on a concrete canvas i'll go making my mark

I gave up on this blog some time last year when I realized that it had become sort of a chore. I never really felt the need to write about anything I did since the important stuff was usually already on Facebook. Plus, I just don't really like writing that much to begin with. But lately, I've realized that this is the only place I kept track of all my weird dreams. They're probably not that interesting to you, but I enjoy looking back and reading through them every once in a while. So I guess I'm gonna revive this blog as a personal dream journal...and maybe throw occasional amusing conversations on here too.

Recent celebrity dreams:

1. Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie was renting a room in my house under a fake name. However, I knew it was him and after living with me for a while, I think he figured out that I knew, so he started helping me record music. His first step was opening my Mbox hardware and taking pieces out, but I didn't question his methods.

2. I hung out with Taylor Swift after the Grammy's. Apparently, we went to high school together and she was a year behind me (despite being like 6 years younger than me) and I had somehow forgotten that we knew eachother.

3. I was running errands around town and kept accidentally finding myself at private acoustic concerts from Chris Martin of Coldplay. I sat next to his daughter each time and Chris started to recognize me and talk to me after a while.

4. The band fun. was hanging out in my room late at night and we watched Spider-Man 4 on my laptop. I enjoyed their company, but the movie wasn't very good.


Recent GRE dreams (even though I don't plan on taking it):

1. One dream was entirely just about studying for the GRE with my coworker Jose and friend Caitlyn at a Poquito Mas. It was surprisingly detailed and accurate...which also means very boring.

2. I took the GRE with my brother Travis and friend Fausto. There was a lot of questions about Batman on the test, but they didn't make much sense and kept referring to a test booklet that I didn't have. Some of the other questions were based on dinner menus being shown on TV screens on the wall, but they kept changing before I could read everything. I eventually gave up halfway through the test and saw that Travis and Fausto had already given up too.

3. I was driving on the freeway to go take the GRE when I got stuck in traffic and decided to let my car drive itself while I did other stuff. After, I left the car, I realized that a) I wouldn't be able to find it later and b) it can't steer itself.


It's interesting to me that some dreams can be so ridiculous and you still can't figure out that you're dreaming. Like when you're flying or talking to animals or running from monsters, there should be a mechanism in your mind that stops to assess the likelihood of whether or not you're dreaming. Somewhow, that mechanism didn't kick in for the next part of dream #3. I continued by foot to my test when I ran into my dad in an elevator. He asked me what I was doing and I explained. As I was talking to him, my dad also called me on the phone and I had to explain to him what I was doing. Phone Dad told me I had already taken the GRE, but I tried to explain to him that I had taken other similar tests like the SAT, SAT II's, and CBEST. He was convinced that I had taken the GRE and that SAT II's aren't a real thing. Meanwhile, the version of my Dad standing next to me in the elevator overheard the conversation and was on my side, but kept interrupting my phone conversation to tell me I was right. Finally, I gave my phone to elevator Dad so that he could argue with phone Dad and leave me out of it.

I also had a dream last night that I was going bald. I was relieved when I woke up, but still kinda paranoid.

one eye on the road and one on you

The Carrolls (minus JoJo and Sammy) begin the long walk to Maryland.

Things don't change too much for me anymore. I've been at the same job for 5 years, living at home for 4 years, driving the same car for 3 years, and avoiding abrupt changes for as long as I can remember. Sadly, today is one of those difficult changes I've been hoping to avoid. My brother Brodie, his wife Jen, and their three kids started the long drive across country for their move to the DC area this morning. Brodie has basically lived with me or near me for my whole life. I remember being sad when I was in grade school and found out he was moving out of the house to an apartment about 3 miles away and I thought I would never see him again. Plus, I've gotten used to seeing Jen and the kids on a weekly basis their whole lives (the kids' lives, not Jen's,) so it will be strange to watch them grow up through Facebook pictures and videos now and only see them a couple times a year. Coincidentally, one of my best friends, Jason, flew to DC this morning for an interview with the intention of staying there permanently. I guess the bright side to all this is that I now have people to visit in DC, but it's kinda depressing that I just lost half of my friends in one day.

