The Downfall Blue Book Exam

When I saw Matchbox 20 several years ago, they had a very simple, understated stage setup...a few speaker towers here and there, and whatever instruments were necessary, and not much else.

But they had three long vertical video screens behind the stage, and flashed patterns and graphics and other such stuff on them like many bands do at concerts. During "Downfall," they did something a little different, and it stuck with me. There were big bright flashes of light on the screens, that quickly zoomed out to reveal a question that stayed for a few seconds and then vanished. And then...another bright light came, and another super fast zoom to show another question. This went on throughout the song.

It was pretty powerful. The one thing I missed from that song, though, was the Gospel choir that backs up Rob Thomas about halfway through. If they could have gotten a big production choir like that together, it would have blown me away. I realize that's a bit tough to do during a tour...pack a dozen or so gospel singers.

Anyway. Back to the questions. I searched around on a forum site a day or two after the show, and found that someone had copied the questions and posted them. The presentation probably loses a bit of its luster without the screens and the light flashes. But I thought they might be fun to answer. Some of them can be simple yes-or-no questions, and others...well, they might take a little more time.


Are you happy?
An easy one to start with, right? Sooo simple. Or, is it? My answer: on a scale of one to ten, one being least happy and ten being most happy, I'm probably about a 3.749. Bump that up to a 4.312 on weekends. And an 8 whenever I'm in Vegas.

What do you love?
This question should be constantly revisited and added to and edited and revised. I love music...I love people who can make me laugh...I love condiments...I love the power of the written word...I love family and good friends...I'd love to spend the time it would take to give much deeper, sexier answers than the ones I just gave.

Do you trust your friends?
Most of them, yes.

...your family?
Implicitly.

...your political leaders?
Fuuuuck no! No matter from which side of the aisle they spout their promises.

Do you trust the media?
Only Nancy Grace. Everyone else I'm a bit leery of. (no, I don't trust the media. all the no-spin zones out there have whirlwinds of spin. And Nancy Grace? someone pleeeease get her off the air.)

Do you trust yourself?
Much of the time, yes.

Do you trust your pets?
No pets to trust or distrust.

Do you care to dance?
I DO care to dance, and I've got rhythm and everything! But often, I'm too self-conscious to let myself go and be a dork out on the dance floor. What's that famous saying, "Dance like nobody is watching, and love like it's never going to hurt."? I probably need to take a lesson from that quote. Many other brilliant minds have also spoken up on the topic of dance..."We should consider every day lost in which we have not danced at least once. And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh."--Nietzsche. "Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who did not hear the music."--Angela Monet. "Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance."--Dave Barry. "The man that can't dance thinks the band is no good."--unattributed. "We're fools whether we dance or not. We might as well dance."--unattributed.

What do you believe?
I believe in karma...I believe in good people...I believe a beer with too much hops is a bad beer...I believe the Lions just might be better than the Packers this year (but I believe that every freakin' year)...

Do you believe in yourself?
Ahh, don't you love introspection? (yeah...neither do I.) Yes, I believe in myself. No, I don't believe in myself as much as I should.

What's on your mind?
Why I don't write more often, when I enjoy it as much as I do...where I'll be a year from now...Willie Nelson is always on my mind...FRIDAAAAY is on my mind...and so is sleep.

Did you see that?
I see a lot of things. I like to consider myself a pretty keen observer and a rather perceptive person.

:-)
What's so funny?
I assume this question pertains to the little smiley face thingie that flashed on the screen during the concert, but I'll answer it with people who are always funny to me: Dave Barry, Steve Martin, Al Franken, David Sedaris, Ellen DeGeneres, Adam Sandler...many more (as soon as I move on from this question I'll think of them). From my little sidebar blog category...she's so funny. And he's so funny.

Do you mean what you say?
I make a conscious effort to try to mean what I say. I hate insincerity, and I think it's so easy to spot. If you don't mean what you say...don't say anything. Pretty simple.

What are you waiting for?
This question made me chuckle a little more than the first time I ran down this list and tried to answer them...because since then, I got a refrigerator magnet from a friend with the exact same question on it. Kinda like a subtle drive-in-the-ass hint, I'm guessing. And I appreciated it greatly. So.......what am I waiting for. I'm waiting for the girl of my dreams to ring my doorbell and tell me she can't live without me...I'm waiting for it to rain money...and apparently, I'm waiting for my life to pass me by.

Who are you most yourself with?
Myself. (is that a cop-out answer? yep, it is. fine...I'll delve a little deeper.) A buddy with whom I shoot darts...a buddy with whom I do a fair share of concert-hopping...my sisters...V.

What's going on?
Often times, not enough to keep me entertained or interested. (and who's fault is that?)

Are you different when you are alone?
Yes.

Do you like your life?
What the fuck are you trying to do, Matchbox 20 people...get me all depressed and shit? Geeeez. The answer is sometimes, ok? I like my life sometimes.

Do you count your blessings?
For all the pissing and moaning I do in some of these questions, the answer to this question is a resounding "yes". I know in the grand scheme of it all, I'm pretty lucky.

Do you know how to be silent?
All too often.

What are you scared of?
Being misunderstood. I don't think I make the greatest first impression. (and we've all heard how many chances you get to make one of those.) I think maybe I make a better third or fourth or seventeenth impression. But by then...it can be too late, can't it?

Was it as bad as you feared?
For the most part, nothing's as bad as people fear. I think anxiety takes hold and messes with people's heads, and when it's over you look back and realize that whatever it was...wasn't so bad.

Are you more than you think you are?
(this one's easy. three simple words, and lots of dots.)
so............much............more.


