Wednesday, January 9, 2008
loose change in my pocket; future in my hand
I’m 32,000 feet above Michigan monitoring progress on my Jet Blue flight tracker, and the corpulent woman across the aisle is quite literally losing it over an episode of the apparently aptly titled “Everybody Loves Raymond.” Another blow for Darwinism – we may be walking upright, but many of us haven’t discerned that wearing headphones doesn’t mean that nobody else can hear us. More relevantly, it’s testament to the well-established fact that I’m not extracting all the available joy life has to offer. Why can’t I derive such unrestrained pleasure from the program? It does have that big guy .. he’s kind of funny.
Maybe it was the captain’s well-chosen remarks before departing a storm-ravaged Northern California. He came out of the cockpit to address the cabin with a reassuring “I’m not going to lie to you..” What bad could possibly follow this? As it turned out, the ride to airport was much more harrowing than the flight, with my brother’s windshield wiper flying off and the remaining arm scratching a deep groove in the glass, making a hellish squealing sound as he attempted to navigate off the freeway in the ensuing deluge. The problem was partially remedied with rag and shoelace, prompting him to dub himself a “regular Macgyver.”
Saw Van Morrison at the Masonic on Nob Hill after catching him at the United Palace in Harlem in October. His tickets are getting a bit pricey, so I might have to consider substituting Ray Romano. I don’t suspect that Van’s the type of guy you’d catch wearing earphones and laughing out loud on a cross country flight. But he can still sing, improvise, blow horn, and turn his back to the audience with the best of them. It’s curious how many still lament this well-established fact, like they’re expecting some kind of miracle Regis Philbin personality transplant. As he put it a few years back “it’s just a job you know, and it’s not Sweet Lorraine..” Thankfully he still does it well. As does Neil Young, whom I also saw at the United Palace in December. He commented on the place being a great venue and an ex movie house with “2001” still loaded up in the projector. Neil continues to play through the rust, and put on a three hour combined acoustic/electric set, pacing the stage like some kind of charged, marauding relic. Some might point to my tendency toward select, repetitive musical acts, but I try and wear different socks each time. When you find something that doesn’t suck, it’s difficult not to stick with it.
I managed my way up to the Sierras as well, seeing enough snow to satisfy my winter quota. (They were getting clobbered again as I returned to mid-sixties temperatures in New York.) While I can debate the relative merits of San Francisco and New York, I’m hard pressed to find anywhere as spectacular as Tahoe. My parents bought the place there in the late sixties and have hung on to it – a wise move among many. It’s a simple A-frame cabin whose mystique and memories exceed its square footage. My dad seemed to give up on the place for a while, but has come back to it in recent years and makes the drive up frequently with Mom. I’ve never brought anyone up there who hasn’t commented on its charms. Wherever bullshit resides, Tahoe always seems far from it. (1/9/08)
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
I was watching a vintage 1998 Letterman episode last night – further proof that one of the unforeseen dimensions of the writer’s strike is the opportunity presented to viewers to re familiarize themselves with a time when the writing sucked less. Or perhaps it was Letterman himself, as every ten years puts a notable dent in anyone’s ability to do whatever they do, be it professionally or otherwise. This is why I’ve never decided to strike, officially speaking, and stop writing this page. Oh sure, there have been a lot of behind the scenes, high level interventions when I’ve threatened to quit, but for the most part the decision to push on has been my own.
