State Fair: Fried Food and Crazy People

My absense from the blog world has in large part been due to me moving halfway across the United States, trying to get a place to live, learning a new city and working every waking moment of my day but not that I have figured some of that out I decided to get back into the swing of things. I am sorry if some of you have enjoyed the absense of my blog because it is back baby!!

There are countless topics I could write about with my new experiences this past month here in Austin, Texas but I have instead decided to go a different route and talk about the State Fair.

This time of year is usually when most states have people from all over conglomerate for a few simple things ... fried food, carnival rides and games and people watching. Well at least that is why I go and I can only speak for myself.

I remember the county fair growing up in my hometown and have some good memories from when I was younger. I would like to thank my grandpa for letting me enter one of his ducks to win a grand champion purple ribbon one year. For anyone who knows me I don't know the first thing about ducks or taking care of one but it was a way for my grandpa to get me some extra cash.

When I got older I hated the county fair mostly because I was ready to get out of town and experience the world and also because some of the cowboys made me mad. Now I live in Texas where more cowboys can make me mad haha. The only two cowboys I ever really liked were John Wayne and the giant cowboy in Las Vegas. I liked John Wayne because I heard he used to own an entire street block and he lived on one end and his wife on the other. You have to love your personal space. With the Vegas one I don't need to explain.

I really fell in love with the State Fair when I moved to North Carolina. An annual event, I would go and try different fried foods. One year I even ventured to try a turkey leg which congealed in my stomach like candle wax and allowed me swallow fire if I wanted to. I also learned the tricks of the trade from eight year old kids on the water gun carnival game. After studying them for a good one or two hours I perfected my approach and am now dominate. I have a stuffed clownfish and a stewie doll from family guy to show for it.

This year I was very excited to check out the Texas State Fair. The Red River Rivalry game and state fair all in one place ... perfect storm right. Well work got in the way and I never really got to spend any time at the fair. After we lost the game in the second quarter I thought about leaving at halftime to go walk around but decided I should keep my job. So afterwards we made one quick walkthrough and got a famous corny dog which by the way is just a regular corn dog and nothing worth bragging about. It was hard walking by the fried bubble gum stand for three straight days and not partaking I can tell you that. Next year I vow to double my fried food intake to make up for this year however.

I did get my fair share of people watching in this year though and let me tell you it never gets old. I can't describe any in particular but I am positive Jerry Springer could do a one stop shop for guests on his show.

To close this week I would like to mention that I have thought seriously for the last two years about leaving my job and going on the road as a carny for one year. I feel I could run a ring toss game or guess people's birthday or something and then just talk to random people. After one year I could easily write a book and become a best selling author.

Austin - Austin, Massachusetts

My apologies for skipping a couple of weeks on my blog. Or maybe it has been a blessing for some people I don't know. A lot has changed in those two weeks. I went from being in my 20's and finding happiness with everything from work to my lifestyle to being in my 30's and not knowing what the hell I am doing (in a good way).

There has been a mixture of emotions during that time. I was running daily at my new townhome which both made me feel better emotionally and worse physically. I picked up a lot of video projects at work that I enjoyed thoroughly and gave me a sense of accomplishment at work for the first time in a couple of years. Then right before Duke's first football game I got an email from the University of Texas asking if I would be interested in a position with football there. Because I felt so good with things in my life I was hesitant but told them I would talk about it.

The next day I had two conversations and by night time I had a flight booked to Austin, Texas (not Austin, Massachusetts) for the next Tuesday to interview. Things progressed pretty well and meetings with everyone were good except the men's track coach who must have woke up on the wrong side of the bed that day. All in all it became a really good opportunity for me to advance my career. Two days after interviewing in Texas an offer was extended and accepted. It was an offer I couldn't refuse both long term for my career and short term for my finances haha.

Hook Em Horns!! This is similar to how Mack Brown and Texas made me feel.

Perfect timing right, I finally put the pieces together and then the puzzle falls off the table and I have to start rebuilding it. Not only did I have a week to pack up my townhouse which I still am renting in North Carolina, but I also had to squeeze in what little time I had to spend with my wonderful friends in Durham. Last Friday was a tough day for me. I am not good at saying goodbye but Duke was the first time since high school that I was in one place long enough to really build strong bonds with people so it made it that much harder. I got to where I could be myself around people in our office which is really just acting like an 8-year old kid half the time. I will miss the fun I had there - no doubt.

