Today is Free-For-All Friday! Free for All means you can post whatever you want on my blog. Say what you want to say, share a link, complain about household appliances, etc…all you have to do is login and post!
This Virtualbox image allows you to keep up with the development of KDE4 without getting burned by bleeding edge software. It is a slightly updated and fixed conversion of the original Qemu KDE4daily image, and runs on any platform that supports Virtualbox.
Posted by mcangeli on November 30th, 2007 | Comments Off | Aside
A while ago I wrote about how diamonds were a girls best friend. Today, I want to share with you the ultimate online resource for finding the perfect stone for your SO (significant other). Diamonds of the Day is the ultimate stop for Diamonds, Loose diamonds, Wholesale Loose Diamonds. The offer daily deals on loose rocks that are WAY below market average and most seem to be very good quality as well.
In addition to the daily deal, they’ll also help educate you for what to look for in a diamond before making a deal. From where I sit, its almost the best of both worlds (its cheaper most of the time to buy the stone loose and have it set in a setting of your choice). If you’re looking for the perfect rock for Christmas, give them a look.
Posted by mcangeli on November 30th, 2007 | Comments Off | Delusions
It started with a teddy bear. A new British teacher at a school in the Sudan thought it would be fun for her class to name a teddy bear and journal about its adventures through out the year. Its not a new teaching method and its one that has helped kids get in to creative writing and thinking for ages now. This one turned out a little different though. The class decided to name the bear after the most popular kid in the class, Muhammad. She didn’t pick the name the children did and the parents of those children in her class were ok with it.
Other parents at the school were not, and now, the teacher who meant to do good, is serving time in a Sudanese prison for insulting the religion of Islam. What makes it worse is that this supposed “peace loving” religion is calling for her to be beaten or even worse, executed by firing squad. Unfortunately, the British government has its hands tied and can only wait until she is released from prison and removed to the UK. In the mean time, I hope she survives.
Its hard to support a religion that calls for the execution of teacher over the name of a teddy bear. We saw this same outcry over a cartoon in a Dutch newspaper last year and repeatedly in France (who do you think the majority of the rioters are in Paris?). I have no issue with people who believe in their own religion, but when it gets to a point (as it has in the Sudan and other middle eastern countries) where its “MY WAY or NO WAY” something has to be done.
As a country we’ve started flinching every time something negative is said about the religion of Islam. We back peddle and apologize and try to make amends (have you heard about the email sent out at the University of Florida regarding a movie ad that claims “Radical Islam Wants You Dead”) we just make the cause for radicals even stronger.
If the revolutionaries had apologized every time they offended the Crown, we’d still be a part of the UK. I have no doubts that the majority of American Muslims want nothing more than to be accepted as nothing more than Americans and they want no harm to come to the country they’ve grown to love. But there is a radical sect out there that wants the entire world to be under Islamic Law (it’s already been beaten down once back in the medieval times).
I’ve been looking for a gift for a friend who does a lot of online gaming and I think I finally found the perfect (if a little pricey) gift. The AudioFX Pro 5+1 Headset look to be the ultimate gaming headset (complete with microphone). These things have built in surround sound (a must for gaming or video watching) and are durable enough to be tossed in a bag for trips to the local lan party or even further. The only down side I see to them is that they do look a little “geeky” and they’re USB 2.0 (you plug them in the usb port and not a speaker jack) other than that these may well be the best things on the market for gaming.
“Console modder extraordinaire Ben Heckendorn put on his extra large thinking cap when he designed the Audio FX Pro 5+1 headset, a product that is as comfortable as it is functional. The headset has everything you could possibly want, including a noise canceling microphone which is perfect for communicating with your WoW clan mates or for calling your mother via Skype to ask for an advance on your allowance.” - GamePro Magazine July 2007
Posted by mcangeli on November 29th, 2007 | Comments Off | Aside, Techcrunch
Linuxtracker.org is pleased to announce the availability of Gutsy, Drupal, Moodle, Wordpress test environment on the linuxtracker bittorrent network. this is a tar file with tutorials, links, and a Vmware Virtual Machine that has gutsy desktop with Drupal/Moodle/Wordpress preinstalled to become familiar with the packages. Instructions Included
I’m not a big Johnny Depp fan. Until his turn as Captain Jack in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies if there was a choice between watching a Depp movie or cleaning house, I’d almost always choose the house cleaning. Edward Sicissor Hands, Benny and Joon, Cry Baby, Fear and Loathing, you couldn’t get me to sit still to watch them. I saw him as Captain Jack in the first Pirates movie and I thought he was perfectly cast for the part though.
