Dropkick Murphys

I have finally seen the trifecta of awesome. Flogging Molly, The Pogues, and, as of last night, the Dropkick Murphys. I was most excited to see these guys out of all 3, because they are my favorite to listen to. All though they were awesome and melted my face off, I would have to say that Flogging Molly seems to be the victor as far as live performance. It’s something I can’t quite put my finger on. They just seem to produce the most love in their music. Perhaps its just because I’m getting old and don’t have as much anger, and like to hear the high-energy mixed up with a mellower ballad a little more. That being said, they still rocked my face off and put on one amazing show, and as far as recorded music goes, Murphys are still my faves. Another criticism is the sound mix at the House of Blues. After seeing several shows there, however, I’m now certain it’s the venue, not the bands. As usual, I would have liked to hear the vocals, bagpipes, whistle, accordion and banjo more, but they sort of always get lost in the guitar and drums. It was pretty neat how they pulled the crowd up on stage until it was full. The musicians were barely hanging on the stage, ready to fall off, or playing as they were buried in the wild crowd somewhere. Randy, Lou, Chris, and I also observed how there seemed to be nobody from the crowd that wasn’t overweight. I guess it’s a sad representation of Dallas! Oh well, I’m fighting the battle of the aging bulge myself and I guess those who live in glass houses…

2010!

It’s been way too long since I’ve posted anything. I need to take care that facebooking doesn’t kill my ‘real’ journaling. it’s so easy to post some 1-sentence, insipid state-of-mind four times-a-day on facebook, mainly just to get a cheap laugh from friends. But blogging is still the real deal to me. A very very late Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.
Sarah and I had a super low-key thanksgiving at home. Sarah made a brined Turkey and it was awesome. My Birthday was low-key too (getting so old). I worked, then opened a few presents when I got home. Henry picked out the card from him by himself and signed it. Naturally, it was a firetruck card that makes the siren noise when I open it up. it’s been amazing watching him learn and grow in leaps and bounds. The understanding and verbiage and problem- solving, and mechanical skills have exploded exponentially this last year. I used to pretty much keep a mental record of the new words he knew and things he did, but that passed up my ability to keep track long ago. he’s starting to tackle open questions, as opposed to questions with 2 options. it’s just amazing seeng how he sponges it all up, and gets more and more of his own personality, preferences, and brand of sass.

My parents and Andy came down for about a week over Christmas. They make a big road trip out of driving down, so I think they’re ready to rest and decompress when they get here. That’s good, though. Takes some pressure to entertain off Sarah and I. So we mainly just hang out and enjoy each others’ company.

Andy and I did get an invite for something awesome, however. Damon invited us to the “Christmas Horror Mix-Up” at the Cinema Brew Pub. I was a bit worried at first because I’m still shockable and not a fan of gore. But they turned out to be some of the funniest, worst B movies from the 80s. They were just shaved down enough to show the essentials of 3 features in the timespan of one. “Iced”, “You Better Watch Out”, and “Silent Night, Deadly Night 2″ were as funny and gloriously aweful as any 50’s B-movie I’ve every enjoyed. And the Mix-Up makers filled up the ‘in-betweens’ with hilarious puppet segments, clips of “Santa Claus vs. the Martians”, etc. Andy was impressed with the Cinema Verite you can find here.

I wish I had more time to visit my folks. it seems I was either working or chasing Henry. And I pulled an all-nighter doing a freelance video the night after Christmas. But there’s definately worse problems to have. I’m pretty darn grateful for my wife, rugrat, and ability to keep afloat as a freelancer.
We did manage to get in one other activity with the family (besides raiding all the comic shops in town with my brother), we took a visit to the annual North Park Mall’s train show. I love that thing. It may become a Christmas tradition. Sarah was good enough to call ahead of time to confirm the mall will loan us a wheelchair for my dad, but naturally they kept the chairs at the far opposite corner of the super-massive mall from the train show. But Henry sure didn’t mind sitting on grandpa’s lap while we wheeled him down the halls. I think he quite liked it. I think the whole family enjoyed the trainshow, hopefully half as much as me.

