PostTitleXX

Content yea baby year

Well, I'm in San Francisco. It's been a couple of crazy weeks leading up to this, with work, new friends, and the fact that I couldn't really talk about or plan my trip. Yesterday started with my luggage being overweight and the lady being lame about it. I managed to fix that, and then was randomly selected for TSA Pre - it was simultaneously awesome and shitty. Awesome, because I didn't have to take my shoes or belt off, or take my laptop out of it's bag. Shitty,  because I didn't have to take my shoes or belt off, or take my laptop out of it's bag - which underscores the fact that TSA check is security theater at it's "finest."

Flight went as non-terribly as a 6 hour flight could go. My remote was broken though so I couldn't play any games (Virgin). After the flight, however, was a disaster. I had made plans for Carolyn to do lunch with Denise before her work, so I could meet up and surprise her as her bday was yesterday. The luggage took 15 minutes to come out, then only like bags came out, and mine wasn't one of them. Another 15 minutes and the rest of the bags came....and mine was one of the last. Time was a tickin!

I hopped on the airtran and made my way to the car rental center. My punishment for finding a great rental rate soon became apparent, as Fox Car Rentals had 20 freaking people in line, and only 2 attendants. Enter what became an HOUR of waiting for my rental to be processed, the minutes ticking down to a point where I might not be able to meet Denise and surprise her before she left for work. Once I finally got to the guy I told him (very nicely) that I was declining all services and bringing back the tank full. Still took 10 minutes of what I can only assume was him playing solitaire on the computer, then he for some reason had to input everything AGAIN. Finally i make my way to the second floor, and have to wait another 15 minutes for my car (even though though everyone else had been given their keys upstairs and got their cars immediately). I finally got in my car, and texted Carolyn to know I was coming.

I got to Denise's, and text Carolyn to come outside and let Denise know that she had to check something in her car or something. So Carolyn comes out, and lets me in, and she walks in through Denise's door, and I stand in the doorway. It faces the bathroom and the bathroom mirror, and Denise was doing her hair. I waited a few seconds, and she looked at me in the reflection, stopped, and goes "SHUT THE FUCK UP"

Hahahah it was good times. I JUST barely made it, literally with 5 minutes left. We ended up taking her to work and checking out her building. Then we went to Sausalito so I could have a burger before I died (in the rush to make the surprise I had not been able to get any food). The town is cute, and we ended up driving into the hills which was an amazing drive, lots of curves and hills, and amazing houses! Then we went over to the Marin Headlands and froze our asses off. Got to see Hawk Hill at night. Then drove back. I took a bath, killed some time, then went back down to Sausalito to pick up Denise. She ended up taking a lot longer than she said but that was ok because I was able to get some good bridge night shots. Thankfully I bought my new travel tripod and was able to use it!

I dropped her off, and then went back to Carolyn's. After being up for 21 hours, I was finally able to sleep!

ERADICATE.....ERADICATE....

I injured my elbow recently. I figured it was due to work, as I have strained it before. See, when I am moving guitars around to merchandise them on the walls, I usually pick them up from the bottom with just one arm as that's the quickest/most efficient way to deal with that task. This puts a strain on my elbow though, as sometimes I have so stretch it while I have a heavy guitar in my hand.

That's when I started feeling the pain this time, on a particular day a week or so ago that I was doing a lot of lifting on. I rested it a bit the few days after, and it got a bit better but it's going on two weeks now and hasn't healed.

I noticed today though that there is something else that might have caused the injury, or at the very least has exacerbated it: playing bass guitar. See, I've been playing bass a bit more lately since I've had a bass guitar to demo at the stores I train at. Nothing too physically exhausting, I haven't been playing much, but when I went to play today I realized that the exact muscle that is hurting is the one flex when playing bass with my fingers.

Interesting, since I hadn't given that a thought at all.

I picked up a brace for it today, let's see if that helps. I will definitely be warming up if I play any bass, and will be doing my best to not put a strain on it while working. I didn't break anything, I don't think, still feels like just a strained muscle. Hopefully it goes away soon!

Deep in the underground, they whisper all men are made equal

What a long and tiring week I've had. This was our weekly "DPS Summit" at Gibson Memphis. Basically all of the other guys that do my job across the US (and the rest of the world) gather together and we have a series of meetings with our bosses and the different divisions, as well as do a factory tour of one of our facilities.

