An Unusual Day at the Office

This is starting to filter out now so I figure I should mention it here. It was announced today that I will be the new host of Weekend America, starting with the August 16th show. The show has been based in L.A. and St Paul but it was decided that we would consolidate operations in St Paul. From a hosting perspective, that means that Bill Radke who has been hosting the show from there will no longer be with the program. Meanwhile, Des Cooper who has been hosting the show from St Paul along with Bill will become a Sr. Correspondent based in Detroit where she lives (she's been commuting between Detroit and St Paul for the last year). So we'll have one host and it will be me.

I haven't known Des all that long but have come to deeply admire her journalism chops, her storytelling, and her work ethic. Plus she's a heck of a friend. I've known Bill Radke much longer, as anyone who knows my radio career will realize. He helped break me into the radio biz ten years ago when I started writing for his show Rewind on NPR. Then he hired me as a staff writer on that show and allowed me to guest host when he was absent. Later, after he got hired on the show that would become Weekend America, he recommended me there as well and after some freelancing I came aboard full time. With no Bill Radke, there's no me on the radio. He, also, is a heck of a friend. Nicer people don't roam the earth and rarely does someone's brilliance match their niceness as is the case with Bill.

When I moved to St Paul, I hoped that I could one day host a national show. Had no idea it would happen so soon. And it's making me rethink my opposition to Jimmy Fallon taking over Conan's spot on NBC. I mean, sure, I don't think he's ready but I haven't seen him host a show before and just because Conan was/is so great, doesn't mean that Fallon can't be okay. Fallon probably sees the task as daunting, sure, but I bet he's also really excited about the opportunity. And he was pretty funny as Barry Gibb.

Anyway, yeah, so...that. Now you know.

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Billy Gibbons

This article appeared in Talk of the Town in The New Yorker a few years ago and for some reason it has always stayed with me. It's about Billy Gibbons of the band ZZ Top. And it's about his eccentricities and, really, about his unanticipated eloquence:

For example, here is his answer to the question “Who was that?” after he’d talked for a while on his cell phone: “Elwood Francis, our guitar technician, took a brief absence from the tour in order to escort his wife to China, where they successfully adopted a baby girl named Joshi. In his absence, his post was attended by a talented technician named Sammy Sanchez, who introduced me to a guitar called the Turbo Diddly, which is made from an old wooden cigar box. It has what you call a resonator, and it sounds like a bad recording from 1949. The guy who makes it, Kurt Schoen, is a pilot for UPS.”

You should read it.



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The Onion's satire jet buzzes too close to my house

McSweeney's Rejects Mike Mussina's Seventh Consecutive Submission

Good to know I'm better than Mussina at something.
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Friday Question: Late to the Party

Posting has been light lately. Busy, crazy times. I'll refund your subscription.

So in the past week I've become a voracious consumer of music by The Hold Steady. Blissfully hard rock music, masterful lyrics, a singer who doesn't sound like he should be in a band but is awesomtacular regardless (I'm a sucker for singers like that), and great use of piano.



The thing is, this band has been around for a while and has lots of fans already. I'm late to the party. This has happened before when I "discovered" The Magnetic Fields many years after everyone else had. In both cases, I was all like Why didn't anyone tell me about this?

So:
Why didn't anyone tell me about (x)? I'm really late to the party regarding (x)!

What does x equal?

Could be a movie, a band, a TV show, a painter, a city, a type of dog, anything. Share it with the world so that others don't have to go without as you did.

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Potentially Exciting News

Charlie (age 7): Dad, can I start a blog?
Me: Why would you do that?
Him: So I can be famous.
Me: Well, I don't know if that's how it works.
Him: You have a blog, right?
Me: Yeah. I used to talk about you on my blog. Like when you were six and then eight babies. But I stopped talking about you so much because I didn't know if it was okay with you.
Him: It's fine with me. I want to be famous.


I suspect it would be like the hamster. He would get to name the blog and pet it sometimes but I'd be cleaning up after the damn blog all the time.
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HEY LOOKY LOOKY

I hosted Weekend America this weekend, America.

I recently found out that since moving to St Paul I've lost a bunch of pounds. Like way more than I had expected to. So that combined with the fact that I'm a big time celebrity means I can offer diet tips.

1. Move to a city that, though you love it and are glad to be there, really can't hold a candle to Seattle in terms of restaurants. Not trying to insult anyone, it's just a fact.
2. Engineer a worldwide energy crisis such that the price of gas soars and it just makes more sense to walk or ride your bike to work and everywhere else.
3. Have the earth maneuver such that summer arrives. Blistering hot, humid Midwest summer. Then sweat like crazy.
4. If possible, have three kids, including a newborn. This will mean less time to cook or even eat and your dinner will often be whatever part of a hot dog gets left behind.

That's it! Book me, Oprah Wimifrey!

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Friday Question: Movie Math

(note: this was originally posted not as a Friday Question but then I realized it was Friday and that it made a pretty good question. So some of the comments might be a bit out of context, like the one where Glenn Fleishman berates me.)

If you remove Minnie Driver from Good Will Hunting, a good movie becomes great. If you remove Minnie Driver from Grosse Pointe Blank, an uneven movie becomes very solid indeed. So then if you take the remaining Driverless parts of those two movies, you get a crazy fantastic movie that could take over the world. And you'd have a double Driver movie of such intense annoyance it would threaten the existence of goodness itself.

These are facts!

What kind of addition or subtraction or multiplication can you suggest to make a bad movie good or a good movie great? I encourage you not to just use this as a diatribe to rail against least favorite celebrities. Don't hate, additionate!

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I...uh...

um...missed...that episode.



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Wow, musical edition.

Ben Folds. Rufus Wainwright. Duet. Careless Whisper.

Here.

I think the best part is the audible gasping of the crowd realizing "THIS IS REALLY HAPPENING!!!"

Wow, chapter 2

Okay, you know a trip is going well when you've traveled halfway around the world, all eyes are on you, you're handed a basketball and you somehow manage to go all Rip Hamilton.



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Wow

As noted on Politico.com, there is little doubt as to who won the battle of visuals yesterday:



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HEY LOOKY LOOKY

I've been told to be more self-promotional. This from the executive producer of my show, who is also my boss's boss, who is also my regular old friend, who has also won a Peabody, who also helped invent This American Life. So I listen to him, even though he's younger than me, which makes me feel ill and dying.

So I hereby launch a new Monkey Disaster regular feature, entitled HEY LOOKY LOOKY.

Right then. HEY LOOKY LOOKY: I had a story on last week's show about whether Satan, or rather the absence of Satan, has anything to do with the baseball team in Tampa. I interview a Lutheran pastor, a Satanic high priest, and a baseball writer. I use real Satan nicknames like Old Gooseberry and Black Donald AND I invent new ones like Smoky Jim.

Here it is.



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An honor

Conservatize Me, a book I wrote, made the summer reading list at the Seattle Public Library as voted on by the Adult Summer Reading Club participants. I'm huge in the place I used to live among readers who don't pay anything to read books.

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Friday Question: Advice

Patton Oswalt is one of my favorite comedians. In fact, it should be a federal law that he's everybody's favorite comedian. He recently gave the graduation speech at his old high school and it's a terrific read.

Here's a passage I've already seen heavily quoted:

"So now I’m going to try to give all of you some advice as if I contained fatherly wisdom, which I do not. I contain mostly caffeine, Cheet-o dust, fear and scotch."

also:

"First off: Reputation, Posterity and Cool are traps. They’ll drain the life from your life. Reputation, Posterity and Cool = Fear.

Let me put that another way. Bob Hope once said, “When I was twenty, I worried what everything thought of me. When I turned forty, I didn’t care what anyone thought of me. And then I made it to sixty, and I realized no one was ever thinking of me.” And then he pooed his pants, but that didn’t make what he said any less profound.

Secondly: The path is made by walking. And when you’re walking that path, you choose how things affect you. You always have that freedom, no matter how much your liberty it curtailed. You…get to choose…how things affect you.