However, I guess the circle of friendship is kinda like the circle of life because I just got another best friend, Brigitte, back from New York. She's been busy doing awesome Hollywood stuff, but it's reassuring for me to know she's around. Plus, I've spent a lot of time the past few months reconnecting with other high school friends and hanging out with my coworkers more often. And to top it all off, my temporarily handicapped friend Caitlyn is still talking to me even though I dropped her on her face.

In other news, I noticed I'm about halfway through the list of summer concerts I mentioned a couple posts back. Fun at the Glass House was pretty...well, fun. I didn't get close enough to make any form of vague contact with my future wife, Emily, and our paths just barely missed each other on the way to the parking lot, but our Words With Friends relationship is still going strong. The Death Cab show at the El Rey was excellent. I've seen the full band twice before, but never in such a small venue. Ben Gibbard is pretty much a hero of mine, so I got a huge rush from being within about 20 feet of him. U2 at Angel Stadium was also pretty spectacular. The show was similar to the Rose Bowl show I saw a couple years ago, but the song selection was better and it was refreshing to see it through the eyes of Brodie and Jen since they had never really been to a real concert before. Hopefully, I've still got the National at the Hollywood Bowl to look forward to in September if I can gather some troops to go.

i won't get better, but some day i'll be free

Just a quick follow-up to last week's dream. I had another good one last night. I was up late at night doing a Simpsons coloring book when my dad came in wanting to borrow a U2 book. I wasn't really sure why he was so interested, but I pulled a bunch from my shelves and went through the subject matter of each one with him. Eventually, my mom came in and told us that Robert Downey Jr. had just called and wanted to hang out for a little bit at our house while he was waiting to shoot a movie. A few minutes later, he walked up to the door and seemed really excited to see me because he hadn't seen me since I was a little kid. He looked kinda sweaty and hyper though, so I got the impression he was back into some kind of drugs. He brought a pretty attractive girlfriend with him and she seemed to be hitting on me, but I was ok with it. The end.

i love you like grave danger

One of the few upsides to keeping this blog is that when I have an amazing dream, I can write it on here and it enables me to relive it in my head any time I happen to look back on this and read about it. Last night, I had a whole bunch of isolated dreams. In one, I flew to New York with Caitlyn to visit Brigitte and happened to run into Sarah K. on the way. In another, I was working on a class project with a study group of Adrianne G. and Sara J. In another, I was playing Mario Party with Matt and Carrie and I kept poking Carrie and saying "tiiiiny stomache" in a high voice to somehow make fun of her for no longer being pregnant.

Those were all enjoyable, but the reason I signed into Blogger and wrote this is so I'll never forget the final dream of the night. I was on an anti-terrorist task force with actor John Krasinski (Jim Halpert from the Office) and we were trying to use statistical programming software to identify potential terrorist threats. Our plan was to cross-reference different types of data to see if certain keywords ("bomb", "explosion", etc.) would show up for certain people. The only real detail I remember is that John seemed to think "goblins" was an important keyword to go on the list and I was making fun of him for it.

Anyway, that's all the exciting news I've got. I've watched about 90% of the NBA playoff games over the past few weeks and I've taken up playing pool, but I'm still not very good. The Lakers getting swept by the Mavs was one of the happiest sports events of my life. I've also been blessed with another nephew, Declan Hartley Carroll, but I haven't met him yet. Hopefully I'll get down to San Diego soon to meet him.

If anyone still reads this and has a question you want answered, post a comment. Otherwise, you're just gonna get a whole lot of boring.

i think the kids are in trouble

Where to begin...I guess the most important thing is family. I've got a new nephew. Samuel Bradley Carroll was born on March 10th in the same hospital as his older brother and sister. Usually, I'd post a picture here, but if you really want to see him, then you probably already know his parents Brodie and Jen and you can find pictures on Facebook or whatever. Everyone's doing well, and the baby's turned out to be a pretty calm one so far.

