Life, The Universe, and Everything

2009-08-30T12:23:00.001-07:00

What I was doing last week...

2008-07-22T23:32:00.001-07:00

Awesome

2008-07-18T10:25:00.001-07:00

My Boy

2008-07-02T09:14:00.001-07:00

Let's do this Bengals...

2008-06-25T15:28:00.000-07:00

2008-02-26T01:53:00.001-08:00

So obviously since I have had a good amount of time on my hands, I have been able to see my share of shitty reality TV, but there is this show on MTV (of course) called America's Next Best Dance Crew and this group called the Jabbowakeez is RIDICULOUS....I think I may like watching them so much because I secretly want to be a dancer.

wow am I lazy

2008-02-23T15:57:00.000-08:00

So I think that having a blog has successfully proven that I am lazy. As it should be serving as a great tool to analyze my life as an unemployed college graduate. Instead, it sits stagnant, for the 5 people that actually check it, only to serve as a personal journal that maybe one of those five people actually wastes their time checking. So for you, 1 person out there, this post is for you. Believe it or not, I am not going to be unemployed much longer. I have had a number of interviews with various companies and am coming to somewhat of a decision on where I want to be and what I want to be doing. That is very exciting for me, and the prospects of moving somewhere new is very pleasing to me. When I have more to say about where, when, how I am going to be in regards to a job, I promise I will update...until then, click on my podcast page and listen to some tunes, I actually do update that page....I know, surprising.

Oh boy

2008-01-22T17:19:00.001-08:00

Life Update: Looking for a job...help!

This seems to be more fun than looking for a job

And Brandon: This dog is going to have an amazing life

Let It Snow

2008-01-05T09:24:00.000-08:00

I'm supposed to be in Boise today. Let's start the story there. Being as I am in Idaho, and the biggest storm that we have seen in close to 4 years is in our midst, I'm not going anywhere soon. Last night I spent about an hour and a half helping people get their cars out of the snow in Carson's neighborhood, Hulen Meadows. Here's a recap of the night: We had a good 4 inches of new snow on the ground when Carson picked me up in Hailey at 5:30. We trekked to Ketchum (about 12 miles from Hailey) and made our way to Carson's house a few miles north of town. We decided to go back into town for dinner at around 7, ate some dinner and went to Charlie Wilson's War at 9:15. When we got out of the movie, 4 more inches of snow had accumulated on the hood of Carson's Denali. We carefully drove back towards Carson's house. When we got to Hulen Meadows, we found 2 cars stuck in the snow on the way to his house, so we quickly learned that we would be spending some time in the snow helping out. We actually made our way to Carson's via an alternative route and grabbed a shovel and my camera and turned around to go and help the two people that were stuck. Luckily, another helper had arrived with a tow-rope and all we had to do was help push the car from its stuck position. After getting two cars out this way, we made our way back to the house only to find another car had got itself stuck right out front of the driveway. This car was a slightly more complicated. Mainly because it was a Honda Accord instead of an SUV. The driver had managed to high center the car so the front wheels were spinning free when she tried to move. Without 4 wheel drive she was in trouble. A guy with a big truck and a few shovels, carson, and myself began digging her car out to try and get her some sort of traction and space to move. This method was an immediate failure, so we moved on to more drastic measures. We found a tow-rope in Carson's garage and hooked it to the only tow loop on the Honda (which we later learned shouldn't be used to tow the car) and the other end tied on to the tow hitch of the truck. After thinking of various methods/places for the car to park, the guy we were with decided that he could pull the car to a heated driveway nearby where the car would be safe. So as we walked back into Carson's house, the headlights of the truck pulling this little honda disappeared into the distance. Our night was complete. I am now sitting on Carson's bed watching Boston College play Kansas, wondering how I am going to get home today. I won't be heading towards Boise anytime soon that's for sure.

Where have I been?

