Yucky Salad with Bones

May 30, '07...Bill speaks again:

So I'm flipping through my new Sports Illustrated this afternoon (which, unfortunately, takes about 4 minutes now-- since Steve Rushin left it's plummeting on my "must read" list) and one page just stopped me in my tracks. An advertisement.

The top of the page reads-- "The bad news: Your movie is sold out." Then there is about a 4 inch picture of a man and a woman at a movie theatre, with a worker putting a "sold out" sign up in the ticket window. Underneath that reads another banner: "The good news: Your movie is sold out." Then in giant caps beneath that..... VIAGRA, what are you waiting for?

You look back at the picture of the couple-- he's about mid 50's, a swarthy looking chap and his eyebrow is raised high and he's wearing a grin the Joker would be proud of. She's late 40's-50'ish.... looks like an older Nancy Travis (I guess it could be Nancy Travis at this point).

WHAT IN THE HELL? That's the obvious next move if your movie is sold out????? His face is completely creepy and you get the sense that he just said, "well, we can't get into the movie..... I guess we should just go back to my place and *#$#%." Her ridiculous smile seems to be answering, "you sly devil you.... well, I guess.... the movie is sold out after all." Slut! How about make him take you to a different movie??? Or go get ice cream? Just do ANYTHING that will get that creepy smile off of Mr. Swarthy's face! Yuck. They're obviously not married either because he's wearing a sports coat, and we all know husbands always throw those on to take their wives to movies.

"So, Julio.... how was your date with Nancy Travis? Did you see that new Ashley Judd movie?"

Julio, "No, my friend, zee movie was sold out."

"Ahhh.... so you went back to your place and *#$#%????"

Julio, "Si, my friend, si..... what else were we to do, zee movie was sold out."

Manly, swarthy laughter ensues.

*********************************

So I saw that freakshow Cindy Sheehan has ended her little grass-roots peace movement outside the Prez's Texas home and is going back to whatever commune she came from.

She said, "I'm going home for awhile and try to be normal." Yeah, good luck with that Cindy. You already seem pretty normal to me. And Pink Floyd wasn't high when they wrote "Comfortably Numb".

Sheehan signed off with: "Goodbye America... you are not the country that I love and I finally realized no matter how much I sacrifice, I can't make you be that country unless you want it. It's up to you now."

Oh well, good try Cindy.... I thought you had it there for a second, I really did. I read that three skirmishes over in Iraq were avoided when rival soldiers stopped and mentioned "that woman sitting in Texas" and took down their arms and instead of shooting at eachother they played a spirited game of kickball and sang songs instead. (True, there was a close play at home and in the arguing that followed, one Jihadist was shot in the face, but what are you gonna do?)

"It's up to you now." I love that part. It's up to me????? Sorry, Cinderoo, I got plans.... tonight I'm heading up to the theatre and waiting outside the new Pirates movie.... I hear it's selling out.

May 20, '07

"Baby I was never cool enough to get a job at a record store.... and if I had, I wouldn't want you anymore"-- Roger Clyne

Last week on my birthday I went to I-Tunes and bought myself about 20 new songs as a little present.

I-Tunes rocks really hard-- a buck a song and you can preview anything for twenty seconds before you buy it. If you like music I-Tunes has become an essential place since corporate radio is so mind-numbingly awful (unless you like hearing "Lips of an Angel" by Hinder 10 times over the course of a work day).

I hear people talk about how much music sucks now, that nobody is making good music and it's just not true, it's just that it's hard to find good music on the radio anymore. Well, that and it's just another generation telling the one after it that their music sucks-- this always seems to happen.

Before I go on, I'm going to make three guesses about those of you out there who do like that Hinder song. (Why do you, seriously, WHY??? I'll forgive you for liking it up to say 5 listens, but after that.... no. We all fall into that trap with tons of songs-- they can be catchy or sappy and they just hit your ear in the right way. I liked most Poisen songs when they first hit the radio, so I'm certainly not coming at you from some musical high horse.)

Anyway, if you still like that Hinder song and you're a guy, you: are white and still have an earring in and you still think it's cool. Dude, it's so not cool. Never was really, but there was about a 2 year period around 10-15 years ago where nobody was really sure "what the hell, white guy-- earring, is that cool?

Not sure, some normal looking guys seem to be trying it... does Jeter have one in?... Wait, is Jeter white? What the hell? Well, we've had our answer now for years: IT'S NOT COOL. Never was. Mark McGrath got away with it for a time, but that time is long over-- plus he was the lead singer of Sugar Ray--- you weren't.

