All Things Rowdy

I needed a 'funny' today. Normally I get it from any sort of lolcats or the meme of the moment. I think this will do ps-i shaved my beard off, so the previous 'compare and contrast' post has been deleted as it is no longer relative.

I heard a saying once a long time ago that made profound sense to me, "You don't get what you don't ask for." In the context of the time it was meant to convey the idea in a relationship that the other person is most likely not a mind reader and if you want something you need to communicate clearly what it is you want. But just as equally important I think it is good to know what you don't want. What you don't like. Now for you I will share some of the things I don't like. -taking immuno-suppresant drugs. -snakes. -most chocolate. -apples. -nightmares. two nights ago I had at least 4 that I awoke yelling from. -ice. -being so sick I spew from both ends simultaneously. -not making as much money as I used to. -the effects addiction has on people, their lives and their family. -90% of all musicals. -reality tv shows. -country music after 1979. -dental work. -clueless or entitled people who have no idea about the social contract we all should l...

I'm paraphrasing but the saying goes, "A truer measure of a man's character is how he acts when no one is watching." In my case 'when no one is watching' is to mean what do I do with my time during the day when the only person I'm beholden to is myself. What do I do when I'm totally self guided? Secondly, in my circumstance I define 'acts' to mean not some moral code, but the physical tasks I choose to occupy my time. And possibly the inherent value they must have or not have based on my willingness to spend my time at them. A majority of my days are "Rowdy" days and this is how I am choosing to spend this rowdy day: -make bed -put away clothes -empty dishwasher -take a shower -eat breakfast of wheat toast, banana, fat free yogurt, water. -50 jumping jacks, 20 push ups, 10 pull ups, 30 crunches -shooting practice focusing on target transitions -lunch date. Greek food. -bike 10 miles around Lake Mirimar -send off travel ...

The one chore I hate doing the most, the dishes. The one song that always makes me teary, the national anthem. The one thing I want most right now, to get into a PA school. The one food I couldn't live without, pizza. The one town I used to live in but haven't visited in the longest, Walla Walla. (and don't care to!) The one thing that must be eaten on Thanksgiving, pumpkin pie. A traditional one. The one thing I dislike the most about my physical self, cavities. The one activity I haven't done but still want to, parachute from a helicopter.

In the "things I never thought I'd see on my blog" category a picture of me shooting a gun, in a bath tub, while a cowboy watches has got to be pretty dang near the top. This weekend I was second place of 6 in my class (stock service pistol/unclassified)and 5th out of 16 overall in all the classes and divisions. Go me! I definitely seem to be getting better and stated to some of the master shooters that I wanted to be expert class within a year. They said I am close and could possibly be there in 8 months! Wow....... I've been called a competitor. Obsessive. All or nothing. So you can imagine that is how I am with this new sport. I mean, if they're keeping score and I'm playing; I'm in it to win it then. I mean, I do have fun but I am strongly focused on improving skill sets and competitive results. My long term goals are to be classified as an Expert level shooter in a year, so August 2013, and to shoot in two major or national tournaments within th...

I've done brazilian jiu jitsu for almost 1/4 of my life! When I was soo sick and beat down with all my medical problems only three things kept me moving forward and one of them was jiu jitsu. Or the desire to participate in it again. I probably trained 15 hours a week for 6 years. That's just over 4,000 hours. Malcom Gladwell says you need 10,000 hours in something to be expert at it. I was halfway there. Clothes, friends, travel, work outs, schedules, tournaments, injuries and everything was wound up in jiu jitsu. I thought it was my job. It was the primary way in which I defined myself. To myself and to others. But I'm done. For more than a few reasons. I know I have blog readers who are heavy into it still. Heck, half the contacts in my phone are jiu jitsu related. But I'm simply done and I guess it is easiest to just list most of the reasons why. -My body is not as strong and resilient as it used to be, jiu jitsu was tearing me down rather than keeping me toug...

Sept 22-shooting competition. Church BBQ in Old Town. Sept 24-friend visiting from Colorado. Mnt biking and shooting. Sept 29-shooting competition, first time with new gun. Glock 34. Oct 4-Black Keys concert with superD. Oct 6-Del Mar Mud Run. Oct 9-MX visits for 5 days. With friends! Oct 13-airshow at MCAS Mirimar. Oct 15-my brother visits from CO to go to Chargers/Broncos game with me. Oct 25-leave for Patagonia trip. November I haven't thought of anything. Maybe do my ABC's of San Diego photo project. December is two weeks in New Zealand!! Wow, 2012 is almost gone. I thought time was supposed to slow down when you were old?

