Music that Fueled My 2012 

Admittedly, I have a problem when it comes to music. A real, bona fide dependency issue that, depending on who you ask, might or might not require treatment. Going back to a time when I earned $2 allowance per week and I saved every dime of it to buy the latest rock album I was lusting over to today when I have a CD rack with about 2,500 CDs on it and a digital music collection that numbers well over 30,000 tracks, my life has always been defined by music.

Music has shepherded me through the good and bad times. It has served as the soundtrack to every last bit of my life - the parts I remember fondly as well as the ones that will live in infamy.

The year 2012 has been a particularly difficult one for your wayward author - those of you who know me well know why. Thankfully, my friend and constant companion, music, has been by my side. Following is a list of some of the music that punctuated the last year for me. Some of the music is old. Some is new. Some of it has been in my collection for decades, while some of it is brand spanking new to me. The end result, however, is a playlist that has carried me through. The artists and styles are as varied as life, I think. Maybe a track or two here will do the same for you.

In no particular order: 

Album	Why It Made My Ears Happy
	Ryan Adams, Easy Tiger, 2007 Say what you will about Ryan's prolific songwriting, but when he gets the bat on the ball, he gets all of it. "Easy Tiger" hits all the right buttons, proving the pedal steel guitar is the most underrated of modern instruments. Key tracks: "Two" and "Everybody Knows."
	Foo Fighters, Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, 2007  Seriously, can we elect Dave Grohl to some sort of public office? Beautiful, passionate fury.That's the best description I can muster for the Foos. "Long Road to Ruin" and "The Pretender" are masterpieces. Rumour has it that the Foos are done. Say it ain't so, Dave.
	Pete Yorn, musicforthemorningafter, 2001  This album has become a desert island album for me, having been in almost constant rotation for 11 years. This record speaks to me on many, many levels. Yorn's subsequent work is brilliant, but none of it touches this album's sheer perfection.
	Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here, 1975 While I would rate "Dark Side of the Moon" or "The Wall" above this record for overall brilliance, "Wish You Were Here" touched me in 2012 in a personal way after the death of my best friend. Listen to it the way all Floyd albums are meant to be enjoyed - with headphones, a dark room and a recliner. (Other accoutrements are your business.)
	The Fixx, One Thing Leads to Another: Greatest Hits, 1989 Didn't see that one coming, did you? Me neither. I've long appreciated The Fixx as being much more than a one-hit wonder, but it's only be recently that I've truly begun to appreciate their genius. Fire up "Deeper and Deeper" and see why it makes my headphones smoke with 80s new wave rock glory. Think MTV's 120 Minutes - loud, loud, loud! And "Secret Separation" - just try not to tap your foot to this infectious little tune. I suggest to you that it can't be done.
	Bob Dylan, Modern Times, 2006 - Uncle Bob proves he's still got plenty of cool left in the tank, even a 65 (when this record came out - he's 71 now). There isn't enough room here to do justice to any description of Dylan. If "Thunder on the Mountain" doesn't put some swagger in your groove thang, then well, I can't help you...
	Ryan Bingham, Mescalito, 2007 Bingham's voice has the road weary growl of a much older man. His lyrics evoke a wisdom that is beyond his age, and if you don't feel just a little "outlaw" when listening to this record, then you might just be doing it wrong. Put this record on, inch the volume up a little higher than you might normally and let his smokehouse-dried voice take you down a dirt road to salvation. Sorry - corny, but man can this kid bring it. Check out "Hard Times" and "Bread & Water."
	Band of Horses, Infinite Arms, 2010 When a friend recently asked me to describe the style of music Band of Horses make, I found that their style truly defies description. I settled on "the good kind." Fire up any of their albums and you'll hear rock with country, folk and blues undertones. Standout tracks: "Laredo" and "NW Apt."
	Johnny Cash, American III: Solitary Man, 2007 Sadly, I did not truly discover the genius of Johnny Cash until after his death. I came across his "American" series of recordings a couple of years ago and the more I listen, the more I realize just what a national treasure he was. Key tracks: "I Won't Back Down," "One," and "Nobody."
	The Alan Parsons Project, The Essential Alan Parsons Project, 2007 If you don't know APP, your headphones don't know true love. Pure, delicious pornography for your ears. I recommend this retrospective package since you get the key tracks, though you can't go wrong with "The Turn of a Friendly Card," or "Ammonia Avenue." Parsons was a key sound engineer for Pink Floyd's classic "Dark Side of the Moon." I mean, really - who doesn't dig a little funky prog rock once in a while?
	The Black Keys, El Camino, 2011 Dirty, grungy, foot-stomping, smoke-drifting blues rock with a serious dose of something funky. Need I say more? Standout tracks: "Lonely Boy," and "Gold on the Ceiling." Oh, and it needs to be scare the cat out of the room kinda loud.
	Justin Townes Earle, Harlem River Blues, 2011 If Nashville and New York City had a love child, Justin Townes Earl would be his name. I really can't explain him or this record any more clearly. Just spin it, and prepare to feel folky groove thing that maybe scares you a little.
	Mumford & Sons, Sigh No More, 2010 Mumford & Sons clearly are the darlings of music critics everywhere - and for good reason. Folk? Maybe. Rock? A little. Alternative? What's that? Really, this band defies labels other than "groovy" and "hip." Yes, I said "hip."
	Chris Knight, Heart of Stone, 2008 Chris Knight is an artist that I stumbled on by mistake while exploring artists similar to other favorites on iTunes - and I am glad a did. Knight leans a little closer to pure country than I sometimes go, but he does so in way that evokes comparisons to other singer-songwriters (Steve Earle comes to mind). Put this disc on a rainy evening, crack a beer and reflect. "Miles to Memphis" is pure gold.
	Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Raising Sand, 2007 In the world of musical pairings, I'm pretty sure I am not alone in being surprised that these two musicians decided to make a record. I'm even more surprised that it's an absolute masterpiece. The personalities and musical styles of both Plant and Krauss shine through while blending to create a remarkable concoction that goes surprisingly well with a good sub-woofer and a comfy chair.
	The Decemberists, The King is Dead, 2011 Haunting and foot-tappingly addictive at the same time, The Decemberists have a sound that starts off feeling a bit folkish, but then starts feeling a little country and then feels, well, just a little weird. All I can say is crank up "Don't Carry It All" or "Down By the Water" and see for yourself. This record is responsible for me discovering the rest of their catalog and I am better for it.
	The Rolling Stones, Exile on Main Street, 1972 Choosing just one Stones album to represent what Mick and his buzzy bandmates have done for me throughout my life is exceptionally difficult. This one, however, wins it by a nose. It's gritty, dirty, feels like it has street grime on it, and it's just the ticket. If not this album, check out "Some Girls," "Tattoo You," and/or "Black and Blue." Or, just buy the whole catalog. Mick and Keith will thank you.

