The words of Woody Guthrie...

In what is a change of pace this week, I actually have a bunch of topics I want to address…

1) As you all know, this month is Cel Phone Courtesy Month. What, you didn’t know that? You mean you haven’t gotten your special someone that Cel Phone Courtesy Card yet? What’s wrong with you? I’m not making this up. As you all know, I’m not that creative. Anyway, given that this is the appropriate month I feel that this is the proper place and time to address a serious issue. Please, for the sake of humankind, please stop using your phone while you’re in the bathroom. This happened to me twice today. I really do not need to here anyone’s conversation while I’m in there. I also really don’t want to imagine just how much sound can travel through the microphone. Let’s have some respect for whoever is on the other end of the line. I mean, if the conversation is apparently that unimportant just hang up and claim that you lost a signal.
2) Just finished an interesting memoir by Esquire columnist Chuck Klosterman called “Killing Yoursef to Live.” In it Chuck (who looks like a Stand By Me era Corey Feldman aged about fifteen years) travels the country for three weeks visiting places where rock stars died. Add this to “A Long Way Down”, which is about people contemplating suicide and “The Partly Cloudy Patriot”, which is about a liberal stuck in our society, and you can see why my mom always gets on me for never reading anything light. Anyway, there were quite a few things that will stay in my mind. He makes a very good point that apparently the easiest way for a musician to remain famous forever is to die at a very young age. He visits Memphis to reflect on Jeff Buckley, who he explains has gone from an interesting young talent to a genius since his death. I can argue that point, since I thought he was a genius before he died but I can’t argue the next point: since his death you can’t view the songs the same way. Given that Jeff drowned and there is all this water imagery in his songs there is now this prophetic sheen over all of his work. I can’t listen to the songs the same way that I did when I was in college. Chuck even brings up the great point that we all view Kurt Cobain as this epic figure (which I’ve written about), which ignores the fact that when he died Pearl Jam was the much bigger band. It just shows how much we need our myths and since the storytelling legend has gone away we must now create our own.
3) Also, Chuck spends half the book talking about his relationships, which I think our universal for any guy who finds himself in his late twenties/early thirties and realizes that he’s probably thrown away a lot of chances. Basically saying that if I ever could bring myself to write a memoir (and I’m pissed that I can’t take this road trip idea), odds are it will be like this one. If you know me, you might want to keep a lawyer on retainer for the inevitable lawsuit.
4) The good news is that I finally got the comments from Blogger this evening, a day after they were posted. Sometimes I feel that I am going to open up AOL and find emails from someone who wrote me ten years ago. You have to wonder what is still being routed through Mars. Anyway, Batman is just a guy. That is why Batman is such an incredible character. At the end of the day, all he is is a guy with a mask and a cape, who could die at any moment, yet he always throws himself in harm’s way. Doesn’t matter that he has more money than he ever needs and could live a simple life. The horror of his parents’ death, a death that he feels responsible for, drives him into the night for vengeance. Now that leads itself to some great story possibilities. Compare that to Superman, who is basically a god on Earth. Sure, there is still the fact that he would rather go back and live on a farm in Smallville but feels duty bound to his new planet but let’s face it, the guy could take over the planet in a few hours. There’s no drama there. Batman, though, they’ll be exploring that character for a hundred years.
5) Picked up Son Volt’s “Okemah and the Melody of Riot” yesterday. If you want to know my opinion, here are the first lines of the album

Can’t taste holy water
Can’t find it in the well
Been doing a lot of thinking
Thinking about hell

Thinking about the ozone
Thinking about lead
Thinking about the future
And what to do then

The words of Woody Guthrie ringing in my head


All I can say is, damn. When that is your first minute you know you’ll be in awe of the rest. Pick it up now.