F’ing Cable Modem!
Cable modem has been on and off all day… I will attribute it to low signal, as the cable tv is fuzzy too. IRK. Dialup is great…yay
Anyways. Had a great Mosh Pit last night, Mike and Lucas will be filling in next week, they are excited and I have a feeling they will do a great job.
Last softball game of the summer season was tonight… Men’s team against a team that is just not fun to play. It started off horrible, they got 9 runs in the 1st inning. But by the bottom of the 2nd, we were winning 11-9! But then we just couldn’t get many more runs. The other team hit a lot of home runs. How did I hit? Grand Slam, 2 Doubles and a Single. 
I wasn’t really great on D though, I got the balls hit to me, but still have a little problem throwing to 1st base. I need more throwing practice!
4 days until ozzfest, 5 days until vacation!
Milwaukee Metalfest was Friday and Saturday. Lots of bands, lots of black t-shirts and well, lots of metal. It’s an annual event, it’s one of those things you have to do, even if the lineup isn’t that strong. Saw a few great bands, and a lot of okay bands. It was also cool to hang out with people from LA and NYC that I talk with via email or phone once a week… (for the radio show).
It makes for LONG days! Next week is vacation. yay!
we won our game on Tuesday! we also won tonight! Tonight was that last game of the summer co-ed season. Kind of weird. Normally we get rained out a game or two, and this year was the first year in all the years of playing, that there were NO rainouts. Cool!! Next week is the last week for the men’s team until fall league starts.
We got a new toy at work. It’s an HP 5500DTN It is DAMN huge, but it’s a sweet printer. After printing color powerpoint presentations at 2 pages per minute tops. now we get 20 ppm! in Laser quality, no more icky banding, etc. It’s a biggun too. The crate was as tall as me, etc etc. Anyways. it’s neat. Also, neat that our station is in the national media for not airing a democratic national committee commercial that points out some uranium thing. I’m really not at liberty to discuss opinions on the matter, but it is kind of cool to have our lil station mentioned in national news!
The big thing about it is, is that FOX is getting blamed for being so RIGHT WING and not airing the commerical, but in reality, we are just a FOX affiliate and really have nothing to do with the network, FOX news, etc. People are kind of dumb in that regard.
I had a little time today, and I knew that last night’s Dream Theater show was my 18th or 19th time seeing them, and thanks to the internet, here are all the shows I’ve seen Dream Theater play:
1/28/1993 Milwaukee, WI (Starz)
6/29/1993 Milwaukee, WI (Summerfest Rock Stage) w/ Galactic Cowboys
11/4/1994 Milwaukee, WI (The Rave) w/ I Mother Earth
11/1/1997 Chicago, IL (House of Blues) w/ Big Wreck
11/3/1997 Milwaukee, WI (The Rave) w/ Big Wreck
11/18/1997 Madison, WI (Barrymore Theater) w/ Big Wreck
5/13/1998 Chicago, IL (The Vic Theater)
8/22/1998 Tinley Park, IL (World Music Theater) opening for Deep Purple & Emerson Lake and Palmer
8/24/1998 Milwaukee, WI (Marcus Ampitheater) opening for Deep Purple & Emerson Lake and Palmer
2/11/2000 Minneapolis, MN (State Theater) w/ Dixie Dregs & Star People
2/12/2000 Milwaukee, WI (The Rave) w/ Dixie Dregs & Star People
2/13/2000 Chicago, IL (The Riviera) w/ Dixie Dregs & Star People
8/10/2000 Chicago, IL (The Riviera) w/ Spock’s Beard
8/11/2000 Milwaukee, WI (Riverside Theater) w/ Spock’s Beard
3/15/2002 Chicago, IL (Vic Theatre)
3/16/2002 Chicago, IL (Vic Theatre)
3/17/2002 Milwaukee, WI (Eagles Ballroom)
8/27/2002 Milwaukee, WI (Riverside Theater) w/ Joe Satriani & King’s X
7/19/2003 Chicago, IL (Aragon Ballroom) w/ Queensryche & Fates Warning
So the official count is 19! which now makes sense, because I remember saying I saw them the 17th time on the 17th, which, well, is funny cuz I saw them for the 19th time on the 19th of the month. Spooky!
I’m fortunate enough to have my fav band tour a lot!
When you get goosebumps during a concert cuz it’s so cool…hmmmm It was great!
I went down to Chicago to see Dream Theater, Queensryche and Fates Warning. What a great day! Left here around 12:30 after picking up Mike and planned on meeting Tom and Bruce at Lou Malnati’s in Lincolnwood, IL for some pizza, and a place to meet. Wow. This place has the best deep dish pizza EVER! True Chicago style. It was just awesome! We were all full after two pieces.
We then car-pooled to the Aragon Ballroom for the show. The web site for the Aragon says the show started at 8, tickets said 7:30 and the sign on the venue when we got there was 7:15. Well, being a veteran of about 17 or so Dream Theater shows, I knew that people would be there WAY early to get a good place to see the show (it was general admission) So the line was wrapped around the corner, we got in a decent place, as it probably quadrupled before they even started letting us in.
