Bourne The Game!

June 6th...
I'm not a huge gamer but I am excited about this game. You have to go and check out the mini video's!

Video Chatin'...

Since my wife has got her new computer she's been learning new things, and finding new things to play with, so the other night we (her, Jenkins, and I) were all sitting in the living room, and Patti starts a video chat with both of us, it was funny us sitting here in the living room on video chat, playing with the effects, and just laughing at the delay in the audio.

Jenkins decided to take a pic of us on the computer in our little chat room.

Then he held it up to the camera on his laptop, I think its funny cause it looks like we were sitting together and her head is on my shoulder but we weren't.

I Drove All Day...

So my day started in the morning still in Huntsville helping snooch, getting things organized, it was fun except for when I hit my head walking under stuff, that part stinks! But overall we had fun, we cabled stuff, labeled stuff like he's doing in the pic, we laughed we cried, we told stories, it was a good time!

Then once I was done, the Wife and I were on our way back to Nashville, first of course we had to throw money away.

And whats a trip with food on the go, mmm milk shakes!

Once I got back, it was off to the shop to unload all the crap in my trunk, yea it was like being in a low rider driving back, all the extra stuff that we didn't need down there.
Then as soon as I got there, I saw the clock and I thought uh oh! I need to pick up a buddy at the airport, so I quick put down the camera that I using to blog with, unloaded everything and booked it to the airport

It was a good day, even the part that I running around town all day

Some Good Stuff....

So the Wife and I are in Huntsville, AL for a couple days, I've had some work down here, and I haven't really been home in a couple weeks, so we thought she doesn't have to work, so she might as well come with and hang out, take a couple days to get away from the norm, and we're together for meals and get to be together at night and not just talking on the phone. So while I was spending my day with the snooch, working for the most part the whole day, Patti found a place for dinner for us to eat something we don't have in our little part of the world, thats right B-dub's, she loves it and so do I! So tonight we got it to-go since there was a lot of loud drunks there, and came back to the hotel, now there are things that my wife doesn't like to share and one of them is onion rings! But she loves me so much that she gave me one, and then took a picture of it, just to show how much she loves me!And just to point out how big of a fatty I am, I got 18 Garlic Parmesan, she had one, and I had 17! But just look at the yummy sauce! LOOK AT IT!!!! (drooling)

What We Ate...

So now that I have time, I wanted to share with you a taste (play on words) of what we got to eat at the festival this week.

It started with me finding out that instead of getting catering like everybody else, us LED guys got $8 vouchers to eat at the vender's there in the festival.

So here's what the vender ally looked like, and it was for the most part crowded, and everything for the most part was $8, for example me and one of the guys got a corn dog, "A" Corndog and that was our dinner cause it cost $8, so I guess my point is that everything was $8 or more. Don't get me wrong, there are days when I would rather have a corndog than catering. So I'm not complaining about us having to eat vender food, just that it was so expensive.

But I would have to say that one of the perks of eating out there was picking what I wanted to eat, and one of the best was we got this nacho thing that had some Spanish name, and it was amazing, some kind of chips, cheese crap, and steak on top, my heart hurt but man was it good!

And finally, I saved the best for last funnel cake! My wife loves funnel cakes and so do I, there was this little food stand that pretty much didn't make anything but funnel cakes, so I figured that out of all the places making them, this place would have to have the best, and was I right, mmmm.....I can still taste it sortof.. just looking at the picture my mouth is watering and I'm hungry for one! I mean just look at it, fried to perfection, showered in powdered sugar, nice and hot, you just can't beat it!

Overall it was a good week, the sun came out on the last day it was still cold but nice!

Happy Places...

I was sitting waiting on my connection flight, and I thought I should call my wife, so I do, and she answers with her normal peppy self, we talk for a bit, and then when I'm about to go she says "So... Today I wonder.. can we go buy a new computer? Cause mine doesn't work any more!" So what did we do as soon as I landed, yup you know it, we went to the happy store and bought her a new awesome computer!

Sitting At The Airport...

