Xuxa: "Tindolele"

One of the great things about raising a son in the 90s...

WATCHING XUXA!!!

2007 end-of-year list

...it was a very good year

In keeping with the raison d'atre of this blog, here is a questionnaire I filled out in January 28, 2008. It was one of those typical "how was your year?" lists that you sometimes see when a new year comes along. I was kind of goofy back then, but nevertheless this will be a valued treasure to me and mine 75 years down the road.


1) Was 2007 a good year for you?
Yeah, actually it was a pretty good year for the most part.

2) What was your favorite moment of the year?
Finding Aubrey on MySpace

3) What was your least favorite moment of the year?
I guess it was when the power went out for a couple of days last Monday...but I can't complain. We got lucky. There are still homes without electricity a week later.

4) Where were you when 2007 began?
Asleep in my bed...exactly where I wanted to be.

5) Who were you with?
Myself...my wife was up with my son watching that stupid ball drop.

6) Where will you be when 2007 ends?
Asleep in my bed.

7) Who will you be with when 2007 ends?
Myself...I imagine Stacie and Bryan will want to see that infernal ball drop again.

8) What did you do in 2007 that you'd never done before?
Played a show in a casino.

9) Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don't make New Year's resolutions. Why set yourself up for a fall?

10) Did anyone close to you give birth?
No. If any of 'em did they didn't want me to know about it.

11) Did anyone close to you die?
My wife's grandfather. He was a good guy.

12) Did you travel outside of the US in 2007?
Not only did I not travel out of the country, I didn't travel out of the state. Hell, I rarely ventured out of town.

13) How many different states did you travel to in 2007?
See above.

14) What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?
A monthly check.

15) What date(s) from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
October 31, and not because it was Halloween.

16) What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Teaching myself how to type.

17) What was your biggest failure?
Having to retire from performing music, although there were good reasons and I wouldn't exactly call it a "failure" but that's about as close as it came. I told you it was a pretty good year.

18) Did you suffer any illness or injury?
I dropped a bass amplifier on my big toe and it looked pretty bad for several months.

19) What was the best thing you bought?
I would say my copy of the Sigur Ros "Heima" DVD, but I didn't really buy it...my wife bought it for me as an early Christmas gift (thanks, dear).

20) Whose behavior merited celebration?
Docky Pecky

21) Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
The collective news media.

22) Where did most of your money go?
Down the drain.

23) What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The first message I recieved from Aubrey on MySpace.

24) What song will always remind you of 2007?
Any and every song from Sigur Ros' 3rd and 4th albums.

25) Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Happier.
ii. thinner or fatter? Maybe just a little thinner.
iii. richer or poorer? Poorer for the time being. Hopefully 2008's survey will have a different answer to this one.

26) What do you wish you'd done more of?
Getting out of the house, visiting friends.

27) What do you wish you'd done less of?
Screwing around on the internet.

28) How will you be spending Christmas?
Alone. Don't feel sorry for me. That's how I like it, although I suppose I would be glad to change that if the right situation presented itself, but I don't see that happening so I'll just rent a few DVDs or finish up a book. Ho ho ho.

29) Did you fall in love in 2007?
I fall in love every day of the week.

30) If yes, with who?
All that is beautiful to my eyes, my mind and my senses

31) If yes, do they know?
They haven't told me whether they do or not

32) Are you still in love with them?
I never fall out of love...it's just hard for most people to tell that I am capable of loving.

33) You regret it?
No

34) Did you breakup with anyone in 2007?
I deleted a few friends from my MySpace "friends list...does that count?

35) How many one-night stands?
None

36) How many people did you sleep with in 2007?
1

37) Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
No.

38) Did you make any new friends in 2007?
I met a few nice people this year but I wouldn't say they reached the level of "friend".

39) Who are your favorite new friends?
No new friends...only old ones.

40) What was your favorite month of 2007?
October

41) Did you miss anybody in the past year?
A couple of friends...Daniel, Warty

42) Did you do anything you are ashamed of this year?
I snapped at our keyboard player when he rightly suggested I remove the earplugs from my ears because they were affecting my performance, causing me to sing at too low a volume.

43) What was the worst lie someone told you in 2007?
I'm pretty gullible. If anyone lied to me I probably still think they were telling the truth.

44) Did you treat somebody badly in 2007?
I'm afraid so.

45) Did somebody treat you badly in 2007?
The manager of Dietrichs Club never gave our band weekend shows, just Wednesday and Thursdays. We got back at him, though, when one of his weekend bands cancelled. He called us at the last minute begging us to fill in. We told him to shove it. HA!

46) What was your proudest moment of 2007?
The point where I was able to type pretty fast without having to hit the backspace key very often.

47) What was your most embarrassing moment of 2007?
I'm sure there were a few but I have successfully managed to block them from my memory.

48) What was your greatest musical discovery?
I wasn't really out to "discover" new music this past year. I was more into re-visiting stuff I'd listened to most of my life. I guess you could say that I "discovered" Modern Jazz, though I've heard some of it over the years, but I was exposed to a lot more of it via XM Satellite radio. Same thing with Death Metal.

49) What did you want and get?
Another year of XM service.

50) What did you want and not get?
That monthly check.

51) What was your favorite new film of this year?
"Heima" and "Reign Over Me"

52) What was your favorite TV program?
All In the Family

53) What was your favorite record from 2007?
Mark Kozelek "Little Drummer Boy Live"


54) How many concerts did you see in 2007?
One. Bryan's Christman concert. It was the only one I wanted to see since Sigur Ros didn't play anywhere close.

55) Did you have a favorite concert in 2007?
See above.

56) Did you drink a lot of alcohol in 2007?
There are people I know who drink more alcohol in one night than I drank all year.

