Rock-tober 09, 2023

While going through NROTC at Auburn, it was a requirement that all Midshipmen pass a swim test. This seemed like a legit requirement, and I found the concept of non-swimmers wanting to join the Navy hilarious. The test took place at the university pool and wasn't that daunting. It included basic stroke proficiency, the ability to tread water for 5 minutes, and jumping off the high dive (to simulate a ship evacuation). The hardest part was being paired with a guy who outweighed me by a good 50 pounds for the rescue swim. I had to carry this dude and do a sidestroke the length of the pool.

A more enjoyable qualification was the sail test. Although from the Mississippi coast, I never did any real sailing. The closest was the infamous Hobie Cat incident that eventually involved the Long Beach Police Department, but that's another post.

In Auburn, the on-water qualifications were held at a local lake - the closest practical body of water for the event. The logistics made sense, hauling a bunch of us down to the coast would have been a scheduling nightmare.

I just have a personal hang-up about sailing on lakes. In my own romanticized view, sailing ships were vessels for exploration. You laid in supplies, updated your charts, and hopped on the rising wind and tide. Pointing your bow toward the open horizon, your destination was an unseen shore. By comparison, a sailboat on a lake feels almost claustrophobic and pent up - you never lose sight of the shore.

They feel like ships in a bottle.

The last time I had a ship's wheel in my hands was over a half dozen years ago on a buddy's boat. Three of us sailed out into the Chesapeake to meet the Eagle, a 295' barque used as a training vessel at the US Coast Guard Academy. She was a magnificent sight as she made her way into the harbor. The guys I was with, one a graduate of Annapolis and the other a graduate of the Coast Guard Academy, were happy to relinquish the helm to me for most of the cruise. It was a good day, and it's been too long.

As I type this, I have another window open on my computer for the NIH Sailing Association. I'm thinking it'll be my winter project to get my quals reinstated. Considering we're near one of the sailing capitals on the East Coast, it's a travesty I haven't spent more time on the water. With all due respect to the crew of the sloop John B, and again in my own romanticized view, I can't help but think a bad day on the water beats a good day ashore.

Brian Wilson & Al Jardine - Sloop John B

Rock-tober 08, 2023

In Junior High, I frequently wore a vest with a Kenworth truck patch on the front. Not nearly as stylish as my buddy Mike's newsboy cap, but it worked for my aesthetic at the time. Walking down a school corridor one day, I saw one of the coaches eyeballing the vest's logo. As we neared, he pointed to the patch.

"Kenworth, huh? Been hauling hogs!?"

"No, sir, coach! Logs. Pig Pen hauled hogs in the Jimmy."

Absolutely no one in my group understood that exchange. However, Coach and I smiled and nodded knowingly at each other like two patrons of a secret society.

That brief interaction was a reference to the lyrics of C.W. McCall's 1975 single, "Convoy". The song hit #1 on several US and international charts and highlighted the struggles the trucking industry was going through at that time. In the aftermath of the oil embargo, Congress passed a slew of new laws from the Double Nickel speed limit to caps on the number of hours truckers could drive each day. These all made surviving in a struggling sector even more onerous.

The song recounts the adventures of 3 truckers in a small convoy heading from LA to the East Coast. Well before the days of cell phones, the medium of communication was the CB radio. I loved the song for the banter between the characters and its use of colorful trucker's jargon, finding it way more interesting than trying to wrap my head around Shakespearean soliloquies and iambic pentameter in Mrs. Marti's English class.

I was naturally jazzed when Dad installed a CB radio in the family van. Dad used to commute between Long Beach and NAS Belle Chase outside New Orleans, and the CB radio was his way of passing the time on the 2-hour drive.

The family took a road trip/vacation in that van one summer in the early 80's. We drove an epic loop west to Texas, north into Canada, east into New York, down the coast to Virginia, and back to Mississippi. For an entire month, I was mesmerized by that CB radio. Truckers were giving intel on alternate routes, where to fuel up, and warnings of upcoming speed traps.

That road trip became a classroom for informal road etiquette not covered in Driver's Ed. To this day, I still flash high beams at trucks passing me to let them know it's safe to merge over. As the rig slides back in, they'll give the proper acknowledgment of momentarily flashing hazard lights as a "Thanks!".

