December 29th, 2003 14:45 hours CST currently listening to: "Only" by The Caesars

Well, the x-mas holiday has come and gone. It was rather nice, very relaxing. One of the requirements for my dream home is a wood burning fireplace. That is without a doubt, the heart of my parents house. If I were a cat, I'd purr. We reinstated some old family traditions and worked on a few jigsaw puzzles, as well as made those crazy date bar things that seem to only last a day or two before they're all eaten. Once again, I made a sickening amount of french toast after we ripped into our presents. I had hopes of getting some Mario Kart Double Dash time in with Rusty, my brother's husband, but he REALLY sucks at driving in video games, so that was a bust. I went out with my brother, brother-in-law and my dad on Saturday to shoot shotguns and my right shoulder is still really sore. We had a pretty good dinner at the Scholar's Inn for mom's birthday on Saturday night. I saw Return of the King with David and Rusty on Friday night. I'll be undergoing my third viewing tonight with DJ. Good grief. That's 10 1/2 hours of Return of the King. Sweet.

I scanned the wedding pictures I took with my Polaroid a few weeks ago, but it looks like not all of them were able to upload to my server. Sonofabitch. I'm missing three of them. Grrrr. Once I get this scanner-from-hell fixed at Mary's desk, I'll redo them. This is going to be a busy month. Airiel is recording the next two weekends, we might be playing up in Milwaukee on the 16th and we're definitely playing on the 29th. That's gonna be a good show. Check out the upcoming airiel shows page for all the details.

December 22nd, 2003 10:05 hours CST currently listening to: "Missing" by The Clientele

Morning, all. My weekend was nice. I got my hair trimmed (I'm still growing it out) and then went over to CB2. Man, they sell cool stuff. Too bad it's all pricey. I can't stand paying $5 for a roll of really cool wrapping paper, only to find that there's hardly any on the roll and you can wrap maybe 2 or 3 presents of medium size. Ptthhppp. I made some pasta and took a good amount out of a bottle of wine and had a very relaxing night in.

Saturday I wrapped presents all morning, unlocked the last of the unlockables in Double Dash and also did laundry. Amanda came over and brought me scotch tape, since I had run out and we both wrapped the last of our presents. We made some pizzas, drank some wine and watched Elizabeth, which I hadn't seen in a long time. It's such a good movie and Cate Blanchett rocks. While in a drunken haze later in the evening, I managed to finish parts to "Airtight Angels", which had been eluding me for a while. I wanted to finish it for the new EP and after last nights practice, it's definitely going on there!

Not much happened on Sunday. I was a lazy bum, but practice was really good. The boys were in high spirits. Cory, John and Adam ripped into some weird, speed-country version of "Where It Belongs" and Cory even through the word muskrat in there and I was on my knees, with a red face, laughing as hard as I could. Cory is supposed to go out with me tonight to hit up all the venues with press kits so we can get some shows scheduled.

I'm looking forward to x-mas. I actually finished my shopping last night. It will be nice to just come home and relax, without having to run around and try to find some piece of shop equipment that my dad doesn't already own. That man is impossible to shop for. I'm going to flood him with music that I think he should be listening to, instead. Hah.

December 19th, 2003 10:05 hours CST currently listening to: "Ba Ba Ba" by Ivy

Every year at x-mas my family declares "next year, we're not gonna buy so much stuff". This will never happen. Well, it might, but when you're shopping for 6 people, it looks pretty massive under the tree. I got 85% of my shopping done last night. I was thrilled. I didn't even have to draw blood. I'm gonna hit Borders at lunch, then all I have to do is hit CB2 tomorrow and then Home Depot and I'm DONE. I get to sit on the floor of my living room, drink a glass of wine and wrap presents. Sweet.

I think I may have a small crush on a new girl in the office. Uh-oh.

