Favorite Things 2012 Edition

Even though the main focus of my blog has been music from decades back, I do have a few other things going on in my hobby circles. With the end of the year upon us, I thought I would take a few minutes to talk about some of the new things that I got into during 2012. Wherever applicable, I'll include some links if it sounds like stuff you want to check out too.

Let's take a look, in no particular order, at a few categories:

100,000 Views and Counting!

This morning, around 4:30am EST, my blog counter crossed over the 100,000 mark. I just wanted to take this moment to thank everyone who comes and visits each day. I really appreciate it.

Disappointed With North Carolina

Most regular readers of my blog know I tend to shy away from things of a political nature. I usually reserve my space to talk about recreational activities I enjoy: listening to music, reading books, watching television shows. To say I am not the deepest of thinkers on many topics is a fair assessment.

However, the passing of Amendment One in North Carolina this week really inspired me to make comment.

Rest In Peace, Dick Clark

After spending an entire day in a company meeting, I flipped through my Twitter feed to learn of the passing of an American icon. This morning in Los Angeles, California, Dick Clark (age 82) passed away after a heart attack.

As a kid of the 70's, I grew up watching Dick Clark all the time.

Record Breaking January

I wanted to take this moment to thank every one of my readers for a record breaking month in January of 2012.

As you can see from the chart accompanying chart (click on it to see it larger), it was the best month ever on my blog with 8995 pageviews over the thirty-one days last month.

I am completely blown away!

Happy New Year 2012

Happy New Year and welcome to 2012.

2011 was an amazing year for my blog and I owe a lot of that you all, my readers. I went from having barely a couple hundred hits of month at the end of 2010 to over a hundred hits a day (leading to thousands of hits a month). The final three months of the year have been record breakers with each month greatly exceeding the previous one. The fact that December's number of hits nearly reached 5,600 is more than I ever could have imagined! I would love to see the traffic levels to sustain and/or continue to grow as word of mouth spreads. If you like what you are reading, please share the links with others (repost, retweet, etc.).

So, you're probably wondering what to expect here at Martin's View for the new year. I actually did a little bit of thinking about that as December 2011 was coming to a close.

Remembering Wendy

I so often use my blog to talk about famous people and their accomplishments, but this is not one of those posts. This one falls very much into the personal category, and I thank my readers in advance for allowing me a few moments to share my thoughts on a friend.

I just learned this morning via Facebook of the passing of a friend of mine from high school. Wendy Sue(Rzeptkowski) Vosper passed away on Sunday, October 9th, after a long battle with breast cancer.

Remembering 9/11/01

Today marks the tenth anniversary of the September 11th attacks on the United States. Back in 2001, as most people were arriving to work for another day, two planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers in New York City, killing hundreds of people, shaking the American spirit to its very core and forever changing the familiar skyline. Soon we'd learn of another hi-jacked plane on a course for Washington DC, and how the brave passengers risked their own lives to take the plane down before it reached its final objective.

This was one of those events that always stays in your mind. Just like the generation before me who can tell you exactly where they were when they heard about the assassination of John F. Kennedy, I can tell you exactly where I was when we heard the shocking news of 9/11.

Thank You, Comic Shops

As this Wednesday (8/31/11) will mark my final trip out for weekly comic books, I thought I would take a few minutes to fondly remember and publicly say thank you to the various places I purchased comic books over my thirty five plus years of collecting.

Why Music Reviews? Why Now?

I was chatting with a new follower on Twitter last night (a guy named Guy), discussing my blog and what was coming up. One of the questions he asked me got me thinking that perhaps others were wondering about the current direction of my blog. So I thought I would take a few minutes and address that.

Why music reviews? Why now?

It isn't uncommon for me to do focused postings on my blog. A few years back I began a marathon of the Buffy, the Vampire Slayer and Angel seasons on DVD. Having never watched the shows before, I thought blogging my first-time thoughts of each episode would be fun. And, as long time readers know, weekly reviews of new comic book releases have been a main-staple here since my blog began. I've been a comic reader since I was a kid in the 70's, enjoying the story and art.

The recent focus here on album reviews really was inspired by another Twitter user, Liz (she is @1001albums on Twitter). Someone suggested her blog, where she's tackling the "1001 Albums You Must Listen To Before You Die" book by listening to and posting a review of an album a day. I found the blog interesting and her take, coming to many of these albums as a first-time listener, refreshing. She was entering the 1980's part of the list when I started to follow her blog.

