DowntroddenInDC

05-27-12 Loooooong Weekend!

DowntroddenInDC — Sat, 26 May 2012 12:52:09 +0000

We plan to spend most of this weekend at Galveston, on the beach. Cold Beer. Fishing rod. Grilling burgers. Music blaring. No one in sight.

That’s what is nice about Texas, there are a ton of people here, but the state is truly massive. So even on Memorial Day weekend, when you go to the beach, there is still plenty of room. My (our) favorite spot is south of Galveston, in Brazoria county. Right past the San Luis Pass, heading into what the map calls ‘Christmas Tree Bay’. You just turn left right onto the beach, literally, just turn left, drive on the sand and then park wherever you want.

You could never do that up north. Going to the beach in Delaware or Maryland is sort of a hassle. First, there are too many people and too little beach. So it’s crowded, and parking is a hassle. Once you do get parked, it’s normally blocks from the beach, so you have to walk all of your shit to the beach.

If you’ve forgotten something, well you better not forget anything. It’s too much of a hassle to get back to the car or house.. Then once you actually get to the beach, you have to find a spot to put everything. If you get there early, you’re fine for a bit. Fine, until a group of forty people set up right next to you and decide they want to play beach football across all of your stuff..

In Texas, and specifically Galveston, it’s not like that. There are probably hundreds of miles of coast here. The water is almost always warm, because it’s the gulf (something that can only be said maybe in late August for the Atlantic). Next, if get away from Galveston proper, where all the tourists like to be on top of each other (presumably because they don’t know better) by driving south, the beach is wide open. We actually drive 20+ miles south to get to our secret spot.

It’s worth the extra few miles too. Not only is the drive beautiful (the Texas Gulf Coast truly is beautiful), but you get to see all of these amazing beach houses built on stilts. Just imagine what those houses have been through – it seems every ten-twenty years Galveston Island is swallowed by the Gulf, only to be spit back up. Want to burn a fire or grill at the beach, go for it. Want to drink on the beach, no worries. Want to camp and stay the nights, absolutely.

Being a native Marylander, it was tough to start admitting this, but Texas truly is awesome. Texans don’t just do the beach right, they do Memorial day right too. I mean most states have flags and banners out. Other places BBQ and remember what the day is all about, sort of. Texans go all out. I mean there are already American flags everywhere here. Just a normal day in Texas would probably trump the patriotism shown in many other parts of the country. But for these big remembrance days, there are flags everywhere.

And it’s not just a few flags, on my way home to work they had flags set out every few feet on everything on my way home, for close to several miles. Then every town around has some parade where local veterans march. Then there are fireworks, and community barbeques, and just about everything you can imagine, but bigger (this IS Texas).

Anyways, lets stop my diatribe, here are the tracks. Also, don’t forget to thank a veteran. And if your military service member didn’t make it back, remember them in a way they would have wanted. Happy Memorial day!

Flosstradamus – Totally Recalled (D.veloped Vocal Edit)
Bad Pop – Useless
WEKEED – Wild Child
YLUV – Never Touch The Ground (Gazzo OFFICIAL Remix)
Filip Filipi Filips – Revolutionary Etude In D Minor

Go Daddy Deal of the Week: Get 15% off your order! Offer expires 6/5/12

05-22-12 Solar Eclipse

DowntroddenInDC — Wed, 23 May 2012 00:54:04 +0000

I believe there was a solar eclipse yesterday and there are a ton of amazing photos being posted. I snagged a few of the eclipse photos that have been posted on Imgur and uploaded them here for you all to enjoy! Earthporn is pretty amazing stuff. Even more amazing is how people were able to capture some of this photos. Send me links or twit me photos of other amazing eclipse photos (@downtroddenindc)

05-20-12 It’s Finally Done!

DowntroddenInDC — Sun, 20 May 2012 17:48:52 +0000

Yep, that’s right. I’ve finally updated all of GrantBeehler.net. Well almost, I still need to fix a few bits and pieces, but for the most part the DC Metro scheme has been implemented throughout the site. Additionally, I’ve updated the interface a bit too. So, now the website doesn’t look like it was made by a retarded eight year old in 1993. It looks like a retarded ten year old did it in 2006! Yay! Huge improvement.

