...I was struck by inspiration and started hunting around and around for a copy of a movie that I was sure I had on VHS tape somewhere. It's a movie that I've loved since the moment that I heard of the concept of it, and I know it so very well that I could play the whole thing in my mind. And it's not out on DVD. Well, not via a legal copy, as far as I can tell.

The movie? 1984's 'Electric Dreams' I was just struck dumb yesterday and started hunting. While hunting I was struck with some doubt that I did have it and perhaps it was still residing at my parents' house, but instead of calling them, I kept hunting.

DH joined the hunt, looking through the boxes in the garage to find the ones with the tapes in them. And we found a box. Hunting through we found some blank tapes, some tapes of things we forgot we had, and one innocuous tape that was labeled simply with a post it note on the tape itself and no other label on the box or anything.

It was a video of a company band that DH was in before I met him, and they were performing at some company function. And so we watched all 40 minutes of it last night. It was... well....

It made me really grateful that there is no photographic/video evidence (that I am aware of) of the band I was in during my high school days. Heee. And those of us in it kept it rather quiet, unless we were looking for gigs (which really means, someone was broke and needed money for something). Ah, but I digress, this is about DH's company band.

They called themselves "The Stormin' Normans" - that probably gives you a good idea of the timeframe of this tape - probably about 15 years... which put me at the end of high school (and the end of my band days too). This was... hysterical.

There was one woman, as DH put it, that could never come in when she needed to - she was a vocalist and had the tambourine. But at least she put her heart into it, and you could tell that from the tape. The two guitarists were pretty good. The lead vocalist, well.... he was enjoying himself. He wasn't bad, it's just funny.

The keyboardist... her solo stunk. And I think she knew it. She was good for accompaniment though, and I think she was enjoying herself.

And then there was the drummer. He didn't smile. It wasn't that he was concentrating to make sure that he didn't drop a stick or anything, because he was really good at what he was doing. He just didn't smile. That's probably because of his years in the Santa Clara Vanguard drum and bugle corps - they never smiled. They just had to perform.

At least, that's DH's story and he's sticking to it - yes, he was the drummer. The kids were in the room reading while the tape was playing. A stuck to her book - she seemed less than impressed. B, however, was "OOOO! Is that *DADDY*?" and kept her attention on the tape. DH was smiling and wincing at parts (mostly because of the vocals) through the whole thing, and I had a few laughs too - not laughing at him laughs, but ones of remembering my own foibles too. It was a definite trip down memory lane, and while it wasn't the movie that I was looking for, it definitely was just as entertaining.

By the way, folks - you have B to thank for this entry. Yesterday I just grabbed the first t-shirt that my hand laid upon in the closet after my workout, and when the tape was finished, B noticed it. It was my "I'm Blogging This" shirt. She pointed at it, and softly said "you're blogging this" to me. And that's when I laughed, and looked at DH and said "I'm SO blogging this!"

He shaded red slightly and asked me if I was. I recounted to him that it's B's fault for mentioning my shirt, else I *never* would have thought of it. So there you have it - you have a break from the Friday Forum (which will appear on Monday, or in longer-than-usual answers through next week because it's a rather good Forum this week, in my opinion) all because the almost 8 year old noticed my shirt after we pulled the tape out of the VCR.

Have a great weekend everyone!