Check out San Diego... dude.

I'm telling two stories, one about the past, and one I HAVE to tell you about this weekend.

I will warn you, I am going to recommend a lot of artists in the musical field. It's important to me to expand everyone's knowledge of music, and little by little I'm going to do it. First rule about my recommended artists: You probably haven't heard of them. I do not normally recommend the most popular of pop, most of the time these people became popular based on luck alone, that is if daddy didn't help them get there. I am a BRAND NEW DJ. I have no contracts, I have no deals. I'm going to make my own music and do it all from nothing. Sure I'll probably sell out, I have to make a living you know, but in the end it will all be the same - music is life.

I'm rambling - my apologies... Today I would like to introduce you to St. Germain. Check out their website. They've been around for a while, and they are pretty popular in the UK right now. It's a wonderful eclectic mix of jazz, techno, and fusion. Fusion, for those of you who do not know, is the fusion of electric instruments with jazz music, which is primarily all accustic instruments. With his funky beats and his chilled upward grooves, St. Germain's second name should be "relax." Check them out, I don't think you'll be disapointed.

The coffee I'm drinking is terrible.

So I wanted to be a solo singer - an American Idol if you will. But hearing the vocal artists of today, man I just have no chance. I like to think that I'm pretty good, but not really good enough, you know? Not good enough to make a career out of it. Plus I also thought, what would happen if my voice dies? That amount of stress on my voice for an extended amount of time, that could put me out of the game. I couldn't take that risk. When I was in high school, however, being on stage was my dream. Singing, acting, doing whatever as long as it was in front of an audience. I like people watching me - like they could be happier because I'm up there.... and that's just a priceless gift for me. On stage I can - NOT be myself. I'm not me anymore. I'm whoever I'm playing - acting as. That was a cool thing. My life hasn't been all that great. I've had girl problems, budget problems, parents problems, education problems... you know all those normal things. But they never used to bother me. NOW - well shoot I can't seem to get away from my problems! Is that a part of life? Possibly, but I'm not happy with it!

So I decided to move on from singing, and acting. I still love kareoke - that's a great time. I go to Rock Bottom in Scottsdale, AZ. Tuesdays nights they have a great Kareoke night. That's the only place I feel really comfortable. Other than that, I haven't been back to the stage.

As a DJ, though, I'll be back up there. It'll be just under a different spotlight. I'm kinda cool with that.

Speaking of DJing - it looks like I might have a Mobil DJ job in the works. I'm not going to announce with who yet, I'm not sure if this will go through, but I'm REALLY excited about it.

This past weekend was very cool. 8:00 in the morning on Saturday I get a phone call from my brother. I wasn't really awake yet - but my brother says "Hey man, you want to go to San Diego? I'll pay for everything." Twist my arm some more brother. Brief backround: My brother is 6 1/2 years older than me, and a graduate from West Point. My mom is IN LOVE with West Point. The two of us are like, whatever... I'm the complete opposite, too. While my broher is going to the number 8 school in the country, I'm not going to college. I focussed more on the artistic side than the institutional. So he calls me up, and before I know it we're on the road to CA. We stayed at the Westin - very nice hotel, but less than what I expected... I mean it was just a standard room - not any bigger than a motel 6 room. It's just a whole lot nicer than a motel 6. We ate at the BEST sushi place I could have ever imagined. The place is called TAKA sushi and it's in the gas lamp quarter of downtown. I have to link this one - I give it a J rating of 5 J's (out of 5). OK that rating means nothing but I do believe it has changed my thoughts on sushi - check it out. From there we hit the bars. It was only like 6:00 so we went to some local dives, enjoyed some beers and Golden Tee 2005. After that we played some pool with off-duty Marines. I want to definately give a shout out to all my military pals out there. I'll get into more of the military stuff in later posts. At 9 we decided to hit a club - thinking it was just about time for one to start kickin. Well, we were wrong. We went to Decos, which I imagine would be a pretty hot club, however, there was NOBODY there. Since we didn't have to pay cover we had one drink and took off, there was no point in waiting for a party to start when there's always a party somewhere else. We went to three more places, having at least one drink at each - amazingly I was still able to walk everywhere. Long story short... I got really wasted Saturday night. Somewhere in there I found a record store - even in the midst of my partying I had to check out a couple tracks at a local record store. I am a DJ still.

Over all it was a great weekend. Special thanks to my brother who paid for everything, also thanks to Kim, the sweet waitress at dinner, and also Danielle who helped me pick out a nice shirt for the evening at Guess. Everyone else, thanks for the good times - I'll be back soon.

Next weekend is Rocky Point, but right now is work. Enjoy the day.