Happy Turkey Day

Today is Turkey Day and I am spending it down here in Florida with my wife and her parents. This is my first visit to Florida and so far everything seems to be good with just a couple exceptions.

Exception one: Egan doesn't like buffet style eating and it seems like the norm down here. Tonight while we were dining at such an establishment, an older man required medical attention so I was a little hestitant to order anything with bones. The restaurant staff says it happens fairly often. I guess this explains why most seemed to be stepping right over the struggling man on the way to the soup bar. Thankfully he appeared to be doing alright as he waved to the restaurant patrons on his way out on a stretcher. Wasn't sure if I should have taken a knee as we were taught in youth soccer leagues, but he was given a round of applause in return as he was whisked off the premises.

Exception two: "We have Coors Light, Bud Light, Michelob, Rolling Rock, and Amstel Light. Do you have any microbrews? Wow, I should have thought once before asking about microbrews. I am in the south, in Florida, in a gated community, and in buffet style restaurant. What the fuck was I thinking?

"Yes sir, we have Mac & Jack's, Sierra Nevada, Alaskan Amber, and Black Butte Porter. While I am it Mr. Snooty, would you like a me to wipe your tree hugging ass too?"

I guess it would have been a reach and way much too ask. I ordeded a white russian instead since I have a weakness for Kahlua and wanted to avoid confrontation. Next time a mojito it will be. Lesson learned --> No microbrews in Florida's gated communities.

Happy Thanksgiving to three or four people that might happen to read this! Gobble Gobble!

Oranges, Turkey, Atomic Bombs, and Joe Smith

Today my wife and I embark on a trip to Florida to visit her father. He and his wife moved there about four months ago from Manhattan. Yes, they moved to the Sunshine State about a month or so before four hurricanes hit. I am interested to see Florida as it is one of the few states, 15 to be exact, that I missed during a cross country road trip in 1998. My wife has always jokingly told me I am not missing anything, but now I will finally have a chance to see the red state for myself. Is it really true where there's water there are gators? I will see. Do golf carts outnumber Cadillacs and Oldsmobiles combined? This will soon to be discovered.

My sole task is to cook the turkey on Thanksgiving. Should be quite fun since I have never done it completely on my own. I have supervised before, but never done the entire thing. At least now I know how to spell brine.

In other sort of unrelated news, here's another example of Egan not listening to lyrics all that carefully. Not sure if you folks out there are familiar with the Ray LaMontagne song Trouble. There's a part in the chorus where he says "I have been saved be a.....woman".... He really carries out the "I have been saved by a" portion where I actually thought he crooned "Alabama". I kept asking my wife if she had heard the Alabama song yet. This past weekend it played on the radio while both of us were in the MINI. Yikes, how could I screw up so badly? Like Ray would sing something so stupid, "Alabama..woman...." I guess this is up there with my other lyrical mishaps for Blind Melon, Nirvana, and Sheryl Crow. We'll save those for another day though.

On other music news, just downloaded How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb via iTunes. The first listen was pretty good. I think they put out a pretty solid album, sure it's no early day stuff... but it's pretty solid in my opinion. Should be nice and relaxing to listen to over the next week. My two favorite non-Vertigo songs are All Because of You and A Man and a Woman. Unfortunately I have to wait on the special iTunes U2 box set since we have Christmas presents to buy for many. Anyone want anything from Egan? Egan Love is free!

My wife told me yesterday that my mom's Thanksgiving is boring. I guess that explains why we never stay in town and why I fled for Canada in my college days. Typically we all go to my mom's house and are forced to watch football by my younger brother, 28 still living at home, since that's all he wants to do. Therefore we end up talking sports non-stop. Not entirely interesting for all attending parties, but who gives a rats ass about them. After we finish eating the turkey it's "bored" game time as usual. Rather painful it can be I must admit. Over the years my large family has tended to stress sports over education, which explains why my blog isn't free of grammatical mistakes. Individuality was tough to come by considering we all were given names that started with E and thrown in a swimming pool at an early age. I have to give my parents credit though since almost all of the names are unique. No Elmers, Eugenes, Ellens, Earnests, Elberts, or Enolas. Here they are from youngest to oldest as I have been reciting since I could speak: Everett, Egan, Ethan, Evan(s)*, Eliot, Elisa, and Emery. And yes, my mom and dad are Elaine and Emery. NO, we aren't Mormon or Catholic.. not that there's anything wrong with that. My mom claims they just wanted heaps of offspring. I really loved it except there wasn't much money left for me by the time I got to college. Financial aid baby. One could call Sallie Mae my mistress. TANGENT: darn, not talking about Thanksgiving anymore and this post is getting too long.

Okay.. I will pick up about the family some other time. It's the holidays and we should just get along. I really don't have any huge beefs with my family anyways. I had an awesome childhood. Somedays I wonder if I ever grew out of those fast food days of my youth. Be good gang!

E-FO

*birth name was Evans Tristan, but went by Evan all the way up to college.

Jude Law is smoking

...however, the movie Alfie sucked. I came rather close to walking out of this movie. If he wasn't so damn hot, it would have been a no brainer. This was one hell of a lackluster movie. Tried too hard to be a male version of Bridget Jones and failed miserably. I just didn't care for his character's plight in the good looking club. At least there were lots of Mick Jagger songs in the soundtrack. It's a darn good thing the next movie of the Jude Law Film Festival, Closer, is getting great reviews. I thought I might have to swear him off for awhile.

For those that have seen Alfie, it was great to know the blonde bimbo from Fox's Ally McBeal found some work in Hollywood. Oh how I miss that intro song to Ally McBeal by Vonda Sheppard. Not sure what's scarier, that I watched the show or that I still know the ladies name that sings the title song. It's no O.C. title song. AND for those of you that haven't seen Alfie, please don't do it. It's a freaking waste of two hours ... but Jude does look hot I must admit.

Gobble, gobble, gobble!

Homage to R.E.M.

R.E.M. was in Seattle for two shows this weekend and I just couldn't justify the $160 it would cost for two to attend. Guess I haven't been to a concert in a while since Sprizee says this is a fairly typical price. I suppose the last concert I witnessed was Peter Gabriel in 2003 and those tickets were around $50 a piece. So I am pathetically at home listening to my REM playlist as if I was at the concert. Not quite the same, but now I can use the $160 that would be used for the R.E.M. tix to buy the complete U2 box set off of iTunes. That's not a shabby trade the way I see it.

Stipe, I still love you and appreciate your outspoken nature this year and over the past 25... give or take few. It's tragic we weren't able to bring the bastard Bush down, but you can't blame us for not trying. Oh and please don't take it personally some curly haired fan wasn't in the crowd tonight. Michael, Around the Sun is definitely your best album since New Adventures in Hi-Fi and should get much radio play time. Your music has personally pulled my through some lows (personal loss) and highs (road trip to Quebec) and all the in betweens. Thankfully there have been a lot more ups than downs. Thanks Michael, Peter, Mike, and Bill Berry (we still think fondly of you).