To make this list, I have to like as much of the album as possible over time.

1. Tool  - Aenema.

2. The Police - Synchronicity.

3. Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine.

4. Helmet - Meantime.

5. The Cinematics - A Strange Education.

Honerable Mentions: Living Colour - Time's Up, Massive Attack - Mezzanine, Primus - Sailing the Seas of Cheese, Quicksand - Slip, Radiohead - Kid A, .

It's just that simple.  I love that I can go to a movie, pop in a DVD, or run across something on TV that can take me away for a while to let my mind think about new things or revisit old memories (that whole escapist thing).  I have a deep appreciation for what it takes to complete the production in so many ways.  But as I begin to digress, I'll redirect my efforts to the list.

5. Good Will Hunting - It just hit home with me. I identify strongly with the whole loyalty to friends theme in the film. But it's the search for one's self thanks to a romantic connection that took it over the top. Call me a softie... Call me mushy... Just don't call me Shirley. Wait, wrong movie. Well acted, well shot, and amazingly written... It'd be higher on the list if it weren't one of those too good to be true things. It deserved many of the Oscar's that year stolen by a crappy sinking boat.

4. The Fog of War - The only documentary to make the list.  This definitely shaped my political outlook in a major way.  Going into how it has done so would be a monumental task, so instead I simply ask that you see this movie and internalize McNamara's lessons regardless of whether you agree with them or not.  It's hard to deny the painstaking logic behind them, and the profoundness of the experiences that produced them.

3. Heat - It's Probably one of the most complete movies in my mind.  It's shot well... it's acted well... It's pretty realistic without the need for either CG or the suspension of disbelief. The story is long and complex - but it all comes around...  The length and complexity are are impressive, but it's also the biggest detraction.  I think I caught this 5 times in the theater, including the last time where I was the only person in the theater.

2. Real Genius - It was 1985.  I was 9, and my sister was 11.  We were crazy for this film.  It was so funny, and the belief that a youngster like Mitch Taylor could hang with the big boys was awesome.  And don't for get about the popcorn. It's one of those childhood things, but it has actually stood up for me unlike a lot of others.  Still great lines and a fun time to be had.  My sis and I saw this 7 times in the theater.

1. Fight Club - It's all about the story in this one - and you have to be a really good filmmaker to pull it off.  It's very complex, and the fact that it was pulled off to the level it was is a big reason why it's at the top of my list.  The other big reason is that the story itself is captivating to me.  It's an amalgamation of many dead-on snapshots of things I currently or previously identify with.  I could care less about the fighting.  It's more about the messages.

Honorable Mentions: Top Secret, Amelie, Blazing Saddles

Doing this list just hit me one day, and it was a great little trip down memory lane...  Growing up in the '80, I spent a lot of time seeking out the video games in malls and hotels... That is when I wasn't playing them at home or in the respective homes of friends...

5. Bioshock - this is a game I wrote about a while back [link].  I don't usually like FPS (first person shooters), but this game was different enough and compelling enough to get me more than just plain interested.

4. Conquest of the World (Odyssey 2) - This was a signiture game for this system that got most of it's lasting fame from being sued by NAMCO for infringing on the PacMan copyright with the KC Munchkin game.  But Conquest was a collection of games that almost felt like you're playing different aspects of military simulations from War Games.  Of course if you went and played the game now, you'd realize how pathetic it is compared to even the most basic games available free online.  But it's still completely awesome.

3. Super Tecmo Bowl (NES) - this was a game that friends and I played for years.  It was the first sports game I got that actuallly had athletes (thanks to licensing from the NFLPA).  Friends and I would sometimes playing a season over a weekend and keeping stats to compare our godly stats to the players in real life.  I always had the best luck playing as the Chiefs or Oilers...

2. Gran Turismo Series - What can I say?  While there are dirving simulators getting better all the time, this series has always been way ahead of the curve.  In terms of the early versions, the games stayed that far ahead of the curve for years in a technical field usually changing by the week.

1. Tetris - it doesn't matter the platform, I can waste hours making lines or whatever unique aspects another version may have (especially "The Next Tetris" on N64)...  It's also something I'm fairly confident in my abilities to do.  Quite the skill to be confident in, eh?

