Musical notes

Went to see the Trans Siberian Orchestra last night with Kiri and a cast of many.

TSO rocked, but I don't think I enjoyed the show as much as the others. Part of it was the ongoing pain in my mouth and my nervousness over the dentist appointment today, but a lot of it was how damn preachy the first half of the concert was. That and the light show was overwhelming at times. A lot of my joy in concerts is watching people play. Half the fun is seeing how they produce these incredible sounds, the looks on their faces, etc. Between the lasers, fog machines, and massive lighting rig (featuring every strobe light KISS ever used) it was sometimes hard to even look at the stage.

That being said, musically the show was awesome. I described it to Kirsten as "ELO and the Billy Graham Crusade had a child!" at one point. The lead guitarist reminded me so much of Marillion's lead that I thought it was him, but I was mistaken. Their styles are almost identical. TSO's Concert mistress reminded me of River Tam in her body language and energy. The bulk of the string section was filled in with locals. They were introduced as "the San Jose Strings", but I'm not finding anything about them. One of their violin players looked about 15.

In other music news, Kiri has introduced me to Pandora, an online "build your own radio station" service. It starts out by asking you to name a band or song, and then starts playing selections based on a matching system. You can rate each song to improve your station's play list. As you go you can also add bands or songs to mix things up. Currently I'm listening to "Hard Stuff" which9ch I built by entering Judas Priest, Dead Kennedys, Iron Maiden, and Black Flag.

Tomorrow, we're going to make me some mix CDs to take to work, since my CD player is mp3 capable. I'm thinking of taking all my live metal/hard rock and slamming it on one disk. Besides Maiden's Live After death I have a pile of Priest, Aerosmith, KISS and a few others.

This is going to be... interesting.

Home from the dentist (and other places.)

I'll cut to the chase. ( Cut for much detailed ranting about my sorry teeth )

There was one very amusing moment at the dentist's. We were getting ready to take X-rays, and technician said "Now just bite down on.. oh." Sorry, ma'am, but biting is not my strong point these days. So I ended up holding the new-fangled computer X-ray thingie in place for several shots, and not once did my thumb get in the way.

Oh, aurictech? All the people who work at the clinic are Russians. I need some choice phrases to use when shit hurts.

Anyway, after leaving the office, Kiri and I went to Costco to drop off my prescription for Amoxicillian (to reduce the inflammation that has been causing me so much pain) and left without buying anything. Because we had to go to the mall. Turns out we made a mistake with madelineusher's present, so had to fix that, as well as grabbing gifts for my Mom and the power team of isomeme and laurellady. I think everyone will be pleased. Also picked up kshandra's top secret, she's-never-gonna-guess-this-one, gift.

Since we're us, we also bought ourselves stuff. Kiri picked up a Mike Stackpole novel, and I grabbed 1633, simply because while I can read it for free, I like supporting authors by buying their books. Also, I take books to work in case I find myself with downtime for whatever reason.

I think we are pretty much done with Wintergift shopping. Except for some stocking stuffers from Goth-n-Go.

Two freaking months. Sheesh. We are having such a "hard, crunchy foods" party when I get my new teeth...

Fight! Fight! Fight!

GO ARMY!!!

BEAT NAVY!!!

Damn.

Navy: 42
Army: 23

We still have the cooler Academy.