When I got my license a few years later, in what I thought was the epitome of cool, I installed a CB radio in the Mustang. However, there wasn't a lot of chatter in Long Beach. The radio is still in the garage back home in Mississippi. I guess I could install it in the Bronco, but it would likely get an eye roll from the redhead.

C W McCall - CONVOY

Rock-tober 07, 2023

I don't mind getting older. There's a certain clarity that comes from walking this sod for 5 decades, and you just learn to not sweat the small stuff. If I'm honest with myself, though, I'll admit to having one annoyance. I miss the lack of aches and pains.

In my late 20s, I walked on to a pickup volleyball game with a bunch of guys I knew. Over the course of the match, I'm running around the court in deck shoes, spinning in place, and diving for shots. I got up after a dig and one of my teammates, hands on his hips, just stared at me. "Dude. Do you just not feel pain?"

I actually didn't. I just dusted myself off and got into position for the next serve. It didn't register at the time, but most of my team were almost the age I am now. These days, I can better understand the question. I actually wince as I think back on some of those dives onto the court floor.

A few years later, I was commuting home on a train. Getting off an escalator at the station, I slipped and fell but managed to reach out and break my fall, saving myself from doing a full faceplant. After making sure I didn't drop anything, I rushed off to my next train.

Onboard, sitting in my seat and taking in the winter scenery out the window, I noticed a persistent throbbing in my right hand, the one I'd used to catch myself at the station. I held it up expecting to see a bruise or cut. I wasn't expecting my little finger's middle joint to be pointing 45° away from the rest of my hand. I actually laughed at the absurdity of the scene.

Andrea met me at the station and we went to an urgent care clinic. Getting impatient with the wait to be taken back, I wound up popping my finger back into place. When I was finally in x-ray, I explained to the resident what I'd done. His look translated to "Daaayyyuuumm" as he shook his head.

Sometime in the intervening years, either my pain threshold dropped, or the cumulative effect of a lifetime of getting knocked around was catching up to me.

More recently, I was helping some of our guys rearrange our equipment storage closet. I nudged one of the larger boxes to be moved to gauge its weight. It didn't budge, telling me it was pretty hefty. My 50-year-old brain tried to warn me. "Looka here, my man. There's no shame in asking for help or getting a dolly." However, my 50-year-old back was having delusions of still being a 20-year-old.

"Pfft. Don't bother with all that. You've got this. It'll be fine." So I hoisted the box like a sack of potatoes and moved it 10 yards to its new location.

 My 50-year-old back is a dumbass.

After a visit to the doctor and some pain meds, I can confidently say I give back pain 0/5 stars - would definitely not recommend.

These days, when I drop something on the ground, there's a mental calculus that takes place as I stare at the object. "Hmph. Do you really need that? What would happen if you just left it there?"

In order to stave off being crowned "The King of Pain", I'm looking at options including Tai Chi. I figured if a bunch of geriatric Asians could handle the regimen and retain flexibility, I should as well. That may be another post.

The Police - King of Pain

Rock-tober 06, 2023

Exactly 1 week ago, after a storied 25-year run, Netflix ended its service as a purveyor of DVDs by mail. For post-millennial readers unaware of the great conflagration of the late 20th century that was Netflix vs. Blockbuster, take a seat and listen to a combat veteran of that conflict.

In the aftermath of the Betamax-VHS wars (the war before the war), the VHS format stood triumphant. But the victory was a hollow one. No one was shelling out $45.00 for the privilege of actually owning a movie. For reference, that's $130 in today's dead presidents. Luckily, some smart cookie discovered while people wouldn't buy these tapes, they'd sure enough rent them.

The concept of renting out entertainment media was a seismic shift in the industry. Soon, Mom and Pop businesses focused solely on VHS rentals - and sometimes VCRs (If you thought movies were pricey, those tape decks could set you back north of $800 in today's currency.) started popping up like dandelions.

This inevitably attracted corporate honchos who caught whiffs of untapped revenue streams in consumers' need to watch Hollywood blockbusters from the comfort of their living room couch. Eventually, most small operators were bought out or pushed out of the market and one behemoth percolated to the top.

Ironically named "Blockbuster", these blue-and-yellow themed stores were everywhere in that era's version of today's Dollar General. You couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting one.