Honerable Mention: Galaga, Oregon Trail, NHL 94 (Genesis), Dune 2, Red Alert 2, Lemonade Stand, Grand Theft Auto Series, Karate Champ, and Bust-a-Move (aka bubble bobble).

5. Summer of 1997
This was a long trip out west and back that I took with two others.  We hit a lot of places...  Mitchell Corn Palace, Devil's Tower, Mt. Rushmore, Dinosaur National Monument, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon, Petrified Forrest, Winslow Meteor Crater, and Sand Dunes National Monument.  And don't forget all those weird places in-between...  The whole experience ended for me with my personal record 32-hour in-a-row driving shift (yes Ian, I remember that you have me beat).  The trip was just over two weeks long, and we also took our bikes along for the ride as well.

4. 2004 Maine
It was the first road trip taken with my wife.  It started of pretty rough with some trailer problems in Toledo (we ended up dumping the trailer there) and continuing onward.  This first day was on my birthday as well.  But Vic and I spent a nice week at the cabin before taking the long way home hitting Fallingwater and Latrobe on our way home.

3. The massive road trip circa 1984
Sure, I was only 8, but this was a trip to remember.  I was mom, dad, Carrie and I taking many weeks on a very large road tip in a big van.  I don't remember all of the details and where we went, but I do remember fragments. Camping grounds.  The Leadville, CO incident (let's just say there were interactions with cops). The Four Corners. Carrie sitting on the Yucca cactus. Listening to Thomas Dolby's The Golden Age of Wireless enough to make my dad go crazy.  Hiking to Indian ruins that I can pronounce, but no idea how to spell. Freeze dried food cooked on hikes.  Carrie and I completely fixated with Steve Miller Band's Abracadabra. My first time to Bryce Canyon. It's one of those perfect childhood memories of fragments that leaves you searching your head for more... and it all brings a smile.

2. 1999 Crested Butte and Breckenridge
Left Indianapolis with Neil, J and kyle in my Defender 110.  Dropped J off in Peoria and picked Kevin up.  Drove straight through, but managed a little balyhoo in Kansas City...  We also happened to find the only WallMart in America without a single atlas in the store.  Met Ian in Crested Butte, and then the off roading began.  No one else had ever done it to this level, so I had to start them off light up around Irwin Lodge before working up to Pearl Pass.  Our time in CB was filled making fun of Blair Witch, playing guitars behind our head (or trying to), getting Slogared, and shooting lots of priceless video.  Ian and Kev left to head back East while Kyle, Neil, and I went on to the Solihull Society National Rally in Breckenridge before heading back.  Somewhere I have the trail names we took...  They weren't that hard - but not that easy.  It was nice that our hotel just happened to be right behind the Breckenridge Brewery.  All things considered, it was quite the experience, and I have the photos and video to prove it.  There has been banter about a return visit in '10 for Colorado veterans, so we'll see how that shapes up.

1. Marriage / Honeymoon (2006)
No brainer that it's #1...  I left Indy, and drove to Rockland, Maine to do all those wonderful preparations.  Vic flew in later that week before all the guests began to arrive.  The wedding was completely awesome.  We judge every other wedding by it. After a day's rest in Rockland, we took a short honeymoon.  We first drove down to Newport, RI for two nights where we stayed in a B&B that used to be the city jail.  It was more novel than it was a place that I'll actually want to stay again.  Saw the mansions and the town.  Got killer ham and cheese croissant's on the way out of town as we headed to New York City for a few days.  In NYC, we did a lot of walking, and saw a lot of sights.  In the end it was easily the best road trip I've ever taken.

Honorable Mention: 1996 Indy-San Fran aka Dinan Delivery, 2000 Indy-Maine-Indy-Yellowstone-Seatte-SanFran-Indy, 2001 Colorado, 2002 Colorado / Rally, NYC-Maine 1998.

The first Concert: Nine Inch Nails / The Jim Rose Circus / Marilyn Manson

This was my second time seeing them on this tour, but the last show was not all general admission, so I was looking forward to not sitting up high to keep tabs on everyone's t-shirts.  The arena itself was an ok size (a little smaller than the venue we had seen them at before). The acoustics seemed a little harsh - but who really cares when you're as close to the stage as we were?