We got in, and got a good spot in the balcony. We could sit, see well, and hear well from up there!
The show itself was amazing. All the bands were sharp, sounding good, and the singers were just awesome. Hit all the high notes, etc etc. Fates Warning played a great 40 minutes, stuck to the faster, heavier songs. Queensryche came out and belted out some new stuff and classic old stuff. They are the real deal! They left the stage and the almighty Dream Theater showed everyone what it was all about! Including a special treat for Chicago as they like to do, “Since I’ve Been Lovin’ You” by Led Zep. And of course, they just NAILED it!! They finished their set up and it was all cool, but since I read the internet, I knew what was coming up next…
The Encore! All of Queensryche and Dream Theater on stage jamming to some songs. Since I did read about this ahead of time, it was cool, but I didn’t know all what they’d do, and since they all like to do special stuff for Chicago, they did… FOUR songs, Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb”, DT’s “Peruvian Skies”, QR’s oldschool classic “Take Hold of the Flame” and to wrap it up, The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”. The best Encore EVER!
So, to wrap:
Best Deep Dish pizza EVER
Best Prog Tour EVER
Best Encore EVER
and, it’s always good to take a trip like that and make it home all safe n sound.
We’ve lost three co-ed softball games in a row now! 
We played the 2nd to the top team tonight and the top team last week… we’re #3. Ugh. Our Defense just was not there, and present company included. I should have had a few that came my way at 3rd base. On the lighter side, I hit two home runs again! That’s 2 on Tues, and 2 tonight! Again, one that JUST made i over the fence and one that I just crushed!
Work was humdrum today. Same ol stuff, ya know, but still busy. Our News at 9 Anchor’s last night was tonight, she’s been there since the beginning about 4 years ago, and now moving on to Milwaukee. Going away party is downtown Friday night, I think I’ll make an appearance.
But of course… Saturday! Dream Theater with Queensryche and Fates Warning, the Prog metal tour of all time. I’ll have permagrin for sure!
Yes, I have a stupid injury. Not even sure how it happened, but I noticed it a couple days ago. The pointer finger on my left hand… The nail is kind of split from the finger, and it has been getting worse, or infected. Today was the boiling point. I hit it on something and thought (expletive!), so I went to Walgreens to get some neosporin with pain relief (this stuff rules) and some finger tip bandages. I just could not take it anymore… even though I have this stuff at home. So, whew… bandaged up.
Drove home, was going to stop at the store and get a frozen pizza, but opted to forage for some food. I made some chicken stir fry with some frozen veggies, chicken (duh), and wow, a package of Ramen… and it was good! I amaze myself sometimes. So, while throwing all of that together, the band-aid came off, no biggie, I’d just put a new clean one on after I ate. So, while cleaning up, and putting dishes away, I banged that finger REALLY hard straight on on the rack of the dishwasher.
OUCH!!!
Very Much Pain!!! *sigh*
So that’s the story and I’m stickin’ to it!
DT/QR/FW on Saturday! YAAAYYYY
For some reason last night at the radio station, I was just irritable. I think I need a break from doing the whole new albums stuff, and just play what I want for 3 hours. Listeners seem to like that more anyways. You know, people like to hear what they know, and they know old stuff. The storms were cool, I think WORT is the only station in town with a real DJ on the air. I was trying to listen to the other stations on the way home for storm information and it was all automated or syndicated programming. Perty lame!
Played softball tonight, the game was at 10pm. In the meantime, the Society of Broadcast Engineers had a meeting at channel 3, so I went over there and checked it out. It was a “Travelling roadshow” of demonstration equipment from the NAB Convention. (The NAB [National Association of Broadcasters] has a convention every year in Las Vegas where companies show off all the new fancy broadcast equipment.) Well, lately, TV stations don’t send a lot of engineers out to it because they like to save money. So this one guy took a show out on the road to bring a taste of the NAB to us. Tonight was Madison’s “Tour Stop,” and it gave me something to do.
So, back to softball… Men’s league, 10pm game. I get there at 9:25 and the 8pm game was just finishing! UGH. So that meant we didn’t get to start our game until 10:45! We did win though, 22-13. I was 2 for 5. Yah sounds crappy, but my “2″ were two home runs! And to toot my own horn, the 2nd one went further than I’ve ever hit one! So, that was exciting. I played 3rd base and it was the “hot corner” alright. I need to work on my defensive skills. So, I guess tonight was practice, as I can learn from the mistakes I made.
Hi there.
I had my son Tim over for most of the weekend, Yesterday and overnight, and til about noon-ish today. Was a lot of fun, we hung around here for a bit, played, went to my mom’s, where she put us to work, but it was fun anyways. We found toads, played some baseball, went to a farm, saw cows, kittens, tractors and corn fields. some pix of the farm stuff are here.
