Browse Category: Music

At Least 50 Words

(Originally posted on the website Continuum…)

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A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS…

But I only need to write 50 words to meet my Holidailies commitment! For lack of a good solid topic to write a full journal entry, allow me to give you a little overview of my weekend. I’m sure I will exceed 50 words and everyone will get their money’s worth!

The photo above is the view from the window right next to my bed. Since I occupy the room formerly known as the attic, the ceilings are slanted and the windows are low to the floor. Plus, since I have the single-guy-mattress-on-the-floor bedding arrangement, all you have to do is roll over and peak out from behind the shade to see what kind of a day it is out there. But if “you” were to do so, I suppose there would be some question as to what “you” are doing in my bed in the first place! I know some of “you” personally. And… uh… well I don’t want to think about it! (Talk about an interesting journal entry!) But if “you” happen to be Meg Ryan, or maybe Gwen Stefani, give me a call and I’ll set up a time to give you a view from my window “again.”

All seriousness aside, folks…

This was the view on Saturday around noon. It was snowing hard at that time. We ended up with at least 10 inches here.

There are two things that caught my eye in this picture. The one is a chimney in the foreground which is covered with several inches of snow. Obviously, there is no heat coming through it. It struck me as an odd sight. The other thing that got my attention is that you can see a portion of the diner that my grandparents used to own. It is on the left side of the picture, above the middle, in front of the large dark building, which is the old theater building. The diner has a red border around the top. One day I will have to write of some of the times there. My grandparents build the original diner there long before I was born. They retired and sold the diner right after I graduated from high school. So, the diner and my grandparents were a huge part of my life growing up. Some day I’ll fill you in.

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Incidentally… I just made myself a killer salad before starting to write this. Lettuce, carrots, green peppers, grape tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, broccoli, tuna, croutons, and Ken’s balsamic vinegarette. Mmmm….

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Oh yeah… you can click on any of these pictures to enlarge them. If you want to…

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I thought about running on Saturday even though it was snowing. I ran in the snow on Friday. It’s very cool. But it just didn’t happen on Saturday. First, I slept until noon just to catch up on some much needed rest. Then I had that I-think-I-slept-too-much feeling in my head all day. I took S to work and T to a friend’s house. I went to Wal-Mart and bought a low priced (sounds better than “cheap,” huh?) pair of boots. The old pair of dress shoes from Payless just did not meet the challenge of the blizzard. Then I did a little food shopping. All the while I was hoping to get the motivation to actually run. Around 7 PM I got sucked in by the boob tube and watched, of all the worthless things, some dumb show about Michael Jackson.

However, after that a show about the Iron Man competition came on. “Watching” people swim 2.4 miles, then bike 121 miles, then run a marathon is almost as good as running myself, right? I was exhausted by the end of the show at 9 PM. Besides, that bag of M&Ms just wouldn’t leave me alone! And the Ponche Caballero…

I did run on Sunday afternoon. But I regretted sleeping late again. And I cursed every M&M that ever entered my mouth. And the Ruffles potato chips! And the Ponche Caballero…

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Ah!!! The Ponche Cabarello! Delicious!

A super friend of mine from Virginia introduced me to Ponche Cabarello a while back. Nectar of the gods! Her brother brought it home from Spain. Neither she nor he could find more of it here in the States. She even went to Mexico recently and didn’t find it there either.

Yesterday, I stopped at a liquor store in my town to pick up a bottle of Yellow Tail Chardonney. I was also looking around for a certain Polish vodka that the guitarist in my band was talking about. I can’t remember its name. I turned to look at the shelf on the opposite side of the aisle from the vodka. There… at eye level… there it was… silver bottle… yellow label… Ponche Cabarello! “No F-ing way!” I called my friend in Virginia and told her. Then I bought the three bottles on the shelf.

Good, good stuff! It’s an orange liqueur, sort of like a brandy. Smooth. Excellent on the rocks. Excellent while writing. Excellent while listening to…

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Tonight’s weblog soundtrack brought to you courtesy of Aerosmith. Usually, I write with some kind of rock music blasting. Come to think of it… I do most things with some kind of rock music blasting! Lately while writing I’ve been listening through my Aerosmith collection. At this very moment, 9:07 PM, “Toys in the Attic” is on.