Marilyn Manson was the first opening act, and they had begun to take off in-between the last time we saw them and this time.  Most of the people on the floor knew many of their songs, so the crowd was definitely much more into it.  The pit was pretty rough.  There was some weird stuff happening on stage, but we were having fun.

The Jim Rose Circus was as entertaining as always.  Pretty much the same show as in Muncie, but much closer this time.

The NIN show was very similar to the last show.  But the experience of being up close completely changed it for me.  I came and went from the pit depending on the intensity of the song played.  It was a surreal experience being in the pit during the movie-screen portion of the set.  I had to step out of the pit for a few after I got a minor case of vertigo from looking up at the large screen and moving with the pit.

The show was better than Muncie, and I left quite drained from the pit.  I bought two gallons of water at a gas station on the way home that evening - one to dump on me and one to drink.  It was a fitting way to end the week.

The second concert: Helmet / Quicksand / Orange 9mm

As soon as I hear that Helmet was on tour, I wanted to go.  When I heard Quicksand was with them, I HAD to go.  I was (am) a big fan of their (then) current albums.  I went to the show with two great friends who were at the NIN concert as well.

None of us were aware of any other attached acts, but we thought there'd be one.  None of us had ever heard of Orange 9mm but their tone and ferocity took us, and the crowd by storm.  Minor pits started up from time to time, but nothing that didn't fizzle out due to the crowd not being completely developed.  It was still more than good enough for two of us to pick up their CD immediately after their set.

Quicksand came on, and you could tell that there was a decent amount of crowd anticipation.  I was so looking forward to seeing them, but their set was only so-so.  Partially because they didn't quite pull off the meticulous nature of their recorded music, and partially because there was a decent portion of the crown not really into them.

By the end of their set, we had worked our way up to about 2-3 people behind the barrier just barely left of center. We set up camp there until Helmet came on.

The crowd was very much anticipating their arrival, and when the first song hit its stride, the crowd up front just exploded.  Jumping and moving with their trademark stop-start style that gave a rhythm to the crowd.  The pit intensity picked up with the harder, more driven parts of the songs.

It was one of the better performances I've been up close at a general admission venue to experience.  I would have waited around after the show to try and meet any of the guys, but the next day I had that pesky thing called school and another concert to go to at the very same venue.

The third concert: Fishbone / Weapon of Choice

The previous summer was my first Lollapaloza experience.  Right in the midst of the lineup was Fishbone, which I was already a fan of because of the wonderful album The Reality of My Surroundings.  It was a great experience, and I jumped at the chance to go see them in a smaller, more intimate venue.

My two friends from the Helmet/Quicksand concert were going as well.  What can I say, We had a lot of overlap in our musical preferences.  My then girlfriend came along too...  She was on the brink of being very ill with the flu, but she really wanted to goregardless.  We got there early enough to be up against the stage.

We were all very impressed with the showmanship of the opening act, Weapon of Choice.  They were a perfect fit to open for a band like Fishbone, but their studio albums weren't good enough for me to follow up on it.  It still ramped up the audience pretty well.  It was getting crowded up front, and my girlfriend was beginning to run a higher fever.

Fishbone coming out was a lot of fun.  For those of you who don't know, it's a larger band with a horn section and all.  They have quite the selection of stage attire, and stage persona that make the concert experience very fun.

I specifically remember hearing many of the more popular songs from The Reality of My Surroundings.  Notably "Fight the Youth", "Everyday Sunshine", and I think I remember hearing my personal favorite "So Many Millions".

The concert was going well, but my girlfriend was feeling more and more dazed.  Not only was she sick, but she'd never been to a concert with a mosh pit in a small venue.  I ended up standing behind her with my arms locked on each side to keep her from getting swept away or pressed against the barrier.

The concert was probably between 1/2 and 2/3 of the way done when everything ground to a halt.  The drummer (Philip "Fish" Fisher) stopped and made everyone else on stage stop the song.  He began talking into his mike with the intention of getting the crowd riled up.  He basically called out my girlfriend (even pointing directly at her with a drumstick) for looking dazed and not as into the concert as he'd like her to be.  We were shocked, horrified, and appalled (myself more so because she was a bit out of it from the fever).  We immediately extracted ourselves from the crowd and left.

