A Quick Hot Take on COVID Vaccine Passports

Some people don't like the idea of COVID vaccine passports because it somehow infringes on liberty or human rights or something like that.  This includes Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida and an alumnus of Yale and Harvard Law School and a former JAG Corps officer at Guantanamo Bay (which is to say a smart guy who knows a thing or two about liberty and human rights).

I think this position is wildly overblown.

If you want to attend public schools you have to show proof of vaccination.  Yes, you can obtain a waiver in many states for religious or philosophical reasons, but either way your local school district knows whether your kids have or haven't been vaccinated for various things.

Many other countries require visitors to get vaccinated for Yellow Fever before they can enter.  So, for example, if you want to visit Angola or Benin you have to show proof of vaccination.  To make this easier, WHO even has an international certificate of vaccination or prophylaxis, or ICVP, to carry with you to these places.  A vaccine passport, if you will.  So when you go to these places their governments know you've been vaccinated for various things.

If you want to leave the US and go to another country, you need ... a passport!  I have one and you probably do too.  Getting it required a bunch of paperwork, a photo, a fee, and an inordinately long wait but now I can leave the country and get back in.  As a result, the government knows a bunch of things about me and so do the governments of the foreign places I visit.  That's just the cost of travel.

Sharing information about yourself with your government is the cost of citizenship.  We share health information all the time (see my school example above; see also anyone over 65 who uses Medicare).  This circumstance shouldn't be any different.

At the end of the day which is worse: a bunch of bureaucrats knowing that you got the COVID shot, or dealing with more masking/distancing/shutdown precautions?  So lighten up Ron.

Corona Files: One Text You Don't Want

There's powerful writing, as our Outer Banks Ombudsman can demonstrate, and then there's the sheer brute force of a 7-word text, one that spares all preparatory run-up or foreshadowing.  And then there's the idiotic blurt of a reply.

My baby girl got the coronavirus.

She's 19. She's otherwise healthy. She should be just fine. And, spoiler alert, she's now through the woods and already out of quarantine. But it still jolted and jarred me to get that news and consider what it might mean.

In the world in which we live, there is an endless supply of Monday Morning Armchair Quarterbacks (most of whom are of the Ryan Leaf variety) who tell us what they would have done, or what we should do, or neither of those but simply tell us that people are doing it wrong... and how dare they?  Where the pandemic is concerned, way, way too many people apparently have some or all of this mess all figured out. Totally pegged. And the more sure someone is about any element of COVID-19, the more quickly I dismiss them as a foolhardy gasbag.

But I'm here to say that the comfort level that the University of South Carolina, its administration, and its seemingly unflappable president amply provided me leading up to and during my daughter's illness reduced my 385-miles-away angst significantly.  While UNC, ECU, JMU and other schools have punted (for their own reasons) and sent kids contaminated and otherwise back to their homes and hometowns, USC said in not so many words, "We have a plan. And we feel good about where we are with it."

To wit, and to an almost alarming degree, there is a USC COVID Dashboard that began at Alert Level: New Normal and has risen no higher than Alert Level 1: Low -- even as the active cases among the student/faculty/staff population topped 1,700.  There have been fleeting moments where even I wondered if the USC Prez was Kevin Bacon in the Homecoming Parade.

And then two things happened.  One, that number quickly dropped to 640 as hundreds of people are graduating from quarantine with clean bills of health. (We presume; what the virus does to the body can have horrible, lasting effects, but unless you want this father to freak the fuck out, let's move on.)

Second, my daughter got better. She was sick for several days (exhausted like never before, achy all over, mild fever), felt slightly better, waited for a scheduled COVID test while self-quarantining, tested positive, moved into the quarantine dorm (in this case, a hotel room), kept at her classes online all the while, waited for the 10-days-from-first-symptoms paroling -- which meant only three days in formal lockdown, and moved back into her dorm room yesterday.  Where she rejoined her roommate and suitemates, who have now all had the virus.

She's back to being a college kid, still in a strange time, but with a mildly augmented sense of calm. She was a total trooper throughout, talking me off ledges here and there and going full Freaky Friday on me by being the composed teenager to the uneasy parent.

Are there potential holes in this university's plan? Almost definitely. Is its success somewhat contingent on the good sense of 34,000 people who are at the age of pre-frontal-lobe-full-development? As in the age when Dave ate a cicada on a dare, when Rob won the projectile vomit contest, and when I got an embarrassing and not quite right tattoo of a girl's name on my groin?  Yes, yes, it is reliant on those kinds of people. Yikes.  But I still like this plan better than a number of the alternatives I've seen.

That's the news for now, and I hope that's all the news of its ilk for a long, long while.  Good luck to each of you and yours out there, and may your own run-ins with this beast of a virus be like mine.  You know, like a ride on a timeworn, rickety roller coaster. It scares the crap out of you, makes you curse and swear and feel ill and you just can't wait for it to be over... but then it is, and you sigh, and you still think you might puke but you're so happy to be descending the stairs that you don't even consider the organs that may have gotten damaged along the way.

And that's just the dad of the patient. Godspeed.

I hate the new blogger but I might have some good covid news, alternatively titled "The Wisdom of Barbers," even more alternatively titled "T is for Trump," with some bad news predicted at the end

We've been awash in a sea of conflicting covid-19 information since the beginning of the crisis.  I think I've found some good news amid this morass of confusion.

