What defines a true fan? Is it the number of magnetic ribbons and other magnetic bumper “stickers” that you affix to your automobile? Is it having your car custom painted two-tone in your favorite team’s colors? Is it having a vanity plate that states your love affair with a team that could care less about anything but your money? Would affixing team logo mud flaps scream “I’M A TRUE FAN”? Maybe adding a trailer hitch cover with your team’s logo will prove it. Maybe it’s giant team logo on both side doors. Wait…would a tire cover showing your team’s dominance do it? Can you be considered a fan if you only have a team license plate holder?

What if you have all of that stuff on your car? A week or so ago, we were driving behind this fanatic going through Bloomfield, and thankfully we had a camera to take a quick shot of the complete lunacy in front of us while we were at a red light.

I wonder if this person’s house looks like this?

(Actually, that room was professionally laid out by a creative set director, so it looks pretty nice.)

Ask anyone, and they’ll tell you that I’m a pretty rabid fan of the Ravens, as well as some other teams, but I find the above photo of that Hummer over-the-top. Some people just don’t grasp the idea of “less is more”. That Hummer looks like it went through the Strip District and people slapped every poorly designed magnetic bumper sticker on it the way people slapped “kick me” signs on those hapless kids in high school. There’s no way someone would actually drive around with 10 – count ‘em TEN – magnetic bumper stickers randomly stuck onto the back of their car by choice, right?

If you’re going to attempt to show that you’re the big fan in Steeler country, I’m pretty sure the two-tone paint job and license plate holder would’ve said it well enough - especially being a Virginia resident. I’ll even let the vanity plate slide, but the rest is just pathetic. I’ve seen some crazy fan cars over the years for other teams that are equally pathetic, too, but this is too good of an example to pass up the opportunity of pointing out.

The magnetic stickers are so poorly designed and made that I’d be embarrassed to even put one near my car – and this guy has 10 of them…at least that I can make out from this lo-res image (I swear it seemed like more in-person). Buying every crappy piece of discount-quality Steelers merchandise during your tourist vacation to the Strip District doesn’t make you a true fan. It makes you look like an idiot with poor judgment and screams of desperation to be accepted into a fan base that would’ve accepted you even if you wore a Kordell Stewart jersey from Goodwill. This is probably the same person who took that homemade Terrible Towel to the Steelers/Titans game a few week back that ended up getting stomped on by LenDale White after the Titans iced the game. Buy the quality stuff if you’re going to flaunt it. Buy the legit Terrible Towel – a whopping $7, you cheap monkey - if you’re going to swing a yellow towel at a game (the proceeds go to a great cause).

If you have to put stickers on your car, at least put nicely designed ones on there, and please don’t just apply them in a way that looks like you just vomited stickers into every spare spot you could find. It’s okay to see the actual paint on your car – especially on your high-priced, pretentious gas guzzler. I would think someone dropping that type of money on their car could afford some officially licensed stuff that’s professionally designed and manufactured instead of the cheap garbage slapped on there now.

Of course, what I think and what others think isn’t always the same…obviously.

With a new PSL bowling season fast approaching, I made it my goal to get back into the groove on the lanes - whatever groove I ever had, that is. I’ve gone bowling about 6 times since I quit my “serious” league back in September, and fortunately, I’ve been steadily improving each time. I’m starting to consistently pick up my spares, especially right side spares, which is a huge factor in my average continuing to improve. With Megan and Meadows picking up their own shiny new equipment, and Samantha bowling with consistency, we should do pretty well this year.

Anyway, last night was ridiculous. I bowled the best game of my life. My first game was unreal (for me, at least) as I began with a 6-7-10 split. I took out the 6-10, and settled for a 9. Then a slight miracle happened…I struck out. 11 consecutive strikes closed out a new high game for me (279). John, the Arsenal manager who was watching, recommended that I throw an extra ball before I started the next game to see if I could hit 12 in a row, so I tossed a 12th ball down the lane. It was the first ball that I missed the pocket with, but in all of it’s Brooklyn glory, all of the pins kindly fell for me. I’m not sure if I’ll ever throw 12 strikes in a row again, but it was exciting. It’s sort of depressing to think that I might never top that game unless I roll a 300, but I’m still pumped for the new league to begin.

“Nine-dash Heroes” - our team name inspired by one of Davis’ many nicknames - hits the lanes January 15th. Here’s to a fun season, and hopefully our third consecutive PSL championship season (summer kickball, fall softball, winter bowling?).