And lastly, and I guarantee this. It’s the one thing I know ‘cause I’ve experienced it:

There Is No Them. "

I've given two graduation speeches in my life and for the life of me I can't remember what either of them were about. I bet they seemed trenchant to me at the time. But at the time I was 17-21 years old. And I really didn't know shit, quite frankly. I wonder what advice I would give now. I like to think it it would be simple. Information you can use. I think I would tell the graduates, "When you're flying on an airplane and they ask if you'd like anything to drink, tell them you'd like a can of Coca-Cola. If you just ask for a coke, they'll just give you a plastic cup of mostly ice and you won't be sated. Ask for the can and they'll give you the cup, the ice, AND the can. Then you're sitting pretty, my friend."

So what advice, practical or not, would you give graduates?

Also, for extra credit, Patton contains caffeine, Cheet-O dust, fear, and scotch. What do you contain?

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Everyone Has Probably Heard This...

but it's the Violent Femmes covering Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" quite beautifully. Make absolute sure you listen through to where Gordon does the "ha ha ha, bless your soul" part.

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Friday Question

Okay, we've been pretty heavy around here lately. Philosophical Friday Questions, long posts that are emotionally exhausting for all involved. Let's take a nice summer week and go back to a long time favorite:

I'm On To You!

I'm on to you, tiny air conditioners.
I'm on to you, Sharon Osborne.
I'm on to you, Vitamin Water.
I'm actually sort of even on to you, regular water.
And I'm completely on to you, Steve Ballmer and David Stern.

Who or what are you on to?

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The Overnight, chapter 4

For all chapters, go here.

Heading west on Denny Way towards the Seattle Center and not yet to mile 17, I realized there was simply no way this was going to be a 20 mile walk. I was devastated. I had told everyone I would walk 20 miles, I had told myself I would walk 20 miles. My feet were pounding with pain, I was somewhat bleary, but I didn’t want it to end. I was kind of angry about it, actually. I ended up passing the 17 mile mark about ten minutes before entering Seattle Center so it worked out to about a 17.5 mile walk.

As I entered the Seattle Center, I was greeted with more volunteers cheering me on (I think I was coming to the finish line much earlier than most people). I was also greeted with the bags that had been decorated to memorialize the people who had died by suicide. I had written about Rick on one of these bags but here were hundreds of the bags, lining the walk, each with a candle inside. All these glowing things, each with someone’s name on them. People finishing their walks slowed down to look for the bags they had made. Some found them and were camped in front just staring, sometimes talking a little. There were so many bags.

“To Mom, we love you and we miss you.”
“Eric! You are always in our hearts!”
“For my friend, Crystal.”

And this one:
“To Jill’s husband, your wife and family miss you very much.”

I didn’t stop to read very many of them because I decided that I simply wasn’t done walking yet. I hadn’t come to Seattle to walk 17.5 miles; I flew across the damn country to walk 20. So after the finish line, I just kept going. I walked out of Seattle Center and started heading downtown on 2nd Avenue once again. The roadside mileage markers had long since been removed so I just calculated on an average 20 minute mile and figured I’d walk 25 minutes then turn around and walk another 25 back. I mean, sure I could have factored in walks to the car and stuff but that doesn’t count. That’s not the rules.

Thing is, walking through downtown at a little past two in the morning means closing time at the bars. Drunks spilling out into the street, kids out partying screaming out plans for where they’d go next, various dodgy looking characters with whom one best not make eye contact. The entire variety of intoxication. I’d never been more sober.

I had never walked this far in one stretch before and by the time I was heading back to the Seattle Center, I was in pain with every step. But I got there. I walked the 20 miles. It didn’t make Rick’s death any more bearable, the extra 2.5 miles didn’t prevent any more deaths. But it was a promise I made that I had to fulfill. I can’t really think of any symbolic relationship between this and the struggles of suicide survival. Maybe they’re there, who knows. But just as I didn’t want to look out at the water during the walk (that’s where Rick’s ashes were scattered), I didn’t want to really think about anything other than the walk.

Returning to the Seattle Center at 2:40 in the morning, I grabbed a plateful of food, a mylar blanket, and a free T-shirt and sat down. Then I covered my face with the T-shirt and collapsed into, oh, about seven minutes of uncontrollable sobbing. Then I dried off and ate the food. Good food.

Eventually I got up to go look at the bags again. There were hundreds of them, each memorializing someone who died, who devastated their families, who caused a chain reaction of despair that will never end, who tipped a domino that will ripple through their families and hurt family members who haven’t even been born yet. These bags all glowed in the pre-dawn darkness. They weren’t ghosts, they weren’t the people who had died. They were bags with candles in them.

And the bags shouldn’t have been there. I mean, I’m glad they were for the purposes of the walk; it was incredibly powerful and poignant. But those people should have been at home in bed. Mom, Eric, Crystal, “Jill’s husband” should all be home in bed. They should wake up hours later and have some breakfast and read the paper and then go to the park or maybe a movie. They should hug their kids, kiss someone, learn a new language. They should dance. Instead, they’re a bag on the grass.

When people ask me how many people were walking that night, I quote the figure of 1200 which I heard somewhere. “That’s great”, they inevitably say. And yeah, that’s true, it’s great that there is attention for this problem. But they shouldn’t be there. They shouldn’t need to be there. That was the first line spoken at Rick’s service in Seattle. The pastor said, “We shouldn’t be here.”

I looked through many bags, trying to find Rick’s. But I gave up after a while. He was in there, someone else had surely seen his and missed their own bag that I saw. Rick was in there, part of this terrible club, part of this sea of bags, this sea of souls with Eric and Crystal and Mom and Jill’s Husband and Kurt Cobain and Chet Baker and Spalding Gray and Sylvia Plath and Ernest Hemingway and Virginia Woolf and Elliott Smith. Here’s a picture I took of someone I never knew:



I returned to the building where people were resting and recovering. I watched through some huge windows as the sky turned a lighter blue. Dawn had arrived. A closing ceremony was held. A girls choir sang. The two walks combined, New York and Seattle, had raised something like 3 million dollars. The money would go to prevention programs, psychiatric research, and other avenues to understand and stop suicides so fewer bags and walkers would be needed one day.

I’ve been sitting here at a keyboard trying to think of what to say in the What It All Meant part at the end here. I think it was a political act, I believe that if depression/mental health/suicide got the attention that drunk driving got, there would be fewer deaths. It was personal, of course, as I awakened to this vast network of people sharing this common experience.

But more than anything else, it was gaudy. It was tacky. It was a little obnoxious. And that’s a really good thing. Here were people in these beads marching through a city, not disruptively, but acutely and glaringly present. And they were speaking about this unspeakable act. They took their horrific pain and put it on display. Depression is a lonely place and so is grief. For one night, it was placed in a community of darkness, pain, and ultimately daylight.

Next year, the walk is in Washington, DC.

**
Here’s Weekend America’s story on the Overnight.
Here’s Weekday on KUOW talking about the walk.
Here's a really interesting article in the NYT Magazine.

Build the fence on the Aurora Bridge.

Thanks for reading.

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A Conversation with Kate (age 5) About Music

(Some music is playing in the living room as we sit down to play cards)
ME: Kate, the person singing here is Neil Young.
KATE: Oh. (pause) Dad, if I have to hear any more of this, I am going to die.
ME: You don't like Neil Young much, huh?
KATE: I only like one rock band and that's Alvin & The Chipmunks.
ME: But you love Wolfmother.
KATE: Yes! I love Wolfmother! But this music now is horrible.

To be fair, it was the unforgivable "A Man Needs a Maid".

The Overnight, chapter 3

For chapters 1 & 2 go here.

A lot of people on the walk were from somewhere other than Seattle, which, along with New York, was one of only two cities hosting the walk in 2008. So these out-of-towners didn't understand why we needed to go up a steep tiny street to see a troll statue. Me, I used to live in Fremont but I never quite got the troll either. As the night wore on, I noticed fewer official volunteers and more people who seemed to be just watching the walk, like they stumbled into it. The guy near the troll statue was like that. "I lost my friend. Thanks for walking," he was half-mumbling, "High five. Thanks. Good job." He may have had a few drinks. This walk meant something to him.

