I might need to test the Caine-Hackman theory this weekend as long as George Clinton doesn’t show up at the house.
Showing posts with label I love you guys. Show all posts
Showing posts with label I love you guys. Show all posts
Thursday, February 27, 2025
Thursday, December 31, 2020
The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day Twelve
On the Twelfth Day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me
Twelve Weird Couplings
Greetings to all the gheorghies on this New Year’s Eve, one that is dreary, muggy, and rainy here in southeastern Virginia. How perfectly apropos for a year that began with promise and ended with resignation.
My Day 12 last time around included this at the end:
“I have tickets to They Might Be Giants in DC with Rob and The Black Crowes in Va Beach unless they implode again. Seeing the Hoodoo Gurus down here in November. Beyond that: Cold War Kids, The Allman Betts Band, Southern Culture On the Skids, Sturgill Simpson, The Revivalists, Waxing Poetics, The Lumineers, . . . join me, gheorghies?”Well, I didn’t see any of those shows, for one obvious reason. Nor did I see The Revivalists, Violent Femmes and X, Wilco and Sleater-Kinney, The Black Keys, and Patton Oswalt -- all of which I had tickets purchased to see.
I did catch the Drive-By Truckers and Carbon Leaf on back-to-back nights in DC and Leesburg alongside several gheorghies. Terrific shows they were, made more glorious now by the finality of such endeavors.
For the first handful of Gheorghemases, I would reserve Day 12 exclusively for appreciations. While 2020 doesn’t seem to have made itself a strong candidate for such a list, there are a number of hidden treasures within the past 366 that stand out. Indeed, lamenting this shabby year in review and yet uncovering some real greatness is something of a paradox.
To that end, here are a dozen weird couplings for 2020…
Live Music vs. The Absence Of
If you’d have told me a year ago that my Concerts Attended number would go from 29 last year to 6 this year… and that the latter half of those shows would be masked and distanced and a bit stressful, I’d have told you it would utterly and completely suck. And I would have been right.
For the first handful of Gheorghemases, I would reserve Day 12 exclusively for appreciations. While 2020 doesn’t seem to have made itself a strong candidate for such a list, there are a number of hidden treasures within the past 366 that stand out. Indeed, lamenting this shabby year in review and yet uncovering some real greatness is something of a paradox.
To that end, here are a dozen weird couplings for 2020…
Live Music vs. The Absence Of
If you’d have told me a year ago that my Concerts Attended number would go from 29 last year to 6 this year… and that the latter half of those shows would be masked and distanced and a bit stressful, I’d have told you it would utterly and completely suck. And I would have been right.
But there were some unforeseen bright spots. Rhett Miller, the lead singer of one of my favorite bands, took to doing one-hour shows from his basement every week and then several times a week. The format was “pay what you want," though if you tip the most of the show, you get a request at the following one.
Which I did.
In the absence of live music, I'll take this.
Lockdown Laziness vs. Confined Creativity
As much as I should have utilized all the days and nights of lockdown to get a hundred home projects done and do something special... I didn't. There was much lounging.
As much as I should have utilized all the days and nights of lockdown to get a hundred home projects done and do something special... I didn't. There was much lounging.
That said, I also pined for the lost days of packed venues enough to finish a project I’d been mulling for a while:
Want to see a cool gift? The QR code plays the song, the song is represented by the waves on a cool wooden plaque. My woman is a hip, hip, hip lady.
Punk vs. Mainstream Rock, Product Placement Version
I was amused and impressed when I saw The Clash Chuck Taylors.
Eric Clapton and Van Morrison vs. Eric Clapton and Van Morrison
When I was in high school (just a few years ago), classic rock reigned supreme, and Clapton Is God was a generally accepted principle. Eddie Van Halen was the new regime, but Slowhand was the man all the young dudes loved. Meanwhile, Van the Man was the ladies' choice but unisexually appreciated. He may not be listed in Steven Hyden's Five-Album Test article, but a lot of folks would suggest that Astral Weeks/Moondance/His Band and the Street Choir/Tupelo Honey/Saint Dominic's Preview certainly qualify. To wit, 88% of every mixtape made for a girl in the 1980's contained "Crazy Love," "Brown-Eyed Girl," or "Tupelo Honey"... and they all contained "Wonderful Tonight."
That was then, this is now. Through the years, I learned about how Van Morrison was something of an insufferable prick with a massive ego. And within the last year I listened to the Spotify podcast on The Clash (narrated brilliantly by Chuck D) and heard about Eric Clapton's 1976 rant on a Birmingham. England stage about "keeping Britain white" and what-not. Real vulgarian type of stuff. Yuck.
Fast forward to 2020. Van Morrison's creative content dried up years ago, but he has rediscovered his muse in the form of anti-masking songs. He has four now. The most recent is a collaboration with Clapton called "Stand and Deliver." The afore-linked article about it begins with a great line: "Eric Clapton and Van Morrison, both age 75 and therefore at 220 times the risk of death from COVID-19 compared to people 18 to 29, have released a blues-rock track raging against public health codes."
Oh, well. On the plus side, they will get some fresh ink written about them when we issue the next version of GTB's Top 20 Douches in Rock and Roll.
"Stand and Deliver" vs. "Stand and Deliver"
You decide. I know which song Dick Turpin would prefer.
You decide. I know which song Dick Turpin would prefer.
Gone from Home vs. Never Gone from the Heart
And like rob mentioned, the lockdown downtime I got with her before she left was unforeseen and exactly what the doctor ordered before her departure.
I mentioned Steven Hyden earlier. He's one of my favorite music writers and has been for some time. I think I first read him at Grantland. I like his tastes, his style, his consistent output.
A couple of weeks ago he posted on Uproxx, his current home, with a piece called The Best Beatles Songs, Ranked. Whew, there's a big and bold idea. I do like that he says up front that such lists are inherently stupid. As Neko Case said, "Ranking lists do NOT represent music or art. That’s some sports bullshit." I said during Gheorghemas three years ago that I dropped good/better/best/bad/worse/worst because "there's just shit you like and shit you don't." But... it's always fun to hear other people's favorites.
Hyden's list is a highly enjoyable, informative read, and he personalizes it quite a bit. There are selections obviously and far less so, and like I sometimes do in such challenging music lists, he totally cheated. (See his #2.) It's worth the time it takes, and you should definitely have the Beatles songs at your fingertips if you read it. You'll want to play one or two you haven't dug up in a while.
One weird thing is that the word "hate" appears in this piece eight times. Mostly in the context of which Beatles hated which songs, or each other. Seems like this labour of love list would dispense with the hate a bit more.
Fran Healy vs. Fran Healy
(also titled "12 is a lot of anything")
Fran Healy was a light-hitting catcher in the 1970's, most memorably for me as a member of the 1977 New York Yankees I bandwagonly cheered for as a kid. My grandmother got his autograph for me when she jumped onto the dugout in Lauderdale that spring, a story I mentioned in the GTB comments recently. In the early 2000's, I got the Extra Innings baseball package to watch and chronicle every miserable game the wretched Mets played, and Fran Healy added color commentary to many of those games. He was light fare, as silly and ineffectual as the team was. This was my favorite exchange between Healy and the all-timer past his time Ralph Kiner in 2005 after a home run.