My family loaded up to head back. We briefly thought we’d have to run Andy to the hospital right before they left, because Henry accidentally bashed him in the jaw and eye, but Andy caught his breath and recooped.
2 days later I got a call that stopped my heart. My mom was saying something through a very horrible cell phone connection. I basically heard “Matt..(crackle crackle)…horrible accident..(crackle crackle)…” (click). Then I could get anybody calling back all 3 of their cell phones. Finally, I got ahold of my dad who said they totalled the car, but all 3 of them were fine and walked away from driving around the curve of a mountain road into a herd of cows. Somebody just didn’t close a gate. Awesome. I just thank the Lord they’re all okay. They finally got home after more than a day of dealing with insurance and rip-off, rapist car rental places who totally used their desperate situation to ridiculously overcharge them. But again, I sigh relief that they were all watched over, and walked away after taking out 2 cows. I just hope that doesn’t discourage them from coming down and seeing us again.
They said they may fly next time, which I understand. But between taking chances with my life and wayward cows, or being scanned, questioned, and anally probed by Big Brother, I just may take my chances with the open road again. But that’s just me.

Jan & Mike

Sarah’s parents came to visit for a few days. They were awesome guests! I love my in-laws!
And not just because they let us sleep in by waking up with the kid. They were fun and we had a great time. Jan took Sarah out and spoiled her by buying her a stack of clothes. They let Sarah and I go out. We had dinner at the Outback steakhouse. Then checked out the Londoner, but it was a bit loud for our taste.
Mike checked out the 6th floor museum. I think he dug it.
We all went to the airplane museum. I love that stuff. We got invited to climb on and look inside a tank. It had a long service going from WWII to the 6 Day war to the Lebanon Civil war. We also got to see the inside of a B-24. It was the world’s oldest working 4-engine prop war plane or somesuch. Mike and I really dig this stuff, but I think it especially pleased Mike that Henry seemed genuinely interested and ‘into it’ throughout the entire several hours we were there.

Later we took them to Pocket Sandwich Theater for a live melodrama (cheesy and zany) dinner play of “Dr. Jeckyl and Mr Hyde”. Always a good time there. We stopped briefly at Trinity Hall to show them Seamus Stout.
The next night they Sarah and I go out again. It’s just nice to go out and not be thinking about what we’ll pay when we get home for babysitting. Sarah and I just enjoyed the wine bar where it was mellow.

It was great to see Jan and Mike again. Once again, really sad to see family go home again.

Andy for Halloween

I’m pretty darn late posting this, but I have to say what a great Halloween we all had. My brother came into town to hang out for a few days and it was so awesome to see and hang out with, and re-connect with him again. Unfortunately I had to work most evenings but we still managed to take in a good amount of cheesy movies. It’s always extra fun watching horror and B- scifi with him. Fortunately a lot of fun things to do fell into place right when he was here, furthering his false impression that I have a life heh heh. I scored some last-minute free tickets to the Pogues and we got to go see the legends, thanks to my pal, Billy K. Andy, Billy, Jon and I went out for a pint afterwards and enjoyed the sight of a genuine vintage mini.

I also held a watch party to take in Alex Jones’ latest documentary “Fall of the Republic”. Got a guy out who I used to work with, but otherwise haven’t had a chance to hang out with. Stu came, of course. And I think I officially melted Andy’s brain with terrifying information overload between “Fall of the Republic” and Aaron Russo’s “Freedom to Fascism” which we watched the night before. But I vibes that he was pretty much on the same page already, and I was right.

Our wonderful nanny, Rhonda took Hanky to a kiddie Halloween party over at the country club. (wow that sentence made me sound so ‘high life’) He had a great time. He dressed in a curious George-looking monkey suit that makes peoples’ face melt with cuteness.

Sarah and I decided on a whim to be Doctor Who and the Tardis. The older Doctor, Tom Baker. She spent hours and hours crocheting a giant beautiful scarf, following the actual pattern from the show. I only wish there will be more opportunity to wear it here in Dallas. I crammed the last day and a half making her wacky tardis. The best part was the painted pizza box with a party light I velcro’d on top. I was pretty proud of that one. Then we delegated Andy to be K-9. He was a great sport. We just scored him a grey sweat suit and I designed some iron-ons for the front and back. He built some zany radar ears out of tinfoil and such.

The day before Halloween, Andy, Hanky and Sarah had fun carving pumpkins. I was too busy finishing Sarah’s costume.