I kept on walking through Fremont down to the Burke-Gilman trail and at this point we were north of Lake Union in Seattle. We were pretty thinned out by then and I just had to hope I was going the right way. I fell in with a woman who was walking alone. Her grandfather died before she was born but she was walking to understand why her dad was the way he was. This woman was a teacher and invited her dad to her classroom on a day when they happened to be having a Day of the Dead celebration. Her dad got panicked and had to leave the room. He's pretty old now but incapable of having a conversation about death. She walked for her dad. He couldn't.

Further east and down to the Husky Stadium parking lot for a midnight (well, 11:45) lunch. Sandwiches, pasta, some brownies, and also chairs and grass embankments. O, you foul temptresses chairs and grass embankments! Such relief to get off one’s feet but tempered with the knowledge that it would make getting back on one’s feet so much harder. I paused, talked to the Wisconsin folks a bit, checked in with the Pirates fans, and then stood up to start walking again, more stiffly. Past the Museum of History and Industry, across the Montlake Bridge and over to Eastlake Avenue and heading south. By now it was way past midnight and no one was really visiting any more. No one was sharing stories of who they were walking for. It was too sparse a crowd and the pain was getting to be a real nuisance.

Part of what I loved about the idea of the Overnight walk, back when I first read about it, was the stagecraft of it all. You walk through the darkness, you emerge in the light, you are part of a mass of people who all share this issue with you. It was a 20-mile walk but it was almost performance art, almost a protest. They didn’t talk about the part where the crowd would thin and it would be dark and kind of cold and you’d be alone. Still, this 12:30 a.m. stretch was just as potent symbolically as the more obvious theatrical moments. There came a point as I walked past the Eastlake Zoo tavern where I was alone. Part of this massive charitable healing event, sure, but really? Alone. No one within 100 yards of me. And I’m in pain, each step like a hammer to the foot. And I’m tired. And wondering if I could really keep doing this thing but knowing I had to. I had to keep walking through this darkness regardless of who was or wasn’t cheering me on. We can wear beads and special shirts and have been sponsored by wonderful friends, we can seek fellowship and sympathetic ears but we’re all ultimately alone.

Unless you’re part of the group of people in red T-shirts. Then you’re with everyone else in the red T-shirts. “Dude, you’re not even walking on your left heel!” shouted what appeared to be their leader, a buff and blond male cheerleader type as I passed them. No, I told him, it was just hurting me a bunch so I was favoring the front of the foot first, hoping it would get better. He had a lot of questions about my shoes in between cheering his team of five or so on. “I’m a personal trainer,” he said, “so I’m, like, REALLY into shoes. It’s all about the shoes! Whoo!” Not the kind of person you expect to meet on a suicide walk.

Down around the south part of Lake Union. A family on the side of the road. Mom and Dad standing and cheering, two young kids in a wagon smiling and clapping, they couldn't have been more than six or seven years old. Way past their bedtime. This family has a reason for being there.

Two teenagers walking near me asked if I knew how long the walk was. 20 miles, I told them. They said that’s what they had thought but they had heard from someone that it was only 18 miles. We snaked through the South Lake Union neighborhood past the mile 16 marker and I fell back in with the exuberant personal trainer and his redshirts. He thanked me for walking. Politely, I thanked him right back. He said that he’s lost two friends to suicide and that he’s battled depression his whole life. “I’ve been awfully close to suicide myself. I have to fight this every day,” he said quietly before turning back to his group with “Whoo! Come on everyone! You’re doing great!”

NEXT TIME: the end of the walk, eventually.


All walkers wore beads. Cheap plastic strands but extraordinarily heavy when you factor in symbolism.
*


We were asked to stretch before the walk even though it was just walking.
*


Seattle just before it got dark.

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Friday Question: Independence Day

Don't stay in and read blogs. Go outside.

But as long as you're here:

What are you independent of/from?

What are you dependent upon that you wish you were independent of?

As for me:

I am independent of coolness.
I am too dependent on staying in touch.

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Still Slammed

Exciting life lately. Here's ducklings in a bathtub.




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Totally Slammed This Week

Here's an inspirational video of a Pinto.

Friday Question: A Handy How-To

I was reading Tina's blog the other day and, unbidden, offered advice. She indicated that she wants to try to make her living as a writer and, since that decision, has a hard time writing. I want her to write because she's really smokin' good at it and I've been more or less making my living writing for a while now (and speaking, yes, but you have to decide what it is you will say). So here's what I said:

My advice on becoming a professional writer:

1. Start calling yourself a writer. Slip it into conversation wherever you can. "Hi, I'm Tina, I'm a writer." "Well, as a writer, I think..." "I was writing something the other day as writers do."

2. Commit to other people that you will write specific things by a specific time and then keep your word. THESE PEOPLE MUST NOT BE FRIENDS, THEY MUST BE STRANGERS. OR MOSTLY STRANGERS. Ideally, this would be something intended for publication, at least weblication.

3. Repeat steps 1-2.

It's simple. It's not EASY, understand, but it is simple.

I got to thinking that there's probably lots of difficult stuff out there that actually has simple instructions. How to run a marathon, how to run a business, how to cook, how to train a dog.

Here's the challenge/question:

What are three simple steps to doing something difficult that you know how to do?

Use your expertise, make the world stronger, help us all out here.

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The Overnight, chapter 2

Chapter 1 is here

I walked with Rob’s mom for a while. The crowd thinned as quicker walkers accelerated a bit. Soon we were in Belltown, a neighborhood where hipsters party and barhop on Saturday nights. A bit of cognitive dissonance for the hipsters: here we were in Mardi Gras beads but clearly not headed for the bars and clearly not festive. I heard a few people ask some walkers what this was all about. I didn’t stop to clarify for anyone. I just walked and chatted about the weather with a man and a woman I took to be brother and sister. Both wore gold beads (loss of parent), the woman asked the man about Seattle, we all speculated about whether it would rain. The crowd continued through downtown, past Hammering Man, turning right on Cherry Street and down to the waterfront where our first rest stop awaited. It had not yet been two miles but here were snacks and drinks and toilets. Some chose to stay and look out at the Seattle waterfront in the evening sunlight. I had seen that water before and, in fact, beautiful though it was, I wasn’t eager to see it again. That’s where Rick’s ashes were scattered. Now wasn’t the time to reflect, it was time to walk.

Walking north through Myrtle Edwards Park, I began to feel the sore feet a bit. Not really sore but the indications of where soreness would be. And oh, it would be. I fell into conversation with a woman who was walking for her aunt whom she barely ever knew. Her aunt and her mother had been very close and when the aunt died, well, the mother was never the same after that and is still something of a wreck to this day. There’s this idea that loved ones will somehow “get better” or “recover” but it’s just not like that. Again and again, I hear of people not getting better, just getting different forever. So this woman was walking as a Mother’s Day present to her mom, to try to raise some money and awareness. Her friend was walking with her because she was her friend. The Overnight wasn’t all people who directly lost someone, the crowd contained many people who have been rocked by the ripples.

Across the freaky Amgen bridge on Elliott Avenue, south on Elliott past the Baskin-Robbins, then back up Queen Anne to Mercer and I met some people from Wisconsin (they didn’t need to tell me they were from Wisconsin, I’ve learned the accent). They walked for cousins and friends, one of whom had served in Iraq and then took his own life. One very cheerful young woman also walked for herself. She was bipolar and diagnosed with PTSD. I didn’t ask what caused the PTSD. “I have to work pretty hard!” she said, cheerfully.

Down Mercer, by this time it was quite dark, to Westlake and the next rest stop where a woman in a Pittsburgh Pirates shirt approached me. “Are you John Moe?” she asked. Yeah, I am, I said. She had read my book and turned out to be this huge fan. She brought her husband over, also dressed in Pirates gear, he had also read my book and said he loved it. “Get off my lawn!” he yelled, citing a chapter where I go to a shooting range, a chapter he said was his favorite. I didn’t tell him that, six months after the book was published, my brother died at a shooting range. Didn’t want to bum him out. He had lost his father two months after his wedding. That happens a lot, I’m told. Babies are born, weddings and graduations happen, suicides of family members. His dad was a huge Pittsburgh Pirates fan, thus the gear. The shirts, the beads, all part of the weight we carry.

