So in May of 2006, I thought we had moved for the last time for years. I thought that this was the house we would raise our kids in. Turns out I was wrong.
When I got my new job, I was pretty sure that I could handle a commute that was two hours each way. I really didn’t think it would take as much out of me as it has. Getting up at 5 am every single day is stressful. Leaving for work at 6:45 and getting home at 7:15 makes a long day away from the wife and the dogs. It’s too long.
Yesterday, we sent a small deposit towards an apartment in Downtown Brooklyn. It’s a huge change to go from a 1280 square foot house with two attic spaces, a full basement and a fenced in yard to a 709 square foot apartment with no storage space, attic or basement. We’re getting rid of a lot of our furniture and most of our clutter.
I’m looking forward to simplifying our lives. I don’t know what that looks like yet, but I’m excited to be getting rid of as much junk as we can.
Posted on 2008-02-26
So last year on February 24th, Amber and I met a little beagle that needed a home. Being soft hearted, we agreed to make this little guy part of our family. The next day we found out that we were not going to be getting the beagle puppy. The family that was housing him couldn’t let him go, so we weren’t going to force them to give him up. I was sulking around the house for a little while after getting that phone call.
Around 11 am, Amber asked if I wanted to go down to the local dog shelter. She knew that I was pretty upset about not getting a new dog. At first I said I didn’t want to look for another dog, but then I yelled out “we’ll leave in 25 minutes. No guarantees.”
We went to the Connecticut SPCA in Monroe, CT and didn’t really see any dogs that we fell in love with. We were told there were smaller dogs available, but they were shy. In a similar story to how I adopted Matty, we went upstairs and saw a few crates with quiet dogs. One was a blond lab and she was calmly asleep, the other was some kinda brown and black dog that couldn’t have been over 20 lbs. I thought that we should see the blond one, because she was sleeping and quiet (that’s my rule about adopting dogs: they have to be quiet and calm in the shelter).
We introduced her to Matty before we agreed. They took one look at each other and didn’t really move much. She walked over and gave him a little kiss on his nose and we knew right then and there this was our dog. On our way home, we renamed her Leeloo Dallas.
This is a photo of her from the first few hours we had her. She was timid, scared out of her mind and thirsty.
She’s our little lady and I cherish the year that we’ve had so far.
Posted on 2008-02-25
So to follow up on Lawrence Lessig and the Change Congress movement…
He has decided not to run for the spot in Congress, but that doesn’t mean he’s giving up on the movement he’s started. He’s got a video posted over at http://lessig.org/blog/, his presentations are amazing so it’s worth a watch anyway.
While it seems like I’m being a sore loser (I wanted Lessig to run for the seat), I have an anecdote from an interview I recorded with Al Gore. This was back in the summer of 2007 when people were trying to convince him to run for the presidency again, he responded saying that he can get more done if he’s not the president. The same will probably go for Lessig.
I suggest you sign up for the updates at http://change-congress.org/.
Posted on 2008-02-25
Background info is to be found in the previous post to this one.
I was thinking about the situation between the band and the magazine from the point of view of the magazine today and came to a conclusion that I’m not sure I like. By reviewing the CD that they never heard, Maxim could be making a very dramatic statement to other bands releasing discs that are deemed important. Check out the statement from the magazine:
‘Of course, we always prefer to (sic) hearing music, but sometimes there are big albums that we don’t want to ignore that aren’t available to hear, which is what happened with the Crowes. It’s either an educated guess preview or no coverage at all, so in this case we chose the former.’”
Can you read the subtext in that statement? Give us your CDs or we will review them anyway. For the musicians, this means including Maxim in their future review copy lists or they risk having their CD unfairly reviewed based on their career, which might not be a good thing.
I have a feeling this is the last we’ll hear of Maxim’s music reviews for a long, long time. Not because they’ve learned their lesson publicly, but because it’s music reviews in MAXIM fer christsake…
Posted on 2008-02-24
