Fortunately for us, .Mrs.. Straight White Guy leaned on Eric (that would be Mr. Straight White Guy) to give Tom Waits a listen, which he dutifully did, and which he shares with us here. Mrs. Straight White Guy knows whereof she speaks, for in order to appreciate Tom Waits (the composer of one of my faves, “Jersey Girl,”) one must listen to him. It is definitely not background music.

Eric points out that the lyrics of the above tune are similar to something that one might expect from LeeAnn, and I don’t disagree. However, the thought of LeeAnn and Tom Waits writing lyrics together boggles the farookin’ mind.

So, go listen, already.

Sam Adams Utopias MMII
A Steal at $200.00 per Bottle
Yesterday, I took a ride over to one of my favorite liquor stores, which is a supermarket-sized place that sells nothing but liquor, wine and beer (and also has a fair cigar selection). In short, definitely my kinda place. The vodka selection alone takes up approximately 2/3 of the average sized supermarket aisle! But I digress.

While there, I took a peek at the high-end stuff that is kept refrigerated under lock and key. Predictably the locked cooler contains mostly Champagnes (there is a separate lockup for high-end things that don’t need to be refrigerated, particularly those that apparently are popular with shoplifters). Anyway, I saw the bottle pictured above and marveled at the idea of a bottle of beer costing $200.00.

When I arrived home, I searched for this expensive bottle of suds on the net in order to learn a bit more about it. I found it here, but the price was not $200.00, but rather was $499.00 a bottle!! Holy Budweiser, Batman!! That’s almost five hundred bucks for a bottle of beer, albeit very fancy schmancy beer. Here is the seller’s description of what must the nectar of the Beer Gods:

At $200.00 per bottle, I probably should run back to the store and buy a case of the stuff. On second thought, that would be a pretty pricey investment, and an “investment” it would have to be, because, as much as I believe that life is too short to drink cheap whiskey or beer, I think I might choke drinking a case of beer at two hundred (or five hundred!) bucks a bottle (even if it does contain “Hallertau Mittelfrueh, Tettnang Tettnanger, Spalt Spalter and Czech Saaz” hops).

I think what I’ll do is go back to the store, explain to the guy that I am an upscale lush and ask the if I could get a small brown bag with the bottle so that I could drink it in the parking lot.

I get some interesting e-mails:

Someone named Susan Parra sent me one with the subject being “Re: YTTROGW, and fell alseep.”

Then there is the one from a person named Elizabeth Lucero. She wrote me about “Re: off die hilltop me te.”

Good ol’ Wilbur Pagan must have thought I was dying to read his e-mail about “Re: itself never bodes frk.”

On December 23rd, I was really glad to receive the reminder from Rufus Greene that “Christmas is near…ticzbbtxcksutaozrj.” Good thing too, because I had thought that Christmas is near..biczbbtxcksutaorzj. Thanks, Rufus.

WTF???

Having lived all my life in the most densely populated state in the union (where when you sneeze and guy next door says “God bless you,” or equally as likely, “Keep it down!”), and having spent a fair portion of my life snarled in New Jersey’s world-class traffic jams, I have often thought about how nice it would be to chuck it all and head for the country, preferably near the sea.

I suspect that many people who live in metropolitan areas harbor the same fantasy — the desire to leave the gut-wrenching rat race and to simplify. However, there are a host of reasons why this remains a fantasy for most of us, not the least of which is the daunting problem of making a living in the boondocks. In my case, for example, if I were to leave New Jersey and wanted to practice law in another state, I would have to sit for that state’s bar examination. Believe me, I would rather lick the men’s room floor in New York City’s Port Authority Bus Terminal than take another bar exam. Still, some folks (with more courage than I) take the plunge.

I came across a blog by a fellow in Ireland (they have traffic jams there too) who packed it in and headed, with his family, for the county (by the sea). He’s sharing the experience in “Country Living Journal – My Escape to Country Life.” I suspect that James is blessed with the “Luck o’ the Irish” and will therefore succeed, but as one can never have too much good luck, you might want to drop by to wish him well, American style.

