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Faded (A Post For Video Store Day 2015)

/ Alex Doriot / 1 Comment

For 2 and a half years in high school and college I worked at a pair of video rental stores. It’s still one of my favorite jobs I’ve ever had.

There were a lot of perks when I worked at the video store. Free rentals. Getting new movies before they were released. Easy access to giant tubs of buttery popcorn.

The most underrated perk of the job? Free movie posters.

Every month we’d get a new shipment of movie posters to plaster in the windows of the store promoting the coming attractions. Whenever new posters came in the old ones came down. Before they went in the dumpster these old posters were fair game for any of the employees to take home.

To a college kid this was a jackpot. My walls were covered by posters for “Batman Begins” and “Wallace and Gromit” – high art to a 20-year-old.

FullSizeRender(3)There was one problem. Often by the time they came off the wall many of the movie posters were faded. Continue reading →

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The Determined Way Of The Sea Turtle

/ Alex Doriot / 1 Comment

If you ever get the chance to watch a nest of sea turtles hatch, I recommend dropping what you’re doing and running to the beach. 

It’s a rare sight and I was lucky enough to witness it with my family on vacation at Fernandina Beach last week.

I’m not a biologist or ecologist or whatever type of “ogist” that would be an expert in sea turtles. That being said, here is my unscientific report on the brief and magical migration I saw firsthand:

The sand above the nest, taped off to protect it by a local preservation society, began to rumble earlier that night. A neighbor came up the beach telling everyone the hatch was imminent. When we arrived the sand was bubbling like boiling water getting ready to explode. Continue reading →

What Garth Brooks Taught Me In Concert

/ Alex Doriot / 1 Comment

FullSizeRenderWithout a doubt the CD I’ve listened to the most in my lifetime is “Double Live” by Garth Brooks. 

There is something magical about this album to me. Garth Brooks’ songbook was the soundtrack to my childhood. Growing up in Tennessee and Georgia I was raised on 90s country music. And Garth’s music was the gold standard.

“Double Live” collected all of Garth’s greatest hits across a 2 disc live set. So to begin with every song was a winner. Add in the raucous live crowd that Garth drew to his incredible live performances and you have the makings for an amazing album.

I listened to that CD on my headphones in the backseat of so many family car trips. I blasted it on the boom box in my room. I’ve rocked out to it with the windows down in every car I’ve ever driven.

Those opening chords of “Callin’ Baton Rouge” on disc one stir up a special feeling in my soul no other album does.

So there weren’t a lot of surprises when my fiancé and I saw Garth Brooks this weekend in Atlanta as part of his first world tour in over 12 years.

I knew when all the solos would be. I knew when Garth would stop singing and let the audience sing the words to “Unanswered Prayers”. I knew to expect the mysterious 3rd verse for “Friends In Low Places”.

Yet as many times as I’ve listened to Garth Brooks live on CD, there was something so incredibly different about seeing Garth Brooks live and in person.  Continue reading →

X-Men: Overcoming The Days Of Failure Past

/ Alex Doriot / Leave a comment
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What sets the X-Men apart from a lot of other superheroes is their origin story.

Unlike many other comic book characters, the X-Men are born with their powers.

There are no spider bites, no dramatic deaths of family members, no gamma radiation.

The X-Men are mutants. Their superpowers are part of who they are and always have been.

With that, each mutant has a choice to make when they discover their power: will they use it for good or for evil? Continue reading →

The One Lesson Anyone Can Learn From Wrestling

/ Alex Doriot / 1 Comment

P2- Hulk Hogan llega al ring en WrestleMania IIIIf I could sum up everything I’ve ever learned from pro wrestling in one sentence it would be this:

The face beats the heel. 

In wrestling terminology there are two types of characters – faces and heels.

The face (short for babyface) is the good guy. Think Hulk Hogan, The Ultimate Warrior, John Cena.

The heel is the villain. People like The Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase, Ric Flair, and Mr. McMahon were great heels.

Wrestling at it’s core is the story of a good guy versus a bad guy. Almost every single wrestling match in history consists of a face versus a heel. And the face beets the heel.

The heel may get the upper hand. He may vanquish a few good-hearted men along a path of destruction. But in the end the heel always goes down.

This is the cycle of wrestling, a never-ending story where the characters change but the outline stays the same each week. Continue reading →