Guess number two if you're a guy and like that song: you play softball and give a crap if your team wins or loses. Guess three: you're over 17 and blast your car stereo obnoxiously loud. 17 and under-- you get a pass for doing that-- driving on your own, going to high school parties, crushing on teenage girls, summer is coming-- you just generally have a lot to be fired up about and your car stereo is a part of that. If you're over 17 and blasting your car stereo you're just a douche. If you're a woman who likes that song you're: single, wear way too much make-up and have a hairdo that looks like a wig. (oh, and you're probably fat and smoke... just sayin').

Anyway.... buzzing around I-Tunes last week I realized how much I miss record stores. I've loved music ever since I was a little kid listening to Casey Kasem doing "American Top 40" on a crackly AM radio in my older brother's room. I remember one Sunday night we cheered like it was a sporting event when Sweet's "Fox On The Run" had climbed it's way past "Disco Lady". The first album I ever bought was Elton John's "Caribou"-- me and my brother Joe had ridden our bikes up to the Wax Museum on Excelsior Blvd-- he got to buy "Captain Fantastic and The Brown Dirt Cowboy" and I bought the other one (we had already worn out "Greatest Hits").

But I was captivated ever since that first trip to a record store. I loved everything about them. They always played great music you'd never heard before. There was always great people watching at a record store. As I got older, I loved going to classic record stores in Minneapolis like The Electric Fetus and Let It Be and buying something shlocky like say, Duran Duran and having the music-snob clerk roll their eyes as they rang me up and mumble "stupid jock" or some such thing as I walked away.

Loved it.

One of the great things about spending an hour or so in a record store, is there were always people there, usually the staff, who took music way, way too seriously. You could listen in on conversations that were funny, fascinating and absurd all at once.

A couple great exchanges from "High Fidelity"-- Nick Hornby's fantastic book on the like:

Rob: "Liking both Marvin Gaye and Art Garfunkel is like supporting both the Israelis and the Palestinians!"
Laura: "No, it's really not Rob. You know why? Because Marvin Gaye and Art Garfunkel make pop records."

Another scene where ulta-nerdy Dick is over at Good Guy/but lost Rob's apartment:

Dick: "I guess it looks as if you're re-organizing your records. What is this though? Chronological?"

Rob: "No"

Dick: "Not alphabetical..."

Rob: "Nope..."

Dick: "What?"

Rob: "Autobiographical"

Dick: "No fucking way!"

I loved flipping through the stacks at record stores, looking up when the bell on the door would jangle as a new customer would walk in and everyone would immediately size them up (the same way as at a bar, party, pick up hoops etc etc-- we just do that, it's part of being human). And girls always seemed hotter in a record store. That same girl from your math class that you never noticed at all-- you'd see her flipping through old Rod Stewart records while bobbing her head along to The Replacements "Answering Machine" and you'd get a 15 minute crush on her.

I had a total John Hughes moment in a record store during my senior year of high school. I had been stood up for a date by a ridiculously pretty girl from another school earlier that year in the fall. It was now late spring of the following year and I hadn't seen that girl since she stood me up, even though our schools shared a lot of the same parties. I'm flipping through a stack of albums when all the sudden miss scorching hot, stander-upper girl walk in with her dad. We catch eyes for about a two-count.

Part of me wants to say something mean to her, part of me just wants to say hello, part of me wants to hold a boom-box high over my ahead while "In Your Eyes" plays (even though that song wouldn't come out for three more years-- understand she was really hot).

What I did, of course, was turn around as fast as I could and pretend I hadn't seen her. When I had the courage to look up again, she and her dad were gone. We were both seventeen years old, we didn't have the social grace or the maturity to know what to do. Just one of those surreal 30 second scenes that happens in your life-- but it happened in a record store and I can still tell you that the song playing was "Save A Prayer" by Duran Duran. I don't know why the hell I remember that, but I do. And I've always liked that song a little bit more since that day.

I haven't been in a record store in over three years now. There's no point. Who's going to spend 18 bucks on a cd with two or three good songs when you can just buy those songs for two bucks? I don't miss buying records, but I do miss record stores-- everything about them-- the people, the vibe, even the smell. I miss going into The Electric Fetus and buying something cool like "Hang Time" and having the punk rock girl ringing me up giving me an approving glance as if to say, "hmmm, maybe I mis-judged you jock-boy" and I also miss buying something like Bon Jovi and having the same punk rock girl give me a dismissive look that screamed "go date-rape a cheerleader, jock-boy"-- I loved both looks and I miss them.