2008-01-01T20:47:00.000-08:00

So if anyone even checks this blog anymore, here I am. Last post: October. So why on earth have I decided to resurface? Well, time seems to be on my side now as I have finished teaching tennis and have taken up/mastered the art of worthlessness. This is the most time that I have spent being completely unproductive and it is driving me mad. I have been out of work for about 1 month now, and am about ready to have a job/career. I was fortunate enough to spend the last week with my beautiful girlfriend as she made a celebrity appearance back in the United States for just under two weeks before boarding a jet on December 31 back to Morocco, where she serves as a Peace Corps Volunteer teaching Health. While I was sitting by a fireplace trying to help Carson install Age of Empires II (Gold Edition) at the stroke of midnight, Anna was sitting on a plane flying over the Atlantic towards France. So, we each brought in the New Year in our own unique ways. I have been spending a good deal of time working on my mixing and listening to loads upon loads of trance and progressive house. It's funny; I spent the last week without listening to one beat of music while I was with Anna, and when I boarded the plane in Albuquerque, my iPod was again my best friend in the world, providing the soundtrack to my life and a coping mechanism for the distance in my relationship. Its no wonder I have had nothing on my mind other than the music I listen to: it is my life away from my relationship. I am going to make an honest attempt to stay as active as possible with this blog so that thoughts on my life (whether it be the blonde beauty, music, sports, books, whatever) will remain up to date and exciting.

Le Tired

2007-10-29T14:04:00.000-07:00

It's been quite a while since I've posted anything worth saying, and this post will keep it that way. I in fact have nothing to report, other than the fact that my girlfriend wants me to send her tooth whitener and she is starting to get angry. I am teaching a lot of tennis here in Avila, CA living with the rents, mixing a lot of music, and hanging out with some new found friends. I am still working on finding a job that means something to me apart from teaching tennis. When that happens, my bags will be packed up and I will depart into the new chapter of my life. But until then, I have nothing to report, or maybe I will.

ps. Partied at Chuck Liddell's this weekend and his house is RIDICULOUS

RAR!

2007-10-20T20:20:00.001-07:00

Embedded Video

Blogged with Flock

Choch's Wedding 09.22.07

2007-09-26T21:51:00.000-07:00

I spent this last weekend about 15 miles from the wonderful town of Cle Elum, which (in case you were wondering) has a liquor store. Let's just start there. I booked a flight to Seattle about a week ago, to set out on a journey. My journey would begin in Tacoma and lead me into Snoqualmie Pass for a very special wedding ceremony. Daniel Coccia (Choch) is the first close friend to get married, and it was quite a fun and exciting occassion. Let me give you a background on my coming to know of Choch.
Choch was one of the first people I met when I first visited the University of Redlands, as he lived with my close friend Carson. Choch was a basketball player, and we immediately became very good friends. I can't say there are too many people in this world who have been true mentors to me in my lifetime, but I can say that Choch most definitely fell into this category. Being as he was a few years older than me, he was always first to include me in any activities on campus, whether it be playing FIFA soccer at their apartment or being one of two people who took me out on my 21st birthday during finals week his senior year.
So having said that, and given a very brief background of our friendship, let us continue our journey in Tacoma. I flew into Seatac at 1:30 on Thursday, with a name and number of Choch's Uncle. I was supposed to call when I arrived, as he and Choch's aunt would take me with them to Choch and Sara's new house, where everyone was waiting. So after a very easy rendezvous, I made my way to the house, only to find all the guys (Drew Moser, Andrew Alhadeff, Ryan Pelo, Billy Shivers, Choch, and his cousins, parents and brothers) waiting for me.

I immediately realized that we were going to be drinking all night as I was handed a beer when I walked in the door. I was given a quick tour of the house, dropped my bags and we were off. We drove through the crumby Seattle traffic on our way to our destination for the night, the Whirly Ball Arena. We made two stops before we played this amazing sport...1st, an extremely overpriced bar for a quick shot of Tequila followed by a shot of Jager...after realizing that this place was ripping us off, Alf (Andrew Alhadeff) decided we should just buy a bottle of something hard, take pulls in the parking lot and then proceed to Whirly Ball. Instead, we found a little bar filled with some guys who looked like they spent the whole day at the mill. If this wasn't akward enough, we barged in and demanded a round of Rum shots, only to find out that this bar was strictly a "Beer and Wine" bar. With a puzzled look on his face, Billy turned to me and said, "I've never heard of that in my life, what the hell is this!?" Instead of panicking, Alf reacted quickly and ordered two pitchers which were downed in under 5 minutes. Ok...Off to Whirly Ball. Whirly Ball is a game played on a court slightly larger than a basketball court. At each end is a backboard that has a hole in the middle, behind which is a net. Two teams of 5 players move around the court in bumper car style carts with a shortened version of a lacrosse stick in their hand. The objective is to shoot a ball (slightly larger than a whiffle ball) into the hole in the backboard.