Finally the festival is over, I'm a little sun-burnt thanks to yesterday and the sun finally peeking through the clouds, it wouldn't have been a good week unless I get burnt, I have some pic's & stories yet of the festival but for the sake of time, I'm not going to be putting them up just yet, instead your going to see what I'm seeing at the moment, only hoping that I had a direct flight, cause I just want to get home to my Wife!

He Brought Me Jamba Juice....

(haha he looks mad in this picture, ((aerrrrr... I'm calling sposts)) course it was like the 4th try I tried to get a pic of him while working!)

Yay it's nick! It's been pretty much the whole spring since we've seen each other, we've tried several times to hang out, here and there, or when he has bus call or whatever, and it always seems to not pan out, but not this week! We were both stuck together for the day for the most part working, and that's ok, cause that's what we talk about anyway, is work stuff, when you live what we live, you pretty much talk about gear, tell stories from your tour or show, (or somebody else's tour when they have good stories "Jenkins") It's always so much fun just hanging out!

Rainy... And Stinking Cold!!

Today was the first of the weekend of shows, it was over cast yesterday when we were setting up, and this morning when we got there, and everybody said "I've been here for 5 years and its never rained!! It's always looked like this for a day or so but never rained!" Well it did today, and cold! Man was it cold, and the three of us that came to do the show had looked at the weather before heading out this way, so wall we brought was shorts and t-shirts, and one light weight long sleeve something, (for me it was a rain jacket, not ment to keep you warm just dry) well that backed fired, it was so cold that we were sitting in the stands before the show had started, we were all shivering just sitting there not talking for the most part, it really was crazy, I had to get up and walk around for a bit. Then for about 4 minutes the sun came out around 5 o'clock, it was awesome, cause for a brief moment I was dry and warm! And......then it went under and it started raining again!

New Kicks!...

My Beautiful Wife talked (told me) me into getting some new shoe's ( I like to call them kicks, I got some new kicks!) for work since my last pair of shoe's were to say the least nasty old, there was really noting left, and there was no support, and when it rained or even if the ground was wet, my socks would get wet, it was horrible, so today was the first day I wore them for work and well I have to say that my Wife was right (like always), I needed some new shoe's and she was right for talking me into the more expensive ones they are really comfortable! So Thanks Patti!!

Crop Circles...

Today I flew to the other side of the country, the first of the two flights I had nobody next to me so I sprawled my stuff everywhere, it was nice, then on the second flight I had a big guy next to me, and when you put two big guys in airplane seats right next to each other it gets a little awkward, first you get the where do I put my elbow moment, I mean who's arm rest is it? Then comes the weird smell, and you think "is it me? Cause I'm sitting all cramped, or is it dinky doo next to me?", that one is the most awkward, cause you can't fake the first bad smell face, especially when they catch you... yea....

So since it was a long stinking flight, I had some time to look out the window, and you wouldn't believe all the crop circles there are in the southwest part of the country! Yea I really didn't have much to do and I was stuck against the wall of the plane for a couple hours!

Stupid Sunrise....

Well it was the last day in the shop for the week, thank goodness, even tho it was nice in the mornings with the sunrise over the interstate signs, its going to be nice not getting up before the sun comes up! But the up side was that it was a little nice spending some quality time with me, and some music, and my toast that I made before I left home that some mornings I had apple butter on it, but had chunky peanut butter this morning, and then a ton of LED, while my wife sleeps comfortable in our bed, I've been so jealous!

Ah the fruits of labor, it only took forever to build everything, but its so beautiful, the colors of Christmas, that makes it all the more appealing!!

My Mulling Isn't Quite Over...

Finally Monday came around, I spent the weekend mulling over all the stuff I needed to do, thinking that I should just go in and work for a bit here and there, but instead I turned my phone off, after putting in some grueling hours, I thought I'm going to take some time to myself for the weekend before the summer festival season kicks in, except for Sunday morning when the truck I loaded left for a gig, and I thought for a brief moment did I pack everything? That's the worst!

Anyway... I got in this morning bright and early, and well back to this...

And then I went on to this for most of the day, after figuring out the sequence I spent half the day daisy chaining, e-taping and zip tying. You know it sounds like fun!

Theres a valuable lesson in this blog, that I have done nothing but work all day, and at the moment am consumed by a plot!

Where Is All The Good Music...

