Sunday, June 26, 2005
I should be doing other things right now. There are some bills I need to pay now that I have the stamps to send off the checks, and normally I’d actually be going to sleep right about now, or at least getting ready for it, but not today.
I’ve come to the realization that I have really boring weekends, but really awesome weeks. Probably because I do homework and watch school over the weekend. But regardless:
Tuesday and Thursday were standard ‘TKD Awesome’. I think my sprinting is starting to pay off a bit in sparring, as I suspected it would. I haven’t been doing it that long, but it’s already helped my 3 mile time tons. I went from a 37 minute 3-mile to a 32:40 minute 3-mile over the course of two weeks by sprinting. Mom wins again. But this week sparring felt easier. It’s really easy for me to burn myself out throwing too many kicks, and then I get sloppy and that’s just no good. I think I’ve been getting my stamina up higher, though, which is good.
Another thing I’ve noticed, though, is that I can throw much better kicks when I’m not all tired out, or at least more powerful kicks. By the time we actually get to sparring, which is at the end of the class, I’m worn down enough that getting everything together is tough. Of course, that may be the idea. But regardless, TKD still roxxorz my boxxorz.
Wednesday, I went out to Joxer Daly’s. Here’s that story:
I heard about this place a few weeks ago and wanted to check it out because it reportedly has a very large catalog of songs, and I’ve been looking for Tool: Aenima to sing for a long time. It’s not really standard karaoke fair, though. It’s not even exotic karoke faire. It’s way out there. But I wanted to check the place out.
Bon and Tyce came out together, which was cool. And Jess came out with some of her friends from hockey. That was nice of her. Rounding out our table was Sol. (Yeah, fake names). Sol has been to this bar before, though, as it turns out. It’s his Redskins Bar. During the football season, the place get all rowdy and packed for Sunday redskins games. They’ve got a song they sing when the Redskins get a touchdown, and everytime they get a first down, everyone goes: “First…first…FIRST DOWN!” That’s a bar.
So I got to this place, ordered up a HEINEKIN (more-real bear, S!) and sat down to watch some Futbol (what you Americans call soccer) while they set up the Karaoke. Then they brought out these *enormous* binders full of songs, and I started browsing through in search of good music. And guess what…THEY HAD AENIMA! I was way thrilled. Then everyone showed up, and we ordered some NEWCASTLE BROWN ALE (bam!) and got into the singing. Here are some of the ones I went through:
Fuel: Hemorrhage
Tool: Aenima (woo!)
311: Down (another one I’ve been on the lookout for)
A Perfect Circle: Judith
I’m very proud that I sang Judih. Those of you that have heard the song (it’s real purty) might remember that the last note rings for probably about 15 seconds or so. I’ve never been able to sing it all before without taking a breath but last Wednesday, I *nailed* it. Evidently it takes less air to sing loud than it does to sing normally. It was fantastic, I felt so great and had such a good time. Thanks to everyone for coming out. Aaaah. Good times. I gotta do that again.
Oh, and the beer? I gotta be honest, here, I can’t tell the difference yet between real stuff and not real stuff. My palette isn’t quite sharp enough yet. Maybe if I got them right next to each other. Give it a taste test. Maybe next time. But they all went down just fine. No gagging or anything. Maybe it was the singing, gotta restock the fluids after you sweat that much on stage (singing is hard!)
Friday I went out to volleyball, which was way monster fun as always, (btw: there was this *crazy hot* girl playing in the court next to us. Like, abs of steel. It was amazing.) And then afterwards, I went out to American Martyrs Church and hung out with some people. Mostly people I knew from my periodic stops at bible study. Good people all around. We hung out, ate some pizza, and just enjoyed each others company. This is a great way to spend a Friday, in my opinion. As we were breaking up for the evening, the two girls said they had to go back home and work on scrap booking a ‘good bye’ scrapbook for Fr. Steve, who is leaving for another diocese. Well I still had some energy, and I was curious, and so I volunteered to come over and help out. And I did. I helped cut out stuff to put under things, glued stuff together, and generally made myself useful. We ended up working on it until 4 in the morning (!) but when we were done, we were done. Whole thing finished. It was pretty neat. Plus, ‘L’, the girl whose house we were at, had some *cats*. They were mostly nervous little critters, but I got to pet them for a while, which was great. I want a cat.
