Well ladies and gentlemen, our 4 day weekend for operation Fuddy Dutty has come to completion. I would to open this post with a random quote from Fuddy himself during the weekend:
“It looks like that guy had butt taken out of his butt, and put in his lips.”
So the first and only really important questions…. Did we have fun? Was it better than sitting at home? Did Rob have more fun with us than he would have had working on his kitchen during the weekend? Did we do all the things we wanted and needed to do? The answer is a resounding yes!!! We had a blast, and an epic trip that I think all of us will remember for a very long time.
Everybody has been asking me about the game. I’ve had taunts and questions from Longhorns, Longhorn fans, Aggies, and people who don’t even watch football. So I thought I’d lay it all out right here. I’m elated with how well the game went. I won’t lie to you guys. I thought we were going to get our butts kicked going into that game. We lost to Colorado, and were going up against top 10 ranked UT who has only lost to the best team in the nation (OSU) so far this year and is last year’s BCS champs. We didn’t get our butts kicked. We started up 21-0. We made a game out of it until the last 2 mins of the game, and lost by just 4pts. That football game was more intense and had better fan/crowd involvement than any Texas Tech football game that I’ve been to since the first time we brought the goal posts down against the Aggies (think that was either 1999 or 2000). It was a great football game and I had a blast being there in the student section with my friends, tortillas, and cocktail. A win would have been fantastic, but I’m happy with how things turned out.
With Blake, Rob and I there with our cameras, you might imagine that we took a ton of pictures. I think we got some great pics and tried some new and fun things with our cameras. We had some great results, and I also managed to blow a few dozen pictures because I’m a dumbass (freakn’ high speed flash sync!) You should check out Rob and Blake’s webpages to see some more of the work. I posted some of the pics from all of our cameras in my gallery.
And I leave you with this…what most people have told me is the best pic taken this weekend.
Rob’s webpage
Blake’s photo page
Day one of Operation Fuddy Dutty has been going pretty well. We showed up at Rob’s place as planned and had him pretty well confused about what the hell we were doing cooking him breakfast at his place for. Right before his wife Stacy had to go to work, we told him the real plan: you have 3 hours to pack your crap, and take care of anything you need to do today because we are picking you up at noon to go to lunch and fly to Lubbock. He had no idea, it was coming, and the first part of our mission was a success.
On the other hand we had a few problems getting out to Lubbock. Our flight was delayed for 4 hours. Then once we got here Blake’s luggage was lost. I’m pretty sure we spent more money on airport beer than we will spend on any beer or food out here (8 bucks a pop! whoohooo). But we made it out and headed down to complete one of our newer traditions. We went down to the strip and procured a bottle of Grey Goose Citron to offer as a gift to BigE in the depot district. I’ll keep this post short, but lets just say that the bottle of goose didn’t last very long, and we had a great time hanging out and eating the best food in Lubbock. More to come!
Operation kidnap Fuddy Dutty:
Well, soon operation kidnap Rob and take his butt out to Lubbock will soon be underway. Obviously I can’t post this blog post until after we get started tomorrow morning. This is top secret stuff!!!!
Basically I’m the single guy…. The bad influence on my friends; and now that Rob is married with a child his life has become a big “restrictive”. He didn’t think he was allowed to come out to Lubbock with us for the four day weekend trip to see the UT vs. Tech football game. This is a tradition that we have been doing since we graduated. We go back at least once a year (three time last year..whoooho!!!) for a big football game like the Aggies or UT. We go back and rip up the town! We do all the things we couldn’t afford to do often when we were starving college students. We see old friends, eat lots of Ellis, and don’t get much sleep. We eat at Spanky’s (must have cheese sticks!), have a beer at Scooners, and listen to music at Bleachers. We do all sorts of things that if Rob didn’t join us for… Well fak, it just wouldn’t be right! He might even die. We might even die!
So unbeknownst to Rob, his lovely wife Stacey called me a few months ago and wanted to surprise Rob by letting him go to the game. We procured plane tickets, a hotel room, rental car, and ticket to the game. Stacy has been working with his boss and admin to make sure that his calendar is clear Thursday and Friday. Everything is falling into place for the kidnapping. If all goes well, John, Blake, Rob and I will be half drunk and having a good time in Lubbock by dinner time tomorrow.