Monday started out with my best Gibson related flying experience yet: managed to find a direct flight, and ended up getting a whole row to myself! Relatively quick flight, no delays. I got to Memphis and picked up my rental car. Last trip I ended up sick for 2 days due to getting car sick, so I didn't want to experience that again! I had intended to drive around that day and explore, but after waiting a bit to pick up one of my coworkers from the airport, I got mentally sucked into waiting around for the others...I mean, I never get to see these guys so I figured I should interact with them as much as I could. (just a shame none of them seem to share my random adventure/exploring spirit!). Ended up eating at "Pig on Beale" with Mark B, Dan, and Chris. I had an amazing smoked turkey sandwich with great fries and onion rings.

Tuesday was the first round of meetings. Mid day we did the factory tour at Gibson Memphis, which I had never seen before. That is where they make all the hollow and semi hollow body guitars. The entire building is this huge cavernous affair, and it lent itself well to the factory. For lunch we went to Dyers, this joint that cooks their hamburgers in 100 year old grease. It was delicious. After that we had more meetings...it was a very long exhaustive day. Didn't get out of there til 7ish. For dinner I went with Aljon, Danny, and Glenn to the Butcher Shop. I got chicken (YES...chicken at the steakhouse) which was actually pretty amazing...I've never had grilled chicken be so juicy and flavorful.

Wednesday was another day full of meetings and more meetings. Lunch was provided by Gibson Memphis, they ordered fried chicken from this place called Gus's. AMAZING...never had fried chicken that delicious. More and more meetings, got out super late again. I ended up going to Texas De Brazil, this all you can eat steakhouse, with a big chunk of the group. Sorta expensive, but I figured what the hell...I got to clear out a good chunk of the price with my expense budget for the day.

Thursday we had a cancellation in the morning, so we ended up having a "roundtable" type brainstorming session. The Gibson Bus showed up around 11:30 and we left for Nashville. I had rented a car not knowing the hotel was 2 blocks from the factory, so I didn't get to use it. I was planning to go to Nashville in it but was told not to due to the expense (even though it had been approved beforehand). I should have just done it and paid for it myself, I ended up getting pretty car sick on the ride. We stopped at Dennys on the way, and I had a burger. It was surprisingly REALLY good...but at this point all this super heavy food was starting to wear on me (and everyone else). I even had to break my semi soda-edge, due to needing to stay awake during those meetings haha. We got to Nashville and met with everyone else at the showroom there, and had a demonstration and dinner. I didn't really eat much that night, like I mentioned the food was starting to wear on me.

Friday morning we had some training from Gibson Pro Audio. They got us box lunches for the bus ride...which, I appreciate and all...but they got nothing but Almond chicken salad sandwiches which were just nasty to me. And they didn't get anything for the vegetarians and even made a stupid snarky remark about it too. I think that lack of consideration really shows someone's true nature and character, and I really dislike it. Anyway, the bus ride back was better since I took some Dramamine before. Took forever, because we caught some of the rain leftover from Tropical Storm Isaac. After checking in I got my car and drove around. Drove over to West Memphis in Arkansas, and around some of downtown Memphis.

Woke up super early today because I needed to drop off two others that were leaving before me. I had 2 hours to kill so I drove down to Mississippi (only 10-15 minutes away) and back. The flight was pretty alright, I had a nice cute girl sit next to me and we chatted for a bit. Now I'm going to unpack all this crap and UNWIND!

Had a really nice conversation today with Ben at Sam Ash, about music. I've said it many times in the last few years, but I REALLY miss having someone to speak to about music. Not just someone that likes music, enjoys hearing music, but someone that - like me - doesn't consider music as something that they really like or love, but rather as just a part of themselves. And important part.

For me, gone are the days of getting in the car with someone and just rocking out to music we both like and singing along like idiots. There are exceptions, to be sure, but when I look to 8-10 years ago the exception was NOT having that happen. I can't remember the last time I was in the car with someone and they actually got excited about me handing them the ipod to pick something to listen to. Now I just get the "oh you can put on whatever, I don't care" reply.

Passivity aside, this underscores a decline in musicblood (the phrase I am using for the rest of this blog entry to describe what I am talking about) that has permeated every facet of my life. When I first started working at Sam Ash I had lots of employees around me that liked similar music to me. Musicians, of course, and sometimes that helps, but sometimes it doesn't at all...point in case, the last few years of working there. Too many diverging musical tastes, all of which ended up being very close minded and unaccommodating. It's one thing to "not mind" listening to new music. It's another to actively seek the new music and embrace it.

Sure, there are many different musical styles and concurrent tastes in those. I'm not even talking about that, I'm talking about musicblood...the energy and spirit BEHIND the love of music, behind the appreciation and excitement of music.

Part of it is moving away from a lot of those people that were like that. Almost all of the newer friends I've made in the last 5-6 years have not really shared the musicblood. Sure, some of them are music fans, and some of them even really love listening to music but...it's just not there.