Exactly one week after that, I turned 26. Last year on my birthday, I worked from 9am to about 10pm and then got denied at McDonald's when I went out for a celebratory Shamrock Shake. This year, I got sick and ended up working from home while watching basketball. I'd say it was still an improvement from last year though. I didn't do anything too crazy this year for my birthday, just had one dinner with family, one dinner with friends, and watched a lot of March Madness all weekend.

That's about it for exciting news and other major milestones. Sleepwalking news has been busy though. A couple weeks ago, I woke up to find myself standing on the other side of my room holding my framed Brandon Flowers poster. I tried to hang it back on the wall, but couldn't find a push pin on the floor to hold it up, so I eventually gave up and went back to sleep. In the morning, I found the poster sitting on the floor and realized it had been nailed in. Then last week, I had one of my best sleep experiences yet. I woke up around 3am with my acoustic guitar in my hands and my electric guitar resting on my lap. Judging by the position of my hands and the notes I was hitting when I woke up, I think I was trying to play Over the Hills and Far Away by Led Zeppelin. Unfortunately, it probably didn't sound that great since 1) I was asleep and 2) that guitar is tuned specifically for Skinny Love by Bon Iver.

Speaking of music, summer concert season is coming up and here's my expected schedule. Anyone going to any of these?

4/14 - fun. @ the Fox Theatre in Pomona
6/7 - Death Cab @ the El Rey in Los Angeles
6/17 - U2 @ Angel Stadium in Anaheim
8/18 - Death Cab @ the Greek Theatre in Griffith Park
9/11 - The National @ the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles

the businessmen, they drink my blood

Happy Valentimes to everyone once again. As I was looking over some old February posts, I realized the Duffman is always my Valentine, but I never post pictures of him, so there you go. He looks pretty serious in this picture, but he's really a nice guy. This year was another ordinary year for Valentine's Day. Worked all day, then came home and ate some pizza with Duff. We also watched the super-computer Watson play Jeopardy and do really well. That scares me a little though, cause it seems like a pretty straight path from there to the world of Terminator. At least if that happens, I'll know my purpose in life...but I'll probably have to compete with a lot of other guys named John Connor for the leadership position.

In other news, despite my protest to some of the Grammy nominations, I did end up watching the entire Grammy broadcast last night, and it had some worthwhile moments:

Good: Muse rocked out with a pretty straightforward performance.
Bad: The protesting actors running around stage probably sounded like an interesting idea in theory, but they were more distracting and silly than entertaining.

Good: Mumford & Sons had my foot stomping and were complemented nicely by the Avett Brothers.
Bad: Bob Dylan was cool in his time, but he really needs to stop singing.

Good: Arcade Fire winning best album and ending strong on Ready to Start.
Bad: Arcade Fire making their Grammy debut with Month of May, one of their worst songs ever in my opinion. It sounds like it could be a high school band's first attempt at songwriting. (By the way, check out this tumblr in response to Arcade Fire's win)

Good: Cee-Lo with G-Pal.
Bad: The 20-minute unecessary show-opening tribute to Aretha Franklin, followed by Lady Gaga's boney-shouldered performance of her new song Born This Way...I assume it's about being ugly.

Worst of All: Justin Bieber, Jaden Smith, and Usher all on the same stage. The Grammy's should be ashamed of themselves.

i stomp my boots before i go back in

As you probably know, I haven't been so into the blogging thing lately. With newer online social outlets like Facebook and Twitter, it's kinda easier to just summarize my thoughts into short fragments and pictures and spit them out that way. Plus, more people are going to read those thoughts (whether they actually want to or not.) However, as I was sitting here with roughly an hour left in the first day of the new year, I realized I had to do my annual New Year's Day summary of how my life is going. Sadly, like this blog in general, not a whole lot has changed and I don't have much to say.