It’s been a while since I saw a commercial so hilarious that it actually caused audible laughter from me. Luckily, the Snuggie commercials are here to help introduce a little chuckle in our sometimes difficult times.

Have you seen this ridiculous thing on TV yet? It was curiously funny when they showed people wearing it around their house, but when they show the people in Snuggies around a fire and cheering at an athletic event, I lost it. Wow, is it bad…

Get yours today!

Okay. I received this team photo of the 2008 Steelers the other night when I was at the tour, and the designer in me immediately screamed, “what the hell?”.

I felt embarrassed for the Steelers. I’ve received Ravens team photos in past years, and I even picked up the Browns team photo this year at the Ravens/Browns game in Cleveland. Both are of impeccable quality compared to the Steelers photo. It’s not like the actual photography is bad or anything. I’m even okay with the idea that the Steelers organization thought that it would be a great idea to shoot the team in one location and Photoshop them onto an old Heinz Field photo background. I mean, maybe the weather was bad or something and there was no time to reschedule. Whatever. What I’m not okay with is the execution of the whole thing.

Now, you’ll probably have to roll over to the Flickr page where I have the scanned image hosted to see the details, but think about this stuff as you chuckle.

1. Lighting. If you’re going to superimpose the team into a location different from your team photo shoot, please at least create common lighting by paying attention to shadows. Seriously. If you look at the background, the light is coming from the southwest and the sun is still high (see how the shadows are cast on the scoreboard from the Heinz Field sign). The lighting on the team is straight-up indoor shooting with the lighting coming from both sides, probably slightly above head level, as evidenced by the shadows cast off of the players onto the coaches’ white polo shirts.
2. Shadows. Whoever photoshopped the team onto the background obviously has no idea about light and the shadows cast from different lighting. He or she has no idea about how distance affects the way a shadow is cast. In fact, I’m not even sure if that person knows how to apply a drop shadow in Photoshop. It looks like the shadow was created with the brush tool and someone with a twitch. Regardless, it was applied with no effort. The soft shadowing that surrounds the players on the bottom make them look like they’re floating. Note to designer: these guys would be sitting on the ground. That means the shadows should be shorter in distance and hard because of the object that is casting the shadows has a close proximity to the surface. Plus, I understand that the photographer gave you conflicting lighting to work with, but at least go with the shadows that the sun would create. That means that the guys standing in the back row shouldn’t have any shadows at all. Or are they so team-oriented that they are constantly surrounded by a noticeable aura of black? Maybe I should be asking Andy Lizanich as he’s the one with the most noticeable glow. Also, the shadows are way too soft, and don’t have nearly the level of variance that should be there. Floating people…so frustrating.
3. Outlining. This might be the only thing our little Photoshop “expert” might be capable of. Congratulations. We always need outliners here at my job to trace t-shirts and camis. Now stop embarrassing yourself and get a less high-profile gig.
4. Creating cohesion between the background and the faked foreground. This is where the real observation and detail shouldn’t be ignored…if you’re a good designer…because this is where some of the magic happens. If the players are sitting on grass, would the lines where the players’ asses meet the ground be a perfect curve? No, you moron. The grass would create a textured meeting point. Copy some grass, scale it and put it over their gold asses, shoes, etc. Apply to the floating footballs as well. Also, if you want two Steelers helmets in front of the team, please don’t just clone one and leave it at that. Please change some of the details, so it doesn’t look exactly the same. The only thing that looks convincing on the picture is the damn helmet in the grass. I guess that’s why the designer just copied it. I think that was actually shot on the grass.

Although, maybe I’m being too hard on this person. It’s not his fault that he was given a task way out of his league. It might not be his fault that the art director was a moron and hired a skill-less putz with no observation or technical skills. It’s also probably not his fault for deciding to ignore the lighting and match it to the background. I could see if this was some small-time company with no budget for marketing, but this is a NFL team. No matter how small of a market your team is in, you should be able to get better workers than this. It’s an embarrassment that an organization with as much of a successful history on the field can’t pull it together to get the damn team photo right. I know most don’t care and won’t notice, but for me, this is ridiculous. Note to all employers: Stop hiring awful designers. All they do is surround us with awful design…and people are accepting the crap as the norm. Stop it. Seriously. Stop. Help make the world at least look better.

