Pearl Jam 2008

Here I am, thanks to Lisa, at the Comcast Center (formerly the Tweeter Ctr) rockin out to Eddie Vedder killin it. Right now he is smackin Pete Townsend's "Reign on Me" on the ass and knockin me out.
These seats are great. The lawn here seems wicked awesome too. We don't have any big screen show but we can see the stage just fine. I would come back for lawn seats (or inside if offered) for almost any show. SPAC has a better lawn, but this is 3 hours closer, and the tailgating before the show is just as good.
Eddie started by saying they are taking tomorrow off, so they are gonna test our endurance. Bring it on :-) More later I hope...

Well, it seems 2 hours is what Eddie thinks will test my endurance. I'll take it, but it wasn't much of a test.

I'll tell you what tested my PATIENCE though, the 2 FUCKING HOURS waiting to get out of the fucking parking lot. It was absolutely ridiculous. We pulled out of our space and got into line and didn't move again for an hour and a half (I turned the car off). Thankfully both Lisa and I had our BlackBerry's (and the joy of each others company and conversation) to keep us occupied, otherwise I'd be fucking boiling (maybe not, I'm usually pretty level headed, if it's not a fire on a submarine under the ice, how bad can it be?). Let's just say forget what I said about the cool lawn seats and good sound, I won't be going back to the Comcast Center (or Tweeter Center, or whatever they want to call themselves).
Great show though, rock and roll wise, Pearl Jam put a lot of energy into it and I felt it. Lots of old "Ten" stuff with new stuff and it all flowed smooth. $75 per seat (we were in section 5, row S, seats 7&8) should buy you a little more production value I think. U2 has high ticket prices, but they put it back into the show. Don't take that as a slam, I loved the show and would see it again, they ruled better than jet boots, I guess I'm just old and spent too much time on the grass at SPAC.

Go see Pearl Jam if you get the chance, you won't be dissappointed by them. I hope you can get a deal on your tix.

Rockland Boat Races 2008

Here I am rocking on the "Instigator" next to the dock, waiting for the Races to get underway. Fog threatens to cancel the races, but a good time will be had (if you're on one of the boats) regardless. Well, since these are the ROCKLAND races, I should say IRRegardless.

The Lobster Festival Sea Goddess looks like she could be having more fun, but maybe she'll perk up once we get underway.

I haven't forgotten

I know I need to blog about the FunTown trip, so here it goes...

Rode out on the sixth grade bus and got to share a seat with a sweet young thing named Lisa who wasn't opposed to snuggling. When I say young, I mean she was 32 as compared to my 39 years, not that she was 11 like the rest of the sixth graders you sickos.

Got plenty of exercise walking around the park, from the Dragon's Descent to the Excalibur and back, a bunch of times. Bumper boats were a blast, but don't waste your time getting in line for the go carts, it's more fun pushing a grocery cart.

Then the ride back with a neck kinking nap.

That was that.

Since then I haven't been too busy. I did make a new poster, I'll try to post that later.

Out for drinks tonight at the Black Bull Tavern in Rockland.

See ya' there...

Maine Motivation

That trip to Old Orchard & Portland the other day was great. We decided to end early by pulling in to a B&B in Freeport that we found on Windows Live Search (every BlackBerry needs it loaded). I recommend B&B's over hotels any time you get the chance.

The Kendall Tavern B&B (www.kendalltavern.com info@kendalltavern.com) innkeeper Tim Rudolph is an awesome guy and definitely a friend to motorcyclists. If it is raining, he has room in the barn for the bikes, a washer and (more importantly if you show up wet) dryer, and even though the need didn't arise, I'm sure he would have a towel handy in the morning to wipe the dew off your ride. He also has plenty of cool pictures and stories about missions he has been on in underdeveloped countries building schools and such for his church, but he isn't preachy or anything, just an all around great guy.

