Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Gorgeous Books!

Today was a very eventful day in my life. First of all, I got a copy of Whistle Pig in the mail (which means that Tony and I are now officially on our way to GETTING BIG IN '09). Here is a picture of me being genuinely happy to have written a book with my good buddy.



Today was also very eventful because I went and bought a new vacuum sweeper. Its a Hoover, and I think Hoover is a brand you can trust. I bought a Bissell from Wal-marts a few months back and it already broke. Life rule: you cannot get a quality vacuum sweeper for 40 bucks at Wal-marts. For quality, you at least gotta drop a Benjamin on one. I even bought a warranty for my new Hoover! I was going to take a picture of it because its gorgeous, but I don't feel like it at the moment. Maybe next blog.

Last night was a very eventful night as well. I will soon blog about what happened, but not yet. Its big.

Tomorrow I plan on meeting Tony in Cranberry, PA to make plenty of blogs, commercials, and Whistlepods. We also are going to figure out how to sell 400,000 copies of our book so we can just write great kids books for a living. After I meet with Tony, I plan on meeting with my bandmates in Pittsburgh to make some more plans. I will follow up both of those meetings with friends on Friday with a meeting with my old friend Josh to plan on making a great video. That last sentence may have been a bit confusingly worded. Well anyway, Josh has access to a great green screen. This is a good thing.

Steve wrote and demo'd four songs that I think are amazing. I can listen to them on repeat even though I'm in the same band with him because I love the songs he writes. I am very proud to be in a band with him! I think we will make another 9 or 10 albums together in the next 9 or 10 years. I'd like to be part of making 10 albums, 15 books, 3 movies, and 14 cakes over the next 10 years. Yep, sounds like a plan.

Here's a great video I blog I made, featuring some great Andre bath footage.

Lana and Sue

I emailed the people at Pets Without Parents (the place where I got Andre) and sent them some pictures and videos of him, and they've sent me a bunch of emails back, but this is one of the best ones...

Hi Chris,

I forwarded your video to Lana and Sue who are the owners of Springwood Cabins in the Hocking Hills area and also the women who fostered Andre and his litter since they were 5 days old! Needless to say they loved the video as they'd gotten very attached to them. Below is their email address. They asked me to give it to you in the hopes that you'd continue to send them updates, pictures and of course....more videos!!

Email address:
info@springwoodcabins.com

In case you're unfamiliar with Andre's story, he and his littermates were found alone in a field at 5 days old. No mother in sight and Lana and Sue bottle fed them all until they were old enough to eat on their own (6-7 weeks old). If you are unfamiliar with what this entails - let me tell you, it's a lot of time and sleepless nights! These women are the best rescue workers we know. They are very committed. Emails like yours make their day and validate all the energy they put into their work.

Thanks again Chris for your willingness to "share" Andre with all of us.

Meg
PWP Volunteer


Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Great old journal entries

I found some old journal passages that are funny...

June 14, 2000 - 1:30 PM (This is a post about how I got a real bad reaction to a sunburn while on vacation with my buddy Johnny's family)

I am lying on the beach in Kitty Hawk right now. Steve, PJ, and Johnny are in the water with girls, but I am just lying on the beach with my shirt on. The reason I'm not in the water is because the first day we were here, none of us wore sunblock. Everyone got burned, but I got it the worst. On Tuesday, I got so itchy that I started freaking out. They took me to the emergency room at the Medical Center. I had been rubbing ice on myself to try to stop the itching at all. The gave me a prescription, and by taking that and Benadryl, I was okay for a while. But that night, we were eating at Jockey's Ribs and it happened again. I was flipping out and making a big scene, but I really couldn't help it. Eventually it calmed down though and I was okay. I really hope it doesn't happen again today. I wish I was swimming right now.

September 6, 2000 - 7:30 PM (A very inspiring/cheesy entry, and also a very bold claim at the end about how people don't usually have outlets for their feelings!)

Well, I'm still in class and yep, I'm still bored. We reordered another 1000 CDs this week. Its pretty cool that we've sold 1000 copies of our CD in about 7 months. This next back of 1000 CDs will be pure profit too, so I'm excited. We also have a lot of new shirts coming in, so we should be pretty much set. If some people come out to Roboto's on Saturday, I'll really feel good about how we're doing. the band is really what keeps my hopes up about everything. I can't imagine what I'd do if I wasn't in Punchline. I still truly believe that music is what I'm going to do with my life. I hope I'm not being unrealistic. I've been trying to write some new stuff lately, but for the most part coming up dry. I think I need something major to happen in my life to inspire me. I did write "Cold As You" a while back and I think its pretty good and people seem to like it, but since then I haven't brought a song to practice that caught on. Music is definitely what keeps me sane. Having an outlet for my feelings and writing makes me a very lucky guy...most people don't have that.