Last night was pretty fun. I mean, everyone knows I’m not a Steelers fan, but having an opportunity to tour their practice facilities and even participate in a punt, pass, and kick competition on their indoor practice field made the night pretty cool.

I headed over straight from work since their headquarters is basically right next to AE’s home office. We had about a half-an-hour to just play around on their indoor field. Since I throw a football about as accurate as Jordan Palmer, and the punting game was going to be all luck (pinning the ball as close as possible to the goal line without going into the end zone), I just practiced kicking field goals…and man, was it fun! I’ve never tried kicking field goals, but I always assumed that - as a soccer player - it would be pretty natural. During our warm-ups, I was able to hit the short stuff with ease (<30 yards). I moved up to 40-yarders with ease, as well, but I started missing once I set up at the 40-yard line. Since that would be a 50-yarder, I wasn’t really bummed about missing from there. I had the distance by at least 5 yards, probably more, but I just kept pushing the ball right. It was still fun, regardless. I could’ve practiced kicking all night…

I ended up doing awful in the pass, punt, and kick competition, though. My inexperience with throwing a football (other than a Nerf when I was 10 years old) showed as I couldn’t hit the dummy once. Pinning a ball via punt from the 30 is really difficult, as well. My only effort ended up bouncing into the end zone. Then my field goal kicking competition ended with me missing a seemingly easy 25-yard field goal. It really wasn’t a big deal, though. The prizes were cheap vinyl footballs with the team signatures printed on it. I wanted to win, but only for the pride. Hopefully I get drawn to go again next year. I’ll be practicing up.

After the competition, we checked out the locker room and ate in the team cafeteria. The locker room was pretty cool. It was simple, but it was neat to see each players’ locker. I thought it was sort of ironic how Hines Ward had some Bible verse about not being vain and staying humble or something…then in his second locker, he had a poster of himself. Troy Polamalu had a bunch of religious stuff, and Big Ben had a little photo of who I presume are his grandparents. Willie Colon had a bottle of Patron in his locker…I wonder if that’s to deal with all the blame he receives when Ben gets sacked. He and Heath Miller both had crazy masks hanging up, too. Not sure what that was about.

The night ended with a brief appearance from Mewelde Moore. He was a replacement for Deshea Townsend, who couldn’t make it. I got a photo and an autograph from Moore on this year’s team picture, which is what I’m going to complain about in my next post after I get it scanned. It’s dreadful. All-in-all, though, it was a fun night. It’s not what I wanted to win when I entered a raffle for tickets to the Dallas game this coming weekend, but whatever.

I can’t believe I never reviewed the movie “30 Days of Night”, but I picked up the King of Leon CD “Only By The Night”, and the first track (“Closer”) is mesmerizing. I think I find it so good because it immediately reminded me of 30 Days of Night, and how tight that movie was. I have no idea if the song was written about that movie, but if it wasn’t, it would’ve been a perfect fit for it. Frickin’ moody and tight as hell. “Closer” started me off on the right foot as I went through the entire album a good 10 times. I think the first half of the album crushes the later songs, but it’s a solid listen all the way through.

Anyway, watch 30 Days of Night, then go pick up the latest KoL CD. The first song will kick your ass when you couple it with the vision of the movie. It’s a solid album and the first 4 songs are worth the purchase alone. The album averages 3.9 stars in my iTunes library…an average that may go up the more I listen to some of the lower-rated songs on there.

I went to the Ravens/Browns game yesterday thanks to Ticketmaster having some extra seats available. Despite being in the very last row, I was really excited as this might be the only Ravens game I get to this year. Plus, while the picture seems like the seats might suck, I don’t think there’s a bad seat in Cleveland Browns Stadium.

After going to eight games and only seeing two wins last year, I was weary of making another drive to see them play, but this Ravens team just seems different. I was so excited when the Ravens drafted Joe Flacco, but never expected him to play this year. Sure enough, 8 games into the season, the guy is playing pretty well and helping to lead the Ravens to the same number of wins (5) as last year with eight games remaining. Yesterday’s game just showed how much he’s improving with each game. He still drove me nuts when missing wide open receivers down field, but that should come at some point. He threw some great passes into really tight places when it mattered yesterday, and the conversion of a third-and-long (16, I think) deep in his own territory kick-started the Ravens comeback.