I couldn’t imagine anyone else playing the scattered pirate and he really played it well. It was a fairly believable act and one that has kind of made me a fan, but I still like to pick and choose which depp movies I watch. I also thought that casting him as the eccentric chocolateer in the remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was good simply for the reason that he’s one of a few actors capable of pulling off the eccentricity of the roll of Wonka (though, Gene Wilder is still the one true Wonka).
I liked both of these rolls for Depp and I feel that they kind of brought him out of his shell a little bit. True, he’s always tended to play the odd character in his movies (you don’t see him in too many bruce willis type action movies) and when I saw the trailers for the Sweeny Todd movie thats coming out, it looked right up his alley. I did visit the official Sweeney Todd movie site to see more of the trailer and find out more about the film and I”m intrigued by it.
Its coming out this Christmas (though its obviously not a Christmas feel good movie) and while I may not go see it in the theater (I can’t even remember the last thing I saw IN a theater) I will probably catch it when it comes out on DVD. Depp’s character is consumed with the act of revenge for a life lost when a wealthy englishman sends him away forever and takes his wife and child as his own. Alan Rickman is at his best as the object of Todd’s revenge in this movie and Helena Bonham Carter looks to be good as Depp’s sidekick in this flick as well.
While I don’t know if its enough to get me to become a true fan of Depp, I did visit Sweeney Todd on MySpace to see if I could find out any more about the movie.
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted! View More Thursday Thirteen Participants
Last night was the CNN/Youtube Republican Debate, and to be honest, I didn’t watch any of it. I find political debates boring and besides, Shrek the Halls and How the Grinch Stole Christmas were on last night as well, so it goes to figure that the TV’s in our house were tuned in to those instead (Shrek the Halls was really cute and the girls like it a lot).
I have however, heard all the scuttle about the debate and I’ve caught a few of the clips on line so far and I think Huckabee came out smelling like roses last night in the debate (an overnight poll in Iowa has him as the current GOP frontrunner by 3 points!!). I think the highlight for him came when he said that the first area to go would be the IRS. Romney and Guliani traded punches most of the night between the two of them and McCaine came out pretty strong as well. Really, from what I can see, only two candidates did poorly in the debate and thats Thompson (who’s been such as disappointment all season long) and Paul (who looks to be gearing up for a third party bid when his GOP nomination falls flat).
I like the idea behind the Youtube debates as I think it brings in more of a national feel to the debates then previously achieved and it helps introduce some questions from outside the box. Its nice and refreshing. I just wish they’d find a better time to broadcast them…
Posted by mcangeli on November 29th, 2007 | Comments Off | Politics
So I’ve been looking for the perfect gift to give some people and I think I’ve found it. With the gift of Personalized Flash Drives I can give my brothers something they can use and I can load one for my parents with ALL the photos from the disney trip. Heck, I could even toss the videos I captured on there as well for them.
The neat thing is that they have some pretty cool patterns as well (Snowflakes, Happy Holidays, Thank You, Butterflies etc) for the front of the drive and I can engrave up to two lines on the back side. I think that’d make a pretty snazzy holiday gift don’t you? Though mom might have a hard time figuring out how to use it…
TOP 10 PERSONALIZED FLASH DRIVE GIFT IDEAS THIS HOLIDAY SEASON
Give them to mom with pictures of her grandkids on them (the new Brag Book!)
Give a personalized flash drive to the college student in your family to keep them organized
Give a drive to your nephew who is into making his own music. Let him save his songs on a drive with his name on it
Give one to coworkers and associates, include a Thank You Theme for their hard work
Give it to your spouse with images and notes of affection, maybe even a song?