I've been searching for the last two days, trying to find some new music to listen too, and so far nothing, can't find anything, its not like I'm looking for something brand new necessarily, but something fresh to listen too.

Numbers...

Yesterday I blogged about not blogging for the last 2 days, this morning I looked at my chart graph thing that lets me know how many people have looked at my blog, and I thought I would share it with you (the ones left looking at my blog), so the graph your looking at is somewhere around the last 40 days, as you can see the decline for the last couple days, (Sigh) it's sad you know?... You don't blog for a couple days and your numbers just go down the drain.

Measure Twice, Drill Once?

For the last month or so, I've really tried to blog everyday, even on days that I'm on the road working I try to make it happen, even if its something small about my day, but yesterday and today, or yesterday and the day before now that its past midnight, I haven't had the time to blog, and I actually felt... well... you know that feeling when you forget to do something that you have a habit of doing everyday, like brushing your teeth or, any of our new year's resolutions and when you skip it you feel guilty but you don't do anything about it, that's how I felt about not blogging the last couple days!

So today I knew that I was going to be supper busy but I thought there's got to be a moment at some point that I'm going to have to wait on something, and I'll blog then! Yea that didn't happen, it worked out just right that as soon as I was done with one project, I was able to move right on to the next, and didn't have to wait for parts (for too long at least) or anything, but I did manage to snap some pic's of the stupidness/excitement that I had today.

It started early this morning putting stuff back together, if I have to be in the shop working I would have to say that this is my favorite part of shop work is the real tech work of pulling apart equipment finding the problem, fixing/replacing the problem and then putting it back together, (and its working when I get it all together) especially when its just me with the ipod on nobody around just me and the equipment, there's something relaxing about fixing something.

That was followed by prepping some equipment that we're (me) getting ready for some friends, they want the stuff a little different than we have them, so I spent the rest of the day taking screws out, drilling wholes, measuring, trying to remember what the little line is called that's before the other line thats a little taller than the one I'm looking at on the tape measure, then having to remeasure cause I've forgotten if the line I need is the big line or the little line? Then looking at the finished product of the first of many changes, and seeing that one of the screws wasn't in line with the rest (DANG IT!!!)

That was followed by more drilling, and measuring, my phone ringing, looking at some diagrams for a while, walking in circles, (I kept setting down the tape measure or my sharpie somewhere) calling people and asking when the parts are going to ready, only to find out they were, getting my second wind back around dinner time when I got the parts, realizing that I could knock most of it out tonight....

Then I was sitting there looking at something to make sure it was straight (level), I realize that I had been wearing my yellow low lite safety glasses for the whole day, and my eyes were starting to hurt, I look at the bay door that I had open and realize that its dark out side. Then at the mess I've made and laughed (by myself with nobody around I laughed out loud, I LOL'd out loud) thinking what a mess I've created, there was stuff everywhere! And didn't remember even getting half the tools that I had, I thought where did those come from? and that's when I decided to go home.

So there's at least todays (yesterdays) excuse for no blog.

Bobby Lynn Doe...

I don't usually do video's on my blog, but this week for some reason I have two!

You have to see this, its not only a video, its a documentary about the greatest guitar tech/dancer of all time, Bobby Lynn Doe, he's a legend in the industry!

More Breakfast time....

Today is crazy Positive Post Tuesday thing, and well I'm not sure what to blog about that's positive, my mom left today after visiting for the weekend, (haha) that's not positive, just throwing it out there, and that I'm sad now, (yea she left, and I have to go back to work!) I blogged about my wife cooking breakfast every morning, thats positive, anyway this morning we thought that instead of her cooking we would go to this place for breakfast, I use to have way to much of this place, and hated it for a long time thanks to bus drivers!! But its my wifes favorite breakfast place, so I mentioned it to her the other day, (by accident! Dag Gum it) that we should go, yea..... there was no backing out of this one, so we got up and went.

And well it wasn't bad! But I don't like grits! I could probably do a whole blog on foods that have no flavor, and grits is one of them, can anybody tell me the origin of grits, I would search it myself but I would rather just think of it as nasty tasteless food, unless one of the 30 people that read my blog can explain to me why I should actually eat this southern tasteless white goo... that when it hardens you can actually use it as dry wall filler, its probably stronger than some of the putty that's out there! But sure is fun to make faces on! YAY!!