But back to Letterman and this ’98 show. It wasn’t so much that the words were better, but that the ideas and execution were both tighter and chancier. He did a remote segment from an LA rooftop featuring “Casey Kasem’s Countdown to Dick Clark’s Rockin’ Countdown to December 18th.” The piece worked well on several premises- both the ridiculousness of televised countdowns and the fact that, on the countdown ladder, Kasem is one rung below the once ageless Mr. Clark. (Dick was a spry 69 in ’98 and looked as well preserved as a fresh Christmas pear.) Dave also did an audience participation segment during which he began an anti-Disney rant that lasted the rest of the show. Even in apologizing for his remarks after coming back from the break, he showed hints of the Letterman of old, railing on how the corporate giant had ruined Times Square by converting it from an authentically sleazy, hooker-laden outpost to a Mickey Mouse themed miniature golf course. This willingness to bite the feeding hand seems notably absent in the post 9-11 Letterman as do any references to New York being anything less than “the greatest city on earth” as the refrain goes in every current Late Show opening. (It was once changed nightly and featured irreverent quips like “From New York, where it’s never a good idea to buy loose Milk Duds ..”)
The show wrapped with an Angelina Jolie interview and a musical segment. Where the current elder statesman and late in life father Dave would likely kiss Ms. Jolie’s hand and comment excessively on her obvious beauty, the younger Letterman was awkward, stilted and unprepared, making unwelcome reference to Jolie’s personal life and her showbiz father (from whom she’d been long estranged.) The 23 year old Jolie was visibly uncomfortable and didn’t wait until they cut to commercial to rise and walk away (Letterman: “oh-there she goes..”) But the segment had a certain brilliance and awkward sexual tension. It was this very discomfort that used to fuel Letterman, and often resulted in brilliant, risky improvisation. He still shows hints of it, as in a solidly edgy Paris Hilton segment from earlier this year where he pathologically refused to change the subject from her recent stint in jail. But the 2007 version of Letterman is far more inclined to make nice than he used to be. Truth be told, even the ’98 incarnation was noticeably mellower and Merv Griffinesque than ten years prior to that. If Letterman hadn’t switched networks, this would be reason alone to hope the writers hold out even longer: old NBC re-runs. As the young Tom Petty so aptly put it: “God it’s such a drag when you’re livin’ in the past.” (12/11/07)
Thursday, December 6, 2007
everybody seems to wonder
what it’s like down here
I was in a bar once in San Francisco having a crackers and cheese dinner. While some might point to the inadequacies of such a meal, I think it fills a certain niche on select occasions. There was a guy there in his thirties with glasses and disheveled blondish hair – kind of a nutty professor meets angry youngish man type. It was still early, but he had apparently been drinking for most of the day. The only other people there were one patron (a woman who knew this guy) and the bartender – a pretty young German girl who was playing Neil Young on the cd changer. I was on my third or fourth cracker with cheese when the guy told the bartender to change the music. She handled him well, politely suggesting that we take a vote. While there are certain parts of the democratic process from which I abstain, I’m not one to sit idly by while someone disrupts a scenario like that – a pleasant early evening in a near empty bar with crackers, cheese and some low volume Neil Young tunes. So we voted. Three against one. Neil stayed and Angry Youngish Man became more so.
He started on quite a rant about Neil being the epitome of an overrated musician; how his guitar playing was awful, his voice whiny and shrill, and his song writing inane and over-celebrated. The two women explained that they were among the masses who had apparently been duped by Neil’s tired act, and generally encouraged this guy to pipe down. But he was having none of it and continued his tirade on Canada’s most inept import. Normally I’ll steer way clear of such conversations, much as I would anyone making some sort of passionate political argument. But “Everybody Knows This is Nowhere” was playing and something in the lyrics made me think about sitting there, next to this guy. So I politely suggested that I concurred with the ladies, and that perhaps he hadn’t given Neil a fair shake. This really set the guy off and he started pointing his finger at me and lecturing on his musical expertise. He was livid – so much so that he didn’t pick up on my non appreciative vibe upon seeing his index finger pointed in my direction. A more prudent side of me prevailed and I moved several stools down. The music kept playing and he eventually left the bar in a huff, but not before I attempted to calm him by asking what he’d been listening to on that particular day. He paused momentarily for effect before answering, “Patti Smith”.
