100th Post:: It is indeed Hip To Be Square

Hey there friends and welcome to my 100th post. I wasnt sure what to write about so i figured I'd go for another story about teenage Jay. I thought i would write about the 4 years i experienced the one thing i ever participated in during high school-The annual Air Guitar Contest. Lets be honest, lip syncing a song doesnt involve brain surgery. You pick a song you like and pretend to sing and play it. We've all done it while looking in a mirror-maybe with a tennis racket for a guitar. It was really fun and pretty much the closest I will ever get to being in a real band. Although i am a descent karaokee singer. Now if you will-the history of my air guitar band.

1986

The first year. I was as you know a shy kid and nervous about everything, Well not much has changed-except the kid part. I don't remember how we decided to sign up but Scott , Colin , myself and 2 other guys chose to lip sync the Huey Lewis classic "The Power of Love." To be honest i was really surprised we got in after the audition. I remember being nervous to "pretend" to sing in front of the whole school. I remember it being a huge rush when everyone actually cheered. It was kind of the first time i got noticed at the school. We pretty much copied the video. We ended up placing third. First place was the preppy favorites who insisted on imitating the same Bee Gees song every year. Second place was an all girls group who danced and jiggles around in little costumes. I would have voted them over me. Yes i am a pig. It was a cool experience and i even got my picture in the yearbook- but what do you do for an encore?

1987

If it ain't broke don't fix it. Yes we did another Huey Lewis song. Jacob's Ladder to be exact. We managed to find a really cool live version of the song. I don't think we placed but the "Bee Gee" preppy favorites won again. I thought it was a better fake performance. One thing creeped me out though. A friend of Scott's decided it would be funny to dress as a woman and rush the stage. I wasnt impressed and tried to ignore him. Still it was fun and again enjoyed the applause. Somewhere there exists photos from this extravaganza. If I ever find them i will surely post them.


1988

This was the year we didn't make it into the contest. Not to sound bitter but we all think it was fixed that year. Yes I sound like Mel Gibson in the Conspiracy Theory. That year the student council was jam packed with friends of those Bee Gee's guys. They didnt even have to audition. There was 2 days of auditions and Colin, Scott and I and a few other guys snuck onto the cat walk to view the fun. We watched a bunch of great performers who we figured would definately be in the show. We also saw some horrible acts--one guy was lip syncing a different song then the one playing on the speakers. Another guy admitted that he didnt know the words to the song he was doing. We auditioned and nailed it. We figured we were in as well as a few other bands that kicked ass. Guess what? We were totally wrong. We didnt make it in and neither did the other good ones. I remember a really cool Guns and Roses act that didnt make it either. All the bad ones mentioned above and some other equally cruddy performers did make it. Like i said it was rigged and big surprise-the Bee Gees who didnt even audition won the contest. Yes i know I sound bitter but it was the one thing i looked forward to every year and we werent even given a fair chance. Yes a fake air band show was that important to me. Sad huh?

1989

The last year of our fun fake run. This year we tried something a little different, We picked out Billy Joel's version of Back in The Ussr. Now of special note this was a week after Colin and i had been kicked out of the battle of the bands for being drunk. Our vice Principal Indiana Vrieswick was looking for any excuse to suspend us. This year we didnt even think about placing. We just went out to have a good time. Can you believe the Bee Gees did Staying Alive Again? Well we went out and did our thing. We were rockin' out! At one point i even jumped on Colin's back as he did a guitar solo. His idea by the way. We were in a groove. Then disaster struck. I lept through the air onto a riser that for some reason had a picture of Bill Cosby painted on it. It wasnt secured properly and i fell on my ass. Didnt matter though i got right up and continued without missing a beat. So fast forward to the end of the show and the mc started announcing the bands. You would walk out and get applause or what not. So we came out and while our friends cheered,we also recieved a lot of booing. What the hell. So i see colin throw his mighty arm in the air and flip the bird to the whole audience. I shrugged and soon i was also giving the middle finger to these rude assholes. I figured, well he's going to be suspended for a few days so might as well join him. It was the only time we defended our selves in our high school tenure, Then i hear a loud voice in the audience. Scott had actually gone to the audience and i hear him shout "yeah show thoe preppy mother fuckers what they're made of." I felt like a hero-until we were cornered by pricipal Indy. The conversation that followed was