Halloween night, we took Hanky trick-or-treating in his monkey suit. We walked to Swiss where everybody goes. A lady on Live Oak must have been pretty starved for trick-or-treaters because she flew out of the house to give Henry candy while we were going to the next street over. He quickly learned to say ‘trick or treat’ and that he gets candy immediately after. He had a pretty good haul when we got home. He would ask for his candy for the next 2 weeks by saying ‘trick or treat’ until it was gone.

Then Andy, Sarah and I went to Damon’s party. I was happy that Andy had a good time and everybody got along swimmingly. Damon put on a great spread. Great decor down to the pickled eyeballs on the food table and full size coffin in the living room. Damon even put together an all-Halloween DVD set to play on the livingroom TV. Everything from old slasher trailers to Halloween segments of Roseanne and the Simpsons.

Andy and I had a good comicbook store splurge before he left, and I was sad to see him go. But we all had a pretty darn great Halloween weekend.

Farmer’s Market

I had a great day. I woke up with Henry and we watched some original ‘Planet of the Apes’. Great Sunday morning entertainment. Then Sarah kindly let me have a nap which did me good. Then we took the kid and ate while he napped in the car before hitting the farmer’s market. It’s only our second time and already it’s become a favorite fall tradition. It’s so pleasantly mellow, especially after battling an ocean of people at the State Fair last week. We just stroll about, drinking our coffee, sampling all the fresh fruit. We scored some molasses and raw honey with a big chunk of honeycomb in the middle of the jar. Then we hit the pumpkin place and buy a couple big ones to carve. I enjoy picking out a good handful of those little crazy-looking gourds for decoration too. I don’t know why I’m so fond of those. Do people actually eat those? Or were they genetically engineered to just look cool and be fall decorations? I have no idea. But I like them.

We hit Target and scored some cute winter clothes for Henry. We then took him to the park for a little bit so he could burn off the rest of his energy.

I had leftover grilled burgers. Even re-heated, they taste barbecue-licious. (We bought a barbeque a few weeks ago because we finally live in a place where we can do that for the first time in about 10 years, so naturally we’ve been doing a lot of grilling).
I then caught some of that new documentary about how the Monty Python guys hooked up. It’s their 40th anniversary, so several channels have been having marathons. I loved that documentary because I’ve always wondered how they hooked up and got started.
So it wasn’t an epic or extraordinary day. It was fun and mellow, which is my favorite kind of day.

State Fair

Today we went to the State Fair with Damon and Jenny because Sarah scored some free tickets. We gorged on corn dogs, gyros, baklava, and fried cookie dough. Sarah saw that really high bumpy slide, the kind with several lanes that you ride down on a potato sack, and thought it would be fun to take Henry down on her lap. I was convinced he’d cry… because quite honestly, I’m sure I would when I would look at the view from the top. But he didn’t. He had that intense ’scared-but-not-showing-it’ look, but he didn’t cry. Then he wanted more when they got to the bottom. We then took the sky tram ride. Pretty neat.

We also showed him the petting zoo again. He got to feed the cows, goats, and other sundry critters. Unfortunately some of the joy of the day was killed by the fact it was absolutely, ridiculously crowded. We must have gone on a weekday last year, because we were swimming in people today. And that can kill some of the joy. People annoy me. Like the guy who rolled his eyes with disgust when Henry popped in front of his path to pet an animal. He was a grown man. It was a petting zoo for kids. Or the guy whom Sarah gave our left over ticket to since we were leaving. He literally took the ticket, staring at her, and didn’t so much as crack a smile or grunt any form of acknowledgement. Or the two drivers that kept trying to race from completely behind me to in front of me during a lane merge without a yield. Or just how annoyingly pervasive ghetto fashion is in the main stream now. Yes, the unwashed masses truly suck sometimes.

