A shot of me and my girl on a Sunday afternoon.
A shot of my girl dressed up tonight before dinner.
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Merry Christmas 2011!!!
Well, what can I say? Another year has flown by and Christmas 2011 is coming to an end. Although I have not had the best year in finances, my family has had a decent Christmas and my daughter had a blast. I'm glad I have a video copy of today's festivities to cherish for a long time to come (I would post it here but it was over 45 minutes of opening of gifts). I can say that today has been exhausting as I'm about to go to sleep as I type this. I hope that all who are reading this have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
A shot of me and my girl on a Sunday afternoon.
A shot of my girl dressed up tonight before dinner.
A shot of me and my girl on a Sunday afternoon.
A shot of my girl dressed up tonight before dinner.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Asus Transformer review
I warned you that I was a tech junkie. I have been waiting to purchase a tablet for over 6 months and finally last week I was able to find and buy the Asus Transformer. I will be the first to admit that I'm a fan of what Asus does and because of this I have waited this long 6 month period researching what is out there, reading reviews and giving multiple tablets a hands on. My best friend recently purchased an Acer Iconia. He loves it and I like it as well, only I really wanted to give the Transformer a try. Am I an expert? No way. I am simply a fan of technology. First off, I love the screen. The size is perfect for reading from my Nook account. Books look great. Magazines look incredible. Portrait mode is almost like holding the magazine in your hand, one page at a time. The user interface is easy and seamless after just a few minutes playing around learning the button placement, the Transformer instantly felt comfortable. The weight of the Transformer is among the lightest in its class. After prolong use the weight has not been an issue in my hands. There is very little lag while typing. I have read many reviews that stated lag issues. Maybe this was before the 3.1 update. I will state that typing on the Transformer takes practice. I have big hands and find that my right hand sometimes causes a menu to pop up on the lower right hand side of the screen. Other than that, no issues. Oh yeah, this thing is a fingerprint magnet. Hard to believe isn't it. It is a tablet and it is expected. Buy a cleaning cloth and some cleaning spray. Simple as that. The pricing on this tablet is perfect from whats out there. As of today the Xoom has dropped $100 in pricing and the Acer Iconia has dropped to $399. I feel that this tablet really is perfect for the price and for my first tablet. I am tempted to purchase the accessories that go with it but I am still on the edge. The dock that makes the Transformer into a netbook is a great idea and will add some battery life to a predicted 16 hours. Unbelievable! Finally the question of all tablet questions...Why do I need a tablet? The answer for me is the ease of use. I can turn the tablet on in seconds and look at news headlines, play a few games, stream my entire music collection from Amazon Cloud and surf the web with a very portable device. I often wondered what the role of a tablet might be in this world of tech. It's my version of a coffee table book with the ability to entertain, educate and nearly replace my laptop. I rate the Transformer a 9 out of 10 for a 1st generation tablet from Asus and I certainly recommend it from a price point. I can't wait to see what advancements happen in the next 6-8 months. Here's to Honeycomb 3.2 in the near future.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Focus on Metal Network: Morbid Angel vs Death Metal
Focus on Metal Network: Morbid Angel vs Death Metal: "Greetings metal fans. I have awakened from my slumber and after a week of listening to the newest Morbid Angel release and reading all of t..."
Monday, May 16, 2011
The Day After...
Time for a quick post. It's the day after my 38th birthday and the good news is I don't feel 38. I spent yesterday watching my daughter, hanging out with my best friend and going out to eat for dinner with the family. I got to strum the guitar for a few a few minutes and watched Super Troopers for probably the hundredth time. It was a good day. The downfall of course is going back to work today. Selling cars in rainy weather can be a bummer and it looks like a stormy day ahead of me.
Here's to another day and hopefully another dollar.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
A Story of Life's Journey, Goodbye Lu Perna
Here is an article that was printed in the Bristol Herald Courier today telling of the passing of a homeless man that was wise beyond his wealth. I was fortunate enough to have run into Lu a few times many years ago. He never asked for money and he always smiled and said hello when I took the time to speak with him. I guess I have always had a soft spot for homeless people(a feeling of sorrow and I wished that I had taken the time to learn his story first hand. I will say that he never asked me for money and I offered him a few dollars myself on many occasions. He would, however, accept water for his dogs. If there was ever was a person that was whole, it was Lu.
