• Back from Branson

    I’m finally home from vacation. Branson is pretty much the same as it was last time we went. It’s not my favorite place, but my Mom likes it, and she likes to have the whole family there. Overall I had a good time.

    We went on some scary ass roller coasters at Silver Dollar City, took a cave tour at Silver Dollar City, fed tigers at the tiger sanctuary, went zip lining, rolled down a hill in a “hamster ball”, rode many go carts and bumper boats, went to a few shows, and ate way too much food.

    Then there are the things that annoy me about Branson.

    Branson is just too conservative, Christian, and country for me. I always feel out of place there. We went to a few shows, and they were good, but every one of them had their “God” moment. It was kind of annoying. For some reason the Christians there feel defensive, and they think Branson is the only place that they can be proud. I hate religion being pushed on me. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for anybody practicing their religion. I will defend your right to practice your religion to my death, but don’t push it on me. The religious sections of the shows just made me leaving with a bad taste in my mouth.

    They also love their veterans in Branson. There is nothing wrong with that, but Branson goes overboard with it. I appreciate everything veterans have done, I lost an uncle in Vietnam, and my Dad is a veteran, but sucking their dicks on every corner is a little much. This may sound insensitive, but military people are just doing the job they signed up for. Sure their job is dangerous, but many other professions are also dangerous, and just as important. Veterans get a lot a praise for doing their job, and while they deserve it, they often get too much praise in my opinion, and hearing about how great veterans are multiple times a day, every day, really gets old.

    I’m glad to be home. A week is a long time to be gone. Now it’s time for me to catch up on my internet now that I got one that works at a reasonable speed.

  • Vacation starts now

    It’s 5:30 AM, and I’m about to head out the door for our vacation. Today it’s just a 9.5 hour drive to Kansas City to meet up with the rest of my family. Then tomorrow we will be off to my Mom’s timeshare in Branson. I will be pretty quiet here and on Twitter. I will have internet access, but I’ll be busy, so I will mostly be offline. I might post a few pictures. They’re with 1000 words anyway right?

  • RIP MCA

    Growing up I was a huge Beastie Boys fan. In fact Licensed to Ill was the first album I bought with my own money. Over the weekend I wrote a long post about the Beastie Boys and Adam Yauch, but I couldn’t get the words our how I wanted them, so I scrapped it. This is a nice little video with MCA’s opening lines from every Beastie Boys song. It sucks seeing part of my childhood die, especially since Adam was so young.

    via Xeni at Boingboing

  • Not looking forward to vacation

    A week from today I will be on vacation. Is it sad that I’m not really looking forward to it? We are heading down to Branson, and meeting up with the rest of my family. Branson is my Mom’s most favorite place on earth, and we are staying at her timeshare. I’ve been there before, and while there are lots of things to do, none of them excite me too much. My Sister-in-law has actually planned the week out, so I guess that’s good. All i know is that We have one day in an amusement park, and another at a water park. Not my idea of fun, but I’m just a party pooper I guess.

    I’m going through Internet withdrawals already. We will have Internet access, but I won’t get my usual 12 to 14 hour fix. Some people like to unplug for vacations — not me. I’m dreading the backlog of rss feeds and podcasts I will have when I get home. I should learn that it’s ok if I miss some, but I can’t. I’m actually looking forward to the 13 hour drive home the most. It will be 13 hours of podcast listening heaven for me.

    It also looks like it’s really hot down there already. I’m from North Dakota — I don’t like it much warmer than 70°. Oh well, I will try to have fun. I guess many people don’t have the luxury to be able to take a vacation every year, so I should be thankful for that.