Coming soon to a myspace near you

I hope...

It seems our band already has a myspace page but it hasn't really been worked on, it just more or less exists right now and thats about it.  However that may change over the coming weeks.  Hopefully we'll get newer versions of some of our stuff recorded (like stuff with me playing on it lol) and that so you guys can check out our tunes.

We had a practice scheduled yesterday to start the new year off right, but the guitarist was sick again so once again it was me and the drummer.  We used our time to print out the lyrics to the most recent (of the 2) song I wrote and played through the vocal parts for awhile, then did a couple takes with the entire bass line and mastered the best take.  It came out really well, and aside from a couple parts where I need to smooth out a transition between parts I'd say the bassline is pretty much where it needs to be.  The track we mastered also has some really epic drumming on it, mostly experimental stuff Brian was throwing out to see how it sounded.  As always he hit a lot of solid beats and the drums sound just like I hoped they would when I came up with it.  Now we just need to get some guitar in there and we're good to go.  But first we have to get the guitar player to show up.

Thats become a little bit of a sticking point with me.  I mean, I know if you're sick then you can't help it...but he has been missing a lot over the last couple months.  Back in late September the plan was to work out enough original stuff to do an hour set and then maybe record enough material to produce a cd on our own.  3+ months later we've gotten precious little further for whatever reason, but I guess thats just how it goes.  I know enough other musicians who can all tell the same story I am right now, so I guess you just grin and bear it.

Anyway, I wish I could post the bass/drum track we put down yesterday because I'm really excited about it.  Hopefully soon we'll have a completed version of it and a functioning myspace page to demo it all.

So maybe I don't hate my job quite as much anymore

Well boys and girls, it finally happened.  After 2 years of a carrot being dangled in front of me in the form of a promotion, and after 2 years of me performing duties well beyond what I was getting paid to do, I finally....are you sitting down?....got promoted.

Its effective when we return this upcoming Monday.  There have been a lot of changes over the last 6 months, and I have done everything I can to help our new boss get things settled down.  I've never been one to adhere to job descriptions.  I mean, I understand what my core duties are but just because I'm asked to do something that isn't in my department or that I'm not required to do doesn't mean I won't do it if I'm capable of taking care of it.  Fortunately that attitude is a plus with our new boss.

So now I officially have the responsibilities I unofficially had for these past couple years, and like I said now I'm getting paid for it and to the tune of a 13.4% raise.  That includes an early performance/merit increase that was due in a couple months and the promotion raise.  In this economy I am damn lucky and believe me I appreciate this.  Now I have to make sure I live up to this, so the hard work is really just beginning. 

There are actually a few people getting promoted, so its a good start to the new year for several of us.  And while I've never really cared much about titles, having one looks good on a resume.  Should things go belly-up for us with the merger (us getting acquired), that will help down the road.

Fa-la-la-la-laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

First off, I hope everyone had a great Christmas.  It seems kind of anti-climactic now, but soon it will be New Year's and then...nothing.  Second, whoever the douchebag(s) is/are that keep zapping negative votes on my blogs, I hope you're enjoying yourselves.

Ok, now to business.  Because of the distance my son lives from me we don't do the traditional (in the divorce sense) Christmas Eve/Christmas day split.  I came up with the idea of alternating between Christmas and New Year's ever year, with Christmas visitation being defined as from his last day of school until December 28th at noon, and then New Year's is from noon on the 28th until the Sunday before he goes back to school.  That way its easier on my son; he doesn't have to run all over the place and can stay in one spot and enjoy the holidays for a few days at least before having to pick up and go elsewhere. 

So this year I have New Year's visitation.  It sucks on one hand since I don't have any family besides my son, but on the plus side New Year's visitation usually gets you an extra paycheck in there to get gifts with.  Plus you have the day after Christmas sales which are nice too.  So I go out yesterday and see Gamestop has their "Buy 2 Used, Get 1 Free" sale going.  Nice.  I go check it out, and immediately score used copies of Mercs 2 and GH:WT for the boy along with a used copy of Lost Odyssey for me.  Nice haul, plus they had a used copy of CoD:WaW but my son didn't care for it too much so I passed.

So I check out the discs and wasn't particularly thrilled with the condition of any of them except for Mercs 2.  And LO is a 4 disc game, and disc 3 was suspect while disc 4 just screamed trouble.  So the kid went through all the disc 3s and 4s they had, and all were worse than the last one.  I even had to ask the manager (who was standing there) wtf man, don't you guys even check these anymore before you take them in?  Seriously.  So I figured I would take a chance and bought them anyway.

I get home and fired up my sliver account, since that way my son couldn't see my PP2 profile on his FL and see what I was playing.  First up was Mercs 2, since that one looked ok.  And...nope.  3 straight DREs.  My console was just replaced in October and has had really no trouble with other games, so I knew it was the disc.  There didn't seem to be any scratches of note, but upon closer inspection a good portion of the disc was discolored along the edge.  Not sure if that meant anything, but it would boot up to the main title then DRE 3 times, so that was it.  At that point I looked at the other games again and realized I was gonna be screwed here.  Disc 4 of LO had what could almost be described as gouges in it, and I wasn't even going to bother with the GH since that was 2 of 3 looking bad.

I had also purchased Civ:Rev used for my son back when I got us both copies of Left 4 Dead, so I figured I should check that one out too.  I played a full game of it with no problems, so thats a break there.  But now I had to return those 3 games I had just bought, which really sucked because that was a nice haul for the price.

So I did some thinking and decided to return those and get both the Scene-It games.  I got a refund at Gamestop but they didn't have the Scene-It titles, so I went next door to Toys'R'Us and they had both games, but only as kits with the controllers.  Obviously I didn't need 8 controllers, so I went with the first one which was only $40 and took a quick drive to Best Buy and found the newest Scene-It game on its own and got that.  So those games will be "family" presents, basically for both of us.  It should be a good time I think.

More holiday highlights

First up for Jikado, a Night Court episode (in 3 parts) "Santa Goes Downton"...sorry man, best I could do:

And now some highlights from a classic Christmas movie we watch every year at my place, Christmas Vacation.  There's plenty of scenes I'm leaving out, but I have some errands to run.  Enjoy!

Saucer sled + food additive = oh shit:

SQUIRREL!

Shitter was full

House lights

Fried pussycat

Where's the Tylenol?

More holiday cheer, this time from The Office

Following up on my tv/movie highlight theme, here's some clips from The Office.  I'll put some more up as I get time.  Also, if you missed my Married With Children highlights, just scroll down to the last blog. 

Anyway, enjoy these clips.  Oops...thats what she said!!

Secret Santa gone wrong:

Dwight brings in a Christmas goose:

Jim's Christmas prank on Dwight:

The rest of these are from the most recent Christmas episode, but its all I could find right now   On the plus side, there's highlights from the intervention at the Christmas party and Michael's attempt to get Meredith into rehab.