Palpazione : Farewell / Celebration Dinner

As the sun sets in the western sky, so this week is the last week of Palpazione as we know it.

Earlier this week, the writer/producer of the Gaylord Kitchen/Maintenance Percussion show came up from Florida to take the guys out to dinner. Below are some pictures recapping our night. Captions will be below the pics.

This is the view of the Wilson Bridge.

There it is, the Gaylord Hotel + Convention center. It has been a great 9 months.

Here are the guys leaving the hotel lobby and heading toward our dinner spot. I forgot the name of restaurant.

From Left to Right: Jeff, Wes, Zak, Charlie, + Chris. Unfortunately, two of the guys were unable to make it. Brett was sick and Dominic was having car trouble.

This is Charlie and I posing before I go on the mechanical bull. Charlie is the one who wrote the show.

This is 'Hands' ... Jeff Neal. He plays drums professionally throughout D.C.

This is Wes ... he is the one who sent the email about the initial audition. Thanks Wes!

Zak took this picture ... he called it his 'art' shot.

There I am ... riding the mechanical bull ... well, not really ... it was broken but we took pictures anyway to make it look like I was riding. The hardest part was climbing on ... I think I'm getting old.

This is Chris ... he recently played one of the inauguration balls, and met Stevie Wonder and a bunch of other celebrities. In this picture, he is being escorted off stage at the dueling piano bar we went to. He wanted to play drums, but we did not go through the proper procedures.

Zak pondering what the guys are saying.

Me smiling ... pretty lame caption but I don't know what to say.

"Wow, I wish I could sing like that ... I wonder if they would let me rap?"

What blog post is complete w/o food. Here we have desserts from the piano bar and 'Galaxy' (the employee diner at the Gaylord) cookies.

The piano guys let Charlie play, "Superstition" by Stevie Wonder. Man, he is a great drummer. When he was done, the piano guys asked him what is his name. Charlie said, "David."

Here we have the guys watching Charlie play "Superstition."

Well, it was a great night of fun, food, drums, and an interesting phone call I received. I will write more about that phone call in upcoming posts. This Saturday will be the last day for me at the Gaylord. God has been showing me through this process that I need to find my identity in Christ, and not in a job. Mari has been helping me see this. There is the possibility we will be back playing in the summer, but there are no gurantees. So, I hope to remember that Jesus Christ is my peace. Whether I have a job that I love or not, I can trust in Him.

Thank you for reading this post, I hope you have a great weekend.

Update + 1 Year Celebration of C.H.K.C.

Life has been busy w/ Mari continuing her 4.0 pursuit of her education degree and me teaching and getting ready for the last week of the Gaylord hotel job. This post will include far more pictures than writing (especially after my short story about the audition last week).

On another note, February 22, 2008 was the first time I published a blog post. Looking back over the last year, I realize that there are not that many "Christian" posts. I hope to do more of that. For the time being, I'd like to recommend Bloodbought. This is a great blog by my friend Jeff Lewis. It is full of theological insight. Anyway, happy one year anniversary C.H.K.C. : The Blog.

For Valentines Day I took Mari to a Bed and Breakfast in Hagerstown + an undisclosed restaurant for dinner. We enjoyed this caramel latte.

Breakfast @ the Bed + Breakfast.

On Wednesday we had our first child ... JUST JOKING. We went to visit the Taracena's who had their second baby.

Here is Mom + Dad.

On Friday I performed at the hotel w/ my friend Zak. This was the last time we are scheduled to perform together. He is a great drummer ... we had a blast!

On Saturday (while I was at the hotel) Mari + my Mom went to the Wizards play the Spurs @ the Verizon Center. There are two Argentine players on the Spurs team.

A big smile for Mari because the Spurs crushed the Wizards. The only problem was that one of the Argentine players did not play.

America's Got Talent Auditions

So, there I am pulling up to the Gaylord parking lot on Friday around 3 pm and what do I see? "America's Got Talent Audition Parking." I heard my friend/real estate agent Wes talk about this show before so I call him to get some advice. After talking with him, I decide to audition. Since this was a last minute decision, I didn't have anything prepared. What was I going to do? My rap ... of course. It is called, "Wind Goes" and was written by myself and some students from one of my elementary schools. As I walked into the main entrance for the audition, I saw that there was no line. I was thinking it'd be no problem to be finished by 5:15 which was when I had to be ready to start playing buckets. The next step was to walk upstairs to the main holding room. Unfortunately for me, there were more people than I expected. My number was 342 and they just called numbers 281-300. I thought, 'this could be a big opportunity ... I should wait untill the last minute, and maybe there will be time.'

Fast forward to 5:05 ... I ask one of the people working the event, "if I come back tomorrow do I have to wait in line." And he says, "yes." I explain to him that I am performing at the hotel in 10 minutes. He said, "Let me see if there is anything I can do." He talks on his ear piece and directs me to an audition room. I was excited.

