Celeb Mourning?

I came home tonight with the full intention of posting about recent celebrity deaths. I open up Google, I look for images to use, then I make an outline of what I'm going to post. Afterwards, I put up a title then post.  I'm pretty sure that's what most bloggers do, but not tonight. I was sidetracked when I noticed the volume of celebrity deaths in June.

It wasn't that I was blown away, I just figured, there are many people who have contributed a lot to society that would not get mentioned. I have heard over and over that 'these things happen in three's', but they don't, they just get noticed in three's. We mourn their loss not because we know them, we mourn them because we feel a part of our childhood passing away or we feel a chapter in our lives closing.

I remember watching Cannonball Run as a child. I thought it was hilarious. I wasn't surprised to hear about Dom DeLuise passing, but I was sad because I remembered not having a care in the world and watching a silly movie with my Dad. Ed McMahon's passing also was no huge shock, but when I reflect as you saw in an earlier post of watching Johnny Carson, I felt those late nights when Mom let me stay up pass away.

Michael Jackson sudden death hit us because his death was so unexpected. Those of us fortunate enough to remember the Thriller debut, all felt that sense of loss hearing that Jackson had died. I even had my parents buy me a faux leather jacket as a child because I thought it was a cool thing to do. I never met the man, but I looked back at that page in my life and realized it was so long ago.

Even loud but effective pitchman Billy Mays struck me, but not because of some childhood memory, but because of the recent fun that my circle of friends has had watching his dubs on YouTube or talking really loud like Billy did for laughs. I felt that part of our lives closing.

The beauty of life though is that we live on to make new memories, to mock new celebrities, to revere others and to enjoy them with our friends. It's not vain to feel sad and miss them, in fact, I think it makes us all kind of normal. Even when dealing with such a morbid subject we all at least still have today.

It's a Wedding

This weekend Janine and I took off for Lynchburg to attend our very good friends' wedding. Jessi and Sam tied the knot over the weekend at her grandmother's house. Everything of course was beautiful and we had a good time. I'm very happy for them both, they are two souls that have so much in common and everyone can tell they really complete each other. So good for them, I'm very happy to know them.

I thought the humidity was going to kill me though. I forgot all about that thin mountain air!

Janine and I stayed close to our hotel Saturday night, venturing out to enjoy some Japanese take out and avoid the thunderstorms. Sunday, we went to their friend's house to throw down and enjoy their pool. The food was good and we had a good time. We're glad we finally got to hang out at least for a minute with everyone and just have fun.

We have some pictures, but I haven't bothered to unpack the camera, so I stole one from Jessi's photo stream on Flickr. I don't think I'll get a take down order, and even if I do, I'm going to declare fair use! Again, Mozoltov to the bride and groom!

Hooray for Youth

As I posted a couple months ago when talking about the signifigance of services such as Twitter, Youtube, Flickr, etc in this world in getting news out quickly, the social internet comes through again.

As we know last week, elections were held in Iran with predictable results, but instead of the young men and women of their country accept those obviously rigged results, they began to take to the streets. With those services at their disposal, with an educated and engaged youth culture, and with the desire for equity and fairness that I know every Iranian posses, we saw the protests grow. But we did not watch the protests on traditional news services. They had very limited coverage with what was going on in Tehran and surrounding areas. And what can be better than this?

They're young. They're really freaking young. The next generation is not a waste, they may save us all!

People got to see the struggles and inspiration of these people through services such as Twitter from people out on the streets like Madyar. Now be advised, there are graphic images from the protests, but I cannot help but feel pride for them as they take a stand. I posted a couple pictures here to give some a general idea, but unfortunately that's all our traditional media is doing too. What a shame to see journalism die in a pool of it's own bias and self importance.

Cake Failure

I have a sweet pick this week. Cake Wrecks is a blog that displays some of the more delicious errors made in cake decoration. A lot of the cakes show common misspellings, while other's just show someone's poor taste...not in cakes, but in the theme or design.

It's like icing on a cake!

I could probably spend all day with the cake puns, but I'll spare you the tasty details. Please remember to save me a piece!