Goad: 'He chose the life he wanted to live'
BRISTOL, Va. --
A memorial celebration is planned for Lu at 7 p.m. Friday, April 1, at Highlands Fellowship’s Bristol campus on Lee Highway.
A few decades ago, Louis Perna II wanted see the country and figured the best way to behold it would be by foot. For a year he saved his money; then he and his dogs walked away from home in Pennsylvania. They traveled from coast to coast twice, hiked the Appalachian Trail and, somewhere along the way, wandered into Bristol, Va.
Over the years, Perna – or Lu as most people knew him – became a barefoot institution on the roads in the businesses around Exit 5. He had a scraggly gray beard, clothes safety pinned together and was, in every conventional sense, homeless – though his many friends said he had all the home he wanted. In the mornings, he would leave his shack in an overgrown field between two streams and walk wherever he wanted to go. Usually he had two dogs with him, sometimes three, lately just one – a German Shepherd called LuLu.
“He chose the life he wanted to live,” said his friend, Glenn Goad, who runs a State Farm insurance business near Lu’s shack. “He was unburdened, dependant only on himself. He wasn’t concerned with what you thought he looked like or didn’t look like. He was just a man who wanted to live by himself – out in the open.”
At first, maybe 20 years ago, he stayed in Bristol for the summers and went south for the winters. But one of his dogs – and there have since been many – got sick and he didn’t have quite enough to pay the vet bill. He wouldn’t leave a debt behind, so he stayed and worked to repay it. Come spring, he decided the winter wasn’t too bad and the people were nice, and he made Bristol his full-time home.
He never begged. He never met a stranger, said Sherry Taylor, a cashier at the Exxon station on Lee Highway. He knew everybody’s name and came by to tell stories and make funny faces. Taylor’s favorite was his pirate impersonation.
Over the years, he so endeared himself to the people who lived and worked nearby that he was constantly fending off offers of shoes (he had some, just didn’t like to wear them), food (he ate only beans and only once a day) and indoor places to sleep on cold nights (he was tough and he liked it better outside).
“I’d have given that man a key to my house and relax knowing he’d leave it better off than when he came,” said Bristol Virginia Police Lt. Sean Carrigan.
Lu grew up in Hazleton, Pa., near Three Mile Island, and he never quite lost his Yankee accent, his friends say. Years after the nuclear meltdown there, both of his parents died young of pancreatic cancer. Then his sister died, too, and he had no family left.
He was a K9 officer in the Air Force during Vietnam, but he never told his friends much about the war. He was a private person, they said. He wanted to talk about their families or his dogs or the books he was reading – from War and Peace and Mark Twain to the romance novels he gave to a gas station cashier once he’d finished them.
The Bristol Herald Courier tried many times over many years to do a story about Lu and his life outside. He always said he thought it would be vain.
Lu and Sue Williams, founder of the Holly Help Memorial Spay Fund, became friends on a summer day years ago when she saw him in a convenience store parking lot fiddling with his dog’s paw. She wanted to make sure they didn’t need anything and stopped.
“He was greasing up his dog’s pads with Vaseline so they wouldn’t burn on the hot pavement,” she said. After that, she stopped every time she saw him. They had something in common – they both loved dogs nobody else wanted.
On the narrow trail to Lu’s shack, his dogs’ graves lay off to the side adorned with flower pots and a statue of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals. Lu would sit in a folding chair across the path and remember them, his friends said. He once told Goad that “dogs don’t think;” they are loyal and loving and not because of what you look like or where you live.
One was named Bite-cha, a quick-tempered dog he inherited in Texas. He had an Obadiah and a Murphy and a Ralph. He kept a photo album chronicling their adventures, with captions like “dancin” and “alertin.”
“They were his best friends,” said Rhonda Harley, who works at Black Wolf Harley Davidson. “He was never worried about Lu, he was always worried about those animals. Even in the end.”
Just over two years ago, Lu learned he had prostate cancer that had metastasized to his bone, likely caused by Agent Orange exposure in the Vietnam War. He spent a week in the intensive care unit at Mountain Home VA Medical Center in Johnson City. Doctors told him that nothing could be done – he had two years to live.
