Omniblog

Yea, it’s a somber day, but I felt like it was time I shared my little contribution to today that I made many years ago.

I used to do an Internet radio show on a station called Freakradio. It has long since passed, but one of my shows fell on 9-11 (I can’t remember what year it was).

In honor of that day, I decided to hunt for some audio clips of Air Traffic control, news reports, etc, and wanted to mix them with a song that was, well, honestly, overplayed during 9-11.

Enya’s Only Time was perfect. (It was a toss up between this and Live’s Overcome.)

Below is a link to my mix of the song with the audio blended in. I haven’t listend to it nor shared it with others since my old radio show. That is, until today. I am not sure what got into me to want to share this, but I guess I thought the song had been hiding for long enough on my hard drive.

Enjoy. I know the people that listened to me that night gave me very positive reviews and some “Damn, you made me cry again.” Well, the whole day still makes me teary eyed.

PS: Yes, MikeyMoo was my DJ name. You can see that hasn’t changed after all these years. I am not responsible for the amount of Kleenex you might need due to listening to the song.

Enya – Only Time (MikeyMoo 911 Remix)

I have 0 permission to distribute the song, so we’ll see what happens.

Looks like everything is ok after I did an upgrade from WordPress 2.9.x to 3.0.

That was pretty painless.

From now until May, the stuff I have tickets to just keeps growing.

Originally it was just my usual Leo Kottke concert at the Paramount in April, but in the past 2 weeks, it’s just exploded.

Let’s see.

• Wednesday, February 17 – Cirque du Soleil – Allegria (3rd time to see this particular show)
• Saturday, April 10 – Elton John – He’s always been on my “I’d love to see him if I ever got the chance.” list. Now, I get my chance. Tickets go on sale this Saturday, Feb. 20th. Next is Billy Joel, who Elton John is on tour with, but I keep forgetting to look up where the tour goes in Texas. This show is just Elton, no Billy, as far as I know.
• Friday, April 16 – Chelsea Handler – ’nuff said. I was hesitant to spend the cash on her first show, but when they announced a second show, on the same day, I figured it was a sign and bought pre-sale tickets thanks to a Facebook group I found. I scored seats in the middle.
• Friday, April 30 – Leo Kottke – The usual annual concert. I have missed a few, but I am not sure how much longer he is going to tour, so I have to catch him every year now.
• Tuesday, May 4 – Stomp – This will be my second time to see this show.

I have a feeling the list might grow. There’s a Celtic Woman concert in Houston/San Antonio May 1st and 2nd respectively. However, I saw them last year here in Austin, so I am going to probably hold off. Leo, Celtic Woman, and Stomp all in less than a week: Ye Gods that’s a lot.

I decided to just say “Fukitol” and dropped the class that started all of these blog posts.

I added the classroom version which starts in early March.

For me, there are some classes I should just be in a classroom for, and this one falls into that category. It would have been too difficult for me to handle doing it online.

The End. We thank you for reading.

Eh, after much thinking, and talking with friends and family, I have decided that:

1. I will stick with the class for a week or so.
2. If it gets to be too much, I will drop it
3. I will add a classroom class that starts later in the semester and is taught by someone different

It should be noted, the professor teaching the class is question is also teaching 3 other classes this semester, 2 of which started this week along with mine.

Note: My school does adult education at night in 8 week segments for most classes. Classes meet twice a week for about 3 hours per night. My online class in question here lasts the entire semester. The classroom class I would sign up for is an 8 week class that starts in March.

Thanks to all who listened to me bitch, whine, moan and think.

Yes, I used shenanigans as a subject, and the fact that I used it in relation to school makes this even more interesting.

Yesterday, I decided to go through my syllabuses to put dates in my calendar so I know what is due when. I am taking 3 classes this semester, all online, I have 2 syllabuses so far.

So, for one of my classes, the syllabus is entirely online, so I am copying and pasting it into Word so I have a copy at all times. In the process of copying and pasting and noticing dates, I noticed a few things were rather strange, off, and just plain dumb.

Note: Spring break for my school is March 15-20. This is important. Remember it.

The mid-term for the aforementioned class will be posted online on Feb. 11th – Sure, no problem, that’s a Thursday. When is it due? It’s due by 10pm Feb. 13th. Wait, what? That’s a Saturday.

Now, in light of sounding like a whiny high-school kid, I mean we are all adults here, but What the hell…barely 2 days for a mid-term, and it’s due on a weekend? Are you serious? This class is by no means a breeze and requires a lot of reading, analyzing, and critical thinking.

Second: The Final. Now, remember that part I said about Spring Break, this is where you will need to know the dates.

The final for the aforementioned class will be posted by 10pm on Friday, March 19th and it is due by noon Monday, March 22nd. Yes, posted and due during the last weekend, and day after, of Spring Break.

