Decade: 2010

2010:


Song: Bang Bang Bang – Mark Ronson and the Business International – This is a strange little song that I heard on one of the late night talk shows this fall, and then ended up getting. I like it, not sure why but I do.



Video Game: Half-Life series – My Dad had the Orange Box set for half-life awhile back but I didn’t have an Xbox 360 until this spring. This summer however I picked it up to play the game Portal which everyone I knew who had Orange Box loved, and that said Portal is a fun game. However, all of those same people hated Half-Life 2 and never really made it past the 2nd level before quitting on it. Anyway I wanted to give it a try, and ended up loving the entire series, I can’t wait for Half-Life 2 Episode 3 even if they have announced it won’t be coming up until 2012 at the earliest. I think that’s a pretty big accomplishment because this year I really got back into video games after 2-3 years of only being a casual player at most.



News Story: BP Oil Spill – Dominated the news for a long time, and for a good reason. One of BP’s oil rigs experienced an explosion that would cause more oil to leak into the gulf than any previous oil spill. The news updated us nightly as to the latest efforts to stop the flow of oil, as well as stories as to how it was affecting the people and wildlife of the area. That said now that it’s been about 5 months since the leak was stopped we don’t hear much about the damage, so maybe it wasn’t as bad as they thought it would be?



Personal Event: The Hike – I would/could post a whole bunch on this event, but really I already have and it’s probably best to check it out here with pictures:

http://nomadwaystation.blogspot.com/2010/07/hike-or-that-time-i-walked-over.html

It was a great event and something I will remember for a long time.

Decade: 2009

2009:


Song: Fireflies – Owl City – I’m not really that big of a fan of this song , it is catchy and a good listen. Really wasn’t feeling much for a song for 2009 it came down to this and “I’ve got a feeling” by the black eye peas.



Video Game: Madden 2009 – I’ve always been a fan of the Madden Series and since I moved out and to a place where I had high speed internet I was able to play games online for the first time. Only problem was that it was the Wii version of the game, which was a slimmed down version of Madden.



News Story: Michael Jackson dies…. Say what you want but this was the news back in June of 2009, Sure the guys life had been in a downward spiral but the news of his death sweep the nation and everyone remembered “hey that weird guy had some good songs”…



Personal Event: Kia Soul – I had been looking for a new car for quite some time as I had been driving Mom and Dad’s old mini-van since the summer before when I gave up driving the Monte Carlo due to gas mileage (15 mpg). So I’d moved out that Feburary and had been looking pretty hard when I finally pulled the trigger on June 1st (my birthday). Scary moment but I knew if I didn’t buy it then I wouldn’t buy it. I really like the car though.

Decade: 2008

2008


Song: Reptilla – The Strokes – To be honest not sure what year this song came out, but I heard it on a guitar hero game and had it on my computer, it was on a playlist I played when I got back from working out at night and would be making a snack of pancakes to eat before I went to bed.



Video Game: Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess – for the Wii, great game in the Zelda series and to be honest was the first game in quite awhile that I really sat down and put a lot of time into. Wind Walker the last major console game was a bit of a disappointment in the Zelda series. (would have been considered a solid game had it not been associated with Zelda) Twilight Princess though, despite the lame name was a good game all around.




News Story: Housing Market Crisis – Yep so I find a job in the summer and then a few months later the bottom falls out of the housing market, banks are in trouble, the Car companies need to be bailed out, and everyone is in a panic. The stock market crashes, the government is pumping money into everything…. Yep pretty big news and the ripple effects are still being felt today, as evidence by November’s elections.

 

Personal Event: Graduated From Purdue – 4 years and a big moment, not because I ever doubted graduating, but because this threw me out into the “real world” and to be honest without a lot of a plan. What was I going to do with a history degree… to be honest I still don’t know, but it was a finish to an important chapter in my life.

Decade: 2007

2007


Song: Paralyzer – Finger 11 this was a cool catchy song, really I don’t know how you can not like it. I’m humming it in my head now. I also thought about putting Harvey Danger’s flag pole sitter as this one, because it was on my playlist when I’d go for walks as this was the year I started losing weight by going on 3 mile walks every day.



Video Game: Guitar Hero II – I honestly wasn’t playing a lot of video games this year, I was still addicted to Hobowars, but console wise things where pretty much dead until next year when I got my Wii. However my roommate at Guitar Hero II and we would play that from time to time, as well as Bruce having is Guitar Hero II release party at the end of 2006, so that carried on some momentum into this year.



News Story: Writers Guild Strike – If you watched TV shows you noticed this, all of the writers went on a strike due to debates on revenue sharing of online sales as well as a few other things and this lead to lots of reruns being played and new reality TV shows (no writers needed) popping up. Many point to this event as the thing that “killed” their favorite series, as many shows such as the hit Heroes never bounced back after the strike.