(update of sorts) I forgot to give the nod to Jessi for reminding me about this blog!

Sixty Five Years Later

Today Americans, Canadians, British, and French along with the other Allied countries during World War II remember the sacrifice and bravery of the men that stormed Normandy Beach in France on this date 65 years ago.

I've had the distinct honor of once speaking with a veteran of D Day and that conversation is something that will remain and haunt me the rest of my life. We've all seen accounts on video and in pictures of this bloody day, but to hear someone recall the sights and smells of that day is both vivid and sobering. Most of these men were teenagers, yet to live their own lives,  but they gave up that opportunity so that we call can enjoy these freedoms today.


Being in Virginia, we have a dubious distinction related to D Day. Bedford County where I used to live is also known for having the most men die on that day per capita. Out of thirty men, twenty are believed to have passed that day which is why the D Day Memorial is in Central Virginia. They were part of the Company A 1st battalion 116th infantry. It's believed this outfit was part of Stonewall Jackson's unit during the Civil War. Take a minute to read about them here. 

I swell with pride at their service, I feel pain and loss knowing they gave so much on this day sixty five years ago. We can never be as great as they, but we can all remember to stop and show our gratitude sixty five years later and beyond.

Around the Yard Again

Our magnolia tree, ironically named Shelby has started to bloom.

And yellowy white it is!

Plenty of green everywhere else.


I'm not sure what kind of house plant this is, but she's all plant.

Here's Conan

Last night was pretty historic in the realm of television and trivia.

As everyone knows Conan O'Brien took over as host of the Tonight Show replacing Jay Leno who has retired/moved to an earlier time slot. This was the first change since I was in high school.

I remember growing up and going into high school watching The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. I can remember his last shows and when he was replaced by Leno. Jay had it rough, there was no way he or just about anyone alive could replace Mr. Carson, I thought.

But over the years, he did OK. Janine and I were starting to regularly watch Leno on The Tonight Show and I always got a kick out of Jaywalking and Headlines. When winding down topical humor is hard to beat sometimes. More than anything, I know that Conan did not have the daunting task that Leno did replacing someone as legendary in television as Johnny Carson.

It makes me feel older seeing this transition, but I really look forward to seeing Conan hosting The Tonight Show. I think it's going to be a lot of fun and more and more people will return to that old tradition of falling asleep with the television on.

Take it away, Johnny!

Chicago Again!

I realized that it's been over ten years since I was in Chicago. I left under bad circumstances and at the time swore I'd never go back. I did leave a loophole in that promise to always be ready to return on business. I've had layovers in Chicago now the last two or three times I've traveled, but Thursday and Friday of this week, Chicago was my destination.

I attended one of those fun industry conferences complete with vendors, speakers, break away groups, you get the idea. The conference actually was very productive.  I learned a lot. Everyone was nice. It's good to be able to network and meet so many people in our industry looking to improve and change things that I never foresaw when I first got into insurance. I hope I can take what I learned with me in my future endeavors.

I didn't have time to do much of anything in town. We were away from the heart of the Chicago that everyone sees on television. We were in Lombard. I boarded the plane early Thursday morning, arrived at the airport, was shuttled to the hotel, and registered and started meetings immediately. Even if I had the time, there was no way I had the energy to do anything but go to my room and collapse onto a very comfortable bed and watch basketball. I was able to find time to check out the Target next door, always a popular Chicago destination...

Friday morning, meetings and breakfast began at 7:30 and ran through 1:30. After lunch, we were all shuttled back to the airport to try to find and earlier flight (wasn't any), and wait for our 4:12 flight back to Richmond. Once back into town, I crawled home to fall into my recliner not to move the rest of that evening. Even today I'm still feeling effects of losing one whole hour.

I know, I'm a wimp, but I had fun, and I know that Chicago will always represent how wonderful bad times can be. The bad times not only help me appreciate the good life that I have today, it reminds me that if not for those bad times, I would not be where I am today...enjoying every minute of the good times. You know what I mean. That's one thing in life we all share. Making good out of just about anything.