What do you love or like to do?

Within the limits of taste obviously.

I like doing stuff around the house mainly. All my stuff is there. I like gardening, mowing the lawn, practicing, playing my guitar and keys, going in the hot tub at night and seeing the freight train's lone incandescent headlight filtering through the trees in the train track gulley right off my property, walking down to the Neshaminy Creek to go fishing right before dusk, then trying to find my way back at night without the aid of my flashlight (scary), sneaking into the heavily fenced in bass lake a few miles away in the springtime before it gets all overgrown. I'm gonna get this huge bass, I know where she lives, I've missed her like 5 times in the same spot. I just have to watch out for the mother swan who blocks the path with her nest. She gets all big and aggressive when she's guarding her eggs if you try and go around her. I don't lol. I like looking at google maps and finding little lakes near me that I didn't know about and try and access them. I like exploring, going down a backroad I never went down on my Honda Davidson I like learning about the courts and how statutes aren't laws and how fraudulent the courts are from YT vids and getting my conspiracy theories straight I like learning about the ancients. I like learning about all kinds of technical and scientific stuff and am spongelike. A voracious, information requiring, spongelike life-form.

Anybody wanna play?

I love to be out in the weather. I live in Phoenix and, believe or not, the constant sunshine can get old after a while. Fortunately, my job requires me to travel, both domestically and internationally, so I can get my fix.

Don't get me wrong, I love it out here in the desert. It has it's own unique beauty, but I'm a transplant from the North East. I miss the woods.

Big fan of going places I've never been. I even just walk around my town and surrounding towns and see what new stuff I can find. Finding a new "small town" I've never been to is super fun. Weird shops, parks, people...

Also love nature and photographing landscapes, but almost never people.

Lastly and most importantly, I love helping people. I don't care if they appreciate it, or don't. I just really like the feeling of helping someone, especially when you're doing something for them they could not do themselves, be it for financial reasons or physical, or even just a mental block of some sort. Solving a big or small problem for someone is a great head space.

I also like to collect bad jokes.

By the way, did you know that coral reefs can die off from stress? Biggest source of stress for them? ... Current issues.

Larry it sounds like you lead a fine life in a bucolic setting.

I have 1.5 hours of dog walks per day. Longer on weekends. I am fortunately 10 minutes from woods and beaches. Am a country boy at heart and like the peace in the outdoors (opposite of drums).
I like to cook, fiddle in a workshop, cut the lawn (great thinking time), make coffee, eat cookies and fix/repair anything (or try to). I also like wearing rubber boots outside.

Apart from my family of course, I love my horses, my cats and my chiggens.

I quite enjoy baking and cooking - I'd enjoy it more if I didn't have to do it. Mr Madge "makes" me (insofar as anybody can make me do anything) make bread, and jam from the soft fruit he grows - actually, I hate making jam - and I cook pretty much every night from scratch.

I used like to sew and knit but I've gone off that lately.

The other thing that I absolutely LOVE to do is to learn languages. I speak fluent French (used to be almost bilingual in my youth), have a good working knowledge of German, Spanish and Welsh, can more or less understand and make myself understood in Italian, have a few words of Swedish and Portuguese, and I'm currently learning Mandarin, for absolutely no good reason other than that it's there.

I like taking care of home, pool, and gardens-and I always have a Fall and Spring veggie garden, live on a pond and I fish but the eagles get all the big ones, I usually play my drums everyday (since my daughter moved in our basement I haven't and I can tell it's affecting me-depressed). I love to read and learn about new things-for a period of 20 years the only thing I read was related to research projects so I had tunnel vision-so I have a lot of catching up to do on other subjects. I'm more of home body but my wife loves to travel-which she drags me along and I always have the most fun (I don't know why I always object because I always love it). I spend a lot of time "pondering" or "problem solving" just thinking about stuff and every permutation of said stuff-I call it mental masterba...... well you know. My Mom called me a Day Dreamer-I still call it -you know. Gosh Magenta thanks for reminding me-my family of course-my lovely wife of 31 years (she's in line for sainthood for putting up with me) and three daughters (all the apple of my eye and heart) and a son-in-law who calls me Bro-dad (I just love that).

I like to ride/race motorcycles, play drums and guitar, go running (I run every day), cycling and watch science fiction tv/movies.

I live and work in the Oxfordshire countryside so the running and biking is much better than it used to be when we lived in London.

opentune said:

Larry it sounds like you lead a fine life in a bucolic setting.

That's right. Just keep thinking that



I have 1.5 hours of dog walks per day. Longer on weekends. I am fortunately 10 minutes from woods and beaches. Am a country boy at heart and like the peace in the outdoors (opposite of drums).
I like to cook, fiddle in a workshop, cut the lawn (great thinking time), make coffee, eat cookies and fix/repair anything (or try to). I also like wearing rubber boots outside.

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I find peace in nature too. We have these great big blue herons at the creek. I've seen coyote back there. At least I think it was. It looked like a German Shepard only it wasn't. There are arched water pass through tunnels with little stalagtites the size of pencils formed on the ceiling. I like trying to know the constellations, but the sky is fairly light polluted where I am. I can see the moons of Jupiter with my binoculars though, and the major constellations.

Growing and eating your own food is a really great way to connect with the earth and is spiritual. Plus the taste and food value is so superior to what you can buy.

