For the Love of Foo

Well, the big day finally arrived. Last night Heidi and I went to go see the Foo Fighters concert at the Joint. This was my birthday gift to Heidi since she is turning 30 this year and the Foo Fighters are her favorite band AND she has never seen them in concert.

So, back in July I found out that they were going to be in town and I decided to get the tickets. I really wanted it to be a surprise, but there was no way she was not going to hear about them coming to town, so I decided to tell her about it.

I actually don’t know too many songs by them other than the stuff that gets regular air play, so I had to start doing some research and prep for the show. I went out and located copies of their set lists from their most recent shows and decided to put together a playlist for me to “study” for the show. That was what? 8 weeks ago? I’m glad I decided to do it; otherwise I think I would have known about 3 songs.

The concert was at the Hard Rock Hotel at the Joint. I know I have mentioned this place before for other shows, but this show was super-packed. Then again, I think the band is so big now that they play in really huge stadiums. It was a real treat to be able to see them in a place this small. They are playing again tonight too.

So let’s start with the opening band. This won’t take long. The name of the group was Year Long Disaster. They probably played about 8 songs and I don’t think I could have told you a single word. They were boring because nothing they did was original. Everything they played reminded me of someone else. Yawn.

So the guys finally took the stage just after 9 and rocked it for the next 2 ½ hours. I think what I liked best about Dave Grohl is how funny he is. I enjoy their goofy videos, but I guess I never gave too much thought to the personalities of anyone in the band. All I knew about Dave was that he was the drummer for Nirvana. And I didn’t like Nirvana. There. I said it. Couple of songs and that’s it.

So here then is the set list for the show. They changed it up a bit from the one I had prepared, but all in all, I think my prep work paid off nicely. For the acoustic version of Hero listed below, I included a You Tube video that was recorded at our show. With the number of cameras I saw last night, I knew I wouldn’t have too much trouble finding a video today. The video contains some bad language, so I wouldn’t recommend playing it at work unless you have a head set.

1)Let it Die
2)The Pretender
3)Times Like These
4)Cheer up, Boys
5)Learn to Fly
6)Young Man Blues
7)Long Road to Ruin
8)Stacked Actors
9)Low
10)Hey! Johnny Park
11)Monkey Wrench
12)Skin and Bones
13)Marigold
14)My Hero (acoustic)





15)Cold Day in the Sun
16)But Honestly
17)All My Life
e:
18)Gimme Stiches
19)Generator
20)Everlong
21)Best of You

The show was fantastic. I would love to see them again. Plus, Heidi had a great time which was the whole point. She ended up with a t-shirt and a poster. Here is a picture of us at the show.

Color Career Counselor

So lately I have been feeling a bit restless with my career. I think the basic problem is that I feel less creative and more administrative. It leaves me feeling in a bit of a career crisis so I find myself looking at career counseling information. I came across this interesting test today so I thought I would share.

I enjoyed it because it was all about colors. All I needed to do was pick my color preferences and then it spit out a short report on my best occupational categories. This is not the first career test I have taken, but I will say that the results seem to be consistent with others I have taken. I suppose that’s a good thing, right? Except for the tiny problem in that it tells me I should be doing exactly what I’m doing. Rats…that’s what they have all basically said. So if that’s true, then why the restlessness?

I guess I have to go back to the first paragraph. I am not as creative in this job as I have been in other jobs. I guess I just miss it. It was a bigger contributor to my job satisfaction than I anticipated when I took this job.

Anyway, you can take the free test by going here. They will try to sell you a more in-depth test, but I skipped it.

I’m not sure of all of the categories available, but my results pegged me as a Creator and a Social Manager. For the Creator, I was given the following description:

These original types place a high value on aesthetic qualities and have a great need for self-expression. They enjoy working independently, being creative, using their imagination, and constantly learning something new. Fields of interest are art, drama, music, and writing or places where they can express, assemble, or implement creative ideas.

Among the occupations listed were Web Designer, Technical Writer, Corporate Trainer, Author, and Editor. In other words, all aspects of what I do now or did in the past. I am still waiting for the warm fuzzies I should have for making such great career decisions. In the meantime, I am looking at some technical classes offered here for things like Flash and Captivate and Photoshop. To feed the need for learning new things, these make the most sense. Plus I think I am too lazy to learn these things on my own, so I would rather go sit in a class for a day or two and just get it done.

Thundercloud

This is no commentary on the weather. But if you’d like an update, we are finally getting down out of the triple digits for the year…although not this weekend. The week has been in the 90’s but we are warming back up again today. Whatever. Honestly, you can feel a difference between 100 and 110 I assure you. And after 3+ months of it, 100 feels nice.

No, this is about my mood. For many reasons I seem to be walking around with a thundercloud over my head. I came out to the blog today and saw that my last entry was August 29. I scanned over the contents again and realized I had absolutely nothing new to write about and another entry would just resemble that one. Why not just copy and paste the stupid thing and call it a day? See? Thundercloud…..

What used to be a place to come and examine my thoughts has recently become a place to come and realize I have nothing new to say. Does my life have to be filled with adventure daily? No. Lord knows if it was I would just find ways to complain about that too.

I suppose part of the angst is that I can’t complain about work out here. No, I pretty much guaranteed that would be a bad idea. Still, I suppose it’s for the best for all of us that I don’t give myself an open platform to really whine. It must be my self-censorship that is chaffing me in bad places.

So now that I am sitting here thinking about bad moods, I am wondering realistically how long I can actually hold on to it? Have you ever really tried to hold on to one? I suppose if it is really focused on a person or situation it might be easier. But what about just a plain old bad mood? I know what you’re thinking…why would you want to hang on to it? I was just thinking that it might be an interesting experiment to see what’s possible. Unfortunately (for the experiment) I am already distracted and not nearly as cranky.

Here are the top 5 reasons now working against my bad mood today:

1. It’s Friday
2. It’s pay day.
3. I just made a fresh pot of coffee and am drinking it out of my “Cake or Death” mug.
4. Money was transferred into my Keane concert fund today.
5. My cherry pants/ hoodie combination actually matches today. Not that it matters, but it just happened so I can totally classify this outfit as “effortless.”
   

It feels very Seinfeld-esque to spend time talking about nothing, but since it makes me feel better, why not? And speaking of Jerry, have you seen the new commercials with him and Bill Gates? They are really kind of cute. Still, I would have to say my favorite commercials are still the eTrade talking baby and the Tide Stain stick talking stains. THOSE are hilarious. The job interview is my favorite.

Fine…I can’t even keep a bad mood going. I don’t know if I should be upset about it or not.