Before I get to that, I guess I should give a little update on the Christmas and New Year's Eve festivities. Christmas was a little different this year, but still good. My oldest brother Jamie and his kids decided to stay in Seattle for the first time since the kids were born. It was a lot quieter around the house, but we didn't really get the same early-morning Christmas excitement as we've always had. Matt, Carrie, and I stayed up until about 3 or 4 in the morning playing video games on Christmas Eve though, so I guess the freedom to sleep in was pretty nice. I also got the second worst cold of my life starting Christmas Eve night and lasting through pretty much today. I don't mind colds too much in general because I get to miss work and it gives me a reason to wear pajamas all day, but I wouldn't recommend this cold.

For New Year's Eve, I broke my streak of sitting alone at home watching TV with my dog to meet up with some high school and college friends in West LA. It was good to get out for a night, and I got maybe 3 miles worth of walking exercise, but I may resume my TV/dog tradition next year. I think bars just aren't really my thing. They're too loud to talk in, too expensive to drink in, and dancing...well, I don't understand dancing. It's not that I'm too cool to dance or something like that. It's more like I'm an alien visiting Earth and I can't comprehend your strange rituals. Hearing funk/techno/R&B/etc. music in a dark room doesn't cause a reaction in me to walk out to an open space, partner up with someone, and flail my extremeties. People say I'd understand if I drank more, but I don't see why I'd want to use rotten liquid to trick my brain into enjoying something it wouldn't enjoy in a rational state. Also, I've had my share of alcohol before, and it never made me want to dance. Just sleep.

Anyway, here's the much-anticipated annual New Year's life evaluation:

Family: I lost a great aunt and a cousin in the past few months, but as the circle of life goes, two new additions to the Carroll army are on their way. Brodie and Jen found out they're having their third kid next March but they're going to let the gender be a surprise. Then Matt and Carrie found out they're having their first one next May and it's a boy. My name recommendations were Waluigi or Salacious Crumb, but I don't think those are gonna make the shortlist.

Friends: With each year, I can feel a little distance growing between me and my friends. It's sad, but I guess that's how things go. I did get to see Pat a lot over the past week and really picked up quickly, so that's been good. Plus, Jason is now back from Portland indefinitely, so I will be able to see him on those rare occasions that I find the courage to make my way into Canyon Country.

Work: Just had my four-year anniversary at my job. I don't know if I'm really proud of that, but I guess I should be proud that I survived the summer of layoffs. Also, I've recently taken up the habit of going to movies and having video game nights with some of my co-workers, so that's helped me fill a void and enjoy the things that made my younger days more fun.

Love: Natalie Portman just got engaged, so I guess it's over between us. Plus, Ryan Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson filed for divorce and that's kinda jaded my hope in true love.

Hobbies: I'll be honest...Potential Difference is in a bad state right now. I have a feeling our summer show at the Orange County Fair may have been our last. Scott and I have been writing songs together for roughly a third of our lives, but I think he's finally lost that loving feeling. There's no Gallagher feuds going on between us or anything; we're still BFF's. I think trying to make it as a band just isn't what we hoped it would be like, and it's no longer a big priority for him. I'm hoping to find a way to finish the album somehow, but it's going to be difficult. Motivation and support is always helpful, so if you've ever had anything nice to say about the music, now's the time to say it.

As far as other hobbies go, TV is still high on my list and going strong. Also, this year, I finally went to a foreign country that isn't Mexico. Granted, Canada isn't very far away or very foreign, but I enjoyed it a lot. I also got to see Portland and more of Seattle while I was up that way, so it was a great experience.

Appearance: My hair's a lot shorter than it was at this time last year, but it's still long enough to be kinda cool. I started off going for the Boone from Lost look, but it looks a little different every day. I've also started doing the Spartacus workout routine a few days a week, but I don't look like a Thracian gladiator just yet.

Alright, 2011...deal me something good.

let me be your comet, i will fly

First of all, happy Thanksgiving. We had kind of a strange one this year at the Carroll house. As far as my memory goes back, Thanksgiving has always been a time of having way too many people eating dinner at our table (or sometimes tables.) We usually have our own full-size family of 2 parents, 5 sons, 2 to 3 wives, and a handful of kids, but then my mom also tends to invite over everyone she can think of to join in. This year, we were gonna skip all that and drive down to my brother's restaurant in Carlsbad, but changed plans last minute to stay home and do the usual. It was hardly usual though. We ended up with just my parents, my brother Travis, our friend Steve, and me. It was pretty relaxing being able to watch TV and talk without all the commotion, but it was a little strange.

