Last night, Susan and I went to New Jersey to see Colin Hay play. We got a hotel somewhere in Jersey and were met there by Paul P. The show took place in a presbyterian church, of all place. (Paul did not spontaneously combust)

The opening act (yeah, there was one), a man and woman couple who have won some awards at folk festivals, played for about thirty minutes. Paul likened them to 'a mighty wind' only, in my opinion, they sucked more than a backward asshole after a Chinese/Mexican casserole chased by a twelve pack of Budweiser.

Colin Hay was fantastic. Not only is he an exceptional musician and song writer, as if that weren't enough for one guy, but he also has perfect comedic timing and an endearing, self-deprecating sense of humor.

I would gladly see him play again.

Regardless of whether or not you liked Men at Work back in the eighties (personally, I didn't give a fuck about them one way or the other) I suggest you pick up one of his solo albums. That is, if you enjoy mellow acoustic music. His stuff is wonderful.

Transcript:

Me: Bye honey, I'll see you in ten minutes.
Susan: Bye, I love you.

Click.

Blue and White flashing lights in the rear view mirror.

Officer: (with attitude) License and registration please.
Me: My license is in my pocket and my registration is in my glove box.
As I reach for my license, me: Can you tell me why you stopped me?
Officer: (again with attitude) You were talking on your cell phone.
Me: (as I hand him my license and registration, look him in the eyes) No I wasn't.
Officer: (now with even more attitude) Yes. You were, you just drove past me and you had your phone up like this (he holds his hand up to his ear)
Me: (pulling my blue tooth ear piece out of my ear, now with attitude of my own) No. I wasn't. I have an ear piece, I don't need to hold the phone to my ear.
Officer: (real attitude) You may have an ear piece in now, but you didn't when you drove past me. You were on your phone.
Me: (trumping his attitude now by a factor of ten or more) No, I didn't. That doesn't even make sense.
Officer: I saw you. (hand up to ear again)
Me: The only reason my hand would have been up to my ear would be to terminate a call. What you're saying makes zero sense.
Officer: Where are you headed. (Note: RI Plates in CT)
Me: Home.
Officer: Where's home?
Me: (gave my address) it's a different address than what's on my license.
Officer: How long have you lived at that address?
Me: I live half of the week there and half of the week in RI, that's where my business is.
Officer: (with no more crap to try to write me up for, and still with fucking attitude, hands me back my license and reg) Have a nice night.
Me: You too, sir.

I haven't had that much attitude from a cop since I cut my fucking hair over twelve years ago.

I went with my sisters and my dad and we all had a GREAT time. I can now cross 'go to the world series' off of my list of things to do before I die.




Me, dad, and the sisters.


Beautiful Fenway Park


Josh Beckett strikes out the first batter of the series (along with the next two)


Dustin Pedroia hits a lead off home run, getting the series started off right.



The final score tells the tale.

~Bicyclists on narrow roads
~Teams of bicyclists anywhere
~Ass kissers of any make and model
~Exploiters of friendships
~People who have to let everyone know that they know a secret cause it makes em feel all cool and shit
~Adults who feel they need to babysit other adults
~Ordering eggs over and getting solid yolks
~Banana Barium Smoothies
~Death
~Taxes

1. I was once an all star basketball player.
2. I own and run my own business (started over three years ago with my dad).
3. I once had the job of riding around on a Key West Police boat for a couple months. (Active Army Guard).
4. I have walked the Great Wall of China. (no, not the whole thing).
5. I've attended a Luau in Hawaii hosted by very old Hawaiian family whose last name is Smith.
6. My cousin (whom I've never met) is Dickie Barret of The Mighty Bostones.
7. I once wrote over 60,000 words of a novel before scraping it.
8. I like driving in snow storms.
9. I miss my mom terribly, every single day.
10. One of the happiest moments in my life was when my love told me we were having a baby.

Why do the insist on rewarding failure with astronomical payouts?

Home Depot's shareholders have accepted the resignation of their CEO Robert Nardelli for failing to maintain and/or increase the value of the corporation's stock.

What does he get for his total failure as a CEO?

$210 million dollars. (Plus unpaid benefits)

Now, as my friend Paul just mentioned in a short discussion we were having...

"I like the reasoing yused by Boards. If we dont' apy big bucks to CEOs we can't get the best and the brightest" Yeah kinda hard to support that reasoing if some of the highest paid run the companies intot he ground"

And it's true...

Another thing is, you're preparing them for failure when you contract them with ridiculous exit packages like this. "Hey, I'm getting a quarter of a billion dollars whether I succeed or not, so what the hell, no ulcers for me!"

Pay them to succeed, don't pay them to fail.

Hope you all have a wonderful day tomorrow. Happy holidays to those of you who celebrate otherwise.

And now, I shall tax you all! TAXES!! TAXES!!