To be continued...

My Letter to Santa...

It was a blustery night.

And in a fitful sleep, I heard in the distance - sleigh bells!

Shaking the dreams of sparkly, dancing crappie jigs from my head, I ran to the window, threw up the sash and gazed into the starry sky. The wind wiggled up my robe and tussled my cap - yes, I wear those...what of it? - and I thought I heard in the distance, the merry ho-ho-ho of good ol' Saint Nick.

I stood with my head poking from the window, scanning the sky in search of Santa and his reindeer-powered chariot for several minutes before deciding that it was probably just gas. Burritos at bedtime tend to elicit odd dreams.

Back in my warm bed, I struggled for sleep that did not come. In the quiet pauses between stomach rumblings, I pondered the last year and decided that yes, I had been a good boy (at least insofar as horseshoes and hand grenades are concerned). And perhaps this year, Santa would skid to a stop on my snow-covered rooftop, plop down my chimney and work his way around our humble abode, leaving cool toys and stopping to enjoy the beer and kielbasas with hot mustard that I leave for him every year.

With a shot, I leaped from bed and ran to my keyboard and began typing my letter to Santa. It went something like this:

Dear Santa,
 
Having been an extraordinarily good boy this year, I am submitting the following requisition from your jolly Santaship:

• First, I would like more fish. Not on my plate, but on the end of my line. For a variety of reasons, things have been slow in the ol' fish acquisitions department and I'd like for that to change, please. Seriously, I've purchased enough rods, reels, tackle, boats and attire to outfit a small village. Certainly, it can't be too much of an imposition to ask for a few more fish in my live well.
• Next, I would like to respectfully request a new spine. I realize that you probably can't leave this one under the tree for fear of frightening the kids, but if we could work out some way for me to get a few vertebrae that work properly, I think that would be right fine. UPS, FedEx, whatever you like. Heck, I'd settle for a gently used model if you have one lying around somewhere in the back. Get it, back? Ha-ha-ha-ha...er, ahem..
• A hasenpfeffer. Seriously, I've been shouting, "bring me my hasenpfeffer!" for years. I'd really like it if someone would oblige me.
• GPS coordinates for the final resting place (or places) of Jimmy Hoffa. I poke around every time I go out wade fishing and I keep thinking that I'm bound to snag him at some point, but...
• A tiny can of Binaca breath spray specially formulated for dogs. Seriously, our beagle's breath could bring down a team of oxen, who incidentally have chronic halitosis issues if their own.
• One-quarter of one ounce of the energy my little boy burns on an average Tuesday morning. I haven't had that much giddy-up in my get-up-and-go in about 30 years.
• My very own island that I can appropriately name the Isle of Misfit Good People. Anyone can come live there with me so long as they are willing to admit that they don't know what's right for everyone and that a one-size-fits-all approach to government, religion, tolerance and so on has had its day. Your religion, race, sexual preference and gender and any of the other thousand or so things that subdivide us are irrelevant. I expect that I will have relatively few neighbors.
• Please bring peace to those who are suffering right now. You know who they are and what they need.
• And last, but not least, I'd REALLY like to have another G.I. Joe with Kung-Fu Grip. The neighborhood bully stole mine about 35 years ago. He and I never got to finish our zip line rescue of Princess Leia who was being held hostage under the dining room table by Sam Cobra.

I ended my letter, slapped it into an envelope and trotted out into the cold, my nightshirt a'fluttering to place it in the mailbox at the end of our driveway.  

As I crawled into bed, warm with holiday cheer, I thought I heard the mighty ho-ho-ho of the red-suited fat guy as he sailed into the sky driving a team of highly irregular reindeer.

Gonna have to give up those midnight burritos.

  

   

25 Things You Didn't Know About Your Wayward Author

1. I am the superhero known as Adjective Man. I have a cape and everything.

2. I think life would be better if random groups of people broke out into Monty Python-like  musicals from time to time. What shopping trip wouldn't be made better if everyone in the produce section suddenly broke into a perfectly choreographed musical that spilled out into the parking lot? I mean really...

3. I think it would be great if someone followed me around narrating my every move. The narrator would announce the mundane things, such as "and with a steely grin, Rick proceeds to dig lint from his belly button," to the more serious matters, such as "and thanks to Rick's boundless courage, the free world will remain free, the forces of evil thwarted yet again."

4. I would like to be Jack Bauer. Well, except for the episode in each season in which he was tortured.

5. I was born a poor black child. I remember the days, sittin' on the porch with my family, singin' and dancin' down in Mississippi.

6. I once fought off a pack of meat fork wielding pixies using only a pellet gun.

7. I'll eat most anything, though I think grapefruit is an abomination. Really, it's a crime against humanity.

8. In my spare time, I like to pole vault.

9. I really like it when I am hailed as "O Captain, My Captain."

10. I would like it if you brought me a shrubbery.

11. When I finally got rid of my mullet, I discovered that with the improved aerodynamics, I was much much faster.

12. Really scary movies, well, scare me. I have a pretty vivid imagination. I don't really need Hollywood's help.

13. I really wish I could yodel.

14. I name each and every fish that I catch.

15. I am a broken hero on a last chance power drive.

16. If they still made Hai Karate cologne, I'd wear it...just so I could say that I'm wearing Hai Karate cologne.

17. I have a new line of Rick Kughen action figures, complete with Kung Fu grip, coming out soon.

18. I once got into a pretty serious fight as a kid because the neighbor brat stole my G.I. Joe with Kung Fu grip. During the melee, the little jerk bit my thumb. I got my G.I. Joe back though.