Converging on Blockbuster became a Friday night ritual. Throngs of people flocked to their local branch trying to pick up the latest release before they were all gone. A common scene was a forlorn customer eagerly watching the returns coming in for the night hoping a copy of "Patriot Games" would arrive. A pro tip Andrea and I discovered was to look in the foreign language section for popular out-of-stock movies. We just turned on the English subtitles and ignored the fact that the Irish terrorists were speaking Spanish.

Blockbuster dominated this theater and made bank for years. Into this blue-box dominated arena, tiny upstart Netflix waded in. Plopping down at the table of the high-stakes rental game, they had an ace up their sleeve. By this time, the DVD format had become mainstream, and this form factor lent itself nicely to being shipped by mail - intel perhaps gleaned from watching the ubiquitous AoL CDs that always marched themselves unannounced and unwanted into people's mailboxes like an autocratic leader on a land grab mission.

Netflix promised a better experience than staking out the local Blockbuster hoping a copy of "Saving Private Ryan" would turn up. They did this by mitigating two of Blockbuster's most grievous annoyances - late fees and the stink eye you got from the teenage clerk if you failed to follow their incessant mantra, "Be kind. Rewind."

Twenty-five years later, the dust has long settled. Blockbuster wound up on the ash heap, just another casualty in the unending campaign for media entertainment dominance. The latest skirmish in this forever war is the arena of streaming services. Netflix DVD, seeing the writing on the wall, chose to go out on their own terms. 

As a remembrance and parting gift, Netflix DVD is allowing customers to keep their last shipments received from them. Earlier this week, we received our final delivery of those little red envelopes that graced our mailbox for the last 25 years with comedies, sci-fi, dramas, TV series, and (snort) blockbusters.

Looking at the Netflix DVDs, I realized what prompted me to put these in my last shipment were the soundtracks just as much as the films. Movies are incredibly dependent on their soundtracks to set the tone and mood of a scene, and I'm always pleased when this includes a well-placed classic. Listening to this again put me in the mood for a $5 milkshake - spiked with rum, of course.

Dick Dale - Misirlou (Pulp Fiction)

Rock-tober 05, 2023

For me, Auburn will always be a special place because of the number of defining, watershed moments that took place there. However, for the majority of the time, Auburn was.....dull. It seemed the epitome of social life was game day and frat parties, and neither was my scene.

Particularly dreary, Auburn had no major shindigs. There were no fairs, no music festivals, no birthday party for Aubie the mascot - nothing to blunt the tedium. When I attended the University of South Alabama (USA) in Mobile, Mardi Gras was not to be trifled with. The entire city paused and the university actually shut down for the massive street party. At Auburn, when Moon Pie season rolled around, I asked where the parade routes were. No one knew what I was talking about.

"You mean people stand in the road and get pelted by plastic coins and costume jewelry? And they scream for more!?" 

*sigh

If you have to explain the concept of Mardi Gras to those around you, you're way too far north.

To be fair, one year, Andrea's mom took us to the town of Loachapoka, 11 miles down the road. This sleepy little hamlet hosts the annual Loachapoka Syrup Soppin' Festival. It's been decades since my last attendance, and I don't remember much, but I do remember some pretty good fair food and, well, a crap ton of syrup. It made at least a vague impression on me because I ask about it every time we roll through town.

So...what does one with wanderlust do if they get stir-crazy living in an overtly pastoral college town? You bloody well get the heck of Dodge every chance you get. In this, you had options.

Gulf Shores was the Mac Daddy, Holy Grail destination with its powdery white sand beaches and emerald green water. But at a 5-hour drive one way, the Redneck Riviera was reserved for long weekends or the breaks between quarters.

Atlanta was pretty hopping, and it was only 2 hours east. Underground Atlanta, dating back to the Civil War, was a complex of shops and galleries below the modern city. Elsewhere, at street level, Cafe Intermezzo had great desserts - I don't think I was able to afford much else. It was classy enough that you could go and feel a little grown up. If you were still hungry after, you slummed it at the Varsity for cheap, greasy eats.

Atlanta was a good escape, and Andrea and I had some memorable dates there. Still, it was a 4-hour round trip, and you lost an hour crossing into the Eastern time zone.

If you just had to get away from the "Loveliest Village on the Plain", the only other city of consequence in close proximity was Montgomery.

A scant 50 minutes down I-85 South, Montgomery is the state capital of Alabama. Honestly, though, the city of Montgomery is the forgotten step-child/rented mule of state capitals. It doesn't have the bustling port activity (and Mardi Gras) of Mobile or the historical steel industry and modern medical services of Birmingham, the two cities most often mistaken as the seat of government for the Heart of Dixie.