Fran: He got all of that, he knew it, and he was Cadillacking around the bases.
Ralph: Well, you know what they say about Cadillacs . . . home run hitters drive Cadillacs.They don't call them the best color men in baseball for nothin’.
F: I tell you, Ralph Kiner coined that phrase many years ago, and kids in the Little Leagues from that moment on said, “Bunt? Forget bunting, I’m going for the long ball.”
R: That’s where that expression came from – he Cadillacked around the bases.
F: Did it come from that?
R: I doubt that.
And then there's Fran Healy. The frontman for the band Travis. I dig their stuff, it's Britpop, fairly mellow, like the Scottish Connells. (There's a musical connection 'twixt the two bands, actually.) You may have heard "Why Does It Rain on Me," "Turn," "Writing to Reach You," "Side," but here they are singing "Sing" at Live 8 some 15 years ago.
Release vs. Resurrection
Last year I assured you that the debut album by Les Coole and The Cukes would come out in 2020. It didn't. No excuses, what with all the downtime. I did get a few songs done, as Rob linked to last Gmas post. I am extremely disappointed to confess that my dream of an album release simply did not happen.
Last year I assured you that the debut album by Les Coole and The Cukes would come out in 2020. It didn't. No excuses, what with all the downtime. I did get a few songs done, as Rob linked to last Gmas post. I am extremely disappointed to confess that my dream of an album release simply did not happen.
And yet, something I was dead sure did not happen, something glorious and profound, did occur. From the ashes, Penny Baker and Les Coole (and original ORF Rocker DJ Bombay) rejoined the on-air crew at WODU for ORF Rock after an 18-month hiatus that by all accounts was permanent. Same lovable co-hosts; same punk, alt, and Elvis bent; same technical difficulties. But we are back on! I cannot tell you how happy this makes me.
Wednesdays at 7pm, starting back up in a few weeks. Give us a listen. Here was one of our shows from a few weeks ago. In it, we play a Les Coole and The Cukes song, so there's that solace.
Strychnine vs. Arsenic
So, 2020 was a disaster by any measure. I don't need to recap it. (But if you need that, go watch Netflix's Death to 2020 for some fun.)
But if you could replay the year and not have any of the disease, death, destruction, lockdown, worry, fear, and angst that COVID caused... but Donald Trump were re-elected... would you? Lots good did actually happen in 2020. Some things rather momentous.
Downward Trending vs. A New Hope
Gheorghe: The Blog, through the years, based on the Number of Posts:
2003: 14
2004: 129
2005: 219
2006: 103 (wtf??)
2007: 192
2008: 373
2009: 394
2010: 402 (!!!)
2011: 365 (perfect)
2012: 307
2013: 338
2014: 289
2015: 265
2016: 235
2017: 212
2018: 216
2019: 193
2020: 258
Hallelujah. Long Live Gheorghe.
Hard Drive vs. Spotify
I grew up with cassettes. Buying them, making them, popping them into the car stereo as soon as I got in, repair-splicing them when they'd break, and collecting as many as I could. When I was in college I switched to CD's. And how. What you can see in one of the Les Coole Studios shots above is a fraction of the 2000+ discs I collected at some stupid price (although Columbia House and BMG were good to me) in the 90's and beyond.
About 14 or 15 years ago, I ripped most of those to mp3. iPods and iTunes made it relatively simple (though still time-consuming), and the portability was amazing. I compiled a hard drive with 37,000 songs on it, and it was a treasure. On this day 12 years ago I related the saga of accidentally wiping said hard drive (back when it had just 22k tunes) and having to pay handsomely for its recovery. I filled my friends' iPods and hard drives for them. It was gratifying.
Of course, of course that technology went by the wayside. Firstly because that's what technology does, secondly because as soon as I and my completist self feel like I've got it all, it goes away and renders my collection obsolete. Natch.
Spotify and other streaming services came along and eliminated the novelty of me having an album or a song that people couldn't find and hadn't heard in ages. Oh well. The truth, however, is that it's an amazing development (if one that squeezes artists out of nearly all royalties) and very useful. I have shared music over the medium with several of you. Zman and I have a collaborative playlist and share rare/new stuff. I dig it.
There are still some songs that aren't on Spotify, some that never will be, that I carry in my own collection. That's a post for another day. For now, though, here's my annual best-of-the-year list.
While you peruse and listen to it, keep this in mind. I love you, gheorghies. You people are the finest in all the land, by some margin. Happy New Year.
Thursday, May 07, 2020
Corona Files, Loosely
A funny and poignant reminiscence from our man in the OBX, with a very timely reminder at the end. The kicker, in the parlance of the ink-stained wretch.
I’ll try to keep this brief, since I’m an adjunct member and most of you know me only marginally or through this digital tree fort. I thought some of you might appreciate it.
On May 1, almost 20 of my college classmates got together for a Zoom call, where we caught up a bit, but mostly remembered and mis-remembered our rampant dumbassery and questionable decisions. The occasion was the 40-year commemoration of our graduating class. May 1 was also the 42nd anniversary of my former roommate’s arrest and brief incarceration for streaking through town, a May Day campus tradition that went sideways that particular evening and was a highlight of our call.
We attended Washington College, a small, liberal arts school in Chestertown on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. The school is notable as the first college chartered in the sovereign United States – George Washington lent his name and served on its first Board – and for the largest literary cash award to an undergraduate in the country. The Sophie Kerr Prize, more than $63,000 this year, is awarded annually to a graduating senior who shows the most promise in the literary field.
Two days after my roommate’s arrest and the absurd aftermath, the story landed on A1 of the Washington Post, what’s referred to in newspapers as a “bright” – a quirky, unusual piece intended to counter more serious news. The story was then picked up by news outlets along the East Coast, including my roommate’s hometown of Miami. It’s an amusing story, with a great kicker. A side note: one of the authors was a young reporter named David Maraniss, who’s still at the Post and who over the next 40 years won two Pulitzers and wrote books on Clinton, Gore, Obama, Vince Lombardi, Roberto Clemente, the Vietnam War and the Tokyo Olympics. We like to think that my naked roommate helped springboard his career and are certain that the story is listed prominently on his curriculum vitae. (The story is available in all its glory at this link.)
The episode seemed to be of a piece within our group, a loosely based fraternal bunch in the late 1970s and early ‘80s whose membership was based on proximity, irreverence, sports and an inclination to color outside the lines. We dubbed ourselves the BOF (Brotherhood of Freshmen) Chi, and though part of the name was taken from the Greek alphabet and campus fraternal system, we intentionally pronounced it “chee.” There were no dues, no recruitment or pledge obligations, and minimal service to the campus and community. Students awoke unaffiliated one day and members the next. Scholarship was optional. Our contributions consisted of the occasional dorm party and a Bizarre Bazaar that included events such as a cat food-eating contest (moist, of course) that drew more contestants than it should have. During one Homecoming parade, our float was a wagon rolled down the street from which we tossed chunks of cheese to the crowd (BOF cheese, get it?).
