Randy Jackson wears a giant watch.

Sitting around the house catching up on DVR'd tv shows and wasting time/putting off going to the gym (I'll get there).

American Idol is on now, and I'm not really paying attention, but damn, Randy Jackson has a huge watch. I mean, it looks like he could get a workout just from raising his arm to look at the time. I'm impressed.

I know you're saying "rewind for a second, did he say 'American Idol'?" Yeah, I did. No, I haven't gotten sucked into it like a lotta people are, but hey, it's fun to watch from time to time. Don't hate.

Right now it's actually a pretty nice break from Sportscenter. Recently all they've had to talk about is Michael Phelps and A-Rod. I've got a little beef with sports media right now. Don't get me wrong, I was SICK of seeing Phelps' face EVERYWHERE sixth months ago after winning all of those medals. I mean, I was proud of what he did, but it got old pretty quick. Now though, I'm sick of seeing the media shoot him DOWN. Give him a break! He didn't cheat at the sport. He didn't hurt anybody. He didn't father any random kids. He just got caught in a bad position. But remember, he won EIGHT gold medals! Michael, I got your BACK, dude.

And the A-Rod deal, come on now. I'm not a Yankee fan OR an A-Rod fan, but this is getting ridiculous. Let the guy play his sport. Yes, he lied bout doing performance enhancing drugs, but when he DID do them, they were LEGAL. Ok, so it was a dumb move of him to deny it at one point, and it was dumb that he even DID it, but technically no rules were broken. Baseball's a month and a half away, and I'm crossing my fingers that this will be DONE by then. We'll see.

I'm not feeling Sportscenter today anyway, after UNC laid it down on my Wolfpack last night. It was a respectable loss. Sort of. Ahh, the life of a State fan. It's never been easy.

But enough sports complaining. I'm done for now. American Idol. Big watches. Music. New "Office" tonight. Woohoo.

D$ykes.

Heckuva weekend.

What a WEEKEND!

Started off with what was probably one of the luckiest Friday the 13th's I've ever experienced. I opened up at work and got through a decent lunch shift only to stick around and have a birthday lunch with my mom, which was great. Happy birthday week again, Mom.

The afternoon rolled around pretty quick and suddenly it was time to rock it out for Amanda's 21st. We went BACK to Sticks and Stones for a great dinner and took our time enjoying the food and the company in a corner table. Her 'rents brought her a cake, which we scarfed down after our pizza, and we headed out to get ready for the party when dinner was over.

After dinner we went on to the Blind Tiger, where the real festivities began. We mainly went to watch the headline band, Holy Ghost Tent Revival (think of an even-more local version of the Avett Brothers), but enjoyed the other acts in the meantime while we sipped on drinks and danced our hearts out.

And speaking of the headline group, let me give all of you a little piece of advice. There's a scene in Ghostbusters where Ray gets shocked by the main ghost at the end of the movie for saying he's not a god. After this goes down, Winston yells at him and says "Ray, the NEXT time someone asks you if you're a god, you say YES!". Well, Friday at the bar, I went up to get a drink, and apparently I was rockin' the style the band wears for the most part, and the bartender looked at my money and said "Aren't you in the band?". Of course, being the honest guy that I am, I said no, and he took my money. It didn't hit me that if I'd said I was I could've gotten it for free. Ah well. I'll be quicker when it happens again. So there's my advice, folks. The next time someone asks you if you're in the band, YOU SAY YES!

Anyway, Holy Ghost went on around 12 and had the whole place dancing and clapping and stomping feet. We were all drenched in sweat and loving it by the end of the show.

Afterwards we went back and hung out until about six in the morning, which definitely made the bed seem hella-comfortable.

Saturday came too soon but Friday was worth it, and with it came Valentine's Day. I've given my two cents on this "holiday" before, and I'll say my name for it again: Hershey's and Hallmark Day, but hey, this year I was actually pretty excited for it. I made it low key for the most part, and cooked Amanda's favorite dinner for her: eggplant parmesan. We ate by candlelight and just enjoyed each other's company. I couldn't have asked for anything more on Valentine's Day, and honestly, I couldn't be happier with how it was spent. Here's to you, St. V...

On top of all of this, work went by pretty crazy today. I was kind of left by myself, but I held the place down with a little help from my boss and luckily made mad bank. I closed it all out just now with a nice dinner with my parents at Lucky 32.