A notable draw, though, for Montgomery is it's the home of the Alabama Shakespeare Festival - recognized as one of the top 10 Shakespeare festivals in the world. Hearing the lines of the Immortal Bard spoken in a southern drawl, well, that's pretty unique.

Also present in Montgomery and absent in Auburn - more variety in that tier of dining above greasy spoon but below the break-the-bank threshold of a college kid's wallet. Auburn had a number of college-friendly, all-night diners, but if you're trying to impress a certain redhead, you occaisonally need a place with cloth napkins instead of paper. 

As a matter of fact, it was at one of these establishments - Darryl's - that Andrea and I were introduced to each other on a group outing early on in our acquaintance. Fortunately, I think I checked off just enough boxes on her list that evening for her to decide I wasn't the typical college frat boy and was worth more of her scrutiny.

Unfortunately, Darryl's shuttered decades ago, so Andrea and I can't revisit it like some of our other old haunts. But latent sparks resulting from that night's group outing keep Montgomery firmly in the "OK" column of "Wayne's Opinion of Cities Visited". 

Bonnie Raitt - Angel from Montgomery

Rock-tober 04, 2023

Earlier this summer, my buddy Trevor and I were the "plus 1's" for our wives at a blowout celebration. Naturally, the two Level 1 introverts in the gathering gravitated toward each other in a mutual defense pact against the huggers in the crowd. A regular reader of and guest star in these missives, Trevor has a vested interest in the subject matter.

"Hey, Wayne, this year's Rock-tober will be covering the juggernaut event of the decade, right?"

I honestly wasn't sure what he was talking about and gave him a "What do you mean?" shoulder shrug.

"Dude! The Taylor Swift's Eras Tour!"

The eye roll coming off me set off tsunami monitoring buoys up and down the Atlantic coast.

Back at home a few days later, I walk into the room and Andrea is streaming a documentary - a biopic of Taylor Swift. The eye roll was less pronounced this time, and I figured I'd distract myself on my phone until I went to bed. Surprisingly, it eventually caught my attention and I got sucked into the show.

Later that same week, Andrea bursts into the dining room/home office, giddy with excitement. "Hon! Guess what has an October release date in theaters!"

I'm going through possibilities for DC, Marvel, and Gal Godot and came up blank. I just looked at her.

"Taylor Swift is releasing concert footage to theaters on Friday, October 13th!"

I couldn't tell if she was winding me up or if a new date night had just been marked on the calendar. Clearly, though, the universe was trying to make itself heard. So, here we are, having a one-sided conversation during Rock-tober about the cultural phenomenon that is Taylor Swift.

Here's the thing, though. In my recent, unsolicited exposure to all things Swifty, I found she has an immense amount of clout. Between her innate talent, business acumen, and the juggernaut of her social media followers, she wields a heavy hammer. And she's not afraid to use it.

TicketMaster is the poster child of why monopolies are bad. Since coming onto the scene, the ticket purchasing experience has dropped while ticket prices soared. What's earned Ticketmaster villain status, however, are their bloody service fees. Back in 1995, these added 27% to ticket prices. By some reports, that's now as high as 78% as of last fall. Unfortunately, because they hold exclusive contracts with 70 - 80% of mainstream concert venues, their near monopoly gives them a formidable shield. Want to complain about crap customer service? Pfft. They're the only game in town. You either take your tickets and eat your complaint or miss the show.

In the mid-'90s, Pearl Jam was at the peak of its popularity and influence. They famously used their celebrity in a classy "good guy" attempt to rein in Ticketmaster and its high service fees with a boycott of their venues. Unfortunately, the band couldn't break the monopoly and eventually had to return to Ticketmaster locales.

Fast forward to the fall of 2022. Ticketmaster assured the Taylor Swift camp that providing accessible tickets would not be an issue. Their failure was spectacular in its completeness. Now, Ticketmaster finds itself in the crosshairs of multiple lawsuits as well as legislators willing to dust off the old anti-trust regulations.

In her own "good guy" moves, Swift has done two things. She restricted Ticketmaster from releasing tickets to the secondary market (i.e. scalpers). This cut deeply into Ticketmaster's revenue stream and ensured more seats were available for her actual fans. Second,  she recorded concert footage for theater release. Here's where she earned street cred with me.