The diminutive Ray Rice - who I was touting as a serious running threat this year after seeing him in training camp – came up huge yesterday, rushing for 154 yards on just 21 carries while filling in for Willis McGahee. It’s a shame that Le’Ron McClain is getting the short-yardage TDs in the red zone after Rice’s efforts, but I’ll take it. That combo worked for the Steelers a few year back when Bettis got all of the TDs after Duce did all the hard work, and if it keeps working for the Ravens, so be it. The dude is exciting as hell to watch…when he’s not dropping kickoffs, that is.

The biggest thing for me yesterday didn’t really revolve around the rookie players as much as it did the Ravens rookie head coach – John Harbaugh. For all of the question marks surrounding his hiring…you know, “can this young guy control a veteran-laden team”, or “is an untested coach going to be able to turn this franchise around after a 5-11 season?”, yesterday’s come-from-behind win definitely showed me that the Ravens have a turned the page in a lot of ways.

With the team trailing the Browns by 14 in the third quarter and the momentum clearly going against the Ravens, I was guilty of thinking this Ravens team was the same one I’d been watching for the last decade. A team that would let their heads get too into the game. A team that would give up and throw fits at the first sign of adversity (or maybe throw flags into the crowd). Down 14 and watching Flacco get sacked deep in the Ravens territory on 2nd down to set up a long 3rd down, the Ravens offense did something none of us fans were expecting. They got the 3rd-and-long…on a pass! I think it was an 11-play drive in total, topped off with a McClain rushing TD that brought the Ravens to within 7.

From there, the game was all Ravens. Some strong defensive plays, and the incompetence of Browns receiver, Braylon Edwards, who failed to bring in a perfect pass from Derek Anderson gave all of the momentum to the Ravens, who would take the lead after a 60-yard run by Rice set up Matt Stover’s 3rd, and final, field goal of the day. Once the Browns were forced to take their game to the air, the Ravens started blitzing and forced Anderson into errors – one of which was a pick-six by Terrell Suggs. 24 unanswered points later, the Ravens were in cruise control.

The amazing thing was that the Ravens didn’t give up. The drive, spirit, and discipline displayed in their comeback showed me that John Harbaugh’s philosophy is coming to fruition. This same team under Billick would’ve folded immediately when things started going against them. While the Ravens realistically may not make the playoffs without 11 wins, the fact is that this team has put itself in the position to win in 7 of its first 8 games this year. Each game has shown an improvement, albeit against some less-than-stellar teams. With the Ravens coming into this season as a team dubbed with the ole “rebuilding” tag, they’ve outperformed everyone’s expectations, and with a half of the season to play, their season still has endless possibilities.

It’s amazing that this team, led by a rookie head coach, quarterback, and yesterday, running back, could even be in this position. Here’s to a great second half of the season. I hope this team continues to improve because they’re finally playing exciting football! Go Ravens!

…and a good offensive line, a quarterback that doesn’t hold the ball forever, avoiding huge penalties on offense, and a defense that can actually stop game-winning drives - none of which the Steelers had yesterday during the Giants 21-14 victory over Steelers.

I was fortunate enough to go to the game yesterday, and it was a lot of fun. I love going to football games as a neutral spectator because I don’t have to invest my energy into either team, and the fans don’t bother me because their anger is directed in other directions, mainly other fans. On that note, it was crazy how many Giants fans were at the game. Seriously. It was very similar to the type of Steelers fan turnout you see in other stadiums. Their numbers definitely created an interesting atmosphere in my section with the jawing going back and forth all game. The real comedy is that the people who wanted to start stuff with the Giants fans in front of us were actually the older Steelers fans, not the typical young, drunk fans.

Anyway, the Steelers looked like crap against the Giants. I mean, aside from two big play touchdowns, the Steelers couldn’t move the ball at all. Ben couldn’t find receivers open even when he had time, which probably helped aid in his 5 sacks and 16 hits. The guy just can’t see the field and holds the ball way too long. Either that, or Santonio Holmes is so good that he just gets open faster. Um. Right. Some of his interceptions were so bad and there’s no excuse for them. The sad part is that Ben is in his fifth year and just got a huge pay day, yet he’s showing that he still plays with the same ignorance that he had the past 4 years. He looked no better than that rookie named Flacco yesterday. I don’t care if he has success avoiding sacks and extending plays from time to time. The reality is that people are going to start getting a good hold on you and taking you down, and we’re seeing that more and more. For all of the amazing plays he’s made, he’s also made a ton of awful ones while trying to make something out of nothing. He still hasn’t learned to throw the ball away fast enough. He’s always trying to Favre it out when it’s not the right decision. I like the gunslinger mentality sometimes, but yesterday he helped throw the game away with 4 interceptions – 2 of which were definitely on him. I’m going to continue with the thinking that his strong statistics have a lot more to do with who’s been around him than with Ben himself. When the game is in his hands, he’s so hit or miss against good teams. At least his QB rating yesterday was better than his appearance in Super Bowl XL.

