retroblog.net

I’ve posted in the past about how I hate mushrooms popping up on my lawn. Well, over the weekend while raking up the endless amount of fallen leaves on my lawn, I uncovered a slimy group of mushrooms that I haven’t seen before. I just had to take a photo because it reminded me of the “Little Shop of Horrors” movie except this time around it’s with mutant alien mushrooms.

and yes I had to touch them in order to remove these unwanted growths off my lawn. And YES, they were just as cold and slimy as they look. maybe even more so. yuck.

It’s tough trying to attain the perfect lawn. There are so many factors going against the average homeowner – long dry summers, fungus, persistent mushrooms and neighborhood dogs doing their business on them. Trying to keep my fescue healthy, luscious and green feels like a full time job at times. I’ve personally had a hell of a time this year trying to keep my lawn full and green especially since we’ve been under water restrictions for most of the year. Since I didn’t fare so well this year, I’m currently prepping the lawn for next season in hopes that things will turn out better next year. So, I spent a day earlier this week overseeding the lawn. There were a couple of bare spots that needed special care as well. Well, this morning I noticed some birds as well as some squirrels enjoying some of the seeds I laid down on those bare spots. I really got pissed seeing that happen. especially since I purchased the expensive name brand seeds this time around. I wonder if they even noticed that they were eating “gourmet” seeds. man, I can never catch a break!! …I guess I’ll head back out to spread some more seeds…

Night, field of stars above us
You pick one, we frame it with our fingers intertwined
Seeds of every generation between our hands
And the promise to teach you the little I have learned so far

Night, field of stars above us
I pick one and name it for you and all who are to come…

Seeds by Brooke Fraser


from the album Albertine
—

I sometimes think back on what I left behind at church – my friends, fellow bandmates, my faith. I’m still not totally sure if I made the right decision but I know I couldn’t stay. It just didn’t feel right to me to see a pastor living a relatively lavish lifestyle and driving around in a mercedes convertible. the church felt more like a business than a place of worship. Since I was part of the band for close to a decade there, I guess I was privileged in witnessing more of what goes on behind the scenes than the average church goer. And what I saw wasn’t about the holy spirit or nurturing the congregation. It was more focused on networking with the more prominent members of the community including local celebrities, athletes, politicians and the wealthy. Essentially the guideline was to latch on to the ones with higher profiles and the rest in turn will follow like sheep. So, it felt like the ones (like me) who didn’t have the money, power or celebrity status, were left on the wayside. And now that I’ve moved on, I’m wondering about the ones that stayed behind. Don’t they notice the corruption and the skewed preference for the wealthy and the elite? what about the downtrodden, the weak, the sick and the poor? Do they have their place in the megachurch? I guess, “the weak and the poor” can’t pay for the pastors’ McMansions and luxury vehicles like “the rich” can. and where is God in all this? Like today’s song of the day says – “Divine love never fails, mercy will prevail, I wanna swear it’s true but it’s hard to believe it.” It’s definitely the song of my heart.

Song of the day: Mercy Will Prevail by The Choir
I wanna swear it’s true but it’s hard to defend it
I know it comes from You and I don’t comprehend it
Love never fails, mercy will prevail
I wanna swear it’s true but it’s hard to defend it

In the chill of a cruel word
In the nest of a wounded bird
In the shadow of doubt, in the smoke
In the smoke of a torch blown out
In the flight of a sharp stone
In the rubble where children moan
In our own apathy, in the blood
In the river at Calvary
- Mercy Will Prevail (Hindalong, Byrd, Daugherty, Chandler)

(more…)

I’m grateful for all the rain this week especially since we’re all still recovering from a long drought. but man, the mushrooms are having a field day on parts of my lawn. there seems to be an endless supply of these things. I can’t seem to pull them out fast enough!

hhmmm, don’t some of these look a bit phallic to you? ..or is that just my mind in the gutter again?

wow. that was painful. my site went offline for about eight hours yesterday. wtf. I reported the problem to tech support pretty early on but since my hosting company is located in Australia, this was all happening “overnight” their time.

I never did get a straight answer from them but I think it had something to do with their nameservers.

well, at least the site is back up and running now.