I’m not as liberal with these calls as I once was, but I’m pretty certain this guy was an idiot. (12/6/07)
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
hates California
it’s cold and it’s damp
It’s past midnight when I get off the train at Montague and notice the picture of Sinatra in the poster shop window – a 1935 mug shot from the Bergen County Sheriff’s Office, featuring a twenty-three year old Frank, clear eyed and with pompadour. I can’t help but think he wouldn’t dig it, this public and iconic representation of a mild, youthful misstep (he was arrested for “carrying on with a married woman”) even though the image is the epitome of cool today and the kind of bad boy street cred Justin Timberlake would likely kill for. I like to imagine Frank would think it makes him look like a punk.
I turn the corner and note the varying colors and patterns of damp, fallen leaves glowing under street lamps and highlighting the wet pavement – oranges, yellows, browns. New York weather can vary wildly between seasons and a late November chill has suddenly and dramatically given way to comparatively tropical temperatures and a steady downpour. Leaves whose hold was weakened by last week’s freeze release their grip in a relatively warm, blustery rain. I’ve become more attuned to the changing seasons, not because it’s the east coast, but because it seems to be going faster. The parents visited for Thanksgiving and Dad commented on how quickly the week passed. It’s been six years since the towers fell. Soon it will be Christmas.
On Sunday night I went solo to catch a film. I’ve been on my own in a lot of theaters in recent years. The movie was “No Country For Old Men.” It was good, but I may have to see it again to determine its exact moral message. The ending will likely bother some people, but I paid more attention to the writing. In one scene, the Sheriff (played by Tommy Lee Jones) stands with his deputy, surveying scattered bodies on the desert, the result of a drug deal gone awry. “It’s a mess, ain’t it Sheriff?” the deputy observes. Jones barely pauses before his reply: “If it ain’t, it’ll do till the mess gets here.”
(11/27/07)
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Roland Galli Sr. died last week. I put Mr. Galli up there with Joe Picetti and Len Stefanelli in a particular triad of my dad’s more charismatic pals. He was a sales legend at KGO radio who kept General Manager Mickey Luckoff on his toes, to put it politely. He was a Little League coach whose sense of humor and perspective transcended the other fathers’ poorly concealed needs to see their kids win at all cost. One of my better memories of the man involves him standing up for a teenage umpire who came under pointed attack from the adult coach of the other team. Mr. Galli politely suggested that the man back down or suffer the placement of a thirty two inch aluminum bat in a highly undesirable location. Like Stefanelli and Picetti, his success in business never translated to losing his sense for people or his ability to stick up for the underdog.
Before I was old enough to play Little League, I was the bat boy for Roland’s team – the Kentfield / Greenbrae minor league Broncos. As with most things, I took the job a little too seriously despite not being on the actual roster. Mr.Galli must have noticed my hyper vigilance and attention to detail in the relatively facile task of running on to the field to retrieve bats and helmets. He frequently referred to me as “the best bat boy” he’d ever seen, and these compliments stuck with me over the years, even more than the encouragement or instruction I got later, while pitching for other coaches. That you were a good kid seemed more important to him than that you were a good athlete.
There are countless tales of Roland’s exploits, many far too colorful to list here. I couldn’t do them justice anyway, knowing only a fraction of them second hand. I was one of the kids, after all, and that I’d always stay that way in these guys’ eyes was strangely comforting. I remember Mr. Galli making that remark – that I was a “good kid” – at a New Year’s Eve party at my parents’ house not too long ago. I was well into my thirties at the time and couldn’t imagine higher praise. (10.11.07)
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
“..out of kindness, I suppose” –
Townes Van Zandt , Pancho and Lefty
If kindness is contagious, unkindness might be epidemic. But enough on that – it’s almost too big to touch. New York looked so nice that day, chaos not withstanding. Just the way the sun was hitting the buildings and that feeling of approaching Fall. I decided that I had to check it out for a while at least, a decision I’d been edging up on for five years. Unkindness aside, it was some sound thinking.
