So really, when were waffles invented?

Today was my birthday and it was kind of a crummy day. I'll spare you the details.

Luckily, my friend Jimmy is really good at cheering people up... I have to say that this email I received today literally made me LOL at my desk. I asked his permission to repost it here as my first guest blogger. All copyrights belong to Jimmy. Don't sue me!

Happy Birthday Kristi!

I hope you have a stupendous birthday even if it is on a Tuesday. Even though you treated yourself with the Muse concert, are you doing anything else for fun or getting any good presents? Its cool that you think you are getting a remote and controller for your PS3. Now if you would ever get it hooked up!

I looked back in history to see if anything else great happened on December 15th and saw that nothing was as great as you being born. Now there were a couple of other significant moments such as Edison patenting the phonograph in 1877 and a tax revolt on Terschelling due to tax on cereal in 1680. But still nothing quite measured up. I thought the only thing that might measure up if it occurred on December 15th would be the invention of waffles. Which led me to wonder when were waffles invented? Hmm...

So I decided to investigate. Where would I begin my investigation? Why the great country of Belgia of course, home of the popular Belgian waffles. The travel agent looked at me kind of weird when I told her my desired destination. She asked if I meant Belgium. Ah, of course, the name of Belgium must be the modern 21st Century pronunciation. Kind of how New York was New Amsterdam or how its Istanbul, not Constantinople. But I didn't tell her that because its really no one's business but the Turks. So with tickets in hand and a burning curiosity, I traveled to Belgium.

The first thing I noticed once I arrived is that Belgium is not made of waffles. I expected the land and buildings to be made of batter with syrup flowing from fountains. I guess expecting it to be like one of Homer Simpson's dreams would be a tad unrealistic. So I decided to sightsee for a bit and see if I could find out anything about waffles.

Have you ever been to Belgium? I was quite impressed with the architecture of the buildings. They have such a sense of history to them. Look! Here is a picture of me in Belgium!

Yes, another surprising aspect of Belgium is how short they were! Even the buildings! I was walking over houses with ease. This also made it hard to understand what the people were saying. Besides having an accent, all of their voices were squeaky and tiny. Kind of like mice. Except mice can't really talk. At least I've never heard a mouse that can talk. I thought I heard a moose talk one time. But it was a German moose so I didn't know if it was really talking or just eating loudly.

Unfortunately, despite the pretty countryside and interesting buildings, I never did find out exactly when waffles were invented. They seem to have their origins from sometime in the Middle Ages but were brought to North America in 1620 by Pilgrims. At least that is what wikipedia says. Isn't the Internet amazing? I travel all the way to Belgium when the answers were mostly at the tips of my fingers on my laptop.

Anyway, I just want to repeat that I hope you have a wonderful birthday. A lot of people have been looking back on the last decade with best of lists, etc. and getting to know you has certainly been a highlight for me. Thanks for being a cool friend and I hope my Belgian adventures made you smile. :-)

Happy birthday!

Jimmy

This could surpass all others to be the #1 concert experience on my list...

Let me just say that I've never seen three guys rock a stage as much as Muse. If you've been wondering where I've been, I've been obsessing over seeing one of my top favorite bands live in Las Vegas.

When they came out onto the tiny Joint stage at the Hard Rock, I knew this was going to be special. They've only recently begun to have a following in the US. I got to chatting with the guy sitting next to me (who also sold me my tickets on Stubhub) who said that he and his wife routinely follow the band around the world. He said it was 'a once-in-a-lifetime' experience to see them perform in such an intimate setting. They just saw them perform a couple sold-out shows in London where the crowd was 90,000+. The Joint was 4,000 people. Yeah, that's like Matt and the boys performing in your bedroom. If your bedroom could hold 4,000 people.

As soon as they came on, they immediately got the crowd into it with their new single "Uprising". It's quite a powerful, rebellious anthem and totally set the mood. I wasn't sure if the crowd was going to be made up of hardcore fans or just passive fans who were there for the other bands, since it was a holiday radio show put on by 107.5 FM.

Definitely hardcore fans.

Muse ripped through 12 songs without even a pause between songs to say hello. It seemed that they were trying their best to fit in as much as they could within their allotted time. The entire crowd sang along to many of the songs, the most moving of which was "Time is Running Out" from Absolution. Unfortunately, that was true for the concert too, because they were quickly approaching the end of their show with a strong performance of "Knights of Cydonia", one of my favorites on Guitar Hero. :)

I don't really have a go-to favorite Muse song. They are one of those rare bands that I can throw on one of their albums and listen to it in its entirety without skipping tracks. I was particularly happy that they played "Hysteria", as it has been one that I've heard is ridiculous live. And it was.

Photo credit: www.Vegasdeluxe.com

I can't even describe in words how well the songs translate into a live performance. You just have to experience it for yourself and be in the moment. If the songs sound like they are powerful on CD or on your iPod, multiply that by eleventy hundred and that is about what it's like in person. Some people have commented that any band can sound good when some of their music is pre-recorded. That's the rumor that circling on some sites. Of course some of the music is pre-recorded. Muse is three guys, with Matt Bellamy playing most everything besides bass and drums. It would be impossible to recreate all of the intricate layers of music live. In this concert, Matt did start out "United States of Eurasia" on the piano... even though it was sort of a sad upright piano, not very fancy, when he's used to grand pianos. To see Matt's hands create the riffs in such a fury is a trip! Same with Dom on the drums. A person next to me commented that he has never seen anyone play like that in his life. It's totally a must-see concert.

Setlist included:
Uprising
Unnatural Selection
Supermassive Black Hole
Resistance
Interlude
Hysteria
United States of Eurasia
MK Ultra
Starlight
Time is Running Out
Plug in Baby
Knights of Cydonia

Send a bail bondsman

I'm at Jury Duty in Santa Ana and it's like PRISON*. No, really it is. The police screen you when you get here, pat you down even, corral you to a room, and leave you there. For hours.

I understand that it's your "Civil Responsibility" to serve on JD. I get that. What I don't get is how I get called for this every year! I heard that for every one juror on a case, they go through 4 or 5 to get to them. That means that they have to call in about 5 times as many people that they need and make them sit here like me. If everyone would just man up and not try to weasel out of sitting on a jury, then we wouldn't need so many people to sit here and be unproductive for an entire day.

I did think it was nice that when they announced they were beginning selection for a 3 month trial, they said that all homemakers, retirees, and unemployed people are REQUIRED to be part of the pool. YES! Those are people who should be jurors. They have extra time and they get paid! So it's only $15, but it's still something.

No really, I'm not this bitter about JD. I've done it several times and always found the cases interesting. It's just that it gets old every year. Like really old.

*This is Anne's term, so I can't take credit. :)