Steven Sanchez, Jr.

Tomorrow, I fly out of this city I’ve called home for the past 9 weeks. The city? Nashville, TN.

We left California on June 7, 2009 and drove four days across the country to finally arrive here. Our first week was spent in a hotel. That is all we thought we would need, for we were sure that we would have a place settled in a week.We were wrong. We ended up living out of a hotel for our first two weeks in Music City.

Those first two weeks were quite adventurous. Actually, the first three weeks (including the approximate week we spent driving over here) were crazy. On the drive over we almost died (so I’m exaggerating a bit..) in a freak storm we got caught in while driving through Oklahoma (not exaggerating about the storm – it was insane). It was our first Midwest storm. The lightning was so beautifully dangerous, winds incredibly strong, and rain pelting down. Dave swears our car got lifted off the road for just a second. When we finally pulled off the road, lightning hit the ground just twenty or so feet away from where we parked. This storm was insane!

The same storm followed us into Nashville. Our first weekend here, we made it to the CMA Music Festival. There we got to see pretty much all the current chart-topping artists in one weekend. The first night of concerts, that storm decided to make an appearance and put the concert on pause for two hours until it passed over.

Also in those first weeks we had been spending our days online – looking through craigslist and numerous apartment sites. We were looking for a place to live. We even signed up on roommates.com (which, by the way, I would not recommend – to get anywhere on that site you have to pay for their services).

But, finally, after the first two weeks, we found the house we have been living in on craigslist. Once we moved into the house, the craigslist hunt continued to find some furniture for Dave. We found him a really nice bed and rocker/swivel chair off the site. We were then settled in the house. The next step of our journey: job hunts.

Pretty much, I had no luck at all on the job market – and gave up fairly quickly because I was only here for a month and a half. Too, I realized that this was time I really needed, especially after last year. This summer has been a good time of rest and spiritual/inner growth. I’ve come to appreciate this time of nothingness quite much. Dave had his internship that he was working for. He had that, but has also been looking for another job. To this day, he has still been unsuccessful. The market stinks right now, and employers out here are really bad about getting back to you regarding job applications. However, in this last week or so, he’s had a few leads come up. I really hope something works out for him.

Out here, we got into a routine. The days Dave worked, I would come into town with him and spend my days at the Starbucks just 3 or 4 blocks down from his work. This Starbucks (which I’m at right now) has come to be known as my office. The days that Dave didn’t work, we slept in and would either spend the day just kinda vegging out at the house, or we would take a trip into the city and explore.

On some of these exploring ventures, we have been able to see some pretty cool stuff. We went and saw the Jack Daniels Distillery, the Grand Ole Opry, Opry Mills Mall, Nashville’s downtown (which is full of a ton of cool shops and bars), the outskirts of the city – which are full of beautiful mansions sitting on rolling green hills, The Hermitage (President Andrew Jackson’s house), the Bluebird Cafe, the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville’s exact replica of the Parthenon, Mellow Mushroom, San Antonio Taco Company, Toyama’s Japanese Steak House,  and my favorite: CRACKER BARREL!

Thinking back, my whole time out here has been blessed. I have spent the summer with a truly great friend – and I’m thankful for that. Today, Dave actually joined me at the office.  He didn’t have to work today. I had planned on him working, so when I found out he didn’t have work I asked if we could still come in. I’m a sentimental guy,  I wanted one last visit in the office. *shrug*  I had asked him to remind me of some of the things we’ve done and saw – and he just kept listing them off. There is so much to write about. Our 4th of July experience, fireflies, How I Met Your Mother, Corrie’s visit, the horrible drivers, and this last note,  – it’s for Dave.

Today on our way to the office, we saw a lady and her daughter get out of a stranded car. We were pulling out of a parking lot because we were returning a RedBox movie. We saw them and decided to help. We parked, and made our way to the lady. She was about 30ish, drove a Mercedes, was wearing heels, and carrying a Louis Vuitton purse. She was Hispanic – and then her daughter was typical cute little 5ish year old girl. We asked her if she would like us to help her. She left her car stranded in the middle of the road. So we did, we pushed her car into the parking lot – away from oncoming traffic. We helped her out.

