Food and Work

My boss and I just got back from a Thursday/Friday trip to Dallas. We installed 4 new Citrix XenServers (very cool virtualization stuff) and performed various maintenance on our servers in Dallas. We stayed up 'til about 4:30 AM working. Yeah, that's a little tough, but we balanced it out by eating a the best Churrascaria (Brazilian Steakhouse) I've ever been to. It's called Fogo de Chão and we new it was going to be expensive, but wow, it was A LOT! The food was amazing (all you can eat Picanha, Rib eye, lamb, top and bottom sirloin, salmon, mushrooms!) and the service was the best I've ever seen. However, considering the cost, you probably won't see us at a Fogo de Chão again. Boy it's good, though.

Then, as tradition must have it, on our way out of town, we stopped at the Cheesecake Factory. Is there anything better than the Herb Crusted Salmon w/ asparagus and mashed potatoes and Chocolate Peanut-butter Cookie dough cheesecake? I don't think so! Unbelievable every single time.

Launch of Family blog

Well, tonight we "launched" our family blog garyandmelody.blogspot.com. I went through about 850 contacts (not all of them real people) and sent a mass e-mail with the new URL. I'll continue to post here when I have something to say, but now we have a family blog that Melody keeps up-to-date.

No, I'm not going to make my blog all about Katy too, but...

Top: I just had to post this picture of Katy in a tree, just like her Daddy. I used to climb this tree (located in my Grandmother's backyard) all the time when I was little. Don't worry, we were standing close enough to leap foward if she had decided to bail.

Middle: Mommy is giving her a bath and toying with the idea of a new hair style. Katy is happy, as usual.

Bottom: This is a good representation of how unbelieveably cute and sweet our Katy is!!!! I love this picture!

My wonderful family!

It has been so long since I've posted, at the very least I wanted to publish a picture of my beautify family. This is at Katy's 1st birthday party at our house. Katy is really enjoying her first cupcake, made by my wife, Melody. Katy is with her 2 favorite things, food and a balloon... followed by Mommy then Me...hehe. God has certainly blessed us!

Another Gixxer Pic

Josh had 21 stickers on the Gixxer when I bought it. Not that I didn't like them, they were cool, but they just weren't me. So I took all but about 5 of them off. Here's a pic of me on the Gixxer.

I have arrived...GSX-R1000!

Okay, you all know I’m crazy for Gixxers (Suzuki GSX-R sport bikes). I had decided a while back to get a GSX-R750, because it was still stupid fast and a good bit cheaper than a 1000. I had been looking on eBay for awhile and wasn’t finding any good deals that were close to Nashville and especially none that were close to Lubbock. Oh by the way, did I mention that I’m not in Acappella anymore and I live in Lubbock, TX again. I think everyone reading this knows. Anyway, I jumped off of eBay and on to the Thrifty Nickel Ads search and saw that there was 1 Suzuki GSXR listed…and it was a 1000 and it was a decent price. I e-mailed the guy, Josh, and he sent me some pics and told me a little bit about it. I was very interested. Hold that thought. Remember, I have a 2003 Kawasaki Ninja 250 (the yellow bike) that is the perfect bike to start with and even keep, if you don’t want to wheelie and accelerate stupid fast (but legally, of course). I had been taking my wife, Melody, riding on the Ninja and she loved it so much that she wanted her own Ninja 250. It was only logical that she get mine and I speed up my search for the perfect Gixxer. Okay, back to Josh and the Gixxer 1000. I thought, “you know, the 1000 is the THE best of the best, and really, how could I not go ahead and get the 1000…bump the cheaper 750, I’m gettin’ a 1000.” I went to Josh’s brother’s house, where the bike was, and test rode it. It brought back memories of when I rode Curtis’ Gixxer 1000 in West Memphis, and how I could not comprehend the power it had. We negotiated a little on the price, he came down even more. By the way, he was the only owner of this bike and he lives in Commander’s Palace (where I live), and said he’d help me work on it or anything else I needed. So I got a GREAT deal on a well-taken-care of 2002 Suzuki GSX-R1000 sport bike. It’s beautiful! Here are some of the upgrades he had put on it:

• Two Brothers Racing exhaust
  
• Power Commander
  
• K&N Air Filter
  
• TRE (Timing Retarder Eliminaor)
  
• RK chain and Geared 1down in front
  
• Fender Eliminator
  
• Clear lens tail light
  
• Tape Works Graphics (neon green graphics to replace the stock white ones)
  
• Blue Chrome Wind Screen
  
• Pirelli Diablo tires
  
• CARBON FIBER:
  
• front fender
  
• triple tree
  
• tank protector
  
• frame covers
  
• case cover

The bike is so sweet! I took Mel for a ride the day I got it and she held on for dear life and said, “I don’t think I want to do that anymore.” It’s SO fast, she wants to make sure I’m comfortable with it before she puts her life in to my hands. Comfortable? How can you be comfortable accelerating to speeds of XXX mph in mere seconds? We’re going to take a motorcycle safety course together. I finally got a Gixxer, now I’ve just got to stay alive!

Dave Ramsey

So we did the Queen concert on Tuesday, then we drove back to Nashville on Wednesday. Thursday, we had the privilege to sit in on Dave Ramsey's talk show www.daveramsey.com. About a year or so ago, Acappella sang for a weekly devo he does for all his employeess, which was a lot of fun. Dave seemed to really enjoy it, and he was so grateful. Then about a month ago they guys were invitied to do another devo for him. A long time ago, Jordan had the opportunity to sit in on one of his shows (through one of many of Jordan's connections...Hey JHouse, how is Will Smith doing these days?). We thought that would be cool to do and Dave said we could certainly come sit in on his show. On commercial breaks he would talk to us and we'd ask him questions. He's a really nice, down-to-earth guy and so is his staff! Thanks Dave!

The Queen Concert

The Queen concert was out of this world! I flew in to Nashville on Tuesday, March 7th and the guys picked me up from the airport. Shortly thereafter, we were on our way to Atlanta to experience Queen. It was Jordan House, Zach Wilson, Robin Brannon, and me. The concert was at the Gwinett Center in Deluth, GA and it wasn't quite sold out, but there were thousands of people there (maybe 10,000). We had great seats that were perfect for seeing over people's heads. Besides Queen's music, the most impressive thing to me were the lights. There were so many lights and the configuration was mind-boggling. They sang a ton of favorites, like Tie Your Mother Down, Hammer To Fall, Bohemian Rhapsody, We Will Rock You, and We Are the Champions. I thought Paul Rodgers was good, but I'll have to be honest, I missed Freddie's voice A LOT! Paul did a good job of making the songs his own. The problem was, they weren't his own, they were Freddie's. But he sounded pretty good anyway. I missed John Deacon, the bass player too. In fact, personally, my 2 favorite things about Queen are Freddie's vocals and John's bass playing, neither of which were present. Don't let me fool you though, I had the time of my life and it was one of, if not the best concert, I have ever been to.

MySpace

I broke down and got a space at myspace.com. My address is http://www.myspace.com/garyeevans.

Africa / Queen

I'm sorry I've been such a poor blogger lately. My family and I went to Africa over Christmas to visit my sister. She's teaching missionary kids over there. I've wanted post some pictures and write about them, but my mom and dad have the pictures in TX and I'm in TN. I only took a few with my camera. I'll be back in Lubbock, TX on Jan 18th and will try and put some cools pics of our trip on the blog.

Last night, me, Jordan, Zach W, Robin, and Allen Brantley watched the Queen: Live at Wembley Stadium DVD. Wow, what a work of art! One thing is for sure, Freddie knows how to work the crowd of 73,000 people and he can SANG! It took me awhile to get past his front teeth sticking out like bugs bunny. John Deacon on bass, Brian May on guitar, Roger Taylor on drums... the best rock band ever. The audio quality of the DVD was stellar, and remember it was done in 1986. Oh, did I mention we got tickets to the Queen + Paul Rogers concert in Atlanta, GA? Oh yeah baby!