Having said that, remember that each and every one of us had been drinking quite a bit of alcohol before the event. We played ten minute games for an hour and a half and probably individually averaged about a beer for every game we played. So, lots of drinking and lots of whirly ball. We continued back to our little "beer and wine" bar, and more rapidly consumed pitchers of beer. At this point in time, I blacked out, and memories from the rest of our time at the bar are vivid. What I can say, is that if I didn't get to rest on that 40 minute car ride home, I would have been done for the night....but no, we continued when we got back to the house. We immediately started cooking, and I remember Drew throwing on about 6-7 frozen pattys on the grill. I made my way inside to find Pelo, and realized he was upstairs puking his guts out. At this point in time, I began helping Pelo find the toilet bowl, since he had obviously missed, plastering the corner of the wall in Choch's little bathroom as well as the entire left side of the toilet (seat included). What made this experience all the more worth while was the fact that we had just eaten an order of chiken tenders while playing whirly ball. Mix that with some ranch and bbq sauce, and you have yourself one hell of a colorful pile of puke. I remain with Pelo for some time until he tells me he just wants to sleep, so I make my way back downstairs only to see Drew piling some fresh cooked eggs on top of his juicy burger. My mouth is salivating at this point as I ask Drew where the burgers are. He casually says "oh, go grab one off the grill." I grab my plate, pop that grill open, and practically singe my eyebrows off as I discover 2 foot high flames burning the shit out the 5 other burgers on the grill. The burgers have shrunk to about 1/2 their normal size, and they are all dark black. I quickly turned off the grill, put the burgers on my plate and walked inside. Of course, being that we are drunk bastards at this point, Billy, Alf and I throw a burger on a bun, place a piece of provolone (double the size of the burger) on the burger, and enjoy this blackened crunchy well-done piece of meat. I cracked open an Olympia and that concluded my night as I passed out upright on a chair downstairs only to vaguely remember running in to walls as I made my way to a bed upstairs in the middle of the night.
As I woke up on Friday morning (after thanking myself I was alive) I reminded myself that I had two more nights of drunken debauchery. Wow. Considering that I have maybe had 1 drink since the day I finished my MBA, I was scared. I had managed to drink more alcohol on one night than I had for the last 3 and a half months, if not the year. So our day started early as Drew decided we should all go sweat out the hangover and play some basketball. We had a nice game of 3 on 3 at the sport court near Choch's place, and came back, made some breakfast, got showered up and made our way to the Lodge where the wedding would take place, and where we would spend the next two nights. Choch, Drew, and Alf all went to pick up the kegs for the weekend, and Pelo and myself traveled with Choch's cousins up to the Lodge. It took a little over and hour to get there. We made our way on some back roads, through the Cascades, and came to an opening where the lodge was located. It was a beautiful setting. The lodge had somewhere around 7 rooms that had at least 3 bunk beds in each room. Ryan and I spent a few hours on our own before the boys arrived, at which point we got ourselves situated in the room. Late that afternoon was the rehearsal and dinner following that. We started drinking during the rehearsal and began our night. Following rehearsal, we were given an itinerary that laid out the rest of the weekend in detail. Since Billy, Pelo, and myself did not have responsibility in the wedding (ie groomsman), we immediately decided that Bill would be in charge of the itinerary, noting that anytime our names weren't on it (the entire itinerary) we would be drinking at that time. This immediately turned into a joke between the three of us, constantly "double checking the itinerary" to make sure that we were in the right spot. Pelo and I would ask Bill if he could check and see what we needed to be doing at any given time, to which he replied, "uh...I think we are supposed to be drinking now". I can confidently say that one of my most memorable moments from the wedding was when Bill and I started playing ping pong on Saturday morning. The girls had started to get ready upstairs at about 10:00, and Bill looked at me with a straight face and said, "what the hell are they doing, they aren't supposed to be getting ready until 11:00?" Bill had memorized the itinerary. Gotta love it. Our time at the Lodge was very much meshed together in my memory as it was non-stop fun. The ceremony itself could not have happenned at a better time. The day began very crumby, and was raining a little bit on and off. About 15 minutes before the ceremony started, the clouds parted, the sun came out, and Choch and Sara were married in the wilderness of Washington. It was a wonderful ceremony and absolutely beautiful setting.