We were on our way to the airport to drop off mom, we were a little early, so went to the mall, and as we were walking around we found a country home store place that had lots of butter's and jams, and well to say the least mom was in heaven!! Anyway thanks for hanging with us this week mom!

7th Inning Stretch!

Just one of the many reasons I'm a Cubs fan!!

Mother's day...

Happy Mother's day to all the Mom's out there, hopefully everybody did something special, or at least called there mom's today!

My Mom like I've said is here visiting for the weekend, and that's pretty much what we've done, just visited, relaxed, watched movies, ate a lot of food, and laughed at the stupid tv.
Here she is with her snazzy phone, she took some pic's today and blogged about it, you should head over and see 'em

I Helped Clean Up!

My Mom is in town, and that makes for a great opportunity for my wife to cook breakfast in the mornings, I'm not a morning person, and my wife isn't either for the most part, I'm mean if I have to work then I get up grab something quick and go, and she does the same, so she doesn't get very many chances to cook anything in the mornings, but my mom is a early riser, so we've been getting up in the morning and making breakfast and hanging out, and since the wife is cooking the breakfast, I figure I might as well put everything away, and clean the dishes, and let them talk, I'm not much for talking in the morning anyway.

First lets just go over what all we had for breakfast, we had Eggs to order, bacon, toast with different kinds of jelly/jam, and assorted fruit. now back to cleaning up, and what I thought, that I was doing pretty good, I was grabbing a bunch of stuff at once and making some pretty good time cleaning up, the last thing to do was to put the 4 different kinds of fruit containers back in the fridge, so I grab all 4 stack 'em up and start walking to the fridge, (about 4 feet) open the fridge put the first of the four in the fridge followed by watching the next container (grapes) start falling towards the floor, now I had plenty of time to make a decision, (they fell really slow!!) I mean I was only 2 feet from the floor, but instead of doing anything I just watched as it hit the floor and the grapes, well...

Some kind of Cake...

My Mom's in town (YAY!) for a weekend visit and Sunday is mother's day. So it worked out great, its always fun having her here! Today we went and got some of that great Greek food that I've talked about, and then we just hung out and talked, followed by watching Shrek the third. It was fun.

My Wife has made a cake that I've never had before, and its amazing! Its white with some yellow fluffy stuff in the middle, some kind of frosting stuff, and theres like this coconut crap on top, I wish everybody could experience this cake, but I really don't want to share!

WIckhamTV...

Phil WickhamTV Live from Portland!
Everybody needs to tune in to the show tonight! 7:30pm pacific time, so do the math to whatever time zone your in, to tune in!

The Dentist...

Today I had a dentist appointment, and well since I was a little kid I've been indifferent to the dentist, hating everything they do, not sure why, maybe its because we're taught to hate the dentists from early on, via other kids and tv, I don't know, but I do know that now in my adult hood I'm making up for all the times I've missed as a kid, going almost once a month, so today my dentist and the cleaning dentist lady, complemented me on how my mouth is totally different from the first time I came to see them, and well I thought man thats awesome!!

So I'm sitting here, playing xbox (thats right, I'm having fun!!) and all of sudden I realize that my lips are no longer numb, (3 & 1/2 hours later) so I think to myself "wow! I'm getting better with my teeth, and what should I do now that I can feel my lips again?"

Yea thats right I made a root beer float!! I think I deserve it, I'm mean for having some better teeth, So here's to the dentist, because of him I had a reason to have a root beer float!

The Positve Post (The Wife)

For Positive Post Tuesday my wife has informed me that I need to do another post on her, and this time it needs to be entirely devoted to her and not other stuff, so (haha) here's a positive post just for her!