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Speaking of toys in the attic… I did manage to squeeze in a little bit of practicing tonight. It was nearly as much as I should practice. Even if it’s only for a short time, it always feels good to play. Listening to Aerosmith right now sure brings back many memories of first learning to play and days of practicing after school for hours and hours. I used to put a stack of records on (especially Aerosmith) and play my brains out. Sometimes I played until my fingers bled. Sometimes I hated myself for not being able to play everything on the records to perfection. That’s the point of practicing though, keep at it until you love yourself again. Then you know you will do a good job at a show and not hate yourself for being a breathing embarrassment.

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The only thing I love more than music is reading. This weekend I finished reading “Bloodclots in the Mainstream” by Rob Santello. He toured with the Bouncing Souls and was their merchandising representative. It was an interesting book, despite the fact that the author’s viewpoint was a little too negative for my liking. So, to balance things out, I started reading “The Phantom Tollbooth” by Norton Juster. My kids had to read this book when they were in fifth or sixth grade. I always wanted to read it. Now I have good motivation to do so as it is this month’s book for the TUS book club.

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20031207dinner

The weekend culminated with a great dinner of swiss steaks with onions, peppers and crushed tomatoes (nicely seasoned by Mom), along with fresh green beans and mashed potatoes (peeled and cut by T). Mmmm! Mmmm!

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Lastly, I picked up a few movies this weekend. “The Usual Suspects” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” The totally cool and the totally geeky! I watched “The Usual Suspects” with Mom last night. I started “Close Encounters” but didn’t have time to finish it. Now, I hear the T has just started watching “The Suspects.” I can’t resist watching. I wrote at least 50 words today, right? Right. Okay, later!

Posted at 10:15 PM (EST)

RUSH TO A PARTY

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(Originally posted on the website Continuum…)

LAST SATURDAY was my niece’s third birthday. She’s as cute as can be! Really, she’s cute enough to be in ads in Parents magazine or on Pull-ups packages. She is also very smart, very articulate. But none of that should be surprising. She came from the same gene pool as I!

So we had a party on Saturday night. It seems that it’s been a while since we had a good old party in our family. We have all been dealing with various adverse situations. It seems like the stress of it all has been getting the best of us. It was good to cut loose and have ourselves a right proper birthday party. There is nothing like pizza and birthday cake to make people happy.

ON OUR WAY to the party, my son, T, asked to listen to one of my Rush CDs. He loves Geddy Lee’s voice and, like the rest of the human race, is astonished by Neil Peart’s drumming abilities. The particular CD he requested was an old one, “All the World’s a Stage.” It’s one of my all time favorite live albums. It’s Rush in their early “hungry” days. It’s straight forward and kind of raw.

I first discovered Rush when I was about 13 years old. I remember sitting in my bedroom with just a black light on listening to them. I was at that stage of my life where rock music was just opening up to me. Listening to albums and increasing my collection became of utmost importance. “2112” was the first Rush album I bought. Soon thereafter I had all of their previous albums. I remember being so excited when “All the World’s a Stage” came out. Hearing Rush live blew me away. Listening to Neil Peart play live inspired me. Trying to practice along with the record humbled me.

I know this live album like I know the sound of my own heart beating. I had it blasting in the car on Saturday, despite my bad sinus headache. (Such a martyr for rock-n-roll, huh?) In nearly every song, I said to T, “Oooo! Listen! Listen! Friggin’ awesome drums, huh?” Then I’d back the CD up and listen to those parts again. The cool thing was that T was just as into it as I was.

A quick side note related to a Rush song: Last Christmas, when my daughters, H and M, were visiting, part of “2112” came on the radio. We were driving in the car on a back road. At one point I could not resist playing the air drums along with Neil on one particularly cool drum fill. It is not too hard to play air drums while driving if one’s legs are long enough to use a knee to steer with. A certain amount of drumming skill is required, as well as a willingness to crash while in the service of rock-n-roll, if need be. So maybe you should not try this at home.

After successfully pulling off the air drums stunt, M, who was six years old at the time, said rather seriously, “Daddy, when you act like that in public, it embarrasses me!”

I promptly called the radio station to thank the dj for playing the Rush tune and to relate M’s comment. They played a clip of our conversation over the radio!

Back to the story…

THE PARTY was a lot of fun. We had a truckload of pizza. The cake and ice cream hit the spot. My niece had a blast opening gifts. Even the dog got into the act and was decorated with discarded wrapping paper. The older boys played outside, jumping on the trampoline and playing soccer with a huge ball in the dark. I wanted to get in on some of that action. However, my ribs still hurt at times from playing tackle football with T and his friends in September. Now that I’m a little over 25 (**cough**), I don’t bounce back quite as well.