There were eight charter members, maybe twice that in total before the vibe fizzled. Several of us transferred, a few others left school for academic or personal reasons. We’ve maintained contact off and on through the years. Some of us stay in touch regularly, others we hadn’t seen in decades before the May 1 call. Like I said, loosely based.
Which is why the G:TB community and things such as the OBFT and various informal get-togethers you all arrange are treasures. Our Zoom call was a blast, but as several of you know from your own virtual meetings, it’s kind of a tease. I eagerly await the times when people can commune again. Maybe there’s masks, maybe there’s distance. But it’s human, and that’s the best we have.
I’ll try to keep this brief, since I’m an adjunct member and most of you know me only marginally or through this digital tree fort. I thought some of you might appreciate it.
On May 1, almost 20 of my college classmates got together for a Zoom call, where we caught up a bit, but mostly remembered and mis-remembered our rampant dumbassery and questionable decisions. The occasion was the 40-year commemoration of our graduating class. May 1 was also the 42nd anniversary of my former roommate’s arrest and brief incarceration for streaking through town, a May Day campus tradition that went sideways that particular evening and was a highlight of our call.
We attended Washington College, a small, liberal arts school in Chestertown on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. The school is notable as the first college chartered in the sovereign United States – George Washington lent his name and served on its first Board – and for the largest literary cash award to an undergraduate in the country. The Sophie Kerr Prize, more than $63,000 this year, is awarded annually to a graduating senior who shows the most promise in the literary field.Two days after my roommate’s arrest and the absurd aftermath, the story landed on A1 of the Washington Post, what’s referred to in newspapers as a “bright” – a quirky, unusual piece intended to counter more serious news. The story was then picked up by news outlets along the East Coast, including my roommate’s hometown of Miami. It’s an amusing story, with a great kicker. A side note: one of the authors was a young reporter named David Maraniss, who’s still at the Post and who over the next 40 years won two Pulitzers and wrote books on Clinton, Gore, Obama, Vince Lombardi, Roberto Clemente, the Vietnam War and the Tokyo Olympics. We like to think that my naked roommate helped springboard his career and are certain that the story is listed prominently on his curriculum vitae. (The story is available in all its glory at this link.)
There were eight charter members, maybe twice that in total before the vibe fizzled. Several of us transferred, a few others left school for academic or personal reasons. We’ve maintained contact off and on through the years. Some of us stay in touch regularly, others we hadn’t seen in decades before the May 1 call. Like I said, loosely based.
Which is why the G:TB community and things such as the OBFT and various informal get-togethers you all arrange are treasures. Our Zoom call was a blast, but as several of you know from your own virtual meetings, it’s kind of a tease. I eagerly await the times when people can commune again. Maybe there’s masks, maybe there’s distance. But it’s human, and that’s the best we have.
Monday, January 06, 2020
The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day Twelve
On the twelfth day of Gheorghemas,
Big Gheorghe gave to me
Twelve Concert Visuals
Eleven Months of Elevating the Art of Blogging
Ten Years of Dipshits
Nine (six, really) goats goatating
Eight Autographs Showing How Sad My Childhood Was
Seven Books for Reading
Six Vinyl Discs
Five golden (Cream Yellow, really) cylinders for Squeaky
Four players playing
Three Nutty Squirrels
Two Chilean bangers (literally)
And a British lass slingin’ hot meat
You knew it would be music-related, right? It wasn’t just me that turned more posting attention to tunes this year – G:TB sported 102 of 193 posts this year that predominantly featured something musical. It’s the #1 content piece, followed by sports, cars, where we visited, William and Mary, food, anything squirrel-related, dumb fashion, Gheorghe Muresan, and vajazzling.
We like music.
We like listening to music, reading about music, watching videos of music, occasionally writing and recording music, and especially going to concerts. It’s what we do, by and large. It’s definitely what I did this year:
29 shows all told. I’m pleased with that, though one of a couple of shows I had tickets to and then couldn’t make (Rhett Miller especially) could’ve propelled me into the 30’s. Whatever. A few years back, times were less blissful for me, and I wrote on Day 12 about not having seen jack squat for live music. I’m extremely pleased that this has changed.
My favorite show of the year was the December G:TB Summit in Montclair, New Jersey for The Cult. I saw better shows with worse company plenty. That one was just right for all-around camaraderie and enjoyment. Kudos to Zman for rallying folks and buying advance tix. We should've done a post about it.
Second would probably be Elvis Costello and Blondie with Rob. Or the Rootstone show! I definitely should have done a full review of our man Rootsy's show in March. My bad, buddy.
I got to see an increasing number of friends make/play great music. You may recall one FOGTB released an album.
The Les Coole open mic was good nerve-wracking fun. Album is delayed til 2020, but we have 8 or 9 rough cuts in the can. Soon enough I'll fish 'em out and finish the project.
On to Gmas... I am a lousy concert photographer/videographer. I don't like doing it, since it both detracts from the experience and sometimes annoys the artists. (Tweedy, I'm talking about you.) But I often end up snapping a quick one and being done with it. The results: eh. They spark a memory, that's about all you can say about them.
So... enjoy the show(s). Dig my avant-garde assembly of them.
That's 11. Here's #12, a video I took of the inimitable Nels Cline performing one of my favorite Wilco songs... and his signature solo.
Big Gheorghe gave to me
Twelve Concert Visuals
Eleven Months of Elevating the Art of Blogging
Ten Years of Dipshits
Nine (six, really) goats goatating
Eight Autographs Showing How Sad My Childhood Was
Seven Books for Reading
Six Vinyl Discs
Five golden (Cream Yellow, really) cylinders for Squeaky
Four players playing
Three Nutty Squirrels
Two Chilean bangers (literally)
And a British lass slingin’ hot meat
You knew it would be music-related, right? It wasn’t just me that turned more posting attention to tunes this year – G:TB sported 102 of 193 posts this year that predominantly featured something musical. It’s the #1 content piece, followed by sports, cars, where we visited, William and Mary, food, anything squirrel-related, dumb fashion, Gheorghe Muresan, and vajazzling.
We like music.
We like listening to music, reading about music, watching videos of music, occasionally writing and recording music, and especially going to concerts. It’s what we do, by and large. It’s definitely what I did this year:
My favorite show of the year was the December G:TB Summit in Montclair, New Jersey for The Cult. I saw better shows with worse company plenty. That one was just right for all-around camaraderie and enjoyment. Kudos to Zman for rallying folks and buying advance tix. We should've done a post about it.
Second would probably be Elvis Costello and Blondie with Rob. Or the Rootstone show! I definitely should have done a full review of our man Rootsy's show in March. My bad, buddy.
I got to see an increasing number of friends make/play great music. You may recall one FOGTB released an album.