Freeport would be a great place to do a clover leaf tour from. One day out around Sebego Lake, one day just for Portland and Freeport (walking and shopping), and one for Damariscotta-Pemaquid-Rockland-Camden. The Kendall Tavern B&B has a special just for motorcyclists, stay two nights and get the third for 1/2 off. That puts it at ~$125/night which is right in respectable hotel range, but you get a kick-ass breakfast and a cool biker friendly joint.
We did part of that on the way home, we went through Damariscotta and out to Pemaquid, all along Route 1 except for the Pemaquid part. Had lunch right there at the lighthouse (next door) and just had a great time. Zipping along on the bike, beautiful weather... Good times. Good times.

As great as it was, the ride did leave me a little saddle sore. I haven't really gotten a chance to put many miles on the bike yet this season, and 100 miles a day for 3 days took It's toll (but it did get easier each day, just not the sore ass part). Practice, practice. One thing I had never noticed before, since I had Lisa on the back, I took it a little easier than I normally would have, and I would have (or ever have), and I got 39 mpg. That's WITH a passenger. I usually only get 36 mpg by myself, but I am usually a little heavier on the throttle.

Next time I'll tell you about the trip to Funtown.

Keep your stick on the ice...

A walk in the park

Got my new BlackBerry Curve (8338) today. I know, I know, I just got the 8830 a month ago, why do I need a new one. Well that one didn't have all 4 bands of GSM, only 2 of the overseas ones and none of the US ones, so slipping a chip in for emergencies or whatever is a no go, AND that one doesn't have a camera. Since I was inside the 30 day window I decided to back out of that one. And here I am.

Had a phone interview for a combustion optimization engineering firm (Anthony Ross) who need a North-East US Service Rep. I think it went well. I'll let you know...

For this evening Lisa and I got on the bike and zipped down to Old Orchard Beach (Scarborough) for dinner with a friend of hers then rode lazily up to Deering Oaks to walk around and catch up with another friend of hers (in Maine we make the most of any trip greater than 20 miles from home. Visit just one friend? That would be wasteful).
Deering Oaks is fun, and I am amazed at how much smaller it is than I remember from when my Dad would bring me here as a kid. We used to buy a bag of peanuts and hold them out for the squirrels but hold on to them really tight so the squirrels would tug and tug on them. I couldn't stop laughing. Might not have set the best example, but he has certainly left me with more than just my name.
Cheers Mickey.


Here are some examples from todays new gadget...

Vroom! Vroom!

Unlike most of my previous blogs which I enjoy posting while I am actually doing what I'm blogging about, this blog is about what I did today (I know, I know, I posted after-the-fact a bunch of times during the X-Country road trip, but I still usually did them while moving in the car. Whatever).
Lisa and I took the Bandit 1200S out for a 117 mile jaunt. I needed to drop off Rapunzel's camera and I figured we could swing by the Harley dealership to check for gloves and facesheilds (a new one every year isn't a bad idea). At Punz's pond we saw some of the biggest tadpoles I have ever seen! These things were as big as frogs, but just no legs, and a big ol' tail. Very cool. Not much at the Harley shop except some gorgeous way overpriced bikes. I can't justify spending so much for one bike the amount that I could get two rock solid Jap bikes for. They all lean into corners and torque their way out, but how come the Harleys look so friggin' good? Oh well.

Lunch at The Ground Round. Eh. Not so good.

THEN... Off to Bluin's Suzuki to check out the DL650 V-Strom and those sumbitches asked me if I wanted to take it out for a spin! Cagey bastards. I spose I'll end up with one in the next year or so.

I need a bigger toy box.


No Frisky quote tonight, just happy thoughts of a beautiful ride with my Baby holding on...

RDHS Graduation 2008

Holy Crap!
It's friggin' hot in this gym.
These folding chairs make me wish I was even fatter than I already am, or at least that I had more cushion in my butt. I didn't think I had a boney butt, but I can sure feel bones in there grinding into this steel pan I'm perched on.

Amazingly, this is only as boring as I expected it to be. I expected it to be pretty boring though. Only two crying babies, but the loud one is sitting behind me.

Thank god I expected it to be hot and dressed for the occasion, otherwise it would be totally Not Scottish.

Krissy and Josh (I came by Krissy's invitation, but I shot portraits for both of them) turned out to be the shortest girl and boy in their class so they got to walk in together. That's about the only cool thing so far. I'm not expecting it to get any better.