Indy: "what did i see you guys doing on that stage?"
Me: "waving"
Colin:" yeah and the lights must have blacked out all our fingers except the middle ones!"
And that was it-no suspension no nothing. What a gyp. The best part of the day? The Bee Gees didnt even place. Thus ended our glorious Airband experience.Wow i sure rambled on and on there. Sorry about there. Hope I didnt bore you to much.

A quick thank you to everyone who has followed the blog. I can't believe I have stuck it out for 100 posts. Thanks for the kind comments.

Hooray! Wolverine didn't Suck!

Just a quick super hero related blog before i hit the hay. Yesterday Kath and Diana attended free comic book day. Kath is the best. I couldnt go due to my committment to getting a headache from rednecks. It was just a beyond horrible day. Just a whole lot of screaming and yelling because of a price increase. At times i felt myself getting really mad. I'm sure i must have sounded like a dick to some of the customers. I guess i shouldnt complain. This week the lights remained on with no golf related Mickey Mouse cartoons. Anyhow Kath was nice enough to wake up early to go to the comic book store where she obtained for me a copy of the coveted Green Lantern blackest night prelude. Also a quick shout out to Bev and Kim and Sheryl. They are the people that run the comic book store and they have been so good to us over the years. They put up with a lot of crap. I thought i was a nerd but i've seen grown ups in there arguing about which Green Lantern is better or people wondering why they can't have 25 comics on free comic book day. They were also nice enough to save Diana a Dc comics kid sampler comic. She loved it. This along with the awesome pot of chilli that kath made actually brightened up my craptacular Saturday.

Today on Sunday we made it out to the first of i hope 4 movies we get to see this summer. We saw Xmen Origins: Wolverine. I am happy to report it did not suck ass. I was a bit worried going in. I had heard nothing but bad things about the film. All i wanted was for it to be a bit better than Xmen 3. It was a lot better than that crap fest. The special effects were awesome. I have to learn to ignore reviews. I'd see another Wolverine prequel. Hugh Jackman is the bomb. Holy crap i just used "is the bomb" in a sentence. It was also cool seeing our friend Mike again. We used to go to movies everyweek. Now we're lucky to hang out a couple of times a year. Oh well. Ok i gotta run. It's probably going to be super busy at week due to the price increase.

Chainsaws and Lando

You know what rocks on my day off? Being woken up by 2 morons with a chain saw chopping down trees in the park at 8:30 in the morning. I don't ask for much on my days off. I just like sleeping in a little bit. I'm up at 7 in the morning on most days for work and i like to catch up on sleep on Wednesday and Thursday. Of course this also woke up Diana so there was no going back to sleep. Oh well. I guess thats a small thing to bitch at.

Just a few minutes ago the first batch of comic book convention guests was announced. So far the guests include Billy Dee Williams and Lou Ferrigno and Beau Bridges. Kind of neat. Not sure if i would stand in line to talk to anyone. Besides waiting to meet Henry Winkler last year the only other time i waited was to talk to a comic book writer named Brian Michael Bendis. It was an hour wait but i did get him to sign a copy of Ultimate Spiderman issue 1. My friend Mike was with me and we couldnt believe some of the fans who had boxes of stuff for the guy to sign. You know it was all going on ebay. My friend Mike asked him if he ever felt like jamming a pen in a fans thorax for making him sign a box of comics. Classic Mike. Maybe i will wait to meet Beau Bridges if Rob and Nicole come. He was in Stargate after all. And no guys you can't invite the "oh a piece of candy" guy.