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: Very Sir Lord Daniel the Unhyphenated of Old Tonbridge Wafers Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

*Business is doing well, we just got a great sale that spreads out over the next three years.
*Susan is healthy (though pregnancy isn't easy on her)
*Baby girl is healthy and probably doing laps in Susan's tummy as we speak.
*I have two of the coolest sisters in the world.
*I have one seriously great dad.
*I've got friends. Quite a few great friends, and many good friends.
*I have a close and supportive extended family.
*I had 34 good years with a wonderful mom.
*We've got a wacko dog who seems more human than canine at times. He's great.
*I haven't had to work for anyone else for three years now. (When my dad and I started our business)
*I've got a great and loving girlfriend, whom I'll be living with in the very near future.
*White Christmas lights make me smile, and they just happen to be everywhere this year.
*I've got a small heater keeping my feets warm as I type this.
*I love winter in New England.

I do miss my mom terribly, but I've got a good life filled with wonderful people. I've got a daughter on the way, and just the thought of her takes my breath away. Yesterday's post was a spur of the moment thing that I wish I'd just kept to myself, but I thank you for your concern.

Things may be rough, but life is charging on.

Happy holidays everyone.

You open the freezer and pull something out at random and see it's something that mom packaged and labeled before she died and that invisible fist drives into your chest and head all over again.

God damn it.

I’ll have a blue Christmas without you
I’ll be so blue just thinking about you
Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree
Won’t be the same dear, if you’re not here with me

And when the blue snowflakes start falling
That’s when those blue memories start calling
You’ll be doing alright with your Christmas of white
But I’ll have a blue Christmas

You’ll be doing alright with your Christmas of white
But I’ll have a blue, blue Christmas

Hope you all have a great day.

With a nod to Barry Mcguire.

Eve of Elections

Campaign spending, it is exploding
Negative ads, war chests loadin’
Candidates value truth, but not for votin’
No one voted for the war, but still Baghdad’s a smokin’
Bullshit’s got so deep, we’re nearly floatin’

But you tell me
Over and over and over again, my friend
Ah, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of elections.

Don’t you understand what I’m tryin’ to say
Can’t you feel the fears I’m feelin’ today?
Mass voting machine tampering, this Election Day
No chads to dangle, in a cyber-ballot grave
[Take a look around ya boy, it's bound to scare ya boy]

And you tell me
Over and over and over again, my friend
Ah, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of elections.

Yeah, my vote’s so useless, feels like it’s evaporatin’
Pitted against multinational corporations
They decide who wins, and know no regulation.
Got a handful of billionaires writin’ legislation
Turnin’ a blind eye to illegal immigration
While the whole middle class is disintegratin’
And I’m unpatriotic if I say that it’s frustratin’

And you tell me
Over and over and over again, my friend
Ah, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of elections.

Media and politicians assignin’ blame to eachother
No discussin real issues, just yellin over one another
Pundits muddlin up debate with emotional distractions
Stirrin’ up shit, getting’ famous, without takin any action
The Pro-Lifers and Pro-Choicers think each are gainin’ traction
And no one for or against Gay Marriage is getting satisfaction
While Lobbyists and Congress consummate their mutual attraction
And… tell me over and over and over and over again, my friend
You don’t believe
We’re on the eve
Of elections.
Mm, no no, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of elections.

Think of all the blood spilled in the War on Terror
Then take a look around to Iran and North Korea
You may think the president we have today is a disgrace
But it'll be the same old whore with a slightly different face
And it doesn’t really matter in the end who wins the race
Or if the map gets colored in with more red or blue states
Cause the news will have moved on to a new missin’ white girl’s case
And… tell me over and over and over and over again, my friend
You don’t believe
We’re on the eve
Of elections.
Mm, no no, you don’t believe
We’re on the eve
of destruction.

Stolen from Erik

IF YOUR LIFE WAS A MOVIE, WHAT WOULD THE SOUNDTRACK BE?

Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
* Put it on shuffle
* Press play
* For every question, type the song that's playing
* When you go to a new question, press the next button
Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool...

Opening Credits: "As Time Goes By" – Jimmy Durante
Waking Up: "American Baby" – Dave Matthews
First Day at School: "Tobacco Island" – Flogging Molly
Falling in Love: "Stay" – Dave Matthews
Fight Song: "The Woman With You" – Kenny Chesney
Breaking Up: "The Wanderlust" – Flogging Molly
Prom: "Livingston’s Gone to Texas" – Jimmy Buffett
Life Is Good: "Something Sexy About the Rain" – Kenny Chesney
Mental Breakdown: "Happiness" – Grant Lee Buffalo
Driving: "Rings " – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Flashback: "Good Enough" – Sarah Mclachlan
Getting Back Together: "Satellite" – Dave Matthews Band
Wedding: "When We Recovered" – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Paying the Dues: "Anything But Mine" – Kenny Chesney
The Night Before the War: "Silence" – Sarah Mclachlan
Final Battle: "Come Down" – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Moment of Triumph: "A Boy Named Sue" – Johnny Cash
Death Scene: "Blackbird" – Sarah Mclachlan
Funeral Song: "Wild Horses" - Jewel
End Credits: "Money Will Roll Right In" - Nirvana

Thanks, deadscrypt

On September 11, 2001, I left around 7:00 in the morning for the airport. I don’t remember who gave me a ride that morning, but I imagine it was one (or both) of my sisters. Maybe my dad. I’d come home for a few days for some reason or other, I think it’d been a short visit, and I was leaving that morning to return to Florida where I was living at the time. Everything went fine, check in was a breeze, it had never been all that difficult and Providence (RI) was not a very big airport.