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One of the highlights of the night began when my brother, who is also a rock star, picked up a small guitar that belonged to one of the kids. When he started to play around with it, one of the other kids ran into the room with another guitar exactly like the first. So we tuned them up to the best of our ability and commenced a good old ho down. What a riot! We could only pull off a few chords on these little guitars given our limited abilities. We didn’t care! We could have made up an infinite number of lyrics with just three chords. G, C and D in this case.

It only took a few minutes and nearly the whole family was involved in the scene. My niece danced, clapped, played the harmonica, while we all made up lyrics about her birthday. Somehow, in the midst of all the fun, my sister managed to change my niece’s Pull-up while she was dancing and clapping! So we added a verse about that. Soon we had kids playing tambourines and rattles. My sister was even playing a stainless steel milk can. She played it well at that! What a fun, funny, fantastic time!

Another quick side note: The little guitars, with their flesh piercing brass stings, reminded me of one old guitar that we had around when I was a kid, back when I was first listening to rock music. I remember trying to figure out how to play that thing. For the most part it frustrated me and convinced me to stick with the drums. But I did manage to figure out the vastly famous opening guitar line of Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water.” If you like that song you MUST, MUST, MUST listen to the whole album that it was originally on, “Machine Head.” This was another of my very early and well-loved albums, one that influenced my drumming style. I still listen to it often today.

ON SATURDAY NIGHT, we had such a good time that none of us wanted to leave. Birthday parties are cool. It’s fun to recognize one individual and let them know that you appreciate the fact that they are part of your life. Birthdays are always fun when it’s a child’s birthday. Yet, even if they are not as fun and crazy when one gets older, they are still an important opportunity to make someone feel special.

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Perhaps this is one aspect of our party that made the night a little more significant. You see, I found out about a special request that another online journaler, Becky, made for her 50th birthday. Her desire was to have people email pictures that they took on that very day to make her day even more special. After people email their pictures to Becky, she will post them on her website. So we made a colorful “Happy Birthday, Becky!” sign and had my niece pose for a picture. When I got home that night, I emailed the photo to Becky, who happens to be in North Carolina.

SO there you have it, folks! Plan your parties and call in advance to book our family for a romping good time. We’ll come on over with our guitars, harmonicas, milk cans and good spirits. Whether you want “2112,” or “Smoke on the Water,” or “This Land is Your Land,” we will rock your socks off! Right on! Let’s rock-n-roll!

CORRESPONDING PICTURE GALLERY:

HERE WE GO – HALLOWEEN WITH THE BOUNCING SOULS

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(Originally posted on the website Continuum…)

I could not think of a better way of spending Halloween than going to a Bouncing Souls show. What better place to see them than The Stone Pony in Asbury Park? The Stone Pony was made famous over the years by the likes of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band and of Bon Jovi, to name just two New Jersey bands. The Souls are a well known punk band from Jersey with a worldwide following of loyal fans. The Stone Pony plus The Bouncing Souls plus Halloween equals… a damn good time!

First, a little background, then the story.

MY SON and some of his friends love The Bouncing Souls. The first time that I took him to see them was September 12. They played at Irving Plaza in Manhattan along with The Arsons, Strike Anywhere and The Pietasters. Unfortunately, I had a migraine that day. By the time we got to New York, I was operating on my last two brain cells, and one of those was shorted out. So, I didn’t enjoy the time. Honestly, the first two bands sounded like consecutive train wrecks. The third band had the most annoying singer. But I did enjoy The Souls. It was either that my migraine medicine was working by the time they came on stage or the sound of hundreds of people yelling “F*** YOU!” when the singer said “East Coast” that jump started my flickering brain cells. Yeah, they have a song called “East Coast F*** You!” Honestly, I love it!

When we found out that The Bouncing Souls were playing on Halloween at the Stone Pony, we were excited. Since seeing them in New York, I had borrowed CDs from my son and a dvd from one of his friends. The more I listened, the more I watched, the more I appreciated this band. There were some last minute fanagling and juggling of responsibilities. Nonetheless, tickets were ordered, arrangements were made, and our attendance at the concert was assured.

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SINCE I drive a little two-door Toyota, and there were five kids and myself going to the concert, we used a van that belonged to one of the kids’ parents. It was a big conversion van with plenty of seats, a cd player, a tv and all the comforts of life. It was a mobile studio apartment. It was huge and green, like a rolling mountain, much larger than my tiny red Toyota. In fact, we could have loaded the Toyota in and still had room for everyone!