The rest of my Thanksgiving break so far has been playing Wii, drinking cider, watching Party Down, and working on music in my room. That's kinda nice since it's the opposite of last weekend, which was the largest concentration of physical activity I've had in the past year. Maybe not that much compared to a normal person, but I did part of a Spartacus workout on Saturday, then bike riding, then 2-on-2 basketball Sunday, then Xbox Kinect (which is surprisingly good and pretty tiring), then more Spartacus.

I haven't written on here in a while and I'm starting to remember why. Time to go do something else.

Top 5 reasons I'm looking forward to December:
1. KROQ's Almost Acoustic Christmas show
2. Inception on DVD
3. Christmas
4. New Christmas songs from Coldplay and the Killers
5. New Year's Eve

PVS pt. 3: Seattle

Trey contemplating his attack on the monster fountain.


Trey the fake-smiler, Riley the doll come to life, and me hanging out by the Space Needle.


Jamie and I took the kids for a ride around Greenlake park...


And made some stops to take in the view and get some pictures.


I spent one of my days wandering around the University of Washington and ran into this familiar character...I don't think it was Charlie though.


Enjoyed my flight home on Virgin Airlines while alternating my attention between the seat-back TV and the sunset.

It's been well over a month since I got back from vacation, but I'm finally posting the end of my series now because it's raining here in Southern California and it reminded me that I hadn't written about Seattle yet. After about a week hanging out with friends in Portland, and exploring by myself in Victoria, I took the boat back to Seattle to see my brother and his kids for a couple days. Although I was a little tired and ready to be done traveling, I'm glad I made the stop in Seattle. I got to cover a couple touristy things like the Space Needle and the University of Washington, but I also got to spend some time riding bikes around the lake and just playing with the kids. The weather was pretty nice at first, but the Pacific Northwest let me know my vacation was over by sending the rain in on Saturday. I flew home that night in the luxury of a Virgin Airlines plane with free TV for every seat.

Overall, it was a fun trip, but maybe a little too much solo travel for one week. I think next time, I'll stick with something simple like a few days on the beach in Hawaii, or a nice cruise. In the meantime, back to a life of work and fantasy football.

PVS pt. 2: Victoria

The Parliament Building for British Columbia.


The Sunken Gardens at Butchart Gardens.


More of Butchart Gardens...the term "gardens" makes the place sound a lot smaller than it is.


My sweet hotel room for 3 nights. I wanted to call up all my friends and have a party...but then I remembered I was on an island in Canada.


Sunset at Laurel Point.

While Portland and Seattle are both nice places with a good mix of city life and fresh air, Victoria was the most scenic stop on my vacation. From what I've heard, most of Canada isn't too different from the States...just a little friendlier and having a misguided sense of pronunciation. However, Victoria was like no place I'd been to before. It definitely had a British vibe with cobblestone streets, castle-like hotels, horse-drawn carriages, and street buskers along the harbor. I think you'd run out of activities (and money) after a few days, but it's a really nice place to walk around and relax.

Monday: After getting off the Amtrak train in Seattle, I walked my way from the south side of downtown by Qwest Field all the way to the Space Needle to catch a boat out to Vancouver Island. The boat trip was nice. Not a lot of scenery once you're out on the water, but I'm happy I didn't get sea sick or anything. I got into Victoria that night and took it easy after checking into my hotel and finding out I was given a free upgrade to a king suite with a kitchen.

Tuesday: Being in Canada on the release day of Arcade Fire's new album left me feeling obligated to go out and buy a physical copy as a souvenir. I left my hotel with the intention of walking around until I randomly came across a record store, but then immediately I saw an advert for a new Best Buy on the same street I was walking on and thought I was in luck. 3 miles later...I finally dragged myself into Best Buy only to find they didn't have the album for some reason. On the plus side, I made friends with three Best Buy employees who were partly excited by the news of a new Arcade Fire album and partly by meeting a real Los Angeles resident. They directed me to a record shop a couple blocks from my hotel and my mission was accomplished.

