I’m still struggling to stop the carousel of disbelief in my head, trying to make sense of where “civilization” is headed. At my core I’m an optimist, but WOW! It’s like the world has collectively lost it’s mind…
This was another “by chance” read by an author previously unknown to me.
It was an unusual story, which I appreciated. The subtitle of the book being “a story from America’s divorce”, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I can tell you it turned out to be nothing at all like I thought it would be.
The basic premise is that a wounded and now discharged former U.S. Marine and his computer programmer neighbor meet up and build a drone together, a miniaturized version of a military plane. Initially they use this drone to assist a militia group that is fighting a battle with a south-of-the-border cartel.
During the course of the story, California, Washington and half of Oregon secede from the U.S., and Chinese forces try to move in to “help” and protect the newly seceded states, the s-o-t-b cartels are fighting each other so as to gain territory control up the west coast, Texas withdraws from the U.S. to once again restore the Republic of Texas, federal interests play both sides against each other, and more. It is a pretty wild ride and I was drawn in pretty quickly.
Overall, I will state that I strongly liked the story. There was enough character development that I felt I had a good “feel” of the characters and it made the story all the more believable. The twists and turns of the story itself were enough to keep me coming back for more. Action, adventure, intrigue – all present and accounted for.
As for my personal “gripes” about the book? Not many. Primarily, the writer needed to engage an editor. I was kinda irked at first by this – the wrong word here or there, weird punctuation… but honestly once I got hooked into the story (which didn’t take long), I was less bothered by it. Nonetheless, it kinda had the feel of a rough draft. Don’t get me wrong, those kind of mistakes are EASY to miss when you’ve read something you’ve written, especially by the 10th pass through. But if it were ME, and I was going to self publish a book that was going to be in print, I’d go the extra step of having an outside editor proof the thing before it went to the printer. I realize this is nit-picking, but this is simply my honest assessment. That being said, kudos to the author for writing and self publishing! We need more, many more, authors putting their work out on their own without the “direction” (read: censorship) of the major league publishing houses.
My only other gripe is that the writer got a little too “in the weeds” with details – both in the flight action scenes but also (especially) in the technical aspects of the building of the drone(s). Now, if you’re a “plane guy” and know the terminology used, or a pilot that has had to execute maneuvers, maybe those parts will read easier to you. In my case I found myself re-reading several passages just trying to make sense of it in my own head with NO experience whatsoever with planes or flying. Honestly I felt a little dumb at times, as the technical material was over my head.
Lastly, the ending was a little anticlimactic, but it left a great set-up for a sequel.
All in all, I very much enjoyed the book. There was a lot of hidden philosophy tucked in there that made you think, but also just interesting characters and a lot of excitement. I will absolutely read the sequel when/if it drops, and I will certainly keep an eye on the author for more work in the future. His style is really different, or I should say his perspective is very different from the mainstream while at the same time he doesn’t veer off into the sheer foaming-at-the-mouth anti- government crap that so many dystopian/post-apoc writers do. Which also reminds me, I really appreciated the authors “reality” of the USA in this book. So many these days are so off the rails and unbelievable, this was a great change of pace. Yes, in the story the country is most definitely falling apart, but it’s still in tact enough to be somewhat realistic. Kinda like real life…
Anyhow, without getting spoilers involved, that’s all I’ve got to say on the subject.
Bottom line, I enjoyed the book a great deal in spite of its minor flaws and I’m looking forward to the sequel. Would recommend! Well done Mr. Maynard!
Thanks for stopping by!
I’ve been a little quiet lately and “off my game”, feeling out of sorts and spending a lot of energy just trying not to get sucked into the vortex of darkness and doom…
It’s nothing I can put my finger on. It’s the overwhelming sense of being pummeled with bad news, destruction, lies and sheer madness. I cannot continue to believe what we see around us (and what /they/ continue to justify, excuse or simply bury if the other two options aren’t viable) is due to ineptitude. It’s too much, too often, too coincidental. But if it’s NOT ineptitude, what does THAT mean? Honestly, I can’t wrap my head around what is going on in the world right now. It appears to be a race to the bottom, and the good ol’ USA is leading the pack!
I made a promise to myself when I started this blog that I wouldn’t let it go down the path of doom and gloom, that I’d do my best to keep things positive or at least neutral. Since lately I didn’t think I could do that, I’ve simply been keeping my big yap shut. That being said, I figured I’d just share a few memes that struck a chord with me lately.
