A Day to Remember

Sometimes, you know in advance when you are about to have a day you will never forget. Sometimes, things just happen in a day that make you remember that day forever. Today, I think, will be one of those days I will never forget. We have tickets to the Predators v.s. Panthers game tonight, and I'm super stoked!!! I've never seen an NHL game live before. I'm real excited to get see one. This will most likely mark the second Saturday in a months time that a day will occur that I will never forget. The Gay Blades show was definitely a day I will never forget. That was a planned unforgettable day, as is today. I already know then when I get off of work, we're gonna have a great day all the way to the end. Did I mention that Caleb and Megan are in town? They came for Thanksgiving (weekend) and it's been real nice to have them around. Unfortunately, I couldn't get time off from work, but these things happen. The span of working while they are here is a mere 24 hours (working 16 out of 24) so when I get off today at 2, I'll be free to do whatever with my friends! Can't wait!

I'm currently streaming an album released in 1999, by a band called American Football. The record is 10 years old and if someone told me it was released last month, I wouldn't doubt them, and I would probably say it has a good indie/chill/90's guitar feel to it. I dig it, but it kinda meanders a bit. Music is fun!

That is all today. I don't wanna write things anymore today.

Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving 2009. The Lions are on, no one in Nashville cares. This includes me, but hey, it's football. so anyway, my good friends Caleb and Megan are currently en route to Music City USA, and I honestly can't wait till there here! They will be the first friends to visit us since we moved here. My mom has been here a couple times, and that's cool and all, but it's different tho actually have friends here. I don't really know what were gonna do when there here other than going to a Predators game. I guess we'll play it by ear. Either way, a good time will be had by all.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Brad

Sorry for making posts too long...

I realize that sometimes when I decide to write a blog, I have a vision of where I want the words to go. I walk the dog and think of topics I am slightly knowledgeable of, and just kind of go off on the topic. I try to make a mental outline of where I want to go. Then I start typing and everything goes to hell. My last blog was supposed to end up talking about how streaming music and paying a small fee to listen to it over and over again, without a monthly subscription fee (Napster, Rhapsody) was going to be the wave of the future of distributing music. Instead, I talked about what is wrong with the music industry, which I could go on for days about. I did not mean to make things so long winded. It's just something I'm a bit passionate about. I remember when I finished writing, I got distracted by something, which I don't even remember what it was, and didn't even bother to spell check it or end it on with a conclusion. What the heck could have distracted me so severely? I fell like when I read that, I was sleeping when I wrote it or something. I don't even remember writing most of that! Well, anyway...

I am in the middle of a weird phase right now where I'm completely obsessed with a number of different sports in a number of different ways. All I can think about all day is hockey. All I want to do all day is play NBA Live 10. All I want to do watch all day is football. I can't seem to focus on one particular sport in which I want to be completely obsessed with. If I had to choose between the options above, I would honestly play my Playstation 3 all day long. I'm not entirely sure how much I really care about the NBA right now, but I cannot stop playing this game! Unfortunately for me, the game is due back to the store tomorrow, so that will end that. But I want to buy it now so I can play the game every second of free time I have. What is wrong with me? But every time I pick up my computer, I go straight to hockey blogs and hockey news and hockey highlights, and hockey live feeds from my new favorite website that Caleb gave me. Football? Well my Niners suck so that is pissing me off. I still devote the majority of my Sundays plopped right here on my couch watching football, no matter who's playing. I love sports and I don't care who knows!

Goodnight from Nashville!

Is streaming music and paying for the right to stream that music at all times for a low price the future of music? It could easily be. I read a statistic in a book I read before that said that over half of the people surveyed that used Napster when it was going full-on said that they would continue using the site if they had to pay for it simply because of the fact that they liked the instant-ness of the whole thing. They liked that fact that they could get their music they wanted to hear without leaving the house, and having it right away, accessible at all times. With that said, I know there are still people that use Limewire or another site similar, to get music for free, because they don't want to pay for music. I understand that, I guess, but I'll go on record and say I'm against it. I deffenetly used to be the kid downloading a bunch of shit that I would not otherwise buy, just because I hate getting burned when I buy a CD that sucks. My defense was that I would steal the music, and if it was good, I would buy it. This rarely worked out, because I already had it so why spend money on something I already own? My thinking was that I would buy the music I actually liked, and support that. People would only buy the good shit, thus making people essentially "vote" for the types of music that was going to be successful. This theory does not work. People still steal music at mind-numbing rates, and buying physical CDs is on a continuing downward slope.

The advancement of iTunes into the population making music available for cheap is great. But there are a lot of problems with that from an industry standpoint. The first major problem with it is that now, when a song gets popular, the 99 cent single sells like crazy on the internet. That is to say people are still buying it, which is good for the companies, but it used to be a lot better. When a song like "the macaraina" or "who let the dogs out" or even that Chumbawumba song that was out in the 90s, people went out and dropped $15 - $20 on the entire CD to have that song. Now, you only have to spend 99 cents or $1.29 in most cases. The whole thing is great for the consumer, but terrible for the industry.