So on to Texas I headed. The good way to get over my sadness was a night of Brad Jones in Atlanta. Not only did seeing the big guy cheer me up but his family is equally as awesome and Bennett maybe the coolest kid in the world. My 21-hour drive over three days also gave me a chance to reunite with a former boss in Tuscaloosa for a quick lunch, a stop at a casino on the Mississippi River and a local hole-in-the-wall saloon in nowhere Texas that had $1.50 beers. Finally yesterday afternoon, on my 30th birthday, I arrived in my new city to start my new life ... broke and homeless but luckily with some family in town. My birthday was depressing at first when I thought about having to cancel my sweet reverse surprise birthday party I had worked hard to plan. But a singing phone call from a friend's aunt and a dinner with cousins helped make my day better and like Tim McGraw sang ...

I think I’ll take a moment, celebrate my age
The ending of an era and the turning of a page
Now it’s time to focus in on where I go from here
Lord have mercy on my next thirty years

Hey my next thirty years I’m gonna have some fun
Try to forget about all the crazy things I’ve done
Maybe now I’ve conquered all my adolescent fears
And I’ll do it better in my next thirty years
Or my line I added "In my next 30 years, I'm going to drink a lot more beers"

Now here I sit in the LaQuinta Inn still broke and still homeless but I know the future here at Texas will be a good one once I am able to get settled in. I just have to get used to this big city livin. There are class sizes at Texas bigger than my hometown and it takes longer for people to commute to work than it does for me to watch an episode of Friday Night Lights on DVD. But as Riggins and my man Tomko say ... Texas Forever.

To close this blog I would like to extend an invite for anyone and everyone to come visit me in Austin. Luckily I have plenty to entice people to come because if I moved to New Jersey than I don't think I could talk anybody into coming and seeing me.  

Do I Have ADD?

I was sitting in a co-worker's office the other day when our assistant tennis coach pointed something out to me that I never really thought of. I had tied a piece of string to a rubber band and was using it to try and lasso items while I conversed with another. I never thought anything of it until the following conversation (words not exact but how I remember them).

Stokke: What is that? Did you make a lasso?
Me: I guess so, or I can also use it to snap people with. I don't really think about what I am using it for
Stokke: Are you any good at it?
Me: I haven't snagged anything yet.

a few minutes later

Stokke: Have you ever woke up in the morning and had serious ADD?

Me: (holding up the rubberband/string lasso) ummm yeah sometimes

That was when it hit me that maybe I do have ADD or better known as Adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I started to look up the definition but then forgot about it and started bouncing a Monique Currie ball off the wall.

Let me break down the words of the disorder to see if it really does apply to me.

ADULT: Debatable - I guess since I am almost to turn 30 I would qualify for this. However many who know me might disagree as I act childish more often than not. When I volunteer at the Children's Hospital I enjoy playing with the toys more than the kids do sometimes, same with my two nieces. I consider myself to be very playful and like to create games to play, usually around the office to the chagrin of my co-workers. At home I have a basket full of balls on my end table in the living room, a slinky, two marshmallow guns and several other games throughout. I have at least two examples of this in my office alone as I have my prizes from the state fair, a stuffed Stewie from family guy and a stuffed clownfish from nemo, hanging up. There are other stories behind this but I will save them for my state fair blog. 

ATTENTION: Average - I can buckle down and focus when I need to but at the same time it is really easy for things to steal my attention. For instance I could be working on a press release at work and someone sends me an email with a video in it. Next thing I know I am watching the video, then talking to someone about the video, then talking to the same person about 20 other random topics and all of a sudden it is an hour later. I then go down the hall to ask someone a question and end up back at my office finishing the release 2-3 hours later when I remember what I was originally doing. At home it is the same way. I get my bills together to pay them and then the stove timer goes off, load of laundry finishes, Swamp People comes on TV and then 2-3 days later I find the bills on the counter and pay them.

DEFICIT - Yes - not relatable but financially it can be a struggle at times. The darn rise of gas prices has caused everything to go up a lot and unfortunately the salary has remained the same so either I stop eating Chick-Fil-A chicken biscuits or I just have to live month to month. Easy choice is I choose chicken biscuits and living month to month.

HYPERACTIVITY - Good here - hyperactivity does not fit me. I am about as laid back as it gets. I am a lean back, prop the feet up and have an iced tea by my side sort of guy. I force myself to run but hate it. Mentally I am bouncing off the walls all the time but physically I could pass as one of those guys who paint themselves bronze or something else and pretend to be a statue like this statue of liberty guy.