I miss being able to hang out with people and talk about music. About bands. Share them. Critique them. Go through an album and discuss the finer details. Jump in my car with someone and share a high spirited, belting out lyrics at the top of our voices, rocking out session.

*sigh*

Poop in the mouths of the inconsiderate.

I've had one of the worst, most miserable allergy-ridden days of my life today.

It started with the car rental this morning. He offered me a Jeep but wasn't sure if it had an AUX in (which is a necessity for my long drives and anxiety) so I ended up with the only other car that was ready, a car which had just been returned. Unfortunately, the assholes who had the car before me had dogs in the car, and didn't bother to clean up. I noticed a few pet hairs on the carpet but a quick glance didn't show more (it was dark hair) so I just took it. BIIIIIG mistake.

The car is FULL of pet hair. It's dark. And I didn't notice this until I had a full blown allergy attack halfway across alligator alley. It's not the rental agency's fault because I took the car before he could clean it. But those people...I hope those dogs poop in their mouths while they sleep tonight. INCONSIDERATE ASSHOLES.

Anyway, I tried my best to drive with the windows down, but that wasn't always feasible due to phone calls and meetings. 3+ hours in that car though, did me in. I spent the rest of the day with on and off allergy attacks. When I finally reached my last store visit of the day, I had been recovering from the last attack. Unfortunately though, I guess that store had a really high dust level, because after an hour I started having an attack. It didn't stop for the next 3 hours. My right eye was almost completed closed. My nose would not stop dripping and my eyes would not stop crying. It was terrible. I kept running to the bathroom to wash my face, and it did not help.

This ended up giving me a migraine. When I finally got to the hotel, I took an hour long bath. It didn't entirely help, but it helped a bit. After I decided to take a cold shower....for 20 minutes. That did the most good. The migraine started going away.

I feel MUCH better now...although the allergies are still killing me. I have tissues stuffed in my nose, that's the only way it's somewhat manageable. I've taken allergy pills but they don't seem to be doing much....baaaaaaaah.

ATTN Chick Fil A bandwagon protesters:

A few things for you to note...
1) First off, Chick-Fil-A's gay-unfriendliness is nothing new. They have contributed to their Winshape organization (which has then in turn contributed to some other gay-unfriendly organizations) for many years now. This is nothing new, so cool your angry jets.
2) If you want to take a stand, that is more than fine. Just make sure you do your research before jumping on angry "we are being repressed" bandwagons. By recent interactions, I know a lot of you that are calling for CFA "boycotts" are working under the bare minimum of information on the matter. You are just mad at recent events. READ UP ON THINGS BEFORE YOU START YELLING AT PEOPLE.
3) This "if you like Chick-Fil-A" we can't be friends business, is really dumb, and a poor showing of where your priorities lie...basically, you value over-emotional attachments to causes over rationale, and what real friendships consist of.
4) Most of these protesters lie on the more liberal side of things, so you can understand this: You don't like when a Christian claims you are a bad person for not believing in Christianity, correct? It's ignorant of them, and how dare they try to push their values on us, right? Well, same thing applies to this "if you eat at Chick fil a you are a bad person/not my friend" mentality: you are now forcing someone to accept your views wholeheartedly, or face being rejected by you. Obviously there are more complications in this case, but the core principle remains the same.


Long story short...if you have a problem with Chick fil A and you have thoroughly researched the cause of that and want to boycott them...that's great. You are even entitled to attempt to share your cause.

You are NOT, however, entitled to
shove it down my throat. You are NOT entitled to cast aspersions on my character and imply I am not a good person due to my refusal to boycott said company. You are also not entitled to put my friendship with you into question due to this matter. (i speak not in terms of "free speech" here, but rather in terms of "being a good, rational person" and "being a good REAL friend")

Have some sense. I've said this before, and I will say this again, I am friends with all of you because you are all generally NOT idiots. Don't start now, please. =]


And for the record, I think Dan Cathy is a goddamned (see what I did there?) idiot. Aside from his comments themselves being something I disagree with, he had no business speaking of his family and company's viewpoint on this matter. Not th
at he shouldn't be allowed to speak his mind just because I disagree with it, but rather that I think a fast food restaurant is a business. Any religious/family/etc ideals should be kept internally because at the end of the day, serving someone chicken as a christian is not inherantly different than serving them as an atheist, agnostic, jew, etc.

It should not be "would you like a side of jesus with that sandwich."

That being said, I enjoy their food. I will continue to eat it. Maybe not as much as I used to. Maybe my position will change, and I will feel a stronger need to not support them. For now though, I don't see and issue with it, and you really shouldn't give me shit about it, and imply I'm not a good person or friend because of it.