Wednesday: Any website about Victoria and any person who's been to Victoria will tell you the main attraction on the island is the Butchart Gardens. Not being much of a gardener myself, I wasn't too excited about it, but figured I should go anyway. It turned out to be pretty cool, as you can see from the pictures above.

Thursday: Packed up my things and got back on the boat to the Seattle.

While the architecture, gardens, and general atmosphere of Victoria were all really great, I think my most lasting memory will be of the women of Victoria. I don't know if it's because it's a tourist town, or part of British Columbia, or what, but there were attractive girl-next-door types all over the place. Every gift shop, restaurant, supermarket, etc. had at least one good-looking, friendly girl I would like to have talked to longer. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure I saw at least three different local girls who I would have married on the spot. If only I had social skills and a worthwhile life to offer them in the States.

where the mice call shots in the corner

Brandon Flowers @ The Troubadour

I know I'm in the middle of a 3-part series on my vacation, so pardon the interruption, but I felt like I should give a quick review of my evening with Brandon Flowers at the Troubadour. I'm terrible at writing reviews of anything, but here are just some quick thoughts for the unfortunate people who couldn't get into the show and would like to know more about it.

I'm not a big fan of singers leaving their bands to go solo, but when I first heard about Brandon Flowers' new album Flamingo, I was immediately on board. I like him as a person and he writes a lot of the Killers' songs, so that's enough for me. Then, when I heard the instrumental version of "Only the Young" on his website, and the first single "Crossfire", I started getting more excited. Needless to say, I put my speedy password-typing fingers to work to get tickets for his sold-out, 500-person capacity show at the Troubadour.

Scott and I got in line on the sunny side of the building about 3.5 hours before the doors opened to try to get close to the front, then waited inside for another hour or so. There was no opening band to keep us entertained, but a comedian came out and did his best for an unwelcoming crowd. Overall, Brandon's show was really good. He was his usual shy-but-charming self and put plenty of energy into the songs. We got to hear 8 songs off the new album, plus an epic reworking of "Losing Touch", and a very suiting cover of "Bette Davis Eyes."

Most of the new songs sounded pretty strong. I had already heard "Crossfire" and "On the Floor", so those sounded especially good, but "Jilted Lovers and Broken Hearts", "Was It Something I Said", and "Magdalena" all got stuck in my head pretty quickly. Even "Swallow It" has grown on me (especially since the iTunes release this week) and I'm looking forward to hearing Jenny Lewis on "Hard Enough."

If I had the choice to do things over, I would definitely go to the show again, but I couldn't help but feel disappointed when I left that night. Brandon's been in a major band for most of the last decade and played shows all over the world, yet he still cut the show short at 45 minutes and didn't do an encore. I can understand the idea of a warm-up tour where you go out and play a few songs and give people a brief preview of the album, but this was a little insulting. He's got 3.5 albums worth of Killers material he could pull from and he claims to love playing covers. Even an encore of one of each would have pacified the audience and sent me home happy, but instead we all stood there clapping and calling him down from the glass room above for about 20 minutes, until one by one, audience members began hanging their heads and sulking away. Scott and I hung out a while longer, even after the drumkit had been torn down, in hopes that he might come out and play an acoustic song. And to make things worse, Brandon ended on "Playing with Fire," the slowest and arguably the weakest song of the night, and left without playing "Only the Young," the song that built up everyone's interest in this album from the beginning.

I guess they say a good entertainer should leave the audience wanting more, and maybe that was Brandon's plan all along. Despite my disappointment that night, I still went home and pre-ordered the most expensive Deluxe Version of the album, complete with signed Las Vegas lithograph. And even though I claimed that I didn't really want to see him again after that miniature show, I'll most likely be fighting for tickets next time he comes around Los Angeles.