19. I write the songs that make the young girls cry.

20. I think it would be great if 1970s fashions came back. I'd look great in bell bottoms, platform shoes and gold neck chains.

21. I once saw Elvis in a K-Mart. He had fried peanut butter and banana sandwich smears on the front of his sequined jumpsuit.

22. Sometimes when I am trapped in a long phone conversation, I pace around the house pretending I am a swashbuckling hero while making jabbing, cutting motions in the air.

23. I wear my sunglasses at night. That's just the way I roll.

24. I know it's an inconvenience, but if you could just knock three times on the ceiling (twice on the pipe, if the answer is no) if you want me, I'd appreciate it.

25. I once had the extreme misfortune of getting the chorus from "Elvira" stuck in my head: "Elvira! Giddy Up Oom Poppa Omm Poppa Mow Mow, Giddy Up Oom Poppa Omm Poppa Mow Mow." I thought I was a goner. 

Mental Jewelry

Sometimes I think I'd like to not think so much.

Being a man of words, sometimes it becomes quite difficult to shut them off. I spend about 99 percent of my waking hours with thousands of thoughts boiling around between my ears. Ask anyone who knows me and they’ll probably tell you that I think too much. Unfortunately, try as I might sometimes, it’s hard to shut that faucet off.

I think about the typical things - work, bills, errands, appointments, manners, food, Jimmy Hoffa’s burial place, you know, the usual - but there are dozens of other thoughts racing around in there that startle me sometimes. Occasionally, I'll share a thought or two with my wife, and occasionally, I think she must think I've lost my mind. Lifelong friends of mine are used to my “fits,” if you will, but my lovely bride and I have been together for a little less than five years, so I think she’s still getting used to being married to half a nutjob.

While I can assure her and you that my mind is still all there, I can’t really say that what is there is normal. When I look into the mirror, I don’t think, “holy cow, you’re f***ed up,” but I do sometimes snicker at the funky monologue that goes on 24x7 in my head. And of course, I don’t know for sure that the rest of you don’t house a similar kangaroo court of thoughts between your ears similar in their breadth and depth to mine. I do know, however, that when I share some of that strangeness with those around me, I often receive quizzical looks that suggest that they think I might be better served to put the peyote away for a little while.

For instance, have you ever wondered about your refrigerator light? I know that it does go off when the door is partially closed, but how do we know it doesn't come back on when the door is shut? There could be a conspiracy between the electric company and the refrigerator people to jack up the electric bills and to see more refrigerator light bulbs.

I've actually gotten on my hands and knees and stuck my eye right up to the crack of the door and tried to see if the light comes back on as the door closes. Perhaps the only way to find out is to remove all the shelves and climb in. I'll let you know what I discover. Maybe I should make sure someone else is home when I do that.

Sometimes, I also wonder about graffiti on bridges and overpasses. Who puts that there? And why? I've never met a single person who would admit to spray painting their beloved's name on a bridge. Sometimes, I think the construction crews must pre-graffiti things just so they blend in with the rest of our infrastructure.

But I assume that the people who do spray paint 'Steve and Lisa 4-ever' (inside a misshapen heart) must be terribly in love. I've done some pretty silly things in the name of romance, but I've never been so inspired as to drive to Sherwin-Williams, pick out a suitable color, locate an un-graffitied bridge, dodge passing traffic and scrawl a love letter to my sweet thang. Maybe I'm just not all that romantic after all.

Do you ever wonder why the people who put graffiti on bridges have common names, like Bob and Mike, Lisa and Mary? I think I’ve figured that one out. It's because people with names such as Montgomery and Willowdeen would never risk permanently scribbling their names anywhere. I mean, there’s about a billion Bobs and Lisas out there, so who’s going to know that graffiti on the overpass is yours? If your name is Willowdeen (I actually knew a Willowdeen, believe it or not) then your graffiti will forever immortalize the fact that you once had the hots for some schlep named Montgomery.

I also wonder who "they" are. I can't tell you how many times I've heard people say "I wish 'they' would find a cure for cancer," Or "'they' are making it impossible for a kid to get good education these days." When I've asked who 'they' are, people say, "you know, 'them.'" Aaargg!

This is a obsession that goes clear back to my college days when I was a columnist for The Ball State Daily News. In those days, I wrote a weekly column, titled appropriately enough Straightjacket Required. In 1987, I first publicized my concerns about this nefarious organization of theys and thems. I’ll spare you the entire diatribe (though I reserve the right to post the entire thing here later) but the general gist of that meandering column was that I want to know just who in the hell “they” are and where they’re holed up. I don’t necessarily mean any harm to the good folks at Them, Inc., but I would just like to see their compound and find out what they’re going to invent or do next.

You ever wonder about the fact that they (damn those faceless, sinister bastards) often include Braille on ATM machines? You know, I’m all for making things in our society accessible to those with physical limitations, but this is one thing that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Sure, a blind person could walk up to an ATM machine and use the Braille to identify the buttons, but they can’t READ the on-screen prompts so that they know what buttons to push and when. And don’t get me started on why drive-up ATMs include Braille. Seriously, do I need to go into why this is a tremendously bad idea?

Have you ever wondered why we call them fortune cookies? The fortune cookies I usually get would be more appropriately titled “statement cookies.” They usually read something like, “You are strong of character.” That’s not a fortune. That’s a statement. I know. I went to journalism school. A real fortune would be something like “you are about to be found out and clubbed to death by those closest to you.” Now that’s a fortune. I could make a mint at the ol’ fortune cookie factory of they’d just hire me. Were I to be filling those fortune cookies with my thoughts, I'd make you take a deep breath before you blindly open your next fortune cookie after downing a plate of egg foo yung...

I also wonder just how there are still job opportunities for clowns? Is there ANYONE out there who doesn’t find clowns to be at least a little creepy? C’mon – grown, pudgy men wearing wildly colored clothes, freaky pancake makeup, gloves and shoes several sizes too big. The last time I went to a circus (and it’s been a long time because I find clowns to be friggin’ creepy) I nearly chin-skipped one clown who got too close me and invaded my personal space. Read Stephen King’s book It and if after you’re finished, you don’t want to bum rush the next clown you see, then I’ll shut up.