I forgot to put the CF card in my supa dupa camera, so no pro shots by yours truly. Rapunzel let me borrow her camera though so at least the family will get some shots.

Roni let Jess use the camcorder to film this since she had a higher vantage point, I don't know what instructions she gave her to film or whatever, but the current development is that the camcorder has run out of batteries (pronounced BAT-trees) and we are only 45 minutes in to what should have been called, "The Caroline Curtis Scholarship Award Acceptance Show" cuz holy shite, that bird is gonna need a satchel to carry out all the scholarships she will be dragging out of here tonight. Seriously, she is getting a free ride to whatever school she is going to this year. She received at least 10 and probably 12 (I know she got a couple TBA ones and there are 8 of them).



Well you're not just waisting your time. Ya know?
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Home sweet home

Made it home from Maryland to Maine today. More about that later.


Who started rumors about my retiring!?
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Insomnia

I think I might be sensitive to caffeine.

Last night when Lisa and I got back from "First Friday" (in Leonardtown, MD, check it out if you get the chance) I had a Cherry Coke from Moe's (a fast food burrito joint) the I had left over. That was about 9-10pm. That kept me up til 1am messing around and playing solitaire. Now I've been up since 4:30am just lying here (and playing Majong, just a trial, but for only $2.99 I think I'll buy it. At least it's cheaper than the Chuzzle I bought for $9.99, but I think I've gotten my money's worth with that one already).

The birds just started chirping. Usually a beautiful sound, this morning I'm just too tired.



Today we are going to drive up to Washington D.C. and go to the National Portrait Gallery. I think the Stephen Colbert portrait is on display :-) Hold on, I'm gonna look...

Nope. I think we missed it. It was supposed to be at the National Portrait Gallery until April first. Oh well, I hear it is a cool place just the same. Well, maybe not COOL cool, but museum cool.



The sun is up now and it is foggy outside. Not because of low hanging clouds, but because it is so ungodly humid out. I think it will be 97F today. Hell, it's already 75F and 90% humidity and it's only 6:30am. Wherever we go, I hope it's air conditioned.





We can never go back to Arizona!

Right back at it

We took a day off and slept in. Ahhh. That felt good, got rolling at the crack of noon and headed in to Pittsburgh to check out the Photo Antiquities museum. Got to stop at Chik-fil-A for my fav fast food (although the super-sonic breakfast burrito is gaining ground).



The guy at the museum was very interesting in his info tour and we got to pick up some Daguerreotypes and tintypes and it was really cool if you are into that kind of stuff like me. The stereographic 3-D images were really impressive in the way they conveyed depth. Lots of cool old pix and hand tinted slides and such.



The Pirates were having a game against the Braves so we couldn't find a place to park for the Andy Warhol museum and we ended up heading back to Daves to get there before they got home from school and work. Oops! We found the Golden Fingers massage parlor on the way back and check to see if they had time/room for a couples massage. JANGO! Not a bad job for Chinese women, usually they don't get deep enough, but this ol' girl did a good job. I know she must've seen my nuts when she did my legs. Oh well, occupational hazard.



Back at the ranch, had some yummy meat loaf from Boston Mkt and took some cool shots of the girls and Ben. When it got to be bed time for Ben, he didn't want to stop the upside down rides Lisa was giving him and cried when he was made to stop. I think I have a new favorite picture.

As with all children, too much is never enough and my sweet pea Anna cried when I said we would be leaving the next day, and again after I finished reading "Don't ride your elephant to school". Breaks my heart and warms it at the same time to know how much she cares. I'll be back Anna. That reminds me, I need to practice big miles on my Bandit 1200s if I'm ever gonna do that tour from Fort Kent to Key West on Route 1.



Just entered West VA for the first time on my way to Lisa's sisters house in Leonardtown MD. Only 6 hours in the car today, another short one. Yay!





First off, it was a half and half, technically...

Short day on the road

BlackBerry users be warned! Leaving your google maps running in the background all night will suck the juice right out of your batteries leaving you with a DeadBerry in the morning with no alarm to get you up in time for breakfast.

