geh! i had an entry completely written and f—ing firefox went and locked up. thank goodness i wasn’t in the middle of anything important, because that eventually led the whole gui interface to lock up (even though everything was still there, somewhere, patiently waiting for me to interact with it). it’s pretty rare that the whole gui locks up…firefox must have really done some magic. anyway, i’ll try to reconstruct from memory what i’d already written….
friday after work i headed to tropioca for the monthly radio show gathering. the turnout was decent, with a cast of regulars and a couple of new faces. kd5 brought his iphone with him, which was cool since i had yet to see one in person. cuda brought a micro-lite remote-controlled helicopter, which was also pretty slick.
from there i headed over to the continental club for night one of big e’s 7th rockabilly weekend. i missed umbrella man, which i’ve been told multiple times is good but i’ve yet to see. i did manage to see the luxurious panthers. they are a rockabilly band, appropriately enough. unfortunately, they sounded sloppy to me and i wasn’t very impressed. chris had seen them before and said they were much better, so maybe they just had an off night or something. for several days i’d been going around saying i didn’t really care for the next band — sean reefer and the resin valley boys. oops. it was a case of mistaken identity on my part. sean reefer rocks! it was a really good set. he’s sort of along the lines of wayne hancock (so, generous amounts of Texas swing and hank williams). as the next band was setting up, i leaned over to chris and jokingly said “they look like a ska band.” it was sean scroggins and the trenchtown Texans. and they are a ska band. i’m wishy-washy on ska and i just wasn’t feeling it that night, so after 4 or 5 songs i left. plus it was 1:30am and i had stuff to do saturday.
saturday morning i got up around 9am. jana, a friend from work, was getting married in college station. i got prepared and took off around 11am. i originally was hoping to take my motorcycle, but the deluge of rain we’ve been having looked like it would be continuing, so i decided to take my truck instead. it’d been awhile since i’d taken my pickup on a road trip, and taking my truck is still a win for me. it ended up not raining on me at all on the trip up, and i was going to be kind of annoyed if it never rained on me (since it’d been several weeks since i was on my bike due to all the rain). fortunately, on the way back it started raining pretty good near houston so i felt good about my choice.
i drove around college station for awhile since i had some time. i’m amazed by how much it’s changed. it used to be this small town, country-ish place with a lot of undeveloped area and unique, individually built, older buildings. now the campus is pretty much completely surrounded by strip malls with the typical chains of stores and restaurants. it’s like a giant helping of suburbia was just splatted down on top of the town.
the wedding was nice. i hadn’t been to a wedding in some time. they’re still pretty difficult for me sit through — especially the vows. nothing on the people or marriage itself, it’s just really difficult for me to hear the power and meaning and depth in the ceremony and promises and concepts and not be somewhat overwhelmed emotionally about the brokenness and failure of my own marriage. i guess i better shape up though, as i’ve got two weddings to attend in september.
the reception was held at a cool old house in bryan that has been converted into a party/event/reception hall (the kyle house). it was an afternoon reception, so finger foods and cake were the options. i decided i would eat supper at some place i used to eat when i was at a&m. i ruled out all the typical chains that had been around, and also nixed double dave’s (which i ate at all the time, but is now a chain with stores close by in houston). i ended up deciding i should eat at the cow hop. before the wedding, while driving around, i noticed i didn’t see it at the two locations it’d been in while i was at school, so i asked one of the wait staff at the kyle house (a recent a&m grad) if he knew where it was now. he said he’d never heard of it. so i don’t know if i just missed it on university, or if it’s somewhere else, or if it’s gone. anyway, i ended up not eating anywhere in c.s. and heading back to houston. *sigh*
i did stop at a convenience store on the way back and purchased a frostie blue cream soda and some bbq corn nuts. i’m telling you…driving in my ’65 pickup, drinking a blue cream soda, eating some corn nuts…hell yeah. despite the conspicuous absence of a cool chick next to me on the bench seat, it was one of those moments of golden sunshine and soul-filled happiness. thank G-d for those small events.
i should mention that part of my prep saturday morning for the wedding was to shave. i shaved down to a goatee. that’s right, no more “punk rock sam houston” — the chops are gone. i’d been thinking about doing it for awhile, and when i got up that morning i decided to do it. i also chose to wear my hair back in a ponytail, which i’ve not done for some time. i must say the look makes my 8 gauge hoops more noticeable, what with them not being hidden behind hair and all. oddly, no one that knew me mentioned anything about my lack of chops. i’m not sure if they didn’t notice, didn’t think it was of sufficient merit to note it, or chose to not mention it for some reason. at least a few people at church today noticed and commented on it. i was beginning to worry that no one knew what i really looked like.