Five Songs To Download This Week: (and it seems that they have to be really good this time)

Time Won't Let Me Go-- The Bravery
Bubbly-- Colbie Caillat
I Told You So-- Ocean Color Scene
Have You Ever-- Brandi Carlile
Michael & Heather At The Baggage Claim-- Fountains Of Wayne

editor's note: Bill is trying to pretend he isn't that character from High Fidelity, and he so it that character. He's if that character and Nick Hornby had a baby. Also, I hate that sone from Hinder so much I wish it was a rabbit so I could kill it with a shotgun.

And no, I'm not dead, I'm just in hiding.- Katie

May 10 '07

It's been 365 days and I'm getting to the point where I almost feel whole again. They gutted me and cut up all my thoughts and feelings and left them to blow away like dust on a gravel road. I felt paralyzed and wasn't sure if I would ever make it all the way back. You learn though that time does heal wounds, you learn that maybe you're stronger than you ever knew you were. The color has slowly come back to my life, both literally and metaphorically and the other day I even smiled when I heard a group of school children playing during recess. I think I even tasted my food the other night-- for the longest time, it's just been shoveling bland foodstuffs into my mouth only so I didn't starve to death.

This post-apocalyptic world has seemed to affect everything and everyone too; it's not just me. A nation, nay, a world, took the sucker punch and crumbled to it's collective knees. The evidence is everywhere: Alec Baldwin calling his daughter a "rude pig," Don Imus, Michael Richards, Tim Hardaway and on and on and on. Madness has raged across the land, up is down, down is up, dogs and cats living together, nothing has made sense. Do you really think Jim Carrey would have made a terrible horror movie before the planet was tipped over? Some giant galactic ogre had taken the snow-globe that is our planet and shook it hard. It's like we are all recovering from post concussion syndrome-- we've all been left trying to dig out from the muck and the mire. Poor Brit probably took it hardest of all, got divorced, shaved her head, hooked up in re-hab and My information could be wrong, but I believe no babies were born for an entire calendar year, I mean, what was the point?

The darkness is lifting though and I can only hope we've all learned our lessons. We all have to try to be better people-- be nicer to each other, reach out to those in need and accept those who are different-- then, only then, will all the colors be back in this rainbow we call Earth.

It was awful and I don't even want to write the words, but I'm finally in a place where I think everything might actually turn out okay.

I'm just going to type it really quick and then forget about it-- I've fought too hard to get back to the light; we all need to start living again.

Chris Daughtry was voted off American Idol a year ago today.

May 1 '07

So I spent the last week trying to be all green and earth-friendly. Heeding the advice of World Leader/Global Icon/Pop Star Sheryl Crow (hey, she's as much the first two as she is the last at this point), I only used one square per sit.

Let me just say, it changes your life a little bit. By the third day I had dreds, was wearing Bob Marley t-shirts and couldn't get anything but sandals on my feet. I found myself spending all my free time playing hacky sack with my new friend Pablo, who I met buying organic pinwheels at Whole Foods.

I've also ruined 13 wash clothes and I have to shower for 45 minutes now, when it used to take me five, but hey-- that's the price you pay when you square your three squares a day (I know, I hate math too, but it's really simple, you're allotted one square of toilet paper per meal.) Cats tend to follow me around now and I'm really starting to get Phish, you know? I mean really get it.

And even though after taking 45 minutes per shower I still stink like, well.... like ASS, I feel a kinship with the trees now when I walk down the street. The other day I was strolling down a tree-lined street and when the wind whipped up and made the leaves shake, I almost felt like they were applauding me and my tree-saving lifestyle. I smiled at the young skateboarder next to me and unable to keep my glee to myself, I looked at him maniacally and said, "I made that!"

He reached quickly to cover his nose and snarked a "no-shit" at me as he hurried by. He doesn't get it. He doesn't get me or Phish. Where's Pablo, he'd understand.

NOT!

Hey Sheryl, pull your head out of your stanky ass and grow a brain! One square?!?! Look, I know your average dinner consists of three carrot sticks followed by a dessert of diet air, but some of us out here in the world eat tacos every once in a while. One square ain't cutting it. I actually tried it once (okay, sorry for that visual everyone, really, I am)-- and if I could quote Maggie Walker, "no sexy".

Sheryl, you want to save the trees, be my guest, but leave my ass out of it.

"If it makes you happy..... why the hell are you so sad?"

Maybe because you smell like arse.

This probably explains why Lance left her high and dry. In fact, he probably left skid marks.

Five Songs to Dowload This Week:

1. Black Betty-- Big City Rock
2. Icky Thump-- The White Stripes
3. Fans-- Kings Of Leon
4. Welcome Home, Luc Robitaille-- Mando Diao
5. Can't Even Tie Your Own Shoes-- Golden Smog