I ended up having to work quite a bit on Friday so I did not start the severe room cleaning. I hope to begin that this afternoon, but I am sure it will cover several days time. We went to the Scarborough Faire Renaissance Festival, just like we do every year. It was fun. I basically go to eat the food and drink lots of interesting beers, and to look at all the freaks running around. I remembered to take a few pictures this year, although I did not take very many, and the ones I took were not all that great. But nonetheless, I will post them here.


I call this one "weird old guy sitting in a tree chair"


Here we have "ye olde pirate talks to small boy"


This is "elephant man with stick"


This one shall be titled "dyke eats turkey leg"


This is "weirdos chowing down"


...and last but not least we have "too many donuts and beer"

Next year I will try and take more and better quality pictures. 8-)

Are diet soft drinks bad for you? If so, why exactly would that be? The problem with regular soft drinks obviously is the sugar. In a diet drink, its artificial sweetener, so that pretty much eliminates the problem right? If you go attempt to do any sort of research on the subject, all you can find is conspiracy theorists that say saccharin or aspartame killed their sister, or they drank diet drinks for two years and got brain cancer, etc.. This is all bullshit. If these ingredients were truly harmful to humans on any measurable level, thousands of people would be dying each day. The point of the diet drink in the first place is to cut out the calories from the sugar. The rest of the ingredients appear to be more or less inert.

It is my opinion that diet drinks are nothing more than artificially flavored water, and therefore do not harm or help a person, and it is perfectly OK to drink as many as you want. The user gets to decide the brand, so the user gets to choose whether to have one containing caffeine or not.

I recently bought some club soda, and I thoroughly enjoy it. The only ingredient listed on the can is "Carbonated water". I'm sure someone out there would say that CO2 causes your balls to shrivel up and fall off, because it happened to their grandmother's sister.

So what's the point here? NOTHING!


I think starting tomorrow, I am going to dedicate a good portion of the weekend to seriously cleaning my computer room. I have crap in my closet that I have had for 20 years, that I am 100% certain that I will never need. I will retain some items for archival purposes, but for the most part, its an "everything must go" scenario. Perhaps I will photo-document interesting items that I discover. You never know, I may find something of value that I can sell on eBay.

I am also going to the Scarborough Faire Renaissance Festival this weekend, so I should have plenty of interesting photos from that. A group of us goes each year, but I ALWAYS forget my camera. This year I will try and remember it.

My blogs seem to be getting farther and farther apart. This is not intentional, but rather based on the fact that nothing is happening. I guess I will get back to my routine of blogging on an interval, and if I have nothing important to say, I will just discuss the first topic that comes to mind, sorta like I did earlier in the year.

I went to the Dallas Stars Stanley Cup Playoff game 4 the other day. It was cool, but we lost. Then on Friday of the same week, I got primo tickets to the Texas Rangers baseball game, which was pretty cool. I sat in the "get hit in the face with a baseball" section. A baseball nearly hit us 3 or 4 times during the game, and another 8-10 balls landed within say 50 feet of our seats.

I opted to hold off on guitar purchases for now in order to buy some new hockey equipment. I think its a wise choice. I have guitars to play already, and the hockey stuff is a serious safety kinda thing. Speaking of hockey, I am back on a points streak again, getting 3 points in the last two games. There are only two games left in the season, then the playoffs start, so I am looking forward to that.

I ordered two hockey DVDs by Robby Glantz (http://www.robbyglantz.com/) I got The Secrets of Hockey Speed volume 1 and 2. They have already made a drastic change in my game, and one that I think will be a permanent feature, rather then something that just feels different due to superstition or whatnot. I can already skate much faster and with a lot less effort than I ever have, and I am on top of my game right now, and it feels great.

one last thing... I have been thinking really hard about porno (no pun intended). There are billions of dollars being made right now in the porn industry and I am not getting any of it. My plan is to invent a new type of pr0n that no one has ever seen before. You might laugh at this statement at first, but there are actually innovations in the porn industry that make people rich, and I plan to make myself one of those people sometime in the future. This is a goal that may take years to achieve, but I think if I can come up with a new, innovative concept, I can make lots of money.

I'm going to go cook tacos now.

Not a lot to report these days...

I really enjoy playing the guitar even though I am really not good at it. I am not even really sure how to find out if I am even half way decent or have any potential to play at all. I do know I thoroughly enjoy it, so ultimately I guess it does not matter if I am any good or not. For the amount of time that I have been playing, I would say I am not very good. In fact, compared to how long I have been playing, I should be fantastic, but instead I probably sux.

I own several guitars:

1 Cadillac Ovation Balladeer Model 1861
1 Translucent Dean Acoustic Bass
1 Sparkle Blue Danelectro Rumor Bass
1 Gibson Epiphone Special Model electric guitar
2 Ensenada Model CG108 Classical guitars

The Ovation is REALLY expensive so I rarely play it, and the rest are basically crap guitars. I don't play the bass much because I do not have a bass amp, and the acoustic bass I never could really get the strings to work well. I play the shit out of my two Ensenadas because they are easy to just pick up and play. I got one of them when my grandfather passed away, and I scour eBay on a monthly basis looking identical guitars, and I found one once, so now I have two of them. I am starting to enjoy electric guitar more and more, but rather than plugging into my amp and messing with all that, I use my Presonus Inspire 1394 to plug my guitar directly into my computer, which opens up a world of endless virtual effect pedals.