North on Westlake and I talk to a woman from Portland. Maybe 50 years old. She was walking for her father who died on Christmas Day when she was 16. She found him. “I’m amazed you can even walk at all, let alone in this,” I said. Four months ago, she lost a nephew as well. Her friend asked me a lot of questions about how Rick acted before he died. She has family members who she feels may be in a dangerous situation and so she keeps her cell phone close at all times and was interviewing whoever she could find to look for clues.

Across the Fremont Bridge. Fremont (Seattle’s Berkeley if that helps) was having their annual festival so there was a celebratory mood in the air. An SUV drove by and, seeing all the people in Mardi Gras beads, a young woman yelled, “Whoo! Show me yours and I’ll show you mine!” No thanks. I wonder if she ever found out what the beads were for. I kind of hope not. Or maybe she meant, “Show me your deep psychological wounds and yearning for catharsis and I’ll show you mine!” and she just didn’t have time to get all that out as the SUV drove past. Yeah, that’s probably what happened.

At about mile 9 at this point. 11 more to go.

He's at the what club now?

Karl Rove gives tips to Republicans on how to characterize Obama:

"He's the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini and a cigarette that stands against the wall and makes snide comments about everyone who passes by."

I think that's going to go over big.

GOP: Hear that, America? He's THAT guy at the country club!
AMERICA: What? I don't belong to a country club! I don't know what you're talking about!
GOP: Oh, you know, it's like you've just finished a round of golf at the club and you're having a cigar and you're talking about the merger deal and this guy comes up--
AMERICA: I'm sorry, I don't have time to talk right now, they're foreclosing on my house. I have to go.

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The Overnight, chapter 1

Warning: I'll be doing some recaps of the Overnight walk I did this past weekend. There will be very few jokes. There will be higher word counts. Shorter posts with more jokes will be interspersed.

It was 2:30 in the afternoon and the walk didn't start for five hours so after registering at Seattle Center's Center House I was just going to leave for a while, get some dinner, a bucket of coffee. But I noticed a lot of people who seemed connected to the walk were milling about the Mural Amphitheater and wearing beads, like plastic Mardi Gras beads. Awfully festive for a suicide walk, I thought. Turns out everyone is asked to wear beads corresponding to how suicide has been a part of their lives. So if you lost a child to suicide, white beads. A parent? Gold beads. Purple was for people who lost a friend. Red for people who lost a spouse or partner. If you have battled depression personally, you wore green. Everyone got blue also for supporting the cause. I went to the table and accepted a blue strand as well as an orange one, which was the color for people who have lost siblings.

All who registered for the walk had been given white paper bags. These would eventually have candles placed inside them and be placed on the ground where the walk ended. Walkers were asked to personalize them in some way and many people had attached photos or art work. I had my bag but had not decorated it. I didn't know what to say. I went up to the table where we were supposed to drop them off. They had magic markers there so I grabbed one and wrote:

"Rick Moe
Brother
Son
Friend
8-24-62 - 4-4-07"

And handed it in and walked away. About 100 feet away I remembered something and walked back and had the volunteer dig out the bag. I added "Father" after "Friend". Rick's daughter Sophia was born three months after he died.

Then I went to get some Pad Thai. And insoles for my shoes. And that bucket of coffee.

When I returned to the Seattle Center at around 6:30 that evening I noticed all the teams. Groups of people seated on the lawn together in matching t-shirts that depicted who they were walking for. Pictures pinned to backs, pictures held on sticks, pictures clutched in hands. Pictures of young men, middle-aged women, elderly people, more young men. Lots of young men. I realized that most people on this walk are walking with someone else – friends, husbands, wives, sons and daughters. Me, I’m walking alone. I’m alone. It would have been nice to be with someone for this thing but then again, we all ultimately walk through the experience alone so I might as well walk through this alone.

There were about 1100 walkers in all and all wearing beads so just by looking at people you knew a lot about the most horrible day of their lives. So that lady lost her child. That guy lost a parent. The other fellow battled depression. And everyone wore beads. Suicide and depression is something people kept hidden most of the time but here it was all out in the open. Before the walk started someone got up and spoke. She had lost a son and had done several walks. She said that on her first walk she didn’t talk to anyone, the pain was too great. But in later walks she found that her pain was so great she had to talk to people and her pain was so great she had to hear other people’s stories. She encouraged us all to talk to each other out there.

Soon we were off, leaving Seattle Center and heading south on 2^nd toward downtown. An older woman walking next to me asked who I was walking for. “My brother,” I said. I was hesitant to say much more but only for a few seconds and then I told her everything. She was wearing a green t-shirt with a picture of a young man on it. She wore white beads. “Tell me about your son,” I said. She told me about Rob.

“He died when he was 22 years old,” she said. “He would have been 33 next week.” She didn’t say this with sorrow or tears or pride or anything. She said this as a fact. He would have been 33. He never got to be 33.

I’ll stop there. More soon and photos.

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Friday Question

Quick question cause I gotta run.

If you could join the cast of one television program for the period of one month, what program would it be? I'm not talking about being an actor here, I mean literally joining their world and being a character in it. When the month was over, you would return to your regular life and no time would have passed. But for that month, you could be in the universe of The Muppet Show or Laverne & Shirley or According to Jim or whatever.

What show?

More Obama Rumors

from Slate.

Including:

There's only one artist on Barack Obama's iPod: FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.

Barack Obama goes to church every morning. He goes to church every afternoon. He goes to church every evening. He is IN CHURCH RIGHT NOW.

Barack Obama's new airplane includes a conference room, a kitchen, and a MEGACHURCH.

Barack Obama's skin is the color of AMERICAN SOIL.

Barack Obama buys AMERICAN STUFF. He owns a FORD, a BASEBALL TEAM, and a COMPUTER HE BUILT HIMSELF FROM AMERICAN PARTS. He travels mostly by FORKLIFT.

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Two Days...

until the Overnight walk that I've been telling you so much about. I fly to Seattle tomorrow via the obscure but strangely popular Sun Country Airlines. The training for the walk is complete after a 17 miler last Saturday, after which I walked around like Redd Foxx for the rest of the day. These last couple of days I've even been driving in to work so as not to risk sudden weird injuries.

You can hear a radio show about the issue of suicide and the walk on KUOW 94.9 in Seattle on Friday morning at 9 pacific. Weekday with Steve Scher will be talking about it. My own Weekend America will also be running a story on this week's show. We had a reporter in New York for the first Overnight walk on the 7th of June and she followed a family that lost a son to suicide. He was a veteran of the Iraq war. By the way, we are on pace to lose more soldiers to suicide than to combat fatalities in this war.

Sorry, no jokes here. Just my gratitude for all your support.

Public Service

I won't be seeing The Happening for many reasons:
1. It's not based on What's Happening (Rerun is not involved).
2. I don't much care for suicide as entertainment.
3. I don't much care for really sucky movies as entertainment.

But there is fun to be had in the mocking of really reeeeeally bad movies. But even then, you have to watch them, right? Wrong. Christopher Orr of The New Republic has a spoiler-intensive guide to the most dumbass moments in The Happening so you can mock without enduring the film itself. Whew!

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Friday Question

Can people change?

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Graphunny

From Graph Jam:

The Way Others See It

I didn't think they were even serving up the quote cups anymore but Samantha, who is pensive, got one. Here's the thing, though: often when people get my Starbucks cup and blog about it, they talk about every other book under the sun. How about MY BOOK, pensive Samantha? Buy that one!

Chris

My friend Mike has a friend and this friend's dog is named Chris. Chris the dog. Obviously this is the greatest dog name of all time.

Friday Question

Let's do more algebra. That was fun. Wow, never thought I'd put those sentences together. (Damn you, Mr. Presas at Sacajawea Jr. High!).