Our adaptive immune systems primarily involve two types of cells: B cells and T cells.  It appears that T cells are more predominant when it comes to beating covid-19.  You can read about it here.

In July 2020, a group of European scientists published an article in Nature describing how they tested a bunch of people who never had coivd-19 and found that about 35% of them had a T cell response.  They attribute this to exposure to other coronaviruses.  This means that about 35% of the population might have some preexisting immunity to covid-19.  That's good news! 

I learned about this from a friend who is probably the smartest guy I know (sorry Dave).  He also posits that about 2% of the population of NJ already tested positive, which means that about 20% of NJ had the virus (the CDC says the true infection rate is about 10 times higher than reported).

Taken together, about 55% of the people in NJ should have some sort of immune response to the virus so we're close to the level needed for herd immunity.  That's good news too!

This conclusion is further validated by my barber.  I subscribe to a theory I call The Wisdom of Barbers.  Barbers spend the day shooting the shit with men of all ages, ethnicities, races, backgrounds, and socioeconomic status.  As a result they gather in an insanely broad range of views on whatever topic the feel like discussing and they can often crystallize that information into a prediction about the future.  My old barber ran a presidential election poll for over 20 years and it was always right.

Anyway, I got a haircut the other day at my local barbershop, an uncle-and-nephew team who may or may not take your action on NFL games.  My friend who told me about the European study also gets his hair cut there, so I asked the nephew if my friend told him about it too.  The nephew said "No, but I read a paper published through the NIH and it says the number could be as high as 50%."  I found the article in Science and he's right.  This is more good news!

All of that said, my friend an my barber are both conservatives.  My friend hates Trump but he's also a bit of a Blue Lives Matter guy (stuff like "If he had just listened to the police he wouldn't have gotten shot."). My barber voted for Trump and I'm pretty sure he will do so again (he's a Ben Shapiro fan).  The fact that they and no one other than zdaughter's speech therapist (who may be kinda Trumpy too) talks about this makes me wonder if it's a right wing talking point.

I suspect it's both.  For once, Republicans are speaking the truth and the virus will soon run its course, turning into nothing more than a relatively routine but life-threatening infection like measles.  I predict this will happen around mid-October.

Why then?  Because that's two weeks before the election.  Of course this is when the virus will clear up.  My old barber with the straw poll once told me "If you're ever at the race track and you see Bill Clinton, bet like he does.  That lucky bastard could bet on a three-legged horse and still win."  This is true--his shitty shenanigans never resulted in any real penalties and he's even allowed to speak publicly despite #MeToo.  Trump is the same guy, a bizzarro Cill Clinton.  Of course our T cells will save his lucky ass right in time to get reelected.

I eagerly await the FDA's approval of Trump brand T cells, yours for only $500 a dose or free when you buys a one year membership to any Trump brand golf club.

Corona Files: People Are (Sometimes) Awesome (Or At Least Pretty Cool)

Humans are an ingenious lot, when we're not defying common sense in the name of tribal allegiance or killing people misfortunate enough to have different levels of melanin than ours. Nick Parker seems to be one of the good ones.

Parker is a musician from Glastonbury, in the southwest of England. During the time of the coronavirus, he reached out to musician friends all over the globe, sending them songs to learn and record and not letting the individual artists know what other artists were participating in the same project. He called the effort Stranger Tunes, and his tastes intersect nicely with ours, as you'll see from the selections we've curated for your listening enjoyment.

Corona Files: The Horse Beating Shall Continue Until the Jockeys Learn Their Lessons

I have thoughts about the following, a typically thoughtful offering from our colleague in name but not yet in technical fact (come on already, Teej), Dave Fairbank. Specifically, I'm embroiled in an imbroglio related to our local soccer club's handling of the cancellation of the Spring season and I spent an hour on a Zoom call with the editor of our town's weekly. Intersection of interests and institutions I'm inclined to support, with a twist. I've had media training, and I think I did a pretty good job of presenting one side of a complicated story, but I have no idea how the story's gonna get written. At the same time, I'm completely in the camp of the media generally. Fascinating times, these.

Not withstanding that, I also think the pandemic will materially change the landscape of college sports. I think Division II and III will swell with refugees from Division I who probably flew too close to the sun in the first place. We're a lot closer to a 65-school mega-conference and micro-regional leagues in everything but hoops and football. But you didn't come here for my bloviation. Eh, you might've, but this is better.

In any case, please enjoy OBX Dave's latest:

As the death toll climbs toward 100,000 in the U.S., and millions suffer physically, mentally and economically, collateral damage from the pandemic is both immediate and long-term. I’m more fortunate than many, which permits me to beat two dead horses, umm, address subjects close to my heart: journalism and sports.

The coronavirus’s impact on sports is obvious. Postponements and cancellations, as people try to
figure how to compete safely. The Bundesliga and NASCAR re-started in empty venues. Korean pro baseball has been up and running for a couple weeks, minus fans. While it’s nice to see live competition again, the vibe is weird – like televised scrimmages or practice sessions.

More discouraging is the number of colleges that have whacked sports programs due to financial hits. University of Cincinnati men’s soccer, Old Dominion wrestling, Bowling Green baseball, several programs at Akron. As of last weekend, a former newspaper colleague tracked 93 programs cut, impacting more than 1,400 athletes at all levels nationally. Expect more sports to be cut, as revenue streams dry up and financial straits become clearer.