There I was in front of 'Brian' (the audition person) and a video camera. I told him I wanted to rap and that it was written by myself and some of my elementary school students. I perform it with energy and enthusiasm. When I was done he asked, 'What are you performing here at the hotel?' I said that I play with a group that is similar to STOMP. I let him know where we are performing, and that was the end of my 1st audition.
By that time it was 5:12. I briskly ran down the stairs, changed, and was ready to hit the buckets right @ 5:15. I was still excited about my audition in the midst of performing. While we were doing our bucket and ladder act, one of the AGT people started to watch us. After we finished she asks if there is anyway AGT can bring their cameras down to record our act. We explain that we don't own the show and that we would have to get approval from Brother Entertainment.
We make a few phone calls to see what we can do to have them record us. But the show must go on, and we only had a five minute break. The next thing I know, I'm about to sing to three tables at Moonbay and all of a sudden, a person in an AGT shirt tries to get my attention. But I'm about to sing to smiling faces. (People are normally smiling and wondering what we are doing, because we walk into the restaurant playing kitchen utensils while wearing chef uniforms. ) I didn't think it would be right to stop working. I told the gentleman, "I'm sorry, but I can't talk right now." He walks away, and that was my last contact w/ AGT on Friday night at the hotel.

On my way home, I talked with Mari and Gene and told them what happened. They both were surprised that I rapped and did not play the drums. So I decided to text the person from AGT to see if I could audition on Saturday playing trash cans. She texted back ... "Sure, come to the registration desk @ 10:30."

So I show up @ 9:30 for my 10:30 audition, and then I'm escorted along with a male A capella group to a holding room. It seems there is a way to receive scheduled auditions. I did not have to wait in the holding room with the people who came to audition like I did on Friday. I go in and audition for a different person. I improvised a short piece on a large plastic trash can, a small metal trash can, and a shredder bin. They asked me a few questions and then asked me to wait outside. I waited for about 10 minutes and then I was escorted to a second audition room. That was the most exciting part of the audition, knowing that I had moved on to another audition.

There they took my picture before I auditioned again. I performed my improv junk percussion piece for the 2nd time. The first time it was much better. I explained to the person how I rapped yesterday but my friends encouraged me to play the drums instead. He asked to hear my rap. After I was done he said, "I've heard worse." He then asked me if I had seen the show, I said no, so he explained how the show works. After that he asked how people respond to my performance. I could only think about responses to the Gaylord show, but I think he meant my 1 man junk show. So I'm not sure my answer made sense to him. I packed up and he said "cheers." He was from England.

After that I went into another room where they asked me a few questions (one of which was what is the closest airport to you). They made a copy of my license.Then they said, if you are selected a producer will contact you, and then I went home.

I had seen other contestants being videotaped and telling their stories to people who looked like producers. They didn't do that to me, so I am thinking I wasn't chosen. However, it was a great experience to make it to the second audition. Two days ... three AGT auditions.

Thanks for reading about my America's Got Talent story. After the audition I took Mari to a very relaxing Bed + Breakfast where we celebrated Valentines Day in Hagerstown.

Argentina Post #3 : The Food

Well, this is the post where I display one of my favorite hobbies ... taking pictures of food. Captions will be below the delicacies.

This is an Argentine treat like no other ... Carmen Coridini (Mari's mother) empanadas.

This is hard to write the captions ... I want to go back and eat them.

This is the food tray the bus company gave us for a mid-afternoon snack.

Our first day in Patagonia, we took my Mom out for her birthday. I believe this is trout w/ french fries.

At the cabin in Patagonia, we celebrated my Mom's birthday w/ this dulce de leche cake.

Similair to the Carmen Coridini empanadas, this is the homemade pizza by Tere, Mari's sister.

Argentina is not the best place for vegetarians. This is the lamb we had for Christmas Eve dinner.

This picture has the chorizo (sausage) and the chicken I marinated.

You know, I have no idea what this is, but rice is served w/ a lot of meals.

Some chicken before it is turned into a fine meal by Carmen.

She loves to cook and I love to eat her cooking.

These olives were incredible!

These are chicken milanesas ... very good!

This was a great cafe we went to in Buenos Aires.

A burger from La Biela.

We were feeling artsy at the cafe.

This is Mario making pastel de papa (potato quiche).

This was our New Years Eve Argentine Asado (BBQ).

Nene (Mari's sister) made this meatloaf for New Year's ... it was incredible.

This was an after dinner fruity champagne w/ raisin bread.

Havana is a classic alfajor shop. The coffee + cookies are incredible.

These are empanadas made by one of Mari's cousins.

I believe this was pizza made by Mari's Dad's sister (aunt).

Tere made lots of pizza ... everything is homemade!

Fresh salads are a staple in Argentina.

This is beef milanesa.

Florencia (our older niece) made these croquetas de arroz (fried rice patty).

Cookies.

One of the highlights of the trip was having dinner w/ Sandra and Ruben. The excelled at showing us incredible hospitality. They were also the ones who gave us the name of the place we stayed in Patagonia.

This was the dinner Sandra made for us. More milanesa ... chicken style.

These were homemade meatballs made by Carmen.

Chicken + rice by Carmen Coridini.

Jimena made this delicious cake for dessert.

Chicken w/ apples ... yeah, delicious.

The final night we had Asado ... these were incredible chorizo ... I can taste them now.

This was pork served after the Chorizo's ... incredible.

And of course, I end w/ the Carmen Coridini empanadas.

I hope you enjoyed this food extravaganza post. Coming up in the next few posts will be an update about the Gaylord percussion gig. Have a great day!