It’s like the new mix cd, but with the capacity to carry photos too - it’s the perfect gift for teens to exchange!
Give someone a flash drive with an online book downloaded on it (for the family geek!)
Give your customers a Holiday Gift with your corporate logo engraved on it!
Give them out at Trade Shows and other events with your own branding
Give them to anyone who already has everything! Nothing beats the gift of personalization
Ubuntu 7.10 is a great distro the only problem is it needs setting up with java, flash, codecs and lots of other little things, I know its not hard setting up Ubuntu as you can use tools like Automatix, Envy and other programs that makes the process automatic but wouldn’t it be nice if it was already setup for you? like this distro does.
There’s been a lot of hubbub on the intarwebs lately about the latest round of Google Spanking going on over blogs doing paid links and paid reviews. While I happen to disagree with Google on their deranking of almost every blog involved in paid posting or paid links, its their system and they can do how they see fit. The one thing I’ve decided is that its my site and blog and if I want to do paid reviews, posts or show photos of my dog licking itself, no one (be they google or not) is going to tell me I can’t.
Thats why I’m fairly certain that realrank (a precursor to SocialSpark) can help replace Google PR, Alexa ranking and maybe even Technorati rankings with its fairly straight forward design. According to Ted Murphy, the man behind PPP, IZEA, SocialSpark and RealRank:
The formula is relatively simple.
70% weighted towards visitors per day
20% weighted towards amount of ACTIVE inbound links per day
10% weighted towards pageviews per day
Another nice feature is that RealRank is calculated at 2am (est) daily. So you could have an awesome RR one day and the next a not so hot one. It depends on your traffic and the number of clicks through the links on your site. RealRank not only looks at links on your site, but active links (links that get clicked in a 24 hour period) and incoming links as well. It seems to be a pretty robust system.
My rank yesterday was in the 400’s this morning, its around 800. Not too bad, but it could be better. Unlike most ranking systems, the key here isn’t to get a lot of links back to your site, but to generate quality content that people want to visit and link to. Quality seems to matter more in RealRanking more than quantity. Something thats refreshing to see for a change.
This weeks ASMW post comes from the cool weekly email I get from Amie Street. I had heard a version of Somewhere over the Rainbow done on the ukulele a while ago and I liked that version. Todays choice comes not from the artist who did that one, but another version. Jake Shimabukuro has been called the Jimmy Hendrix of the ukulele and its very apparent why. Just listen to it.
I learned how to play the ukulele in school once, and I forgot just how much fun the tune can be…
Why Amie St. Wednesday? Music is in everyones lives. It surrounds us even when we don.t it. This is a way to discover new artist, and share the artist that you enjoy listening to on AmieStreet.com. If you enjoy the music please support the artist. Amie St. Music Wednesday has no affiliation with AmieStreet.com and the opinion about the music and/or artist is the that of the postie.
Jessie is at it again. This time, claiming that the Democratic Candidates are ignoring the african american population, well, everyone except for Edwards that is. Which is kind of surprising when you think about it, he came out and endorsed Obama several months ago (of course that was before Jackson called Obama white). I kind of think that it all comes down to jessie feeling left out of the party.
On another note, the GOP is gearing up for another YouTube debate. I happen to think its more fun to watch the questions that won’t be asked rather than watch the debate itself. But who knows, I might tune in…
In case you haven’t noticed, I haven’t been around much this past week. The family (and by family, I mean WHOLE family, all 15 of us) went to Walt Disney World for Thanksgiving. We were down there from last Tuesday until last night (rolled in the house about 2am). I would have posted daily updates, but aside from getting to sleep at 2am every night network access down there was 9.95 a day and I wasn’t going to pay that.
Needless to say, I have a ton of photos to post (you can check the gallery), some really cool videos I’m going to clean up and post on youtube and then here and a couple of days worth of blogging about the trip to do. Stay tuned!