DISORDER: Your guess is as good as mine - ADD up all the previous information and it certainly sounds like I could have ADD. When it comes to playing around and making up games I might be an ADDict because I do it pretty much all day long. This may be something I need to ADDress in the future but for right now I think I am fine.

If any of you think I do have ADD and need to seek help I am open to an intervention. I have never been a part of one and am always looking to improve myself. I won't change my ways but that is just being stubborn.

Come On Irene

I have bought all the 2x4s at Home Depot and Lowe's to board up my windows, hired a company to raise my house six feet off the ground, stocked my pantry with nothing but 100 loafs of bread and 50 jards of peanut butter, purchased 25 10-gallon water jugs, filled 20 gas cans with premium unleaded and cleared out every bag of gummi worms in the state

 so I say ...

Come on Irene too-loo rye-aye
Come on Irene too-loo rye-aye
Toora toora-too-loora

Now you have grown, now you have shown, oh Irene
Come on Irene, these things they are real and I know
how you feel
Now I must say more than ever
things round here have changed
Too-ra loo-ra too-ra loo-rye-aye

With this super, mega hurricane coming our way tomorrow I have almost come to the verge of evacuating the city. Unfortunately I filled so many gas cans for my house, the Circle K is now out of fuel and my truck has gone from F to passed the E and is almost to say see ya to the D on the fuel guage. I am also not sure where I could go because the waves are sure to swallow half the United States and I don't think I can get to the Mississippi river by tomorrow afternoon. They say this storm may claim more victims than Hurricane Shapiro recently did to the University of Miami.

HURRICANE SHAPIRO

I am afraid of going into shock with all of these natural disasters of late. In back-to-back days my home state of Colorado was rocked by an earthquake that could have put true meaning to the Continental Divide and split the state down the middle. It could have done two things: create a new Grand Canyon or give the U.S. 51 states. Of course most people out here in the East don't know Colorado is not just one big mountain that people ski on so the Rocky Mountains would have stayed Colorado and the rest would be called Western Kansas. The other huge earthquake was claimed to take place in Virginia but I think it was the effect of the entire U.S. trying to blast New Jersey into the Atlantic Ocean. The "earthquake" was also felt here in North Carolina by many. There are t-shirts for sale that say "I survived the 2011 Earthquake". The tremors moved Duke's four national championship banners just enough to make room for No. 5. I also heard the basketball team was awakened over in China from the tremors. It was either that or Georgetown fighting the housecleaning staff at the hotel. Maybe the entire thing wasn't an earthquake after all and was really the Graboids from the great Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward film "Tremors".

 
 I am sure these rash of natural disasters will bring up more talk of the apocalypse. Well with my stash of gummi worms I am ready to go with a smile on my face if that happens.

Music and War ... What Is It Good For???

So last weekend I had a couple of hours of free time believe it or not and was chillaxing on my couch watching TV when I came across a great movie ... The Patriot with Mel Gibson. I have always been interested in the Revolutionary War and especially the Civil War. I was watching one of the battle scenes and the British were marching forward with drums and flutes a blazin. I started wondering "why in the world did they play music during battle?"

I started reading up on the history of music during war and it goes back a long ways. Apparently it has always been used to help build morale and as a psychological weapon against opponents. Dating all the way back to the Old Testament when they used ram's horns which are also used by the orcs in Lord of the Rings. The Greek and Roman armies both used brass (tuba and trumpet type instruments) and percussion during war. Of course Scotland used bagpipes which were somehow banned by the British after Prince Charles Edward Stuart's Scottish army was defeated in 1746. What I want to know is who is the governing body of war. Do you think they are like the NCAA and dish out suspensions when you hire mercenaries to hide in the bushes and use unfair tactics during battles or are they like the NFL and hand out ungodly fines to people who do not obey the gentleman's rules of combat?

It has always baffled me that two foes used to line up straight across from each other in a wide open field so they can easily gun down a large percentage of each other's forces but that could be another blog all together. In the middle ages military bands were used to transmit orders sort of like a morse code I guess. I also like that after fighting another country soldiers would bring back new ideas of how they could improve their military band. It eventually became where trumpets were not used in combat as much but more as a wake up call or like a buzzer to assemble the troops. Drums and flutes became the battle instruments to help soldiers march to a certain beat and stay together during infantry maneuvers.

Just think about how it would be now if music was used during war. They would probably design an AKA47 with a built in speaker and a place you could plug your IPOD into. How would the Afghanistan soldiers feel about hearing Miley Cyrus' Party in the USA or Toby Keith's Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue coming from the bushes? Some may even stand on the sidelines and play Edwin Starr's War (What is it Good For, Absolutely Nothing). I would think they could also advance their strategies and include dance fighting like in Zoolander or South Park. Our troops could do the Dougie or break out the sprinkler and yell "You Got Served!!" when dominating another soldier with our sweet dance moves.



