Within A Mile Of Home

An interesting weekend full of ups and downs.

So I went up to Lynn and Doug's place on Friday. I think I got there around 4 or so in the afternoon. Doug was flying, Lynn was running errands, Ryan was sick, James was at a friend's house, and Taylor was hanging out with their neighbor Kallan and Ryan's friend Mik. Since Ryan was sick, it was pretty subdued, at first. We just hung around watching crappy movies on tv for a while. Then James came home. And he brought friends. So all of a sudden it was everyone from before, plus Lynn, James, Jay, Jake, and Tristen. Right around then Mik left for the night, so that helped. But then another friend of Taylor's came over, Jenny, which was even worse because unlike Mik, she likes to talk and has a lot of energy.

Now the house is filled with four fourteen year old boys hopped up on sugar and caffeine. Great. So we all went outside to play some night games (minus Ryan). Just ghost in the graveyard and the like, which I haven't played in like 8 years. It was kinda nice to just be a kid again. After that, we all went downstairs so we wouldn't disturb Ryan. The boys started playing X-Box, and the girls went to Taylor's room to do whatever.

At some point the girls came back out, and wanted to play truth or dare with us. This could be interesting. So we started out, and everyone is nervous and doing truth over and over. Finally Jake (the macho, arrogant one of the group) started doing dares, and they got interesting quick. Started out as lick a sweaty, dirty sock, and progressed from there. At some point a gay comment was thrown into the mix, and Jake just flipped. He started saying all of this homophobic shit, and saying how wrong homosexuality is. Then I started to notice all the quick "fag" or "gay" comments he was making. After a little bit, it really started to get on my nerves, and I had to do my best to control myself. Both internally and externally. I did try and punch holes in his logic, by asking him to explain how something was gay or whatever, but without much success. If he wasn't 14, I probably would have punched him in the face. But that would also raise a lot of questions that I don't want to answer.

I just get so fucking tired of all the ignorance, intolerance, and hatred in the world, you know? Why can't people just accept the fact that homosexuality is not a sin, or a crime, or anything bad at all? We're just like them, but prefer the same sex. Big deal. I've noticed some of my friends share the same, "gays are bad" mentality, and it's really starting to drive me up the wall. Part of me wants to come out to everyone, so I can prove that there is nothing wrong with being gay, but the other part doesn't want to say anything. Mostly out of fear. There are certain individuals I know, although not really friends anymore, that do not like "fagots" and would love to beat the crap out of one to "teach them a lesson". I'm sure if they found out about me, they would love to come after me. We haven't been on the best terms for a couple years, and I can't even remember why. So we do our best to avoid each other. But they're one of the reasons I'm glad I carry a knife with me wherever I go. But I don't expect anything to happen, at least yet, so let's move on.

Finally, around 5 AM the kids started getting tired, and I realized I had a 3 hour drive ahead of me still. Great. So I decided to take a hot shower to wake myself up again. I also downed a pot and a half of coffee and about six mountain dews. I jumped back in the truck and took off. About thirty minutes later, I was getting really tired (surprisingly, what with all the caffeine and sugar I just drank) and was trying to stay awake. I was on I-35 heading north, driving 75 MPH, when all of a sudden a deer runs on to the road about 30 feet in front of me. SHIT! I slammed on the brakes as hard as I could, and hoped I wouldn't hit him. The deer got to the ditch about 3 feet away from my bumper and ran off. I started driving again (thankful no one was following close behind me at the time) and drove the last 5 miles to my first exit. I pulled into a parking lot and just sat there shaking, as the adrenaline pumped through my veins. After smoking a cigarette, I got back on the road and was wide awake. I made the rest of the drive fine, and didn't see another deer the whole way, thankfully.

I got to the cabin at about 8 AM and went straight to bed. I was lying there trying to sleep, when all of a sudden my heart started racing, I started shaking again, I got extremely hot, and I couldn't breath well. I started freaking out and grabbed the fan next to me to try and cool off. I tried to control my breathing, and after about 3 minutes I began to calm down. I don't know what the hell happened, but it scared the shit out of me. I was up there by myself in the middle of nowhere. I would have been screwed if something had happened. But fortunately nothing did.

Woke up a few hours later to more rain. It seems every time I go to the cabin it rains. Oh well. Hung out watching movies and tv for a while and then started playing my bass. I am the temporary bass player for the band, and am in charge of writing the parts for the demo. So I got to work coming up with new riffs and whatnot. I got two songs done, and then had some dinner. Spent the rest of the night watching movies and then went to bed rather early.