Anybody else wanna share?

"But some things in this world

Man, they don't make sense.

Some things you don't leave

until they leave you."

—Bright Lights, Matchbox 20

Can I Get An "Amen!!"?

I recently had the great fortune of attending an unusually diverse trifecta of musical performances on consecutive nights. I would have pushed for more, but my menu of musical options was running thin after those three.

The first was my nephew's high school jazz concert. Actually, there were several jazz bands performing that night, from sixth and seventh graders to eighth and ninth graders up to high schoolers.

I was a band geek (saxophone) through school, and I stuck it out for a number of reasons. One...it was an easy A. Two...I was pretty good with the rhythm 'n stuff. And three...I got to play in jazz band. Like about 98 percent of people with ears, I love music, and in jazz band we got to play good music. Sometimes. That was worth it for me.

But seeing the group my nephew plays in...not to mention some of the younger groups below his...makes me think that we didn't know what the hell we were doing back then. Some of the kids these days are just ridiculously talented. I saw a symphony concert of his last year, and came to the same conclusion. The bar is being set higher and higher.

The third concert I saw was my niece's and nephew's elementary spring vocal concert. Their school is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, so the grades sang songs from the '50s in its honor. Last year they did a Beatles theme for Paul McCartney's 64th birthday. (get it?) It was definitely grin-inducing this year to see third-graders singing "Rockin' Robin," and fifth-graders singing, "We Go Together" and doing the Hand Jive. (that one's a little more current than the '50s...apparently the students talked their music teacher into letting them get away with that one.)

So we've got high school jazz, and we've got elementary kids singing songs from 40 years or more before they were born. Might as well throw a little Gospel music in the middle, right? Ohhhh yeah.

I came home on that Sunday night after the concert and had to look up the word, “hallelujah,” because I didn’t want to misspell what I was shouting. And I also broke my rule of no more than two punctuation marks together...this one deserved three.

“Hallelujah!!!” I proclaimed.

After seeing a press release blurb in the paper a couple weeks ago about a visit by the United Voices of Praise Gospel Choir of Milwaukee to a nearby church, I had to go and investigate.

I’ve got a rather eclectic mix of musical genres on my DellPod...from Metallica to Neil Diamond to Counting Crows to Green Day. And while I don’t own any, I will bravely state out loud that...good Gospel music rocks!!

As someone who’s wrestled for most of my adult life with the broad canopy of ideas included in the word, “faith,” and what that word means to me, I was a little nervous that if there was a quiz at the door as to what one’s beliefs were, I might be turned away and told to go home and repent.

Luckily for me, this was an exam-free event, and I found a seat in the smallish church up near the front.

As the church filled up, I began to notice that, save for a soon-to-be-teenage boy a couple pews in front of me, I was probably the youngest person in the crowd by at least a couple decades.

Having heard the strong chorus of a Gospel choir in movies and on backing tracks for several well-known popular music groups, I had an idea in my head as to what I might hear that night, and when the 27 choir members walked up the center aisle to take their places on the risers at the front of the church, I was anxious to hear if they could deliver.

The choir’s opening number started out rather slowly and quite mellow, and a thought immediately crept into my head that I’d set my expectations for the evening a bit too high. But about halfway through that first song, the swaying started, the clapping began, and the volume was amped up a couple dozen notches, and a different thought replaced that first one that said, “This is what I signed up for!”

Good, live music is all about passion. And as the group sang, that passion was palpable throughout the church. There wasn’t dancing in the aisles, or audience members jumping out of their seats shouting, “AaaaaMEN!!” But I got the feeling that if something like that would have happened that night, it would have been a perfectly acceptable reaction.

One of the featured soloists in several of the numbers personified what good Gospel music is to me. A reserved, almost timid personality when she was among the rest of the choir, a bit of a transformation took place as soon as she grabbed the microphone and stepped out in front to sing, belting out songs of praise in a gorgeous, powerful voice.

Even in the lobby after the performance, when I stepped over near her to offer a quick three-second compliment and a handshake, she seemed reluctant to acknowledge how much she impressed the crowd.

No matter one’s faith or beliefs, it’s nearly impossible to leave an hour like that and not feel more than a little bit spiritually uplifted, and that a bit of soul cleansing had taken place. It's about the music...and the passion.

— • — • —

OK, so here at the bottom is where I give you a little heads-up as to what's coming tomorrow. (yes, I said "tomorrow"! as in...two entries in two days. hopefully this in-a-row stuff will catch on.) I'm giving you all fair warning that there will be a test tomorrow. A slight tie-in to today's post, because when I think about Gospel music, I think about the backing vocals from the song, "Downfall," by Matchbox 20. And tomorrow's exam will draw from "Downfall." I'll 'splain it better later, but...all you lurkers out there, get ready to become non-lurkers. I wanna read comments. The post will be quite similar to many of the memes you see floating around out there, but this one's got a bit of a unique origin to it. And may require a bit of soul baring. If I'm gonna flash mine, I expect y'all to do the same. (well...I might not bare my complete soul. but I'll probably show a little leg.)

Check back, and have your keyboards at the ready, and your brains in gear.

"If you believe what you like

in the gospels, and reject

what you don't like,

it is not the gospel you believe,

but yourself."

—St. Augustine

Cheers! (I think.)

I fear that my brain may be shrinking, and there may not, in fact, be much of it left.

A recent article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel revealed a study that has found that over time, drinking alcohol has contributed to decreased brain volume.

Yikes! So all those Super Bowl Sundays, all those summer holiday weekends up north, all those...Thursdays and Tuesdays and Fridays and Mondays, are whittling away the big squishy mass of knowledge in my noggin.

