Curling (the Olympic ice sport - www.kccurling.com), languages, Germany (lived there a few years), traveling, amateur photography with my Canon Rebel XT 350 (www.flickr.com/photos/violinsoldier/), adult beverages, (Guinness leads the way, but there are so many other favorites - I seem to drink now to enjoy the taste instead of the buzz - must be getting older!), Traditional Roman Catholicism (Tridentine Latin Rite - FSSP or SSPX), gerbils (www.agsgerbils.org), music (see below), anything related to the violin/fiddle. NHL hockey (Blues) and MLB (Cardinals)... Apple/Mac computing ...
I am 1% Idiot.
.. I am not annoying at all. In fact most people come to me for advice. Of course they annoy the hell out of me. But what can I do? I am smarter than most people. Take the
Idiot Test
@ FualiDotCom
I'd like to meet:
Anyone who wants to meet me ... one can never have too many friends... I generally don't turn down friend requests unless there is something that truly bugs me on your page. I have many friends - liberal, conservative, gay, straight - it's all good.I especially want to meet people who served in Afghanistan or Iraq (Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom). Anyone, though, who has served or is serving in the military (or their family/spouse/kids/friends), feel free to add me as a friend. We are all in this TOGETHER.
Mehtar Lam, Afghanistan
Music:
Metallica to Mozart. Literally. See "My Friends" section, as I've added a lot of groups/artists that I enjoy. I play the violin :) and just visited Salzburg on leave from the war to celebrate the 250th anniversary of Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Gottlieb (Amadeus) Mozart's birth. (AKA Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.) I love most music except (c)rap.... My favorite living artist is Alison Krauss - she sings like an angel and is the main inspiration for my violin playing. Dead would be Elvis Presley (if you believe he's really dead) and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart...... Almost anything with a fiddle/violin in it is good. I really love BLUEGRASS :) I also love 80s music, as I am a child of the 80s. I lived/survived/partied during the metal years - a part of me still wants to be W. Axl Rose or Kirk Hammett.... I spent January of 1986 to June of 1989 in Frankfurt, Germany, and partied hard and saw a lot of huge metal concerts. I can say I am a survivor :) Some of my other favorite composers include Niccolò Paganini, Felix Mendelssohn, Johann Sebastian Bach, Ludwig (Louis) Spohr - to name just a few ...
I am 84% Metal Head.
.. I lived, partied and survived during the REAL heavy metal years: the 1980s ... 'nuff said. Just call me 'Axl' ... :) Take the
Metal Head Test
@ FualiDotCom
Movies:
Film Noir..... (Double Indemnity, The Maltese Falcon, Detour, etc.) A great movie to watch about Afghanistan and the way women were and are still treated here is OSAMA (The title has nothing to do with OBL...) Another good one is Kandahar, but Osama is really good. I have some movies that I can (and have) watched over and over: Amadeus, Angela's Ashes, A Few Good Men, Full Metal Jacket, The Passion Of The Christ, Casablanca, to name a few. They just keep drawing me back in! Right now, it's Napoleon Dynamite. Don't ask why. Gosh!
Television:
American Idol. One of my guilty pleasures :P Also, Mail Call on the History Channel. I had the pleasure of meeting R. Lee Ermey. Great guy - I waited in line til after midnight to talk to him, and took 5 minutes chatting with me - I told him my Uncle Charles was a Marine who was killed in the Korean War, and that touched him. He stayed late to talk to everyone, and he had to be at the 2nd GWB inauguration the next morning (and this was in KCMO) as guest of the Commandant of the Marine Corps. I have a pic of him choking me, like he did to Private Pyle in the movie (Full Metal Jacket), as well as a couple normal ones.... The X-Files is probably my all-time favorite series. I watch Hockey Night In Canada every Saturday during the NHL season..... Other than that, it's rare to watch the idiot box. Since Newton Minnow, Chairman of the FCC declared in 1961 that television was a 'vast wasteland', nothing much has changed. TV in general rots your brain and is full of useless crap such as pop psychology, dangerous ideas (liberalism, modernism, communism and socialism) and psuedo-intellectuals. I would like to eat anything that Rachael Ray cooks, however :P And you just gotta love Spongebob Squarepants!! He's the best :)
Books:
History - especially Roman Catholic Church history and military history. Right now I am reading "Mozart's Letters, Mozart's Life" and a book about Al Capone.
Heroes:
Pope Saint Pius X, Saint Louis IX, Saint Therese of Lisieux (The Little Flower), Ronald Wilson Reagan.
Anyone in the military - especially those I served with in Afghanistan, and those still serving there, and those serving anywhere in harm's way. I am a life member of the Veterans Of Foreign Wars (VFW), the Disabled American Veterans (DAV), and American Veterans (AMVETS). I am also a yearly member of the American Legion and the Catholic War Veterans Of America (CWVA).
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