Mariachi

We had our Fiesta event at our building today. I just missed the Mariachi. They finished playing their last song as I was parking. I did get to say Hi to one of my acquaintances from the group. I was still able to enjoy tacos and coffee, even though I am not a big coffee drinker.

Hispanic Elvis

We met up with the self-proclaimed Hispanic Elvis. I've seen him all over town, but he lives on my side of town. I think it's great that he portrays Elvis and keeps true to the role. Everybody says that he is crazy, but I think he is unique. His life is dedicated to greeting people and causing shock and awe. I truly am proud that he is a part of the San Antonio ambiance.

A.C.T.S.

During practice with my group, I saw this coffee cup. I thought it was neat how the artist incorporated San Antonio by using the Spurs and the A.C.T.S. abbreviation. I've seen the A.C.T.S. abbreviation on many things, including bumper stickers and decals, but this is something a little bit more personal, since the owner will be using it to wake up to every morning.

Fiesta 2014

I'm grateful that the city extended Fiesta to two weeks. We are always very busy. We came to Fiesta early this year in case we couldn't make it out later. We always miss Fiesta. Now, we still have some time to make it out to another event.

Disney On Ice

I'm grateful that we've been able to make it out to all of these events since my daughter has been born. We have so many pictures of the magic that Disney creates on this tour. I'm glad that it is as interesting for us as it is for my daughter. And we got pretty good seats this year!

Local Music

I went to practice with a buddy of mine who met up with these cats. They're getting together to play a gig at a party. They play local rock music, but with a different feel. I always enjoy meeting new people especially talented musicians from different genres.

Freeplay Music

A repository of royalty free music.

http://www.freeplaymusic.com/index.aspx

Hohner

I am grateful for my new accordion tuning tool set from Hohner. Hohner is a respectable accordion maker. I used to own a Hohner accordion. This tool set was expensive and the of the best quality. I know this tool set will help me tune accordions in a professional manner.

El Musico

I saw this on the restroom door at a Mexican restaurant that we played at tonight. They have a woman in a folklorico dress for the women's restroom. I thought it was pretty creative. It certainly was a lot more entertaining than just having women's and men's labeling.

Packages

I received these packages today. I'm hoping that it will be the start of a new hobby of mine. I went on eBay and purchased an accordion bellows and a tuning kit. I plan on learning how to tune my own accordions. This is not very common amongst accordion plays here in San Antonio. I'm grateful that I finally got started purchasing the materials that I need since I have been trying to do this for years now.

Technology

I am happy that I found this place. It is the first all digital library that incorporates technology for kids. There is a vast amount of ebooks for rental. They even have devices that you can rent including nooks. This is totally free to the public. Their institution has a few meeting rooms and free wifi. The place is called Bibliotech. You can get a library card just as you can in any library.

Audacity

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/
I'm not sure if Audacity has an online feature, but this program available for download has helped out on various occasions. Mainly to complete class projects. I have ProTools, that has recently changed due to the vast production of music that is both CD quality and cheap. It is now harder to produce such material. I still have the equipment to produce this, but it is hard to power up and get the results that I want where Audacity lets me edit audio quickly. I would highly recommend using Audacity, if you can tackle the learning curve of audio editing, get it.

Long-time Friendships

I don't have many friends, but, today, I am grateful for long-time friendships. Over 15 years ago, these guys came up to me and had faith in me. I was just learning how to play, but they taught me the ropes week-by-week, month-by-month, and year-by-year. I have been playing with this group for over 15 years, and I do not plan on going anywhere soon.

Los Tovares

I am grateful for having the opportunity to play in a Tejano group that had a #1 hit song on a local radio station. This was a semi-professional group, but I was able to go to a radio station, do events, sell CDs, and try out all of the amenities of a recoding artist on a smaller scale.To top things off, I recorded the song and helped throughout the song creation process.