He got a prescription for painkillers and went home to his shack, where he continued a long-standing competition with a beaver over a spring that ran past his dog memorial park. The beaver would build a dam, Lu would tear it down and the beaver would build it up again. Rain made Lu’s bones hurt, but during one storm, the stream flooded and Lu watched the dam, and the beaver, float away. He told his friend, Goad, that he “had the last laugh.”
The pain got to be too bad to walk like he was used to. He had just one dog, LuLu, left and he worried what would become of her.
A year ago, after decades of only walking, he went to Crabtree Buick GMC, where Jim Clifton, his friend of 20 years, is the sales manager. He said he’d gotten his driver’s license, wanted a truck and liked a little red one sitting on the lot.
It cost just over $20,000 and he paid in cash. He had just a few thousand dollars left in his bank account, Clifton said. He was not an eccentric millionaire, as rumor had it.
Lu drove the truck, with LuLu at his side, to and from his monthly appointments at the VA. He was independent and contrary, Clifton said, and didn’t want to bother anyone with his illness.
Lu was in excruciating pain, but he never complained, his friends said. They could see it in his eyes, his walk.
On his 62nd birthday, he signed a Do Not Resuscitate Order, pre-paid his cremation then gave his book collection to Highlands Juvenile Detention Center. A woman who works at the Harley Davidson store promised to take LuLu to her farm.
Last Tuesday, he met with Goad and said the pain was unbearable. He could barely walk, barely stand up. He gave him all the papers he would need – the funeral arrangements and the Do Not Resuscitate Order.
“He did things his way,” Goad said.
The next day, Lu was taken to the hospital and he held on until Monday morning. He had dozens of visitors.
“Some people always said, ‘poor Lu,’ ” said Lt. Carrigan. “But maybe he’s the one who had it figured out. He lived at peace with the world. He didn’t cause problems; he didn’t have problems. And I’m glad to have known him.”
Once it was all over, Goad found a composition book in Lu’s things. Lu was left-handed so he’d started at the back of the book and wrote forward.
“How have we come to the assumption that you have to be housed, propertied and well dressed in the modern world?” Lu wrote. “True manliness is non-conformity.”
cgalofaro@bristolnews.com
(276) 645-2531
Goad: 'He chose the life he wanted to live'
BRISTOL, Va. --
A memorial celebration is planned for Lu at 7 p.m. Friday, April 1, at Highlands Fellowship’s Bristol campus on Lee Highway.
A few decades ago, Louis Perna II wanted see the country and figured the best way to behold it would be by foot. For a year he saved his money; then he and his dogs walked away from home in Pennsylvania. They traveled from coast to coast twice, hiked the Appalachian Trail and, somewhere along the way, wandered into Bristol, Va.
Over the years, Perna – or Lu as most people knew him – became a barefoot institution on the roads in the businesses around Exit 5. He had a scraggly gray beard, clothes safety pinned together and was, in every conventional sense, homeless – though his many friends said he had all the home he wanted. In the mornings, he would leave his shack in an overgrown field between two streams and walk wherever he wanted to go. Usually he had two dogs with him, sometimes three, lately just one – a German Shepherd called LuLu.
“He chose the life he wanted to live,” said his friend, Glenn Goad, who runs a State Farm insurance business near Lu’s shack. “He was unburdened, dependant only on himself. He wasn’t concerned with what you thought he looked like or didn’t look like. He was just a man who wanted to live by himself – out in the open.”
At first, maybe 20 years ago, he stayed in Bristol for the summers and went south for the winters. But one of his dogs – and there have since been many – got sick and he didn’t have quite enough to pay the vet bill. He wouldn’t leave a debt behind, so he stayed and worked to repay it. Come spring, he decided the winter wasn’t too bad and the people were nice, and he made Bristol his full-time home.
He never begged. He never met a stranger, said Sherry Taylor, a cashier at the Exxon station on Lee Highway. He knew everybody’s name and came by to tell stories and make funny faces. Taylor’s favorite was his pirate impersonation.
Over the years, he so endeared himself to the people who lived and worked nearby that he was constantly fending off offers of shoes (he had some, just didn’t like to wear them), food (he ate only beans and only once a day) and indoor places to sleep on cold nights (he was tough and he liked it better outside).
“I’d have given that man a key to my house and relax knowing he’d leave it better off than when he came,” said Bristol Virginia Police Lt. Sean Carrigan.