The Les Coole open mic was good nerve-wracking fun. Album is delayed til 2020, but we have 8 or 9 rough cuts in the can. Soon enough I'll fish 'em out and finish the project.
On to Gmas... I am a lousy concert photographer/videographer. I don't like doing it, since it both detracts from the experience and sometimes annoys the artists. (Tweedy, I'm talking about you.) But I often end up snapping a quick one and being done with it. The results: eh. They spark a memory, that's about all you can say about them.
So... enjoy the show(s). Dig my avant-garde assembly of them.
 |
| The Avett Brothers |
 |
| Citizen Cope |
 |
| Big Head Todd and the Monsters |
 |
| The Cult |
 |
| Father John Misty |
 |
| Jason Isbell |
 |
| Les Coole and The Cukes |
 |
| Rootstone Jug Band |
 |
| Cracker |
 |
| Melvin Seals and JGB |
 |
| Wilco |
Let's keep up the music in 2020.
Unearthing new stuff and sharing it. Unearthing old stuff and sharing it. Reviewing it. Making it. Photographing it. (Someone else besides me.) Seeing shows together as a roving band of half-drunk gheorghies. I have tickets to They Might Be Giants in DC with Rob and The Black Crowes in Va Beach unless they implode again. Seeing the Hoodoo Gurus down here in November. Beyond that: Cold War Kids, The Allman Betts Band, Southern Culture On the Skids, Sturgill Simpson, The Revivalists, Waxing Poetics, The Lumineers, . . . join me, gheorghies?
The last day of Christmas, officially speaking, was yesterday. We're just a day off for Gheorghemas. Here's hoping everyone's holiday was less serious and that there were songs to fill the air. Cheers.
Monday, December 31, 2018
The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day Twelve
On the eleventh day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me:
Twelve Numerical Milestones
Eleven Months of Memories
Ten fingers and ten toes
Nine (ten, actually) Gheorghemas albums
Eight Bud Lights with Andy
Seven Book Categories for Reading
Six Cylinders for Shlara
Five Givings of Thanks
Four Badass Women
Three(+) Decades of Love’s Labor
Two Things You’re Needing
And a Fat Guy in a Sweet T
Welcome to another edition of the Twelfth Day of Gheorghemas. Day 12, like the Yeti, or his North American cousin the Sasquatch, has been rather elusive the past couple of years, in part because I've had a lot to say and yet nothing. Wrote a song about it. Like to hear it? Here it go:
I'm not the only Gheorghe: The Blog staffer to be divorced. In fact, I'm one of four. I am, however, the only one to get divorced after having children, and I'm also the only one still divorced. It's been . . . a journey.
Recently, after a couple of handmade vodka drinks, I explained semi-seriously to some good friends that even I have periodic moments of reflection, and a particular image frequently enters my mind. It's this: I once had this beautiful meal on a plate: my life in culinary metaphor. And that I took this delectable, would-be thoroughly satisfying plate of food and dropped it. Down a flight of stairs. Into a basement. Where the plate shattered, sending shards of ceramic and sustenance into dusty corners, never to be retrieved and reassembled.
It was, even delivered with my standard stupid smile, a dramatic and depressing proclamation. But it's how I feel -- sometimes. Certainly not all the time. And certainly not never. I routinely acknowledge that I've been handed quite a lot of good in my life, from my socioeconomic station to my clever wit to my dashing good looks and debonair (see wit, clever). I am not feeling sorry for myself. I'm just recognizing that I have thrown a pretty good life into the thresher at least once, maybe multiple times. And I feel like I epitomize Dion's B-side, "The Squanderer."
At least until now...
* * * * * *
For most Day 12's that have hit the blogwaves, I have polished off Gmas with "Twelve Appreciations." This year is a little bit of a pivot thereon, incorporating a dozen numerical milestones that mean something to me and interspersing it all with how I got here.
So . . . I got married at the ripe old age of 26, when I knew neither who I was nor what I wanted. Genius. When I expressed some indigestion at the prospect of my looming wedding date to a trusted family member, I was offered this piece of Confucian wisdom: "She checks all the boxes. You're immature. Don't screw it up." Not blaming anyone, but . . . thanks.
Anyway, she was and is a truly great person, but there was some already loose footing on that trip down the aisle. No worries, we had a big party in Richmond and a number of my dudes were there to support me / love company. And later that summer we embarked on the 4th Annual Outer Banks Fishing Trip. We had a bunch of dudes make a trip to NC for four years in a row! That's a feat by most people's standards. It would be interesting to see how much further we could take that.
25 Years of the OBFT
Are you kidding me? A quarter of a century of a dudes-only sojourn to a little cottage on the beach that sleeps eight? And we routinely boast 15-20? I cannot accurately convey what the unflinching dedication of my comrades to keep this wagon rolling means to me. It's just the best.
In between fishing trips, the missus and I got up to the devil's business a couple of times, as ol' Evan would say, and I helped to create the two greatest points of vulnerability that could possibly exist in my universe.
17 Years of Being a Father
The Marls saga brought tears to my eyes -- a significantly more common occurrence in my old age -- because as much as I was being honest about the vulnerability part, it's even more true that these two girls represent the most overwhelming joy I could ever experience in all my life. Nothing comes close. They are my reason for being, which candidly translates: they are, in all likelihood, the reason I'm still alive. I just spent four days in Florida with them. When they laugh, usually at me, the world is perfect.
Now back to your regularly scheduled dipshittery. Like dressing up as Abe Lincoln!
14 Years as Abe Lincoln
Hard to believe I made such a ridiculous trip back in time/up I-95 for so long. I was a fat guy portraying the skinniest president ever. (Obama is second, maybe?) I was a young guy playing a much older president and I had to dye my fucking beard to make it look younger. And I left a popular beach region on a holiday weekend to sweat to the oldies in DC. Full disclosure... Abe partied all night long before traveling up to the parade on no sleep more than once. Super swell idea. No more. The final curtain (insert Ford's Theater joke here, yuk yuk) has fallen.
So . . . I had a pretty full life going on back then by most accounts. And I filled in my happiness gaps (the gappiness) with excursions like...
6 Nations
Every February/March, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France, and Italy square off in a round-robin rugby tournament for bragging rights and some sort of trophy. It's great fun. The Six Nations. I went in 2000 with 12 hoodlum ruggers from American U, several of whom I knew from work. Reykjavik and Cardiff have never been the same. One month from today, more than 10 guys from our college posse will fly to Dublin to watch Ireland host England in the marquee match on the tournament. Hell yes. I'm stunned we pulled it off. I'm more stunned flights from Dulles to Dublin were $319 on Icelandair. I'll be even more stunned if I make it back in one piece. I appreciate the old Irish expression, "may the road rise up to meet you" but not so fast that you break your face, lad.