When we were pulling into the Starbucks parking lot, we were welcomed by this jolly homeless man. He had the biggest smile on his face and waved us into the parking lot. He brought a smile to both of our faces.

According to Dave, we did a good deed for a lady, and a nice gesture was returned to us.

At first, I thought that Dave was silly, and didn’t think much about his statement. But now, after actually writing it out and thinking on it – maybe it was coincidence, maybe it wasn’t. Whatever it was, it reminded me that we need to take note of the small things in life. Just that smile and welcome we received from the homeless man made my day.

Nashville – you’ve been great. Will I ever come back? Who knows. It’s been real. It’s been fun. It’s been real fun.

Welp, this is my last full day in Nashville. Dave works tomorrow, so we can’t really do too much. I fly out of here on Saturday evening. One last thing I’m going to do for sure on Saturday is have breakfast at Cracker Barrel. I’ve yet to experience their breakfasts, and so I’m going to go out on that note. Then the rest of Saturday I will probably be consoling Dave. I’m expecting he’ll be a mess that day. A big, blubbery, crying mess (because I’m leaving). Haha, just kidding.

But agenda for today? I don’t know. All I do know is that I do not want to spend it in the house. Granted it is a nice house and all – but I want to spend the day in the city.

I’m just throwing that out there. It really is going to be sad leaving this place. But I’ll leave the mushy reflection stuff for tomorrow

So my time here in Nashville is running out. I’ve only got about two weeks left here. It is kinda sad, really. I like it a lot out here and wish I could stay longer. It would be nice to be able to get a job and settle for a bit. Then when I get off work, we would go to the bars and listen to new and upcoming artists perform. I am a huge fan of Music City. But, I equally miss everybody back home. Too, I’ve gotta go back to finish my last year of school. Honestly, my schooling is the only thing bringing me back to California. But, who knows what’s in plan for my future. Maybe I’ll end up back out here after I graduate? Maybe I won’t? It’s all a mystery and out of my hands – that’s the beauty of it.

Alas, with my last few days here, we are going to be doing a lot of sight seeing that I’ve wanted to do and we never really got around to. Today we’re going to drive an hour south and head into Lynchburg, TN. What’s there you may ask? Lynchburg is the home to the Jack Daniels Distillery. Granted, I haven’t had many pleasant experiences with Mr. Daniels, I still would like to visit the place and see how it’s made. I looked at the website, and they still do it the same way that they have been making it for the past hundred years or so. Also, the tour is free! Ha, so why not?

Too, on the drive down there, I believe is some really pretty greenery. Pretty much any drive outside of the city in Nashville (and surrounding cities) is beautiful. Abundant green trees, green rolling hills. It’s really nice So, those are pretty much our plans for the day.

Behold. This is the Tennessee State Prison. It is a beautiful building Dave and I learned about while on our drive across the country. Dave was googling images of Nashville, and this was one one of them that came up. Actually, it wasn’t this particular one, it was one that was ten times prettier. I couldn’t find it, though. We have yet to find this building in person, but we have it on a list of things to do before I leave. Simply to find it, and get some (hopefully) wicked cool pictures of the place.

Now, granted this picture has had some post-touch ups done, it still looks super cool. I did a bit of background research on the prison. It was originally built with 800 cells. Upon its opening, it was filled with 1,400-some inmates. Thus immediately making the place over crowded. The building was also very expensive to build, so to help defer some of the costs, the inmates provided the manual labor for grounds upkeep. They would work 16 hour days to get their daily rations of food.

Then, eventually, because the place was so crowded outbreaks started to occur. Several inmates escaped and the problems just grew from there. The prison couldn’t handle the inmates anymore. A new prison was built, and this one was closed in 1989.

Now, from sources I’ve read, the building is just sitting there, rotting away. Apparently the city/state doesn’t want to share this historical landmark. Reasons why? I have no clue. Nonetheless, I look forward to finding it and getting to take some pictures of the place.

