A co-worker of mine let me borrow the first season of LOST on dvd. I’m sad to say that I’m hooked. Great characters, great drama, and best of all no commercials. I’ll never watch a suspense show on tv again. Between the commercials and the weekly wait, I’d probably end up killing myself from all the anxiety. DVDs are the way to go, my friends. In fact, most of my upcoming Netflix rentals are old tv show series. My latest fascination besides LOST is In Living Color. It’s a pleasure to catch up with Fire Marshall Bill, Homie The Clown, and the rest of the gang. Great comedy.
Speaking of which, I had the pleasure this past weekend to perform improv comedy for my buddy Angel’s birthday bash at 180 Studio Cafe. I was teamed up with 3 close friends of his, Andrea, John, and Vanessa. I love being on stage and having to think on my feet. I should seriously take an improv class so I can upgrade my skills. The night went well. I was a bit nervous (as usual) before we had to perform, but as the games went on, I felt comfortable again. Unfortunately our last performance, the Three Headed Wiseman, was a disaster. One of my teammates started talking to an audience member in the middle of our performance. I… I… couldn’t believe it. You just don’t do that while you’re on stage. We ended on a low note.
All in all I received some positive feedback from folks in the audience after we finished. The manager from the cafe even told me she would like me to come back and be a part of their future Improv Nights. I was all smiles. Can’t wait to perform again.
Here are a few of my recommended Podcasts to subscribe to. They all make me smile with joy. Type in the titles into your iTunes Music Store to search and subscribe to them.
Bored Again Christian
– Target audience:
All Ages.
If you think music put out by Christians is lame, then it’s time for you to subscribe to The Bored Again Christian. They’ve got tunes to make your toes curl with delight. Each podcast is about 30 minutes long with back to back songs by christian artists. Great stuff. Christian music for people who are tired of Christian music.
Subscribe via iTunes
The Movement Podcast
- Target audience:
Middle School and High School.
This is sure to become a favorite of mine. West Kendall Baptist Church’s very own Rey De Armas records his Movement sermons for your listening pleasure. Each sermon is thought-provoking and challenging. Missed one of the Movement meetings? Catch up with this podcast and even enjoy pictures and slides with the podcast on your iTunes preview window. ROCK THE MOVEMENT.
Subscribe via iTunes
Dirty Little Secrets (Mature)
– Target audience:
College Age and older.
This is a podcast put out by the 2 pastors who started xxxchurch.com, Mike Foster and Craig Gross. They discuss relevant issues such as pornography, ministry, theology, current events and lots of other cool stuff. This is one of my favorites, but I must advise that this is for a mature audience.
Subscribe via iTunes
The Relevant Podcast
– Target audience:
College Age.
From the creators of RELEVANT Magazine comes the RELEVANT podcast. This is a weekly podcast highlighting current entertainment releases, news, and magazine updates. This is my personal favorite podcast because they address topics with a light-hearted attitude and they encourage feedback. I’ve been listening to this one since they started. A MUST for anyone who wants to stay in tune with God, Life, and Progressive Culture.
Subscribe via iTunes
That’s it for now. As I continue to discover more podcasts, I’ll make sure to make note of them. For now, enjoy the ones I’ve listed above. God Bless.
-Dave
After my class this morning I decided to use the first few hours of my free time to run some errands. Alright, two errands. The first was getting a fade at the local barbershop. I’ve had it with Hair Cuttery. I’m done with women cutting my hair. The last time I cut my hair there (about 2 months ago) the lady left one side of my hair (the right side) longer than the other. That’s just wrong. She must’ve been drunk on that hatorade. So this time I was willing to go back to my old style of hair cuts. I drove 10 minutes north from school to Alonzo Mourning-owned barbershop Cutz. The interior was spacous and inviting. I waited on the oakwood bench with a Rolling Stone magazine as the TV above played 106th and Park. In case you didn’t hear, dirty south rap has taken over the game. Gross, I know, but whaddayagunnado.
After about 10 minutes of waiting and reading, the barber finally calls me up. A warm quiet black gentleman sits me down and asks me what I’m getting.
“A one-and-a-half on the side and just trim the top with some scissors.”
“You got it,” he replies.
He proceeds to clip the side and rear of my head with precision and care. I’m taken back to my middle school days when I would go to Clippers, the local hiphop barbershop specializing in fades, blowouts, ceaser’s, and graffiti cuts. Yeah, cool stuff. But they also specialized in ringworms so I decided not to go there anymore. Plus I was tired of all the lame music videos they would play on the big screen. Booties and more Booties.
Cutz was different. It was peaceful. It was quiet. It was more expensive. Yeah, I was hesitant to stick around when I found out how much it would cost, but I figured I might be paying for some top quality fading. And I was right. He sculpted the hair on my head into a classic fade without any flaws. I saw the precision in his eyes through the reflection of the mirror. He was in another world, a world where each individual strand of hair is as important as the next. A world of conscious hiphop and subconcious designing. He was fading. It is his art.