There are more than a few of them around, but I particularly liked Jeff’s (Mr. Side Salad) lists, one of which he was paid to write.

I hope he was well-paid, because it certainly was well written.

A slideshow that Sgt. Hook recommended. As usual, he is on the money with his recommendation. Have a look (It also features sound).

I’ve been banging around the music business just about all my adult life. I’ve played with bands in dives, average joints, upscale joints, countless weddings, anniversaries, graduation parties, block parties, Christmas parties, New Year’s Eve parties, and even a handful of (oy!)bowling banquets. I have loved just about every minute of it (except, of course, lugging the equipment). As such, I would like to offer a bit of advice to the folks who play CDs for a living.

1. You are not Cousin Brucie.
You may call yourself a DJ (Disc Jockey), but you are not on the radio. You are selecting and playing CDs for a room full of people. Therefore, please lose the radio announcer rubber voice when speaking to the audience. Hell, real disc jockeys don’t even talk like that anymore.

2. You are not Elvis.
Just because you play CDs does not – I repeat – does not mean that you can sing. Please spare us.

3. Know your audience.
Take a walk out into the audience, and take a look at the people for whom you will be playing CDs. If just about everyone in the room is older than 45, it is probably a pretty good idea to avoid heavy doses of ACDC. Similarly, if you don’t see a good number of Latino people, you might want to consider not playing back to back salsa tunes when the first one resulted in a dance floor that resembled an unpopulated basketball court.

4. Remember WHERE you are working.
Obviously, this is related to the previous point and, in this case, applies to DJs who work in North Jersey. In North Jersey, it’s a pretty good bet that lots of shit-kicking, country music will not work for most folks. I happen to like country music, but trust me, most people in North Jersey don’t even know who Toby Keith is. They never heard of Dwight Yoakam, and they sure as hell don’t want large helpings of John Denver.

Speaking of country music, please, please, at all costs, avoid playing Achy Breaky Heart, even if the two brofus “line-dancing” dolls in the place beg you to play it. I guarantee you that they will do the same “line dance” all night to virtually every tune you play (possibly even including “Misty”), so you should spare everyone else in the room having to listen to Mr. Cyrus’ seriously stupid song.

In North Jersey, Sinatra (no one ever uses his first name) is King. So, the simple rule is, when in doubt, play Sinatra. Although it pains me to say this (as one of the handful of Jersey natives who thinks that Bruce Springsteen is way, way, way overrated), you probably want to toss in a couple of Mr. Springsteen’s tunes, which will of course spawn the inevitable “BRUUUUCE” from his devotees in the audience.

5. Guard the microphone.
Don’t hand the microphone to anyone who wishes to sing along with the CD. Tell these people to sing in the shower or go to a karaoke bar. This may be difficult if the woman asking to sing a Mariah Carey tune has nice torts, but please remember that there are a couple hundred other people in the room who should not be subjected to such an auditory assault. Instead, consider offering the budding Mariah a special audition after the gig.

…and finally,

6. Shut the f**k up.
Talking over, or, worse yet, shouting over the music does not improve the song. It also does not liven up the party. Instead, it just pisses people off and you might wind up in the proctologist’s office to have a microphone-ectomy.

God, how miss music played by real-live people who actually can play and sing real-live music.

Since approximately this time yesterday, I have not been able to access my site. I had assumed that no one else could either. However, the Site Meter shows that people are getting to to the site. I have no problem accessing internet sites in general and non-BlogSpot sites, so I assume that the problem lies with the BlogSpot folks.

Color me puzzled (and pissed).

Happy New Year, BlogSpot. You’re off to a great start.

Update: It appears to be OK now. It must have been a cyber-version of one of those “24 hour things” that docs resort to explain how in 24 hours one can go from feeling fine to feeling like death is only around the corner, to feeling fine again. Then again, maybe the folks at BlogSpot are all really hung over.

Update to the Update: I spoke too soon. The problem is back. I’m going to get away from this computer for a bit, lest I put Mr. Fist through the screen.