Personal Event: Family Vacation Arkansas – This summer our family was all home and we figured this might be our last chance for a full family vacation (see 2005 and 2010) so we packed up the car and went on what was probably our most random and one of the most memorable trips we ever took together. The main destination was Carter of Diamonds National Park in Akansas, which is an actual diamond mine where anyone can come and mine and keep whatever they find. Now several business men throughout the years had tried to turn a profit on this land (including Henry Ford) but there just weren’t enough quantity to be mined so it ended up in government hands, and is now a park for everyone. We mined two days, however we found nothing…

But the diamond mine wasn’t our only stops, I picked James K. Polk’s house as my choice on the trip, Casey picked Graceland, and Mom picked Historic Washington, Arkansas as well as the Gateway Arc in St. Louis and Grant’s farm. So we had a lot of fun stops along the way! I video taped the vacation and I have to say this was my favorite vacation of all time. Also before I wrap this up I feel compelled to mention Lambert’s Café home of the Thrown Roll (awesome food) and

Decade: 2006

2006


Song: - Lips of an Angel – Hinder… this was one of those songs, I liked it the first maybe 10 times I heard it, then for the rest of the year it just wore you down until you couldn’t stand it. This was Hinder’s huge hit, then they pretty much fell off the map, at least as far as I know.



Video Game: KingoftheBling – this was an online game, and not a popular one at that… I think maybe 100 serious players tops. It was an offshoot of Hobowars.com that I mention previously. Some former players of that kicked this off, and it was pretty much the same idea. It was fun while it lasted and I was one of the top players in the game. A great group of players and we became a nice little community but as I said it never took off or got popular enough to keep itself running. Once the owner of the site got addicted to WoW that was the end.

News Event: Saddam Hussein Executed – The man whose threats and doings were blamed for provoking the Iraq War was executed after being tried in Iraq. However, in the grand scheme this didn’t mean a lot to the war effort as people here in the U.S. still remained heavily divided and the rebuilding efforts would go on for years.



Personal Event: Gecom – My first real job. This summer break from school I got my first “real” job. Working at a factory making trunk door latches for Honda Civics…. Yep not exciting, I remember a “game” I used to play with myself would be to try and go as long as possible without looking at the clock. It didn’t pay great and it wasn’t fun waking up at 5:30 every morning to go to work, but I learned a lot from the experience and am glad I did it.

Decade: 2005

2005:


Song : -Boulevard of Broken Dreams – Green Day - About this time I’m thinking I shouldn’t have picked song as one of my catagories, I guess I’m not that big of a musical person. I thought it would be easy to pick a song I related to each year but it is getting hard… I don’t like this song but I’m picking it because I remember it used to come on every day in the dining hall when I ate lunch the second half of my freshman year at Purdue, it got very annoying.

Video Game: Fable – Yes I know this released in the fall of 2004, but if you notice a trend I’m a step being on video games sometimes and I got this game at a flea market in Brookville in the summer of 2005, loved the game, even if it was short and not as fleshed out as it could have been. 2005 was sort of a down year for my video game playing.

News Story: Hurricane Katrina… say what you want about the action and recovery that happened later, but this was by far the biggest story of the year. Even more so that the Presidential election of Bush over Kerry. It also shot gas prices up like crazy… I remember buying 4 dollar gas that fall.

Personal Event: Going to Walt Disney World with my family, when I came home from college this summer I didn’t end up getting a job and with everyone home for the summer the thought was we might not get another chance for a full family vacation…. So we went to Walt Disney World, this was my third time going but I still had a great time. I remember Casey and I would stay out late, until the park closed, finding out that the best time to ride popular rides was during the firework show that closed the park, since everyone watched the fireworks and didn’t get in line. (Splash Mountain also has an awesome view of the fireworks by the way.) After staying out till the close Mom and Dad would be going to bed when we got back to the hotel by bus, and we then we would wake up later and meet them in the park before lunch. (Though this sometimes proved difficult due to Mom never hearing her phone.) Moms liked going to the Animal Kingdom to take the safari ride in the morning when the animals were more active. Also I have to note that at the Rainforest Café on this trip is where our family had the famous Dangerous Desert creation discussion.

Decade 2004

2004:


Song : Hotel California – Eagles- So totally not a song of this year for most people, but for me… totally. In the spring of 2004 I bought a Eagles Greatest hits CD, and this song ended up being the official driving song for me and my friends. Every time I hear this song I think of driving down 421 with Steve, Bruce and Farrell after school singing along holding out hands out of the windows of the car, good times.



Video Game: Hobowars – I thought about Warcraft 3 as I became totally addicted to it my Freshman year of school when I got high speed internet and could play online, Then there was Halo 2… the best title for the Xbox but I’m going with Hobowars.com a game I started playing this year and would be addicted to for the next 4-5 years. I spend so much time on that game and met some interesting people through that game.



News Story: Presidential Election – Bush edges out Kerry again, in a very ugly and close campaign. I remember this campaign being a lot more vicious than any of the others I have witnessed with a ton of anti-Bush hate going against a rally around the country and the Iraq war as the big matchup.  