While I wasn’t amazed by the Giants, they were impressively consistent all game. Their running attack was stifled by the predictably strong run defense of the Steelers, but they just kept pounding away at the Steelers with the same enthusiasm for the entire 60 minutes. While the Steelers were hit hard by some holding penalties on crucial plays, and the loss of their long snapper, the fact is that the Giants won because they just kept hammering away and the minute the Steelers offered up some momentum, the Giants’ consistency was there to take it all out of Heinz Field and back to Jersey. The Giants play for 60 minutes, and teams like the Ravens, who have lapses throughout the game, are going to pay the price if they don’t stay disciplined for the entire game. The fact that Eli didn’t get sacked once by the Steelers also shows how good the offensive line is for the Giants. They win with consistency, discipline, and solid play from their quarterback. Those are the three things that the Steelers just didn’t have yesterday.

I’d also like to add that I still believe that Mewelde Moore is the best running back on the Steelers. Although it’s purely hypothetical – making it completely useless, yet I’ll still bring it up – I have to believe that Willie Parker wouldn’t have come close to 84 yards against the Giants. His inability to bounce outside and push up the middle would’ve left the Steelers with even less of a running attack. It’s a shame that Willie will probably regain his starting spot despite the fact that Moore’s performances the last few weeks – including his game changing play in overtime against the Ravens – could possibly be the main reason the Steelers don’t have a few more in the loss column. I like the way Mewelde plays. Hopefully he doesn’t get pushed back down the depth chart without a fair fight.

Oh, and the long snapper thing was amazing. Yesterday, Greg Warren, the Steelers long snapper ended up hurting his knee in the third quarter. It’s amazing how that changed the game. After the Giants pulled within two points at 14-12 with another field goal, and held the Steelers deep in their end, Pro Bowl linebacker, James Harrison, filled in for Warren at long snapper. The result was a snap that went way over the punters head and out of the back of the end zone for a safety that would tie the game at 14-14. You knew at that point that the game was over, and I seriously couldn’t believe how I never really thought much about how important the long snapper was. I mean, when’s the last time you even thought about the long snapper. They rarely make mistakes and only do one thing, so they sort of fly under the radar. Never again.

Of course, I don’t really care that the Steelers lost…at all. In fact, on a day that the Ravens would crush the hapless Raiders at M&T Bank Stadium during the one o’clock game, this Steelers loss was a nice way to keep the division close (although, I still don’t know if the Ravens can beat a team like the Giants, either, to win the division). Regardless, today sees the Ravens only one game back with plenty to play for. We’ll see what happens after next weeks game.

The best seats I’ve ever had at a NFL game!

“If you build it, they will come.” On an uncharacteristically humid night in mid-October, that statement applies more to the idea that if you let the other team build a commanding lead, eventually AE’s team Indigo Heather would show up to play. And play we did.

Despite a 3-2 record and a number three seeding, careless fielding errors and inconsistent hitting during the 5-game regular season had left our softball team in a cup-half-empty mentality going into the playoffs. While we did take the eventual number one seed to extra innings before losing a scrappy week 3 affair, the consistent batting and fielding of both the Cardinal and White teams – number one and two seeds, respectively – made our team the long shot going into the playoffs.

In the first semifinal game of the night, we faced the White team, the team that trounced us 21-10 in week 4 of the regular season, and the number two seed with a 4-1 record. During the regular season meeting between our two teams, team White took advantage of a slew of fielding errors and slumping bats at the plate by our team, to clearly show who the better team was. Fortunately, we left our inferiority complex far from the weathered Gardner Field in Troy Hill.

