All I can say is wow. I knew he was going to be amazing, I just had no idea how amazing. He's the reason that I started playing the ukulele and he just wowed us. Our friends Billy and Ed went with us and I think they both became fans tonight. Of course we took a few pictures.
Jake playing, and I mean PLAYING!
Jake talking to the audience (us).
Me talking to Jake.
Jake signing my DVD cover and CD.
Jake giving me a hug!
Me and Jake.
Ami and Jake.
Ed, Jake, and Billy.
I told Jake that he was the reason that I started playing the ukulele and that it's my first instrument. He seemed genuinely touched. He asked how long I've been playing and told me how it opens up a whole new world. He was unbelievably nice and gracious. I really couldn't have asked for a better experience. I'll definitely be seeing him live again when he comes back and I might have him sign one of my ukes since other people were having him do that.
The Jake Shimabukuro show
Lots of stuff going on
I'm so proud of my wife, Ami, who made the Scrap N' Art design team! She's so talented it's great that her work is now going to be shared with a wider audience.
I'm also excited because tomorrow we go see Jake Shimabakuro live in Atlanta with Billy and Ed. I've heard that Jake is even more awesome live so I'm probably not going to wear socks because they'll just be knocked off anyway.
Did I mention
That Ami is the bestest wife ever? She just ordered me a subscription to Make Magazine! I've wanted to subscribe for a while because it just looks awesome and I've always wanted to tinker with electronics but wasn't allowed as a kid because I "just tore things up" or "would burn the house down". Hopefully this will be a step toward doing some interesting things!
Well, THAT just happened
I decided to put the new brushed nickel fixtures in the guest bathroom tonight. I needed a bit of adult supervision as I tore a small hole in the wall while trying to remove a wall anchor, made the clock in there fall and break part of the molding, and just caused general mayhem. I was lucky that Ami was there to help patch things up. I swear I should just leave things alone sometimes.
Mother's Day adventures
Here are some pics we took on Mother's Day 2009. We went on an adventure in Macon County where we grew up and where our parents still live.
This is the steeple of one of the Twin Churches in Montezuma, GA. There used to be two churches that looked exactly alike next to each other and this one is said to be the haunted one.
Menacing looking front door.
Our niece Jessi going in.
The sanctuary.
This door opened by itself with a lot of force when Jessi, Ginger, and Ami first got inside and bounced against that big heater. There was no wind blowing.
I'm not sure what this used to be. I think it's just a storage shed and it might still be in use.
Ami took this one out on a dirt road. I love the colors.
I hate it when that happens
I was having a ton of network issues with my work PC and my other PCs were acting a little strange networking wise. I restarted my DSL modem and router and everything was still acting strange on my work PC. I dug around in my mass of cables and found that one of them was pinched and had to switch it out. I so wish I could make all my PCs and devices wireless.
Big weekend coming up
This weekend we'll be just around the house. We don't typically do anything on holiday weekends if we can help it. If we do, it's just to go down and see our parents usually. We try to stay off the roads when there are lots of people traveling.
Next weekend, however, will be a big one. We're going to see Jake Shimabukuro live in Atlanta. He's an AMAZING ukulele player. As seen here:
That video is one of the reasons I picked up the ukulele. I was just amazed at what that little instrument can do.
I've been slacking on my practicing lately and really need to start back practicing in earnest. We bought some wall hangers for my ukes and hung them over my desk so they're at hand all the time. I think it's since I've gotten my new laptop that I just started slacking. Ah, the siren call of video games.
Cinematic Titanic
We went and saw Cinematic Titanic with our friends Melinda, Jill, and Doug. In case you don't know Cinematic Titanic is the original cast of Mystery Science Theater 3000 riffing on bad movies just like the good old days but better. Instead of just Joel and the bots we now get Joel Hodgson, Mary Jo Pehl, Frank Conniff, Trace Beaulieu, and Josh (J. Elivs) Weinstein. Here's a sample:
The show was fantastic! We had great seats, too. We were 6 rows back on the left side of the stage so we were about 15 feet from Joel, Josh, and Mary Jo. The movie was terrible (Danger on Tiki Island), but they made it hilarious. We expected that. One thing we didn't expect was the warm up act. It was a man named Gruber.
He was hilarious and all of us kept thinking that he was very familiar, we just couldn't place him. He put on a great set and we were in stitches.
After the movie there was a meet and greet that Ami and I stayed for. We were at the very back of the line but only had to wait about an hour. Gruber was also talking to people while we were waiting so we went and talked to him and got our picture taken with him. He was super nice as was everyone else.
Ami also got pictures of me with everyone.
It was great. Josh also said that they were going to be doing the live shows again next year as far as he knew and were probably coming back to Atlanta. Well, we'll be there!
We went out to the car and the shit really hit the fan after such an amazing night. First we had to wait until someone came out to even get into the parking deck, then we couldn't find the car. After walking around and riding the elevator several times we found it.
After that, we were leaving and found out that you have to pay $5 to get out of the deck! We didn't have any cash either! The guard (over the little speaker) said that he couldn't let us out and that we'd have to wait for someone else to leave and sneak out behind them. We freaked out but luckily some one came along a couple of minutes later and we followed them out. Quite an adventure!
Recent pictures
Here are some pictures that I took recently that I liked.
Beatrice in her box. I used available light and the handy flip out LCD of the Sony A350 to get the shot at that level.
This is QuadNot, one of our outside kitties. It was taken from a distance with our Tamron 70-300mm f/4-5.6 Di lens. I haven't seen her in a few weeks and I'm worried about her.
The sun through an oak leaf in our side yard. I really just liked how the light shows through the leaf.
This is a rose bud on our miniature roses in a pot on our back patio. I just loved how they looked after the rain so I got some pictures. For the first few years these roses didn't do much blooming but for the past couple of years they've been really beautiful.
