Happy Birthday Jett

It was 5 years ago today that Jett was born.


It's crazy how fast time goes when you have a kid. And it's crazy to stop and think about how much a kid's mind learns in those first 5 years. How to, walk, talk, eat solid food, colors, numbers, letters, use the toilet, get dressed, how to feed themselves, plus so much more. Crazy.


I think our society is expecting kids to mature too quickly now. Which is why when Jett asked me, "When I'm 5 I'm still gonna be goofy, right?"

My answer was I hope you are always goofy.

Happy Birthday Jett.

Favorite Albums Of The Decade

In no way am I saying these are the best albums of the decade. Music is a silly thing to try and proclaim something "The Best". It's too personal. So maybe by making this list if it makes one other person check out one of these albums then it was worth doing.

With all three of these, they were my first hearing of each of these bands. With all of them it took just a snippet of one song to suck me in and make me buy the album and listen to it non stop. It has also lead to me seeing each of these bands live multiple times and buying every bit of music they had released previously and since each of these albums.

And you will know us by the trail of the dead- Source Tags and Codes


Minus The Bear- Highly Refined Pirates


Brant Bjork And The Operators- Self Titled

Because It's Cool

Sometimes you just have to post naked pictures of famous girls.

Better Late Than Never

Pics from my office holiday party.

I Don't Feel So Good

See all of the original series of Upside Downy Face images here.

Crazy Bike

Upside Downy Face; The Movie

See the video. Enjoy the video.

BSS | Upside Downy Face from Bruton Stroube Studios on Vimeo.

As seen (but not heard) at the December 4 gallery showing, this is the full-length behind-the-scenes look at Brandon Voges' Upside Downy Face series.

To see more of the Upside Downy Face multimedia experience, visit www.brutonstroube.com/blog.

Random Gripes

Well I have a few different rants that I will throw all together in this post.

I started off my morning reading this opinion piece that talked about Obama's approval rating. It talked about how his rating has dropped below 39% amongst whites but has stayed steady among blacks and hispanics. My issue is our country seems so stupid when it comes to race. There is always talk about how we can't get past racial differences, but then I ask, why even break down poll results in this manner? What good can come of it? I don't personally talk that way. I would talk about my friends in general terms. And until the country also does that, race will continue to be an issue.

Then it was a shitty day for football. The Steelers lost. Making their playoff hopes become more of a long shot. But I did like Miami beating New England. And of course the Rams lost again.

And lastly I had heard talk of this story on the radio. About an obese passenger on a flight. You have to be fucking kidding me! I can't even imagine how pissed I would be if this fat ass plopped down next to me on a flight. And sorry, if you are a huge fatty you need to buy 2 seats.


And the one bright spot was seeing this TV spot.

Jett and his girlfriend

Santa's magic kingdom

Send A Holiday Postcard

You can send an actual postcard via snail mail through gmail.

[go here to do it.]

You should probably send it to me.

In a drive thru

10 Most Expensive Bicycles

If you are looking for something to buy me for Christmas...

[See all 10 here]

November music

It was a huge month for getting new music. Many were things Nancy got from a co-worker. Really.

533 songs
which would be 1.2 days of continuous listening.
Below are the bands I got complete albums of. There were many other various things as well.

The Beatles- Everyday Chemistry (a mash up album some fan made)
Beirut
Belle $ Sebastian
Ben Kweller
The Cars- Candy-O
Chris Bell- I am the cosmos
The Flaming Lips- Hit to death in the future head
Guided by Voices- 5 different albums. (too lazy to type them all)
Handsome Furs- Face Control
Jens Lekman
Life Sentence- This was a record I remembered well from the 80s. Some guy made MP3s from his old vinyl. Thanks.
Loney Dear
Magnetic Fields
Magnolia Electric company
Mercury Rev
Minus The Bear- Into The Mirror
Pelle Carlberg
Ramones- Greatest Hits
Res- Black.Girls.Rock
Robert Pollard- Moon
The Rolling Stones- Exile On Main St.
Sean Hayes
Silver Jews
Sparklehorse
Them Crooked Vultures
Vitamin String Quartet- Tribute to the Flaming Lips
Warren Zevon

November Stats

So another month is gone. Here is the basic info about visits to this blog.

1,866 Visits
461 Visitors
33 countries
33 states
219 network locations

And while keyword searches have been rather bland this month there were at least a couple interesting ones:
super happy site to watch when high
who's opening skanksgiving

Thanks for reading.

Go Read This

A great email exchange.
Funny Stuff.

[Read Here]

Upside Downy Face

The show is this Friday.
Come out. See cool things.
Drink Beer.
Have Fun.

[Read More]

Fuck The Patriots

I will admit I didn't think the Saints would beat them.

Just the laws of chance were stacked against them. Since the Colts went to 11-0 on Sunday, it seemed the chances of having two teams reach that same mark in the same season were a long shot.

And I would think that the Patriots would want to put that extra effort to stop an unbeaten team since they had failed to do so against the Colts.

It started off as a close game. Well for the first couple possessions. But then the Saints turned it on and never looked back.

It was also awesome to see the evil Patriots pull Brady out late in the 4th quarter, completely admitting defeat and giving up.

Wouldn't it be cool to see both the Colts and the Saints remain undefeated till they both reach the Super Bowl? I doubt that could happen but it would be quite cool.

Cool Video Game Paintings

These are very cool.

My new shirt came today

First indoor fire of the season

Personal Property Tax

It's one of the things I hate about Missouri.

Personal property tax.

I don't know how it's all handled in other states but I do know that it sucks here in Missouri.

1. The fact that it's due in December, when people are using their money for the holidays always seemed beyond retarded to me.

2. The fact that it seems almost illegal to have to pay taxes repeatedly on the same item year after year.

3. That the payments are made out to a person and not to a department seems that wrong doing would be far to tempting.

So I just made out my check and will mail out my payment on Monday. They have an option to pay online. I went to the site to do that. After I clicked a few buttons and typed in my account number, I then saw they wanted to charge me $16 dollars for a "convenience fee".

You have to be fucking kidding me.

While yes it is more convenient for me, I would argue that it is also more convenient for them. They don't have to open the envelope I sent, match the check up with the paperwork, deposit the check, etc.

Now I could see charging the fee if the payment is late, to avoid the hassle of having to go to the actual office to pay. But there is no way in hell I am going to pay one extra cent on top of a payment I already hate to make, year after year.

Movie Review

The Last Emperor-

I had never seen this.

The last time B&N had criterion discs on sale I had bought it.

I really liked it, but it did make me realize how little I know about history.

[Roger Ebert Review]

Movie Review

Salvage-

I bought this cheap on Amazon.com.
I knew nothing about it. but it sounded interesting.

It was very cool. A unique way to tell a story.

Movie Review

Calvaire-

The title of this movie translates to "The Ordeal' in english.

Watching this mess was an ordeal.

Avoid this at all costs.

Although watch the one good scene below. Hilarious.