree looks nice hanging on the wall, but does it really make you more qualified than a person who never went to college? In some areas yes, it does matter. But in others, it doesn't. I see a lot of people who are fantastically book smart but couldn't be more dumb and unqualified for a job than somebody who has common sense. The sad part is that generally the person who has the degree gets chosen over the one who doesn't. Having worked in a restaurant for the better part of the last two years, I see it all the time. I've had really good managers who work tirelessly for the good of the restaurant get passed up by more unqualified people for promotions simply because they don't hold a Bachelor's Degree. It's not really a fair way of doing it, but that's just how it is.

Which brings this rant back to me. I earned my Associates Degree last spring. If A) I knew what I wanted to do in my life and B) I thought I could make the type of living that I want without a Bachelor's Degree, there is no way in hell I would have continued my education. I am so sick of school. Granted, in ten years I will probably miss it but for now I would love to be out of it. But I couldn't convince myself that I'd be fine without holding a Bachelor's Degree. I like working in a restaurant. If you pay attention you'll learn a lot about business and especially people. But I don't want to be serving people all my life. I see too many people making it their livelihood, and you know that's fine with me they can lead their own life how they please. But that's not me. I don't want my life to depend on how graciously or crappily people want to tip me every week. The only way I would willingly stay in the restaurant business is if I could climb the promotion ladder, which to the level I would want to go almost always requires a Bachelor's Degree (at least).

So, I'm stuck in the cycle of school for one (God willing) more year. If it lasts much longer than that I may shoot myself. And don't get me wrong, I like my life for the most part and I have nothing to really complain I like being at a big university with a proud tradition. I like having to walk through thousands of people during passing period every day. I think its pretty neat. And for the most part its nice living on my own, although there are downsides to it (I hate cleaning... I also hate cooking. Well not hate, but my own shortcomings at it and my general pickiness with food leads to lots of meals consisting of lunch meat, pasta, canned ravioli, Mac & Cheese, and ramon noodles. And that's if I don't get something out instead [or just not eat altogether]. Little Caesar's has good pizza and for only $5. I can make that last two or three meals, which brings the cost down further). But I'd gladly give it all up if I didn't have to go to school anymore.

Anyways, I'd like to close by saying I'll post more often but knowing what will probably happen I'll just say cya next year!

2010-01-06T02:03:00.005-06:00

So I figured that since it is has been just about a year since I last blogged that perhaps maybe I should post something. I've never really gotten into blogging like I thought that I would when I first created this blog three years and some months ago (think it is three months). I suppose its just a sign of what is big and popular these days. So anyway, I've had some interesting things occur in the last year and thought I would share some of them.

First of all, I have a job now. I work at Olive Garden as a busser. My best friend tried for months to get me to apply there and finally succeeded in getting me to do so. I wasn't sure if I would like it but I have loved it for the most part. I have a lot of physical work that I have to do but it keeps me in pretty good shape. And it gives me something to do rather than sitting around the house doing nothing (since I'm such a good student that always studies or does homework...).

Second, I got to visit a lot of cool places this past year. My church had a group that went to Washington D.C. and New York City among other places during our one week trip. I got to tour the White House, Pentagon, and the US Capitol while in D.C. I'll tell you something about the White House that I didn't quite realize from looking at it on TV... it looks old. Seriously... especially when compared to the Capitol. That is one beautiful building. Out of all the tours I was most disappointed in that one because we weren't able to see the House or Senate floors, which ticked me off because they weren't even in session so it wasn't like we were going to disturb them from their "work." The Pentagon was the most interesting of the three tours. We got to walk where the plane crashed into it on 9/11 and look at names of the people who died. During our stay there, we also got to tour the National Cathedral, which was seriously messed up. It is such a beautiful building but totally weird at the same time. They have a sculpture of Darth Vader at the top of one of the towers. No joke. In addition, we saw almost all the Memorials, a couple Smithsonian museums, and got to walk through Arlington National Cemetery and see the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

NYC was completely different from DC. It was cool, but wayyy too compact for my liking. The best thing about our stay there was the harbor cruise we took of the city and getting to go to Times Square at midnight. That was pretty sweet. On the way home we visited the Hershey's Chocolate Factory too. I did forget to mention that on the way out to DC we toured the Air Force Museum (which was 10X better than the Smithsonian's in DC) and a three hour tour of the battlefield of Gettysburg, which was very interesting.

Later in the summer I also was able to visit Chicago for the first time in years. I got to see a Blue Man Group concert which was awesome and then the next day went shopping in a big mall by the John Hancock building (believe its called the Water Tower). I wish I had been able to go to Six Flags while I was up there but I didn't have the time. I did get to go to the Six Flags in STL though in June and that was an absolute blast. Me, my aforementioned best friend, her brother, and one of her workmates went and it was absolutely dead that day. We once rode the Boss three times in a row (I think we rode it a grand total of six times that day).

The highlight of amusement parks came in early October though. I finally made it to the mecca of theme parks: Cedar Point. It was amazing. It was cold out that day but I think that helped keep the crowds lower than they might have been since it was Columbus Day weekend. Anyways, I got to ride some of the best roller coasters ever built. Millennium Force was a blast but Top Thrill Dragster... what a ride. 0-120 in 3 seconds and your heart is in your throat the entire time. I got to ride it twice... the second time at night, which was cool. Anyways, I was able to ride every coaster there at least once (most of them only once actually haha) and I bought a hoody to commemorate that I was there at least once.

I could comment about the political landscape that we have been watching for the last year now but that would make this post way too long. Plus it'll give me a reason to post again sometime in the near future.

I should be doing my history quiz

2009-01-22T23:38:00.002-06:00

but I've found myself in a posting mood. And it'll only take me about five minutes to complete so I guess I'll make another post or two. I could probably find enough material to make ten posts about the new administration or things related to it but before I do another political post, I want to do something more lighthearted. I'm not a big fan of stand up comedy, but one of my favorite comedians would have to be Jonathan Winters. He has done some of the funniest stuff over the years and he might be my all time favorite comic. I don't really have much to say about him; I thought I'd let the videos do that.

Thoughts on the inauguration

2009-01-22T15:02:00.003-06:00

I've given myself a couple days to process everything that happened in the inauguration even though I didn't watch one single minute of it. Even though I'm taking a political science class this semester (and my professor, who is a legend at my college, has met Obama personally) I decided I wasn't watching it a month or so ago. I also had a history class at that time so I didn't see the Lord Messiah inaugurated. Oh, but I've read about it... and seen it. This inauguration was full of flubs from the start. I guess we should've foreseen what was coming when Dianne Feinstein introduced Chief Justice John Roberts to administer of the oaf of office. And while I respect Chief Justice Roberts, he did mess up on the oath. However, Obama flubbed it just as bad as Roberts did. I just knew after I saw the oath on youtube that the media was going to make excuses for this and by jove! it didn't take long for them to start!! The excuse going around is that Obama had the oath memorized (which he well should have) but when Roberts screwed up Obama was waiting for him to correct himself. Nuh uh. Sorry. It didn't work that way. Obama started to repeat what Roberts said but faltered about halfway through. I guarantee you that if that had been George W. Bush instead of Obama they'd be all over him today. Bush is an incompetent idiot!!... This is our President?!? What a disgrace to the office he is... and other stuff like that. But enough on the oath, lets move on to the Messiah's speech. I didn't really hear anything but pure drivel in his speech... the crowd was lost. I mean, I was just listening to it and they didn't know what to do. And then we have the poem. That poem was just... sad in every since of the word. Is this what poetry has come to? No wonder there aren't many famous poets anymore. And to top it all off, was that really a prayer that Rev. Lowry delivered? I'm sorry, maybe its just me, but anything that has we ask You to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around; when yellow will be mellow; when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white would embrace what is right in a prayer is not a real prayer in my book. Prayer isn't meant to be funny.

I find it highly disrespectful that the crowd there A) booed George Bush and B) sang "Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey hey, goodbye!" That is just infuriating to me. I don't like Obama, I never probably will, but I still respect the office he holds and I would not disgrace him in that way. My church is going to Washington next summer and if we would happen to be lucky enough to take a tour of the White House and if we happened to see Obama then I would still consider it an honor. Anyway, you may love him or you may hate him, but Bush held the toughest job for eight years to criticism that would strain a Vulcan's emotionless state. The media's portrayal of him has been classless and what those people did there were just as bad. I got on facebook after getting home from school earlier and I found a rare thing: a group thanking President Bush for what he did (for those who aren't familiar with facebook, a group is something that anybody with a facebook account can create and other people can join. And for an idea of what most George Bush groups are like, most are terribly disrespectful... ie George Bush is a f*****g idiot or something along those lines). I quickly joined and wrote on a comment thanking him for keeping us safe. I don't agree with everything the man did, but I respect him for the way he handled his job and his dedication to it. I've heard that he wants to write a book and I hope he does it soon because I'd love to read something from his point of view rather than the twisted, perverted view that the media gave (and will continue to give) us. If I had the opportunity to meet him someday then I would definitely make an attempt to.

We are now mere hours away...

2009-01-20T00:03:00.005-06:00

from the Lord Messiah's crowning in Washington D.C. No, he will not simply be inaugurated President, he will be crowned as Emperor. Now, before you start to lecture me about how the United States is a democracy and on top of that not an empire (though some people argue that we are), let me explain. The term Emperor is a tongue in cheek reference to Obama's and the Democrat's ideas during the next few years. According to Dictionary.com, Emperor means "the male sovereign or supreme ruler of an empire." These two forces, combined together, are going to lead this nation into a deeper mess than its in now. For starters, Obama is going to start TRILLION dollar deficits next year. We're probably going to be getting national healthcare, higher taxes for another two examples. Add on the fact that we're going to bailout everything from car companies to the porn industry and its whoa... whatever happened to JFK's idea of "its not what the country can do for you, its what you can do for the country"??

Lets take the car companies as an example. Ever since the government started regulating cars the American companies have continually lost to the foreign market, particularly Japan. I have to hand it to them, they know how to make good cars that meet the stupid environmental standards in place. But if you take all the crappy regulations out of the way, who do you think wins there? I don't have the link at the moment, but there is proof that American cars outsell the Japanese cars in unregulated places (China is surprisingly one place). Another problem with the American companies is something called a labor union. Now don't get me wrong, labor unions have allowed the worker to not be cheated by the company. But you see, there is the problem. Because nobody is perfect and everyone is greedy, both sides can't get what they want. Hence you create the situation where either the company is able to make more money but the worker isn't necessarily being compensated for his work... or where the labor union has gotten too much power over the company, leading to the company not being able to make money. This is preciously why the American car companies (GM in particular) are going bankrupt... the UWA has wayy too much power. GM is currently paying far more people for simple retirement/healthcare than they are for people who are working (and this number is growing because these people are retiring in their 50's and often living twenty-thirty years this way). If you add in the fact that they also are paying over $10 more an hour for their workers than Toyota and it doesn't matter how many cars they sell, they'll never make a profit. I'm sorry to say this because I am a GM fan and I love Chevy to death but in order to fix this they A) need to go belly up or B) allow someone OTHER THAN THE GOVERNMENT to take control of them. Government intervention into the private sector is a failure every time.

Speaking of labor unions, why do you think all our jobs are being outsourced to other countries? Because the companies can get people to work for them cheaper than they can here because of the absence of a labor union or one that doesn't have much power. Labor unions in this country have too much power. One of FDR's attempts to get us out of the Great Depression was to give the labor unions more power. Nothing like telling a struggling company "here you have to pay each worker more now because we passed a law allowing labor unions to gain the upper hand over you." I'm sure that really helped create new jobs for everyone. And not to get on a rant, but FDR is given way too much credit for getting us out of the Great Depression. He threw almost everything but the kitchen sink at it, but we never really got out of it until we got involved in WWII. FDR is really one of the luckiest Presidents to have been President of our country... his Presidency had been pretty much a failure until WWII. But rather everybody remembers him as this great figure in history that saved us in our darkest hour (and don't get me wrong, he was a good wartime President and he did lead us through that dark tunnel... but not the Great Depression). Lets examine a few things about his Presidency. He introduced deficit spending, introduced us to socialism, gave us the idea that government will provide for you rather than yourself...

Hmm... does any of that sound familiar? This is exactly what Obama and company is going to do. Its amazing how much history repeats itself. Its one of the fascinating things about humans... even if we remember our past mistakes, we still make them over and over again (doesn't quite fit the old adage that we've all learned... that if we don't remember history then we're doomed to repeat it). There is almost nothing standing in the way of Obama and friends from doing whatever they want other than themselves bickering about it (which will happen at some point... they are sorta already doing it). But you're probably thinking that the Republicans can filibuster since the Democrats didn't get 60 seats right? Wrong. It won't happen and I'll tell you why. One, the Republicans are too wimpy to do something like a filibuster. Two, the Democrats don't need 60 seats to get the legislature they want passed... there are a lot of Republican moderates (paging John McCain, paging Lindsey Graham, you're wanted at the White House) that will vote with the Democratic policies. Stupid fools.