Meanwhile, the single most consistent enhancement of my life in times good and bad has been music, something chronicled on this blog by many of us ad infinitum. Starting in 2006, I started to issue a year-end CD to keep my musically-inclined-but-not-quite-current friends up on the latest and greatest. 20 from 2006 and it subsequent ilk were tons of fun for me and well-received. Damn the technology! CD's are dodos, and with their extinction went my outlet for fun. Yay, technology! Via Spotify I can issue dueling playlists: 20 from 2018 and 100 from 2018. F anyone who says there's no good new music any more.
20 / 100 Songs from This Year Worth a Listen
But that didn't solve the marital stuff, and in 2009, I blew it up. People assumed I was a maniac, because it didn't make sense from the curbside view. Whitney was going off half-cocked again, so to speak, and it was neither fruitful nor possible to convey the thought and pain that went into that. Nor the pain that came from it, both for me and everyone involved. Agony not worth documenting. The three words that best describe it are as follows, and I quote: "Stink, stank, stunk."
So you dust yourself off and try again. I leapt into the waitingtentacles arms of the one who would be wife #2. It's mean and a tiny bit unfair to lob grenades her way now, but let me just say this . . . sometimes your comeuppance comes in the form of a mate, and that can be humbling, humiliating, horrible. For my countless flaws, I do try to follow the "I shit the bed, now I must lie in it" (or something akin) adage, and so I set about making myself happy in other ways.
After a disastrous experience working for the Devil herself for 12 months, 3 weeks, and 1 day, I found myself unemployed and searching for meaningful, not just gainful employment. For six long months. These were not the salad days, as they say.
7 Years of a Dream Job
The good fortune that follows me came through hugely in 2011. I landed at a nonprofit that serves people with disabilities. I'm the Director of Business Development, finding jobs for this underserved but amazing subset of our population every day. It's fucking awesome. I could talk about this for hours, but let me say this: I am awed just about every day there. I get to help people who've been passed over. I get to go to Richmond and Capitol Hill and advocate for them. I gave a rather animated, 15-minute speech in the Virginia Capitol three weeks ago, and the kudos I got from senators, delegates, people in the industry, and even people who fundamentally disagree with my argument brought (more) tears to my eyes. I love it. We are an ass-kicking machine of a nonprofit with a $47 million annual budget and over 1,000 employees on 18 federal government contracts and countless commercial ventures serving people with disabilities of all kinds. Including cool-assed shit like this (I either had a bender the night prior or just look like it, so please forgive):
My job and my daughters were the bright spots of joy in an otherwise depraved and joyless time. I was behaving like I thought I was playing bass on Aerosmith's Live Bootleg Tour in '78. Having abandoned a home that was sadly lacking but stable, and having sacrificed a lot of time with the lights of my life who needed me . . . for a life that checked no boxes except a bit of Hugh Hefner and maybe some Sam Kinison . . . well, that needs some heavy supplementing with good old-fashioned happy stuff. Enter ORF Rock!
4 Years of Being a College Radio Disc Jockey
I love ORF Rock. I love Les Coole and Penny Baker. My OCD loves that my lovely co-host gives me control of the track lists. Okay, my real dream job is this...
And so that time of my life went. Until it could not go any more. In September of 2016, I blew it up. Again. The maniacs.
I then went pretty dormant for a while, by design. For one thing, there are few things more financially ruinous than divorce. I was broker than broke. Moving money around I didn't have to stay one step ahead of pauper's prison. All my doing. The plate down the stairs. To put it in a very gauche perspective, a decade earlier we had sold a house for seven figures and now I was scrounging for coins on my car floor to buy lunch.
Here's one way to make some money, though! Let yourself go in an era of utter decadence where there's neither a cheeseburger nor a pale ale that doesn't have your name on it. Be a slovenly pig for years in the ultimate sandbag . . .
30 Pounds in 3 Months
Then meander innocently into a bet with Marls and Buck that you can get down to 230 pounds by Thanksgiving. Make $230 off each of them! It's a cinch!
Okay, since this post is full of way-too-full disclosures . . . my manorexic father had already bet me a far larger sum to reach that identical goal AND offered to pay for gym and trainer fees. Sorry, boys, I had to go for the con. But I did reach that goal. And that bet was settled 13 months ago and the weight's still off and I am now paying my own freight at the gym and still going. So there's that.
That helped my self-esteem in some down times, I do have to say. And down was down not just for my own self-inflicted wounds, but also some family stuff. I think I disclosed along the way that my dad was diagnosed in early 2016 with Stage 4 lung cancer. Tumors in lymph nodes and nasty shit. In April of that year his sisters came from North Carolina and Hawaii respectively to pay their last respects . . . and then he miraculously got better. (I just knocked on wood 73 times, one for every year he's been alive.) Immunotherapy (Opdivo was his brand) saved his life. Like, really fast. It's a fucking miracle serum (for some people with some cancers) and should be produced and dispensed freely to all. I already feel pretty bad about the friends I love who've lost their nearest and dearest to the Big Casino. So unfair. Fuck cancer and anything that stands in the way of anyone getting this treatment.
And I will always be grateful for this chapter of my story, not only because it saved my dad's life, but because the process majorly closed a gap between my father and me -- one that had been pretty wide and had been so since . . . wait for it . . . he left my mom in 1978. Life is funny. Not always haha funny. And it doesn't always work out so famously, obviously. Like when . . .
36 Years of Being a Stepson
My stepmother, my dad's wife of 36 years, wasn't as lucky. She had cancer all over her body and wicked, degenerative dementia that bode very ill and strained life for her and Dad. She passed, mercifully, in April of this year. I've never seen my father so emotional, and I say that in a good way. He scattered her ashes on four different beaches, including at the Martha Wood Cottage at dawn with me standing next to him. And because we are now closer than ever before, I was able to be there for him in a way I could never have just a few years ago. We road-tripped five hours to PA for Christmas at my sister's, and we listed to a live Grateful Dead compilation I created for him. Which he loved. Life is funny.
Earlier this year he and I went to see the Mr. Rogers documentary. Front row of the balcony of the old Naro Theater in Norfolk. I absolutely broke down crying from it, and the old man was weeping as well. I've never had such a visceral reaction to cinema anywhere, much less in public. I was so glad I could take my dad to that film.
So . . . things have been on the upswing of late. And to aid my career, and maybe just maybe because I had a chip on my shoulder about squandering my undergrad education on Milwaukee's Best, rugby, and countless hours of idiocy with some of you jive turkeys, I went all Rodney Dangerfield.
24 Years Since Attending College
As I wrote to you in May at the end of my first semester, I enrolled in the College of Knowledge's night school MBA program in January. Insane. This shit is arduous! Oh, well. Self-improvement and all that crap. I currently have a 3.85 through the first five classes, which feels like wearing another man's suit to someone whose undergraduate transcript is Stephen King-worthy. Hell, it feels like wearing women's undergarments. What? No, what?
And yet there is still time when I need it to expand my productivity. Between work, school, and part-time parenting (and oh yeah, there is still some good times-ing), I'm usually exhausted but still driven by my innate carpe diem as inflamed by lost friends and aging. Especially when I see this...
