and the band played on

2008, a new direction.

2008, the tortoise and the heir.

2008, uhhh traveling... again.

2008, keeping things interesting.

2008, fuck yeah!

sorry, just trying to figure out a good opening line.

to commemorate the interesting tail-end of 2007 on the road i put together a little video montage of the trip. well, to call it a montage is partially inaccurate, so i will just say that i composed a video and posted it on youtube that attempts to encompass the events that unfolded in the past couple of months..

click here to view it

moving forward.

one of the highlights being home in michigan for the past few weeks was spending the new years holiday up north on lake charlevoix. ahhh, it was a good dose of good old american fun: shooting ranges, board games, drinking and adventure sports.

awesome.

i have been to a shooting range once before in my life. it was a nice summer day and i was tagging along with my friend ryan. we went skeet shooting. i think we chucked out about 3,000 of those orange discs in the air—half to me and half to ryan. i am reasonably sure that ryan has a future as a marksman because he was hitting those fucking orange flying saucers with the kind of accuracy that suggested perhaps he had a career as a sniper. contrary to ryan, i didn’t hit a goddamn single one of those stupid clay things. my shoulder felt like it would fall off at any moment and no audible sound could be sensed by either of my ear drums. this had to have been one of the worst days.

fast forward about 5 years to my latest shooting extravaganza—this time with two of my uncles, a cousin and my father and brother. i woke up and was advised that we would be doing some “gunplay” later in the afternoon and i was instructed to dress in my neon orange bibs and jacket.

awesome.

i was perfectly pleased not going to another shooting range, but it was either go shooting with the men, shopping with the women in nearby petoskey or stay at home with the dogs. i hate shopping and dogs both, so it would have to gunplay—the lesser of the three evils.

we showed up and it became instantly apparent to me that i would be frozen solid and unable to shoot anything within 32 minutes. the shooting range was outside. everyone was wearing thick boots and clothing that made them look as if they weighed 30 pounds more than they actually did.

i stepped out of the car with my vans on, a pair of tight wrangler jeans and a jacket that wouldn’t keep me warm for more than 10 minutes in this frigid cold. i stepped inside to the “lodge” where a woman barked orders at us regarding which shooting stations we would be manning for the afternoon. she was no more than 5’4’’ and had enough makeup on her face to cover her entire body. she wore what appeared to be a bright blue sharpie marker line across her eyelids and i was questioning whether her eyebrows were tattooed on her. i understood maybe 20% of the phrases that came out of her mouth because i wasn’t so much as familiar with even where i was.

we stepped outside to our designated spot at the range.

it was fucking freezing. the bottoms of my feet felt like steel in an ice pond. rock solid.

the guns were pulled out and i started to get skirmish. i couldn’t even give you any idea of the caliber of these weapons—they were just shotguns that were very large and one appeared to have a sawed off barrel.

awesome.

skeet shooting ensued. my dad was knocking down an occasional orange clay disc and i am reasonably sure he wasn’t even sure where the trigger was on any of these assault weapons. my 14 year old brother knocked down plenty of the fucking discs. my other cousin, 10 years to my junior, was also nailing fuckers left and right. the uncles were kicking ass and giving me plenty of instruction—much needed instruction.

i didn’t hit a single fucking disc. not one. at one point in the skeet shooting competition i was standing roughly 15 feet from the stupid orange disc and still couldn’t hit it. awful. i was getting awkward instructions at every turn like “stop sticking your ass out” or “hold the gun on your shoulder.” jesus, little did they know my shoulder felt like raw meat being pounded by a kitchen hammer every time the goddamn gun would fire off. not to mention my fucking feet. i couldn’t feel anything on my body below my dick.

awesome.

clearly my skills as a marksman are just non-existent. some things never change.

board games are another story. i consider myself to be a very successful board game player. i usually always win in monopoly (this happens to be my favorite) and can out-act anyone in a game of charades. my success rate tends to be fairly consistent, however, it gets somewhat difficult to maintain undefeated records in a day and age where there are at least 12,000 board games available to you when you shop for them at the toy store. what ever happened to hungry hippos? checkers? card games like war? things get infinitely more complex with games that encompass every sort of odd category you can imagine.

taboo was the name of the game we played over the holiday break. this game was not my idea of perfection in a game—after all there was no board—but could certainly keep my attention occupied.

board games get intense with my dad. he typically yells at 3 times the volume that everyone else is talking whilst playing. he remains very intense throughout. jokes run rampant but all with the intention of pissing the opponent off and causing a competitive advantage. dad was on my team. my brother rounded out our team of three. he is calm and collected with board games. i tend to be somewhere between the two—occasionally screaming and scaring the shit out of opponents but also trying my damndest to remain intensely focused on winning. i hate losing in board games.

the three hours of taboo that ensued were victorious for my team. we won 2 out of 3 in the series. the rubber match came right down to the hair—we took the cake when we got the 35th point.

success.

watching the ball drop with my family was really nice. i mean i haven’t been home for this type of celebration in a long time. as it is this year, i was supposed to be in chicago having a rip-roaring dance party with my friends but plans change and those unfortunately did.

that being said, i was intent on drinking heavily to bring in 2008 despite the participants in the party being all contained within my blood line. my thought is that this fact should never matter. as such, i demanded talking to my uncle about mostly things related to naked women or some mild variation of that topic. a particular talking piece that kept coming up was why it’s socially irresponsible for hannah montana to be dancing on stage in times square at the age of 14 looking as though she is 21. i mean christ, that spells prison for any warm-blooded male with a dick.

later as we flipped through the channels it became apparent to me that there was a hawaiian tropic bikini contest that was showing on one of the sports networks. i demanded we watch this for "wholesome entertainment" and the rest of the family filtered out to the other room. i eventually caught on to this and uncle and i succumbed to listening to anderson cooper and kathy griffin on one of the major networks in times square. that griffin is a character though. i think she would be an interesting woman to have a beer with.

despite the women flashing on the screen and the amount of bass ale i was consuming, i couldn’t help but think about the past year that was 2007 and what would be in store for 2008.

so far the year has me beginning with a job. i suppose thats about the best possible way to start the year at this juncture. i am going on a nationwide tour to marathons, festivals and events doing "experiential marketing" for the client i am working for-- crocs. yeah, those goofy looking.... ehhhh.... sneakers?

i am excited.

i mean, how the hell could i not be? i am travelling coast to coast in a box truck for the next 6 months in warm climates with 3 other people. we are encouraged to travel at our leisure in between the events. meanwhile, everything is paid for and i am earning some nice coin to boot.

i won't complain.

i will keep the blog updated with my whereabouts in the coming months. hopefully this time i wont be talking so much about ramen noodles and canned green beans. i will be sleeping in hotels all the time, too. a pleasant upgrade from my recent digs in the back of my ford ranger. things are looking good.

i'll keep you posted.