And so I return to my original point of the Messiah being crowned Emperor. All of this is why the Lord Barack will be for all intensive purposes an Emperor if all this happens. All the freedoms that we hopefully still hold near and dear to our heart are in danger. If he succeeds, then say goodnight to the US you once knew. The only thing conservatives like me can hope and pray for is that either he gets hit in the head tomorrow and forgets that he's a liberal (not likely) or that his Presidency is a complete failure. Which very well could happen. You wouldn't hear about it in the mainstream press because he has them in his back pocket, but it would still be there. The problem will be whether enough people see it themselves.

Vinyl records rock

2009-01-08T01:38:00.003-06:00

For anyone who has heard a vinyl record and then heard the same song/album on CD or an MP3, its obvious that vinyl is the superior source of audio quality. As someone who was born when the CD was almost a decade old, I obviously did not grow up with records. The first time I heard a Beatles record on my stereo that we have floored me... I couldn't believe how good it sounded (and that was with only one speaker working). My dad managed to unearth his collection of old records a few years ago, which mainly consists of classic rock. My favorite albums to play have been the Led Zeppelin albums... they just sound so awesome and their sound isn't affected as much as the Beatles records are with only one speaker. I have loved this stereo that we but the turntable is about all its good for... we can get two AM stations and one FM station (which is usually modern hip-hop). It stinks because I'd love to listen to the radio on it but I haven't ever been able to (other than the occasional Cardinal game)

Well, recently we added to our collection another stereo cabinet thats been in my mom's family for maybe fifty years. This stereo has the exact opposite problem of the stereo we use now... the turntable doesn't work while the radio does. Well, I have a friend at my church who's dad loves to tinker around with old electronics and cars. He's done work on the turntable we have now and also my grandparents turntable. So I asked him if he could get the tuner out of the one we recently acquired and drop it in the cabinet we use now. It turned out that this would've proved to be too difficult so instead he took the stereo my mom's family has had and has been working on it the last month or so. He found a new turntable that was just perfect to drop in there and put new speakers in. Unfortunately, as he was finishing up in it, the radio tuner blew out. So he began to look for another one and he found a different one to put in there a couple weeks ago. And now, as an added bonus, he's looking for a CD player to put in there so that we can listen to CD's as well. I'm really excited about getting it. As it turns out, the cabinet will match the wood in our house better than our current one anyway. Unfortunately, it means that the one we use now won't have much use other than as a space hog so we'll probably have to give it away. But before we do, I'm going to take the record player from it out because its unique... it runs fast, creating a higher pitch and faster play. I may never find anything to put it in, but I want to keep it anyway because I share a connection with it... its electrocuted me at least three times (rim shot). Yeah, yeah, bad joke I know but I like bad jokes/puns/wordplay.

Anyway, before we get this "new" beast of a stereo back, I decided to record some videos of a few Zeppelin songs that I enjoy. Its amazing how high Robert Plant sang in his prime but with the pitch being a half step higher on this record player it really brings it out... take a listen to a couple. And keep in mind that you are hearing the audio from pretty much just one speaker.

I'm guessing that after viewing these videos it will be pretty obvious which Zeppelin album is my favorite lol.

Your tax dollars at work (Most likely)

2009-01-08T00:58:00.003-06:00

Yesterday, we had three former presidents, our current president, and our about-to-be president gathering together for a lunch. Three Democrats and two Republicans (who happen to be father and son). Who knows why, but it was Obama's idea for them to have a get-together before Bush left the White House. This is such a waste of money and food. What is the purpose of having five presidents meet? Discuss political agendas? Yeah right. Carter probably went so he could show off the Nobel Peace Prize he didn't earn and also earn some time in the press, the first Bush went because his buddy Bill was there, Clinton went probably to see if he could get anything more out of Obama besides his wife's appointment as Sec. of State, and Obama probably only suggested this to so he could discuss with the elder Bush about the kinks in his golf swing but invited everyone else to "be polite." Now, of course I am only kidding, but the reality of the situation is that the whole lunch couldn't have been that far from my joke. Its only too bad that they didn't have Ronald Reagan there, his sense of humor would've made the lunch at least half worthwhile.

Today

2008-11-07T17:52:00.002-06:00

is my dad's birthday. Go wish him a happy birthday! Happy birthday Dad!

Sing along!

The best commercials ever

2008-10-16T00:59:00.002-05:00

I have the proper thing to watch when I need a lot of laughs. I turn back the clock to anywhere from 1997-1999 when the greatest commercials in TV history were airing. Yes folks, I'm talking about the old Budweiser commercials with the frogs, the lizards, and the ferret. These were the funniest commercials of all time bar none. They should've kept these commercials because even as a little kid I liked them even though I didn't necessarily understand what they were talking about. Louie rocked!!!

this video is missing a couple videos here and there, but overall it has the best clips I think.

I was browsing the web the other day...

2008-10-15T23:54:00.003-05:00

and on one of my favorite sites (a huge Star Wars forum) I saw a thread on the "any subject other than Star Wars" forum about an Obama channel. I laughed as I thought the people were referring to ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN. I unfortunately discovered this afternoon that there is indeed an Obama channel. Well, ain't that just dandy. A channel featuring nothing but Obama's empty words. I was able to stand about fifteen seconds of it before going berserk and flipping it over to an episode Frasier that was airing.

I'll be the first one to tell you that I didn't watch any of the Presidential debates or the Vice President debate. I held no interest in hearing minor barbs being traded for a short time and then the two meet and act like old friends... and this holds especially true for the Presidential debates. I actually held some interest in the Palin/Biden debate but I didn't get to watch it. I think the "polls" have said McCain won each one (I know definitely the latter two)... but he could've blown Obama out of the water if he had really pulled off the gloves. I'd like to think of myself as a half of optimism and half of pessimism most of the time, and its no different here. Half of me is thinking there is no chance that Obama will win and the other half thinks he will. McCain needs to really go through the last couple weeks leading up to the election with a fire and poise with a willingness to attack Obama and other liberal Democrats in Congress. He did fire some bullets at them last week at a rally when one of his supporters showed his anger at this situation that many people feel... but this isn't enough!! He's got to keep this up. He definitely will not win the election if he doesn't do this.

One of the things McCain needs to be rebuking Obama for until he is blue in the face is for Obama's comments to a plumber the other day. I'm going to embed this video because people need to watch this.
So remember that. Obama wants us to be successful but only to a point... you know, to keep it fair for everyone else. This reminds me of that story about the kid a couple months who was so good for his age at pitching that they got him banned because "it wasn't fair" to the other kids. Jeez.....

At this point, I think we all could use some humor. Well, when you think about it, while it may be humorous it is sure sad. For this, we need to turn to Joe Biden. He's had many gaffes over the last couple months and here are two of them.

And if that wasn't sad/funny enough, get a load of what he said about the Great Depression.

I don't have anymore I can say at this moment about these last three videos.

The RNC

2008-09-05T10:47:00.000-05:00

So I'm at school on one of the library computers and I'm inbetween classes. I could do my math homework which I haven't done since I didn't get my activity back until today but instead I'm here writing about the RNC. I haven't been watching it much but I did watch McCain and his VP choice Sarah Palin speak. And since I haven't blogged in awhile, let's do some updating.

A few months ago I said I couldn't vote for McCain. Well, that was a few months ago. A few months ago I didn't realize just how stupid Obama was. We cannot afford to have this guy in the White House for four years with a Democrat controlled Congress. It spells for a disaster that our country might never recover from. McCain has also shown that he is willing to be conservative by keeping the taxes low, drilling for more oil, building new nuclear power plants, and fighting terrorists overseas. He also shored up getting my vote by nominating the governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. This was a BRILLIANT move on his part. He chose a woman, but this is not just a woman. This is a woman that believes in values that conservaties do.

I thought Palin's speak Wednesday night was superb. Her speech had the right mix of everything in it. What's even better is that the teleprompter she was reading off of was screwed up. The guy running it forgot to stop it when the crowd applauded (something they did a lot). So by about halfway through her speech, it was way ahead of her. So she did the rest by memory (the same thing happened to Rudy earlier as well). Contrast Obama, who stumbled his way through his speech was lots of "uh's" and "um's" until they fixed his teleprompter.

McCain's speech was a little bit of a downer for me; but it was going to be hard to follow Palin's speech from the night before. The thing that I hated about the speech was at the beginning (and Rush said he really hoped that McCain wouldn't do this yesterday) where he was talking about respecting Senator Obama, etc. I really could have done without that. That's not what I want to hear for your acceptance speech. Say that after the election if you want. Just not then and there. Thankfully, he didn't stay on that long and began to show the differences between the two. His rhythm seemed a little messed up at times because of the crowd's applause but overall I think it was pretty good. The one thing I am concerned about however, is that Palin will do a better job of conveying the conservative message than McCain will. I hope that will not happen, but regardless of this election's outcome, Palin quite possibly has a future in Washington and I don't mean as a VP or in Congress...

My blood pressure is probably off the charts now...

2008-07-16T01:03:00.004-05:00

I heard some soundbites on Rush's show today from President Bush discussing oil and such. He made the reporters look absolutely stupid with their questions (why can't Republicans do this more often?). One of them asked of he was going to call for conservation and he said that's for us to decide as we're the ones paying for the gas. Its really refreshing to hear this. I hate hearing about how we need to conserve here, conserve there, blah blah blah. Screw you!! I can figure out on my own whether I need to be more frugal with my driving or whether I'll use the A/C or not (and I haven't yet this summer).

This whole thing with oil really frosts me. I was tired when I started this post but now I'm ticked off. I swear, maybe more people today have had more schooling than people had a few generations ago but most people today have no common sense whatsoever. How else do you explain a caller like at the end of Rush's show today who asked why the oil companies were asking for more land to drill on even though they already had 68 million acres. I cannot understand how people with the educations that they have received in our country can be so utterly... stupid. I don't use profanity but my goodness I'm almost at that point now. Anyway, to get back on the point of oil, the problem we have is all these environmental groups and leftists out there trying to protect the precious environment. The arguments that they make are stupid but the sad part of it is that people BUY IT!! The price of oil went back up over the weekend and today here the price went back over 4 bucks but I found on Drudge an interesting piece about how the price of oil dropped ten bucks after the President's speech. So that shows that part of the price is due to pure speculation but the problem is that it isn't just merely speculation by itself... we have a real oil problem with with India and China. They have growing economies and they're using more oil than ever before. Meanwhile our refineries can only produce so much (and if anything some of them aren't producing as much as they used to) and we're not being allowed to drill for more oil. Check that, we aren't allowed to drill for more oil and we aren't allowed to build more nuclear or coal power plants.

The solutions are so clear and so far McCain has recognized this and jumped on the drill here, drill now bandwagon. Meanwhile, we have Obama who doesn't get it (as usual) and I think recent polls have shown the gap between the two close. I rarely disagree with Rush on political issues and as usual he's been spot on lately saying that this issue is a gold mine for Republicans. If they'd only point out that they'd been blocked by the Democrats every time they or President Bush tried to push for drilling.... unfortunately its just wishful thinking because todays Republicans are (for the most part) wimpy and afraid to be conservative. This is why they lost control of Congress in '06 and why they'll continue to lose more seats this November. And they'll stay in the minority until they stop this kind of thinking.

Back to oil again. So I seem to recall that one Bill Clinton vetoed a certain bill eleven years ago that would've enabled us to drill in ANWR. Can you imagine what we'd be paying now if Clinton hadn't done this? Speaking of ANWR, one of the things heard so often from liberals is that even if we drill there it won't help our problem. Well, let me ask you something.... how in God's green earth would it not help us? Even if it was only a little (and it would be more than a little by the way) wouldn't a little be better than nothing?? You have to start SOMEWHERE. Between ANWR, off-shore drilling, more nuclear power plants, and drilling in the lower 48 it would go a long way towards lowering the price of oil and reducing our own dependence on foreign oil. And yes it will take a little time but there is a phrase I've heard before. It goes something like this...

The Pyramids weren't built in a day

This is rarely reported, but every time I hear we need to develop alternative fuels I get to thinking about something. Developing alternative fuels available to the mass public will take far, far LONGER than putting some holes in the ground and using what comes up. And this is what I'm talking about when I say people don't have common sense anymore. If people would think a little instead of just believing every single thing that they hear, see, or read then all this stuff would be so obvious.

I have one other point to get across here. We are always hearing about how bad the economy is right? Nobody has a job, nobody has any money, can't pay for gas/food/housing, etc etc. Well drilling for oil, building new power plants, and other things like that would help stimulate this economy and create new jobs for everyone. Is this stuff really so hard for people to get? I haven't taken an Economics class and yet I know this.

Just a suggestion to you all

2008-07-11T16:34:00.002-05:00

If you ever go to Wisconsin Dells, do not plan part of your vacation around downtown. Stick to the water/theme parks. Most of the stores stink and are very pricey. Why am I telling you this? Well, my youth group just took a trip up there on Tuesday/Wednesday. Tuesday we went to Noah's Ark, which was a lot of fun. They have a lot of neat water rides there but my favorite was one called 'The Point of No Return'. Its a high speed water slide ten stories tall and you get to the bottom roughly around 3 1/2 seconds (depending on your weight). Here's a picture of the ride from a side angle.

