The Obama-rama and the Str8 Talk Express

Ten things I learned this week about politics:

1. If you want to be a player, you gotta be a hottie with a back story and down with Jesus.

Some slob with good ideas is never going to be President. It's all about having a story that Oprah Show voters will love, that shows you have overcome or been redeemed in some way.

The Obamas are easy on the eyes, have cute kids and both walked right out of updated Horatio Alger stories. Sure, Biden is no silver fox, but the man does have nice capped teeth, a pretty wife, and a great biography.

McCain was a stud POW which is Teflon, baby, and he used to look like Tom Cruise. You can't pick on that. Then he picks Sarah Palin, a MILF with five kids, a spunky governor from the wacky, libertarian state of Alaska for his VP, who hunts, has a Native American husband, is against abortion, appears to be conservative and is "willing to stand up to special interests" who used to be a journalist AND a beauty queen. Suburban women might dig her - until they catch their husbands drooling.

2. Never, ever, wear a tangerine pants suit.

Hillary Clinton was better at being gracious and when the pressure was off than she was during her shrill, poorly run campaign. Not to go Mr. Blackwell on you, but that outfit she wore for her fine speech, it was like something a transvestite convict on a road crew would wear. Not sexy - and we're tired of the Clintons' story.

Lenny Kravitz music and Clinton. The mind still reels. I thought she would play My Heart Will Go On from Titanic.

3. Why even bother going somewhere cool for a convention?

You never would have known the convention was in Denver but for the names of the football players on lining the stadium, the mighty bronco at it's enrance.

Note to media types: You go to one of the most beautiful places in the United States, but you might as well just be in a TV studio or back at your office, because that's all you dipsticks know - a hermetically sealed bubble filled with the hot gas of Fox News, CNBC, CNN, bloggers and political blowhards. To the 12 of you who actually talked to real people, or found out anything at all about life in the Rocky Mountain West, I apologize. The rest of you are just part of the problem.

4. Barack Obama IS a rock star.

There is nothing wrong with that. He should embrace it. If you can get 85,000 people to stand in line for hours to see you, well hell, crank up Living Color's Cult of Personality and surf the crowd. Bring da noize.

Because if you are going to judge candidates by speeches, well this isn't much different than enjoying Springsteen jam - or in the case of McCain, jitter-bugging to the Glen Miller Orchestra.

In fact, they are all rock stars. Who has lives like these people? Aren't these jobs best suited to single people who have no interest in sex or social lives (which would make them Christian rock stars)?
I can barely get up in time for work some days, and, as but one example, here's McCain's uber woman VP choice, running a state, taking care of a infant with Down Syndrome, running off to hockey practice for one of her other kids, hunting caribou, and talking to people on two Crack Berries.


5. Most ludicrous campaign promises thus far:

Obama: Energy independence in 10 years.

McCain: I will track down bin Laden to the gates of hell.

6. Be wary of the phrase, "how things ought to be," and the people who use it.

Exactly who makes that determination?

7. America reluctantly enters the 21st Century.

It IS great that we finally have a bi-racial, multi-ethnic man running for president and a woman VP nominee - but it's also kind of a shame that it's taken 232 years for this to happen.

It's silly it's even an issue - and that it isn't really that hard to find people who still have a problem with both.


8. No one is going to miss GW Bush.

I listened to McCain speak when he introduced Palin, and Bush's name didn't come up once. In fact, he sort of sounded like Obama.

9. It's 1992 all over again.

It's been 16 years since Clinton first took office and the issues are pretty much the same, but with more high tech toys and the volume amped. Bad economy. High gas prices. Terrorists on the loose. A shaky Middle East. Iraq. Iran. So for all this talk of change....


10. Believe in something.

That's the new, baffling U.S. Cellular slogan, which shouldn't be confused with Obama speak, which is asking us to believe in his ability to change Washington and our ability to change ourselves. I wonder what kind of calling plan the DNC offers? Are incoming calls free?

A foul ball and a beach smooch

Family legend has it that way back in the 50s, my grandmother got hit by a foul ball at a White Sox game. Hard. They took her to the hospital. Turned out she was fine, and the team paid her hospital bill and gave her an autographed ball.

Well, Friday night, history came about 10 degrees from full circle. Sitting six rows up, down third base line at US Cellular, not far from where the warning track starts, a foul ball sauntered our way. I watched the ball spin toward the stands, slower than I thought it would.

The trajectory seemed to put it several rows behind us, so I just sat there, beer in left hand, my eyes on what turned out to be the prize. Suddenly, as if doing that lame wave, people near me, grdually and in a sort of order, were all standing up. Then the guy right behind me had his arms stretched up as he tried to nab the ball.