Edit: There are currently, 1416 photos in the gallery from the trip. I’ll be uploading approximately 130 more in a week or so… Also, I’ll be back dating the blog entries for the trip to coencide with the day it was like I did for the west ward trip…
Saturday was a long day. We were up early and struck off back to the Animal Kingdom so we could see Finding Nemo the Musical and ride the Safari ride. We got to the park and booked it back to Africa and the line for the Safari (which was less than a 5 minute wait, not bad at all). We had a really cool safari and its done a little well (even if it is a little cheesy).
We saw several animals up close (see the Giraffe?) and in their somewhat native habitat (if you can call middle Florida native for a Giraffe). The ride was fun and totally worth getting up and heading out early for. The Safari is a must do in the morning (lines are shorter) as the animals are more active in the AM then in the PM. We saw the top of the lion’s mane but not much else, but the other animals made up for it. Once we were safely back from the safari we made our way over to finding Nemo the Musical.
We’ve seen Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King several times and loved them and Finding Nemo is well on its way to being the next musical hit from Disney. It was really well done, the songs, the costumes everything about the production was top notch and an awesome start on their next broadway hit. I’d go back and watch it again (we bought the cd so I can sing along with it!).
Once done there we headed over to Disney/MGM Studios park. We caught beauty and the beast, and the little mermaid before we met up with Denise and her family for dinner at the Brown Derby. If you go to Disney and miss eating at the Brown Derby, you’re at a loss.
The meal was GOOD. One of the best of the whole trip. Their chopped cobb salad was excellent. Plus our reservations reserved us a seat at the evening showing of fantasmic. A battle of Good vs. Evil in Mickey’s dreams.
It was really well done with the effects (they use a wall of water as a projection screen) and the appearances, the music everything. It was a show you don’t want to miss and yet grace fell asleep through the end of it.
Once that was over we piled in to the rinaudo’s minivan and headed back to the Magic Kingdom. We got there in time to watch the evening’s fireworks (the little green dot thats moving in the upper right of the video is tinkerbell coming out of the castle). It was a very good show (trust me, I know).
We also hit some of the rides. Grace wanted to take me on Pirates, Its a Small World and Peter Pan, we hit all of them except Peter Pan. I was somewhat frightened by Its a Small World. The colors, the puppets, the music, it all seemed like a really bad dream or a nightmare. I wasn’t too fond of it, but Grace liked it so thats all that really matters. We did manage to catch a pretty cool night time parade that reminded me a lot of a mardi gras parade in the way it was done.
The last ride of the night was Snow Whites Adventure which is good. After it, we were in Sir Mickey’s (a shop just outside the ride) and Emma decided she had had enough and proceeded to throw up. Luckily it mostly landed on me and not the merchandise in the store. So I went and got her cleaned up and we headed out towards the entrance of the park on our way back to the cabin. We took the ferry back to the campground (there are, as I have said, several ways to get from most of the resorts to the parks) and made it back by about 1am. Grace continued her streak of closing down the parks at night. I am amazed at how well she did the whole trip.
Today was no different. Even after staying up and closing the park last night, Grace was up by 8 am. We made breakfast (I cooked up some eggs and toast) and got ready to head to Epcot today. We had a lunch scheduled today at 11:30 with some of the Princesses at a Castle in Norway (not really Norway, but the Norway country in Epcot).
It was pretty cool. When we arrived, Belle greeted Grace and Emma and took some photos and signed their books. We sat down to a really really good meal. Grace had Mickey shaped ravioli, I had a BBQ Pork Sandwich, Amy and Denise had a Salmon sandwich and mom had roast chicken. While we were eating the other princesses came around and signed books and took photos. Grace got to meet Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Jasmine (I had my photo take with Jasmine… ).
After lunch we walked around the rest of the “countries” @ Epcot. This time around we didn’t have too much of a chance to go take a look at some of the other stuff (its not really for the younger kids), but we did manage to snag a pint from the Rose and Crown Pub in the England section. Sometime in the afternoon we made our way back to the cabin for a bit of a nap.
We made it back to Epcot that evening for the Magic Hours and the evening firework show. Before the show we made it to the Sea area and rode the Nemo ride before the show. The ride is cool in that it ends at the Aquarium in Epcot. The Aquarium has two dolphins and some other really cool fish that you don’t get to see too often.