Sunday was basically the same, just shorter. I got up around 10, and had to leave at 1 to make it back in time for practice. So after lunch I loaded up the truck and started the long drive home. I got home a little after 4, and practice was at 4:30. Perfect. Went to Wyatt's place and started hammering out the rest of my drum tracks for the album. Got them all done in one or two takes, and then we called it quits. We have to move all the mics and re-due the levels for the guitars, so we're going to wait until Thursday to start recording that. Hung out at home for a while, and then my buddy Anthony called to hang out. He's staying at a hotel with his dad right now, so we went and hung out in the hot tub there for an hour or so. Then we went to Perkins and grabbed a bite to eat. I dropped him off at the hotel and then came home and went to bed.

I didn't do hardly anything today. I woke up and wanted to go play some disc, but Paul wasn't feeling well so he didn't want to go. I suppose I could have gone alone, but what fun is that? So I went on a bike ride around town for a bit, and then went home. I played some drums for a couple of hours, and then hung out with my mom for the night. And now here I am. Pretty boring day.

Tomorrow I have the chiro, and a battle of the bands I might go to. We'll see. My friend's band is playing so it would be cool to see them again. Wednesday my parents are leaving for Idaho for my cousin's wedding. I was going to go with them, but I have to babysit on Thursday/Friday so I can't go. I didn't really care about the wedding, because I think they're boring, but I was really looking forward to the drive. If you haven't figured it out yet, I love to drive. So a 20 hour drive across country is perfect for me. And I thought it would be cool to be in the same state as JJ. Although the wedding is in Coeur d'Alene instead of near Boise. But still, it would have been cool. So JJ, if by some chance you see a gold minivan with a Minnesota plate that says LATER, that's my rents! I doubt it, but you never know.

I'm sure I'll be back on before the weekend, but I'll be babysitting my cousins Thursday/Friday. I just hope I don't have to see Jake again. I don't know if I can control myself again. But it'd be cool to see Tristen, I really like him, and started to bond with him at the cabin. We'll see.

Well that's about it. This seems really long. At least to type it, maybe not to read.

Everyone be well, and take care.

-Kevin

I've been listening to a lot of Flogging Molly lately, and this seemed like a fitting song.

Testing Testes Testing

First off, thank you everyone for the nice things about Larry. I don't understand how people could say anything bad about such a wonderful person, but some people like to say hurtful things just to hurt other people. Thank you JJ for the song information. I checked out some of their other songs, and they are pretty good too. And thank you for linking to me off your blog as well. That means a lot.

Spys89: At least for the time being, Paul has deleted Larry's blog which had the whole story on it. Maybe someday when he is up to it, he will put it back up, but only time will tell. I don't want to ruin his legacy by trying to remember every detail either. So unless someone else wants to inform you, I'm afraid you will have to wait. Sorry.

So all that aside, this hasn't been a very good week. Ever since I saw that video, I've been in an odd state of mind, but it was worth it to see such love still alive in the world. The cabin was nice, although it rained the whole time I was there which sucked. So I spent the whole weekend watching movies and playing guitar. Could've been worse I guess.

All week since I got back I have been battling with my truck to get my new headlights to work properly. So far the truck is still winning. My dad, my brother (the mechanic) and myself can't figure out the problem. So we took them out and put the stock ones back in. Now we're going to recheck the wiring on the lights while they're out of the truck. It's been a huge headache, because I haven't been able to drive at night. I had to borrow Aaron's (BP) car to go to the cabin last week because I was afraid to drive the truck. At least with the old lights I can drive at night again.

Anyway, so that's been the annoying part of the week. Yesterday, the band started recording our demo. We're doing it ourselves in our practice space with some computer programs, but getting all the kinks out was a pain. I was supposed to lay down drums first, but we had to spend three hours getting all the fine details taken care of first. Finally we could start recording, but we ran out of time pretty quick, so I only got two tracks laid down. But the fact that we are finally making progress is really nice. We're picking it back up on Sunday, so I should be able to get the other tracks down, and hopefully some guitar tracks too.