Funny stuff! I'll be posting more old journal entries from time to time if I feel like it.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Fantastic Monday!

Its a great Monday today. First of all, the Steelers are going to the Superbowl. Second of all, the hardback edition of Whistle Pig went on sale at WhistlePigBook.com. Third of all, through the place where I got Andre (Pets Without Parents in Columbus, Ohio), the family that adopted one of Andre's brothers got in touch with me and sent me some pictures of Andre's brother! This is Captain Jack...



He definitely seems pretty cool, though I highly doubt that he can be as cool as his brother! Through our emails, it seems like Andre and Captain Jack have a lot in common. Speaking of Andre, he is featured playing in the snow in my new video blog (which I definitely think is my best video blog ever)...



I am looking forward to filming a commercial for Whistle Pig for next week's episode of Geekscape. I'm pretty sure I'm going to make it ridiculously great. I am very inspired to sell 1.2 million copies of Whistle Pig.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Whistle Pig Preorder Day, A New Holiday

Today is the biggest day of my book-writing career (and also the coldest day of the year)! Whistle Pig is now officially available for preorder, and I couldn't be more happy to finally get it into people's hands. I'm also very glad that Tony and I will be immortalized on people's bookshelves forever. It seems like almost yesterday that Tony sent me a poem about a Whistle Pig on my sidekick. I think it was probably our destiny that we would write our first book together. I am also very excited that once February 2nd rolls around, Whistle Pig will be out in full force. I look forward to doing live readings from the book, and I also look forward to starting our next book.






Obviously, I would like to get a book deal. It would be incredible to really live out the Whistle Pig poem "If This Were My Job" (which hopefully you'll soon be reading). I'm spending my whole day today spreading the word about The 'Pig, which is my cool abbreviated name for the book.

THIS is where you can order the book of books.

I also figured the best possible video blog I could do would be in French, as to really get the word out to all our fans in France.



You should also look to the right at my links and go read Tony's bloggings.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Videochat Wishes

I have been editing Punchline studio footage for the past 5 hours straight. While I've been editing, I've also been thinking about how cool it would be to videochat with someone famous. I don't really care who it would be, just as long as they are famous. I'd videochat with Kelsey Grammar, Ed Harris, Darryl Hannah, Chevy Chase, Marilyn Manson...literally, anyone famous. I'd even videochat with Puck from The Real World. In fact, I'd preferably chat with Puck from The Real World. No, preferably would be Kelsey Grammar.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Early Mornin' Bloggin'

Its 8AM and before I get my shower and head down to the 'Burgh for a majorly constructive day with Steve, I figured I'd do a quick blog. Last night, Sarah made some baked ziti and we had 3 friends (Johnny, The Sneak, Duke) over for dinner. It was a nice dinner. Sarah and The Sneak did not eat salads. I had 2 plates of Ziti. We ate a lot of cookies after, courtesy of the big plate of cookies that my Mom made. Duke does not like Andre. Andre chases Duke all over the house, and Duke just spent the whole time trying to avoid him and get away. Duke was so happy to leave. I thought for sure that Duke would like Andre. Maybe someday they will be friends. To Duke's credit, Andre definitely was in Gremlin-mode.

My good buddy Adam has a blog now. You can see it HERE. I think I'm gonna put up links for Anthony and Adam's blogs, because they're definitely strong blogs. I like a good strong blog.

I am going to be recording Steve's narratives for our DVD, as well as building a little set in his attic to film a homemade music video for "Maybe I'm Wrong". We're also going to be doing an all-out big-budget video for "Somewhere In The Dark" in which hopefully every person we've ever been friends with will come be in.

Okay, I'm gonna go get clean and then go to Steve's (but first I gotta stop at Walmarts and get clothespins).

Here is a classic Duke-tube.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Music is real bad sometimes.

I think there is a ridiculous amount of awesome music in the world. Probably so much, in fact, that no single person could ever listen to it in their entire lifetime, even if all they did was sit around and listen to music all day and night. That being said, I really don't think there's ever an excuse to listen to bad music. Here is an example of bad music (I found this 'tube on the antpants tumblr). This is almost unwatchable. Please let this song and performance just all be a bad youtube dream I had.



Let me post an example of good music.



I already know that everyone who reads my blog knows the difference, I'm just sayin'.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Forgot My Toothbrush

I had a good time last night. We saw many good buddies and we played loud rock music at a huge crowd of people. I had a somewhat "off night" as far as talking to the crowd went, so I of course resorted to talking about my favorite vegetable onstage (sweet potatoes). Of course I probably should have stuck to the standard things to talk about (like having a new album out), but I figured I had some fellow sweet potato enthusiasts in the crowd. I was somewhat right.

