Mike Jurewicz’s Blog

I’m a little late on this but felt I need to just pay tribute to one of the greatest professional wrestlers that most of the world has never heard of.  Mitsuharu Misawa was nothing short of a legend in his home country of Japan.  You can not mention the names of Inoki, Tsuruta or Baba without Misawa as the greatest wrestlers to come out of the land of the rising sun.  He held All Japan Pro Wrestling’s top prize, the Triple Crown, on five occasions and Pro Wrestling NOAH’s GHC Heavyweight Title three times.  He has more Wrestling Observer 5 Star matches than any other wrestler in history.  I could go on and on about his achievements but it would end up taking up a lot more space than I wanted to.

Misawa passed away on June 13th, just a few days shy of his 47th birthday, doing what he loved.  An apparent spinal cord injury from a seemingly basic back suplex is what is being said may have caused his passing.  His family has asked for confidentiality in the actual cause of his death.  Misawa influenced many and entertained many more.  He was the epitome of a pro wrestler in it’s truest form.  He will be missed greatly by the wrestling community but never be forgotten.

June 18, 1962 – June 13, 2009

Yesterday I posted a video of Jesse Ventura verbally smacking down Sean Hannity and today he dishes some more out.  This time to crazy right wing show host Elizabeth Hasselbeck.  I would vote this man as our president!

Yes I know I fail again at updating regularly.  I started writing another post but got side tracked.  I am actually thinking about going in a different direction with the site so more on that as it comes.  In the mean time an awesome video of Jesse “the Body” Ventura taking on Sean Hannity and not backing down.

Thanks to my co workers blog I found this cool like music tool that is kind of just like a beat machine.  It’s called the Tone Matrix.

http://lab.andre-michelle.com/tonematrix

The Tone Matrix is also included in another tool called AudioTool from Hobnox.  Here is that full tool.

http://www.hobnox.com/index.1056.en.html

It’s really cool and have a good time messing with them.

So for awhile I have been thinking about writing entries about my time playing music in bands and my time being involved in the music scene.  My biggest conflict was that I have some very unflattering things to say about some of the people that I shared stages and floors and practice spaces with.  But then I realized, I don’t care so here is part one.

Now the title of this may seem a little odd and honestly it has nothing to do with music but is rather a metaphor that I put together because it was something a teacher of mine in high school said.  Directly across the street from the school use to be a big area covered with trees and in the summer between my sophomore and junior years those were leveled in favor of zero lot line single homes.  My first day of junior year in my history class our teacher just spontaneously (or really well planned) ran out the door of class, looked to the doors down the hall pointing to the former field and yelled “Where did all the trees go?  Where are all the kids going to go to smoke dope?”  Absolutely hilarious at the time and actually still today.  But thinking about what he said it could sort of relate to the number of venues that shut down over the years.  Thinking to myself, “Where did all the venues go?  Where are the kids going to go to play music?”

Through the three bands that I played in and two one time off deals I have played pretty much across Palm Beach County and bits of Broward and Dade.  I even got to play in Fort Myers and Lake Mary each.  That is definitely nothing compared to most bands but it is something I’m proud to be able to say that at least I played out.  I’ve had the honor of playing at some great venues and the dishonor of playing at some horrid ones.  All experiences unique and ones that I can fondly look back on and enjoy or laugh.  I feel great that I have been able to play at one time staples in the county like Spanky’s, Ray’s Downtown Blues, Ovation (or Orbit) and the Kelsey Club.  But alas none of them even exist anymore.

Venue owners or managers were also an odd bunch to deal with at times.  Some would go out of their way to make you feel welcome while others you wouldn’t even meet until the show was over.  Some were so delusional that they were the greatest venue in the world that no one could stop them, not even the town they were in that wanted them shut down.  But here are some stories about a handful of places and my stories about them. (more…)

Wow once again I have neglected my poor blog.  Sure I can run excuses up and down about why, and I will, but that shouldn’t have stopped me from making some rant or posting some funny videos.

A week ago today I became a homeowner for the first time in my 26 years on this planet.  I consider myself quite lucky that this was a great time for me to do this.  Price and interest rates are down and I was able to find a great place pretty much for a steal.  While the process was a pain at times I’m glad everything is all set now.  I spent all of this past weekend cleaning the place with my family.  Vaccuming, scrubbing, mopping and some painting.  Next is to get the place painted inside and then I will be all set to move in.