Following the wedding, we ate dinner and I proceeded to dance the rest of the night away. I absolutely love dancing, especially after having a few drinks and had a blast on the dance floor doing line dances, swing dancing, and just having a lot of fun. The night concluded after Choch and Sara were off to their own cabin and the rest of the young folks drank more and ended the night sitting around, catching up, and being drunk. I think that this is a great way to end my story. Being amongst this group of people may well have been the best three days I've had this year. It was absolutely unbelievable and I thank every single one of you for making it memorable enough to write an essay the size of my Master's thesis about it. In case you care, it was about comparative advantage and the use of GIS/location analysis (sexy I know). Please feel free to comment with one of your favorite moments from the wedding or even just to give your two cents on the story. Hope all is well :)

U.S. Open Reflections

2007-09-02T22:29:00.001-07:00

Let's start things off with Fed. I really don't see him having any trouble winning his fourth consecutive U.S. Open and he continues to show everyone why he is the greatest of all time. Federer is truly extraordinary and his next match-up will be against Feliciano Lopez, which I think could be painful for Lopez.

Also, If you didn't get to witness Fed's outfit from his first night match, check it out. He wore all black, had custom "tuxedo shorts" with the standard shiny black stripe down the side, a custom pair of shiny black shoes (with three swiss flag logos which symbolze each of his 3 U.S. Open titles), black socks, a black wristband, a black headband and of course a black polo (with his initials custom printed on it obviously). Overwhelming, yes.
Next issue of business....James Blake. He is playing some real close matches, and most of them have not been pretty, but he finally won a 5 set match, and even though it was against a 34-year old, I can guarantee you noone in that tournament wants to see Fabrice Santoro in their section of the draw because he is just a grinder and is so different (you don't know if its going to be some wacko slice or if it will be pounded at you). Despite this 5 setter, I really think Blake has shown up during this tournament even though some may claim he's still a "loser" with "no heart". What is nice also is that Blake has a quite favorable draw, which means he could have a chance to make it further than last year. So, keep cheering on those Americans. Unfortunately Roddick may meet up with Fed in the quarters, and we all know how good a record Roddick has against Fed.

Podcast update

2007-08-25T00:17:00.000-07:00

There is a new podcast just posted on my podcast site @ http://d2rmix.blogspot.com....CHECK IT!!!

The Mix: Episode 3

2007-08-22T13:09:00.000-07:00

So I have had this trance mix that I put together a little over a week ago that was supposed to be episode 2, and I think it is going to wait even longer because I have been just absolutely tuned into progressive house music lately, maybe because my mood has been more low key and mellow. Anyhow, I am going to record this set I have been thinking about for a while tonight and probably post it tomorrow. For those of you that enjoy progressive house music, this is going to be pretty enjoyable. For those of you that do not like progressive house music, try and throw this set on in the background, while you are doing something, and I think you will really like it, not too soft, but not too loud. I'll make an official post once I have uploaded it and all that good stuff.

Fed Reaches 50

2007-08-20T10:35:00.000-07:00

Congrats Roger,
50 Career wins, and the 5th youngest to get there just passing Pete. If you don't know this by now, Federer will forever be, in my opinion the epitome of a role model and all around great athlete. The way he composes himself on and off the court really shows a lot to the people that watch and respect this sport, and it also gives kids a positive role model to look up to. Keep doing what you're doing Roger, and good luck in New York.