15 minutes later I’m shaking his hand with a tip. I feel like a new man. Sure I have 20 dollars less in my pocket, but I see my reflection and I feel good again.
Afterward I walk down the same plaza toward the camera store. I needed to stock up on photopaper and film. I found what I was looking for and ready to pay. The young white girl at the register is pleased to help me, but she struggles with the buttons. It’s obvious that she’s new to the job. Naturally she fumbles up the student discount thing but I’m not upset. The owner offers me an extra roll of film for only 2 bucks to make up for the lost discount. It’s a good morning after all.
Now I’m going to eat a tuna sandwich and call it a day. I love Thursdays.
I miss the days when I was a musician. I had a keyboard and piano lessons once. Then middle school happened and that dream went out the window. My latest fascination is with another percussion instrument, the drums. I can’t help tapping on my steering wheel and stomping my left foot while listening to any song. I want to learn the beat and I want to perform! I suppose the only thing stopping me from getting my own set of drums is myself. I don’t think I could afford one at this point and I’m pretty sure I’d have no place to put it. ‘Tis a nice thought though.
I’m almost inclined to learn the piano again. It’s hard not to get jealous when I hear awesome musicians like Ben Folds or Keane rock out on the keys. I could be the next Billy Joel, minus the goatee and the alcoholic problem. Unless it comes with the package. I guess that’s like saying I wanna be like Hulk Hogan minus the muscles and the fame. That leaves me with a blonde fu-man-chu and shaved legs. Gross.
Speaking of sandwiches…
About twice a week I go to this little sandwich shop in front of my school called The Metro Deli. It’s a pretty cheap place to eat and so close to school, so I usually stroll in after my first class to do some eating and studying. But the owner is such a jerk. Everytime I’ve ever walked in there I’ve heard him say some expletive about his employees. If you don’t like them so much, why don’t you just fire them and get a whole new staff of mess-ups you can complain about? Complete the circle of life. What bugs me most is that he says all this garbage in front of the customer: me. Ruins the whole digestive process. I guess dealing with people face-to-face day in and day out for the majority of the day can make an old man bitter. That, or a shortage of Prozac.
Fortunate for me I barely have to deal with people during my days. I sit in front of a beautiful glowing G5 Mac and only talk to about 5 people every once in a while. It’s quite peaceful. I suppose that’s what makes socializing at the end of the week seem so appealing. My weekends typically consist of wrestling dudes at the gym, watching movies with pals, going to church with amigos, and eating at restaurants or food joints with compadres. Ah the beauty of friendships. I can’t wait for the next gathering.
So there ya have it. Pianos. Angry Sandwiches. Friends.
It’s Thursday! I love Thursdays!
How about you?
It’s good to be painting again. After not doing it so long, it takes a while to get back in the groove of it. It just takes a bit of catching up. This weekend I was up in Tampa with Steph and her family to work on a mural. They provided the transportation, I provided the brushes, the help, and the embarrassing stories of my upbringing. A good time was had by all. Even Ena and Bryan seemed to enjoy themselves, despite having to sit and watch us paint the whole time. I’m considering changing my comedy performance style to more of a story-telling one. I didn’t realize until this weekend how silly my life has been these 20 years. Every dumb moment makes a great story. I’ll test some of them out at The Movement in the upcoming weeks to see what kind of response I get with a larger audience.
The Monteros are such a great group of people. Seeing the dynamic of 3 siblings is always entertaining for me. The two gals heep tons of abuse on the guy and he loves it methinks. You can feel the love between the three of them, no joke. Mr. Montero (a.k.a. “X”) never seems upset. Always in a cheerful mood, he selflessly offers what he can to whomever he can offer it to, be it time, food, driving directions, or compliments. What a great guy. It is a family of strong believers with even stronger hearts (And a great-looking bunch, I might add). They are truly blessed to have each other. It is an envious sight to see.
Here’s the good news, it looks like we’ll be heading back to Tampa this coming weekend to finish up the mural. We’re about 70 percent done with Cinderella’s Castle in Danielle and Isabella’s room. All that’s left is the background and the details on the castle itself. Might take only a day to complete. I’m excited. The mere thought of traveling with friends gets my heart pumping with adrenaline. By the time I’m done writing this, I’ll feel strong enough to lift a car! One of those MicroMachines, at least. Despite what all the muscles seem to imply, I’m not that strong.
Seeing how I have a lot of time on my hands between classes and that I’m forced to use Internet Explorer (yuck) here at the computer lab, I decided to try and figure out what was wrong with my site on the IE browser. So I chose to look into the CSS and the HTML to see what the problem was. Turns out that all I needed was to put a break after my title image. Stupid Internet Explorer. Can’t you break on your own? Firefox and Safari do. And look how good they turned out.
So now you can read my ramblings on Internet Explorer again. Not that you would want to.