It's weird how people behave over such a souvenir. It's sort of a blur, but folks seemed to rush toward him, scrum-like. For whatever reason it popped out of his hand, and landed right in front of me, practically in my lap. On one bounce, I grabbed it off the concrete, with my right hand, beer still cluthced in in the left paw, and yelled in a gruff Chicago meets Batman voice, "I got it!"

For a moment I felt like the Hindu god, Vishnu, with extra hands and chubby limbs where they should not be without permission. Interestingly, when I claimed possession, which after all is 9/10ths of the law, the appendages disappeared. And a couple guys apologized for their role in having me lose maybe an ounce or two of beer on my short pants, and maybe for copping a feel.

A kid scampered back to his seat, and for a second I thought about giving him the ball. But these were expensive seats and I assumed the lad was from Naperville and 13or so, so no deal. The guy behind me almost lost his hat, and I offered to buy him a beer, but he said cool, but it wasn't necessary.

Like a 12 year old, I texted a couple buddies and called my niece and nephew to brag about my summer's coolest accomplishment.

We buried the ball in my friend Jamie's bag and for a good part of the game I had a case of the giggles. In the car on the way home I played with the ball as if it were my favorite Christmas present. I think when no one was looking I kissed it.

Hey, you gotta kiss something, right?

I also secretly kissed the sand, through a towel, while lounging on Michiana beach off Lake Michigan late Saturday afternoon. It was such a beautiful day - and it was such a taste of my fantasy Michigan beach house lifestyle (the place where it's always in the 80s, late summer, and I'm holding court on a pier with friends and people I love), I felt I owed the place a smooch.

Yeah, like you didn't know I was goofy - and that I am going to miss this summer.

Fly boys, whisky and a Sentimental Journey

If I were smarter, younger, better-looking, studlier and less of a slacker I would quit my job and become a fighter pilot. One of the Blue Angels, so I could tour the country like a rock star, wowing people gathered on beaches, scaring animals in zoos and pestering high rise high rent district types with my soaring skills like they did last weekend in Chicago.
 
Imagine how easy it must be to get laid if you are such a fly boy. Just run the You Tube clip of your stunts off your iPhone and have your potential mate extrapolate from it how wild you must be in bed. Can you really make it go up like that, big boy? And dart across the sky at a 45 degree angle?

But hey, at least this summer I have the other parts of this suburban fantasy-on-a-budget lifestyle down pat. Starting off that weekend, I golfed in an outing for work Friday, where two in a foursome behind us could barely speak English by the 7th  hole, they were that stewed. And I am not saying anyone cheated, per se, but a winning score of 57, even in a best ball format, means 3s on just about every hole. White people. No wonder we rule the world.

I'm not complaining - a sunny day outside, cracking wise, having a couple beers, and dressed in shorts and a ... what the hell is the difference between a golf shirt and a polo shirt anyway? One of those.

And that Sunday, I headed up to the Irish Fest in Milwaukee, where the baking concrete and asphalt surface of the Summerfest grounds made me thirsty. This led to learning a valuable lesson about whisky, namely that it is not a good idea to drink much of it on a hot day, even if you are in the shade and some guy on a business trip from New Jersey is buying it for you and for your big red headed friend who looks more Irish than you but actually isn't. And it didn't help that the bar tenders were nice guys who seemed to ply us for their amusement.

All I am gonna say beyond this is around 9 p.m. I left DNA samples in a garbage can shortly after taking a bite out of a corned beef sandwich - and that someone may have licked my ear. I am not sure about the last part. It could have just been a beautiful dream. But I am pretty sure there will be some stories told back East and up in Milwaukee about some idiots from Chicago at the Jameson Bar on the roof. And before anyone calls MADD, I did NOT drive home. I also was not that drunk - no headache, but damn if my stomach didn't feel like Dick Cheney had crawled inside and took a peat bog piss.

Thing is, Monday I actually was supposed to go up in military plane, Sentimental Journey a B-17G bomber that survived World War II. Out of commission, it winters, like a lot of oldsters, in Arizona and spends its summers touring the country. While my stomach had its act together, one of the plane's engines needed a few parts from NAPA, so the trip was delayed until Wednesday.

Tourists have to pay $425 for a 20-30 minute voyage this weekend at DeKalb's Corn Fest, but it costs $3,000 an hour to keep the craft in the air, Russ the pilot told us.

Back in its prime, the plane could climb to 30,000 feet, but the cabin wasn’t pressurized, so it got to arctic temperatures inside the cabin. They had to plug in their clothes in an attempt to stay warm and guys got frost bite while shooting waist guns that held 9 yards of ammo a clip - supposedly leading to the phrase, the whole 9 yards, we were told. (The WWII phrase most fitting for any era: SNAFU).

