• Tag Archives 80’s

  • “Always make the audience suffer as much as possible.” Alfred Hitchcock

    Posted on by The Thousand Yard Stare Comment

    It’s been pretty quiet on the blog-o-sphere front for a while now. (And what shape exactly IS a blog-o-sphere?)

    Recently, someone from the relatively recent past dredged up the fact that I used to wear glasses. Thick, Buddy Holly type glasses.  A lot of times I forget that I wore them for so long, having Lasik for a little less than ten years now.  So this person called and said, “Hey, you look like Buddy Holley right?”.

    It wasn’t surprising, since I’m sure that everyone from my childhood remembers me with glasses on. Think of the mental images in your head of some of your friends with glasses. Naturally, you imagine them with glasses on.  Even though this person had seen me since and KNEW I had Lasik, their mental image of me had those glasses on.

    Here’s what they remember (excuse the non-internet quality – this is a really old badge):

    In the span of about 2 or 3 years, it became: (Oooh. AND HIPPA Certified!)

    So, the first one is what he thinks of when he thought of me. Even though he’d seen the second “me” in the period of time that he knew me.

    Story time:

    When I was in elementary school, video games “came of age”. I suppose I was 10, and arcades were EVERYWHERE. Rooms of video games. With the sole purpose of  sucking quarters. Old school, no bill acceptors built into these puppies. Dragon’s Lair, Space Ace, Defender, Pac Man, Burger Time, Q-Bert, Joust, Galaga, Tron, etc, etc.

    So, one time I got invited to a church “lock-in”. I supposed I was getting invited to a lot of church events, but that’s pretty much how my friends rolled.  This specific lock-in was a lock-in in an ARCADE with FREE PLAY. You cannot imagine how pumped I was. I was completely addicted to video games, and this was like a dream.

    We attended some pre-lock-in activities, which included a spaghetti dinner. Now, until recently, spaghetti dinners and me were not friends. Looking back, I think it had a lot to do with how much I was NOT eating as a kid. Pretty much no breakfast, crappy carb lunch, then more or less no dinner. In my excitement of the lock-in, I ate even LESS that day, and so we hit that dinner. Well, loading up on more carbs with no protein all day long I quickly crashed into a massive sinus/migraine headache.

    We were about to leave to the arcade and I was dizzy, sweating profusely, and then I threw up all over the front steps of the church.

    Needless to say, they took me home and I missed out on what would have probably been the highlight of my childhood.

    Lastly, I love Zapps. That is all.


    📂This entry was posted in Main 📎and tagged

  • “If you worried about falling off the bike, you’d never get on.” Lance Armstrong

    Posted on by The Thousand Yard Stare Comment

    My daughter had a recent need for a bicycle.  After we got it road-ready, I found myself warning her, “If someone wants to steal your bike, give it to them. Don’t get hurt over something as dumb as a bicycle.” After she reminded me what kind of lily-white crime free neighborhood she lives in now, I had to think for a minute. Then, I looked around and I was definitely talking about my neighborhood.

    It took me back to some of my bestest bike riding experiences. One of my first was defying my parents and biking down to Westwood Mall – in the middle of the dried out Braes Bayou. Another was my 70’s banana seat Raleigh – – that managed to be stolen three separate times. Each time, I found it further and further away. Once, leaning against a house at the end of the block. The other time I found it at Westbury Square, where I worked for a while at The Company Onstage. The last time I’m not sure where it went. Odd walking in such a remote area from my home and seeing such a distinctive bike. “Hey! That’s my bike!” I googled it, but it was such a weird bike that I’ll probably never find it.

    Then there was my black Huffy. My ultimate pre-car bicycle was my Mongoose. Ahh…..my Mongoose.

    The Mongoose was subject to many a schoolyard debate on the merits of…..uh….whatever we could throw at it. “Mongoose vs Diamondback” My first Mongoose was stolen by a kid who lived next to our elementary school. My second looked just like this:

    What a great looking bike. Lightweight and chromed out, it was a gorgeous bike. I ended up taking the bike with me to New Zealand where it was (unbeknownst to me) the Rolls Royce of bikes. I rode it to school two times. After the stares and envious looks, my theft paranoia got the best of me and I walked the 1.988 miles instead.