The study raises an interesting debate as to whether drinking may be good for the heart, but not so good for the brain.

I wish I could say that it’ll make me stop and think *ahem* the next time I crack a beer if that act means I’ll be losing some nugget of information I learned back in elementary school.

Just to be sure, on Memorial Day weekend, I might have to make a toast with each beer I open, pausing to say, “Goodbye, multiplication tables. It’s been good to know you, 9x7.” That’s why calculators are so readily available on all of today’s computers, though, right?

But what if those beers or glasses of wine erase some of the things you didn’t want to remember anyway: old girlfriends, bad football seasons, uninspiring presidential administrations. Perhaps there’s an up side to this drinking thing after all!

To be fair, the study specifies that it did not measure if decreased brain volume meant a decrease in cognitive function. So it’s possible that all of the information up there now could still be there after you go on a weekend bender or pay a visit to a kegger at your local frat house.

Besides, isn’t there another study that says that most humans only use a tiny percentage of their brains, anyway? Alcohol’s not that smart...if it’s going to obliterate some brain cells, it’d probably go after the vacant ones first.

Ann Helms, an assistant professor of neurology at the Medical College of Wisconsin, read the study and had a much harsher stance on what may or may not be acceptable. “There is no safe level of alcohol when it comes to loss of brain volume,” she said. “If you are worried about cognitive function, you shouldn’t drink anything.”

Not too much wiggle room there. If a statement like that doesn’t make you want to belly up to the bar to drown your sorrows while considering the harm of all the binge drinking you did in the past, then the brain cells that held your binge drinking memories have already been killed off anyway.

Some of us will have to either change our weekend ways, or change our opinions on the importance of cognitive function.

I, for one, would rather have a drink or two to help my heart and run the risk of forgetting how many planets there are in our solar system. (Nine, right? No, eight. No...yeah...eight. I think.)

I just don’t see myself canceling out of too many summer barbecues or concerts or ball games in the hope of saving my brain cells.

Doesn’t Google give us everything we need to know, anyway?

"I have taken more out of alcohol

than alcohol has taken out of me.”
—Winston Churchill

I'm So Peeved

Seeing as how the big wide InterWeb has a little corner for everything else, it shouldn't come as a surprise that there are sites to piss and moan and air one's grievances. (wait...I think I just described every online forum and message board, didn't I?)

How about a site dedicated to pet peeves? Found this in an article by the Associated Press last week, and thought I'd pass it on. Maybe it'll be good for a laugh, and maybe those who pass by this blog will want to stop and jot down a couple of their own.

One of mine biggies is people who think they never make mistakes. And when they do make mistakes (we all make mistakes), they try to blame somebody else, or if that doesn't work, they make up some lame-ass excuse to make their mistakes seem like no big deal. Their mistakes are miniscule, while everyone else's mistakes are so gigantic they run the risk of knocking the earth out of its orbit!

Repeat after me:
"I. made. a. mistake."
The End

There. Is that so tough to say?

Another pet peeve of mine is people who don't hit on a 16 when the dealer has a seven or higher showing. But it's not like I'm a blackjack expert or anything.

Anyone else care to share?

"To have a grievance
is to have a purpose in life."
—Eric Hoffer

Open Mouth...Insert Foot

Here we go.

Expect to see much...much...more of the scene on the left over the next 18 months, as presidential debate season has gotten underway. I didn't catch much of either of them, but the GOP held its first mass debate on Thursday night, and the Dems held theirs a week earlier. (podium builders are currently working overtime, as everybody and their brother or sister on both sides of the aisle are announcing plans to run for president. there should be an official announcement on this blog by next week as I throw my hat in the ring, also. my platform: free toast across the country with the purchase of any specialty omelet, be it at a nationwide franchise restaurant or a mom-and-pop diner. oh, and lower taxes and better health care and more jobs and three-day weekends for everyone, of course.)

I saw some of the talking heads going back and forth on the highlights...or lowlights...of each debate.

One that made me sit up and say, "what the fuck??" was a clip I saw of The Dairy State's former guv, Tommy Thompson, who was asked if employers had the right to fire homosexual employees just for being gay.

He hemmed and hawed for several seconds, saying something to the effect of, "I think...umm...individual businesses, and uhh....states, should...umm...be able to decide those, umm, types of issues themselves." At least I think that's what he said. He wasn't being very direct with his answer.

The moderator jumped in after he was finished, and asked, "So your answer is.....yes?" Thompson: "Yes."

And the debate moved on.

The very next day, Thompson was talking to reporters, changing his answer, and saying he didn't really hear or understand the question.

If anyone's looking to send a parting gift to Mr. Thompson as he exits the race, may I suggest a bottle of tough-actin' Tinactin for his athlete's tongue?

Republicans are trying to figure out the best ways to make themselves shine leading up to the primary. John McCain, one of the front-runners, first distanced himself a little from Bush, and then cozied up to him a bit more in recent months, and now seems to be trying again to put a little...but not too much...separation between himself and G-Dub. It's a difficult task, to be sure. Bush has no coattails to ride, and why would anybody with any hopes of a political future want to be in bed with a president who just might close out his reign with an approval rating so low it begins with a decimal point? (he is "the commander guy," though. so he's got that going for him.)

Rudy Giuliani is at least a social liberal, which will persuade me to listen to him more than any of the others. Not that he's going to get my vote (probably)...but I won't pick on him as quickly as I will the other nine hundred and fourteen conservatives who are running—or thinking of running—for president.

