Michael Smyth's Page

The second show was a much greater success. I guess we needed Saturday's set for practice. We played well and everyone seemed to enjoy the show. We had a smaller response, but there were a lot fewer people there. It was Sunday and there's football all day. I imagine that kept a lot of folks home.

We ate more crap food and drank free beer. Chris, a guy from one of the other bands and a guy somehow involved in the show, welcomed us to his supply of Yingling and we happily accepted. We watched his… Continue

It's over 90 degrees and I'm on my second shirt. I changed because I managed to sweat right through the first one and I have hardly done a thing. Despite the heat and the fact that my legs, from ankle to knee, are dusted with Florida dirt, I'm enjoying myself. I have two Bud Lime's in me and I'm hanging out with the coolest guys on Earth. I'm at the West Coast Bike Rally in Sarasota, FL. In about 20 minutes we're supposed to perform on a makeshift stage that is set-up on the back of a flat, trac… Continue

I'm sitting beside the left-handed Lithuanian while he ignores his hot girlfriend and talks on his cell phone about the "punk-ass" who "tried his shit." He arrived a few minutes ago and disrupted my calm. She's clearly annoyed as well. Upon arriving he offered her no greeting of any kind; no hug; no kiss; not even a nod. He's too deep in the urban-American Gangsta character he's playing, likely gleaned from watching too much MTV back home. It's his own uninspired caricature of the typical Americ… Continue

Words are symbols. Each symbol carrying a specific meaning. You can unite them together and try to express some idea or emotion, but you're limited by the tools available. String a series of symbols together and you create a larger symbol for a broader vision or insight. But there is still the underlying thought not fully expressed.

Physicists and scientists talk about how hard it is to describe, or create a model of, objects on the sub-atomic level, where everything is probability. Similarly,… Continue

One may wonder how the moth has survived for close to 400 million years when they seem at such a disadvantage. How could a creature make it through all the ages if it seems compelled to fly into eminent danger?

Many insects use celestial objects to navigate. It's called transverse orientation. They maintain an angular relationship with a single point of reference, perhaps the moon, or a bright star, and this allows them to fly in a straight path. Since these objects are so far away the change i… Continue