Again, are you fucking kidding me? And yes, we are all adults here, but still.

The professor also ends class on April 1st. This class technically goes until April 26th. Again, what the fuck?

The professor has taught this class many times online, and just used an old syllabus and changed the dates around. So, my thinking is either the professor is totally clueless on dates, or he’s just outright malicious.

I have not yet written the professor to make sure they were not on acid when they changed the dates, but I will be fairly soon.

In the meantime, I can’t help but shake my head and laugh and get somewhat irritated.

If this is intentional, and I stick out the class with these silly dates and deadlines that will most certainly not bring about my best work, then the class evaluation will be priceless from me.

It has recently come to my attention that Fox Sports Radio decided not to renew the contract of possibly one of my favorite radio hosts: Steve Czaban.

I rarely caught his show in the morning (6am – 9am EST), so I caught bits and pieces of the replay from 12pm-3pm EST when I would go out for lunch.

I started reading a few things, like Czaban’s blog, as to what happened: Czabe’s Blog

I then found, in the comments of the above post, what really happened: The Truth.

I then learned who they replaced him with: Steven A Smith. Say what?

Yes, that Steven A Smith. So, it appears the new direction that FSR is taking is getting rid of good hosts that speak in a normal tone of voice that are funny, and great entertainment, and replacing/keeping hosts that like to yell.

3 examples: Steven A Smith, Petros, and JT the Brick. All of them yell, all the time, and it makes listening to them very painful, figuratively and literally. So, why didn’t they can Petros or JT the Brick? I mean all Petros likes to talk about is USC and he and his partner, Money, always have Pete Carroll on their show, or so it seems. (granted it is/was college football season, but still). And yes, I am aware that Petros used to play at USC, but come on.

JT the Brick constantly yells at callers. He kind of reminds me of Nancy Grace in a sick, twisted sort of way. JT the Brick: the Nancy Grace of sports talk radio? Ye Gods.

Steven A Smith – words cannot describe how much I despise this man. Not just how he is on TV or the radio, but his voice inflections. I am seriously starting to wonder if he really talks that way, or if it is an act when he is on TV or the radio. (Let me be clear before the mass internet reading audience jumps to conclusions: I am not racist in any way, shape, or form. I am simply making an observation.)

So, way to fail FSR. One of the main reasons I have XM Radio in my car is to listen to 2 FSR hosts: Czaban and Dan Patrick.

Will I keep my XM? Yea probably. Satellite radio is great when you are driving in the middle of nowhere in Texas.

As I sit in my office at work, I have been pondering “Why don’t I feel Christmasey?”

Then it dawned on me, in my 11 years of living in Austin, only once or twice have I felt in the holiday spirit. Why?

Because when it’s 60-70 degrees outside, it tends to be a little difficult to get into the spirit. There’s no snow, no cold, no reason to bundle up and watch Frosty the Snowman or other classics and drink hot chocolate. Nothing.

Unfortunately, this year is no different. It’s about 60 now, and it will be 70 by Wednesday. Then it will cool off, on Christmas Eve. Great. It’s all too little too late.

I thought, “Hey why not move where it is cooler and snowy and more Christmasey.” Sure, no problem, until that big ass storm hit the Northeast and buried it in snow. Of course, that’s not typical, but still, it can happen. So, that’s not going to happen either.

Of course, I could invent my own frosty weather by turning the A/C down to 60 in my apartment, bundling up under layers of clothes (which would include a Snuggie – yes dammit it’s comfy and warm), making hot chocolate, and maybe throwing some fake snow around, but sadly it just wouldn’t have the same effect.

So, I’ll make do with the warm. There is a the bright side, however. When I do my Christmas shopping, instead of freezing my ass off, it’s comfortable and warm.

This is a comment I recently posted to a friend’s status about, well, broken ice makers and tea using Facebook’s new Email reply feature.

I was using Gmail when I did it, so I am not sure if other email providers would cause this same issue.

So, it does work, but they obviously have some kinks to work out.

Facebook Email Reply – Use at your own discretion and don’t expect it to look pretty.

Ok, seriously, ESPN, this is a bad trend. Although it has evolved over many years, it’s still quite interesting.

First, Rush makes his comments about McNabb and whatever else.

Which was then followed, years later, by Harold Reynolds getting fired for sexual harassment.

Which then leads us to today’s top story:

Steve Phillips – Ok, really, he seems like such a nice guy, but oh how looks can be deceiving.

Leave of absence because of an extramarital affair. Nice, Steve, real nice.

What’s next? Chris Burman goes on a bender, or Ditka gets caught doing crack, or the entire College Gameday crew gets caught altering the lyrics to the University of Texas fight song while stealing Bevo?

I won’t even go into the Erin Andrews fiasco.

So, I’m taking wagers on who is next to go.