Barack Obama In Charlotte/Expectations

Hello to All,

I hope everyone is doing well this week. I know I am slow reporting this but Barack had a rally this past weekend, and even though I didn't get the chance to see him, me and the fam stood in line for about 3 hours for the experience. When we finally got to the front, he was midway into his speech. No hard feelings, I am just glad that I was there for the experience and that my little man experienced it as well. Speaking of Barack, I was thinking that I am definitely going to have to make that trip to Washington, D.C. to be a part of the inaugration, but this is living history for real. What do you think?

The debates are supposed to start on Friday, so I am really looking forward to see how they transpire even though John is requesting that they hold off for now until they get the bailout under control.

Expectations

I am slowly learning that with some people it is not wise to have any type of expectations. When you don't expect anything out of certain people, I find myself less stressed and not so worried. Stop worrying about things/people that you can't change. Just try to continue to do the right thing, and just remember that karma can be a rough thing.

Happy Hump Day To All!!

Take It Easy!

How Much Was Your Gas?/Fantasy Football Update

As Hurricane Ike approaches Texas, and the folk in Charlotte started to worry like crazy, I saw the price of gas change within hours. I paid $4.09/gal!! Isn't that crazy? I just wanted to know how the hurricane is affecting your area?

Fantasy Update: Even though I lost my man Tom Brady, I still managed to pull out the win. When money is on the line, this become serious business lol. My roster has remained intact, however, I did change my defense and I am using the Cardinals' defense since they are playing the Dolphins'. Do you blame for that? I just hope the Redskins has worked on the 1-minute drills. We shall see..

I hope you all have a good weekend, and I hope to have a positive fantasy report.

Take it easy!!

Charlotte Shout Fest 2008

This past Tuesday, I got the chance to go to a Shout Fest. What is a Shout Fest? It was a meeting of great music that included shout bands (tubas, trombones, trumpets, tambourines) and various choirs.

http://www.charlottecentercity.org/nav.cfm?cat=18&subcat=102&subsub=0&id=2038

Let me tell you, after hearing them, they wanted me to go and get my tuba and mouthpiece and start marching again!! I was just amazed about their improvastional skills. I didn't see a piece of music everywhere and the crowd from age 2-82 were spiritually moved by the music. At one point, I felt like I was right in the middle of a battle of the bands because 2 Shout bands were facing each other at the front of the church and each band were respectful but going at each other full force. One band would hold their last note at triple fortismo, with the lead trombone meandering around the last note as his slide almost falls off, while the other band were itching at the chops, to take that last note, change the key, and rock it on to a brand new song. They really bought gospel music life and force fed it right to your soul. If you ever get the chance to see a Shout band, I would strongly encourage you to go, as there are several bands across the country.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shout_band

Take It Easy!!

Charlotte Was Taken Over By The CIAA!

This Weekend brought the culmination of the CIAA tournament festivities. I could be wrong but I believe Charlotte will be hosting the tournament until 2012 I believe. Well, being the frugal person that I am, I only attended the free stuff, except I scored some tickets to the final basketball game as well.

Well, the CIAA Fan Experience was this past Saturday at the Charlotte Convention Center, which was free to the public. Some of the big sponsors included: Ford Motor Company, Luster Hair Care, Geico, Dirty South Customs, McDonald's, US Navy, Alltel Communications, and Best Buy. For my car buffs, I am going to need for you to go to Ford's website and check out the new Ford 650. They had it on display there, and that piece of metal was a beast for real. (http://www.f650pickups.com/) I also saw my next vehicle, the Ford Expedition, in black, which had me salivating. But has economists are predicting gas prices to finally reach $4 by summer, I may have to rethink that decision. Best Buy had their setup quite nicely with flat-screen plasma and LCD TVs all over the place, and with Wii stations as well.

But, with the overall demographics for the event being very young, I was quite shocked that many of the CIAA schools were absent from the event. This could have been an excellent opportunity for them to showcase their schools to the young folk who may have never heard of say Virginia Union, or Fayetteville State University. Missed opportunity there. (http://www.ciaatournament.org/home). However, there were vendors which gave the parents of these young folk, the opportunity to check their blood pressure, as well as other health screening information that was nice.

Now, to the entertainment portion. I must say that I was presently surprised by some of the performances. When we got there, Lyfe Jennings was finishing up his set, but then Rick Ross came up on the stage. Blah, blah, wonk, wonk....I really wasn't impressed. However, I do like one of his songs which takes the sample from my movie's soundtrack, "Scarface". I think the name of the song from the movie is "Take It To The Limit". But his performance is quite lacking and gave me further reason to give up on hip-hop. (http://www.defjam.com/site/artist_home.php?artist_id=607)

Chrisete Michelle was also there but she was a little uninspired up there. Like, these kids did not pay to see me, so let me give them like 25%. One thing that caught me off guard is that I think Lyfe came strong with a live band whereas Chrisette was using tracks. I don't know I wasn't feeling that at all. I think one of the best performances of the afternoon had to go to Raheem Devaughn. Washington' D.C.'s own did not have a live band, but he did rock the crowd and had the ladies swooning, all the time, he had an onstage artist, painting Raheem. If you haven't got the chance to see him live,I will strongly suggest you do. He will give you hope for R & B music. (http://www.theloveexperience.com/index_main.html)

Tiffany Evans had a short set of I believe 2 songs, but she was setting up the crowd for Mr. Chad "Bow Wow" Moss. I hate to admit this but Bow Wow had the performance of the afternoon. He shut the place down, had those teeny-bopper girls feening, screaming, standing on trash cans, on the shoulders of tired brothers who were ready to go home. I never knew how many hits Bow Wow, but he was doing his thing with flavor and passion, and as a music lover, you would have to give him his props.

I ended the evening with the final CIAA tournament basketball game at Bobcats arena. Older alumni were there, dressed to the nines, with the Bros wearing their frat pins on their suit lapel, and the lovely ladies looked so elegant. Folk with old money was everywhere. The arena cameras flashed on Free and Rosci from BET, as well as Bow Wow who were on the front row. The final game was between Fayetteville State and the hometown Johnson C. Smith. Being a former band head, I was checking out the pep bands, but I think the Golden Bulls band took this one. Their one tuba player was filling up the area quite nicely. I am going to have find him on campus and show him some love from one tuba player to another.

Overall, I had a good time....take it easy

Bass Clef