Plan A- apply to PA school. Get in. Move away for two years. Graduate. Return to SD working as a PA and life happily ever after. Plan B- find a nuclear medicine job full time in San Diego. Happily ever after. Plan C- uh..... ummm..... what was the question? A and B are starting to look dicey. I have no Plan C. I seemingly have no strong desires. I don't know what to do. The saying, "when you can't stand it anymore, kneel" comes to mind. I'll see what happens....... (excuse the ellipses madness)

If I'm gonna spend 5 days walking around Patagonia, I want good boots. I still have black toenails from the ones I wore on Mt Whitney back in June. Goodness! Quick trip to REI, huge bump to next years dividend and I have some new boots. With today's materials and manufacturing it is not as crucial how you break boots in, but they still should be worn a bit before the big trip. Especially if you have leather boots. As mine are mostly synthetics, the break in period is quick. I remember having to wear them hours on end. Walking in a heavy pack around the yard or block. Soaking them completely in water and then wearing them until dry. And rubbing in waterproofing compounds and leather conditioners. No need for that anymore thankfully. Just a quick run up and down Cowles.

If you don't get the at least 3* ways that is funny, you either didn't watch much Bugs Bunny as a kid or you're not that bright. Either way, should we still be friends? When I was in Iraq I grew a beard for part of my time there, it was just something you did. One, because you could if you were a contractor or SF. Secondly, since I was often driving around in a car by myself, outside of the wire, the hope was that I'd pass a cursory glance as a local if I had a beard. For some reason I feel like having a beard again when I go to South America on vacation next month. Maybe the latent "rugged Oregon/Washington boy" in me is returning. Since I actually am one, but who just happens to be living in so-cal. Here I am as of yesterday with two days growth: I trim my upper lip and my neck, so whatever style that would be, I have. As comparison, here is an Iraq picture: If any of my readers have been to Baghdad, you know exactly where I am standing.(Why oh why ...

Remember when you were a kid and would play the game of, "what would you do if you had a million dollars?!?!?!", and all the crazy and cool exciting things you thought of. Exotic cars/motorcycles. Huge houses. Travel around the world. Having your own zoo and aquarium (with sharks). Never cleaning or doing chores again. Then you age and that game isn't nearly as fun. You become practical. Rational. Playing the game today this is how it works out for me: $1,000,000!! Woo hoo!! Let's spend it, oh wait....... Taxes 40%. So now I'm down to $600,000. I pay tithes to my church of 10%, so now $540,000. Debts. Let me just list all of these and then add them up: Student loan-$23,000 Child support-$10,000 Credit card-$2,000 Mini Cooper S-$10,000 for a total of $45,000. Leaves me with $395,000. Wow, that's really a lot of money! Oh wait..... Guess what I didn't list in my debts? Yep, the house. Which is more than the roughly $400,000 I have left. Much mo...

Toot toot goes my own horn. As I'm new, all of this is new to me so please forgive me. Evidently the "Postal Match" I shot on Saturday is a standard match all across the USA. Year after year. So I looked up the results for 2011 and this is what I learned... In the marksman class for ssp I would have been 102nd in the US out of 398 shooters. In novice class for ssp I would have been 6th in the US!! (out of 110) hahaha, This reminds me of being excited about being the best white belt. No one really cares but me, hahaha, but I do.

Today was my 4th time doing an action/IDPA style pistol competition. Well my oh my, but at the end of the day today I was 3rd overall in the Postal match and 4th overall in the total IDPA match!! And not out of like five or six people either. (I saw you smirking over there!!) It was out of 22 shooters! A lot of beginner's luck. Also a small pool of shooters. But still!! Can you tell I'm happy about it? The way things are measured are that you have a skill class for how well you shoot and then a class for the type of pistol you shoot. I shoot a SSP or stock service pistol gun. Very very few modifications allowed. For skill level I am what is called 'unclassified'. To accurately rank people accross the USA there is a a course that is uniform for everyone called 'the classifier'. How well you do there determines your skill ranking. As I have not shot it, I am unclassified. The ranking order from least to greatest goes like this: unclassified, novice, marksman...

An astute reader will know I have been up to something new. I've been rather circumspect about it but time for a little more disclosure. As I've moved away from competitive jiu jitsu I needed something new to fill that void. In keeping it rowdy, the void is now being filled with competitive pistol shooting. Primarily what is called "IDPA", or in other words a shooting competition based on defensive scenarios and tactics with a pistol. Not just running and gunning in the open but a little more strict about cover, concealment and such. Primarily shot with a production gun, not a "race" gun. I've really been enjoying it. I grew up with guns and hunting and such but nothing ever 'tactical' or 'practical'. Anything like that I learned from friends in the teams or groups and while in Iraq. Obviously that means I have quite a bit to learn to move from middle of the pack to competing for podiums. And you know I am in it for the win! While a...