5-ash
So there's a dude named Robert Fiveash. I've know him most all my life. We went to school and camp together all the way up. His family co-owns the Martha Wood with mine. He also attended William and Mary's MBA program with our tiny dictator two decades ago. And he helped found and runs a promotional product company called Brand Fuel. Anyway, he's a Superfan. The object of his adoration? The Drive-By Truckers. For those in the know, the DBT's go back to Athens, GA every February and play a trio of shows that (1) assemble their legions of fans, (2) feature up-and-comer opening acts, and (3) raise money and awareness for a suicide prevention nonprofit called Nuçi’s Space. The shows are called the HeAthens Homecoming.
Robert is a crazy DBT's fan. He hits a ton of shows, is always there at the rail starting at soundcheck, and he spends lots of time on the Three Dimes Down DBT's fan forum. His moniker is ramonz. And he conceived of and spearheaded a herculean effort to produce a book that's a tribute to this annual event and the people that comprise it. And the proceeds go to the same worthy cause. It's called The Company We Keep.
And what a book it is! It's huge, 10" x 14". Amazing photos from Homecoming shows, interviews with band members and tons of affiliated people. Read this from Patterson Hood of the Truckers:
I'm blown away by this endeavor. We can do stuff that matters. In a movie not too many people loved but I did, Benjamin Button laments, "I was thinking that nothing lasts, and what a shame that is." Well, this book and the collaborative efforts that brought it to life will last. And I want something in that vein.
My NOLA buddy Ned released another album this year. As did another guy we graduated high school with, as well as another old friend of mine. Dave still makes music when he's inspired. Rootsy still makes real music. And twice he has let me defile his music studio with my vocals and guitar playing. As McManus once posited, "There's nothing that can't be done."
10 Tracks
That's what my goal is. That's what my plan is. Now that I do have a little money in my pocket (so long as I stay away from Pristine Auction), I plan to turn my third floor into a home music studio. And crank out an album's worth of stuff. I have lots of lyrics penned. Let's sample:
Crescent City Sunrise
Someone said it's darkest / Right before the dawn
I can't tell, said Marcus / From the barstool that I'm on
A painter with a problem / has a breakfast margarita
I slap him five and tag out / And slug down my Abita
Crescent City Sunrise
Just beyond that wall
New day through the window
Serves as my last call
Stagger to the sidewalk
I have to close my eyes
From the bright beams of a
Crescent
City
Sunrise
I was drinkin' with my sorrows / I know that it's a sin
And I was thinkin' about tomorrow / When tomorrow just walked in
Not ready for the day / Wish tomorrow would head back out
Time flies, as they say / When you drink until you black out
Crescent City sunrise
Mine eyes have seen its glory
A streetcar rattles by
All the riders know my story
Shuffling out of Igors
Anybody can surmise
I wasn't doing laundry
Til a Crescent
City
Sunrise
Garden district sunup / It'll steal your breath from you
Am I the only one up / To enjoy this perfect view
A million slumbering dreamers / Couldn't dream this kind of sight
Beautiful day New Orleans / And so I say good night
Crescent city sunrise
Sends me home to bed
Gorgeous and serene
And the one thing that I dread
I'm gonna hear about it
'cause there's really no disguise
Stumblin' in to a
Crescent
City
Sunrise
So that's Day 12 by the numbers. I'm still learning something new every day. After the second divorce (D2), I spent two years with a wonderful twentysomething who helped me restore my sense of being worth a damn. And then I let her go, as our roads had to diverge. I blew it up again. Such is life. Since then I learned what "ghosting" is ($#@&!), and I've also spent time in the company of beautiful greatness whose timing was unaligned, breaking my heart for the umpteenth time. Such is life. I'm growing. Learning. Evolving.
Whatever. I'm still the guy that Rob linked to Rhett Miller's 2018 song (see the playlist above) "Total Disaster." I'm still more than capable of doing something really stupid and blowing up my life again. But I'm less regretful now and I'm less worried about scraping myself up off the sidewalk and having another go. Life is hilarious when you get the joke.
Speaking of superfans and Rhett... this is so dweeby of me and the coolest thing ever by him.
So here's where I am on the last day of 2018. I still . . . still . . . have more going for me than 99.9999% of the people who occupy this planet. I've seen some pain, I've unfortunately inflicted it on good people I love, and I'm probably not done with either of those things. But I'm far more aware of my surroundings and more keenly interested in bettering them, so that's a start. And I'm back to adoring most every minute of what I do.
Thanks for waiting for me to get around to a Day 12 after several years. Thanks for letting me air out my failings and flaws like a Dear Diary moment.. Thanks for meeting up with me for beers the next time I'm in your town.
Anyway, I love Gheorghe: The Blog and all you people. Like for real. As Mr. Rogers would say, 143.
Now back to your regularly scheduled dipshittery.
Twelve Numerical Milestones
Eleven Months of Memories
Ten fingers and ten toes
Nine (ten, actually) Gheorghemas albums
Eight Bud Lights with Andy
Seven Book Categories for Reading
Six Cylinders for Shlara
Five Givings of Thanks
Four Badass Women
Three(+) Decades of Love’s Labor
Two Things You’re Needing
And a Fat Guy in a Sweet T
Welcome to another edition of the Twelfth Day of Gheorghemas. Day 12, like the Yeti, or his North American cousin the Sasquatch, has been rather elusive the past couple of years, in part because I've had a lot to say and yet nothing. Wrote a song about it. Like to hear it? Here it go:
I'm not the only Gheorghe: The Blog staffer to be divorced. In fact, I'm one of four. I am, however, the only one to get divorced after having children, and I'm also the only one still divorced. It's been . . . a journey.
Recently, after a couple of handmade vodka drinks, I explained semi-seriously to some good friends that even I have periodic moments of reflection, and a particular image frequently enters my mind. It's this: I once had this beautiful meal on a plate: my life in culinary metaphor. And that I took this delectable, would-be thoroughly satisfying plate of food and dropped it. Down a flight of stairs. Into a basement. Where the plate shattered, sending shards of ceramic and sustenance into dusty corners, never to be retrieved and reassembled.
It was, even delivered with my standard stupid smile, a dramatic and depressing proclamation. But it's how I feel -- sometimes. Certainly not all the time. And certainly not never. I routinely acknowledge that I've been handed quite a lot of good in my life, from my socioeconomic station to my clever wit to my dashing good looks and debonair (see wit, clever). I am not feeling sorry for myself. I'm just recognizing that I have thrown a pretty good life into the thresher at least once, maybe multiple times. And I feel like I epitomize Dion's B-side, "The Squanderer."
At least until now...
* * * * * *
For most Day 12's that have hit the blogwaves, I have polished off Gmas with "Twelve Appreciations." This year is a little bit of a pivot thereon, incorporating a dozen numerical milestones that mean something to me and interspersing it all with how I got here.