OK, after a week long effort, I think I’ve finally settled on a template that I actually like. It was tough finding a basic template that fit in with what I blog about here. I ended up adding my own images and tweaking this and that. Let me know what you think.

… and now to finally go back and create some worthwhile content…:P

longtime readers of retroBlog probably have noticed a recent change in look here on this site. I was never that satisfied with the original look of the blog and have been meaning to change things around for a long while now. I finally had a chance to play around with the templates a few days ago. and I’m still not done. The modified template that is currently on the site is most likely only temporary. I’m still in the process of finding and tweaking the right look for retroblog. So, things might appear a bit funky at times here for the next few days while I try different things out. let me know if you encounter a problem or error here. I just wanted to warn all the visitors just in case…

Song of the Day: Changes by Yes
I’m moving through some changes, I’ll never be the same
Something you did touched me
There’s no one else to blame…

download the song of the day [via mediafire]

I recently purchased Virgin Mobile’s Super Slice for my dad. Since he doesn’t use a cell phone enough to warrant a regular monthly plan, I thought a prepaid service was the way to go. An interesting thing happened when I tried to activate the phone for him. I couldn’t activate the phone through their website. When I called up customer service they told me the phone’s serial number (ESN) was already assigned to another account. wtf??!! It’s a brand new phone from best buy and YOUR telling me I can’t use it b/c SOMEHOW the serial number has been stolen off the phone???? well the guy couldn’t exactly tell me how this mix up came to be but there wasn’t anything that they could do on their end to get the phone activated. I had to go back to best buy and exchange the phone for a new one. brilliant. definitely doesn’t bode well for the phone or the service. hhhmmmmm….

“well, hello again. how ya doin’?” a voice appears out of nowhere in the dimly lit parking lot startling a woman in her mid-thirties loading groceries in her minivan.

“ummmm, hi. i’m fine,” she said hoping the man would just go away.

“mmmmm. *fine* is right,” the stranger remarked with a smirk, inching closer to the woman who’s noticeably perturbed about the man being there.

eeewwwww. the woman tries desperately to transfer the grocery bags from the cart to the van as quickly as humanly possible.

luckily a grocery store employee who was in the vicinity rounding up carts saw that the woman was in distress and swung by to wait for her to finish loading her groceries.

seeing that the employee wasn’t going to leave, the creep finally slinks away.

“why do i always attract these creeps every time i go out??” she screams at me after arriving home from the store visibly all frazzled from the incident.

she continues on her rant, “do i have a red target on me? or the kmart special blue light flashing above my head? why do strange men come and try to talk to me when all i want to do is get groceries for my family and get right back home!!!!”

i tried to put a positive spin on it. “obviously it’s because you’re attractive and you can’t help but get men’s attention.”

“then why can’t it be Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp? why is it always quasimodo or some grease monkey from jiffy lube?” she asked as she hands me the milk.

“i don’t know. but shoot. i’d love to get some attention. normally i just get ignored by everyone. i’d have to wave a big red flag wildly in the air to get somebody to look at me,” i said trying to bring the overall volume down.

“that’s why, you’re going to go get the groceries from now on,” she said to me as she places some produce into the refrigerator.

surprised at the new development i stammered back, “h-h-honey, you know i’m terrible at picking out produce!”

“well, you’ll get the hang of it,” she said with finality.

crap.

damn those creepy men hanging out at the grocery store. damn you all.

i better get me some hair gel and a members-only jacket so that i can fit right in.

The Band: Array
A RetroDan Flashback
setting: thursday evening at Andy’s house. our senior year. 1987.
band members: Andy- guitar and backing vocal, Johnny- bass, Daniel- drums, Rebecca- lead vocal, Kimmee- keyboards, backing vocal

“shit, boys, we are going to rock the house saturday night,” andy exclaimed as he gave me a hi-five. he turned to do the same with johnny but realized he wasn’t paying any attention. johnny was, as per usual, in his own little world, sitting back, smoking a joint and staring out at nothing.

a little perturbed by johnny’s lack of enthusiasm for the upcoming gig, andy picked up his guitar and played an intricate arpeggio that he had been working on the past few days. andy was a lanky rich boy who’s mom was never home and usually had the whole house to himself after school to play loud music in. he was the class clown and was even voted the “funniest senior” in the yearbook that year.