Looks pretty awesome huh? Well it is let me tell you. I didn't want to go on it at first but I changed my mind and said I'd go on it later in the day. That was a bad decision on my part because I was only able to do it one time... as the last ride I went on. There are various signs the whole way to the top designed to rattle you and make you extremely nervous (like: At this point you're still confident or At this point you are ignoring the screams). I surprisingly didn't get that nervous because I was so focused on getting to go down this super slide before they made us get out of the water (it was thundering, drizzling, dark, very windy, and the temp had cooled off to the low 70's). I made it just in time... about five minutes after I did it they sounded the "get out of the water" siren, which was, of course, followed by the sun coming out. There was another memorable ride there called 'Time Warp' where you and two or three others sat in a raft and went down a tube in darkness. After a pretty good drop for a water ride you go in circles for about half a minute before exiting into daylight and the end of the ride. The people who did this before my friends were extremely unfortunate because their raft popped and they were stuck in the circular part of the ride. They did get them out but it freaked out a couple of my friends.

So anyway, the next day was very disappointing in that the stores stunk. All way overpriced and most of the stuff wasn't worth getting anyway. The description that I heard about downtown Wisconsin Dells was very deceiving to say the least. The best store that I thought we visited was a book store... and the prices were actually reasonable. They had a Ripley's Believe It or Not but it was about fifteen bucks to get in that so virtually nobody did that. I was starting to think that we should've gone to the water park again. The day had started off promising though because we rode an Army Duck that was used in WWII. These vehicles were made for both land and water and were very useful in the war. The scenery was great and the guy driving had a great sense of humor. He first asked us how many of us were riding on a Duck for the first time and when he saw that 3/4's of us hadn't done it he added "Well good, me too." When we got on the water we went by some rock that looked like a grand piano that had fallen off the cliff. He said the only music it still played was hard rock. Really bad I know but I couldn't help but laugh at it. After that though things when downhill because downtown was a bust. We hung out there for over three hours and it wasn't very enjoyable but I was still with my friends so it wasn't all bad. So just remember, if you visit up there, stick to the water parks and don't plan your whole day around shopping in the downtown area.

Pardon the Interruption...

2008-06-06T14:21:00.002-05:00

but I love this show. I remember when it first aired years ago and I enjoyed it even then, although I didn't like it as much as I do now. Kornheiser is awesome, the show never seems to be as good when he's not on. I'd love to listen to his radio show; I bet it would be really entertaining. I looked up his radio show on wikipedia and discovered some interesting things. One of his "rules" is that callers do not ask him how he's doing when they are put on the air... it reminds me of how Jim Rome doesn't allow callers to introduce themselves after Rome just previously did. Speaking of Rome, apparently the two have a bit of a feud, or used to have one. Before the turn of the century, Kornheiser's show was moved to a midmorning/early afternoon time slot in I think DC. This reduced Rome's show down to two hours there, which infuriated Rome (who doesn't appreciate it when radio stations don't carry all three hours). He voiced his displeasure loud and clear, to which Kornheiser responded by having a "Snackdown" (a parody of Rome's Smackdown). He also mocked Rome by impersonating some of Rome's phrases. I don't know if they ever became "cool" with each other but I found that interesting.

Anyway, back to PTI. I found some videos on youtube and thought I'd post them:

This was painful for me to watch. Now I'll admit, not many things on tv or in movies make me wince but that girl falling flat on the ice like that was almost too much for me. Tony's reaction was great though. OHH!!!! OHH!!

This has to be by far the worst Odds Makers ever!! LeBetard and Adande do a terrible job here... its so bad its funny. I loved Adande's comment at the end about his win in Odds Makers that he wanted it added to his win total on Around the Horn.

almost anything with Joe Buck is going to be funny, and this definitely was. I remember watching this last fall and it was hilarious.

And finally, what would we do without a BAM! video from LeBetard?

My music playlist

2008-05-19T11:36:00.002-05:00

After seeing my dad post about his playlist I decided to do something like it myself. My list is by far longer than his and is almost exclusively classic rock. I have 100 songs on mine (the max # you can have) and I thought I would write out how many songs each group/artist has on the playlist. I've never really kept track so it'll be interesting for me to see what group has the most songs.

Guns N Roses - six

The Rolling Stones, Queen, Van Halen - each have five

The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, Iron Maiden - all have four

Velvet Revolver, Jimi Hendrix, The Beach Boys, The Who - all have three

Pink Floyd, Boston, Deep Purple, Quiet Riot, Elvis, My Chemical Romance - all have two

Tom Petty, Pat Benetar, Foghat, The Killers, Elton John, Ratt, The White Stripes, KISS, Ronny and the Daytonas, Kansas, Great White, .38 Special, The Scorpions, The Kinks, Judas Priest, Cheap Trick, Ozzy, Aerosmith, Journey, Alice Cooper, Accept, Black Sabbath, Cream, Sammy Hagar, Billy Idol, The Hollies, Don McLean, The Eagles, Nirvana, Motley Crue, The Surfaris, Poison, The Guess Who, George Thorogood, George Harrison, The Monkees, The Mamas and the Papas, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Frasier (yes I have the Tossed Salad and Scrambled Eggs ditty in there haha) - all have one song

So there you have it... my entire playlist. Thoughts anyone?

We need more people like this

2008-05-07T22:50:00.002-05:00

A couple weeks ago Rush had Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (TX) on his program. I unfortunately wasn't listening to the program when she was on that day but I did get to read the transcript. It was spot on! This lady knows what she's talking about when it comes to our current oil situation. I would post the link to the article on Rush's website but they have a tendency to disable the link after a time so I'm going to paste the transcript. It's a little long but well worth the read.

RUSH: I'm really excited to have with us for a couple minutes here, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas, and I wish to speak to her about this ethanol problem because she's really on the case and has written an op-ed piece in Investor's Business Daily about this. Senator Hutchinson, welcome to the program. It's always nice to have you here and talk to you.

SEN. HUTCHISON: It is great to be with you, Rush. We are listeners in our family. We think you have done a great job for kind of changing the thought processes of America.

RUSH: I appreciate that.

SEN. HUTCHISON: It's great to talk to you.

RUSH: What's going on with this? Where are we headed with this? Why is it that you are one of the few voices in the elected government that's trying to stop the growth of ethanol, given the problems apparently related to it?

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, of course there are many interests that don't want to stop this ethanol mandate; and I think that the time has come for us to really, Rush, look at the things that we can do that might bring the cost of fuel and the cost of food and gasoline at the pump down. We can't do a lot, but one of the few things we could do is put a freeze on this ethanol mandate and just let's take a pause and not have this kind of requirement where we are on the one side subsidizing this product, but on the other side the price is so high that it's causing really a ripple effect throughout our food industry.

RUSH: And around the world.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Yes.

RUSH: I mean, even Prime Minister Brown is suggesting something similar to your idea, that it's just gotten out of hand. It's just typical. I'm sure people behind this, at some point -- I'll be gracious -- had good intentions, but the unintended consequences of this make it clearly a boondoggle. But there's some politics involved here. I remember talking about this, Senator, not long ago on the program; and I was besieged with phone calls from people in Iowa who said, "Rush, don't you know who votes for Republicans out here?" meaning agricultural people and this sort of thing. So that's a factor in this, too. Do you feel like you're taking any kind of a risk by proposing this?

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, yes. I mean, they're in a different system, and they're used to it, and we have to understand everybody's problems. But right now the price of corn is so high, farmers are doing great; and we don't need a mandate. The price will stay high, but it will just come down some, and it will also -- I mean, yeah, I think the market can work here. I think that farmers will continue to do well. But the emphasis on corn is now crowding out people who used to plant wheat. The emphasis on ethanol is also affecting soy and maize and palm oil. It's having unintended consequences. I think when we do something in Congress and it has an unintended consequence, our responsibility is to assess the situation. We're on the brink of recession. We're not technically there yet, thank goodness, but we need to assess where we can make a difference, and this is one area that would be relatively easy.

RUSH: Well, to us out here, it seems like a no-brainer. There are problems related with it. It's not the sole reason why transportation costs are up and fuel prices are up and food prices and scarcity are happening, but it's a contributing reason. Those of us out here who, you know, we don't understand the day-to-day workings of what goes on in these bodies such as the House and the Senate; it looks to us like it's not working. Stop it. It just isn't working. We've tried it. The intentions might have been honorable, but it isn't working, so we move on. But if we're not going to do that, it's going to keep wreaking this damage -- and you're right, it has ripple and residual, ancillary effects throughout the culture.

SEN. HUTCHISON: I met with a group of people who process chickens -- Pilgrim's Pride, Anderson Farms, Tyson -- and they are shutting down parts of their plants, their operations. They are all going to report drastically reduced, not just profits, I mean losses. They're going to have big losses at the end of this month. And they're just saying, they have got to have some relief. I sympathize with them. They're putting the food on the table for us, and I've talked to cattle producers. I've talked to pig producers. They are all saying the same thing: The cost of food and the cost of fuel, is just killing their ability to continue to operate. So I think it's going to get worse, and I'd like to try to do something that might mitigate this and not cause the crisis.

RUSH: But this is just one element. I know the agriculture community likes this. It's something very profitable for them. But at the root of this you find liberalism. You find the environmental movement. This is all part of global warming; this is all part of reducing carbon emissions, reducing dependence on oil and so forth; and none of that is possible. Yet we go down this road because people want their lives to have meaning, and so they buy ethanol thinking they're saving the planet and so forth. It's a devious scheme that we're up against. This food price, this is serious, Senator. I remember the first time I learned when I was a young boy that the profit margin in grocery stores, on food -- not the ancillary things they sell, but the profit margin on food -- was one to one and a half percent. I asked my dad, "How can they survive?" He said, "Son, people have to eat. Food is not a commodity. It's not something that you can mess around with price-wise like you can other things, like electronics or televisions or whatever."

SEN. HUTCHISON: Right.

RUSH: Everybody has to eat. So it has to be affordable for people from all economic ranges, and it's not now. I mean people are reorienting the way they live based on the price of gasoline, and the price of milk and rice and so forth. This is going to have devastating consequences if the problems here that cause this are not really addressed, and that's why I hope you succeed. Your column is very courageous.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it. I have gotten the same kinds of calls that you have, but it's just, something that we've got to say, "Look, we did have good intentions, but now we have a lot of other alternative fuels." What we need to do is drill for our own natural resources.

RUSH: Amen!

SEN. HUTCHISON: We need to go into ANWR.

RUSH: Amen.

SEN. HUTCHISON: We need to go into the Outer Continental Shelf where we have our own resources that can help us through this. We need to continue to do research into other forms of renewable energy. Besides solar and wind energy, we can also use waves and currents in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and Pacific. We've got so many alternatives that we need to pursue. We need more nuclear power plants. We need more refineries. These are things that honestly, Rush, the Democrats are stopping in Congress. Every time we put forward something that could really make a difference, the Democrats are stopping it.

RUSH: Why do you think that is, Senator?

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, I think they wrongly believe that it's going to hurt the environment to drill in ANWR.

RUSH: Yeah.

SEN. HUTCHISON: ANWR is an area the size of the state of South Carolina. The part that would be drilled is an area the size of JFK airport or Washington National Airport or Dallas Love Field. It's an area the size of an airport that would be drilled because the new technology allows us to drill underground for just hundreds of yards and you don't have to have a lot of wells to drill anymore. But they're not acknowledging that. The people of Alaska want this. They have had referenda. They want the jobs, they want the economic security, and they know it won't hurt the environment. Yet we cannot get a bill through Congress that would allow drilling in that small part of ANWR. These are the kinds of things that just don't make sense when the price of gasoline is so high.

RUSH: Ah, sadly, they do make sense if you understand Democrats. I know you do. We're talking, by the way, with Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas. Now, yesterday the president made a presentation on energy and said much of the same thing you just said here; and Senator Schumer from New York went out and responded to it and said, "If we started drilling in ANWR today we wouldn't have a drop of oil for ten years." Well, of course, Bill Clinton vetoed the first time this came up in 1994. We could have been at this four years according to his ten-year plan. He also said something that mathematically doesn't make sense. He said that this million barrels a day that ANWR would produce would reduce the price of gasoline or oil -- I forget which one he specified -- by a penny. Well, that's absurd, because when the price of oil... When we lose a million barrels in the supply, does the price only go up a penny? They're using scare tactics, here. We need resources. We need our oil, and you got Schumer out there saying, "No, it wouldn't matter," and they're misleading people thinking that there's a substitute for it right around the corner when there's not.

SEN. HUTCHISON: You're right. When President Clinton vetoed ANWR, we would have been producing. But I totally disagree and reject the argument that it would be ten years. We could start drilling in ANWR, and I think within a couple of years you would start seeing the results. But more important, if we were drilling there and people in the market, in OPEC -- if the people who are hedging in the market for futures in this oil industry. If we were drilling in ANWR -- do you think the price would stay up? No. People would know that there would be an availability. They would know that there was going to be a real difference in what we could produce. The one million barrels a day is the amount we import from Saudi Arabia every day. That's what we would be getting from our own resources and control it; and that doesn't count what we could do if we were drilling off the Atlantic and the Pacific, in environmental safe ways. That's the key. If we took control of our own destiny, we could become energy independent and self-sufficient and not depend on places that don't like us very much like Venezuela.