I’ll be back before long. Just gotta get out of my head for a bit (or maybe get fitted for a tin foil hat!?!). A book review is in the works, concerts on the horizon and other assorted stuff. No travel ’til Autumn due to tightly squeezed budgets, but it is almost surfing “season”, so if nothing else some beach time is right around the corner.
In the meantime, focus on food, water, shelter, medicinal needs, and a means of protection. The LAST thing anybody needs is to become reliant on this Clown Show commonly known as “government”. They do NOT have your best interests at heart. That is YOUR job.
Keep your chins up folks, sanity certainly MUST return at some point…
Well, a guy can dream, can’t he?
Thanks for stopping by!
The Chapel is a new venue for us. First impressions were less than stellar – our “e-tickets” were coming up as “invalid” when they were scanned, causing some problems that had to be sorted out by the staff. It turned out to be equipment error on their scanner and it all worked out, but that was a rough start. I will say though, the staff was very nice and polite during the entire thing and very apologetic when they realized it was a problem on their end. So, hats off to the Chapel staff for excellent customer service!
Cloe Wilder was the opening act, however we got a late start and the aforementioned ticket issues, so we missed her set completely…
Dylan Conrique was already on stage when we got in the door. We didn’t have any idea of what to expect, as we were unfamiliar with her work, but suffice it to say, there were no surprises. Her “band” consisted of one guy, alternating between guitar and keyboard, and a laptop. Not exactly exciting to watch. It was the musical equivalent of cotton candy… overly sweet, full of hot air and almost completely without substance. I couldn’t help but think this young lady must have grown up on a steady diet of Disney movies and Arianna Grande… To be fair, she’s really, really young so there is a LOT of room for growth. Her voice is actually nice, but her music is bland and a lot of it WAY TOO DULL for a live setting. She has a lot to learn about pacing her set and song selection. I doubt eliciting yawns and eye rolls was what she was striving for, but that was the reaction of this writer…
Spencer Sutherland came out, and honestly I didn’t know what to make of him from the start. Picture this: sleeveless, yellow satin, bell-bottomed jumpsuit with white fringe! I mean, honestly? I couldn’t tell if he was being “ironic” in the hipster sense, or if that is what the cool “new” thing is. Between the outift and his weird “Kung fu moves”, it was a bit like watching someone imitate Harry Styles, channeling Elvis Presley. Frankly it was a little off-putting and just weird for weird’s sake.
Musically, he sounded good BUT he relied HEAVILY on backing tracks, which is kind of a bummer to me. On the one hand, I get it – touring is very expensive and paying all the expenses for an extra few musicians can make the difference in whether you can go one the road or not. On the other hand, when you’re watching a singer engaging with the audience, his mic is NOWHERE NEAR HIS MOUTH, and yet you’re hearing his voice along with 3-part harmonies(and nobody in the backing band is singing!)…well, that’s a WTF moment for me. And a lot of other music lovers I know. ESPECIALLY in a small venue! You can maybe fake it a little better in the Enormo-Dome, but from 15 feet away, you’re not fooling anybody.
His band was solid, but nothing stands out in their performance. Spencer didn’t engage with them at all during the set, and they didn’t do anything to add to the visual aspect of the show whatsoever. It could’ve been a studio session based on the band’s excitement level.
And again, when you rely on backing tracks extensively the band is LOCKED into a precise tempo and length of the song, so there is no room for improvisation, no letting loose, no “life”… which kinda defeats the purpose of a LIVE show, right?
Did they sound good? Yes. Was he entertaining? Yes, fashion sense aside. But was is a great show? Nah. I’ve seen worse. FAR worse. But I wouldn’t be rushing out to see him again. Which is a shame really, as I do like his music.
To be fair, this was his first tour as a headliner, so he’s still gotta find his feet and I suspect he will continue to get better if he keeps it up.
All in all, it was an OK night. Nothing earth shattering, but nothing horrible either. I’d give the whole shebang a B-.
Thanks for stopping by!
Friday night was a great night of laughs for us! Our daughter was kind enough to pick up tickets for a comedy night at a legendary local comedy club, Rooster T. Feathers, in Sunnyvale.
The featured comic was Chris Porter, one of our favorite current comedians. This was our second time seeing Chris live and we were thrilled to get the opportunity to him him again!
The club itself was great. I’d never been there before, despite the fact that it’s been in our “backyard” since the 1980s. The Mrs. had been there once before – at her Bachelorette Night, 31+ years ago! It’s a small room – we were maybe 10 feet from the stage – but it’s a great place for comedy. Nice room, decent sound, friendly staff, and spotlessly clean bathrooms. I’d be more than happy to go back, and would absolutely recommend the place.