Speaking of people who dress funny, do you ever wonder just what in the hell is up with those Shriner dudes who drive those little souped up go-karts in parades? I mean, really. Most of those old coots shouldn’t be driving automobiles on clearly marked highways in the daylight, much less doing figure eights and crisscrossing in front of each other at light speed in the middle of a crowd of people, many of whom are children. I mean if just one of those guys has a painful gas bubble at the wrong time, it’s going to look like an air show disaster as one after another crashes into the Shriner ahead of him. Just because they’re Shriners, however, I think we give them a pass. You know, they’re cute on their little toys with their fezzes a’flyin’. C’mon folks, they’re a public health hazard. If they want to ride their tiny cars around together, that’s their prerogative, but they should do it somewhere well away from the general public.

I could go on and on about the things that vex me – and I will in future posts – but for now, I’ll leave you with two more random thoughts:

1. How do huge flocks of birds fly together and all move in the same seemingly random way? Is there one leader bird that all of the other birds follow blindly, or more frightening, is there a collective consciousness within flocks of birds and are we doomed if they ever decide to all take a dump at once?

2. Did you know that you can take a Hostess cake donut, place it on a plate and leave it in a closet for two years and when you come back, it will still look like a cake donut? I know because I did that once when I was a kid because I wanted to see what happened. It didn’t mold or crumble. It got really hard, like a hockey puck, but other than that, it looked like a donut that I could go buy at the store. Just what in tarnation could they be putting in a garden variety donut that could make it survive the trials and tribulations of two years deep in the bowels of a 9-year-old boy’s closet and come out the other side intact? And we wonder why our digestive tracks hate us.

I'm sure that They have answers to all of these questions.

What's Good for the Goose...

This morning while driving to work, I received a speeding ticket. I admit that I was driving over the posted speed (not by a lot, but enough) and I do not dispute the charge. Subsequently, I will pay the fine and outrageous court costs without complaint.

I do, however, find it objectionable when I frequently see police officers speeding themselves. I'm not talking about officers on their way to an emergency call (meaning that they are using lights and sirens). I am talking about officers with what appear to be spouses in the car, who are in plain clothes, or who are from agencies that don't have jurisdictions in that area (county police from 75 miles away or more, for instance). These officers are driving in excess of the posted speed, without lights or sirens and very clearly not on their way to an emergency call of any kind. In short, it appears that they are on their way to or from work, or to some other engagement, just like I was this morning when I was stopped.

What makes police officers exempt from the same traffic laws that govern me?

I see this often enough, that I feel that I must speak out, especially when citizens, such as myself are ticketed for the same offense. In fact, the last time I received a ticket, I was absolutely amazed to see an officer in plain clothes - but driving a marked vehicle - go past the same speed trap I was caught in while driving faster than I was traveling. The police officer who stopped me just seconds later actually waved at the first officer before pulling me over and handing me an outrageously expensive ticket. Again, I was wrong here, but so, too, was the off-duty officer ahead of me. At least if our law enforcement officers are going to apply the laws so selectively, they could try to be a little more clandestine about it. There were a good 10-15 cars in the immediate vicinity and every one of those motorists saw the laws unevenly applied. In fact, the officer who drove away unscathed had been tailgating me because he wanted me to lane over so that he could go on his merry way, at a speed a full 20 mph over the posted limit.

I realize that there are times when an officer might exceed the speed limit without lights and sirens for some official purpose unknown to the general public, but I do not believe that each and every time I see an officer speeding in a marked car - often times wearing plain clothes or from a jurisdiction far outside the area I’m in - that the speeding is warranted or legal. Because I take the same home route every day from work, I regularly see the same officer who must get off work at the same time I do. He is a city officer who obviously lives 15 or so miles outside the city in which he has jurisdiction. He consistently speeds, rides the bumpers of the cars in front of him, and in general is an ass on the road. And he’s obviously just driving home. Where’s his ticket?

I have an immense respect for police officers and for the work they do ensuring the public's safety. I realize that their job is dangerous and mostly thankless. That said, I get a pretty bitter taste in mouth on days like today when I receive a ticket for the same offense I see police officers committing regularly. That’s pretty hard to accept or respect.

Frankly, I think those officers out there who do drive in excess of the speed limit because they know they can do so with immunity ought to be ashamed – especially if those same officers write speeding tickets for civilians who are caught speeding. The inequity is just flat stunning.

In the end, I will pay my fine because I was wrong. I just wish the officers I see speeding illegally had their wallets tapped, too.

Communication Breakdown

I made a pretty, ochre-colored splotch on the carpet in my office when I melted down today.

I was in mid-groove this afternoon as I slid out of my shirt and tie and eased into a battle-scarred pair of jeans and big, floppy sweatshirt, and then saddled up to my computer desk.

Everything was fine here at the Kughen Home for the Mentally Deranged and Criminally Insane...that is until I logged in and pulled down my email. Now, it is not unusual for me to receive in excess of 100 email messages a day during the week. I accept this as part of the obligatory ball and chain that goes with being a modern Internet user at home and at work.

But today, as I watched the happy little parade of email roll into my equally happy PC, I began to shudder. With hands trembling and my butt sinking deeply into my high-back chair, I rested my face on the keyboard and wondered just what had happened to my once serene, non-technical existence. As I drifted into a fitful sleep, face-down at my computer, I dreamt of those carefree days when I actually talked to folks on the telephone, occasionally visited in person and almost never got more than a few emails a week. Those were happy days.

With a snort, I flopped over into a bale of computer cables beside my desk and ebbed farther away into a deep sleep. Then, I dreamt of running through a flowery field in the sunshine, the birds singing and chirping in the distance as a fair maiden's lithe voice drifted o'er my head. But as I ran through that utopic field, chasing maidens (all of whom, incidentally, were my wife) and butterflies, I began to notice the world around me begin to change. The change was subtle at first, but it grew more overt with each passing second.

The sun slipped behind menacing clouds, and flowers wilted and dropped their pedals into the yellowing grass. The skies opened and a black rain began to hose this once beautiful field. And as I lay there, cowering in the crab grass, I heard the rodent-like scurries of an army of little feet tramping my way.

That's when I saw them.