Back during the Gulf War why didn't soldiers carry boom boxes on their shoulders during battles. Why don't soldiers install subwoofers and high dollar stereo systems in the humvees and fighter planes? The government already spends a boat load of money on the military so might as well go all out to provide some great music for the troops during battle. If nothing else I think they should get this group of soldiers to perform during combat because the girl is really good.

Taking Off the Helmet is My Hard Knocks

I invite everyone to visit GoDuke.com or click on the link below to see the first edition of my own version of HBO's Hard Knocks called Taking Off the Helmet: A Behind-the-Scenes look at the 2011 Duke Football Training Camp.

Taking Off The Helmet

First off I would like to say we had fewer members on our staff then HBO had makeup people but in a week's time myself, Chad Lampman and Mike Cappetto were able to piece together a pretty good show if I do say so myself. I also give special thanks to Tom Long and Adam Barkley in our football video department for working with us and letting us borrow a camera. It was great how we worked around only having one handheld video camera, one set of wireless mics and three computers to edit on. All this with our staff doing a lot of work with basketball as they get ready for this China trip. I am not going to lie, I am ready for them to leave already so we can focus on this football show.

Working on the show has been great for me. It took me some time to get used to doing video work again since I haven't shot any video or edited any since my junior year of college in the spring of 2003. It was a quick transition back after eight years as I picked things up pretty quick and started remembering bits and pieces of my classes and training. Who knows how great the show can be if I actually become halfway decent at it again.

The show is definitely our own and different than Hard Knocks. Being in a college environment we can't do the types of storylines such as position battles or coaches speaking about players individually as much. However we do have such things as guys still taking classes during camp which most people don't realize. Our coach David Cutcliffe will give us some great audio and is a gem to work with so the show was really fun to work on this first week. It almost made me forget about my real job at Duke as I was in my office for a combined 20 minutes this entire week. I did enjoy hanging out with Chad and Cappetto however.

I hope everyone likes the first show and will tune in the next two Fridays for the last two episodes. I will try to make them entertaining for all.

Maybe the Greatest Tattoo Idea Ever

For some of my friends this will come as no surprise to you since I have had a hard time keeping it a secret. I have an idea for a tattoo that will be lifelike, scary, original and imposing all in one. The placement of the tattoo is on the neck. First reactions are usually "wouldn't that hurt?" and the answer is probably since I have never gotten a tattoo. To best describe my tattoo here is a picture of something I would have in mind only in closer quarters since there is not as much space on your neck.

Now the tattoo would mostly be outlined except for the teeth, ears, eyes, nose and claws. The rest would be filled in with human neck hair to bring a 3D look to it. Depending on if you have brown or black hair will determine the type of bear obviously. The greatest thing is that it defends everyone's tattoo argument about what happens when you get older. Well with age the bear just becomes a polar bear when your hair turns white. Problem solved.

If you are judging me for this idea and think it sounds similar to a chia pet well my answer to you is it is just an idea because I will never in my life get a tattoo. I can't stand tattoos about as much as I can't stand smoking. The closest I ever came to a tattoo was in Hawai'i when I had a tribal tattoo drawn on my entire arm with a marker at a Luau. The bartender at a local bar thought it was amazing until it started rubbing off when I spilled beer down my arm.

My two biggest turnoffs with females is smoking and tattoos. I don't care if people have them, I won't judge, but for my personal preference I could not date a female with tattoos. I had a hard time in Las Vegas earlier this summer because some of the most attractive females I have seen up close and personal became very average when I saw they had tattoos - and most of them did. There were tattoos up and down their legs, covering arms, all over their stomach and back - you name it. I would take a less attractive girl with no tattoos any day (and I have to because lets be honest I am not much to look at).  To me tattoos take away from a person's natural beauty.

A lot of my friends have tattoos as do three of my sisters. I think some of them are pretty cool but obviously not as cool as my bear tattoo idea. I don't know if you can see it but one of our football players, Donovan Varner, has my favorite tattoo.

It is a mobster with a tommy gun and it says "You need people like me." Donovan also probably has the best hair of anyone on our team but I will leave that off of this blog.

For the most part though I do not like tattoos but if anyone wants to steal my idea for the bear tattoo please do. All I ask is that you take a picture of it and sent it to me for my office wall of heroes. You will go right up next to Donovan.