That big ball of light in the clip is a giant globe with a couple of matrix screens where the contentets are. It was pretty cool, that and the flames…
After the show we went to the land section, watched the circle of life, rode the boats through the land and the Epcot “farm” it was cool to see the way they planted some of the stuff they’re growing. We also went back to the sea to ride nemo one more time and hit the turtle talk with crush exhibit, which was neat as well. Crush the turtle from Nemo interacts with the kids in a really fun manner.
To end the night, Grace got to see many of the characters. It was a good day over all, but Amy and I both weren’t too impressed with epcot on the whole. It might be more fun when the girls are older.
Morning came early on Thanksgiving day. Bolstered by the fact that we were at Disney, the girls (all three of them) were up by 8 and ready to go. We had breakfast at the cabin and got ready. Grace was in her Ariel costume (since we were going to the Magic Kingdom) and the rest of us were dressed a little warmer due to the overcast skies. We drove to the MK parking lot (which is a mile and a half away from the entrance to the actual park itself) and then rode the monorail over from there. Thankfully this monorail was not like Blaine and it just took us where we needed to go. We saw the Wedding Chapel (a nice site for beach weddings) and some of the other resorts as well.
When we got to the MK we made our way in and headed towards Cinderella’s Castle and the center of the park. Grace had her photo taken in front of Disney and Mickey Mouse and in the WDW Photo they were able to add Tinkerbell to her hands. Its pretty cool. The castle was blocked because of a show so we made our way around the back to the Tea Cups. I wasn’t too sure if they’d like them or not, but as you can see from the video, Emma and Grace loved the tea cups.
After that we rode the Dumbo ride (Uncle Eric joined us for that one) and Grace got to meet Ariel, who was very impressed with Grace’s “fins” and offered to go swimming with her some time. From there it was off to the Bibbidy Bobbidy Boutique for a princess makeover (Not me you dolt!). The boutique is in Cinderella’s Castle and has a crew of “fairy godmothers” working on hair and makeup for little princesses of all ages. Packages range from just hair to full makeover (which includes a costume). Grace of course got the full package.
While G was getting her hair done, Emma and I went and rode the Carousel and the Winnie the Pooh ride which was fun (emma liked the colors on the Winnie the Pooh ride). By the time we got back to Grace and Amy, she was almost ready. The FGM sprinkled half the container of glitter on Grace’s hair (it all came off on my shirt later) and poof, time for daddy to pay the bill! Grace selected Ariel’s wedding dress as her dress (which is one she doesn’t have) and we made our way out of the castle and back towards the front of the park stopping to meet Belle along the way.
While we waited for the parade at the front, Grace had her princess photos taken (which took several tries…). We watched the parade and then made our way back to the cabin around 2pm to rest and cook for the 3pm dinner we were having.
Pops fried a turkey, I made Green Beans, Denise and co brought Sweet Potatoes, Eric and tracy made mashed potatoes, Brian and Tonya brought biscuits and Aunt Denise, Uncle Bill and the girls brought a desert. Dinner worked out very well at the cabin and it was nice having everyone together for a meal. Much better than eating at a restaurant.
After dinner, Amy and Grace headed back to the Magic Kingdom with everyone while Emma and I stayed at the cabin to clean up and sleep. They had a lot of fun riding the rides with Uncle Eric, Aunt Tracy and the Rinaudo clan and Grace rode a couple of rides I wasn’t sure she’d like. She liked Pirates of the Caribbean, Peter Pan and Its a Small world. Grace closed down the park (made it until midnight) for the second day in a row.
Posted by mcangeli on November 22nd, 2007 | 2 Comments » | wdw
Thirteen facts about Thanksgiving and Turkeys!! In no particular order…
The date of the First Thanksgiving is not precisely known though it occured between September 21 and November 9, 1621.
The Plymouth Pilgrims dined with the Wampanoag Indians for the First Thanksgiving.
The First Thanksgiving lasted for three days. (Good thing today’s celebrations don’t last that long, no one would be able to go shopping!)