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Our first stop on the trip to Asbury Park was at the McDonalds in our own town. Five excited teenagers and one crazy dad is a recipe for chaos in any fast food establishment. From blowing straw papers at the girls behind the counter, to me speaking as if I had brain damage (and my son playing right along with it), we caused a little commotion. People! We were on our way to a punk rock concert! How else were we supposed to act? That’s why, when the proper little family in the powder blue mini van blocked our way through the parking lot, one of the kids jumped out of the van and motioned for them to move out of the way. What else were we to do when the man rolled down his window and proceeded to yell at the kid than to give them the middle finger with all sincerity and earnestness? For crying out loud, this is New Jersey! Just to emphasize our sincerity, I drove around the building again, pulled up along side the cute little mini van in the drive up line, and we all gave them the finger one more time. “East Coast F*** You, buddy!” How funny it was when the wife jumped out of the van with her middle finger raised in the air. F*** you, sister! Get back in your van!

Ahhh! New Jersey! Ahhh! Punk rock!

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AFTER some time, we finally made it to the Garden State Parkway. We in the front listened to various punk CDs on the way. Those in the back amused themselves with video games. All was smooth sailing until…

We ran out of gas at a toll plaza on the Parkway! It wasn’t my fault! I’m used to driving a Toyota! They go forever on a tank of gas!

“What are we gonna do now? I knew it was a bad idea to give the finger to a family in a mini van!”

After a few tries, the van started again. At the toll booth, I was told that there was an exit about a half mile down the road. As it turned out, it was the exit we needed to take for Asbury Park. I was told there was a gas station there.

We made the exit. But we saw no gas station. A little way down the road, the van stopped again. There was no gas station in sight an to make matters worse, all the kids had to pee due to the super size sodas they drank.

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After a few tries, the van started again. (So it’s not such bad karma to flick off a mini van family after all!) A little further down the road we saw the ever glorious Texaco star! An oasis! It was up a hill and the traffic light at the intersection turned red as we approached. Yet, we made it into the entrance of the gas station just as the van conked out again. At that point the doors of the van burst open and five boys with bursting bladders burst through the doors in a desperate search for a bathroom. Miraculously, I was able to start the van one more time and pull up to the pumps.

The attendant, obviously bewildered by five screaming boys holding their crotches so as not to piss themselves, said to me, “What happened? What’s wrong?”

I replied, “What do you mean? Gimme ten regular, please.”

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With the gas tank full and all bladders empty, we soon made it to Asbury Park. The club was easy to find. Parking was readily available. We waited in line for some time. Then we were in.

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THE FIRST band to play was Let it Burn. They were good. They played their hearts out. The bass player was decked out like Frankenstein. Very cool. The guitarist was a decent punk rock version of Eddie Munster. Also very cool. A very good opening act. And oh… they had the cutest girl (Sharon Stein) in the world playing lead guitar. There’s nothing like falling in love while the opening band is playing!

NEXT UP was Tsunami Bomb. Their Scooby Doo costumes were pretty cool. Musically they were good. Their female singer just needed a little more confidence. She’s got a great voice, smooth and strong. All in all they were a great act.

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THE THIRD band to perform was Strike Anywhere. Now, you have to love a band whose singer comes on stage dressed as Alice Cooper, eye make-up and all. Awesome! As a diehard Alice Cooper fan, I instantly loved these guys! My admiration was not for nothing either. They sounded great! They sounded much better than they did at Irving Plaza in September. (Though the Stone Pony is small, they do a great job with the sound system there. Much better than Irving Plaza.) They played their guts out and the crowd loved them.

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THEN CAME the Bouncing Souls. Just as they did at the Irving Plaza show, the crowd increased their excitement as they waited for the Souls to take the stage. To hear all those kids singing the band’s lyrics “Here we go, here we go, here we go,” before the band even came out was pretty cool. The kids in Jersey love the souls. It is obvious that the Souls return that love. Even though it’s a punk show, there is a certain affection and identification that is communicated from the band to their fans. That is very cool. The Bouncing Souls are not a group of unreachable, untouchable superstars. As the singer expressed from the stage that night, they are just a bunch of guys that get up on stage and “act like a bunch of retards.”