There were three things I actually wanted to write about, but I put the other two ideas aside, because I am due for a life update. Maybe I’ll even have multiple posts today…

Topics to be discussed today (as I previously mentioned) will include our church hunt, pics of our house, my musical endeavors, and what I’ve been doing with my time.

To begin – I’m going to start with our house. We are living in the Brentwood area of Nashville. It is about 15ish minutes from downtown Nashville. Our house is a 3 bedroom, 1 bath house. Dave and I are sharing a room. The second room is where Dave M. (the other guy in the house – crazy they have the same name, right?) lives, and then the third room is currently empty. Dave M. is working on finding  the final tenant. Also in the house is the living room, and shared kitchen/dining room. We also have a large basement downstairs which is cool. I’ve never had a basement growing up, and always thought they were cool. I don’t know why, to be honest.  But needless to say, it is cool having one. We have a lot of stuff stored downstairs, and the washer and dryer are down there, and Dave’s (brother’s) keyboard is down there, which I’ve been practicing on – but I’ll talk about that later.

These are the only two pictures I have of the house. They’re from my phone. Just yesterday I gave my parents a walk-through of the house via Skype video call. That was fun. Our backyard is huge, btw. Dave and I were talking this morning, and I think yesterday made two weeks that we’ve been living in the house. Ha, and in case there are any more concerned mothers out there – we’re eating fine. If you click on the kitchen picture, you’ll see that food is cooking on the stove. That night I made spaghetti .

The first week or two, Dave and I ate out a lot. That was mostly because we didn’t have a place to cook – even though our hotel that we were staying in had a mini kitchen. The room was just so small, and the smells of food would stink up the place and mix with the permanent stench of cigarette smoke that lingered. It wasn’t a good combo. Now that we’re in a house, we’re cooking a lot more. I am more than okay with that. I love to cook. We’ve been watching a lot of the Food Network as well. All of that has been really making me want to go back to culinary school. Maybe I won’t do Le Courdon Bleu, like I was initially enrolled. But I’m seriously thinking about the one in Clovis after I graduate. We’ll see!

Hrm, now as far as a church goes – we’ve attended 3 different ones. The first church we went to was Belmont Church. This was a nice church. It was extremely family oriented and the people were SUUUUPER nice and really welcoming. We went here the first two weeks. This church was just a little out of my comfort zone, though. I grew up in a traditional Catholic Church. Here, during worship the congregation were more charismatic than I’m used to. Now, I’ve gotten used to contemporary worship – I’ve been going to The Well in Fresno for the past year or so, and really like the service and teachings there.  Something else that was cool, too, was that 3/4 of the service at Belmont was worship (which was really good!). Then the last quarter was a message. However, it was extremely difficult for me to stay engaged during the message.

Our third week, we decided to try out a different church. This time we went to New River Fellowship. This church was actually founded by Michael W. Smith. I didn’t know who he was until Dave told me. To be honest, I wasn’t the biggest fan of the church. The pastor had huge potential to be really good, but the people there were really unresponsive. To me, it felt like the people went every week in hopes of seeing Michael. When he didn’t show, they were disappointed and only stayed because they were already there. Make sense? That’s just how I felt. As if they weren’t going for a Godly church experience, but to get a glimpse of a celebrity. I could also be totally wrong. That’s just my view on it. Dave wasn’t much of a fan, either.

This last week we tried out yet another church. This one was called Cross Point Church. Immediately after I walked in to this church, I felt at home. It was a younger crowd – mostly college aged students and newlyweds. It really, really reminded me of The Well. The worship was amazing – simple and heartfelt. Then the pastor there was a younger guy who was super easy to relate to. They just started a new series called “Rewind”  and are studying characters from the Old Testament. We went over the story of Samson. We pretty much read the whole story from Judges, and then he made it really clear what the story was about  and how we can relate the trials in our life. His sermon was really plain and simple  and easy to put in the context of life.