I'm in love with Ivy. I bought a few albums last night at Crow's Nest. It's simply delicious pop. I also got the new Clientele, which is fantastic. I'm having a good day. Ivy makes me bouncy and happy. I had a spring in my step this morning. The winter air, which wasn't too cold and the excitement of upcoming x-mas. That and I get to hang out with Amanda tomorrow night, which hasn't happened in a season or two...... or three. Hope, I promise that this time I'll have cookies for you when I come back from Bloomington.

December 18th, 2003 15:50 hours CST currently listening to: "On Tooting Broadway Station" by The Kitchens of Distinction

I'm about to submit to wild consumerism. I'm going x-mas shopping tonight. It aint gonna be pretty. Hopefully I'll be the warm, calm, 'Hindu cow' type person that will make a retail clerks day by not being an impatient asshole who thinks the world will end because Crate and Barrel is out of their x-mas themed oil lamps. I came up with a good list of CD's for my brother and my father. They've been liking the stuff I've been playing in the house stereo at the last few family gatherings. Things like Beaumont, Blue Boy and the Clientele. Some of things I'll buy for me and then copy for them, explaining that they're rare and I couldn't find real copies or something. Not that they care if they get copies or nuthin. I'm looking forward to getting Rusty to play Mariokart Double Dash. I finally unlocked Toad the other night and that made all the difference. He was my favorite in the N64 version and he's my favorite for the GameCube as well. Once I got him, I started passing out open cans ofwhoopass to everyone I encountered. Life is good.

What else..... I'm way behind on posting the Sci-Flyer reviews on Clairecords.com. I feel really bad about that. However, Dave is gonna be out of the office all next week and the following week, so I'll be able to get them done then for sure. Plus, I'll get to be on AIM again, so that also rules. Next week should be pretty busy still. I'm heading down to Indiana on Tuesday night. This year I actually get to take the day after X-Mas off, so I won't be driving back to Chicago on x-mas night for the first time in three years. Granted, I'll probably be going batty at my parents house, so I'll be back up here by the 26th. Hahahah. I plan on taking it easy. Going to some movies, making cookies, etc. I'm in full holiday weight mode and I don't care. I'm gonna hit the gym hard once I get back. My knee is back to normal and I'm going to try hard to hit my target weight this summer. I'm gonna make aconscious effort to drink less beer and eat smaller meals. Until then, however, I'm hitting Panda Express and pizza places a lot more often.

December 17th, 2003 11:30 hours CST currently listening to: "Feel" by The House of Love

Well, for only getting 2 hours of sleep since yesterday, I'd say I'm doing pretty well so far. I met up with Mischa and Maria last night to see Return of the King. It rules. Plain and simple. Three and a half hours of pure bad-assery. The army of the dead worked really well and the sequence where Pipin lights the beacon at Minas Tirith is fantastic. New Zealand has become the new Montana, in as much as it may be the most beautiful place on earth captured on film.

I bought Mariokart Double Dash!! the other night. It's fun, but it's also a bitch. It doesn't have much replay value in single player. I'll bring it down to the parents house with me for x-mas and I'm sure we'll have fun with it. What severely pisses me off is the fact that the stats on the cars mean absolutely NOTHING to the AI players. I'll be neck and neck with the exact same car, and suddenly they're in front of me. Nintendo needs to get it's shit together with it's first party titles. It's pretty, but it could have been a lot cooler looking.

Yesterday was extremely busy and I became very impatient with people at work. We did, however, get our new computers in and I love them. HP finally made a decent desktop box. I'm using one right now. The keyboard itself is really nice and it's also quiet. Oh man, I'm really tired. I'm also hungry. When I'm this tired and my blood sugar is this low, I can't say no to Panda Express. I'm gonna go back to the gym on a regular schedule AFTER the holidays are over.

December 15th, 2003 15:15 hours CST currently listening to: "Never Enough" by The Cure

This day has kind of been the pits. I had a really busy morning. HR was really lazy in getting me the basic information for the new employees that started today, so I didn't get their accounts created on time. Feh. I also didn't have the machines ready, so I was running around setting up stuff all over the office.

