Tag: Family

The Six Year Walk

I just finished walking in the 2025 ZERO Prostate Cancer Walk at Liberty Station in Point Loma. Some of my closest friends and family joined me for a leisurely early morning stroll with several hundred other survivors, patients, families, and supporters. This year we raised just over $1000 dollars. Thank you so much for your support.

ZERO reached out to me ( literally ) the day before the event and asked if I would speak. I reluctantly agreed, prepared a speech, and was more than a little relieved that, in the chaos, the organizers never invited me up to the microphone. 

Sometimes things sound better on paper, anyway – especially when you’re vying for the attention of a half-awake crowd under the San Diego flight path, with jets doing their best to drown you out.

So, here’s what I was going to say…

Hi. My name is Scott.

I’m a prostate cancer survivor.

This is my fifth walk. 

I missed my first one in 2019 because I was still reeling from my diagnosis and all the awesome decisions that go with it ….

Decisions like….

Do I tell my kids? 

My family? 

My friends? 

The answer for me was yes. 

And I’m glad I did because they were, have been, and continue to be my own little support group. 

A lot of them are here today —-

——-aaaaaaaand I squeezed donations out of the ones who couldn’t be.

For such a common cancer, prostate cancer isn’t really talked about much. And I get it – sure – the prostate just isn’t as sexy to talk about as boobs. 

And ….  while I see sports teams of every shape and form wearing pink every October, blue is typically just an afterthought – like an accent color on a uniform.

That’s not to diminish any other cancer – we all have our battles to fight, right?  But the fact is : guys don’t like talking about their prostates. All of the accessories attached to the prostate are fair game – sure, but problems and worries and cancer? Hell, no.

That’s why I appreciate ZERO and this walk and their mission to keep men informed. ZERO gives a voice to something that no one wants to talk about. 

After my diagnosis I remember spending a lot of time on Google playing doctor 

——-and a lot of time with my doctor telling me to stay off of Google.

The problem with Google is that if you tell it you have a papercut? Google will have you wrapping a tourniquet around your finger and racing to the emergency room for a blood infusion.

And then there’s ZERO – a concise, informative mecca of information. 

If you haven’t visited in a while, you should. There’s information for those who have been newly diagnosed, caregivers – and survivors, like me.

Surviving is part of the battle, too – and I mean any cancer, not just prostate cancer.

Diagnosis and treatment is just part of the battle. 

After all that shit, you still gotta’ survive. And, I don’t mean just live – I mean you gotta sort out what the hell just happened to you, pick up the pieces, glue em’ all back together, and try and make something beautiful out of the mess it left behind.

When I was diagnosed years ago no one could tell me, honestly, if I’d be alright – and I don’t think I would have believed them anyway. 

I’m still working on it – but, yeah, I think I’ll be okay. 

But only because of the support I’ve had from

——-my family

My friends.

My doctors.

——-and organizations like ZERO.

Thank you.

If you want to read more about my prostate cancer journey I’ve posted ( and illustrated it ) here on DrawnAndCoded.

I can’t emphasize enough how I wouldn’t be here today without the love and support of so many people.

Thanks again.

Live live. Stay Healthy. And take care of yourselves out there.

-Scott

#prostatecancer #cancer #ucsd #oncology #prostatezero #zero

Sunset on Summer

The Rubber Band played for the neighbors’ of Chieftain Court at their Labor Day block party this weekend. We kicked it off with a set of songs from 60’s through early 2000’s. In a little over a month ( October 11th ) we’ll be playing at Rancho Beer-nardo for Oktoberfest, so it was good to get in some stage time.

John Hatcher, our bassist, mastered the audio, combined it with with video we captured using a GoPro, and posted it on our new Rubber Band YouTube Channel. Here is just a few of the videos….

And that’s all, folks! Thank you, as always, for your continued support. And….if you could subscribe to our YouTube channel, that’d be great …..m’kay.

Take care. 
Stay healthy. 
Live life.

– Scott

#therubberband #westwoodrubberband #dadband #labordayblockparty #coverband #90s #90sCoverBand

Rock Out, School’s Out!

The Rubber Band played at yet another block party on June 13th to celebrate the end of school and the start of summer break. We played for about an hour-and-a-half, running through about twenty songs.