The next round of debates is scheduled for early June, I believe. And it'll be fun to watch how all the right-wingers dream and strategize and explain their vision in an attempt to win the White House in '08.

You know how I think that'll best be accomplished this time around?

Be a Democrat.

"Finishing second in

the Olympics gets you silver.

Finishing second in politics

gets you oblivion."

—Richard M. Nixon

Show Me The Way

Tao.

In Taoism, one of the great religions of ancient China, "the Tao" translates into "the way," or "the path." The Tao Te Ching is its most important text, a simple yet profound book of wisdom.

Over the years, people have applied the Tao to other areas, in books such as the popular The Tao of Pooh (as in, "Winnie the..."; didn't you know that Pooh was a closet Taoist?) and The Tao of Writing, aimed at tapping one's creativity.

For the purposes of this blog entry, however, Tao refers to a hip, happening nightclub in Las Vegas. Forgive me for being so shallow.

On my recent trip to Sin City, members of the group I was with discussed spending an evening at a club, perhaps reserving a table and getting European bottle service, which is a fancy way of saying you're gonna pay through the nose if you want the privilege of "owning" one of their tables for several hours during the night and partying like a rock star.

I pushed for Tao, quite honestly because of its name, and the fact that I'd read the club had such lavish interior touches as a 20-foot Buddha, and also hundreds of mini Buddhas lit by candles surrounding one of the club's three bars.

I'd also read that among the hip and trendy clubs in Vegas, Tao was considered by many to be the hippest and trendiest. If I was going to party out of my league anyway, I may as well party all the way out of it, right? Right.

Members of the L.A. Lakers hold events there, rappers are known to drop in and hang out, celebrity A-listers show up and mingle, or retire to private VIP skyboxes. Paris Hilton spends time there, dancing sans underpants.

Anyway...by the time our group made its final decision on Saturday night, there were eight of us, and we were headed to Tao. Three-bottle minimum for a group that size, and I doubt I'll ever pay that much for two bottles of vodka and a bottle of Captain Morgan again. (until, you know, the next time I go back.)

At the entrance to the club, there were more than a dozen hosts and security people and ushers and...you name it, they were stationed there. We were herded into an elevator that took us up one floor, and when the doors opened, the first thing we saw was the bar with the 300 little Buddhas. I returned to that spot more than a handful of times throughout the night, just to stare.

The club was fairly empty when we got in, because we were advised to arrive early, or there was no guarantee that our table could be held. (someone with a handful of Benjamins could have come in, and our names would have mysteriously disappeared off of the guest list.) But within an hour, the other tables were filling up, as were the aisles and bars and every other available space. During its peak time, about midnight to 3 am, the place was jam-packed, and the bass-heavy, high-energy music was thumpin'. I was on an adrenaline high the entire time I was there.

There are two main rooms in the club, and I spent my time traveling between the two, going to the one in which our table was located to fill my drink, and then maneuvering back into the main room with the dance floor and an outdoor terrace with a view of The Strip.

The smallish dance floor could not have had any more people on it than it did. You didn't exactly have to be "dancing" when you were out there, you just had to bob up and down a little bit, and you looked as hip as everybody else. Seriously...sardine companies should contact Tao to get tips on how to more effectively pack their tins.

In the elevator on our way up at the beginning of the evening, the attendant told us to make sure and catch the show at 3 a.m. Someone asked, "what kind of show is it?" and he replied, "just catch the show."

I was in the main room at 3 a.m. to catch the show, and I still don't know what I saw. On one of the platforms off to the side of the dance floor was a guy dressed in a full-length Native American headdress, waving a five-foot scepter along with the music, and next to him was a stuffed animal of some sort...a lion perhaps? Don't know. Those two bounced along to the music, revving up the crowd, along with several gorgeous Tao dancers, of course. And then...shaved ice started falling from above the dance floor. So it was essentially snowing on the crowd.

No wonder the elevator guy couldn't tell us more about it. He didn't have a clue, either.

Here's where my story gets good...

During the snow and the headdress guy and the stuffed mascot guy, a girl standing next to me on the dance floor turned to me and yelled in my ear, "Do you have any idea what this means??" Possibly the most profound question of the night. I yelled back, "I have no idea! I've never been here before." (didn't want her to mistake me for an A-lister, ya know.)

I got a grin out of her, and she grabbed my hand and led me a little farther out on the dance floor. I wasn't complaining. So we're doing the dancing thing for a couple songs, bobbing up and down among the crowd, enjoying the, umm...atmosphere. I think (soon you'll find me questioning my thought process) that she's digging me, and I'm digging her. After about 10 minutes or so, she leans in and yells to me, "Are you from Vegas?"

And I say, "No." And before I have a chance to lean in and continue, "I'm from Wisco.....," she lets go of my hand, turns away from me...and a quick move here and a shimmy there, and she's four or five people away from me. A few seconds later, she's gone.

Apparently...........the correct answer to her question was, "Yes!" (I swear, next time I'm out in Milwaukee or Madison or anywhere for that matter, if someone asks me where I'm from, I'm gonna say Vegas. I learned my lesson, boy.)

So not only did I get to party at Tao. I also got rejected at Tao. Score!!

I was a bit confused, but unscathed. My goal was to stay until closing, and a buddy and I did just that. On many of the Web sites I've seen, they're supposed to stay open until 5:30 on Saturdays. But they closed down the room with our table at 4, and then closed the main room at 4:30.