When I got home from recording, Erik told me to throw my bike in the truck and to go to Demian's. I guess we were going on a big bike ride. So we loaded up and went over there. After getting everything together, we biked to one of D's friend's houses, and had some awesome burritos for dinner. We hung out for a while digesting, and then loaded up the bikes. We had around 15 people with us this time, so I knew it would be intense. D had the trike, I had my cruiser, and Erik had his, and then it was a mix of road bikes, mountain bikes, and cruisers. We ended up biking all over Uptown, down to the river where we hung out for around an hour, and then throw Downtown back to Uptown. All in all the ride was about 4 hours long, and we probably did 15 or 20 miles. I was really tired after because it was 3 AM, and my body was sore from drumming a lot earlier. So I loaded the truck up and headed home. I crashed as soon as I got home and just got up about an hour ago. I really love the sporadic rides through Uptown, especially with that many people. And we get some really interesting stares and comments as we go by too. Probably from the 120 decibels coming from the trike :-P

Today, I decided to go back to the cabin, again. Again I'm going by myself, but I think it will do some good to clear my head. All week I've been in this funk, and I need to get out of it for my own good, and those around me. Unfortunately, since we are recording on Sunday I'll have to come home earlier than I want. I was going to go up last night, but then the bike ride happened and I really wanted to go.

I would really like to offer my condolences to Gabey, who just lost his father last weekend. I haven't lost a parent yet, but I've lost people close to me so I can understand a little of what you're going through. There are lots of people here for you, and I am one as well. Take care of you and yours, and be safe. I'll be thinking about you this weekend too while at the cabin.

And lastly, I would like to wish Rowan a very happy 16th birthday! I don't think he reads my blog, but what the hell, right? I hope you have a great day, and all your wishes come true!

Well that's about it. I'll be back Sunday night, so either then or Monday I should be back here. Everyone take care of themselves and be safe.

-Kevin

Return To Earth, Return To All That's Normal

What a weekend. Totally what the doctor ordered. The drive up was pretty uneventful. I stopped at Lynn and Doug's house on the way up. Turns out my youngest cousin, Taylor, got chickens. So they now have eight little chicks running around. Spent some time playing with them and harassing my cousins before jumping back on the road. I got to the cabin around 1 am, and started getting the cabin back to running order. Turn on the water, water heater, air out the rooms, stuff like that. Shortly after I crashed. On Thursday my grandparents showed up and we got the rest of the cabin going. Hung out with them for a while and then a little after dinner my parents showed up with Kodi. spent the rest of the night relaxing. Friday, again a lot of lazing around, until around 8 pm when my aunt and cousins showed up. Then all hell broke loose. The oldest, Ryan, didn't come, so the middle, James, brought a friend along, Tristen. They all started running around and being crazy kids while the rest of us had a bonfire. I finally went to bed around 1. Could not sleep at all that night, so ended up getting up at about 6 am. My grandparents were just getting up, so we hung out on the deck enjoying the quite and then I helped them make breakfast. After breakfast, my mom and grandpa went out fishing for the day, and the rest of us went into town. On the ride in, James really wanted to listen to Gogol Bordello, so we listened to that, and got both James and Tristen hooked :-P. Looked around Main St. Hayward for a while, and then made the journey back to the cabin. It's about a 15 minute drive, again filled with Gogol. A little after we got back, my mom and grandpa got home with their fish, so we fired up the grill and had a nice fish fry. Was pretty good too, since I don't like fish. But there's something about fresh caught walleye that I like. Had another bonfire that night, and I went to bed rather early, since I didn't sleep much the night before. On Sunday we went golfing. Well, they went golfing, I just rode along. My back still isn't very good, so the last thing I want to do is twist and bend a lot. Normally I love to golf, so it was rather sad. But we all had a good time nonetheless. After wards, we went to a great little tavern for lunch and had some really good burgers and pizza. It's my mom's favorite place to go. She claims they have the best pizza and onion rings. That night we had another fire, and then played some gin. We have a tradition of playing gin with everyone when we're all there. So it was 5 people per team, and surprisingly, Tristen, who had never played the game before, was the best player and our team won. It's a pretty cut-throat game with us, so there were a lot of harsh words being thrown around. After that we all went to bed. Monday was kinda sad, because it was our last day there. But we made the most out of it and spent the day out on the lake. Normally we would go out everyday, or close to it, but out schedule just didn't allow it this year. So we cruised around the lake and stopped at a sandbar to let the kids and Kodi go swimming, which they all enjoyed. Once we got back, we started the long battle of packing everything up again. After what seemed like hours, we had everything loaded up and we took off, leaving my grandparents up there for the week. Again, pretty uneventful drive home, just battling traffic. Normally I would have left later to avoid the traffic, but I wanted to get home and go for a bike ride while there was still light. After unloading the truck, jumped on the bike and rode around for an hour or two. Then I was really beat so I went to bed pretty early.