Mental. So much of life is what goes on between your ears. What happens in your mind can make or break you. The classic idea that your thoughts lead to actions gives physical weight to something entirely unseen. Why the rumination? Last week someone said to me, "You're obsessive." The context being that when I find something I really like or am interested in, I don't toe dip, I dive in head first. My best friend through college tried to analyze my personality and reactions to life solely through the prism of my health experiences having Crohns disease. Two different sports psychologists have told me I have a fear of success and an inability to maintain focus. What does it all mean? I have no idea. I'm very very self-aware, but extremely un-introspective. I could care less "why" I do things, only dealing with the fact I did. I know exactly what I do, everything is planned in exquisite detail. I just have no reason why. I guess, and it truly is a...

2007 2012 Some records are meant to be broken.

Human history is filled with war and conflict. I myself have seen it and been to: Pearl Harbor and stood looking into oily water. Munich and walked the streets of Nazism's birth. Hanoi and cringed at the cells of Hoa Lo prison. Little Big Horn of last stand fame. Rome with its Coloseo of ritualized killing for entertainment. Israel, the West Bank and Jerusalem. Iraq in depth from Basra, Kirkuk, Tikrit, Baghdad to Mosul. New York City and ground zero. In our enlightened, modern society it may not be correct to think like this but violence has been part and parcel of human existence from the beginning. From the jealous slaying of a brother to world encompassing wars. Conflict and struggle are never going away. My question to you is, on this day when so many remember victims, the dead and what it all means is this; Are you going to be the one acting or the one acted upon? What in your life is worth protecting and fighting for? Patrick Henry said it soo eloquently with ...

Things I Am A Wuss About. Soaked in sweat along my whole backside, from head to toe. How I was when I got out of the oral surgeon's chair for the second time in a week. I had a piece of bone poking through my gum all weekend that cut a huge gouge in my tongue and inflamed my gum. Thus the need for a second visit. For shots under my tongue and grinding down of my jaw bone. To which they said I was a trooper for suffering all weekend through what they actually called a "ginormous" piece of bone doing all that damage. It really is not big surprise a trip to the dentist would have me covered in nervous sweat, as it does almost every one. But here on my blog I try to present for the most part a certain view of me, Rowdy. One of action, perseverance, toughness, excitement and a happy-go-lucky life. But there are things I am a wuss about. Believe it or not Ripley. 1. Food. Raw meat. Under cooked things. I hate hate pink hamburger. I hate touching raw meat in the kitchen. I...

Jane's Addiction Santigold Jimmy Eat World Beats Antique These good bands, festival food, good vibe and outside at the beach. Really a great time! To me, Santigold rocked it best. She even had like the two first rows jump on stage and dance with her. And asked people to get off the stage who were taking cell phone pics rather than dancing! Which I totally approve of. She crushes Lady Gaga or MIA in my opinion. All in all a great time and I'd for sure go again.

Before my trip to Norway and Israel earlier this year I bought myself an early birthday present of a Nikon D3100 dslr camera. Or as I like to call it, "a real camera". I mean, you could leave it in the auto mode, treating it like a fancy point-n-shoot. Many people do; I feel that is doing your camera and yourself a disservice. But what to do with that nice piece of equipment you don't totally understand? What I did was to thoroughly read the manual. Then I talked with people who had a similar model, asking them questions. I watched tutorials on Youtube. I bought a book on composition and studied it for a month. I even tried to take a photography class at community college, but they were full. Google. Yep, so I started Googling photography lessons in San Diego. Most were too basic, some were too complex. Too short in time or I just didn't perceive them as a good value for my time compared to what I wanted to learn. Eventually I ended up HERE. Reading a book an...

I speak English as my primary language. In high school I took 3 years of French and one semester of Spanish. Later in college I had a Mexican (born in Mexico) girl friend and picked up much more Spanish. Immediately after graduating college I lived in Arizona and had days where I only spoke Spanish. I've taken a semester of conversational Spanish at a community college, getting a D, and a two month class at Language Door, where my ability really increased. Then later as I traveled the world or met people from other places I picked up the basics of hello, thanks, no, goodbye and such in Japanese, Arabic, Russian, Brazilian Portuguese and Norwegian. (with SuperD knowing German, French, Italian, Swedish and Russian we can talk to people almost anywhere but Asia) But Spanish would definitely be my second language based on my level of diction, sentence structure and so on. I like watching TV and movies in languages other than English, but I very rarely enjoy contemporary music fro...

Normally my time travel machine works OK. I get into it, lay down and boom, I open my eyes and it's seven hours into the future. But thanks to a trip to the oral surgeon I was only able to sleep from 1am until 3am. Yeah, not even 3 Vicoden and being totally comfortable on the couch helped. I sure hope this doesn't happen tonight. Really though, everyone is tired so I should just shut up about it and do what I need to do. We're all tired. Hopefully this most recent cause is a transient one.