As everyone was clearing out and it was easier to hold an actual conversation, my buddy and I stopped to talk to a security guy, and asked him if we could sneak upstairs for a minute or two and check out the VIP boxes. He said no, in a very friendly manner. I asked him if that was where Paris spent her time when she was at the club, and he informed us that, no, she liked to get her VIP table right near the dance floor, and every time she got up to dance, the DJ would announce her as "Princess Paris." Awwww. He also told us that she was there the night before we were there. Don't know if that's true or not, but who am I to say she wasn't? When we asked him if any big-name celebs were there during our Saturday night, he mentioned something that he thought one of the Wayans brothers had made an appearance.

So, not the cheapest night I've ever spent partying, but would I do it again? In a heartbeat. I would have stayed until sunrise if they'd have let me.

A little time spent in the casino at the Venetian before we left and a stop at the lounge in the middle of Mandalay Bay when we got back, and I didn't get to sleep until after 7 am the way it was. Only to be awakened two hours later, to get packed up and pointed toward the airport to catch a flight.

Can't wait to do it all again. Whenever that may be.
This time I'll remember........I'm from Vegas.

"The Tao is so vast

that when you use it,

something is always left."

—Tao Te Ching

Time To Hang The Sign

This past week went zooming by so quickly, I don't think I even heard the, "Whooshhh!" Did anybody else?

In the interest of avoiding the embarrassment of posting back-to-back Sunday Squibs with nothing in between but background, I figured I would use this space to post the following lame—but completely acceptable from my perspective—explanation for the dead calm around Ton-Fifty-ONE as of late.

The last several days at work were some of my busiest and most brain-frazzling of my year, as they are every year. We put together a 60-page commemorative program for a local sports hall of fame banquet each spring, and with all the award winners and bios and enshrinees and advertisers and etc., it's like one big puzzle, with pieces sporadically walking in the door over a period of a couple months.

And I shouldn't really toot my own horn, but what the hell...it's my blog, right? Here it comes: Guess who's in charge of puzzle piece organization and page layout and book design and overall "gotta make it look somewhat professionally done"ness? (Toooot!!)

This week, all those puzzle pieces finally came together into one pretty good-looking book. Everything that needs a spot has one, and there are once again 60 pages in the book (for printing and binding purposes on 11x17 paper, your page total has to be a mutiple of four. And if it's not, then you need to imaginatively "create" extra pages, or scrunch two down into one, or whatever.)

So while the banquet isn't until next week, the book is officially out of my hands, and metric tons of stress have been unloaded off of my shoulders. And it feels soooo good. And I'm tired.

I've got to rejuvenate quickly, however, because in a few short days I leave for a four-day weekend in Vegas. (and ask me how many times I'm going to be thinking about my blog...or my job, for that matter...while I'm out there. go ahead, ask me. that's right...zero. which is coincidentally the exact same number of poker tournaments I'm going to win, slot machines that are going to spit more than a handful of coins at me, and "dates" I'm going to acquire on a rent-me-by-the-hour basis.) (that...was one long long parenthetical aside.)

It's been quiet for a week, and it'll be quiet for one more. And for that, I apologize. I'll be back, though...perhaps with a dozen blog posts filled with tales from Sin City, because ya know...the whole, "What Happens In Vegas, Stays In Vegas," slogan might make for good commercial marketing. But what happens in Vegas almost has to make for good grist for the blogger mill, as well, don't you think?

For now, I've got shit to do, and not a lot of time in which to do it. And I've got a couple columns to churn out, too. And my brain is still a little more than slightly frazzled. I need to recharge. So I'm...

"In Vegas, I got into a long argument

with the man at the roulette wheel

over what I considered to be

an odd number."

—Steven Wright

Hey, Buddy...Got A Light?

So now smoking not only causes cancer...it might also cause the next movie you see to be rated R.

Anti-smoking groups are pushing the Motion Picture Association of America for all movies that feature smoking to be slapped with an R rating.

I'm all for trying to keep today's young people away from taking up the nasty habit, and steps like raising the cigarette tax are fine and swell with me. But to treat smoking in the movies the same way you treat blood and gore and f-bombs and bare breasteses?

That just made me stare at my screen with a rather puzzled expression.

Next up...R ratings to all movies that feature inattentive driving, or skipping school.

"We know [smoking tobacco] is not

good for kids, but a lot of other things

aren't good. Drinking's not good.

Some would say milk's not good."

—Bob Dole

A Creatively Worded Compliment

I...hate...creative people.

By "creative people," I mean those people who have cooler blogs than mine (note: everybody's blog is cooler than mine), or who are better writers than I am, or who are more tech geeky than I'll ever be, or who can take a blank piece of paper and a No. 2 pencil and create more than stick figures, or who can make a musical instrument spring to life, or who see things through a camera's lens in a way I never could.

And by "hate"...I, of course, mean "admire more than all the words in the dictionary can say and want so desperately to be like."

I'm in the process of updating my sidebar, if you haven't glanced in that direction...adding some more blogs that I visit regularly or on occasion, or some that have made a good enough first impression on me to warrant a link in the hope that I'll return to visit again. That list will be ever-growing and changing, as will the other categories of hobbies or topics of interest or related miscellany.

It never fails to amaze me the things I find when I go off on a random link-clicking romp through the internets, jumping from one blog to the next, looking for something to catch my eye and hold me there for more than a quick scan of the first few posts.

I find laugh-out-loud funny, utterly flawless writing. And I find people who obviously know what the acronym HTML stands for (Howard Taft Made Lasagna. right?), because their sites are crisp and clean and all neat and tidy 'n stuff.

And I come back to this little corner I call my own, and tell myself I better learn a few more five-syllable words. And then I try to bribe my tech geek buddies into giving me free pointers on how to be a killer code jockey. (see? I can't even make up cool nicknames like that on my own. I stole that from an e-mail I got a year or so ago.)