If the movie studios were salivating at the thought of having a seat at the table of the Eras tour cash buffet, Swift dashed their hopes in a major flex of her personal clout. She made distribution deals directly with the theater, bypassing all the studios.

Normally, theaters are utterly dependent on the Hollywood machine for marketing and publicity of anything shown on their screens. They simply don't have the infrastructure to generate that necessary buzz with the public. Pfft. But we're talking about Taylor Swift - she's her own marketing behemoth, and she just tweaked the noses of the big guys.

Standing up to the establishment and sticking it to the man - these are heavy-duty rock and roll traits. And they're found in spades in this tall, slender crooner out of West Reading, PA.

So here's the thing - normally I'd now drop a vid of one of her songs that had personal meaning for me. But I'm no Swifty, and I know nothing of her discography. However, she did an exceptional cover of Train's "Drops of Jupiter".

Taylor Swift - Drops of Jupiter

Rock-tober 03, 2023

My buddy, Zack, does not eat pork. For him, it's a dietary restriction of his religion. Whenever we're out grabbing a bite to eat, I'll abstain from getting a pork dish, because it genuinely makes him uneasy. I personally can't imagine life without a good BLT, but I get it. Unless you're a cajun - those guys will eat anything - we all avoid certain foods.

Sometimes it's a texture thing - I'm looking at you, fried liver.

It may be genetic. I happen to be in the unfortunate minority of folks for whom cilantro tastes like soap. Happily, I did avoid the trait in the genome shuffle that renders the vast majority of mainland Asians lactose intolerant. Life without rum raisin ice cream would be pretty bleak.

Sometimes, it's just plain crappy, bad luck. An acquaintance of mine knew an award-winning barbecue pit master who was bitten by a lone star tick. Through their saliva, these ticks can pass on a specific carbohydrate not produced by humans. Some unfortunate souls, like our pit master, develop a severe allergy to anything containing this specific carbohydrate. Guess where this molecule can be found in abundance. Yup - red meat. 

Being able to cook a prime rib to perfection and never be able to partake again is kind of an apt description of hell.

I've mentioned previously in the social ether my disdain for cornbread. Here's another unpopular opinion: I don't like shrimp. When people find out, the reaction is usually, "Dude! You grew up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast! You're a stone's throw from waters plied by one of the finest shrimping fleets afloat! And you don't like shrimp?!" 

Yep. I'll gladly help you negotiate a bargain with an incoming skipper to fill your ice chest with their fresh, daily catch, but I won't be joining you for dinner. I'm not allergic to shellfish, I just don't like the taste. Maybe it's psychological. As a kid, when Dad and I went fishing, our bait of choice was shrimp, preferably ones that were a little past their prime. Maybe in my head, I'm just like, "Yeah. I don't eat bait."

It's not that I'm inadventurous - I'll willingly venture beyond my comfort zone. On occasion, I've found myself presented with gator, snake, and emu - absolutely none of which tasted like chicken. At a large, regional gathering of the (Filipino) highland clans, I once was served up some black bear. Not gonna lie - it wasn't bad. I've even sampled haggis (from those other Highlands), for crying out loud. I just know that my comfort zone has a discrete, definitive edge. I can't say exactly where it is, but I know it when I see it.

It may be the ingredient list. Even though I willingly sampled haggis in the UK (because teenage me didn't know any better) it was a hard pass on the blood sausage. In the Philippines, there's a similar dish of pork stewed in spices and pig's blood. My aunt once served it up for Andrea and me on a visit shortly after our wedding. I instantly recognized the dish and politely declined. Andrea was also aware, but wanting to establish her street cred with the family, she took a healthy portion. I'm giving her the side eye to gauge the reaction, but she genuinely enjoyed it. Yeah. My girl is pretty hardcore.

Another dish that's a hard pass for me is balut. This is the ubiquitous street fare on any major roadway in the Philippines. For the casually unfamiliar, here's a hint. It was once featured on Fear Factor.

Balut (ba - loot') is a boiled, half-gestated duck egg.

The instructions for handling this gastronomic entry are as follows. Crack open the top of the shell and slurp out the broth. Afterward, you peel the egg and eat the contents whole, maybe with a dash of salt and vinegar. I imagine you just tend to ignore the crunchy bits.

Dude. There ain't enough ketchup in the world.

"Weird Al" Yankovic - Eat It