Which reminds me! June 10th there is an ‘adoption festival’ right across the street from me. I want to go. Not because I want to adopt, more because I want to hang out with all the pets. Might get a sense of things you need to know before owning a pet, too. I really want a cat someday. Maybe when I get more stable.
Okay. Now I’m sleepy. Gotta get my winks in. SAYING GOODBYE!
[Edit:] Ooh! I almost forgot. I got *sick* this weekend. Yeah, that was the whole point. I had a really exciting week, and then when the weekend kicked in, I got sick and just sat around watching class, doing homework, and drinking a lot of Orange juice. Yeah. There, my post has a theme.
Oh, and I'm already over the illness. I woke up with a sore throat after staying up until 4 in the morning friday night scrapbooking. (Coincidence?) A little sore throat, a little aches, and a little bit of runny nose. *Really* wimpy cold. Okay, I'm done.
-N
I’ve come to the realization that I have really boring weekends, but really awesome weeks. Probably because I do homework and watch school over the weekend. But regardless:
Tuesday and Thursday were standard ‘TKD Awesome’. I think my sprinting is starting to pay off a bit in sparring, as I suspected it would. I haven’t been doing it that long, but it’s already helped my 3 mile time tons. I went from a 37 minute 3-mile to a 32:40 minute 3-mile over the course of two weeks by sprinting. Mom wins again. But this week sparring felt easier. It’s really easy for me to burn myself out throwing too many kicks, and then I get sloppy and that’s just no good. I think I’ve been getting my stamina up higher, though, which is good.
Another thing I’ve noticed, though, is that I can throw much better kicks when I’m not all tired out, or at least more powerful kicks. By the time we actually get to sparring, which is at the end of the class, I’m worn down enough that getting everything together is tough. Of course, that may be the idea. But regardless, TKD still roxxorz my boxxorz.
Wednesday, I went out to Joxer Daly’s. Here’s that story:
I heard about this place a few weeks ago and wanted to check it out because it reportedly has a very large catalog of songs, and I’ve been looking for Tool: Aenima to sing for a long time. It’s not really standard karaoke fair, though. It’s not even exotic karoke faire. It’s way out there. But I wanted to check the place out.
Bon and Tyce came out together, which was cool. And Jess came out with some of her friends from hockey. That was nice of her. Rounding out our table was Sol. (Yeah, fake names). Sol has been to this bar before, though, as it turns out. It’s his Redskins Bar. During the football season, the place get all rowdy and packed for Sunday redskins games. They’ve got a song they sing when the Redskins get a touchdown, and everytime they get a first down, everyone goes: “First…first…FIRST DOWN!” That’s a bar.
So I got to this place, ordered up a HEINEKIN (more-real bear, S!) and sat down to watch some Futbol (what you Americans call soccer) while they set up the Karaoke. Then they brought out these *enormous* binders full of songs, and I started browsing through in search of good music. And guess what…THEY HAD AENIMA! I was way thrilled. Then everyone showed up, and we ordered some NEWCASTLE BROWN ALE (bam!) and got into the singing. Here are some of the ones I went through:
Fuel: Hemorrhage
Tool: Aenima (woo!)
311: Down (another one I’ve been on the lookout for)
A Perfect Circle: Judith
I’m very proud that I sang Judih. Those of you that have heard the song (it’s real purty) might remember that the last note rings for probably about 15 seconds or so. I’ve never been able to sing it all before without taking a breath but last Wednesday, I *nailed* it. Evidently it takes less air to sing loud than it does to sing normally. It was fantastic, I felt so great and had such a good time. Thanks to everyone for coming out. Aaaah. Good times. I gotta do that again.
Oh, and the beer? I gotta be honest, here, I can’t tell the difference yet between real stuff and not real stuff. My palette isn’t quite sharp enough yet. Maybe if I got them right next to each other. Give it a taste test. Maybe next time. But they all went down just fine. No gagging or anything. Maybe it was the singing, gotta restock the fluids after you sweat that much on stage (singing is hard!)
