State Prison Surprise

And we’re back…

My weekday blog streak struck out, yet I’m optimistic I’ll start a new one now.

Monday was the day of driving, seventeen hours in all. I saw familiar landmarks, such as the sign that reads “Dust Storms May Exist” as well as new ones. There is a sign in Arizona that reads:

State Prison
Surprise
Wildlife Zoo

This could be interpreted in a variety of ways.

All three lines could be read as one: “Welcome to the State Prison Surprise Wildlife Zoo.” Maybe they only have zebras and jailbirds inside.

You could divide the sign in two, “this exit, State Prison Surprise and a wildlife zoo.” I think a “state prison surprise” would be a casserole with a nail file or a shiv (is “shiv” a Yiddish word?) baked inside. Other interpretations could include, “don’t drop the soap or you’ll get a state prison surprise.”

Finally you could interpret the sign as three separate places or events, a state prison, a surprise, and a wildlife zoo. What is the surprise? I didn’t find out. I was deterred by the “don’t pick up hitchhikers who are wearing orange jackets,” sign. That’s a killer for local tourism, if you know what I mean.

Phoenix was a success once again. I played Fiddler’s Dream for the second time. This gig tends to be a bit rocky from a performance perspective. Like last time, we left LA that morning and drove six hours. As the locals say “it’s a dry heat” in Phoenix. That’s not great for the voice. Also, it was my first solo show in a good long while. There were kinks. I’m sorry, Squeeze, for gently wounding the third verse of “Pulling Mussels from the Shell”. Despite those setbacks I had a great time, stayed the course, and no one asked me for their money back.

San Antonio was a different story. I was originally slated for The Red Room, which I’ve played at before. Due to circumstances beyond my control, I was bumped like a standby airline passenger to The Revolution Room, which is just down the street from The Red Room’s new location. There are a lot of Rooms that start with R in San Antonio, so if you have Elmo Fudd Syndwome I’d suggest booking a different city. The turnout was modest but supportive in San Antone, and I had a good time on stage. Before the set, however, I was less than enthused.

I was playing the San Antonio Indie “SASW” fest, which is one of a few different concert series set up around the same time as SXSW in Austin. Due to whatever, I didn’t get paid for doing SASW. I have no problem with that. I was asked to thank San Antonio Indie. I have no problem with that. I was also asked to thank a beer company that was sponsoring SASW. I DO have a problem with that. If I’m going to sell out and thank a corporation for putting on a gig (pulling a “Tony Bennett at the Grammys”), I’d like to at least get paid something more than a free bottle of water and a whopping two spots on the guest list. I thought about thanking the wrong beer company, but I decided it best to simply stew privately and voice my displeasure on the Internets.

Back to the subject of gently wounding a verse, let’s move on to American Idol. Now every artist who has ever performed on a stage has had moments of forgetting lyrics. Frank Sinatra apparently forgot everything but the title to songs at the end of his career. The measure of an artist is not if he makes a mistake on stage, but how he handles it. I thought Brandon Rogers did a fantastic job of staying focused after his slip up during “You Can’t Hurry Love”. Of course having known Brandon for nearly a dozen years, I’m biased, but jeez! Did Brandon dump Randy’s sister or turn one of Simon’s four thousand black v-necked sweaters inside out?! They have a vendetta! This is reaching the “NBA-penalizing-Kobe-for-trying-to-draw-a-foul” proportions. I don’t know what the hizzle is going on here.

And furthermore, this “you performed like a background singer” crap is inaccurate and foolish. What does it mean to be a background singer? You have to be able to blend well, sing in tune, and usually be able to snap and do a few dance moves. Is that what they’re criticizing him for? If Einstein made a mistake while formulating an equation would you say he’s “calculating like a patent clerk”? Enough!!!!! Enough, I say!!

I didn’t get to watch the show live, since I was on stage shilling for Colt 45 in San Antonio, but afterwards I made sure my family used all four of the central time zone based T-Mobile phones and we got through forty hundredy times.

When we arrived at my mama’s place in Corpus Crispy at around 1:00 AM, I used my Californee Sprint network phone to try and, as they say in Chicago, “vote early and often”. I got a busy signal literally every time I called in. My mom thought I was trying to call Brandon, which then inspired a little riff…

“Brandon, I’m calling your number, 1-866-idols-01, but you’re always busy! I guess you’re too good for me now cuz when I do get through some dude just answers and thanks me for voting for contestant one. I thought we were friends!”

My mom used to say “Intendo” instead of “Nintendo”. These misunderstandings are a few of my favorite things.

On the drive home we drove through a Texas lightening storm of Biblical proportions. I was “blinded by the light” as the song says, we may have even been “rapped up like a deuce” or whatever the unintelligible next line is. Happily, we lived to tell the tale, or lived to the write the blog, in modern terms. Tomorrow, I’ll do it again.