An Introduction of Sorts

Here we are, in the second day of NaBloPoMo. You might notice that things look a bit different around here. I started toying around with some of the new templates on Blogger to see if a change of scenery might jumpstart my creativity. I’m a visual person, and am driven quite a bit by what things I see and how I see them. As a result this page may morph a time or two again in the near future – or then again it may not.

But enough rambling for now; there will be plenty of that going forward anyway, I assure you.

I am going to take a cue from my friend Carol and, while we’re still early in the month, give you a brief intro (you never know what poor soul will stumble across this and say “dear God – what have I done?”). Anyhow, if you couldn’t figure it out from my info over to the right, my name is Mike Carvin (and if you did figure that out already, you get a gold star – just not from me). I grew up in the teeming metropolis of Laurens, New York but am now living in Fitchburg, Massachusetts (by way of Potsdam NY, Framingham MA, and Marlborough MA) – each is probably fodder for another day. I live there with my wife Patti our two youngest kids: Bethanie, who will be 17 in January, and Thomas, who turned 15 back in September. Our oldest son, MJ (Michael James) is 19 and a PFC in the Army National Guard and presently stationed at Fort Eustis, VA where he is attending AIT (Advanced Individual Training) in aviation electronics. Oh, and we also have a 6 year old cat named Angel (rather, she deems us her purr-sonal assistants).

I am a system certification engineer (a type of QA engineer) at a not-to-be-named computer company. While I must strive almost daily to not say anything negative about the job, I can say that I’m happy to have a job, and one that (nearly) pays the bills at that. That said, I look forward to the day when I can leave there (preferably on good terms) and start out on my new career as a photographer. More stories for another time I see.

In my spare time (wait – spare time? what’s that?) I, with Patti, are members of the Montachusett Chorale, and am involved with our church choir. I will also occasionally dabble in yarn crafts – crochet and knitting to be specific – which is where the “CraftyGuy” moniker comes from. I had until fairly recently also been involved in barbershop singing, which I have had to back-burner in order to make time for school; once I have a degree or certificate in Photography (whichever), I hope to be able to again make time for that hobby. Again, more blog fodder to avail myself of.

A pretty good start, as far as introductions go, I suppose. I can’t very well dump out everything in one sitting, now can I?

Here We Go Again

November 1. NaBloPoMo starts again. And yes, Virginia, I’m giving it another go. I know the last two (or three) attempts have been less than stellar, but what can I say – I’m tenacious (or stubborn).

Here I sit with the family watching “Dancing With The Stars” (get over it). Well, we’re all in the living room anyhow; Bethanie is on the kids’ computer, surfing for photos of Andrew Lee Potts or Tristan McManus one moment, chatting on Facebook the next.

Do I actually have something to write about tonight? No, not really, but why should that stop me?

Long Weekend (not in the good way)

It’s been a crazy past few days.

Friday evening was quartet rehearsal – a really good one at that.  Yeah, we probably spent a great deal more time chatting than rehearsing, but it was still all good (and the actual rehearsing also went very well!) We’re starting to work on our contest songs for the Division Convention this March. Work, fun, work, fun, fun.  More on that in another post.

Saturday consisted of getting up waaay too early, running Bethanie and Thomas to the school so they could catch the bus to attend Band Day as UMass Amherst, take Patti out to Shirley for a craft fair where she had an Avon table set up for the day, take MJ to breakfast in Gardner (Gabby’s Place is a great diner, btw!), then down to (West?) Boylston to the Army/Navy store so that MJ could pick up a sea-bag that he needed, then back to Fitchburg for a couple of hours, go pick up Patti and then crash for a little bit until time to pick up Bethanie and Thomas later that night.  Yes, that was a run-on sentence – but it was a run-on kind of day.

Sunday came, and the day was greeted by a series of very wet “splat” noises coming from the third-floor stairs. Thomas had come down sick with a stomach bug that had been going around.  When this kid barfs, he BARFS! All over the stairs, the wall, and even the upper part of the door frame! How can a 14-year old contain so much semi-digested stuff? “Eww” didn’t even begin to describe it!

That evening was chorale rehearsal, as we are getting ready for our Holiday concert in less than a month.

Wow – what a weekend! Did I mention that I’m sill trying to get over being sick also (which has been the case for over a month now).  On the mend finally, but sheesh!

Just in case you were wondering what happened to my blog posts for Friday and Saturday – I’m suspecting that perhaps Thomas ate them…

Working From Home

Was planning on (finally) making an appearance at work this week – other than working from home, I mean. But the train had other ideas. A one-hour delay due to mechanical problems made me decide that my time would be best spent working from home one more day.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I dislike working from home – I prefer it in many ways. But there’s just some things that can done far more productively in-person (I may hate my job with the burning intensity of a thousand white-hot suns, but I still plan on doing a good job while I’m there!)

