Steve's Online Brain Dump

The Ty Curtis Band

Chalk up one more point in the “bands I’ve discovered through satellite radio” list. While out passing the many miles under the tires over my recent Christmas travels, I had the dial set to Sirius 74 “B.B. King’s Bluesville.” This channel easily earns its spot in one of six presets on my radio; the latest reason being the subject of this post. While passing mile number something-something hundred (somewhere between here and We’ve Been Driving Too Damn Long, FL), a rockin’ tune started snapping me out of the monotonous counting of roadway dash markings. Standard procedure for when something like this happens is to document the artist name and song title to look up later on. Being the model of driver safety that I am, I had the wife reluctantly wake up and shoot me an email (gotta love the digitally tethered age we live in, sometimes) with the simple blurb: Ty Curtis Band – Do I Love You Too Much.

Click here to give your music catalog an adrenaline shot

You might have heard the nasty, derogatory, defamatory, unbelievable rumor that I–a self-proclaimed Apple hater–have brought one of the Apple flagship devices into my home. To further defile my good name, you might have even heard that I actually use this thing quite a bit. Well folks, it’s time I stop hiding and admit my guilty doings (let’s not get carried away and call them “pleasures”).

Click here to read my confession…

I realized that I never really gave a review or thoughts on Restrepo; your life must be hanging in perpetual imbalance, for which I apologize. The recent TV premiere of Restrepo gave me another chance to watch the film and muster some thoughts, as well as remind me to spout my opinion here.

Click here to read my compiled dribblings…

Photo courtesy of the Restrepo Facebook page: facebook.com/restrepothemovie

Restrepo, the award-winning documentary co-made by the author of War, is making its premiere on the National Geographic Channel next month. Mark your calendars, set your smartphone’s reminder app, set your DVR now for Monday November 29th at 9pm EST on the National Geographic Channel. Of course, if you’re reading this after that date, you’ll need to dig through the TV listings to find it.

The “movie version” of the book War has been making its way across the country in smaller Indie film theaters for the past many months. Not only has it generated a cult-like following of fans in less than a year, it leaves many unsuspecting folks wide-eyed and full of a perspective they’ve likely never thought of: the soldier’s daily life on the front line in the thick of it. All walks of life–pro-war, anti-war, service men and woman, military family members, Americans, non-Americans–have been checking this unbiased documentary out and pretty much all agree that it’s incredible in many ways. From raw footage recorded while on patrol with the subject platoon to deep thoughts with the soldiers (yes, they’re more than capable of that!), you’ll probably see and learn things previously unknown to you.

Enough build-up! Make time to watch this. If you have cable or satellite TV that gets the NatGeo channel, do yourself (and these guys who’ve sacrificed much to protect your butt–American or not) a huge favor and watch it at least once. It couldn’t get any easier. You don’t have to go to an old crummy theater that only hippies frequent. Fair warning though, I’m not sure if NatGeo is going to bleep out the bad words (which the film is chaulk-full of). If they don’t, it may not be a good idea to let little kids watch it. If they do, by all means let ‘em watch as there is little to no blood and guts. It’ll be one of the best history lessons they’ll ever get!

I’ll get my review (that i know you’re so dying to read, right) posted after the TV premiere. I saw the film only once int eh theater and I’d like to soak it in another time before putting thoughts together.

UPDATE: I just found out that the documentary premiere will air unedited and with limited commercial interruption. Keep this in mind for the little ones; it might be a bit rough for their ears.

War by Sebastian Junger

Time for a book review: War by Sebastian Junger is a book that I picked up by recommendation of the guys over at the MilBlog Blackfive (the source of a few book recommendations now that have turned into purchases and reads for me–good track record). In a nutshell, it’s a book written by an embedded journalist about what he experienced with a platoon of the 173rd Airborne while they were deployed in Afghanistan during 2007/08. If there has ever been a pure look at what a soldier experiences in heavy combat, free of political or personal agendas or slants, this is it. It’s simply a “I was here and this is what I saw, experienced, and witnessed others experience.” End of story; a damn good story.

Click to read the rest…