Memorial Day Weekend

Three day weekends go by way too quickly! It was certainly nice to have some time to recharge this weekend.

Saturday was my Star Wars Marathon party. Nine people, including myself, showed up for it and watched Ep 4-6 and 1-2 in my basement on the wall then we headed over to the theatre for Ep 3. Being that Ep 3 has been out for over a week and a half, the attendance of the party was relatively low, but it seemed like those who came enjoyed it. Mission accomplished. I think this is my last movie marathon party. Movie viewing is such an anti-social event and while I suppose I have a prime spot for such an event it seems like a waste of a day I could spent actually talking and getting to know people.

I haven't had much time for "fun without a plan" for a long while, and Sunday was a great day for not having a plan. It felt like I was back in high school, just hanging out with friends, killing time outside, no real plan. I can't remember the last time I did that. Life gets so busy it is so easy to forget how important it is to just connect with people. Those are the kind of times you remember for a life time, where you are able to hang out and be real. No structure, just basic, honest fun.

Back to the work world now. Time to make some money so I can afford to make some more real memories.

Plumbing

At 6:30 a.m. Saturday it was raining and predicted to rain all weekend. As such, my plans of putting up gutters were cut and I told my Dad not to come up. Naturally come 10:00 a.m. the sun was shining and there was no rain for the remainder of the weekend. ARRRHHH!

It wasn't a wasted weekend however. My faucet has been leaking like mad from the handles and was all around a piece of junk. Fresh from working at my friend's place on his basement plumbing, I felt confident I could remedy the situation. While I was able to successfully cut the existing copper pipe, install stop valves, supply lines, and the new faucet, I learned an important lesson about plumbing: Minimum water pressure is all that is needed to create a big mess.
Halfway through the project I thought I might be able to get some water out of the basement sink if I turned on the main super low and had all the basement valves open. After all, water goes down before it goes up right? Maybe, but it doesn't go down fast enough. I had to break out a few towels upstairs.

Weddings: It's Go Time!

Let the festivities begin! I went to my first wedding of the year Saturday. The first 1 or 2 of the year are always the best. It is before I get burnt out on having every weekend of the short summer eaten up, and are typically during poor weather anyway. I know both the bride and groom, they are a couple friends from church. Aside from having to deal with finding parking in Minneapolis it was a great wedding, beautiful church, and not overly wordy. After the wedding we had about an hour to kill before the reception so we ran over to the nearest non-Starbucks coffee shop.

It was nuts to meet up with some people I hadn't seen in a year or so. It always amazes me how quickly people's lives can change. Apparently one of them dated, married, and had a 5 month old kid all within that time. Either that or I was so out of touch a year ago I didn't notice. I'm guessing the latter is more likely.

At the wedding I met the great Erin, and she was even more enthusiastic in person. Her husband was quite swell as well.

The dance was one of the best I have been to in years, despite it being the shortest. This was the second wedding dance in a row I got to do a special performance, how odd is that? The last wedding I was at I did my OuttaSync "Bye, Bye, Bye" bit (originally from my stint in Rochester, MN circa 2001). This weekend it was the Nap Dyn dance. Wow was it rough. No practice or anything since the April 20th original performance and the music was the album version, not the movie version. Yikes. Still, it was a blast.

This was also one of the few dances in a while I've been to where I knew about a quarter of the people on the dance floor. It is always easier to get the groove on when you don't have to work at getting into all those clicky dance circles that inevitably evolve.

Afterwards a couple friends came over and we were able to wind down from an exciting evening with the less than adequate movie "Collateral." Wow was that movie mediocre. Everyone got what they deserved in the end, the good guys win, and yet nothing is resolved. But it is always more important the company you spend your time with than what you do. At least I had that going.

The next wedding has a lot to live up to. June 4 is 19 days away and counting! Woo hoo!

David Dynamite - Official Video Release

As promised, I have encoded my Nap Dyn dance to divx and posted it online. If you don't already have divx installed (if you don't know what I'm talking about, that means you don't), you can download it from http://download.divx.com/divx/DivX521XP2K.exe.

If you have been living in a hole the past year and have no clue what all the fuss is about, below is a link to the original clip from the movie. You MUST watch the original before seeing my dance, otherwise it won't make any sense.

Original Nap Dyn Dance (WMV - Requires Windows Media Player)

Now for the link to my attempt:
David's Nap Dyn Dance (13 MB divx file, to download, use this link: http://www.archive.org/download/Napoleon_Dynamite_Dance_Parody/daviddynamite.avi)

I hope you enjoy watching me make an idiot of myself as much as I enjoyed doing it!

Legitimate Holidays

I don't think anyone would argue that the whole retail industry could not survive as well as it is without the non-stop slew of holidays they now enjoy. A few of these holidays have legitimate reasons for existence and even fewer have legitimate reasons for gift giving. Other than Christmas, a holiday with its historical origins based in the wise men giving gifts, I see no reason for gifts elsewhere.

It just so happens Mother's day is coming up (in 1 hour). I know I have the greatest mom in the world, and she deserves to be treated as nothing less. Does that mean I should spend $100 on a new necklace for her? No. Should a gift even be required? No. In my perfect world a thoughtful act would go further than a gift. But thanks to commercialism I'm a bad son if I don't spend money on something she doesn't need. I'm only using Mother's day as an example because it is so immediate. And yes, I did buy my mom a present.

So am I the only anti-gift on for no reason on holidays person out there? If not how do you address this problem? Is it even a problem? What are the other "legitimate" gifting holidays if there are any?

Two Lessons Learned

Strange weekend. I went back "home" (if I even still have such a place) this weekend to spend some time with my Dad and celebrate his belated birthday. While I was in town a couple things were a little weird which helped me learn a couple important lessons.

1) Friends change, I change.
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2) You don't know the people you know.

As usual since this is a public blog, I don't list any names so don't ask, but this weekend I learned that someone I know attempted suicide and was very close to being "successful" (strange way to put it, as there is no real success). The suicidal mentality has fascinated me since Kurt Cobain died in April of 1994. The hopelessness, both real and imagined, the pain, and the justification that a person thinks through boggles my mind. This weekend it became a lot more real to me and a lot less academic. You can't punch someone into a formula and determine if they are going to try to kill themselves. If they don't want you to know, you won't. I've looked at many of the "warning sign" lists and if those were true I would have been dead years ago. In any event, it has given me a lot to think about.