Props

Joey my cosine and friend, you are amazing. That goes for all of you! To every single person who has helped me in tough times recently (there are too many to name so I'm not even going to try), I owe you a sincere thank you! Most of you will never know how much you've helped me and in how many ways. If there's one thing I've learned in the past month it's that I have some fucking amazing friends and I love you all! Seriously, you guys mean the world to me!

Thank You

Thank You

Thank You!!!

Tomorrow

Today the new and improved Jason is reborn, cleansed of the past and focused on the future. Look out world, here I come! :)

Dust in the wind...

7 Second Delay

Lord knows I have a lot to talk about right now, but I'm way too tired, so tonight you get this.

"I don't know why I took so long to love and lose. I spent too much on flowers, and not enough on booze!"

Mad props to my homiest of homies JPDawwg! 5 hours of power bitchez, recognize!

Green Day!

Just in case any of you were wondering what I am going to be doing tonight I thought I'd give you a little clue. This is a picture from last time Green Day was in Salt Lake. Green Day is one of my favorite bands live and I don't think I've ever seen them put on a bad show. My first Green Day show was in my junior year of high school at Saltair. I've seen them 3 times since, twice at the E-Center and once at one of the most amazing shows I've ever been to; Pepsi Smash at the Canyons in Park City where they closed the show playing Queens "We Are The Champions" to a huge fireworks display. I still wished I would have kissed you under those fireworks Mckell! ; ). Anyway, enough about the past, tonight's gonna kick ass!

Billie Jean is not my lover, she's just a girl who thinks I am the one.

Rich

This is Rich... Rich is 18 years old and has been diagnosed with Leukemia. Leukemia is essentially cancer of the blood and bone marrow and is one of the deadliest forms of cancer. Yesterday Todd and I went to visit Rich and take him a couple pairs of tickets to his favorite band, Green Day.

The first thing that greets you when you enter the cancer unit at Primary Childrens Hospital is a set of giant steel doors. A press of a button opens one set of doors and reveals a small room with another set of large steel doors. You enter the room, allow the first set of doors to close behind you, wash your hands and call a nurse to open the second set of doors. The purpose of all of this is to keep outside air which could contain harmful pathogens from entering the cancer unit. Since the immune system is completely destroyed when cancer patients are undergoing chemotherapy, the smallest cold or virus could potentially be life threatening so the cancer unit uses only sterile filtered air. After walking through the second set of doors one of the first things I saw was a girl probably only 3 or 4 years old who was obviously undergoing chemotherapy. She had about 4 strands of hair on her little head and she was so skinny you could see most of her bones. She was playing with some of the dolls and toys that are spread all over the floors. I saw a few more small kids walking around as we went towards Rich's room, but I had to force myself to look away, there's really nothing sadder than seeing a little 4 year old girl with cancer.

When we walked into Rich's room he was watching Animal Planet on TV. On a table in front of him was a magazine propped up with Green Day on the cover, a bunch of get well cards and a few CD's. The room was dimly lit which just added to the glumness of it all. Rich laid in bed, he looked good for someone on his last day of chemotherapy. He had short buzzed hair (something most people loose) and seemed a lot livelier than most. He was skinny, however and you could tell that this once 6'3" deuce and a quarter kid had lost a considerable amount of weight and muscle. We gave Rich CD's, t-shirts, a hat and his Green Day tickets. We then talked for 20 minutes about how Green Day was by far his favorite band, how he owned all their CD's and what the meaning behind the name Green Day was. You could tell he was a happy camper. We then talked about Rich's life before and after cancer. It wasn't a happy story. After being in Rich's room for a little over an hour, the nurse came in to take him in for his last chemotherapy treatment of the month and we left.

If there was one thing I took from the entire experience it's that no one is guaranteed anything in life. A year ago Rich was playing guitar in a local band and going to high school. Now he's sitting through meetings where doctors tell him that he has a 50% chance of being killed by this, and a 30% chance of being killed by that. Rich knows there's a chance he won't make it, you can see it in his eyes but he still has hope. I think he'll make it. Being in the cancer ward forces you to realize that no matter how bad things seem to be in your life, you still don't have it that bad. As I was leaving the hospital, everything I had been worrying about the past few months seemed trivial and meaningless. I just wanted to do something, anything to help these people. It got me thinking maybe I'll go volunteer at a homeless shelter, or soup kitchen just so I can do something to help someone less fortunate. I came to the realization that compared to a lot of people in this world, I've got it about as good as it gets. I don't think I'll forget this experience anytime soon, I went into that hospital thinking one way, and left a little different. It's unfortunate that people have to live through this and I almost feel guilty saying thank you to him for helping me open my eyes to reality. I only wish I could be half as strong in life as he. It's been a long time since I've had a reality check like that.