Of course, that got me thinking about my own musical interests.

Music has always been a big part of my life. I grew up listening to the radio all the time in the 70's and 80's. I spent a good bit of my allowance and gift money purchasing vinyl (45s and albums). In college, I found cassettes an affordable way to get lots of new music. With the popularity of CD players in the 90's, I switched my collection over to that format. Jumping then to December 2007 when I got my first iPod, I ended up converting all of those CDs to digital. Today I have an iTunes library with thousands of albums represented - some complete, some partial. And it is always growing, with new CDs imported or new downloads gotten from emusic.com or iTunes. I like discovering "new" tracks - be they deep tracks on older albums, never heard past albums, and the occasional current new releases.

So, what I have been doing and will be doing for the forseeable future is to continue to parallel the 1001 list along with Liz. The 1980's period has some amazing records in it, and that is the most represented decade in my musical library (over one-third of the music that spans over fifty five years(!) in my library comes from the 80's). Now, there are some records on the 1001 list that I'll be skipping (they just aren't my style). But when I do, I'll continue to supplement with some of the blog features I've already established - Seventies Saturday (picking an album from the next largest represented decade in my library) and Soundtrack Sunday (albums that accompanied some favorite films).

Eventually the 1001 list will roll into the 1990's (I calculate it'll be at least four months or so for Liz to get there) and beyond. I'll still sprinkle in my reviews of the albums there I have when they pop up, but I'll continue to focus a lot more on the 1980's (and the 1970's too). With so much music to explore and talk about, I expect album reviews to be a permanent fixture here at Martin's View.

I hope you'll continue to take this journey with me.

Feel free to drop me a comment here or a direct message over on Twitter (links are available on the banner and the right column) if you have any suggestions of albums you'd like me to talk about. If I have the tracks or can find a place to stream them for a listen, I'll be happy to offer my thoughts in a future blog posting. I really enjoy intereacting with all my readers. I want this to be a place you come back to visit often.

The 2010 Gap

To all my blog followers, I apologize for the period of silence from June to December of 2010. Lots of things factored into my lack of motivation to writing.

In June, a very good friend of mine suddenly learned he had a very advanced case of cancer. By the time it was detected, there was very little that could be done to prevent things from spreading. He went through the whole chemotherapy thing, moved back home with his parents, yet sadly had only a couple months left to live (and those months had a lot of pain and discomfort for him). He passed away during the summer. KC was a wonderful amateur writer who shared his work with the web. He was a master storyteller, and he is greatly missed by all of his friends. Since then, I haven't felt very into working on my own fiction.

In the summer, my son started his sophomore year of high school and with that marching band. So, my wife and I became band-booster-parents, going to all the home games to help with parking and tickets sales and going to competitions on weekends. It was a good way to spend our time while supporting all the kids at Fred T. Foard high school. We enjoyed it a lot and look forward to next fall.

In the fall, my wife's aunt learned that she too had a form of cancer. Despite treatment, she spent her last weeks in the hospital. My wife was able to go up to be with her family during this very sad time. Still and especially during this holiday season, the absence of Aunt Jane in all our lives has left us somewhat sadder. She was a very unique person, always friendly and welcoming and encouraging. She too is greatly missed.

My hope for 2011 and beyond is to blog a bit more when I can. I'll try to keep the weekly comic reviews and well as comments about TV, music and more. This is a good outlet and a nice way to do some writing on a daily basis. I hope you all check in periodically. Thanks.

Inauguration Moment...

In watching the inauguration festivities today, one thing that struck me - and it always does for some reason - is seeing the former Presidents come together at events. It is nice to see them at something more positive than say a funeral for one of their own. I realized that these were, for the most part, the men who led this country for most of my life - the time for which I knew what the President was or did. Carter, Bush Sr., Clinton, Bush Jr. - all that was missing was the great, late Ronald Reagan. It just struck me as a very important piece to an already historic day. That they can all come together, despite political differences and personal differences, to be present at the inauguration, really says a lot about this country in which we live. Makes me proud to be an American.