Good photographs were few and far in-between this go around. I stole this one from a GoPro we clipped onto the speaker stand.

I think everyone had a good time. The only complaint was a lack of water bottles – but that’s what happens when six guys plan a party. Beer? Plenty. Water bottles? None.

My oldest daughter, Ashley, and I.

The band is going to take a much needed break for the next two weeks before hitting it hard for our upcoming gig at Rancho Bernardo’s upcoming Oktoberfest celebration, “Rancho Beer-nardo”.

Keep livin’ life,

-Scott

#therubberband #garageband #illustration #dadband #ranchobeernardo #ranchobernardo #westwood #drawnandcoded

Yummy

Pica, dog eating rocks
My dog, Chip, has developed a taste for rocks.

My dog, Chip, has developed a taste for rocks. This is addition to his eclectic taste for other household items including crayons, pens, Lego, and toothbrushes. Up until the rock everything had passed through with flying colors ( yes, even the toothbrush ). The rock cost more than I’d like to admit to extricate. Let’s just say I paid as much for his rock, as my wife’s.

While picking him up at the vet I was told there are many repeat offenders, one patient even consuming the same rock that was just extricated. For several months afterwards Jodie and I would only walk Chip with a “Hannibal Lecter”-esque muzzle on. This of course concerned other people we ran into while walking him.

“Wow… is your dog mean?!?”, I’d get asked.

“No, not mean”, I’d reply, “Just stupid.”

-Scott

#pica #mydogeatsrocks #pets #dogowners

The Coolest …

Happy Mother’s Day, Jodie “Of-the-North”

May is bookended on one side by Mother’s Day and on the other by my wife, Jodie’s, birthday. Throw in Memorial Day, busy kiddos, and a new job and I was surprised to get this comic done. Well, almost done – I’m posting it now ’cause I didn’t have time to color it when I gave it to her on Sunday!

The New Job

I guess it’s probably time to make an official announcement. Before I started working as an “Artist in Residence” at Rancho Bernardo High School (RBHS) I had applied for a Programmer Analyst position with Poway Unified School District – and was subsequently turned down. Well, about two months into assisting in art class I got a call from the district office to see if I was still interested in the programming position.

Honestly, I had to think about it. The art position I held was part-time, without benefits, and had very little chance of being renewed for the next school year. Compared to a full-time position with benefits at a much higher pay the decision should have been easy, but it wasn’t. The problem? I really liked teaching art and working with the kids. It was very fulfilling.

I ended up taking the programming position, but made it clear that long-term I’d want to be back in the classroom. My new supervisor seemed to be on board. She’s the executive director for Poway’s CTAAE Department, a mouthful of an acronym that translates to : “Career Technical Adult Alternative Education”. If you live in Poway and Rancho Bernardo and get the “Adult School” booklet in the mail, that’s one of the things my department does. My department is also in charge of CTE, or “Career Technical Education”, which spearheads a lot of the “alternate” classes that I used to like so much when I was in high school so long ago. My daughter, Ashley, for example, took a Computer Graphics course last semester at RBHS which was sponsored by CTE, and loved it!

It’s only been a few weeks, but I feel like I made a good decision. I like the work, the people are great, and for the first time in a long while I feel like I can make a difference. And who knows? Someday I might get to teach one of those CTE classes myself!

On a more personal note, I’ve yet to have the any of the anxiety attacks that used to plague me while working as an Application Development Manager at my last job. I’m beginning to realize just how unhealthy that place, and my manager, really were.

Take care. 
Stay healthy. 
Live life.

– Scott

#PowayUnifiedSchoolDistrict #PUSD #CTAAEPoweayUnified #CTAAE #CTEPowayUnified #CTE #Teaching #ArtistInResidence #ProgrammerAnalyst #MothersDay #Illustration

Back to the Sac’

A quick and dirty concert flyer, but everyone seemed to like it.

Back to the Sac’ …. well, that’s what I wanted to call The Rubber Band’s return to Alacran Court.

It’s a cul-de-sac. We’re returning. Can I be any more clear?

The guys, however, thought that there were some childish innuendos in the name. Needless to say I got vetoed and we decided to go with the more mundane “Block Party”, instead. March 30th will always be remembered as the “Back to the Sac’” show to me, though.