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There is so much energy and excitement when the Souls play. The moshing in the crowd was wild! A few times, I got crushed up against the end of the bar where I was sitting. If I wasn’t old enough to be everyone’s father and didn’t weigh almost 220 pounds, I would have jumped right in there and moshed with the best of them. However, the words “law suit” prevented me from doing so.

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As their latest album is titled, “Anchors Aweigh,” the band came on stage dressed as pirates. They looked fantastic! To complete the Halloween motif, there were plenty of pumpkins and plastic skulls on stage. Being that it was a punk concert, these ended up either smashed on stage or thrown out into the audience. What better definition of a good time than loud music and pieces of pumpkin flying through the air?

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AN INTERESTING tradition that the Bouncing Souls have is to print their logo on the back of used work jackets, leaving the original name tags on the jackets. My son has one. Before we went to the show, he assured me that it would not be a “weird dad” thing if I got a jacket for myself. Disappointingly, they were not selling any jackets that night. However, I found one on eBay this week. I watched the auction for a few days. During the last hour, two eBay newbies were bidding like crazy on the jacket. I waited until there were only 45 seconds left and placed my bid. I won. See, I may be too old to jump in a mosh pit, but when it comes to winning something on eBay, I’ll kick your ass! And the name on my newly acquired jacket? “Donte.” How cool is that? East Coast F*** You! I got a Bouncing Souls jacket and you can call me Donte!

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AFTER the show we hung around for a while. We all bought T-shirts and I got another Souls sticker for my car. A real treat for the boys was meeting Johnny X after we hung around long enough. The Souls do a song about Johnny (“Johnny says he’s bound by only 6 strings to this world/ Johnny always keeps them one turn out of tune”). He appeared on stage to perform the song with them that night. When we saw him outside, he agreed to a picture with the boys. They were delighted. I was happy to be part of their excitement.

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We left Asbury Park, all wound up. What a great show! The ride home was uneventful (other than paying way, way too much for burgers at a rest stop on the Parkway). I remembered to stop for gas before we ran out this time. ! We finally made it home at 3:30 in the morning. I slept until 3 in the afternoon. My ears were still ringing on Monday morning. But I was inspired. Long live punk rock! Long live the Stone Pony! Long live the Bouncing Souls! Long live the middle finger! Long live the opportunities to be involved in the lives of our kids!

THE END
THE END

YOU SMELL SOMETHIN’?

(Originally posted on the website Continuum…)

YOU SMELL SOMETHIN’?

I was driving along on my way home after work today, glanced up into my rearview mirror, saw a good looking girl driving a Jetta. With the aid of my sunglasses, I was able to keep one eye on the road and the other on the girl without my peeping being noticed. Both of us had just gotten onto the highway. She was bopping around in her seat a bit, getting comfortable, playing with controls on the dash. She started lifting her hair up off of her neck, obviously sweating in the 96 degree afternoon. She lifted her hair above her head, allowed it to slip through her fingers, left her arm up above her head, let out a relaxing breath. I’m thinking, “Nice…”

Then she turned her head and smelled her armpit!!!! She glanced back at the road and then took another sniff! (She must have needed a second opinion.)

I have seen women doing numerous things while driving: brushing their hair, applying make-up, singing and dancing in their seats. This is the first time I’ve seen a woman dive into her own armpit while driving! She was in there too! Her whole face!

Suddenly she wasn’t so cute. I put both eyes back on the road in front of me before she had a chance to pick her nose or something while I was still peeping.

I wonder what her weblog might say today. Maybe something like this:

“So like, I’m driving along listening to the new Jewel song. Can’t believe she went all Brittany-like. She must have gotten implants too. Like that slut, Amber, who sits two cubes away from Jenny. She always has a whole football team of guys hanging around her desk. I hate her. So I was driving along. It was like so, so hot today! The back of my neck was all ewwwwwie. Like gross!

“Speaking of ewwwwwie… there was this half-bald guy in front of me. He kept cleaning his ear with his pinky! Like totally really gross! Then, I swear, he smelled his finger! Yuk! What is it with guys? Always burping and farting and sticking their fingers in places. Pigs. And it was like sooooo obvious that the perv in front of me was watching me from behind those like so yesterday style sunglasses. Pig. He probably even has kids.

“By the way… I tried that new improved ‘works for a man but is made for a woman’ deoderant this morning. I think it like stopped working on my drive home.

“I’m taking a poll. What do you think? Should I get implants like Jewel?”

Posted at 6:30 PM (EST)