The weekend was alright. I ended up working late on Friday, which zapped my motivation to go to Laval Lounge. I was asleep by 10 and I slept for 12 hours, which I never do. I managed to clean up most of my apartment and get some time in with Rogue Leader on the GC. That game can be a real bitch. I met up with Alejandra and we got food over at Penny's because Hi Rikki was closed. We met up with a friend of hers over at Cans and had a beer. I went over to Cara and Nikki's place to be an extra in some student film that was being shot at their place, but nobody showed up, so it was pretty much a bust. We played Uno. I met up with Alejandra again at an art gallery that had some really great pieces up. After that, we went to some party in Boystown. I met a guy named Mike who was pretty cool and it turns out he knew of my band, so that was also cool.

Sunday, I went over to Jeff and Kim's to chill out with them and setup Jeff's new computer. When I got their DSL working, I then found out that Sadam had been captured. I never thought I'd see that actually happen. Hopefully it won't get Bush re-elected. I told them about my trip to London and Kim made cookies. We ordered pizzas and watched my extended DVD set of The Two Towers. It was a nice, relaxing day. I then loaded my car and went up to band practice. John and I met up afterwards at Lava to hear Kerry spin. They put her on early, so we only got to hear a few songs. Poor girl. I hate to see people with broken hearts. I just want to give her a big hug and make her feel better. They didn't have any Stella on tap. That's bullshit.

December 11th, 2003 10:22 hours CST currently listening to: "Melt" by Guitar

Wow oh wow, I'm tired. Airiel played a great show last night. We had a really great turn out for a wedensday night at the Fireside. I was really happy with it. We got great responses all around with exception to Cory's drunk-ass speaches on stage. I was really happy to see David Golitko show up. He's just a few short blocks away from that place. I'm glad he got to check out just how much the sound has changed now that we're a 4-pice, before we go in to record with him in January. Ok, I need a diet coke.

December 9th, 2003 14:00 hours CST currently listening to: "Honey" by Venus Hum

Ok, I'll try to sum up the last week and a half for you, since I've been MIA. Thanksgiving was pretty nice. We had the whole family there. I brought down the PS2 and Gamecube. Rusty and I got hooked on Super Monkey Ball 2. Waverbird wireless controllers are the shit. We had a really great birthday dinner for my brother at the Scholar's Inn, which is honestly the only restaurant I ever want to go to in Bloomington now. Our hostess was royally cute and reminded me of my friend Cathy. I ended up coming back up to Chicago on Saturday night instead of Sunday morning. It was just easier on me to do that and I know Stella was going batty without me. Hope did a great job cat sitting for her though.

I had a Microsoft Exchange 2000 class all last week up in Schaumburg which is becoming my personal hell. The class itself was very enriching, but I'm not going to be able to apply it to anything at my current job since our Exchange servers are still running 5.5 anyway and will soon be under the direct control of our headquarters, and not by me. *cry* I feel like my job is being taken away piece by piece. I'm going to do my best to create a test lab and keep everything totally current so I can be an über win2k admin. Anyway. There were these two super geeks in the class who drove me up the god damn wall. They are by default uncool dorks, so the only time they talk about anything is to rip on it to make themselves look cool. 95% of this shit was stories that they made up about hardware at work that exploded or crashed or some other bullshit that I didn't care about. The instructor gradually noticed me rolling my eyes towards the end of the week and that was the clue to get them to shut up so he could continue with the course material.

The airiel show on Tuesday went off without a hitch, really. It was at the Village Tavern, which is this weird pub in Longrove. Longrove, is in the middle of nowhere. I was blown away by the amount of people that showed up. The sound was kinda crap and I couldn't put any reverb on the vocal mics without it feeding back. I hate running sound at my own shows. We even whipped out a cover of Level 42's "Something About You". It was fun. Nobody knows what the hell song it is we're playing until Cory sings that falsetto chorus part. We were all really happy with the show. I was proud of Adam. He's only been with us for a month and he nailed his parts. He was high-fiving me like mad after the set was over. The future is bright.

