To Whom It May Concern

Excitement Delivered Monthy

When I was young, probably around 10 years old or so, I can remember reading Popular Mechanics and Popular Science at the local public library, and how enjoyable that was. Mind you this was in like 1984 or so, in a time long before the internet and in a period when cable television was not yet taking off, and certainly not available for our family being way out in the country (to this day there is still no cable or satellite television at my family’s house where I grew up).

I think sometime around the end of the 7th grade, beginning of the 8th grade, I sent in a subscription card to Popular Mechanics and started receiving their publication once a month. I loved it. I can remember how excited I was to get a new magazine each month and spend hours reading it from cover to cover, and then some. It was an amazing, innocent time in my life. Too early yet to be interested in girls, too naïve to realize the impracticality of pursuing many of the amazing gadgets I read about within those pages.

I held that subscription all thru high school, and once I headed off to college I let it go. In college I became much more interested in sports than I ever had been in high school, from watching ESPN, on cable television of course, and I ordered Sports Illustrated and Time magazine to keep up with current events in both the news and sporting arenas.

After getting out of college I ordered a few more magazines, I gave up on Time and instead got U.S. News & World Report because it was, and to this day is, in my opinion, the most reliable and unbiased source for accurate news reporting. Time isn’t real bad but they have a liberal slant, where as Newsweek is pure liberal garbage and propaganda and has no value whatsoever in the field of credible journalism.

I remember getting Car & Driver for a few years, an amazing magazine dedicated to promoting the newest vehicles available to the public. I can also remember my frustration with them about their continual fascination with European cars (I have never liked BMW’s and Mercedes cars, too much money, too little distinction, all YUPPIE). I ordered the inaugural subscription to ESPN the Magazine, and although I enjoyed it somewhat, it just wasn’t as good as Sports Illustrated, I’m not even sure ESPN still does a magazine? I’m guessing they still do.

Currently, I have no subscriptions save for the Maxim subscription belly has for me, which goes to my parents house, because I never got the address forwarded. I sort of feel bad for my father, he reads it and tells me “You know that is terrible how the girls dress and some of what they say in there” but he is also quick to point out “Some of that stuff is really really funny.” My mother, as is true to her nature, throws them away as quickly as she finds them, sometimes right out of the mailbox, because she tends to be hypocritical, and while allowing if not reading Cosmo and other women’s trash, she fails to see that Maxim is merely the exact same thing, only for men.

In this age of internet information, I guess that’s why I likely let my subscriptions to the magazines I loved run out. I spend a lot of time getting whatever info I need online now, and therefore do not see the reason to pay for something I’m not likely to read. But as I sit here in Iraq reading issue after issue of Hemming’s Muscle Machines (a magazine dedicated to muscle cars of my father’s era, which someone thankfully sent us about 30 copies from 2004 till now), I remember a time where a young boy sat in his room reading about the new space shuttle, 6000 people on an aircraft carrier, and the brand new 1987 Corvette (not sure about that year midas, just guessing haha). Wow, those were the days.

Current Lyrical Ramblings

You know the tunnel of love, well it ain't my style.
So I'm gonna take on the ferris wheel.
Way up in the sky, with the stars in her eyes,
I'm gonna tell her just how I feel.

County Fair – Chris Ledoux