I guess the weekend's not officially over, but it's been a whirlwind, and I'm still loving it. I've still got 3.5 hours til Monday, so I'm gonna go enjoy it for now. Peace outside, folks.

Drew.

Ahoy, yo.

Mayercraft 2 is BOOKED.



Well, I guess the actual trip was booked back in October, but as of today, EVERYTHING else is taken care of. I got my ticket to Mayer's Eve, ticket to the VH1 Save the Music show (which includes a Red Carpet), AND my plane ticket to LA. All I've gotta do now is wait and pack.

I've told a handful of people about this, but kept it quiet for the most part until now, and let me say that I couldn't be more excited. It's a four day cruise on the Carnival Splendor from Los Angeles down to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, and the music is non-stop on the way.



I'll be flying into LA on March 26 to board the ship and throw my bags down, only to immediately go out to enjoy the sun and an open bar for the start of "Mayer's Eve", a pre-cruise celebration that involves DJs and cocktail attire. Once this gets into full swing, I'll make my way to the main arena for a VH1 benefit concert involving John Mayer, Gavin Rosdale, Sara Bareilles, Jordin Sparks, OAR, and Guster. And this is just the first night!

The ship sets sail the next afternoon and we spend a day at sea on the way to Mexico. Mayer is giving two full-band performances and an acoustic show on the deck of the boat on the way there and back. I'll also be rockin' out to OAR, Guster, Justin Nozuka, David Ryan Harris, and several other acts throughout the event.



Once we get to Cabo, we get a day at port, so I'll definitely be hitting the beach while I'm there.

After some time south of the border, we get back on the ship and rock it out the whole way back. Besides the concerts, the boat will have several different forms of entertainment, ranging from karaoke to mini golf to a casino to all-night pizza bars that will save several of us from the regular bars. It's gonna be awesome.

I'm also really excited to meet so many other people that are as big fans of Mayer's music as I am. That's right, folks. There are others like me out there, and there are lots of them!

I've gotten even more hype about this the last few days because of the Grammys (where I realized I cheered for Mayer to win like I cheer for my sports teams--sad, right? No shame, though. No shame). He won 2 last night, which was great, and now his next big event is the cruise, so who knows what he'll bring out (I'm keeping my fingers crossed for some new tunes, but we'll see).

Anyway, it's a month and a half away, but you know I'll be counting it down until I get on the boat...

Ahoy, yo.
Drew

Citizen Cope.

I guess it's about time I write about the Citizen Cope show in Raleigh.

First of all, it's easy to sum it up by saying it was amazing. I've always liked his sound (Side note: "Citizen Cope" refers to the lead singer, Clarence Greenwood, so he's a person, not a group. I didn't know this until Tuesday), but I never knew much about him or his music outside of a handful of songs. The show was at the Lincoln Theatre, so being a smaller venue, the tickets were a good deal and Amanda and I knew we'd be able to get close to the stage since it was general admission. In weighing all of this out, we decided it would be worth the money and the drive to catch the concert. We were right.

Doors opened up at 7, but we took our time trying to get there and stopped by an old friend's house. It was my first time going back to Raleigh since November, so I felt a tug of sadness and realized that I really do miss the place. Thinking about it though, it's more the people that I'm really wanting to see again soon. And the memories that I'm missing. But that's not what I'm writing about now, so no more tangents...

After driving around town for a bit, we got to the Lincoln Theatre at 7:30 and the line stretched down the street. My problem with shows is that I get to the ones I DON'T need to get to super early and nobody's there, but when I take my time, every ticketholder ends up being in front of me. As it turns out, this didn't matter, because as soon as we got inside, we crawled our way to the front of the group and ended up standing behind only one row of people.

The opening act was a chick named Mieka Pauley, and she rocked the stage with a solo acoustic performance. Her guitar playing was very Jack Johnson-esque, and she had a real chill vibe going on. She was definitely entertaining, starting strong by using her guitar to drum a beat and singing her heart out. The highlight of her performance came towards the end with a cover of Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah". She teared up during the song, and definitely did it justice.