I found out that my good buddy Anthony also has a blog. You can find it HERE. I was going to buy him a domain name last night but I couldn't think of a good one. I want to get some more domain names.

I am terribly bummed about so many of my youtubes being taken down because of songs used in them! 3 episodes of Texas Toast have become casualties of this raid. I blame Atlantic Records. I even saw today that someone's Punchline video was taken down for using a Punchline song! What the heck. I thoroughly encourage everyone to use songs from Just Say Yes in their youtubes. Hilariously, Texas Toast Episode #4 was taken down because we used George Lamond's song "Bad Of The Heart". I still think the awful awful stand-up comedian Dane Cook is behind all of this.

Here are some pictures.



This is me and the man.



This is AntPants. You know, from Tumblr.



This is Adam. He knows Diddy.



This is what I look like when I'm bloggin'.



Here is a video blog from the backstage Winnebago last night.

Friday, January 9, 2009

Croozin' in the 15 Passenger

I'm riding in the van on the way to Long Island right now to play a show with Bayside tonight. It'll be real good to really rock the bass guitar on a show with those guys. I'm hoping to also make some great new youtubes with Jack O'Shea and something that begins with a B, like some of my favorite youtubes I'm made like "Jack O'Shea of Bayside with a bird" and "Jack O'Shea of Bayside with a bug" and "Jack O'Shea of Bayside with a beer and a bone". I also videoblogged my 20th videoblog a few minutes ago, which hopefully will be uploaded by the time I finish typing this so I can include it in my blog. I'm really happy that no matter how bad my video blog happens to be, I still get over 100 views. I must really have a solid videoblog fanbase. I also like to switch between the 2 word "video blog" and the 1 word "videoblog".

Today was also a big day for another great reason - my Mom got text messaging! Its about time. Now the next step is getting my Dad to start texting. Just the thought of my dad text messaging makes me laugh as if I was making Video Blog #20.

Only a few more weeks until the whole planet is gonna be WhistlePiggin' so hard! I have decided that if Punxsatawney Phil sees his shadow, we're going to sell 1 million books. If he doesn't see his shadow, we'll probably only sell 800,000 of them or so.

A song I'm really not enjoying but listening to anyway today is "Christmas Shoes". I love how specific it is, and also how blatantly depressing it is. I want to write a very specific and depressing song about meeting Jesus.

I posted a great new Andre video of him fetching his rope toy. The dude loves to play fetch. I can't wait to get him in frisbee training. I'm guessing he'll be a world champion frisbee dog. He has been being a very good boy lately, except for last night. I fell asleep on the couch and woke up to find he had peed twice in the living room and also was under the television chewing on the wires (this was a first). I gave him a good yellin' at and put him in the kitchen. He then proceeded to whine for a while, and then go rip up the newspapers that he is supposed to go to the bathroom on. I then gave him another yellin' at and put him in his kennel. He didn't like that at all. He proceeded to flip out and be very loud at a very late hour. I then took him downstairs, where he was even louder. I dealt with it for a while, and then I couldn't take it anymore. I took him out and yelled at him, and saw that there were tears coming out of his eyes. I felt real bad and gave him a hug. Then I took him up and put him back in the kitchen. He was good after that.

Some guy in front of me in line at the gas station used the expression "Yeah, I could stiff talk a banana boat too". No idea what that expression means.

Oh hey, here's that videoblog!

Thursday, January 1, 2009

Puffins in '09

Its 2009 now. Went to Nick and Lynn's house last night, it was a nice time. Probably my favorite part was the guy in the Fender thermal undershirt who would come up and say annoying things. I stopped and got Steve some Sour Patch Kids along the way, but as it turns out, he didn't even really want Sour Patch Kids. I couldn't have guessed that though, considering he sent me a text that said "if you come down bring some sour patch kids".

When I woke up this morning, it was a very happy and then sad time. I was at first happy that Andre did not go to the bathroom in the living room on his first night of officially being allowed to stay in the living room at night. My joy was then quickly shot down when I realized that Jeremy the Goldfish had died. I said a prayer and gave him a proper burial. I am going to miss that little guy. I also feel bad for Lil' Mama, who is now swimming alone. I'll give her some time to grieve, and then consider getting her a new bowlmate.

I'm glad the first thing I did on the internet in '09 was blog. I had a dream about being at a hockey game where a puffin took a penalty shot. He obviously scored, mostly because the bird that was playing goalie came out way too far to try to cut off the angle.

I didn't know this before, but there was a Pittsburgh Women's hockey team called the Pittsburgh Puffins.