If there’s a silver lining, it might be that the pandemic will force schools to reconsider geographically distended alignments and needless expenses. Schedule locally. Limit trips. Quit housing the football team in a local hotel the night before home games.

The Aspen Institute, the think tank and advocacy outfit, has tried to address pandemic effects in many areas, sports included. The institute’s Sports and Society program conducted a national survey in early May, gauging people’s thoughts on sports and re-starting. Among the findings: almost 50 percent of all parents worried that their child would get sick when they resumed playing a sport, and 46 percent worried that they would become ill themselves; 18 percent of parents said that their child was unlikely to resume playing sports when restrictions are lifted; 54 percent said that their finances had been negatively impacted; more than 20 percent said it will be too difficult to transport their kids to play sports; and 25 percent are uncomfortable with their children playing elite-level travel sports that will expose them to outside communities and people.

The pandemic has disrupted most lives, including those whose job it is to report on it. Journalism, particularly local journalism, has been reeling for years due to staff cuts and shrinking ad revenue and corporate vulturism. The coronavirus is another gut punch, on steroids. The New York Times estimated that approximately 36,000 people who work in media have been laid off, furloughed or had their pay cut during the pandemic. Admittedly, that’s a drop in the bucket when national unemployment claims are north of 36 million in the past three months. But I’d argue that reporters, especially local reporters, perform an outsized service to their communities, not just during a national health crisis, but daily.

Difficult as it is to do the job well in the best of times, it’s now increasingly perilous. You may have recent video of a Long Island TV reporter who was harassed when he covered a re-open rally. The group that organized the rally later issued an apology, but that doesn’t address the initial encounter. Nor does it help that the Tweeter-in-Chief praised the rally attendees and called out the reporter. I get that people are critical of Rachel Maddow or Tucker Carlson because their political views don’t align. I also get that a lot of folks are crispy around the edges due to lengthy quarantines, economic anxiety and coronavirus exhaustion. But we’re entering dangerous territory when local reporters are targeted and harassed for asking questions and doing their jobs, with the same rhetoric used for gasbags at the national level.
seen the

The crisis within local news is such that a group of 18 U.S. Senators sent a letter to Congressional leadership arguing that any future stimulus packages include money for local journalism. Among the signees were Virginia’s two senators, Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker and Sheldon Whitehouse. All 18 are Democrats, so given the present power structure, spotty oversight of aid packages thus far, and sudden reluctance about further stimulus measures, I’m not holding my breath. But it was a nice gesture, albeit a decade late.

No one knows what normal is gonna look like. If we can get sports back safely and keep local newspapers alive for another 20 minutes, I’ll take it.

Corona Files: Here I Am Now, Entertain Me

TR and Whitney have shown us little glimpses of their personal Corona habits (and we're thankful that it's only been little glimpses, for obvious reasons), and since we love a recurring bit, I'm happy to do my part.

I've been binging a ton of comedy of late, which seems a fairly obvious response to a time of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. If you aren't familiar with it, the show runs about 20 minutes per episode, and features Jerry driving a different (usually old) car to pick his guest and take them for coffee. As the title might suggest. I'll post the definitive list of best episodes when I've completed the series. Spoiler alert: Jerry and Patton Oswalt don't have great chemistry.
darkness and uncertainty. I don't claim to be original. I've made it through about half of the episodes of Jerry Seinfeld's series,

In addition to Seinfeld, I've enjoyed the work of Hasan Minhaj, John Mulaney, Neal Brennan, Mike Birbiglia, Bo Burnham, Tig Notaro, Sarah Silverman, Aziz Ansari, and Ellen Degeneres. I did not enjoy the work of Tom Papa.

All of that stuff is on Netflix, as is Abstract: The Art of Design, which is a series of mini-documentaries on different creative professionals and their processes. Mark and Zed will enjoy the episode on Tinker Hatfield, Nike's lead shoe designer. My favorite thus far has featured Bjarke Ingels, a Danish architect, who designed VIA 57 West in Manhattan, among other things. Because I'm a 12 year-old, I enjoyed the fact that his website address is big.dk.

The English Game is also on Netflix. It's a six-episode fictionalized telling of the story of the first workingman's team to win the English Football Association (FA) Cup. The story pivots around two men: Fergus Suter, a Scotsman who becomes one of the first professional footballers, and Arthur Kinnaird, an Old Etonian blueblood who chafes at some of the strictures of his upperclass lifestyle while fighting to retain the Cup. It's directed by Julian Fellowes, the creator of Downton Abbey, and it's similar in its observations of the differences between upstairs and downstairs, societally speaking. It's a fast-moving series, and a fun distraction. Kinda like sports. I miss sports.

But I did get to watch three Bundesliga games this weekend, which was nice. And my wife is so starved for novelty that she willingly turned on a NASCAR race today and is excited about the final two episodes of The Last Dance this evening. She ain't much of a sports fan, but Corona makes for strange bedfellows.

In addition the things that have entertained me via screens, I've been making a weekly trip to Vanish Farmwoods Brewery to stock up on 32 oz. crowlers. At three for $28, they're a bargain, and if I can support my favorite local brewery while ensuring I have enough high-octane tipple to get me through a week, all the better.