The MC for the night was a young man by the name of Maxx Eddy. He was pretty funny and certainly shows promise as an up-and-comer.
The opening comic was Emily Van Dyke. We’d never heard of her, and while I wouldn’t say she was great, she certainly had her moments and there were more than a few LOLs during her set.
Chris Porter delivered a fantastic set and had us rolling pretty much the entire time. He did all new material, with the exception of one “old joke”, done by request of the peanut gallery.
We had one drunkard in the audience that kept blurting stuff out loud to Chris – not exactly a heckler, but a distracting dingbat nonetheless. Chris took it all in stride and managed to riff off her nonsense, which turned the interruptions into some great laughs. A true pro!
All in all, we had a great night. Chris Porter just keeps getting better and we look forward to seeing him again as soon as the opportunity arises. And we’ll certainly be keeping an eye on the upcoming shows at Rooster T’s, it’s a fun place and right up the road. A great change from driving all the way up to San Francisco!
Thanks for a great night Chis, Emily and Maxx!
And thank you for stopping by!
Still lamenting the Chuch show that I missed this week, I’ve been listening to them a lot…which led me down the path back to some Australian faves from back in the day. Enjoy!
Enjoy your weekend!
Thanks for stopping by!
I can still distinctly remember the very first time I heard The Church. It was the Fall of 1982, my Freshman year of high school.
A Senior by the name of Art had “taken me under his wing” in the marching band’s drumline, and one day he invited me over to his house after school to listen to records. Earlier, he’d brought a couple LPs to school for me to check out – the Ramones “Road to Ruin” and the Sex Pistols “Never Mind the Bollocks”, two albums which forever changed me. So an invitation to explore his record collection was an exciting endeavor, despite the 3 1/2 mile walk to get there!
Amongst the mind blowing artists he introduced to me that day were The Church, starting with “The Unguarded Moment”. I had never heard music like that before and I was instantly hooked.
Art dubbed a copy of the album onto cassette for me and I wore it out, listening to it over and over and over again all through my high school years.
I was lucky enough to see them live TWICE – once in the late 80’s and again in the 90’s, and both times they were outstanding.
Several months ago I saw that they were once again on the road, so I snapped up a couple tickets for the Mrs. and I to see them again. I figured, these guys are no spring chickens, this may very well be the last opportunity to see them on stage, how could I NOT go?
I’d been on an elevated excitement level for a couple weeks prior – it’s hard when you sit on tickets for months, those last days before the show can be excruciating!
Then the day came and…things went horribly sideways. We had our unannounced inspection by “The State” finally show up. If you’ve ever worked under the watchful eye of government regulations and regulators, you know how much it sucks. If you’ve never had the pleasure, let me tell you, it sucks. Big time. Some inspectors are better than others, but none of them are what you’d consider a “friendly”. They are the ENEMY. Their ONLY reason for existing is to find “deficiencies” in your operation. They crawl up your a** with a magnifying glass and a fine tooth comb and they don’t relent until they find SOMETHING to write you up for. A typical inspection (called a “Survey”) lasts 3-4 days, and I’ve seem them go longer. We’re still in it now in fact. But I digress…
So there was that AND simultaneously our company got hit with a “cyber attack”, taking down our entire network. 95% of what I do requires access to our network, putting me even further behind.
Then, to add a little excitement, we had a MASSIVE storm roll through too- mudslides, road closures, flooding, trees falling over. General mayhem that only Mother Nature can provide. Good times!
The cherry on top was losing power again at home, where the Mrs. was home, having succumbed to ANOTHER cold.
So, instead of catching one of my all time favorite bands in what could very well be their last Bay Area show EVER, I was sitting at home, mostly in the dark, with a sick wife, fretting over how much food we were going to lose THIS TIME. (We were without power for 3 days back in January and lost quite a bit, which at today’s food prices is not a happy situation!)
I hope the show was great and that our Aussie friends felt the love from the Bay Area. Hopefully the storm didn’t stop too many folks from making it out to the show. The rain was treacherous and the winds worse! I’m sorry I missed it, barely beating back depression while I was “in the act” of missing the show!
But life goes on. There will be more shows, just maybe not The Church… At least I have the distant memories of yesteryear! Better than nothing, right?!?
Thanks for stopping by!
This is yet another book that I cannot recall how I ever came across… I had never heard of the title, nor the author but I did buy it myself, so I must have heard about it from some other blogger, or maybe someone dropped the name in a comment on a blog or social media or whathaveyou…. Who ever it was that turned me on to this book – THANK YOU!