So . . . I got married at the ripe old age of 26, when I knew neither who I was nor what I wanted. Genius. When I expressed some indigestion at the prospect of my looming wedding date to a trusted family member, I was offered this piece of Confucian wisdom: "She checks all the boxes. You're immature. Don't screw it up." Not blaming anyone, but . . . thanks.
Anyway, she was and is a truly great person, but there was some already loose footing on that trip down the aisle. No worries, we had a big party in Richmond and a number of my dudes were there to support me / love company. And later that summer we embarked on the 4th Annual Outer Banks Fishing Trip. We had a bunch of dudes make a trip to NC for four years in a row! That's a feat by most people's standards. It would be interesting to see how much further we could take that.
25 Years of the OBFT
Are you kidding me? A quarter of a century of a dudes-only sojourn to a little cottage on the beach that sleeps eight? And we routinely boast 15-20? I cannot accurately convey what the unflinching dedication of my comrades to keep this wagon rolling means to me. It's just the best.
In between fishing trips, the missus and I got up to the devil's business a couple of times, as ol' Evan would say, and I helped to create the two greatest points of vulnerability that could possibly exist in my universe.
17 Years of Being a Father
The Marls saga brought tears to my eyes -- a significantly more common occurrence in my old age -- because as much as I was being honest about the vulnerability part, it's even more true that these two girls represent the most overwhelming joy I could ever experience in all my life. Nothing comes close. They are my reason for being, which candidly translates: they are, in all likelihood, the reason I'm still alive. I just spent four days in Florida with them. When they laugh, usually at me, the world is perfect.
Now back to your regularly scheduled dipshittery. Like dressing up as Abe Lincoln!
14 Years as Abe Lincoln
Hard to believe I made such a ridiculous trip back in time/up I-95 for so long. I was a fat guy portraying the skinniest president ever. (Obama is second, maybe?) I was a young guy playing a much older president and I had to dye my fucking beard to make it look younger. And I left a popular beach region on a holiday weekend to sweat to the oldies in DC. Full disclosure... Abe partied all night long before traveling up to the parade on no sleep more than once. Super swell idea. No more. The final curtain (insert Ford's Theater joke here, yuk yuk) has fallen.
So . . . I had a pretty full life going on back then by most accounts. And I filled in my happiness gaps (the gappiness) with excursions like...
6 Nations
Every February/March, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France, and Italy square off in a round-robin rugby tournament for bragging rights and some sort of trophy. It's great fun. The Six Nations. I went in 2000 with 12 hoodlum ruggers from American U, several of whom I knew from work. Reykjavik and Cardiff have never been the same. One month from today, more than 10 guys from our college posse will fly to Dublin to watch Ireland host England in the marquee match on the tournament. Hell yes. I'm stunned we pulled it off. I'm more stunned flights from Dulles to Dublin were $319 on Icelandair. I'll be even more stunned if I make it back in one piece. I appreciate the old Irish expression, "may the road rise up to meet you" but not so fast that you break your face, lad.
Meanwhile, the single most consistent enhancement of my life in times good and bad has been music, something chronicled on this blog by many of us ad infinitum. Starting in 2006, I started to issue a year-end CD to keep my musically-inclined-but-not-quite-current friends up on the latest and greatest. 20 from 2006 and it subsequent ilk were tons of fun for me and well-received. Damn the technology! CD's are dodos, and with their extinction went my outlet for fun. Yay, technology! Via Spotify I can issue dueling playlists: 20 from 2018 and 100 from 2018. F anyone who says there's no good new music any more.
20 / 100 Songs from This Year Worth a Listen
Back to the story. We moved back to my hometown of Norfolk in 2005. By all metrics, a great move for everyone. As Buffett sang before he cliff-dove into awfulness, I Have Found Me a Home.
But that didn't solve the marital stuff, and in 2009, I blew it up. People assumed I was a maniac, because it didn't make sense from the curbside view. Whitney was going off half-cocked again, so to speak, and it was neither fruitful nor possible to convey the thought and pain that went into that. Nor the pain that came from it, both for me and everyone involved. Agony not worth documenting. The three words that best describe it are as follows, and I quote: "Stink, stank, stunk."
So you dust yourself off and try again. I leapt into the waiting
After a disastrous experience working for the Devil herself for 12 months, 3 weeks, and 1 day, I found myself unemployed and searching for meaningful, not just gainful employment. For six long months. These were not the salad days, as they say.
7 Years of a Dream Job
The good fortune that follows me came through hugely in 2011. I landed at a nonprofit that serves people with disabilities. I'm the Director of Business Development, finding jobs for this underserved but amazing subset of our population every day. It's fucking awesome. I could talk about this for hours, but let me say this: I am awed just about every day there. I get to help people who've been passed over. I get to go to Richmond and Capitol Hill and advocate for them. I gave a rather animated, 15-minute speech in the Virginia Capitol three weeks ago, and the kudos I got from senators, delegates, people in the industry, and even people who fundamentally disagree with my argument brought (more) tears to my eyes. I love it. We are an ass-kicking machine of a nonprofit with a $47 million annual budget and over 1,000 employees on 18 federal government contracts and countless commercial ventures serving people with disabilities of all kinds. Including cool-assed shit like this (I either had a bender the night prior or just look like it, so please forgive):
4 Years of Being a College Radio Disc Jockey
I love ORF Rock. I love Les Coole and Penny Baker. My OCD loves that my lovely co-host gives me control of the track lists. Okay, my real dream job is this...
I then went pretty dormant for a while, by design. For one thing, there are few things more financially ruinous than divorce. I was broker than broke. Moving money around I didn't have to stay one step ahead of pauper's prison. All my doing. The plate down the stairs. To put it in a very gauche perspective, a decade earlier we had sold a house for seven figures and now I was scrounging for coins on my car floor to buy lunch.
Here's one way to make some money, though! Let yourself go in an era of utter decadence where there's neither a cheeseburger nor a pale ale that doesn't have your name on it. Be a slovenly pig for years in the ultimate sandbag . . .
30 Pounds in 3 Months
Then meander innocently into a bet with Marls and Buck that you can get down to 230 pounds by Thanksgiving. Make $230 off each of them! It's a cinch!
Okay, since this post is full of way-too-full disclosures . . . my manorexic father had already bet me a far larger sum to reach that identical goal AND offered to pay for gym and trainer fees. Sorry, boys, I had to go for the con. But I did reach that goal. And that bet was settled 13 months ago and the weight's still off and I am now paying my own freight at the gym and still going. So there's that.
That helped my self-esteem in some down times, I do have to say. And down was down not just for my own self-inflicted wounds, but also some family stuff. I think I disclosed along the way that my dad was diagnosed in early 2016 with Stage 4 lung cancer. Tumors in lymph nodes and nasty shit. In April of that year his sisters came from North Carolina and Hawaii respectively to pay their last respects . . . and then he miraculously got better. (I just knocked on wood 73 times, one for every year he's been alive.) Immunotherapy (Opdivo was his brand) saved his life. Like, really fast. It's a fucking miracle serum (for some people with some cancers) and should be produced and dispensed freely to all. I already feel pretty bad about the friends I love who've lost their nearest and dearest to the Big Casino. So unfair. Fuck cancer and anything that stands in the way of anyone getting this treatment.