57) Did you do a lot of drugs in 2007?
Not as many as I did the year before. HA!

58) What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I think Stacie may have taken me out to eat. I can't remember where, though. I had reached the ripe old age of 45.

59) What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
I hate to admit it, and I'm sure this is the most popular answer to this question by a huge margin, but it's true: money.

60) How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2007?
Sloth chic.

61) What kept you sane?
The memory of what it's like to be insane and the fear of it ever happening again.

62) Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
You know, I can't think of a single one. I don't care much for the whole concept of "celebrity".

63) How much money did you spend in 2007?
Too much, not enough..

64) Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007:
Some, maybe even most, of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers, but every once in awhile He'll surprise you and give you your heart's desire.

65) What are your plans for 2008?
Move into a new house. Get some nice stuff for myself and my family. Read a few more Charles Dickens novels. Read more of the classics. Learn more about history and Western Civilization. Write a lot of junk on my blog, maybe learn some new HTML tricks. Try to write a few more songs that I'm not emberassed to play for friends. Continue to improve my typing skills to the point where I can type faster than my wife. Listen to lots more music. Get out of the house more.

66) Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
"I don't give a damn what anybody thinks...what do you think about that?"

Recovering My Memories: jazz and the big jump

When I was a sophomore or a junior in high school (can’t remember which) I attended the Stan Kenton Jazz Clinic during the summer. It was a 5 day camp that took place at the University of Texas in San Antonio. They put you up in the dormitory and during the day you would go to classes that were taught by people associated with jazz legend Stan Kenton’s big band. His band members, his arrangers, people like that. You’d be assigned to one of several bands according to how well you did at an audition, then the best band got to open for Kenton’s band in a concert that took place on the last night. I’m not sure if Kenton himself was there or not. He was pretty old by then, but I had seen him play a show not too long before this, so there’s a good chance that he was, in fact, present.

Which is all fine and good. Loads of fun already. But the real good times took place in the late afternoon and evening when all the “educating” was done. It’s not hard to strike up a conversation and/or a “temporary friendship” with members of the opposite sex when you share a common interest in jazz music and you both play a musical instrument (extra points for actually playing the SAME instrument). So that was great but, even so, it’s not what I remember most vividly about the week.

A belly-buster just waitin' to happen

The college had an Olympic size swimming pool, complete with diving platforms and the works. I don’t know how many of you have seen the diving boards used in the Olympic games, but they are TALL. There are two of them, and the highest is so tall that only the university’s swim team was allowed to use it. Not meaning to say that the one in the middle didn’t look intimidating…it’s just that it wasn’t quite as ominous, being about halfway between the ground and the top board.

Oh, it did look intimidating, and perhaps that’s why I thought it would be a cool experience to jump from it. The key word being “jump”, because I was no diver. After all, I always had a great time jumping off of the “high board” at the Municipal swimming pool in my hometown. So what if the platform was two and a half times higher than the board at the pool?

So I climb up the steps. If memory serves there were actual steps, not a ladder, as I was accustomed to. That was probably something that emboldened me. I never would have climbed the rungs of a ladder to get up there. But stair steps was another story.

I got up there and looked over the edge…at which point I had to ask myself, “What the hell have I done?” What was I thinking? I knew I had a fear of heights. I guess the idea of water below made me temporarily forget. But it all came flooding back when I judged the distance between where I was and where I would land. I don’t think I was even afraid of hitting the water the wrong way and getting hurt, though I’m sure that crossed my mind as well. This was an irrational fear, I understood that, but I wasn’t able to process the “irrational” part.

I decided I couldn’t go through with it. No way. It didn’t take too long to reach that decision. I turned around and headed back for the steps, letting other, braver souls pass by. But when I looked below to take that first step I saw something that made my heart sink…

The steps were drenched with water from the wet feet of divers returning for another jump. So wet that they glistened in the sun. They looked so slippery that I doubted a ladder would have been any easier for me to climb down. You see, I don’t really have too much of a problem with climbing up…it’s the going down that scares me. And I was scared, I tell you. Terrified at the prospect of slipping and falling to the concrete. Plus, there were other swimmers climbing up, as if they were determined to use this particular platform since the higher one was off limits. Squeezing by them not only increased the danger level, it would also make me look like a yellow-bellied chicken.

So the choice was cut-and-dried. Either walk down the slippery steps or jump into the water. If ever I was between a rock and a hard place, this was the time. Another glance over the edge into the water and I made my decision. It all came down to this: water or concrete. Which would cause the most damage? Hypothetically, of course. And I decided, taking into consideration the distance between myself and the water/concrete, that I would have to grit my teeth and take the plunge.

So that’s what I did. I did everything in my power to remain in an upright position so the jump wouldn’t turn into what my friends and I used to call “a belly buster”. I’m sure, from this height, a “belly buster” could have easily become a “head buster” or a “back buster”. At any rate, I did all I could to avoid a “buster” of any sort. I’d have hated for my parents to have to drive all the way down from Oklahoma to San Antonio, Texas, to visit me in the hospital.

As it turned out I was very lucky…and “luck” is all it was. I went into the deep end without a hitch, re-surfaced, looked up at the diving board and thanked the gods that I was okay. No fatal “busters” this time around. I thought, “What the hell was I thinking???”

I wish I could remember whether or not I wanted to do it again after it was all over. Looking back at the experience now I would say probably not. Surely not. What kind of a fool would put himself through that again, even if the successful attempt had emboldened him? Surely I didn’t think that my fear of heights had been conquered by this one occasion?

But then again, I don’t know. There’s every chance in the world that the only reason I didn’t give a repeat performance was prevented by a lifeguard insistently pointing out that the boards were for DIVING, not for JUMPING.