    I just looked at that map – in no way is that 1.988 miles flat – there’s a 40 degree slope on both sides of Cumberland. We called that “Cumberland Hill”. It is in fact the largest hill I’ve ever had to traverse in any school bound travels. So when I tell my daughter “it was uphill both ways!”, in a way it really was.

    So that second Mongoose actually was nearly stolen once, then was completely stolen the second time – although I got it back. The first time is when my friend Jeremy and I were riding to Sharpstown Mall (that’s a LONG ride from my house). We were walking our bikes through the mud and this kid comes up, grabs my bike and pushes me down. I was so astonished, I wasn’t sure what was happening. So I grabbed the back tire (not smart, but it wasn’t moving). I yanked and he pulled out a screwdriver. “Let go!” “No!” “Let go!”. He then kind of stabbed the tire with the screwdriver but it just bounced off.

    By that point I had figured out what he was trying to do and I was freaking out. Somehow this lady way across the street started yelling at this kid, “Hey! I see you! Where’s your momma!” I was so startled I yelled, “At home!” The big kid kind of muttered then let go of my bike.

    The second time was actually pretty anticlimactic. In my junior year of high school, I get this knock on the door. At the door is a police officer and two kids. The police officer asks me if anything has been stolen out of the garage. I tell him I have no idea. He gives me the look like, “Say yes you idiot.” He then tells me that these kids admitted that they stole my Mongoose. Of course I didn’t notice, I’d been driving a car since then. The only thing left on it that was original was the frame. The cool lightweight rims were long gone.Later, one of my friends that worked with me at Meyerland General Cinema asked if he could have it so I gave it to him.

    He said that the guy at the bike shop was amazed, “This is one of the first Chrome framed Mongooses!!”

    I miss that bike.


    📂This entry was posted in Main 📎and tagged

  • “It gets her nervous even thinking about it, talking about it. It’s very hard, very difficult for her. She’s just a little girl.” Shirley Garner

    Posted on by The Thousand Yard Stare Comment

    Today in my Rock and Roll History class, I admitted that I had seen Metallica in ’89 and AC/DC in ’91. Somehow, I was magically transformed from “that old guy who knows a lot about music” into “that cool old dude who’s seen it all”. This one kid who was born in 1990 (!) said that he was sorry that he missed that time period.

    I had to remind him that the internet didn’t exist then. That fanzines and magazines were the ONLY way to stay in touch with a band – unless you were lucky enough to like a band that had an active fan club. No twitter, no google, no motor cars, not a single luxury…..

    My daughter has plowed through Season 1 of Lost now. She’s got this gurgling thing that she does with her throat when she’s nervous. I can always tell when the tension is ratcheting up because she’ll be making that noise a mile a minute. Pretty entertaining.


    📂This entry was posted in School 📎and tagged

  • “Bicycles are almost as good as guitars for meeting girls” Bob Weir

    Posted on by The Thousand Yard Stare Comment

    Those bastards laugh at the green hair, until all the pretty girls come talk to ME

    Muaaaahahahahaha!!!

    All part of my evil plan.

    Now that I’ve got an all day Chemistry class on Saturdays, I probably need to be sleeping right now….uh….yeah….sleeping.

    Oops.

    Going back to school…….makes me have so much in common with the young folk of today.

    Example:

    My teacher (who is probably only 10-15 years older than me)

    Teacher: Does anyone know why the death of Michael Jackson is so important?

    Me: Anyone who was alive in the 80’s knows why Michael Jackson was so important…

    Dude (kid) sitting behind me: Man, if I was alive in the 80’s I wouldn’t be listening to that – I’d be listening to Testament. Metal!

    Me: Uh….only in the late 80’s.

    This kid was probably born the year I graduated high school. Now THAT is depressing.


    📂This entry was posted in School 📎and tagged