On the B-17 belly is a ball turret, so compact that the shooter could only be 5’ 4’’ tall and weigh no more than about 150 pounds. And even those these planes has early computer systems on them, it took different, maybe ballsier skills than the video game math heads who are fighter pilots today. You can learn more yourself if you Google it and come to your own conclusions.

Once airborne I was thinking, sure, this is pretty cool, me up here with a video camera, maneuvering my less than agile frame through a ramp and crawling into the front gun station for a panoramic view of the smooth as a baby's butt landing near farmland. But how odd that I am up in a plane where young men were probably scared shitless fighting in a war that was the sequel to the war that was supposed to end all wars. And since they were in this plane, they were pretty damn good at what they did and/or pretty damn lucky too, seeing as most of these big aluminum cans in the sky didn't make it back.

War shouldn't seem so fun. Then again, I am a pussy at heart - and a guy who knows he has it pretty easy, whose only real complications, thus far, have largely been of his own making. Lucky, indeed. At least for now.

A pierced ear and a Bryan Adams song stuck in my head

So last week, a PR person offered us tickets to cover a Rod Stewart concert.

Now I was a fan of his old stuff from the 70s, the Faces stuff and Maggie May (an early cougar song come to think of it), and Every Picture Tells a Story, and Gasoline Alley. Then came Tonight's the Night and If You Think I'm Sexy and his inner cheese molded forward. And this century Stewart recorded a couple albums of Great American Songbook standards on which he sounds like Macy Gray trying to sound like Sarah Vaughn.

Needless to say, I took a pass and sent the offer to someone who is a fan. And she was happy because Bryan Adams was opening the show. too. (Which made me think - Adams may have been there to sing off stage in case old Rod the Mod couldn't hit any notes. They do have similar voices.)

And that's where trouble began.

First, somebody at work started singing Adam's Summer of 69 - the one where he got his first real six-string at the 5-and-Dime. If that weren't bad enough, next thing you know I have his opus from Kevin Costner's Robin Hood stuck in my head. Yup, Everything I Do was playing on an endless loop in my brain.

If that weren't bad enough, attempting to exorcise that demon, I shuffled through my 5,000 song iPod and played the damn song in my car. Yes, I am man enough to admit I have a handful of Bryan Adams songs downloaded. They remind me of when I and my firefighting friend Tim used to deejay wedding receptions.

Having to play Love Shack, the Hokey Pokey and YMCA 10,000 times did get old. But there was free food and drink and it was usually fun. Sure, about half of all marriages end in divorce, but for the most part receptions seem so damn optimistic. Almost every guy looks nice in a tuxedo, fresh and almost innocent. Brides even more so. Of course bridesmaids often have to wear those dreadful dresses (perhaps to make the bride look even hotter), but that adds to the fun.

Watching white people dance is always a good time - and where but a reception do people slow dance anymore? So when we were deejays, we had to play a lot of songs like and including Everything I Do.

But who amongst us doesn't have wuss music in their collection? (And at least one of you better not be laughing too much because I know YOU like and own Celine Dion music!!!) Thing is, though, playing the song alone in my car, I teared up a bit.

Yes, I become a blubbering wimp. I have mixes that make me sad and lots of Sinatra and I on occasion play this melancholy music when I am driving. It's therapeutic. Maybe it's a middle aged thing, but either way it cleanses the pallet. I turn into Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye and start missing everyone. And I think about wedding receptions and, for better and worse, not ever getting hitched myself. And about not having kids to take to baseball games and dinosaur shows. And about time flashing and the novel yet to be written. And about my flailed relationships. And about the last time anyone said they loved me.

Yes, my heart will go on. But I SWEAR that is NOT one of the songs I play!!!!

I bring this all up because this past weekend I went to a 10th wedding anniversary party for my friends Allison and Tony. I saw some old friends, some couples I didn't know with their babies toddling about and it seemed to reinforce (in those post-rational way we make connections) me playing the Adams song (yet nothing excuses me singing along with it).

All of which is a roundabout way of saying congratulations to all of you who have found and have had success holding onto those you love. May a better song play in your head.

Me, since I don't see myself donning a wedding ring anytime soon, I bought another piece of jewelry. I got my ear pierced. The right one if that matters to you. And by right I mean the left. Earring codes have me confused. For all I know it could mean I joined the Latin Kings and love to sleep with goats.

It was only $23 at the Piercing Pagoda, where they will split a pair for you, at half price plus $2.