"The Record Rack with Moondog Johnson" skit

Moondog Johnson

The year was 1984...or then again, it may well have been 1985. I get them confused. Either way, they were better times. Within a year of when I joined the Navy and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Looking back at this video I can spot the symptoms even then. I held them in check, though, and very well. I just thought of myself as being creative. Recording funny little skits like this on a borrowed video camera were nothing more than killing time on a bored weekend afternoon when the wife was gone to work. It wasn't until many, many years later that the condition became a real problem, so I don't think of these gems as a manifestation of a manic swing. Just something to laugh at and wish I was young enough to do again.

The thing I like the most about the video is my hair. Really! I wish I could get it to grow that long and wild today, I definitely would. The idea behind the gag was to have a very unkempt stoner review record albums on a show called "The Record Rack". Having never been high before that period of time I'd say I pulled it off with a good degree of authenticity. The character, known as "Moondog Johnson", winds up reviewing nothing but Grateful Dead albums, almost the entire catalog at the time. And of course he gives them all "10"s on a scale of 1 to 10 (double records get a "20 on a scale of 1 to 10 because it's double album", and three-fer "Europe 72" actually gets a "30 on a scale of 1 to 10"). He offers commentary, always praising the band, and has a spastic attack whenever he comes to a record that contains the song "Truckin'" (the joke was that there were SO many of their albums that featured that song...it's probably my least favorite Dead song).

Anyway, I won't say anything more about it so you can watch with at least a couple of surprises left. Be prepared for some goofy nonsense...

ties that bind

Adolescence is equally cruel to both parent and child. At least I should say it has been in my case. So it may well be, at least my son and I have one thing in common:

some facebook status updates...

A few of my facebook status updates that I wanted to save from the infinity of the timeline.

~~~My guru just stepped off his high horse, broke a spoke in the Karmic wheel, fell back down to earth and was forced to admit that the only reason he ever wanted to be a guru in the first place was because he craved the attention of the girls who used to hang out at the old Starwind bookstore. Since then he has replaced his enlightenment bulb with the more economical halogen model and downgraded from 100 watts to only 40...a process he admits "seemed more reasonable" and will "likely save a lot of mammon in the long run." Gotta love a guru.

~~~Within the next 3-5 hours all the grass and weeds in my lawn will be mercilessly slashed to the ground. My weapon is powerful and filled with fuel. It could easily sever a man's arm so it will have absolutely zero problem with puny green grass no matter how tall it has been allowed to grow. Pesky dandelions haven't a chance against it's steely blade. I will lay low in one hour what nature has been given 2 weeks to nurture. And I will do it before the neighbor mows his with his puny, sputtering, exhaust-coughing machine. For the second time in a row I will school him as to where the property boundaries are on this lot. He may not cry, but he will curse me for the extra strip of lawn he'll be required to mow.

~~~So now I know how to use a toilet auger...

~~~The guy on E Street Radio just said that the odds of Bruce Springsteen putting on a bad show are about the same as walking into a synagogue and being offered a ham sandwich. HAHAHA!!!

~~~Q: Is it socially acceptable for a pastor to use a downloaded version of the Bible on his iPad in services, evangelism, etc.?
A: Tablets have been an approved method of conveying God's word since he gave two of them to Moses.

~~~Acch! My crime was caught on tape.

~~~Anyone out there who still doesn't believe in demons should have been here last night when all my books perished as the result of spontaneous combustion brought on by the rage of a poltergeist who disagreed with me concerning the literary merit of Stephen King's "Under the Dome" as published in the Kindle format.