Podcast update

2007-08-17T00:09:00.000-07:00

So when I was trying to upload my 2nd podcast to my .mac account I got some ridiculous message about spending some god awful amount to increase the size of space on my site so I could post more podcasts there, and I scrapped that idea, knowing that I could do what I wanted to do as far as posting podcasts online another way that was free, and thats exactly what I did, so go to http://d2rmix.blogspot.com and I have updated the first two episodes that work in itunes or just in the browser to listen to....check it out and enjoy.

Time to vote!

2007-08-15T10:32:00.000-07:00

So, it is my favorite time of year, which means that the DJ Mag holds the rating for top 100 DJ's in the world at the end of October, and voting has started. You can vote for the 5 DJs you think are the top 5 in the world, and you can do so here:
DJ Mag Voting
What is cool about this is that if you really wanted to you could fill in the blanks with any old DJ, the one from that trashy nightclub you go to or even your own name.

Anyways, I will disclose my top 5 now:
1. Armin Van Buuren (My personal favorite, and, in my opinion, it is his turn to be #1)
2. Tiesto (Possibly the best set lists (to steal a quote) "in the history of ever"
3. Hernan Cattaneo (His sets truly represent what DJing is all about, setting a mood and taking his listeners on a journey)
4. Above & Beyond (After the creation of Trance Around The World, its hard not to put them on this list)
5. Kaskade (A smaller scale DJ, but in my opinion one of the not-so-well-known amazing DJs)

Let me know what you think, or who you put in the top 5

More trip photos

2007-08-13T11:26:00.000-07:00

So here are some more pictures from my road trip up to Washington and back. Check it...
Most of them are from Leavenworth, but notice the last picture of some fool stacking rocks up along the water in Sausalito...James found it just about as amuzing as I did, claiming "what's so special about that, we've all seen rocks before". We both agreed it would be much more amazing if everyone were huddled around a guy eating rocks rather than stacking them.

The Last 3 Weeks

2007-08-11T19:02:00.000-07:00

After finishing up Grad. School on July 17, I promptly made my way to Pismo Beach from Redlands, renting a U-Haul, packing up all my belongings and hitting the road. I started unpacking at my parent's house in Pismo Beach, only to leave for Washington two days later. My mom and I drove to Leavenworth, WA to gather some stuff from storage to bring down to the newly acquired house in CA. After spending a week in Leavenworth, we packed up yet another (slightly larger) U-Haul and made our way south. My mom drove the U-Haul to Pismo Beach, and I detoured to Seattle for a week. Following Seattle, I made my way to Portland for 3 days and stayed with some old high school friends and finally made a stop for one night in San Francisco with an old college friend. All in all, it was an exciting trip, and I will be posting more photos soon.

-R

The Mix:

2007-08-11T17:08:00.000-07:00

Since I am obsessed with electronic music, I have taken up the wonderful art of DJing,and have been fooling around with a program called Ableton Live for about 8 or 9 months now. It's fun for me to be able to mix tracks I love hearing and have a hobby that is continually changing and is never the same from one mix to the next. Every week I want to include my favorite tracks to mix, so for all you electronic music people out there, check them out. So I finally decided to record and post my own mixes....so no laughing..I'm still a beginner. I decided to kick off my very first mix as a progressive house mix with some fun tracks....I have attached a link to my podcast site, so check it out....hit me with some feedback :)

The Mix: Podcast Site

This week's tracks:
1. Pryda - Armed
2. Deadmau5 & Glenn Morrison - Contact
3. Daft Punk - Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger (Deadmau5 Edit)
4. Paolo Mojo - Everybody (Original 2006 Mix)
5. Cyro - Score A Million

Contact

2007-08-11T13:21:00.000-07:00

Welcome! I figure now is a better time than ever to start my own blog that will remain separate from myspace, facebook and the numerous other networking tools that I constantly use in my life. I wanted to create a page that was a compilation of my thoughts on the various journeys I take in my life as well as providing continuous insight into my life. If any of this sounds interesting to you, hang around...check out the blogs as they come and reply to anything you find interesting, cool, terrible, etc. etc. I think it's important to have a place in which I can present myself through pictures, music, and words. Join me as I ramble, rant and rave. Cheers...

Ryan