Oddly, I also bought some topsiders, which means I've just set myself up to look like a Jimmy Buffett fan - or one of those CPAs who fancies himself a biker. Sometimes all you can do is something silly to break a mood - or get a song out of your head.

Post it notes from a stormy night and the last two weekends

Ok, so I have had a busy summer. That's a good thing. It keeps me off the Internet.

So did Monday night, when Chicagoland turned into a rain forest. I got stuck at a Toyota dealership for two hours waiting for an oil change as the storms roiled through the area. The power went out a few times and the strange thing is the place was pretty crowded. Apparently I am not the only dumb ass who thought, hey it's gonna storm, the Toyota place won't be busy.

A friend who moved to Chicago's Lincoln Square from California called while I was waiting. He had never been through a tornado warning of this magnitude before so he asked what he should do. I wanted to tell him, "call somebody you love, then kiss your ass goodbye." But instead I told him to go to the laundry room in the basement. He decided to stay up in his apartment so I told him if he heard something that sounded like a train, he was toast.

I called my folks to kill time - and because, well, you never know. What a perfectly odd ending it would have been - dying because I decided to get my oil changed.

So I reflected on how I have spent the last few weekends - hardly saving the world, but doing my part to enjoy the planet. Here are the highlights.

And then I wound up talking to a big white guy who plays drums with a group that plays the music of the Lakota. He's played on reservations and at prisons - like Johnny Cash if Cash were a former Boy Scout and engineer.

So add that to the following list.


1. Winding up a night on the town, about 3 a.m. at air brush artist's office. It felt like being in a Quentin Tarantino movie, without the viloence. The owner, the husband of a coworker, also is a part-time musician, so he had a caged dove sitting on a counter. The bird was ansty for food. Me, I kept thinking Mr. Pink was going to show up. I dug the incense burning near the air purifier, the mural on the wall of a wizard smoking a hash pipe, and the motorcycle shell with dinosaurs painted on it. We left there to have Mexican food at an all-night taqueria.

2. Golfing. The funny part is they check ID more at the public golf course than they do at an airport. But we can't let the terrorists ruin our courses. At Wing Park in Elgin, hearing karoake from a nearby party ruled. God Bless America. Sweet Caroline. And Welcome to the Jungle. And at Bonnie Dundee there was a guy dressed like ChiChi Rodriguez golfing with a tan pretty boy who looked like former Illinois senate candidate Jack Ryan.

3. Hearing karoake at a dive bar in Hoffman Estates (n a strip mall with a 7-11 and a laundry), with the coolest number a butch bowling ball of a lesbian in plaid golf shorts and a sweater vest rapping Baby Got Back while her sisters bounced their big booties before here.

4. Catching a reader's theater version of Romeo and Juliet in Spanglish at Little Village High School in Chicago. The sword fights in the original became knife battles in this version - albeit highly stylized videos that seemed like iPod ads. Muerto, indeed. The cast included a Brian Dennehy-like Chicago actor who played a priest who wouldn't keep his pie hole shut during an audience Q & A after the show. I had forgotten how hare-brained the plot is, with the poisons and faked deaths.

5. Hearing a man soprano sing in a church without air conditioning. While I enjoy the falsetto voices of old school soul bands from the 70s, seeing a white guy sing classical music in a really high voice is unnerving. Maybe it's knowing that some of the turnes were written for guys who had their family jewels removed is what I can't get out of my head. Of course, I was re-writing lyrics in aforementioned cranium to such gems as "I sing like this because my nuts are gone, and that is very, very, wrong."

6. Seeing the rap version of Much Ado About Nothing. It was sort of like one of those old Carol Burnett Show skits, but funny. Funny too, was despite the best efforts of the cast, the pretty much white suburban audience (which seemed to enjoy the show) just wouldn't participate in the hip-hop, with barely a head bopping, and nary a "hey, ho, put your hands in the air like you just don't care."

7. Feeling the heat at the Blues Traveler concert. I am not much of a jam banc fan, though it was interesting to hear this one cover Shout! and Cheap Trick's I Want You to Want Me. The heat came from the huge flash pots they shot off after the show as part of the fireworks display. I still smell like propane.

8. Having a beer and a BLT after the above - and a chubby woman coming up to us from out of the blue asking if we knew a place in Elgin where she could get a draft for $1.75. I wanted to say, try 1983 and successfully guessed she was a native of the South Side of Chicago. A nicer buddy suggested she head to the area's closest thing to a college bar.

9. Not having water for a couple days. Because I am a dumb ass, when the water heater broke I couldn't figure out how to have cold water while I waited for the landlord to return from his Alaskan cruise. So I needed a bucket to flush the toilet. And I showered at the gym.