I've listened to their music some since, but I'll never support the band again after such a display of calling out a fan in the middle of a set for the complete wrong reasons.

It was a downer to end the week on, but not enough to diminish was was what I look back on as "the week of concerts".

Top Five Songs lately

5. (You're So) Deadly by Self
4. Asleep at the Wheel by the Cinematics
3. Sweet Disposition by The Temper Trap
2. An End Has a Start by The Editors
1. Blackest Eyes by Porcupine Tree

Honorable Mention: Revenge Destroys Everything by Helmet, Mountain Song by Jane's Addiction, Binario by Komeda, We Carry On by Portishead.

So yeah, I was on the golf team for three years in high school.  A few things to note.  First was that I was required to wear a hat during matches to cover up my non-standard hair color (purple was my favorite).  Second was that I was kicked off the golf team for a practical joke involving Ex-Lax.  That's a blog for a different time...

Anyway, I went golfing after school with two of my best friends one fall/winter afternoon.  It obviously wasn’t golf season.  It was something to do.  Because I haven't head from either in a long time, I don't want to use their names.  So I’ll call my friends Mr. H and Mr. T.

Mr. H was on the golf team with me, and Mr. T was just a friend in common that liked to play for fun.

So we went to play at Saddle Brook which was just a nine-hole course at the time.  Saddle Brook is on the west side of Indianapolis and I'd played there a lot since I had a brother that lived on the course.  But it was just a round for fun, and we were playing like it.  Not taking ourselves seriously and enjoying the activity.

I was playing about average for me.  two thirds of the way through I was headed for my usual score of around 42-44.  Mr. H was right there with me, and Mr. T was way up there.  None of us really cared about our score because it was all about fun.

I found a ball on hole 7 (now hole 16), and laughed out loud because of the corporate logo.  It was a Beanee Weenee logo golf ball.

When we got to 8 (now hole 17), I checked the yardage which it claimed as being 177 on the card, but I thought it was at least 10 yards short.  It's a cheeky little hole with an elevated, two tier green.  I grabbed my 7-iron and threw a ball from my pocket onto the tee box.  In my usual style, I just set up and hit it without teeing it up and with no practice swing.

Mr. H and Mr. T were both still getting their clubs and one of them asked where my shot was heading.

"Right for the green" I responded not thinking much of it.  It looked like a good placement.  One of them asked where it went.  "I think it went in the hole" I responded.

Without them hitting their tee shots, we all ran up to the green and jumped up with celebration at finding the ball in the hole.

So I've taken thousands of images over the years (boy that makes me sound old). No where near all of them have been digitized, and very few are posted... But nevertheless here's a list of my five favorite images that I have posted on Flickr.  Most of my Flickr images are relegated to the landscape and inanimate object variety, but that's only because in this day and age I don't like posting images of people without their 100% permission.

So the photos here may be my favorite for composition reasons, or because of the memories associated with the image.  Regardless here's the list as it sits now and could very well change with the weather.

5. untitled - 2007. That is the top of a willow tree up at my grandparents place in Angola Indiana. This is an infrared image, but the thing that makes me love this is light clouds in the sky. There's nothing technically hard about this if you know basic infrared, but it just makes me happy for a reason that I can't quite say now that I'm trying to.

4. Defender 110 and Neil on Pearl Pass - 1999. I love this image for what it shows and the time it takes be back to. The storm in the distance is a bit looming, but the sparse landscape shows you that there's something different about where this image was taken. This was actually taken with my first digital camera. A Sony Mavica that only got up to 1024x768... That's right, less than a single megapixel.

3. Smear over Silver Lake - 2008. This image was something I had to work for.  This was the culmination of a few years of trying to learn High Dynamic Range (HDR) photography.  It's not that I hadn't produced HDR photos that I'd liked in that time, but this was the first one that came out in the way I really wanted to when I set out to learn HDR.  Then again, it is one of those easy to take scenes, but the processing hoops I went through were pretty complicated.  This image probably stopped what was my increasing frustration in getting what I wanted out of HDR.