PVS pt. 1: Portland

The view of East Portland from the hospital on the hill.


Did I mention it was a zero-gravity hospital?


Washington Park (in Oregon)


Japanese Botanical Garden at the top of Washington Park


Jason contemplating at the top of the Ira Keller Fountain

I have too many good pictures from my vacation, so this is just a small sample. If you want to see more, look at my Facebook albums. If you don't have Facebook...you should.

Of the 3 legs of my vacation (Portland, Victoria, and Seattle), Portland was the most fun. There wasn't a whole lot of touristy stuff to do there, but it was good to have a free, unstructured weekend with a couple of my best friends. I don't like writing long stories, so here's a day-by-day breakdown of the trip:

Thursday - Went to LAX straight from work and met up with Jason and John Paul at the Portland airport. Since it was late and Jason had work the next day, we just spent a couple hours playing darts and Cards in Hat before going to sleep. (For a brief history on Cards in Hat, try searching it in my blog's search box.)

Friday - John Paul and I spent most of the day wandering around the northwest side of Portland taking pictures and looking for excitement. We found a supposedly haunted pizza place for lunch, then walked/hiked up to the Japanese botanical garden at the top of Washington Park. Once Jason got out of work, we went out for a wild night of Mazatlan margaritas and Voodoo donuts.

Saturday - With a mission in mind to find good Portland food, the three of us set out to explore the southwest side of the city. After several hours and miles of walking, we unfortunately gave up and ate lunch at the mall food court. However, I must admit that was one of the best meals I had on my whole trip. At night, we went to the local baseball stadium to see the minor league Portland Beavers take on the Salt Lake Bees...and I realized the only sport more boring than major league baseball is minor league baseball. After that, we went out for a bit with Jason's coworkers and got the inside scoop on Oregon politics.

Sunday - As you can see from the first picture above, we drove over to the OHSU hospital and took the skyrail thing up to the top. There isn't a whole lot to do once you're up there, but it's worth it for the view of the city. We then took a quick drive through the east side of Portland to check out Apizza Scholls (pretty overrated) and to take John Paul to the airport. Jason and I took it easy for our last night and hung out at a coworker's apartment for dinner.

Monday - Took the early-morning train out from Union Station. To be continued...

the high road is hard to find

So the big Potential Difference OC Fair show at the Hangar ended up being a success by our standards. Despite 3 hours of traffic, we still made it to the fair with plenty of time to kill and wander around. I had never been to the OC Fair before, so it was an interesting experience. I didn't realize how big and busy it was going to be. And while it did seem like a fun place to kill some time and money, unfortunately most of the things there are aimed at making you feel a little sick...which isn't the best way to prepare for a performance. I still managed to wander around for a bit with my brother and his wife and eat some really good pizza, but I decided to save the spinning rides and deep-fried Twinkies for my next visit.

All in all, it was definitely the best venue we've played. The worst part of most shows is unloading all the gear from our van, walking across parking lots, squeezing through hallways, and trying to quickly set up in the dark, but this show was a piece of cake. We pulled our van up about 5 feet behind the venue and had a full staff of roadies provided by the fair to help us get organized and set up. It would have been nice to fill the 1,200 seats in the audience, but at least we got a good amount of traffic from fair-goers passing by and checking us out. Hopefully we can play there again next year. If you'd like to see a little bit of the show, check out the Potential Difference YouTube Channel.

I don't have any pictures yet and I don't have much time to elaborate more because I am busy packing for my first real vacation in a while. I'm not much of the travelling type, but with my friend Jason temporarily living in Portland and my brother possibly leaving Seattle soon, I couldn't pass up an opportunity to explore the Pacific Northwest for a week. I think most of all I'm looking forward to a few days by myself in Canada to relax and hopefully celebrate my 4-year anniversary as an economist by not working.

See you next month with some pictures maybe.

fools rush in where angels fear to tread

After a couple years of looking like a caveman, I finally built up the courage to part with my long hair. Every other time I've thought about going short, I got cold feet at the last minute and backed out. But this time, I gave my stylist a picture of Boone from Lost and let her go to town. It's kind of a relief to have it gone...it's like wearing a cowboy hat for 2 or 3 years and finally taking it off. It feels good.