~~~Another successful Wal-mart run. From aisle-blocking family reunion gab-fests to a performance by the Three Stooges, it was everything I've come to expect from our bi-weekly shopping jaunts. All that plus a bag of hot dog buns on the floor.

~~~I will be boycotting Halloween this year. Basically because my son is too old to go out on a candy run for me. He's got the Darth Vadar costume which would sufficiently cover up any facial hair and other indications of adolescence, but his height is a problem. Moreover any candies he might haul in would be offset by the cost required to purchase his participation in the scheme. I could buy out the entire inventory of Candyopolis for that kind of cash. Soo poo-poo on Halloween.

Recovering My Memories: Snookie

Here's a picture of me and our dog Snookie from the early 70s. Probably 74 or 75, but I can't really tell.

I don't have any idea what kind of dog she was. Mixed breed to say the least. Probably a mix or two of three or four  mixed breeds. She was considered to be my brother's dog, as I had a chihuahua. My parents had heard from somewhere or another that chihuahuas were therapeutic to people who had asthma, so they got me one. I don't know if there's any merit to that or if they'd just been duped. I didn't even realize I had asthma, for that matter. But she was a good dog and so was Snookie.

The most unique thing about Snookie was that she was rarely at home.  We lived across the street from a wooded area, pastureland for a bunch of donkeys. Snooky would go over there and wouldn't come back for days. I'm guessing she killed her own food, as she did seem to have a bit of a wild streak about her. She'd do that for a few days then next thing you know she would turn up on the front porch and stay for awhile. I don't remember ever feeding her dog food or leaving water for her. I don't guess it mattered because she always stayed nice and fat (relative to how she would have been if she weren't being fed).

There was this one time when me and my brother had a fool notion to collect a bunch of glass bottles and take them to the storm drain (?) in the road and break them all against the concrete inside. That storm drain was kind of like a hide-out for us. We played down in it all the time. We'd broken a bottle on the wall a time or two, but never had we gone all out and smashed a lot of them at once.

So we hauled all the bottles in a box down into the storm drain and let her rip. We got a kick out of the sound of breaking glass and the echo in the hollow drain. Before we're even finished, here comes Snookie, probably looking to see what all the commotion was about. She runs through the place, all through the broken glass. I don't remember, most likely don't want to remember, how bad she got cut up but I felt awful about it. Remarkably she healed up very quickly and next thing you know she's back out on the hunt.

I recall the day she died, I looked out of the back window onto the driveway and saw her lying on the concrete. I thought she was sleeping. Her head was turned away from me. I'm pretty sure this was in 1977,  maybe 78. I called out to her a few times and when she didn't move I knew she was gone. My memory is very fuzzy at this point. So much so that I only now seem to remember walking out just far enough to see a small trail of blood coming from the region of her head. I remember it now, because I'm almost positive that I didn't get far enough to see her face. It was the blood that made me realize she was dead. I got on the phone and called my dad and he came and took care of the body, which he buried in a spot next to a shack he'd built in the backyard (it's where my chihuahua wound up, as well as my own family's pet Pomeranian several years later). It shook my dad up quite a bit, but then he had been through hell the last couple of years before so it was just one more thing to deal with.

Recovering My Memories: the 1st computer

"Memories, like the shadows of your mind...misty water colored memories of the way we were." Is that how it goes? I may have forgotten. No, I've PROBABLY forgotten. You see, my memory isn't the most reliable function of my psychology. I'm not sure if it's always been that way or if it's a situation brought on by years and years of living in a subculture that was indifferent to the potential effects of it's central activity (</discretionary code>).

That subculture helped forge a sense of identity for me, even as it stole the memories it helped make. And so I know full well that I had a lot of good experiences, many good times, but most are still stuck in the moment in which they occurred. Where they will likely remain until the day I die. Then again I guess the trade off being all the bad "trips" that I'm spared remembering by the same process of brain cell annihilation.

Then comes the real horror...the possibility that I could develop Alzheimer's. I don't know if the killing of so many brain cells in the past makes more susceptible to Alzheimer's in the future. It's a sobering thought and definitely a good reason to repent of all those wasted years. I used to say, "well, the experiences I've had with the help of this drug are worth just about anything that might come about as a result of it"...which was a stupid mindset. The only thing more stupid was the fact that I made myself believe it. I was only trying to convince myself that I had nothing to fear and it would all be worth it in the long run. Things would even out, the good times and the bad, the risks and the rewards. All the while I knew better, but denial is an easy friend to keep.

But I didn't come here to bemoan my fate or express my fears of memory damage...or I should say continual worsening of memory damage that I hope does not lead to Alzheimer's. I don't think I could handle that. No, I wanted to start a series of posts that describe some of the memories I have left (not saying that the reservoir is close to empty, just that it should probably be more full). I like to think I'm a typical human being and that it's perfectly normal that I wouldn't have really BIG events to write about in posts like these. Most, if not all, will be just little things that come to mind, and that's really what I'm wanting to record here. The seemingly insignificant details that are likely the next memories to join the flock that have flown. I realize that writing such "trivial" moments could well come off as being narcissistic, but I don't guess I care. It's a blog and open to everyone, true, but really, I'm not under any false illusions that I've got some huge audience of readers out there who follow my every word. A couple of friends who check in when they can, and that's more than I would ask for. When I shut down my last blog I was hoping that this one would have a much more "personal" flavor to it. That's what I've been shooting for. Now I'm ready (at least I THINK I'm ready) to move it into even more personal territory and the truth of the matter is that this will take on the aspect, in part if not whole, of a chronicle, sort of an autobiography, something I can look back on in 10 or 20 years and say "Aha! I forgot all about that!" I do that sometimes with the old Listening Room, but there's so much content there that has nothing to do with me. Here I'm going to post stuff that I'm going to be interested in several years down the road. Jeez, I guess I should be writing all this as a "statement of purpose" page. I'll make a note of it.