Some people have gotten into DIY projects to fulfill their nesting instincts. My wife has gotten into buying patio furniture and hiring our landscaper to do a bunch of new projects. I shouldn't complain, because we're so very fortunate compared to many, and so I won't. Our back yard looks awesome, and will look even more so by the end of the week, when we're having a bunch of new work done in time for my daughter's high school graduation party.

Yeah, about that.

Corona Files, The Grooming

My hair, as you will see momentarily, was as long as it's been in my adult lifetime when I woke up the morning. You saw evidence last week, and it didn't get any shorter. I might've from carrying the weight of all that hair and product.

I'd long ago grown tired of looking at myself on work video calls and seeing Ed Grimley, I must say. So yesterday, I took a risk.

My eldest daughter ordered barber shears and a comb from Amazon, which arrived on Friday. She watched at least one YouTube video tutorial on cutting men's hair. She's an artistically-inclined kid, talented in a number of visual forms, so I trusted her sense of shape and balance. And I allowed her to cut my hair.

For your enjoyment, a story in six pictures:

I looked like fucking Teen Wolf

Sexy (from the) back

Action shot!

The result, prior to application of product

Can't do anything about the face, unfortunately

Sample This

In these times of quarantine, stay-at-home, lockdown, house arrest, or whatever you're calling this downtime from the world, it sure helps to have a hobby.

(Clarification: it helps to have an indoor hobby. Dave is going berserk not being able to run around and play sports. Check out his madness at Gheorghe's sister blog.)

I have two activities of choice lately, and they're closely related.  Listening to / watching music and writing / making music.  The latter is a long-standing work in progress; I've threatened to complete an album in the home studio for a while, and -- with inspiration from Dave and FOGTB Lecky -- this is my chance to get there, or at least get close.

In the meantime, while people I know and articles I read advise me on which series to binge watch, I am going against that grain. With certain exceptions (John Oliver, reruns of classic sports events I loved, etc.), I am limiting my programming to one genre: music documentaries. I'm off to a great start, but there's a long way to go.

Step 1: Compile the list.
There are more search returns for "best music documentaries of all time" than you can count -- by a long shot.  And those lists are, as you would figure, a mixed bag.  I made my own list based on culling those recommendations, falling back on my own knowledge of good music docs, and also just pursuing work about bands I like.

My list is now set, but only until someone else whose opinion I value (yes, that includes you people) chimes in with a new rec and I add it.

Step 2: Prioritize.
Eh. I have been a little haphazard. I am trying to juggle 'twixt genres and long form vs. quick hitters to some degree. But so far it's been somewhat random. One x-factor is how I can watch them; if a music documentary is on Netflix or Amazon Prime, I don't know how long I'll be able to see it for free, so it inches up the list.

Step 3: Watch.
This has been fun. It's interesting to watch music docs in succession. It definitely makes the terrific ones stand out, and I catch myself critiquing any time there are any sorts of lulls that drag. You get why some film critics are irascible and stingy with stars; a movie I happen to like may be just fine, but when some reviewer saw three things this week that absolutely blew them away, the one I like simply ain't gonna measure up.

I've also noticed that Hobby 1 bleeds into Hobby 2. Watching scenes about the recording process, studio tips and tricks, or just hearing a good song gets the creativity brewing.

Current Status
Here's where this project stands. First, there were entries on the list that I had seen semi-recently, and even the best ones aren't getting re-watched when I have so much more to view. They included:

I told you how much I liked the Dead doc (saw it in a local old theater), and similarly, the Tom Petty one is a long but great 4-hour number.  We've also had back and forth in the comments on Country Music; it's amazingly good. And I'm an easy mark for The Clash, R.E.M., and Talking Heads, so those were all banner. But anything I watched in the last 2 years won't be revisited.

Nota Bene: Stop Making Sense is one of the few concert films that made this list.  I really wanted true documentaries, not footage of music being played. Of course I love a good show, but this quest is different. I think only Aretha, Prince, and Zeppelin made the list with predominantly concert films.

The First Batch (in order of viewing)
David Crosby: Remember My Name (2019)
The one that launched my plan, it's been on HBO a bit. It's solid, informative, and well done. The takeaway: Crosby is a dick, he knows it, he can't help it, and he wishes he could change. But man, can he sing. Great old footage and photos of CSN and CSNY.

Searching for Sugar Man (2012)
The best thing I have seen in a very long time, period. Someone urged me to watch this years ago, and I put it off. Stupidly. Don't read about this one, please just go watch it.

ZZ Top: That Little Ol' Band from Texas (2019)
After that, I wanted to veer in another direction. This worked just fine. I forgot how good ZZ Top was in the '70s and early '80s. Lots of big, blues-based guitar sound. And lyrical dick jokes. Highly enjoyable.

Sample This (2013)
An oddity that would be the strangest of the lot, were it not for Sugar Man. Cohesion and production values aren't as high, but it does not want for a more fascinating story. My interest stemmed from my favorite Beasties song, "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun," which samples, among many other pieces, a 1973 song called "Last Bongo in Belgium" by a random outfit called the Incredible Bongo Band. On that same album is the IBB's take on the song "Apache," and their rendition has been sampled... wait for it... 613 times since. (Ed. Note: it read 611 when I started writing this post. No bullshit.) It's been said that pretty much every hip-hop act has sampled this particular song at least once. Anywho... the backstory, the legacy, and whole thing makes for a super interesting homeboys bonanza for music nerds like me. Check it out.

Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage (2010)
Yep, I wanted to get involved in this debate. Great film. I'm never going to love that much of Rush's music, but I certainly appreciate the band more, and like TR offered, there are quite a few nuggets of Did You Know??? And "Tom Sawyer" is still a lot of fun. Neil Peart's passing earlier this year makes it more impactful, and it's just a well-developed chronology of an influential trio who's been making music longer than anyone not named ZZ Top.

Fleetwood Mac -- Rumours ("Classic Albums” series) (1997)

I figured this would be light fare, and in some aspects, it is. It's just over an hour long, and it's simply what went into one hit album. While it offends any punk rock sensibilities I have, I like Fleetwood Mac and this album quite a bit, so I gave it a whirl. Most of the intrigue involves the dynamics at play among the band members when it was recorded -- basically two intra-band couples were splitting and Mick Fleetwood, the odd man out, was being left by his wife. And yet they came together and made a record that sold a bazillion copies.

That story is told a bit like a soap opera, but it's interesting. More appealing to me is the behind-the-recording stuff. A number of scenes at the mixing board with the engineers and a couple dozen tracks for any given song, and they deconstruct it accordingly. You won't hear a song the same way after it's been broken down like that -- for the better. It also inspires studio fun. "Gold Dust Woman" has tracks of harpsichord, dobro, and other instruments layered into the mix.  And in the scene Lindsey Buckingham describes "Second Hand News," he plays a track from it that's... chair.  A pleather chair in the studio, repurposed as a percussion instrument. Gets you thinking in your own studio.

* * * * *

Okay... so far, so good.  Here's what's left on my long list. You can look up any titles that aren't self-evident. I have seen a number of these before, anywhere from 4 or 5 to 25 or 30 years ago. Long ago enough that it will feel like the first time, to quote a band whose documentary (if it exists) I likely won't be watching.

What do you think?  It beats watching mindless shows about Floridiots with tigers.

COVID-757: The Musical

Picking up where Zman and then Rob left off, it's time to highlight a few musical selections whose theme can be summarized by a decades-old borrowing from the venerable Adam Yauch:

I come from Norfolk 'cause that's where I'm from.

Rob bastardized the Zeezus' original concept, but I'm gonna take it back to simply this: 20 tunes by people from around my way.  My way, as I did it, means Norfolk, VA and the surrounding entities.  Hampton Roads, if you will. Tidewater, if you would have 30 years ago. Coastal Virginia.  The Norfolk-Virginia Beach area. The Seven Cities.  SEVA.  The 757.

A quick and obvious asterisking... the finest musician/singer ever to come from these parts is undoubtedly the Queen of Jazz, the First Lady of Song, Her Majesty Ella Fitzgerald. The breadth of her ability can't be encapsulated in just three songs, but you would do yourself a favor to listen to "Someone to Watch Over Me," "Dream a Little Dream of Me," and "Airmail Special (Live At the Newport Jazz Festival" to get a sampling that stretches from gorgeous rendition to heart-warming duet to kick-ass scat talent that seems to forerun hip-hop as if ancestry.

Her work stands apart in style just enough to leave her be and corral the rest of the locals for a 757 playlist.

Here we go:

SPREAD THE LOVE
Track 1. "Happy," Pharrell Williams (Virginia Beach)
Track 2. "Get Ur Freak On," Missy Elliott (Portsmouth), produced by Timbaland (Norfolk)

"THE NORFOLK SOUND"
Track 3. "Quarter to Three," Gary U.S. Bonds (Norfolk)
Track 4. "If You Wanna Be Happy," Jimmy Soul (Norfolk)
Track 5. "Just Ask Me," Lenis Guess (Norfolk)
Track 6. "That Man of Mine," Barbara Stant (Norfolk)

ROCKABILLY, BEACH MUSIC, AND THE BLUES
Track 7. "Be-Bop-A-Lula," Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps (Norfolk)
Track 8. "I've Been Hurt," Bill Deal and The Rhondels (Portsmouth and Virginia Beach)
Track 9. "Savin' Up," Clarence Clemons and the Red Bank Rockers (Chesapeake)
Track 10. "Smoking Gun," Robert Cray (Newport News)

INTO THE EIGHTIES
Track 11. "Copperhead Road," Steve Earle and the Dukes (Hampton)
Track 12. "Mandolin Rain," Bruce Hornsby and The Range (Williamsburg)
Track 13. "Queen of Hearts," Juice Newton (Virginia Beach)
Track 14. "This Little Girl," Gary U.S. Bonds (Norfolk)

UNDER YOUR RADAR BUT NOT MINE
Track 15. "My Latest Girl," The States (Norfolk)
Track 16. "Baby Jane," Waxing Poetics (Norfolk)
Track 17. "My My," Seven Mary Three (formed in Williamsburg)
Track 18. "Switzerland," The Last Bison (Chesapeake)
Track 19. "Another Man's Woman," Carbon Leaf (lead singer from Norfolk)
Track 20. "We Are Doing Fine," Super Doppler (Norfolk)

Enjoy, and keep the music flowing.

Leesburg, A Musical Radius

Our man from the Neck had an inspired idea, and we've got nothing if we don't have time. So here's a playlist inspired by my hometown and guided by two (very loose) rules:

1. I must have seen the band/artist at a small club in the greater Washington, D.C. area (For the purposes of this exercise, I deem the new 930 Club too big, but the old 930 Club and the old Bayou just right), and/or,
2. The artist must have grown up within a 37.1-mile drive of Leesburg, Virginia. Which allows me to include North Springfield's own Dave Grohl.