According to Edward Winslow, a participant in the First Thanksgiving, the feast bconsisted of:
Corn
Barley
Fowl including Wild Turkeys and Waterfowl
Venison
52 Pilgrims attended the ‘First Thanksgiving’ in 1621
Approximately 50 Native Americans attended the ‘First Thanksgiving’ (combined thats a total of 100 people. Thank goodness I only have to cook for 15!)
This ‘First Thanksgiving’ was actually a secular event that was not repeated. A Calvinist Thanksgiving actually did occur in 1623 and did not involve sharing food with the Native Americans.
The first National celebration of Thanksgiving was declared in 1777 by the Continental Congress. However, this was not an annual event.
Each year the President declares a day of National Thanksgiving.
Turkeys have heart attacks. When the Air Force was conducting test runs and breaking the sound barrier, fields of turkeys would drop dead.
Turkeys can drown if they look up when it is raining. (I have an uncle like this as well)
A spooked turkey can run at speeds up to 20 miles per hour. They can also burst into flight approaching speeds between 50-55 mph in a matter of seconds. (My car is barely faster than a speeding turkey!)
Benjamin Franklin wanted the national bird to be a turkey.
Happy thanksgiving!!
Links to other Thursday Thirteens are in the comments!
(leave your link in comments, I’m a dofollower!)
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted! View More Thursday Thirteen Participants
Wednesday started off early. I was out of bed before 8 and on my way from the Animal Kingdom Lodge to the Fort Wilderness Campground Outpost to check in and get our tickets for the day so we could be off and rolling. It wasn’t tricky getting there. Most of the roads at Disney make loops. It was just a matter of finding the right loop. Our cabin wasn’t ready yet, but with tickets in hand I headed out of disney in search of a supermarket. Didn’t find one, but I did snag breakfast from McD’s for the fam.
By the time I made it back to the room at the AKL the girls were all up and bouncing off the wall. There was a Giraffe just out the window which was pretty cool to see first thing in the morning. We packed up (its amazing the CRAP four people need to get by for a week), checked out of the room and headed over to the animal kingdom.
On the whole, Disney is very well laid out and it spans a massive amount of property. You could go for days and never see everything there is to see (we were there for five days and never even saw the stuff in the area we were staying in!). We parked in the AK parking lot and made the short walk (it took less time to walk to the entrance than it did to the tram to get to the entrance) and before you know it we were inside. The park was very cool. We made it around to Camp Minnie Mickey and caught the Lion King show. It was cool. Kind of Cirque like in the way it was done and a lot of fun.
After the show we stood in line and met Minnie Mouse. Grace really got in to meeting the Characters and getting autographs and photos during the time there (I think she enjoyed that most of all). The lines for the characters moved quickly for the most part and it seemed like they spent a decent amount of time with the kids. We left Camp MM and made our way through the park to Africa and the Train to Rafiki’s Planet Watch.
At Rafiki’s we met Rafiki and Pocahontas, the first of many princesses we’d meet, and got to go to a petting zoo. In the gallery, you can see the photos of a cow named cat and some of the other animals there. It was pretty cool. By the time we got done over there it was around 1pm and the girls were getting pretty tired so we decided to head over to the cabin at Ft. Wilderness (Disney’s Campground) and have a rest.
I don’t know what we were expecting, but you can see from the photos that the cabins were pretty nice. A queen (I think it was a queen) and two bunk beds in the bedroom and a murphy bed in the “living room”. Pretty spacious and of course, it includes maid service! Once the car was unloaded and the place kind of moved in to, the girls went down for a nap. Which is a good thing cause amy and I were tired as well. They slept until about 6 or seven and then we headed back out to the Animal Kingdom.
One of the “perks” of staying on property at Disney is that they have special Magic Hours in their parks for resort guests. Wednesday was MH in Animal Kingdom so we were able to go back and ride some of the stuff that we didn’t get to earlier. We met up with mom and dad and made our way to DinoLand USA. Grace and Emma loved riding the Triceratops Spin and Amy and Pops enjoyed the Prime Evil Whirl so much I couldn’t get them back on (check out the video below!). For the last ride of the night I went with Denise and Alex over to Expedition Everest and rode the coaster. It was really well done and the view from the top of the tracks of the park at night was worth it.
