Danger Zone

So, last night I drove Kate to the airport. She's off to spend a week in the Dominican Republic. She's be hanging out, seeing the country, and learning to surf. My concern is that she'll be doing it all by herself. Now, this is one very smart, independent lady. Still, she's by herself and speaks not a lick of Spanish. I'm not gonna torture myself, but I am definitely concerned. I'm sure she'll have a blast and comes home safely. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

So, on the weirder side - my guitar (pictured right) crapped out on me last night. I tried to repair it myself but to no avail. Good thing I've got a full one year warranty right? So I call up the warranty place, tell them what's wrong and they say this: "We've decided that it would cost more to repair your guitar than to simply refund your money so we'll be sending you a Guitar Center credit for what you paid for it." They never even LOOKED at it - just from my description over the phone.

Thing is - they don't even want me to send the guitar back - they just want to pay me off and forget it. Sweet! I'm going to take the guitar to Chuck Levins in Wheaton this weekend and see how much it would cost to fix. Regardless, I now have $370 in Guitar Center cash to blow. Since my amp is totally fine I might just get me another guitar. HA.

Athletic Excellence

So, this weekend was one of athletic excellence. Friday night I went bowling with Angela, Joe & Carol, and Yoshi and the incomparable Miss Silvia. It appears that after exactly three gin and tonics, I can just throw strike after strike. Weird. If I were an alcoholic, I could totally be on the pro tour. After the bowling we went out to do more drinking.

Unfortunately, once I start drinking gin I sometimes forget to stop. For that reason, Saturday became a couch marathon. I was able to make it out to see the Irish band O'Tasty that several of my friends play in (they were fantastic) but I had not a drop of alcohol on St. Patrick's Day.

On Sunday morning, Kate and I were up early and ran an 8k run with some of her friends and 3500 other folks. The course ran around downtown DC where the streets had been blocked off for the event. There were all the beautiful views of downtown DC plus bagpipers about every mile or so. It was fun. At the end they had food and Irish step dancers.

Of course, all of this reminds me that it will soon be biking season again! I am going to warm up the Team Roadhog biking machine. In the meantime, think about whether you will be willing to ride with us on May 20-21 to fight MS. Details soon.

So mad that this wasn't my idea

So, I'm talking to my mom about her job at American Express and a company that would like AmEx to help them track the carbon emissions related to their business travel. At this point it hits me - why not have a credit card that, instead of air miles, cancels the carbon footprint of your spending??? It's a genius idea that will make somebody a LOT of money and do great things for the environment.

Of course, just like my weatherproof bike stereo, most great ideas are already in the works by someone just a little bit quicker than yourself. Indeed, that very day a press article came out about Bright Plant. This card, the brain child of two recent college grads, will take 1% of your purchases and use it to fund carbon offsets. Initially, they are going to fund new wind power projects. The card comes out in May and will, for now on, handle the bulk of my spending. If only I'd thought of this two years ago! For more information, visit http://brightpla.net/.

Calling all poets

So, I’ve been writing a lot of music for the new band. We have four or five songs done and a few more in the works. The problem is that we don’t have lyrics for any of these tracks. Back in the Lavajet days I did a lot of lyric writing. Now, it seems, I am having a bout of writer’s block. I almost feel like I have lot my ability to write poetry. I used to write all the time in high school and college. Sure, it wasn’t great stuff, but it doesn’t need to be. 99% of poetry is crap, but that’s okay. It was MY crap – my random thoughts or abstract concepts laid out in a hopefully interesting way. Now I can’t even write bad poetry! Is it the endless meetings I attend? The tracking of statements of work and task numbers? Does owning a home and thinking about “settling down” rob us of that part of our creative self? God, I hope not. I will keep hacking away and hopefully get past this rough patch of non-inspiration.

In the meantime, if you’ve got any of your own words/poetry/lyrics you’d be willing to share with me, that would help give me something to write to.

Throw the book at her!

So, I just read a story about two 19 year old, seemingly affluent white girls who robbed a bank and were then captured after a brief car chase. The mother of Ashley Miller (one of the alleged robbers) went on Good Morning America to tell America that her daughter was not a bandit, but simply a "little girl that made a bad choice." Funny, just last week four black kids (ranging from ages 14 to 17) were arrested in DC for a stabbing. Why did I not see one of THEIR parents on Good Morning America? Were they just little boys who fell in with the wrong crowd?

By even having this woman on their show, Good Morning American was supporting this double standard we have in society that when white kids (especially females) commit crimes they have been somehow corrupted and are not at fault. Meanwhile, when black kids (especially male) commit crimes they are dangerous criminals who must be removed from society so all those white girls can walk the streets safely once more. I think it's disgusting that a 14 year old black boy will probably go to prison because his friends stabbed someone while these two LEGALLY ADULT young women will likely be treated like mischievous little rascals and be given a slap on the hand so they can get on with their lives at some nice, mostly white, university.

We can't have it both ways. We can't expect minorities to embrace mainstream American mores if we are going to apply different standards of behavior to them. We can't claim to support women's lib and then treat young women with kid gloves when it comes to the legal system. I will wait to hear about the outcome of both of these cases. I sincerely hope that I am wrong and that justice will be done - justice that punishes the crimes fairly and protects the rights of the accused. I hope this is done using the same standards in both cases. I am hopeful, but not optimistic.