DadJack.com Blog

Although it’s already feeling Fall-like (It’s officially Fall Friday.)  The kids are back in school, the weather has been cooler (especially at night) and the Halloween stores are all up and running (places like Target already have Christmas decorations out too!)  I know many of you look forward to the change of the season and the beginning of the holiday craziness… But not me, I like the summer, the kids are out of school and available to play, the weather is warm and there’s just less stress.

There is still much going on around town.  I already told you about the Pierce College Halloween Festival which runs now through Halloween.  Speaking of Halloween, if you’re looking for a place to get costumes and really cool decorations check out Halloweentown in Burbank… It’s open year round, but obviously this is the time they really rock.  My sister found this one, the final cemetery screening at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery is this weekend and they’re screening E.T.!  Nothing like a movie under the stars, next to the dead stars!   This is also a great time of the year to get out and ride your bike (not too hot, not to many tourists), this Sunday is the Folk Art Bike ride downtown… It’s a fun way to get some culture and get some exercise in.  Also, The L.A. County Fair is still running… There’s never a bad time to have something deep-fried!

Stench and I (with occasional drive-by’s by Alina) continue on with the Podcast …  We are on show #1110 or 46.25 days of non-stop podcast power!

I have Back To School Night tomorrow… I’m excited to meet the kids teachers and find out what they’ll be up to this year! Not so excited to see the Ex!

Rock on, Jack

I just wanted to take a second to warn you all of something.  KTLA often asks for feed back via text… And since I often disagree with what they’re saying I will text my thoughts.  Well I was going through my cell phone bill I noticed that I was being charged for some dating website… Now mind you I am a single 40 year old guy, but I have not made the move to dating via Blackberry!  I called my service provider ( T-Mobile) and they quickly removed the service and reversed the charge, the representative also said that he has seen this with many “news” outlets.

I wanted you to be aware for two reasons: One, I only have a single user account, so it is easy to tell when something like this gets slipped in… When you have a family plan with multple lines it’s not always as easy to tell when they slip in an extra $6 here and there.  Two, DON’T TRUST KTLA!  And not just them, many news outlets especially the local ones masquerade advertisements as news.  Many of the “stories” they have covered on local news programs are actually paid guests or products.  In my case it was a product slipped in… But that should not happen from a legitimate news source.

Trust me after years in radio I understand the drive to maximize revenue through non traditional sources (things other than commercials), but we always had to disclose that anything  endorsed was paid for… And we weren’t a news outlet, we were a lifestyle show.

OK, that’s it, just wanted to complain!

Rock on, Jack

I love new and creative ideas, especially when I throw random thoughts out into the blog world and you guys share.  So when I said I was over flowing with kids drawings it was no surprise that you guys had some great ideas, the one that was most popular was to scan them and save the files or make a photo book from them.  I thought about this for awhile, and it did solve my storage issues, but for some reason it rubbed me the wrong way…  Partly because this plan requires me to throw them away after I scan them.

We have become very used to living in a virtual world, giving up more tangible variations of things.  No longer do we have a record (if your old like me, CD is you’re younger) collection our music is on MP3,  Movies are no longer stored on DVD but downloaded or streamed on demand, photos are shot digitally and stored on a hard drive, very rarely printed… Heck, now-a-days you don’t even have the burden of storing these files on our computer, they can be stored in the “cloud.”  And this has made life easier, less expensive and less cluttered.  We didn’t really need to be able to touch these things… Although some of my fondest memories are of listening to a new album while looking at the artwork and reading the liner notes, spending late nights at Tower on Sunset thumbing through records, CD’s and videos with my friends or discovering exactly how the photos I shot came out after getting them from the lab, seeing if I technically made the right choices and what the results were.

So does it make sense to scan and toss the kids art… Yes and no.  Those tattered papers, covered in crayon and marker with the images conjured up by innocent, developing minds may not last as long as a digital file, but they also were touched by those little hands, colored wax pressed under the pressure of tiny fist directly to their surface.  There is no piece of famous art work I cannot Google and see at an instant right here on the couch where I sit typing this… But it’s still not the same as seeing it in person.  I thought what if when I gave my Mom the ashtray I made her in elementary school (Yes, we used to make our parents ashtrays!) she told me how much she loved it, took a picture and tossed it?  Sure, we’d always have the photo to look at, but it just wouldn’t be the same.

So I re-evaluated my original concern over what to do with the kids artwork…  And the answer was still found in those suggestions, the solution was digital.  With all the space I save by having my music collection on a cloud, my photos on a wafer size chip, movies streamed directly to my TV, books stored not on shelves but on a device no bigger than the composition books they used to make us journal in at school… I can fill all that extra space with the kids art work.   I figure I’m still ahead, just based on the thousands of songs in my iPod, Those thousands of records would take up way more space than those drawings…  And someday my kids kids will be able to touch the same paper their parents did when they were their age.

Rock on, Jack

There are many times we find ourselves  in the middle …  Although many are denial and wait until they are older to claim it,  I am in the middle of my life. (And that’s only if I make it to 80… odds are against me!)  I’ve been in the middle of scandals… Two instantly come to mind: A “friend” cheated on his girlfriend while she was out of town and contracted VD which he promptly gave to her and then claimed he was hanging out with me and not random tramps (you have a better chance of me helping you cover up a murder than you do of me helping you cheat).  The second was when a large company I once worked for told me to cover up a sexual assault and if I didn’t I would be fired ( I didn’t do it and wasn’t immediately fired, although I don’t think they had access to my deposition).  I have been in the middle of a divorce… at the time I didn’t know it was the middle, it seemed as if it would never end.  I have even been in the middle of a couple riots…  Not that all middles are bad, they’re just the ones that come to mind.

