Website now up!

For more ramblings, and other tidbits, visit www.bobsaydlowski.com.

(This blog will now cease in favor of the one on my website.)

Shakedown

My 1st gig with the band "Shakedown" was this past Saturday night at JM Randalls in Williamsburg VA. A moderate crowd in attendance. The band sounded good! Getting home at 3:45AM wasn't much fun, and I had noise hangover much of the following day. (Old guy can't take it...)
Anyways, it's great to be playing again.
For a nice change of pace, I have no one standing in front of me on stage in this band. But look at the photo...it figures....damn vase of flowers....

Generation Gap...

I was standing in line at the bookstore last night. A young couple in front of me started quizzing each other on whether there were towns named after states, but not in that state. I chimed in, "like Washington, Massachusetts"? Then I said, "Arlo Guthrie lives up there." Blank stares. "You know -- Arlo? Woodstock Festival?" More blank stares. "Never mind..."

I've become part of the generation gap...

Talking to yourself

In this techno age where everyone's walking around with Bluetooth earpieces on, it's getting harder and harder to distinguish the "normal" people from the "crazy" people...

My first encounter with someone on a hands-free cellphone was in a supermarket parking lot. This lady was talking loudly to no one I could see, moving her hands all around. Oh great, I thought, here comes a wacko. Surprise! Just a high-tech lady on her high-tech phone headset.

I remember not too long ago when you could easily pick a wacko person out because they were the ones walking down the street, talking to themselves and making hand gestures. Today, I see someone walking down the street and I still can't tell if they're crazy or just talking on their mobile phone until I get a look at one of their ears. Maybe we should give all the crazy people Bluetooth earpieces so they'll fit in with the public better and give the aura that they're important people too, with the need to be in constant touch. (No one will know there's no one on the other end.)

Or maybe the ones on their phones ARE the crazy ones.

One reason I love Apple...

Last Friday morning, my "left Mac", the iMac G5, went down for the count. I got a kernel panic on the screen, shut it down, tried to start it up and...nothing...dead. No light, no sound, no power.

I went to the local Apple Store the next day after diagnosing that the power supply was fried (and also with checkbook in hand, prepared to buy a new Mac, rather than shell out $ for a new power supply and who knows what else -- the computer ended its warranty a year ago). I was told that Apple had an extended warranty on my model for defective power supplies and logic boards, and they would repair it for FREE.

I dropped it off at 2pm for repair and to my surprise, got a phone call only two hours later, saying it was ready for pickup! I got it home with a new power supply and logic board installed, it started up just fine with all my data intact, and I was ready to continue computing.

Now THAT'S customer service! Thank you, Apple. I've been a long-time customer and shareholder, and have now turned into a super-evangelist for your products. (That's also the reason I have 5 Macs in the house--plus an old SE30, a Newton Message Pad, an eMate, and various iPods--and not a single PC anywhere!)

Cub Camp

This past weekend, my family and perhaps 400-500 other families went to an overnight Cub Scouts Campout (my son is a Wolf Cub). Now, in Virginia, you wouldn't think it gets VERY cold in October, but it does. The daytime was nice & sunny, and he did lots of fun activities like BB guns, archery, fishing, etc. But as soon as the sun went down, nature turned the air conditioning on High. After freezing around the campfire, we went to the tent to try and sleep. Keyword = TRY. I was awake most of the night, since it was so cold. I know that when we left at 9am Sunday, it was only 40 outside, so it MUST have got down into the 30s overnight...

So there we were, the four of us squeezed together in a supposedly 4-person Wenger tent, dressed in multiple layers, in our sleeping bags, freezing to death. The ground outside the tent was completely covered with cold dew, which in some areas, was iced over. The tent itself was a dew collector to the point that water started leaking into the sides, causing some extreme drips and dampness. Of course, at 4:30am, my son woke up, stating he had to go to the bathroom...

In the morning, the breakfast was a cholesterol-fest of eggs & bacon (since all the dads arranged the pack's meals). So, I had to be content with a blueberry Pop Tart we had brought with us and a small cup of coffee I stole from the mess hall.

The last time I was camping, I was a teenager and I now think I know why... Nowadays, "camping out" to me means staying in a nice hotel with a lobby, room service, restaurant and wireless internet. I'm no Nature Boy, that's for sure...

49+1

This Saturday night was the gig in White Sulphur Springs, WV. It was rather long -- we played 7:30-12M with only a 25 min break at 9pm. Whew.

I'll say this: while I thought I bought a quite-comfortable D.W. drum seat, sitting on ANYTHING for 2-1/2 hours straight will cause a bit of an ache. ;)

Good thing I was staying overnight, cause it was pouring at the end of the gig, and a 3-hour drive home at 1am in the dark and the rain wouldn't be too appealing. So on Sunday, I woke up in a Hampton Inn in West Virginia and aged a year. Yep, I'm now 49+1. How the heck did I get this far?? Someone up above made it a pleasant day, as I drove back home escaping any rain. So, thanks, whomever you are.