Social Networking

After my high school reunion last August, I joined MySpace to connect with friends from my class. I also had a few other friends there from other activities over the years. Net total of friends: about a dozen or so.

On Sunday, my wife convinced me to join Facebook (she has a page there). I created an account and as of this morning have reconnected with 20 friends from the past. Big difference. Facebook definitely helped facilitate finding folks too.

Guess which one I'll spend more time on?

I like how in this day and age it is very easy to locate and reconnect with people from your past. It really is amazing. We can talk with friends from all over, any day, any time. We don't have to wait for the mail to deliver our communications, or pay for phone calls. Just type and send.

Most of my friends I connect with are online, and we use the Internet to communicate. Sure, I have people I know at work, the place I spend most time at every day, but those are co-workers. I've never been one to hang with folks from work. Work is your job, a place to accomplish tasks and get assignments done. It should not be a place for major socializing. You know the folks that socialize at work - they're at the water cooler or hanging outside the conference rooms, chatting and laughing and planning where to go for lunch. Know what? They're using the company dime to be social. I never got that.

I do my socializing on my own time, from my own house on nights and weekends. That's the seperation of work and play (much like the seperation of church and state, without all the messy stuff that happens with politics).

2008 Resolutions - How Did I Do?

I was going to do a 2008 year in review entry (still might), but of course I didn't have the time over the past week or so. We had a house full of company (my wife's brother and his spouse, and their four kids all under the age of 7 - we are so past that stage having just one kid who is now a teenager) so I didn't have a lot of quiet time to reflect.

So, looking back at my 2008 New Year's Resolutions, let's see how I did.

1) to lose a few more pounds. I didn't hit my 175lb weight goal by Christmas but I am close. I'd like to be at least 175 by my 25th high school reunion this summer, whenever it ends up being.

I just weighed in this morning at 170lbs. Had a two pound gain over the holidays, not bad considering all the eating out and eating at my inlaws' house. Once I get back into normal mode I should be back to 168lb easily and on the road to 165lbs. I did hit below 175lbs for my reunion, so that one was a success.

2) to add another 45 minutes of exercise each week. This will help with number 1 above. I already do two 45 minute sessions each week (Saturday mornings at the YMCA) and Wednesday night walking. We'll see what I can do to add a little here and there.

I did add another hour and a half of walking on Monday nights when my son was at his Boy Scout meetings. When gas prices were topping in near $4 a gallon, it made no sense running back and forth the ten plus miles to the meeting. So, I did walk and that helped a lot with the weight drop and maintenance. So, this one was a success too.

3) to catch up on some reading. I still have a back pile of novels and other things on the nightstand to read. With a cut back on TV viewing, maybe this will give me the time to get some of those books read.

Well, I starting going to the library regularly and managed to read 30+ Spenser novels by Robert B. Parker (a new author for me) plus a few books on writing. I did also read on oustanding novel on my nightstand, so I'd consider this a success as well. Wow, three out of three - that's pretty good.

4) to cut back on TV viewing. The ongoing Writers' Strike has showed me I don't miss the viewing so I need to seriously review what's on the DVR when the shows return to determine what gets my time and what goes.

I think the shortened TV season in 2007-2008 cut me back a bit. When the fall season started in 2008, I did get back to my usual shows - the Monday CBS comedies, Heroes, Bones and I added a new comedy Gary Unmarried. VH-1 still provided me some with Sunday night mindless reality shows like Rock of Love: Charm School, I Love Money and such. So, I don't think I've cut back too much on my schedule. Maybe in 2009 when I am seriously considering to not set the DVR for the three American Idol shows each week.

Going Back to Raleigh...

...to Raleigh, to Raleigh. Going back to Raleigh - I don't think so.

(my apologies to L.L. Cool J)

Actually, we did take a trip three hours across state to head back to Raleigh on Saturday of this past weekend. Part of our family Christmas gift was tickets to the Carolina Hurricanes hockey game. The other part was incentive for our son to get back into the groove of walking after six weeks from his knee surgery (he's out of the wheelchairs and now getting around just fine - no running yet, but the surgery seems to have done the trick).

We took off in the van on Saturday morning, had lunch at Kanki (our favorite Japanese restaurant - since the Japanese in Hickory stinks on ice) at the mall, then shopped around a bit (didn't buy a thing though). Then we drove up to Wake Forest to check out the old houses we lived in (mostly just a drive by for old times sake). Then before the game, we checked into the North Raleigh Hilton where we were staying for the night and got changed into our jerseys.

