Can a risk-averse insurance salesman on the rebound from his bride’s infidelity (during their honeymoon) find happiness with a waitress he knew in junior high who’s averse to commitment? This is a cute flick. Ben Stiller (Ruben) is a smidge annoying but that’s part of the characters he plays, isn’t it? Ruben’s buddy Sandy & risk taking corporate mogal Leland Van Lew are quite funny additions to the movie as well. It’s not one to own but I enjoyed it.
3 stars out of 5. 
I’m back again. This time, for the “rest” of the summer. We have 2 more weeks before we start leadership camp then all the kiddos come back for summer band on August 1st. I feel a bit bummed that my summer is coming to an end but it’s been such an eventful summer, I have no regrets of not spending this time “wisely” this year.
This last bit away was spent in the Rio Grande Valley with Len, friends & family. Just to let you know now, Len took most/all the pictures this run with his “new” camera & borrowed lenses from Nino (thanks man!!!) so there are only a few photos and a video or two to show off. So, I flew in on Sunday to Harlingen. It was a quick flight with a longer layover in Houston than I spent in the air! Luckily, I had a great book to dig into so the travels really didn’t exhaust me as they normally would. We went straight from the airport to McAllen to Anita’s new house to have some barbeque and see some of Len’s family from Linares, Mexico. Good food, good conversation (what I understood and what was translated) and good company! Anita has a beautiful house, too!
Monday was the 4th so we headed out to meet all the local folks for a day of sun, drink and fireworks. Turns out, all the local friends either didn’t want to deal with the tourist crowds (which weren’t that bad) or had other things come up so we hung out with Connie & Frank Miller and “their” kids. I say “their” because only Sami is their daughter. The two other girls are friends of Sami’s so they’re “adopted” by the Millers.
We were in and out of the warm waters (86 degrees waters!!) and kicking back in the wonderful sunshine. It was a great day. From there, we cleaned up and headed to South Padre Brewing Company for dinner and a good view of the fireworks. The girls kept putting money in the jukebox but it wouldn’t play what they had requested. Sami decided to get even by playing some Celine Dion songs (get even at whom, we’re still not sure) so all during the fireworks, Celine Dion kept wailing from the speakers everytime someone opened the door. So, if/when you hear “Sami, you suck” on the video, that’s what I’m talking about.
http://bigbenford.com/MOV01382-1.wmv
On the 5th, we celebrated Len’s 35th birthday. We met his friends Aaron & Vanessa for lunch. We didn’t quite make it up early enough for the fishing the guys wanted to do. Then, we hung out around McAllen & Weslaco before we headed out for some dinner with Kelly, Kumar & Lakshmi (sorry if I spelled that wrong). We went to Bennigans for dessert and drinks and there was a band playing in the bar that was TERRIBLE!!! It wasn’t amateur night, either. Regardless, we all still had fun.
On Wendesday, we went out to the University (UT-Pan Am) and visited with the wonderful people Len used to work with. We went to see Mr. & Mrs. Smith since Len hadn’t seen it yet and I enjoyed it just as much as I did the first time.
Therapist: How long have you been married?
John Smith: Five years
Jane Smith: Six years.
John Smith: [chastened] Five or six years.
My favorite quote from the movie. I think Len liked this movie as well.
We had dinner again at Anita’s house. This time, with different family members. More wonderful conversation (again, what I understood…or was translated), food and company. Len got a Hostess Cupcake as his cake and we all sang him Happy Birthday. Good stuff. Since we were leaving quite early the next morning, we headed back to his mom’s house to pack and get a good night’s sleep. Mission accomplished.
We got up, loaded the car and the four of us headed to San Antonio. Len’s mom & Aunt Chita joined us on this leg of the trip. Who’d have thought that two little ladies would weigh down the car so much. With his mom headed on a 3 month trip and his aunt headed home after extended time in the RGV and all my shoes, there was a lot of luggage to weigh things down. The drive was only about 4 hours and immigration didn’t stop us at the check point so the trip was quite smooth. Our San Antonio destination was Len’s brother Gilbert’s house. I’ve now met 6 of 7 siblings and all the grandkids! We had a wonderful lunch at a little neighborhood Italian restaraunt and visited for quite some time with Len’s niece Adriana & nephew Anthony.
We then headed to St. Mary’s to watch a Revolution DBC rehearsal and surprise my students that are marching with them this summer. I sure do miss working with this activity. Maybe someday, I can go back to it somehow.
OH, on the drive back to Austin, there was some beautiful lightening we saw between San Marcos & South Austin. I tried to get pics on my phone (only camera I could reach) but to no avail. I did get some nice pics of the rainy skies. The colors that came out are pretty cool. You can see them on my phone photo blog. There are pics of fireworks there, too. We had dinner with my family then came back to my place to crash. Quite the funfilled adventure we had this past week.
