Hit Songs on my Birthday

I saw on twitter someone posted, the #1 song on your 22nd Birthday is how your 2022 is going to go, this lead me to this neat website Birthday Jams and here is the list of hit songs on my Birthday every year since my birth...June 24, 

1979    Ring My Bell - Anita Ward

1980    Comin Up - Paul McCartney

1981    Bette Davis Eyes - Kim Carnes

1982    Ebony & Ivory - Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder

1983    Flashdance... What a Feeling - Irene Cara

1984    The Reflex - Duran Duran

1985    Heaven - Bryan Adams

1986    On My Own - Patti LaBelle & Michal McDonald

1987    I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me) - Whitney Houston

1988    Foolish Beat - Debbie Gibson

1989    Satisfied - Richard Marx

1990    Step by Step - New Kids On The Block

1991    Rush Rush - Paula Abdul

1992    I'll Be There - Mariah Carey featuring Trey Lorenz

1993    That's The Way Love Goes - Janet Jackson

1994    I Swear - All-4-One

1995    Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman? - Bryan Adams

1996    The Crossroads - Bones Thugs-n-Harmony

1997    I'll Be Missing You - Puff Daddy& Faith Evans featuring 112

1998    The Boy Is Mine - Brandy & Monica

1999    If You Had My Love - Jennifer Lopez

2000    Be With You - Enrique Iglesias

2001    Lady Marmalade - Christina Aguilera, Lil' Kim, Mya, & Pink

2002    Hot in Herre - Nelly

2003    This is The Night - Clay Aiken

2004    Burn - Usher

2005    We Belong Together - Mariah Carey

2006    Hips Don't Lie - Shakira featuring Wyclef Jean

2007    Umbrella - Rihanna featuring Jay-Z

2008    Viva La Vida - Coldplay

2009    Boom Boom Pow - The Black Eyed Peas

2010    California Gurls - Katy Perry featuring Snoop Dogg

2011    Rolling In The Deep - Adele

2012    Call Me Maybe - Carly Rae Jepsen

2013    Blurred Lines - Robin Thicke featuring T.I. & Pharrell

2014    Fancy - Iggy Azalea featuring Charli XCX

2015    See You Again - Wiz Khalifa featuring Charlie Puth

2016    One Dance - Drake featuring Wizkid and Kyla

2017    Despacito - Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee featuring Justin Bieber

2018    Sad! - XXXTentacion

2019    Old Town Road - Lil Nas X featuring Billy Ray Cyrus

2020    Rockstar - DaBaby featuring Roddy Ricch

2021    BTS - Butter

I'm way more familiar with the songs in the first tens years of my life than the last ten years. The middle two about 50 / 50.  I found another website that does the same thing and the majority of the songs are the same.  

Until Next Time!

Cold Crisp Morning

I stepped outside to take trash out and start my van before work, it was just after 6am and it was a crisp 10 degrees.  It's the coldest morning we've had since last winter and I loved it.  There is just something about those cold crisp mornings, where there is no wind and the air just feels so clean.

There is nothing like take few deeps breaths on morning like these.  I'm sure it's all in my head, but it just feels like it cleans out the lungs and it's refreshing.  

The moon looked awesome with a double ring around it, my picture doesn't capture it like I would like it too.  

It was a very serene few minutes before heading to work.  

Until Next Time!

It's snowing

It's snowing outside, we aren't supposed to get much and it's going to be in the 50's and rain this weekend, but it still does put me in that Christmas spirit!

I love Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol' it's such a great story and I have watched many different versions of it over the years.  As a child Mickey's Christmas Carol was my favorite, the 1938 version starring Reginald Owens is a masterpiece!  The Muppets had a bad ass version, and the Bill Murray take on the story in Scrooged is wonderful. 

There have been so many different takes on the story, but the most recent 2019 BBC Version starring Guy Pearce is terrific.  I've watched it the last two years and had the itch to start it last night.  It's broken down to three episodes on FX with a commercial free runtime of 173 minutes.  It has it faults but I like this take on the story.   

I think tonight is good night to break out the Christmas specials we have on DVD & Blu Ray and fire them up!  Until 8pm when AEW Dynamite comes on. 

Until Next Time!

8-Bit Christmas

I watched the HBO Max flick 8-Bit Christmas this past weekend.  Based on the trailer it looked like an updated version of A Christmas Story and after watched that I do get the inspirational vibes that it got from the timeless classic.

In A Christmas Story Ralphie pines for a Red Ryder 200 shot range model air field with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells times.  In 8-Bit Christmas Jake pines for a Nintendo.

Overall I really enjoyed the movie and I could, at times, relate to how desperately Jake wanted a Nintendo.  I would give this recommend and say it's worth your time for a watch, but I'm not ready to say it's a new timeless classic like A Christmas Story became.  I could see myself buying it when it comes out on home video because it has just the right amount of nostalgia for me to want to look back at it. 

In Christmas 1988, when this movie takes place, I was 9 1/2 years old and my brother and desperately wanted this home entertainment system.  Our parents agreed to pay half, but we had to work and earn the money for it.  So we worked under the table for a farmer at his enormous chicken barn picking eggs. 

This barn has rows and rows of chickens in cages, stacked on top of each other, looking back it's not that sanitary.  I would push my cart down the row and collect the eggs in flats of 36, I believe we got 18 cents a flat.  The downside was that some chickens would peck your hands as your took the eggs, and that hurt like crazy. 

