Ante Up!

Happy Monday!

Look forward to much blogeration tonight.

So Bill, How Did You Spend Your Weekend?

Well, thanks for asking. I spent the entire weekend at PopSmear studios in San Rafael, hanging out with the band, Scott, our fearless producer, his engineer Joel (from an amazing band called Scene of Action), and Scott's dog Cooper. And I tell you what, dear readers, recording is some exhausting stuff. You all know me to some degree, and you all know that I'm not one of those people who sleeps, really. Yeah, I sneak in a day here and there to really put head to pillow, but generally speaking, I trend to not require as much sleep as the average bear. But man, I tell you what, recording is some exhausting stuff. It's not mentally taxing, it's not even specifically physically taxing, there's just some combo of having to be listening critically, being ready to play at any second, and drinking that really takes it out of you.

So now, after three full days in the studio, we have the vast majority of four songs recorded (sans vocal harmony, but that's about it, and everything else sounds flippin' fantastic). And now that I'm home for the night, I'm dog tired. Things sound great, I got to rock the CD in my car all the way home, and all I can do is think about hopping in the shower and sleeping like the dead.

Of course, as happens in the life of Bill, I happen to have plans every night of the week. I know they say no rest for the wicked, which makes me wonder what cosmic being I pissed off in order to wind up like this. You'd think I slept Vishnu's sister or got drunk and punched out God's cousin. Oh well. Thus is life.

Nerd Transport, Part 2: The Segway

Sorry for the delay - I was out of town all weekend, and haven't hardly been in front of the computer since Thursday.

But, walking to work this morning, not only did I walk behind the tool that fell off his scooter some days ago, another block closer to my office, I saw coming towards me such a singular abomination, I couldn't get the camera in my iPhone ready in time to take a picture. Coming towards me at about 5 mph was a Segway.

Yeah, I see them around, I know about all the tour groups that use Segways as easy transportation, and I think it's wonderful. Then again, they also use those silly little electric yellow three-wheeler thingies, but I don't see private citizens running out to buy one of those.

So once again you have it: nerd status symbol, lazy transportation, and yet another means of transport that I wouldn't be caught dead on. See a few weeks back, I had a discussion with a friend about Segways. He said they were compelling, and that it seemed interesting, and I agree wholeheartedly. However, the problem is, if I actually got on one of those things except for on an organized tour, I might have to punch myself in the face.

Yet another piece in the puzzle of my Segway aversion: this past year in the Jeopardy Teen Tournament, there was a chubby lad of about seventeen whom most of us would call a dork. Granted, the mere fact that he was on the Jeopardy teen tournament probably didn't bode well for him. Still, he had a rather unfortunate bowl cut, glasses, and was wearing a blazer that looked like it needed a crest on it. So in the regular "meet the players" part of the program, Alex Trebek talked to him about his plans for college and the fact that still at almost eighteen, the gent didn't have a driver's license. He informed ol' Trebek that he never really planned to get a license either. And when asked about going around campus, Alex asked if, like most people, he was planning on getting a bike.

Of course, he replied that he had one plan: to use the money that he might use on a car to purchase a Segway. Thanks kid, for confirming every single stereotype about doughy nerds and their choice of transport. No bike, no car. Just him leaning forward ever so slightly to get wherever the world needs him to be. Plus, we know all too well, there is only one person on this whole planet who can make a Segway look cool...

Confession

I'm going to come out and say it: I don't like camping.

I suppose even that is a bit rash. See, it's not that I don't like camping, it's just that even the idea of camping has absolutely no appeal to me whatsoever. I know it's wonderful to get away, to find places with no cell reception or anything and just "be one with nature" and all that. But not for this guy. No way. Not me.

I really quite like getting outdoors, even out of the city. I like a good hike from time to time, I really enjoy both the fresh air that is to be had out amongst the wonderful trees, and there is hardly a single sight I enjoy than a pitch black night with a sky full of stars. No noise pollution, no air pollution, just a clear night sky through the treetops. But here's the kicker about all that: I like to take all that in, and then go have a nice snooze somewhere inside. On a bed. As much as I tend to enjoy relieving myself in public (I mean, come on, who doesn't?), I prefer having that be a second option behind indoor micturition. It's the simple difference between choice and necessity.

The other big lure everyone talks about other than sleeping under the stars and getting away and all that is the whole "ohh, every night you can have a camp fire to sit around." Well, I find fores to be far more enjoyable when either on the beach or when they are across from a couch with a nice young woman on it. Again, proximity to a bed is a factor in this one, but you know what I mean - wink wink. Then again, no cozy fire anywhere has done me much good in general lately.