There were thousands of sickly grimacing little email notes that had sprouted knobby legs and were wielding pitch forks and hot pokers. They scampered my way, whining and chortling, and in general seeming as though they were up to no good.

I know trouble when I see it, so I stumbled to my feet and ran like the wind, the rain biting my face and the sick, dead grass squishing between my toes. I ran and ran and ran.

They ran faster.

And then I heard their battle cries. They screamed like berserkers as they bailed from miniature airplanes that darted overhead. The sky grew dark as millions of miniature emails blotted out the sun and drifted into the dead grass around me.

Panting like a dog, I stumbled once, twice, then careened into the grass landing on my schnoz with a dull thwack. I lay there for a few seconds with blades of grass stuck to my tongue - eyes hazy and wild - too tired to give additional flight.

They then surrounded me, shouting something about Custer and Little Big Horn, but by then I was curled into a ball, shielding my ashen face from their tiny little hot pokers. I saw one of them wing by my head with what appeared to be a rather large meat fork.

I opened my mouth to scream, but was silenced as they rushed to me, their tiny feet digging into my soft, lily white beer belly and as I tried to bellow again, my mouth was filled with thousands of them and...

With a clatter, I careened away from my desk, knocking over a pile of blank CDs and launching my wireless mouse across the room. Spitting mouthfuls of paper out, I realized that I had swallowed a sizeable portion of a notebook on my desk.

Shaking the sick mass of paper that had formed a spitball the size of a small dog on my tongue, I glanced at my computer screen to see that my in inbox of unsorted mail had grown to more than 1,600 individual pieces of mail in just the past month.

Kicking aside the CDs that had been dashed to the floor, I settled back into my chair and saw that some 100 or so email messages had invaded my machine just today and were now marauding about my inbox. I thought I heard one or two of them snicker, but I wasn't sure.

So after my meltdown, I settled back into a posture that all to familiar these days: me hunched over the keyboard, illuminated by the flicker of a computer monitor, hunting and pecking at breakneck speed, answering the daily typhoon of email.

Sometimes I wonder just why it is necessary for any human to communicate that much. I try to remember a simpler time when folks had to use a crude device known as a telephone to talk to folks who weren't standing in front of them.

I vaguely remember telephones. I believe they're those funky looking things with buttons antennas. If you're not sure, walk over to it, shake the dust bunnies away and lift it off the charger and place it to your ear. You should hear an irritating hum. That's a telephone.

Now if we could just remember how to use the damn things.

The Mustached Lady and the Kid

She was big and ugly.

My third grade teacher used to stand over me with pursed lips and her dark female mustache quivering as her face twisted into a phantasmagoric sneer. She would rap my desk with one of her hairy-knuckled, knobby fingers while showing me the finer points of penmanship.

She was the pure embodiment of all that was wholly frightening to an 8-year-old boy. This was in the days when children watched scary movies, read scary comics and weren’t sheltered from everything slightly that side of wholesome. That meant I had seen my share of bugbears and bogeymen and I was absolutely sure that at that moment, I was staring at pure evil.

Nevertheless, my fellow third grade runts and I spent those long afternoons bent over our desks, tongues jutting from our mouths, gripping our No. 2 pencils with a fury better suited to slaying dragons than to toughing out the alphabet.

I was the class idiot who thought it wise to ask one day why we were spending so much time on our penmanship when all the adults I knew wrote just slightly better than Cro-Magnon man did when all he had for ink was some squashed up bat shit and a gob of saliva, and used a big rock for a tablet. That's not to mention that he used his finger as a pen.

I spent a lot of time that year staring at the corner of the room - my very own Purgatory, as it were - while she continued to enslave her remaining minions, making them fit those damn letters between the lines on page after page of Goldenrod paper until several students had to be carried off to the art room and force-fed some paste before they snapped back to reality.

Evil, that woman.

Life through my early teens was pretty much normal in the penmanship department until I was introduced to my first typewriter. It was a big, old manual-style typewriter that was missing a key or two, giving it sort of a leering, toothless grin. I learned to type on that monster. You had to step back 20 or 30 yards, get a good running start and leap on it with both hands to get it to peck at the paper, but it produced documents somewhat neater than my ransom note-style of writing could ever hope to turn out.

Then, in college, along came the computer...your friend and mine (yes, I had friends who had TRS computers back in the eighties, but they were also the kids who spent their school years getting stuffed into lockers and being given “swirlies” in the john - and wasn’t about to be one of them).

The computer allowed us to type reams and reams of worthless drivel, make and easily correct mistakes, use fancy fonts and put pictures of our dogs into our term papers. For us writers, it became our virtual notepad, our endless canvas where we could feel free to make obscene verb choices and to let our participles dangle. We could even feel free to be obtuse - or as Les Nessman would say, “rounded at the free end” - with correct type only as far away as the backspace key.

This computer fad – as some of the blue hairs called it then – never faded away. In fact, most of us wouldn’t dream of sitting down to write an actual letter to save our very lives. We’ll happily sit down and pound out a windy email on most any topic, but actually grasp a pen and put to paper, c’mon!

Recently, I have realized, with a certain amount of horror, that I have nearly forgotten how to write with a standard pencil and paper. While in the checkout line at the supermarket, I sometimes actually struggle to write a check. Signing a simple Christmas or birthday card is a chore and writing a grocery list is just pure torture. I am so used to being able to back up, revise my thought, correct mistakes and then move on only when it’s perfect, the act of actually writing by hand is frightening.

In fact, this past holiday season while trying to handwrite a note in a Christmas card, I suddenly found myself nearly chewing my tongue off while trying to scratch out a simple note. If I had been under any more pressure, I'm afraid I would have had a third grade flashback and begun winging spitballs and making gross noises with my armpit. When you’re only writing maybe 20 words, it’s pretty bad when you make three mistakes that need to be scratched out. Where’s the backspace key when you need it?

Being of the writer ilk, I used to take my tattered journal out to a riverbank, toss a line in and sit pouring my soul into my little book while nature did the natural thing around me. Now, I'd strongly consider lugging along my Dell and a cigarette lighter power adapter attachment to sit in my truck near a river and surf Facebook or YouTube. I still have all the same “writerly” thoughts I had way back when. It’s just that my medium for getting them from the scary recesses of my head to the paper is totally electronic now.

