Category Archives: Entertainment

The Kindness of Strangers

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I’ve been living in a darker state than normal these past few years, especially lately. Negative memories about my life have resurfaced, but this time I experience these events as a well seasoned adult instead of a inexperienced young child. In some ways, this time I’m lucky, as I’ve done some things financially that put me in a situation where I have options in my life. But even with these options, my mood is still sour.

A recent habit that I’ve picked up is going to “dive” bars to drink and contemplating about life and my current situations. I’m in very good shape and I still have a quick wit about me even if I’ve been drinking that makes me a good person to talk to (or so I believe). So recently, I went to a small, rundown dive bar to escape and engage in this odd manner of thinking that I prefer. The bar had five other people in the bar, three elderly men and what appeared to be a youngish couple playing pool so I started drinking and thinking…

I was talking to the bar owner when the youngish couple came up to get some drinks from the bar owner (who was playing the role of bartender that night). The female from the couple recognized me from the gym that I attend and we all started talking and getting along quite nicely. We got along so well, that after our drinks the couple invited me to explore another dive bar that was about 5 miles away.

We drove to the “other” dive bar and I surprisingly had an awesome time. They were such a fun and giving couple I was astonished! First they offered to drive me there because of my mood they probably assumed I was drunks, but I wasn’t. I explained I was good, so I drove separately. Once there, the male instantly bought a round of fireball for all of us. I actually said I would get it, but he beat me to it. I said I would get the next round, but I was beat again, so I only got to reciprocate on the third round. We slowed our drinking after than and that’s then the magic started to happen! We all laughed so hard about some many things! They were both of a similar background and sense of humor as I was so we gelled! I’m not doing the experience justice here, but I had a blast! For the last few hours we all sang Karaoke, which as an introvert, I never done before.

These practically strangers created one of the best bar experiences that I’ve ever had in my life. The rabbit hole goes much deeper than this, and I am indebted to them for their kindness!

Life is full of surprises! And this was far above and beyond one of the better bar experiences that I’ve ever had!

Don

Puddles Pity Party “Royals – by Lorde” Cover Review

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As a fan of Lorde’s Royals, I heard about a cover that was as good as Lorde’s original, but with a different flavor.  Intrigued, I had to go and check it out and much to my surprise I wasn’t disappointed!  While the singing is great, what really makes this a great cover is the facial expressions by the singer!

As someone who doesn’t really like clowns, this time it’s different!  This might be one of the coolest clown singers ever.  He also has a site called puddlespityparty.com.  I’m actually thinking about getting a shirt from the store page!

 

I would go on, but I think the video is enough in itself… check it out and enjoy!

 

Just in case you’re not familiar with the original “Royals” version by “Lorde”, I’ve included it below.  It’s incredible too, but I think I prefer the expressions while Puddles Pity Party version slightly better.  What do you think?

Which version do yo prefer?

First Time Golfing With My Daughter

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This past few weeks, we (my son and I) have been taking my daughter to the golfing range.  At first, she was hitting it 5 to 10 feet, but on the first day at the driving range, I taught her that it’s her form that matters most, and after about a 20 minutes of practicing swinging, she started to hit the ball 50 to 100 yards!

For an eight year old girl, hitting the ball 100 yards is quite exciting, and it really showed in her face!  She was smiling ear to ear after she started nailing the ball!  It helped that both my son and I really made over how well she was hitting!  My son is a great guy and looks out for his little sister!

In fact, the entire golfing session was my son’s idea!  He asked me if I thought my daughter was ready, and I agreed!  Next he asked if Grandpa could go too, and of course I thought that was be a great idea too.

And then Tuesday rolled around and I totally forgot! lol…

Luckily he didn’t and ended up calling Grandpa and got the ball rolling again (pun totally intended…)!

Golf Cart

Golfing With My Daughter

My daughter and I rode in the same cart and honestly had a ball.  She actually played much better than I expected, and actually beat my son and tied me on 1 hole in particular (obviously we beat her overall, but for that one hole, it was hers!).  Although she doesn’t hit it 200+ yards, she definitely got it past 100 years a few times!  And you could see the confidence that she gained from playing well.  The funny thing was on the first hole, she even missed the water hazard (unlike my son and father).  I had a rare day where it seemed like everything I hit went super far (on the last two holes that were over 300 years, I landed on the green both time… this is very rare for me).

So all in all we all had a great time, and I was so impressed with my daughter and son that I took them for ice cream and pie.  Both of my kids like chocolate & peanut-butter pie, and so it was a great conclusion to a fun day golfing.

All in all it was a great memory…  I’m looking forward to taking them out again,

Don

Best Super Bowl 2012 Commercials And Game Thoughts

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The Super Bowl XLVI was a close game as expect, and the Giants won again.

In fact, in many ways it was very similar to their previous Super Bowl match-up.

While it was a fairly entertaining game to watch, I’m still glad I’m at home instead of paying the face value of Super Bowl  XLVI which is $5,000!  I’ve hear that it’s rare that the tickets go for that much though.  Usually they sell closer to 60% of that price…

 

Super Bowl 2012 Halftime

The half time show was performed by Madonna and was by far one of the most elaborate that I’ve seen in a few years.  She looked incredible, but did lack a certain spring in her dance performance.  Still very much worth watching… and I’m not even that crazy about Madonna songs.

 

Best Super Bowl 2012 Commercials

Ironically, even though the game was great, my favorite part was watching the Honda’s Matthew Broderick commercial which was a spoof of the movie “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off“.

 

 

I have to admit I also like the Toyota commercial too:

 

 

Not to be outdone, Acura had a great commercial two with both Leno and Seinfeld. Seems like the car commercials are ruling the Super Bowl commercials this year.

 

Okay, Enough Commercials, Now Onto Game Thoughts…

At the end when the Giant’s play Ahmad Bradshaw fell backwards over the goal line to make the touchdown was very interesting.  I’m sure the New York coach told him to stop on the 1 yard line, then they would probably have Brandon Jacobs pound it in to make the last touchdown and game winning score after taking most of the time off of the clock.  Instead Bradshaw made for the goal line, but then not meeting any resistance slowed and appeared to stop, but then fell over backwards and made the touchdown by falling over the goal line on his butt, almost like it was slow motion.

Now I know tomorrow at work we are going to debate if he intended to do this or not, but either way it made for a much more exciting game.  It’s always good to see the losing team be given another chance (unless you’re the winning team).

So by Bradshaw falling, it made it much more exciting!  One of the most original ways to win the last scoring point in a Super Bowl game, but all the same, I would want to make the last scoring point too if I were Ahmad.

Overall, a very close game if not the most exciting.

Hope you enjoyed it too,

MR

More on Bradshaw touchdown:  My wife asked me why didn’t Bradshaw want to make the touchdown.  Well he did, but the coach told him not to because there was 1 minutes still left on the clock.  The smartest play from the team perspective would have been to run the ball to the 1 yard line which would have either caused the Patriots to waste their last timeout, or ate up the majority of the clock.  Then have Brandon Jacobs pound in for a touchdown (at 6′ 4″ and weight around 270, he would be practically unstoppable).  Giving Tom Brady 1 minute to try and win was a bad move from the perspective of the NY Giant’s coaching staff…