My father-in-law took a fishing trip this past weekend. His firm wrapped up a big case and he treated his associates to a fishing trip in and around the Gulf with Captain Frank Moore (aka Fishing With The King). They had an incredible catch as evidenced by this picture. According to the Captain’s Log…
Month / June 2004
Blah Blah Blah
I finally got around to delving deep into the new code for the comments portion of MoveableType 3.0 Developer Edition. The latest version of MT includes a multitude of ways in which to configure comments, including using the TypeKey authentication system. The motivation behind all of these changes in the comment system is to combat the problem of comment SPAM. Since installing MT-Blacklist I haven’t had much of a problem with SPAM, but unfortunately MT-Blacklist doesn’t work with MT 3.0. According to Jay Allen, the comment features built-in to MT 3.0 don’t warrant the need for MT-Blacklist any more. Time will tell on that one, but so far I like what I see. 🙂
But I could use some help.
What The Deuce?!?!
I’ve been without cable for the past few months since Comcast turned it off and I’ve been on the fence regarding paying to have it turned back on. On one hand, I don’t watch as much TV as I used to, mostly because the major networks play nothing but crap. Not watching a lot of TV is a good thing because it means that I’m spending time doing other things. My weekends are much more productive because I’m no longer lured into watching home improvement shows. I’m actually out there improving my home. 🙂 However, last night it came into sudden, sharp, crystal clear focus, that by not having cable, I have been left out of the loop.
As anyone who has read this weblog can attest, I enjoy bicycling a great deal. The super bowl of cycling is the Tour de France and I’m insane about watching any and all coverage concerning the event. As it should be obvious by now, I’m a HUGE Lance Armstrong fan. If I’m crazy about cycling, and crazy about the Tour de France, then 2 + 2 should equal 4 right?
A Little House Cleaning
Did a little housecleaning this afternoon. I consolidated the Workout log into the main weblog under the category Health And Fitness. I haven’t posted to it in a long while and if I do in the future, it will be in the main weblog anyway. I also pulled the old Webcam page into the Odds And Ends page. It just made more sense to keep the navigation as simple as possible.
There’s never enough time in the day, but there’s a few things that I’m working on for the future…
Things Parents Say That Leave A Legacy
You wouldn’t know it by looking at me today, but I used to be a little kid. I was the smallest, skinniest little kid in school and being at the bottom of the food chain, as it were, had it’s own set of hurdles. As you might imagine, I had issues just like any child growing up would, but my issues centered around my height (or lack thereof) and my weight (or lack thereof) and how being little sucked. There were plenty of people along the way that helped bolster my confidence. Take Coach Newport for example. My 6th grade gym coach made the comment that being the smallest was a good thing because, “You get to be at the top”, whenever we would make a human pyramid. Clearly this made a lasting impression on me, as did other people in my life, since I remember it to this day. However my Mom made the most lasting impressions. Impressions that still have an indention in my psyche today – only I didn’t know they were false.
If anyone shared my pain of being little, it was my Mother. She was the one I’d run home to, to share my fears and anxieties over my size. Like any good mother, she would do everything in her power to make me feel better about myself. I remember one instance where she took me to the doctor. I don’t recall if I insisted, or if she thought up this on her own, but we went to him to ask him how tall I would be when I grew up. My Mother is 5′ 10″ and my Dad is 6′ so the doctor told me I would be 6′ 4″. To a kid that is smaller than every single person in his class, this was akin to being told you’re going to pull the sword from the stone, or grow up to be president. It wasn’t until I was in college and my height stalled at 5’10” that I realized that the doctor had just pulled the answer out of the sky. He had no way of knowing for sure. Yet, I always had doubts about his answer. There was no machine, or instrument he used to come up with his answer, he just said “You’re going to be 6’4” “. Although I hoped he was right, when he wasn’t, I didn’t put a lot of weight in it. I mean it wasn’t like he was family or anything.
Tales From A Pantry
Author: Marjorie Sweeney Beck Edition: Paperback, 65 pages Publisher: Unknown ASIN: Unknown Category Food
While strolling through the French Market in New Orleans on a gorgeous afternoon, I happened to stop into Aunt Sally’s Creole Pralines. Although clearly geared for the tourist, Aunt Sally’s stocked a very nice selection of true Louisiana fare. Things that you might find in just about any home in Louisiana. Although my wife and I were back in Louisiana to visit family, we had been a bit homesick recently, so seeing items that we grew up with really made us feel all warm and fuzzy. I had just taken up a keen interest in cooking, so I was wondering around looking at all the cookbooks.
They stocked the classics, such as “River Road Recipes” and even some avant garde fare such as “White Trash Cooking“, but there were several cookbooks that I had never seen before. One that particularly caught my eye was called “Tales From A Pantry: Reminisces of Growing Up in New Orleans in the Thirties and Forties, and Just a Few Recipes”. The small book appeared to be self published with a plastic comb style binding. As I glanced through the pages, I saw more stories than I did recipes, which piqued my interest, but when I saw that there was a recipe for Grillades, it instantly became a must have cookbook. 😛 Continue Reading
The Depressing Side Of Playing The Trumpet
I wrote this early Sunday morning, even though I didn’t get it posted until today. I bring this up because I’ve left the present tense used in the entry since I wrote it before I began playing on Sunday
I’ve been playing the trumpet for around 25 years, since the 6th grade to be exact, and it’s something I really enjoy a lot. Most people don’t know that I have my bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts in Trumpet Performance, but at one point I planned on being a full-time musician. After graduation, I changed paths and I don’t regret the choices that I’ve made. I don’t play as much as I used to and to be completely honest, I simply don’t have a lot of time for it. It takes a lot of practice to keep your chops up and I don’t make the time like I should. However, there are a few gigs that still come my way. This weekend I was asked if I would play for all the masses at church in honor of Memorial day. I readily agreed to perform, but there was a part of me that wanted to say no.
Why? Because the reason I was asked to perform was so that I would play Taps after each mass in remembrance of our fallen soldiers. In all of music, I cannot think of a sadder song than Taps, yet for a trumpet player it is part of the standard repertoire. Think about it, the only time you hear that song is when it’s played for the dead. Funerals, memorials, anything where you’re remembering a soldier that has died, Taps is called for. I suppose that if I did it often enough, I’d grow hardened, or accustomed to the song and the scene that accompanies it. However, that’s not the case so as a result each time I play it, it’s a struggle to get through it.