My Itinerary would take me from Providence, RI to Cleveland, OH, to Tampa, FL. The first leg of the journey was uneventful, I had window seats the whole way, as I always requested. We left somewhere between 8:30 and 9:00. I slept most of the way as I usually tried to do when up in the air just to make the trips go by faster. Like all good airlines, mine had me on a schedule that required a near sprint from my landing gate to my connecting flight. I made it easy enough through the usual hustle and bustle of airport traffic, showed my ID at the gate and boarded the plane.

When everyone boarded, they locked up the cabin and taxied out to the runway. We were back in the air no more than ten minutes later. Again, I fell asleep.

About forty minutes into the flight, I heard an announcement through the haze of sleep. They were requesting any off duty pilots to please come to the cockpit. I listened, and watched a man from the aisle ahead of me stood up and walked to the front of the plane. My head resumed its barely comfortable lean into the sweatshirt I was using as a pillow against the window.

No more than two minutes later, the pilot came back on the intercom and gave us what probably ranks as the most unexpected and disturbing news I’ve ever received. Two planes had flown into the World Trade Center Towers in New York, and a third plane had crashed into the pentagon. The FAA had ordered all planes to ground at the nearest airport, which for us was Columbus. The woman in front of me, whose husband was a pilot, turned around and looked at me and all she could think to say was ‘Oh, my God,’

When we landed, we were bussed immediately back to Cleveland, as our flights when air traffic resumed, would have to leave from our original departing airport. I spent that night in a hotel (once they shut the tvs off at the airport) watching the entire disaster over and over again on television. Like most folks, I was in shock.

A friend of mine had a friend in Columbus who offered to put me up as long as I had remain in Ohio. In all, I spent six days there waiting for them to open the airports back up. When they did, Jodi, the woman who’d shared her home with me, drove me to Cleveland and I got on a plane, this time heading to Newark, and from there to Tampa.

I requested an Aisle seat. And I didn’t sleep.

In Newark, I had just enough time to run outside and have a smoke (it would be another three years before I’d finally quit), and the smoking area looked out on New York City. Two giant columns of smoke scarred the view. I don’t think I was the only person outside that day to cry at the sight. I see it as clear in my memory today as I did that day five years ago.

My heart goes out to the folks who had to experience that attack up close, and to those who didn’t make it through. I was seeing a woman who had a meeting no more than three blocks away from WTC that day. She had to walk out of the city with a legion of other lucky souls. If you lost someone there, or at the pentagon, or in that field in Pennsylvania, you have my sympathies. If you lent a helping hand that day, you have my undying admiration and gratitude.

That’s my story. What’s yours?

Lee Thomas stole my woman! And Nick Kaufmann is NOT happy about it!

At 12:30 am when a cop pulls you over.

A friend of mine from Florida is spending his summer managing a beach club in Connecticut. I met him tonight at the Mohegan Sun casino and commenced to losing some money. We parted ways and I retrieved my car from valet, heading on my merry way. I'd had a few beers over the course of several hours. Probably not enough to blow a breathalyzer test, but I don't like taking those chances. So, I caged my lead foot and opted for cruise control. Well, I exited the highway and took even more care on 138, the road that leads to my neighborhood. Had the radio and the A/C cranking as I crept along. A cop passed by going the other way and I looked down to check my speed out of some misguided paranoia carried over from a somewhat reckless youth and saw that I was within the limits. Four seconds later I've got flashing blues in my rear view and I'm cursing at the steering wheel.

I pull over, put it in park, and put the window down, sticking one hand out and keeping one on the wheel. A nineteen or twenty year old cop walks up and shines a flashlight at me and asks for my license and registration. Trying not to breathe in his direction I un click my safety belt (click it or ticket) and grab my wallet from the pocket of my jeans, then I reach behind the passenger seat and pull out the little binder in which my dad (did I mention I had my dad's jeep?) keeps the registration and insurance papers. I hand both to him and, still trying not to breathe in his direction lest he smell beer, I ask him what he's pulled me over for. He said 'are you James?' as he took the papers. 'No, I'm Dan. This is my dad's car'

'There's a warrant out for his arrest. Larceny of a calling card'

Now, my dad has had his crazy days, but he's been a business man for close to forty years. He's approaching sixty five years old. He's respectable by default, you might say.

So, I turn to the young (very polite) man and say...

"MY DAD???" and, no longer trying not to breath on him I laugh out loud.

Anyway, I explain to him that the vehicle has been pulled over four times already for the same thing and that he's looking for someone named Keith and not Felonious Fox. He went and checked it, came back and gave me my papers and bid me a fond farewell with all due apologies, etc. etc. etc.

I can't wait to harass my dad.

In closing, if your name is Keith, and you live in Coventry, RI, and you've stolen or molested a calling card sometime in the past six months, PLEASE TURN YOURSELF IN!! It's getting kind of old.