But aside from that detail, it was fun to hang out with Damon and Jenny, and to show Henry some fun stuff. The weather was great. Pleasantly cool. The recent cold snap and rain trend combo we’ve had here in North Texas made a nice crisp 57 degree day. But then we got rained on. Everbody was waiting in line for fried cookie dough/ fried butter when it rained. Luckily, Sarah sent me to get fried peaches and cream which was inside the building. The line was insanely long. And then it became frustrating when it didn’t move worth a crap. 20 minutes later, I was about 10 people ahead. Then it became even more frustrating when a dozen cops marched in the little food room I was in and the big Arriflex lights turned on. Suddenly crowds from everywhere were in the room with their cameras and cellphones in the air. Turns out Oprah decided to pop up in that little separate food court room in that gift building I was in. Then the line stopped moving altogether, even though there was still like ten people working behind the counter. I guess they were too busy trying to gawk at a famous person. And I only wanted my damn fried peaches. Sarah finally relieved me of the duty of scoring her fried peaches, so we just scored me a coffee, and they got some food elsewhere.

By then it was getting time to leave. The rain wasn’t going away and the temperature was dropping. I was getting a bit worried about Hank even though I know he runs pretty hot like me. After getting warm at home, I decided the State Fair is still an event worth doing, in spite of all the Texan Tards everywhere.

Wow It’s been a long time!

Life just gets ahead of me. I haven’t posted for so long! Apologies to all my loyal readers (that means you, dad). It’s been a crazy weird long summer. Our downstairs neighbors decided to start being mean because they said we were too loud. That means Henry’s footsteps, pretty much. So we were sort of forced to be gone all day every day. Soon as we’d get up, we’d go to the park. And have to think of things to do all day to just not be home. Home became where we slept. Period. Lots of fun that was, especially when it got too hot. We had to get creative. Going to do laps around the mall or McDonalds, the pet store, etc. Life sucked all because of some nasty grumpy neighbors. We couldn’t ever sell our place, but finally found somebody willing to rent. We had just a few days to get out and find a new place. We found one pretty quick, and thanks to some good friends, we got all moved in half a day.

The new place is great. An extra bedroom, extra space. We can breathe again. No A**hole neighbors. It has hardwoods so Hanky can cruise on his various wheeled riding toys. We both love the place.

But we didn’t get moved out before the airconditioner conked out. That cost us 3 grand to replace. (Yay). Apparently an old airconditioner can single handedly triple your power bill too. I really wish I knew that years ago. It would have been replaced much, much earlier.

Right around our move time, I got laid off from work, along with a bunch of others. I scored some freelance gigs. Music video, EPA stuff, Frito-Lay stuff. Then got a full time but temporary job at Dallasparties.com editing bar mitzvahs. That lasted about 4 weeks, but ran out of stuff to do. Then AMS called me back to do some stuff in the evenings, so that’s keeping me fairly busy now.

I somehow became a political cartoonist for D.Medina, who is in the primaries as a candidate to become governor of Texas. That’s been fun to be drawing again.

That’s about it, I guess. Only other thing I can think of is the fact my politics, at least according to some (myself included as of a few years ago) has gone off the deep end. I guess I identify with the angry ‘teabagger’ as the spin-hack corporate media so glibly calls us. But I guess I’d rather be a ‘teabagger’ than another unthinking party-boy ‘douchebagger’.

Oh yes, and Henry seems to grow every day. Physically and mentally. I was pretty much at work all day every day for a week recently. He seemed to be talking twice as much the first day I spent with him again.. twice as much as a week prior.

Well that’s about it, really. Nothing much else going on. I would still love to move back to the more temperate climate of Utah, where family is. But since Sarah has a lucrative, sure job (not me of course), in a time when they’re so rare, I guess I’m chained to this pisshole city. But at least the weather is finally letting up. The temperature has mellowed finally when it rained on us for 3 days straight. Maybe it’s just because we had to spend so much time at the park and out of our house in general for the first half of summer, but it sure seemed like the longest, most miserably hot one of my life. Hooray for fall!

Independence Day

We couldn’t go to Royce this year. Elvira had to work. But luckily, Sarah found out about a wee kid’s parade just a few blocks away. Sarah had to work too, but I took the kid over to the parade just in time for it to start. We found a spot pretty quick but it was toasty. It was worth it, though. Henry was a little startled by the volume of the classic firetruck siren. But after he latched on to me and started to tear up, I just started imitating firetruck noises and he joined in. He wore my new straw cowboy hat to keep the sun off and settled in to watch sitting on my lap. He collected and wore a lot of beads, and we gathered a lot of candy. And he didn’t even have to move from his seat to collect it. He didn’t dig into the candy like he didn’t know what it was. But he proved that he did soon as we got home.he dumped it and started trying to dig in. I helped him try his first tootsie roll. I think he liked it a little too much.