Yesterday, Wednesday, I spent the day at a photography lesson. The whole day, like 9 hours. It was a great learning experience. All of the pictures I took were basically exercises to understand aperture, shutter, iso and focal length. And then from there figuring out how they work together and are interconnected. All with the idea of managing light and your subject. I know these aren't amazing photos as far as the composition, but they are ones from doing all the drills and learning stuff, so I still feel like posting them anyways. I mean, after spending hours taking pictures of water bottles and stuffed animals I gotta do something with them! I will write a real review of the class and such later this week.

Ok, I deleted the old posts about the first of the two upcoming vacations because things changed. Here is the REAL deal. Fly from SD all they way down to Punta Arenas, Chile. Essentially the bottom of the world. Penguins live there for goodness sake! From there proceed to Las Torres in the Torres del Paine part of Tierra del Fuego/Patagonia. The lodging: Spend 5 days in the Torres del Paine area of Chile trekking, horse back riding, exploring and just enjoying being in an amazingly beautiful place. An extra day in Punta Arenas on the way out and back to SD and vacation will be over. It's a 23 hour flight, so gladly splurged for 1st/Business class.

So you want to get into IDPA style competitions? If you lived in San Diego you could shoot/compete 6 times a month! That is a lot of action if you ask me. Well having just tripped into it and then really getting into it I have some advice from one not-as-beginner to another beginner about what it costs to get into this.... A minimum IDPA membership $40 Condor pistol belt $30 solid color, $40 multicam Itac magazine holder $25 5.11 vest or BDU style jacket $75 500 rounds ammo $180 holster $35 eye protection $10 foam ear plugs $5 2 spare magazines $60 ---------- $460 You like it All of the above but.. 500 more rounds for a total of 1,000 $180 IDPA practice paper targets $35 target stand for above $25 3 more magazines $100 electronic hearing protection $50 ---------- $460 + $390 = $840 You want to win SSP at Marksman or Sharpshooter all of the above plus..... Glock 19 or even a 34 $650 year of range membership $350 (American Shooting Center) professional inst...

Fitspo: The amalgamation of 'fitness' and 'inspiration' to describe a picture extolling the benefits of physical fitness and exercise. Have you been to Pinterest? I know I've joked about this before, but it is either fitspo or food porn. Ad I think it has effected my life! I start the morning like this at Antique Row Cafe: Which forces the rest of my day to go like this: What is your ideal body weight? Mine for my style of sports and frame is 2.1 pounds per inch of height. 136 pounds. I weigh 141-2. What is my basal metablolic rate? What is my BMI? How many calories do I need to restrict to lose 6 pounds? How many calories do I need to expend to lose 6 pounds? It's all math. Calories taken in - Calories used up = how much you weigh.

I know I'm going to start painting this picture with a wide, rough brush but here goes... When men first starting doing stuff there were just two kinds of men, free men or men who were enslaved or subject to other men. As things developed then new roles opened for men. Free men could choose to be in the clergy, merchants or in the military. In the discovery of the world these men were then asked to find and settle frontiers. Science, the Industrial Revolution, "progress" allowed a man to be just a worker. A provider. Originally a man had to fulfill all the roles. Then he was limited to just a few choices. Now what is a man to do? Get a degree? More bachelor's degrees are awarded to women now than men. Be a father? More children are born to single parents than not. Be a warrior? Extremely out of favor.. A priest? No thanks... Merchant? Seen this unemployment? When all of a man's traditional roles are gone, limited or frowned upon; what's a guy t...

My latest nephew! I hope he is healthy and everything goes good! His name will be some sort of variation of Brecken, Breckon

In the past few months I have heard women around me talking about their dogs in this sort of manner, "Oh, dogs are better than men. They will never leave you. They will always love you. They are always happy to see you. They won't cheat on you." Generally comparing dogs more favorably than men. But guess what? "Dog" is a negative appellation for a man. Your oh-so-better-than-a-man dog? Well he will still try to hump your leg. Constantly. You're still fixing all his meals. And buying them. And constantly cleaning up his crap. Piles of his crap. And he doesn't have a job, only wants to play. Good choice girls, good choice.

In learning how to get better at taking pictures I've heard that dramatic clouds can help make outdoor pictures go from tame to stunning. So I thought, why not just take a picture of dramatic clouds? So I did. A few nights ago I went to La Jolla Playhouse and watched " An Iliad ". This was a 105 minute, non-stop, one man play. Well there was a very prominent musician playing an off stage roll of a 'Muse', and while riveting in performance the true star was on stage. A sparse stage setting, an indeterminate time and location, but within modern history the main/only character proceeds to tell us in spoken prose the general story of Homer's Iliad. With some subtle and not so subtle allusions to our times and the human nature's response to the inhumanity of war and conflict. Frankly, it was completely enthralling. I did not even look at my watch or know how much time had passed till well past an hour into the performance. I can't remember how many mor...