Road Rally 2012 Thoughts

(L-R: Matt Hirt, John Mazzei, Michael Laskow, Dave Walton, Barry French, Dean Krippaehne)

I got home last night from another incredible TAXI Road Rally and to say that this was the best Rally ever might be an understatement. I truly can't even begin to put into words just how incredible the past several days have been but I'll give it a shot.

This year I went to less panels in the main ballroom, less breakout driver's ed classes, didn't attend any mentor lunches, didn't sign up for a one-on-one mentor session, only talked about music for about 25% of the time, and I have no doubt that this was the best Rally I ever had.

For those of you who have been to the Rally before, then you probably understand what I'm talking about. For those of you who have never been to the Rally, you might be a bit confused as to what I'm saying. See, in years past I was very focused in on creating as many "transactions" as I could to help further MY music career but this year I was much more focused in on creating as many "relationships" as I could, but not necessarily to further my music career.

In fact, I'd say that the most meaningful conversations I had all weekend had absolutely nothing to do with music. There were some conversations with two people in particular that I had never met prior to arriving in L.A. that I will never forget for the rest of my life. It was bigger than music. SOOO much bigger than music.

I still can't believe I was on a panel. So humbled to be included with the four people that I've been modeling my career after for the past three years. The wisdom and guidance that they've provided to me has been something I'll never be able to repay. And a special thanks to Michael Laskow for inviting me to be a part of that panel. Extremely grateful to call all five of them my friends.

It was great to catch up with some old friends and to meet some new ones as well. I truly believe I made some new lifelong friends this weekend. That's one of the benefits of the Rally that you just can't put a price on.

I'll probably have some other thoughts about the Rally to share but for now I need to wrap this up.

Until next time...

Back in the swing of things

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joiseyshowaa/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

I knew it had been awhile since I last posted, but until I actually looked at my site, I didn't realize it had been almost a month! Yikes! Gotta say that the blog contest I participated in definitely helped me post on a more frequent basis.

One reason for my lack of posts is that March is the height of the college basketball season here in the States and I end up spending quite a bit of time following my favorite team, the Kentucky Wildcats. I really thought we were going to bring home Championship #8 this year but alas, that didn't happen. We had our worst shooting night of the season against a team that was having one of their best and in a one-and-done type tournament, that usually spells disaster for you. But regardless, I was very proud of our team this year. I can't remember when I ever had so much fun watching the team play but it was probably the '95-96 season, ie. Championship #6, and the first one that I could remember. I was only 4 when they won #5 so I don't remember that one. But I can tell you exactly where I was at when we won #6 (and #7) :-) Earlier tonight several of the players announced that they would be entering the NBA draft so it looks like next year's team is going to be a brand new group of players. Let the fun begin!