For now, though, I'll start the ball rolling with recollections of our first computer.

A very young Bryan with a very old Compaq

We bought our first computer in 1999. I remember, because it was the year my father passed away and we were living in a run down hovel of a house. I became so obsessed with it that I would set it up in the kitchen of that tiny house so I could screw around online all night long without disturbing the wife and son. I was fascinated. More than once I stayed up all night long and well into the morning waiting for those websites to load snail-slow with a 56k connection.

It was a piece of junk Compaq PC with Windows 97. Oh, I shouldn't call it that. From the vantage point of today, sitting here typing on a decent laptop, it doesn't look like much (then again, though I DID use the word "decent" to describe this laptop, I would also designate it as every bit a piece of junk as the Compaq in several key areas). It was more than enough for me, as my knowledge of computers was EXTREMELY limited. Like expecting a 9 year old to read and understand "War and Peace". So it was, but at that level all I really needed to know was how to click on the Internet Explorer icon.

I spent considerable time on the Rolling Stone website at first. I'd read about it in the magazine. Had no idea about how to use the message boards. I remember writing a post on the Flaming Lips page. Probably some boasting that they were from Oklahoma...ah, I remember...I DID brag. I told of how they used to play acoustic shows at Shadowplay Records in Norman. I'm sure I made a point to mention that I knew the owner of the store quite well. I also posted on the R.E.M. page pining for the good old days when their music was good, complaining about the direction they'd taken. I got a couple of responses from that one. No surprise that they were both in disagreement, what do you expect from people who hang out on the R.E.M. page? Anyhoo, I soon bored of posting on band's pages.

I noticed that a lot of the conversations on the band boards were off topic (probably obvious, but not to this novice). I did engage in some of these discussions and became "friends" with a few regulars. Also found myself plagued with a few enemies whose only purpose for being there was to incite flame wars (Lysergic Aaron, Plokoon, these were a couple of the more incendiary).

It was 2000 by this time and I was a little (reiterate LITTLE) more familiar with the Internet. One night, likely coasting on a manic swing, I had an idea. Why not create a message board that was for NOTHING BUT "off topic conversation"? It would bring together posters from different boards and they wouldn't have to worry about discussing the bands from whose pages they came. Once again I stayed up all night putting the thing together. It wasn't just an R.S.V.P. affair. I set it up like it was a club and called it JACkory's Insect Lounge (JACkory was my user name and "Insect Lounge" was in tribute to a radio program of the same name that used to play underground music on the radio station at CSU back in the early 80s). We joked about being a gang that would protect the place and fight off unwelcome visitors. Somehow or other a "Clockwork Orange" vibe came into play and we began calling ourselves "droogs".

The board became very popular and was a staple in the RS community until the message boards were shut down (there are still people who believe that the demise of those original message boards can be traced back to the influence of the Insect Lounge...who knows, maybe it did). It inspired several "copy-cat" boards, as many of the Lounge's regulars decided they wanted their own version. Some were very good (JLLM's Beatnik Cafe), some not quite as much (Clicker's Cave). My board stayed fairly active through it all, even if there were some who defected. That was to be expected, what with the divisive nature of the new boards. A lot of people came around just to watch flame wars that I somehow got into. Immature, I know. Ridiculous for someone in his late 30s (God, I'm embarrassed to have to admit that). But I had fun.

I'll talk more about the Lounge at a later date. We were reminiscing about the first computer, remember?

I'd read about Live 365, probably in the same issue of Rolling Stone where I learned of their website. Live 365 seemed like a godsend. It may well have been. I wouldn't know because I couldn't get it to work. Really pissed me off. It wasn't too long afterwards that I realized that the reason it wouldn't work for me was because I had nothing but a dial-up connection. Then again, I was so computer illiterate that I paid something like thirty bucks for a "premium" version of Real Player, thinking I could listen to music with it. Ha. What a waste of money. 56k, oh how I miss you. I learned patience from you but you were a cruel teacher.

The one site I hung out during the very first days and weeks after buying the computer was called "the Party House". "Welcome to the Party House!" was the header. It was nothing more than a fancy chat room. You logged in and started in the front room. You could chat with the whole room or you could have a private conversation. Or you could go into another section of the Party House, maybe the bedroom or the kitchen, whatever, and there were people to chat with there. Inane chat. Typical chat. Mindless chat. I always figured it was a place where people hooked up for cyber-sex. Wait, did I sound like I didn't know this for sure? Sorry. It WAS a place where people hooked up for cyber-sex. Cyber-sex, my God, how much more pathetic does it get?

Believe it or not, it was my sister-in-law who brought the Party House into our lives. She had bought a computer a few months before we did. When my wife was visiting her she would go to the Party House and they would laugh and joke about it. It wasn't long before we got our machine that she showed the site to me. I'm not proud of the time I wasted chatting on the Party House website, but in my defense I would insist that I didn't know any better, such a noobie in cyberspace.

I'm not sure if the Party House is still around. I seem to remember looking it up out of curiosity some time back. I think it might have still been there, but it had changed considerably. (I just googled it...if it still exists it is NOT on the first page and I'm not gonna bother looking any further).

A few years later we gave the Compaq to our son and bought a Dell. It was a much better computer, even if it was another PC (XP OS this time). Not much later I had the opportunity to buy another  one and by then I really wanted a laptop. I got a VAIO with Vista Premium. People generally tend to hate Vista, but I kind of liked it. I can't really complain about it, other than it seemed like the keys were a little more difficult to press than should have been and there was a sharp ridge where my wrists hung off of. That kind of hurt.