This church is also really media-savvy. Which I like. Seriously, check out their website (above) and you can watch their promo video for the “Rewind” series. You can actually watch a service online. I really enjoyed this church a lot. I’m really anxious to get plugged in here and meet some of the people there (..even though I only have a few more weeks left, but whatev!) Yeah… it really felt like home. I’m excited about this church.

Uhmm… my musical endeavors! Lately I’ve been learning piano! Well, technically I’ve been learning how to play the keyboard, but it’s the same concept. I have really enjoyed being able to make music. This summer, I have realllly missed music and my passion for it has multiplied like no other. So much so, that I kind of regret not pursuing a music degree. I’ve thought this numerous times, before though. In the bigger picture – my communication degree will do more for me. AND this will make me pursue my musicality on my own, which will make it that much better.

However, back to my keyboard/piano progress. I’ve learned four chords. C, G7, F, and G. I’m able to play using the range of two octaves. I’ve progressed up to playing “When The Saints Go Marching In”. That is on page 60-something of my 200 page book. In the same Skype Video Call with my parents I spoke of earlier, I played some songs I’ve learned for them. I messed up a lot, though. I tried recording my playing on my phone to put on here, but the quality was not good at all. I need to have Dave help me get a recording of myself so I can share. I’m determined to make some huge progress on the piano before I leave Nashville. Haha, then next we’ll have to work on my singing abilities… we’ll need a miracle for that one :/

Now you may be wondering, what exactly do I do with my time over here? I don’t have a job. Dave normally works 3 days out of the week. While he is at work, I come to the office (office=starbucks if you missed that blog) and enjoy some coffee and check emails, write on here, and browse the web. I’m usually here for 3-4 hours. It all depends on how long Dave works. This week, though, is a busy week at work for Dave. He’s putting in full days. Monday he worked, and didn’t know he was going to work a long shift. Because of that, I was at the office for 7 hours. Quite frankly, I did not enjoy it one bit. I wasn’t prepared for that long of a day. I didn’t bring a charger for my computer, or anything else to keep me busy. Half way through the day, I went out and walked for about an hour, just roaming around Music Row.

It was that day that I really learned I need people to keep me sane. I feed off of their energy. It is hard too, because I don’t know anybody over here. I mean, at the office I’m starting to get to know the employees, kind of. We are making more and more small talk, because we recognize eachother. But still, it isn’t much.

Dave also needs his car at work. So anymore, he can’t let me use it while he’s working. I’m learning that I hate not having my own means of transportation. However – this afternoon I’m going to attempt Nashville’s public transportation. I think today, I’m going to look up a mall that I can walk around. Depending how today’s adventures go on the bus, I may be seeing more of the city.  I’m excited. Ha, I’m sure I may even meet some crazy people on the bus, too.

When Dave doesn’t have to work, we sleep in a bit and leave the house around 1ish. From there it is kind of random what we do. Last week we spent a lot of time fixing, cleaning, and trying to sell his keyboard. Yesterday we were bums at the house all day. Then went to see a movie. Nothing is really out. I wanted to see Drag Me To Hell but Dave didn’t. So we watched The Proposal. It may seem like a chick-flick, but I don’t care. I wanted to see it, haha. It was really funny!

Uhmmmmm. Yeah. That’s pretty much been it … *nods head* yeah.

Last night Dave and I went to Cracker Barrel (or Crackel Barrel as Dave kept saying, haha) for dinner. I don’t remember where it was, but when we got into a certain state, I began seeing signs for this place all over. I finally looked them up online to see exactly what it was. It is a country store. When you walk up, you will see a porch lined with rocking chairs of different types. People are sitting in them, just rocking. All of these are for sale, too. They were pricey, though. $100+ but oh well.

Next you walk into the doors, and you are in the country store. They’ve got everything here. There are shirts, hats, all the traditional gift shop items. Then as you keep going they have all of the old fashioned candy  for sale. As you keep walking to the back you will come up to shelves that are stocked with jams, jellies, canned fruits – pretty much everything you expect to see in your mom or grandma”s cabinets (assuming they are like mine and do everything from scratch and real good-like).