Friday I went out to volleyball, which was way monster fun as always, (btw: there was this *crazy hot* girl playing in the court next to us. Like, abs of steel. It was amazing.) And then afterwards, I went out to American Martyrs Church and hung out with some people. Mostly people I knew from my periodic stops at bible study. Good people all around. We hung out, ate some pizza, and just enjoyed each others company. This is a great way to spend a Friday, in my opinion. As we were breaking up for the evening, the two girls said they had to go back home and work on scrap booking a ‘good bye’ scrapbook for Fr. Steve, who is leaving for another diocese. Well I still had some energy, and I was curious, and so I volunteered to come over and help out. And I did. I helped cut out stuff to put under things, glued stuff together, and generally made myself useful. We ended up working on it until 4 in the morning (!) but when we were done, we were done. Whole thing finished. It was pretty neat. Plus, ‘L’, the girl whose house we were at, had some *cats*. They were mostly nervous little critters, but I got to pet them for a while, which was great. I want a cat.
Which reminds me! June 10th there is an ‘adoption festival’ right across the street from me. I want to go. Not because I want to adopt, more because I want to hang out with all the pets. Might get a sense of things you need to know before owning a pet, too. I really want a cat someday. Maybe when I get more stable.
Okay. Now I’m sleepy. Gotta get my winks in. SAYING GOODBYE!
[Edit:] Ooh! I almost forgot. I got *sick* this weekend. Yeah, that was the whole point. I had a really exciting week, and then when the weekend kicked in, I got sick and just sat around watching class, doing homework, and drinking a lot of Orange juice. Yeah. There, my post has a theme.
Oh, and I'm already over the illness. I woke up with a sore throat after staying up until 4 in the morning friday night scrapbooking. (Coincidence?) A little sore throat, a little aches, and a little bit of runny nose. *Really* wimpy cold. Okay, I'm done.
-N
Sunday, June 12, 2005
By request:
I make some vague, occasional referencest bo 'beard experiments' every once in a while. "What are those?" you ask. I answer with these pictures:
"The Beard"
This is me, circa a few months ago, finally done with school and ready to reduce my study-imposed beard with something a little less hairy. But since I don't have any scalp-hair to play around with, I play around with my beard-hair instead. Coming up with this:
"Squares"
I was planning to turn the squares into a '+' and a '-' the next week, but the shave job turned out pretty sketchy, so I just went back to goatee. But over the past month or so, I've been growing out my next one. Check it out:
I call it: "Heartbeat". Pretty neat, I think, but a serious pain in the keester to shave.
Aww...who wishes they were photogenic?
So there you go. Larger versions are available, if you're keeping these things for prosperity. E-mail me and I'll send them to you.
Also, head on over to http://noel.zerothpower.com and check out two brand new, never-before-seen (except for mom) chapters of my continuing story. It's coming along pretty good, writing is fun!
Gotta go shopping. I made curry chicken roast (one of my favorite, simple, crockpot recepies, and supplied by my *awesome* sister) but that's only going to last me for so long.
Ciao!
-N
I make some vague, occasional referencest bo 'beard experiments' every once in a while. "What are those?" you ask. I answer with these pictures:
"The Beard"
This is me, circa a few months ago, finally done with school and ready to reduce my study-imposed beard with something a little less hairy. But since I don't have any scalp-hair to play around with, I play around with my beard-hair instead. Coming up with this:
"Squares"
I was planning to turn the squares into a '+' and a '-' the next week, but the shave job turned out pretty sketchy, so I just went back to goatee. But over the past month or so, I've been growing out my next one. Check it out:
I call it: "Heartbeat". Pretty neat, I think, but a serious pain in the keester to shave.
Aww...who wishes they were photogenic?
So there you go. Larger versions are available, if you're keeping these things for prosperity. E-mail me and I'll send them to you.
Also, head on over to http://noel.zerothpower.com and check out two brand new, never-before-seen (except for mom) chapters of my continuing story. It's coming along pretty good, writing is fun!
Gotta go shopping. I made curry chicken roast (one of my favorite, simple, crockpot recepies, and supplied by my *awesome* sister) but that's only going to last me for so long.
Ciao!