A LONG story surrounds what happened to that VAIO and I'll definitely have to put that off until later. Suffice to say that I replace it with a HP Pavilion dv6. Also suffice to say that I'm NOT satisfied with it. It gets by, and that's about it. I wish I had a Macintosh, but I am not a rich man. I can't even afford to dump this one and buy a decent PC.

It's better than the Compaq, though. Which is great, but then again the novelty of the Internet has been worn out for a long time. Seriously, the only things I ever do on the computer anymore is check out facebook, listen to Spotify, check my e-mail and every once in awhile, when the mood strikes and the wrists aren't too sore, write a little something for this blog. I guess there are times when I'll do something else, but they get rarer and rarer every day. I used to love Stumbling, now I could really care less. So much Internet culture is worthless. The Internet itself is full of junk and misinformation, the comments and opinions of people who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about. So much hate abounds.

Ah, but my "Starred" favorites list on Spotify is a thing of beauty. 1381 tracks. Over 4 days worth of music. If for that alone I will not abandon the Internet.

King Tongue: "Waiting for the Rain"

It's time to share another video from the archives...this is King Tongue performing an original composition entitled "Waiting for the Rain". Actually we wrote it around the same time Head were breaking up but it's the same song. Recorded in 2000 at Charlie's Fire Lake steak house in Tecumseh, Oklahoma, the "event" was a wedding reception which hopefully explains the presence of small children walking to and from the "stage". They seem to really enjoy the music. Probably more than the adults there did. From left to right, that's me playing bass guitar and singing, Charles Casey in the middle banging on the drums, and Gregg Dobbs on the end doing that thing he does with the guitar.

"Waiting for the Rain" © 2012 by James Arthur Casey. All rights reserved.

Modern country music in the ring

Notice he wasn't wearin' black back when this picture was taken

Yeah, Johnny! That's the way I feel about what passes for country these days. Most of it. If only you were still around to provide a little perspective.

But since that's not looking like it's going to happen anytime soon, I've got another idea:  MMA cage matches between modern country music stars.

Eric Church vs. Keith Urban, that would be a wager easily won.

Montgomery Gentry vs. Rascal Flatts: three men down, two riding Harleys to the honky tonk.

Trace Adkins vs. Toby Keith, since guns aren't allowed in the ring you would be smart to put your money on Adkins because, face it, he is one big, tall mother lover. He's survived a gunshot wound to the abdomen, in case you didn't know, so it's obvious who has the advantage in this match.

Tim McGraw vs. George Strait, well, it's bad enough that Tim buys his cowboy hats at Big Lots or that George is probably at least 20 years older, the fact of the matter is that George Strait is the king. One pop to the noggin and McGraw will learn a whole 'nother meaning to "Live Like You Were Dying".

We could do a special "C&W Veterans Match" and pair up George Jones and Merle Haggard. They're both past their fighting years, you have to cut them some slack. George has overcome a lot of obstacles. He's beat alcoholism, he's beat cocaine abuse and he even beat a couple of his wives (not verified). A formidable opponent. But on the other hand Merle Haggard just got out of the hospital having whipped pneumonia or some other potentially deadly malaise, so that SOB is TOUGH! And obviously he's still at the top of his game, so I have to lay my wages at the feet of the "workin' man". Sorry, Possum.

Zac Brown vs. Scott McCreery: surprisingly enough I think Scotty would win, simply because I don't see Zac as the kind of man who would strike a kid. Not just out of respect for the "right thing to do" but even more out of respect for the law. He's obviously a tough guy, but I doubt he wants to find out just HOW tough behind prison walls.

Sugarland vs. Lady Antebellum...I think that one will be a tie. The Antebellums certainly outnumber the Lands three-to-two but once that Sugarland dude gets his wacky signature hat knocked off he will be pissed to the gills and a force to be reckoned with. He could very well, in such a state of righteous anger, pull down a good 2/3s of the Ladys, but that one guy with the tattoo might be able to fend him off for a few minutes at least.

Taylor Swift vs. Martina McBride...Reba McEntire vs. Sara Owens...Rodney Akins vs. Dierks Bentley...Brad Paisley vs. Alan Jackson...Billy Currington vs. Big & Rich...What a great bill! The mat will be spattered with blood and Tennessee whiskey when the last cowboy has gone home. A lot of superstars will leave the arena on stretchers and even more will require extensive first aid from qualified paramedics. And I don't mean band-aids and alcohol. I'm talking about stitches, splints, neck braces, IVs, the works. Some will never make another country music video for the rest of their lives. Many will take the stage with a limp from now on. As for the winners? A chance to pray for Keith Urban's recovery. Membership in a tiny, exclusive, elite club of people who have prayed for Keith Urban's recovery. New-found respect from fans who won a lot of money betting on them. Another chance to write the perfect country song, somehow incorporating their victory into the mix with momma, trains & getting drunk. Respect. Winner take all. Until the casino hosts another C&W cage fight extravaganza.

And when the bell has rang for the last match of the last C&W MMA cage fight in history, there will be only one man left standing. He'll have knocked the hat off Tim McGraw's balding head. He'll have bought Josh Turner a ticket for that long, black train and stood at the station to make sure he got on. He'll have put Hootie back in the Blowfish. He'll have put Kenny Chesney in a Jimmy Buffet tribute band and made sure he never played in Nashville again. He'll hide Willie Nelson's weed and laugh to watch him frantically searching for it. Cruel. He'll have made Blake Shelton scream so hard, so loud and so long that he will forever lose his voice. And he'll keep kicking ass until he's 100 years old, when he'll retire and go back to roping cows on the range. "I was a young troubadour when I rode in on a song," he sings, words were never spoken as true as they, "I'll be an old troubadour when I'm gone." That'll be a long time to come. Until then, watch and be amazed as GEORGE STRAIT wreaks havoc on the state of country music in these times.

"Gravedigger" - Dave Matthews Band/Willie Nelson

Okay, folks, the time has come for pondering our mortality. And what better way to do it but through the all-inclusive medium of music video, right? The genre well known for tackling the really "heavy" topics. From R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion" (spiritual uncertainty), Tears For Fears' "Shout" (Janovian Primal Scream Therapy"), Pearl Jam's "Jeremy" (bullying & suicide), Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" (national indifference) and Poison's "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" (botanical certainties), these 3-4 minute gems are the perfect vehicle for dispensing deep philosophical & philosophical ideals into the minds of the attention-span-challenged Joe Public.