If the zombie apocalypes comes, I will live off of the plants and animals that live on the 1000's of acres of utility/railroad property behind my house. I hope I don't have to do that, I like my internet lol.

Magenta said:

Apart from my family of course, I love my horses, my cats and my chiggens.

I quite enjoy baking and cooking - I'd enjoy it more if I didn't have to do it. Mr Madge "makes" me (insofar as anybody can make me do anything) make bread, and jam from the soft fruit he grows - actually, I hate making jam - and I cook pretty much every night from scratch.

I used like to sew and knit but I've gone off that lately.

The other thing that I absolutely LOVE to do is to learn languages. I speak fluent French (used to be almost bilingual in my youth), have a good working knowledge of German, Spanish and Welsh, can more or less understand and make myself understood in Italian, have a few words of Swedish and Portuguese, and I'm currently learning Mandarin, for absolutely no good reason other than that it's there.

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I can't wait to visit! Did I tell you I booked my flight? So the original plan is on.

Languages eh? Very cool indeed. I suppose you would get more use from it than I would, beings that all those countries are so close relatively speaking. Talk about your brain plasticity, languages must really mentally tie the knot in the cherry stem. Good for you Madge.

I was at an open mic jam 2 days ago and it occurred to me that everyone there...their youth has long since passed, but all these people didn't age mentally. The passion for music is the closest thing to a fountain of youth there is in my life anyway.

Aside from the obvious musical 'stuff' I like to get out and about too. I'm on holiday at the moment and ended up on Dartmoor. Took a few photographs (another thing I enjoy). Here's one that I rather like (obviously lower quality to upload it to the forum)...

I love baseball...watching, coaching, working on fields...whatever it needs. This past Saturday I pitched batting practice to about 24 high school kids. Even professional pitchers get pitch counts. I probably threw around 300 pitches. I thought my arm was going to fall off the next day. But I loved it!

I watch pro and college baseball. I work in the concession stand at my 15 y/o's high school games.

I love college football too, and spend way too many Saturdays in front of the tube.

I used to love yard work, but I've gotten really tired of it in my old age. I'm glad the boys can take most of that over now.

Had my keyboard poised and then read "Within the limits of taste..."

In all seriousness, I like hiking, bicycling, traditional archery, photography, painting, going dancing, and writing. I like to read a lot, too. I'd love to travel more, but $ and vacation time are scarce.

I have just started some serious beginner woodworking and have a few power tools that I am playing with and learning to use. The favorite of these is my leaf blower used to blow out the garage after a few hours of altering felled tree parts. Here is a two-sided photo frame I made, Just flip it over for a new face.

GRUNTERSDAD said:

The favorite of these is my leaf blower used to blow out the garage after a few hours of altering felled tree parts.

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I just discovered this last year. It is fairly gratifying and easy. The kind of thing where I say to myself, damn that was a good idea.

Cool flip frame.

Ummm.....sorry guys, I have to come clean. I can't stand leaf blowers. Too noisy. What happened to sweeping or raking?
Larry.... coyotes are a moving in. I give it 5 - 10 years before you see them even in big cities. Very adaptable, and they love people's small pets.

Apart from drum related activities - I love having my 3 year old grandson 1-2 days a week. ( I've had him since he was 6 months of age) We have a special relationship. I love watching him develop and challenge himself. I love camping and sitting around a fire with my wife with a beer or glass of wine. I love sitting in my large garden when the day is almost done, with a glass of red wine listening to the last call of the birds, in quiet contemplation. I love looking into this forum every day for education, information and the frequent hilarious entertainment.

opentune said:

Ummm.....sorry guys, I have to come clean. I can't stand leaf blowers. Too noisy. What happened to sweeping or raking?
Larry.... coyotes are a moving in. I give it 5 - 10 years before you see them even in big cities. Very adaptable, and they love people's small pets.

Click to expand...

My leaf blower is electric and quiet essentially and then of course there are ear protection devices which I used for both the router and the miter saw. The saw dust is just that, dust. Sweeping does nothing. Since it is biodegradable it sits in my lawn until it rots or decomposes. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

I have a gas blower and weed eater that I edge with too-I like a neat yard. Yeah the coyotes have moved into our neighborhood-they have bred with dogs and larger than usual so they have been wiping out neighborhood deer population. They've been taking neighborhood pets but so have a lot of raptor birds-hawks and bald eagles swooping down and flying off with peoples pets-that's a heck of note to see your Yorkie flying off in the talons of some big bird of prey. I see a lot of foxes too-that all my life have been the most elusive reclusive yet these are bold coming across my yard challenging me in the middle of the day-fortunately I had my weed whacker.

I'm pretty satisfied with the places I've been and the things I've seen so far. Exploring and traveling doesn't interest me much anymore. I just go to work everyday and then go home and hide from the world in my bedroom until I wake up the next day and do it all over again. Music is the only thing that gets me out of the house nowadays.

Reading all this zen middle-aged communing with nature stuff, I have to remind myself this is a drummer's forum - you know, those wild and irresponsible consumers of drugs and despoilers of women..... well, either the stereotype is wrong or we are a very atypical collection of drummers.

I'm just as bad as the rest of you. Mild-mannered government employee who lives in the country with kids who garden and train horses, make maple syrup and grow Christmas trees. The kids do all that stuff, not me. I spend half my day commuting so they can live this lifestyle. But I like driving and the countryside is beautiful, so I'm not complaining!