Let’s see if the train behaves tomorrow…

Status Quo

I’m too tired to stay up and watch the rest of the election results, but it would appear that our lovely Commonwealth has opted for the status quo once again.

Disappointing, yes. Surprising, no.

Ah well.

NaBloPoMo Rides Again!

It's November 1st - you know what that means! Another year has gone by, and so begins another attempt at NaBloPoMo, and getting my lazy ass back into blogging mode. We're just gonna take this day by day and see what happens.

As it is, I nearly forgot until about 10 minutes ago (it current 10:40pm), just when I was thinking of heading up to bed since the NyQuil is kicking in (yup - been sick on and off for about a month now - never fun).

But sick or no, I wasn't going to let the first day of NaBloPoMo go by without at least an initial check-in.

Good night for now, and here's hoping for something more coherent tomorrow.

Photo Friday: Vehicle

Keyed Up, originally uploaded by CraftyGuy.

I took this photo over two years ago, and had messed around with the brightness and saturation to come up with what I thought was pretty cool (and still do).

Since this week's Photo Friday theme is "Vehicle", I thought I would dig this up and share it.

Scrap-ghan

Just checking in quick tonight to let all y’all (“all y’all” is the plural of “y’all”) know that the patchwork scrap-ghan I had working on is finally done!  The hard part was piecing together all the squares (well, rectangles, but you know what I mean), but I think it was worth it.  Ran it through the gentle cycle with some Woolite and a low-temp dry cycle, and it’s ready to donate!

On the Mend

I’m finally feeling better – well enough to return to work.  Of course, I will likely just be working from home tomorrow since, despite feeling better, I do still get into the occasional coughing fit which could be a bit disconcerting to some.  So technically it’s one more day at home.

I normally don’t mind being at home, actually prefer it most of the time.  But I’m very prone to going stir-crazy when confined and have little to do other than watch TV or poke around on Facebook (both fine activities, in relatively small amounts). Fortunately, I managed to dig up the “scrap-ghan” I started working on last year but never finished (due to that whole “ice storm/power outage/being out of the house for six months” thing), and am working on completing it.  I should have it done either tomorrow evening or Tuesday.  Once it is done, I plan on donating it to a local halfway house.

It’s good to be feeling better, and feels better to be doing good.

And We’re Back

Lest anyone think that I ditched this whole NaBloPoMo thing less than two weeks into it, rest assured I didn’t.

I was home from work Wednesday with the intention of running the errands for Patti as she was feeling under the weather.  But, best-laid plans being what they are, before the day was out I had a fever of my very own. And not to be outdone, it was over 102! I like it warm, but that’s a bit much…

Today is the first day I’ve felt at least semi-functioning, so back to blogging I go.  Since the first of the month, my blog attempts have largely been – admittedly – at bit on the feeble side.  A sentence here, a link there, a YouTube video tossed in for good measure.  I can’t promise the rest of the month will fully be more substantial than that, but I think I might be actually be gaining a little more momentum on the blogging front now.

That is, if I can squeeze it in between coughs…

One Oh Two What?

That’s not a temperature, that’s a radio station!

Feh.

The 11:15 News

Lessee…

Patti’s is feeling less then under the weather and is in dire need of lots of rest, and I’m exhausted, yet presently the healthier of the two of us.

The kids have the day off from school, but Bethanie and Thomas will need to be up early enough to get ready for a Veterans Day function in the morning (Bethanie is in marching band, and Thomas is in Boy Scouts).  I will be working from home tomorrow so that Dad’s Taxi can handle the driving around (so that Patti can rest). MJ (and hopefully Patti) will be sleeping in tomorrow.

Angel is being her typical chowder-head self.

And that’s the news.

Funny, but Wrong… but Funny!

Don’t get me wrong – I like the Food Network, really!

But this website is just too freakin’ hilarious – foodnetworkhumor.com.

You can thank (or scream at) me later.

My Day in 14 Words

Awake. Coffee. Church. Gas. Mall. Home. Lunch. Football. Online. Dinner. Crochet. TV. Blog. Goodnight.

My Latest Project

I haven’t crocheted in nearly a year, mainly because I find myself just too dang busy.  But I was recently motivated to make this toque (winter hat, for those unfamiliar with the word) for myself.  The motivation came from the increasingly cold weather lately – since I have decided to keep my head shaved all the time, I needed a way to keep the noggin’ warm.

Anyhow I came across this pattern via ravelry.com and threw it together in about 3 hours (which is fast for me).  Other than scarves, this is my first clothing type crochet project, so I am especially proud of having made this!