Farm Aid came to the city on Sunday. There aren’t too many of these epic cause-oriented events that I’d consider attending. Live Aid, while likely a good cause, seems like a truly tortuous afternoon to me. Sitting through a Madonna set and hearing her wax philosophic on starving Africans in a faux English accent approaches the surreal, never mind the unpleasant. Bob Dylan got a lot of heat forplaying Live Aid and mentioning that perhaps some of the money raised could be put toward paying off the mortgages on American farms. Apparently that didn’t sit too well with Bob Geldof’s Irish sensibilities, and he criticized Dylan for not understanding the difference between “losing one’s life and losing one’s livelihood.” He should have been thankful that Dylan even played an event whose credibility and commercial potential rest so heavily on the stature of the individual performers. Personally, I’d take Bob over Bob. What has Geldof ever done besides reiterate his distaste for Mondays?
So there I was on Randall’s Island on Sunday, a spot not entirely familiar to many native New Yorkers. It was a great afternoon despite the heat and humidity, momentously long porta-john lines, and the show’s more than twelve hour running time. Then again I’m a sucker for any test of endurance that wraps up with with Neil Young and Willie Nelson. I also liked the mix of influences in the crowd – youngish Dave Matthews types rubbing shoulders with Neil, Willie and Allman fans and a sprinkling of roll up your sleeves family farmer types. (Enough of a sprinkling that John Mellencamp, having finally settled on a last name, got a smattering of boos for getting specifically political and critical of current foreign policy.) Regardless of one’s slant, I like an event where the crowd keeps you honest and focused on the specific subject at hand. Neil stayed more on-topic, with an aimless ramble about New York’s excellent tap water and the blackbirds that mysteriously disappeared from his ranch. The mass exodus from the event and island involved hundreds of city buses lining up and transporting folks like cattle from the concert site across the bridge to mainland Manhattan. The people on my bus were tired, but astoundingly polite and well-behaved. Call it lingering short-timer naivete, but for a very big city I continue to find New York impressively functional and, outside of isolated pockets, surprisinglynot unkind. (9/11/07)
Well, that just about sums up my life. Got a kick out of this article from today’s SF Gate website on the untimely torching of the Nevada festival’s revered icon and ultimate hippie magnet. Apparently, 35 year old Paul Addis of San Francisco couldn’t wait for the event’s final climactic evening to see the Burning Man do his thing, and as a result is being charged with felony arson. This is quite a trick, if you think about it – getting strung up on arson charges for burning a structure built entirely for the purpose of being burned. I’m guessing there will be lesser charges as well .. something along the lines of the mass bumming-out of thousands of acid-eating, dust-covered, bicycle-riding, would-be Deadheads. My favorite passage from the article was the following:
“I am disturbed that the Man is burnt. As I looked at it, I was going, ‘This can’t be happening,’ ” said Bob Harms of South Lake Tahoe, a seven-time burner.
You kind of get the feeling Bob was no joy to be around when they broke the news to him about Santa, either. It takes a lot to cause that level of disillusionment in a seven-time burner from South Lake Tahoe. Although I have a few acquaintances who partake in the whole Burning Man deal, its appeal for me registers somewhere between unrequested toenail removal and Ben Stiller’s remake of The Heartbreak Kid. Faithful attendees all seem inclined to swear by the event’s life-changing qualities and to a person are bent on converting the unconverted. But in my experience, it’s always the people you don’t want to see getting naked and flocking to the desert who end up doing it. I’m sticking with Vegas, where early burn-out is inevitable and as God intended it. (8/28/07)
rode with the muggers in the dark and dread
and all them sluggers went down like lead
-Mark Knopfler “Song for Sonny Liston”
So Michael Vick got nailed for dog fighting. Some will point out that it’s just animals involved, but this argument has been applied with equally dismissive distinction to certain groups of people too. My mom’s an animal lover and I’ve probably adopted this trait from her. Strictly speaking, I don’t trust too many people who feel nothing for dogs. I’ve met a lot of animals and a lot of people in my time, and there are several from the first group that I’d take over several in the second. You don’t see many horses betting on people, and for the most part dogs don’t inflict as much psychological damage on their young. Still, I’m no vegetarian and I don’t go around splashing paint on fur-wearing model types, so I suppose my stance is more philosophical than moral or practiced.