Last week we talked about things that you just couldn't enjoy even though other people did. The response was great although just a tad, shall we say, fueled by white hot rage. So we'll go positive this week.

You have a music collection, whether you use the Compacted Disc format still or the iTunes or the what have you. And there's something in there that if some people spotted it, well, they'd make fun of you. Something cheesy, something out of style, something that may have been a little out of style even when it was in style. BUT YOU DON'T CARE WHAT PEOPLE SAY BECAUSE YOU LOVE IT.

And sure, yeah, it might not be the latest hip band like Oh My God There's Something Wrong At The Disco or that other band There's A Fire In The Arcade Run For Your Lives, but it's music that you like. Maybe you're ashamed of it and love it anyway or MAYBE there's no shame at all. Let's tear down the wall here. Let's proclaim our love for the music that the cool kids say we shouldn't like. Let's put the system on trial.

"You might make fun of me for having z in my music collection but I am proud of it!"

What does z equal?

I had to use a new variable in the question because X is already a band.

For me?
z= Meat Loaf. I can't consume Meat Loaf every day but sometimes a big helping of the Loaf just hits the spot. I love Loaf. And that cell phone commercial never happened.

Here's Meat looking all sweaty and dangerous.


And here's a picture of a sunrise on Mars. Not related to the topic but, you know, hey wow.



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Joe Pesci stars in the new film Tiny Dancer

Oh wait, it's just my daughter modeling her new socks. Sorry. Never mind.

A Question from Charlie (age 7)

HIM: Is Herrelly Clinton going to be president?
ME: No.
HIM: Then why is she still on TV and in the newspaper?

Kate (Age 5) Explores Folk Music and Annoyance

HER: Dad, can we practice that one song Charlie sang in school? I can't remember all of it but I know the part where I saw it bug me.
ME: You saw what bug you?
HER: No! That's what the song says. It says, "I saw it bug me" and then there's a golden valley.
ME: Are you talking about "This Land Is Your Land"?
HER: Yes!
ME: Oh, wait a minute, is there an endless skyway in there?
HER: Mm-hm.
ME: Okay. I think I know what we need to do. Let's sing it together.
HER & ME: "As I was walking that ribbon of highway
I saw it bug me, that endless skyway
I saw below me, that golden valley
This land was made for you and me."

Stupid endless skyway. Really gets on our nerves.


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Friday Question: Am I Missing Something?

A bit of Friday Question algebra here.

"Everyone seems to be crazy about x, but I just can't seem to get into it."

What does x equal?

This could be a band, a movie, a food, an author, a city, a political figure, anything you like. Or rather anything you DON'T like but everyone else in the world seems to like a lot and it makes you wonder, "Am I missing something here? It's not THAT good." So it's kind of like I'm On To You but with more insecurity. Like it's something you know you SHOULD like but you just can't seem to do it. How can the world be in love with it and you're not? Is there something wrong with you? Or are you right and millions of other people are wrong?

For me:
x = Radiohead. Tried. Tried again. Can't. Everyone calls them the most important band ever. I wonder why it just doesn't work for me.
x = Gourmet cupcakes. They must be fantastic if they're a whole industry. Just taste like cupcakes.
x = Massage.

So: What does x equal?

No need to elaborate if you don't wish but please answer in the form of algebra: "x =" and then your answer.

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All I Need Is A Truck To Drive Through Those Holes

Lately, I've become very interested in flawed security systems. There are measures in place to protect children or employees or air travelers that are well intentioned but just completely unworkable. But unlike most unworkable products, they persist anyway. I think it's a testament to the intention being more important than the relatively smaller threat of whatever danger they're supposed to present. There's the classic "small amount of liquid" at the airport thing, of course, but I've noticed several equally dunderheaded measures in day to day life.

1. During this family leave, I've been volunteering a bit at my son's school. When I go in, I am supposed to go to the office, which is kind of tucked away, in order to sign in. Nothing makes me do this, I just know that that's what's done. Once there, I sign my name (illegibly like all others) and write down why I'm there. Then I write my name on a sticker, affix it to my shirt and walk away. No one checks ID, no one makes eye contact. I could sign nothing and make up a reason ("Amway sales", "fistfight") and write THREAT on the sticker. It would not make a difference. The system is in place today.

2. At another school I'm familiar with, parents are asked to sign their children out when picking them up at the end of the day. But there's often a big line around the single notebook used for this purpose and so most parents don't bother. Those that do might wonder why they bother. The system is in place today, as far as I know.

3. When I worked at Amazon in the late 90s, the company did not yet have real security badges (too busy taking over the world and hiring me for jobs I was unqualified to do). So they gave us pieces of construction paper with our names on it. We were expected to hold these up to poorly paid inattentive security guards as we walked past. Sometimes, often, the guards would be across the lobby and would yell, "Can I see your badge?" and we'd hold them up even though nothing could be checked or verified. We could be holding up any piece of blue paper in the world. This system is not in place today but it was in place at one time.

There are creeps and bad parents who have been denied custody but try to get it anyway and corporate spies and disgruntled employees in the world. And they must be stopped. But there are a thousand really stupid security systems in place that actually make things worse and make it harder to stop bad folks because they fool people who should be in control of the situation into thinking that security is under control when it is absolutely not.

Friday Question: About That Movie

Okay, so the producers called. They've had some new thoughts.*

Making a movie about your whole life would be difficult. The casting, the locations, the research of it all. Too much. Instead, they want to make a movie about your week. Starting last Saturday and going in to today. There's no script yet, we'll get to that later they say, but they want to talk genre so they can get the right screenwriter and director lined up. Was your week a buddy comedy? A French tragedy? A coming of age sex romp?

If it was MY movie (and it's not, it's yours), I would describe the genre of my week as a bittersweet domestic comedy. Not laugh out loud screwball type, just ordinary people presented with the challenge or dramatic conflict of this new baby and adjusting to that. The characters adapt, maneuver around each other. More dramatic tension is brought when one of the kid characters insists he's sick but the dad sends him to school and then the kid barfs in class but he's oddly proud of that. Meanwhile the dad has never been home from work this long in his life and needs to adjust to that. The baby screams a little but mostly just looks gravely concerned all the time. There's also the triumphant bike riding scene, the possibility that new friends for the parents have emerged, and the rather tedious shopping for pants scene that didn't really need to be in the movie at all, actually. No tragedies, no thrilling capers, just a bittersweet domestic comedy.

But again, it's not my movie, it's yours. So the question is:

In the movie of the past week of your life, what is the genre?

And don't worry, you don't have to elaborate if you don't want. Just say, like, "Tragic adventure made by Belgians" or something and leave it at that if you want. More mysterious anyway.


And congrats to Team Rowley!

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* This is something I often heard during some very abstract, preliminary, and disorienting talks last fall about Conservatize Me film rights. These talks happened and don't get excited because they happen all the time with tons of books. The movie has not happened. Nor has world peace or a Mariners world series title. I give them all equal odds.

_

Also, I've changed comment moderation so that I don't have to approve them. Most comments are just fine. Just don't swear and get all gross and don't be mean. Common sense. Pretend you're at a dinner party.



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Things to say

Sometimes I just don't have the energy to work up a whole cogent post especially when I have three children who enjoy stomping on my energy level.

1. I added a feed from Twitter over there on the right. It allows you to see brief glib things I have to say. As I flood the world with words you can see if I somehow get more trenchant.

2. Highlight on Twitter today. I posted a comment: "Why can't the Mac and the PC both be friends with the Panasonic video camera?" To which John Hodgman then replied, "because that guy is an ass." And we all know who John Hodgman is. Which means, that's right, I got my own little private Apple commercial there, didn't I?

3. Today, a trip to the mall.
JILL: That mall wasn't as depressing as I thought it would be. It wasn't that bad of a mall. Or that good of a mall.
JOHN: It was a mall. We could have been anywhere. Nothing actually just happened.