RUSH: All this makes so much sense that we out here don't understand why it isn't done. We understand the politics of liberalism and the Democrats trying to create as much chaos as they can for reelection purposes in November, but they consistently oppose this kind of independence; despite the fact they're the ones claiming and whining and moaning how dependent we are. But they're the ones that always stand in the way of becoming energy independent, and there has to be more to it than just their own desire for electability. I think it's a little bit more hideous than that. I know you wouldn't want to comment on that. But this is really serious stuff to all of us. The price of everything going up all based on the price of oil and energy. It's all related. There's an ideological group out there, the environmentalists, who are get... They're the only ones that are happy with this. They're getting everything they want out of this. Of course, the people they donate to and vote for are thus happy about it, too; and the country, in the meantime, suffers.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, Rush, if we would do this -- if the Democrats and if the people understand this issue enough to force them. If we could open refineries, make it easier to do so; open nuclear power plants, which is the cleanest form of energy at the best, most efficient prices that we could possibly produce it; and drill in ANWR, the Outer Continental Shelf and deep drilling in the Gulf Coast, we could be a country that doesn't have to rely on anyone else. I think we need to make this an issue in this election.

RUSH: I couldn't agree more.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Don't let the Democrats get by with saying, "Oh, it's just terrible that the price of gasoline is high, and it's the president's fault." It is not the president's fault. It's the Democrats in Congress who continue to keep us from drilling in ANWR. We had almost enough, 60 votes, to pass that last time. We were one vote short, couldn't get it, and so here we are again.

RUSH: Quick question, last one. I know you have to go. Senator Obama's running a campaign on "unity" and solving these kind of problems. Could he bring people together on this, Senator, to renew our effort to become energy independent?

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, I haven't seen any ideas yet from the Democrats that would actually make a difference in our energy independence. That's the key. It's walking the walk as well as talking the talk. We've got to have real action which could be done right now in Congress today. The Democrats are in control of both houses, and yet we can't even get free trade agreements with Colombia much less an open trade --

RUSH: Oh, that's dead, and that's just to protect the unions.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Well, it's just wrong. We've got to have action, and we could make a difference in our energy independence -- and we could certainly make a difference in price, because I think the price of oil would start falling when the other countries that produce oil see that we are taking our destiny in our control. I cannot leave before I say that I listen to you on WBAP when we're home in Dallas. So I hope that you keep running there so that all these messages get out.

RUSH: Thank you, Senator, very much. I appreciate that. It's nice to get so much time with you today. We really appreciate it.

SEN. HUTCHISON: Thank you, Rush. It's great to be with you.

RUSH: Same here. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas.

Prices here today went up to $3.79 a gallon, which is incredible but the stations looked about as busy as they usually are. I honestly don't like the price being that high but in order for anything to be done then it has to be this high and continue to climb... which it will. I can't believe how misinformed people are (well I can because the major networks are liberal biased and give misleading info most of the time... how often are the news anymore dedicated to positive stories?) on this whole thing... most people don't realize we import most of our oil from Canada for instance. Another thing that I don't think is reported is that most of the oil we use every day is for housing and stuff like that... not gasoline. If we were to build more nuclear/coal/hydrogen/solar/wind power plants then the prices would go down. There was a caller that talked to Rush a couple weeks ago that lives in New York. I don't remember all the details (and I haven't looked through the archives on his site) but he was telling Rush that they built a new nuclear power plant in NY and they followed all the ridiculous rules the environmentalist wacko's put in place and shortly after completing it the environmentalist wacko's made them destroy what they did and do things to the reactor so that it could never be used. And get this... they spent 1 BILLION dollars on the project and it was all completely wasted.

It's sad people are so misinformed on this. I am a fan of the show Car Talk on National Public Radio (the only time I bother listening to NPR) and the two brothers are very knowledgeable on cars and entertaining but they just don't get it. They believe in global warming and all that crap. Recently they made some for PBS about the "Car of the Future" and I saw it on YouTube. Because of YouTube limiting videos to being a max of ten minutes long there were about six or seven videos. I watched the first video and it was pure anti-oil, pro-global warming. And they used something called Scare Tactics in it... I know because it very briefly had me too until I realized what they were doing. It was full of dark images, "scary" facts, and one of those announcers with the voice that can give you goosebumps. I'm not going to post the link to it but if you wanna see it on YouTube type in Car of the Future or something and see if you find it.

I'm still saving for that Firebird or Camaro by the way. Even though I'm more of a Firebird fan because I like the looks of a Firebird better I would almost rather have a Camaro because it's a Chevy. Pontiac's are cool and everything but I don't like the direction they've taken in the last few years... that and my love for Chevy is too great. I don't know exactly when it happened because I used to not care (I did like Ford a little though) but when I was about ten my grandparents were looking for a new car and my Grandpa was looking at a Monte Carlo. This was right after they had gotten the new model and when I saw it I guess I fell head over heels for it. Also Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt (Sr was still alive at the time) both drove Chevys so I guess between those two factors my love for Chevy was born. And in the last few months I guess with me watching NASCAR every week and rooting for Chevy so hard that I guess I started wanting to own a Camaro more than a Firebird. Go figure huh?

Gimme back my son!!

2008-04-16T21:45:00.005-05:00

Anybody who is a fan of The Jim Rome Show will understand the title of this post. I decided to search for videos with Rome earlier and I found that some of his "clones" decided to use their membership privileges on his website and repost on YouTube. Some of thees sound clips are classic.

Before I post them, let me familiarize those who have never been fortunate enough to listen to Rome. He is a communications major who started a radio show around San Diego in the early 90's. In 1996 his show became syndicated and today is around the 20th most listened to talk show host in the country. The show is notable for its bumper music at the top/bottom of the hour. At the top of the hour the Iggy Pop song 'Lust for Life' is played. The song played at the bottom of the hour is the classic 'Welcome to the Jungle' by Guns N Roses, and fittingly the show is called "The Jungle."

The show is built around Rome's sarcastic sense of humor and his talk of "smack", which has resulted in him being given the nickname "Van Smack." As a result, many of the callers attempt this form of talk when Rome goes to the phones. This also results in callers making fun of the other callers on the air. Rome will "run" a caller if they are having trouble making their point or violate one of the "rules" he's laid out over the years. It usually results in the caller being ridiculed in some manner after the caller is run. As a result, listeners are not encouraged to call into the show until they are familiar with the format. Rome usually doesn't take as many calls as other talk shows do, saying that "more of me and less of you is better for the show." He usually reads quite a few emails during the show, and most of these are highly entertaining. After an especially entertaining take on something, Rome will often read emails that read Rome I had to pull over to keep from wrecking or Jim I just spit coffee all over my monitor. Interviews with athletes or other celebrities occur usually three times a day, once every hour.

Rome has also been on TV since the early 90's as well. In 1994 he gained notoriety when he had NFL QB Jim Everett on his show, Talk2. In the 1989 NFC Championship game against the 49ers Everett was hit/sacked by the 49er defense so often that on one occasion he hit the deck merely in anticipation of the rushing defense. He later commented that his confidence was never fully restored from this. Rome began to call him "Chris" Everett (referring to female tennis star Chris Everett) and one day Everett appeared on his show. This was the result.

After Talk2, Rome went on to host The FX Sports Show and The Last Word. In 2003 Rome returned to ESPN with Rome is Burning, which was on once a week for an hour. A couple minor changes were made in '04, but in 2005 Rome's show began airing five days a week for half an hour. Currently it airs at 3:30 CST.

So now that you know a little about Jim Rome, let me post some hilarious/famous "takes" he's had in the last couple years:

Rome talking about the (now) infamous comment by Miss Teen South Carolina plus a segment after that

Rome's take on the banning of the game tag

Warning: Jim Rome doesn't want to talk about sweatpants

One of the most famous calls in the shows history

Softball Guy

Why if you are over the age of 8 you shouldn't be wearing a costume for Halloween

Rome's impersonation of Hacksaw

Rome's take on cops and rioting

Alvin's mix, a mix of famous soundbites that have been collected over the years

Random musings

2008-04-15T13:53:00.006-05:00

This year's Presidential race is getting more and more ridiculous with every passing day. I do not want Obama in the White House. Hillary is bad enough but Obama is just....... creepy. He is really starting to show (thank God) his true-blue liberal agenda and thoughts. His wife is out there proclaiming government healthcare, his pastor (who is NOT really a true pastor) absolutely hates America and according to recent reports is a former Muslim, and Obama himself has totally thrown his grandmother under the bus with his comments about her.... ouch.

A few weeks ago, Obama all but appeared to have the nomination for the Democrats. Enter Rush Limbaugh, who is the 2nd greatest conservative political figure in the last thirty years (Ronald Reagan is 1st). Rush started "Operation Chaos", which was where he called on his listeners to vote for Hillary instead of Obama. Many people, as a result, did this and switched parties in order to vote on the Democratic ticket. This has led in the race between Clinton and Obama to tighten up considerably, while also succeeding in the two spending vast sums of money fighting each other instead of McCain. This has also led in the liberal media reporting in this huge increase in voters for the Democratic party. This is one of the most ingenious ideas I've heard of in recent memory and as a bonus is making Obama and Hillary, little by little, show their true socialist and liberal agendas.

I can't watch the Weather Channel anymore. I just can't. It makes me too mad. You can't watch it for five minutes without hearing something about Global Warming or "going green" (this is also another reason I don't watch the major news networks anymore). I'll be honest, I could care less with what the environment is like. It's so much cleaner than it was 35-40 years ago and we're still making strides on it without it being blown in our face every day. So I don't care. Global Warming is the biggest joke and lie we've had in our lifetime. There is not enough proof behind it to make it logical. I'll tell you what it's really about. It's about the government under the guise of "helping the Earth" taking YOURS and MY freedoms away. Nothing more. They want more control of our lives and this is a way for them to accomplish this. And even if the temperatures had risen well above normal, could somebody please tell me why this is bad? If the Ice Caps are melting then they are melting. They weren't always there you know. Greenland didn't get its name because of the snow/ice. It was once green. There's evidence of civilizations having lived there a thousand years ago or so when the Vikings were out and about. So you know what that means right? It means it was once far, far warmer on the earth than it is now.

This topic reminds me of what I want to mention next... gas prices. Getting really high aren't they? I have bad news for you... they're going to get higher. They're not going down. The demand is getting higher and higher with India and China gobbling up more and more oil every year. Like it or not, there is no denying the fact that we will have to drill for more oil someday. There is no way that we're getting off oil..... it would require us to go back to the horse and buggy. Ethanol is a dead-end that hasn't been realized yet. It's ruining the economic growth we were experiencing... it's making all the food prices go up and milk was already really high. It's sad too because for the most part all these farmers in the Midwest and people at the Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) Company all believe in Ethanol. It's really sickening that people are so easily fooled by this.

Today is Tax Day... so in honor of that day, I will close this post with a couple great guitar songs for everyone to enjoy about taxes and about money.

NCAA tourney picks

2008-03-18T17:44:00.001-05:00

I'm going to try to make this simple so I'll start at the Sweet Sixteen and work my way down to the national champions.

East:
1. North Carolina
2. Notre Dame
3. Louisville
4. Tennessee

Midwest:
5. Kansas
6. Clemson
7. Kansas State
8. Georgetown

South:
9. Memphis
10. Pittsburgh
11. Kentucky (yes I have them upsetting Stanford)
12. Texas

West:
13. UCLA
14. Drake (another upset over UConn)
15. Xavier
16. Duke

Elite Eight:

East/Midwest:
1. North Carolina
2. Tennessee
3. Clemson
4. Georgetown

South/West:
5. Memphis
6. Texas
7. UCLA
8. Duke

Final Four:

East/Midwest:
1. North Carolina
2. Georgetown

South/West:

1. Texas
2. UCLA

Championship game:

1. North Carolina
2. UCLA

National champions:

1. North Carolina

After going with Illinois three years ago over UNC this time I'm going to go with North Carolina as my national champions

I don't know what to name this post so you make up something

2008-03-13T19:42:00.002-05:00

Well, I guess the best place for me to start would be to say that the internet is finally running correctly. It was fixed a couple weeks ago and it seems that everything has been running fine since. From what I've gathered Comcast is upping the price for everything they offer.... internet, tv, phone. Glad we have Dish so we could watch the Big Ten Network... if I had really any desire to see the sorry Illini play this year. I don't understand why people think Weber's a great coach. He's not. His two best years were when he had Bill Self's recruits (Williams, Brown, Head, etc). After that, they've gone progressively downhill. Weber cannot recruit. He can't. And that reminds me... Illini fans need to get over the fact Eric Gordon didn't come to Illinois. So what he decided to go to Indiana... you were only going to get him one year anyway cause the only reason he's even in college this year is because of the NBA rule that players have to be one year removed from high school.