Lu grew up in Hazleton, Pa., near Three Mile Island, and he never quite lost his Yankee accent, his friends say. Years after the nuclear meltdown there, both of his parents died young of pancreatic cancer. Then his sister died, too, and he had no family left.
He was a K9 officer in the Air Force during Vietnam, but he never told his friends much about the war. He was a private person, they said. He wanted to talk about their families or his dogs or the books he was reading – from War and Peace and Mark Twain to the romance novels he gave to a gas station cashier once he’d finished them.
The Bristol Herald Courier tried many times over many years to do a story about Lu and his life outside. He always said he thought it would be vain.
Lu and Sue Williams, founder of the Holly Help Memorial Spay Fund, became friends on a summer day years ago when she saw him in a convenience store parking lot fiddling with his dog’s paw. She wanted to make sure they didn’t need anything and stopped.
“He was greasing up his dog’s pads with Vaseline so they wouldn’t burn on the hot pavement,” she said. After that, she stopped every time she saw him. They had something in common – they both loved dogs nobody else wanted.
On the narrow trail to Lu’s shack, his dogs’ graves lay off to the side adorned with flower pots and a statue of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals. Lu would sit in a folding chair across the path and remember them, his friends said. He once told Goad that “dogs don’t think;” they are loyal and loving and not because of what you look like or where you live.
One was named Bite-cha, a quick-tempered dog he inherited in Texas. He had an Obadiah and a Murphy and a Ralph. He kept a photo album chronicling their adventures, with captions like “dancin” and “alertin.”
“They were his best friends,” said Rhonda Harley, who works at Black Wolf Harley Davidson. “He was never worried about Lu, he was always worried about those animals. Even in the end.”
Just over two years ago, Lu learned he had prostate cancer that had metastasized to his bone, likely caused by Agent Orange exposure in the Vietnam War. He spent a week in the intensive care unit at Mountain Home VA Medical Center in Johnson City. Doctors told him that nothing could be done – he had two years to live.
He got a prescription for painkillers and went home to his shack, where he continued a long-standing competition with a beaver over a spring that ran past his dog memorial park. The beaver would build a dam, Lu would tear it down and the beaver would build it up again. Rain made Lu’s bones hurt, but during one storm, the stream flooded and Lu watched the dam, and the beaver, float away. He told his friend, Goad, that he “had the last laugh.”
The pain got to be too bad to walk like he was used to. He had just one dog, LuLu, left and he worried what would become of her.
A year ago, after decades of only walking, he went to Crabtree Buick GMC, where Jim Clifton, his friend of 20 years, is the sales manager. He said he’d gotten his driver’s license, wanted a truck and liked a little red one sitting on the lot.
It cost just over $20,000 and he paid in cash. He had just a few thousand dollars left in his bank account, Clifton said. He was not an eccentric millionaire, as rumor had it.
Lu drove the truck, with LuLu at his side, to and from his monthly appointments at the VA. He was independent and contrary, Clifton said, and didn’t want to bother anyone with his illness.
Lu was in excruciating pain, but he never complained, his friends said. They could see it in his eyes, his walk.
On his 62nd birthday, he signed a Do Not Resuscitate Order, pre-paid his cremation then gave his book collection to Highlands Juvenile Detention Center. A woman who works at the Harley Davidson store promised to take LuLu to her farm.
Last Tuesday, he met with Goad and said the pain was unbearable. He could barely walk, barely stand up. He gave him all the papers he would need – the funeral arrangements and the Do Not Resuscitate Order.
“He did things his way,” Goad said.
The next day, Lu was taken to the hospital and he held on until Monday morning. He had dozens of visitors.
“Some people always said, ‘poor Lu,’ ” said Lt. Carrigan. “But maybe he’s the one who had it figured out. He lived at peace with the world. He didn’t cause problems; he didn’t have problems. And I’m glad to have known him.”
Once it was all over, Goad found a composition book in Lu’s things. Lu was left-handed so he’d started at the back of the book and wrote forward.