4. On Saturday, Charlie Moe got an idea. He figured he could go out in the front yard, find some cool looking rocks, and then sell those rocks to passers by. He found a cardboard box which became his counter and desk. For pricing, he thought, well maybe $8.95 for a set of rocks. I suggested 25 cents per rock. Jill suggested selling perhaps some lemonade, her silent reasoning being in agreement with my sentiment: AIN'T NO ONE GONNA BUY ROCKS! Well, by the end of two hours, he had sold ten bucks in rocks. Everyone was buying rocks. One lady had no change so she gave him five bucks. He paid his sister/assistant manager two bucks, bought some donuts, and saved the rest. He sold rocks that were already on the ground. They were at these people's feet. But Charlie is charming.

5. We have some fancy cable at the rental house. Fancier than I'm used to. Not like HBO fancy but channels like MSNBC. And here's the thing: I thought MSNBC was like CNN or Fox News and had news on all the time. But after a certain point in the evening, it's just prison documentaries all night long. Straight on until morning. Every night. And...wha?

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Friday Question

Congratulations! Hollywood Pictures is making a movie of your life. We'll get to things like casting, treatment, genre, and musical score later. But short term there is a more pressing issue: toy tie-in. A little giveaway item to promote the film version of you. Available with any meal. Production needs to get started right away.

Your job is to design the toy. WHAT DOES THE TOY FROM THE MOVIE OF YOUR LIFE LOOK LIKE AND WHAT DOES IT DO? Keep in mind it needs to be pretty simple and cheap. Still, it should capture the essence of you, or at least the you character from the film. And please describe how the toy is played with. BONUS QUESTION: At which restaurant is your toy distributed?

I'll go first:
The toy me is seated on a couch with a laptop computer. The computer screen is blank. Above my head is a plastic thought balloon saying "DEADLINES!!" in creepy gloomy letters. Around the couch are children in pajamas who are not going to bed. When you pull a little lever, my hand reaches up to my hair and pulls on it in stressed out fashion while the pajamaed children punch each other in the head.
The toy is available only at Paseo, a Caribbean restaurant in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood. Negotiations to distribute it at Dixie's in St Paul fell through.

So once more:
WHAT DOES THE TOY FROM THE MOVIE OF YOUR LIFE LOOK LIKE AND WHAT DOES IT DO?
and
At which restaurant is your toy distributed?

_

Cheers created by Kate (age 5) in support of her brother Charlie (age 7) as she watches him ride his scooter

Charlie Charlie, he's the man!
He can do it, he's the best!

Charlie Charlie, he's the best!
He can fight, he's the best!

Charlie Charlie he's the winner!
He can win two trophies!

Charlie Charlie he's the winner!
Trophy two, trophy he!

Charlie Charlie he's the man!
He can win three trophies!

Charlie Charlie he wants a dog!
He wants a collie he he he!

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Friday Question

Making it easy this week (complex questions possibly returning next week).

Who or what are you on to?

I'm on to you, processed fruit snacks.
I'm on to you, Bill Bavasi.
I'm on to you, CBS dramas.

Highly Observant Commenting

This from kbow on the post about Margaret's big premiere:

Also, whaaa!? You instigated a life-altering household move when your wife was eleventy months pregnant? Mrs. Moe is a ROCK STAR!

Yes. She is. Like Queen of the rock stars. Atop her throne in Rockstasylvania.

And also, yes we did move while beset with pregnancy. We found out about what would eventually be Margaret late last August. So everything written on this blog since then was written with the knowledge of our knocked-upatudedness. That means deciding to move to St Paul, getting ready to sell our house, selling our house, packing up, moving across the country, the I'm On To You phenomenon, watching Mr. Megnorium's Munger Penorium. Everything. And it also colors the sort of multiple nervous breakdowns I had along the way. The baby was actually part of our decision to move out here. We could afford a 4-bedroom house in St Paul and could have three kids there. Seattle is more a place for the one child wrapped in plastic sheeting inside a $400 stroller. We were becoming a Midwestern family; better get our asses to the Midwest. The baby that would be Margaret made only indirect appearances here.

I was excited and delighted about the baby, of course, but I've been around enough to know that things can happen in the pregnancy process and it doesn't always go according to plan. It's stressful, as is moving. But you look forward to the brighter tomorrow you're arranging for yourself even as it all seems like great big truckloads of madness.

I remember last December, my arms covered in paint and my head full of hassles trying to get our home gussied up to attract suitors, thinking how in May I would be living in a different part of the country in some house taking some baby for a walk. It did not seem real. It wasn't going from point A to point B. More like going from point A to point 672JKLH991.rr3. And actually that daydream of that walk really sustained me. It was the happy place I went to even though it seemed about as likely as walking into a movie.

And once again, kbow, yes, Mrs. Moe. Holy Toledo. Give it up for the woman. Everyone up on your feet. While I was psychically weighed down with this existential blah de blah, she had a person in her uterus and all the attendant STUFF that goes with it. So while we planned this whole thing and made eleventy billion phone calls she was going through all that. And she was tired and couldn't lift things, which is kind of a big part of, uh, moving. On the plus side, repeatedly lifting most things we owned did wonders for my upper body strength. First rule of Move Club: don't talk about Move Club.

But we got through it in two ways: first, we had sort of sealed our own fates on this one. We had set things in motion that were pretty much irreversible. Secondly, we knew that time passes. We would get there, the temperature would rise above -4, the baby would arrive, that walk would take place. And a couple of days ago after Margaret returned from the hospital and experienced direct sunlight for the first time ever, that walk DID take place. It also featured Kate clinging to the side of the stroller and repeatedly poking Margaret, which was not part of the plan but whatever.
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Granted...

Margaret's first attempt at impersonating Joe Pesci playing Popeye flipping someone off wasn't perfect. But she was only a day old. We'll keep practicing.

Yogurt Monkey Sylvia Poggioli

So I've been in public radio full time for almost seven years now. And I get asked all the time how I got involved in something like that (people always add that emphasis because public radio = you so crazy). And it's kind of screwy, really. See, first I was an actor in Seattle. Then I was a frustrated bored actor who felt like he was wasting his time on dumb projects. Then I was that same actor who wrote plays.

Then Rewind came on the air. First local, then national, news satire on NPR, produced at KUOW, hosted by Bill Radke. Jill heard it, thought I should write for it. I said meh and did nothing about it. Andy Jensen heard it, was directing a play I wrote, thought the play could use some publicity, cold called Bill Radke pushing me as a comedy sketch writer, Bill called me, I started writing for the show. The reason: the money. Make no mistake. For every 3-5 minute sketch they bought, Rewind would send me $200. I could not believe it. So I wrote as many as I could and got a pretty good track record.

Later, I went to work for the show full time as a writer, then elbowed my way on to the air as a sort of correspondent and later a back up host. Then Rewind got canceled so I elbowed my way into the rest of KUOW as a producer and later on the air. Meanwhile, Bill decamped Seattle and went to LA to host what was to become Weekend America. I started freelancing for them, elbowing my way on to their airways and was later offered a full time job.

So how did I achieve this weekly national air time? Not journalism school, not internships: funny writing, stubborn persistence, and lots of sharp elbowing. And Bill Radke more or less.

So I knew baby was on the way this week and I knew my work week would be short. No time to report and file a story. So I pitched the idea, which was then accepted, of me writing a comedy sketch based on current events that Bill and I could do together. If you listen to this sketch and never had a chance to hear Rewind, well, you're listening to Rewind on Weekend America.

(whoever is the first to explain what the title of this posting has to do with the subject matter wins a free invisible theoretical Monkey Disaster t-shirt.)

Friday Question

All I can come up with for the Friday Question is:

Hey guess what?!

Not much of a question but I've been a little occupied.

Please welcome to the world Margaret Eleanor Joy Moe. We'll call her Margaret. We might even call her Maggie. So far: Margaret.

Name etymology:

Margaret - a name we've always loved. We think it's smart, kind of sophisticated, classical, and fun. Also, if she's Maggie, that makes her the baby sister with an older brother and a middle sister, just like The Simpsons, a program I've always enjoyed (but wait a minute, if Charlie's Bart and Kate's Lisa, that makes me...d'oh!)