A Cappella, 80s-Style

I love music from the ‘80s (1980’s, smart-a**!), and I love a cappella.  And I also love things done with creative spin.

Put that all together, and what do you end up with?  How about a couple of these gems on YouTube for starters – the minds behind these are brilliant!

 

Blah

I’m exhausted, and I really don’t feel like blogging tonight.  However, I want to get back into the habit of regular blogging and foisting my random brain-dumps on an unsuspecting public.  That is why I am posting tonight, even if it is only for the purpose of saying that I am not posting tonight.

(How’s that for a contradiction?)

Wheel of Blogger 2009

I haven’t poked around other people’s blogs lately (with only a couple of exceptions), but with November being NaBloPoMo and all, there could very well be a lot of activity to check out.

The NaBloPoMo site (hosted by Ning) has a “randomizer” feature, that will take you to a random blog page.  This can be fun, educational, surprising, or even shocking at times.  I had run through a few of them a couple of years ago and blogged about it, and thought it might be fun to try it again.  So here for your dining and dancing pleasure is some samplings from another round of “Wheel of Blogger”.

1. "Brainella the Librarian”. Today’s entry brings a delightful love letter to something near and dear to me: the Starbucks “red cup”.  You know, those special holiday flavors that ‘bucks offers each year (my favorite is eggnog).

2. “Teacher Anonymous”. Here we have a post regarding a particularly good (in the opinion of the blogger – I would like to try it myself sometime) recipe for a cinnamon lamb stew.  It looks really good.

3. “Eat Play Love”. The post du jour is about being a Yankees fan.  As tempted as I am to say something really snarky at this point, I won’t.  This post was specially about remembrances of a father and his love for the Yankees.  Kudos for that, even if it is the Yankees.

4. “Clutch Cargo Lips”.  Differences in towel folding methodologies.

5. “Threads of Light”. Wonderful photography here.  I will be visiting this blog often.

6. “The Anonymous Adventures of Us”.  A nice little slice o’ life.

Good stuff all around.  I might revisit this treasure trove that is the Randomizer later on this month as well.

A Quick One

Honestly, I’m tired and brain-fried, and really don’t want to do a blog post tonight.  But I am going to post *something*, so I’d thought I’d share a joke sent to me in email today (thanks, Dave!)

John Bradford, a Dublin University student, was on the side of the road hitchhiking on a very dark night and in the midst of a storm. No cars were traveling that night.

The storm was so strong he could hardly see a few feet ahead of him.

Suddenly, he saw a car slowly coming towards him and stop. John, desperate for shelter and without thinking about it, got into the car and closed the door.... only to realize there was nobody behind the wheel and the engine wasn't on!!

The car started moving slowly. John looked at the road ahead and saw a curve approaching. Scared, he started to pray, begging for his life.

Then, just before the car hit the curve, a hand appeared through the window and turned the wheel. John, paralyzed with terror, watched as the hand repeatedly came through the window, but never touched or harmed him.

Shortly thereafter John saw the lights of a pub appear down the road. So, gathering strength, he jumped out of the car and ran to the pub.

Wet and out of breath, he rushed inside and started telling everybody about the horrible experience he had just had. A silence enveloped the pub when everybody realized he was crying and....wasn't drunk.

Suddenly the door opened and two other people walked in from the stormy night. They, like John, were also soaked and out of breath.

Looking around, and seeing John Bradford sobbing at the bar, one said to the other...”Look Paddy...there's that freakin' idiot that got in the car while we were pushin' it.”

Old and Stuffy? I Don’t Think So!

Anyone who’s known me over the past 7 or 8 years knows that other than photography and yarn crafts, my other major hobby is barbershop.

“Isn’t that just a bunch a old guys dressed up in striped vests and straw hats singing old songs really badly?”

Uhm, no – not even close…

Barbershop harmony – for those who don’t know (and a good deal of my Facebook contacts do know – a big “hello” to them via the RSS feed from this blog to Facebook!) consists of 4 parts sung a cappella (without instrumental accompaniment): the melody is sung by lead, with the tenor harmonizing above, the bass below, and the baritone filling the remaining fourth notes of each chord.  The resulting sound is quite amazing, I assure you; if the tuning is just right (I won’t go into the physics of this), one or more overtones can be produced, creating what is often called “lock and ring”.  If you have heard this before, you know that it’s really awesome.

Barbershop isn’t just quartets, either.  There are many, many choruses out there singing in this musical style as well.  Better than explaining this though, would be to offer a demonstration.  Here, for your viewing and listening pleasure, is the 2009 Barbershop Harmony Society International champions (yes – there is an annual convention/competition) – the Ambassadors of Harmony from St. Charles, MO.

This is so NOT old and stuffy!  In fact, it’s freaking cool!