In fact, I find it hard to actually even be creative any longer with a pen and paper. I get the ideas, sure, but they don’t flow out unless I am behind a keyboard, squinting at my screen and drumming my feet on the floor under my desk.

I sometimes wonder now whatever became of that evil woman. I could go on about the ways in which she is permanently ensconced in my childhood memories, but that’s not the point (at least not for this column). If I had to guess, I would say most likely she was summoned back to whatever fiery pit from which she originally sprang forth. That is, after she tortured another generation or two of kids who feel into her clutches after I moved on.

My whole point here is that despite her pure evil nature, that third grade teacher might actually have had a point. While not as important as it used to be – at least for many professional pursuits these days – penmanship does still have a place. I guess she actually she taught me something on those long spring days when a young boy's fancy turns to kickball and to laying claim to the top rung on the monkey bars.

Good penmanship is an art and that no matter how far we go with this whole technology thing, we're still going to have to scratch our names every now and then, so it pays to not totally eschew the lowly pen and paper.

The again, I could just get a tablet PC…

One Foot in the Grave

40.

4-0.

Forty.

FORTY.

Cripes, 40…

Ahem, sorry, I’m just getting used to saying (or typing) that out loud. Honestly, it’s taking a little time for me to get groovy with that number.

But, alas, with just under three weeks until the big day cometh, I’d better come to grips with the fact that I’m officially old. At least I’m old by the standards I set when I was a teenager. In fact, by those standards, I’m not just old. I’m a Geritol-sucking, left-turn-signal-forever-blinking, sweater-wearing-in-July, dentures-in-a-glass-by-the-sink, liver-spots-on-my-arms old.

Strange thing is…I really don’t feel old. Sure, some things are different now than they were when I was 20, but for the most part, I still feel like the 20-year-old that I left behind in the Bush Part I era (I guess, sadly, some things really don’t change).

Upon further inspection, however, I know that there are a variety of ways in which my life has changed, for the better. I might still be 40 and not at all cool anymore by today’s teenage standards, but I do know there are a variety of ways in which I’m better off as I begin my 40th trip around the sun.

Bye-bye, Mullet

Perhaps the single largest headline grabbing change I’ve made in the last 20 years was finally ditching the mullet that sat atop my head like a tired little woodland creature for far too long. In its heyday, the much maligned mullet was a perfectly acceptable way in which to coif one’s ‘do. For more than a decade, some of the day’s biggest stars wore their hair in the ever-popular business in the front, party in the back style that has today, earned the unfortunate “mullet” moniker. Back in the day, however, we didn’t call them mullets. We just called it a hairstyle and at worst, if your mullet was really long in the back, we said you had long hair. Today, however, sporting a mullet is a little like shopping without pants. It just draws unwanted attention.

Unfortunately for me, however, I wore my mullet off and on for a bit too long – into the late-90s. Unfortunately, that was about eight years too long I expect. According to Wikipedia.com, the hairstyle was popular until the early 90s, so the fact that I kept mine until 1998 means I was just a little past the times. As you can see from this picture, it was a great look for me in the day. Of course, I have worse pictures of me with this unfortunate hairstyle, but I am fortunate enough that all of those pictures were taken with standard film cameras and thus don’t exist digitally anywhere that I am aware of. I plan to keep it that way. I might want to run for office one day…

Today, I sport a radically shorter ‘do that involves copious use of clippers with no guard. Were it to be a little less spiky on top, I believe the military folks out there might call it a high and tight. The biggest advantage to this hairstyle over the mullet is, of course, that I am far more aerodynamic and thus, I run much faster now – even at 40 – than I did in my teens.

Have AAA; Don’t Usually Need It

My first car was without a doubt, the coolest car I’ve ever owned. It was a 1979 midnight blue over silver blue Camaro Rally Sport. The rumble at startup was enough to make the young girls cry. Unfortunately, it also was seriously prone to breaking down – something it did with alarming frequency. While it looked as good sitting dead at the side of the road as it did cruising down the highway at 120 mph, I spent far more time at the side of the road than was reasonable.

After investing literally thousands into new paint, chrome mags, custom exhaust and a stereo system, I discovered that I had to spend thousands more on more important things. You know, things like alternators, spark plugs, belts, carburetors (remember those?), and other things that made it go. On a journalist’s salary, keeping that car running was just slightly easier than bathing a cat.

In 1992 or so, I parked it for the last time in lieu of a vehicle that actually ran reliably, though it looked far less cool than its predecessor. Every vehicle since has had its good points, though none of them sound as throaty or go as fast. Of course, breaking down now is something that almost never happens, which is a good thing. Unfortunately, the young girls don’t break down into sobs when I go past in my run of the mill SUV, but I’m learning to deal with it.

See Ya, Super Chicken (Hello Pillsbury Dough Boy)

You might think this segment is my lame attempt to justify the spare tire around my waist (and you’d be right) but one of the best things about the last 20 years is that my friends can no longer call me Super Chicken. This was an unfortunate nickname I earned while in high school (thanks to my brother) because even at 6-foot-5, I weighed a mere 185 pounds soaking wet and wearing a snowsuit. When I graduated high school, my waist size was, believe it or not, 30 inches. If I turned sideways and stuck out my tongue, I looked like a zipper. Today, I wouldn’t be referred to as skinny, I expect. No, today, I think you might hear me referred to as a well-fed Hoosier boy. I can live with that.

Hiya, George (and Abe, and Jackson)

Not to be materialistic or anything, but the fact that I now have more than a couple of dollars in my wallet at any given moment is perhaps one of the biggest blessings of reaching middle age. Seriously, there was a day when I was digging through the couch cushions, looking for spare change so that I could afford Taco Bell and a six pack of Old Milwaukee Light. Today, at least, I can just reach into my wallet when I want to dine on Qdoba and wash it down with a few cold Miller Lites. Obviously, my tastes have matured as well. I’m certainly not wealthy by any stretch, I’m officially past the wonder how I’m going to pay my rent portion of my life.

I Fought the Law (And the Law Didn’t Win)

Another great thing about being 40 is not wondering if arrest warrants might be out on me. Not that I was exactly a bad kid, but let’s just say that I was no stranger to some less than legal activities. I think the statute of limitations has run out on anything I might have done in the early 80s, but just in case, I’ll not go into details here. Suffice it to say that I am now a squeaky clean, mostly square and entirely boring 40-year-old who bitches about the creepy teenager next door and from time to time says things like “what’s wrong with kids these days?”

