So here I sit, sipping from a hot mug of Yogi Kombucha Green tea, preparing to rant and rave whine and bitch and moan about my soar throat and my non-existant voice. It sucks. I think it has to do with 1.5 weeks of yelling at little kids for approximately eight hours a day. Yuch. And then I go back tomorrow morning and do it again. The only good thing is that tomorrow is effectively Friday for me. Yeah, yeah. I know, "Tomorrow's Wednesday, Dufus," you all are saying. The fact of the matter is that I am quite well aware of that. However, the little hellspawns get Thursday and Friday off, on account of Independence Day. These means: FOUR DAY WEEKEND!!!! Seriously, five o'clock tomorrow evening cannot roll around soon enough. I am going to chill out with my friends, and just kinda' relax. I want to be able to utter that immortal cry made popular by MXPX: "Responsibility: What's that?!" I want to shout it out at the top of my lungs as I irresponsibly take intravenous drugs and have unprotected sex with multiple women. Just kidding about the drugs and women.

Perhaps all will be well in the morning. I hope my voice will come back. I fucking hate just rasping through the day. It sucks worse than a cheap whore. Especially when you have to deal with other people. Remarkably, I have so far been able to keep a zen-like calm about me, but with my health all screwy, that is rapidly dissolving. Perhaps a good night's sleep will help me out.

Music: It's that time of year again: Summer. Time to buy loads of music and CD's and such. Here are a few of my recommendations:

The Red Elvises: Picture a mixture of Russian folk music, surf punk, rock-a-billy, and, well, Elvis, and you would see the Red Elvises. I like to call their style "Communist Roc" (get it? Communist BLOC, Communist ROC?). All of this adds up to create an immensely enjoyable sound that is easily distinguished from most of the other stuff out there. Another thing I really like about them is their bizarre sense of humor. Such lines as "I got a girlfriend Marylou./She is a folk singer./I gave her a ring./She gave me the finger" just make my day. It's so true.

Blind Guardian: It is virtually impossible to overstate my admiration of these guys. At first glance, they appear to be little more than some German heavy-metal band. However, after a closer look, they are revealed to be a talented band who writes about, not girls and sex, but fantasy literature from the world over. One of their greatest classics is a concept album entitled "Nightfall in Middle-Earth." It is basically a heavy metal rock opera of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion, which is the mythology behind the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Other topics that they have written songs about include the Trojan War (in the epic 15-minute "And Then There Was Silence"), Arthurian legend (in the songs "Past and Future Secret" and "Mordred's Song."), and the Dragonlance books. Very cool, indeed.

The Blue Man Group: You may know them from the old Pentium commercials that Intel used to run. These guys do really cool performances, and their music features some pretty cool beats and such. It's basically techno, and it's a lot of fun. Plus, you gotta' love a bunch of guys who run around in all-blue attire.

The Grateful Dead: Yeah, I know these guys are old, but sometimes you just can't get much better when you just want to mellow out for a bit and relax. When I'm all burnt out, I like to crank up such songs as "Truckin,'" or "Touch of Grey," or one of my personal faves, "Friend of the Devil." Give it a shot. These guys are quite talented, and, in my opinion at least, you don't have to be a total stoner to like them.

And that brings to close another day in the life of me, the MOST POWERFUL DARK LORD TO EVER WALK THE EARTH!!!!!!!