Staying with the topic of college basketball... I think the tourney is setting up to be a good one this year. I've missed filling out the brackets the last two years but when I was a freshman I had the best year I ever had with I think three of my four Final Four teams actually getting there and having Illinois vs. UNC in the title game.. I did have Illinois as the winner though so I messed up on that one. My grandparents, my dad, and myself all used to fill out brackets and see who the winner was. My Grandpa won that year with his choice of UNC as national champs but I did have the distinction of getting both of the last two teams correct. So this year it looks like there are about six or seven teams worthy of a #1 seed. I think North Carolina will be the #1 overall seed with two other seeds being UCLA and Memphis. The fourth #1 seed is somewhat up for grabs but I think Kansas will end up nabbing it.

This baseball year promises to be dandy in the AL East and the season is over three weeks from starting. Between George Steinbrenner's son mouthing off insults every chance he gets and Joe Girardi's pathetic complaints and also (alleged) actions in yesterday's Yanks/Rays game it's shaping up for a very interesting year. In the NL central, the obvious favorites are the Cubs (for some odd reason). It's been 100 years since the Cubbies won and a lot of fans think it would be great for them to win this year. No I don't think so. I think the Cards need to win a couple more championships first. I can honestly say however that I am NOT in favor of changing Wrigley Field's name. The place may be falling apart, but there is no way that the Cubs should play their home games at a park not named Wrigley Field until they finally decide to put the safety hazard out of it's misery and build a new stadium.

So continuing with the sports theme of this post I was very sorry/upset to hear Toyota won it's first race in NASCAR last week at Atlanta. I have nothing against Toyota (I think GM owns them in fact) but they are a foreign company. I don't care if they actually build the cars here and the Big Three don't that's not the point. They are a FOREIGN company... nothing has changed there. But alas! they are here now so I'll just have to get used to it. I'm still not completely sold on this new car but I like it more than I did before Daytona. The so-called Hendrick dominance has been non-existent through four races in terms of wins but they have had at least one car in the top five every week. Junior has gotten off to a great start with a top 10 and two top 5's and probably would have a third if he hadn't gotten screwed at California. Jimmie Johnson and Casey Mears have had some struggles this year and Gordon's DNFed two races so actually Junior's gotten off to the best start for Hendrick. Tony Stewert's complaints about the tires was probably warrented but taken a little too far. That said however, Goodyear needs to get a tire figured out for this car and they need to use different sets of tires for all three series. This new car is some 400 pounds heavier with less downforce than the old car. It's between 10-15 mph slower in the turns than the old car but still manages to attain over 200 mph like the old car. I love the FOX broadcasts but I get sick of all their praise for the car and also Kyle Busch as well. The car hasn't been all that bad but like I'm still not completely sold on it. I am really tired of hearing about Busch though. They give him more TV time than any other driver. I still like FOX broadcasts a lot but just lay back a little on Busch and the new car and I'll be fine.

And the ridiculous item of the day is....

2008-02-27T00:50:00.004-06:00

this incident that happened in Florida with the Nuclear power plant being shut down. I was at my grandparents eating lunch and they had the tv on FOX News. And my gosh they just kept going on and on about it like it was the most horrible thing ever. Oh yeah, 4 million without power in 70 degree weather is the all time worst disaster ever. I'd like to invite everyone that was down there up here next time we have an ice storm that knocks out power for a week in twenty degree weather. And yes, I did know that their was a tornado warning out. Does not having electricity prevent people from going to their basement/interior room? Sure wouldn't stop me. I'd be either outside looking for the tornado or in the basement. These people having their power out was unfortunate, don't get me wrong, but it's not the end of the world like FOX was preaching (or seemed to be). I don't know, maybe FOX just needed something else to talk about for a couple hours besides the Democratic debate that was going to be taking place.

Was anybody that watches NASCAR a little ticked with their decision making on Sunday? I'm a Junior (and then Gordon) fan and I was more than a little displeased that the way Denny Hamlin ran up the track to hit the wall wasn't evidence enough to the fact that they needed to take care of the "weeping" track. And if that wasn't bad enough, after they stopped racing because of the rain it took almost five hours for them to decide to postpone the race. I had been working on HW and was checking in from time to time and saw each time that they were still trying to get it in that night. Finally I thought they'd be going racing at 1 AM my time and that's when they decided to give up and postpone it. I'm sure that really set well with the fans that had probably been there twelve hours already and could've gone home seven hours earlier had NASCAR used a little more common sense.

So I'm still having trouble with the internet. I've about reached the end of my tether with this..... I cannot send emails on one address but can receive, I can't even get on my other address, and I have trouble with ESPN's website. I can do whatever I want on myspace long as I don't try to log in (kinda defeats the purpose of myspace though). Then I can't do anything. I want to call and give Comcast a piece of my mind but what can I say? I have some internet connection and so it won't matter to them.

When I'm really irked, nothing helps relieve tension more than by watching a good Looney Tunes cartoon (or say... twenty). I love Looney Tunes, grew up watching them. Seen most of them at least three times yet love them to pieces. I don't know what I would've done without Looney Tunes growing up. Road Runner/Wile E. Coyote cartoons were always my favorite followed by Bugs Bunny cartoons. I especially love it when Bugs and Daffy are together... Daffy thinks he just knows it all but Bugs gets him every time. Daffy learns too slow to catch on too. I think maybe my all time fav Bugs/Daffy cartoon is this one. And here's a Road Runner/Coyote one... I always loved that alternate intro's music (not that the one everybody has in their head isn't bad either)... I always knew it was a Road Runner cartoon then.

I hate math

2008-02-23T23:12:00.002-06:00

Simple enough statement don't you think? Over the course of my thus far almost six weeks taking intermediate algebra at college I have rediscovered my hatred for math. It doesn't help that my dad could run rings around my teacher, who is a nice lady but very, very different in her style of teaching. I didn't know what headaches were like until I started this class. I get one every day at some point now. If I can only survive ten more weeks!! Man I'll be celebrating that night.

Other complaints for the day is my internet. Our broadband internet company is in the process of changing all the cable tv/internet business over to Comcast Communications... and I'd like to be the first to say I was not in favor of this when it was first mentioned last year and I am not in favor of it now. They've been squabbling with the Big Ten for months about airing their games or not and basically the run-down is pretty much anybody that doesn't have Dish Network or Direct TV can't watch Big Ten games unless they are on ESPN or ABC. They did the same thing when the Expos moved from Montreal to Washington a few years back until the FCC stepped in and made Comcast air the games. According to Wikipedia, Comcast had the lowest customer satisfaction rating last year in the whole country, and that list included the Internal Revenue Service. Imagine that... more people were satisfied with the IRS than they were a cable company.

So anyway, today I ended up spending most of my day trying to get my computer on the internet. Evidently the change to Comcast just occurred a couple days ago because mine and my parents old email addresses' are acting somewhat funny and my hotmail isn't working at all. Neither is myspace. Everything works all right until I try logging in... then it does nothing. I'm really starting to get irritated with this... and every time I restart my computer I'm playing a cat-and-mouse game with my wireless connection because it just wants to sit there tell me it's trying to finding the network address.

Going further with my thoughts and complaints here are a few of my thoughts on the Presidential race thus far:

This year's Presidential race is an absolute joke. It's gone far, far beyond ridiculous. McCain and (from the looks of things) Obama? I'm sorry, but could somebody please tell me what in the world Obama has done in his very short tenure as a Senator to grant him being the Democratic nominee? I mean, I live in his state and I hadn't even heard of the guy until he managed to become elected to the Senate four years ago.

I'm very excited to be saying that McCain is my party's nominee this year. Yeah, I'm hearing all the time we conservative's need to rally around our candidate and support him against the Democratic nominee. That ain't happening with me right now. He's shown in the past he's very willing to embrace Democratic policies and in some case's succeeding in getting bills passed. He doesn't support lower taxes or having terrorist prisoners down in the Caribbean to name a couple things I disagree with him on. He supports the War in Iraq but that's not to say he wouldn't if it would get him somewhere with support. He's played both sides of the aisle many, many times over the course of his many years being a Senator.

The real key to this election as I see it are the House and Senate races. All you conservatives reading this, you need to be looking at who is running in the House and Senate races in your state and what their values. If Obama wins the Presidency we're looking at higher taxes and government health care to name a couple things. The only way to prevent this is to tie up the House and/or Senate. If McCain's elected then we're probably doomed to get these things either way Congress ends up because most of the Republicans are going to be loyal to their party and go with McCain.

And to finish off my post here are a few other thoughts:

Gas prices... notice anything about them? Yeah, everybody says it's ridiculous how high they are and that the price jumps around everywhere. Ok, I've been the one in the family filling up the tank for both our cars most of the time in the last few months and I've noticed something.... most of the time it's been in the $2.90-$3.10 range around here. Does that really show that it's jumping all over the map? I don't think so. Forgive me if this sounds harsh, but if your so upset about paying that for gas then you don't have to be driving that 15 mile per gallon luxury car or that truck that gets you 10 miles per gallon. You could drive the Hybrid and say "Now I'm screwing that big-oil!" Don't get me wrong Hybrid's will be a useful car... when we run out of oil (which isn't going to be happening anytime soon) or when the technology improves on it enough... and from what I've seen it's got a ways to go. Oh yeah, and did I tell you yet what I'm determined that the first car I own will be?

If your big on drinking milk like our family is you can partially blame the skyrocketing price on Ethanol (it's also affecting meat prices and other stuff like that). Yeah, that stuff that was supposed to help those gas prices we complain about seven days a week. I got news for you people.... it's a bunch of bull. It doesn't and in fact has been proven to actually give cars less miles per gallon. Great money saver there huh?

You know how most neighborhoods have a Neighborhood Watch? I think there should be something added to that... let's call it the Neighborhood Shovel. Every time it snows and the city hasn't plowed your street because they are busy keeping the main roads clean the whole Neighborhood should gather and shovel/snowblow their street out. Seriously, it would safe people a ton of trouble of failing to get their cars up the street. Not to mention that it would be a lot easier to shovel as a neighborhood rather than just one person. Why am I suggesting this? Because about a month ago yours truly literally had to shovel my way 30-40 yards up the street so my dad could get to work. My work mainly consisted of just making a section of the snow not so high so that our car wouldn't get bogged down so much. I'll tell you though, it's hard work (As a side note to my parents, I kindly request we get better shovels for next winter. Those plastic ones we have were ready for the pasture five years ago).

I own five seasons of Frasier on DVD, and I must say I'm a little disappointed with the lack of extra features after season 3. Surely, out of 11 years there were more interviews with the actors and more great outtakes/bloopers than just the ones circulating on youtube. I also happen to own all five seasons of The Dick Van Dyke Show on DVD and there are special features on virtually every disc (each season has five discs). My mom owns a couple tapes about Lucy and there are probably a hundred more out there somewhere. So, come on Paramount and give us the goods!

I received a box set of all six (original) Star Trek movies for Christmas and I thought each movie was good. I, III, and V were the weakest and II, IV, and VI were the best. If pressed to make a more definite answer I'd say I was the weakest movie and IV was the best. How can you beat having six people from the latter half of the 23rd Century visiting the late 20th Century? It's quite funny. And as McCoy said so matter-of-factly to a surgeon,

My God man, drilling holes in a man's head is not the answer!!

I couldn't tell you if I liked the Star Wars or Star Trek movies better. Star Wars rocks but there's something really cool about Star Trek. Maybe it's because the story takes place in our galaxy, not some galaxy far, far away.

The MacBook Air recently came out. I'm not going to lie and say that it's not cool but it's also not very practical. Just look at the thing. It has no CD drive, no USB ports, nothing like that. Pretty much everything that is standard on a computer these days isn't standard with this thing. It's like the L88 version of the 1967 Corvette (for those of you who aren't familiar with the Corvette's history, in 1967 the Corvette came with an option for an engine called the L88. This sucker put out almost 600 HP but at a price... no heater, radio, or practically anything else standard on cars at the time. It also required at least 103 octane fuel. Obviously this thing wasn't meant for your commute to work every morning). And the price is kinda high for something so lacking as well. You can almost buy the MacBook Pro for the price of a MacBook Air.

Speaking of MacBook's, I want one. Besides saving money for that stick shift, V-8 powered Firebird, I'm also trying to save for a new computer. I've thought about it and I've decided that Macs are better than PC's. For one thing you don't have all the security crap to go through that you worry about with PC's all the time. That means you won't be spending almost two hours loading Norton on your computer every year so your up-to-date on those new, pesky viruses. Macs also have the benefit of having built-in wireless so you can connect easily enough anyplace there's a connection. They also have a good photo program and one for movies as well. Of course then there's music. iPod's are one of the greatest inventions in the last few years. I have almost 2500 songs on iTunes and I don't mind saying I'm glad I don't have to use a CD player anymore. And to sum up my talk on Mac's, it reminds me of this hilarious scene from Star Trek IV when Scotty is trying to talk to a very early incarnation of a Macintosh computer using a mouse.