Central time zone is totally my Bitch! We left Mountain time yesterday morning and didn't stop until we arrived at Sturgis, Michigan, which is in the Eastern time zone. Suck on that Central! I have to say though, 16.5 hours in that seat took its toll. That left only a six hour drive to Dave's house in Pittsburgh which was easy breezy.

Slim! Slim! Slim! Slim! (My other moniker) To hear 6 and 8 year old girls vying for my attention is almost music, I haven't seen them in almost a year and have only talked to them twice in that time. How come I am the only one I know who visits? Oh well. What do you call a dog who takes a bath? A SHAM-POOdle. What do you call a dog who plays football? A golden receiver. I was a bit surprised when I heard the "what do you call nuts on a wall" line. Rest assured, after some smooth investigation, it turned out to be as second grade as I had hoped and there was no mention of nuts on a chin.

Tomorrow I get to explore Pitt with Lisa and when they get home I'll get some pix to send off to their Mommy who has been called up in the reserves.

There is a word for an intentionally incomplete sentence, but I can't for the life of me remember it. Apiosemetism? Something like that. Oh well...

Day Two

We made it to Ogallala, Nebraska last night at about 3am and were back on the road at about 8:30am. As we were driving across Wyoming last night we were nice and dry, but off to the center left on the horizon there was a spectacular display of lightning that went on for hours. I think that is probably the best you could expect from driving across Wyoming, not that much to see as a rule, so I think we were pretty lucky. Lisa was driving so I really had the best seat in the house.

When we figured we'd had enough driving for one day we called ahead to the hotels at the next exit off I-80 to check prices (windows live search may come from the evil empire, but it's pretty friggin' handy). Holiday inn express had $109/night, no deal there, second call was to the Econo Lodge where they had a reasonable $69 but when we pulled into the lot it was a shithole, no deal. Comfort inn across the street looked nice and were $89 and we were spent so that sounded good. We hit the desk and the guy says he just started an audit on the system and that it would be a couple of minutes before he could get us a room. How many is a couple I asked and was told 20. See ya. Super 8 across the street had $79 rooms and immediate seating ("I only have rooms with two beds, but I'll only charge you for one bed." Does it cost more for two beds? "I'm only charging you for one." that is the point I realized any more engaging this clerk would only make it take longer to get to bed so I dropped it) BOOM! Asleep inside the 20 minute window.

Did you know that Arby's serves breakfast? Not too bad. Sausage egg and cheese biscuit tastes just like McD's, and it may have come from under the heat lamp, but the chocolate turnover was friggin' awesome. Light and flaky with a warm gooey chocolatey filling. I'd eat another one of those, hell, given the chance, I'd skip the biscuit and go straight for the turnover.

845 miles and we saw our first cop car on the median. That's when I started this blog. I had to stop blogging a bit ago so that the second cop we saw could politely tell us that we might want to be a bit more careful with our speed. He was great. To be fair though, Lisa's mind wasn't on the road at that point and I apologize for that. Nuff said on that matter for blog purposes.

We are hoping to make it past Toledo (all the way to Lorain if we can), Ohio, tonight. If we make it that far then we can get some sleep before getting to Dave's instead of having excited giggling girls wake us up after a couple of hours of sleep and being dead all day for the visit with Dave. I can't ever recall going to Pittsburgh, so that will be cool. I need to see what all the fuss is about "Eat-N-Park"

Remember, if you don't have anything nice to say, shut your fuckin yap!

Today is the day.

Bon voyage.

We are slowly setting sail on this journey across America, with a new twist. Pregnant Kitty has decided to join us, so now the three of us are really excited. We definitely need to swing by REI to pick up a roof rack system so we can move stuff up to the roof for more space for the kitty supplies and room to roam (already have a roof "bag" carrier to stuff things in, but need a rack to mount it to).

There is stress involved with such a move (on Lisa's part) because this is a big decision. Is this the first step in moving to Maine? If it is then this will only make it easier. Still though, the future is uncertain. Best to think of this for what it is at face value, Lisa will have her own car in Maine for her summer vacation.

If all goes well and the rhythm of life in Maine becomes too desirable to live without, then we can make that happen quite easily.

This is a journey.
A journey into the unknown.
We are pilgrims fleeing complacency for the new world of hope.

I dare to dream...



I've got six bars