So here we go:

Car Seat Headrest frontman Will Toledo grew up in Leesburg and went to Loudoun County High School, the same school that my daughter's boyfriend attends.

I've seen Carbon Leaf (featuring FOGTB - or at least FOW - Barry Privett on lead vocals and tin whistle) twice at Leesburg's venerable Tally Ho Theater.

My daughter and I saw Jake Shimabukuro and his band at the Tally Ho. Justin Trawick opened for him.

Seen George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic at the same little venue. Twice.

Pimps of Joytime

Pimps of Joytime played the Tally Ho on a cold, snowy Tuesday night in February. The 50 of us that braved the elements saw a killer show.

I've seen Rhett Miller play too many times to count, but only twice at a venue as small as Vienna's Jammin' Java.

Winchester, Virginia is 35.1 miles from Leesburg. It's the former home of Danimal. And Patsy Cline.

Back to the Tally Ho, where I saw Fishbone last year.

Saw The Seldom Scene, local bluegrass legends, at The Birchmere a decade or so ago.

The aforementioned Dave Grohl, object of much G:TB affection, was the drummer for Nirvana and is the frontman for Foo Fighters.

The first club show I ever saw was They Might Be Giants at the old 930 Club in 1988. I was with my then-21 year-old girlfriend. Been a stud from way back.

Our friend Giti Khalsa is the drummer for Seven Mary Three. A bunch of us, including a different then-girlfriend (who's now my wife) saw them play at the old 930, as well.

Different bunch of us, including the KQs, their way-cool daughter and niece, and the Marls' caught Sister Hazel at the Tally Ho.

More to come as people like Whitney who remember my life better than I do remind of shows I might've forgotten about.

Or more to come when my own memory jogs itself:

Caught the first few songs of a Dave Matthews Band show at the late, great Bayou before my sister puked all over herself and I had to take her home.

JMU band Everything played a fun show at The Bayou, as well. I saw them a few times at The Atlantis in Nags Head, as well. Partied with them back at our shithole of a house, too.

Speaking of The Atlantis, that glorious dump, I saw Fighting Gravity, nee Boy O Boy, there. Also saw one of The Waxing Poetics' final shows in the same place.

And several of the assembled Gheorghies saw The Connells at Trinkle Hall on the campus of The College of William and Mary. That was a mess.

Ooh, just recalled that I saw Trombone Shorty at the State Theater in Falls Church, right before he blew up.

Oh shit, forgot that Thao Nguyen grew up in Falls Church before matriculating at William & Mary. Added one of her tunes.

The Corona Files: Episode Three

I've been calling my far-flung team this week, checking in on folks to let them know we've got their backs and such. Man of the people, and all that. One of my colleagues has kids the same age as mine, and we talked about what they're going through. He said he told his 18 year-old son that life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you respond. With that in mind, I asked my own 18 year-old if she felt like making her G:TB debut. To which:

The author, my kidlet, of
whom I'm mad proud.

Senior year. I bet you remember yours fondly. Back at the tail end of summer, the prospect of My Senior Year stretched out ahead of me like a beacon of hope. My very own yellow-brick road out of the hellscape of high school.

Ideally, the first half of the year is spent grinding as hard as possible in order to squeeze into the college of your choice, and the second half is spent relaxing, slacking because we earned it. The first half of my senior year went pretty much as expected: I worked fairly hard, I got good grades, I kept my GPA up, I applied to college. Not to mention the time I spent at the dance studio, which served essentially as a second education as far as I’m concerned.

Between all of that stressing was my incessant worry about the state of the world, and how, it appeared, to be falling apart before my very eyes. None of the old guys in government seem to care too much about climate change, and why would they, since they’re leaving it in twenty-odd years? And that worried me, as I’m the one who they’re leaving the world to, and I would like it to be not on fire, and not polluted as all hell. This was my first vote in a presidential primary, so that too weighed on me heavily (I’m a Sanders stan. I’ll leave it at that.). Among all of that, I then had to worry about actually getting into college. I did, and I’ll be attending VCU in the fall, but that victory was pushed to the wayside when COVID entered the picture.

At the start, I was very aware of how Coronavirus was being portrayed; it gave people a pass on being xenophobes, which pissed me off greatly. But when people gossiped and giggled about the possibility of school cancellation, I waved it away, certain that the year would continue, perhaps limited slightly by a few days off. And then Governor Northam had The Press Conference announcing the closing of all Virginia schools.

Let's not forget that Wooderson was robbed, too.

I spent the rest of the day sad, somber, teary eyed. The class of 2020, MY class, had been robbed of our year. Our graduation, our prom. The school-sanctioned bullshit that we all proclaimed dumb, but looked forward to anyways. Gone. On top of that, I like school. There, I said it. I love learning and bettering myself, furthering my knowledge. Doing it from home is different. It feels wrong. But what choice do we have?

I’m not going to lie and pretend that I’m not pissed off, because I very much am. My senior class went through some shit, and the thing that brings us down is a virus? Talk about a bad dystopian novel. There are some times where I do feel that my year was ruined, and in those times I recognize that there will be things that I’ll never be able to relive. We didn’t even get to appreciate our last day of school, or tell our teachers goodbye. Other times, though, I notice that this has never happened before and that all of us are scared and uncertain together. That thought brings me comfort; everyone is working out the kinks of this “new normal”.

