Bringing the Drama

thanks to some guys who weren’t paying attention to where they were digging, my cable and internet were out last week. after the first guy was not able to do anything, a 2nd guy came out on Sunday and installed an orange wire that will serve as my cable line until they can come bury it. all this commotion that could have been avoided if the first guys last week could have paid attention when they were burying my neighbor’s line. my cable problems came right at the same time as my parents’ issues with the cable internet. some maintenance was being done in the neighborhood and messed up their internet. it was out for a week, but they now have dsl and aren’t looking back. they’re also on the lookout for a new tv so they can watch hdtv. i was 20 before they decided to get cable, so all of this is coming rather quickly to me.

i was mistaken for grizzly adams at work yesterday, so the beard must be pretty noticeable.

i’m going to nashville today. i’m going to see the last two nickel creek shows. i can’t say i’m that stoked about it, i’m honestly more excited about the possible guests that will just drop by the ryman. i’m hoping the show will be as good as the time i saw them the night of the cell phone incident then the two times i saw them earlier this year. there just wasn’t the same spark or passion earlier this year, it was more like they knew they were going to break up and were just going through the motions. so i have high hopes, and am anxious to see how it turns out. however, no matter how the shows go, nashville is awesome, and there’s been a guitar hero battle royale scheduled for friday.

speaking of guitar hero, i got the version for the wii and have been playing it. i’m a big fan of ZZ Top, mostly because of my dad, and on GHIII, ‘La Grange’ is on there. i must have tried 25 times to get a perfect score on the easy level. one night, i came home, and on the 4th try i succeeded. it’s 444 notes long on easy! i know it’s on easy, but still, it’s a PERFECT SCORE!

it didn’t really do anything after i got the perfect score, which is kind of disappointing. right now i’m going back through all the songs on medium, and am currently stuck having to battle Slash in order to be able to play “Welcome to the Jungle”. so obviously i’m not sure about competing with Brandi on hard, but no matter, it will be broughten.

after a frustrating visit to target (probably the first time that’s ever happened), i came home to read the email that my friend chris wanted me to stand in his wedding. three of my good friends are getting married next summer, and i’m in two of the weddings. i had met chris the summer before we both ended up at clemson. i remember sitting at the kitchen table as me, him, my mom, his stepmom, and my archenemy talked about what we thought would happen in college. then how when i went to drink the milk she had poured to go with the cake, and how it was sour. yuck. anyway, chris and i didn’t really hit it off major or anything, so the next time i talked to him was at the bowling alley at the student union during welcome week. we’ve been friends ever since, going to football games, struggling through engineering, and both at one time dating the same crazy girl (four years apart, and i dated her first). i’m not sure if i’ll have to give a speech like i did last year at scott’s wedding, but at least this time if i am asked to give a speech, i’ll bring some experience to the table.

in other news, i’ve been amped up for the Clemson game since last week’s game ended. when i got to clemson, it was the end of a decent era in football, and the dawning of a couple of lean years. Clemson’s on the brink of playing for the ACC title. i wish i could go up for the game, but grad school work is going to have to be the priority. last year i had a charmed life going to Clemson games, three games, three wins. fear not though, earlier this evening Chris and i agreed if Clemson makes the Orange Bowl that we would go. here’s hoping we both have to follow through on our agreement.

on the way home from work today, Chad and I were listening to XM as usual with me flipping through the stations to find the best of the what was on at the time. a lot of times that is literally having to settle for something like Gin Blossoms (it’s okay, but really not that great), but occasionally we’ll stumble upon something good. today, i stopped on the America station where they were playing Jerry Reed “Westbound and Down”. i commented how there’s also an “East Bound and Down” from the Smokey and the Bandit movies, at least i thought so. the songs sounded the same, but the lyrics were different. right after “Westbound and Down” finished, “East Bound and Down” started. it WAS the same music just different lyrics. we postulated that since there were sequels to the Smokey movies that maybe the songs were for different movies. then after “East Bound and Down” finished, none other than “Texas Bound and Flyin’” came on. all three had basically the same music, but at least Texas sounded different. the lyrics for Texas were also a lot different than the other two. a quick google search turns up the first two (East and West) were done for the original Smokey movie and Texas was done for Smokey II. unbelievable! why didn’t they just use the same song for both movies? why did he do two songs that sounded exactly the same and only change a few lines of lyrics?