After you reach the back of the country store, you come to a doorway where a hostess greets you and seats you. We were seated at our table, and the place was really simple and homey. So far, also, the service was great. The people were really sweet, mother-like, and kind (and they all speak with a twang, which makes it even more legit). As soon as we sat down, I knew I was going to have to write about this, so I took a picture! The place was busy, too! The wall on the left was just a room divider. There may have been one more divider, creating three dining areas. We were in the first one, but I saw another to my left, and like I said, I’m pretty sure there were two more dining areas. The people in there eating were also just real chill and homey. There were a lot of older couples and a few families, and then there were just a few younger people that I saw.

Our waitresses’ name was Tina. Tina was a taller lady with long reddish-brown hair that was pulled back into a low ponytail. I would say she was in her late forties, early fifties. She was a really skinny lady, and a really good waitress. I had initially planned on getting their pork chop dinner – it is their Monday special. As I looked the menu, though, I saw that they had roast beef. I couldn’t pass it up. My mom makes a killer roast beef, and I wanted a taste of home. The way the menu works is this – you pretty much pick your main entree, and then depending on what you order, you pick your vegetable sides. Different entrees have different number of sides you can pick.

I ordered the roast beef and got to pick three sides. So I went with mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet baby carrots, and corn. My meal also came with two buttermilk biscuits. Dave got biscuits, tenderloin steak, and mashed potatoes.

I took my first bite into my meal and felt at home. I was soooo happy! It was exactly like a meal I would eat at home – with one exception. Instead of biscuits, we’d be eating grandma’s homemade rolls. Needless to say, it was a really satisfying meal! Now, are you ready for this?  How much did it cost, you may ask? $8.49 I’d say that’s a pretty fair deal. And for being such a large meal, I didn’t leave feeling stuffed and gross. I was a happy and content full.

If you ever make it out andd find yourself somewhere near a Cracker Barrel, make a point of stopping. It was delicious. Their breakfasts are supposed to be even better. ((sidetrack – I’m sitting outside of the office and just saw this what appeared to be prim and proper lady who, was driving a BMW, screaming at the top of her lungs singing along to a song — I got a good laugh out of it!)) But, where was I? Breakfast, yes. We’re going to try it out soon. I think it would be nice to go to breakfast before church, but I can only imagine the crowd that would be there. We may go another day. But alas, Cracker Barrel = legit.

As for upcoming writings: I still need to get you guys photos. I’m sorry. Yesterday I just received a new wide angle lens adapter thing for my camera. It’s not as great as I thought it would be, but I still need to take it out and try it. Also, be expecting a life update – similar to the one I wrote on Facebook.  Subjects to be covered in the life update will be our church hunt, pics of our house, my musical endeavors, and what I’ve been doing with my time.

Until next time!

So… have you ever seen Team America and remember its certain theme song? “America, ____ yeah!” haha, yeah. That’s right. *shrug*

Yesterday was the celebration of America’s independence. They really do know how to do it big out here. We went to the riverfront with our cameras and $10 WalMart lawn chairs in hand. We arrived around 2:30 and there were already thousands of people there. There were 6 (ish) different concerts lined up for the day/night performed by different artists. I didn’t know any of them, except for Wynonna who performed at the end. But I’ll get to that.

We were sitting enjoying the music. To the left of us was the cutest and sweetest older woman I’ve seen (except for my grandma, of course).  She was joined by her daugter and another couple who came and visited several times throughout the day. I think I heard her name was Velma or Thelma. Not sure. But she was wearing pink pants and a striped white and pink top with cuffs and a collar. Her hair was short, white, and curly, and had little clips in it to hold it out of her face. I think the thing made her stick out were her big, happy eyes that went along with her big smile that she wore all day. When the music was playing, it was even more amazing to see her dance to the music in her seat with her arms up by her side. She was just so happy! It made my day sitting next to her.