Well, that pretty much wraps up everything going through my head. Hope you've enjoyed it and knowing how often I post I'll either be talking to you all again in a couple days, couple weeks, or couple months.

The Led Zeppelin special

2007-12-09T12:45:00.000-06:00

All right, well we're one day away from the big concert. I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to post anything today as we're battling another round of freezing rain like we did last year. Fortunately we still have internet right now so off we go on this special post.

Originally the Zeppelin concert was only going to be one hour long, but the band decided to change that when they realized it would only allow them to do seven or eight songs at best. So now the question is..... what songs are they going to play? Well, I've come up with my own set of what I think they'd play. I might end up being very wrong but I'll take that chance. Here's what I think they'll do (and in no particular order other than the first song..... I think they'll open with that):

'Rock & Roll'
'Dazed and Confused'
'Whole Lotta Love'
'Heartbreaker'
'Bring It On Home'
'Immigrant Song'
'Since I've Been Loving You'
'Black Dog'
'Stairway to Heaven'
'Going to California'
'Over the Hills and Far Away'
'The Ocean'
'Kashmir'
'Ten Years Gone'
'Achilles Last Stand'
'For Your Life'
'Fool in the Rain'
'All My Love'

That's eighteen songs if you didn't already count it. It seems something like a set they might do. At least a couple songs from each album. Other possible songs they might play are as follows:

'Communication Breakdown'
'What Is and What Should Never Be'
'Tangerine'
'Bron-Y-Aur Stomp'
'The Song Remains the Same'
'No Quarter'
'Trampled Under Foot'
'Nobody's Fault But Mine'
'In the Evening'

Or, they might pull off something completely different and perform some songs that were never performed in concert (such as 'For Your Life', which is in the first list cause it's been confirmed that it will be played) or hardly played ('When the Levee Breaks' is an example of this) If that's the case, look at a set list somewhat like this:

'Rock & Roll'
'Babe I'm Gonna Leave You'
'Dazed and Confused'
'Whole Lotta Love'
'Heartbreaker'
'Ramble On'
'Since I've Been Loving You'
'Hey Hey What Can I Do'
'Black Dog'
'Stairway to Heaven'
'When the Levee Breaks'
'Over the Hills and Far Away'
'D'yer Mak'er'
'Custard Pie'
'Houses of the Holy'
'Kashmir'
'Achilles Last Stand'
'Royal Orleans'
'Hot Dog'
'Carouselambra'
'All My Love'

That set list would be twenty one songs. I guess we'll all find out just how accurate I was tomorrow.

I'm going to post twice as many videos today (in other words six instead of three). The first video is 'Dazed and Confused' from 1969. This was apparently before it became a twenty-five minute long song. Like Jimmy Page's violin bow on a guitar or not, it's pretty nifty. He plays an absolute blistering solo as well.

The second video is 'What Is and What Should Never Be', also taken from the Royal Albert Hall. This song, which is on Led Zeppelin II, is a quiet--loud--quiet--loud type of song... something that Page later repeated later in the album with 'Ramble On'. 'WIAWSNB' is one of the rare songs where Jimmy's playing slide..... as you can definitely hear during the solo.

The third video is well...... guess. Yep, 'Stairway to Heaven'. You didn't actually think I was going to go through all these posts without posting a 'STH' video did you? Most people have heard the version of 'STH' from The Song Remains the Same but not everyone has heard the Earl's Court version. I don't think I really need to introduce this song other than that.

The fourth video is 'Over the Hills and Far Away', one of my personal favorite Led Zeppelin songs. It might very well be the best song off Houses of the Holy and definitely the hardest rocking (other than perhaps 'The Ocean'). Starting off on a quietly strummed acoustic guitar, the song builds up into electric fury and Robert Plant's voice flies off into the stratosphere (where it remained and never came back down... haha sorry bad joke).

The fifth video is one of my favorite videos from the MSG concerts: 'The Ocean'. Any video that features Bonham on a mic is definitely worth hearing even if it's a bad song. And this is far from bad. I like this better than the How the West Was Won version. Everybody's in good form on this song especially Plant as he sometimes had trouble with those high notes after early 1973 (this is around Sept '73 I think).

The sixth and last video I'm posting will be 'Achilles Last Stand'. That song is Led Zeppelin at it's best I think. The running bassline inspired Heart's 'Barracuda' and made heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden thrive. In '77 while Zeppelin was touring they played 'ALS' way too fast and it became sloppy as a result. But in the '79 tour they seemed to slow it down to the studio version speed. In the video, you can tell Jimmy's sorta out of it from the heroin. But he still played great despite that.... this had to be one song that they breathed a sigh of relief when it was over because it's ten straight minutes of hard, fast rock n roll.

The late edition of Led Zeppelin (day three)

2007-12-08T21:38:00.000-06:00

All right, well sorry folks for the late post. It's been a long day (took the ACT today) but here I am, ready to entertain you with more videos and more useless trivia haha. Todays (or rather tonight's) videos will feature excerpts of a concert filmed a few days before the LA Forum concerts... and then two songs from Zeppelin's music library that aren't quite on the level of 'Stairway to Heaven' in terms of popularity... but I assure you, the songs are very good.

The first video features excerpts of a Led Zeppelin 1972 concert in California. The audio isn't the best but it's somewhat of a rare video and I just happened to stumble across it last weekend. I must say, Jimmy's dragon outfit is cool, but I like when all of them are just in jeans and stuff better.

'White Summer': this is from the Royal Albert Hall in 1970 and features basically Jimmy alone except for brief portions when Bonzo joins him. Page is on fire in this version he's spot on. It's basically eleven minutes of improvisation but Jimmy briefly cuts into 'Black Mountain Side' from Led Zeppelin.

'The Wanton Song' is from Physical Graffiti and is on the second album. One of Page's most aggressive riffs, it also features some studio trickery as the solo sounds like an organ, but is actually a guitar. To accomplish this, Jimmy used a Leslie speaker cabinet (mainly used for organs) to create the effect (think of the 'Good Times Bad Times' solo, he did basically the same thing there). George Harrison used one on several recordings for the Beatles as well.

Tomorrow will hopefully be the special with more videos than usual and also my take of what the set list should be for Monday's reunion concert.

Led Zeppelin, day two

2007-12-07T17:14:00.000-06:00

Alrighty, now that I've discussed Pearl Harbor I can move on to posting a few more Zeppelin videos.

First video I'm posting today is 'Rock & Roll', taken from a concert in Sydney, Australia in early 1972. This is the same concert that the footage in the 'Immigrant Song' video I posted yesterday is from, only this is black and white. I'm guessing what you hear at the beginning of this video is the very end of 'Whole Lotta Love' and then the band kicked into 'Rock & Roll'. This isn't necessarily one of Jimmy's best performances but it's still a video worth seeing.

Second video is 'In My Time of Dying' at Earl's Court in 1975. This is Led Zeppelin's take of an old blues number and it's a rare treat to see Jimmy Page playing slide guitar. His playing is incredible; in fact, I like this live version better than the studio version on Physical Graffiti. A bit of Zeppelin trivia here: The band played five concerts at Earl's Court and many people rank those five concerts as possibly the best concerts Zeppelin ever performed.

And the last video for today is 'Nobody's Fault But Mine' at Knebworth in 1979. This song was probably the most popular song off Presence with the exception of 'Achilles Last Stand'. The riff and a good portion of the lyrics were taken from an American blues singer named Blind Willie Johnson, who recorded it almost fifty years before Led Zeppelin did. This song is also one of the last songs to feature Plant's fine harmonica playing.

All three of these songs can be found on the Led Zeppelin DVD.

Sixty-six years ago today

2007-12-07T15:57:00.000-06:00

The US was attacked by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor. In that one surprise attack alone, Japan nearly succeeded in crippling the US Navy in the Pacific. If we had lost our carriers there we wouldn't have been able to launch our own surprise attack on Tokyo or fight at Coral Sea or Midway. This would've given the Japanese more time to push themselves farther east and become more firmly entrenched.

This may seem strange to say, but we should be thankful the Japanese attacked when they did. It's what this country needed..... a kick in the rear. To be challenged, to be slapped in the face. Especially when you consider the state of our economy since the stock market crash twelve years prior.

Not only that, but if we hadn't officially become involved in WWII when we did there is the very real possibility that we would've entered far too late to stop Germany and Japan. And that means we might have very well been defeated. Granted, I'm speculating here but it's something to think about.

I have a book called the Reader's Digest Illustrated Story of World War II (it's a great but sometimes gruesome read by the way), and I'd like to quote some statistics about what the US economy produced after entering the war. The numbers are mind boggling. Historian Louis L. Snyder wrote:

Within a year after Pearl Harbor the United States was equaling the entire Axis war production, though the enemy had a head start of ten years. By the end of the war the United States had produced 300,000 planes, 87,000 tanks, 2,400,000 trucks, 17,900,000 firearms, 61,000 pieces of heavy artillery and many millions of tons of shells, bombs and other explosives. From tens of thousands of factories came finished tools of war, more war material than produced by the rest of the world combined. It was an awesome example of audacious planning, mass activity, prodigious energy.

After mentioning various ships that took place in the Battle of the Philippine Sea the following is stated:

None of these warships existed in December 1941. All told, after most of the Pacific Fleet was left twisted and shattered at Pearl Harbor, American shipyards produced 17 fleet carriers, 9 light carriers, 5 battleships, and enough cruisers, destroyers, escort carriers, submarines, and other combat vessels to bring the entire total to 1265 brand-new men-of-war

.

Amazing isn't it? We owe all that to the Japanese being stupid enough to attack us when they did. By the way, with all those figures in mind, consider this: the Japanese only produced two fleet carriers after 1941.

So today, as we think about what happened sixty-six years ago in 1941, we should remember the brave men who died at Pearl Harbor. But also, I think we should thank God for that day as it was a blessing in disguise; it made us face reality and get our act together before it was too late.

And the countdown......

2007-12-06T15:56:00.000-06:00

is four days. Four days. Four days. Four days until the Led Zeppelin reunion concert in London....... provided Mr. Page doesn't break another finger in the meantime. I hope they know what they are doing by having this concert. Many, many things can go wrong. For starters, Robert Plant does not have the voice he once did. True, after '73 things haven't been the same with his voice anyway, but he still had a great voice for their later songs. But he's almost sixty now, I'd imagine his range isn't even close to where it was in the late 70's. In fact, I read an article confirming my guess... the band decided to transpose the songs to a lower key to "avoid any embarrassing vocal wobbles with the world watching."

The article also mentions that the waters haven't been completely smooth for Jimmy either...... "he is a bit rusty" is what's being reported. Great..... I guess John Paul Jones and Jason Bonham haven't had any problems or at least the article didn't mention any.

However, that said, I am excited about this concert. If they get their "troubles" straightened out and perform an outstanding concert, I think they should have a world tour next year for all their fans. I would try to get a ticket myself if they went to Chicago or someplace like that (and provided it wasn't $500 a ticket.. which it probably would be). If the concert is a bust though, I don't think they should tour unless they do something to improve themselves beforehand.

Every day from now until Sunday (by the time I'd get around to posting Monday they'll have already had the concert) I'm going to put up a few live Zeppelin videos and also a couple rare "bootleg" videos that I've come across... some of which are pretty good in quality. On Sunday I hope to provide everyone with what I think their set list should be.

The first video I'm going to post is 'Immigrant Song'. This was recorded at the LA Forum in 1972 and is the concert Eddie Van Halen attended/got the idea of "tapping" on a guitar. You can hear this song on Zeppelin's live album How the West Was Won or on the Led Zeppelin DVD (which features video footage from the one of the band's Australian concerts).

Second video is 'Black Dog' from what is I'm guessing the Madison Square Garden concerts in 1973. I'm not completely sure if this was on The Song Remains the Same DVD or the Led Zeppelin DVD. Both DVD's have this song from Madison Square Garden so your guess is as good as mine which DVD it's on.

The last video I'm going to post is 'Since I've Been Loving You' at Madison Square Garden in 1973. As with 'Black Dog', this song is on TSRTS and Led Zeppelin DVD's. So I can't tell you which DVD to find this song on either. Oh well, no matter, just enjoy the songs!

Oh look...... I'm back.... again

2007-12-05T18:34:00.000-06:00

If you haven't noticed by now I guess my blog isn't something I do as much as some. I spend more time on Myspace and Facebook than I do Blogger. But after some complaints from my grandparents about the lack of activity on my blog, I've decided to post something to please them. So here you go, Grandpa and Grandma, a new post for you. I, like my dad, have added a music playlist (actually I have two) so everybody that doesn't have dial-up enjoy the music......... for whoever views this blog besides my grandparents.