Here is the highlight reel.

Were we perfect? Far from it.

Did we have fun? Oh, yes.

Did the crowd have fun? Yes, all three of them did.

I’m just kidding.

There were at least four people listening.

Please follow us on Instagram at @the.westwood.rubber.band ( we need all the help we can get )

Take care. 
Stay healthy. 
Live life.

– Scott

#therubberband #dadband #blockparty #ninetiesrock

How’s the grass over there?

After 25 years of corporate software development I am trying something different.

I just received an email from Rancho Bernardo High School confirming that I am eligible to start work as a part-time assistant art teacher. The opportunity caught me by surprise and I owe a debt of gratitude to my friends and neighbors for recommending me for the role, and their ongoing encouragement. The position is only through June, but will hopefully give me a taste of the classroom.

I also volunteered for Encorps, a non-profit organization that helps STEM professionals get into the classroom and, eventually, credentialed. Over ten weeks I will volunteer as a computer science instructor in underprivileged schools once a week. 

Why am I doing this?

I want to teach, but I’d like to “test the waters” first. Originally, my plan was to substitute teach, but my applications went largely unnoticed. This way, however? It’s better. I get to teach kids what I love – Art and Programming – and see if the grass truly is greener on the other side of the fence, at least for me.

Holy Cr@p, Teenagers

Ashley takes after many women in my family. Like my Vavoa, however, it's all about finding the right approach. For my Vavoa it was See's Candy. For Ashley? Just give it time ;-)
Ashley takes after many women in my family. Like my Vavoa, however, it’s all about finding the right approach. For my Vavoa it was See’s Candy. For Ashley? Just give it time 😉

I now am the proud father of two …. teenagers. Ashley is now 15. Kaylee is now 13. Being a guy, it’s amusing to experience how the teenage years play out for my two girls. To all the girls I knew when I was a teenager, you had me completely fooled! I thought you had everything figured out the entire time I was tripping over my own hormones and treading water in an ocean of social awkwardness. Ha! I know better now! 

Anyhoo, I drew Ashley a comic on the eve of her 15th birthday. She’s notorious for being difficult to shop for. Her sister, Kaylee, however, is not. I hope I did a good job of conveying that in the comic.

Suno – A Generative AI Music Service

Will Work For AI Tokens
I strongly believe that Generative AI is going to dramatically change how music is created. I only hope it’ll be for the better.

If you haven’t tried out AI by now, you should. I’ll admit, I was scared of it first, but I am also finding it to be an amazing tool. 

Several months ago I used generative AI to help me create  some artwork for an application I developed. Since then I have started using ChatGTP to clean up correspondence and generate cover letters for my ongoing job search.

About a month ago my friend, Ben Good, introduced me to Suno, a generative AI music service. First, he showed me how he could provide Suno a “theme” ( i.e. “I want a happy summertime song about driving along the beach and enjoying the sun” ) and a “style” ( i.e., “American Folk” ) and it would generate a song complete with vocals and a backing track. Then, as a gag, he fed Suno lyrics – in this case a random wikipedia page – to show me that Suno could make a song out of just about any source material. You haven’t truly rocked out until you’ve rocked out to Wikipedia, by the way.

I was hooked ( Ben already was ). I bought a subscription and started feeding it some song lyrics that I had been working on. Low and behold! Suno generated a song. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a start. A huge start, honestly. Just hearing my lyrics sung to a backing track got my creative juices flowing. 

Since then Ben and I have discovered you can explicitly tell Suno through a prompt what exactly you want your song to sound like ( baritone, edgy, acoustic, heavy metal, twangy, emotional, simple melody, etc …) as well as specify the structure of the song ( verse, chorus, intro, solo, etc … ). The end result? Still not exactly what I was looking for – but close enough. 

Here’s the coolest part if you can play an instrument and have a decent voice ( cough, cough – me ). Suno also allows you to download what’s called “stem” files for any song it generates for you. One stem file is the vocals. The other stem file is the music track. Then, you can take the stem files, feed them into a transcription service, generate the sheet music for your song, and learn to play it. Of course, you can generate them by hand – I mean ear, too, it just takes a little longer. 