This little rant was born a couple weeks ago, but was reaffirmed last night as I was trying to place the golf photos in my previous post, along with captions, and make everything look all copacetic in its end result. Blogger wasn't being very cooperative, and was mocking me by proving that it'll do anything it damn well pleases with the hard return, no matter how carefully you insert them. It's not a difficult concept, is it? Hit the "Enter" key on your keyboard, and a space should appear. Or not. Or...sometimes two spaces appear.

After more attempts than I'd care to admit, and many f-bombs dropped, I finally got something resembling a visually acceptable post. And then I went and had a nervous breakdown, clutching an HTML 4 manual in my carpal-tunneled hands.

But I digress.

There are wheelbarrows of creative talent all over this big wide InterWeb. And as I discover more and more, I expect my sidebar to continue to stretch vertically.

Some are writers of the highest caliber, who don't even write for a living. Some take breathtakingly gorgeous photographs. Some discuss ideas that make you stop and think, and then think some more. Some are outrageously funny.

And some...are all of the above, rolled together into one big creative über-stud.

Those are the people I really hate.

And I couldn't be more grateful that they're there to help carry me through my day.

"Creativity is the sudden cessation of stupidity."

—Edwin H. Land

"A hunch is creativity

trying to tell you something."

—Frank Capra

It Looks Like A Mirac...It's In The Hole!

It's Masters week.

I came home from work yesterday and today and flipped over to the USA Network's coverage before I did anything else...before I took off my shoes, even before I checked my e-mail! This is serious stuff.

Yes, I'm talking about golf. The Masters is as important to me as the Super Bowl. More important than March Madness, way more important than the World Series, far surpassing the NBA Finals. Golf ranks a close second on my list of favorite spectator sports, behind only football.

When I come home from work during the first two days of a major golf tournament, I get a little twitchy while I wait to see where Phil Mickelson is on the leaderboard...or if he's even on it! This year...he's a few shots further back than I'd like him to be, but at least he's around for the weekend. He's seven shots behind the leaders, so there's hope, but somethin' really cool's gotta happen for him to get into contention.

Of golf's four majors, I love The Masters most. The history, the reverence with which the announcers use every word they speak, the immaculately manicured landscapes, the crystal white sand in the bunkers, the way almost everything on the grounds has a name: Hogan Bridge, Butler Cabin, Amen Corner, Rae's Creek, Sarazen Bridge, Magnolia Lane, Nelson Bridge, the Several Landmarks Eventually To Be Named After Tiger. (Woods' Woods, perhaps?)

As cliché as it sounds, every inch of Augusta National Golf Club is as close to hallowed ground as it gets. Someday, I'd like to say I've been lucky enough to visit and walk the galleries, and see the great tradition that is The Masters.

If given the opportunity to play the course someday (don't worry...it'll never happen), I don't know if I could accept. I'd be too afraid of bruising it, or leaving it permanently scarred with my golf *ahem* style. *ahem* While the pros have a fade and a draw and a punch and a bump-and-run, I've got.........a duff. And a hack. And a "kindly deposit your putter in the drink after rolling that three-footer two feet past" putting stroke.

— • — • —

Time to go off on a tangent. I know this started out as a post about The Masters, but now we're moving on to the PGA Championship, because I've got photos!

In August 2004, the biggest names in golf descended upon tiny Haven, Wisconsin, (or Kohler if you want to give ultra-cool guy and big-wig owner Herb Kohler some free pub) to play one of the four biggies at Whistling Straits. Not wanting to miss the opportunity, I bought a week pass to go see the superheroes of golf teeing it up just a hop, skip and a half-hour drive away from my own backyard.

Monday through Wednesday were practice rounds, where autograph hounds could hound all they wanted, and amateur photogs could click their shutters. I snapped more than 330 shots in those three days with the hopes that I'd get one or two worth saving.

And then Thursday through Sunday, things got a lot more serious. No cameras, no yelling, "you da maaan!" until after the golfers had hit the ball...they were playing for real, and keeping score and everything! Electric stuff. (Yes, I just used the word "electric" to describe a golf tournament. Shut up.)

I logged more miles and walked more hills during that week than I thought I would, and it was so worth it. Can't wait to do it all again. (see next paragraph.)

Wanna know how well our fair state did in hosting such a monumental event? Well, the U.S. Senior Open is playing here in July, and the PGA Championship is coming back in 2010 and 2015. And pending the availability of enough hotel rooms, the Ryder Cup matches are coming here in 2020.

Northeastern Wisconsin. Golf mecca of the world. (and I'm only half joking when I write that. there are some very impressive, very serious golf courses in this area. courses that would require me to surrender an entire week's paycheck just to step onto the first tee. that serious.)

The shot of the Augusta National Golf Club flag up above is obviously not one of my photos, because I haven't been there. Yet. But the pics below are from the 2004 PGA.

There's just something magical about a gorgeous golf course. I'd rather shoot a 53 on a course that looks like a work of art created with earth movers and bulldozers than have a chance to shoot a 43 on a wide open course that's got the occasional tree and shrubbery.

I watch golf. On TV. And in person.
And I love it.

(comments are enabled, as always, and I put on my extra-thick skin before I published this post. give me your best shot.)

"It took me seventeen years to get

three thousand hits in baseball.

I did it in one afternoon on the golf course."

—Hank Aaron

Fooled You.

I just won the lottery!

The Detroit Lions are 2:1 favorites to win the next Super Bowl!

Random House just signed me to a four-book, $20 million book deal!