Saturday I made it down to Indianapolis for Jeff Gibbs' wedding. I officially met Jeff at my 4th birthday party, along with his little brother Kevin, Adam York and Adam Estes, all of whom were in attendance. Kevin was the best man and Adam York was one of the groomsmen. I didn't know Adam Estes was there until we sat down at the same table together at the reception. It was a night awash with flashbacks and old stories. I had such a good time, despite the fact that I had no date (I called over a dozen girls).

Mike Nickhols was there, who is the owner of Camp Palawopec, where Jeff, Kevin, Adam York and I spent 10 straight summers. His son Nate was there with his girlfriend Beth, who I also knew from the camp. I saw this gorgeous girl with glasses at the church, who was also within eyesight at the reception. Despite the blips I was getting on the gay-dar, I asked Kevin about her. Sure enough, she was bi, and her ex-girlfriend was the girl she was with. The Ex currently had a boyfriend, so I thought I could at least talk to this girl. Well, Adam York's girlfriend introduced us and we talked for a bit on the dance floor. We went for a walk during some Dave Matthews song and after we got to the lobby, the Ex shouted "um, where are you going?" We explained that we were just going for a walk at least until the song was over (I said that as a joke because I hate Dave Matthews) and the Ex gave me the most evil "touch her and I'll kill you where you stand" look I've ever received in my life. So the Ex left and we walked around and talked. She was a dancer and was living in New Mexico presently. We talked about our separate travels to Europe and I was quickly realizing that I hadn't talked to a person in this way for a long time and it was amazingly nice. The Ex showed up and declared that the song was over and that we should come back inside. We groaned at that. I made and effort to talk to the Ex, to explain that my intentions were honorable. She appreciated that and tried to tell me all the back-story, mostly as a ploy to get me away. Well, it worked in the end, because I was hardly able to get a word in to the gorgeous girl with glasses. I went to my room alone, as usual, watched a "movie" in my room and lied awake in a drunk pondering session for a few hours.

We drank a lot. Apparently Becky Gibbs' (Jeff and Kevin's big sister) wedding had a $12,000 bar tab. Ouch! I had so many Jim Beam and Coke's that I can't even remember. Oh, and I love the Gibbs'. Every one of them said I looked thin. Rock on. Becky even dropped her jaw when she saw me. She's as gorgeous as ever and is also 9 months pregnant. Her husband Zach is a really nice guy. I met some pretty cool people. Mostly parents and stuff. I guess I was mentioned a few times during the rehearsal dinner, so that makes me extra happy that I made it down to the wedding.

I got up around 8 the next morning and decided to just get the road trip back to Chicago under way, instead of nursing my hangover in the stale hotel sheets. Airiel had practice that night. It went really well and I'm closer to finishing Airtight Angels now. Poor Cory. He's sick with the flu. I hope he's better by tomorrow night. He'd already been sick for a couple days so I'm crossing my fingers that he gets it out of system. I've doing lots of updates to the airiel site in the last two days. Reviews and press kit stuff, mostly. I'm really excited about the show tomorrow night. It's gonna rock.

December 8th, 2003 11:25 hours CST currently listening to: "Idiot Country" by Electronic

Ok, I'm now back in the city, thank heaven. I was in Schaumburg all last week for a Microsoft Exchange 2000 corporate class and I'm sooooooo glad to be done with it. I'll explain more later. Thanksgiving was nice. I made chocolate chip cookies with cinnamon chips in them. Rusty and I got addicted Super Monkey Ball 2. The airiel show went off without a hitch. Jeff Gibbs' wedding was fantastic and while seeing friends that I've known since I was 4 years old, it also left me rather depressed. Or maybe it was because I had a crush on yet another lesbian. *sigh*.