Eleanor - (music geek alert! beware!)
We wanted to involve music in this child's name in some way since music is such a beautiful part of life. One of my favorite songs is "Eleanor Put Your Boots On" by Franz Ferdinand. It's this slow dreamy song about how Eleanor can do all these wonderful things and leap from the Coney Island Roller Coaster and the Statue of Liberty and have air streams gently set her down and how "I could be there when you land". It's just magical and beautiful. Better still, it was written about the lead singer's girlfriend Eleanor Friedberger, who is in the band The Fiery Furnaces, a band SHE started with her brother. So you have beauty, magic, love, and family all in the one name. And it's kind of classy besides.
(music geek alert complete)

Joy - Two middle names! Because why not! This is Charlie's. He says it was the feeling he got when he thought about the baby. Come to find out he also heard it in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles "and Pokemon!" Kate pointed out. But he insists it came from his heart first, not a cartoon.

Moe - Well, yeah, Moe.

Doppelsota

When you live somewhere for a long time you get used to seeing the same people over and over. So when you move somewhere new, I think you instinctively look for those same people. They're not there, of course. So you start to find people like them. Last night I went with my friend Michael to the Town Talk Diner and I'll be darned if the waiter wasn't Minnesota Matthew Baldwin. It's turned into a whole thing around here. Jill and I will be out somewhere and she'll say, "Hey look, there goes Minnesota John Smersh!"
"Yep, he's talking to Minnesota Steve Scher," I'll reply.
It's like my whole life has been recast and staged like they do on America's Most Wanted. Still murder-free for the moment.

“I, a CD-ROM?!” ribbed a bearded Mordcai.

A blog dedicated to Falindromes or failed palindromes. (found via Andrew Sullivan).

_

Me and my impossible to avoidedness

Ways you can load up on more me than you'll ever need.
1. I hosted Weekend America today. I talked to the 2007 Mr. Irrelevant and chronicled a cross country drive with my hamster.
2. I was recently a guest on The Sound of Young America, talking to both Jesse Thorn the host and also to young america. It's in the archives. Hunt. If you want. If you don't know about this radio program, please learn.
3. Twitter. I twitter. When I remember. And I keep getting new subscribers. These are people who want access to brief things I say. You can evidently be one of these people. Although honestly between the blog, Facebook, various freelance writing and, well, MY RADIO JOB, I'm running out of things to say. Like a while ago.
4. The Seattle Times asked me to write a breakup letter to Seattle. I did. I've never been paid to break up with someone before.
5. We're home most nights. Come by!

UPDATE: My breakup letter to Seattle is presently the #1 most e-mailed and #3 most read article at SeattleTimes.com. This means that torrents of hate mail and angry letters to the editor are about to come gushing forth. And yes, it bears some resemblance to a blog posting of a while back.

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Friday Question

We've all heard the question about what music you would take if you were to be stranded on a desert island. That's ridiculous, though. That kind of thing never happens. I've got a better idea.

1. Let's say the laws that govern our universe were suddenly and radically altered specifically in regard to music.

2. Let's further say that an eccentric authoritarian government was able to seize power over every aspect of our lives for precisely one year, after which point their power would expire and everything would go back to the way it was. There is no doubting their power and also no doubting it's precise one-year time line.

3. This government then issues a decree: you must select one band or artist. The music of that band or artist will be the only music you hear for precisely one year, the duration of this government's odd power.

4. You will have no control over which song you hear at a given time. It will be a shuffle of the entire catalog. You can simply choose to listen to music or not to.

5. Often, however, music just occurs during the course of life. So let's say you go with REM. When a child sings Happy Birthday, you will instead hear, say, Cuyahoga. And not kids singing that song, I'm talking about the original REM recording emanating from the children's mouths. The "I'm Lovin' It" commercial jingle for McDonald's might become Gardening at Night. Someone walking down the street with their lips in a pucker will not make a whistling sound, they will producing the full recorded version of maybe Oddfellows Local 151. Every cell phone ring tone is REM.

6. Other people will hear different music of their own choosing.

7. You have no volume control.

8. Again, after one year all will return to normal and your catalog expands once again.

So. You must pick a band or an artist that will be your entire musical experience for one year.

Factors to consider:
a. How expansive is the catalog of work from this music provider? Are there recordings you're unfamiliar with?

b. Considering there's a decent chance you get sick of them, is it a music provider you're willing to risk hating/resenting for the rest of your life?

c. How dynamic is this music provider? Do they represent a multitude of moods and genres or are they one kind of music all the time?

So the question is: Which band or artist do you choose to be your only source of music for a period of one year?

Also, one more thing: this eccentric authoritarian government wants you to explain your choice. If you don't pick anyone, they will automatically assign you Big Country.


BEGIN!

THOSE books

Jeannie over at DEFCON House has some thoughts on those books where people go off to do wonderful things in pastoral locations and their lives are much better and happier than yours and then you're supposed to buy their book to give them more money as they recline on a divan in Provence while you have to catch the fucking bus to go to your fucking job.
~


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Bonus Coverage

I stopped blogging the thoughts of Charlie (Age 7) a while ago. But I am powerless to stop myself from posting the conversation of this morning.

HIM: Dad, do you believe in heaven?
ME: Well, I don't know. I've seen no proof for or against it.
HIM: But I don't believe in the other place. The devil place. It doesn't make sense. Why would the devil want to torture people he supported before?
ME: Good question.
HIM: And who's in charge of heaven?
ME: God. That's what they say.
HIM: I don't think He is in charge because He has too much other stuff to do.
ME: So he's in more of an executive position and someone else runs the day to day operations of heaven?
HIM: Yeah. I think a fairy, probably.
JILL: Female or male?
HIM: Male fairy. And what do you think heaven's like?
ME: No idea.
HIM: I hope it's not old fashioned girl stuff. Like, I don't know, unicorns and beautiful peacocks and flamingos in tutus.


Friday question below.

Friday Question: Convenientpowers!

(a weekly feature, at least until I start forgetting to post it or lose interest)

What makes a superhero so super? And heroic? Superpowers, that's what. Abilities that far outstrip the capacity of mere mortals. For the big names, this is stuff like flying, bulletproofness, lightning speed. But where does that leave the rest of us?

I was talking to my friend Larry the other night and he was explaining how he had two notable abilities.

1. He watches a TV show. Commercial break comes on. He changes the channel to watch something else. THEN! He switches back to the original show RIGHT EXACTLY when the program resumes! He doesn't miss a thing!

2. This one's a little less useful, relying as it does on out of date technology. Driving in a car, listening to music on cassette, song comes on he doesn't like so much, Larry hits fast forward and is able to stop the tape and hit Play RIGHT EXACTLY as the next song begins.

These superpowers won't earn Larry his own comic book or action figure but they are small examples of how a person can skillfully gain an advantage over the petty challenges the day presents. I guess they're less "super" powers than they are "convenient" powers.

Convenientpowers! The mundane real world version of superpowers!

The Question is this: What is your greatest convenientpower?

Together we will form a sort of superfriends! Well, convenientfriends anyway.

The Election

I'm not going to publicly endorse one candidate over the other. Journalism and all that. But I will say this: if McCain wins, that means Darrell Hammond stays on Saturday Night Live for another four years AT LEAST. If you're of the opinion that it was time for Hammond to go at least four years ago, please consider that on election day.

(and surely someone, besides Fred Armisen, can be found who can find something in Obama to make fun of.)

A Song from Kate (Age 5)

From down the hallway, we hear Kate (who is a dwarf) singing a new song to herself.

ME: What's that song you're singing, Kate?

KATE: It's about dwarfs! But it's like "George of the Jungle". Goes like this!

"Dwarfs, dwarfs, dwarfs, dwarfs, dwarfs dwarfs dwarfs dwarfs.

Ahhaahhaaahh!"

(pause)

ME: "Watch out for that dwarf"?

KATE: No! "Watch out for that tree, dwarfs!"


Yep. Watch out for that tree, dwarfs.

The Guys In Skates I May Love

So I live in St Paul now (official city motto: "We Seem Nice But Are Evidently Intent On Killing You With Our Cars"). It's trouble with my sports teams. The Mariner games don't start until 9pm local time so I don't know what happened until the next morning usually. And the Sonics? O, woe.