Good luck Rich!

Village Inn

Why I haven't been banned from the Village Inn on 4th south I will never understand.

Just Say No

Chalk another one up for corporate radio! One of my good friends Brandy (second from the right) and some other cool people I used to work with got laid off the other day in the coldest firing I've ever heard of. Radio is a brutal business, and from what I'm learning working at a local TV station, so is TV. So if you're thinking of getting into the entertainment business, save yourself the trouble and don't. Become a bikini inspector instead.

Anyone want to hire some cool D.J.'s?

Coming Clean

Well I guess it's about time I reveal to everyone (if anyone at all) what all these cryptic and depressing posts I've made over the past few weeks have been all about. Three weeks ago from today my girlfriend Mckell and I broke up. Although things are going fairly well now, the past few weeks have been some of the hardest of my life. As I attempt to stand back from the situation and look at it from an observers point of view, it amazes me how deeply I was effected by everything. I've been on this planet for 24 years now and in all of those years I can say with a fair amount of certainty that this is the hardest thing I have ever gone through. It amazes even myself. Love is truly a vast and overwhelming emotion. Love has taken me to some of my highest highs, and most recently, some of my lowest lows. The amazing thing about love is that it's something that is not palpable, measurable or discernible to anyone but yourself. So what is love exactly? Nothing more than an emotion? It seems too powerful to be an emotion. Emotions are things like happiness, sadness, fear, etc. Love can certainly cause emotions, but I think that love is something far more complex. Haddaway called it when they wrote a song called "What is Love?", and I second that question, what is it? I have come to realize that love can either be your best friend or your absolute worst enemy. As an enemy however, love is a foe that cannot be defeated or vanquished. No one can defeat love, it has to chose to leave on it's own. For some, love wages a life-long war against them that they can never win, leaving them with a melancholy life of sadness and depression. For others, love can leave as quickly as it came causing little to no emotional repercussions. It all has to do with who you fall in love with, and how deeply. I fell deep and hard, and now I'm left waging a war against love that I never wanted to fight. Of course, love is winning the war although I've been victorious in a few of my battles against it. Music, photos, videos and memories seem to be my love's weapons of choice. The hard part for me is that I don't really want to win the war right now. I find myself fighting this war debilitated by the very love I'm fighting against. You can not fall out of love, and waging a war against a love that you've held so close to your heart for a long period of time is somewhat arduous and futile. All I find myself being able to do is pacify myself by abjuring from love and trying to run away from it. Love is faster than I, however, and no matter how fast I seem to run she always manages to catch up and mount a formidable attack again. So here I sit, love closing in preparing to mount another attack. The nights and mornings seem to be my love's preferred time of engagement, although she can strike at any time. I will fight this battle with all my might, but sleep will probably be my only temporary escape. For as always, love will be stalking me in the morning.

The Warriors Prayer

I'm starting I think I should change the name of my blog to Jason's melancholic blog of unhappiness. And so, in the spirit of trying to cheer things up around here, I bring you straight from the mouths of the Kings of Metal, the warriors prayer!


Gods of war I call you.
My sword is by my side,
I seek a life of honor, free from all false pride.
I will crack the whip, with a bold mighty hail,
Cover me with death if I should ever fail.
Glory
Majesty
Unity
Hail!

I wrote a song tonight, I think it's beautiful.

None of you will ever hear it....

♥ 9/10/2004 - 8/23/2005 ♥

Today I wish the date September 10th, 2005 did not exist. It would have made things much easier.

The One That Started It All

This is the first Phil Hendrie clip I ever heard and the one that started it all for me. It is seriously one of the funniest things I have ever heard and I strongly recommend checking it out. The clip is a little long, but well worth it. You do however, have to promise me you'll listen to the whole thing if you download it, you'll see why. Podcast it or just check it out if you're bored and have a little time... I promise you won't be disappointed!

Click on the clip name to download.

Clip: IROC Camaro
Artist: Phil Hendrie
Runtime: 30:18

Knob jobber...

It Really Can't

Nothing can make it better,
nothing can take it away.
Nothing can ever replace the damage when you went away.

Now my heaven is a hell in my own mind,
I know why the caged bird sings, but the song of the free I can never find.
Now the bed I lay in, is of my own make,
freedom is cheap when it's just for freedoms sake.

Nothing can make it better,
nothing can take it away.
Nothing can ever replace the damage that I did that day.

No substance can be the answer,
no person can ever replace.
Everyone is you, yet when I look they wear a different face.

Now my solace is, my cold dark room,
where I can be angry in a distant womb.
Reverberations caress my skin and lick my lips,
yet there's only air when I reach out my finger tips.

From riches to rags.