So for all the wonders of relaxation, starlit nights, and communing with nature, I think I'd do much better with a flushing toilet and a bed.

Stability: Or, The Nerd Scooter

I work in a part of town that panders to nerds. It's commonly called "media gulch" in tech circles, and there are times when I'm walking around that I don't know if I am more inspired by the hipsters from the Academy of Art, or mildly repulsed by the nerds who talk about processor speeds and latency with the fervor that most people reserve only for discussing carnal relations.

So it is with this kind of "slightly over all the nerds I encounter every day" mentality that I set out of the office at the end of the day yesterday. I've been in a wee bit of a funk as of late, and therefore I have not been the most empathic person in all of the SOMA district in the past week or two. One thing that I have been consistently rolling my eyes at for the entire duration of my past year's employ at my company has been all the grown men (because, let's be honest, it's always the men) going around on some nerdy "professional" version of a Razor Scooter.

You all remember the Razor scooter, right? They kind of went out when Hansel rode one to the VH1 fashion awards back in 2001 when he upset Derek Zoolander for Best Male Model. You remember them - the scourge of college campuses not because of the sheer number of people riding the, but for the number of people who fell all over the place in an attempt to ride them. Well, thing is, for some tech "professionals" they never went out of style - they just got a little bit bigger, and for some, they got motorized.

Now it's these motorized ones that bother the living hell out of me. They're noisy, the people that "ride" them tend to be asshats, and they leave a nasty trail of exhaust. So despite my funk, I had a little glimmer of sunshine on my walk to the bus yesterday. One of the office buildings I walk past every morning and evening has a long winding walkway (in accordance with the ADA), which I've seen a handful of hotdogs ride their bike up. So as I'm walking towards the bus, awash in the sounds of Explosions in the Sky, I notice a dork with a motorized scooter exiting the building. Rather than being rational, and waiting to crank up the old motorized scooter, he apparently decided that he just needed to risk the hairpin turns of the handicap walkway. So in the blink of an eye he cranks his motor, heads down the ramp, and thwap he goes ass over handlebars, over the railing on the walkway, and into the bushes.

For the little part of me that couldn't help but stifle that "man, I hope he's okay" reaction, there was a huge part of me that smirked and thought "and this could have all been avoided had he simply not been a tool and tried to take his scooter down a wheelchair ramp.

But before you curse me and the fact that I'm a heartless bastard, rest assured - he got up, walked his scooter down the remainder of the walkway (as he should have in the first place) and rode off around the corner.

The "We" Thing

I spend a decent amount of the week (and really a decent amount of my life these days) around a number of married friends and coworkers. I am a big fan of all of them, and all of their respective spouses (at least those I've met, and hell, even those I haven't met). There's one thing, however, that does tend to grind my gears a little bit.

Yes, I know this comes from my bitter single self. It comes from having oh... six years or so of fairly contiguous singularity. But I tell you what, it still kind of makes me a little grumpy from time to time when friends only in the "we". And no, I don't mean the royal "we."

For instance, when I ask a friend what he (because let's be real, it's a he 95% of the time) did the past weekend or what he's up to that night, I am asking him. I know that for most married couples (at least I'd certainly hope so) their evening and weekend plans often involve one another, but come on. Once you light that unity candle, there's a reason you don't blow out your individual candle. To hear statements like "we don't get out as much as we used to" or "I have to see what we're up to this weekend" it is really just a way of making it seem more passive that you have to check with the wife before doing things. I get that. I understand that. Hell, I support that. By all means, please communicate with your loved one. Just don't try to pass it off as something it isn't - just say "I have to check with the wife" or whatever it is. And when I ask how you are doing, I am asking how you are doing. Allow me that and give me a straight answer; chances are, right after I ask that, I'll ask how the wife is doing. (or the husband, or the life partner - I love 'em all)

Yes, I realize in the sick twisted world that is English Grammar, the plural of two people is also "you". If anybody knows that, it's me. But do you really think your single buddy would really be asking about the coupled activities that filled the days of you two people sharing in matrimony?

Again, I know that I just sound like bitter single guy, but I really don't think I am (at least not in this particular instance). I congratulate and commend all of you wonderful married readers for your years of wedded bliss, and I wish you many more, and in this case, I do mean you as in you two, whomever "you two" may be. But I just want to put the word out there as a public service announcement for all you wonderful married folk, be mindful of your "we" since there are some people who have been an "I" for entirely too long.