The Civil Wars and The Staves

Last Saturday night Jess and I got rid of the kids, had dinner at Arthur's and then went down to Covington to Madison Theater for a concert. We had missed The Civil Wars last time they were in town because it was a Thursday night (Biggest Mistake of our lives). We redeemed ourselves not only by going, but also by getting a spot way up front.

The show was refreshing for me. The all acoustic show at the large venue was perfect. The crowd was respectful and in control, the sound was amazing, and the bands were even better. The Staves were the opening band. They are 3 sisters from England who harmonize and take turns leading songs while one sister plays guitar, and another sparingly plays ukulele. I thoroughly enjoyed them.

Next up were The Civil Wars. Wow, they were amazing. They had command of the stage and the crowd, they were classy, and humorous. They took it right where The Staves left it and took it to the next level. They played every song that they have ever recorded along with all the covers that they have ever done with the exception of two songs, which equals about an hour and a half of them on stage.



This easily moved into my top 5 concerts of all time, maybe even top 3 (I'll have to review my stubs).

Bottom Line - Great Company + Good Music + Good Food = Great Times

Jim Brown

I completed Book #1 of the year. "Jim Brown: The Fierce Life of an American Hero" By Mike Freeman.



I enjoyed this book. Before reading it, I never knew much about Jim Brown other than hearing that he was a great running back. The book is a pretty good profile of his life mainly through stories that are not necessarily in chronological order. At first that bothered me, but as I progressed it worked out to be a good flow. Jim Brown is a complex man that had a lot going on in his life. Some highlights were the stories of his football days, quitting football in his prime to be a movie actor, he was probed and watched by the FBI for several years, he went to the gangs to promote peace and change. There was also a lot of information about Paul Brown, when he coached Jim Brown on the Browns. A lot of Browns. Jim Brown is a smart guy who chases change with action. For those who don't know here are some football highlights.



Bottom Line - Jim Brown is the greatest NFL running back of all time.

2012 Resolutions

My take on New Years resolutions isn't far from what the world perception usually is. To me, it is about selecting a few areas of my life to try to improve on. This is important to me each year because it gives me an opportunity to look in the mirror. As the great Bob Marley says in one of my favorite and slightly overused quotes, "Open your eyes, and look within. Are you satisfied, with the life you're livin?" For me if I am not challenging myself to become better, then I am most likely sleepwalking through life. For me it is an awareness issue. If I don't make resolutions, then I am most likely not aware and not looking within.

Throughout my resolution career I have learned to make the resolutions attainable. By doing that, the success rate increases. I never really complete my resolutions 100% every year, but I know that by increasing awareness, improvement is there. I usually make my resolutions after the first of the year, after I have had time to reflect on the past year. So without further ado, here are my official 2012 resolutions in no particular order of importance.

-I resolve to correctly operate the vehicle I am driving at stop signs. It has been brought to my attention (by my wife) that when I stop the vehicle and the stop sign is past my door while looking out the passenger window, then I have committed a crime.

-I resolve to think of God and His surrounding presence 3 times a day, not counting meal times. This seems easy, but it is actually probably the hardest one that I have ever tried and will be the one that I fail the most.

-I resolve to go on at least one long walk a month. I've given up on the exercise resolutions, I never do them, so for me 12 walks is attainable.

-I resolve to do a minimum of one 24 hour fast a month. This is about boosting my prayer life, and is definitely attainable.

-I resolve to play at least one board game a month. You can't play board games alone, so this is about boosting community.

-I resolve to complete and cast a vision and mission for my immediate family. My wife and I have talked about doing this for some time now, and this year we will get it done and put it into action.

-I resolve to complete the Children's Book that I started writing. "Tuesday Night Jazz" is the title, based on my Tuesday nights with the kids while Jess is at her girl's group.

-I resolve to write at least 2 letters to my Compassion kid David Ni Quei who resides in Ghana. I've been sponsoring him for about 6 years now and do not write him enough.

-I resolve to journal. Not blog, but journal. Last August I started keeping a journal of events and things that I did. I want to keep that going, but also add personal notes, thoughts, and prayers in a handwritten book.

Feel free to hold me accountable on these throughout the year. Like writing on my facebook, "How are the stop signs?" or "Hey want to get together to play Settlers of Cataan?".

Bottom Line - "The future's uncertain and the end is always near" - Jim Morrison (another overused quote by me)

2012 Reading List

In 2011 I read 19 books and the entire New Testament. I got tons of books for Christmas, and I've had books piled up in the reading list, so here is what is on the reading list as of right now in no particular order.