We made it back to the cabin and crashed. I think the girls had a fun day at the park, the only thing we didn’t get to do was the Safari ride, but we have plans to come back so we can.
Posted by mcangeli on November 21st, 2007 | 4 Comments » | wdw
The rhythm and blend of melodic lyrics make the choice for this weeks ASMW an easy one. Ford Turrell’s easy style and good blending of everything musical makes for a fun, soulful listen on this track and the rest of the songs on his album. Enjoy the music and have a good Turkey Week.
Why Amie St. Wednesday? Music is in everyones lives. It surrounds us even when we don.t it. This is a way to discover new artist, and share the artist that you enjoy listening to on AmieStreet.com. If you enjoy the music please support the artist. Amie St. Music Wednesday has no affiliation with AmieStreet.com and the opinion about the music and/or artist is the that of the postie.
Surprisingly we were out the door by 7:10am. Granted, we didn’t leave kennesaw for another hour due to dropping my car off at the body shop, but we made good time leaving the house for once. With the Xterra dropped off at CrashMasters,everyone piled in to the van (I say everyone, but really, there was only four of us in the van) and a movie spinning in the DVD player (how the hell did we manage road trips when I was a child?) we made for I-75 South.
The drive down was rather uneventful, I got bored of watching the GPS on my phone after a couple (one) minutes. Outside of the potty breaks, food/gas stops and the slowing down to throw our exact change at the toll booth collector people (yes, that is their OFFICIAL title) we managed to make pretty good time. We pulled in to Disney’s Animal Kingdom lodge around 5pm est and checked in.
If you’ve never stayed on property at Disney World, its a definite must. I’ll talk about the other accommodation’s later, but the AK Lodge is freakishly cool. Animals outside every window, nice staff and very good (if pricey) food. Amy checked us in and since it was our first time we all got first timer buttons (YAY US!). It was cool that we all (except emma) got our own room keys, it made Grace feel important. Once we found our room the first thing we did was open the blinds to the balcony so we could see the cool animals out our window.
The animal kingdom lodge has several style rooms, the coolest ones are the savanna view rooms. These look out over the “savanna” and you can see some of the animals out in the park. Nothing to interesting that evening aside from some antelopes. We left the room and went exploring. Along the way we saw some zebras and a couple of giraffes eating.
The AK has a big hall in the main area where check in is, several restraunts and bars. There seemed to be something going on all the time there and while the place was busy it never seemed over crowded. We found the pool, the hot tubs and the play ground and had a fun evening. All in all it was a pretty good way to spend the first night. Amy and I would like to go back to the AK Lodge sometime when its just the two of us….
He’s old. While he’s not the first to admit it, dad isn’t the spry young thing he used to be. He takes longer making it down the trail head to the campsite these days. It takes a little longer to get him to help move larger objects around the house (though he still manages to do it) and it takes some advil and a beer in the evening to help ease the pain. Its not that he’s inactive, but quite the oposite.
Several years ago, he started the volunteer group at Kennesaw Mountain to help the park with trail work and he actively contributes his time and talents today working at the park (if he’s not at home doing something, chances are he’s at the Mountain working on a trail or a bridge or something). The guy is amazing. Its a wonder he keeps working as hard as he does. Of course, its also because of the work that he see’s a chiropractor several times a month and I own stock in the company that makes Alieve.
Recently, I had the opportunity to use Freeze It Gel. I received some in the mail and I thought I’d give it a go on my lower back pain. I was pleasantly surprised. The gel worked so well on my lower back pain, I gave the second packet to him to try out and he liked it as well. With in seconds of applying the gel, the pain actually melted away. It worked on my lower back and I figured if it worked so well on my constant pain (I hurt my back several years ago swinging grace around in a way I shouldn’t have ) it would work for him.
While his pain comes from the work he puts in helping to preserve one of our nations historic battle field parks, the cooling effect of Freeze It would help him more than it would help me. Freeze IT helps with sore muscles, arthritis, muscle strains and more.
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