-N
Saturday, June 11, 2005
So those of you that keep track of this sort of thing might notice that I didn't post anything last week. That's because nothing really *happened* last week. It was pretty standard stuff. Not boring, really, hanging around my house is never booring, I've enough video games, writing projects, and drum practicing, along with all the other stuff I do on a regular basis, to keep me quite entertained. It's just that nothing notable happened, that's all. Booring stuff.
So this weekend, to make sure that didn't happen again, I went out to Karaoke!
This was the game plan:
1) Find nearby bar that does Karaoke on friday nights
2) Go there
And I did! There was a bit of a false start, where the first bar I went to had evidently not updated their profile on Citysearch and so they had live music, but no Karaoke. Not bad, but not what I was looking for. So I went to the next bar down on the list, The Scarlet Lady. It was pretty good times. I got there at 9:00 and didn't leave till about 1 AM. Sang some rockin' songs (I prefer rock Karaoke to the more traditional 'classic' or 'sing-song' stuff, just my thing) struck up a *few* conversations with strangers, and then came home. I had a pretty fun night, drank a couple beers...ooh...remind me to write about that later...um...yeah, and gave myself something to write about.
Now I'll admit, I didn't go out with the express *purpose* of going out and picking up chicks, but being a fan of the female persuasion that I am, it's usually always an option on some level. Did I pick up any hot ladeez? No, not really. Talked with some, but not a whole lot of 'pickin' up' happened. I honestly wasn't really worried about it until somtime this morning, when I just felt, I dunno, lonely, I guess. Couldn't *really* tell you why, I think fast, but I *feel* slowly. Just a minor funk for a few hours this morning. And about halfway through watching my lecture, I realized I didn't feel lonely anymore. Just that same sort of playfull happiness that seems to be my default these days. Guess I am a pretty happy person by default after all.
Oh, and the girl I ended up talking to most of the evening, she recommended another Karaoke bar that evedently has an *obscenely large* catalog for you to select and sing from. It's on wednesday nights, and it's really nearby, so I know what I'm doing on wednesday! The very, very, very first thing I'm checking for when I go there is to see if they have Aenima, by Tool. It's one of my favorite songs of all time, but heavy metal doesn't make it onto a whole lot of Karaoke playlists. Still, though, I look, just cause I've *always* wanted to sing that song.
Oh, and the girl that gave me the place was *really* cute.
So lessee...oh, right, beer! So evidently I've gotten enough of a taste for the stuff that I can drink a generic 'beer' without choking on my own bile. (Early in the night, mom, I was solid as a rock by the time I was driving again.) Good news, I suppose. I had a couple Bud Lights at the bar, just lacking any other brand to try out, and drank them both back without even thinking that...hey, I used to *hate* this stuff. Course, I don't want to get any flames from Beer Afficianados telling me that Bud Light isn't 'real beer', cause I've heard that stuff before. Just accept the fact that I'm trying out new flavors, albeit slowly, and be glad for me, eh?
Oh, and somthing else notable. On the way out, I realized I was *hungry*, and was planning to get some sort of munchie-kinda-deal when I got there. But I ordered my 'couple beers and just started singing, and completely forgot about food until about 2 in the morning when I was already home. I know they call this stuff 'liquid bread' but come on, that's a freakin' meal, right there.
Other interesting news, I got promoted! Paperwork finally came through, and I evidently started earning my higher salary at the beginning of last week. This is kinda cute, because between going back up to a 40 hour work week, getting my yearly raise, and getting my promotion, my paycheck has been steadily increasing in volume every single week. So...yeah, I'm rich.
Derek's roomate Chris is going to be coming down in a couple weeks. He's interning at Raytheon for the summer and will be staying with us and splitting rent. Yeah. I'm freaking *rich*. Plus he likes to play video games and will be buying a Gamecube when he gets down here. *Everyone wins*.
Sleep experiments: I am a *tired* guy. I've been getting 8 hours of sleep a night...well...maybe more like 7.5...for a while, but I still end up tired and drained during the day. Maybe that's normal...y'know...cause I'm working and all, but I've been trying to be better at it of late. I'm getting there, but I still end up lying in bed, resting, but not asleep, for an hour or two before I finally pass out. I'm hoping the repeated, consistent attempts at locking in 8 hours will lure my body into getting the sleep it needs. And if that prooves not to be enough, I may just have to sleep more. There are worse things.