I’ll be continuing to update GrantBeehler.net and DowntroddenInDC to improve issues. Currently, the whole site is ad free! I also need to work on the social media and share buttons, as I think they’re slowing down the load time. And lastly, I need to completely redo the Houston Jobs Directory page. It’s grown a lot since I first built it, and it’s now a massive undertaking, with hundreds of links that need to be updated and also sorted in a more convenient way.

Not sure, how to approach it. Anyways, enjoy the new site. I’m going to attempt to re-start posting on at least a weekly basis. We’ll see how long that lasts… It seems, I get some free time to contribute to the site, and then life jumps in the way with a million other priorities. Anyways, I’ll keep improving and working on the site. I’ll provide updates when I’ve completed anything of note. Take care.

-Grant (AKA DowntroddenInDC)

02-24-12 Go Texan Day

DowntroddenInDC — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 19:19:35 +0000

Go Texan Day 2012

Here’s my ‘getup’ for this year’s Go Texan Day 2012. Improved the outfit a bit with a bolo tie and some cowboy boots. Maybe next year, I’ll be able to get some woollies. Working on trying to get some of the photos a co-worker took of a group of us. There were five people, including myself, that dressed up and participated in the photo. The photo was a time lapse, so we jumped in the air as a group and it looks pretty good.

Just need to figure out how to make a looping-gif with the photos.

Go Texan Day!

And here it is:

Rodeo Jump Up!

02-23-12 Tomorrow is Go Texan Day

DowntroddenInDC — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:37:09 +0000

Arguably, tomorrow is one of the fun-est days in Houston all year. It’s the one day, in the whole year, when it’s acceptable to dress up like a cowboy and go to work. No teasing. No taunting. It’s completely normal, one day a year, it’s Go Texan Day! (Now all they need is GO Star Wars Day, or Pajama Day.)

Here’s a picture of me in front of the Texas flag from last year’s Go Texan Day:

Grant - Go Texan Day 2011

Go Texan Day sort of sneaked up on me this year, so I’ll be wearing the same thing again. Still no cowboy boats, can’t get behind spending several hundred dollars on uncomfortable boots I’ll year once a year.

Read more about Go Texan Day at the Houston Rodeo’s official page and leave comments and send photos of you and your co-workers dressed up for Go Texan Day!

02-14-12 Happy Valentine’s Day Liz Lemon!

DowntroddenInDC — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:56:33 +0000

I tease a coworker all the time for being Liz Lemon. You know, eating Lean Cuisine at home alone and choking and having to do a ‘chair heimlich’ so that her 30 cats don’t feast on her body. Light, playful stuff, you know?

It being Valentine’s day, and her having a sense of humor, she brought this in today:

There was another one that said ‘Lasagna for 1′, a Flight of the Conchord’s reference to Jerome being dumped and lonely. Brilliant! Happy Valentine’s day to everyone!

02-10-12 – Those Greeks keep rioting

DowntroddenInDC — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 20:25:04 +0000

Those Greeks keep rioting and I saw this picture on Yahoo! news and all I could think was:

Stop! Hammer Time….

02-05-12 Super Bowl Commercials #6

DowntroddenInDC — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 02:48:04 +0000

With a minute left to go, it looks like this is the NY Giants game to lose. We’ll see, and I hope the Giants keep their lead. Here are the last batch of Super Bowl Commercials (kind of slowed down after half-time);

Fiat ’500 Abath’

Toyota Camry ‘It’s Reinvested’

Samsung ‘Samsunged’

Careerbuilder ‘Business Trip’

02-05-12 Super Bowl Commercials #5

DowntroddenInDC — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 01:36:21 +0000

E*Trade ‘Fatherhood’

And here are a few of the local (Houston) Super Bowl commercials:

Reliant ‘Ladies Man’

BMW ‘The Close Call’

02-05-12 Superbowl Commercials #4

DowntroddenInDC — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 00:39:59 +0000

Continuing the Super Bowl commercials and man, seems like there have some really awesome commercials this year. I’m getting behind writing them down and looking them up. I had read on Friday that NBC sold $250 million worth of ads this year, a record. Sure seems like it… 75 minutes into the game we’ve seen about 50 minutes of commercials. And here are some more Super Bowl commercials:

Coca-Cola ‘Catch’

Dorito’s ‘Man’s Best Friend’

Chevy Sonic ‘Stunt Anthem’
Loving Rob Dyrdek as the stunt driver!

Cars.com ‘Confident You’