Death. It looms large and is frightening in it's ability to loom larger and even larger with each passing day. It is pervasive. Duh! We take it for granted. Duh! But seriously, it does seem like we subconsciously marginalize it, perhaps in an effort to cope with the magnitude of fear and uncertainty that is a common denominator of all mankind...let me be clear, I understand that many people have found ways to conquer what I would consider the "fear" of death. I'm sure they would feel insulted by my suggesting that we all, alike, are terrified by it. Still, I have not met a man yet who could tell me that he wasn't afraid of death in his final moment. 

But back to what I was saying. We marginalize it. We trivialize it. We compartmentalize it. Anything we can do to not have to face it's reality. Our language is filled with metaphors & colloquialisms that reduce it to an impotent word in a throwaway phrase: "Dude, I'm gonna KILL you!" "I love you to death." "Meryl, that dress is TO DIE FOR!" "Dead ahead". "I'm just DYING to meet you!" "I listened to Rush Limbaugh's show yesterday and there must have been at least ten minutes of DEAD AIR during the commercial breaks," "Urgh! Your breath smells like death!" "Jimbo, you're so funny! You SLAY me!" "You gotta love Jerry Lee Lewis! He's 'The Killer'!" "I just died in your arms tonight." "Dead heat". "What a great performance, Mr. Cobain! You KILLED it!" "Turn me on, dead man." 

We watch movies that depict death and dying in the most realistic manner and it doesn't affect us one bit. I'm not talking about the "Saving Private Ryan"s or the "Schindler's List"s. I mean "Dawn of the Dead". "Day of the Dead". Night of the Living Dead". "The Evil Dead". "Dead and Buried". "Diary of the Dead". "Braindead". "House or the Dead". "Zombie Strippers". "All You Need is Brains". "Bloodsucking Nazi Zombies"....in fact, the pervasiveness of Zombies is so prevalent in this day and age that I could write a whole 'nother article about it ("All You Zombies" by the Hooters, "Zombie" by the Cranberries and/or Fela Kuti, whichever way your taste lies, the television series "The Walking Dead"...the possibilities are endless).

Nevertheless there are times we are forced to take it seriously. An attentive viewing of Bergman's "The Seventh Seal" is a sobering experience. How can you listen to "Love Will Tear Us Apart", knowing that the composer killed himself, without being just a little bit spooked? You watch "The Crow" and you can't help but find yourself super-attentive to the scene where Brandon Lee gets killed, and it actually disappoints you to learn that the actual killing was cut out of the film. As a child you are fascinated and repulsed by the "Faces of Death" video, watching it becomes a reluctant rite of passage. You may even feel cheated when you find out, as you get older, that the vast majority of stuff in that film is staged, faked, bogus. 

You wonder...even as we minimalize it, even as we fear it, we are compelled to "look it in the eye". To perhaps place our own individual existences within the context of the Greater Reality.

At any rate, the two videos I wish to share are about as somber a rumination on the Grim Reaper's handiwork as any I've ever seen. The first one is by the Dave Matthews Band, an original song called "Gravedigger". Though I'm not much of a DMB fan, I will confess to liking this song. It is a relentless comment on death's indifference. It claims the guilty and the innocent alike. It could care less about justice.

The second one is Willie Nelson's cover of the same song. Where Matthews version was frightening, Nelson's is creepy and spooky. All the more so since much of it takes place at "his" gravesite. Willie almost seems to be taunting his fate with quirky facial expressions that verge upon the bizarre. He sings the song very well, with his typical warbling voice. This is another aspect that sets it apart from the Matthews original, which has quite the defiant tone to it. Willie's, on the other hand, is one of acceptance and certainty. 

Decide for yourself which is the better of the two. You don't have to watch them in order.

food food food good lord how i love food

I usually don't attend "family functions", but today was my wife's grandmother's 90th birthday so I decided to make a surprise appearance. The venue for the celebration was Sirloin Stockade, home of one of the finest buffets I have eaten at...better than Golden Corral, that's for sure. I overdid it, as I knew I would. Decided to post what I ate so that someday I can look back and say, "Good God, how could you eat that much food???"

1st Trip:
Salad: iceberg lettuce, blue cheese dressing, shredded Parmesan cheese, cheddar cheese, red onions, jalapeno peppers, bacon bits (real, not the fake Bake-Os kind), green pepper, cottage cheese

2nd Trip:
Pulled barbecue beef, baked beans, steamed carrots, french fries, dinner roll

3rd Trip:
Taco salad: tortilla chips, seasoned ground beef (a LOT of it), beans, lettuce, taco sauce, melted cheese, just a few chopped red onions, sour cream

Ah, it doesn't really seem like all that much now that I read it back. But I was still eating a long time after everyone else had finished. I'm a slow eater, but the sheer amount of food took a long time to devour.

To top it off, whenever I eat at buffets like this I always make myself an ice cream cone to eat on the way out. I'm really good at making them. The ice cream sticks up, like, 6 or 7 inches out of the cone. So high that I fear it will fall over, but it usually doesn't.

It's been about 8 hours now since I enjoyed this fine repast. I can't say I'm very hungry at the moment, but I may eat a few chips with salsa later. The local store is having a sale and Red Gold salsa is marked down something like $1.30, selling for only 99 cents. I bought my first jar of Red Gold a couple of months ago and it's very good. The hot variety is definitely not false advertising. Hot hot hot! I like hot stuff, but I can't handle it. So we get medium. You have to eat quite a bit of medium before your tongue will start to burn, but burn it will. The wife picked up 3 jars when she first saw it on sale and I went back a couple of days later for 5 more.

I better lay down and rest for awhile...

Underworld - Push Upstairs

It's that time again!

It's time for a few more pictures of the dog! 'Nuff said!

SIREENO KIN!!!

"View from a Keyhole"

I really do think this is one of my best poems. You are invited to compare it with a good chunk of the rest at Bipolar Confessional.

"View from a Keyhole"


I see you hiding beneath
Old shirts and memories
Dirty jeans and worn-out shoes
That have walked a saddening mile
Weakest armour of cloth
Ripped and torn by cruel adolescence
Cursed with hate or blessed with indifference
I see you in there


Surrounded by toys
Some broken, unneeded
I see you and I know that you want to play with them
But time seems to have withdrawn permission
Or maybe you're frightened
Of how happy they once made you