Hopefully, next week will be a smidge calmer while I get back to work. The adventures we’ve had this summer have been a lot of fun but I’m ready to kick back for a few days.
Currently Listening To: The Whitley Rooftop Jazz Orchestra
Palacios
The Chicken
Camp was awesome. I was priviledged to work with 4 wonderful other staff members and 17 spectacular students! We had so much fun this past week, I didn’t want it to end. Reagan (t-bone tech) and I even talked about taking the group on the road and doing a series of learning institutes, like Stan Kenton did during his time. Unfortunately, it’s expensive to do something like that and I can imagine getting the money for something like that would be difficult.
I can’t express what I got from this experience. The entire camp was at Texas A&M Commerce but the jazz portion was housed at Commerce HS, about 1/2 a mile away from the University. This was just what we needed. The kids had the chance to learn the language of jazz without interruption or distraction from the rest of the camp. It was much like going to another country to learn their native language. The kids bonded within hours and were inseperable for the rest of the week. The staff was about the same. We learned 4 tunes and performed 3 times to 3 different audiences. The Air National Guard Band of the Gulf Coast came and cliniced our group, as well as gave a concert for the entire camp.
Part of the jazz camp was supposed to be a directors workshop and there really wasn’t time to do major discussions during the day but every night, the jazz teachers all got together at the end of the day and had our workshop meetings in the hot tub/pool area of the Holiday Inn Express the University put us up in. I learned so much!
I’ve got two recordings you can check out up at the top. This was from our 2nd performance, which was at the chamber ensemble recitals. The first piece is called Palacios and it is named for the city of Palacios, TX. We begin the tune by introducing all the members of the band and allowing each to get their big intro as they join the ensemble. The 2nd is called The Chicken and it was by far the band’s favorite tune. I hope you enjoy listening to them as much as we enjoyed playing them. I should have the recording of the final concert in a few weeks.
Thanks to Andy (White Chocolate), Ashley (Chunk…not), Kristina & Taka (Crazy Ninja) of the saxes; Michael, Josh, Jared (Subway) & Andrew (Andres) of the trombones; Kevin (The Colonel), Kraig (The Quarterback), Becca & Nick (Starbucks) of the trumpets; Ian (Sir Elton), Nathan, Katie (St. Ruby), David & John (Superfly) of the rhythm section; and Ronnie, Fred (The Professor), Reagan & JD of the staff for such a wonderful week. Never again, will any of us have the same experience again. Go Whitley Rooftop Jazz Orchestra!!
See the pictures in my gallery.
Okay, I’m home from teaching at camp. It was an amazing week. I’ll update more tomorrow…I’m beat!
I’ve got quite a bit to do tomorrow. Laundry, house cleaning, re-packing. Then, I’m headed to the Rio Grande Valley for the 4th on The Island (S. Padre) and the rest with Len’s friends and family for his birthday on the 5th. This summer has been wonderful!
Well, I’m here in Commerce, TX at Jazz Band Camp. I’m teaching trumpets and helping where I can with the full ensembles. It’s really a lot of fun and I feel like there is so much I can write about but really, most of it is little things that happen during the day and aren’t funny when you aren’t here to experience it. Timing is everything, you know? Anyways, if you’ve never been to Commerce, let me tell you, don’t rush to get out here. There is a university — Texas A & M at Commerce, formerly East Texas State University — and a Wal-mart and that’s about it. Tonight, we’re going to head to the next town over for dinner ’cause they have a Chili’s and Applebees. I really hope we don’t go to Applebees. Not my favorite.
I’d like to hook up with Len’s nephews Pat & Matt. He needs to send me their numbers…. Also, going out to the lake in Sulphur Springs with Connie’s brothers sounds pretty good, too. I guess I should have gotten their numbers at Connie’s birthday party. Connie, can you help me out here?
Speaking of Connie’s birthday party, it was a BLAST!!! The margaritas, food and company were so good! Mostly parents of Sami’s friends from Bowie HS Band. I love band parents!!! They can be a lot of fun when they let their hair down (and when you put a water gun in their hands).
So, my rehearsals start at 9 and go until 4 with a lunch break in between so I get time to work out and read and play on “the internet”. The guys I’m working with are a lot of fun, too but they’re night owls and I can’t hang as late as they’d like to. Especially when I’m trying to keep to working out every morning. I really wish I would have stopped to get some glucosomine before I left. No supplelment store for MILES!!!
Okay, that’s it for now. If there is a late breaking, funny story that you’d get without being here, I’ll make sure to post it.
~B
Benford's Musings 
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