Speaking of comic books,tomorrow is free comic book day. Once a year all comic book stores in North America set aside a day to hand out free comics. All the different comic book companies are involved and usually provide comics containing reprints. This year is a bit different, Dc comics is providing a brand new never before seen Green Lantern story which actually kicks off a major story this summer. I cant get the day off from getting yelled at by rednecks so Kath and Diana are going. Fingers crossed there will still be a copy of the Green Lantern story when they get there.


Spoke with our friend "the cat lady" and it looks like tomorrow Merlin the Cat will be joining the Stewart family . Diana has agreed to feed the cats from now on. Should be interesting.

Finally got to do a wagon ride today. Thought it was going to rain again but it got hot. Dumb ass me was wearing a leather jacket. Did more vacuuming and cleaning.Back to the grind tomorrow. Kath will be home soon. Will actually make it to the dollar store and maybe get another slurpee. Just heard from my friend Mike (of wait in line to meet Bendis fame) and he is definately in for Wolverine on Sunday. We're still hoping Andrea can make it. Hopefully her work schedule permits it. Thats it for now i guess. Just gonna wait for Kath to get home. Have a great first of may everybody.

Jay

The last day of April

Well here we are the last day of April. Sitting here enjoying a day off with Diana. So turns out Diana likes the old Spiderman cartoon. Kath came across it last night and stopped on it as the theme was playing. As soon as the familliar "spiderman spiderman does what ever a spider can" song was heard Diana was hyptnotized and just stopped what she was doing. Another super hero show she wants to watch. All i can say to that is--Proud!

So in work related news,turns out the energy drink fueled idiot hasnt quit yet. The good news is he is pretty close to getting fired. Also i learned yesterday that my former team manager is indeed coming back to our team next week. That totally rocks. She is really nice and somehow has the abillity to get me days off that other team managers can't. Last year i was told by two people i couldnt have the Saturday off to go to the comic book convention. I started asking for it off last May. In August i admit i was going to call in sick that day and go. However I got put on my cool managers team last August and within hours i had the day off. Man i would have been pissed if i missed seeing the Fonz. Man i can start looking forward to team meetings again as well. When she was our fearless leader we didnt even discuss work at our meetings. Usually the conversation was about what wacky shit she had done that week. It was great and always entertaining. Lately i have dreaded the meetings with the new guy. All work related with a lot of complaining and yelling. Good times.


Today I'm helping Diana organize her toys and she's really having a good time doing it. The living room was starting to look like a toys r us. Was upstairs for three hours and lost track of the time. Took her toy kitchen upstairs and immediately Hesh took over the empty spot on the floor. Was going to do a wagon ride but it started raining. Damn you rain! Damn you straight to hell! Made some english muffin pizzas. That one year of home ec has paid off! Diana helped put pepperoni on the. I swear the kid is going to grow up to be a chef. Also today i went down to the basement to add an action figure to a shelf and what did i find? A huge ass spider web complete with a dozen or so dead bees around it. Well happy to say that spiders reign of terror is over. Buh Bye spider!

Kath will be home soon. Going to the cool dollar store and Wallmart. We are getting a birthday present for my nephew, I can't believe he's 14 years old. Time flies. Well back to cleaning. I have tomorrow off as well and then one more day of work this week. Hope everyone is doing well. Talk to you soon

Jay

Jays in first-Hell must have frozen over

So last week I was channel surfing and i came across a Blue Jays game. I thought i would stop for a bit and see how they were doing.Now just to be clear i was a huge Jays fan from the 80's until a couple of seasons ago. I used to go to games. Kath and i went to at least 2 or 3 games a year and followed them on tv as well. Now i know you're suppossed to stick with your team through the good times and the bad and that every year can't be a world series win. I guess a couple of years ago i just got tired of watching them lose and just didnt follow it as much anymore. I think i tuned in for maybe 2 games last year. As a matter of fact i didnt even really know who was on the team anymore. Its not like i decided to follow another team or anything like that. I just stopped being interested in baseball. I also didnt watch the world series which is something i did every year no matter who made it. Anyhow i put the game on last week. First of all i realize its at least 15 games into the season. I was so out of touch. Then i notice how well they are playing. I started to get interested again. And that was before i heard of their winning record and the fact they were in first place. I actually watched the next four games. They actualy won all of them. So i think i will give the team another chance. They were my team for all those years. They are ahead of the Yankees so i would have that to rub in my father in laws face. And that makes me happy. Go Jays!

