What's New With Andrew

January 2013 – A new year has begun and I have been at AutoAnything for just about 8 years now.  The experiences and people I have met along the way have been so extremely humbling. At certain points, I’ve wished that I had taken a more proactive role with bigger things regarding music. But at the same time, I couldn’t have imagined what would have unfolded in regards to my professional career.

My mind has been altered by everything related to search, especially natural search. And every effort that has created success or failure feels so worth it after dumping heart and soul into every day over these years. Working for such a trusting company that gave me the liberty to build an amazing team has enabled for success tenfold. What we have built feels very similar to the energy that you feel in a band when everyone’s gelling and clicking on the same page. But it feels even bigger than music creation could because so many other team members, business owners and customers are effected. Music, or art for that matter, is very self-serving.

I don’t exactly have the same mental approach to thinking about or writing music these days. Call it maturity or whatever you want. It’s much simpler now, but still very alive and excited. I’m always posting new jammers on my soundcloud here.

From last year into the new one, I now have a wife and a new career opportunity. Both far surpass what I imagined being able to obtain during my lifetime. Until having children, these without a doubt will be the largest stepping stones in life for me. Some may find sayings about love and marriage to be cliché, but shouldn’t. The power that marriage has provided me with is the ability to be unselfish in a selfish world. Marriage is created by the ultimate chemical reaction between two people, the strongest atomic bond that you can feel. More than what friendships or projects could ever provide. There are obviously tough spots since we’re all so unique mentally, but the connection I have now with my amazing life partner has kept my mind on track and shows no boundaries for what is possible in life.

SEO is a methodology that will forever be a part of my professional and personal life.  It’s time to add to the every-growing onion. User focus and web management are keys to success this year. Laughing and sharing are keys to success this year. And for the pups, walks and antler bones are the keys for success, period.

In case you have a Rickenbacker guitar or even an old amp, you can find out when it was manufactured on their site here:
http://www.rickenbacker.com/service_serials.asp

I plugged in an old vintage 10 watt space heater looking amp into it and found out that the date goes back to ’64! Pretty cool. Give it a go if you’re a Ricky owner.

If you haven’t had the pleasure of seeing or hearing face-melting riffs lately, then you’ll want to come to this:

http://casbah.frontgatetickets.com/choose.php?a=1&lid=72978&eid=82434

While music is my primary passion, love for my Honda Element ranks pretty high on the list as well. And with my daily exposure to cool products at AutoAnything, I am developing a laundry list of mods and upgrades I’d like to shoot for. In addition to my custom mats, I have accomplished adding the following enhancements to our utilitarian driving machine:

• K&N air filter
• Flowmaster exhaust tip
• Rain-x wiper blades
• Valley trailer hitch
• Hitch bike rack
• Sylvania bulbs
• Napier Sportz SUV tent

When it comes to the next round of upgrades, I want to start with deflectors. I’ve already had to replace a windshield from a rock dinging it, so a rock/bug deflector and matching vent visors would be sweet. The vents would help out because we could have the windows down more often without getting wind blown hair. And I’m sure the dogs would love it too

Then I’d like to build up towards getting a Thule roof rack system along with one of their cargo carriers. It would be especially helpful for road trips. And a set of step bars would make it easier for us to access the rooftop carrier.

There you have it. The next Honda Element mods on the horizon to further my quest for building the ultimate road trip machine!!!

This was a really fun video to watch. Steve Jobs talks about their design which was built from Hewlett Packard and Atari parts. And more info about their visions of creating printed circuit boards in Mountain View. Super cool!

I found that this video was pretty inspiring. Especially the notion that “It’s better to do what’s right as opposed to doing what’s easy.”

Last night was a crazy night of fun in true Bernhardt fashion! The Zombie fest was a weird surprise and being in Long Beach was a cool change of pace.

We are so stoked that we are able to see Band of Horses. And Naomi was lucky enough to meet the guitar player afterwards

This first picture was taken from the top area where we started and eventually moved down to the bottom front. Seeing them live gives you a whole different level of respect for the dudes’ vocals and for their music overall.

We finally got our Snooze on and were able to walk in without a wait thanks to Naomi’s birthday being a weekday. First time for hollandaise style and the blueberry pancake was amazeballs! Grub here when you can, just avoid weekends and long spillover lines from Urban Outfitters.