Reluctantly believing they will never again make you smile or laugh
For they have become little more than fodder for the garbage heap
You find yourself beneath


On the other side of the locked door
I bend to peek through the keyhole
Expecting no more than shadows on the wall
But I see you


I've watched you walk in...
(you didn't know I was there...sorry)
...and it broke my heart
To see how swiftly you ran to the door
To behold the look of relief on your face
That broke up and melted the death mask of grief
Saved by grace
When you stepped in and turned the lock
A beaten veteran getting off a plane, whose salvation is the tarmac beneath him
You kiss the dirty carpet and call this place "home"


"How can a man be born when he is old?
can he enter the second time
into his mother's womb, and be born?"
Behind a locked door
You found the answer
Discerning flesh from flesh and spirit from Spirit
From the crowded confines of  your mother's womb


I wanted so badly to see the look on your face when you emerged
Refreshed and ready to battle demons
Or downcast, crestfallen for another day
It would have been worth the waiting hours to bear witness
To the power of this basement haven
Alas, sleep was not as curious
I could not risk your discovering me
Where I was not meant to be
Fallen from my hands and knees
Best to settle for forbidden glimpses through a keyhole
Best you didn't know I'd stolen a tiny part of your soul


I see you there, hiding from the light
Books on shelves half read or dog-eared to the very ends
A hardback Bible, the binding cracked, it's pages would spill out on the floor if not for your curiosity
66 books held tightly in your grasp to hold them together
In order
Camus, King...Baldwin, Irving...tattered paperback
Koran, Augustine...Srimad Bhagavatam, L. Ron Hubbard...sturdy hardback, spines still cracking
Barnes &amp; Noble books unnaturally pinched between mold smelling garage sale bargains and bulky Salvation Army bookends (Webster's Dictionary, Complete Works of Shakespeare, Bullfinch's Mythology, Asimov's Chronology of Science &amp; Technology...anything thick and sturdy enough to squeeze in a row of lesser volumes)
I see all those books but I don't see you reading them
Still, I don't wonder why they are there


I only wonder of you
Why you lie like a skeleton
Beneath piles of junk


I only wonder how
You find comfort there
And not in the arms of the ones who love you

Music service merry-go-round

Much has happened on the subscription music service front. Many times I have thought about writing about it. Many more times I have decided against it because I just haven't been in the mood to write much of anything. Well, that's only partly true. A few times I started something and gave it up a couple of paragraphs in because it was so lame. Or I should say it was lamer than the norm I've established on this blog....

Okay, that's not fair. I think I write halfway decent for a personal blog that will be viewed by very, very few people. It was never meant to be about quality writing, anyway. Nevertheless, the subscription music service situation since I last posted has been interesting (at least to me) and something I am up for writing about.

(Actually I have written two or three scraps of poetry that I don't think are too bad. They can be found at Bipolar Confessional, a clearinghouse for all of my poetic inspiration.)

So, when last we met I had cancelled my SiriusXM Satellite Radio, a service which had served me fairly well during the last 8 years. I did it to save $5 a month by switching to Spotify for my streaming music needs. However, when I got fed up with the loathsome Spotify iPhone app and a few connection drop-outs I decided to switch to Rhapsody. There was a 2-week free trial on it, and as far as I knew I was on a month-long freebie with Spotify (which didn't turn out to be the case when they renewed my membership after I cancelled...at least I thought I cancelled, I only let it slide because I wasn't sure I'd done it right). I knew that Spotify used higher bitrate files than Rhapsody and yes, I was concerned that the sound quality would be an issue. Still, the music database of Rhapsody is incredibly huge...whether it's bigger than Spotify's, I don't know, but they do have stuff that Spotify doesn't...I also really liked Rhapsody's music/song organization capabilities. They definitely beat Spotify hands down on that front. To top it all off in Rhapsody's favor, I never had any problems with their iPhone app. It was easy to use, though I couldn't say if it was easier than Spotify's because theirs kept crashing on me before I had the chance to notice.

Well, here's how it all turned out. I found that Rhapsody's sound quality was a much bigger issue than I though it would be. I didn't think I'd notice it what with my crappy hearing, but it was very noticeable. I decided to ditch it before they got the chance to charge me and re-upped with Spotify. I screwed that up, too, because I clicked on "renew subscription" with a almost 2 weeks left on the month I hadn't wanted anyway. I know, I'm a wimp for not sticking up for myself. But it was just so much easier to take the loss without going through the bs that would surely accompany fixing it up.

The iPhone app situation still bugs me. I've tried everything I know of to do...deleting and re-installing from the phone itself, deleting and installing from iTunes, nothing works. All I can do is hope and wait for an update that addresses the issue. I like the service, and use it enough to justify paying $10 a month to use on my PC alone. Hopefully they'll will come out with an Android version I can use on my Kindle Fire and even more hopefully it will be free. Not that this will atone for the worthless iPhone app. They're a growing company, more users everyday, they've got Mark Zuckerberg offering rave blurbs for crying out loud. SURELY it's only a matter of time before they get all of this ironed out.

Here's the kicker. I guess it had been at least a couple of months after I cancelled SiriusXM and I'm not ashamed to admit I was starting to miss it. I knew I would. I'm positive the marketing geniuses at SiriusXM have a perfect understanding of when someone is missing the service the most after cancelling...and that's when they send the bargain "Come back and we'll give you a hell of a deal" offers. 6 months for $25. When you consider that a typical month of SiriusXM service runs a bit over $15 you have to admit, this is a well-baited hook. We had a little extra money put back so I swallowed my pride and hooked it back up, this time with the understanding that I WOULD keep the Spotify along with it.

That's where I'm at now. Definitely noticing the better sound quality on Spotify. Sometimes I still get connection drop-outs and they are very, very annoying (especially when listening to a classical piece). For now I'm content to bite the bullet. The XM is hooked up in the bedroom, where it always was. I listen to it every night before falling asleep. So glad to be able to "channel surf" again. Sound quality is disappointing but I'm almost convinced that the problem there is with the stereo system I've got it running through. A new one should be at the top of my wishlist.