When I rented Guitar Hero (the Rock the 80's edition) a couple months ago I discovered a really cool song sung by Quiet Riot. It's probably their most famous song along with 'Cum On Feel the Noize'. Here it is:
QUIET RIOT

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Bonanza

2007-03-27T16:03:00.000-05:00

One of my all-time favorite shows is the western Bonanza, which ran for fourteen seaons and over 400 episodes (as far as westerns go only Gunsmoke was on longer... twenty seasons). It was set by Lake Tahoe in Nevada and near the lake was a land called the Ponderosa, so named because of the Ponderosa Pines that grew on the land. The Ponderosa was a sprawing 600,000 acres of land that was owned by the Ben Cartwright and his three sons. The three Cartwright sons were all half-brothers because of their father having married three times (and in each case the wife died). The eldest, Adam, was the most level-headed of the three but eventually went off to be a sailor (actually, the actor playing him, Pernell Roberts, wanted to leave the show so he was written off). The middle son Eric was better known as Hoss and was the huge yet gentle giant except when someone pushed their luck too far. The youngest, Joseph, or Little Joe, was the hot-headed member of the family as well as the most handsome, charming, and laziest. And finally, last but not least, their father Ben who built up the Ponderosa and who was always the wise father who helped his sons when they were in a mess of some kind. Bonanza wasn't the typical western in the sense of gunfights and the use of guns but when needed all four Cartwrights could shoot. Joe had the fastest gun draw but ironically he was also usually the one who was shot in most episodes too.

During it's first two seasons, Bonanza's ratings weren't the greatest but NBC kept it on the air and moved it to Sunday nights for the third season. That year they went top five in the ratings and for three seasons it was the highest rated show in the US. After ten seasons at the Sunday night slot, NBC moved Bonanza and from there the show started falling in the ratings. The shocking death of Dan Blocker (Hoss) before the beginning of the show's fourteenth season was basically the writing on the wall and the show was canceled halfway through the season.

Here's a great website all about Bonanza.

And here are some videos that I found on youtube:

Introduction of Bonanza used mainly in early part of season one

Another introduction of Bonanza used in seasons one and two

The most famous introduction of Bonanza.. used from season three through season six

After Pernell Roberts left, they reshot the introduction with the three remaining Cartwrights.. and this was used until season twelve

Like Lucy, Angus is still alive

2007-03-25T14:10:00.000-05:00

Well it's been awhile hasn't it? The two or three weeks after my last post were plagued with a sickness that usually went away after about three-four days but then would return a few days later. Finally it went away a few weeks ago and I've actually gone about two weeks without a sore throat, fever, cough, and/or drainage. So yeah the last few weeks have been "thrilling" for me. But I'm still alive.

I would like to make this post about a high school that has been practically unbeatable for the last year. Maroa-Forsyth's basketball team began 2006 (yes 2006) playing second-fiddle to Warrensburg-Lathem, a team in the Okaw Valley conference that was gathering all the attention by everyone in the area for the most part (even though both teams had practically the same record). Well, the two teams met in early Feb and I was at that game. For the sake of my friends that go to both schools, I tried to be neutral. That didn't work so well. Anyway, the game had been highly awaited by everyone and it was a great game of high school basketball. Maroa ended up winning in the final seconds of a thrilling game. And after that, Maroa was just rolling along. They kept winning until they finally found themselves in Peoria as one of the eight teams left. The way it works is that IHSA (Illinois High School Association) plans four games on the first day. The next day, the four winners from the previous day will play twice and are guarenteed hardware of some kind to bring home. So Maroa won on the first day but lost their first game on Saturday. So they played for 3rd place and they won.

Some months later, the football season began. Maroa was loaded with talent for the football team this year and they didn't disappoint. They destroyed every team they played and didn't even have a game where they didn't win by at least 20 points (their "closest" game of the year was 34-12). At the state championship game (at the U of I's Memorial Stadium) quarterback Luke Hockaday and wide receiver Robert Kreps put on a show that will not be forgotten anytime soon.

For many of the football players, as soon as the football season ended it was time for basketball games the following week. Some of the players that decided to do double-duty were Robert Kreps (who was touted to be ever better at basketball), Andrew Mills, and Dustin Moore (two huge linemen from the football team). So as the season started Kreps was clearly their best player but really they played as a team. The other two seniors that led the way were Ben Cochran and CJ McClellan. They quickly became the #1 ranked team in the state and hadn't lost a game going into February. That changed in mid-Feb though when they played rival Monticello (another Okaw team) and lost their first game of the year. They played again the following night (a Friday) and won big. Now, because of a snowstorm earlier in the month, the always-heated game between the Trojans of Maroa and the Cardinals of Warrensburg was rescheduled. As it worked out, it was rescheduled for a Saturday..... and yes you can guess which one. To set the game up Warrensburg had lost basically all their better players last year and nobody expected them to be any good. However....... they were surprisingly good and if they won this game then they were the Okaw Valley Conference champions of 2007. And they were playing at home against Maroa this year. It promised to be a good game. Once again I went to the game only this time in full support of Maroa. Over the last few games Kreps (or Robo as everyone calls him) had been scoring over 30 points a game. To counter this teams began to double and even triple team him in effort to make Cochran or McClellan have to shoot more (both were averaging about the same.... 13 points a game to Kreps 25ish). This strategy is what Warrensburg employed for the first half of the game and to great success as Maroa was held to 20 points while Warrensburg was on fire and had 34. Warrensburg's fans were rocking and having a great time (both sides were packed... being that the two schools are about roughly fifteen or so miles apart) while us Trojan fans were discussing what the heck was wrong with their high scoring offense and punishing defense. Well, you might say that most high school teams being down by 14 at the half might've given up hope for winning. But Maroa didn't. They battled and pried their way back into the game through great defense and finally making a few shots. As the game wound down to the final seconds Maroa took the lead 52-50. In one last effort Warrensburg got a three off but it didn't fall and Maroa pulled off a great comeback.

Regionals began the following Thursday and I was there to see Maroa take on Heyworth. It was no contest Maroa ran them off the floor. The game was practically over at the end of the first quarter. Unfortunately for me, I got sick the next day so I didn't see them win again that night (I did listen to the game though). The next week, sectionals began and I was still stuck at home sick. I did get to listen to the games on the radio however, and heard them win another game on the following Wednesday. By this time Kreps was having a lot of trouble getting points being double and triple teamed every time he touched the ball. In the final sectional game, they were playing a very good team that had them down at half. The Trojans exploded out of the third quarter though, sparked by Ben Cochran's play. As the game wound down it was a close battle and Andrew Mills was fouled and was sent to the line. Mills is a good friend of mine and I knew he'd make them.. even with all the pressure on him. Calmly, he put both free throws and that basically sealed the win for the Trojans. Robo only scored 13 points, but it didn't matter as Ben led all scores with 26 points.

Two days later on a Sunday evening, Robert Kreps had an emergency appendectomy and for some all hopes of Maroa winning the state championship (or even getting there for that matter) seemed to be dashed. Even if they won the Super-Sectional game on Tuesday the odds of Robo playing were against him. So anyway, the Super-Sectional was at ISU's Redbird Arena and I was there to cheer them on. I don't know about how everyone else felt, but I knew everything depended on whether Ben Cochran could carry them through the game. He needed to have a good game and get Maroa off and running. Kreps showed up at the game but he didn't look like he felt too great, haven't just gotten out of the hospital the night before. Fortunately for Maroa, Cochran got on a roll halfway through the first quarter. He single-handedly took over the ball game in the first half and most of the second. However as the fourth quarter started the Trojans began to lose the big lead they had built. To make matters worse Ben received his 4th foul halfway through the quarter. The last thing they needed was to have him foul out. I remember starting to get nervous watching Maroa's lead shrink and Cochran's foul trouble. After a dangerous attempt at a steal that could've been his 5th foul he was taken out when Maroa was on defense and put back in on offense (when possible). Eventually the game came to a close with the final of Maroa winning 48-43. Cochran scored 26 points over half his team's total. Now the future didn't seem quite so dim as perhaps Kreps would be able to play for the games at Peoria on Friday (and Saturday if they won).

Amazingly Kreps was going to try to play for the Friday game. Reportedly on Tuesday before the game Robo walked about FOUR miles. So you can see he was doing everything possible in effort to play. He was in the starting line-up and played a good portion of the game and scored some points. Once again though, Ben Cochran held the spotlight as he led the Trojans to victory.

Saturday was going to be a long day. They played T-Town, which is farther south and east than Maroa. On Friday T-Town had pulled off an amazing upset over Nashville, who had replaced Maroa as the #1 team in the state after the Monticello loss. T-Town was much bigger than Maroa but the Trojans were quicker. It promised to be a great game and it was. The real action didn't take place until halfway through the 3rd quarter when the Wooden Shoes (T-Town's nickname) were up by 13. Amazingly enough, like in the Warrensburg game, Maroa's defense got them going and they erased that lead. At the end of the 4th quarter it was tied so they went to a 4 minute overtime. At the end of the overtime the score was once again tied so they went to a second. Thanks to a couple of plays that Kreps made and also great defense, Maroa took the lead and held it. Robo had played the entire game amazingly enough.... he still had one more to go though.

Their last game was against Chicago North Lawndale. Maroa needed to get off to a fast start and they did. Kreps and Cochran hit some jumpers early on and Maroa led at halftime by 11. But North Lawndale wasn't going to go away easy. They battled their way back and even took the lead, only to lose it as Cochran nailed a three pointer to give it back to the Trojans. As the 4th quarter waned both teams were battling hard but because North Lawndale apparently never practiced free throws as much as three pointers Maroa pulled out the win thanks to some gutsy defensive play by the Trojans and two free throws from Robo in the last minute of the game. Kreps led all scores with 27 points and once again he played the whole game. It was an incredible performance by a team that almost everyone had written off because of Krep's appendix being taken out. I wish I had gone to more games but I got to see a few fortunately.

For anybody that is interested...... here is a website with all kinds of great pictures for Maroa-Forsyth. There are also pictures from the football season, guys soccer, volleyball season, and I'm sure they'll have baseball and girls soccer up as well soon. I'm not as familier with the baseball team as I was with the football and basketball teams but I do know that Maroa's baseball team is looking really good too this year. I'm not suggesting anything..... yet.... but last I heard they were ranked #8 in the state. But it's still way early in the year so who knows. Only time will tell.

SNOW DAY!!!!!!!

2007-02-12T23:22:00.000-06:00

Whoo hoo it's snowing here right now. Reportedly we're supposed to get about 6-12 inches of that white stuff and all the schools are canceled already. I am 'Jump'ing with joy. This has been a snowy winter compared to past years I can remember. It must have something to do with "global warming" lol. So around here unless your an immigrant from "the land of ice and snow" then it's probably going to seem like a lot.

My mom's favorite group

2007-01-30T21:30:00.001-06:00

My mother's favorite group is the Rolling Stones. She loves them dearly and Mick Jagger most of all........... okay okay before you kill me Mom let me rephrase that. She can't stand them. Or our most famous frontman Mick.

So yeah, in honor of her "love" for the Rolling Stones, here is a song called '19th Nervous Breakdown' being performed live by the 'Stones in the mid '60's on the Ed Sullivan Show I believe.

Oh that poor horse

2007-01-30T21:02:00.000-06:00

Barbaro the horse has died. I was listening to Rush Limbaugh when he came on the radio this morning and he was saying (as you'll see if you click the link) that they were sending FLOWERS and CARDS to a HORSE!!!!! For crying out loud can we get any more stupid? Do you think the horse could read? I'm sure if (and when) the people taking care of him read these letters to him he was really touched by them and wanted to write a thank you note back for caring about him. We're not talking about Mister Ed you know.

Guitars

2007-01-27T00:52:00.000-06:00

Okay..... so I really, really like guitars. I'm a guitarist after all so naturally I should. In this post I am going to post pictures of some of my favorite guitars and videos with that guitarist as well as some facts on the guitar or guitarist(s) who played the instrument. So let's start out with the Fender Telecaster.

This was a guitar that Fender sent to George Harrison in early 1969. He used it on
what would become the Let It Be album and the famous rooftop concert. He later gave it away. Jimmy Page also played a Telecaster for a time before getting his Gibson Les Paul which I'll discuss later. The solo that Page played on 'Stairway to Heaven' was in fact played on a Fender Telecaster (he had his Les Paul by this time but he said the Telecaster produced the more biting sound that he was looking for).

In 1964 when the Beatles first came to America Rickenbacker gave a twelve-string guitar to George Harrison and made another for John Lennon (which he only used live once). Harrison found that this guitar was really neat. A twelve-string guitar sounds brighter than a six string. Twelve-string's are also a bit more difficult to play obviously with the extra six strings. So when the Beatles recorded their next album A Hard Days Night a couple month or two later, the album was filled with this new bright sound. Especially on the song 'A Hard Days Night' with the famous opening chord. Harrison continued to use this guitar for another year or so before Rickenbacker sent him a new one. This one had more rounded edges and he used it to record the song 'If I Needed Someone' in late 1965 which ended up on Rubber Soul.

In late 1964 Paul McCartney bought a Epiphone Casino. He really liked that guitar and so Lennon and Harrison eventually bought their own too. The Beatles really liked these guitars and on their last world tour in 1966 Harrison and Lennon used them (except when Harrison performed 'If I Needed Someone'). After going psychadelic the next year they did a crazy "homemade" paint job on them. In 1968 though they shed their psychadelic stuff and returned to normal clothing, etc. This included some of the guitars they had painted. Like Lennon's Casino. He had it stripped down to natural wood and sanded. The result was very good and this is basically the guitar he used from this point on (see 'One After 909' from the rootop concert or the 'Revolution' promo below).