Most mornings when the kids are here Bing is the first to wake…  And it’s usually early.  Normally I hear him get up, it’s not easy being Bing in the A.M.  You have to find Baby who often travels around the bed at night, locate any other  items that are currently important to you (right now it’s a stuffed animal version of Baby, an Angry Bird and two stuffed cupcakes – vanilla and chocolate), grab a Hot Wheel or two, maybe make a stop at the potty and then come in to wake up Dad.

When I was married I had a side of the bed… as I dare think all married couples do, I’ve never met a pair that said they change sides on a regular basis.  I was the right side if you were lying in the bed.  On my nightstand was the alarm clock, the one that was set to go off at 3:30am for years, but I would usually wake up a few minutes before it was to go off and turn it off.  There was a framed photo of Lucy and I sleeping together, she a tiny baby in the crook of my arm. (that’s still by my bed)  I would set my cell phone there to charge, it’s glowing numbers competing with the clock.  From my side of the bed I could easily glance over and see the time, instantly calculating how much time I had to sleep before the alarm would sound.  On my left slept my wife, I only had to move a few inches to feel her next to me and know she was there.  This was my position for my entire marriage… and for a longtime after.

Sunday morning I did not hear Bing as he gathered his menagerie, I was still deep asleep when he wondered into my room hands full of stuffed monkeys and faux baked goods.  He made his way to the edge of the bed and yelled “wake up!”  He’s not a subtle little man.  My eyes popped open and I was not near the edge of the bed to meet my Bing bong eye to eye, but I was dead center in the middle.  It struck me that this has become the norm, I no longer need to make room for someone else, I have no need to glance over the edge at an alarm clock that has no reason to ring…  So once again I am stuck in the middle.

Like to share our favorite things… Only people care when Oprah does it!  I haven’t been posting in awhile so I’ve slacked on sharing some cool sites and events, so here I go:

- This weekend it’s the Port of Los Angeles Lobster Fest!  This is the original Lobster Fest founded in 1999 by podcast friend Jim.  We have broadcast live on radio from this event, podcasted many shows and judged contests at this event over the years.  It’s always a great time… And where else can you get an amazing lobster meal for 19 bucks!?!?  They also take great care in booking stellar up and coming bands (and a few classics, like Teri Nunn and Berlin on Sunday!)  The kids and I will be popping in at some point this weekend to enjoy a family tradition.

- Now through October 31st (Halloween, duh!) you can enjoy the Halloween Harvest Festival at Pierce College!  This is another tradition in my family, I’m pretty sure Lucy and Bing have gone every fall of their lives so far (sometimes multiple times!) Not only can you buy a pumpkin grown right there at Pierce College by kids who will soon graduate and be unable to find jobs, but there are rides, food and (my kids favorite) The Spookley Show.   In the heart of the valley (Woodland Hills) it’s usually a nice place to visit in the early evening.

- I have always loved art, but never had the income to actually become a collector…  Except for in one of my favorite genres, street art…  Many times limited edition prints can be purchased for under $100, here are some of my favorite places to browse (I’ve been unemployed and unable to grow my collection, but I love to check in and see the latest cool prints): Obey Giant featuring the work of Shepard Fairey, Poster Child Prints which sells limited edition prints from many well known artists including Skullphone, Fairey, Tim Armstrong (From Rancid), Mark Mothersbaugh (From Devo), Curtis Kulig and many others,  1X Run which features limited runs of limited edition prints from known and upcoming artists.

-  My Sister mocks me because I care about this, but Klout measures your social media influence.  With social media growing more and more important to business everyday I believe Klout (or some site like it) will grow in importance… And it’s fun to check your score and see how you compare to your friends.  They also offer “influencers”  perks to try out new products and services and Tweet/Facebook about them.

-  Rocket Fizz is a cool retro soda/candy store where you can relive your youth and your kids can catch a really good sugar buzz… and the best part is they are opening a location a block from Porto’s in Burbank, which means you can have some potato balls and then chase them with a Faygo soda.  (there is another location down the street, the location near Porto’s is set to open at the end of this month.)

There you go, I know I’m no “You get a car! And you get a car!” Oprah, but those are some of the cool things I’ve come upon lately.

Rock on, Jack

As television rolls out the new fall season I thought it would be a good time to get back into blogging too!  I have really slacked over the summer… Really since The Insana Quotient was canceled.  I know so many of you can relate to being laid-off, down-sized, part of a staff reduction… or whatever other catch-phrase they’re currently using to cover that they have fired people.  It’s no fun, the stress and worry weigh on you.  For a long time now we’ve been hearing that things are getting better… I’m waiting, I’ll believe it when I see it.  But I figured the blog need not wait any longer, so I’m going to do my best to update it regularly… even if I have nothing to say! (Luckily there is usually something for me to complain about.)

The only bright spot of being unemployed this summer was that I had a chance to spend a lot of extra time with the kids.  I always enjoy time with my kids, but it seemed a little more important this summer… It was the last summer before they would both be in school, before they are both officially big kids.  You want your kids to grow up and gain an excellent education… But it’s a little heart breaking to see your babies grow up and not need you as much as they once did.  I know there are new and exciting things to come as they grow…  But a part of me will always miss my little babies that I could hold against my chest and soothe their worries and pains away.

Rock on, Jack