Eva Longoria recently announced, "Screw Tony Parker, I want Gregg!"

— • — • —

Happy April Fool's Day, everyone. I really had you all going there, didn't I? One after the next after the next. Boyyy did I pull one over on you guys! (believed 'em all but the Lions one, you say? yeah. thought so.)

I figured a good squib for today would be a little history of April Fool's Day. Apparently, if you enjoy playing pranks each year on this day, you can thank the stubborn and gullible French, who just said, "non," in 1582 when Pope Gregory XIII ordered the adoption of the new Gregorian calendar, which moved the New Year's Day to January 1, instead of April 1 in the old Julian calendar.

Well...that's one theory, anyway. Another theory claims that the French were actually first to initiate the change in the calendar, but many failed to keep up with that change. (scroll down to the "calendar-change theory.") Regardless of which theory you believe, or how many others you find, it looks like the French deserve most of the blame. Or the praise.

There have also been many, many hilarious pranks pulled over the years...much more elaborate and original than the ones I've listed above, surprisingly enough...collected here in the Top 100, ranked according to notoriety, absurdity and number of people duped. I haven't gone throught the entire list of 100, but the first one is funny enough to make you want to keep reading.

Happy April First...fools.

"The first of April is the day
we remember what we are
the other 364 days of the year."
—Mark Twain

A Travel Tale of Two Cities

So dart league is over for the year, and once again I closed the season without that elusive "ton-fifty-ONE." No six-dart-out for me for the second straight year. Maybe I'm getting old. I used to notch one or two a season.

That's not really the direction in which this post is going, however. I got to thinking this week about my favorite dart story, seeing as how I didn't have to go out and actually shoot any, or drink any beer, or eat any chicken wings. (oh, how I miss dart night.)

My favorite dart story doesn't involve hat tricks or triples or perfect games. It involves two airports. Last April I went to New York City to visit a friend, and had strict orders to bring my darts, thinking that during our long weekend we might go in search of a Manhattan bar with a dartboard, on which I could show off my finely tuned skill in how not to shoot a perfect game.

We filled our weekend with many touristy-type activities and never gave darts a second thought. Turns out there's a lot of stuff to see in New York City. Who knew?

The tale begins at the security checkpoint at Mitchell Airport in Milwaukee. Not wanting to hassle with checking luggage, I had a backpack and a big duffel with me as carry-ons. My duffel went through the X-ray machine, and a woman watching the screen stopped it to take a closer look, and called another security person over. She pointed to something on the screen, and he nodded and whispered, and then he pointed to something also, and I heard the woman say, "Oh, those are just darts."

So apparently the darts were fine. I had forgotten that I had a scissors in my shaving kit, though, and that's what caught her eye. She told me she had to open it up and check it, and got nothing but cooperation from me. Once she found the scissors, she measured its length and found it to be within the acceptable limit. And she never even thought twice about checking out my darts. So my shaving kit, my scissors, my darts and I all got on the plane together.

Fast-forward through the four-day weekend, to me standing in the security line at LaGuardia Airport, shoes and belt off, pockets emptied, duffel going through the X-ray machine. The scissors had been deposited in the wastebasket of my hotel room before I checked out. I had no interest in giving the aiport people a reason to go shuffling through my duffel.

Deja vu: the woman standing at the X-ray screen stops it to stare a bit, and motions for another security person to come take a look. They both stare, confused, and the woman asks, "Sir, what are these?" She points at the screen as I see my darts among all the other non-terrorist items I have packed in my bag.

"They're darts," I answer.

"...what?" is her reply.

(I begin to think that we may not have found a bar with a dartboard if we had decided to go bar-hopping.)

"Darts," I repeat. "English darts."

"I'm going to have to take these out and see them," she says with authority.

"That's fine," I say, as I watch her take out the dart case and open it...upside down...sending a spare dart tip or two scattering to the floor.

After a bit of examination and discussion, and an inspection by their immediate supervisor as well, I'm told that I can't take my darts on the plane, and that I'll have to either put them in a bag to be checked, or else go to the post office located within the airport and mail them to myself.

I ask both the man and the woman if I can throw everything else away and keep only the barrels of the darts, because those are what cost the most money. The flights, shafts and tips can all be replaced for a total of five bucks. I was willing to disassemble them and leave the pointy tips behind.

Once again, they go over to discuss it with their supervisor, and come back with a big fat, "No." At this point I'm considering just surrendering the darts and getting on the plane, and buying a new set when I get home. But...see those little ridges and curves on the gray barrel of the dart in the photo above? Those are called knurls, and my fingers know those knurls sooooo well, and they like them very much. Those knurls and my fingers have combined to throw more triples and bullseyes than I can even begin to count, and being more than a few years old, I wasn't sure if I'd find a set exactly like that one.

So the kind people at the security station led me to the line to check my bag, and once my bag was safely on the right flight (I hoped), I went back through the security checkpoint...sans weapons.

It was shortly after I got through security for the second time that I realized I'd left my camera in one of the end pockets of my duffel when I checked it. Wonderful. Crush a $400 camera to save a $50 set of darts.

The story has a happy ending. Everything made it back to Wisconsin in one piece. Well...except the scissors. They got to live out their existence rusting away in a landfill somewhere in Midtown Manhattan. (note: there's no roooom for a landfill in Midtown Manhattan.)

Next time I travel with my darts, I'll separate them into as many pieces and corners of my luggage as I'm able.