Citizen Cope came on around 9:30 and the crowd went wild. It was his second night in town, and he recognized a few of the fans from the previous show, which was cool. I only knew about 5 of his songs going into the concert, but I immediately became a fan of everything else he did as he played. Most of his music is very anthem-like, and a lot of it has a marching feel to it, which is great. He was really good about getting the crowd involved, and everybody loved singing along.

Their version of "Let the Drummer Kick" had everybody bouncing their heads, and "Bullet and a Target" had everybody doing backup of the chorus while Cope sang the verse. Another highlight of the show came when he played the song "Holdin' On". I'd never heard it before, but it was slow, so I started swaying with Amanda, and as he got into singing, he said "I love it when people start touchin' on each other when I play this song" and looked right at us with a smile. The lyrics of the song really fit our situation, and after that, we officially found "our" song (cue the "awww"s).

After the show we stopped by the Village Draft House and chowed down on their fried pickles. They were amazing, and I freaked out even more when I realized it was Tuesday, so it was RIB NIGHT! Talk about the memories, eh? It was definitely a great way to end the evening, and we drove back to Greensboro talking about how great the show was, and how we'd found our song (cue the "awwww"s again. No shame here).

Definitely looking forward to the week ahead, but before that gets here, enjoy a few pics from the show.

Latas,
Drew

#3 on 2.

Today is Groundhog Day, a holiday that I've pointed out before as being mad-underrated. I won't go into too much detail about it tonight, but I'll let everyone know that Punxsutawney Phil has officially predicted another 6 weeks of winter for 2009. Bummer.



Of course, there are some major events going down in these final 6 weeks of winter, so there are definitely things to look forward to while riding out the cold. "Like what, Drew?", you might be asking. And I'd say, "Like this:

1. Citizen Cope concert in Raleigh tomorrow.
2. Important birthdays on the 11th and 13th.
3. Friday the 13th. This one's got a double meaning, because the NIGHT is gonna be money, AND the movie is starting. Nice.
4. Hershey's and Hallmark Day, a.k.a. Valentine's Day. This is one I usually bash, but I'm actually looking forward to it this year. Woohoo.
5. More resume action. Yes, the economy still sucks, and yes, I feel like the underdog now, but you can't score if you don't shoot. That's word.
6. Another important birthday on the 28th.
7. March 2nd. "Keep me where the light is..." Day.
8. Spring break for you people who are still in school. I'll find a way to make my own.
9. MARCH MADNESS. Oh yeah, it's six weeks away.
10. Six weeks from now, I'll be two weeks away from Mayercraft. Nice."

So there you go. Six more weeks of winter may be a slight bummer, but a lot of good things are happening in that time period. Get hype for the coming months, because Spring will be here soon...sort of...

Drew

8:07 a.m.

Made it to sunrise. Felt pretty good about it. Clear day so far. Pretty tired now. Took some pictures. Enjoy.

D.

Still awake.

It's 5:42 and I'm still awake.

I hope you're asleep now, and that you're sleeping well.

Since I'm still up, I figured I'd try to watch the sunrise. In order to do this, I checked Weather.com to see what time this was supposed to happen, and it said 7:19. That's a good chunk of time away from now, but at the same time, it's not. The question is, is it worth staying up for? It's kind of like when you go out to dinner and eat most of your food, but you've still got some left and you're still kind of hungry. You know that if you eat a little more, there won't be enough to save, but you'll be satisfied. If you SAVE the food, you'll be stuck still kind of hungry, but you'll have enough for another meal or a good snack later. Of course, if you REALLY think about it, how often do you reheat the food once you take it home? For me personally, I usually throw it out after a few days of looking at it under the bright white lights in the fridge. Overall, I think it's a better decision to go ahead and eat the last bit of food. It makes sense, you become satiated (which is a fancy way of saying you reach the perfect level of fullness--yes, I paid some attention in nutrition class and listed to "Something's Missing), and you don't waste anything in the process. Good deal, right?

So yeah, it's a new month and a new day. I think I'm feeling [and needing] this sunrise. Screw doggie bags. You only live once.

Goodni--
I mean, Good Morning,
Drew

[P.S. I'm slightly delirious, but my head's on straight]
[P.P.S. Never force anything.]
[P.P.P.S. Catch a sunrise soon if you can]
[P.P.P.S. Follow your heart, you'll never fall apart]
[P.P.P.P.S. Done with the cliches for now. Gonna wait for the sun...]