This could suck

The other day I was looking at my paycheck when I noticed something odd back in the beginning of June. I had transitioned from "transition" employee to full time. It appears that they may have paid me for unused vacation days.

Now they may be coming to collect. I had an email asking what my start date was. Am I going to get pro-rated now? That could suck. It shouldn't mess up my Vegas trip in September, but it could ruin any other trip I may want to get in at the end of the year.

The funny thing about it is, I rarely use up all my vacation days in any given year. Yeah, I hear most of you groaning out there. How could I waste my days like that? It just happens. Sometimes at the end of the year, you just can't get days off of work. The days just get burnt off.

It should be interesting to see how it plays out. Maybe I get lucky and nothing comes of it.

So my friend burnt me a Slayer CD the other day. The "sickest" Slayer CD ever made. Now don't ask me what makes this thing so "sick" because I have no idea. There is no track listing so I cannot begin to brag about the "sickness" of the CD. See, I have never been much of a Slayer fan (STOP- I must stop because Al or BadBlood may be shocked). Figure this one out. Back in college in the 80s, a friend introduced me to Anthrax. Now at the time, I was really into the 80s hard rock scene. I was loving Motley Crue, Whitesnake, Bon Jovi, etc. at the time. Then this guy brought in "I'm the Man" and played it all the time. He also brought in Helloween and gave me a copy. That summer, the local video music station would play the top 10 requested songs of the day. Like clockwork, Anthrax would be the number one choice with "Indians". Megadeth was usually at two with "Wake up Dead". Then my sister comes home from college with a copy of Master of Puppets. That is what I heard all summer. From there I bought Anthrax, Metallica, and Megadeth CDs. I still loved the Crue and other guys but some of the harder stuff was quite interesting.

However, I didn't like all of it. I found some of it to be rather crappy. I was rather picky. For example, I got a copy of a Testament CD. I really liked "Practice what you Preach", but the rest of the CD didn't do anything for me. Same with Motorhead. I like some of it, but I couldn't make out what the hell Lemmy was saying half the time.

That is probably why I didn't care for Slayer that much. That fall, I had friends who were totally into Slayer. But the death and devil lyrics didn't do anything for me. I just didn't get it. I didn't see what made them different from Anthrax or Metallica. It seemed like a knockoff to me that just wasn't any good.

Ironically, that change just a couple weeks ago. While talking about another song (Ballad of Chasey Lane by the Bloodhound Gang) with a friend of mine at work, he asked if I had ever seen the video. Not having seen it, he burnt a copy of it to a disc for me to watch. He also packed the disc with some music. I popped it on my pc and listened to it as I played poker. Song after song went by. I enjoyed most of it. Then one song stood out. I thought, wow, that was killer. Then the next one sounded like the same band. That song rocked as well. The songs? Seasons in the Abyss and Angel of Death. I was surprised to find out it was Slayer. When I mentioned this to my friend, he insisted that he make me a Slayer disc. Long story short, I have been jamming it in the car. The lyrics are beyond me, but the music is damn good.

Sometimes what is old is new.