MikeLovesBeer.com is sort of taking off.  It’s becoming quite popular in the beer blog community, at least in my eyes.  For the second straight month it has had a record amount of visitors.  I’m really happy with it and am glad that other people are enjoying it as well.

Work has been good.  I continue to do my best at everything there and learn new things pretty much everyday.  I feel really lucky to say that I love my job and really enjoy the people I work with.

I have started to plan my vacation.  As much as I love Philly and the rest of the tri state area and all of my friends and family up there I just want to go somewhere different for a change this year.  So I am going to go out west.  Going to go to Arizona and visit my friend Sara in the Phoenix area.  I’ve always wanted to go out into the desert and see different things there.  Going to go to the Grand Canyon and maybe to Cali if certain things fall into place.  I’m really looking forward to that and am going to start stocking up on my sunscreen.

Okay well that is my catch up on what’s going on in my life.  I promise a new entry later today or tomorrow.  Some people have given me some good ideas to write about.  So be sure to check it out later.

So as many of you already know I am a bit of a Lost fanatic.  And as normal I was home last night watching the newest episode.  I thought this was an amazing episode and it actually started to bring certain things together.  While not all completely you started to see a certain path it was taking.  After last night I did some thinking about a connection I saw.

For the the courtesy of those that have not seen the episode or are behind I will place this behind a Read More so don’t to spoil anyone.

(more…)

Goodbye 2008 and good riddance at that. To say that this year was a shitstorm would be liking saying George W was a bad president. It gets the point across but it really is an understatement. I battled with so much inner and outer turmoil that I feel sometimes that my mind and heart just need a year long vacation just to get over it all.

The constant battle between my heart and…..well the rest of me put me in the situation where I was going to move back up to Philadelphia.  But that girl, whom I try to not say or write her name, just strung me back in.  For years I fought this insanely one sided fight with her and it just all came to a conclusion this year.  Not only was I going to leave because of the girl I love but I stayed for her when she wanted me to stay and then just left me high and dry again.  She didn’t care about me.  She only cared about herself.  Whenever she needed someone to show her affection so she could feel better about herself she knew she could come to me and get that.  Then as quickly as she reappeared in my life she was gone again.  Then the cycle would just happen over and over.

My last remaining grandparent passed away in May and it just struck me exactly that way.  I just couldn’t stop thinking, “I have no remaining grandparents.”  Despite being up in Pennsylvania for that period I don’t like being there for those types of situations.  My mind was absolutely lost.

My dad lost his job in October when the company that he worked for shut down.  He had been with them pretty much from the start.  They were a company with a great idea and great plan but could never get the funding that they needed to truly prove it to the world.  And I can’t help but be angry and bitter that they never got that funding because if they would have proved their idea correct a lot of other jobs would not be as important as they are right now.

These were probably the three biggest things to hit me this year.  Sure there was more but these are the ones that truly effected me in extreme ways.  But luckily I have started working on these things.

My dad is working hard at trying to find a job while also entertaining the thought of starting his own business.  I have been helping him and my mom with paying bills until things can get straightened out.  Here’s hoping that the new year brings some better times for my dad.

I eventually got past the scary reality of not having any more living grandparents.  It just hit hard because of how involved all of my grandparents were in my life.  When growing up we would see them all quite often, not just family functions.  But I know they are not in pain anymore from what ailed each one of them at their time of passing and that in a way makes me feel better.

Then there was the girl.  On November 4th I voted for change in our country when I voted for Barak Obama to be our next President and on the same day I decided it was time for a change to my own life.  I wasn’t going to take the pain that she gave to me anymore.  If she wanted to throw away everything we had then why should I try to stop her any longer.  She wanted to toss out our almost 6 years of friendship, all the things I ever did for her and the relationship that she denied despite it being great.  I just said fine.  I deleted her from my life as she had done to me but by actually saying something.  She always tried to avoid conflict even when it was inevitable and needed her attention.  My heart is still very fragile and it will be.  I still have days where I think of her a lot but I’m glad I haven’t cracked on my decision.