Sarah came home and we let Henry nap about 4 hours because we knew he’d be up late. We went to Fat Daddy’s burgers with Damon and Jenny. Then we went to the Lakewood Country Club to meet Jeff, Kelly and E for fireworks.

Henry was wound up and hyper. Strangely, he crashed right out dead asleep just about when the noisy fireworks began. The noise seemed to make him flinch occasionally or squeeze his mom tighter, but we were sure he was exhausted from all his hyper running, and the show didn’t start till almost 10 . But soon as the show was over and people clapped, Henry popped up making his usual ‘all done’ gesture. He wasn’t sleeping at all. He was scared, but dealing with it in a way other than crying. Like he was exercising some kind of mind-over-matter, withdraw-to-a-happy place kind of technique. Pretty sophisticated for a 2-yr old, I think!

Well he was pretty tired by the time we got home. It was a good Independence Day.

Father’s Day on the Railroad

Sarah set up a great father’s day. She figured out what both Henry and I would love, and it is a train ride. She found out where they have classic steam train rides and bought us tickets. We knew Henry would love it because he’s discovered ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ and it’s his new obsession. He already has a pretty sweet train set. I have to admit, I enjoy playing with and expanding his Thomas train set as much as he.

Sarah, Henry and I took a road trip down to Palestine, TX (about 2 hrs). Henry responded as soon as we got to the station and he could see some trains.

We got our boarding passes and checked out the gift shop.

Henry and I were both drooling because it was a vast collection of Thomas stuff. Then we had our included-with-the-package barbeque lunch outside and listened to a guy with a guitar sing. Henry liked to listen and clapped after each song. Sarah took him up to give him a tip.

Then it was time to board.

Henry was so excited, I could literally tell he was tensing up with excitement. He gave the conductor our tickets. We took our seats. The conductor, who was all ‘gussied up old-school’ even came round to punch our tickets. Henry was slipping into his ’serious business’ mode. He did that before when Rhonda took him to see the fire station. Oh and he did that when he took a ride on the tractor at the goat farm as well. He purses his lips and gets all rigid and focussed.

Soon we were chugging down the backwoods of Palestine. The train rolled through the woods and some cow pastures and a couple swamp bogs. We were allowed to move up a few cars to the concession stand where I scored some ice cream. The people were all nice. Lots of well-behaved kids.

We got to the end and watched the engine detach, loop around, re-attach at the opposite end, and blow some steam.

The train made a mysterious stop on the way back. We found out a lady dropped her camera going out. They were apparently kind enough to briefly stop the whole show so she could get out and grab the camera where she dropped it. I thought that was pretty awesome. Henry made many fans. A lot of folks loved the way he made ‘woo woo’ train noises almost the entire time.

We got back to the station and scored a couple ‘Thomas’ toys for Henry at the gift shop. By the time we got back in the car, it was 4 minutes before Henry was crapped out. Sarah timed it. We got home and played with his new toys for awhile before his bedtime. It was a great father’s day. Thanks, Sarah!

Hanky’s 2nd Birthday

I didn’t even get the chance to recover from the culture shock of experiencing Cleveland again when Texas welcomed me back in a very Texas way.

To celebrate Hanky’s birthday, Sarah arranged for us to take him to a real working farm. Our friend Amanda’s parents work a goat farm (with a bunch of other animals too) in rural Sunset, TX.
So on the same day I woke up in Cleveland, flew home, met up with them, drove to the country, picked up a bunch of goats and neutered them… all before lunch.
That’s right. Amanda’s step dad asked for me and Josh’s assistance in hooking up the livestock trailer, picking up some newly-purchased goats, taking them back to the ranch, separating them, and elastic-banding their nuts. Just another day in the life of Matt Walker.
We had a great time. Walking the field with Hanky, showing him the animals, checking out the livestock graveyard, etc. He loved the critters. And there was a little mud, so luckily we had some newly-purchased fireman galoshes for Hanks.
We then had some giant burgers and cake and presents for Henry. It was a pretty long and exhausting day for me. But what 2 year old could ask for a better birthday? Come to think of it, what exhausted dad could ask for a better Sunday?