So what happens next? 

Well, it doesn’t take too much effort to see the music industry is fighting back. Their claim is that Suno has “trained” its AI model on existing songs. I know for a fact that I heard inklings of well-known artists’ voices in the songs that it generated for me. However, in my very humble opinion? The train has left the station and is roaring along at breakneck speed. I, personally, don’t think they can stop it.

As for me? It’s an enormous win. Suno is helping me create music – my music – music that might have never been heard, otherwise. And with the stem files? I plan on learning to play and sing it, too. Ben and I are currently collaborating on an album. I’ll post here soon about it!

Vandervort Realty has a website

Last, but certainly not least – I finally got around to launching a website for Jodie’s brokerage, Vandervort Realty! You can see it here. Jodie is still very much into the sales side, but has been expanding more and more into property management as well. If you have any questions regarding buying or selling a home, or if you need help with a rental, feel free to use the “Contact Us” page – mainly because I haven’t tested it yet. ( Just kidding, I have ).

That’s all for now! Thanks for reading, people, I hope to post again soon. In the meantime? Go create … and….

Take Care. Live Life.

-Scott

#Suno #RanchoBernardoHighSchool #ArtTeacher #HighSchoolTeacher #GenerativeAIMusic #GarageBand #MakeSomethingCool #Teenagers #TeenageGirls #DadOfTeens #MakingMusic #ChatGTP #Comics #Encorps #ProgrammingTeacher #Volunteer #VandervortRealty

Clean-ish

Clean-ish
An ode to my old mini-van, R.I.P.

The van was a mess
I must confess
It was time to give it a good cleaning

It had accumulated enough soot 
For plants to take root
Giving dirty a whole new level of meaning

( And that was just the outside )

I rolled open the door 
And gaped at the floor
It was completely covered in shit

As I held my nose 
And shoveled out moldy clothes
I found myself ready to snap

From the windows I scraped stickers
From the seats I plucked  “pickers”
Left over from last winters’ colds

I tossed out dirty spoons and utensils
And worn broken crayons and pencils
And Tupperware containers full of old food

The van now exorcised
I spun around in surprise
And found my daughters staring back at me in shock

There stood my girls
Trash bags unfurled
Filling the van back up with their crap

#familytruckster #badpoetry #comic #parentfail #adulting #drawnandcoded

This one time at band practice …

We’re the best band in a three block radius.

It has been almost three years since a jam session between Shawn Burgwald and I prompted the founding of the “Rubber Band”. I think we tried to play “Shook Me All Night Long” by AC/DC. Almost three years later and I’m still learning the damn solo. 

The band has changed a little. Shawn now primarily plays electric guitar rather than drums. Colin Young has taken up the drums in his place. Mike Jock, our original bassist, has decided to pursue other things. John Hatcher has replaced him on bass, and has introduced a banjo into some of our covers. Kenn Matthews maintains his role as lead vocalist. My brother, Todd Vandervort, and I bring up the rear on our respective guitar.

Aside from playing guitar I’ve started singing a little, too, lending backup vocals for Kenn as well as the occasional song. I joke with the guys that I have exactly two octaves to play with, but I’ll leverage them to the hilt if they’ll let me. The shower is now my studio and my family, the unfortunate audience. As for guitar, I find myself mostly playing acoustic. At band practice, surrounded by amplified electric guitars, it can be like bringing a knife to a gunfight, but I manage. 

I started writing songs, too. I’ve had a lot of fun garnishing my illustrations with poetry, so songwriting seemed like a natural progression. Time will tell if they ever see the light of day and the drums of ears ( other than mine ).

As far as the future of The Rubber Band? We’re trying to get out of the garage and start playing live more. It’s tough, though. We’re all Dads with families, jobs, and responsibilities vying for our attention. It’s hard enough to find time to practice alone, let alone as a group. But, we manage. And the good news? We’re getting better, too.

Maybe someday we’ll be the best band in a four block radius.

The Rubber Band and their merry group of band aids.

Take care. Stay healthy. Live life.

– Scott

#therubberband #garageband #music #guitar #musician #rock #beatmaker #drums #garagebandmusic #newmusic #beat #bass #cover #rockband #comic #illustration #drawnandcoded