Do You Feel Lucky, Punk? Well, Do Ya?

There was a time when I had a very weak grasp on mortality. Like most kids (boys in particular) I had a sense of invincibility that led me to pulling some purely stupid stunts. It wasn’t that I was exactly reckless, but I think like most young males, I had this ridiculous belief that things would always shake out in my favor. Of course, this led to some beautifully stupid stunts, such as leaping off cliffs into the reservoir at night when I didn’t know how deep it was, to driving excessively fast through tight curves, or to drinking enough to stone an entire rugby team. Of course, I’d probably be doing some of that stuff if it didn’t hurt so bad now, but the fact of the matter is that I don’t do crazy crap like that any longer and that fact alone will probably add a fiver or more to my lifespan.

Huggies vs. Pampers

Before the birth of my daughter nearly seven years ago, I didn’t know the first thing about parenthood. Those of you out there who are parents know that this kind of training is generally received on the job under a lot of pressure. While there have been some hiccups along the way, I’ve come a long way in my maturation as a father. And I can, unbelievably, extol the virtues of Huggies over Pampers, as well as a thousand other things that I almost can’t believe. Sometimes, when I listen to some of the things coming out of my mouth when speaking to my daughter, I think “wow, that’s without a doubt the first time you’ve ever strung those words together in that order.” Things such as “Honey, you really shouldn’t touch the doggie’s privates,” really are things that only a parent finds himself uttering (unless, of course, he’s a total nutjob). I can say, without a doubt, however, that I’ve gotten more joy out of this Daddy experience than I’d have ever thought possible. I’m still hip and all. Really, just ask my little girl.

I Caught the Clapp

(I’m sorry, but that subtitle made me laugh out loud).

Seriously, my lovely bride’s maiden name was Clapp and it’s given me no end of joy to announce from time to time that I have indeed caught the Clapp. Joking aside, she and my daughter, Alexa, are what make my world go around now and they are why turning 40 is worth doing. Otherwise, I’d probably still be living in a really dated bachelor’s pad, eating really unhealthy food while sitting on furniture that doesn’t match.

Hell, I might’ve even considered growing that mullet back by now...

A Hunk-a Hunk-a Burnin' Love

Ned, my imaginary friend, saw him first.

He was standing there with a chubby handful of Zagnut candy bars and raspberry fruit rollups.

We – Ned and I – were wading our way through the throngs of hell-bent shoppers who were making a dash for a blue-light special on eyelash curlers when Ned caught a glimpse of The King’s belt buckle.

“Aaarrrgh!” Ned winced, poking a hapless shopper walking behind him with one of his meaty elbows. “What the #@$#@% was that?” he spat out between gritted teeth while absent-mindedly stomping a heavy hiking boot squarely onto the unfortunate shopper’s back.

After helping the dazed little old lady back to her feet and retrieving her dentures from under a shelf stacked high with laxatives, I looked up long enough to see the intense glare coming from The King’s belt buckle – which incidentally, was roughly the size of an early 70s model Buick.

The sequins dazzled in the light as they shimmied from side to side in a rhythmic manner. I was mesmerized. A heavy, ropey stream of saliva swayed dangerously from my chin. Ned was rubbing his eyes and gibbering something about purple and green spots floating in front of him wherever he looked when I spied the rhinestones and bell-bottomed, white jumpsuit bedazzled with sequins. The heels on his leather, side-zippered boots were taller than my dog.

“It’s him…Eh, Eh, Elvis…and we found him right here in Kokomo, hitting the blue-light specials,” I mumbled, dropping an armload of volatile hair chemicals onto the floor. “And look, there’s fried peanut butter and banana sandwich smears on his lapels.”

Squinting through one beady eye, Ned watched The King, sashaying his way through the crowd, softly singing something about hunks of burning love and being someone’s personal teddy bear. As he rounded the corner of aisle nine with a grind of his hips, we heard the thud of a sweat-soaked fan as she dropped to the floor with a shriek.

Rounding the corner, close on his heels, we saw The King wipe his sideburn tangled face with a long silk scarf and drop it on the unconscious young lady who lay lightly twitching on the floor.

“Here you go, Honey,” he said with a thick, Mississippi drawl. “Elvis loves you, HOO-AAH!”

Ned, still half-blinded, stepped on the woman who was just beginning to regain consciousness. Neither of us noticed her muffled cry as we closed in on fate, on destiny, on The King. I did, however, quickly abscond with and pocket the scarf for evidence of my encounter.

“Elvis!” I shouted, trotting up behind the sequined slab with my loathsome friend in tow. He stopped – walking, that is – his undulating hips never missed a beat.

“Whatcha y’all needin’ there,” he said with a snarl that made a woman picking out cat litter in aisle eleven slump over her shopping cart.

“Ya, you, you’re alive,” I stammered, trailing a hand along his studded arm, across his shoulder and through the thick mat of sweaty hair atop his head. Ned had to snatch me by the belt loops as I swooned and nearly joined the women in aisles nine and eleven who were still drooling on the cool floor tiling.

“Easy on the ‘do, son,” he said while swatting away my quivering hand and re-cocking his hips. “The name’s Wilbur and I don’t know where you’ve been since The King checked into the afterlife while sitting on his throne, but whatever you boys been smokin’…”

He trailed off, starring quizzically at the dumbfounded zombie in front of him, who was still being held upright by his belt loops. “I’m an impersonator, son,” he mumbled close to my ear.

“You’d better take this blithering idiot friend of yours home,” he said to Ned who was now tossing me over his shoulder. “I think some a’that hair crapola he’s wearing seeped through his scalp and is eating what’s left of his brain,” he said gesturing toward my still unscathed hair helmet. “The name’s Wilbur and I’m a shoe salesman. I just impersonate Elvis on the weekends.”

I watched from my upside down position over Ned’s shoulder as The King paid for his Zagnuts and fruit roll-ups and made his way through the parking lot, oozing a sweaty funk that toppled nearly every shopper he passed. Once in the parking lot, he climbed inside a beat up AMC Pacer and disappeared in a cloud of oil-blue exhaust.

