Saturday, October 27, 2007

Hallowoes vs. Blood and Guts

So I'm a little bummed. Halloween is quickly sneaking up on us (hopefully to scare the crap out of us), and don't feel that I can successfully participate in the holiday (at least not in the fervent manner for which my soul longs).

We don't have a show on Halloween, but we have to be on the road. I won't be able to walk around Town in some fantastic costume enhanced to the max by a REAL mustache.
"Hey... did you hear that guy dressed as (Burt Reynolds Edgar Allen Poe Teddy Roosevelt) actually grew a legit, attached to the face mustache!? He had to have committed to his costume weeks ago! Who would want to be (Burt Reynolds Edgar Allen Poe Teddy Roosevelt) so much that they would walk around Town with a mustache weeks before Halloween!? What a chowderhead."

In addition to the travel schedule, I won't really have the time or resources to prepare one of the (3) Halloween costumes I had in mind... especially not to the level of completion that's been floating around in that same mind.


In addition to that, my girlfriend has been making me jealous. Last night, she got to go to a birthday/Halloween party dressed as a really good lookin' Dorothy (Garland). Its the third year in a row that I've had to see her Halloween costume via the magic of camera phones. Those pictures are the same quality as magic poo. ... Anywhooo... My girl and I also went to an apple orchard/ pumpkin patch right before the tour started (she's sitting on those pumpkins in her myspace photo). We picked her out a really little pumpkin and me a tall, kinda skinny one to carve. At this point in the story, I suffer the same Hallowed fate as my good friend John Warne. Both John and I purchased an elegant , orange, orb of carve-able wonder and FORGOT to carve it before going on tour!
I think we're both still a bit sheepish about it.

All is not lost, however. I intentionally Netflixed all four of the Silence Of The Lambs series. I will begin watching them tonight after the Ohio State game. I can't decide if I should watch them in the chronological order of the plot, or in the order that they were released. I'm pretty sure I'll go with the release order. Either way, I'll have a Haniball. Haha. Who says "have a ball" anymore anyway. Old men? Am I an old man?

Last night I finished watching the Band Of Brothers series on DVD. As far as Halloween goes, it wasn't scary. However, it did have a plethora of gory footage (and I don't mean An Inconvenient Truth). Joking aside, Band Of Brothers was excellent for a variety of reasons. It was filmed well, it was written wonderfully, and it made me look at WWII in some new ways. Despite the fact that this country (and others) can't seem to stay out of wars, it seems as if our world has learned some crucial lessons from the detestable crimes of the Nazis. That can't happen again.

"Excellent report Mr. Thiessen. Please hand me that paper football and return to your desk."

In memory of Mrs. Homrichouser('s class)

Matthew Thiessen

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Virginia's West Sieeede

Its late and I'm tired, but I figured I'd jot a quick note down. I've spent the last two days in West Virginia preparing for and kicking off our new tour. The first show was tonight, and it wasn't as bad as a lot of our tour debuts. It definitely wasn't a tight set, but I'll take a C+ on the first show of a tour any day of the week.

I spent most of the afternoon on Sunday driving down to Nashville. This prevented me from enjoying any of NFL action, and I'm still not sure how I feel about that. I went to Nashville to re-sing some vocals on "Deck The Halls" for some Shrek Christmas special. Replace "deck" with "Shrek", and you're starting to get the vibe of it. I hope they use the song... it'll be funny to hear myself singing on something animated (other than the seemingly short-lived Woodland Forest episodes). After tracking the vocals, I drove up to downtown Nashville and hung out with my buddy Kevan (he ended up moving to Nashville instead of Florida). Unfortunately, I could only spare a bit more than an hour before I had to leave to get on the steel horse (that's Bon Jovi for tour bus).

I won again in Fantasy Football, the Browns won, and Ohio State looks like a beautiful bird perched atop the poll. #1 (for now).

And in closing....

I shaved my scruff yesterday. Did I miss a spot?

The answer is yes.

The area above my upper lip and below my nose is warmer than the rest of my face. I have achieved chowderhead status in all self-respecting social circles. I look too scary to babysit, and I have all the contraband that Bullwinkle was hiding under his bed.

My friends....



I have a moustache
(or as Bullwinkle put it, a moose stash)
Matty

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Baby Got Back (80's edition)

I'm back.

More importantly...

I think Baby Got Back should've been the title of Dirty Dancing II (pauses to confirm via Google that there was, in fact, a Dirty Dancing II). It should've been the story of how Baby came back from summer vacation, put on a creepy mask, and used her new dancing abilities to rip her victims limb from limb. Her victims.........?

Everyone.


Release date: Halloween 1988

It is almost that time of year, isn't it? I'm excited. Its my favorite season. As a kid I was set on it. I would sit and swing on my swingset around sunset, and I'd pretend to see thousands of bats flying all around in the changing leaves. I LOVED Halloween. (I was a weird kid. I had two twin imaginary friends. For a LONG time. Maybe I'll blog about that someday.)

The cruise was great. I did cruise for a bruise, but minimal burnage.

This story is better if you have seen "Say Anything". (1989)

Not the band... The movie, silly.


My buddy Josh and our respective lady friends were hanging out in my cabin, and these people on another balcony started blasting music really loud. I grabbed my portable iPod boombox, put on Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes", and blasted them out of the water (well, that would've blasted me out of the water too.... I just played the song REALLY loud). The best was that I did it standing like this (photo taken during performance)



She's gone. She gave me a pen. I gave her my heart, she gave me a pen.



Next item on 80's agenda. I've decided not to shave for a while, and go back to the mustache look. I should have a good start by the beginning of tour. I miss the stache. Its a really funny thing to walk through the world and have every stranger that you encounter think that you're a complete chowderhead.

I also miss the word chowderhead. I'm going to start a show called Chowderheads, and my buddies and I are going to film ourselves doing dumb stuff like giving ourselves paper-cuts and snorting wasabi. My name will be Matt. Other's will have names like Johnny Nashville and Ban Margarine!

I'll be rich. And there will be no more butter substitute.

Ok. Gotta get back to working on tour stuff. I'm waiting on Hoopes to tell me when he has to switch guitars during the show. Excitement! Rock and Roll!!!!

By the way, I won two games of Fantasy Football. One of them was against my good bud Joshy. It felt good to defeat him, but I felt sad that he had to lose... oh wait... nope... didn't feel bad at all.

Matthew.


Get it?