With that said, you have to ask yourself, whose side am I really on here? Well for me it's the artist. But the label ultimately means something to me, I guess. I personally want the entire industry to be successful, but I don't like reading about when bands got fucked over royally in the golden days because they could throw around money on the next big thing and dump a band like Saves the Day when their album doesnt sell enough copies in the first week. The majors are going to burn, this is true. But I don't want to see chaos in the industry either. Free music is great, everyone knows that. But it's unhealthy for the world of music. people should have to pay for it. That's just how I feel.

Another issue I had thought of was that online music stores like iTunes and Amazon are a problem because of the way you have to buy the music. Typically, you would need a credit card or a check card of some sort to buy music from your bank account. How many people under the age of 16 have checking accounts? Credit cards? Even people 16-24 don't always have access to those plastics. But chances are, they have a computer. And everyone they know, knows about free music sites. So the music is free. The one way I can think of is that Target and Walmart sell iTunes gift cards, but that still sucks because it takes away from the instant-ness of buying music online. scenario: "OH SHIT! THE NEW (insert obscure band name here) ALBUM IS OUT?!?! NO SHIT!!! OH HOW AM I GONNA GET THIS? I NEED TO HAVE MY MOM DRIVE ME TO WALMART, BUY A ITUNES CARD, COME BACK HOME, ENTER THE CODE AND I CAN HAVE IT! WOOHOO!!!"

or scenario #2: "OH SHIT! THE NEW (insert obscure band name here) ALBUM IS OUT?!?!?! NO SHIT!!! OH HOW AM I GONNA GET THIS? WELL MY MOM ISNT HOME TO TAKE ME TO THE STORE, AND I WANT IT RIGHT NOW!!! and he/she goes to limewire, or a bittorrent for that matter, and gets it, simply because he/she didn't want to wait.

that's all I have to say on this matter today. All I'm saying is that if you love it, support it. that means throwing your hard earned dollars at it. Because all the love in the world that you throw at your favorite band, doesn't matter if they aren't able to measure it.

Yeah. I'm back. Whatever.

So after an extended hiatus, I return with a vengeance and ready to admit that I still feel I have nothing to add to the blog-o-sphere. Lots of things on my mind this morning though...oh where to begin?

How about my attempt to quit smoking?

So, as you may know if you follow me on Twitter, I am attempting to quit smoking, after having done so for the past 15 (give or take, off and on) years. If you do the math, that would make me 11 years old when I "started" smoking. I put quotations around that because, I mean, really, did I consider myself a full-fledged smoker at age 11? probably not. But I know I did smoke cigarettes quite often at that very young age. It wasn't until the weekend before high school graduation that I realized that I was not alone in the smoking world. It was brought to my attention that my best friend, Chris Wright had been smoking on the DL for quite some time. Not to get into the history of how me and Chris even became friends in the first place, over a cigarette on the bluff behind Lincoln st., but anyway, once I realized that I was not alone in being a young, of age smoker, it became much more acceptable in my mind. I realized later that after Chris quit in 2004, our friendship started to erode. I realized that smoking cigarettes was what we had in common and what we did together. Though this is not about me and Chris' friendship, there is a real tie there with the social acceptability of the whole thing.

I pretty much always had a friend that was a smoking buddy. It's what we did. Weather that was Chris, my brother, Andy, whomever. I don't have a smoking buddy anymore. I don't need one like I used to when I was younger. But now I just feel like a sad, aging man, who relies on that smoke to maintain some form individuality and youth. To be young, smoke and be bad ass. I look at how unhealthy other people around me are and look and scoff at them sometimes. This comes from being a vegetarian and me thinking this makes me better than others, which it clearly doesn't. I have that same sense of belonging with a vegetarian crowd, although that is a crowd in which I don't know anyone else that is in it. It's weird, but basically I am an addictive personality with need to feel like I belong to something. That's where it makes it hard to quit. The other reasons it's hard to quit is the obvious physical addiction to nicotine.

Withdrawals are so fucking weird to describe. I go to a one-track mind about needing a cigarette. That's how I spent Thursday. All I thought about was how I needed a smoke, and I needed nicotine. Once I got some nicotine in my system, it seemed to lighten a bit, but still, it was my main focus. Another hiccup (literally) is that I am using these nicotine lozenges. They taste alright, like a weak mint, but they burn my throat, stomach and make me feel like I have to burp, but can't. If I eat too many, they give me painful hiccups. So I bought a pack of cigarettes last night, because the lozenges are not the same as the real thing. I'm working on making the right decision to have a lozenge instead of a cigarette, but sometimes there's no changing my mind on what I want. I use cigarettes as something to do when I'm bored at work, which is most of the time, so trying to find something else to occupy my time is an issue. I have a feeling this is going to be a long, drawn-out struggle, and I may not be successful this time, and I understand that. That doesn't mean I'm not going to try 100% to get there. I'm not giving up by saying I know this may not work out this time. I hope that by feeling that way, it doesn't give myself an exit strategy, a fatalistic view of the whole thing.

I want to win.

i shall return...very soon

This is quick reminder that I have not died and I will be returning to the "bloggosphere" er whatever its called, very soon. Like, tomorrow or Friday. I will try to make it a regular thing to write about stuff I think about. It's all bottled up right now and i'll let it out, for virtually no one, soon enough.

Stay Tuned. Listen to Owl City and pretend you never heard the Postal Service before, and you'll love it!

-Brad