My wife does deserve to have her own post, she puts up with me on a daily bases, not only that but she's so good at just giving me the much needed time to relax, when I get home the last thing I want to do is go out to dinner, go to movies, go shopping, really just going any where other than my chair, and she lets me just sit there, (sometimes) I love that she's her own person, one of the things that I love is she yells at the tv when she disagrees with something on there, or watching a tv game show and she knows the answer she yells it at the tv, and when the person gets it wrong she laughs and tells the tv their stupid! And if she's..(before I finish I need to explain something about my wife, she doesn't laugh at things like some people do, something can be stupid funny, and she'll just sit there and look at the tv, and when you ask her if she didn't find that funny she'll be like no that was really funny, I just didn't laugh)...watching like funniest home video's or one of her shows that she likes to watch, she starts laughing you can't help to laugh with her, She has that contagious laugh its awesome!

One of the funniest things is when she gets in bed, or goes and lays down in the after noon just watch tv (cause I'm playing xbox) its like her legs are broken and she no longer can get herself anything to drink, or eat, so she with a faint voice will ask me to get her something, its pretty funny.

And she loves to AIM (iChat) me when we're sitting the same room! That drives me nuts sometimes cause I'll answer her verbally and then she types back cause she knows it drives me crazy! You have to Love that!

And for the longest time she wouldn't eat ice cream, cause when she did she said she would be to cold afterwards! How can not love that.

The To Be Continued...

Here's the "to be continued" post...and I thought I would share another picture, this time of the entire crew including the merch guys, we're all standing on the out skirts of a Gaff tape shape of a the bands logo, I thought that was a pretty cool idea! And again just a good group of people to work with!

And when you have a crew thats been together for 90 shows and most of us had done other tours together, you get a crew that pranks the opener bands together!!

Whats that? oh you wanna know what we did??

First, you have to gather all their cases and stack them..

Second, during load in you have the riggers hang a spare 1 ton motor upstage!
Third, you need some gaff tape.
Forth, you need a ton of industrial shrink wrap.
Fifth, you fly the finished product 35 feet in the air.

Crew Picture...

I have to much to say in the brief moment I have before the show, but I wanted to share this picture of just a great group of people that I've worked with for the last 87 shows!

I'm going to have to do something that I haven't done in a while and do a "To Be Continued!"

What Was I Thinking?!

So this morning I did something that I haven't done in a while, and that's almost miss the beginning of load in, I've never actually slept in passed a load in time, but once I came pretty close, and today I did the same thing. So there I was laying in my bunk and hear Harry waking somebody up that doesn't have an alarm, and I'm thinking to myself "what in the world is Harry doing up this early?" (Harry doesn't have to come inside in the early morning ((An hour before load in starts)) to help mark points, and do the walk threw) So I lift up my curtain, and see that I'm the only one left in the bunk area! (As Harry hurries and closes the door to the bunks like he in his words "woke the sleeping Bear!") So I put down my curtain, and lay there for few more seconds, then open my phone, and see that its, 7:44am, I'm like "I got 6 more minutes before I need to get up, then I realize that I'm an hour and 6 minutes from when I normally get up, yea this fat guy was moving, I don't think I've put my shoes on that quick in a long time, it was close one, and as I'm walking in the venue door my alarm goes off! What was I thinking? 7:50am? That should of said 6:5oam! (Sigh)


In light of the day, I thought I would try and be cool like everybody else and try making a statement with my hair! (I'm searching for a statement if you care to help!!) But once again the curliness strikes again, and my mohawk has turned into a birds nest!

I've Been A Slacker

For the last two days I've been working on a picture book (with pop ups) for the tour I'm on at the moment, its something that I like to do, I like to put on the coffee table or just look threw it every know and again, the two other tours that I've done this on I've done all the pictures by myself, the first time I took 10,000 pictures, followed by 12,000 on the next tour, this tour I thought it would be fun to see some other peoples pic's in the book so Farns is chipping in some of his pic's the part that stinks is I slacked off big time with my picture taking, I only took 4,000 pic's. I got some good one's but nothing like the first one! I just hope it turns out good?!

We eating more Cake!!

This tour I'm on has had so many birthdays, all I have to say is we are some cake eatin' fools!

Today was one of the kids, (there are a lot of 'em, like I said before you have to watch where your going, cause theres all kinds of little rascals running around, and it stinks when you run into 'em! Trust me!) he turned 10 and I can't imagine a better cake than one served on some Transformers plates! Even as an adult I'm like Sweet! A Transformers plate!!