When Lord?-whens it gonna be May?

I wish April was over. There I said it. April was ok-much better than March. I can't wait for May though. So many cool things to look forward to. Diana turns 4 in May. We're going to see both sides of the famly to celebbrate her birthday. Kath also has a birthday in May. We're going to see our first summer blockbuster on May 3rd-Xmen Origins:Wolverine. I hope its good. I'll settle for it being better than x men 3 which to me ranks up there with that cinematic masterpiece Batman and Robin. Also hoping to see Star Trek with my mom on April 24th. I believe this will be the first star trek since that horrible one where william shatner went looking for God that i will see with my mom. Also in May- Free Comic book day and May 1st they start announcing celebrities for the comic book convention in August. May should be cool. SO hurry up April-you've worn out your welcome.


I managed to get through my long ass day of work and maintenance meeting. Found out we're going to be required to stain our ricketty fence. Oh joy. I did get one piece of good news today. That nerdy,hopped up on energy drink douche quit today. He is close to getting fired anyhow. So yay me i will only be annoyed by customers at work now. Anyhow watched the season-possible series finale of Chuck tonight. Good tv man. Well getting kinda sleepy, Rachel is messaging me now. Just telling her about the stupid meeting. Hopefully we will have more information about the cat tomorrow. Diana is really excited about it. No new insane customer stories to tell. Well see what tomorrow brings. Until then this is Mork calling Orson. Nanoo Nanoo.

Weekend Update

So had a pretty cool weekend. Worked yesterday and for a change there wasnt any crazy Saturday customers to report on. Don't get me wrong the customers still whined but nothing over the top like I'm used to. Still had to deal with the lights being turned off. This week instead of Mickey Mouse playing golf we were treated to the three Stooges. Again would have preferred to see my keyboard. What can ya do? After work we met up with Nicole and went across the river to get some groceries. We also hit a 7-11 over there. Guess what? Yet another Slurpee cup movie tie in started this week. Now we are getting Terminator four cups. We are so fancy.

Sunday is just a laid back day. Diana let me sleep in and that rocked. I really needed to catch up on sleep.Watched some cartoons. Yet two more super hero related cartoons appearred on the schedule this week. An old Superman/Superboy series from the late 60's that i remember watching as a kid and a Batman cartoon from the 70's that turns out is really horrible. I kind of remember the Batman cartoon. Adam West had come back to voice Batman. Wasnt as cool as i remember. THey had this little cute character named batmite who was from another dimension. Man who green lit that idea? Kath wanted to kill me for taping it but Diana loved it.

When Kath gets home we're setting up the barbeque. I love grilling. Can't wait. The weather is awesome and warm today. A great day to not be cooped up at work. On the cat front-yes we are going to take merlin. Not sure when this will occur. Diana says she will let him sleep on her bed. She won't even let Hesh sleep on her bed.

Looking forward--hope Monday goes fast. Have to work 10 hours followed by a maintenance meeting at our Co - op. At our residence you are required to be on a comittee. We werent really given a choice. One day we got a flyer stating i was on maintenance. To anyone that knows us this is funny. I suck at fixing things where Kath is awesome at it. I've been lucky up until now-between work and babysitter issues i've been able to get out of most of the meetings. I have no excuse tomorrow. I'll probably just sit there and nod my head a lot. Just want to get out of there and watch 24 with Kath. Anyhow thats about it. Hope everybody has a great weekend and I'll talk to you all soon.