Boxing has been subjected to more vociferous objections over the years than has dog fighting, undoubtedly because there are people (primarily men) involved and it is brutal. But it’s also a decidedly honest vocation at its core, despite all the corruption surrounding it at the highest level. With all the falls taken for money, it’s still nearly impossible to fake a true knockout. Just freeze-frame a few at the moment of impact from early in Mike Tyson’s career, then try launching a recruiting drive. Most people don’t want that kind of honesty in their lives, thus the demand for lawyers, accountants, and indian chiefs. A guy who worked for our company in a mid-level position once described to me a great day that he had at work. It involved handling several different tasks – printing and assembling sixteen and thirty-five millimeter film – along with competently answering varied client phone calls centering on complex questions. He said that he didn’t realize it until later, but at that moment he was at “the top of his game.” Sonny Liston may have been at the top of his game in 1959, and not many years after that was looking up from the mat at Ali in that famed shot. While it might not lead to restful retirement, that kind of decisive career arc seems invaluable on another level. How many of us even allow ourselves to get in the game in the first place? (8/21/07)
Bon is gone but Brooklyn rocks on
A long time ago a girl I liked at work had a denim jacket with a “Riff Raff” button pinned to it. At first I thought it reference to the AC-DC tune, and then I figured it a character from Rocky Horror Picture Show, but I believe it was actually from a Ken Loach film about a recently-released Glaswegian prisoner. On this I could be wrong too .. it’s been known to happen. The phrase “riff-raff” comes from the medieval French “rifle et rafle” which referred to the plundering of dead bodies on the battlefield and the carrying off of the booty. By about 1470 the English term referenced citizens of the “common order” and several decades after this it came to mean the dregs of society. Riff-Raff was also the name of several bands, a magazine, and a character in the animated TV show “Underdog.” The first part of the word, “riff” means a short melodic phrase or chord progression. I think this was part of the gist of the AC-DC tune as Angus Young has always been the undisputed King of the Guitar Riff.
A tornado touched down in Brooklyn the other night, which I find infinitely more fascinating than a tree growing here. It occurred in the middle of a torrential downpour that hit the borough with violent force. I did the only logical thing and made my way to the roof, seeking out the highest point on a water tower ladder to see what was going on. Upon informing my brother of this move, he suggested I might want to do some “reading up on Ben Franklin.” Though such research has potentially life-saving ramifications, it would also cut in to my understanding of things like the definition of riff-raff. And whether you venture to the roof or not, sometimes you can’t help being at the center of the storm. (8/10/07)
Enjoying another fine weekend in the borough with the intention of using my new bar b que set up this evening with my friends Sara and Steve. This morning, my dad sent me this link to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle on the recent death of Jim Mitchell, the last surviving Mitchell Brother. The article includes reference to San Francisco’s “historic” Monaco Labs.
While Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez paid fine tribute to the brothers in their epic 2000 made for TV feature, it should also be noted that my dad always said they were two of the most honest guys you could ever come across, and that they always paid their bills. Being in the motion picture processing business for as long as my family has, this comment carries a certain amount of distinction and weight. I met Jim Mitchell some years ago while attending a benefit with my girlfriend for paramedics who had rescued his brother’s son from a surfing accident off the Santa Cruz coast. It was at a post party at the O’Farrell Theatre, and he was obviously sedated and still standing trial for his brother’s death. He shook my hand and told me to “make sure” that I told my father hello and that he always liked him. Despite whatever assumptions anyone might make about a guy who made a living as he did, Jim knew a quality person when he met one. The older I get, the more I’ve come to appreciate such insight and grace. (7/21/07)