Anyhoo, I believe that every guitar player needs a minimum of 6 guitars. You need two toss around guitars, two mid range 300-400$ daily playing guitars, and two top end 1000$+ guitars. I say two because you should have an electric and an acoustic model for each price range. It may sound odd, but there is no rush to get all of these at once... you should collect them slowly over the decades. So, this brings me to the point of today's verbiage.

I need two new guitars. My current electric guitar is breaking down. I bought the absolute cheapest guitar I could at the time, in case I hated playing electric guitar. I have had it for many years, and so now it is time to add a mid-range model to my collection. I am looking for something in the 300-400$ range for this purpose, then I can buy a high end model later on down the road. Also, I need a mid range acoustic guitar. I have my Ensenadas and they are great. They are low end so they can be taken on a journey if necessary, and since my Ovation hardly ever leaves its hard shell case, I need something mid-range to fill the gap between pwnage and teh suck. Again, I would like to stick in the 300-400$ range.

Buying guitars is an odd thing. If you read reviews one person will rave about a certain guitar, and the next guy might say its crap. I have done extensive research, and I have come to the conclusion that the only proper way to buy one, is to go to the store and play them all, then go home and buy them online, unless they are the same price. Guitar Center has finally pulled their head of out their asshole and joined the mid 90s and now sells guitars on their web page, and their prices in the store are identical to the prices at online vendors such as Musician's Friend and American Musical.

I am sure I will report on any purchases I make. Right now I am trying to figure out if I should buy the acoustic or the electric first. I want both at the same time, but that's not a very good financial strategy. I bought some parts to repair my electric guitar, so maybe I will go with the acoustic first, and keep playing my low end electric for now.


Vote for Sanjaya!

I got my new truck yesterday afternoon. I ended up getting every feature available on a Dodge Ram truck, short of a sunroof. Turns out you cannot get both a sunroof and a 34 gallon gas tank on the same truck. I have no idea why. Here is a quick list of the cool stuff:

5.7 Litre HEMI Multi Displacement Engine
Remote start system
Power adjustable pedals
Heated leather power seats
Dual zone climate control
Rear power sliding window
In-dash 6-disc CD/MP3 player
DVD Based GPS navigation system
Sirius satellite radio
Infinity 7 speaker audio
Steering wheel mounted audio controls
Uconnect bluetooth phone system
Fold flat rear seat system
Chrome tubular side steps
Chrome fuel filler door
Rear wheel well liners
Chrome exhaust tip
750 amp battery
Class IV trailer hitch receiver
Fold up and/or away power trailer tow mirrors
34 Gallon fuel tank
20" Chrome clad wheels
Front tow hooks

The truck is amazing. It is very tight feeling, and very modern. The electronic acceleration controller is REALLY smooth. Also, it has something called "tip start", which feels odd. You barely have to turn the key for it to start. It is almost as if it is only requiring two pieces to make contact, then the computer starts the truck. I guess this is similar to cars that feature a push button type of starter, only it is in the steering column instead.

The remote start is also really awesome. The doors stay locked after it starts until you unlock them, then you just stick the key in the hole and you are good to go.

It also has some advanced electronic Stability Control (ESB) features. This system monitors your intent versus what the truck is actually doing, and compensates. In other words, it monitors your speed and the angle of the steering wheel, and when it detects that the truck is not turning as you intend it to, it will apply brakes independently to whatever wheel is needed to make the truck do what you are wanting it to. Additionally, this same system applies the technique to help avoid rollovers.

The GPS is really nice. It will show you gas stations, restaurants, hotels, etc.. in a radius around your current location. Also, the truck has a gyroscope and a speed monitor built in, so the GPS is "live". If you swerve back and forth, the position indicator on the screen also will swerve back and forth.

I have only had the truck for 24 hours, so I have not had a chance to really explore all the features. I will do so over the next month or so and report on them later. Also, I will get a few pictures going as well.

Tomorrow I begin my quest to obtain a new truck. I will upgrade my current 2003 Dodge Ram 1500 Quad Cab SLT Lone Star Edition to a 2007 Dodge Ram 1500 Quad Cab Laramie. This time around I will have leather seating, a DVD based GPS navigation system, with Sirius Satellite Radio, U-connect Hands Free phone, a Remote Start system, and a over sized 34 Gallon Fuel Tank. Additionally, with the Laramie edition, I also get dual climate control, which will resolve a constant point of contention inside my truck. Returning will be my 20" wheels. This time around though, they will be chrome, rather than alloy. I tried alloy last time to see if they were easier to keep clean, and they were not. Also returning will be the spray in bed liner, which is the best investment you can make in truck upgrades in my opinion. This time I will go with Bright Silver Metallic, rather than the darker gunmetal gray type color.

I am thinking that with the current incentives that Dodge has, I will be able to achieve this without paying much more per month than I am right now. I am right about even with the value of the truck being about what I still owe on it, so now is a good time to upgrade.

Again, I think I will start this off with a lease, which typically saves shitloads of money, then I can always refinance at the end of the lease, and own the truck. This always seems to work out well with Dodge trucks, at least in my neck of the woods.

If the quotes I get are way above what I am expecting, then I will consider keeping my current truck, and perhaps "upgrading" it a bit, by replacing the stock in dash head unit with a unit that can MP3s and Sirius Satellite Radio, and perhaps adding a few hardware pieces to add gas mileage and/or horsepower.

The stock HEMI is still running like a champ, and I have had absolutely no mechanical issues whatsoever. So worst case scenario, I keep my current ride, and its good times.