Ahh, so we now come to George Harrison's Gibson Les Paul. This guitar was originally Eric Clapton's and bore the name Lucy. In 1968 Clapton gave the guitar to George who used it most of the time for the remaining Beatles songs that they recorded. The first time you see Harrison using it is for the 'Revolution' promo in Sept. of '68. It was later stolen while George was in the US in the '70's but he later recovered it.

I already talked about Jimmy Page earlier but the 'Heartbreaker' video and the picture of him are good examples of what his Les Paul looked like. So I don't need to go into too much detail about his Les Paul other than he had two of them and the main one that he used was the first one that he had received. He now has his own signature model. Here is another video of him using it in 'Rock & Roll' late in Led Zeppelin's career.

Now we come to Angus Young, who has rarely (and I mean rarely) been seen without a Gibson SG. The above picture is some of the guitars that went on tour with him a few years back. Angus has his own signature model nowadays but still sticks with the old SG's. SG stands for Solid Guitar and it's history begins in the early '60's when it was (originally) released as a Les Paul SG. Les Paul, upon seeing the guitar, said he wanted his name off it and then parted ways with Gibson. The guitar remained however, and became a famous guitar like it's cousin the Les Paul. George Harrison had one and you can see it on the 'Paperback Writer/Rain' promos as well as the 'Hey Bulldog' promo. After getting Clapton's Les Paul George gave his SG to Badfinger's guitarist. That guitar today is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Eric Clapton also played a SG at one point and Jimi Hendrix used a white one one time. I believe Pete Townshend of the Who also played one. But Angus Young is the only one who has stuck with the SG over all these years. It's like the band's other trademark besides his school-boy outfit. The only thing's that vary with Angus' SG's are the colors. Mainly they are all black or red with black. I have a total of four AC/DC videos, two of which are the all black and the other two red and black. Here are the two with the all black guitar: 'Riff Raff' and 'Jailbreak.' The other two with the red and black guitar are these: 'Shot Down in Flames' and 'For Those About to Rock (We Salute You).'

And finally, the above picture is my very own guitar (and the reflection of the flash from the camera lol). It's a Yahama so it may not be the best in the world but it suits me for now. I really like the colors and it looks great I think.

Jimmy Page and Led Zeppelin

2007-01-26T18:57:00.000-06:00

In view of my recent post about Van Halen, I decided to give tribute to the guitarist who gave Eddie the idea of "tapping." That guitarist, is of course, Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin. Reportedly Van Halen said that he got the idea of tapping from the song 'Heartbreaker', off Led Zeppelin II. I have found what seems to be a somewhat rare video of Led Zeppelin performing it live a year before their break-up. Until now I had never seen a video of Led Zeppelin performing 'Heartbreaker' but there does exist a video of Page and frontman Robert Plant performing it a few years back. Unfortunately I cannot find it on youtube at this time.

I've found some notable similarities between Led Zeppelin and Van Halen. Here are a few of them:

This one's a no brainer but Jimmy Page and Eddie Van Halen are two of the best guitarists ever
John Bonham and Alex Van Halen are (in my opinion) two of the best drummers in rock history
Robert Plant and Sammy Hagar could hit upper range notes with incredible ease and shared somewhat similar hair-styles (I'm serious... look for yourself)
Both Page and Van Halen were experimental (Jimmy more than Eddie though) and were also excellent songwriters

Led Zeppelin is one of my favorite bands and Jimmy Page is one of the best guitarists ever. I must give credit to my dad who got me started on them (he has everything Led Zeppelin released on vinyl and basically everything on CD). My favorite song is 'Stairway to Heaven' (and no I don't believe any of the crap that some say they hear when they play it backwards) and some other favorites that I have include: the rare 'Hey Hey What Can I Do', the "Cadillac song" 'Rock & Roll', the Lord of the Rings inspired 'The Battle of Evermore', possibly also the LOTR inspired 'Over the Hills and Far Away', yet another LOTR inspired 'Ramble On', and the song about the Vikings: 'Immigrant Song.'

St. Louis to host All-Star game in '09

2007-01-26T17:28:00.000-06:00

I was just searching for something to write about on Cards Clubhouse and on the Cardinals section of the forum there is a thread about the All-Star game coming to St. Louis. Apparently commisioner Bud Selig (who according to Mike Shannon will go down as the best baseball commisioner in MLB history) made the news on Monday evening at a dinner hosted by the Baseball Writers' Association.

I am happy to see that the Cards get to host another All-Star game finally after all these years. The last time St. Louis had an All-Star game was in 1966 when the old Busch stadium was brand new. Yankees and AL manager Casey Stengel had a nice thought about the new stadium. He said that his impression of Busch Stadium was that "it holds the heat well." Reportedly the temperature on the field was in the 130 degree range. Man, I bet that was one uncomfortable game for everyone there. I have a picture of Jack Buck interviewing Casey down on the field and Jack's wearing a regular ole' suit and smiling like it's a nice 70 degrees.

This is off the topic of St. Louis hosting the game in '09 but I really think that one of the dumbest decisions that the MLB has made was whoever wins the All-Star game gets home-field advantage in the World Series. The only thing I have to say is....... why? I think it should go to the team with the best record. But I'm not in charge so I guess we won't be seeing that rule change anytime soon.

Eruption

2007-01-24T21:54:00.000-06:00

Haha no not that kind of eruption.

This kind of Eruption ^^

I figured I needed to have a post about Van Halen so this is it. Personally.. I think Eddie is one the most brilliant guitarists ever and he's not bad with the keyboard either. Unfortunately he's practically destroyed his band too. Van Halen is rumored to be going on tour sometime soon and his 16 year old son Wolfgang (I guess he watched the Munsters when he was growing up.. lol no he named him after Mozart) is replacing Michael Anthony as bassist in the band. And then there is the controversial frontman spot. Is it Dave? Is it Sammy? Is it anybody? Van Halen last toured in '04 with Eddie and Sammy reuniting... briefly. The result was Hagar saying that he'd never tour with EVH again. I think if it's anybody it'll be Roth... though who knows how long that reunion will last.

I made the comment of Eddie having almost destroyed his band. He seems to have done the same to himself. Check out this photo it'll leave you in shock after seeing it especially after looking at the healthy Eddie.

If he looked in the mirror that day he would've been having 'Dreams' about the way he used to look.

Rain

2007-01-12T23:16:00.000-06:00

Yes folks, it's been a long time since I've blogged. Since right before our infamous ice storm at the end of November. Well, speaking of ice storms.......... we have a date with one in about oh, I'd say, two hours (as I'm typing it's 11:20). It's just raining right now. Raining quite hard at times and by now I'd say we've gotten more than enough rain to freeze the roads, trees, lines, etc.. again. Isn't that just swell? Let's add cable internet to that list as well. But anyway, it is raining right now, I found a song that with a nice title that fits in quite well with our current weather. And yes, for those of you who are curious, these are the promos where Sir Paul has his chipped tooth. The day before our favorite bassist had a moped accident... which by the way started the whole Paul is dead rumor thing.

AC/DC Live @ Donington

2006-11-27T20:48:00.000-06:00

Recently I bought the AC/DC Live at Donington DVD. It was a two hour concert and AC/DC's third trip to Donington (they were previously there in 1981 and 1984). There are a few things not to like about the concert but overall it's pretty cool and shows how good of a live band the group is. Here are a couple of songs from the show: 'Thunderstruck' and 'For Those About to Rock' (the opening and closing songs of the concert respectively)

Week 12 football picks

2006-11-26T10:58:00.000-06:00

For the games on Thursday I was 1-2. Here are the rest of my picks for this week:

Minnesota
Carolina
Chicago
Cincinnati
NY Jets
Jacksonville
Atlanta
NY Giants
Indianapolis
Pittsburgh
St. Louis
San Diego
Seattle - Monday night

This day in Beatles history

2006-11-23T10:37:00.000-06:00

On this date in 1965 (it wasn't Thanksgiving that day though) the Beatles started what would evolve into music videos. By this time in their career the Beatles were no longer anxious to go perform their new singles live for every TV show that asked for their appearance. That said though, they still wanted their singles to be promoted by these shows. So they came up with the idea of going to a studio and have themselves filmed miming to their songs. This they did and so 41 years ago today the Beatles were filmed miming to these songs: 'We Can Work It Out', 'Day Tripper', 'Help!', 'Ticket to Ride', and 'I Feel Fine'.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2006-11-23T10:31:00.001-06:00

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone! Be sure to take a moment today to thank God for our freedoms and last but not least..... eat lots and lots of turkey (and deviled eggs too)!

Football picks week 11

2006-11-19T11:10:00.000-06:00

Baltimore
Buffalo
Chicago
Cincinnati
Indianapolis
Minnesota
New England
Kansas City
Pittsburgh
Carolina
Philadelphia
Washington
Detroit
Seattle
Denver
NY Giants - Monday night

I was 9-7 last week. My overall record for the year is 87-57.

Ok everyone, I'm Back (but not In Black)

2006-11-16T23:04:00.000-06:00

Hey everybody finally I'm hopefully going to get back to posting stuff on a more regular basis (and since I have a title of a song in the title of the post... here's the promo of the song.. one of my favorite songs by the way). When my dad helped me start my blog I was really busy with soccer so I wasn't able to post things often. It ended some weeks ago but I just haven't been able to get on the internet much at all.

Well............... alot of things have happened since I last posted something. Some good some bad (the bad I'll have to post about later). The good thing was the Cardinals winning the World Series. So I'll make a few quick points about the Cardinals.

The Cardinals winning the World Series was one of the greatest sports experiences of my life. It was so awesome! I was in shock after that happened for the next couple of days. The only complaint I had about the whole World Series is that I couldn't listen to Mike Shannon and John Rooney on the radio. You see, ESPN has the rights to broadcast the World Series games on radio except for the flagship stations of each team. So in other words, if I wanted to listen to Mike, then I had to be able to get KTRS. Which isn't easy in the city and especially at night. But I wanted to try for the 9th inning for Game 5.... and I managed to actually hear Mike... in between coughs of static. But overall it was so awesome!! Shannon was so excited and so was I. I didn't really feel like going to bed that night but somehow I managed to. Now... hopefully Pujols will win MVP too. Hopefully. That would be like double the pleasure. He should win but I don't know if he will or not. I guess we'll be finding out soon...

An introduction

2006-10-08T22:03:00.000-05:00

So, as everybody can see, I haven't had a chance to change the look yet but hopefully I'll be able to soon. Hopefully....... So if I might be able to, please allow me to introduce myself. I am the son of Scottius Maximus and Lutheran Lucy. In the past, generally the anonymus person commenting on my parents blogs was me.

Thankfully though, I finally came up with a blog name, and a pretty good one I'd say. Here's what the name means.... "Angus" stands for Angus Young, the guitarist of the famed hard rock Australian group AC/DC. "G" stands for George Harrison, the guitarist from the most famous music group of all time the Beatles. And the "Van Halen" stands for yet another guitarist: Eddie Van Halen.

So now that we've been properly introduced, let me tell you some random things about myself:

I belong to a Lutheran church that is conserative in its teachings and (in the eyes of todays world) backwards and dull

I am a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals, the Chicago Bears, and Chevy drivers in NASCAR

I hate the Cubs, Packers, and most Ford/Dodge drivers in NASCAR

Mike Shannon and Joe Buck are the two best announcers in baseball and Tim McCarver is the worst

I am a big classic rock fan and some of my favorite groups include: The Beatles, AC/DC, Van Halen (GASP! what a shock considering my blog name is based around those three groups), the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Guns N Roses, and Queen

Jimi Hendrix is over rated but still a great guitarist

I like American cars best but especially Chevy's

I enjoy giving my mom a hard time and she has on occasion come up with some of the... shall we say, interesting sayings ever uttered on the face of the earth

I seem to be the only person in this city of mine that actually follows the speed limit

I am one of those people who set their alarm clocks ten minutes ahead of the actual time

Rush Limbaugh is the best talk-show host and Bill O'Reilly is over rated

Some consider me quite witty

The keyboard on my computer can do more things than the one that my dad has

I want a lightsaber, the color of green or blue (not sure which one I like better)

I like getting comments

I hate having short hair
I am an Arial person when it comes to fonts
I listen to the radio more than I watch tv

And that I believe is a fairly good description of me. I hope you all enjoy my blog... I will post things about everything but especially sports, music, and funny things. Todays world is far from a bright place and while that's probably a sign of the times I believe in being able to keep ourselves in a lighter mood as well. And hopefully this blog will accomplish this.

Hello everybody

2006-10-05T21:29:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone have a blog.. it's interesting isn't it? So dull and plain without anything interesting on it. I can say that the "dull and plain" aspect won't last long. Promise. But, for now, enjoy my blog. Oh and check out this video. A classic piece of Beatles comedy from their first movie A Hard Days Night (made in 1964).