But I am becoming increasingly intrigued by the Minnesota Wild of the NHL. It's hockey! And they're up 2-1 over the Colorado Avalanche.

I've watched much of each playoff game, all of which have gone into overtime. I've even seen goals scored. I have begun to recognize player names like Koivu, Gaborik, and Demetra. But really only those three. Oh! And Rolston also.

I dig the pace, the drama, and the sweaters but I still don't know anything. I don't know what anything means in a game, don't know why all the fans start yelling for no apparent reason sometimes, am years away from knowing what an icing penalty is.
But I am fascinated by it. I stare slack-jawed while others understand.

Hockey to the rest of Minnesota is LA Confidential:


Hockey to me is more like Boobah:

Things Learned

That's what it's about, right? Learning things? Here are things that people have learned in their lives so far.

Friday Question

(a weekly feature, at least until I start forgetting to post it or lose interest)

Let's switch over to movies this week.

You're traveling. Alone. You're in a hotel and you've got some time to kill. Maybe it's evening. Maybe it's morning and you don't have anywhere to be until 1pm or something. Regardless: alone and spare time. So you watch TV. And you're flipping around the various channels and you come upon THAT ONE MOVIE. The movie that you know you're going to get sucked in to watching even though you've seen it before. Maybe many times. But you just throw the remote over your shoulder because you know you won't watch anything else when that movie is on. It has power over you.

This week's question: What is your toss-the-remote movie? The one that saps your free will and makes you watch.

I'll go first. Back to the Future. I have to watch it. And I think it's for all the little moments. George McFly falling out of a tree, Marty being mistaken for a sailor in a life jacket, Marvin Berry calling his cousin Chuck, Biff's comeuppance. Knowing that there's always a moment like that around the corner means I can't leave the set.

Moving up fast on the list: Ocean's 11. Soderbergh/Clooney/Pitt/Bernie Mac version. Again, too many perfect moments to steer away from. Damon in the bar in Chicago, the Mormon brothers racing cars, Pitt and Clooney wondering if ten would be enough but maybe they need one more. Don Cheadle's terrible dialect which isn't really a moment but just a hilarious abomination. Enough perfect moments that I can endure Julia Roberts angry giraffe-like performance.

Again: What is your toss-the-remote movie?

Playoffs start tonight!

In St Paul! With the Minnesota Wild taking on the Colorado Avalanche! I hope that Lemaire has his boys ready and that Gaborik and Demitra really come through. And...that they all skate...good. Also that whoever is the guy in front of the...netting...is able to catch the...hockey...ball.

Still trying to adjust.

.

Oh yeah, forgot to mention

The big box of stuff. What started with a frustrated posting here, ended with a radio story here.

Listen, if you'd like to pick over the remains of my...uh...me.
.

Friday Question

(a weekly feature, at least until I start forgetting to post it or lose interest)

Let's stay with music for a little while. A two-parter:
What was your first favorite band or solo artist? Talking about the musical entity that first made you aware of artist identity. The one that lifted you beyond having a favorite song to having a favorite singer/guitarist/drummer/electric flautist.

Second part: How's that holding up for you? Are they still beloved? Scorned? Little of both? Can you listen to them at leisure or only in a setting of nostalgia?

I'll go first. Fleetwood Mac. I don't know how the Rumours album happened to come into my life but man I wore that dang thing out on my little turntable. Memorized lyrics, stared at the hirsute males in the band and their spangly multi-frocked female counterparts/companions/lovers/ex-lovers/who could even keep track. There's all this stuff in there about sex and cocaine and betrayal and it all flew FAR above my head but all those voices, all that emotion, and it sounded so adult! Nothing like the Candy Man can cause he mixes it with love and makes the world taste good (wait, what the hell kind of song is that anyway?).

Plus, obviously, hot for Stevie. Who wasn't? Turns out that originally the rest of the band wanted Lindsey Buckingham to join and NOT Stevie but he said either my girlfriend gets to be in or I won't go. Because, yeah, that's going to be a band headed for a smooth working relationship. Later, of course, she started sleeping with Mick Fleetwood, which is like hooking up with Sasquatch as opposed to Lindsey Buckingham who was more of a, I don't know, genteel Sasquatch.

But today? Can't really stay with them. I'm told Tusk is amazing but, yeah, well, can't do it. It would be like trying to rediscover one's love for Fonzie.

Are we seething with turmoil or just so completely massively 12 different kinds of stoned?

So again. Two part question:
What was your first favorite band or solo artist? How's that holding up for you?


Have at it!

The results of walking to and from work each day, which works out to about 6 miles a day.

1. I have not put gas in my car since it arrived in Minnesota. When it arrived it had about a quarter tank of gas.
2. My clothes fit better and in many cases are looser, especially in the pantsal region.
3. Exposure to the early spring snows and cold temperatures may have exacerbated this flu I got, which kicked my ass all over the place. One of those "what if this means I'm DYING" kinds of sick. Better now. Somewhat.

So, two out of three. And that ain't bad. Right, Meat Loaf?

Actually, we had a lovely time on the train

Although it's true that, as the photo would indicate, the children did become a tad restless.

So second part of the story. The house sold rather quickly, like I said, and we knew we had a closing date of 3/3. So we booked our train tickets for that afternoon. Understand that in late January, March 3rd can seem like a lifetime away. We slacked off about a week and then began packing, making phone calls, solving puzzling situations. It was exhausting in every single way: physically, emotionally, spiritually, uh...uh.. dermatologically! We got the flu. We got along. I went insane a few times.

I think I was prepared for the hard work but what took me by surprise was the psychic toll of all that is related to moving. More than once it felt like death: you say goodbye to people, you get your affairs in order, (loading up a moving truck - that part not so much), and you wait to be reborn in this other place that you don't really know all that well. Sometimes you have to go through your personal papers too. You break up your rock bands.

And the thing is, you really don't know how to pace it. I've never moved like this before. Does it require 12 hours of work per day? Two? By the time we got down to the final day, it was also down to the wire. We finished packing at about 3:24pm on 3/3. We had to leave for the train station by 3:30. Jill and I did a final moment in our house that was not unlike Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo checking out the Grand Canyon in National Lampoon's Vacation. Then, weeping, off to the train.

Hear me now: TAKE THE TRAIN. But also DO IT RIGHT. We had booked passage on the Empire Builder. It's a train financed by various neoconservative think tanks. Not really. But it is called the Empire Builder. Don't go coach, you'll never sleep. You get a sleeping compartment that converts by day into a regular compartment with seats, a conversion enabled by a porter. Getting said sleeping compartment means you're a First Class Passenger and thus your meals in the dining car are all covered (total bargain, by the way, if you book carefully it's not even very pricey). Best yet, the waitress in the dining car gets to know you over the course of the trip. "Pancakes and orange juice, Charlie?" she asks my much delighted boy.

But man, the train is great. Big windows, leisurely pace, and you get to see America from the ground. If you need a kid friendly adventure and you're not in a hurry, take the train. At least once.

We left Seattle around 5:45pm, dozed off around Moses Lake or Ellensburg even. Woke up in Glacier National Park with all its glacial majesty. Slept the second night somewhere in mid-North Dakota and woke up north west of the Twin Cities, arriving in St Paul around 9am. Stepped off a train and into our new life. Which felt infinitely cooler than walking out of a jetway and into the MSP airport terminal.

One regret: we didn't bring enough to read or play with. The kids had Pokemon DVDs, we had a few novels we had never read before (which turned out to be novels we still didn't want to read) and one New Yorker I grabbed from beside the bed on Monday afternoon. And it turns out the Havre train station doesn't exactly carry the Utne Reader. Or Sports Illustrated. Or anything. So we kind of had to make do. And we did. Train = awesome.

Then we got to our new house and the kids started playing in the snow. A practice that will continue on this the first day of April. There are several inches of freshly fallen from yesterday. No fooling on that one.

UPDATE: But no wi-fi on the train! Be warned!