Personal Event: I have a lot of choices for this one, went to Toronto with the music department, went to the state finals as the captain of the Social Studies academic team, graduated high school, started school at Purdue… but I’m going with my Spring break trip. I went to Brown county with Steve and Farrell for 3 days. We rented a family cabin at the park and had a great time with and plenty of inside jokes were born. The “Bitch Game” hit its hayday, a smoke alarm got set off, it snowed, a song was written, and there was a linen fight… great times!

Decade: 2003

2003:


Song Hey Ya – Outkast – A cool little rap/pop song that reminds me of this year, it was huge and played all of the time and I liked it then as I do now. It’s just simply one of those songs that bring back memories of this year.



Video Game: Eternal Darkness – This came out in 2002, but if I remember correctly this game took its rounds among my circle of friends this year, honestly this is probably my favorite GameCube title of all time. The Sanity meter was an awesome feature and it had an interesting story.



News Story: The Iraq war, my views on this have changed a little over time, I remember at the start I fully supported going in and removing Saddam. (I actually still support the removing of him) But my political views have become more libertarian since then and I see little use in staying over in Iraq as long as we have… currently the war is officially over… but we still have troops there. The rebuilding effort, I wasn’t much behind.



Personal Event: I had a hard time picking this one as nothing of note jumped out at me at first, but this was the summer I went to Hoosier Boys State, which was this summer camp thing that was supposed to teach us about politics and be an honor to go to. I was selected to go for my school, to this event, it was a weeklong thing held at Indiana State University. However, simply put this sucked… They made us march out every morning at like 5:30 am and salute the flag. It was very “text book” government and ignored any real issues in the system. I was disappointed as someone who likes politics in the overall production.

On the other hand later that summer I went on this awesome 4-H trip to the State Fair, where I stayed a week with other 4-Her’s doing fun events and helping out at the State Fair. I wish I knew what it was called. I also got to go to my first concert while at this event… even though it was Kelly Clarkson. It was defiantly a lot more fun that Boys State.

Decade: 2002

2002


Song: Hot in Herre – Nelly… ugh crazy right? I’m not sure what was going on to make me pick this song but I was looking through a list of top songs of 2002 because honestly I have nothing that jumps to mind for this year. I just remember this song being popular and then it being made fun of for a long time afterward, but seriously take a look at a list of 2002 singles… some good songs, but nothing memorable for me at least.

Video Game: Halo – yes I know Halo came out in 2001, but none of my friends had an Xbox at the time… it wasn’t until 2002 that I got to experience this super hit. I remember going over to my friend Steve’s to play through the campaign mode. It wouldn’t be until Christmas 2003 that I would get an Xbox of my own, and of course a copy of Halo.



News Story: DC Sniper, two guys in Washington D.C. kill 10 random people of a course of a couple months that is a pretty huge news story for this year.

Personal Event: I was having a hard time thinking of something for this year but I decided to go with a school music department trip to Walt Disney World. I was in the Choir and got to go down to Disney world over spring break. I had been before, but it was still fun/exciting. We rode buses down and back and stayed at the music resort. I wish I had some pictures to post here but I don’t believe I currently have any of those. I remember that we were divided up into groups, but my group ended up just being me and another kid named Peter Maddux most of the time since we didn’t mess around wasting time and resting, we pretty much just wanted to get from place to place to experience as much as we could.

Decade: 2001

Since December, 31^st 2010 marks the end of a decade (2001-2010) I thought I would remember this time span with a series of blogs highlighting a few things that remind me of each year of the Decade. To keep it simple, I will mention a song, a video game, a news story, and a personal even that remind me of each year.  I hope you find this an interesting look back.

2001


Song: Butterfly – Crazytown – not the most popular song of the year, but whenever I hear it I always think back to around this time, just reminds me of this year.

Video Game: Madden 2002 – this is for the memories I have playing with friends, so of the inside jokes of which we still bring up today. Also I loved the franchise mode and the whole game seemed like a huge upgrade from what I used to play on the N64. I will admit Super Smash Brothers Melee got some consideration here but it came out late in the year. And yes Madden 2002 was released in 2001.




News Story: 9/11… yeah pretty much sums it up as this was one of the most memorable events in my entire life. I remember I was taking the ISTEP standardized testing in the school library at the time, So I didn’t even hear that it had happened until about 3 hours after the fact after we finished the days testing. Crazy stuff, I also remember getting home that night and NOTHING being on TV but coverage of the event.

Personal Event: This was the last year I tried out for the basketball team (and didn’t make it like always), I ran conditioning for it after school during the fall and would have to say it ended up getting me in the best shape I was in high school (though still not that impressive), but despite being cut I was asked to be the video guy for the team, filming all of the games. It wasn’t that great of a job, but it was interesting going to all of the basketball games in 2001-2002