Now, this book is a work of fiction but WOW! The picture it paints of our country and the “what if’s” it draws out of you while reading, it seems highly plausible that such an action could in fact transpire right here on our very shores.
Without giving too much away (the hardest part of a book review!), the story starts with a passenger airplane being shot out of the sky over Arizona. The responsibility for which is laid at the feet of a domestic terrorist organization, “The Iron Web”.
A lone survivor of the crash is rescued by some folks in an isolated community, that just happens to be under seige by the FBI due to the shooting of an officer over a search warrant situation earlier in said community.
I will say unabashedly that I really, really enjoyed this book. It’s the first novel I’ve read that comes from I guess what you’d call a political dissident mindset, that doesn’t try to shove some crazy dogma down your throat or meander off into cringe territory with crazy religious or racial diatribes. What it did do, and I thought it did so masterfully, was put forth a compelling argument for the lack of necessity of an all encompassing, behemoth government entity. There was a touch of Ayn Rand to it, without getting so “in the weeds” as she was fond of doing. If you’ve read Atlas Shrugged, you know what I mean. (And if you haven’t read it, you SHOULD.)
This novel was certainly not the best written thing I’ve ever read, and there were some parts that were a bit predictable and frankly, corny. That being said, it was a compelling story, a relatively believable story and it makes you think!
Honestly, I wouldn’t mind seeing this book as required reading for High School English classes. It’s not often you find a book that is fun to read, but also an eye opener.
On the one hand, I feel like I should give this book away, with the caveat that it be passed on to someone else afterwards as I think everyone should read this book. On the other hand, I’ll likely want to read it again!
All in all, if you like a little action and intrigue, mixed in with political shenanigans and topped off with some general civics and a dash of philosophy, I think you’ll like The Iron Web. I know I did!
Thanks for stopping by!
Just shy of a year ago, I lamented in a post about putting off what you need for so long that the item is no longer available. We’ll, in my case it wasn’t something I needed, just something I really, REALLY wanted.
Well, I’m happy to say that after 50+ weeks of relentless hunting and several strikeouts, I’ve finally obtained my unobtanium guitar!!
At Christmas I was convinced that I was never, ever gonna get my hands on one of these beauties, and came very, very close to pulling the trigger on an alternate. The thing was, this guitar WAS my alternate in the first place! And I’ve dreamed of owning a guitar like this since about 1982! Anyhow, thankfully I talked myself out of it and just a couple short months later I found THE guitar I wanted – used, but you’d never know by looking at it! And the best part is I picked it up with a factory hard-shell case (a pricey option!) for less than the guitar alone would have cost me a year ago, had they not been discontinued. Small blessings! So yeah, I had to hunt for a year but in the end I saved over $300, not too shabby!
It’s not very often that I’m the recipient of “good luck”, so I’m really relishing this moment.
Now I need to start practicing!
Thanks for stopping by!
To say the last month has been a whirlwind would be an understatement!
It seems as though things have been firing on all cylinders lately and half the time I don’t know if I’m coming or going!
Work has been busy – the end of the fiscal year, plus the start of a new one brings all kinds of mind-numbing nonsense, but overall things are going well on that front.
The Mrs. had a bit of a health issue that got us into the Urgent Care facility a couple weeks ago, but thankfully that’s all resolving nicely and she’s getting back to full function without any further intervention.
My gym routine has been pretty solid. It took a minute to get back in the swing of things, but I’m feeling confident again and getting stronger by the week. I haven’t got to the point where I’m enjoying it again, but I don’t dread it every morning either, so I consider that progress!
My musical stuff has been going slower than I’d hoped, but again I’m still progressing. My playing continues to improve and I’m slowly but surely getting acquainted with some new gear that will help me continue my pursuits.
We just recently returned from another trip up to Oregon, which was fantastic! It was our daughter’s birthday recently, so she and her BF headed up to Gold Beach and we joined them up there for a couple days, just relaxing and enjoying the quiet.
Our view from the patio soaking tub…Not too shabby!
And most recently, just a couple nights ago in fact, we got to see our favorite live band – Magic City Hippies – at one of our favorite venues – the Fillmore, which was absolutely amazing! This was the 6th or 7th time seeing them and they continue to get better every single time.
So yeah, it’s been a bit of a blur, but in a good way.
More to come, thanks for stopping by!
Rock & Metal Reviews That Hit Hard
hear ye, hear ye!
Speaks his mind on music & movies!
Leadership, Tactics, Innovation
The Boring Old Man 