Other than that, well, I went to a wedding reception on Friday for a college friend, that was pretty cool, got to catch up with the friends that I don’t get to see very much. Then they all left! So I left too. That’s okay, I got out of dancing and didn’t catch any garter thing.
Thursday, lost another softball game. This was against the top team from the 1st half of the season and the team we beat for the championship game last year. It was close, but our Defense again, sucked for an inning or two, and that was enough. Of course, we only got 7 runs, so that doesn’t help.
Looking forward to softball on Tuesday at 10 and Thurs at 9 this week. yay. and Dream Theater / Queensryche with Fates Warning on Saturday, where, yup, it’s in Chicago, but I get to see my friend Tom (and Bruce too)!
After battling backup after backup of holiday traffic on Sunday, Mike, Todd and I finally made it to Chicago for a wonderful evening of Metal. In Flames with Soilwork, Chimaira and Unearth played at the Vic Theatre in Chicago. Normally I don’t roadtrip that far for a show, but these bands are special. I really like In Flames a lot, and Soilwork has put out one of my favorite albums (Natural Born Chaos) Soilwork graces my desktop wallpaper on my computer. So, yah, I was excited to see them. All four bands were solid. Soilwork was amazing, and did not play long enough, and In Flames was superb! Best performance I’ve seen them do (of about 7). Chimaira in the past as been pretty boring and nothing special, but their new album is good, and their show was great as well. It was an early-ish show and was back home by 2! (had a half day off on Monday).
Um, Had the radio show last night, it was great as usual, it really is a fun thing to do, and I’m showing Mike his way around the studio so he can fill in for me when I go on vacation.
Softball was called off tonight, so I went to Best Buy to wander around, ran into a college friend and shot the breeze for a bit, and went back and looked at this new TV. Wow! A Samsung DLP HDTV Not that I would buy this, but the picture put every single projection screen TV there to shame. Turns out this is a new-ish technology that Samsung perfected. It uses a single light with a something like 920,000 microscopic mirrors. Anyways…. it was just like I said before. WOW!
So after getting home and watching “Road to Perdition” on DVD with the sis, I came down to the computer and opened up yahoo!. And, low and behold, one of the news headlines:
“Britney Spears Says She’s Not a Virgin”
I think as people read this across the country and world, you’ll hear a collective “NO FUCKING SHIT”
haha
And that’s my post for today.
Wednesday was Summerfest night. I got some freebie tix from work and Mike and I headed over to Milwaukee. We were planning on just walking around for a little bit, catch the beginning of Mudvayne at the rock stage at 10pm, then wander over to the Miller Oasis to catch the Reverend Horton Heat. All went according to plan, until um, we walked into the Rock stage area, and it was more packed than I’ve ever seen. Of course, the bleachers were all full, and everyone stands on the benches. Good luck seeing anything. They either need to get rid of the benches or make the stages taller!
So, after two songs, we took off, and checked out the Reverend. Same deal over there, but not as crowded, so we found a table to stand on in the near/back area. Great show! Afterwards, back to the bus, to go back to Waukesha! What a way to go… dropped off at the front gate, picked up at the front gate!
Thursday was softball night. 7pm, very hot, very humid. All games in this part of the season are big games. We started off with a few runs, then it all fell apart, the other team got like 8 runs one inning! We came back and actually had the lead, but lost in the bottom of the 7th. We were down by one run, and someone on the other team won it with a 2 run home run. Heart breaking! Getting blown out is one thing, you know you deserved to lose, but a close game like this is just a downer.
So, after the game, it was off to the Nitty Gritty. Sis’s b-day! Hung out there for a bit, some pictures from there as well will be online soon.
Friday, the 4th, over to my Mom’s for the 4th celebration and combined b-day party. Sis is the 3rd, Mom is the 5th and Farrell is the 9th. As it got later in the evening, we kind of wanted to see some fireworks…. so we headed to the Elver Park fireworks… a bit of walking, but it was cool, we found a place along the road to actually sit and watch without having to go into the park! Went back to my mom’s (with a stop at work to give Sandi and Farrell a tour), and hung out for a bit, watched some TV. (Beverly Hills Cop was on HBO… what a classic!)
Today it’s veg day, and catch up on some pictures… so, check out a few galleries:
A new golf gallery: http://www.mattymo.com/gallery/golf
A new softball week (last week actually)
Last but certainly not least… Family Reunion 2003!
http://www.mattymo.com/gallery/mommaerts2003
Hey there…
I had a great weekend, My dad rented a cottage for the weekend/week, and I drove up there (Lakewood, WI) for the long weekend (fri-mon). Family Reunion time! It was a whole lot of fun, met/re-met some family and had a great time at the cottage where it was held (cousins place). I got to drive a JetSki, and just had a good time all around. I took a whole lot of pictures and have not had time to process (crop and post online) them yet ! I will post a lot of pix and caption them… it should explain everything good nuff.
Played softball tonight… we won, a great come from behind victory… we were down 10-2, tied it up, and eventually won 12-11. It’s nice to be on the other end of that sort of game on this men’s team I play
That’s it for now…