in other news, whiskerino has commenced, and while Jacob is a returning contestant with David and Geof being new, i decided not to enter because there’s no way i was going until the end of February. then after the deadline, i changed my mind a little (i know i know!). i did shave last Sunday and will grow my beard out again for the rest of 2007 unless one of two things happen; A) i get a job interview or B) i get a new badge at work (which means new picture). i had grown a beard in early 2005 then shaved it off along with almost all of my hair to run in the crescent city classic. a guy at work, Tom, called me Jeremiah Johnson. i had no idea who that was since i’m not really a connoisseur of 70s movies, but i figured it out later. JJ is the guy on the far left. and i have to say, by the time i shaved off my beard, Tom wasn’t really far off.

The other night, I had a dream that involved me running from someone, or something. In the dream, it was me and three other people, one being a girl I know from work and i can’t remember the other two. We made it to this big house decked out 70s style, much like the house i stayed in while in Fort Worth a couple of weeks back. The family there gave us some cheap walmart flip flops, because for some reason we had showed up shoeless. I had stepped outside to make sure the coast was clear, and saw Tom Morello driving by ominously in a van. By ominous I mean he had dark sunglasses on and didn’t turn his head as he drove by, almost Terminator like. I woke up before anything happened, so I’m not sure if the rest of Rage was in the back of the van and were going to subject us to their political tirades or try to sell us those ridiculous shirts they had at voodoo fest that pretty much said SUCKER on them. The house reminded me that I had to type about some final Ryan Adams road trip thoughts.

One of the things I’ll remember about the Dallas show, was when the guitar tech brought out the acoustic, everyone kind of got anxious of what was going to happen next. When he then brought out the harmonica, everyone kind of knew. When RA actually started Come Pick Me Up with the harmonica, it was almost as if the room smiled. I’m not sure how else to describe it, but it was a feeling of everyone in the room experiencing the same “oh man, he’s actually playing it!” moment at once. It was a great thing to be a part of.

After the show, we drove over to Fort Worth, where we were going to stay at David’s grandmother’s house. (btw, does anyone else to type Forth instead of Fort and have to correct themselves?) After the show, I met two of his bandmates from Father Maple; Michael, the lead singer of Father Maple, and Zach, the drummer for Father Maple, also FTR, David is the bass player. In a quest for some post show brew, we were denied by Texas’ blue laws where you couldn’t buy beer after midnight. We found a sports bar called No Frills. (HA! FORTH!) Food AND beer, JACKPOT! I had a turkey sandwich with avocado and a Fat Tire draft. I made a comment to the table that our waitress reminded me a little of Lindsay Lohan. Michael took it upon himself to notify her of this the next time she came to our table. She questioned whether I meant the drugged out Lindsay or the Mean Girls Lindsay. Not having seen the movie, I said the latter, because I certainly didn’t mean the drugged out version. Following our meal, we were able to witness a domestic dispute between one of the other waitresses and her b/f. Then David was rebuked by the bartender when trying to order a shot of tequila. I was not present for the rebukement, but I was told later a short summary.

We arrived at the house, and each picked out a bedroom. It was a giant house, complete with a lot of wood paneling, just like my grandmother’s house. The night included us out on the back patio recounting the awesome show and listening to Shadowlands via Zach’s Blackberry. I had never realized the beauty of that song until that night. It’s so simple and building and pretty, I’m surprised I had never listened to it more. I remedied that on the way home. The next morning David and I went over to the nearby IHOP to have breakfast. The area we were staying in was great, not much traffic, yet near the interstate. It was light years better than Houston. I’m not sure how it is on weekdays or anything, but a Saturday morning was pretty nice.

I made it home from Dallas in time to vote in the election that was going on that day (i vote at a mall, how cool is that?) and get home in time to watch the LSU/Auburn game. I highly recommend taking old US highways over interstates, esp on LSU gamedays. Not only is it a way to take the scenic route, but you avoid some traffic. Right on.