After The King made his grand exit, Ned rifled through my wallet, paid for my hair arsenal, then prodded me out of the store with a series of sharp, fast finger jabs into my low back. All the while, he was muttering something about never shopping with me again.

I’ve recovered now, and through some intense shock treatment, counseling and few well-timed slaps from Ned, I now know it wasn’t Elvis I saw on that fateful day in aisle nine. It was just Wilbur the shoe salesman.

Perhaps even someday, I’ll stop wearing that sweat-stained silk scarf under my shirt.

Not.

Space. The Final Frontier...

Author's Note: This column originally was published in June 1995 on my now defunct personal web page. I refurbished it a bit here, cleaning up the prose a little and removing some of the more stunning displays of my skills with adjectives. After reading the original again tonight for the first time in years, I thought there's a time and place to be judicious with the descriptive language. This was one of those times.
After reading this, you might think, "now just what in the heck did he cut out?" Trust me. Have keyboard. Will use it. My recent edits aside, most likely, you will end up deciding that only a truly warped individual who spends far too much strapped into his computer chair would dare write this for public consumption. I am that warped guy. This is a true story.

It resembled one of those alien space probe gadgets with an action racing remote control unit.

And as the doctor advanced toward my posterior with this half K-Tel, half Weird Science set prop thingamabob that he planned to root into a most private place, I nearly scampered off the exam table, pants around my ankles and howling.

I am, of course, referring to a colon exam, more affectionately known as a Sigmoidoscopy. The pamphlet my doctor handed me early last week to help explain what we, in the interest of good taste, will refer to as "the procedure," described the apparatus as being "a flexible, fiber optic camera that would be gently inserted into...," well you know where.

I was glad to hear that they planned to be gentle and that the doctor and nurse were not planning on playing yard jarts, with my tail being the target. A guy could break into a sweat thinking about a television camera being jammed, with a certain amount of lower forearm strength, into the backside of his front by a benignly smiling nurse.

When I arrived for my doomsday appointment for the procedure, obviously I was a tad on the jumpy side (we males are furiously suspicious of anyone who wants to introduce foreign objects into our bottoms). After an few anxious minutes in the waiting room, the good nurse called my number with a cheery voice one might expect from a school teacher and not from someone who in just moments would be probing parts of my body that I'd just as soon remain un-chartered territory, where no human has gone before.

So when I entered the exam room, I was surprised to see the standard exam table, with the obligatory disposable tissue covering and the standard jars of cotton balls and tongue depressors. I guess I was expecting an iron maiden and hot pokers. Then I spied the device that would be inserted into my no man's land during the procedure. I began to sweat as she made a few a minor adjustments to what can only be described as a light saber attached to a standard camcorder.

She told me to drop my drawers, climb under the sheet and wait for the doctor. I resisted an urge to ask her if they'd all like to go out for a spot of lunch and get to know each other a little better as I usually have my scruples about probing nether regions on the first date. She didn't seem like the humorous type, so I refrained in the interest of not, um, inspiring her to make the whole experience any more memorable than it had to be.

So, with a fair amount of dread, I dropped my drawers and crawled under the sheet, trying to appear casual, which is quite difficult, I might add, given the gravity of the situation at hand. While she and the doctor were outside planning the invasion of the southerly territories, I had a chance to get a good look at the apparatus and was somewhat relieved to see that from the right angle, that the business end of the device kinda of looked like a length of extra-thick coaxial cable - you know, the kind of cable that delivers your cable television to your TV or the kind we old school computer nerds used years ago for networking cable.

I decided to resist the urge to give the field goal gesture that I often give when making my Ethernet connection on my computer network at home.

Somehow, I just didn't think that the good folks at the butt doctor clinic would find the humor in an off-color computer geek joke. When the doctor (looking a great deal like a prison camp guard, I might add) entered, I tried to make the clumsy chit chat that we all try when we're about to be embarrassed out of our minds. He, however, was all business, obviously ironing out the final details of his voyage into my deep space nine.

He bade me to enjoy the show on their 27-inch color television. I said thank you, while wondering if this just might be an unwanted insider's view of one part of my body that nature obviously placed on our undersides so we couldn't see it.

He explained that the device would be advanced (damn the torpedoes, charge) into my, well, you know, so that they could see if I had developed any polyps in my colon. He further explained that the device was equipped with a camera, a light, a suction device, a device for spraying water and a biopsy device. I resisted the obvious urge to ask whether it could slice, dice, chop, puree and frappe my milkshakes. I'm not always able to quell the urge to be a smartass, but at times like these, I think that my sense of self preservation outweighs my need to be witty.

Without much ado, the procedure was underway. I'm not sure what I expected, but I was surprised with how, uh, matter of fact the doctor was with the whole thing. I guess I thought he might have some kind words for me or that perhaps he would tell me to buck-up and keep a stiff upper lip or something. Instead, he just plowed ahead, as it were. I can't say that the departure into space was tortuous physically (or at least, I didn't cry out for the mercy of the gods), but I can tell you that it was one of those odd, unpleasant and uncomfortable experiences that's best not spoken about around the dinner table (you're not eating while reading this, right?).

Perhaps the most poignant observation I could make is that one finds it difficult to appear dignified while total strangers are plowing the back forty as it were. The visual experience was one I'll not soon forget. And the audio...let's just say that the audio was wholly terrifying.

In the end (that's exactly where they were spelunking, too) the entire exam took about twenty minutes. Although it looked as though they traveled through galaxies of the abyss, I'm told that they actually only perused a few feet of colonspace. Then again, for me, a few feet inside my tuckus was farther than Kirk ever went in his five-year voyage through space.

I left the exam center that day feeling, well, violated in a way that I cannot quite describe (imagine that). Of course, I was pleased to learn that everything down under was just as it should be and that at least for the time being, all was good. Having lost my father to colon cancer when I was teenager, I know that exams like these will be commonplace for me in the years to come. I just hope that I can keep my sense of humor about them. It's easy to laugh now that I'm home, wrapped from head to toe in a large blanket with the lights off and the door securely bolted.

Of course, I'm never going to look at a length of coaxial cable in quite the same way...