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failure is not an option. it's a requirement.
I’m not sure if I know what you look like.
I would have picked the Cow Hop too. It’s really gone? It must be, I mean how can someone go to A&M and *not* know about it? That’s so wrong.
I’m pretty sure that the chance of getting a cool chick in your truck is inversely proportional to the extent to which your truck is infused with eau de Bbq Corn Nut. Unless of course, you’re interested in getting Heather Chandler in there with you; I’m sure she’d be all up-ons. I mean, if she were still alive … and, uh, non-fictional.
kev — i’ll let you slip by, since you haven’t seen me in who knows how long. although you should probably remember at least vaguely what i kind of look like.
jamie — i normally would completely agree there is no way an ag of any value wouldn’t know about the cow hop, but after having been there and seen what the town has become i’m unsure many current ags would know much about the a&m i knew. time marches on. does that make me old army?
don’t forget that jason dean was well-versed with the selection at snappy snack shacks; he also rode a motorcycle, liked guns, and was a social misfit. so hopefully i can find a veronica sawyer, instead of some heather whose last dying words were “corn nuts,” in reference to the “bq” corn nuts she had before the remington party. (note how “bq” tied the two conversations together.) heather was interested in remington men, and i’m no remington man. i’m a true ag and lived in hart hall, where our shirts read “rent a friend, join a frat.”
I’ve been through College Station several times over the past few years. Never really stopped in it, but I’ve seen what it has become. I completely agree with this: “now the campus is pretty much completely surrounded by strip malls with the typical chains of stores and restaurants. it’s like a giant helping of suburbia was just splatted down on top of the town.” Actually in some places it is almost like there are strip malls on top of other strip malls … like over by SW Pkwy – Oh the humanity! (<< tee-hee) I’ve never driven down University though (except for that one time I went to IHOP @ 3 AM) – is The Chicken still there?
I never realized before how much you have in common with JD. Eeeps. Your dad isn’t into demolition, is he? This Heathering stuff is fun and has inspired me to blog.
If the Cow Hop is not gone, it may as well be. It was one of my favorites too, and my last time eating there some years ago left me quite disillusioned. It was under new ownership at that time — apparently the owners sold the name. It was back in or near its previous location on University. (You may remember they had moved into a bigger building on College in front of that supermarket which seems to change names every couple of years.) Everything I liked about the old Cow Hop was gone. It existed in name only. I’m glad you did not have to suffer the same disappointment.
jamie — the chicken is still there. not that i was looking for it. but i’d think i’d have heard if it was gone.
tim — yeah, i seemed to recall they’d moved back onto university, so i looked there. but when i didn’t see them i looked in the supermarket parking lot location just in case they moved back or something. it’s a cajun place now, iirc. and i think the supermarket part of the building has been abandoned for some time. seems like maybe it was a skaggs alpha beta when i first got to a&m.
As long as Dudley’s is still there! (drastic
topic change) So, what’s up with Firefox? It’s been crashing a lot on me lately too, to the point that I’ve been forced to…um… (gulp) use MicroSuck Exploder. I feel guilty, but don’t have time to figure out what the deal is w/ CrashFox. Are there any other good browsers out there (they have to support Chinese though, or it’s useless to me).
Ash
i assumed dudley’s was there, but i didn’t really look closely.
i’ve been having problems with firefox at times on both linux and mac. (i don’t run any windows boxes, so i don’t know about firefox on windows.) the linux one appears to be a memory leak, and when it crashes it locks up then closes all open firefox windows. which is annoying since i have multiple desktops and firefox windows with tabs all over. the mac one doesn’t happen as often, but it’ll lock up firefox too. i wouldn’t be surprised if it’s also memory-related. hopefully they’ll get it figured out, because i really like firefox overall.
as far as other browsers…there are a lot, but i’d suggest opera and camino. camino is only for mac though. try opera — http://www.opera.com