A moment of silence please.

It has been tough these last few weeks. We knew the time was coming. He finally passed tonight.

Let me take you back.

In 1996 I started working at Circuit City and Nana expressed her concern that perhaps it was a bad idea due to my known love of electronics, music and movies. She thought I would squander all my income. Oh she had no idea! (alright, who am I fooling, she knew everything, but never complained, just let me make my own choices)

My prized possession was a surround sound system that was way too big and way too loud. Two front speakers with 12" sub woofers built into each speaker to provide the best bottom end sounds. But the prize in the whole system was a JBL sub woofer. The thing could boom with a good resonance, not that cheap boom you hear in low rider cars (guilty pleasure: We Like the cars that go boom-Le Tigre. Sorry only owned it on Tape. Hey it was 9Th grade, we all made mistakes in our adolescence years.)

In its eulogy, I remember two things:
1. How the boys always watched my glee when the THX promo came on at the beginning of movies. (Which they always did with both hands over their ears)

2. My all time favorite experience with the ol' boy. THE GUY DOWNSTAIRS had a cheap AIWA mini-system. Not to bad for a little shelf system, but still little. The guy downstairs loved to play rap music really loud, it was obnoxious, not because it was rap music but because it sounded bad. One day Mike Ike, my roommate and I took these huge tower speakers and tipped them over onto the floor of the apartment sending the sound to The Guy Downstairs. I dipped into my pre-ipod CD collection (I know kids, dad is old) and busted out Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor (TocattaandFugueinDminor.mp3), da da da (pause/rest ) da da da da daa daaaa daaaaaaa. Then the bass really kicked in, ah sweet torture. We would go down three flights of stairs to see if we could feel it, not hear it on the bottom floor, to feel it. Oh, we could, and it was beautiful!
After coming back up the stairs I went into my bedroom while Mike Ike jumped into the shower. About a minute later, I heard what I thought was pounding at the door. I poked my head out of the bedroom and saw, THE GUY DOWNSTAIRS. . . upstairs. I think he was mad. I couldn't really tell, he was yelling but I could only see his mouth moving, I must not have got the message because he eventually reverted to sign language although if I ever see my kids using that kind of sign, I am washing their hands with soap. I stood there and he stood there, I think I heard the counter melody of wha-aaa-aaa-aaa, wa, wa , wa. (you know, Clint Eastwood, The Good, The Bad, The Ugly) The guys downstairs was a big dude. Looked like Karl Malone, I was basically John Stockton sized compared to him. I was just stalling for Mike Ike to get out of the shower, cause he always comes out with just a towel on, and he was a big boy. When Mike Ike came out, The GUY DOWNSTAIRS went back downstairs, decrescendo. . .mezzo-piano. . .piano. . .pianissimo. . . pianississimo. The 'ol sub must have made Bach proud.

So please pause your movie, and for one breif moment, let silence ring.

OK, all done, come on boys we're going sub shopping. Here is a song that I would not normally post, but I think the sub would have wanted something with a little bass. I'llBeMissingYou.mp3