When we would get paid our mother made us put have of it in the back, then half of what was left, a quarter, we go towards the Nintendo and the remainder we got as spending money.  It felt like it took years, in reality it was months, to save up the money for the Nintendo but we did.

Today I'm not a huge at home gamer.  I love old arcade games and I'm a pinball fanatic, but at home my favorite games to play are the classic Nintendo and Super Nintendo games.

I just found out that this movie is based on a book that came out in 2013, I think I'll have to read that.

Until Next Time!

It's the Christmas Season

I love me some Christmas, always have, it was my favorite holiday.  I just love the time of the year, the family get togethers, the food, the holiday spirit.  A then along the way someone made it very hard for me to enjoy Christmas, it just became more frustrating than fun.

My wife's favorite holiday is Thanksgiving, as she says the only expectation is a good meal and she's got that down.  My wife has really made Thanksgiving so appealing and exciting, and she really is a marvelous cook. 

Last year on Black Friday, Wesley asked if we could go and get a Christmas tree, the look on his faceand the excitement in his eyes reminded me of how great Christmas was for me.  So we headed to the tree lot and picked out a nice one.  Christmas 2020 was one of the best that I have had in years.  Christmas 2021 feels like it's going to top last year easily.  

Before Thanksgiving Wesley asked if we were going to get the tree the day after again, and I said that we would.  Even my wife said that Wesley's excitement was rubbing off on her.  I mean who doesn't find a 6 years old innocent wonder and excitement contagious.  

The weather Black Friday forecasted rain with a mix of snow all day and I didn't want to bring a wet tree in the house, as the lot was open on Thanksgiving day I decided to get it that morning.  So at 8am when it opened Wesley and I were there to fetch the tree.  We had to be back by 9am to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, he was very excited to watch that.

We got the tree in the stand but didn't decorate it until Friday.  I worked in the morning, then when I got home Addison and I made the popcorn strands, Kate had already put the lights on it.  Wesley and Addison then decorated it.  I must say it looks fantastic!

We watched Christmas Chronicles 2 on Netflix while we trimmed the tree, so I guess it can be said that we are definitely full ahead Christmas!

Until Next Time!

This and That

I'm enjoying my life right now, I'm just not finding the time to do some of the things that I used to have more time to do.  Since July I have just been so swamped with work, not at work and while at home.  I've managed to do plenty with my family, going to wrestling and what not.  However, for work I am behind a computer all day long and the last thing I want to do with my free time at home is sit behind a computer even more.  

Maybe if I had a comfortable set up to sit on my couch and use my laptop, I don't know.  My buddy has a new webpage and message board, Middle Aged Fat Kids that is well worth your time.  It's a fun mix of 90's based pop culture.  The Forum is cool as well because I used to use these all the time and now I just don't.  

I get it, reddit is all the rage, but I don't like sorting through it.  I like a good old fashioned forum, but that's me!  I mean when I want to play video games at home I just want to play Nintendo or the SNES Classic Edition Mario Kart.  

Until Next Time!

Monster Trucks

 I loved Monster Trucks as a kid and watched them every week, with USA-1 being my favorite truck.  I own a die cast of the truck today.  Later I became a big fan of Gravedigger watching the USHRA.  Even though Bigfoot was the first and one of the most popular Monster Trucks I was never a huge fan, probably because it was not a part of the USHRA so I didn't see the truck on a weekly basis.  

I went to my first Monster Truck show in 2000 at the Cumberland County Civic Center.  Back then when USHRA ran small indoor arenas like this they called it the Thunder Nationals tour.   The floor is basically the size of a Hockey rink so what they can do is limited, but it's still impressive.  I don't have pictures from the show that I can find and the only trucks I can remember on the show was Sting and Blue Thunder.

After that was a couple times at Wiscasset Speedway a few trucks did some stuff on the infield between races.  Then I went to a few USHRA outside at Speedway 95 in Hampden and these were the best shows that I went to.  

On the Bigfoot side of things I did see it displayed a couple times once in Florida in 2002 at the then Race Rock Cafe.  This truck featured 10 foot tires.  I saw a standard Bigfoot truck on display in 2004 at New England Battery & Tire in Vassalboro, Maine.  My last show was in April 2016 at the Colisee in Lewiston and I got to see Bigfoot in action that night. 

It's hard for me to believe that 15 years have passed since the last time I went to a rally.  It's not because I didn't want to, but life and things like work and other plans seemed to constantly interfere.  I really want to go to one of those huge out door USHRA Monster Jam shows with all the big names drivers like at Gillette Stadium.  

Trucks I've seen live not a complete list:

Sting

Blue Thunder

Gravedigger

Little Tiger

Firemouth

Adrenaline Rush

Wolverine

Bigfoot  - three different trucks

American Guardian

Adrenaline Rush

Trasher

Backdraft

Wildfire

Stone Cold Austin 3:16

Hulkster

The Rock

Raminator

Eradicator

Sudden Impact

Black Stallion

Warrior

American Outlaw

Bounty Hunter

I'm going to post more about my former monster truck adventures in the future.  Honestly though I have wrestler Perry Von Vicious to thank, his love of the sport has rekindled my fire!  

Until Next Time!