And I will always be grateful for this chapter of my story, not only because it saved my dad's life, but because the process majorly closed a gap between my father and me -- one that had been pretty wide and had been so since . . . wait for it . . . he left my mom in 1978. Life is funny. Not always haha funny. And it doesn't always work out so famously, obviously. Like when . . .
36 Years of Being a Stepson
 |
| My Xmas gift to Dad this year |
Earlier this year he and I went to see the Mr. Rogers documentary. Front row of the balcony of the old Naro Theater in Norfolk. I absolutely broke down crying from it, and the old man was weeping as well. I've never had such a visceral reaction to cinema anywhere, much less in public. I was so glad I could take my dad to that film.
So . . . things have been on the upswing of late. And to aid my career, and maybe just maybe because I had a chip on my shoulder about squandering my undergrad education on Milwaukee's Best, rugby, and countless hours of idiocy with some of you jive turkeys, I went all Rodney Dangerfield.
24 Years Since Attending College
As I wrote to you in May at the end of my first semester, I enrolled in the College of Knowledge's night school MBA program in January. Insane. This shit is arduous! Oh, well. Self-improvement and all that crap. I currently have a 3.85 through the first five classes, which feels like wearing another man's suit to someone whose undergraduate transcript is Stephen King-worthy. Hell, it feels like wearing women's undergarments. What? No, what?
And yet there is still time when I need it to expand my productivity. Between work, school, and part-time parenting (and oh yeah, there is still some good times-ing), I'm usually exhausted but still driven by my innate carpe diem as inflamed by lost friends and aging. Especially when I see this...
5-ash
So there's a dude named Robert Fiveash. I've know him most all my life. We went to school and camp together all the way up. His family co-owns the Martha Wood with mine. He also attended William and Mary's MBA program with our tiny dictator two decades ago. And he helped found and runs a promotional product company called Brand Fuel. Anyway, he's a Superfan. The object of his adoration? The Drive-By Truckers. For those in the know, the DBT's go back to Athens, GA every February and play a trio of shows that (1) assemble their legions of fans, (2) feature up-and-comer opening acts, and (3) raise money and awareness for a suicide prevention nonprofit called Nuçi’s Space. The shows are called the HeAthens Homecoming.Robert is a crazy DBT's fan. He hits a ton of shows, is always there at the rail starting at soundcheck, and he spends lots of time on the Three Dimes Down DBT's fan forum. His moniker is ramonz. And he conceived of and spearheaded a herculean effort to produce a book that's a tribute to this annual event and the people that comprise it. And the proceeds go to the same worthy cause. It's called The Company We Keep.
And what a book it is! It's huge, 10" x 14". Amazing photos from Homecoming shows, interviews with band members and tons of affiliated people. Read this from Patterson Hood of the Truckers:
I spent an hour looking through it (it will take far longer to actually take it all in) and I was moved to literal tears. I don’t know if anything like this has ever existed in any other band’s community but I was blown away by the enormous amount of work and love that obviously went into its creation. It has made me want to strive even harder to be worthy.Robert had a lot of help and will take little credit, but make no mistake, this is his doing. He said with a smile it nearly cost him his marriage, but all is well. And it's done. You can buy one here. I did. In fact, I'm mailing another copy to Zman later this week.
I'm blown away by this endeavor. We can do stuff that matters. In a movie not too many people loved but I did, Benjamin Button laments, "I was thinking that nothing lasts, and what a shame that is." Well, this book and the collaborative efforts that brought it to life will last. And I want something in that vein.
My NOLA buddy Ned released another album this year. As did another guy we graduated high school with, as well as another old friend of mine. Dave still makes music when he's inspired. Rootsy still makes real music. And twice he has let me defile his music studio with my vocals and guitar playing. As McManus once posited, "There's nothing that can't be done."
10 Tracks
That's what my goal is. That's what my plan is. Now that I do have a little money in my pocket (so long as I stay away from Pristine Auction), I plan to turn my third floor into a home music studio. And crank out an album's worth of stuff. I have lots of lyrics penned. Let's sample:
Crescent City Sunrise
Someone said it's darkest / Right before the dawn
I can't tell, said Marcus / From the barstool that I'm on
A painter with a problem / has a breakfast margarita
I slap him five and tag out / And slug down my Abita
Crescent City Sunrise
Just beyond that wall
New day through the window
Serves as my last call
Stagger to the sidewalk
I have to close my eyes
From the bright beams of a
Crescent
City
Sunrise
I was drinkin' with my sorrows / I know that it's a sin
And I was thinkin' about tomorrow / When tomorrow just walked in
Not ready for the day / Wish tomorrow would head back out
Time flies, as they say / When you drink until you black out
Crescent City sunrise
Mine eyes have seen its glory
A streetcar rattles by
All the riders know my story
Shuffling out of Igors
Anybody can surmise
I wasn't doing laundry
Til a Crescent
City
Sunrise
Garden district sunup / It'll steal your breath from you
Am I the only one up / To enjoy this perfect view
A million slumbering dreamers / Couldn't dream this kind of sight
Beautiful day New Orleans / And so I say good night
Crescent city sunrise
Sends me home to bed
Gorgeous and serene
And the one thing that I dread
I'm gonna hear about it
'cause there's really no disguise
Stumblin' in to a
Crescent
City
Sunrise
(Les Coole)
So that's Day 12 by the numbers. I'm still learning something new every day. After the second divorce (D2), I spent two years with a wonderful twentysomething who helped me restore my sense of being worth a damn. And then I let her go, as our roads had to diverge. I blew it up again. Such is life. Since then I learned what "ghosting" is ($#@&!), and I've also spent time in the company of beautiful greatness whose timing was unaligned, breaking my heart for the umpteenth time. Such is life. I'm growing. Learning. Evolving.
Whatever. I'm still the guy that Rob linked to Rhett Miller's 2018 song (see the playlist above) "Total Disaster." I'm still more than capable of doing something really stupid and blowing up my life again. But I'm less regretful now and I'm less worried about scraping myself up off the sidewalk and having another go. Life is hilarious when you get the joke.
Speaking of superfans and Rhett... this is so dweeby of me and the coolest thing ever by him.
So here's where I am on the last day of 2018. I still . . . still . . . have more going for me than 99.9999% of the people who occupy this planet. I've seen some pain, I've unfortunately inflicted it on good people I love, and I'm probably not done with either of those things. But I'm far more aware of my surroundings and more keenly interested in bettering them, so that's a start. And I'm back to adoring most every minute of what I do.
Thanks for waiting for me to get around to a Day 12 after several years. Thanks for letting me air out my failings and flaws like a Dear Diary moment.. Thanks for meeting up with me for beers the next time I'm in your town.
Anyway, I love Gheorghe: The Blog and all you people. Like for real. As Mr. Rogers would say, 143.
Now back to your regularly scheduled dipshittery.
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