Her daughter was a sweet lady as well. She was a larger lady, wore a white button up, and had longer (but still short) curly hair. Her hair was grayed, and she resembled her mother a bit. We chit chatted with them throughout the afternoon. But, to the right we had a huge Tennessee Titans fan. Was a nice guy, though. He was the one to actually inform us of Steve McNair’s death. The crazy part about it: it happened, literally, just down the street from where we were. His condo was downtown. Insane. The whole Nashville community took it really hard.

After listening to 2 or three artists, unforgiving clouds began to roll in. The host of the event came on stage and made the announcement. They were going to put the concert on pause until the rain passed. They covered the electronics on stage and we were waiting it out. The rain began, and it was just sprinkles. I didn’t bring an umbrella, so I remember thinking “Oh, it’s not that bad”. But then, the clouds just opened up. We tried finding shelter under a tree, but it only helped so much. We left our chairs, and went briskly walking down the street to find something to stand under. Finally we found shelter under a ledge of Fort Nashborough.

Standing there, I took a video. Check it out on my Facebook. I can’t insert it into the blog this time. Pretty much, the streets had 3 inches of rain easy – and happened in like 5 minutes. People lined the walls on bulidings trying to stay dry. Craziness. Dave and I were pretty wet. Our shirts got pretty wet – it wasn’t too bad. We made our way back to our seats, and luckily they were still there! I thought for sure somebody was going to take them. We returned to them and were welcomed back by Velma/Thelma who was now wearing her baby blue Tennessee  Titans poncho. We poured out the puddles of water that formed in our seats and sat back down. Moments later the concerts picked back up and we were good to go.

One last group performed – they were good! I can’t remember their name, but they were commissioned to write a song for Nashville tourism. The song is called “Music Calls Us Home”. It’s a pretty good song. The group performed some of their other stuff and we really enjoyed it. They cleared the stage and then brought on the Nashville Symphony Orchestra. Joining them was Wynonna Judd.

They played the music for her while she sang. Now I didn’t think I was going to enjoy her performance. At all. But, it was really good. I was surprised and honestly wouldn’t mind going to see one of her shows. Her performance did have to get cut short to only 3 songs. This was because the rain was coming again. It was maybe 7:30 pm now. The host said that even though the rain was coming, that they were going to do the firework show regardless. That the audience needed to ensure their own safety first and do as we need to stay safe. After ensuring our safety – to enjoy the show.

This firework show was legit! It started sprinkling about 3 minutes into 30 minute show. It was a fun, added element. The fireworks were synchronized to music – the first song was from Star Wars, so it was fun. By the end of the first song, which was one third of the way into the program, the rain picked up and got harder. It was still tolerable and fun. We were getting wet, but watching a great show. There were these ones that shot up into the sky, and then these balls of fire fell down and landed on the river. Dave and I were nervous because we didn’t know if that was supposed to happen, and that the weather was affecting the show and messing up the fireworks. These red balls of flames were floating on the river, then, BAM. They lit up like fire crackers. They were supposed to do that. They were legit.

Thennn, the rain got harder. So bad, that Dave and I jumped up, I put my chair away, and we started to leave. By the time we got to the other side of the two-lane street, we were soaked and dripping wet. Nothing left on us was dry. The rain was that hard. We stood under a food booth for a few minutes until the show ended in hopes that the rain would let up. It didn’t. Now that the show was done, we had THOUSANDS of people trying to rush to get out of the rain. It was insane. We joined the crowd and slowly started our way to the car. Even 3 blocks down from the riverfront, streets were still packed with dripping wet people. Cars stood no chance of getting out of there easily.

Luckily we saw an outside restaurant. We went in and sat down to try and dry off a bit before we got into the car. By this time we were freezing cold, shivering, and dripping wet. Dave got a cup of tea, myself a cup of coffee, and we both had a bowl of hot (and delicious) chili. Granted, neither of our drinks mixed well with the chili, but they were hot. We were there a while, which was nice. We got to dry off a bit, the traffic cleared out, and we warmed up a little. The rain even let up. It was still coming down, though.