“How have we come to the assumption that you have to be housed, propertied and well dressed in the modern world?” Lu wrote. “True manliness is non-conformity.”
cgalofaro@bristolnews.com
(276) 645-2531
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Queensryche: Operation Mindcrime
Track Listing
1) I Remember Now
2) Anarchy-X
3) Revolution Calling
4) Operation Mindcrime
5) Speak
6) Spreading The Disease
7) The Mission
8) Suite Sister Mary
9) The Needle Lies
10) Electric Requiem
11) Breaking The Silence
12) I Don't Believe in Love
13) Waiting for 22
14) My Empty Room
15) Eyes of A Stranger
1988 is the year that truly exposed Queensryche to the world. In May of that year Queensryche released "Operation Mindcrime" and unleashed a rock opera unlike any before or after. The story was original and the music was memorable. This album is considered by fans and critics alike as Queensryche's masterpiece and although the follow up album "Empire" may have had more "hits", Queensryche have yet to create another album that contained the magic that "Operation Mindcrime" conjured. On to the story behind the songs:
The story is about a junkie named Nikki that was saved from the streets by Dr. X. Dr. X took Nikki into his secret underground revolution by brainwashing Nikki and suppling him with fixes. The price? Nikki becomes an assassin that through his brainwashing cannot recall his dirty deeds. The secret lies behind the word "Mindcrime". Once Nikki hears this word, the mission begins. Nikki then meets a former prostitute, now nun, Mary, and falls in love with her. This love seems to start to erase the brainwash affect that Dr. X had worked hard at refining. Dr. X becomes suspicious of Mary and a corrupt priest, Father William, and orders Nikki to kill both Mary and Father William. Nikki goes to Mary and both decide to leave Dr. X's organization. Dr. X reminds Nikki that he is an addict and only Dr. X can provide the fix. Nikki leaves and goes back to Mary only to find her dead and then believing that he was the one who had killed her and never realized it. Nikki then submits to his own insanity and runs through the streets crying out Mary's name, only to be subdued by the police. Nikki is then placed into a hospital with a complete memory loss until he see's a news report on the recent murders and this jogs his memory and then he begins his story.
This album is a must have for any metal fan. This needs to be in your collection as this is a timeless album.
Operation Mindcrime
Spreading the Disease
The Mission
I Don't Believe in Love
Eyes of A Stranger
Now Playing:
Queensryche: Operation Mindcrime
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Back For The Attack
I guess you could say this blog is for the older "metal" crowd out there, however the album that I'm about to review is a classic that should be in every metal fans catalog. Dokken, yes, I know, hair metal, glam metal, whatever metal you want to call it, unleashed this incredible album back in November 1987. I was in high school and I promise you that this album was "Heaven Sent". The album is a complete masterpiece from the album cover, the Dokken Coat of Arms, through all 13 tracks of classic rockin' metal. To quote Ricky Bobby, this album pisses excellence. As a fan of guitars I will tell you that guitarist George Lynch was playing his heart out on this album. Incredible riffs, massive solos and an all around great vibe. Some fans call this Lynch's swansong. I don't necessarily agree, but at the same time I don't disagree. His playing on Back for the Attack is certainly some of the best guitar rock from this decade and unfortunately was the beginning of the end of Dokken. This record made them more popular than ever, it achieved platinum sales status, spawned multiple top 20 hits and within two years the band broke up. Dokken's main line up throughout the 80's was Don Dokken, vocals, George Lynch, guitars, Jeff Pilson, bass and Wild Mick Brown, drums. That was a lot of great talent to be tied in together and unfortunately this would cause the band to implode. Now on to the music:
Track Listing:
1) Kiss of Death
2) Prisoner
3) Night by Night
4) Standing in the Shadows
5) Heaven Sent
6) Mr. Scary
7) So Many Tears
8) Burning Like a Flame
9) Lost Behind the Wall
10) Stop Fighting Love
11) Cry of the Gypsy
12) Sleepless Night
13) Dream Warriors
The album starts off full blast with Kiss of Death. This song screams metal.
Fan Favorite Heaven Sent
Pure cheese, right?
For fans of shredding guitar, Mr. Scary
Another hit, Burning Like a Flame
Now my personal favorite from this album, Sleepless Night
Finally the album closer and a video that defines 80's cheese and hair metal, Dream Warriors
If you are a fan of metal, you owe it to yourself to pick up a copy of this classic record. The good news is that this day and time you can pick this up for a couple of bucks used and even find new copies for around $5.00. Friends, this is one that you can't go wrong with.
Do I even need to say what is now playing on my iPod?
Back for the Attack
, Dokken
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