Tuesday, I had a chiro, and that was it. Just hung around the house, and then played a round with Paul. Went for another ride that night, and then turned in. Pretty boring.

Wednesday, I find a package at my door. My new headlights! After my accident, the brackets got damaged, so after looking online, found that it was only an extra $20 to get projector headlights instead of the stock ones. So I called Paul and he came over to help put them in. The high beams didn't work right, but we ran out of daylight so we left it for today. Headed up to the BP and hung out with Aaron for the rest of the night.

Today, I woke up early so I would have time to fix the lights before band practice. Paul came over, and after spending a long, long time on the phone with the company, got it figured out. Now I just have to wait for the sun to go down so I can double check the brightness of the lights is right. Biked over to band practice, and tried to get into it, but all of us were tired so it wasn't a very productive practice. After about 2 hours we called it quits, and I biked home to eat dinner. And now here I sit.

One of my grandparents friend's died this week, so they came home from the cabin early. Which means the cabin is open. So what would one do with nothing to do and an open cabin? That's right. Go up. So tomorrow evening/night I'm going to drive up there again. I tried to get someone to go with me, but since it was short notice, no one could. So I'm going up by myself, which is also nice. I like having some time to myself where I can do what I want, when I want. Although, it would be nice if Gabey lived here, so he could come up with me like he wanted to last week. Sorry buddy. So I probably won't be on for the next couple of days. My phone internet is kinda weird. I can check the blogs, but I can't post or comment. Oh well. I should enjoy nature, right? I hope all of you have a fun, safe weekend, and I'll talk to you when I get back.

-Kevin

The view off one side of the deck



The view off the other side



A view of part of the lake from the pontoon



Fire!



I realized I talk a lot about my band, but you guys have no idea who or what we are, so here is a rather poor quality video of us playing a song I wrote entitled, Anthem, from a few months ago. It has changed some since then, but it gives you a general idea. Right now, it is the only instrumental we have, but I don't like our singer, so I'm not going to post one with him.

Keep On Truckin'

Yesterday, hot. But not as hot as Monday or Sunday. Did the chiro, went and started my allergy shots, which will hopefully help with the migraines, and then went on a bike ride. I got beat down by the bike again, about half way through my thighs started burning like crazy, even when I wasn't pedaling. Just sitting on the bike hurt. But I pushed on and made it home. Grilled some food with the family (no Erik tonight) and then it started raining. It was nice because it really cooled off the air so it was actually quite comfortable. Erik showed up and had to finish up a car in my driveway in the rain. It really sucked, and I felt bad for him, but he got it done pretty quick. Hung out with the rents, and then kicked it with Aaron at the BP for a while. Then just spent the rest of the night watching movies, since I didn't want to be in the rain. Before I went to bed I ordered up some new headlights for my truck, because they got kinda damaged in the accident. They still work, but the aim is off and the brackets broke so I can't adjust them. Hopefully they will be here middle of next week.

Today, I woke up and right after I got out of the shower, Kaija and Ian were standing in my hallway. Kaija remembered my garage code, and when I didn't answer my phone, let herself in. She hasn't done this in probably 5 years, so it was an interesting surprise. I was just glad I had gotten my pants on first. We hung out on the deck for about 15 minutes, but then I left for the chiro and they went home. Now I'm at home slowly getting ready to head to my cabin in Hayward, WI. It's the first time of the year, so I'll have to open it all up and get it working again before everyone else shows up Thursday/Friday. My grandparents and parents are coming up tomorrow, and then my aunt and cousins are coming up on Friday. Should be a good time. Hanging out on the deck, going for boat rides, not being in the cities. I can't wait! That's why I volunteered to go up and open it up, so I could just get up there. Ever since it's been about 45 degrees outside, back in March, I've wanted to go up there. Now I get my wish. It's only about a three hour drive, so it isn't too bad. I've done it many times before, so going up in the middle of the night by myself on a two-lane, dark highway full of deer won't be a problem. I just wish I had my new headlights. Fortunately, my high beams are still aimed right (weird) so when there aren't other cars I'll be able to see fine. I'll probably take some pictures and post them on here when I get back. I'll get back on Monday, so you probably won't hear from me til then. There isn't internet up there, but I can sometimes get shaky internet on my phone up there, so when I get bored at night I might get on. We'll see.

Everyone take care, and be safe this weekend!

-Kevin

My dad, and subsequently my brother, are HUGE Grateful Dead fans, and this was the first song of their's I ever heard. Still one of my favorites. I thought it was fitting.