After an adventure like that, we finally made it home at 11ish. We were wet, thankful for our water-proof camera bags, and full of memories of a 4th of July that neither of us will soon forget.

Today, Brother and I were in the presence of the Corn Goddess. We were in WalMart checking to see if his digital prints were completed yet. They weren’t. As we were walking out, we saw the produce section of the store and decided to grill some corn with our dinner. As we walked to the corn stand thing, I chuckled as I saw a lady madly husking corn right at the stand.

We walked up to it, and Dave and I looked at each other in confusion. We had no clue how to pick out the ears of corn. Then she spoke to us. The Corn Goddess asked how many ears of corn we wanted and we told her 4. She then began madly and quickly rummaging through the corn, and husked and gave us 4 beautiful ears of corn. We thanked her, and went on our way.

We came home, grilled the corn, and it was delicious.

Thank you, Corn Goddess.

“Good news! She’s Dead!” … okay, that’s just the Wicked soundtrack I’m listening too. Don’t judge me, it’s a good soundtrack. Good show, too. But it is indeed a beautiful day in the neighborhood. Friday morning. People are happy because the weekend is here. It’s currently 73° and slightly breezy outside. My name is Steven Sanchez, and this was today’s weather report. Back to you, Bob.

…okay, maybe not.

So, instead of staying in, I chose to sit on my patio at the office today. Sitting here, snacking on my multi-grain bagel and my triple grande white mocha. It is a good morning. Ha, I even got sidetracked sharing my bagel with the birds for a bit. But I am enjoying my seat, here in the corner of the patio, with my feet up on the other chair. Good stuff I’m tellin ya.

I didn’t post yesterday. Oops. Dave didn’t work yesterday, so we kinda slept in. We made breakfast – made some pretty bomb breakfast burritos. Then we went on an adventure to get bids on his keyboard that he’s trying to sell so that he can purchase a digital piano. We took it into one shop, and they looked at it and found some things were wrong. There was an internal battery that was dead, and because it was dead, the keboard couldn’t load any of the sounds. It had been that way since Dave owned it, so he didn’t know any different. The guy at the shop was going to charge him $75 an hour to replace the battery and reload the sounds. He estimated it would take 2 hours.

Dave wasn’t a fan of paying that much. So we brought the keyboard back home and did it our self! The battery came in a 2-pack and was $5. It took us maybe an hour of total labor to take off the back of the keyboard, replace the battery, and reload the software.

We showed him.

The keyboard adventures took us into the evening, and afterward we spent time driving around, taking in more sights of the city and learning our neighborhood. Then we came back home, and spent the rest of the night working on a project that will soon be posted. Right now it will remain top secret, but it is EPIC. Trust me, it’s going to be grand. I’ll post it as soon as we are finished.

It was those previously mentioned adventures that took up my day yesterday. Today, I’m not sure what our plans are. Tomorrow, however, is 4th of July! Yay America. The celebrations are going to be insane over here, I’m predicting. Dave and I plan on going to the riverfront. They have a fireworks show, some artists perform, its an all day type of deal. Then when the fireworks start, the Nashville Symphony is going to play and Wynonna Judd is going to sing. Should be pretty legit. It is all on the website here.

So I did it. Brother and I finally caught our fireflies. We definitely don’t have these back home, so it really was a treat when we saw our first ones during our first week here. Then we moved into our house – and they light up our backyard in the evening. Yesterday we tried catching some using a glass jar and the lid. We were unsuccessful. So today, we bought ourselves a small net, and caught close to twenty!

Now, if you haven’t seen a firefly, this is what they look like:

Also, how do fireflies light up? Pretty much, it is a chemical reaction in their body between oxygen, ATP (a type of energy), and calcium. Why do they light up? For the most part in what I (briefly) read, it is all for mating purposes. If you want all the scientific low-down, ask the Scientific American.

Alas, we caught them, put them in a jar, and now I’ve got a treat. I took a video. It’s short, not the best quality, but shows them light up! Enjoy!