The game was a lot of fun. Carolina was wearing their new, black home jerseys though (more merchandising for the fans to purchase I guess). They were playing the Boston Bruins, who were very good and beat us 4 to 2. Still, for us, the game isn't about winning (though that would be nice). We so enjoy going to hockey games in person, so you can scream and get psyched and just have a blast. Much better than watching hockey on TV.

We got back to the hotel around 11pm and flipped on the TV. Found Star Trek: First Contact on so we watched the last hour. The Hilton has these fantastic, widescreen LCD TV's in all rooms - and most of the channels were in HD to boot. It was a nice way to unwind before bed.

Before driving back home on Sunday, we had to hit another favorite restaurant for brunch. This time it was the Twisted Fork where kids eat free on Sundays. So, we had a little savings. Good thing too as my son ate more than any of us at Japanese the day before. It's tough having a growing pre-teen. He slept on the way home, and my wife watched some Grey's Anatomy episodes on her iPod. Thus, I made great time driving home while listening to the First Wave channel on XM/Sirius.

It was a fun little trip and a great edition to the vacation time.

I Found My Calling...

With today being Christmas, my wife and I got our 13 year old son (our only child) the one thing he wanted for Christmas - Rock Band 2 for the XBox 360. Now, I've mentioned in the past how we all enjoy Guitar Hero games, so this seemed like a natural next step. It combines great rock music (past and present) with an interactive video game and it comes with a couple instruments (a guitar and drums).

So, what's my calling?

I'm the singer of our house band - Da Rockrrrzzz! (my son named the band)

Yup, finally knowing the lyrics to "Hungry Like the Wolf" and "Eye of the Tiger" can pay off. I can rock those tunes like a master.

Good thing too since I can drum worth a darn. I'm okay on the hand-eye coordination needed for guitar and the main drums, but my foot-eye coordination sucks big time and that kick drum note kills me every time! This why my wife couldn't teach me to drive a standard.

So, we'll be doing a lot of rocking out over the holidays - until I go back to work on the 1st of the year.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a "are you ready to rock?". :)

Early Christmas Present

This holiday season we haven't felt into it yet. We haven't decorated yet, we've barely bought gifts. Just the blahs. Then this week we got an early Christmas present.

No, not the new garage door motor that we had to replace (which burned out on Sunday).

We found out this week that my son's knee has healed since the surgery he had on it back in November.

See, back in August his knee was bothering him so we took him to the orthopedic. They did an MRI and xrays and determined that blood was not getting down to the cartiledge between the thigh bone and the knee bone. For eight week he had to wear a brace to keep it immobilized (i.e. no bending). Great way to start the new school year, eh?

After eight weeks, there was little impovement. So, next was knee surgery - an out patient thing where they drilled a few holes in the bone to allow blood to flow to the cartiledge. That meant no weight bearing while it healed. That meant five long weeks of being in a wheel chair (a motorized one at school so he could get around, and a manual one for home and short trips). Of course, we have no bedroom on the first floor so he had to do a lot of scooting up and down the steps like a little kid. I had to give up my van since that is the only car big enough to transport the motorized chair (which weighs hundreds of pounds and needed heavy metal ramps to be put together each time to get the chair in and out).

So, come Friday the motorized chair goes back. We now start the process of him learning to walk again, mostly trusting he can put the weight on the leg without fear of falling.

Changes...

Damn, it's been a couple crazy weeks.

First, I'm halfway through a three week cycle of working third shift on a remote installation project for my company. Gotta love those 10pm to 6am work cycles to mess with your biorhytms. I don't think I've watched any TV regularly of late.

Second, there's the gas chaos in the south - but it is getting better. More stations seem to be keeping in stock of late, so that is good. Luckily with working the third shift from home I haven't been burning through the gas.

Third, with the bank chaos, our bank Wachovia gets bought out on Monday. I'll let my wife handle that stuff as she has a past in banking and is the financial mind of our coupling. Still, that's always a surprise.