Despite all these things that hurt me earlier in the year and well up until the last couple months I am doing good now.  Since the beginning of November I have just had a better feeling about myself.  Things seem to be looking up going into the new year.  I went to Pennsylvania and visited my family for my first trip up there in the winter in a very long time.  I had a great birthday with my friends, though Chris was missing.  Despite not really having much in the way of a Christmas it was good being around my family.

Now going into the new year I have some good things to look forward to.  I’m looking at buying a house and finally living on my own.  And I am finally feeling a little healed in my heart to go out and maybe try dating someone.  By no means do I feel I am anywhere ready to “fall in love” but I miss the companionship of a relationship.  I want someone that I can have fun with.  Someone to go out with whether by ourselves or with friends or just stay in and hang out.  That’s what I want at this point in my life.  I just haven’t actually dated in such a long time I really don’t remember how to go about doing it.  Most of the people I have dated in my time have been introduced to me or approached me.  I guess I need the 101 on things.

But anyway a pretty shitty year turned into a good couple of months and hopefully that continues when it leads into 2009.  I hope you all have a safe night tonight and a great new year!

Sometimes I just like to post funny things and this is indeed funny.

So I haven’t wrote anything in quite awhile, which I am trying to get better at, because of work and just other things in general.  But it has been a rather slow day at work and I came across a story that just made me fume.

The story is of a NJ couple that were turned down by local grocery store Shop-Rite to write out their 3 year old son’s full name on a birthday cake.  But when finding out that the child’s is Adolf Hitler Campbell then I think Shop-Rite management had a really good head on their corporation shoulders.  Even more appalling is that this was not the first time the family had requested this done.  They had been denied the two previous years the same thing but also wished swastikas added to the cake as well. The family eventually found a local Wal-Mart that would accomidate the dunderhead request.

The thing that just gets me about this is that the parents went on record as saying they named the kid as such to be unique because there would be no one else with that name.  Being unique is fine and dandy, I really like the names Rocco and Kenta for my future offspring, but when using a name that is synonymous with such evil acts you deserve to have your children taken away.  Oh yeah I did say children, meaning they have multiple offspring.  Would you like to know their lovely names?  Of course you do.  They are JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell.  So they named their child Adolf Hitler to be unique yet have two other children with Nazi related names?  Oh yeah I forgot to mention I have some beautiful land for sale in Maine.  Anyone interested?

The mother and father go on to say that they were brought up to be hateful but do not wish their children to live that type of life, giving them those names they are well on their way to that.  I have never seen such pure idiocy in my life.  Even if I believed that these people wanted their children to not grow up to be hatemongers why would you just damn them away with those names.  Firstly they will be ridiculed in school relentlessly.  Then that ridicule could very well turn into violence once kids learn about the Holocaust.  Some kids may not take kindly to having kids in their classes named Adolf and Arayan Nation.  You just killed their chances of doing any better than you right at birth.  But then again I really don’t believe a damn word these parents say about them wanting their children to be different from them.

I also must commend Shop-Rite for standing up against these people and not backing down.  They could have very easily said yes to doing it and made their money but they said no.  But Wal-Mart on the other hand….well I guess I’m not surprised by them.  I have always been a huge opposer of Wal-Mart and this just adds to it.  Instead of having some integrity they just cave in.  This “morally upstanding” corporation that won’t carry parental advisory music because they think it is wrong has absolutely no problem with put the name of the leader of one of the world’s most horrific series of events on a birthday cake.  Wal-Mart just continues to shoot itself in the foot time after time.

After this past week being in Pennsylvania I realized a few things about kids.  I spent a good amount of time with my cousin’s daughter and saw how much she admired me.  She liked being around me and liked me helping her with her homework and holding her hand when walking around.  Kids are impressionable, especially at a young age, and if you act a certain way around your kids they are going to want to do it.  These Campbell kids are going to grow up and realize what their names are and see that daddy denies that the Holocaust ever happened.  Sure I would love nothing more to be proved wrong on this and see these kids grow up and denounce their names and become great people, but unfortunately growing up in the household that they do I just don’t see that happening.

Here are some links to stories about this.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081217/ap_on_fe_st/odd_hitler_cake
http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/today/index.ssf/2008/12/holland_township_family_angry.html
http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/warren-county/index.ssf?/base/news-0/122923112231930.xml&coll=3