We’ve all, as a whole, been squashed inside our homes and forced to carry on. Nobody has dealt with this before, and although that is chaotic and overwhelming, it is also surprisingly helpful to know. My advice to you, as a senior whose year was pretty much ruined, is to take time to embrace stillness. Find moments where you can slow down and breathe. Who knows if you’ll ever have this much free time; you might as well take advantage of it. Personally, I’m finding stillness through yoga, which is such a wonderful practice (I highly recommend Yoga With Adrien on Youtube). Overall, I’m trying my best to take the bad with the good. This, too, shall pass, and when it does, the whole world will breathe a collective sigh of relief. Until then, appreciate your family, check in on your friends, and give yourself some extra love.

Right now, we all could use it.

From the Heart to the Neck, a Playlist

Things are looking grim in my hometown right now. I won't bother linking to all the bad news. Teaneck's been through rough times before and the town will make it through. In the meantime here's a Teaneck playlist, annotated, to keep everyone occupied for a little while as we all hunker down.



Track 1. A schmaltzy way to kick things off, I know, but we're talking Jersey so we need Bruce.
Track 2. The Isley Brothers are from Teaneck. Their record label was T-Neck Records.
Track 3. Dray is THS class of 1988.
Track 4. Donald Byrd lived in Teaneck. "No need to worry 'bout tomorrow, and yesterday is gone." Sounds right to me.
Track 5. Phoebe Snow is THS class of 1968. Her stage name is from a train that used to run through town.
Track 6. The mayor is Mohammed Hameeduddin, THS class of 1991. From what I've read he's providing remarkably good leadership right now.
Track 7. The Wrens are allegedly from Teaneck. This song's title captures the situation.
Track 8. There's no way I'm only including one Isleys song. This one seems appropriate for a quarantine.
Track 9. Chubb Rock name-checks Teaneck (and Das EFX samples it on "Brooklyn to T-Neck").
Track 10. Ricky Nelson was from Teaneck. The title seems appropriate.
Track 11. Name-checks Phillip Pannell.
Track 12. Johnny Copeland lived in Teaneck and the title seems relevant.
Track 13. DMX was arrested for dogfighting and weapons possession in Teaneck.
Track 14. Rufus Reid lives in Teaneck. I went to school with his son.
Track 15. According to the liner notes to "Return of the Boom Bap," KRS-ONE had offices in West Englewood, which is a neighborhood in Teaneck. When I went to the address the office appeared vacant but whatevs, KRS is the don so he's included.
Track 16. Pat Boone lived in Teaneck.
Track 17. Biggie and Lil Kim lived and were arrested in Teaneck.
Track 18. Jodeci lived in Teaneck. All of them, in one house. I suspect the party scene was insane circa 1992 but I wasn't invited.
Track 19. MNDR is produced by Peter Wade. Before he created WonderSound Records, worked with J-Lo and Marc Anthony and Kylie Minogue and Lindsey Lohan and Spragga Benz and Sean Paul and Charlie XCX and Mark Ronson, released an album as Shitake Monkey, and won some Grammys, he hung out with me and did a lot of stupid stuff of questionable legality in and around Teaneck. THS class of 1992 represent. He has a bunch of very strong podcasts on iTunes, mostly dancehall and old school reggae shows from his days as station manager at KWUR. I just don't know how to link to it. Search podcasts for "peter wade".
Track 20. More from Pete.
Track 21. Sarah Bob is an amazing pianist and Artistic Coordinator of the New Gallery Concert Series. And she's simply the best despite being down with me and Pete, more class of 1992. Support NGCS, we need more art nowadays and it's a 501(c)(3) so you can write it off. Tell Sarah zman sent ya!
Track 22. I am aware of no connection between Slade and Teaneck but this seems like the right song to close things out, a message from me to COVID-19.

L'enfer, C'est Les Autres

Friday is garbage day so on Friday morning I went outside to take the empty cans back to the garage. I saw a neighbor on her lawn across the street brushing her dogs so I waved and yelled "Hi!" She waved back and said "How're you guys doing?" I am blessed with a rapier-sharp and lighting-quick wit so I instantly came up with the best response. I said "I feel like I'm living out Huis Clos." She looked at me and smiled while tilting her head, her demeanor indicating that she was trying to be polite but had no idea what I was talking about.

via GIPHY

I realize what was happening (this happens frequently, my neighbors don't read anything more complicated than coloring books) so I said "Did you ever read the book No Exit?" This particular neighbor is a teacher so I thought I had a shot here, but she said "No."

via GIPHY

I decided to make my wittiness clear. "It's a book by Jean-Paul Sartre. He was a French Existentialist author."

via GIPHY

"I had to read it in high school." (I left out the part where I read it in French, not English. I knew that wouldn't help me.)

via GIPHY

"It's about three people locked in a room and they can't get out. Eventually they realize they are in hell and one of them says 'Hell is other people.' That's what this is like!" (This is witty because being trapped inside with my kids is hell, but we have to do this because if we don't we'll catch a deadly disease from one of the people outside our house, so those people are hellish too. It's a really smart quip.)

via GIPHY

She failed to see the wit. I think she thought I was just complaining about my kids and that I really felt like I was trapped in hell. My neighbors are very literal, but not literate. Obviously.