A combination of simple hitting, aggressive, but well-executed base running, and solid fielding allowed our underdog team to jump out to an 11-3 lead going into the bottom of the 4th inning. Unfortunately, our team’s penchant for fielding errors came back after a solid start. A nine-run bottom of the 4th, saw the White team jump out to a 12-11 lead. Fortunately, we didn’t let being on the losing side of the score line affect us like it would’ve earlier in the season. Quickly regrouping, our team in all it’s indigo heather glory continued putting up runs with everyone pitching in and hustling around the bases, regaining the lead and never looking back. Despite a strong push in the final innings from the White team, Mike’s relief effort on the mound and the sure hands of the fielders behind him and in front of him – namely Kourtney’s timely tag at home – allowed our team to complete the upset none of us could’ve have imagined during the regular season. It was a team victory in every way with players like Carmen outrunning throws to first, Meadows hitting hard and trucking the baselines, and Eric finding his form at the plate at just the right time of the season.

The other semifinal game pitted the confident Cardinal team against the underrated fourth seed - the Yellow team. In watching Yellow produce runs at ease against the previously undefeated top seed, it became obvious that we were going to have our work cut out for us regardless of who the opponent was in the final. Yellow demonstrated how to win with effective hitting up the middle and through the infield gaps while backing up their offense with flawless fielding – things that our team had only been able to demonstrate in spurts during the regular season and semifinal game. After the Yellow team effectively acted as the Cinderella team, downing the previously-dominating Cardinal team, the final showdown was setup between us and Yellow – the three and four seeds. The battle between the two underdogs and a demonstration of consistency versus inconsistency was to follow.

First, there was the erratic inconsistency of our team against the impressive offense of Yellow, resulting in a 7-1 lead after the first inning. While we began fighting back, time just seemed to be running out on a possible comeback, as Yellow continued to exceed or match our run production inning-to-inning. With the game sitting at 13-5 in the bottom of the 5th, Stinogle got us started, followed by myself, and Raina – all three of us would touch home plate before the end of the inning. With the game sitting at 13-8, Yellow managed to knock in one more run, but that would be the last run of the night for them, as the final two inning were all Indigo Heather.

The comeback gained steam in the bottom of the 6th. Down 6 runs, our inconsistency actually paid off, as everyone pulled together and showed up to play. Every batter picked up his or her game, both in the batters box and on the bases. Starting with Jeff’s two-run homer, the final 4 runs in the 6th inning came with two outs. With Yellow obviously in shock at the rapid shift in momentum, and the game knotted up at 14, the championship was now in our hands. Literally. The top of the 7th would require only four fielders – Valenty, Kourtney, Konrad, and Raina. With Valenty pitching to Kourtney, the first batter popped out to Raina. The second batter grounded straight to Valenty for an easy out to first basemen, Konrad. While the third batter made it to first, Raina’s ridiculous catch on a line drive over her head against the fourth batter ended the top of the 7th, and provided us with a chance to end the game with the next run. The once cup-half-empty team was now overflowing with confidence and hope, the end result was no longer going to be a surprise.

Kristen, who had played two superb games at 2nd base, stopping nearly everything that came her way, led off the bottom of the 7th inning with a great single that got through the infield. Next up came Valenty – AE’s playoff quality pitcher, who struck out in his previous opportunity to be a hero during the regular season. Fortunately, Mike wasn’t going to let himself make the same mistake twice, hitting a ball that seemingly traveled about 300 feet into left field with no hope of being caught. While the unfortunate initial result was a ground rule double because the ball ended up lost in Gardner Field’s thick outfield ivy, his monster hit advanced Kristen to 3rd base with no outs. With Ryan up next, the only meal on the menu was a deep fly ball, and that’s exactly what he delivered. What ensued as Kristen crossed home plate was reminiscent of the type of celebrations we saw when the Red Sox downed the Yankees in 2004 – cheers, chest bumps, high fives, and a newfound camaraderie between the once down-and-out players that were now champions. Go AE, er, Indigo Heather!

So…in the process of rating my iTunes music library, I came across this little recording I did about 2 months ago of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Simple Man”. While it’s very raw and sort of boring, I figured that I might as well put it out there. This was actually the first song I recorded in preparation for recording some of Aaron’s requests from way back when. Some of those requests are forthcoming, but this recording test – the first with my shiny, semi-expensive microphone, and my not-so-new-anymore Taylor – is at least my attempt at NOT being a perfectionist AND not hording recordings for my own personal enjoyment. I was never pleased with it, and Davis can attest to my inability to “let go” of songs.

This recording was also for Lisa. Now, she won’t have to request it if I see her again. She can have it to listen to whenever the hell she wants to! Ha ha. Enjoy…or not.

Simple Man (9.1 MB) (please right-click and save…)