The plan right now is for Blake and I to go to his house early tomorrow morning and cook him surprise breakfast. After all, I’m sure he thinks we are total jerks since we didn’t get him anything for his birthday (not even a card lol!). After we make him think that his gift is a surprise breakfast, we are going to let him know he has 3 hours to pack his stuff and take care of anything he needs to take care of for the weekend because we will be picking him up for lunch and a flight to Lubbock at noon. His real gift from his wife and his boys will be a 4 day trip back to the motherland and the continuation of a tradition! Should be fun!!! As far as I know he has no idea this is coming. Stacy even talked me into staging a fake fight with her when I was over at Rob’s house for Monday night football this week. She wanted me to fight with her about Rob not being able to go to the game. So I did! She ripped me up and down about how one day I too will grow up and get real responsibilities. That I would be like Rob and rather stay home and take care of my family than watch stupid football. We got into it for 3-4 mins and made Rob uncomfortable. Nice touch Stacy!!!! This will be an epic adventure.
I’ll try to take my camera tomorrow morning, and post updates before I hit the road.
Guns Up you sons’of’beeches!!!!!!!
What it is?!?!?! Not sure why I said that, but I couldn’t decide how to start this blog post, and that was the first thing that came to mind. So down to the skinny. This post will mostly be about some of the pictures I’ve taken over the past week or so. There have been two events that are really worth talking about: Blake and my trip to the State Fair of Texas, and the photo shoot with Ally David at Bend Studio.
Blake and I decided it would be fun to take our cameras and tripods to the State Fair to take some evening/night long exposures. The fair is so full of lights and motion, it would prove to turn out to be a great place to work with that type of photography. So we headed down before sunset and scoped out a few places to shoot. We found my friend Jack Pyland who owns several of the food stands at the Fair and got some good food and a tour of a few of his stands. I even got to see Caz, my old skydiving buddy who I only see a few times a year now. Before the night was done we ate Jack’s Fries, Quesadillas, fried Snickers bars, friend Oreos, and a few beers. Fried Snickers…. Who thinks of that??? I bet it was a health nut who was rebelling. It could be that, ort or someone who is 29 years old with heart disease from years of eating fried candy. But that is inconsequential because they were good!
The second event was the photo shoot with Ally David from Bend Studio. Ally is my Yoga instructor and the owner of one of my favorite live music studios. She also produces larger shows that are hosted at other venues around Dallas. On top of all of that, she is stunning, and I was fortunate that she asked me to take some pictures of her. We played around with a few strobes to try some different effects and got some good pictures. Lots of trial and error, and lots of learning for me!!
I’ve decided this post is going to be wayyyyy toooooo long because I think I’m going to put way too many pics in here. So I should probably stop my jabbering here and just post pics. Check for links at the bottom of the page. WHAT IT IS!!!
Bend Studio
Goood news and Bad news.
I made it out to Son’s of Herman Hall to see Sorta and Guy Forsyth play their music. The good news is that I finally got to see Sorta, and Sorta is a band that I’ve heard a lot about for the past several months but never had the opportunity to see. The bad news is that I had to leave before Guy Forsyth went on stage. I’ve seen Guy once before, and he is in my top 5 list of live acts that I’ve seen in the mast year or so.
I really enjoyed Sorta’s show. Their sound is steady and easy to listen to with country overtones (have to have country overtones if you have a slide guitar in the band right? RIGHT!). The lyrics were deep, evolved and well refined. The vocals belting out the lyrics complemented the feelings and meanings behind the song. The band was right in tune with the music and really came together well as a group to make music with sound and feeling in harmony. The lovely Miss Marcy was also at the show, and she agreed that the show was fantastic.
If you would like to hear their music or check out their calendar, click their myspace link below. This is defiantly another band that goes on the list of shows that I would recommend anyone to see if they get the chance. It was a great night; I hope I get a chance to see Guy play again soon. I’ll add his myspace link below if you would like to see his calendar or hear his music.
Sorta’s Myspace Page
Guy Forsyth’s Myspace
This show was a Bend Studio Production. Check out their page for other shows and music here