And before I get any hate mail from people who read the wrong tone into the words of this post...I may poke a bit of fun, but I have absolutely no problem with the very minor inconvenience I was caused at the airport in NYC. The people there were just doing their jobs, and doing them well. The fun part of the story comes in comparing the "oh, those are just darts" attitude in Milwaukee to not even being able to bring the barrels back with me from LaGuardia without checking them.

Lesson learned.

"Our only security is our ability to change."

—John Lilly

I Give You...A Squib.

Welcome to the first installment of what I hope might become a regular feature on this blog.

I learned a new word the other day, which immediately triggered this idea. It even inspired me to create the corny little graphic you see above. If all goes according to plan, that should appear just about every Sunday, followed by something resembling a short blog entry. (it would look a little out of place on a Wednesday, for obvious reasons.)

The word came from one of those word-a-day, page-a-day calendars. And so did my first entry, incidentally, as a little trivial fact at the bottom of the page of another page-a-day calendar. I thought it was interesting enough to share.

— • — • —

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote nine books in 1939, and was paid a total of $33 for them.

I don't know if this is true or not, because I can't find anything online to support it. But...there it is, black on white, on March 25 of Uncle John's Unstoppable Bathroom Reader page-a-day calendar (which I don't keep in the bathroom, by the way. I keep it at work). Maybe he sold them, but they were never published, I dunno. He died in 1940.

Anyway...Thirty. Three. Dollars. For nine books! (and how do you write nine books in one year? that's a lot of words.) This is the author responsible for The Great Gatsby, one of the great classics of American literature. (Gatsby didn't become popular until after Fitzgerald's death, however.)

Stephen King probably tips more than thirty-three bucks when he goes to get his morning bagel and cappuccino!

Remind me again why I've got such a desire to be a writer?? Oh yeah...poverty, loneliness, despair, alcoholism, rejection, depression, insanity, a disorganized brain overcrowded with characters and ideas and plot points. Never mind. Those are all the reasons I need.

The average annual salary in Major League Baseball is about $2.9 million. That's...average! Why couldn't I have had a serviceable hanging curve ball instead of a knack for spotting a dangling participle?

"No man can be happy

without a friend,

nor be sure of his friend

till he is unhappy."

—F. Scott Fitzgerald

PVC: For Plumbing or Percussion?

Sunday night, as I rolled over many miles of pavement, I pondered what words to put here. Not “what words” in the writer’s block sense, where I’ve got nothing to say. But instead how I could describe what I saw last weekend.

I was in Chicago to attend a show by the cult phenomenon known as Blue Man Group. And when people ask me how I liked the show, I don’t know what I’ll say. Because, “...it was really, really good,” doesn’t even begin to shed the right light on it.

How do you explain a group that runs an LED single-line scroll bar on the sides of the stage before the show, announcing that there will be no intermission, so to avoid inconveniencing other audience members, it would be best to make a trip to the “comfort stations” before the show begins?

What do you say about a group that also forces you to take a “no-photos pledge,” threatening the use of ejector-seat mechanisms in your chair should you break that pledge? (my camera was around my neck, but the lens cap never came off.)

How do you explain a show in which arm-length strands of white crepe paper are handed out to all audience members before the show without instructions, and 85 percent of the crowd instinctively wraps them around their heads as headbands. Makes for a pretty cool-looking group when the black lights are turned on.

How do you explain a trio of bald men dressed in loose-fitting black sweatshirts and sweatpants, their heads covered in blue latex paint...wide-eyed, silent yet expressive, quizzical...banging on PVC pipes and paint-splattering drums to create some of the most infectious rhythms around?

How do you explain an audience-participation skit in which a teenage boy is nabbed from the audience, dressed in white coveralls and a black snowmobile helmet, led backstage and strung up by his ankles, his front side slathered in blue paint with rollers and brushes, and then swung against an empty white canvas to make abstract body art?

How do you explain the Blue Men attempting to woo another audience member by impressing her with gifts such as romantic candlelight, fine art, flowers, Twinkies and...Jell-O. (Speaking of which, how do you explain a group that has on its staff an actual Jell-O consultant?)

And how do you explain getting a glimpse of the jealous side of the Blue Men, and their actions when they turn against each other in their fight for the young lady’s affections?

How do you explain a skit featuring almost exclusively the amplified crunching sounds of Cap’n Crunch cereal?

How do you explain a 40-tube pipe organ/xylophone-type thing named simply, “the PVC instrument,” which mysteriously changes from white to pink and orange and lime green and blue under the black lights, and when struck with foam rubber paddles can play tunes from the likes of Ozzy Ozbourne, Madonna and Lynrd Skynrd?

How do you explain a thundering bass from an instrument that is just as simply named, “the Big Drum”? It’s description in the CD liner notes reads: “...a really big drum that is hit with a really big mallet.” How big is the mallet, you ask? In response to the clichéd question, “Is it bigger than a bread box?”, the answer would be, “ohhhh yes it is!!”

How do you explain roll after roll and stream after stream of white crepe paper being unrolled and passed from the back row of the 650-person audience all the way up to the stage, row by row, while being bombarded with strobe lights and more booming bass and PVC rhythms?

How, I wondered, as I replayed the concert over and over in my mind. How do you explain all of this, and so...much...more?

You don’t.

You simply tell people to go buy a ticket, and prepare themselves for the oddest, most entertaining, most uniquely percussive assault on their senses they’ve ever received.

(Please share any and all accounts of firsthand sightings of the Blue Men in the comments section. I'm anxious to hear about what other people have seen.)

Random final thought: Do the members of Blue Man Group have Blue Man Groupies?

[By the way, two of the photos in this entry were taken by me. And two...were not. I'll let you decide which are which.]

“Blueness doth express trueness.”
—Ben Johnson