i played a couple of warmup drum fills on the tom-toms and then turned to andy and asked “are you sure we don’t need more rehearsal time before the party? i mean, i’m a bit nervous about it …and it’s like one of the biggest parties this whole semester, right?”

andy walked toward my drum set. actually it wasn’t mine. it was trey’s. andy stole .. i mean, had it on loan from Trey for the time being. “what are you kidding me? we are rock solid. you got that ‘neil peart’ thing down on the skins, i got the mad burnin’ leads on the geeettaarr and johnny boy over there …. he’s like the best damn bassist in our whole damn high school! what more do you want D?” andy asked while doing one of his motley-crue-rock-star-poses.

“i’m not talking about us necessarily. i’m more concerned about … uummm..” i discreetly motioned over to the two girls hanging out on the other side of andy’s oversized basement/activity/rehearsal room. rebecca was a bit preoccupied at the moment with getting her makeup “just so” in front of a mirror while Kimmee was lounging on a couch, busy yammering away with her boyfriend on the phone.

andy looked over and nodded. “look, i know they’re not the most talented, musically speaking but that’s not completely why they’re in the band anyway.”

i raised my eyebrows.

andy continued. “see, we (referring to johnny, andy and me) provide the musical foundation. we’re rock solid. no one’s gonna knock that. the girls, .. the girls.. are just the icing on the cake. they are our “hook”. there are a dozen other bands out there but with rebecca and kimmee, we stand out. rebecca’s out in front with the miniskirt and the tight shirt and then we got kimmee on keys and she’s smokin’ hot. you see what i’m getting at?”

“yeah. we’re a gimmick band,” i said crossing my arms, “a band with no integrity.”

“integrity? D, we’re in high school, there is no such thing. don’t worry, D. i’ve got it all worked out. i’m the mastermind behind the group anyway. i’m ‘Pete Townshend’ if you will.”

“who?” rebecca interrupted and then playfully grabbed andy’s ass.

“exactly,” andy replied back.

“if you’re Pete Townshend, does that make me, Keith Moon?” i asked while trying to be polite and not stare too long at Rebecca’s mini-skirted legs like i’ve tried to do this whole year.

“who?” rebecca again asked.

“YES” andy said while resuming back to doing rock star poses with his sunburst gibson les paul.

“no, i don’t want to be keith, he’s *dead* and all. but since you mentioned ‘Yes’ i can be ‘Alan White’” i said knowing that Rebecca would have no clue what i was talking about.

“nah. be Bill Bruford and i’ll be big ‘Chris badd-ass Squire’ on that mammoth rickenbacker!” Johnny interjected under a haze of smoke.

“whatever you guys are talking about, just stop it. it makes no sense.” Rebecca pouted. God she was so cute pouting like that. frankly she was cute all around but … but being “cute” doesn’t really redeem her from some of the bum notes she was trying to pass off as melody.

i walked over to andy and in a serious-down-to-business-tone tried to convince him to go over the set list with rebecca because i really didn’t think she knew all the words to *all* of the songs.

“don’t get your panties in a wad, Big D” Rebecca said to me after overhearing what i was saying to andy.

“you know i don’t like you calling me ‘Big D’” i said turning to Rebecca, “you make me sound like i’m fat or something.”

“dude, it’s a compliment. ‘Big D’ isn’t about your *whole* body,” she said with a wink.

andy stopped in mid-riff. “and how would *she* know this?” andy asked with all eyes in the vicinity turned and focused on me.

“she doesn’t. .. i mean… i DO… you know, i mean.. we didn’t … but size-wise..” i stammered losing all credibility.

as i continued to sink like the titanic, Kimmee waltzed back to her spot behind the Roland, waved at andy and asked, “now, Andy, show me how to do that C-chord again?”

a car is then heard pulling up in the driveway. andy ran upstairs and checked on who it was. “damn, it’s mom” andy said while coming back down. “OK, folks, we’re done here. i’ll see y’all at the clubhouse saturday, alright?”

on our way out andy raised his hands in the air and yelled “everybody, hi-fives, we . are . going . to . rock . the . house !”