This week, Karaoke at Joxer Daly's in Marina Del Rey on Wednesday. Everybody better be there!
-N
So this weekend, to make sure that didn't happen again, I went out to Karaoke!
This was the game plan:
1) Find nearby bar that does Karaoke on friday nights
2) Go there
And I did! There was a bit of a false start, where the first bar I went to had evidently not updated their profile on Citysearch and so they had live music, but no Karaoke. Not bad, but not what I was looking for. So I went to the next bar down on the list, The Scarlet Lady. It was pretty good times. I got there at 9:00 and didn't leave till about 1 AM. Sang some rockin' songs (I prefer rock Karaoke to the more traditional 'classic' or 'sing-song' stuff, just my thing) struck up a *few* conversations with strangers, and then came home. I had a pretty fun night, drank a couple beers...ooh...remind me to write about that later...um...yeah, and gave myself something to write about.
Now I'll admit, I didn't go out with the express *purpose* of going out and picking up chicks, but being a fan of the female persuasion that I am, it's usually always an option on some level. Did I pick up any hot ladeez? No, not really. Talked with some, but not a whole lot of 'pickin' up' happened. I honestly wasn't really worried about it until somtime this morning, when I just felt, I dunno, lonely, I guess. Couldn't *really* tell you why, I think fast, but I *feel* slowly. Just a minor funk for a few hours this morning. And about halfway through watching my lecture, I realized I didn't feel lonely anymore. Just that same sort of playfull happiness that seems to be my default these days. Guess I am a pretty happy person by default after all.
Oh, and the girl I ended up talking to most of the evening, she recommended another Karaoke bar that evedently has an *obscenely large* catalog for you to select and sing from. It's on wednesday nights, and it's really nearby, so I know what I'm doing on wednesday! The very, very, very first thing I'm checking for when I go there is to see if they have Aenima, by Tool. It's one of my favorite songs of all time, but heavy metal doesn't make it onto a whole lot of Karaoke playlists. Still, though, I look, just cause I've *always* wanted to sing that song.
Oh, and the girl that gave me the place was *really* cute.
So lessee...oh, right, beer! So evidently I've gotten enough of a taste for the stuff that I can drink a generic 'beer' without choking on my own bile. (Early in the night, mom, I was solid as a rock by the time I was driving again.) Good news, I suppose. I had a couple Bud Lights at the bar, just lacking any other brand to try out, and drank them both back without even thinking that...hey, I used to *hate* this stuff. Course, I don't want to get any flames from Beer Afficianados telling me that Bud Light isn't 'real beer', cause I've heard that stuff before. Just accept the fact that I'm trying out new flavors, albeit slowly, and be glad for me, eh?
Oh, and somthing else notable. On the way out, I realized I was *hungry*, and was planning to get some sort of munchie-kinda-deal when I got there. But I ordered my 'couple beers and just started singing, and completely forgot about food until about 2 in the morning when I was already home. I know they call this stuff 'liquid bread' but come on, that's a freakin' meal, right there.
Other interesting news, I got promoted! Paperwork finally came through, and I evidently started earning my higher salary at the beginning of last week. This is kinda cute, because between going back up to a 40 hour work week, getting my yearly raise, and getting my promotion, my paycheck has been steadily increasing in volume every single week. So...yeah, I'm rich.
Derek's roomate Chris is going to be coming down in a couple weeks. He's interning at Raytheon for the summer and will be staying with us and splitting rent. Yeah. I'm freaking *rich*. Plus he likes to play video games and will be buying a Gamecube when he gets down here. *Everyone wins*.
Sleep experiments: I am a *tired* guy. I've been getting 8 hours of sleep a night...well...maybe more like 7.5...for a while, but I still end up tired and drained during the day. Maybe that's normal...y'know...cause I'm working and all, but I've been trying to be better at it of late. I'm getting there, but I still end up lying in bed, resting, but not asleep, for an hour or two before I finally pass out. I'm hoping the repeated, consistent attempts at locking in 8 hours will lure my body into getting the sleep it needs. And if that prooves not to be enough, I may just have to sleep more. There are worse things.
This week, Karaoke at Joxer Daly's in Marina Del Rey on Wednesday. Everybody better be there!
-N