-The Old Testament - The Bible (This year I would like to get through the entire OT, never have before)

-The Life and Legacy of Lincoln-Grant School Covington KY 1866-1976 - Joseph M. Walton (Written by my next door neighbor, this would have been #20 for 2011, but I'm only 97 pages in)

-Jim Brown, The fierce life of an American hero - Mike Freeman (not to be confused with James Brown, Jim Brown is great, don't believe me, you tube him, I'm interested to learn about him through this book)

-No Country for Old Men - Cormac McCarthy (I read McCarthy's Border Trilogy last year, love his writing)

-The Road - Cormac McCarthy

-Escaping the Delta - Elijah Wald (Book about blues man Robert Johnson and his 1936 recordings)

-Heaven's Wager, When Heaven Weeps, & Thunder of Heaven - Ted Dekker (also known as the Heaven Trilogy, huge Ted Dekker fan)

-The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. - Edited by Clayborne Carson (Looks pretty sweet)

-Sacred Hoops - Phil Jackson (hopefully I'll finally figure out what the triangle offense really is)

-Preachin' the Blues The Life and Times of Son House - Daniel Beaumont (Dug into Son House last year, great blues man who wanted to be a preacher)

-Face To Face Volumes 1 & 2 - Kenneth Boa (These are scripture based daily readings for morning and night)

-A Canticle for Leibowitz - Walter M. Miller Jr. (My Father in law says I will like this)

-Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life - Jon Lee Anderson (Recently learned a little bit about Che, now I want to know more)

-The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin America Journey - Ernesto Che Guevara (His diaries from his trip on motorcycle through South America at age 23)

-Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation - John Ehle (Read "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" by Dee Brown last year and heard that this was another good book about the end of Native American freedom)

I figure that is a good start. I'm usually a Fiction guy, but I read a lot of Non-Fiction the second half of 2011 so I'm being over aggressive on it this year. We'll see how it goes. Let me know if you have any recommendations.


Bottom Line - Reading is fun

A Birthday story

A month ago today, I had a birthday. The day started by awaking at 5AM to load the fam into my truck to depart from Ocean Isle Beach after a week of vacation. The trip home was off to a great start. The kids were behaving, we were making good time and while crossing from North Carolina over the border into Tennessee, all of the sudden something popped in my truck and it sounded like my engine was going to explode. So I pulled over and checked it out. If you know me, then you know that I know nothing about cars at all. In fact I can barely figure out how to pop my hood. Luckily we were about a mile from a rest stop and the truck was drivable up to 40 mph.

So we pulled into the rest stop and awaited for my father in-law to return to check things out. We had called him when it happened since we were both traveling home and his car was ahead of us. He happened to find an auto store at the exit he got off of to turn around. There he procured a new spark plug and some other items after listening to the noise through a cell phone. After deciding that we were not able to fix the problems ourselves we called a tow truck. 30 seconds later the tow truck was there and I was scrambling to get the kids car seats out to get them into the other vehicle, then I hopped into the tow truck with my wife's sister's boyfriend and the tow truck driver.

On the way to the body shop we got to hear "tow" stories in a thick hardly understandable Tennessee accent about people falling asleep at the wheel and going through the divider wires, running into trees, and an elderly person who pulled over and could not figure out how to restart their BMW so they called our Tow truck driver. He got there and simply pushed the button for them to start it, then left.

So we take some Tennessee back roads and end up at a gas station/service station and the guy drops my truck off, gets his 20 dollars and pulls out. Being a Saturday, the place was packed and a sneaky looking guy with "Tommy" on his shirt told me that he would fix 'er right up while holding a rolled up wad of cash, and then walked away quickly. He didn't say how long, or how much. I kept following him around and asking him and his response was always the same, "We'll fix 'er right up".

Finally after waiting about 20 minutes this guy that could have been Carl from Slingblade's twin brother comes up to me and asks me in the same voice and mannerisms as Carl to pull my truck in the garage. Another 20 minutes later they changed the spark plug and they were done. Finally I cornered Tommy again and he whipped out his cash wad and said, "How about 40 dollars" I threw him two twenties and hit the road. I was shocked that the whole incident was that cheap of a fix.



We got back on the road and were going good until I noticed that we needed gas. The kids were asleep so I tried to stretch it out until the last possible second. So we pulled over at an exit and pulled up to the gas pump and I swiped my card and started opening my tank lid when the tenant came out and said, "We just lost electricity, the whole exit did, so you'll have to wait to get gas." Twenty minutes later Jess and I decided to risk it to drive down to the next exit to get gas. Little did we know, the next exit was 15 miles down the highway. So we turned the air conditioning off and prayed that we would make it in a drive that felt like an hour to the next exit to find the gas station.

The next gas station had electricity and we filled up and noticed an Arby's so we decided to get chocolate shakes for the last leg of our trip. We ordered the shakes in the drive thru which I ordered 3 small shakes, and I asked for one shake to be split into two cups. They said to pull forward. Once at the window the girl asked me again what I wanted. I said that I had two kids and asked if it would be possible to get a small shake in two cups so each cup would be filled halfway, I said "Is that possible" She stared at me dumbfounded and said "I.......have........no idea". After a couple of awkward seconds and consulting her manager she came back with 2 shakes in even smaller cups for the kids. Jess and I were so slaphappy at that time that we laughed about her quote for the next 2 hours.

Finally we had reached the cut in the hill from Kentucky going into Cincinnati and of course, we hit stopped and slow moving traffic, but eventually after 15.5 hours, we made it home. Krissy brought us milk and cookies and Magic Hat #9 and I ordered Pad Thai from China Wok and ended my birthday with a great meal.

Bottom Line - Birthdays are not just another day

Where's Scooter?

I could not have shared this story any better than it was already shared and written by my lovely wife, so I will ask you to read her post by clicking the link below.

http://lydianicole.blogspot.com/2011/04/wheres-scooter.html


Bottom Line - Joel is on the move