Not long ago, I was looking for things to add to my media collection, and I stumbled across a boxed set of the surviving first season of The Avengers and the complete second season. Published by Studio Canal, it is an amazing set, so I purchased it.
Alas, I knew it was a Region 2 DVD set, but I knew how to rip those.
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From the moment that I bought my first DVD player (probably 1999 or 2000) I started collecting the plastic discs. Favorite movies, TV shows, and the like were voraciously purchased and enjoyed over and over. Shows like Family Guy, South Park, The Avengers (1960’s) and tons of movies found their way into my collection.
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About a year and a half ago, I re-entered the realm of PC gaming, buying a high end NUC and dropping in an nVidia card. It has served me well, providing countless hours of enjoyment playing my favorites and some new titles.
But recently I have decided to wade back into the Fall Out universe. I played a bunch of Fall Out 4 on my Xbox, and wanted to get the same experience on my gaming rig.
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Yesterday, I did one of those periodic rituals. About every 5-6 weeks, I go to the local “Great Clips” and get my hair cut. I am pretty boring, trimmer #2 on the back and sides, scissors on the top, and sideburns off at the top of the ears.
Sorry, I am not adventurous.
Then I noticed that instead of the $21 listed price, I was charged $18, because the stylist listed me as “Senior”.
Ouch.
Mega ouch.
So I gave her an extra big tip. (I have been tipping heavily to help them through the pandemic anyway, this time I tacked an extra three bucks on it)
The march of time…
More on the music theme. By the time I was in my early teens, I had become infatuated with music. This was the mid to late 1970’s and I skipped the trendy Disco era (dafuq was up with that?) and went straight to the classic and album oriented rock direction.
I listened to a lot of radio, and growing up in the SF Bay Area, we had several titans of the airwaves battling it out daily. KOME, KSJO in San Jose, and a slightly less edgy player in San Francisco KFOG. All three of them played the greatest music.
Late in my High School life, I decided to take up Guitar. This was circa 1982, and back then it was a lot tougher, for a variety of reasons.
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Our toaster is dying. We had a good one that was gifted us for our wedding in 2000, and a couple years ago, it gave up the ghost. Alas, time and resistive heater elements are not entirely compatible. Bummer.
We bought a cheap-ish replacement, and it worked for about three years, but the left slot ejector is stuck, and it is a pain in the arse to get toast out of it.
Time to buy a new toaster.
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No, he didn’t tell me that I sucked, or that I ought to give up trying.
It was probably about 18 months into the lessons, weekly 1 hour sessions that covered a lot of theory and practical groundwork. I was making a lot of progress, and feeling pretty good. I had learned several of the songs that I thought would be pinnacles of my playing. ‘That which shall not be named’ (1), UFO’s “Rock Bottom”, several Michael Schenker songs, some of Gary Moore’s rockers, and others that I considered my go to songs.
Then I brought him a song to learn that was more of a loosely structured jam session.
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I was interested in music at a young age. My father built his HiFi system from a Heathkit, and I am pretty sure my fascination with Progressive Rock was kindled by hearing Emerson, Lake and Palmer on the radio (Karn Evil 9, 1st impression, part 2 was frequently aired).
But, my desire to learn to play guitar was driven by the discovery of Michael Schenker. My first brush with his playing was when a friend in high school introduced me to the song “Shoot Shoot” from the UFO album “Strangers in the Night”, a live album recorded on the last tour that Michael did with the band before a brief return to the Scorpions, and then launching his solo career with the Michael Schenker Group.
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If you have been following the weather in California, you are probably somewhat in awe of the sheer volume of rain that has been dumped. The phenomena of “Atmospheric Rivers” have essentially led to wave after wave of intense, constant rainfall, quite atypical of California weather patterns.
What this has led to is that my morning walk with Cerberus have become both wet and treacherous. Last year, the very day that our Christmas shutdown began, I slipped and fell on the algae slicked sidewalk, needing stitches, as well as a few days of concussion protocol observation, a huge “no bueno” situation.
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In the mid to late 1970’s I began to listen to local rock radio stations. One of the huge benefits of growing up in the south Bay Area was that we had to iconic rock stations, KOME and KSJO that just played kick-ass music.
I was a total n00b, not knowing ANYTHING about music, but I know that there was one song that when I heard it, I loved it.
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