Finally, AOL sends an email out last night saying on October 31st they are pulling the plug on user FTP sites. What the $^#%*?!? No reason why - just "sorry for the inconvenience". Hey, AOL, forget you. I just changed from my monthly paying account to the free version. You don't want to give me FTP space, I'll forgo giving you money and use your free email service. Thanks but no thanks, dudes. That's crappy customer service and that's what you get. So, I'm moving my websites to another locale - something free. Sure, its work but what the heck. Time to prune my online presence some. Still, I hate the idea of all those dead links on the Internet. So untidy.

Crazy About Gas part 2

Well, things have gone from bad to worse here in western North Carolina in regards to gasoline. When Hurricanes Gustav and Ike hit the continental US, they took out some of the oil refineries that feed the pipeline that gets gasoline to our part of the country. Those storms were two weeks ago.

As of yesterday, many gas stations in our area are still without fuel.

Actually, that's not completely true. While many have the little plastic bags on the nozzles or signs out front saying "No Gas", not every station is completely out - at least not at the same times.

Wednesday night I witnessed about thirty cars lined up on the main drag of downtown Hickory (US-127) in front of an Exxon. A tanker truck was in back depositing fuel, and as soon as he finished filling the station up - the customers drained the place. When I drove past this morning, it was plastic bag city there.

Just up the same road I saw traffic in the right lane backed up for nearly a mile. I got in the left and continud by the BP where cars were lined up to fuel up. Had to be at least fifty cars. I swear, it was as if I had suddenly been transported back in time to the mid-1970's. Crazy!

Now, I was lucky enough on Monday to top off my tank so I've still got about 2/3rds of a tank in my van. Also, with doing a third shift project for work (which I can do remotely from home), I am saving on gas a bit for this week and the next couple. Still, eventually the little trips to pick my son up from school and to the grocery store and such will eat away at the gas I have.

Hopefully things will get better soon. The news every morning is always so depressing. The story from Charlotte is the same - no gas here or there, lines where there are some, everyone is in a panic. The word is saying things will get better by the weekend - we shall see.

Remembering Pete Newmann

A friend sent me an email last night that really caught me by surprise.

Back in the late 90's I was involved in a collectible card game called OverPower. It pitted a team of four characters versus four other characters to see who could knock out whom. The characters were based on comic book heroes and villains from the various comic book universes (DC, Marvel, Image). Besides buying the cards, I often made my own homemade versions with PhotoDeluxe and shared them on the web. It was online I met other players, often playing games via chat dialogues and even got to meet a number of players in person.

One such person was Pete Newmann, who went by the AOL screen name of Eboladude. See, Pete was a research scientist in Maryland who studied the ebola virus for a living. He was also a devoted husband and father.

Pete and I chatted often online - not only about OverPower but about other things too. I actually got to meet him in person once when a bunch of us planned a road trip to Niagra Falls, Canada, for a card tournament weekend. I drove up to his house early that Friday morning, hung with him and his son until the other guys arrived, and then we took his van on the trip.

Now, neither Pete nor I were hard-core players. We played for fun. We liked to make homemades. In fact, on that weekend, he even presented me with a couple of gifts. First, a CD that included all his and my homemade images. Second, a huge box full of color print-outs of all my homemades to date (I am sure he printed a ream of paper at work for them all, and killed some toner doing it).

Not being the best of players, that left us some free time to talk and such. I remember us having dinner one of the nights at the restaurant near the hotel, eating wings, drinking beers and just chatting about life and such. He was more than just someone I knew online. He was someone I considered a good friend. On the drive home Sunday night, while the others slept in the back of the van, he drove and I kept him company as we talked through the night.

But, as often happens, people change interests, move on to other things and start to loose touch. That happened with Pete and I. OverPower, the game, sort of folded. We'd chat now and again but in the last decade we sort of lost touch.

That brings us back to the email I got last night. Another OverPower buddy was searching for folks online and came across a link for a local Maryland comic shop that had posted about an event in late December of 2006. It was a memorial HeroClix tournament in Pete's honor. Pete had moved on to playing HeroClix after OverPower it would seem.

I searched the web this morning but so far have not found out exactly when Pete died or of what causes. I think I want to know just so I can have some closure for myself.

Anyone who knew him would say Pete was a friendly, approachable person. He could make you laugh but at the same time be someone with whom could have serious talks. My prayers go out to his family and friends.