I am positive that if I said that to any number of gheorghies I would get a chuckle and a wittier reply. Dave would likely throw back some veiled Camus reference involving death, maybe dead mothers in nursing homes. Whit would've made a comment in French (I assume he read it in high school French class too). TR would've called me a pussy, dragged me into my own house and jammed me in the powder room shitter--but he would've gotten the reference.

via GIPHY

Perhaps the niftiest part of this story is that Sartre said "hell is other people" because everyone has angst about they way other people perceive them. He wasn't writing in favor of isolation, but just explaining what social interactions do to our heads. Which is exactly what happened when I tried to make a joke with my neighbor and ended up feeling like a tool.

All this is to say I appreciate all you clowns. And this is why I've been practicing social distancing in my neighborhood for years.

The Corona Files: Episode Two

It seems increasingly likely that my 18 year-old daughter will never set foot in a high school classroom again, that she'll miss out on all of the ceremony and silliness that comes with being a second-semester high school senior. As she comes to terms with this reality, she's had some maudlin moments, but she's 73% goofball, and so she's been a breath of fresh air most of the time.

Yesterday, she and her sister were huddled around our dining room table, giggling about something. Several minutes later, she displayed this on our kitchen organizer:

The small image is hard to read for us older folk, so let me copy it here in blogtext. It's a quarantine drinking game, courtesy of my daughters.

drink every time you're bored
drink every time you text/tell someone you're bored
drink every time you see a corona meme
drink each time you see a different government official
drink every time you see Trump
drink every time JoJo scratches at the door
drink every time Katy asks to see Jack
drink every time Dad is angry but says he's not
drink every time someone mentions needing time organization
drink every time Dad turns a video on at full volume
drink every time Katy leaves the house
drink for every hour Reilly's in her room
drink every time Mom makes a disdaining remark about Trump
drink at any time politics is brought up
drink every time Katy is with Jack
drink any time Katy is seen with a book
drink every time Katy says something about how Reilly's room smells
drink every time Mom babytalks the dog
drink every time the only thing to do is go outside
drink every time Mom says she's doing work, but is on her phone
drink every time Katy mentions her tattoo
drink every time Katy complains about senior year being ruined
drink every time dad is seen with a beer
drink every time someone walks JoJo
drink every time Mom asks about our plan for the day
drink every time Katy lights a candle
drink every time the news is on
drink every time someone cries
drink every time you open snap and close it
drink any time someone thinks we won't go back to school
drink every time it's unseasonably cold out

If nothing else, we're going to be very hydrated. The kids are alright.

The Corona Files: Episode One

I'm growing increasingly convinced that the effects of the current novel coronavirus pandemic will last months rather than weeks. And the experts' guidance that we avoid crowds and self-sequester will have impacts both predictable and not on our local and national economies - and more importantly, on our psyches. So in the spirit of community that lives large in this little space, we're kicking off a series of reflections on the virus's impact on our lives.

Today, Dave Fairbank weighs in from the beach.

Dispatch from the Sandbar:

The Outer Banks and Dare County officials tell us that as of Monday afternoon, there are no confirmed cases of the coronavirus, though a necessary addendum should be, “that we know of.”
Gov. Roy Cooper instructed schools across the state to close for at least the next two weeks, and the county declared a state of emergency that follows guidelines set up by the Centers for Disease Control and the N.C. state Department of Health and Human Services. Gatherings of more than 50 people are restricted, though that measure doesn’t include hospitals, shopping centers, restaurants, offices or grocery stores. There are no travel restrictions.

Folks have begun to self-quarantine and to restrict public movement to necessary trips for food, booze and presumably, toilet paper. Many local events, such as small concerts, food tastings, church gatherings, were canceled or postponed.

On the bright side, the county school Nutrition Department will serve breakfast and lunch at no charge to any child up to age 18, Monday thru Friday, at various locations around the county for as long as schools remain closed. Dominion Energy, the county’s primary electrical power provider, suspended disconnections for non-payment during the crisis. A Mexican joint that the missus and I frequent expanded their $1 Taco Tuesdays to Monday thru Thursday, and now offer a 10-percent discount to locals. Muy Bueno, if and when we decide to eat out again.

A debate sprang up here over the past few days. Of course, it pits public health vs. commerce – no small concern in an area heavily dependent on tourism. Some local businesses and realtors see school and office closures as an opportunity and invite people to visit, and to spend money. The mayor of Nags Head took to Facebook the other day, and while applauding many measures being taken to mitigate the threat, said that inviting visitors “is absolutely contrary to the spirit of the guidelines and common sense. I urge them to reconsider.”

The coming weeks, and perhaps months, here are going to be interesting. Will Spring Breakers and vacationers adhere to previous plans and bring and leave the coronavirus here? Will those who visit, whether they have symptoms or not, rationalize that if they remain in their houses and hotels and only venture to the beach and to open spaces that it will keep people safe? In addition, an increasing number of foreign students, many from Russia and eastern Europe, comprise a significant percentage of the seasonal work force, in hotels, restaurants, grocery stores, and shops. Travel bans and fears about the spread of the virus will almost certainly disrupt the labor force and could hamstring local businesses.

The Outer Banks has a remarkably communal and charitable vibe, understandable given that it’s a sparsely populated coastal space where everyone is handy (present company excepted) and one Big Blow away from being a happy memory. I’d like to think that will ultimately help us endure.