2. Millennium Park - 2007. This is here mostly because it's such a cool subject, and I was pretty happy with this being my first serious attempt at HDR. I've reprocessed it since and gotten a few things better, but not the intense blue gradients with no other people around. I actually shouldn't have had time to take this because I was waiting for a group of people to get into Chicago, and they should have been there hours beforehand. While I was pissed that they were so late (completely within their control), I'm pretty happy I was able to go and get this and a few other images.

1. War Memorial - 2007. I just really dig the backlit thing going on in this. I was actually in the middle of doing a time lapse with my D200, but I had the D100 on hand to take quick one-offs like this.  I'm glad I did. This was the best thing I got all night.

Honorable Mention:

5. Bryce Canyon, Utah - so breathtaking. I've only been there twice, but it it's a definite place for a long lasting impression.  It's one of those places that you expect to be beautiful, but it surpasses any expectation when you're actually there. Unfortunately it's so remote that one can't see it without a very planned effort. Because it's so close to the Grand Canyon, it's skipped over by a lot of people who make the journey out that far. The grand canyon is amazing for it's size, which also handicaps your accessibility to it.  Bryce is amazing for it's sheer beauty and accessibility.

4. Chicago - The closest major city to all of the places I've lived. It's a place to go for all those major city things that aren't so common.  The museums...  The culture...  The unbelievably large number of places to go, and people to see.

3. Paris, France - My favorite place outside America (so far). Specifically, I love just absorbing things at a cafe in place St. Michael. You can't walk down a block and not be surrounded by history and culture that boggles the mind. I know I like to be somewhat relaxed, but even with specific plans and schedules I've had a blast because of the just amazing number of things to do in and around Paris. I've been there more than a handful of occasions, and each time has been a complete joy.

2. Pemaquid Point / Chamberlan, Maine - Since the edge of my memories, I've never been more than a handful of years away from the rocks and ocean that make this one of the most majestic places on earth. It's not surprising that the lighthouse was put on the Maine State Quarter. Sure, my mother and sister moved out there, so I have lots of reasons to go out. But It's so relaxing if you have the time to enjoy the surroundings and especially the stars that you just never get to see in anyplace with even the slightest light polution.

1. Pearl Pass Summit, Colorado - This is a mountain trail linking Crested Butte and Aspen Colorado. This is by far the hardest place on my list to actually get to, but it is so very amazing. So few people will ever understand, but it's just more amazing that words can really express here. The journey itself is full of adversity, tension, and an increasing sense of remoteness.  Once you get above the treeline, and up to a certain point, it just overtakes you with such amazement.  You can't not stop and admire the amazement.

Honorable Mention: Tetons, Yellowstone, St. Petersberg (Fla), NYC.

I thought I had left the sleepless night and pensive morning behind until I sat down for dinner with my wife. The local news was ending, and there was some image of a small plane in a body of water. She had just gotten off the phone with her mother and we began to enjoy our Mow & Johnny's take out when the phone rang again. Like anyone else, we don't like being disturbed during dinner. But it was my father, so we answered the call.

He was calling to ask if I'd seen the news, and when I told him I had just turned it on he informed me that the father of a high school friend was killed in a plane crash. My old friend was seriously injured, and his mother was also in the plane and also injured, but not seriously. Not only was I in the same graduating class in a small high school, but we also lived close to each other. I spent a decent amount of time at his house, and vice versa. We drifted away when college started.

I've spent the last few hours trying to let all those that I know who have had any connection to the family know, and I finally have a chance to let it sink in. I don't think it has at all. I can't imagine what it's like for anyone in the family.

I've never known how to really deal with death. Does anyone? I'm no stranger to having loved ones passing or being there for the passing of a friend or family member. I just don't know how to process it. I've never been able to. I can go along and function fine in the wake of this type of tragedy, but it's something that stays with me for years whether I like it or not.

This was a not so great time in my life, but my friends helped me pull through some nasty sh*t. Many of the emails I came across were ones that meant enough for me to actually keep them. What has made me pause is that most of these emails came from people that I'm not in contact with for one reason or another.

I do this from time to time. I'll find something that takes me back to times of old, and I'll wonder why things happened the way that they did. Inevitably I'll write it off to growing apart or whatever conflict may have happened, but there's always a period of remembering how things were. In today's case it a odd mix of bitter, fond, and even gut wrenching.

Hubbard and Cravens take me away!