Anyway, that's the most blogworthy news I've got for this month. The sports world has been ugly: USA lost in the World Cup today, Coach John Wooden died last week, and the Lakers won the NBA championship. D-Bags will be free to flaunt their arrogance around Los Angeles for another year.

In music news, Brandon Flowers' first single has hit the radio. I like it, but I was hoping for a bigger departure from the Killers on this album. I think that's still possible though with the other tracks, so I'm looking forward to the release in September.

In the meantime, I'm working up a scheme to do some travelling. I think I'll be making a little tour of the Pacific Northwest to see Jason in Portland, my brother in Seattle, and any Canucks that happen to be wandering the streets of Victoria or Vancouver. If you have any thoughts that might push me toward one or the other of those two, let me know because I still haven't completely decided.

Well, that was a disjointed blog post, so let's end with a random list...

Top 5 Movies I want to see (Unreleased, in theaters, or on DVD):
1) Inception
2) Toy Story 3
3) Knight and Day
4) Iron Man 2
5) Shutter Island

Honorable Mention: The Informant!, The Other Guys

we got a word for that kind of odd in english...it's called suspicioius

Looks like I haven't updated this in about a month and now seems to be a good time since I'm locked in my room all weekend. My brother flew down from Seattle with his two kids and for some reason my niece cries and hides in the corner whenever she sees me. I would blame it on my general ugliness, but my other niece loves me and asks for me to come back whenever I leave the room, so I'm not sure exactly what's going on. Anyway, my banishment from the rest of the house gives me an excuse to hang out in my room and relax and do things such as the following:

1. Continue messing with my new computer. A few weeks ago, I was trying to catch up on Lost before the finale (which was awesome) and my laptop started dying. It kept getting slower and slower until I couldn't even open the calculator without a long pause. So I went out and bought a new HP laptop and I'm pretty happy with it so far. Also, since it has a built-in webcam, I'm now a part of the world of Skype. Unfortunately, my only friend is my parents...whose computer is downstairs...making Skype kinda pointless.

2. Continue messing with my old computer. The downside to my new purchase is that my Mbox (recording contraption) is not compatible with Windows 7. My best bet is to get my old laptop running well enough to last through an hour or so at a time of recording, but it's still struggling with that.

3. Watch movies.
a) Last night, I finally watched Inglourious Basterds and I was pleasantly surprised. I'd been wanting to see it since long before it came out, but I felt like I'd be let down since I'm not a big Tarantino fan. However, I think he restrained himself to some extent so I really liked it, even though I could have still used a little less gore and a little shorter runtime.

b) A couple nights ago, I bought and watched Fantastic Mr. Fox. I couldn't get anyone to see this with me in theaters because everyone thought it was just a kids movie, but it turns out it wasn't much of a kids movie at all. It was basically like any other Wes Anderson movie, but animated. I ended up liking it a lot, and as with other Wes Anderson movies, I'll probably like it more over time.

c) I also have Sherlock Holmes and Traitor in my desk, but haven't gotten around to watching those yet.

And in non-things-I-do-in-my-room related news, Potential Difference now has two shows coming up at Orange County Fair. From what I've heard, the first is July 23rd at 10:30pm and the second is August 12th at 5:40pm, both in the new Hangar facility. But in the meantime, we're working hard (or at least as hard as we usually work) on making a real album to be out early next year. We'll soon be entering the design phase for album art, which is fun, but involves a lot of decisions. Feel free to give us input on what you look for in an album.

Update: I played catch with my niece for a little bit and I think we're cool now. And on a side-note, when my nephew was crying, I cheered him up by putting Duffy in a big cardboard box and telling him it was a present, but Duffy jumped out and ran away as soon as the top was opened. I was going to sing "It's my dog in a box...", but I didn't think that was the right audience for Justin Timberlake/Andy Samberg references.